Cake! (Dare/Michael)

[Dare Blackwood-Hardt]

It had taken forever to get out the door, but as late as they were, Dare for one couldn't have cared less. They'd decided to bypass Diagon Alley and go to London for now. For one, they were less likely to receive any kind of resistance, but perhaps more importantly, Dare just couldn't keep his hand out of Michael's pocket today, nor could he keep the stupid grin off his face.

[Michael Blackwood-Hardt]

Michael hadn't minded the delay, and he certainly didn't mind Dare's hand in his pocket. As a matter of fact, he had his own hand in Dare's. His own grin wasn't quite as wide as Dare's, but the sparks in his eyes made up for it as he pulled as close as possible to Dare without making walking completely impossible. "Any idea where these places are?"

[Dare Blackwood-Hardt]

"No clue," Dare said. "Does the book have addresses or anything?" That was their best chance, as far as he knew. Of course, he still didn't know how they'd find any of those addresses, not without summoning the Knight Bus or something. "We could find that shop again and ask there," he suggested, giving Michael a playful smirk. He could think of a lot of reasons to visit that shop again, but he really did think the man would be able to give them at least a direction.

[Michael Blackwood-Hardt]

Michael shrugged, he would be fine with just walking around until they found somewhere, it wasn't like they didn't have plenty of time. He flicked his eyes up at Dare, thinking about the store and the fact that they had never picked up the other book they had bought. "That would probably be the best idea," he said, though he wondered if he would be pulled to look around again by his own curiosity.

[Dare Blackwood-Hardt]

"Then we'll have to find it," Dare said. His eyes watched Michael's for as long as he dared before looking forward again. As serendipitous as his last crash had ended up, he didn't really care for a repeat. He made up for his lack of visual attention with a slight firming of his hand that brought his grin right back.

[Michael Blackwood-Hardt]

It hadn't taken them long to find the shop again, and the man had gladly given them directions, along with a hearty congratulations and a small, free gift card for his shop. Michael had tucked it away in his pocket before they had left in search of the small shop the man had circled on a little map. It wasn't long before they went in the glass door, a small bell chiming softly to announce their entrance to the little, hairbrained-looking woman behind the counter. She smiled broadly, bright red lips parting, and welcomed them into the shop.

[Dare Blackwood-Hardt]

Dare only managed to make his hand retreat as far as Michael's lower back. He wanted almost desperately to refuse to move that hand from that warm pocket of denim until it lay on the floor somewhere, but thoughts of the ceremony chimed in and suggested that he pretend to behave himself.

He settled the obvious first, announcing that they were looking for a cake. His mind was more than half on Michael anyway, so any ridiculousness in the statement went over his head. It was when the woman asked for details about the ceremony that he paused. "What do you mean, what are our colors?" he asked. Dare looked aside at Michael. Was he really supposed to know these things?

[Michael Blackwood-Hardt]

Michael's eyes widened slightly and he glanced over at Dare. "Um..." his hand mimicked Dare's and moved to his waist, then he looked up at the woman. "It's going to be outside...by a forest," he said, unsure. They hadn't even considered colors yet. They were supposed to consider colors? How in the world were they supposed to think of colors?

[Dare Blackwood-Hardt]

"Green?" Dare asked, looking from the woman to Michael. "Forest green? And white for the moon? It's at night," he added in an aside to the woman. He wasn't sure what these colors were for, but that was what they had. His eyes asked Michael if that sounded good. They'd intended to have lights echoing the stars and greenery on top of white columns, so it seemed about right to him.

[Michael Blackwood-Hardt]

Michael raised an eyebrow and gave a small shrug. It sounded fine to him. They now had colors. He looked over at the woman and nodded, though she couldn't have saw him do it, since she was already turned around, one thin hand running absently through her hair as she gestured with the other for them to follow her.

[Dare Blackwood-Hardt]

Dare returned Michael's shrug before moving to follow the woman into another room. There were some kind of fake-looking cakes on display and shelves packed with albums, one of which the woman plucked from the shelf. She gestured for them to take seats at a small table and flipped the book, labeled Green, open. Dare nearly winced at the first cake he saw. In his artistic opinion, it took the green theme too far. He sat anyway as she started asking questions about how many guests, among other things.

[Michael Blackwood-Hardt]

Michael watched as the cakes flipped by, answering the questions as they came and refusing to look up at the woman when they gave her the pitifully small number of guests. His hand somehow found its way to Dare's thigh and he tried his best to imagine any of the cakes pictured at the ceremony. Many of them were too much, he knew, but there were a couple that he could almost see them using.

[Dare Blackwood-Hardt]

The woman flipped a few more pages, then put on an eager smile as she got to a small, inexpensive cake she'd been looking for. "These were actually fern leaves, but they could easily be trees," she said. Dare couldn't refrain from grimacing.



"I think we're looking for something... simpler," he said delicately.

[Michael Blackwood-Hardt]

Michael's eyes flickered up at Dare and then to the woman, nodding his assent. He couldn't really see them using the cake on the page, it was too much for them. Something smaller, something less...he wasn't sure what the word he was looking for was, so he dropped his eyes back to the page to think. Of course, all of the cakes he had ever seen were large and fancy, so he had no idea what to ask for.

[Dare Blackwood-Hardt]

"Simpler," the woman repeated, looking back down at the picture. She started flipping through more elaborate cakes, some of which looked more like St. Patrick's cakes than wedding cakes, repeating the word to herself under her breath.

Dare entertained himself looking around at the displays. There was a rather large one on display that definitely fit the word simpler, and he couldn't imagine it would hurt anything to cut it down a couple layers. He nudged Michael lightly and gestured toward it with a nod of his head.



Just then the woman stopped flipping and tapped another picture in her book. "Am I getting closer?" she asked. Dare gave her credit for trying. He wasn't sure how a cake like that could be cut, though.