[Closed Post: Cinnamon Roll]

[timebethine]

A few days' recovery have left Laertes feeling refreshed enough to return to his baking, although not quite ready to dive into anything particularly complicated. Thus, he abandons the more complex direktørsnegl recipe he'd been meaning to try in favor of perfecting the humble cinnamon roll.

The days are getting shorter--even Laertes can feel it, though his sense of time is poor. He can no longer rely on the sunrise to wake him at a decent hour for baking, and so today he's up a little before the sun, kneading the bready dough by hand rather than using the paddle of the stand mixer in the hopes that the physical exertion will wake him up a little. It's not working particularly well; his eyelids keep drooping.

Comments

[timebethine]

"As good to him as thou art?"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"Yes," with another fierce edge to the word.

[timebethine]

Laertes licks his lips. He knows that he should eat, but his stomach feels too tightly clenched to admit a single bite. "I would be such a friend to him, if he'd have it so."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Another splash of cream into the vanilla icing. Perhaps too big of a splash? She mixes it in, and then drags her finger across the back of the spoon so she can taste it. "I rather think you already are," she says. "He speaks highly of you."

[timebethine]

... he is not allowed to watch her suck icing off of her finger. He turns to find his tea again and drains the cup. "His good opinion does me credit."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

The icing wants a little more vanilla. Susan adds a smidgen more, and then takes a deep breath, glancing back up at Laertes. "Don't let both breakfasts get cold," she says, with a faint smile. "Shall I check on the rolls? How much longer is on the timer?"

[timebethine]

Laertes checks. "Seven minutes," he reports. It feels like it's been at least three days. Then, with a great wrench of will, he makes himself start in on the bacon. (It's streaky.)

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Susan sighs and, pushing the vanilla icing away, too, leans against the island, savoring her lukewarm tea. "Have you got the friends here that you deserve?" It's not intended as a big, intense question - more of an idle curiosity than anything.

[timebethine]

Laertes swallows a mouthful of bacon. "I know not how to answer that," he says. "I don't think I really had friends, before I came here--even the Normans I met in Caen weren't friends, although I dearly wished they might be. Every new person seems an outrageous blessing, and I blush at the surfeit."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"Then it sounds like your answer is 'yes,'" Susan observes. "I'm glad to hear it."

[timebethine]

"And thee? Hast thou all the friends thou deservest?"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"I did have friends in London." There's no clear tasks to work on - starting dishes whilst Laertes is still eating and there are bowls full of frosting waiting for their rolls seems redundant - and so Susan feels a little adrift without something to occupy her hands. She settles for retrieving a platter for her biscuits and going to start moving them over onto it. "Dear ones. Everyone here is so - different." A thoughtful pause. "I'm working on it."

[timebethine]

"Canst spend time with me and Sagramore," Laertes offers. "He's brighter company than I am--more easy to rouse to joy. He can make a game of anything."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"Oh! Thank you," Susan, who has essentially no intention of spending time with Sagramore (unless perhaps Lancelot and Laertes both will it), says graciously.

[timebethine]

"Hast thou spoken with Tress yet? I think thou wouldst like her," says Laertes, still thinking. "I've never met a girl more sensible and scientifically minded."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"Not since I first arrived." Susan's memories of the conversation are vanishingly dim - just like her memories of the time she'd slept with Laertes's husband with the specific vague hope that there might be some ensuing uproar difficult to unpick. How things change in a matter of months! She refuses to feel guilty about her past decisions, but she does decide to help Laertes out with whatever effort he's trying to make on her behalf: "I've mostly spent time with Lancelot and Janet. Oh, and Thomas and Shen Yuan. But I rather like Qi Yan, too, and I've been getting to know Nina recently."

[timebethine]

"Excellent friends, all," says Laertes warmly. "Especially Nina; she may be the best of all of us." He takes a big bite of toast. "By Thomas, thou meanest Thomas Nightingale, dost thou not? He's begun teaching me his craft."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"I do. You're learning magic?"

[timebethine]

"Just a little. To conjure light into my hand," he says. "It was Janet who first gave me hope that such things can be learned. Her art requires patience, though, and attention--and to be frank, I've never had either in abundance."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

This aligns with other things Susan has learned of Laertes, so she nods. "I've never thought to learn," she admits, "but the things Thomas has told me of the science of magic are jolly fascinating."

[timebethine]

"Thou couldst--" but then the timer beeps, and Laertes loses his train of thought entirely as he puts on potholders and opens the oven. "They look good," he says. "A deep golden, but not yet brown." He whisks out both trays of cinnamon rolls and sets them on the racks that Susan has just vacated to cool.

[quote_gentle_unquote]

The recipe had said to put the icing on the rolls whilst they're still warm, so Susan passes one of the bowls over to Laertes and gathers the other to her own side. "They smell marvelous," she says.

[timebethine]

"The fruit and nuts were a wise choice," he agrees. "The smell is richer for them." He takes the vanilla icing and begins to drizzle it carefully over the rolls, making sure to get at least a little on every roll.

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Susan does the same with the cream cheese icing. "You were about to say something," she prompts, as the icing drizzles over the rolls. "A moment ago, before the timer went off."

[timebethine]

"Was I?" Laertes thinks back as the last of the icing drizzles out. "It's gone now."