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Damian Desmond, the second son of the prestigious Desmond family, a family with centuries of wealth, history, and achievements, sometimes can succumb to the horrendous academic and social pressure in Eden College. Trying to be the perfect role model student, molding himself to be the perfect gentleman worthy of the Desmond name; always guarded, refined, hiding his emotions, swallowing any insults and retort back as subtle as he could… He can only take so much before he bursts out like a tickling bomb. It’s so exhausting.
Damian knows that he always has anger issue since he was young which fortunately, mellowed as he grows up but it's still an issue. Who knows… what kind of stupid things could ignite his anger and drive him batshit crazy? The last thing he needed was for him to unleash his wrath, letting people know how ugly the real him is, and making more students scared of him or making bad rumors about him because people already find him intimidating. He’s tall; he stands proudly at almost 190 cm, and his facial features grow sharper as he matures. Anya Forger has the audacity to ‘diagnose’ him with a permanent resting bitch face as students, especially the younger ones, are terrified of him, and some even couldn’t look at his eyes, which, much to his dismay, is a fact. It’s not like he could do anything to it; he was born with this face!
At least, with this resting bitch face, people would likely avoid or think twice before deciding to mess with him. Saving him from trouble, unlike a certain someone who is much smaller, bubbly, and looks harmless enough to make people think it’s okay to mess with her. Only to be destroyed as she kicks ass, making a big ruckus, and then the entire Eden knows what happened, which usually ends up with her being in detention.
Fortunately for him, Mr. Forger was kind enough to help and guide him when he was much younger. The older man told him that it wasn’t a good thing to suppress his emotions and he needed to release them once in a while, which, unfortunately, he couldn’t because people in high society suck. He didn’t want give more weapons that they could use against him; he didn’t have anybody to lean on; his mother and Jeeves could only do so much to protect him. In conclusion, it’s a bad idea; he just couldn’t do it. The Forger patriarch then suggested him a different way to cope; to release his anger in different and subtle ways, cooking.
At first, he found it ridiculous. He couldn’t understand how anybody could find inner peace or whatever bullshit in cooking, but he complied as he respected Mr. Forger and didn’t want to disappoint him. He started with simple things: simple stir fry, chopping meat… okay, he did actually find it quite relaxing. He could channel his anger to cut vegetables as thin as he wanted during his bad day. To butcher a chicken with his pent-up frustration when his classmates did stupid things that hindered his progress. To rip and clean innards from chickens like how he wanted to rip some of those bastards’ hair before seasoning them and throwing them in the oven. It might not be the best way to cope, but it works for him. Mr. Forger still diligently tells him that it’s better to naturally overcome his anger issue than keep coping like what he did, but what can he say? He has been doing this for years and he feels much better, plus, he has the benefit of eating good food as he is actually gifted in cooking and baking; and doing some little experiments as treats.
It's not a secret from his family or in the Eden boy dorm. Almost everyone in his year knows that he likes to cook and just wanders off to their home economics kitchen to cook (and to release some steam; this one is a secret as only Mr. Forger knows about his anger coping mechanism). They, in fact, quite like it because Damian usually cooks quite a lot and brings them to the dorm. And for his family… They don’t say anything or prohibit him from doing it, so it’s okay, he guess? He often accidentally butchers too many chicken or beef, accidentally cracks too many eggs for making cake, chops too many vegetables, meat, mushrooms, anything, and then he needs to readjust his cooking size. Whenever they believe that he secretly enjoys seeing people eating his cooking or he just doesn’t know how much he needs to buy to feed one mouth, he doesn’t care.
“—Dark chocolate, cocoa powder, sugar, butter, all-purpose flour, eggs… I think that’s all.”
Damian said as he once again rechecked and inspected every ingredient on the counter, making sure that everything is ready and of their best quality. If he decides to make something, he will make it good, perfect, not half-assed. It’s Friday and the Eden ground is quiet, only a handful staffs, professors, and students could be seen roaming around the college doing their own stuffs as majority of the students and staffs already went back to their home, enjoying their weekend. Some of the older students, such as his yearmate, are hanging out outside the campus, taking a break and changing scenery. It’s a good time for a little pastry experiment, as Damian wants to recreate something. The choux his mother gifted him last week was insanely delicious and he had been craving it for days. It’s a new pastry she tried in a neighboring country and is currently a trend in Berlint. An alternative version of the infamous choux with a crunchy exterior and a soft filling inside, it’s so good. It’s much easier to buy from the store, but because of how insanely popular it is, people are queuing for hours to try the new trendy pastries. He doesn’t really want to ask one of his house staff to queue for hours for a pastry or resort to different methods. It's just a pastry; he can make one.
