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It started with the doughnuts. At least, Illya was fairly sure it started with the doughnuts. With Napoleon, one could never really tell.
“So,” Napoleon said, coming into their shared office holding a huge, flat white cardboard box. “We’ve been working together for almost six months now, and as your partner, I feel that it’s my responsibility to introduce you to the wonders of American culture.”
“What did you have in mind?” Illya enquired, eyeing the cardboard box warily.
“We’ll start with these,” Napoleon said, flipping the box open grandly and offering Illya a doughnut.
And, really – Illya’d been trained to resist interrogation, poisoning and twenty different methods of torture, so it just figured that his new partner would find his one weakness after six months on the job. Illya sighed, cursed his sweet tooth and took a doughnut out of the box.
Napoleon beamed at him.
***
Napoleon had clearly taken Illya’s acceptance of the doughnut as a sign of encouragement, which was how, a week later, Illya found himself in a restaurant of questionable hygiene and an even more questionable menu selection, sitting in a booth upholstered in violently red vinyl and staring at his partner over a breakfast plate twice the size of his head.
Apparently noticing his look of extreme trepidation, Napoleon proceeded to assure Illya him that yes, eating in a diner was indeed an essential part of American culture that Illya needed to experience, and no, the food wouldn’t give him a stomachache.
Illya prodded cautiously at his ham and eggs, eyed the gravy with suspicion, then steeled himself and took a bite of the whole thing.
It was delicious.
“What is in this gravy?” he demanded of Napoleon, before taking another huge bite.
“Rainbows,” Napoleon said solemnly. “And unicorns.”
Illya put his spoon down and stared at his partner. “You have no idea what is in the gravy, do you.”
“None at all,” Napoleon admitted. “I’ve tried to replicate it at home, without success. There’s probably more butter and fat in there than I’m comfortable thinking about, but I guess that’s what makes it taste so good.”
“Hm.” Illya considered the laden plate in front of him, then picked up his spoon again. “I suppose we had both better run a few extra laps in the gym, then.”
***
Three weeks and one successfully completed mission later, Napoleon brought Illya to a funfair.
“I don’t see what’s supposed to be difficult about this,” Illya complained, as he expertly shot down a line of rubber ducks bobbing gently in a row. “The targets are barely moving.” As he shot down the last rubber duck with the toy rifle he was wielding, the teenage girl standing next to Illya treated him to a nasty look as her boyfriend managed to miss every single target then hung his head dejectedly.
Napoleon coughed gently into his hand, lips twitching. Illya shot a quick glance at the two teenagers next to him and cleared his throat sheepishly. As the girl flounced off huffily, dragging her boyfriend with her, the man running the Shoot-A-Duck game handed a huge, stuffed pink unicorn to Illya, grinning widely at him. “Your prize, sir!”
Illya took the unicorn gingerly, staring at it in confused disbelief. Next to him, Napoleon wasn’t even bothering to stifle his laughter anymore. Illya turned, scowled at his partner and shoved the unicorn into Napoleon’s arms.
“Hm.” Napoleon said, holding the unicorn up with both hands, turning it this way and that. “I like her. I think I’ll name her Betty.” He tucked the unicorn under one arm, then turned to Illya. “Cotton candy?” he asked cheerfully.
Illya consented to try some cotton candy, which he would not, under pain of death, admit to Napoleon he actually rather enjoyed. Going by Napoleon’s smirk, though, his partner figured it out anyway, since after Illya’d wolfed down the first stick of cotton candy, a second one magically appeared in his hands, courtesy of a grinning Napoleon.
They went on a rollercoaster after that, which Illya didn’t enjoy nearly as much. The Ferris wheel, however, was tolerable, Illya decided, watching his partner’s handsome profile as Napoleon gazed down at the view below them, a small, contented smile on his lips. A small lock of Napoleon’s usually immaculately coiffed hair had loosened itself and curled over his forehead, and Illya experienced a sudden and inexplicable urge to smooth it back. He quashed the ridiculous impulse and followed his partner’s gaze instead, glancing down at the view.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” murmured Napoleon, still gazing out the side of their Ferris wheel car. Illya looked back up at his partner.
