Page 25 of A Winter Romance
“Yes. I bake bread but also special loaves. Around Solstice, I’ll make Solstice loaves and Solstice cakes, which are sweetened and spiced with cinnamon and shaped like crescent moons. I also make Solstice cookies, which are star-shaped and filled with a Solstice-berry jam. Some are dipped in chocolate. I’ll even make some chocolate sweets.
“When I’m away, my father will bake bread but nothing special. No cakes or special loaves. So there is usually a high demand when I return.” It was always nice coming back and knowing people were looking forward to his baked goods. It made him feel appreciated.
Aryn pushed a lock of hair out of his face. Unfortunately, his hand had been covered in flour, and now his brown hair had a streak of powdery white. The sight made Sero’s insides turn all soft.
Sero was enjoying having Aryn in his kitchen too much. And when Aryn was with his sisters, helping them mix ingredients, it made Sero think things he definitely shouldn’t. It made him think of the two of them living together in this house with their own children.
He turned back to cleaning the counter. He always gave his heart away too quickly. Always too quickly, and always to the wrong person. A pattern of behaviour that he needed to stop repeating. It was hard though. It wasn’t like there were that many options in the village or the valley.
And now here was someone new, a sweet, cute man, who looked happy and content in his kitchen, who his family liked, who was incredible in bed, and who was completely and entirely unsuitable for him.
“I was going to make more Solstice loaves. Did you want to help me?”
“Ahh… All right.”
“You sound uncertain,” Sero said.
“Well, I just don’t want to ruin your loaves.”
“You won’t ruin them,” Sero said gently. He’d noticed a few times that Aryn seemed to lack confidence. “And I’ll be here to assist you every step of the way.” He pressed his shoulder against Aryn’s.
Aryn gave him a sweet smile, and Sero felt a strong urge to drag him to his bedroom and stay there for the rest of the day. Instead, he began to pull out the ingredients. There would be time for bedroom antics later.
For the next several minutes, they measured and mixed ingredients to make the dough. They worked well together. Something that Sero tried not to find too much pleasure in.
“You said you foraged for some of the ingredients. What about the other stuff?”
“I order a lot of it from Castle Evermore. The sugar, flour, chocolate, and any other ingredients that are hard to get here in the mountains. They aren’t grown at the castle, but they can get them for me there.”
Aryn mixed the ingredients, seeming happy to just follow Sero’s instructions. Side by side they kneaded the dough. It was comfortable and quiet, and it felt too damn perfect.
Aryn chuckled.
“What are you laughing about?” Sero asked.
“I’m just thinking what my parents would say if they knew that I was spending two weeks in this little village in the middle of nowhere, helping someone bake cakes and loaves for Solstice. They’d be so angry.” He shook his head. “They’d tell me I should have gone straight back to Bordertown after I lost the perfumes. Not waste my time like this.” He laughed again.
Sero swallowed at a sudden bitterness in the back of his throat. “Is that how you see this, wasting your time in the middle of nowhere?”
“Well, ah…,” Aryn stuttered. The smile disappeared from his face. “No, I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just… My family… It’s just… They’re just bread and cakes.”
“I see.” Sero kneaded the dough.
Just bread and cakes.
That was how Aryn saw him and the work that he enjoyed. That was how he saw the food and sustenance that Sero so proudly produced for his family, friends, and community.
Just bread and cakes.
Too aggressively, Sero kneaded the dough. He knew he was overworking it, but he had nowhere else to put his sudden anger.
He could feel Aryn beside him, staring at him, tension radiating from him, but Sero wouldn’t make it easier for him, not when he had just insulted Sero’s livelihood, his home, him. After a minute, he stopped and took a deep breath.
“Sero… I’m sorry.”
Sero stared at the dough in his hands.
“It’s just different. My family… They are different. They have expectations of me and…if they saw me here, they’d probably think… They’d be so upset with me.”
