Taylor x Travis: In Every Life

the perfect poptarts

Travis' POV

"Baby!"

"Yeah?" Taylor called back.

"Can you help me?"

A moment later, I heard footsteps and Taylor came in, folding a bookmark into the book she'd been reading. She laughed at the sight of me standing in the kitchen, the marble island covered in open cookbooks. I smiled helplessly as she came over, looking around at everything I'd laid out.

"What are you doing?" She giggled.

"Well it's Andy's birthday party tonight remember?" I reminded her, and Taylor nodded. "And he's a sucker for baking so I'm trying to pick something to make, but I'm pretty sure I'll mess all of these up." I waved a hand at the recipes. "Can you help me pick one and make sure I don't ruin it?"

Taylor pressed her lips together, thinking for a long moment before she crossed behind me to the cupboard and stretched up on her toes to grab a thin folder, bringing it over. Flipping through it, she found whatever she was looking for and then handed it to me. I looked down, skimming the handwritten recipe laid out in front of me. Pop tarts. I smiled, nodding. Taylor had made them back when we'd first started dating, and I remembered now that Andy had absolutely loved them. These were perfect.

I'll relocate and read my book here." Taylor told me. "You can make them all by yourself, but I'll just hang around and make sure you do it right."

"Thank you baby." I said gratefully, and Taylor winked at me as she hopped up on a stool, sitting on the other side of the kitchen island to me and opening her book back up.

Grateful for her help, I packed up all of the cookbooks and read through the recipe before starting to get all of the ingredients out. I knew it was probably not going to be easy, but I knew Taylor wouldn't let me mess it up that much. Andy would appreciate the effort.

"You need to flatten it more." Taylor murmured as I rolled out the dough, and I glanced up to see her watching me. "Otherwise it'll be all doughy."

I nodded, picking the rolling pin back up to flatten the pastry more. Taylor gave me a thumbs up when it was at the right thickness, and I put it in the fridge to chill for a while. Cleaning up the few dishes I'd made, I mixed together the filling and then took the pastry out once it had been in the fridge long enough. Taylor watched while I cut it into pop tart shapes and chilled them again before brushing them with egg wash and sealing the filling inside.

Poking holes in the top of each pop tart, I chilled them again before placing them into the oven. Taylor didn't correct me on anything else as I worked, so I took that as a sign that I was doing the right thing. I was much better at cooking than I was at baking, so I normally left that to Taylor, but this time I really wanted to do it myself. And I didn't think I was doing half bad.

After an hour, all three trays of pop tarts were out of the oven at varying stages of cooling as I stacked them onto racks, not wanting the bottoms to get soggy. I washed the baking trays and put them away as I waited for them to cool down properly, and when they had, I made up the glaze and very carefully put it over all of the pop tarts. Getting the sprinkles out of the cupboard, I dropped them on top of the glaze so they'd stick and then stood back, smiling to myself.

"What do you think?" I asked Taylor, who had moved to the couch in the few hours it had taken me to make them. She looked up, putting her book down and getting to her feet to come over.

"Hey, look at you!" She smiled when she saw the pop tarts. "Those look amazing! See, you can bake." Taylor nudged me playfully and I smiled at her.

"Is it dumb to say that I'm proud of myself?"