“Yes,” he said. He’d barely noticed the view.
Napoleon beamed at him then, all warm brown eyes and wide, sincere smile. Beautiful indeed, Illya thought, and then froze, because where had that thought come from? He cleared his throat hastily.
“Thank you, Napoleon,” he said gruffly.
Napoleon’s smile somehow managed to grow even warmer. “Thank you, Illya,” he said. “It’s not every day that someone wins me a stuffed unicorn, you know.” He patted Betty, perched on the seat between them, with affection.
“You are ridiculous,” Illya informed his partner, but couldn’t quite stop himself from giving Napoleon a tiny smile.
***
The American soap opera, Illya decided, was rather ridiculous.
A few months after their evening at the funfair, Napoleon had introduced Illya to the Days of Our Lives soap opera on daytime television. Illya had found the plot ridiculously dramatic and overly convoluted, and yet, somehow, whenever he had any downtime between missions, he found himself guiltily turning the television on to catch whatever snatches of the show he could. He had to admit, if only to himself, that the show was not without its appeal.
That appeal had, of course, nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that Napoleon sometimes invited himself over to Illya’s apartment, takeout boxes and bottle of wine in hand, to catch up on the episodes they’d missed while they’d been away on missions.
It had, in fact, become something of a regular occurrence, Illya realized, when he found himself unlocking his front door and stepping into his apartment after his and Napoleon’s latest completed mission, plastic bag containing Thai takeout for two in one hand.
Illya put the takeout boxes on his dining table and scowled fiercely at them. Napoleon had gone home after the mission, saying something about needing a shower, and Illya had – Illya had just assumed that Napoleon would come over to his place after. He was getting sloppy. A good spy did not assume.
He put the takeout boxes into the refrigerator, and had just turned the television on when his doorbell rang. Illya opened the door to find Napoleon on the other side, freshly-showered and dressed in a navy blue sweater and a perfectly-pressed pair of dark gray slacks. He was clutching a bottle of red wine in one hand.
“Sorry I’m late,” Napoleon said.
Illya waved his partner over to the couch, then went to sneak the takeout boxes out of the refrigerator while Napoleon wasn’t paying attention. However, he failed to account for the fact that Napoleon, too, was a spy and thus caught him taking the food out of the refrigerator anyway.
“Why’d you put the food in the fridge?” Napoleon asked inquisitively, leaning over Illya’s shoulder to look at what he was doing as Illya grabbed the takeout boxes from the middle shelf. “I don’t take that long to shower.”
Illya shrugged noncommittally and mentally scrambled for a smooth way to change the subject. Did Napoleon really have to stand quite that close to him?
“Make yourself useful and pour us some wine, Napoleon,” he finally said, which was not smooth in the least, but Napoleon’s proximity was making Illya feel a little flustered, something fluttering low in his stomach and heat rising in his cheeks, and it was the best he could do on the spur of the moment.
“Anything you want, partner mine,” Napoleon said, thankfully putting some space between them as he reached for the wine opener, and flashing that warm grin at Illya again.
Illya turned away before Napoleon could see his blush.
***
Somewhere in between watching soap operas with his partner and watching the daily evening news, Illya managed to get himself addicted to watching cooking shows; specifically, Julia Child’s cooking show, ‘The French Chef’. French cuisine was all the rage in America at that moment, and Illya, who very much enjoyed good food but was mildly horrified by the exorbitant price tag that seemed to accompany all good French food in New York, took to the idea of cooking French food at home like a duck to water.
Having had no experience in cooking before coming to New York, though, Illya’s forays into cooking were a constant work in progress. The omelette, he could manage. The quiche, which on-screen Julia chirpily insisted was “foolproof” as Illya busied himself kneading the dough on his miniscule kitchen counter – he’d cleared everything off the counter to give himself room to work – ended up with a burnt crust, although the rest of it was edible.
