[paris] what's inside | maddie

sugar, butter, flour

Brita's Portkey to Paris had been an old can of baking powder, which she thought seemed appropriate for going to meet Maddie in Paris. She'd gotten directions from both Maddie and Ben, but she'd gotten sidetracked by taking a detour through the charming little Passage des Panoramas. She knew herself well enough by now to suspect that this might happen--Brita couldn't resist the beckoning of that kind of open archway--and had allocated an extra hour and a half before she was due to meet the younger girl. Despite that, though, she was only a few minutes early by the time she finally pushed open the door to the bakery, shutting the door behind her quickly.

It had started to snow a little while she was walking; a few tiny flakes swirled in in her wake, although the clouds were still thin. Brita's first impulse was to breathe deeply, sugar and vanilla and fruit blended to intoxication. Brita counted a few bakers among her cousins, but from what Ben had told her about his sister's work, Maddie was in a different kind of league, with the professional training and drive to have made it to the point of running the kitchen of this bakery already, at her age. It was a different kind of ambition to Ben's, but she thought it maybe came from the same place.

Ben. Thinking about the recent developments in their relationship brought a warm feeling to her chest and smile to her face as she unzipped her coat in the warmth, exposing her bright coral jacket underneath. It was still early days in the romantic part of their history, but it felt a lot like it did before, just...more real. Without the uncharacteristic undercurrent of nerves beneath their encounters, Brita was freed up to be more herself. Ben was so familiar, someone she'd known off and on for over half her life. She knew just how he reacted to her. It was natural to imagine him forward in time, too.

The young woman at the counter smiled at her and asked her something she couldn't understand in French. Hazarding a guess that it was something along the lines of 'can I help you,' the English witch smiled apologetically. "Oh, um," she paused, looking for words. "I'm just meeting Maddie?" Was that a nickname in France? "Madeline?" Brita gestured towards the door which she assumed was the kitchen, hoping enough of her meaning got across. Bending closer to the display case anyway, her eyes lingered on a rose macaron. "This looks amazing, though," she said out loud to herself.

Her face lit up when Maddie appeared, and she straightened up instantly. "Hey," she said, deciding to go for the hug. They'd met the one time before, and Brita was a touchy person. And maybe, just maybe, Maddie could be her sister someday. Brita had sisters and cousins that were like sisters, but Skye and Petra and Liv were older than her and Freya was still like her kid sister. Maddie might fall somewhere in between. "This is amazing, you know," she exclaimed, throwing her arms out to gesture at the whole bakery. "I'm so glad I could come see it."

Adjusting her coat in preparation for going outside again, she smiled at the other woman. "So where to?"

"Allez savoir porquoi!"

The colloquial French phrase that was said in a very English accent belonged to a tall girl who had thrown her hands up in despair, showering herself with icing sugar. She didn't know why. It was anyone's guess why the bride had decided to casually pop by and announce that she'd decided to change her entire wedding colour scheme.

The original, pale pink, mint green and soft grey, was a dream. The little macarons would look like a pastel paradise, all boxed up and gorgeous. But no. Aimee, the bride from the depths of Hell, told them that she now wanted red and blue. Not jewel tones, actual brights. Maddie wanted to scream. She wanted to shake her bride, tell her that she was making a mistake. She had enough to deal with. She had Emilie's upcoming nuptials and she still didn't have a date. How could she not find one single, relatively nice, unattached man in the city of love?

Speaking of love, she was meeting with her brother's new girlfriend and that alone took the edge off her rage. Brita and Ben had been hovering around each other for months and while it was really cute at first, she and her parents had taken bets on when they'd admit feelings and get their act together. Christmas must have been some sort of a catalyst.

Maddie genuinely liked Brita. Ben was happier, brighter and less stressed out. She didn't feel jealous, at least not as much as she thought she might. She hadn't had a relationship since Ernie and it wasn't for a lack of trying. Madeline had been on blind dates, group dates, even asking people out in bars and clubs and restaurants. The Continental way of dating was still a bit weird to her, despite calling Paris her home for two years. If a man was "dating" you, he was also "dating" three other girls. At the same time.

She heard someone say her name, the proper way. Everyone called her Madeleine, the French way. Like the biscuit. Maddy-len, not maddy-lyne. The tall witch changed swiftly in the back, assuring her coworkers not to make the cupcakes for Aimee's wedding just yet because she had a feeling that the bride would change her mind yet again.

