In for a Niccal, in for a Pound (Cake)

**January 2, 2020, Niccals Family Community Center**

December passed with much less happening than usual, and the new year settled in with lots and lots of crossed out 19s written on things. And 19 isn’t a thing you can easily make look like 20, so everyone knows that you messed up.

With Boon’s mom incoming in a matter of days, she and Verve have made plans to meet up at the community center kitchen. It’s a lot bigger than they’ll need, but it’ll work. And they have several hours before it’ll be needed to make supper for the regular food-eating residents.

Verve is perched up on a countertop, phone in hand. Her heels kick softly against the cupboard as she waits. Her home screen is open, a picture of the aurora borealis from a few weeks ago set as the background, but she doesn’t have anything pulled up.

Verve’s mind is racing. *She’s late. It’s probably fine. But what if she ran into trouble? Like, super trouble? What if she forgot? I know she texted me yesterday to confirm and stuff but what if she forgot? What if she’s stuck somewhere? What if she’s hanging out with someone else and decided she didn’t care about meeting up with me. What if she’s with Atlanta? That would make sense-No. Wait, I’m Atlanta. Breathe.*

Verve flops back onto the counter and stares at the ceiling, trying to calm her racing thoughts. Taking a deep breath, she starts humming Gay Adjectives by Rescue: the Girls.

Suddenly there's commotion outside and the kitchen door flies open as Boon comes barreling in. She wastes no time in greeting her friend. "Verve Verve Verve! She said yes! Atlanta said yes!" Boon makes her way to Verve and wraps her in a tight hug. "She said yes and she's so cute and I'm so happy! Thank you so much Verve." Boon looks at the startled and Verve and stops hugging her. "Right. Sorry. Ahem, Verve can I offer you a friendly celebratory hug?" She offers after remembering her manners.

Verve had jumped down from the counter in surprise when the doors flung open. As Boon hugs her, her face turns bright red. It takes her a moment to respond. “Um. Sure. Yeah. Hugs are nice. And that’s great. About Atlanta. And stuff.”

Boon gives a second hug, shorter and more restrained this time. "Sorry, I'm a hugger, it's in my nature. I'm just so happy!"

She lets go and takes in her surroundings. The kitchen is large and sterile with large stainless steel tables and some lining the walls and the center and various cooking implements hanging from racks on the ceiling. Large pantries and stainless fridges and freezers stock all sorts of food to cater events and feed the various residents that call this place their home, at least the ones without… complicated diets… Boon can see that Verve has laid out bowls, scales, a stand mixer, and various baking ingredients on one of the tables.

"Oh Gods" Boon checks her phone "I'm late aren't I? Did I keep you waiting? I'm so sorry."

“No! Well, a little, but it’s okay.” Verve smiles, relieved that Boon hadn’t ghosted her. “So are you ready to get started? Do you have your own recipe? If not, I looked up a couple and printed them out.”

Verve gestures at a small stack of papers. It would appear that “a couple” means at least ten.

"I wish I had my mom's, but she keeps it written down on a card in her recipe box which is back in Georgia so… no go on that. And I don't trust myself to remember it. My memory is… not great… evidently…" she appears nervous as she reaches the last bit. "In any case, I think I'll defer the expert here! Any of these catch your eye?"

As much as she wants to ask about Boon’s memory, she restrains herself since Boon had asked her to drop it last time. Instead, she picks up the stack and starts flipping through. “Okay, to be totally honest most of them are pretty similar. Like, some have more or less chocolate, this one calls for gelatin for whatever reason, uh, this one has rum, so probably not this one, this one has instructions on how to make meringue mushrooms, ooo, this one has espresso in the frosting.” Verve sets the recipes in two different piles, eventually weeding it down to two. “Yay or nay on the espresso frosting one? Otherwise this one looks pretty standard.”

Boon grins as her coffee addiction speaks for her. "Espresso for sure! So uh, do we start with the cake or the filling?"

