While it was a huge weight off Sören's shoulders for his lodging to be paid for by the production company of Let Them Eat Cake, which meant now he could save money for a new place to live, he still felt like he couldn't relax completely, a lingering sense that the other shoe was going to drop... a storm coming.
Sören had PTSD from growing up with his abusive alcoholic aunt and uncle - even years of Eiliv's tender loving care hadn't cured him - and Sören knew he was further traumatized by living with Justin and it was normal for someone with trauma to always expect the worst. Nonetheless, it was hard to tell himself that it was just his brain being an asshole to him and that everything was fine. He couldn't shake the feeling that something was about to go very wrong.
That feeling finally proved itself to be something more than just a symptom of trauma, and more like his gut warning him, at the next filming of Let Them Eat Cake. As he was coming out of the bathroom and preparing to head to the studio, suddenly he saw Justin running through a doorway. He did a double-take - wondering if his trauma was playing tricks on him - but their eyes met and Justin slowed down and made a purposeful beeline towards him, grinning. Sören noticed Justin's nose had been broken from when he had to defend himself a few weeks ago; Justin wasn't as pretty now.
"How the fuck did you -"
"Oh, I fought security. Big bruisers but it was worth it." Justin smelled like beer, so overpowering it made Sören want to retch. Justin had a wild, crazy look in his eyes that suggested he was on some kind of drug, too. Out of the corner of Sören's eye he saw Anthony coming out of his trailer and into the hall leading to the studio; Anthony paused as Justin moved closer, and Sören took a few steps back, heart pounding. Justin sneered. "We have some unfinished business, you and I."
"No, we don't." Sören put his hands up, preparing to run or fight. "I don't know what part of me leaving, you didn't fucking understand -"
"I understand plenty. I understand you joked about how you wanted to shag Anthony Hewlett-Fucking-Johnson a few weeks after you first moved in, and now you left and it's pretty obvious why. But you're coming home -" Justin grabbed Sören's wrist so tightly it hurt and was going to leave a bruise; Sören yelped.
Anthony strode over and shoved Justin off Sören. He quickly pulled a pager out of his pocket and pressed a button, and then he glanced at Sören, concern in his eyes. "This clown bothering you?"
"The fuck you call me?" Justin shoved Anthony back and took a swing, which Anthony ducked.
"Oh right." Anthony shoved Justin back, this time hard enough to knock Justin onto the floor. As Justin lay there on the floor, Anthony snorted and gave him a disdainful look. "My bad. Not a clown. A cuck. Isn't that right? Came here to indulge your little cuck fetish, I see? Do I make your tiny dick hard?" Not waiting for an answer, Anthony kicked Justin in the balls, then stomped on them.
As mortified as Sören was that Anthony had overheard the bit about how he was sexually attracted to him - a confession Sören wished he hadn't made, when he and Justin were still friends and talking about celebrities they had the hots for - Sören couldn't help laughing so hard his sides hurt and his eyes teared up as Justin howled with pain and Anthony gave a smug smile just before more security guards rushed in to drag Justin away.
"BITCH!" Justin screamed at Sören, and spat, even as the security guards grabbed him by both arms and kept moving. "I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU!"
Sören stopped laughing and shuddered, the pit of his stomach rising. He absolutely believed Justin would try.
For a moment Anthony and Sören just stood there, looking at each other, and then Anthony came a little closer, but not too close, as if he didn't want to crowd Sören's personal space and trigger another fear response. "I'm not going to ask if you're all right, because I know you're not."
"No," Sören admitted. "I'm not."
"OK." Anthony exhaled. "I'm going to postpone filming for an hour while I get the police here - you need a restraining order, quite frankly he needs to go to jail, and I'll make a witness statement."
"Ohgod." While Sören didn't disagree, he didn't think the contestants would take very kindly to being held up for at least an hour, which meant they'd be going home later, and he knew word would spread it was because he was talking to the police and he didn't want everyone to hate him; he already knew the other contestants didn't like him, other than Josiah and Vivian, because of jealousy, and coming from such a different background - no culinary school, just time on a cruise ship.
"He won't get past security a second time. He shouldn't have gotten past security a first time, I'm going to see to it that the ones who failed their job are fired."
"Ohgodohgodohgod." With the pandemic making jobs scarce, Sören felt like he was somehow personally responsible for a couple guys potentially going into poverty. He tried to push away the guilt - it's Justin's fault, not yours - but it was there anyway.
"Deep breaths." Anthony nodded, looking into Sören's eyes. "Police will come, we'll get a restraining order and maybe even an arrest... you'll be safe, OK?"
Sören nodded back, even though he felt like his problems were far from over.
Sure enough, the other contestants weren't happy that filming would start late - the report with the police took closer to two hours than an hour, starting with how long Sören and Anthony waited for the police to even arrive - and of course word got out that Sören had met with the police, so as the contestants proceeded to make today's round of cakes, Sören kept getting dirty looks.
