Chapter 1
Erik was panicking. He’d promised to call Charles after Nina was put to bed but the time had come and he was overwhelmingly anxious.
He paced nervously in his office, remembering just that morning when he’d been brave enough to take his lovely neighbors hand. Where was that courage when he needed it?
Erik had spent the rest of the day alternately playing with Nina and doing household chores. At least he was able to fold laundry now without crying over his beloved wife. He knew she’d have wanted him to move on, she was the angel on his shoulder telling him to go for it. If only he had the guts.
He’d spaced out a few times over the day, imagining kissing Charles and holding his hand again. And of course proposing and then running off to the courthouse before Charles could change his mind.
He would introduce him to his family and finally see that pinched, worried look leave their eyes. His parents always looked so concerned when they thought he wasn’t looking.
But here he was, counting his chickens before they hatched. In order to live his fairy tale life with Charles he first had to work up the nerve to call.
He glanced at the clock. He’d told Charles Nina’s bedtime was 8 on weekends; it was currently 8:07. Would it seem desperate to call so soon? Would he seem reluctant if he waited? Would Charles think he’d forgotten? Or changed his mind?
His phone screen went blank, he swiped it irritably only to startle in horror to realize he’d hit call. No going back now, it would show as a missed call and Charles would know just how chicken shit he was.
He fumbled the phone to his ear as it started to ring. He held his breath willing the other man to answer while equally hoping he wouldn’t. But then he’d have to leave an unplanned voicemail and he’d really rather die.
“Hello? Erik?” Charles asked brightly. He must have been waiting by the phone. Erik couldn’t help but grin.
“Yes, hello Charles. I hope you weren’t expecting anyone else,”
“No! No…no. I wasn’t. I was hoping you’d have time to call.” His smile was audible.
“I have lots of time once Nina is down for the count. I’m sorry to have kept you waiting.”
“No, its fine. I-I think it’s great, how you dote on her,” he confessed softly.
“Thank you,” he smiled his real smile, the one he wouldn’t show Charles until their tenth anniversary. He wasn’t going to risk scaring him away. “Do you have kids? You’re a natural with Nina.”
“No, no. I’ve always wanted kids, but I never found a guy who wanted to settle down with me and have a family,” he admitted shyly.
“Not even, Sebastian?” Erik tried not to imagine what the guy looked like; hopefully he was a fat, dissipated, alcoholic.
“No, all he cared about was the restaurant. Whenever I brought up taking time to go on vacation, or hinted at something more permanent he’d accuse me of trying to derail his career. It’s funny how you notice the bad things once you break up. All the little stuff I used to let slide really bothers me in hindsight.”
“He’s a jerk, Charles. I know you wouldn’t try to destroy anyone’s dreams.”
“Thank you, Erik, you’re very sweet.” He was sure he could hear the smaller mans blush. “Though I do have a confession to make.”
“Oh? Were you trying to derail his career? You can tell me, he probably deserved it,” Erik teased conspiratorially. Wondering if Charles had a wicked streak.
Charles giggled, “No! He was paranoid and jealous. But…when I came over this morning I had an ulterior motive. I was worried that you’d have the wrong impression of me-of what I do for a living. Just based on what Nina said. I wanted to clear the air.”
Now it was Erik’s turn to blush and hope that Charles remained unaware, “Oh. Right. How did she put it?” he stalled for time.
“She told you I make videos on the internet,” Charles said with a soft laugh. “I know what I would think if someone told me that’s what they did for a living,”
Erik knew he had to come clean. “I did entertain the notion that you might be a-an adult entertainer.” He said carefully. He was usually so much better with his words than his. He had to be with his job as a prosecutor.
“Oh my god!” Charles groaned playfully, “I knew it! I thought for sure you wouldn’t want anything to do with me after that.”
Erik didn’t tell him the exact opposite was true in a rather unsavory aspect. But if that was true, then Erik was curious, “Then what made you come over?”