“The cake. We can make the fillings while it’s baking and cooling. I’ll start melting the chocolate if you want to get the pan ready?” She taps the first step in the instructions, detailing how to prep the pan.

"Got it" Following the instructions carefully Boon coats the pan with cooking spray and begins to cut parchment paper to fit, coating the whole thing again in non stick spray and then dusting it with flour. "How am I doing?"

“Great!” Verve has started boiling a small pot of water, and has the butter, chocolate, and water ready to go in a small bowl. “Do you know how to separate egg yolks?”

"Oh yeah that's easy" as Boon cracks an egg on the counter the insides begin to float up into the air, separating at their zenith. Boon points at the eggs smugly with one hand while the other hand traces a magic circle in the air. "Eh? Eh?" She says half braggingly. The separated yolks and whites float gently into their respective bowls. As she repeats the process a few more times she begins making conversation with Verve, "Hey so uh, about Atlanta… I'm gonna be honest I didn't think I'd get this far. And now I've got to actually, you know… decide on when and what to do? For a date!? I asked her a few days ago and I feel like I'm just keeping her waiting at this point but uh… I'm nervous." As she finishes separating the eggs it's clear that she's blushing.

Verve watches Boon’s magic wide-eyed. “Well that’s just cheating.” Her own blush comes back a little at the mention of Atlanta. She hadn’t really thought about how long it had been, since they’d been planning this meetup together as well. *You should tell her...but it’d be awkward now. It’ll still be awkward later...* “Wait, why are you nervous? Haven’t you gone on dates before?”

Verve sets the chocolate over the boiling water to melt.

Boon freezes for a moment. "Hahaha, yeahhh plenty of dates! A completely plural number." Boon scratches the back of her head nervously "No, kidding, I've only been on one date, and it was… weird…" Boon flashes back to making out with Rea in an ice cream parlor. "Anyway I'm not exactly a veteran."

“Oh. I just guess I figured you’d have gone on lots. Uh. Because you’re cool and pretty and stuff. Not for like, weird other reasons. I don’t know what that means.” Verve blushes and clears her throat. “Was it like, *super* kind of weird, or just normal kind of weird?”

Boon blushes in return. "You uh, you think so? Heh, thanks I guess. And as for my last date, it was… definitely a mix of both. But it was certainly chaotic." She continues as she carefully pours sugar into the bowl of the stand mixer. "It was fun though, and I liked Rea. But, between you and me she's thinking of leaving Halcyon, which complicated things. So the second date just… didn't happen." Boon finishes pouring the sugar and looks at Verve. "I don't want this one to be chaotic though. Rea is... a gremlin, and I mean that in the nicest way possible. But Atlanta is so sweet, and I don't know if she'd be into racing me across the city…. Among other things..." Boon looks nervous as she finishes mixing the sugar and egg yolks.

Verve focuses on the melting chocolate for a moment before answering. "That's too bad about Rea. I was hoping to meet her again when I wasn't so...distracted…and Atlanta definitely has zero superpowers or cool phasing devices, so racing doesn't seem like her…" She hesitates, clearly having an internal debate, but finally asks, "What other things?" Her tone makes it pretty clear she's afraid of the answer.

Boon freezes up, realizing the hole she's just dug herself in. She sighs deeply. "How much uh… how much do you know about my powers? Like, where they came from."

Verve thinks back to when Boon visited Atlanta-her after the dinner theater fiasco, and shakes her head. “Nothing.”

"Okay so, um. Can you promise not to tell Atlanta about this? I- I want to talk to her about it myself…"

“Um.” Verve looks conflicted for a moment before choosing her words carefully. “Yeah, you can tell her yourself.”