That, in and of itself, would have been uncomfortable enough. Sören was used to not being liked, starting when he was the bullied smart kid who was bad at sports, and the years had not given him a "thicker skin".
Today's cake theme was mandalas - Anthony's late mother Elaine would have been seventy today and his mother had been a hippie, so the cakes were a tribute - and to add insult to injury, the meditative process of assembling and mixing ingredients together and mentally designing a cake on the spot slowed Sören's mind down enough that it kept replaying Justin showing up - so crazy from booze and whatever he had taken that he was able to fight a couple security guards and win - and threatening him... replaying the day Sören left, where Justin choked and beat him.
Sören started to feel like he was choking again. He tried to bring his focus back to the task at hand, but the red food coloring for one layer of his rainbow cake made him think of the way he'd broken Justin's nose with the frying pan, Justin's nose bleeding, and Sören's hands visibly shook, dumping way too much food coloring in the batter. He was going to have to start that layer all over again.
"God dammit," Sören yelled, then he remembered he was on camera and clapped his gloved hand over his mouth. Then he realized that wasn't sanitary and now he would need new gloves, too. "Dammit. Shit. Fuck." Hot tears stung Sören's eyes and he fought them back, not wanting to fall apart on camera. His hands shook so much as he got out new gloves that the first pair fell on the floor.
Brittany, one of the younger contestants, began giggling, not bothering to contain her amusement at one of the rising stars cracking under pressure. Sören glared and Brittany laughed harder. "Loser," Brittany taunted, making a L on her forehead.
Anthony began walking towards them, and Sören braced himself to get eliminated right then - only a few times in the history of the show had Anthony eliminated someone during the cake-making process, and he knew the way he was panicking and freaking out was unprofessional - but instead it was Brittany that Anthony turned to, looking murderous.
"You," Anthony growled softly, "are done. When one works in a professional kitchen, if you see a team member in distress, you bloody, sodding help them, you don't stand there and laugh at them. That is how a kitchen is run, you cooperate, you work together, it's not 'fuck you, I got mine', or the entire production fails. You wouldn't last thirty seconds in one of my establishments with that attitude. Goodbye, and the best of luck to you, you'll certainly sodding need it."
Brittany huffed, rolled her eyes, and threw her apron at Anthony on the way out, waving both middle fingers at him. Anthony flipped the V at her.
Then Anthony turned to Sören. "Come with me." He began to lead Sören away from the kitchen; one of the cameramen followed, rolling along. Anthony stopped and waved his arms. "Stop filming."
"Ignore him," Clive said. "This is great."
Anthony whirled around and glared at Clive, then he turned back to the cameraman. "Stop fucking filming RIGHT NOW or I WALK."
Clive made an exasperated noise then he made a chopping gesture at his throat and the red light of the camera went off; the cameraman moved back.
Anthony took Sören a few more meters away and glanced around to make sure they weren't secretly being filmed, then he pinched the bridge of his nose for a moment, looking like he was gathering his words.
Sören felt the tears brimming, overwhelmed with hot shame. "I'm sorry -"
Anthony held up his hands. "Don't apologize." Anthony cleared his throat, once again looked back at the kitchen and the cameras, and then at Sören. "I know you're having a rough time of it. What happened today was... horrific... and I feel like I should be the one to apologize for going on with the show rather than giving you a day to decompress."
"Well, that wouldn't be fair to the other contestants, coming out today for nothing -"
Anthony shrugged. "Shit happens, and we would have given everyone some money for their trouble. But... now that we're all here, I really, really need you to get it together. I don't want to have to eliminate you this round because you're losing it. The reason why I'm not is because I know what happened today, and you have all my sympathy. I can't imagine what you must have been through."
"Jaeja." Sören nodded, not wanting his pity, but where the police had seemed judgmental, he was grateful for Anthony's compassion.
Anthony narrowed his eyes. "When you said you had a 'late husband'... that wasn't trying to pretend this Justin Roberts guy is -"
"No, I actually was married, years ago, and he's dead. Died in 2011." Sören pursed his lips, and the sudden flare of irrational anger - like Anthony had been wondering if Sören was married to Justin, and that somehow cheapened what Sören had with Eiliv - finally made the tears break.
"Oh god. Oh shit." Anthony frowned. "I'm sorry. I am... so sorry."
Sören sobbed harder. He missed Eiliv so much right now. It was like rubbing salt in the wound; the great love of his life had been stolen from him all too soon by a violent bastard, and he'd eventually ended up involved with a violent bastard.
"OK. Sören. Sören. Look at me." Anthony pointed to himself. "It's OK. It's going to be OK. The police are dealing with Justin. You're safe now... and you're here, you have a really good shot of winning this but I need you to pull yourself together. I need you to try."
Sören kept crying, feeling like Anthony had asked him to do the impossible. Being ashamed of crying like this - even though he despised "stiff upper lip" macho displays - just made him cry even more.
Anthony took a deep breath. "Would you like a hug?"
