challah | darcy/pietro, soulmates
He froze in the middle of the corridor, sniffing the air. The scent, warm and yeasty and familiar, curled in his nose, sending bouts of homesickness crawling in his chest.
Pietro shook his head. Not more than two days since he and Wanda had left Sokovia and arrived in New York, and he was already yearning to go back.
He moved down the corridor with his usual speed, pausing at the doorway. The smell was stronger now – definitely bread, freshly baked and kneaded by hand if the floured countertop of the common room kitchen was any indication – and it made his mouth water a little.
An unfamiliar woman was standing with her back turned to him, scrubbing at dishes in the sink as she hummed, smooth and low. He took a moment to admire her – chestnut hair piled on the top of her head, with stray curls falling around her ears and slender neck. She had slim shoulders that narrowed into a tiny waist, cinched by apron strings, which then flared out to ample hips with sharp curves that made his mouth water a little.
And it was just her back – if the front was even half as alluring, he was definitely interested.
He moved across the room to the island counter quietly, taking a seat at the bar to peek at the oven. It was challah, the distinctive braided shape visible through the oven window, and he paused, another wave of homesickness washing over him – not just a longing for Sokovia, but for a time he had buried in the back of his memories, when it was him and Wanda and their mother, living quiet, happy lives in their little apartment.
Juliana Maximoff had made challah and cozonac and kolač for as long as Pietro could remember, the smell of freshly baked bread wafting through their little apartment and waking him up every morning. After their mother died, he and Wanda had lived off white, store-bought bread and butter, packaged and preserved with none of the freshness they were used to – they were too poor to buy from the baker, and to desperate for revenge to care what they put in their stomachs.
It had been years since he’d followed the smell of bread wafting in the air, and while it hurt to think of the past, he was suddenly grateful to this strange girl who baked challah on Tuesdays.
He sat there in silence, basking in the familiar smell and listening to the soothing sounds of running water, until he finally recognized the melody of the girl’s humming. It was an old lullaby – a Hebrew one, that he remembered from his childhood – and whenever he or Wanda used to hum it, his mother had smiled sadly.
“Just like your father,” she had murmured, and he let the memory fall away as he refocused on the girl.
Pietro cleared his throat, and spoke in careful Hebrew, “Why do you bake challah on a Tuesday?”
The girl froze, turning to look at him, and he couldn’t stop himself from inhaling sharply. She was beautiful – pale skin offset by dark brows and hooded blue eyes and full lips slicked in red, striking and stunning and utterly gorgeous. A beautiful girl who baked bread and hummed Jewish lullabies – he wondered who she was, and why she was here.
And then she said the words that made him breath stop.
“Because your sister said you liked the smell,” she replied back, her Hebrew a little accented but still clear – her voice sounded like honey and wine, warm and thick and throaty. “And because I’ve been waiting for someone to say those words to me since I could read.”
He stared at her, speechless with his mouth falling open, and the woman in front of him smiled shyly. “It’s nice to finally meet you, soulmate.”