A/N: Hi everyone! So as per schedule, the first chapter of Vanilla is up on a completely new book, [Vanilla]! ^0^/ enjoy.

*

[Rachel]

Minutes later of nonsense through the gap in the door, I was on my way back to my room—so shaken from the escalation of events that I'd completely forgotten about the chocolates meant for Mr. Yamazaki.

Having heard close to everything that the critic had to say, I was certain of exactly how adamant he was to make the trick up his sleeve work to his advantage. Whether it be for purposes of vengeance or sheer hatred, there hadn't been enough to tell. He must have, in some way or another without justification, figured that I had something to do with him being fired. Yet, I was so sure that someone like him had not the resources to do anything about the current situation and would be kept out of the picture.

I must have been dreaming to think so simply.

Returning to my room, I thought of why and how I would be facing the rest of the judges later at the dinner party. Unable to keep myself in check however, I decided first to pick out a dress. No use sitting around doing nothing, after all.

I'd called Jennifer over with the intention to share my findings but she had arrived, then, with information about tomorrow's segment and we spent the rest of the time planning the upcoming recipe instead of discussing the matter at hand.

It wasn't that I'd forgotten about it; it in fact plagued my every thought and refused to leave the back of my mind even for a brie second. The dinner party was a disaster inside, simply because everything, even the smiles of the judges, looked so dull with this newfound anxiety that nothing was real.

That night, I could not sleep. I'd even decided to take my medication that I'd hadn't touched in quite a while but I remained in bed, tossing and turning. At last, I decided to give my best friend a call.

"Trudy?" It had taken her about several rings before she picked up, which probably meant that she was still at work. Or perhaps busy with other matters regarding her father's company.

"I was about to call you," her voice sounded distant, leading me to assume that I had been put on speaker mode. "Did something go wrong on your end? I was informed about an additional candidate for the prize but I'm sure they wouldn't be able to win against your popular vote."

"No, Trudy—listen," I sighed, reaching for the light. "It's not just anyone they're considering all of a sudden. It's Honeycutt... all because of that critic from before. He came over in the afternoon to hand the Times some profiling. I think he was bribed."

"Honeycutt?" I could hear the change in her tone at once. "It can't be. Wasn't he the critic going on about hating their red velvet cupcakes? He gave them a two the previous time!"

"I know. I heard," I shook my head, massaging my temples. There was nothing more that came to mind. Everything else was a flurry of complaints and yet, I did not know how to voice them.

"Get some sleep Rachel. You have tomorrow to work on. I'll handle this," her voice was clearer now, and I had made myself some chamomile tea to soothe the nerves. "It's pretty simple. We just have to get the profiling. They wouldn't have anything to work with without that."

I nodded unconsciously, forgetting that she couldn't see. "Thanks Trudy. Sorry, I'm a little tired..."

"There's nothing to worry about when I'm taking care of things," she'd laughed then, and I did too. After a day's worth of worrying over a matter she could so easily solve! There was nothing I should have worried about in the first place. Perhaps I'll spend some time rethinking my recipe for tomorrow while finishing the tea before turning in.

A part of me did wonder if Chip Honeycutt had caught wind of every segment's theme beforehand; and if offered a choice, tempted, I would say, would he be able to resist?

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

[Chip]

"Okay Xan," I turned to my husband first thing in the morning, after brushing my teeth and in the middle of wearing my contact lenses. "You get to choose the menu for today's segment. Since Giselle chose yesterday's."

"So..." he was looking at me through the mirror in the bathroom, the sides of his face covered in shaving cream. "Anything?"

"Mmhm!"

"I can even put you on the menu?" Xander laughed, smirking as he did and dodging the punch I had aimed at his upper arm. Sometimes I wonder if he does it just to annoy me, since my punches didn't particularly hurt anyway ;-;

Either way, he seemed to think the question through for a brief moment, running his fingers through the tufts of hair sticking up in all directions at the back of his head. Nu! Stop being so attractive!

"I don't know a thing about flavour combinations, Angel. What if I ruin your work?"

I gave him the look. "You don't trust my magic? That I can make anything taste good?"

"I just... okay. I'm craving carbs, so. I don't know how you're going to incorporate that," he shrugged, poking my cheek. "Don't stick to it if the theme turns out to be some complex shit or if it's just going to give you trouble."

"I'll prove you wrong! Hehe," I accepted the challenge whilst smooshing some moisturiser that Shea got me over my face.

