Antique Bakery fic
Aug. 10th, 2008 06:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
new_kateOh yeah and while on the subject, everyone needs to read "Flower of Life" by Fumi Yoshinaga, because it's absolutely wonderful.
The Travels of Ono Yusuke
Warnings: The Paris years, R. Sort of follow-up to that one.
Paris is beautiful in spring.
Everybody says so, and it’s true. Ono loves Tokyo, its harsh brightness and clutter of straight lines, sharp tang of sea and fumes in the air, but Paris is like nothing he’d ever seen before - although, of course, he hasn’t seen that much yet.
He’s yet to visit any museum or go on a sightseeing tour, but the city already overwhelms him, fills all his senses. He takes it slowly and lets every moment sink in, lingers over every joy like the customers in their bakery linger over Jean-Baptiste’s pastries: eyes glazed in delight, moaning softly over the mouthful.
Tatsushi is very industrious in his approach. He studies the maps of Paris with the same academic fervour he shows for his curriculum. He goes through a roll of film almost daily, documenting and cataloguing everything. Ono praises his enthusiasm, but doesn’t even own a camera himself. He wanders around the streets, not noting the direction, because it’s all good, because Paris is everywhere. Cobblestones and bridges, amusingly rude shopkeepers, booming chime of church bells, small cafes spilling out into the sidewalks, buzz of foreign speech he can barely discern – he drinks it all in, and lets the city swallow and claim him. It makes him feel weightless, fearless, and amazingly free.
Some moments are painfully perfect, and he almost regrets not being able to capture things like that: sunset pink on the stone walls, scent of tulips mingling with the aroma of fresh coffee, and the man who bought it looking at Ono from across the café table, fascinated and hopeful, all the more gorgeous for the blush of excitement and the pleading look in his eyes.
Meeting people in bars is different – everyone is on a prowl there, knowing what they want. When he hits on men on the streets, they are flustered and bewildered, and he tries not to do that too often, but he can’t help it. Paris is full of beautiful men, and he is notoriously bad at resisting temptation.
He lets them buy him a coffee, drinks it slowly, savouring the moment. The men usually babble so he only understands every third word, but he has heard the ode to spring in Paris often enough to follow.
“Oui,” he purrs in response, smiling his naughtiest smile, and the man in front of him gasps and drops the teaspoon. “Tres magnifique.”
His accent is bad, but he’s learning fast. Tatsushi is struggling with grammar and verb forms, and of course it’s holding him back. Ono just wants to be understood, and doesn’t care about making mistakes. His French is fairly fluent yet horrendous, but Jean-Baptiste doesn’t cringe, the customers are getting used to it, and the men he meets after work are very forgiving about things like that.
Sometimes he gets letters from Japan, and it’s so surprising and sweet that he feels a sharp pang of homesickness every time. He reads them, sitting on the floor in his room – it’s really quite spacious once the mattress is put away – and misses everything and everyone. Mother is worrying about his health, and he answers shortly and politely. Bar Master and old friends want to know what Paris is like, and he tries to describe it and fails every time.
Everybody asks about the wonders of the real French cuisine, and it always amuses him that he still hadn’t really tasted anything but the pastries. He mostly eats at the bakery while he works, and there is always plenty of cake trimmings, broken pie crusts and leftover fruit filling to satisfy him. Jean-Baptiste notices, of course, and often lectures him about the importance of good diet and the dangers of being too skinny. Ono almost suspects that the bakery’s savoury menu was introduced just to get him to eat some protein.
With his eighty hours working week he doesn’t have the time to eat out, and he's saving all his extra money for fashionable clothes. Monsieur Loui had invited him to an expensive restaurant several times, but they were both so excited to see each other that they barely touched food before rushing back to Ono’s place to unroll the mattress and fall on it in a messy tangle, half-undressed, laughing and kissing. It’s really a shame that didn’t last longer, Ono thinks sometimes, but Loui’s wife was getting jealous, so that couldn’t be helped.
Jealousy is a terrible thing, and he can see it weighing down on Tatsushi now, making him miserable. He doesn’t talk about his conquests, but he’s not very good at being discreet. Tatsushi knows, and does his best to put up with it, but he might not last much longer.