“I wanted to check on Nina, she was so scared yesterday. And I-I didn’t want you to have the wrong impression of me. Also, people don’t usually turn down cake so I figured it would get me in the door.”
It had gotten him well into Erik’s heart, but he knew better to tell the other man that. “Well, it did. Not that I wouldn’t have let you in. I can never thank you enough for watching over Nina for me.”
“Oh, it was no trouble. She’s a great little helper.”
“Yes, she’s always loved to cook,” he said softly, amazed at how well it was all going. This call was shaping up to be his best mistake.
~~
Charles hung up the phone and rolled onto his back to smile widely at the ceiling. He hadn’t felt this way about a guy in ages, if ever. It was well after eleven but it felt like he’d just noticed the phone ringing. That was a good sign right? Erik had to go to bed, apparently Nina woke him early everyday and he wanted to catch a few hours of sleep. He’d promised to call again the next night. Charles was over the moon.
He’d never dated a guy with a child, but it seemed very doable if the man in question was Erik and the child in question was Nina. He was more than ready to settle down, but it was daunting to know that if things went badly he and Erik wouldn’t be the only ones affected. They’d have to tread carefully, but he was cautiously optimistic that they’d be great together.
~~
Erik had gotten lucky the night before and he knew that, casual conversation did not come easily to him. He had to assume that it had been a fluke that he and Charles had literally been able to talk for hours. Now would come the tense, awkward silences and Charles would start to dodge his calls. He had to make a game plan to avoid that horrible eventuality.
So the next morning, after Nina woke him by leaping onto the bed with a war cry and elbowing him in the ribs. He fixed them a safe and easy breakfast of cold cereal and calmly asked “How would you like to watch more of Charles’ videos?”
“I’d like that, papa. I want to be a chef just like Charles!” She informed him happily, swinging her feet in her footy pajamas as she slopped cereal and milk around in her bowl.
He smiled at her excitement. “That’s good, sweetheart.”
Last week she’d wanted to be a fairy princess so maybe she was finally old enough to start dreaming practical dreams. “Papa, why didn’t we move to candy land?” She asked apropos of nothing. Then again maybe not.
After explaining as clearly as possible that her favorite board game was not a map of an actual place- and promising to ask Charles if he knew how to play- he’d cleared their breakfast dishes and had her run to start up his computer. He had research to do before talking to Charles again.
~~
https://www.tastemade.com/videos/egg-yolk-hack
Charles was so dramatic and playful; it was no wonder his videos were so popular. His antics had Nina laughing and Erik blushing in infatuation.
“Get a little suction happening and put the lips right there,” perhaps he hadn’t been too far off with his original assessment of Charles’ job.
He wondered if Charles’ natural charisma made him seem so flirtatious or if he was turning on the charm for the camera. Even his mistakes were endearing, though he wondered why he left any in his videos at all.
The night before he’d mentioned how carefully he edited his work, so leaving them in must be intentional.
“Gramma has one of those!” Nina grabbed his forearm dramatically, redirecting his attention to another video thumbnail that showed a slice of pizza in a cast iron skillet.
“So she does, let’s see what Charles does with his,” he clicked it eagerly.
https://www.tastemade.com/videos/ultimate-pizza-reheat-hack
The video was like the others they had seen, interesting and incredibly informative. He approached cooking like a science and made it fun. Erik couldn’t help but picture him making props for his videos to have a visual representation of his grading scale. It was such a sweet mental image he felt his heart contract in his chest.
The video had Nina asking “What are molecules?” and the slightly more awkward, “What’s a shot glass?” and “Can we have pizza for dinner?”
“Sweetheart-“ he began.
“Look! Charles has a Pizza recipe!” she grabbed the mouse and clicked the video. Erik relaxed as it began to play. It looked like an older recipe; Charles’ hair was a little bit longer in it. Erik liked the look.
He wasn’t unduly concerned about Nina’s desire to make pizza. They didn’t have pizza dough and he had no idea where to find it. He told her that in no uncertain terms. He was always unfailingly honest with her so she took him at his word, accepting this fact with a rather pouting resignation before turning back to the video.
