[Team 1] Wine a Little

[green-eggs101.livejournal.com]

roughly 2700 words of a self indulgent au where Riku works at a wine store and Sora needs to learn how to taste wine for his final project in culinary school. pairing sora/riku, rating: T? M-ish due to alcochol?

“Your wish is my command,” Riku said, trying to disguise his grimace as he pulled the requested wine off the shelf.

It wasn’t that it was a terrible wine, exactly. A simple white blend that would have easily fit into anyone’s idea of stereotypical “wine flavor.” But it wasn’t too many steps above 3 buck chuck one would get at the convenience store.

But what the customer wants, the customer gets. No matter how many times Riku has tried to encourage them to at least try a rosé.

So instead he filled the bag with six bottles, rang the customer up, and waved as she left, pleased with her purchase. Letting out a sigh, Riku leaned against the counter, checking his watch for the fifth time that hour.

He still had three more scheduled hours. And that didn’t include the wine tasting. If the usual crowd showed up tonight, that would be another 1-2 hours tacked on.

He groaned, rubbing his eyes as the bell above the door rang, indicating another customer. “Hi, welcome to the Wine Key, how can I— Sora?!”

“Riku!”

Sora practically lept at the counter, placing both hands on the marble surface and leaning in close. His black chef coat was half unbuttoned, a sauce of some kind already staining the sleeve. Riku thought he saw a small fleck of the same sauce up near Sora’s eye, and he clenched his fist to stop himself from reaching out and wiping it away.

“Riku! What does wine taste like?”

Riku blinked in confusion, “Excuse me?”

“For my final project,” Sora exclaimed, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a crumpled piece of paper. “Chef Remy is assigning me to do a wine and food pairing. I have to match a four-course meal up to four wines of our choosing, but I don’t know wine at all! I don’t know what it’s supposed to taste like, so how can I match food up with it?! What even goes with wine?!!”

Riku reached out, grabbing Sora’s hand, the one that was holding the crumpled up paper tightly. “Hey… calm down. Let me see…”

He gently pried the paper from Sora’s grasp as Sora leaned against the counter and caught his breath. Flattening it out, Riku read the assignment aloud.

“Final project: pair up a four-course meal with four wines (one for each course). Wines should include different varietals of grapes.’ That doesn’t sound too hard,” Riku said.

“Riiikuuu…” Sora groaned, talking more to the marble countertop than to Riku. “Pairing food with any kind of drink isn’t necessarily easy. And I don’t even know wine! Not really…”

Sora raised his head to stare up at Riku with his big blue eyes and Riku swallowed around his dry throat.

Even after all these years, Sora’s eyes could still get his heart racing like it did when they were teens.

And unfortunately, the baby blue eyes were something that Riku always had trouble saying no to.

Not that he wanted to say no.

“Of course I’ll help you,” Riku said, reaching out to ruffle Sora’s hair since he couldn’t cup his face like he wanted to do. “I’m still surprised that after all these years in culinary school, your only wine experience has been your grandmother’s paopu wine on Christmas.”

“And that strawberry wine. Remember?”

Riku froze where he had been about to pull Sora out a glass.

He hoped Sora had forgotten all about that night with the strawberry wine. Riku wished he could forget about that night with the strawberry wine.

“Riku?”

Riku swallowed around his dry throat and finished his task, pulling ou the glass and passing it towards Sora before heading to the wine chiller and pulling out a white blend, a pinot grigio, and a chardonnay. “Yeah, well… this is a little better than that convenience store strawberry wine.”

Sora chuckled. “I’ll be the judge of that.”

Riku grinned, hoping it hid his nerves. “Do you even remember what that wine tasted like? You guzzled it down so fast, I wasn’t sure if you were even tasting it.”

“My tastebuds will remember,” Sora huffed, watching as Riku poured the pinot grigio first.

“So what do you know about wine?” Riku asked, pushing the glass over.

Sora furrowed his brow. “It’s… alcoholic?”

“And?”

“It’s made from grapes?”

Riku chuckled, pouring himself a glass. “Well, you got that right. It’s made from fermenting grapes. And other fruits as well on occasion. Different grapes will give you different varieties of wine.”

“So… white wine is made from white grapes?” Sora took a sip of pinot grigio and wrinkled his nose (adorably) at the taste. “Is red wine made from red grapes?”

“Uh… yeah, but it’s not the grape juice that makes them red. But rather the grape skins.” Riku turned the bottle of the pinot grigio around so Sora could see the back of the label. “So when wine tasting, you’re looking for appearance, aroma, taste, and finish. So first is appearance. What color is the wine?”

Sora looked closely at the wine. “White.”

Riku chuckled. “Okay, yeah, but it’s also a little yellow right? Is it golden yellow or—”

“You don’t wanna know what kind of yellow I think it is.”

Riku covered his mouth with his hand to hide his laugh this time. “Sora!”

“Riku!” Sora laughed, a flush coming to his face, though Riku was sure he couldn’t be tipsy already off of one sip of wine. “Okay, okay, it’s like… yellow-greenish? But mostly clear.”

Riku nodded, pulling another glass out and pouring a chardonnay. “And this one?”

“Definitely more like… gold. Like a block of cheddar cheese. Or yellow squash.”

Riku grinned, showing off the chardonnay’s label, an image of a beautiful golden flower and the words ‘Corona Cellars - Happily Ever After Chardonnay.’ “That’s a good comparison! Now, smell the wine in your hand.”