Illya steeled himself for the long hours of practice ahead of him, although he couldn’t say he wasn’t looking forward to it – he’d always enjoyed a challenge, and the (hopefully) delicious meal at the end of the process was just the icing on the cake, so to speak. He made a mental note to perhaps add a cake recipe, if Julia had any good ones, to his recipe list.
And if the expectation that he’d be able to cook a good meal for Napoleon at the end of this spurred him on a little – well, his partner had always been an excellent cook. He’d invited Illya over to his place and cooked dinner for both of them quite a number of times, so if Illya was looking forward to cooking for Napoleon in turn, then it was just his competitive spirit not allowing him to accept his partner being better than him at anything, that was all.
***
Napoleon displayed, in Illya’s opinion, an inordinate amount of interest upon finding out about Illya’s newly-acquired culinary hobby. He cheerfully commented on the texture of the omelette (perfect), sampled spoonfuls of boeuf bourguignon (and diplomatically made no comment when Illya accidentally oversalted it), and when Illya finally got the quiche right, Napoleon put a forkful of it into his mouth and immediately made a positively indecent sound of such unadulterated bliss that it made Illya’s ears burn hot.
Illya would never, even under the worst T.H.R.U.S.H. torture, admit that that particular sound had shot to the top of the list of things that featured prominently in his fantasies.
Some time after Illya had mastered quiche and had started working on perfecting crêpes Suzette (he kept getting too enthusiastic about the “setting on fire” part of the recipe and always added too much Grand Marnier), Napoleon showed up with a little parcel wrapped in brown paper.
“For you,” he said, handing it to Illya, then grinned. “I saw it and immediately thought of you.”
The parcel turned out to contain an apron, sea-green with pink trim and a pink ribbon around the waist, with “Kiss the Cook” emblazoned across the front in bold black letters, complete with a bright red lipstick imprint next to the text. Illya held the apron up, examined it, then raised an eyebrow and looked over at his partner, who was still beaming at him.
Napoleon gestured at the front of Illya’s blue shirt, which was covered in flour. “I thought it might be useful for you.”
“Hm,” Illya said diffidently, refusing to read anything into the words printed on the front of the apron for the sake of his own sanity. ‘Kiss the Cook’? Napoleon had seen the apron, and thought of…Illya? Did Napoleon want to…kiss him? No, Napoleon had never show the slightest inclination toward reciprocating Illya’s secret and ill-advised…crush on his partner. Ah. Probably a joke then. A good-natured jest between partners.
Illya brushed the flour off the front of his shirt. Well, the apron would be useful, no doubt about that.
“Thank you, Napoleon,” he said to his partner. “It will indeed be useful.” He shook the apron out, then put it on.
Napoleon’s cheeks were a little pink. Illya eyed him, fascinated. Was Napoleon embarrassed by Illya’s refusal to be ashamed of his partner’s gift, no doubt made in jest? Ha! He clearly hadn’t been expecting Illya to be such a good sport.
Deeply pleased with himself, Illya smirked at Napoleon and was rewarded with his partner’s blush deepening to a delightful rosy shade. Illya adjusted the ribbon of the apron around his waist, carefully retied it into a neat bow, and turned back to the saucepan on the stove.
***
Six months later, Illya and Napoleon were sent on a mission that required them to temporarily take up residence in a rented house in the suburbs. It was a lovely neighborhood, charming and quiet with manicured lawns and children playing in the street, but when they moved in, Illya’s mind was on none of those things.
His pesky feelings for Napoleon had not gone away; if anything, as their partnership and friendship had deepened, his feelings, too, had grown accordingly. Consequently, Illya was mostly thinking, with a deep sense of foreboding, about how being with Napoleon twenty-four hours a day could not be good for either his heart or his sanity.
Illya threw himself determinedly into the mission, which proceeded mostly as expected: a period of establishing themselves in the neighborhood, doing some surveillance and getting to know the neighbors, interspersed with the occasional surprise visit from T.H.R.U.S.H., generally fairly easily dealt with.
