Chapter Text
“I like them,” Yuuri says, as he takes a bite out of another cookie. The filling in this one is smooth chocolate, melting deliciously against Yuuri’s tongue as he chews.
“What.”
When Yuuri looks up, Viktor looks almost pained.
“I… like them?” Yuuri brushes flakes of cookie off his shirt. Viktor had laughed when Yuuri’d been so excited to try the Purim cookies on the websites he’d read. Adamant that he wanted to share in Viktor’s traditions, Yuuri had asked Viktor to make some. Or buy some, he wasn’t picky.
“Sure,” Viktor had responded with a smile. “I’ve got a family recipe, people used to say my babushka’s hamantaschen were some of the best.” He’d come back the next day with the ingredients, and this morning, when Yuuri came back from taking Makkachin out for her morning walk, Viktor had been standing in the kitchen, wearing an apron. Yuuri played video games while Viktor baked, and it hadn’t taken too long before the smell of cookies filled the apartment.
What Yuuri can’t figure out is why Viktor looks almost disappointed now.
“Am I not supposed to like them?” he asks slowly.
“It’s- it’s like I don’t even know you. Hamantaschen are a holiday lie, Yuuri.”
“What do you mean, a lie?” Yuuri picks up another one, noting the strange look of the filling before he takes a bite. The filling itself has an interesting texture. Coarser than the others, a sweet paste instead of chocolate or jam.
“The crust, it’s pretty much... it might as well be made of sand,” Viktor says, gesturing widely, “and there’s never enough filling. You can’t even add more, because then they fall apart and just become crumbs of disappointment rather than cookies made of lies.”
The cookie is pleasantly sweet, with a flavor Yuuri can’t quite pick out. He pops the last of it into his mouth, chewing slowly. “This one’s my favorite, I think,” he says, glancing across the plate for another. Smiling when he sees one, he plucks it up happily, only to notice Viktor’s expression go from painful disappointment to outright despair.
“Poppy?” he says in disbelief. “You… You like the poppy ones?”
Yuuri nods as Viktor rubs his temples. “The poppy ones are the worst of the lies, Yuuri. They… they’re like… they’re the raisin cookies of hamantaschen. Their sole purpose is to trick you into thinking they’re chocolate, only to unpleasantly surprise you with grainy seed filling.”
“I like raisin cookies,” Yuuri protests.
“One, that’s not my point and two… raisin cookies? You like them?”
“Vitya, you eat chocolate raspberry everything, you can’t get mad at me about this,” Yuuri says adamantly. There is a time and a place for raspberry, and it is “almost never” and “certainly nowhere near chocolate.”
“Chocolate and raspberry go together perfectly, Yuuri, it’s the perfect mix of sweet and tart!”
“It’s disgusting,” Yuuri says with a grimace.
“So are hamantaschen,” Viktor retorts. Yuuri shoves the offending cookie in his mouth defiantly as Viktor sighs in defeat. “I’ll make the rest of the batch,” he says, “and I guess I know what I’m doing with whatever hamantaschen I may get.”
“I’ll eat all of the hamantaschen,” Yuuri says. “All of them.”
Viktor kisses him softly. “Let me know which ones are your favorites so I can make them next year.”