Unexpected

Thoughts, Casseroles, and Big News

Barton and I parted ways, him heading off to who knows what and me heading to the kitchen where I found Ed and Ben doing a deep clean in the cafeteria. Nodding uncomfortably to them, I stepped into the kitchen and closed the door behind me. I needed to get into a better mood, lighten my spirits that felt like they were being torn and squished by my situation. I looked at my playlists, passing by Taylor Swift (I didn't need a romance or break up song), Skillet and Fall Out Boys, (Didn't need harder rock songs), and skipped over Owl City, Imagine Dragons, Coldplay, and several other bands and singers it felt like I had been listening to a lot lately, landing, strangely enough, on Disney. I laughed as Hakuna Matata started playing. Can't look for anything happier than a good Disney song.

Turning my music up, I set about putting together pan after pan of cheesy bacon and chicken penne casserole. I chopped raw chicken along to 'A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes' from Cinderella, fried bacon to 'I've Got a Dream' from Tangled, 'Reflection' from Mulan, and 'A Whole New World' from Aladdin, and set the pots of penne noodles to boiling to 'Be Prepared' from the Lion King, singing along as I worked. The music did its job and I found myself singing loudly as I bopped around the kitchen, allowing my thoughts to travel to nicer things. I was throwing together the ingredients in my readied 9x13 pans when 'Something There' from Beauty and the Beast started playing.

Raising my voice along with Belle, I sang "There's something sweet and almost kind, but he was mean and he was coarse and unrefined," Sounds like Loki when I first met him I thought to myself, layering some cheese in the casserole as the song continued, "And now he's dear and so unsure, I wonder why I didn't see it there before." The music played for a moment and I thought about the words and my previous thought. He, Loki that is, had seemed to be more... kind and friendly towards me, his smiles genuine and more frequent, his telling me things about himself that he never would have before.

I had fallen so deep into my thoughts that I had to scramble to catch up to the lyrics as the Beast sang his part, "She glanced this way, I thought I saw, and when we touched she didn't shudder at my paw! No, it can't be, I'll just ignore, but then she's never looked at me that way before." Then Belle's voice came over my phone's speakers again, "New and a bit alarming. Who'd have ever thought that this could be?" I knew that feeling, or did I? No. She was talking about love and I wasn't a romantic and I wasn't falling for the demigod, "True that he's no Prince Charming, but there's something in him that I simply didn't see!"

The song was then handed over to the talking clock, candelabra, and teapot, and I laughed as I put accents on my voice accordingly, "Well who'd have thought? Oh bless my stars! Oh who'd have known? Oh, who in-" the doorknob started turning and I cut off my singing and rushed to pause my music as Ed and Ben entered the kitchen, their cleaning supplies in hand. They, wordlessly as usual, put the supplies in the cleaning closet before turning to me, ready to be given their next task. I had the casseroles almost all finished off except for the baking, so I told them that they could cover the finished pans in saran wrap and put them in the fridge to keep them cool until it was time for them to be baked.

This task was carried out quickly enough and I found that we still had two hours before we'd have to start baking the casseroles and preparing for dinner. What would we do to fill the time? I had to keep Ed and Ben busy or else they just stood there in the kitchen, stock straight like soldiers, waiting for some order from me, and their blank, turquoise eyes staring at me expectantly unnerved me as much as their personalities once had. My mind wandered to my conversation I had had with Barton outside my room.

"Well," I began, "Since we have time, let's make dessert."

The three of us then set about gathering ingredients for cookies. Once again I whipped up chocolate chip cookies, a double batch of them that would make at least eight dozen. Unlike last time however, since I had the extra hands helping me and also extra people to feed since that day that felt so long ago, I had the men help me whip up a double batch of snicker doodles and another of peanut butter cookies. Both ovens were filled with trays of cookies that soon made the entire kitchen smell like a bakery, and by the time all the cookies had baked and been placed out on cooling racks, it was time to start baking the casseroles. As Ben and Ed washed and dried off the cookie sheets that were still kind of warm from baking, I gathered up an armload of the canned dinner rolls that you unwrap then smack on the edge of the table to open before breaking them apart and baking them. These also were placed in the ovens to bake.