“When you said you’d follow me to Paris when I go to the University, I thought…” Tatsushi says as they are resting together, watching the tree shadows dance over Ono’s ceiling as the night wind plays with them. He doesn’t finish, just sighs sadly and leans on Ono’s chest, kisses his nipples slowly, lightly. Ono pets his hair, coarse with bleach and dye, and doesn’t say anything, because Tatsushi is right. He should have thought – but he didn’t, of course, he never does.
“But I guess you just wanted to travel, huh?” Tatsushi’s face is a little wet against his skin, and it can be sweat, because the lovemaking was certainly energetic. They are both grateful for the dark, and Ono pulls him closer again, and does his best to make him feel better. Tatsushi is lovely and sweet, and he will miss him a lot.
But it's hard to brood for long, because every day brings something new. French words to memorise, names to attach to faces, streets he hadn't explored yet, skills to master at work. His head is buzzing with information, his palette remembers hundreds of new tastes with all their nuances and flavours, and his old life keeps slipping further away.
One day, while he's helping to make shortcakes, he realises that he can’t remember what Tachibana looked like.
He remembers the lines of his shoulders, the slimness of his hips, the way the ends of his hair curled against his cheeks and brushed the collar of his school uniform, but he can't remember the face. He's not sure why he wants to, and why it feels like a loss. It's not a good memory, regardless of how beautiful Tachibana was, not something he should struggle to keep.
Perplexed, he spaces out, overkneads the dough and ruins the whole batch. Jean-Baptiste yells and slaps him across the face, knocking his glasses off. It doesn't hurt any more than usual, but somehow Ono can't stop the tears welling on his eyes, and can't say anything, can't even apologise.
Jean-Baptiste apologises instead, unnecessarily and too much. He softly presses a damp cool towel to Ono's swollen cheek and fusses over him till the oven timer goes off. After closing, still feeling guilty, he takes Ono out for drinks.
They drink and talk till they both feel tipsy. Jean-Baptiste complains about his father, chides Ono for his lack of ambition and fantasises about the new menu for the bakery the way other people daydream about a lover. The summer is coming, he says. We need to change with the seasons, to grasp and harness the unique beauty of each of them. This spring was dedicated to fresh, crisp flavours, complex light textures, contrasting tastes. The summer menu will be completely different.
"Lots of fresh fruit, of course," he muses, absently stroking his glass. "Everything is wonderful when it's just been harvested, you only need to know how to unlock the taste to get the most out of it. Bases that melt in the mouth, airy whipped cream, delicate combinations of tart and sweet. We should start test-baking some items soon, and announce the arrivals of summer specials before anyone else does. This will be a great year for the bakery, Yusuke."
He's so attractive, with his golden hair artfully tousled in glossy waves, lovely stubborn chin and strong, well-defined arms. His enthusiasm is infectious, and it's pulling Ono in like an undertow. He's tempted, but he doesn’t want to lose this job when the tryst goes sour like it inevitably does. Jean-Baptiste is completely unpredictable - it's really common sense to try and avoid complications, but, oh. It's not that easy.
So Ono excuses himself before he gets drunk enough to get reckless and heads down to his new favourite bar to unwind. He's too excited to sleep and the night is too good to waste – summery warm but still fresh, scented with spring flowers and soft cool breeze. Ono thinks about Jean-Baptiste walking home alone, devising a way to transform a night like this into a perfect summer pastry, to serve this feeling wrapped in a golden crumbly crust with some vanilla ice-cream on the side. It would probably be based on a mousse, velvety in texture, with a distinct tang of lemon…
And then he hears the music and forgets about all that.
The bar is lively as usual, and he receives the warmest welcome. Ten minutes in two young men are competing for his attention, and he just cannot decide which one he should get to know better. Andre is tall, strong, dark-skinned and handsome; Antoine is a lithe young beauty with a shiny mane of hair that would be so nice to play with. When Ono goes to refresh his drink, he complains to the Bar Master about his dilemma. Monsieur Pierre nods gravely and dispenses his advice:
"Maybe it's time for you to learn a new French word, Yusuke. Try to say ménage-a-trois."
Ono laughs and shoots both men a mischievous glance over his shoulder, and they blush and sigh wistfully in perfect unison. Perhaps. The possibilities are endless.
