#overnightheartbeats

🌙 * ― 𝐒𝐂𝐄𝐍𝐄 𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐌𝐏𝐓𝐒: 𝐂𝐇𝐑𝐈𝐒𝐓𝐌𝐀𝐒 𝐄𝐃𝐈𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍 ( a collection of various settings for drabbles or prompts, or both!) | @overnightheartbeats

011. in the dining room building a home: a gingerbread home! decorate the home and make it one fit for a little gingerbread man.

The first – and last – time Lydia attempted to build a gingerbread house, it had been a catastrophe. Everything that could go wrong did go wrong: the house itself crumbling, pieces not staying together, icing smudged the whole thing and the candy pieces of decoration fell off. Honestly? It had looked like the wolf from the Three Little Pigs story huffed and puffed and blew the silly, little gingerbread house down. It was all so completely unlike Lydia, someone notorious for her perfectionistic ways and meticulous precision. The hours she spent dedicated to it and nothing to show for it. A complete waste of time. And so, she vowed she would never ever waste her time trying to make one again. Never. Ever.

That was… until Aaron suggested trying to build one. Lydia’s face must have said it all, her nose scrunched up, eyebrows furrowed. “Why on earth would I want to waste time doing that when you can buy one that already looks nice enough from the store?” she questioned, a not-so-subtle ploy of trying to wriggle her way out of it. Aaron had gave her a look that said, really? She wondered what else was running through his mind. Maybe something along the lines of, since when does Lydia turn down a challenge? In that moment, she knew there was no way she was escaping it. Even a small smile threatened to worm its way on to her lips. Besides, what’s the worst that could happen? He’d said. She looked at him blankly, eyes going distant as she spoke, deadpanned, “The worst thing that can happen?” A dramatic pause. “I’ll show you.” With that, she cleared her throat, picked up her phone and scrolled through until she found the photo from a good few years ago. Without saying anything else, she passed her phone to Aaron, feeling quite triumphant with herself about being determined, not going through that ordeal ever again. Her gaze fixated on him as she watched his reaction, watched as his expression swiftly changed from being puzzled, to curious and morphed into amusement. Brows arched, Lydia mirrored his face, her hands on her hips as she demanded, “What’s so funny?” Trying to conceal the laughter in her voice as she quickly cleared her throat. But she couldn’t keep a straight face for long. The sound of his laugh was contagious, his smile so wonderful and infectious. Even if she had a severe case of Resting Bitch Face, she couldn’t stop herself from cracking. So, now they were both just laughing. 

In the end, he managed to persuade her to take another shot at building a gingerbread house. “The way I see it…it can only go up from here.” Or something along those lines. Some variations of it can’t get any worse. Earning a playful roll of her eyes, but in the end, she conceded. She’d already lost some of her pride and dignity the moment she showed him her poor first attempt. But at least if this one sucked, then they would suck together. But weren’t two heads supposed to be better than one? If it had been with anyone else, she may have disagreed. Having someone under her feet whilst she was trying to concentrate on achieving perfection? Lydia would’ve ushered them away and not-so-politely told them to go away. But nope, he was persistent. They were definitely doing this.

A quick trip to the store to get everything they need, and more just because they may as well since they’re there… and there they were, diving straight into it. Lydia read out the instructions from the recipe she found on Pinterest after tons and tons of scrolling, and they took it in turns to do all that was needed to do. Getting the things out as and when they needed, she was surprised how comfortable and easy it was to adjust, shuffling around each other. It was amazing how he fit in perfectly with her. No awkwardness, no Lydia getting frustrated because something was out of place or not done to her standards - a shocker. It was all very new to her but it didn’t feel new. It was like they’d been doing this forever. Shuffling around, arms occasionally brushing against each other, smiles on their faces all around. Christmas songs faintly played from the stereo, humming along as they made the dough; humming turned into singing as they waited for the gingerbread to break, happily setting up the dining room ready for decorating. She playfully swatted Aaron’s hand when she realised he was slipping the candies meant for decorating their work-in-progress gingerbread house in for a little treat. “Enough of that, we won’t have any for the -” Until he was the one plopping a gumdrop into her mouth - she wasn’t complaining then. Another laugh tumbled from her lips as she chewed it, leaning in to kiss his cheek gently before the timer on her phone beeped. They were ready!