"Just over a year ago was just about the lowest point of my life, or well, one of them. My um… my Dad had just been killed. He meant the world to me and I was just inconsolable." Boon reaches up and feels the newly sprouted horns on the top of her head. "An… entity approached me and told me she knew who did it. And could help me get revenge. I… I wasn't in a place to say no to that. Maybe I'm in a different place now… but, she's still here, like, in my head. And she gives me powers and stuff and it's rad but… I don't know if I can trust her or not." She's silent for a moment. "I'm going to have to tell Atlanta at some point but like, she's just a normal kid! What if she doesn't want anything to do with me when she finds out I'm basically possessed?"

Verve takes the chocolate off the stove and puts a hand on Boon’s arm. “I’m so sorry that’s happened...happening...to you. But I think Atlanta will surprise you…” *Might not be a good surprise at this point…* Verve thinks back to going into Casper’s head. About how the Abyss might still be in hers… “And hey, if you need help getting rid of a possession, I’m one for one.” *Does it count as getting rid of a possession if you get possessed instead?* Pushing that aside, she gives a comforting smile to Boon. “The team has your back. We saved Casper, some others saved Mini. You’re in a good place to get help with that, if you need it.”

Boon looks like she's attempting to remember something "Mini… yeah… I've met her." Boon gives a half smile "That means a lot to me Verve, thank you." She continues baking, whipping some egg whites to stiff peaks. "It's just, I'm always nervous about telling people. I never know how they're going to react. Everyone that's found out has been really cool about it though. This team… feels like family to me sometimes… and everyone is so supportive." A tear streams down her face.

“I get that. I uh, you know only about twelve people know who I am? And I only told one of them... It’s not like, as bad of a secret, but what I mean is that I get being scared to tell people. And that’s what a team does, we support each other.” Verve opens up her arms. “Do you want a hug?”

Boon sets down the mixer and turns to face Verve, "literally always" she accepts Verve's hug, taking care not to crush her this time. When the embrace ends Boon returns to baking, carefully folding the egg whites into the yolks. "Also, hey. I don't know if people have pressured you into telling them who you are or whatever. But like, offers on the table, I will beat up anyone who gives you shit about having a secret identity." Boon flicks some remaining egg white into the bowl for emphasis "just say the word"

Verve continues prepping the chocolate, then sifts together some of the dry ingredients. She chuckles awkwardly. “Well. You can’t beat up the two worst ones, but I appreciate it, Boon. Ready for the dry ingredients?”

Boon looks skeptical at being told there's someone she can't beat up, not realizing that 'can't' more likely means 'shouldn't' here. "Yep! Bring em here!" Boon lifts the top of the stand mixer to make room for the dry ingredients.

Verve pours in the dry mixture and starts to fold the two together. “What’s winter like in Georgia? Does it even snow there? Wanna grab me the pan? It’s ready now.”

Boon grabs an appropriately sized cake pan and sets it on the counter. "It's warm there. Snow's pretty rare. It actually snowed like 3 inches a few years ago and we had to shut down all the roads because they didn't have enough plows. It's been wild having so much snow up this way, but I kinda like it! It's serene, I could use more serenity."

“Yeah. Me, too. I’ve never actually been to Georgia, which surprises some people,” Verve abruptly stops talking. *Verve isn’t a city there, stupid.* Hoping Boon didn’t catch that, she pours the batter in and smooths it out. “Great, now put that in the oven for 4 minutes, then we’ll rotate it and put it in for another four. In the meantime,” Verve looks at the instructions. “Hmm, we should have actually made the ganache first. But hey, what’s the point of having superpowers if you can’t use them to cheat at baking, right?” She grins.

Boon isn't paying attention to Verve's slip up. "See now you get why I separated those eggs the way I did. Use your powers to evenly heat the cream, I'll get the chocolate. A bar of baking chocolate lifts into the air as Boon draws another magic circle in midair. It collapses into a sphere, which then expands into a larger sphere of crushed chocolate shards. "Tadaa!"

