Thank you for all the comments on the last chapter, I honestly love reading you guys' comments, they make my day :D
When I get up for work the next morning, the house is quiet. I can hear snores coming from Tris's room so I assume that neither him or Brad are even close to being awake yet. I find my mum in the kitchen unloading the dishwasher.
"Morning" I say, going over to the cupboard to make some breakfast.
"Oh, Ella sweetheart" my mum chirps, turning her attention to me, "I've got a job for you today"
"Doing what?"
"I want you to use your artistic talents" she smiles, "to design a new cupcake for the shop"
"I thought you were going with that raspberry one with the white chocolate"
"I want something that appeals to kids" she explains, "to bring more families into the cafe"
"Okay" I nod. Sounds like it will be quite a fun task.
"So Phil and Brittany are gonna help me with the cafe so could you stay here and keep an eye on Millie whilst you work? I don't trust Tris and Brad to keep her out of trouble, you know what they're like when they're together"
"Sure"
"Just play around with some ideas, see what you come up with"
When everyone leaves to go to the cafe, I grab my sketchbook and take it to the kitchen to start brainstorming. My initial ones include glitter and rainbows and popping candy, which I then sketch up a few prototype designs with. Then I get a bit carried away and start thinking of extravagant designs with galaxy-fied buttercream and unicorn horns made out of ice creams cones; my sketchbook looks like a stereotypical teenage girl's tumblr page. I mean, they look pretty cute but I'm not sure if practically they'd work, given that we'd have to make them from scratch and they need a lot of time and effort. And so I decide to consult Millie.
"Millie, what kind of cupcake would you like Mum to sell?"
"A rainbow one, with glitter!" She exclaims, "or a unicorn one!"
I sigh, "yeah, no, they're a bit over-aspirational, what do kids like?"
She gives me a few good starting points like Pokemon and Star Wars and Marvel so I create a few designs based off of those with her help. Then I have a nosy through her room to see if I can get any more inspiration. I don't really find much until I discover a box of her old toys underneath my bed. There's a lot of crap in there; Barbie dolls with missing arms and lone pieces of Lego. However, I do come across a set of small Disney dolls, one of each princess and it gives me an amazing idea of how I can incorporate them into the cupcakes. I grab all of them and then take them into the kitchen to start working on the designs.
I get so engrossed in my work that three hours later, the kitchen is a mess of mixing bowls, ingredients and baking trays filled with cupcakes, and I'm partway through icing my creations. I've made a hole in the top of each cupcake, pushed one of the little dolls in it and then iced the top of the cupcake to look like a dress. They look pretty cute and I'm proud of my work so far.
"Woah, what happened in here?"
I look up to see Tris and Brad stood in the doorway as they take in the mess of the kitchen. I glance and realise just how much mess I've made. There's a plethora of kitchenware just scattered about the countertops. There's approximately six bowls of buttercream that are filling the table in front of me, each containing a different coloured buttercream for each doll's 'dress'.
The six different colours were definitely not needed but I made them all anyway.
"It looks like they filmed an episode of The Great British Bake Off in here" Tris says, laughing at his own joke. I just roll my eyes and carry on with my icing as the two of them come in the kitchen to most at what I'm doing.
"Aw, have you made these, El?" My brother asks, pointing to the five cupcakes sat on a plate near me that I've already finished, "they look cute"
I can't disagree. So far I've made Cinderella, Sleeping beauty, Princess Jasmine, Rapunzel and Ariel, and for each one, I experimented with a different technique of icing them with the buttercream to represent different textures of the dresses. Then I sprayed each 'dress' with a light layer of edible glitter. They look pretty adorable.
"Mum's asked me to design a new cupcake for the cafe" I tell him absentmindedly as I focus on finishing the delicate yellow swirls of Belle's dress.
"They look good" I hear him say, and I glance up to see him picking one up.
"Put it down" I say sternly, before pointing over to a plate of cupcakes that I hadn't decorated yet, "there's some spares cakes over there, you can have some of those"
Thankfully, he puts Sleeping Beauty back down and grabs a couple of the plain cupcakes. He hands one to Brad and then scoops up a large dollop of buttercream onto his.
"Mm, they taste pretty good, El" he mumbles through a mouthful of cupcake, "I'll go take one to Millie" he says, before grabbing another cupcake. He completes the same procedure he had done to his by scooping up the buttercream, before leaving the kitchen.
I realise that means Brad and I are alone again and this never usually ends well, especially with his recent bouts of flirting.
He sits down on the table adjacent to me as I start to spray Belle's dress with a light coating of gold glitter. Then I place her on the plate next to the other princesses.
"Can I have a go at one?" Brad asks. I stare at him blankly, "please, I'll try really hard to make it look nice"
I sigh, "fine, you can do Tinkerbell"
I hand him the cupcake in which I've already placed the Tinkerbell figure in and the icing bag filled with green buttercream. He grabs the bag, obviously a little carelessly as a large dollop of buttercream squirts out of the nozzle and onto the crotch of Brad's black jeans.
"Shit" he mumbles whilst I snort with laughter. I watch as he tries to scoop it up with his finger but there's still remnants of green buttercream smeared across his jeans.