It’s going to be a wonderful summer.
The Travels of Ono Yusuke
Warnings: The Paris years, R. Sort of follow-up to that one.
Paris is beautiful in spring.
Everybody says so, and it’s true. Ono loves Tokyo, its harsh brightness and clutter of straight lines, sharp tang of sea and fumes in the air, but Paris is like nothing he’d ever seen before - although, of course, he hasn’t seen that much yet.
He’s yet to visit any museum or go on a sightseeing tour, but the city already overwhelms him, fills all his senses. He takes it slowly and lets every moment sink in, lingers over every joy like the customers in their bakery linger over Jean-Baptiste’s pastries: eyes glazed in delight, moaning softly over the mouthful.
Tatsushi is very industrious in his approach. He studies the maps of Paris with the same academic fervour he shows for his curriculum. He goes through a roll of film almost daily, documenting and cataloguing everything. Ono praises his enthusiasm, but doesn’t even own a camera himself. He wanders around the streets, not noting the direction, because it’s all good, because Paris is everywhere. Cobblestones and bridges, amusingly rude shopkeepers, booming chime of church bells, small cafes spilling out into the sidewalks, buzz of foreign speech he can barely discern – he drinks it all in, and lets the city swallow and claim him. It makes him feel weightless, fearless, and amazingly free.
Some moments are painfully perfect, and he almost regrets not being able to capture things like that: sunset pink on the stone walls, scent of tulips mingling with the aroma of fresh coffee, and the man who bought it looking at Ono from across the café table, fascinated and hopeful, all the more gorgeous for the blush of excitement and the pleading look in his eyes.
Meeting people in bars is different – everyone is on a prowl there, knowing what they want. When he hits on men on the streets, they are flustered and bewildered, and he tries not to do that too often, but he can’t help it. Paris is full of beautiful men, and he is notoriously bad at resisting temptation.
He lets them buy him a coffee, drinks it slowly, savouring the moment. The men usually babble so he only understands every third word, but he has heard the ode to spring in Paris often enough to follow.
“Oui,” he purrs in response, smiling his naughtiest smile, and the man in front of him gasps and drops the teaspoon. “Tres magnifique.”
His accent is bad, but he’s learning fast. Tatsushi is struggling with grammar and verb forms, and of course it’s holding him back. Ono just wants to be understood, and doesn’t care about making mistakes. His French is fairly fluent yet horrendous, but Jean-Baptiste doesn’t cringe, the customers are getting used to it, and the men he meets after work are very forgiving about things like that.
Sometimes he gets letters from Japan, and it’s so surprising and sweet that he feels a sharp pang of homesickness every time. He reads them, sitting on the floor in his room – it’s really quite spacious once the mattress is put away – and misses everything and everyone. Mother is worrying about his health, and he answers shortly and politely. Bar Master and old friends want to know what Paris is like, and he tries to describe it and fails every time.
Everybody asks about the wonders of the real French cuisine, and it always amuses him that he still hadn’t really tasted anything but the pastries. He mostly eats at the bakery while he works, and there is always plenty of cake trimmings, broken pie crusts and leftover fruit filling to satisfy him. Jean-Baptiste notices, of course, and often lectures him about the importance of good diet and the dangers of being too skinny. Ono almost suspects that the bakery’s savoury menu was introduced just to get him to eat some protein.
With his eighty hours working week he doesn’t have the time to eat out, and he's saving all his extra money for fashionable clothes. Monsieur Loui had invited him to an expensive restaurant several times, but they were both so excited to see each other that they barely touched food before rushing back to Ono’s place to unroll the mattress and fall on it in a messy tangle, half-undressed, laughing and kissing. It’s really a shame that didn’t last longer, Ono thinks sometimes, but Loui’s wife was getting jealous, so that couldn’t be helped.
Jealousy is a terrible thing, and he can see it weighing down on Tatsushi now, making him miserable. He doesn’t talk about his conquests, but he’s not very good at being discreet. Tatsushi knows, and does his best to put up with it, but he might not last much longer.
