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“What are those tiny chickens called again?” Nick calls into the living room.
“Cornish hens?” Harry calls back from where he’s curled up on the couch, flicking through the episodes of The Simpsons saved on the tele. Nick can’t even be bothered to tell him off for messing up the cushions by shoving his feet under them – he looks too cute, and Nick’s got bigger problems than a few misshapen cushions today.
“Yes! Those!” Nick says, leaning down to add them to the list. “Right, you wouldn’t happen to know anything about cooking those, would you?”
“Not really, watched Nigella make them once,” Harry says absent-mindedly, still focused on the screen. “Kind of just like cooking a tiny roast chicken, I imagine.”
Nick considers this, “Hmm, and what do we else do we need to cook these tiny roast chickens?”
“Are you trying to cook again? Might want to sort out the spinach pie recipe before you move on to more complex dishes.” Harry tips his head back against the couch to flash Nick a wicked smile.
To be fair, his attempt at spinach pie had left something to be desired. Ideally, the person you’re cooking for doesn’t have to supervise the shopping trip or get half-drunk on wine in the living room because it takes you three hours to cook a “thirty-minute meal.” But in Nick’s defense, it wasn’t the first time Jamie Oliver had overestimated his audience.
“Very funny, but I seem to remember someone coming round looking for leftovers,” Nick says, trying not to let on just how thrilled he’d been when Harry had knocked on his door that evening. “But no, I have come to terms with the fact that I’m not a chef.”
“What are the hens for then?” Harry asks, getting up from the couch – leaving the cushions all misaligned like Nick knew he would – and moving to stand across from Nick at the island.
“Well, I’ve not quite come to terms with other people thinking I’m not a chef, so I may or may not have said that I would take care of Sunday dinner tonight.” Nick shrugs and gives a sheepish grin.
“Nick, it’s already half eleven!”
“Well, that’s why I’m getting the mini chickens – less cook time, innit?”
Harry doesn’t seem impressed with Nick’s culinary forethought. “And you’re cooking everything?”
“Well, Daisy’s bringing dessert, and I’ve left Aimee in charge of drinks, but everything else… yes.”
“Alright, let’s have a look at the list then.”
Nick slides it across the counter and runs a hand through his hair while Harry inspects it.
“All you’ve written so far is pigs in a blanket, jacket potatoes, veg with a question next to it, and Cornish hens. You’re hopeless.” But the look on Harry’s face is fond, like even though Nick is a mess, Nick is his mess. It’s a look that he’s seen before but still hasn’t stopped making him feel like a butterfly sanctuary has set up shop in his stomach.
Harry takes the pen from Nick’s hand and starts scribbling down a list that’s much longer than Nick thought necessary. This is probably why Nick has to make half a dozen trips to Waitrose every time he cooks anything. Well, that and the fact that he’s usually starving by the time he gets to the shops, so he mostly ends up buying more bread than one man should ever eat.
Harry, on the other hand, is like a machine in the grocery store, though Nick does catch him dawdling a bit in front of a display of holiday chocolates.
When they get back, Nick is sat at the counter, carefully wrapping puff pastry around the cocktail hotdogs just like Harry showed him, and humming along to the Christmas songs playing from his speakers. The novelty of Christmas music hasn’t worn off yet, probably a result of Matt strictly limiting the number of holiday songs they can program into the show each morning. But on his own time, Nick fully intends binge on festive music until he feels sick at the mere thought of Michael Bublé.
When he finishes the final row, he leans back to inspect the tray. Some of his look a little lumpier than the ones in Harry’s sample row, but overall he’s pretty pleased.
Nick turns around to face Harry, who has been diligently rubbing olive oil and rosemary salt under the skin of the hens. Nick was spared the task of caressing raw poultry because Harry knew he wouldn’t be patient enough not to tear the skin.
As much as Nick likes watching Harry when he’s so focused his tongue peeks out from between his lips, he knows they’ve got a schedule to keep. So he proudly holds out his trays and shouts, “Get Big Boss Joss on the phone. I’m quitting radio, my true calling is the kitchen!”
Harry looks up, all dimples and crinkly eyes, and Nick suspects that his heart might actually melt into a puddle on the kitchen floor. “Perfect, I’ll let Nigella know that you’re after her time slot, as well.”
“I’m just a boy with a spatula and a dream.”