I laugh harder.
"Hey, shut up" he tries to be angry but I can see him trying to hold back a smile, "I'm not a bloody professional cake decorator, am I?"
"Good job, isn't it?" I grin as I take Snow White and the same yellow buttercream that I used for Belle to start on her dress. Just as I'm icing the first strands of dress, a hand comes into my line of vision and cheekily smears buttercream across my cheek.
I look up at Brad with a deadpanned stare to see a large grin on his face.
"You shouldn't have laughed at me!" He argues, the smile never leaving his face.
"You're a dick" I mutter before turning my attention back to my work. He chuckles and I glance up after a few moments to see him concentrating as he tries to ice Tinkerbell's dress, the tip of his tongue poking out of the corner of his mouth. Not going to lie, it's a pretty adorable sight.
Whilst he's not looking, I take the opportunity to swipe the buttercream off my cheek and quickly smear it in Brad's hair. He grabs my wrist but it's too late.
"Fuck"
"Don't give it if you can't take it" I state matter-of-factly.
"I only washed my hair this morning" he pouts.
"Even better"
"I think you have a thing for my hair" he says, rolling his eyes.
"Eh?" I ask, confused at what he's talking about.
"Remember that time you said I had nice hair-"
"-I said quite nice-"
"- and evey time we make out, your hands are all up in there" he says, way too casually for what he was saying, before he adds with a smirk, "not that I'm complaining"
I just ignore him and ice Snow White's dress, pretending that he's not openly talking about us making out.
"It's cool, I get a lot of compliments on my hair" he shrugs, "I understand your affinity for it"
Ignore him, Ella.
"You can touch it again if you want" he says innocently, but if I look up, I know he'll have that smug grin plastered across his face.
Ignore him.
"We can make out again if you want" he continues, leaning closer to me, "and you can play with my hair all you like"
Do not let on that you like his hair.
"Her name is Ella" he starts to sing to some random tune, "and she likes to pretend, that she don't wanna make out with me again, even though she does, 'cause she fancies me so much-" he cuts himself off as he starts to laugh at himself, "that was good, don't pretend you didn't like it"
"Is that the song?" I smirk, looking up to see him looking a little confused, "Millie said you wrote a song about me"
He looks stumped at that, his mouth hanging open a little and I think I've managed to make him speechless. I smirk.
"That shut up you up, didn't it?"
"Millie shouldn't have told you that"
"Millie's loyalties lie with me" I tell him, "so I suggest you don't tell her things that you don't want me to know"
"Noted" he nods before we fall into a slightly awkward silence. Brad opens his mouth to say something, then changes his mind and let's out a very awkward laugh. I raise my eyebrows at him as I wait for his comeback.
"... I... I didn't... it's not... just..." He trails off, before quickly exclaiming, "hey, you drew a picture of me so..."
"I draw a lot of people" I shrug, turning back to icing the cupcake. It's quiet for a few moments.
"... Ella?" He says quietly, and I look up at him expectantly, "you know that I really li-"
"So Millie loves her cupcake" Tris announces as he waltzes in the kitchen, interrupting Brad unknowingly, "and now she wants another one"
I watch as Brad sighs and looks down at the table,
"Where are the cupcakes?" Millie exclaims as she bounds into the room and takes my attention away from Brad, "ooh!" She coos as she spots the Disney princess cupcakes and wanders over, standing in between where Brad and I are sat, "they're so cool, Ella"
"Thanks" I smile.
"Apart from that one" she adds, pointing at Brad's half-finished attempt of Tinkerbell.
"Hey, that's mine" Brad pouts, looking at her. With him being sat at the table, she's at the same height as him.
Not that Brad's that tall anyway.
"It isn't very good" she tells him, making Tris and I laugh.
"It's not finished" he argues.
"You should stick to singing," she says bluntly, and Tris snorts with laughter.
"Savage, Mil"
"You are literally a mini version of your sister," Brad tells my sister.
"She gets more and more like me everyday" I gush dramatically, "soon she'll be graffiti-ing cars and threatening to stab people, I'm so proud"
"You graffiti-ed someone's car?" Millie questions, raising an eyebrow at me.
"Shh," I say, holding my pointer finger over my lips.
"Come on then," Brad says as he pulls Millie into his lap, "You can finish it off for me"
She grabs the icing bag and starts to pipe Tinkerbell's dress in the way that my mum has shown her so many times over the years.
"When you get shown up by a ten-year-old" Tris snorts.
"Tris, you're not very good at icing either so you've got no room to talk" Millie fires back, making Brad let out a surprised laugh. I just smile at how she's growing up to be just like her big sister.
* * * * * * *
Whilst Brittany's still at work, I take the time to get a look at the state of my room. I don't care what anyone says but it's still my room and it has been since the day I was born. I have every right to be possessive over it, even if it's being used as some sort of ferret hutch.
I open the door slowly before I take a good look at the inside. Since the last time I've seen it, everything looks pretty much the same but it's all amplified. It's more pink, more girly and smells even more of Brittany's nasty perfume. There are more pink, fluffy pillows scattered across the bed and more bloody hair extensions lying about the place and worst of all, more posters of Brad fucking Simpson pasted across the walls.