Xander was looking at me as though I was cookie batter waiting to be sent into the oven. "You're just asking for it, aren't you? Angel, I love you but you're mad for inviting yourself into the fire."

"W-well!" I paused, slightly fazed by what he said. "We can't possibly make the same things again and again, can we? Stepping out of our comfort zone is the first step to improving!"

My husband was laughing amidst my protests, splashing water on his face and wiping it with a towel before coming up behind me with a hug.

"I'm not saying you're wrong, Angel. Just amazed at how hard you are on yourself even when the rest of the world isn't treating you right."

I blinked, peering up at him but also slightly embarrassed that he was shirtless and hugging me from behind. "C-clearly, you're wrong because I do have people treating me right." I turned around to hide my face in his chest.

*

The beginning of the segment was similar to the procedures of yesterday's—starting off with a brief introduction and schedule of the segment and theme before handing the time over to a demonstrator. This time, it was chiffon cake.

Admittedly, I was surprised by the reveal. After all, we'd only just made cake yesterday and I'd had the impression that the entire event was organized for diversity and maximising creativity. Chiffon cake on the other hand, was sort of 'back to the fundamentals'; safe and definitely within one's comfort zone.

Yet, another angle could very well be that we were tasked to think out of the box for creative flavours to spice up something otherwise ordinary and common. After all, it was the basics of pastry making that were the hardest to master and the plainer, simpler something was, the harder it would be to impress.

"You're not sticking to the idea I have, are you?" Xander had leaned down to say beside my ear but all he got in response was my tongue sticking out.

This time, Mr. Huang was the pastry chef in charge of the demonstration and everyone else seemed to observe the same thing that I did: that he was a completely different person baking.

"It doesn't take a genius to know that all of you are probably familiar with the chiffon cake. I can't assume otherwise, can I?" He was laughing, and it was odd because he was never really a smiler, let alone a laugher unless he was speaking to Mr. Yamazaki or Chef Randy. "Definitely one of the first things you'd learn in culinary school. The challenge is, of course, making it yours."

Similar to yesterday's procedures, guests were seated before participants were given several minutes to discuss recipes and tidy things up at their work stations, getting out the necessary trays, pans, spatulas, whisks, aprons... and their baking spirits, hehe.

It was at this point that Giselle refused to give Xander his very own 'day of request', making one of her very own. "Thursdays are purple."

"O-oh? Purple?" I blinked, pausing for a moment to run through every purple that I knew of and had used in baking or cooking. Lavender... blueberry... e-eggplants? The eggplant emoji crossed my mind and I had Xander to blame for it. It was his among his most used emojis.

Regardless, a blueberry chiffon cake was not going to be anywhere beyond my comfort zone or appear creative in one way or another. The last thing I wanted to do was put Chef Randy and the other guests in a cycle of boredom since they would, ultimately, be tasting other cakes apart from our own.

Y-yet, eggplant was out of the question. So lavender? But lavender itself was a subtle flavour, easily lost after the batter is sent into the oven and honestly it wasn't a natural purple either way and I'd have to include food colouring...

I turned to Xander who was pinching his sister's nose and telling her not to be so demanding when the back of my mind ran into a list of the newly introduced baking ingredients and—there.

My husband must have somehow noticed my mini eureka moment because he was looking at me concerned while we were headed for our station to wear our aprons and brainstorm.

"You okay?"

"Purple carbs! Wouldn't ube fit the description?" I peered up at him excitably, unable to stop myself from grinning. Xander stared blankly in return.

This is what happens when you have a volleyball dummy as your husband. "Do you know what ube is?"

"It sounds like the name of a car company," was all he had to say. "Hop in my ube, I'll give you a ride. Something like that."

I poked his abs. "That's definitely not it. Ube is purple yam. It's sweet, remember? Mr. Yamazaki was talking about it the first day we arrived. He passed out samples!"

"Oh, right... shit I remember now. Damn, your memory's good," Xander looked at me in awe and I nodded knowingly, waiting to be presented with the 'best husband' award. "Okay, so we're using that in the batter? Or the icing. Is there icing on chiffon cake? What the fuck was I doing in home economics."

"Hmm... being my slave," I laughed, helping him with his apron after he'd done mine. "But it's not like we were doing chiffon cake at any point of time specifically either, so. That's okay though! It's all relatively easy, so. The hard part's getting the special ingredient to taste right, which isn't hard since there's no alcohol in this now and no one's going to complain about me getting lucky," I was able to laugh it off.

