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Post by Nathaniel Zsoldos on Jan 19, 2013 2:58:02 GMT -5
Nathaniel followed Dante, feeling a rush of sympathy for him. Younger sisters had a supernatural power of persuasion, and Nathaniel had felt his pain acutely - he had worn his share of fairy wings and princess tiaras, although thankfully Angie had never forced him into drag. Yet. But he clapped Dante on the shoulder, and nodded in solidarity. "You never told me anything," he assured him. Nathaniel made a mental note to beware Dante's sisters after he met them.
He walked a little ahead, starting up towards the librarian's desk. "Well," he started, trying to change the subject for Dante's sake, "What's your favorite thing to cook? I like baking and cooking both, but I really enjoy making pot roast and pasta." Mostly because they were easy to prepare! Nathaniel loved cooking, but he was a simple guy of simple tastes. Fancy things were fun to do, but if a recipe was too complex, he usually gave up and threw everything in a frier. It was an inelegant situation, sure, but it usually worked. His lazy cooking skills had lead him to crazy good dishes, all on accident. Sometimes, he and his kid sister would each pick four ingredients and the challenge was to make something using those. One night, they had chicken with a maple syrup glaze and grilled potatoes, peppers, and bacon. For dessert, they had grapes. They couldn't find a way to spice up the grapes, so they tried stuffing them with jelly beans, but it got messy and they ended up just eating them straight. The chicken had tasted weirdly sweet, and overall it was just kind of a weird food night, but it had been incredibly fun. Nathaniel wondered if Dante was up for that. A lot of people (his parents included) were very suspicious of his food experiments. He didn't blame them. The fried zucchini dipped in chocolate was, he admitted, not his best idea.
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Dante Giovanni
Weapon
Demon Rapier
Among thorns grow roses.
Posts: 122
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Post by Dante Giovanni on Jan 22, 2013 23:26:27 GMT -5
Well, at least the secret of that particular fiasco was safe as far as Nate was concerned. That made Dante feel somewhat better, being able to tell that tale and not worry about it being spread around the entire school. He didn’t even want to think of the new nicknames that could potentially arise from it, especially if Natsuki happened to find out. The blonde tried to not give any thought to those scenarios since they didn’t seem very likely to happen.
Trailing along behind Nate, Dante tilted his head to look up at the ceiling. His favorite thing to cook? Well, that was a tough one. He knew so many recipes, and the act of cooking itself made him happy regardless of what it was he was making. Apparently Nate’s favorite to create were pot roast and pasta. Dante couldn’t blame him since both were excellent, particularly pasta but that was just the Italian being biased. Speaking of bias, he did manage to figure out an answer,
“I’d have to go with pizza. I make it a lot so it’s pretty much my specialty, plus you can do so many different things with it that it never really gets old.”
That last part was key. Dante usually wound up making pizza for his sisters at least three times a week after school. It was easy to make and usually he just made up the dough and then formed into discs before stepping back and letting Felicia and Guiliana put on whatever it was they happened to be craving. He couldn’t help but think they were lucky that he really didn’t have any preference. True to his Italian nature, Dante would at least try just about anything as long as it tasted good. He and his father were the human garbage disposals in the house for sure.
Another topic struck Dante as the two made their way towards the librarian's desk, grinning slightly at the memories it brought up,
“What about cooking disasters? What’s the worst thing that’s ever happened when you were trying to make something?”
Dante’s own list of kitchen mishaps was several miles long, ranging from the simple fire in the frying pan to that one time the blender exploded and coated the entire room in blue-green goo. That had been a bitch and a half to clean up, even with his sisters helping him since they had been the ones to demand food. Regardless, Dante was interested in what Nate had to say.
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Post by Nathaniel Zsoldos on Jan 29, 2013 14:41:42 GMT -5
Hefting the book up so it didn't slip out of his grasp, Nathaniel squinted up at the ceiling. "Disasters, huh?" He mused. He, like anyone who spent any time in the kitchen, had his share of mishaps. Of course, he liked Dante, so he didn't want to give him any old "I Caught The Soup On Fire" anecdote. Nate wracked his brains for a good story to tell.