Napoleon, being Napoleon, managed to have everyone in the neighborhood - especially the women - eating out of the palm of his hand in under a fortnight. Illya starting having to forcibly school his expression so as to not glare murderously at the parade of women who came by to borrow a cup of sugar, or ask Napoleon's opinion on what flowers to plant in the spring, or drop off a freshly-baked batch of cookies; he had the distinct feeling that he was starting to scare some of the neighbors off, which was not terribly conducive for intelligence-gathering.
On the day T.H.R.U.S.H. delivered a bomb to the house disguised as a bottle of milk – that laid an unsuspecting Illya and Napoleon flat out on the floor but thankfully did no lasting damage – Illya gloomily reflected to himself that there may have been many things wrong with T.H.R.U.S.H., but the one thing he couldn’t fault them for was a lack of imagination.
His ears were still ringing. He turned his head to check on his partner. Napoleon, flat on his back beside Illya on the floor, stared dazedly back at him.
And Illya was never trusting anything that got delivered to this house ever again, seriously, because the image of Napoleon blinking slowly at him, drenched in milk, streaks of white staining his cheeks and dripping off his eyelashes, had sent Illya’s beleaguered mind straight into the gutter and was now imprinted on his brain forever.
Illya sighed to himself and threw himself even more deeply into his work.
THRUSH bombs disguised as innocuous grocery items aside, Illya was slightly concerned – and more than a little surprised – at how easy it was for him to adapt to living with Napoleon. They split the chores (well, Illya decided on the split and Napoleon mostly went along with it), did surveillance together and discussed the mission over lunches and dinners.
It was all terribly domestic, and despite his best efforts to not get lulled into a false sense of complacency, Illya kept having to forcibly remind himself that this whole setup was for a mission, and that he and Napoleon weren’t actually cohabiting by choice.
Even so, when Illya walked out of the bathroom after brushing his teeth that evening and saw, through the open door of his partner’s bedroom, Napoleon fast asleep in the huge king bed with his hair mussed and falling over his closed eyes, tranquil and unguarded in slumber, he couldn’t help but wish for things that he couldn’t ever have.
***
After a couple of weeks in the suburbs, they’d settled into a routine, of sorts. Napoleon did most of the cooking, although sometimes Illya tried out some of the recipes in his still fairly small repertoire. One evening, he made an excellent boeuf bourguignon which Napoleon was in raptures over, and, boosted by this success, decided that the next dish he cooked for Napoleon would be a soufflé.
The universe, however, seemed to be conspiring against him. First, Napoleon forgot to buy him the eggs he’d asked for, then his partner transparently used Illya’s attempt to make a soufflé as an excuse to invite their pretty neighbor over to ‘help’, which instantly sent Illya spiraling into a bad mood, although he didn’t quite care to examine the reasons why.
While Napoleon was out doing some investigating for the mission, Illya experimented a little more with the soufflé, which was more difficult to make than he’d expected. On his first attempt, the soufflé didn’t rise and on the next attempt, the soufflé collapsed. And then, typically, just when he thought he’d figured the recipe out, things with T.H.R.U.S.H. abruptly escalated, and Illya, rather embarrassingly, got himself captured, and had to be rescued by Napoleon.
After that little incident, though, they did manage to wrap the mission up in a satisfactory manner – well, except that Illya still hadn’t gotten to make his soufflé. He brought the matter up to Napoleon in their last evening in their rented house, having decided that he would make his partner a soufflé for dinner.
Napoleon – uncharacteristically – blinked, turned a little red, ducked his head and mumbled something that Illya couldn’t quite catch.
Illya raised an eyebrow. “What?”
“I, ah, was hoping you’d join me for dinner, actually,” Napoleon said, a little too quickly. “At – at a restaurant, I mean. Betsy recommended it, and I thought perhaps you’d, ah, like to try it. With me.”
