The tension was suffocating her and as if to aid herself, Daphne tugged viciously at her tie, undoing it and leaving it in disarray, a reflection of her inner most thoughts. "What's the next step? Did you pre-heat the oven? I'm pretty sure you had to preheat the oven..."

Snatching the recipe, Daphne grumbled at it, not feeling happy nor comfortable if she wasn't in some kind of control. "Says here it takes up to an hour to bake." Daphne's eyes made a shifty sort of movement before her plump lower lip became captured between her teeth.

That was going to be one awkward hour.

"Yes," Garret said in exasperation, his neck starting to cool now as Daphne started acting like herself again, "I pre-heated the oven, I'm not completely stupid, ya know?"

He put the cake mold into said pre-heated oven and then proceeded to lean his back on the counter. His feet crossed, he tucked a hand into the pocket of his robes with a secretive smile for Daphne, "I knew it was going to take a while... and in case if doesn't turn out right..." he drew out a bag of assorted sweets he'd picked up from Honeydukes over the weekend, "Here you go."

"I didn't say you were stupid, no need to be so touchy," mumbled Daphne, ignoring the flush invading her cheeks and even though her tie was completely undone, she still felt claustrophobic. As if the house elves had multiplied and the walls, kitchen utensils and all, were circling her, trying to smother her.

Pulling the tie off entirely, she ditched on the counter. Ha! He knew it would take a while? So this was all part of his plan? He was trapping here in this kitchen and forcing her to bond with him despite her wishes?!

Daphne took a deep breath and steeled herself to give him her best 'you think you're so clever' leers when he was dangling a bag of sweets underneath her nose. "HUH?!" remarked the blond dumbly before catching herself. "I mean....for me? Why? I don't like sweets," finished Daphne yet she snatched the bag from him and fumbled with the inside contents of the bag.

Garret sniggered when she snatched the bag of sweets from him, protesting the whole way, and as he watched her dig into it... he patted his other pocket to reassure himself. There was an even bigger bag of sweets there, for him later. Good thinking, G-Dawg.

"Cos..." he shrugged, "I tho' it'd be somefink nice to do, and..." he smiled sheepishly, "I didn't know what else you liked... that I could afford." That last bit was said in a lower tone so that the elves couldn't hear and then spread around the school that Garret Crocker was dirt poor.

Daphne laughed, tilting her head backwards as she pinched the bridge of her nose between her fingers. "You're so funny!" declared the girl, trying to hide her flush behind the excuse of mirth.

Garret Crocker was much more considerate than she had imagined, and the last part of her sentence didn't go by unnoticed. However, she'd ignore that. Just for him. And her. Mostly for herself.

Of course. As if she'd ever do something for Crocker's sole benefit. "You didn't have to," repeated Daphne plucking out a sugar quill and wiggling the bag in front of his face. "I'm not fond of sweets you know. You have them."

The grin that spread across Garret's freckly face was so large that the kitchen lights shone on his braces and caused him to look even crazier than he usually did, "Awww, you should keep it, I bought them for you," but even as he protested, he fished out a fizzing whizzbee, silently congratulating himself on his ingenious, fool proof plan.

He just KNEW that Daphne would reject the offered sweets.

Something didn't sit right with her and she shot Garret a sideways glance, as if detecting he was trying to deceive her. "I repeat, you really shouldn't have. I don't like sweets..."

But I'm sure you knew that already. "But now that I think of it," trailed off Daphne tapping her lips, again arching her brows in that fake innocent gesture she liked to adopt a lot. "They would make a very touching present for Celandine," finished Daphne snatching back the bag of sweets.

"No, no no no no," Garret snatched the bag back from her and held it up against his scrawny chest, "I already got her a bag for herself, this is for you."

But he continued to cradle the bag to himself. It was either Daphne kept the sweets for herself, or she gave it back to him. There was no other way he was going to release the bag into her custody.