“When you said you’d follow me to Paris when I go to the University, I thought…” Tatsushi says as they are resting together, watching the tree shadows dance over Ono’s ceiling as the night wind plays with them. He doesn’t finish, just sighs sadly and leans on Ono’s chest, kisses his nipples slowly, lightly. Ono pets his hair, coarse with bleach and dye, and doesn’t say anything, because Tatsushi is right. He should have thought – but he didn’t, of course, he never does.
“But I guess you just wanted to travel, huh?” Tatsushi’s face is a little wet against his skin, and it can be sweat, because the lovemaking was certainly energetic. They are both grateful for the dark, and Ono pulls him closer again, and does his best to make him feel better. Tatsushi is lovely and sweet, and he will miss him a lot.
But it's hard to brood for long, because every day brings something new. French words to memorise, names to attach to faces, streets he hadn't explored yet, skills to master at work. His head is buzzing with information, his palette remembers hundreds of new tastes with all their nuances and flavours, and his old life keeps slipping further away.
One day, while he's helping to make shortcakes, he realises that he can’t remember what Tachibana looked like.
He remembers the lines of his shoulders, the slimness of his hips, the way the ends of his hair curled against his cheeks and brushed the collar of his school uniform, but he can't remember the face. He's not sure why he wants to, and why it feels like a loss. It's not a good memory, regardless of how beautiful Tachibana was, not something he should struggle to keep.
Perplexed, he spaces out, overkneads the dough and ruins the whole batch. Jean-Baptiste yells and slaps him across the face, knocking his glasses off. It doesn't hurt any more than usual, but somehow Ono can't stop the tears welling on his eyes, and can't say anything, can't even apologise.
Jean-Baptiste apologises instead, unnecessarily and too much. He softly presses a damp cool towel to Ono's swollen cheek and fusses over him till the oven timer goes off. After closing, still feeling guilty, he takes Ono out for drinks.
They drink and talk till they both feel tipsy. Jean-Baptiste complains about his father, chides Ono for his lack of ambition and fantasises about the new menu for the bakery the way other people daydream about a lover. The summer is coming, he says. We need to change with the seasons, to grasp and harness the unique beauty of each of them. This spring was dedicated to fresh, crisp flavours, complex light textures, contrasting tastes. The summer menu will be completely different.
"Lots of fresh fruit, of course," he muses, absently stroking his glass. "Everything is wonderful when it's just been harvested, you only need to know how to unlock the taste to get the most out of it. Bases that melt in the mouth, airy whipped cream, delicate combinations of tart and sweet. We should start test-baking some items soon, and announce the arrivals of summer specials before anyone else does. This will be a great year for the bakery, Yusuke."
He's so attractive, with his golden hair artfully tousled in glossy waves, lovely stubborn chin and strong, well-defined arms. His enthusiasm is infectious, and it's pulling Ono in like an undertow. He's tempted, but he doesn’t want to lose this job when the tryst goes sour like it inevitably does. Jean-Baptiste is completely unpredictable - it's really common sense to try and avoid complications, but, oh. It's not that easy.
So Ono excuses himself before he gets drunk enough to get reckless and heads down to his new favourite bar to unwind. He's too excited to sleep and the night is too good to waste – summery warm but still fresh, scented with spring flowers and soft cool breeze. Ono thinks about Jean-Baptiste walking home alone, devising a way to transform a night like this into a perfect summer pastry, to serve this feeling wrapped in a golden crumbly crust with some vanilla ice-cream on the side. It would probably be based on a mousse, velvety in texture, with a distinct tang of lemon…
And then he hears the music and forgets about all that.
The bar is lively as usual, and he receives the warmest welcome. Ten minutes in two young men are competing for his attention, and he just cannot decide which one he should get to know better. Andre is tall, strong, dark-skinned and handsome; Antoine is a lithe young beauty with a shiny mane of hair that would be so nice to play with. When Ono goes to refresh his drink, he complains to the Bar Master about his dilemma. Monsieur Pierre nods gravely and dispenses his advice:
"Maybe it's time for you to learn a new French word, Yusuke. Try to say ménage-a-trois."
Ono laughs and shoots both men a mischievous glance over his shoulder, and they blush and sigh wistfully in perfect unison. Perhaps. The possibilities are endless.
It’s going to be a wonderful summer.
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no subject
Date: 2008-08-10 08:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-08-10 10:28 pm (UTC)