Betsy? Who was Betsy? Illya incongruously thought of the stuffed unicorn he’d given to Napoleon at the funfair some months back. No, Napoleon had named her Betty, not Betsy. He frowned at Napoleon in query.
Oh. Napoleon probably meant Betsy, their neighbor. At that point, Illya realized that he had probably been silent for a beat too long, as Napoleon had, even more uncharacteristically, begun to fidget.
“You could make us a soufflé for dessert,” Napoleon offered in a hopeful tone. “Come for dinner with me, and we’ll come back here for dessert after?”
“That would be acceptable,” Illya said agreeably.
***
The restaurant that Betsy had recommended turned out to be the most expensive restaurant in town, all gilt and velvet, with high chandeliered ceilings and lushly carpeted floors. The prices on the menu made Illya’s eyes water.
He and Napoleon were seated at a small table by a window that looked out onto the moonlit park next to the restaurant. The lights were low, a small candle flickering gently in the intricately engraved glass candle holder on the table between them as they ate. Illya didn’t know how much the wine Napoleon ordered had cost, but it certainly tasted expensive.
The ambience was, very distinctly, romantic.
And the way Napoleon was looking at him –
– ah. Illya was quite sure he knew what that look meant. He’d been watching a lot of Days of our Lives.
“Napoleon,” he said carefully. “Are we on a date?”
“Er,” said Napoleon, going a little red. Illya stared at him. Of all the outrageous things his partner had ever done, taking Illya on a date didn’t even make the top ten. Or the top twenty. And this was what made his partner blush? He found himself wondering how far down Napoleon’s neck that flush extended.
"I'll take that as a yes," Illya said.
Napoleon cleared his throat, not quite meeting Illya's eyes. He was still blushing.
Illya put his fork and knife down. “I think I’m ready for dessert now,” he said.
***
True to his word, Napoleon signaled the waiter for the check right after they’d finished eating their mains, and they headed back to their rented house so that Illya could make his soufflé for dessert.
Once they got back to the house, Illya took his jacket and shoes off and very pointedly put on the apron Napoleon had bought for him, pleased with the way Napoleon’s gaze lingered hungrily on him as he tied the pink ribbon of the apron tightly around his waist.
“Sit,” he said to Napoleon, waving a hand at the dining table. “This won’t take long.”
To Illya’s delight, his Grand Marnier soufflé turned out perfect. When he brought it to the dining table where Napoleon was seated, though, Napoleon barely glanced at the soufflé. Instead, he groaned, scrubbed his hands through his hair then peered up at Illya. He looked a little frazzled.
“Illya,” he said plaintively. “Are you going to let me kiss you, already?”
Illya gave his partner a small smile, putting the soufflé carefully on the table. “I thought you’d never ask,” he said.
Napoleon made a frustrated sound, grabbing Illya’s apron and using it to pull him close. Illya ran a hand over the ‘Kiss the Cook’ text emblazoned on the front of the apron and laughed softly.
“So you did want to ‘kiss the cook’,” he said.
“I’ve been wanting to since before I bought the damned thing,” Napoleon agreed, and pulled Illya into his lap. Illya yelped, grabbing at his partner’s arm with one hand to steady himself. Then, Napoleon leaned in and kissed him, and Illya immediately forgot about the apron and his soufflé and everything else that wasn’t the taste of Napoleon’s mouth and the warmth of Napoleon’s broad hand on his thigh.
When they parted, Illya smiled at Napoleon. “You still haven’t tried my soufflé,” he said. Napoleon made a protesting noise when Illya tried to get off his lap, so Illya stayed where he was, leaning over to pick up the soufflé and spoon from where he’d left them on the table. He dug the spoon into the soufflé and fed Napoleon a bite.
“Mm. Delicious,” Napoleon said, his eyes fixed on Illya’s lips.
“The soufflé, Napoleon.”
“Yes,” Napoleon said. “That, too.” He grinned and pulled Illya close to kiss him again.
End.