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“Oh, good morning Olly!” Qifrey greets as he turns the corner to see him finally out of his room. The sun hasn’t risen yet, which was perfect timing to begin preparing breakfast for everyone. “You’re up early for once.”
Olruggio looks up, his eyes bloodshot. “Didn’t sleep.”
Ah.
He pats his back while chuckling. “Well, that explains it. You should get some sleep while you can—I’m about to make omelettes for the girls, but I can make yours first.”
Olruggio leans into Qifrey’s touch, holding it briefly with his own warm hand. The other reaches for the depressions in between his eyes. He attempts to rub out what Qifrey can only assume to be his strain from overworking the entire night.
“No, no. Don’t rush on my account. Besides,” Olruggio sighs while motioning to the table in front of him. It was only then did Qifrey’s heart stutter, recognizing where it might have come from. “Already had some food. The banana ones are really good, did you make them?”
“Olly…” Olruggio freezes when Qifrey’s face turns pale.
“Why? Are you–”
Qifrey’s grab on his shoulders tighten. Not enough to hurt—never anything like that, but Qifrey is currently Panicking so he doesn’t stop to adjust himself. Lowly, as if the other occupants might hear through their dreams and rooms, he hisses. “Those were Richeh’s snacks! Euini sent those over for her birthday!”
“Oh shit.”
“Did you eat all of them?” Surely he left some behind and the one or two remaining pieces on the table aren’t actually what remained. Surely.
Olruggio blushes. “I thought– There were only a few, so I thought the girls already had their share and you saved me some again. I had no idea they were from Euini!”
Qifrey covers his mouth with his hand, shocked. “A few,” he says incredulously. In reality, there had been dozens of carefully wrapped balls and cylinders, paling in comparison to the deflated white, yellow, and blue wrappers in front of them. “Richeh is going to be livid…”
They can’t exactly reach Euini and Alaira again, both for being too risky to initiate contact and plainly impolite. What were they supposed to say, ‘Hi, we know that you sent this for your friend’s birthday, but the Watchful Eye accidentally ate it all’?
“Alaira is going to laugh and curse us out,” Qifrey sighs. He lifts his hand to softly entwine his fingers into Olruggio’s hair. It’s super oily. He must have been to hyper-focused on his recent deadlines to rinse it through properly. “Don’t you worry about it now, Olly. What’s done is done– you should go take a nap while I make you some proper food.”
Richeh will most likely strike out again from her lessons from this incident, but Qifrey doesn’t want Olruggio to stress about it. Save that for him, Qifrey hoped to say, if only the ominous phrasing wouldn’t ring out alarm bells in the other’s perceptive mind.
Olruggio himself, however, isn’t convinced. “No, this is my fault. I would have known if I went out once in a while to catch up with the girls,” he runs a tired hand across his beard and eyes. “Also if I hadn’t been so hungry just now– I’m telling you, I almost ate the cupboard wood, seein’ it like chocolate!”
His eye twitches, making Qifrey even more concerned. He looks towards the cupboard in question— It’s colored orange.
“Go close your eyes now, Olly,” Qifrey says with a (fake) smile and turns to begin cooking. “I’ll handle our food as always.”
“Hold on.”
Olruggio hastily approaches Qifrey, stopping just before their toes could touch. His breath is warm and smells like sugar, blowing against Qifrey’s lips. “What are you–” Olruggio reaches beyond Qifrey’s head as he smirks with the little energy that he has left.
“Bananas,” he says simply. Olruggio shows them off to Qifrey, delicately holding it like it had the answers to the universe. “I remember the snacks, and we have the ingredients. Can’t we make them in exchange?”
“Oh that’s a brilliant idea!” Qifrey snags the bunch of fresh bananas from Olruggio’s grip, turning around almost immediately. “Thank you Olly. You can describe the snacks to me while I–”
“While you cook?” Scoffing, Olruggio keeps a hand on Qifrey’s elbow. “Come on now, let me help. My meddling stomach caused this.”