Xander turned around with a surprise hug all of a sudden and me, thrown off, only managed a 'uwawhat' into his apron.

"Do people like you really exist?" He said, rocking me back and forth in his arms while I struggled to get out of the husband trap and write down the recipe forming in my head.

"W-well. I don't know what you're talking about, but I sure hope they do exist. I-I mean, otherwise what would I be now, a wandering spirit that only shows itself to you?"

*

Minutes later, Xander and I found ourselves bustling about the ingredient pantry with grocery baskets in our arms, browsing the aisles with the vague list I'd come up with. Well, not exactly bustling, m-more like strolling, I suppose. Like an ordinary day at the supermarket, you know, just that no one's going to accidentally drop a packet of strawberry-flavoured, um, 'you-know-whats' into our basket.

"Is that ube, sir?" Shin had magically turned up right by my shoulder, peering over it and down at my basket. Startled, I'd almost knocked into a tower of tomato puree.

"O-oh! Shin," I had to calm myself, glancing around for any sign of Xander. He was, however, in the next aisle getting the many eggs that we needed. I could see him frowning from afar, staring at the labels. "Hi there. And yes, you're right! It's ube. Giselle wanted it to be purple you see. And Xander—I mean, um. Mr. Jaxon—felt like having carbs all of a sudden."

My adorable baking assistant nodded enthusiastically, giving my ingredients a thumbs-up. "Cupcakes above, why didn't I think of that? It sounds amazing... I can taste it already sir. Sweet purple yam, such smooth texture and and I'm losing my grip on English, so uh." Shin raised his own basket of goodies. "Would you, um, like to know what I have in mind?"

Before I could agree, Japanese boi added that he had been assigned to the station right behind ours, and that he was sort of replacing his father, who was apparently supposed to be participating today since his role as judge was temporarily replaced by someone else due to... something that had cropped up on their side. A-anyway, I could easily tell that things were becoming increasingly complicated which served as a great disincentive to ask more than what I already had.

"It doesn't matter whether you were meant to replace someone—be it your father or not, Shin," I patted him on the head. "Someone as talented as yourself would be able to pull off incredible things regardless. I really think this is the stage you were meant to stand on!"

Shin was clearly flustered. "I-I, sir I am a nothing sir a very nothing, like I said."

"Tell me if you think my husband's over-complimenting." A familiar voice—definitely Xander's because I'd identified it almost at once—came up from behind me. "He does it a lot, but I have my way of keeping his lips occupied."

I turned around, slowly, for good measure, to give him the look of burning pebble hell, inherently destructive by nature. Xander proceeded to poke my cheek and Shin, beside me, looked as though he was trying to imprint the very scene before his eyes into his head. Ah, for Nguyen-purposes, then. I assumed.

As payback, I ordered Xander to fetch the ube concentrate which I had nearly forgotten while I headed over to the section for whipping cream, bidding Shin a temporary farewell so that he could continue his search for ingredients as well.

On the way, due to unfortunate circumstances, clumsy me had to bump into someone who also happened to be picking out a tub of whipping cream from the shelf. I'd apologized (an automatic reaction, really) before noticing that the person I'd bumped into was actually Miss Rachel.

"Oh! Oh no, I'm so sorry about that. I really. I didn't mean to," was all I managed to say, doubling back quickly and checking to see if I'd made her drop anything from her basket. Phew. Nothing happened.

Miss Rachel seemed overall unfazed by our mini-encounter, remaining quite the same as she was on every other occasion we'd met. Slightly icy. Resembling a chilly breeze on a winter night. There was, however, an additional spark of worry in her eyes that I felt might be a figment of my imagination, especially since it lasted for barely a second or so.

"It's alright," she nodded stiffly in return, turning back to the rows of whipping cream. The act had drawn me towards the basket under her arm and my impolite eyes had, in that brief moment, recognized her ingredients at once.

"Oh! You seem to have grown fond of using the cherry blossom syrup! Could it be that you have a liking for floral flavours, Miss Rachel?" I asked, glad to have found a miracle topic out of the blue. One less awkward encounter with neighbour, check!

Miss Rachel glanced sideways at me, then rested her gaze on my basket. "Hm. Is that what it looks like?"

"W-well um," I'd definitely swallowed then, uncertain within a second. "Was I mistaken? I just thought you must like it to use the ingredient a second time."