It's virtually unrecognisable that it was once my room.
Suddenly, I hear footsteps behind me and before I can even look to see who it is, a pair of hands curl around my shoulders.
"Wow" Brad says in a playful tone and I don't even have to look behind at him to know that he's smirking, "I love your room, Ella, it's all pink and fluffy, very you"
"Hilarious" I mutter, trying to push his hands away.
"Wait, is that..."
Fuck's sake. He's fucking seen them.
"Oh my god" he breathes, letting out a short laugh.
"I didn't put them up" I say flatly.
"Wow, Ella" he says with an obvious smirk in his voice, "I knew you had a thing for me but I didn't think it was this serious"
"Fuck off" I scoff, turning around to face him, "you know full well that it wasn't me that put them on the wall"
He stares at me with a smirk tugging at his mouth, his face just inches away from mine.
"I'm flattered"
I huff and give him a shove away from me but he just chuckles to himself.
"Now Ella, don't hyperventilate" Brad grins as he steps around me and into my room further, "but Brad Simpson is stood in your room"
"I wish he wasn't" I deadpan, making him laugh, "I'm so glad I didn't have to sleep in here last night, having twenty Brad Simpson's watching you isn't the most relaxing experience"
"I don't like that one" he adds, pointing to the largest poster that is stuck above my bed, "his eyes follow you around the room"
"Do you find it weird?" I ask him genuinely, "that people like you so much they stick pictures of you on their walls?"
"Well, I don't normally get to see inside the bedrooms of fans," he tells me, before jokily adding, "after seeing this, I'm kinda glad" he sighs, "I guess the whole 'fans' things isn't something that a lot of people can relate to"
"Yeah" I muse, "I can't relate to being a fan of you either"
"You're a big enough fan of me to make out with me" he smirks, the grin widening on his face as I initially have no comeback. He raises his eyebrows as he waits for my excuse.
"...was that you?" I come up with, "I was drunk, I thought you were..." I rack my brains to think of someone with brown curly hair, "Harry Styles"
"You weren't drunk the second time"
"Says who?" I joke.
"Ella!" I hear what sounds like my mum call from downstairs, telling me she must be home. I thank her internally because I really didn't want to have to keep talking to Brad about us making out. It might have ended in us making out again and I'm not sure whether that would have been good or bad. Well, I'm sure it would have been good, which is bad.
"Yeah?" I call back, hearing footsteps coming up the stairs. I pop my head around the door and see her reach the landing.
"Hi sweetheart" she smiles, "how's your day been? Did you come up with anything?"
"Yeah, I had loads of ideas and then I made some experiment cupcakes" I explain, "they're in the kitchen if you wanna have look"
"Oh, thank you, love" she beams, "I really appreciate it, honestly, and I've added your hours to the time sheet so that you'll still get paid for your time"
"Cool" I nod, not arguing with her.
"Anyway, I'll- oh, hello Brad" she cuts her self off as Brad obviously emerges from the room behind me. She's looking between me and Brad confused, yet whilst still trying to hide a smirk, "erm..."
And that's when Brittany comes upstairs and sees the same thing; Brad and I stood in the doorway of her room. She's doesn't look pleased.
"Hi" he says, cool as a cucumber, "Ella was just showing me her room"
"My room" Brittany says quickly. Brad ignores her.
"Ella was just showing me her posters" he adds, looking at my mum but aiming the comment at Brittany. I roll my eyes, but Brittany's face turns a deep shade of pink.
"They're not mine" she quite clearly lies, "they're my friends'"
"Of course they are" he smiles, but I can hear the slight patronising quality to his voice. Honestly, why couldn't he have been like this when she came to visit the flat? Life is so much easier now that he sees what an idiot she is.
And then he waltzes off downstairs, leaving Brittany scowling at me. My mum raises her eyebrows at me.
"What?"
"You and Brad..." she says, still trying to hide her smirk. I pull my face.
"Ew, there's no me and Brad-"
"Ella!" Brittany cuts me off, "don't you think it was a little rude to invite a boy into my room without permission?"
I roll my eyes again. If my mum wasn't stood here, I'm sure Brittany would have started screaming and tried to pull my hair out again.
"It's my room, I don't need your permission" I reply, "anyway, it's not my fault you've made it into a Brad Simpson shrine"
"It's not a shrine!" She snaps, before remembering that my mum is here and composing herself, "it's isn't a shrine"
"Well, I'm sure he thinks it's a shrine so good luck with that"
She glares at me and then struts around me and into her room, giving me a small shove (that I'm sure would have been much more forceful without the presence of my mother) so she can shut the door. I pull a face at the wood even though she can't see and then look back at my mother who is still watching me with that smirk on her face.
"So you and Brad were hanging out in your room?" She asks.
"No!" I groan, "he barged in because he's a knob, anyway, come and look at my cupcakes" add, walking to the stairs quickly.
"Alright" she smirks as she follows me, "we can talk about it another time"
Yeah, like that'll happen.