Qifrey eyes the tender touch he has on the crook of his arm. Once again—or rather, as always—Olruggio’s touch is warm and inviting. If they had not the need to cover for Richeh’s eaten snacks or him to cook breakfast, Qifrey would have preferred that that touch to drag him to bed as well. Catch up on their sleep deprivation, together.
He swiftly shakes that thought out of his head. There’s no time for what-ifs!
“Richeh is one of the last to wake up,” Qifrey says with a hand on his chin. “But she is usually the first to come out her room–” –they’ll really have to remind the other girls again not to overly practice in the mornings, without so much as a breakfast first– “so we’ll have to hurry.”
Olruggio rolls up his sleeves, revealing the unshaven skin underneath. He ties the loose fabric up with ribbons usually used for when he’s drawing and didn’t want the inks to leave a stain. “There were three. The yellow ones were like chips of bananas.”
Using a knife, Qifrey cleanly removes the peel of some bananas. He hums, listening to how Olruggio washes his hands and selects more ingredients from across the kitchen. “And then? Were they crunchy?”
“Yeah, they were baked, I suspect. Probably with sugar? Ah– cut those into thinner slices.”
“That’s hard then,” Qifery frowns. He does as Olruggio orders and makes sure that the slices are even by measuring by his other finger. “The sugar might burn. Or the bananas themselves.”
A fire gently roars as Olruggio flashes a seal towards the firewood of their magic clay oven. “That’s what I thought,” he sighs. “They didn’t have a sugar layer either, so it might not have been that.”
“Then maybe it was just baked as is.” Qifrey tilts his head, thinking of ways to improve the array of banana slices in front of him. “Oh! What if we cut them into tiny hats?”
Olruggio snorts. “I thought we were trying to copy Euini’s snacks? She’ll certainly figure out if they’ve suddenly turned from circles to triangles.”
“You’re right,” Qifrey says, deflated. He’ll have to note these recipes down if he wanted to adjust them so suddenly. Speaking of, “There’s some of the snacks left, right? Perhaps I could take a more direct look.”
Unfortunately, when they looked back at the table Olruggio was sitting at earlier, they only found a mess and one piece respectively of the blue and white snacks. On top of it all, there’s crumbs scattered everywhere.
“…I’ll clean that up later.” Olruggio looks away sheepishly, wiping down his sweaty, nervous hands against himself. “Oh,” he says as he realizes that something is in his pocket. “Qifrey, could you figure it out from this?”
Again with the same kindness as earlier, Olruggio holds up a broken piece of baked banana slice to Qifrey. He’d hate to imagine a dark-colored lint attached to it.
Initially, he had no idea what to say. Olruggio seemed pleased with himself, catching the final existence of Euini’s gift for Richeh, so how should he respond to not overly discourage him? …Should Qifrey chew on the—ahem, dirty and possibly oily—fragment of the yellow snack?
Thankfully, it didn’t come to that, as the sight and smell suddenly became familiar.
“Ah, it was coated in lemon juice prior to baking.”
Olruggio, being so sleep-deprived as he is, merely watched in silence while Qifrey dug through their fruits to select a juicy one to coat their sliced bananas. When he slides the tray into the oven, he asks with confusion, “How’d you know it was lemon?”
While washing his hands, Qifrey hums. “Do you remember that glowrose tart bouquet I made you?” Olruggio momentarily brightens, making Qifrey smile to himself as well. “I also used lemons—to prevent it from browning.”
He nods, accepting the answer. “You have a keener sense of smell than I do.”
Well, the banana chip didn’t smell like lemon anymore. From being in his pocket for who knew how long, it began smelling like Olruggio, which let Qifrey recall the pastry. “So, which one’s next?”
The sky outside still remains dark, but the starts have begun to disappear. Soon, the biggest, brightest star will rise from the horizon and warm the colors around them. They’ll have to hurry against the clock before any of the girls can have the chance to wake up.
Qifrey turns to Olruggio, who is standing over the two remaining wrapped snacks even if his head is nodding off. Maybe the brightest star has already risen.