“Why don’t you pop those in the oven then, Gordon Ramsay?” Nick opens the oven door and slides the trays onto the center shelf, below the potatoes. “Then you can just get ready, I guess. Everyone should be here soon, and there’s not that much left to do.”
Nick may or may not have a lazy wank in the shower in the hopes that it will take the edge off of spending the whole evening in the same room as Harry – who will no doubt have his charm on in full force for the guests. And if he gets off thinking about how the dip in Harry’s collarbones would taste or how it would feel to bite the bit of skin at Harry’s hip, well, Harry will be none the wiser for it.
When he rounds the corner into the living room, still adjusting his freshly dried hair, the living room looks well ready for guests. In the time he’d been gone, Harry had set up all the appetizers on the coffee table in the living room, and Aimee had arrived with what looks like enough wine for a small French army.
“Hey, babes, Harry wants you in the kitchen,” she says, still pulling more bottles out of the bag at her feet.
When Nick enters the kitchen, Harry is stood at the stove, pushing green beans and sliced almonds around a skillet. “Hey, Nick, I wanna shower before everyone gets here. Can you just pop some foil over this to keep it warm? And keep an eye on the birds? I could only fit three in there with the potatoes, but once they’re done I’ll put the rest in.”
“You can count on me, your loyal sous-chef,” Nick says, already pulling the foil out of the cupboard.
Nick is having a lovely time having a beer and talking to Gellz about someone she’s interviewed for work, when Harry walks out from the bedroom, hair still damp. Nick's eyes immediately go wide when he remembers that he’s not checked on the hens even once since Harry had left. He promptly turns around and heads for the kitchen, but he can tell that they’ve burnt before he even opens the oven.
It’s not as bad as it could be, he reckons. The sides look fine, but the tops are definitely blacker than they’re meant to be.
Nick can feel Harry walking up behind him, as he’s pulling the tray out of the oven. He looks up, ready to apologize for ruining Harry’s hard work, but Harry is smiling and shaking his head. “I told you you should’ve mastered the spinach pie first. Also you’ve gotta eat that one,” he says, pointing at the especially burnt one in the middle.
Nick can’t help but laugh. Because of course Harry Styles is the only human on the planet that will rescue you from ruining a dinner and then just have a laugh with you when you still somehow manage to ruin that dinner.
Harry puts the rest of the hens into the oven, while they finish the potatoes and vegetables. Every once in a while Nick will hear a peal of laughter from the living room, and Nick knows that in the past he would have feel like he was missing out on the party. But now, he’s more than happy just to have a beer and watch Harry carefully cut open jacket potatoes.
When they finally walk back into the living room, food in hand, everyone erupts with a cheer. At first, Nick thinks that maybe they’d taken longer than he'd thought and everyone was drunk and hungry. But then he sees Aimee pointing at a spot above Nick’s head. He tilts his head up, even though he knows what he’s going to find. Sure enough, there’s a tiny branch of mistletoe taped lopsidedly on the doorframe.
The room immediately breaks out in a chant of, “Kiss, kiss, kiss!” so maybe Nick’s initial guess that his guests were hammered wasn’t so far off.
Nick glances nervously at Harry. It won’t be the first time they’ve kissed, not even the second or third. But it will definitely be their most sober and most public, so Nick wants to make sure he gives Harry ample time to jump ship. But Harry is smiling like there’s nothing he’d rather do than stand in a doorway and kiss Nick while they’re both wearing oven mitts.
Nick isn’t sure if they should put the food down first: he can’t decide if it would be more mortifying to lose control of his limbs and send nine Cornish hens skidding across the floor or to have to actually, properly kiss Harry in front of everyone. But before he can make up his mind, Harry is tilting his chin up to bring their mouths together.
They just barely press their lips together, but it’s enough to send Nick’s heart hammering in his chest. The soft pressure of Harry’s lips against his remind him of the other times Harry’s mouth has been on his – breathless kisses while Harry presses him against the door after a night out and soft kisses that taste like wine on the couch while Bake Off plays in the background. And no amount of pre-dinner wanks could stop Nick from feeling a wave of warmth spread through his whole body.
When they pull apart, Nick can hardly hear his friends cheering over the blood rushing in his ears. Nick sees a flash of panic in Harry’s eyes, one he's sure is mirrored in his own. If his hands weren’t holding a scalding hot casserole dish, he thinks he’d quite like to cup Harry’s face in his hands. But he can hear everyone settling down at the table, so instead he just shoots Harry a small smile and says, “Merry Christmas, huh?”