SVU SMUT & PREFERENCES

Nick Amaro/Rafael Barba

i love these two together :)

Nick shoves another cupcake tray into the oven with a huff. The noise he makes borders on a growl and his warm, beloved kitchen shivers at the sound of it. Sighing, Nick turns away from the oven and leans his palms against the center island, head lowered. These are not sounds for his kitchen. Not this banging around and huffing and angry noises. The kitchen is his peaceful place. Where Nick smiles without realizing. Rocks his hips offbeat to Frankie Valli singing Sherry in the background while boiling bubbles pop and eager veggies zizzle.

Today, it's anything but. Today, Nick wears a tight frown rather than a smile. No music plays at all, and even if it did, Nick is in no mood for offbeat dancing or out of tune singing. Not even a whistle would make it past his lips.

He's wasting time, too. There are two manuscripts in the office that he should editing right now -- he does have a deadline to meet -- and instead, he's in the kitchen. Baking. Angrily. But any chance at concentrating on work went right out the window the second they started fighting.

"Oh, I could kill him," Nick grumbles as he snatches up a mixing bowl and scoops some batter out with two of his fingers. He sticks them both in his mouth. Mutters with his mouth still full of batter, "I could just kill him."

Taking a few more bites of raw batter, Nick drops the bowl into the sink, considers washing it again, but decides to just grab another set of mixing bowls. He has several of them so he can keep baking for special occasions like holidays and birthdays and such. Rafael has made sure of that.

Nick digs through the cabinets under the sink for the bowl and starts mixing up another batch of batter. This time for chocolate chip cookies. But he uses dark chocolate chips instead of milk chocolate just to be spiteful. Rafael likes milk chocolate better.

It's not all that often they fight, but when they do... boy, they can be real doozies, sometimes lasting for hours or even days. Nick's not sure where Rafael is right now. He's thinking the gym. That's usually where Rafael goes when he storms off. A way to clear his head like baking. Even if, right now, the baking's not doing too much.

When Nick's phone vibrates, he snatches it up only to find that it's an email from his Senior Editor about the first drafts that're due in two weeks. No messages on from Rafael. Rafael is just being plain ol' stubborn now, not texting him to at least let him know where he is and when he plans on coming back. To be fair, Nick's being just as stubborn and hasn't texted Rafael either, and he doesn't want to be the one to give in and text first.

Instead of getting in touch with his boyfriend, Nick just goes on to pour out cookie batter on a sheet pan. Once he gets these baking, he'll start frosting the red velvet cake that's been cooling on the counter. By the time he's done with that the cupcakes should be ready to come out of the oven.

There's something new today as well. Nick's trying his hand at blueberry pie. That's if he ever stops picking at the blueberries.

Sighing, he decides that since he made the cake from scratch he should make the icing from scratch, too. That way it'll take up more time. Not that the frosting will take all that long to make. Which only frustrates Nick even more and leads to him slamming the frosting spatula down on the counter. Not fair, really. Neither the spatula nor the counter has done anything wrong. They're both, in fact, here trying to help him.

He's in the middle of frosting the cupcakes with chocolate icing when the front door opens. Nick's spine stiffens and he turns just enough so that he's not quite facing the hall, but can still get a glimpse of Rafael when he comes in. That's assuming it is Rafael and not some intruder, but from the sounds of the keys hitting the glass bowl in the entryway and soft clunk of shoes on the hardwood floors, Nick's going to assume it's Rafael.