"You know Garret," spoke Daphne with her hands on her hips, turning her face to the side slightly to better fix her really evil left eye on him better. "The way you're behaving it's like you're almost forcing me to believe that you want to keep all that candy to yourself."

Underneath her, her foot tapped against the floor at an obnoxiously rapid pace.

"Nuh... uh!" Garret protested as he forced his arms to thrust the bag towards her, "Look, keep them, okay? They're yours, but if I hear you've been sharin' my treats around with ovver people, I won't like it."

Unless the other person was him, of course, then that would be entirely acceptable. He smiled a little hesitantly, a question in his eyes, as if he too wasn't sure if he wanted her to have the sweets or not.

Startled, she took the bag of sweets clumsily holding them against her chest, forgetting to keep herself hidden behind the school robes. Round hazel eyes fixed on him, Daphne tried to detect some kind of lie or secret hidden behind those annoying freckles on him which insisted on pulling her attention away from more important things.

Impertinent little attention seekers.

"You're surprisingly bossy," commented Daphne staring down at the cluster of freckles on the tip of his nose. "And demanding!" Just in case it was dirt, Daphne reached out with a finger and gave them a good rub.

Garret's bright blue eyes followed the movement of her finger til he got a little cross-eyed, trying to see what she was doing. When it became apparent that she was only rubbing the tip of his nosie, he crinkled up the body-part in question when he felt his neck growing warm again.

"Only when it counts," he smiled that hesitant smile again and rubbed his nose for a moment, trying to get rid of the odd tingling feeling that her fingers had left.

"Hmph," was her simple response to his peculiar behavior before she turned to the counter and poured the contents of the paper bag on it. Spreading the goodies with one hand, Daphne was hard pressed to say which one was catching her eye. "We'll split them."

Feeling a nagging sense of what he suspected was guilt, Garret watched her back as she sorted through the colourful sweets he had so carefully chosen for her. "Errr..." should I tell her? "Look, Daff, I... I bought sweets for meself, so you really don't need to feel bad."

He walked over to her side and picked up a Sugar Quill which he twirled in his fingers as he bent to lean his elbows on the countertop, "If I didn't wantchoo to have 'em, I wouldn't bovvered givin' 'em t'you in the first place, ya know wot I mean?" In his normal playful way, he tickled the tip of her nose with the feathery section of the Sugar Quill.

Going by instinct, Daphne first arranged them by type, settling the sugar quills away from the round shaped things whose name she couldn't think of. "No, I don't know what you mean," replied the girl now separating them into sub-groups according to color. "In fact, what you said is rather contradictory. Did you know you do that a lot, Crocker? You contradict yourself all the time."

Wrinkling her nose, she pulled her head back away from the offending quill, one hand flying up as a shield. "Sto--I'm talking here! I don't understand you," continued Hopton sweeping the candies with one hand. "You buy them for yourself but then you tell me you don't mind if I have them? Which one is it."

"Noooo..." Garret grew exasperated now and straightened up off the counter, "I bought sweets for myself too," He pulled his larger bag of sweets out of his pocket to show her, "See? But I bought sweets especially for you, too."

He replaced the bag in his pocket and then stood there for a moment, reaching up to scratch the back of his head as he looked down at her in confusion, "Get it? S'not that hard to understand, Daff, honestly!"

Spluttering and blushing, Daphne upturned her nose, not willing to face Garret at the moment. "It's Daphne! DAFT KNEE!" protested the girl for lack of a better come back, clumsily pushing the sweets back into the bag. "No need to act all huffy," she mumbled more to herself than anyone. "You should have been clearer with your intentions in the first place."

How was she supposed to know that he was trying to court her with sweets! She didn't know! In fact, she wasn't aware Garret was a boy at all! Awkwardly, she glanced at him over her shoulder briefly before shivering. This was so weird.

"Me, acting Huffy?" Garret shot back at her, pushed past his boiling point by confusion, "You're the one getting all defensive and confusin'," He grabbed his head with both hands, and pulled the hair out slightly to get rid of the growing headache, "Look, I couldnt've been clearer: I'm givin' you sweets and I'm baking you a cake to apologize, okay?"