Maybe they could have pizza flavored hamburger helper. Or they could order in. That was probably their best bet.
“Massage it and you push your fingers into it like this and just begin to stretch it” Charles was saying in a mellow tone. Erik nearly swallowed his tongue.
Thankfully Nina was too enraptured by the video to notice his sudden need for a tall glass of ice water.
He came back into the room after collecting himself for a moment in the kitchen to hear Charles talking about teaching fractions to children.
His heart skipped a beat. If he hadn’t already fallen that would have done it.
Nina turned to him with a mischievous quirk to her lips and looked so fully like her mother in that moment that he stopped in his tracks. “Charles has a pizza dough recipe, papa.” She highlighted one of the suggested videos with a wicked gleam in her eye.
He hung his head in defeat. At least he had a delivery place on speed dial, because this was not going to end well.
~~
“I don’t know why she likes cooking with me! We ruined your recipe beyond description but she seemed to be having fun. So I guess that counts for something.” He was telling a laughing Charles over the phone at half past seven later that night.
Nina had school the next day so her bedtime came earlier.
“That sounds wonderful, Erik! I’ve always wanted to inspire others to at least try to cook!” he sounded so pleased that Erik could almost over look the fact that his kitchen still smelled like smoke and burnt cheese
“If I could have edited out that part of my evening I would have.” He confessed sourly, happy to set Charles into new peals of laughter.
“Well I like to leave some mistakes in to show that even the professionals don’t get it right all the time. I want to show to have an intimate feel.” He said warmly.
“Well, you’ve succeeded in that, I feel like I’m sitting in your kitchen watching you cook.”
“We’ll have to do that sometime,” Charles said in a low tone. “Why don’t you pick something you like the look of and I’ll make it for you?”
“I’ll be sure to do that,” he felt his face stretch into a wide smile. That sounded like a proper date to him.
“So tell me more about your shopping trip?” he goaded.
Erik groaned playfully and told him all about their attempts to find the ingredients he’d mentioned in his video. They’d printed out the list, but “There was a wall of cheese, Charles! A wall of it! And so much of it was mozzarella!”
Charles was laughing again and Erik felt his heart flutter in relief. Maybe yesterdays call hadn’t been a fluke after all.
You even made the dough?” he sounded incredulous and happier than Erik had ever heard him.
“Yes, that was the easy part, to tell you the truth, but even that didn’t come out right. Maybe it would have been better in Nina had been patient enough to wait six hours,” he conceded thoughtfully
“Well she is only five, I’m sure six hours is the length of her school day,” Charles chuckled at the thought of the excitable little girl.
Erik grunted his agreement. He was still sore about the mess they’d managed to make of the kitchen while still not producing anything approaching edible.
“It just takes practice, Erik. You’re on the road to success.” Charles said encouragingly, like he could hear his defeatist thoughts. “Like Gustav says in Ratatouille ‘anybody can cook.’”
“...Who’s Gustav and what’s Ratatouille?” he asked in blank confusion. There was prolonged silence on the other end of the line. “Charles?”
“You’ve never seen Ratatouille? It’s my favorite Pixar film! It’s also the name of a classic French provincial stew! Wait, you’ve never hadratatouille?”
Charles sounded so scandalized that Erik just had to laugh. “I guess we’re just uncultured swine over here. I’ll understand if you want nothing to do with us anymore.”
“Oh my goodness! Nina hasn’t seen it either? Erik! Some people would consider that child abuse,” he laughed disbelievingly.
“I hope you’re not one of them, Charles. A man is allowed to make mistakes every once in a while,” he cajoled playfully.
“That’s true. I guess I’ll just have to correct this myself one day soon. I’ll make you some stew and we’ll watch a movie together?” he asked shyly.
Erik grinned so hard his face hurt, “Sounds great, Charles.”
Was that two dates or one? He wondered, though hopefully soon they would lose count and their lives would blend seamlessly. A man could dream and it was looking like sometimes dreams came true.