Page 56 of Baking Battles

MATTIAS: You’ve got your own man. Stop talking about kissing mine.

DANIJEL: So bloody possessive. Don’t worry, I know who my Daddy is.

MATTIAS: I don’t want to know about your sex life.

DANIJEL: Yes, you do. Pablo shows me all your texts, I mean my Daddy knows how to make his boy horny. He gets all riled-up chatting to you and then he just has to get me over his lap and give me a good spanking.

MATTIAS: FFS DANIJEL. Emi is right here.

DANIJEL: Then stop texting me. I’m going to go and blow my gorgeous man.

MATTIAS: I still didn’t fall for anything.

DANIJEL: Mattias. Face it. I managed to get you to go on a baking show. I managed to weasel my fiancée and sister on to the show, just so I could get you to realise that you had options. I had a best friend, who deserved to get the man of his dreams. I had a friend who deserved to be that man of his dreams. Easy. I pulled it off, and I’m awesome.

MATTIAS: All right, you’re awesome.

DANIJEL: See. I totally pulled it off, and you fell for it. Hook, line and sinker. And look at you now, you are fucking happy. I rate this as one of my greatest achievements.

MATTIAS: So bloody smug. Okay. Okay. I admit it. I fell for it. And I hate to admit it, but, thank you. Thank you for trying, and for being Christopher’s friend. He adores you. You should know that.

DANIJEL: Of course, he does. I’m awesome.

MATTIAS: That, my friend, you are.

* * *

He’s hated the last two weeks, despite knowing he has survived almost his whole life without the man who now holds his heart. Christopher has worked in Paris, staying with the designer who kickstarted his modelling career. Gushing on the phone over French food, the designer’s wife Madame Merlo, who treats him like a son, and the campaign he will be fronting in the spring. Then he jetted off to New York for a string of castings and meetings with his agent, a never-ending line of people and places that Mattias lost track of by the end of the first day. He’s been working hard, and Mattias has been rotting away in his glass office, wishing he was down on the studio floor. Nothing’s the same anymore. It’s like there is an itch in his body that he just can’t scratch.

“Shall we ring him?” Mattias asks, grabbing the phone from the coffee table in front of him. “Shall we see if it’s snowing in New York? “

Emi almost shouts when Christopher’s face fills the screen, jumping up and down on Mattias’s lap and talking non-stop as Mattias just laughs. Happiness filling his chest as Christopher bends down, holding up the camera, so he can show Emi a little dog he has just encountered on the pavement. Talking to Emi in soft voices, telling her he will be home soon. That he can’t wait to see her. Asking if she has opened her advent calendar, and if she is saving the last chocolate just for him. Laughing gently as Mattias lets Emi take the phone over to show her latest addition to her maybe not-so-educational advent calendar.

The two of them had spent a whole evening building, and then carefully taking a Lego set apart and wrapping each piece in a colourful parcel, waking every morning to help Emi build another section of her Ice Princess castle. It’s a thing. It’s their thing. They even got Sara on board, carefully transporting the castle back to the house when Emi went back home for the week. It’s a thing. It’s a family thing. A happiness thing. A love thing.

* * *

Christopher comes back, of course he does. And Mattias is waiting right outside customs at Gardermoen airport, with Emi jumping up and down in the pushchair at the sight of Christopher walking nervously through the doors. Like he would ever doubt that Mattias would let him take a taxi back on his own. Like Mattias would let him get the airport train on his own, and anyway, Christopher has promised Emi to go on the train back, and Christopher has promised to be brave, as long as Emi will hold his hand. He throws himself into Mattias's arms and Mattias doesn't let go, breathing in the scents and the skin and the warmth and everything that Christopher is, like he has been starving. Well it's the truth. He has missed this man more than he ever thought he could.

It’s the day before the day, the twenty-third of December, and he has his family right back where they belong. He feels like he can finally breathe after the stranglehold being apart from Christopher had put on his chest. He can breathe, even though he is standing on a packed train hurling them all towards Oslo’s central station. Emi, holding her arms tight around Christopher’s neck, keeping him safe from the crowds, whispering little childish words of encouragement into his ear, making the man that Mattias loves, smile like he just won the lottery.

“I missed you.” He mouths, trying to hide the ridiculous smile that is a constant on his face these days. He’s happy. He’s so bloody happy that it’s kind of scary.

“I’m tired and weary and jetlagged, but I don’t think I could sleep now. Can we just keep going? Where are we going? Did you say we had to go see Sara? I can do that.”

He’s totally wired, Mattias can see that, the mess of a man who expertly straps Emi back into the pushchair as they step onto the platform.

“You need a sleep, and a shower.” Mattias insists.

“I need a cup of tea and a hug.” Christopher smiles, grabbing Mattias and twirling him around in a circle, almost knocking out an elderly lady with a dog. Then of course Christopher has to apologise and fuss over the dog and introduce Emi, and suddenly Christopher is behaving like the little old lady is their new best friend, and Mattias just wants to scream.

“We’ll be late, we need to go.” He tries as Emi shouts at him to get her out of the pram so she can walk with the doggie.

“No, Emi, we need to go. We need to go and drop you off with Mummy, remember?”

“Nooooo!!” Emi screams, and Christopher looks like Mattias has just punched him in the face.

“But I want to spend time with you guys. We can’t just drop Emi off, I haven’t seen her for weeks!”

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