Brita seemed entranced by the cakes and Maddie felt a swell of pride as she grinned. Contrary to popular belief, they weren't made with magic. Blood, sweat and tears went into them. Madeline had learned to bake properly and magic was really only used if the cakes were massive or had special details (sparkles, glitter, levitation, ice cream cakes that remained frozen for hours.)

"Hi!" She exclaimed as she looped her arms around Brita and gave her an affectionate squeeze back. Maddie didn't have a sister and even knowing Brita peripherally seemed to  fill a hole that she didn't know she had. "Thank you so much," she said primly, two spots of colour high on her cheeks as she flushed. Madeline was still getting to grips with the massive chance Loren had taken on her. The bakers weren't her staff and she didn't refer to them as such. She was no better and no worse than the people around her, they were a team, a family.

"You know you're welcome any time," she told Brita warmly, making a note to box up some new stuff that she could take home to Ben. When asked where to, she grimaced. "I'm having a nightmare," Madeline confessed as she held the door open for Brita to exit, turning to blow a kiss off her gloves to the fellow bakers before sliding on her sunglasses. Paris had changed her, emotionally and physically. "Chic" was a word that was banded about a lot here but she'd most definitely shed her school girl image. Gone were the hair ribbons and mad curls and in their place were tailored trousers and whatever the heck a chignon was.

"A friend of mine dropped a bombshell. She's getting married in a week," Maddie explained to Brita as they began to walk down the street, snow swirling in their wake. "I didn't even know she was engaged. He turned up, having gone missing for like a year," she blabbered. If she was going to be honest, she was worried about Emilie's safety. She hadn't even met this man and she was gung-ho-ing this entire thing at warp speed. Maddie wasn't sure she liked him at all.

"I don't have a date or a dress," Madeline huffed, angrily shoving her hands into her chequered trousers and almost dislodging her precariously balanced coat. "And I'm making their cakes and I'm really stressed and I'm starting to flap." Paris was full of boutiques where she could theoretically buy a dress…if she was willing to sell a kidney to cover the cost. "Do you know any single guys?" She fired at Brita promptly, accidentally putting her on the spot. "Could you bribe a cousin?"

Brita's grin overflowed as she felt Maddie squeezing back. There was a deep down rightness that she felt, like it was a piece of what her life could be falling into place. Were things really just going to be this easy? Merlin, she should have said something months ago! Years, maybe--no, that was a little too much, but with the way things were going it was easy to wish for every day she could get.

Her face twisted into a sympathetic wince at the word 'nightmare,' followed by widened eyes and a little drop of the jaw as the younger woman elaborated. "She what? Merlin, that's insane. First, why on earth would you only want a week to plan your wedding, and second, why would you marry someone you hadn't seen in a year?" Her brow furrowed as she imagined what she would say if any of her cousins tried something like that. "My family would full-on riot," she said matter-of-factly, as if familial opinion was enough to settle these kinds of things. With the Tricketts, in some cases, that wasn't actually wrong. "Actually, one of us would probably have tracked him down eight months ago for being a colossal jerk, but I'm guessing her family isn't like ours," she said, laughing at the idea. Very few families were like theirs--maybe the Regans, but the Irish clan had a sort of different flavor. She hoped Ben didn't think they were too crazy. There wasn't anything about him that would bother anyone, after all--he was basically the ideal fit.

"Okay, okay, one thing at a time," she said, her voice taking on a hint of the four-year-old-swallowing-water-for-the-first-time voice without veering too far into being patronizing. "That is indeed a total nightmare but it sounds doable. See," she grinned, "I'm secretly a terrible procrastinator and I usually get away with it." She started to tick off items on her fingers. "I have seen proof that the cakes will be amazing no matter what, so count that one in the bag." One. "Can we get a dress today? Do you have any dresses we could get altered a bit and freshened up into practically a new dress, if that's cheaper?" Two. "And I have buckets of single cousins, and probably "a trip to Paris" would do the trick for some of them." She took a breath, trying to think through her cousins like a catalog. "Arick, maybe? I think he was your year, Gryffindor? Little bit of a hothead, I dunno if I'd recommend him for long-term partnership, but he'd probably survive the night without offending anyone since it's a wedding--if you can put up with him maybe thinking you're a goddess come to earth," she said cheekily. Three.

"Actually, you could ask my brother too. Were you friends in school?" Jesper had been a Hufflepuff in their same year. "I know he fell off the radar since he ran off to Brazil for a while, but he's been back in England for a few months. Or maybe you can convince your friend that this is a bad idea, that might count for all three," she wiggled all three fingers before dropping them. It really seemed like the second thing would be the easiest thing to address today, but Brita was okay trying to wingwoman in a strange French-speaking city if it came to that too.