"I would have appreciated if you asked to look at my ingredients before allowing your eyes to wander, Mr. Honeycutt. You will be making...?"

Attacked by a wave of guilt, I lowered my head at once, apologizing before saying that I would be making a carb-inspired chiffon cake.

"Xander said he was craving some," I went on to explain, feeling slightly relieved to see that she was responding with a nod.

"I see. Interesting. I've never thought of incorporating carbohydrates into a recipe meant to produce otherwise light and fluffy cakes. I can foresee the batter being very thick and heavy, likely ruining the original texture of a chiffon cake which would, of course, look terrible on presentation. Good luck," she acknowledged stiffly, stalking away on her nude pumps. They looked like something only Gretel would wear, and Rose would disapprove of.

Me, a pebble left behind, let out a sigh of relief. Somewhere along the way, I'd gotten used to the way Miss Rachel and my conversations flowed and ended, which meant that her harsh undertone (and criticism) weren't exactly new and hence, a relief. Admittedly, however, she did have a point about the batter being overly thick.

At once, I was thinking of ways to solve this—silently thanking Miss Rachel for the hint.

My husband came back just in time with the ube extract and I tasted it on the spot, confirming that it was, indeed, natural and concentrated enough to bring out the fragrance of the purple yam while I could afford to use less of the yam itself.

"I saw Rachel coming by," Xander lowered his voice. "Did she say anything?"

I smiled in return, reaching up to give his shoulder a pat. "Thanks to her, I'm confident even outside of my comfort zone!"

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

With most of my doubts out of the window and every ingredient on the list checked twice, I was certain that nothing could go wrong this time round. Xander, too, had been quick to adapt to the recipe and tasks that I'd assigned to him (which were similar to the ones he had yesterday) and the two of us were oddly in perfect sync. I say oddly because, w-well, we more often than so had different attitudes, values and thoughts about certain things and even different ways of looking at issues.

Simply put, we were entirely different existences—supposedly living our lives apart from one another. All of me and all of Xander were never supposed to... fit.

"Not all," my personal mind-reader begged to differ, lowering his gaze just in time to catch mine peering up at him. He used the spatula in his hand to point at my chest; where the heart was kept.

Immediately, my face felt like it was on fire and ready to bake cupcakes on top. Inside, I died.

"X-Xan! No. No good. Not good at all," I breathed, clutching my heart. "Please concentrate on folding the meringue into the batter. I'm worried about the consistency. And no more heart attacks!"

Xander only laughed, nodding at my instructions. "Yes, yes... as you wish, Angel."

I nudged my husband in the side, whispering something about letting him off the hook only because he was a decent human stand mixer that boasted fair arm power—which was why I had him mash the yams and combine them into the batter, which definitely made it thicker than every other batter for chiffon cakes.

This response, however, triggered a counterattack by husbando. Choices I regret.

"Do you want me to point out where else we fit together?" He flashed that signature smirk of his, a teasing lilt in his voice while his eyes drifted downwards.

"N-no we don't! No pointing. No fit. No together," I warned with a wooden spoon I was using to get the whipping cream out of the tub. "We can talk about this later."

Xander laughed, harder this time and the pastry chefs at the station in front of ours actually turned to look. "You definitely don't have a clue about what we're talking about."

I huffed, about to turn the real stand mixer on to get the whipping cream into stiff peaks when a loud crash coming from the station behind us directed our attention elsewhere. It was Shin.

"A-are you okay?" I stopped everything at once, turning behind and rushing over to his station. "What happened?"

"Uh, no. I mean, yes. It's nothing, sir. Chip. I, haha," he had the stiffest smile upon his lips, "I just dropped my whisk. That's all. I'm sorry for the noise, haha. Sorry for the interruption. Sorry."

His overall demeanour, although not so different from his usual self, betrayed an underlying anxiety in his eyes along with the colour of his face—drained. How was I to close an eye and believe his lies?

I went up to him, calling his name twice. He didn't seem to respond, which was by itself worrying. Something must be wrong.

"Shin?" I came up right to the side of his station, just in time to see him bending down to clean a white stain on the floor with a kitchen towel. "Is everything okay?"

"No sir, nothing is wrong," he successfully contradicted himself in five words. "Please don't bother about me and um, I'm sure you're busy with your icing too, so."

I shook my head at once and straight up grabbed him by his shoulders. "Y-you! Tell me what's wrong at once or or or I'll... I'll confiscate your whisk!"