Verve touches the pan she boiled water in earlier, absorbing the heat that's left. "Not quite enough," she murmurs, and turns the burner back on to absorb some of the fire. "There we go." She nods, satisfied. She pours the cream into a pan and holds it in her hands. After about a minute, it starts to simmer. She keeps it there for a bit longer, then sets it down and whisks in the espresso powder and powdered sugar. When that's done, the timer beeps and she turns the cake in the oven. The kitchen is filled with the aroma of baking chocolate and coffee. Verve smiles in satisfaction at her progress. She measures out the mascarpone and begins to beat it. With her focus on baking, she relaxes and starts to hum.

As Boon whisks the ganache together she finds herself humming along as well, the most relaxed she's been in a while. Everything's coming together as the timer goes off on the oven again. Boon retrieves the cake and sets it on a wire rack. As she waits for Verve to finish the filling she again attempts to make conversation. "Oh yeah, we kinda got off topic before. If you had to guess, what kind of things do you think Atlanta would like to do for a date?"

"Oh. Uhhhhh." Verve flushes a little. "Do you have any ideas? I've never actually been? On a date? So I don't really know what people do on dates? Besides go to stuffy restaurants, and that doesn't seem like something either of u- you would like."

"Yeah last time my parents dragged me to a fancy restaurant I got them thrown out. That was like, 10 years ago. Not my thing." She ponders for a moment as she continues prepping to roll the cake, and then she chuckles. "Any chance she likes baking? This is a ton of fun." She continues pondering, "Oh I know! What about ice skating?"

"Oh! That sounds like fun! The ice skating I mean." Verve mixes together the last of the mascarpone filling and absorbs the heat out of it. "She's pretty athletic, she'd probably have fun with that."

"Yeah, I know she's on the swim team and stuff. I'll ask her about it after this! I think that'd be perfect." Boon finishes dusting the cake with cocoa powder. "Okay, I think we're ready to get this thing together, got the filling ready?"

"Yep! Flip it out of the pan and let's get rolling." Verve brings the bowl of filling over and waits. "Moment of truth, can you get it out in one piece?"

Boon holds the pan and stares at it for a few seconds. "Okay here goes." She closes her eyes and flips the pan, when they reopen a rectangular cake sits undamaged on the table. "Ha! I did it!"

"Great! Good job, Boon." Verve hands Boon a second spatula and sets the filling between them. They spread the filling over the cake, then Verve scoops up some of the leftover on her spatula and licks it. "Mmm, the espresso was a good call. You wanna roll it or should I?"

"I've got this" Boon says with a smirk. "I always mess this part up, but this time, I've got it." Ever so carefully she rolls the cake in on itself until it creates a snug spiral. "Aaaand, no cracks! Look at that, it's beautiful!"

Verve claps lightly. "Perfect! I can cool down the ganache and we can ice it!" She walks over to her bag first and pulls out a plain white rectangular plate. "I brought this so we didn't steal any of the center's stuff." After handing that to Boon, she picks up the bowl of ganache and slowly absorbs the heat from it.

Boon carefully and telekinetically transfers the cake onto the plate. She looks at Verve. "Hey uh, this was a lot of fun. I appreciate all your help, with like, everything. I cannot begin to thank you. Just between this and helping with Atlanta. You're a miracle worker Verve." A cocky smirk crosses her face. "And I think I've got a knack for this baking stuff. We should do this again sometime! I can catch you up on how things are going with Atlanta. And who knows, maybe next time you'll be coming to me for dating advice?" Now that the hard parts of baking and the talk of possession are behind her an air of relaxed confidence underlies her body language. "You're a great friend Verve. We should keep hanging out."

Verve chuckles awkwardly. “Yeah. Dating advice. From you. I’ll totally. For sure.” Double thumbs up. “But uh, yeah. I love baking. I don’t know if you follow me on chitter, but I bake a lot. It’s really calming to me. Like, I can take a bunch of things and make them into something amazing. And then I get to decorate them.” She grins. “It’s just a lot of fun. And yeah, I’d like to keep hanging out and stuff.” She pauses like she’s going to say something else, but instead just starts to frost the cake.