Damian had been researching and consulting with some of Eden's chefs or pâtissiers to help him with the recipe since he still needed some guidance for this type of choux. He only ate it once and currently, from what he heard, is currently exploded in popularity for the high-class people also-no wonder his mother decided to try some of craquelin, the currently famous pastry.
Damian opens his notepad and reads the instruction he already made days ago, reviewing once more before nodding in satisfaction and starting to work. He measures every ingredient according to his recipe before mixing them together.
“Alright, let’s make the choux first. I need to make two separate batters for this one.”
The young teenager starts mixing the unsalted butter, sugar, cocoa powder, and all-purpose flour. He's mixing it until it becomes creamy with a whisk, as he has a lot of energy to spend, especially after hearing some dumb yapping from some of his classmates. Truly, he has known most of his yearmates for around 11 years, yet some of them still pissed him off daily.
“-woah, Sy-on! Holy shit, Elman and Egeburg are right! To think that Damian Desmond frequently spends his time inside this home economics kitchen!”
Damian jolts, he’s so focused with mixing his dry ingredients until creamy and not noticing someone had entered the room. Great, he just asked permission to use the home economics kitchen and didn't book it for himself. No one actually uses this room after schooltime except for the cooking extracurricular. His eyes squint as he turns his head toward the sound source, a familiar and annoying pink haired girl with weird horn accessories smiles smugly at him.
“What are you doing here, Forger? Don’t you have better things to do right now? Like, going home?”
He asks annoyedly; the last thing he needs right now is getting distracted by the pink-haired gremlin. He really wants to nail this recipe as he is craving one. His first batter starts getting creamy, and he adds a sprinkle of salt to adjust the taste.
“Before you start to bitch out, I already got permission from Professor Henderson to use this kitchen also. I want to make something too.”
The annoying pink-haired girl, Anya Forger, said with her equally annoying emerald eyes that sparkled like gemstones. She radiates so much energy, and Damian doesn’t know how the hell this embodiment of chaos still has this much energy after an exhausting school day.
“Why bother to make it here? Don’t you have Mr. Forger? He’s an excellent cook; you can learn one or two from him.”
Anya looks quite offended with his statement; Damian finds it amusing.
“You don’t need to know, Sy-on. And also, not everyone is talented like you or Papa! My cooking is just fine.”
He can see her pouting expression, cute. Anya quickly starts unpacking and preparing her own ingredients and tools. He swears that he saw her eyes burning with determination to nailed this cooking to shut him up. He would love to see it, though.
“Whatever, said that after you manage to cook a perfectly cooked schnitzel.”
“Oh, come on! You keep bringing that up!”
Her face is getting red. Cute, he wants to see more.
“Never in my life did I think that one day someone would serve a still raw schnitzel to me.”
Damian said and continued his work, leaving Anya huffing and ignoring him. Kind of disappointing. After he is satisfied with his batter consistency, he rolls his batter thin enough before placing it on a tray. He then walks toward the refrigerator to chill it for around 30 minutes, and getting a glimpse of what Anya’s currently doing.
From her ingredients and tools, it looks like she’s trying to make some chocolate dessert too. Her station looks way messier than his; she looks troubled reading the instruction as he notices her dumb expression whenever she doesn’t understand a thing. To think that an amazing cook like Mr. Forger spawns a talentless cook like her…
“What?! Mind your own business, Sy-on! Don’t bother me and also, stop insulting me.”
“I didn’t even say anything!”
“Hah! Your stupid face already said so. You can’t fool me, Mr. Open Book.”
That girl really knows how to hit his nerve but weirdly, he doesn’t get that annoyed with her. Sure, Damian is annoyed with Anya’s stupid attitudes but not at the same annoyed level with some notorious Eden troublemakers. He gets… this weird feeling that he doesn’t want to know what.
Damian quickly makes his second batter; he starts melting some unsalted butter, chills it for a while before mixing it with all-purpose flour and cocoa powder. He mixes the batter until it homogenous and the he adds two eggs and mixes it again until it reaches the right consistency.