Sören blinked, not able to believe what he'd just heard. It had been so long since someone hugged him; Justin didn't count. It wasn't just the pandemic, though that had intensified his loneliness. Even on the cruise ship, he'd kept people at an arm's length, he didn't have a whole lot of friends, all of whom were either in Iceland or Norway and while he kept in touch with them over e-mail, it wasn't the same as visiting them, hugging them.
As much as it was weird to be hugging someone he didn't know well, and he didn't want to be pitied, he found himself accepting a hug anyway.
Anthony's arms clenched him like a vise, and Anthony's chest was like a shield wall. Sören had seen from photos that Anthony kept in shape - he had, in fact, posed in his underwear for a magazine, and Sören had jerked off to those pictures - but it was one thing to see it in photos and another thing to feel the strength and power of his body. He wasn't a beefy giant the way Eiliv had been, he was lean and wiry, but Sören had no doubt Anthony could hold his own in a fight. And for all of his strength, he also felt like a cuddly teddy bear the way Eiliv had been. There was strength but there was gentleness and grace there, warmth and softness. Sören clung, crying on Anthony's shoulder, as Anthony rocked him a little, rubbed his back.
"It's OK," Anthony said softly. "It's all right. It's going to be OK. It's going to be all right."
Sören didn't want to let go, but he finally did, feeling like he was holding up production again, not wanting to be hated even more. They lingered, pulling back gradually, and for a moment they looked into each other's eyes. Silent tears rolled down Sören's cheeks but he wasn't a sobbing wreck anymore.
Sören was also starting to feel a little horny - now his mind's eye replayed Anthony kicking Justin in the balls and stomping on them, and Sören found that really hot - and Sören's cheeks burned as he remembered how Justin had yelled about his crush on Anthony. He hoped Anthony didn't think he was a weirdo.
"OK, now... try to calm down." Anthony waved his hand like a conductor. "Take a deep breath."
Sören did.
"Hold it."
Sören did.
"Let it out."
Sören exhaled.
"Take a deep breath. Hold it. Let it out."
After a few more deep breaths, Sören was less agitated, and feeling more ready to get back to work. Anthony clapped him on the back. "Atta boy, Sparky."
Sören narrowed his eyes, but he couldn't even be mad at the big, cheesy grin Anthony flashed him, then the little wink before Anthony stepped back into the kitchen, Sören following a few meters behind, feeling like he was carrying lead on his shoulders.
Sören went back to his table and tried to start again. He wasn't feeling it - he didn't want to try to construct a big, elaborate mandala and that meant he might very well get eliminated this round - but he was going to try.
He wasn't going to let Justin Roberts take this chance from him, he was going to fight to the end.
Today's guests were all friends of Anthony's mother, and some of his relatives on his mother's side. That made Sören feel especially nervous, but he took some more deep breaths as the guests did the walkthrough of the cakes, sampling and making observations to the camera of the taste and appearance.
Sören felt his cake was fairly plain compared to the others and he braced himself for elimination. He had gone with an aqua background and a floral mandala pattern in lines and dots of blue, yellow, teal, orange, hot pink, deep violet, the frosting covering seven layers of the rainbow, with a thin layer of aqua frosting in between.
To his surprise and relief, his cake was not the elimination. That went to Lexi, a giggly blonde thirtysomething who looked ready to cry as Anthony passed his judgment. At first Sören couldn't tell what was wrong with the cake - the top had a fiery floral sun in red, orange and yellow with black curlicues on a white background, and the sides of the cake had a lotus-and-leaf pattern in blue, purple, and green, with elaborate black latticework over red, orange and yellow borders, and then at closer look he saw what Anthony was criticizing.
"The yellow is bleeding into the white, and some green is bleeding into the blue," Anthony explained, gesturing to the little messy spots. "It was a nice idea in theory but flawed in its execution. The messiness makes it look like a tacky imitation of stained glass. You should have known when to put the frosting away. My cousin's kids can color more neatly than that."
Meanwhile, Vivian had made a cake that looked like it was, in fact, made of stained glass, a starry wheel of vibrant blue, green, purple, orange and pink, on a red background with a red center. The sides looked like they had been made out of gold.
Josiah gave Vivian stiff competition, with a matte black background on which there was a mandala made of dots in soft rainbow colors, and the layers of the vanilla cake had marbled pastel-rainbow frosting between - even the inside was pretty.
But the winner was Vivian, who grinned and gave an excited little clap as Anthony pinned another gold star to her apron.
With two eliminations today, there were twelve contestants left. Sören had survived, but he knew his cake today wasn't his best. At least there hadn't been messy spots on it, but he knew that very well could be a problem if he panicked again, with the way his hands had been shaking today.
Justin was gone, probably about to go to jail, and Sören was free. But now he had an entirely new burden to carry - Anthony knew about his crush, and that was intensely, painfully awkward. And that hug had made it even worse, Sören remembering the way Anthony's body felt against his once he was alone in his hotel room, jerking off madly as he fantasized about what it would be like to feel Anthony's naked body, to be in those strong arms as he rode Anthony into the sunset.
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