"Yeah I've seen your chitter! You bake so many cupcakes it's wild." Putting two and two together, Boon chooses her next words carefully. "Are uh, stop me if you don't want to answer but uh… is all the baking a distraction from something in particular?"

“Oh. Well, kinda. But nothing new. The same stuff as last week. But baking helps. And while I am banned from cupcakes, I’ve been baking bread and stuff at home, too. And uh, you know, holidays when you’re short a family member is just kinda...stressful even when you didn’t just mess with time and literally lose part of yourself.” She shrugs and gives a sad smile, knowing Boon would understand.

"Yeah that's… mood." Boon gives a sympathetic smile. "But hey, we've got each other! And the rest of the team." Boon looks as Verve puts the finishing touches on the yule log. "My mom's gonna be so surprised… I've been avoiding her lately. But recently I've been coming to terms with my Dad being gone and… I want to get closer to her. And I want to tell her all about the family I've made up here in Halcyon. None of it fills the hole my Dad left of course but… it's been easier. I want to ask her to stay here in Halcyon, and maybe she can find a family here too, if that makes sense."

“Yeah, that makes sense. That’d be great, if she could be here. Having support nearby is really great, and as great as having the team is, having your parent supporting you would be really special.” Verve steps back from the cake, satisfied with how it turned out. She sets down the bowl and leans against the counter. “You know, it’s maybe not the easiest ice breaker or anything, but Atlanta’s mom is gone. If you told her about your dad, if you need support with that or something, she uh, she’d be there for you.”

"You sure know a lot about Atlanta. You two must be pretty close. Maybe the three of us could hang out sometime!" Boon smiles and pulls out her phone. "Speaking of Atlanta, I'll see if I can set up an ice skating date with her sometime soon… ...ah damn bad reception in here, I'll have to text her later." She slides the phone back into her denim jacket. Boon joins Verve in leaning against the counter and admiring the cake. “This cake looks incredible, thank you so much Verve, really. I had no idea I was capable of making something like this! Even if you did most of the hard parts. And hey, I'll hit you up soon so I can tell you all about how the meeting with my Mom goes!"

Verve chuckles awkwardly. “Yeah, the three of us. Hanging out. That’d uh, be a thing. We could totally do. For real.” *This is only going to get worse. You need to tell her.* But being an awkward bean, she instead nods too quickly at Boon’s last statement. “Yeah! I mean, yeah, I’d like that. Unless, you know, she thinks the espresso filling is some kind of terrible breach of tradition. Then don’t tell me,” she jokes. “But I hope it goes well.”

“Heh, I’m sure the espresso is fine. And I’m sure it’ll go well. The cards have been pretty good for once so I’m feeling hopeful” Boon pulls her tarot deck out of her jacket pocket and gives a wry wink before putting it away. "Alright, I've gotta get home soon to feed Brimstone. If I let Lukas do it he'll end up feeding him sausage and I don't think that's good for him. I'll go pop this in the fridge for when my Mom visits! I know I've said it a lot but thanks again for all your help Verve, honestly."

“Hey, I get an excuse to bake something new. You’re helping me.” She grins. “But seriously, I’m glad you get to see your mom. It seems like you’re close.” Verve smiles a little wistfully. After a moment, she pushes off the counter and starts gathering dirty dishes. “Give Brimstone a treat for me.”

"I'll let him know one's from you!" Boon grabs the plate and covers it in plastic wrap. "I'll see you later!" She gives a peace sign and heads out the door.

“Bye!” Verve waves, nearly dropping a bowl, but catches it just in time.

Shortly after Boon leaves Verve feels her phone buzzing. She checks it immediately, actually dropping a mixing bowl with an obnoxious clang. After quickly picking it up to stop the racket and depositing it back on the counter, she opens a text from Boon.

`**Boon:** hey, wanna go ice skating soon? They've got a rink set up near City Hall ;)`

`**Atlanta:** sure! sounds like fun!`

`**Boon:**  !!!!!!! <3 <3 <3`