“Here, taste this.” Olruggio hands out the white one shaped into a small ball.
“Taste?”
Though he shrugs his shoulders, Olruggio looks nervous. “I have no idea what it is. It’s not like we can just show her one candy, so you might as well. All I can tell you is that it’s super sweet.”
Before plopping it into his mouth, Qifrey tries to inspect it closely. But ah– as expected, he can’t see a thing other than it being brown. Whether it be against the light or towards it, his vision ends up blurry to the minute details.
“Why are you looking at it like it killed your family…?”
Qifrey jolts, not realizing that his squinting was so intense to be seen. Or, maybe it’s Olruggio being excessively perceptive again. He mumbles something alike to Nothing, nothing, before eating it in one go.
“Certainly sweet. It almost feels like the sugar debacle again. It can’t have just been made with sugar.” He licks the remainder of the sticky residue from his fingers. It melted even while it was in between his fingers.
For some odd reason, Olruggio’s cheeks flush. “W-Well, yeah. It tastes, uh, like custard?”
Qifrey keeps his finger by his lip, slightly biting into it. “So, sugar and egg? How would we keep it from being a meringue, though, or make it brown?”
He looks sadly at the slightly wet fingers. If he hadn’t eaten it in one go, Qifrey might have tried it again, or allowed Olruggio to think of more ideas.
“It tasted milky!” Olruggio says abruptly. He quickly wipes the tips of Qifrey’s fingers, the parts where he’d been licking them, with his cloak.
“Olly, you don’t need to do that,” Qifrey tries to remind again, but it’ll start feeling like a cycle from how overused the sentence is getting. Instead, he shifts into concern, “Are you alright? You’re looking a bit red.”
“Sorry– just, I’m a bit tired,” he says, stuttering again. “Don’t give me that look, we’re nearly there and this is nothing compared to commissions.”
“If you say so.” Qifrey pats his hand comfortingly. “But the milkiness, is that not from the custard?”
“Maybe,” Olruggio huffs. “You would know better than me, at least. But it felt like there were… multiple dimensions of sweetness, correct?” Qifrey licked his teeth and lips again to try and check, though it causes Olruggio to spin around and cough. “I’m thinking maybe they added a type of milk–”
“Oh Olly, that’s it!” Qifrey gasps. He rushes for their cupboards again, narrowly missing Olruggio or tripping him over. “Obviously to reach both that shape and that stickiness, they would have had to use condensed milk.”
He whips out their last can of condensed milk—perfect!
“Ah.”
Qifrey stares at Olruggio, who watches him with a frown. “What is it now?”
“Well,” he says, rubbing the back of the neck. “Yeah, it’s most likely condensed milk and some custard but–” Olruggio raises the final item, the larger sphere wrapped in blue. “I know this one uses condensed milk as well.”
“Oh dear.”
Qifrey accepts the blue candy. It’s softer than the previous two, folding in between his pinched hold. Upon taking a smaller bite this time, Qifrey finds that there’s an outer made of sweetened biscuit, and an inner core of marshmallow with chocolate bits.
Hold on–
Qifrey’s neutral smile shifts into a grimace. “So, Alaira sent over dozens of snacks packed with sugar, huh…?” Olruggio, who finished all the snacks in one sitting and still had room for more if there were any, stays silent.
They had biscuits, marshmallows, and chocolate a-plenty—over-prepared groceries reserved for an upcoming camping trip where the girls planned on making s’more sandwiches. Those can be easily used and re-purchased before then, but the can of condensed milk is far too small to complete their task. The sky also seems to be brightening sooner rather than later as they’d hope.
“Qifrey…” Olruggio looks up at him, a fiery passion in his dark (and dark-rimmed) eyes. “Let’s use a repetition spell. Duplicate it.”
“Will that work?” Or rather, is that allowed? It overly seems like a slippery slope that would get Easthies in a knot. A spell like that can easily fall into the wrong hands, causing them to destroy the value of a coin or reproduce something in mass that shouldn’t exist in the first place.