"Well," he began slowly, "It's not so much a cooking disaster as a regular one, but once I made walnut chicken for a friend who I really liked - a female friend, if you get what I mean," he said conspiratorially. "I wanted to impress her really badly. It turned out she was allergic to walnuts, and neither of us knew that until her throat began to close up." Nate sighed. "She lived, and was totally okay, but I sort of lost that chance while she was in the E.R." Nate scratched the back of his head with his free hand, embarrassed smile making its way across his face. "I think that's the worst thing that's happened because of my cooking."
Nathaniel had felt so bad - his parents had paid the medical bills, and he had apologized profusely, but although she said she wasn't mad she had stopped talking to him and the next day at school all her friends had given him dirty looks. He hadn't known, but ever since then Nathaniel had been extra vigilant about knowing people's food allergies before cooking. He wondered what had happened to the girl - he didn't even remember her name anymore. He remembered that she had a dog named Dog, which had always struck him as odd, even though she had insisted it was ironic. It was the only thing, though, and he wondered why that one detail stuck in his memory out of everything.
Shaking his head to get rid of the memory, Nathaniel turned to Dante. "How about you? Bet my story beats your worst kitchen accident," he joked, once again adjusting his grip on the book he held. Boy, it was heavier than he had thought.
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Dante Giovanni
Weapon
Demon Rapier
Among thorns grow roses.
Posts: 122
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Post by Dante Giovanni on Feb 9, 2013 19:24:14 GMT -5
Dante winced. Damn that sucked! Shaking his head, he tried very hard not to laugh, but a small snort and a retrained grin escaped him. That was terrible, he had to admit. Yeah, that would definitely ruin one’s chances with a girl. Sending your crush to the hospital: not the smoothest of moves in the slightest. Still trying not to chuckle, Dante glanced up at Nate,
“Man, that totally bites!”
It could be worse though, right? She could’ve died, that would’ve been especially terrible since Nate probably would have gone to prison. Then Dante would never have met him and he’d not have found a cooking buddy, but that was beside the point,
“I can see why that would take the cake as far as cooking mishaps though. Damn, I don’t think I’ve ever been happier that I don’t have food allergies. Cats, on the other hand…”
Ah yes, Dante’s one allergy that he truly hated. The blonde loved cats and could be in the same room as a cat, but if he happened to touch a cat…well, it usually ended in hives and sneezing and coughing and generally unpleasant experiences for him. It didn’t bug him too much, save for when the family had contemplated getting a pet when he’d been around eight years old. They hadn’t had the room for a dog back in Italy, and his sisters weren’t fond of smaller things like birds or rabbits or hamsters, so it had been a bust. Dante had honestly contemplated making it up to them one day by bringing a puppy home, but of course he’d need to ask his parents first.
His worse kitchen accident? Dante heaved out a sigh and adopted a pensive look, still smiling slightly,
“Oh yours beats mine by a long shot. I know I gave Felicia food poisoning once, but that was her own fault for eating leftovers after they’d been in the fridge for two weeks…hmmm, let’s see…”
There was the exploding microwave, the blender mishap, the pizza dough getting caught on the ceiling fan, pizza dough sticking to the ceiling, dough overflowing and seeping out of the oven, the deep fried mystery figs, the bubbling cheese creature, the fish that turned into a freezer experiment, and of course the vanishing pot roast of Christmas past. They never did figure out just how it had gotten from the oven to the top of the stairs, but needless to say someone had pulled quite the prank in going so far as to even make a face out of toothpick and olives to make the slab of meat even more terrifying. Deciding he could always regale other tales later, Dante went with the blender mishap,
“I’ve got quite a few kitchen misadventures, most of them horrifying and hilarious to some extent, but the worst had to be the blender mishap. Couple years ago, we’d just moved in and gotten everything settled. Guiliana and Felicia spend the day running around the house and tire themselves and it’s summer so it’s ridiculously hot. They bust down the door to my room and drag me into the kitchen demanding smoothies, so I of course oblige them so they don’t do anything vengeful like shave my eyebrows while I’m sleeping.”