“Now… now is make or break,” Lydia declared when the gingerbread finally cooled. Everything already set out, ready for them to dive straight in. First, to assemble the house. Her mind cast back to her first attempt, how disastrous the whole thing went. It will be better this time. Had to be. The aroma of cinnamon and ginger filled the cosy, festive-filled atmosphere, every inhale made it all the more tempting to just give it all up and dive right in to gobbling it all up. It was like she was waiting with bated breath, any moment it could crumble and fall apart. But Aaron’s extra pair of hands made it all worthwhile. He would help her assemble the little house piece by piece, holding things in place as she brought the next part out. So far, so good. It was like they had all the time in the world, every piece fitting together felt like a gigantic milestone worth celebrating. And at some stage, Lydia definitely cracked out the bottle of wine as incentive to keep them going.

In the end, it was all worth it. She hated to admit defeat but Aaron was right; it did only go up from there. Though, the bar was pretty low to begin with. And sure, maybe it wasn’t her ideal version of perfection but the time spent with him absolutely was. Lydia placed the final piece, the marshmallow snowman outside the newly built gingerbread house before leaning back against him with a content sigh. “We did it. I can’t believe we actually did it.” A beaming smile on her face as she tilted her head to look at him adoringly, before looking right back at their little creation before them. The walls of the house were slightly uneven, a few cracks in the icing revealed glimpses of golden-brown gingerbread underneath, gumdrop windows a little askew, and licorice shingles overlapped on the roof. These imperfections which, any other time would have had Lydia fuming and threatening to smash the whole thing over the kitchen counter, were the magic and beauty of it. Perfectly imperfect. It was magical because it was theirs. It was something they built together, and it was what they had to show for it. A funky yet whimsical-looking gingerbread house. Feeling him nudge her with his elbow, a grin curved Aaron’s face as he passed her something, a brief flicker of confusion etched on to her face as she lowered her gaze to her hands, a laugh leaving her as her fingers traced the ridges of the gingerbread man - or should she say woman? - before her. “Is this supposed to be me? Wow. Impressive. And, that’s funny, actually, because…” Biting her lip to conceal a laugh or give away the reveal. She couldn’t get her head around the fact they had both been doing the same thing without the other knowing. Putting her gingerbread persona to the side, she picked up the version of Aaron she’d secretly made, laughter finally escaping as she passed it to him. “I swear I didn’t steal your idea! We just…clearly have great minds that think alike.” 

So to say it wasn’t ideal was a huge understatement. Their paperwork was all ready, her lawyer had made the call to her saying that they were meeting the next day at 3pm to sign everything. That would be it, over. Three years of marriage done and dusted. It was a shame, really. She still loved him, but the situation just was not working out between them. Her work was keeping her busy and the tension between them had grown and grown until it was too much to bear. But then this had happened. The biggest spanner anyone could have thrown in the works. 

So she had called him and asked for a meeting prior to their signing, knowing that she could not, in her heart, go through with this divorce without telling him what she knew. She stood from the chair in the small cafe she had suggested as he entered, offering a small hint of a smile before her face became more serious. 

It was well over due, their first date. Their first fake date was more proper but this whole arrangement was fake, there was no reason to put fake in front of everything. It wasn’t like they were easily going to forget what they had going was fake. Still, it was nice for them, Declan, to get away from the pressure of their engagement. So yes, while Danielle had moved in and made this whole thing even more realistic, Declan was certain to make sure they enjoyed themselves. At least a little. It was a wonder Danielle even put up with him, she was nice, but a simple no (after he asked her 5 times) would’ve been okay. If Declan didn’t know better, he’d think Danielle actually enjoyed the things he put them through. He was sure today wouldn’t be different. “Something tells me this isn’t the place to be cocky” he grinned, glancing at Dani before looking back at the adventure park. “I think we’ll definitely work up an appetite here.”