“Tsk, whatever. What are you trying to make, anyway?”
Damian asks as he puts his second batter into a piping bag. He keeps hearing loud noises from Anya’s side and is curious about what happened—it’s not like he is worried or something like that. He just wants to make sure she doesn’t do something crazy and endangering both of them.
“Argh! I’m trying to make some cookies, okay?!”
Yikes, it looks like he hits her nerve as Anya looks annoyed enough. It’s funny that cooking did the exact opposite thing for Anya as the girl looks on the brink of ripping her hair off.
“I swear if he doesn’t like this, I will freaking lose it. Why am I even listening to Becky of all people…”
Anya said in a low voice but not low enough for him to not hear it.
Oh
Oh
She’s making this cookie for someone else, a boy. Whoever he is, Damian doesn’t know and doesn’t care. It’s not his problem that Anya is currently having a crisis because she couldn’t make some stupid cookies to impress some random boy. It’s not bothering him a bit, not at all.
It doesn’t concern him, and he doesn’t care, really. It’s not like he wants her homemade cookie; it might taste awful. Damian still remembers that still raw schnitzel Anya cooked for him; it was a miracle that he didn’t end up in ER that day.
He notices that Anya gets more upset and sadder; she looks really frustrated, and Damian decides not to pick more fights with her because as much as he enjoys messing with her, he really wants to taste this craquelin again.
“Well, good luck then.”
Damian starts preheating the oven before taking his chilled first batter and cutting it into a circle using a round cookie cutter. After cutting like a shit ton of circles, Damian starts piping out the second batter into small mounds. He puts the circles on the top of the mounds and then tosses them into the oven for around 25 minutes for each batch.
His eyes spark in happiness as he witnesses his dough start to rise up and the top is cracking, resembling the pastry he ate around a week ago.
The alluring smell of freshly baked dough fills the room; the smell is heavenly enough to make Anya get distracted from her own cooking, and her eyes can’t stop following the craquelin.
The craquelins look great for his first time; Damian is satisfied with the result. He only has two steps left: making a chocolate cream and filling up his craquelin before he calls it a day.
The scion doesn’t waste more time as he chops and melts some dark chocolate and mixes it with milk. Once he deems the mixture is homogenous enough, he whisks some whipping cream and sugar in a different bowl until it is quite fluffy before mixing it with the chocolate mixture and whisking it until the mixture becomes fluffy. It takes quite a while as he manually whisks it, but no complaints.
He finally put the chocolate cream inside a piping bag and began to fill up his craquelin. He internally cheers for his successful cooking experiment. He makes quite a number—a few dozen. He doesn’t know how the heck he managed to make that much in such a short time. He plans to share them with Emile and Ewen back in the dorm and maybe leave the rest for the younger grades or his yearmate on the boy dorm’s refrigerator.
He takes one and cut it into half, he could hear the crispy sounds as the knife cutting the craquelin into two. The inside looks insanely pretty-like seriously, he’s really proud of this one. Maybe, maybe he should save some so he can ask Jeeves to come over and take them for his mother to enjoy, he isn’t sure about his father but maybe his older brother might like it knowing how sweet tooth the first son actually is. Well, a little consideration from him wouldn’t hurt, right? Especially since he made too much. It’s not like the boy dorm’s refrigerator can store all of them and he doesn’t like to waste his hard work. Also, he still needs to repay his mother for her generosity last week. Yeah, sounds reasonable enough.
Damian can only admire his hard work for a while before remembering that he isn’t alone in this kitchen, Anya freaking Forger is here and yikes, she looks like in verge of breaking over there.
Damian sighs; the last thing he needs after his successful experiment is a crying Anya because it will make him look bad, okay? Not because he worried or anything. Besides, he’s a proper gentleman. It’s not polite to leave a lady—if you can call her one—in tears.
“You want half, Forger?”
Damian offers her; Anya blinks before looking straight into his eyes. Her big, adorable, and unfortunately teary emerald eyes are sparkling. She looks a little bit unsure before, but after seeing the heavenly chocolate craquelin, whatever inner turmoil is inside her silly head is shutting down as Anya couldn’t resist the delicious chocolate pastry. Anya nods and takes half of his craquelin.
She takes a cute, tiny bite; her dull eyes suddenly spark with life, like a pair of shining emeralds.