They’d done that when he was twelve. The blonde had not been amused in the slightest,
“I get the blender set up and tell them to add whatever kind of fruit it is they want and then I’ll work my magic. Now, this was an older blender that had been slowly dying over the past few days. It would start and stop every now again at random. Unbeknownst to me, the button was stuck halfway in the on position, but I plug it in anyway. I don’t realize I until the thing’s full of fruit, at which point I dash towards it to try to fix it. Of course as I reach it, the thing buzzes to life and bam! Technicolor fruit goo all over the kitchen and my sisters and I.”
It had been a cleaning nightmare, not that Felicia or Guiliana had helped with that in the slightest. No, they’d run shrieking upstairs to wash their clothes and their hair while Dante had slaved over scrubbing the floor, walls, ceiling, and everything else clean before his parents returned home. All hell would have broken lose if his mother had seen that mess, then again she’d have fainted first before yelling at them. They were a dramatic family, but then they were Italians after all.
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Post by Nathaniel Zsoldos on Feb 16, 2013 20:03:36 GMT -5
Nathaniel laughed, not unkindly. "Classic blender blunder story," he said, grinning. "I don't envy the cleanup job you had to do, though." Nathaniel hadn't had any mishaps with the blender like that, although he guessed you could count horrible tasting protien shakes a mishap in their own way.They had by this point reached the library checkout area, and Nathaniel eased the heavy book onto the counter with a relieved sigh, although he was bummed. Dante was a fun guy. Nathaniel wouldn't have minded chatting with him more before they had to part ways. Dante was easy to talk to, especially about cooking. It was great to see other students that shared the same hobby - Nathaniel had assumed that Shibusen would be full of military types, only focused on Kishin Eggs and Witch hunts, but he was immensely relieved that this was not the case across the board.
But he'd see Dante later, when they got together to cook! The thought cheered him up. He made a mental note to actually unpack his other cookbooks - he had been at Shibusen a couple months now, and hadn't really unpacked all his boxes. Half of it was laziness, the other half was a sort of general unbelief at his situation. Sometimes he woke up and forgot he wasn't at home. To unpack all his boxes would make it scarily final, and Nathaniel wasn't quite sure if he was completely ready for that. The more he talked to the people in the school and started to understand what was going on, though, the better he felt about it. Things were less scary when you had friends around - or, at the very least, a cooking buddy.
He turned to Dante now. "Well, I don't know what your plans are, but I'm probably going to hang around here a bit longer. You said to meet at the entrance of the school after classes, right? Top of the steps?" Hopefully the plan was still on, and Dante hadn't reconsidered in the short time it took to walk to the librarian's desk.
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Dante Giovanni
Weapon
Demon Rapier
Among thorns grow roses.
Posts: 122
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Post by Dante Giovanni on Feb 22, 2013 15:06:11 GMT -5
Dante set the book he still carried upon the librarian’s desk as they reached it. Hopefully the books wouldn’t be too painful to carry around for the rest of the day. If they were he may just leave them in his locker and read them between classes. He could ask Felicia or Guiliana to carry them home, but they’d probably say no. Or demand compensation if they said yes, which he really didn’t feel like dealing with today. Dante really felt like he was at the center of some crazy underground dessert ring with them sometimes with how they always wanted bribes in the form of pastries of some sort. At least it seemed to help them all get along. Most of the time.
Hearing Nate’s words, Dante nodded and looked up at the other blonde,
“Yup, top of the steps. I won’t be hard to miss; I’ll do handstands or something to make myself more obvious.”
Doing handstands near the Shibusen steps may not have been the safest thing in the world, but Dante was likely to do it anyway if only to prove he had the skill to. Besides, he needed to practice his parkour more than he did. If he could manage to get wall walks down, everything would be ten times easier, but he just couldn’t get them right for whatever reason. Ah well, practice makes perfect and all that jazz. The librarian had checked out the books and shoved them back towards them by now. Scooped them up in her arms and wobbling a bit before regaining his balance, Dante nodded at the doors,
“Well, time for me to get back to the age old tradition of trying not to fall asleep in class. See you at the steps, Nate. Fino a quando ci rivedremo, amico mio!” ((Until next we meet, my friend!))
Was the Italian necessary? Not really, but it did add an extra air of mystery about him, or at least Dante like to think that it did. Winking at the gentle giant, the blonde trotted off towards his destination beyond the library doors. He hoped the rest of the day would be as great as meeting a new friend had. He couldn’t wait until classes ended and they could start cooking!
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