Baking Practice

"Time?"

Gabriel swiped at his iPad's screen to check the timer he had set earlier and said, "Fifteen minutes left."

No reply. A minute later, a loud ding! echoed in the room. He looked up to see a triumphant Cams grinning at him, making jazz hands over the display she set up on his kitchen counter. "Done!"

Gabriel smiled and clapped his hands slowly. "Great job," he said, rising from his seat and walking over to Cams' workspace—his kitchen, which she had borrowed for the afternoon so she could test recipes and practice baking under time pressure in preparation for her upcoming stint in Dream Baker, the newest baking competition show on TV.

"Is that your ideal time, though?" he asked, pulling one of the wooden stools closer to the counter and taking a seat, leaning his elbows on the smooth granite.

Cams shrugged, tucking the strands of hair that had fallen loose from her braid behind her ear. "It could be better," she admitted. "But I made and frosted five kinds of cupcakes in the last hour, so I think this is still good."

"Overachiever," Gabriel teased, reaching over to give her a braid a light tug, making her laugh. "Okay, so I watched a few Dream Baker episodes last night. Three rounds, right? Cookies, cupcakes, cake?"

"Yup. We have to follow a theme and include the surprise ingredients they'll give us at each round."

"Are you going to think of recipes on the fly?"

"They emailed the theme to us last week, but the surprise ingredients remain a surprise. I just did a bit of research on the theme and figured that at least one of these different things I brought here today would somehow be one of them." Cams pulled out her phone, tapped on the screen several times, and pushed it to him. "Oh, and I also got some from your pantry, sorry."

"I did tell you the kitchen is all yours this afternoon, so no need to apologize," he replied, glancing at her phone. The theme jumped at him in red and boldfaced letters on the email on her screen. "Love?"

"Yep, that's the theme." Cams wrinkled her nose. "It is kind of cheesy, but at least it's easy? Unlike, I don't know, a horror movie, basketball, or something."

"Come on. You can bake anything." Gabriel, meanwhile, didn't. The love for food and the skill in making food ran in the entire Evangelista family, but Gabriel somehow missed out on the baking gene, if there was a thing. Ask him to make smoked bacon or roast chicken or plan a full-course meal, and he'd do it without thinking so much, but bake? Technically, he can bake—a decent pan of brownies and maybe a loaf of bread, if really needed—but it wasn't his favorite way of making food for people.

"You're just saying that because you're my boyfriend." Cams rolled her eyes. "Anyway, I bet I'd be competing against all these bakers who have been in the business for decades. Sometimes I wonder why a sideline baker like me got in the competition."

"Cams." Gabriel pushed the phone back to her, catching the hand that received it into his. "The fact that you even got in as a contestant out of all the thousands that try to get qualified means you've got something, and they see it. Don't listen to those gremlins in your head, okay?"

"You've been listening to Brené Brown again, are you?" Cams said with a smile. She looked down at their hands, took one deep breath then looked back at him, her expression grateful. "Thanks, Gabriel."

He shuffled around the counter to stand beside Cams and kissed her on the cheek. "So, what do you need me to do now?"

Cams brightened. "Taste test!"