Desime Collection

[Story] Chocolate Bars

Tomorrow is Valentine's Day and Greed is supposed not to take a bullcrap about that.

Emphasis on "supposed".

Also, it's "this", not "that".

She, for some reason, wants to make something. Not just something. Something special. She can do this in just under six hours-- heck, three may suffice if possible. But the recipe says four, so she will leave it at that.

Lust has suggested to put a certain thing into her homemade snack, in which Greed, of course, refuses. Gluttony only cares about getting them, and there's a high possibility that the snack will go into his bottomless belly by tomorrow if he finds out about what she is going to do today. Sloth... is being Sloth. Wrath does not care about this, albeit his cooking is admittedly pretty great. Envy is so... jealous of her doing (for what reason who knows!) that he might as well become her salt supply for an infinite amount of time. (He's that salty.) Pride... yeah, she definitely will give some to him. She is sure that he will pet her if the snack turns out delicious.

Petting, huh.

Being petted feels good, especially in mini form. Not that she minds if she is in human form. She doesn't care; as long as she gets affection, everything is well. Pride's caressing hand is sincere, kind, and gentle. He has done that for countless times and it always feels the same. His caressing is so uniquely soothing that she will immediately recognize him by his hands alone.

Then comes a different arm. Bigger and stronger than Pride's, and yet the palm touches her gently. Maybe because it's new for her to be petted by a different person (or Spirit, for this matter), but the sensation makes her shiver. The warmth-- she can feel it right on her skin. Butterflies dance inside her stomach, and fly up to her chest, eventually resting on her heart.

"Ah--"

She opens her eyes.

Why is she thinking about him?

Not Pride-- him.

That dog.

Greed sighs, then looks at her kitchen. Chocolate bars, dates, nuts, sugar, wine, et cetera. Too difficult to remember all of them. What matters is that she will make homemade chocolate bars. Just giving them obligatory chocolate bars should be enough, but for some weird reasons she wants to make this a thing.

No. She will make this a thing.

She begins to unpack the chocolate bars from a plastic bag. She has bought way too many. One bar, two bars, ten bars. White, milk, strawberry, mint, and dark. That greedy. It's in her name.

She won't give these to her fellow Sins, save for Pride. Her most probable targets are people from Akram Foundation. Especially the children; Neith and Mido will absolutely love them. A random human she met in her distant past once said, "Sweets are the best way to bribe kids!" And she couldn't agree more.

Her primary target is him, but--

"Can dogs survive eating chocolate?"

Short answer: no. Long answer: it depends. Yes, he is a dog. But a spiritual dog. No, he is not even a dog. He is a Spirit who happens to have a canine form. So he should survive because he is not an animal in the first place.

Yes, Greed must be overthinking.

She opens two boxes of milk and strawberry bars. Probably the best choices for the kids. Then, the white bars for the rest of the co-workers. For some weird premonition, she wants to add some cheese to Fahim's share of chocolate. Next, the mint bars. Maybe Pride will like it. Should she add wine? Perhaps no; Pride's human form is basically a minor. He used to have a more mature body, but her memory is blurred.

Last but not least, the dark chocolate bars.

Greed opens the box, unwraps the chocolate, and puts it on the cutting board. She looks at the bar intently. Its dark colour is mesmerizing. She feels like she is being reminded of something, but she can't grasp it quite well.

Until she can.

The image begins to become clear inside her mind. A tall figure; white, long hair, with a golden headband--

Greed winces, her face clearly shows annoyance.

--gentle and husky voice; big, but warm hands; heart-warming and sincere smile--

She can feel her face becoming warmer each second.

--polite and amiable demeanour; playful, yet generous and helpful; calm, mature, with such a soft heart--

She hates this. It must be this body's fault. The human form's fault. It is because she has human form, that she has begun to develop weird, unexplainable feelings towards her rival. Her rival. Among all Spirits she knows of, she only has these annoying emotions towards him. Why? Just why?

--the cutest mini form I have ever seen--

She glances at the dark chocolate bar. Her eyes widen. She gasps. Now she gets why the dark chocolate bar reminded her of him.

--and such beautiful clothes and cape, especially the cropped shirt--

The realization terrifies her.

--which exposes his tanned skin and muscular--

She throws the chocolate bar straight to the wall across her.

The wall becomes dirty, but she doesn't care.

She needs to rid of her wild fantasy.

Right. Now.

She grabs one of the milk bars and prepares her cooking equipments. Maybe I'll send him flowers instead. For now, I'll just focus on making the rest of the chocolate. Hope he doesn't get in the way.

But it's too late. Her brain keeps picturing him, especially on the sacred, terrifyingly glorious part of his; which she will call "the choco bars" from now on. She needs to keep composure, but for each time he appears in her mind, she acts like a deranged witch (which she sees as an exaggeration, but perhaps also an understatement). She bangs her head on the fridge, scratches her head, taps her foot furiously, walks back and forth in a quick pace, bounces her body, whatever.

No one has ever made her become like this.

No one.

Except him.

She inhales and exhales. She repeats that three times. She tries to picture Pride in her head. Yes, much better. Even if that dog comes again, she just needs to protect her mind with her beloved brother and everything will be okay.

She continues making chocolate.

.

.

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Nope, not gonna make the Indonesian version out of this. Too cringey.

Don't forget to be awesome. :)