Qifrey pauses. It will get him in a knot. And for the sole reason of it being Easthies, Qifrey grows inclined to agree.
“If you’re the one making the spell,” he decides to say, “I’m sure it will turn out fine.”
“You’re flattering me again.” Olruggio huffs, bringing his elbow straight up to draw at a 90 degree angle on the page. Despite his drowsiness, or maybe because of it, his lines are steady and sure.
Leaning in close, Qifrey lets his head gently rest against his ear. “My, it’s almost as if you’ve practiced this before. Tell me, what did you want to replicate in the past?”
Though he grumbles, Qifrey is close enough to hear and chuckle at it. “Definitely not another kid…”
“You adore them as much as I do,” he laughs. Their very impromptu activity proves it—Olruggio doesn’t want Richeh to feel disappointed, even if it weren’t his own mistake for doing so. “But I bet you didn’t expect we’d be doing something like this years out of the Great Hall.”
“And what if I said that I did know?”
“Then you’d be a prophet,” Qifrey raises an eyebrow. Where was he going with this?
Olruggio rolls his eyes until they stare into Qifrey’s. “At least I imagined this life with you now.” He finishes the final ring of the spell; it’s a simple one, but Qifrey is confident that it is no less perfect from being made by him. “Did you expect something like this too,” he asks under his breath.
The spell is exceptionally successful, duplicating the can down to it’s dents, but its witch’s words pushes a heavy weight on Qifrey’s shoulders. The girls were, as he regretfully admits, a selfish reach to bring chaos. But they’ve grown to be a more kinder form of exhilaration, of wondering what can come next in their journeys. This house—Olruggio, them cooking in not a minute more of the sun rising, figuring out things together—it’s more than he could have ever dreamed about finally receiving.
But could he ever truly deserve this life?
If Olruggio’s memories came back right at this moment, as Qifrey leans himself onto the other like a snugstone in the middle of a blizzard, would his tone and affection remain the same?
At least, there’s some dark comfort in having those questions plague is mind.
Qifrey drags a finger on Olruggio’s stubble on his chin, now grown longer without his regular shave. He lets a smile be felt against the other’s cheek. “Where else, other than by your side?”
They both flinch when a bang is heard around the corner. Thankfully, no one seems to be there, but it does signal the need to quicken their pace. As they untangle, Olruggio’s face grows red again. “We can split up here. You roll up the marshmallows, while I finish the custard one.”
Olruggio turns away before Qifrey could comment again on his crimson pallor; next time, he’ll refuse Olruggio’s help and push him to rest after a long, work-packed week for him. For this moment, Qifrey does as he instructs him to do and balls up the marshmallows in a mix of the crushed biscuits and condensed milk.
As they work, they hum in tandem to one another. Olruggio finishes first, and proceeds with wrapping both the custard triangles and the banana chips from earlier with their respective colors.
After Qifrey’s done with and wrapped up the blue candies, his fingers are covered in sticky residue. He licks it clean, though he’s oblivious to someone else staring.
“Ahem–” Olruggio catches his attention. He places a hand on his hip and gestures smugly at the table filled with various wrapped snacks. “I suppose that’s all?”
“I can’t believe we made it,” Qifrey sighs while looking out the window. The sky is now a light blue; any moment now and their apprentice with the same colored hair will come out of her room.
“We should open a candy shop next time.”
Qifrey laughs. “You’ll be the one finishing all the food before anyone gets a chance to buy.”
Just as he thought, the voices of the girls started coming closer to the kitchen. “I’m telling you, Agott, they were about to kiss–”
“It’s too early for this, Tetia…”
“Professors,” Richeh says, slightly surprised as she spots the table of snacks. “What’s this?”
“It’s just the gift Euini sent over!”
“Oh, I know.” Richeh looks over, impassive. Qifrey hopes that the gaze means it’s successful in posing as her friend’s gifts. Only, that hope crumbles from another question they’d fail to anticipate.
“But what’s for breakfast?”