Apologize? Hardly! Did he think she couldn't see through his false bravado? No, in fact, she was to blame! How couldn't she not see it coming? It was only a matter of time before Garret realized all her wonderful characteristics and fell head over heels for her. She should have been more butch, and slapped on a little dirt on her cheeks to make herself look hideous for his and her sake. However, what was she to do? It wasn't her fault he fell for her. Sighing dramatically, Daphne placed a hand on her forehead.

"Whatever let's you sleep at night, darling."

DARLING?!

Garret's neck and ears grew so hot that he was quite sure they were burning a solid red at this point. His freckles probably looked like pale dots compared to the blush that had spread across his cheeks and the bridge of his nose. She was- he was- she was coming up to the wrong conclusions, and he really couldn't blame her. He was a great guy, after all, and she already had feelings for him before.

But it looked like his baking for her, and being nice had pushed all her feelings out in the open and now... now he didn't know what the hell to do with them.

Just as he opened his mouth to stutter some sort of explanation, some excuse as to why he couldn't return her feelings, a sound interrupted the silent bustle of the kitchen.

DING.

Saved by the bell, "Cake's done!"

A-ha! She was right, after all. The evident flush all over his neck was proof enough that Daphne had caught Garret in his lie. There was no point in hiding it anymore.

Garret was in love her.

Oh, what a cruel cruel joke! The world was out to get her. It's not funny, Big Guy. Not funny at all.

"Cake," repeated Daphne dully, wondering how she was going to handle this. It was better to put a stop to it now before it got ridiculous. Last thing she needed was Garret dressing up in Shakespearean' costumes, reciting lines from Romeo & Juliet or belting out tunes of old wizarding ballads by Celestina Warbeck. "Garret," she began, using his first name carefully. "There's something we need to talk about."

It'll be alright, Daphne. Just break it to him softly.

Garret had popped the oven mittens on and was bending over to peer through the glass oven door, his hands on his waist, when Daphne spoke up behind him. It was a good thing he was facing away from her, or else she would have taken offence and cried or something at the wince that resulted from her words.

"Erm," he replied, still staring intently at the cake in the oven, "No, there isn't."

This was clearly going to be tougher than she thought. Drawing circles on the tabletop of the counter, Daphne hummed surreptitiously, wondering how to go about breaking Garret's little heart. Poor baby. "Are you sure? Because, you know...I think--there's something I need to tell you, and I'd much rather prefer it if you were looking at me instead of the bloody inside of the oven, thanks."

How rude! Here she was, trying to figure out a way not to completely destroy him emotionally and all he could do was avoid her gaze like a cowardly crup puppy!

CRUP PUPPY!

Sienna watched the two intently, sitting cross-legged on the floor now as she tried to listen to their conversation. What the hippogriff were they talking about? However, her short (for the moment) attention span was distracted by the mention of cake.

CAKE!

Her navy blue eyes watched very closely as she had another handful of chocolate chips, and her stomach did double cartwheels as she stared in agony at the luscious-looking cake, a reminder of home-made sweets from back home. Not the insta-mix stuff her sister made for her boyfriend, but the stuff made from scratch.

Oh, how she'd love to have even just a tiny spoonful of that cake.

Deciding that the time was right to pull the cake out and not have it fall flat, Garret pretended to ignore Daphne's insistence that they talk about her feelings for him. He was biting the inside of his cheek to keep from dying of mortification or blurting out to her that no, he did not feel the same way for her as she did for him.

But all he did was pull the oven door open and extract the cake. The wonderful smell of freshly baked chocolate rose from the warm oven and continued to waft around him, til all he could do was sigh happily.

He finally turned around to face her, the cake in his hands and an excited gleam in his eyes, "Look, Daff, let's just pour the chocolate icing and decorate it with strawberries!"

And hopefully forget that you want to pour your heart out to me.

He seized on the opportunity that the Ravenclaw provided by being there, "D'you wanna help?"