“Mmnn… this is really good.”
Damian feels weirdly giddy and happy after hearing Anya’s praise. Nope, it’s just a fact; he’s a good cook, and it’s a fact, just like how silly she is. Nothing more than that.
She’s such an honest girl, never hiding her feelings, unlike him, something that he likes and admires her for. Seeing her adorable face blooms with smile again make his stomach flutters, especially knowing that he did it.
“It’s good, right? I’m such a good cook.”
Damian lightly jokes—surprisingly, Anya laughs at that; she usually disses him after he boasts about something, but this time, she plays along.
“You’re right. You’re such a good cook. Maybe you should consider it as a career, Sy-on.”
That smile, that silly smile, looks perfect on her silly face. Yeah, she looks way better like this rather than all frustrated and teary like before.
“Here, take this with you. I made quite a lot anyway. Consider this as a thank you gift to Mr. Forger for teaching me cooking.”
Damian quickly packs six craquelins and shoves them to Anya. It’s a good thing that he made dozens of them.
“Thank you, Sy-on… I think we must clean up right now. I will help you as a thank you.”
Damian raises one of his eyebrows. Anya is still making her cookie, and yet, she wants to clean up?
“But you’re still working on your cookie.”
Anya's eyes dim a little bit; her head hangs low. Damian knows her quite well to notice that she feels uncertain and insecure about something.
“I—forget it, this is not a good idea. Maybe he doesn’t even want it…”
Something inside Damian feels upset after hearing that. Who is that ungrateful bastard? Damian would gladly give a piece of his mind to him.
Seeing her sound so low and teary like this really stirs something inside him; something makes him restless. Anya already sacrificed her time and energy to come here and even made something—albeit it still not a success…
“Argh! Fine! I will help you, Forger. Don’t think much about this, though. I only think it’s a little too sad for someone to leave this kitchen without making anything—not because you’re special or something.”
Anya's face lit up again and lit up his heart too. She gives him a sincere smile. Ugh… how can someone say no to that face?
“Thank you, Sy-on!”
“Tsk, whatever. Let’s start working.”
Damian quickly dismisses whatever giddy feeling is growing inside his stomach as he grabs more bowls and spatulas. Anya is surprisingly, quite a good partner to work with. She listens to his instruction and is attentive to his needs, providing him with tools or ingredients he needs before he asks for it, just like she is able to read his mind. It’s weird; Damian notices that Anya actually did that quite a lot, especially toward him. And considering that one stupid confession on their first dance in their first school year… Whatever, it's just some stupid speculation anyway. He just wants to finish this and clean the kitchen before the security guard comes to scold them.
With leftover of some all-purpose flour, butter, sugar, dark chocolate, chocolate chip, egg, baking powder, and salt, they manage to make a simple and quick chocolate chip cookie after Anya and Damian just mix them up and throw them into oven for around 12 minutes.
“Thank you, thank you, thank you! You’re the best, Sy-on!”
Anya couldn’t stop her excitement as she was very happy looking at her cookie. It looks and smells so good. Damian feels much prouder of this quick and spontaneous recipe since he can witness how happy and proud she is. He did like 40% of the work, but whatever. The cookie is soft and gooey, just like he prefers.
The two of them quickly clean the kitchen before leaving. Damian offers to walk her to the bus stop as it’s already quite late, which Anya instantly agrees to. She’s beaming in happiness, and her steps are light; she looks happily at the craquelins and cookies on her arms.
Just as he wants to bid his goodbye, Anya shoves something toward him.
“Here, my token of appreciation for you today. Thank you so much, Damian. See you on Monday!”
She said with her silly grin, which he likes, before rushing into the bus. Damian is caught off guard and couldn’t comprehend what happened for a few minutes before looking at a small pouch Anya had shoved into him.
It’s her cookie that she made with him.
Damian smiles softly at the small pouch. What a silly girl, gifting someone their own hard work? Only she can think of something insane like this. He should get offended by this, but somehow, he is happy.
He takes another cookie and bites into it. The sweetness and richness of chocolate really elevate his whole mood on this cozy evening. It tastes way better than the usual chocolate chip cookie he made.
What can he say? He’s such a good cook after all. It’s probably a small improvement since he was in such a great mood after successfully making his first batch of craquelin. Maybe he should really consider a career change as a pâtissier if he’s bored with politics and such.