Work Text:
The door to the tastefully decorated apartment swung open and in walked a man with slicked back blond hair and small, round, tinted glasses. He was K.N.Date a popular creator on FansOnly. He was dressed in a tan suit and carried a canvas shopping tote. He paused in the genkan to remove his brown leather brogues. “I’m home.” he called out into the apartment. He knelt down to make sure his shoes were neatly in place and stepped into the apartment proper. The golden sunlight from the setting sun filtered through the sliding glass door that led out to the narrow balcony and set his hair a glow.
He approached the camera and leaned against the painted wall slightly, one socked foot tucked behind the other a small smile across his lips. “Did you have a long day at work too?” he asked as he loosened up his dotted tie as he paused again, “Yeah. I’m certain that I avoid overtime because of how vocal I am with management about how much I hate it.” He lifted up the canvas bag he had in his hand, “I got the ingredients for that clam linguine that you liked so much at our anniversary dinner.”
K.N.Date stood up away from where he had been standing leaning against the wall and headed to the kitchen, the camera following him. It was framed low making sure that the shot got both his shapely but muscular ass and the way the fabric of his tailored suit stretched across his well built shoulders. He set the canvas bag onto the counter and pulled out what he had picked up from the store. A mesh bag of clams, fresh parsley, a few lemons, and a bottle of dry white wine. The other ingredients were already stocked in the pantry and fridge.
“You want a glass of wine while I get dinner started?” there was that signature little pause as if he was giving the viewer time to reply. He nodded his head and reached up into a cabinet pulling out a wine glass and setting it on the counter. He reached into the fridge and pulled out a half finished bottle of the same white wine he had parched earlier. He poured a generous glass and reached his arm behind the camera as if he was handing it to the viewer, “I know you’ve had a stressful day at work but let it breathe before you start to drink.” K.N.Date gave a little chuckle.
He took off his suit jacket and passed it over the back of the camera. He then proceeded to roll up the sleeves of his blue dress shirt making sure that he gave the camera a good look at his forearms as they flexed. K.N.Date pulled out a linen apron from a drawer and put it over his head before tying the waist ties, he took off his glasses, setting them on the counter and set some royalty free jazz music on his phone to play before he washed his hands. Once satisfied that his hands were washed and there was music to set the mood, he got down to the actual cooking.
From the cabinet he pulled out a large glass mixing bowl and from the pantry the glass canister of flour. With the practiced ease of someone who cooked pasta from scratch quite often, K.N.Date eyeballed the appropriate amount of flour into the bowl, sprinkled in a generous amount of flaky sea salt from the little jar that had a permanent place on the counter top. With a fork he mixed the flour and salt together before he made a little well in the center of the pile of flour. He once again asked how the viewer’s day was and made various noises and vocalizations that he was engaging in the conversation as he worked.
He half glided to the fridge and pulled out a couple of eggs, cracking them into the well he had created especially for them. He broke the yolks and began to mixed the eggs into the flour, little by little until a dough had formed. It was a little dried then he needed it to be and gathered a bit of water from the faucet into his hand and sprinkled that into the dough, mixed it further, and once satisfied with the consistency reached his hand into the bowl to knead the dough with his hands.
K.N.Date kneaded the dough for a few minutes, pulled out some cling film, wrapped it up and set the pasta dough to rest. With the dough resting he washed out the bowl that he had just used in the sink. He opened up the bag of clams, dumping them into the now cleaned bowl. He filled up the bowl with water, and with a small brush scrubbed the outside of the little neck clams, rinsed them under the water multiple times until the water ran clear. All the while he kept nodded and would ask questions like “and then what happened?” as he pretended to still be speaking with the viewer of the video.
Once satisfied that the outside of the clams has been cleaned he dissolved a hefty amount of the flakey salt into the bowl of water and the clams and tucked them into the fridge. Enough time had passed for the pasta dough to have rested, so from one of the lower cabinets he pulled out the pasta roller and began to run the dough through the roller decreasing the width of the roller accordingly as he laminated the dough. He prepped the counter with the appropriate about of flour on the counter, attached the linguine plate to the roller and finished off the pasta prep, twirling the pasta into little nests. And covering them again with cling film. Before pulling out a jar of minced garlic, the butter and clams from the fridge. He drained the clams in a colander in the sink.
The camera angle was changed as K.N.Date moved to the stove. He placed a stainless steel pan on the stovetop and a pot of water that he salted generously with his trusty flakey sea salt. While he waited for the water to boil, he heated up some olive oil and a generous pat of butter in the pan. He then heaped a heaving spoonful of the minced garlic into the pan and a generous sprinkling of red pepper flakes into the pan. He stirred with a wooden spatula and waited for the garlic to brown.
When the garlic was sufficiently golden brown he deglazed with an appropriate amount of the wine that he had poured the glass for the viewer from earlier and half of a lemon. Gave a brief stirring from the pan making sure to get the fond off the bottle of the pan then dumped the drained clams into the pan. He gave the pan a couple of shakes and covered the pan with the glass lid. The pot of water was now at a rapid boil. With a spider, K.N.Date lowered the nests of pasta into the boiling water.
There were only a couple of minutes left before the meal would be completed, so he pulled out two plates and a glass for himself from the cabinet and placed them on the counter. He sliced up the other half of the lemon putting an even portion of it on each of the dishes.
He lifted the lid from the clams and gave them a stir with the wooden spatula he had in hand. Then K.N.Date reached in and removed the clams that hadn’t opened up. Once the bad clams had been discarded he took his spider and removed the pasta, giving it a shake and allowing the linguine to drain the excess water before he placed it into the fragrant wine and lemon clam sauce. He quickly minced the parsley up and tossed everything together. He tasted a piece of pasta, to check the balance of salt and after thinking for a moment he gave his small smile to the camera and said “Perfect, just like you.” before plating up the meal for two.
K.N.Date balanced the two plates on his right forearm, his empty glass in his hand. He grabbed the opened bottle of wine from the counter with his left hand and gingerly walked to the small dining room table for two that had a bouquet of fairly, fresh flowers in the center of the table. The camera had been moved to sit opposite of where he was going to be sitting. He placed one dish in the space where the viewer was supposed to be sitting and put his own plate in front of himself, and poured himself a glass of wine for himself.
“Let me go ahead and fill you back up.” he said, reaching across the table and poured the remainder of the wine left in the bottle into the glass for the viewer. He smiled lifting up the glass and tilting it towards the camera. “Cheers to us.”
K.N.Date took a sip of his glass of wine, set the glass on the table and then took a bite of the pasta he had made with an “mmm” coming from his throat as the camera faded to black.