Sora’s brow furrowed in confusion but he leaned into his glass, taking a big whiff. “Woah! There’s like… peach? Apricot maybe? and... “

Riku took a sip of his own glass as Sora sniffed the wine again, closing his eyes as he tried to figure out that last scent. Sora was always cute when he was trying to figure something out, his eyebrows furrowed up and he would tilt his head on occasion. Riku took a sniff of his own, heartbeat speeding up as nostalgia wafted over him.

“Strawberries!” Sora exclaimed. “That’s it!”

Riku nodded. “Now taste again, and this time taste it slowly. Do you taste all the things you smell?”

Over the next hour, Riku took Sora through all of the wines he had open for customers to taste, laughing as Sora’s wrinkled nose of dislike appeared after every first sip of wine (especially at the darker zinfandel from Pumpkin King Wineries.) But by the end, Sora had a better idea of how to approach his project and was writing diligent tasting notes on each wine and ideas for a few pairings. By the end, Riku figured that Sora deserved a small treat and pulled out a bottle of sweet rosé Moscato.

“This one had a second fermentation with peach juice, so…”

“Oooh sounds tasty!” Sora held out his wine glass. His cheeks were flushed from the alcohol now and his smile only got bigger with each sip.

Riku poured Sora and himself a glass. Sora did everything Riku taught him, holding it up to the light to see the color (a very soft pink), took a deep breath to smell it (definitely peaches, but also a bit floral), and tasted it slowly, holding it in his mouth for a moment before swallowing.

“Oh, I like this! This would be really good with some grilled peaches and cream. Or a bit of angel food cake? Definitely something with cream, or…” Sora trailed off as he wrote down his pairing ideas.

Riku watched, a soft smile overcoming his face. “You really like cooking, don’t you? I remember when you couldn’t make a grilled cheese without burning it.”

Sora paused in his writing, looking up. “Yeah! It’s really fun to put different ingredients together, especially ingredients you don’t think should go together, but really, really do! And it can be challenging, but… I enjoy it. Especially studying under Chef Remy. I learned to scavenge the nearby forest for local foods and grow my own food. It’s really cool!”

Riku listened while Sora talked, just enjoying seeing Sora so excited about the profession he had wandered into. Riku loved listening to Sora talk about his passion for cooking, discovered while at his first job bussing tables at the Twilight Town bistro, then going to culinary school with the encouragement of Chef Remy. Riku could only wish he had that same confidence in such a wayward approach to life. Instead, he had gone to college because it was expected of him, had gone to law school because it was expected of him, and now—

“I’m sure you felt the same when you quit law school to go to wine school,” Sora said, leaning in again till their faces just inches apart. “It’s amazing that your wine school was so close to Twilight Town! I missed you when you went to college.”

Riku felt his face heat up with something that wasn’t caused by the alcohol and he leaned back, rubbing the back of his head. “Yeah, amazing… and I missed you too.”

Sora laughed, taking another sip of wine. “You left after that night. With the strawberry wine… Felt like you were running away from the islands.”

Riku glanced away, taking a sip of his own wine. He remembered stole kisses that tasted like strawberries, whispered confessions that didn’t seem real in the morning light. Especially with the hangover. Then going home and quickly packing before leaving for college that afternoon. He didn’t look back, scared to death of what he would find.

Of what Sora would think of him after the hangover wore off.

“I kind of was. Sorta.”

Sora hummed, suddenly quiet. Riku glanced back, finding Sora’s eyes struggling to stay open as he swirled the wine absently. “I think you’ve had enough for tonight Sora. Let me call Kairi to drive you home.”

“No need, I’m already here!”

Sora turned with a grin. “Kairi! You got my message!”

Kairi laughed, pushing some wayward hair out of her eyes. “Yep. Now, Riku, what you got open?”

Pulling out another glass, Riku only half wondered when Sora managed to message Kairi. “A peachy Moscato rosé. Interested?”

“Oooh, that sounds yummy! I’ll have a little bit,” Kairi placed her purse up on the bar and leaned heavily against it.

“Long day?” Riku asked, pouring her a small glass of the Moscato.

“Ughhhh…” Kairi groaned. “So, you remember that client? The one that was wishy-washy on approving the sketches until I finally got an answer from them?”

“Oh no…” Riku grimaced. “Don’t tell me—”

“They changed their minds!” Kairi explained, the hand not holding the wine glass flailing in frustration. “And not just… a color change, or moving a design element from left to right. Nope. Completely scrapped! Start over. Now they think they want to do something more with water…”

“Water… as opposed to?”

“Musical notes,” Kairi groaned again. “I even had a sketch of, like… watery musical notes and they weren’t sure about that either…”

Sora looked over. “At least they’re still paying you for the time you put into the other work… right?”

Kairi grumbled a bit more but didn’t answer. Riku poured her a tiny bit more wine.

Sora sighed, then emptied his glass. “Well… now that Kairi’s here to keep you company, I gotta, uh… the little boys’ room?”

Sora hopped on his toes a bit and Riku hid another grin behind his wine glass. “It’s around the corner. Behind the clearance bottles.”

“Thanks!!”

Sora ran around the corner and Riku watched him go.

“Oh… I know that look.”

“Huh?” Riku turned back to Kairi. “What do you mean?”

“That ‘I’m in love with Sora’ look,” Kairi deepend her voice to sound a little like Riku before bursting into giggles. “You know… the look.”

Riku frowned, finishing his wine and setting the glass in the sink. He would clean them during his shift tomorrow. “I don’t have a look…”

“Ahh… but you didn’t deny being in love with Sora.”

Riku paused where he had reached over to grab Sora’s glass as well. “I don’t—”

“Riku…” Kairi sighed.

Riku stopped trying to deny it and instead put Sora’s glass in the sink a litlte more gently than he had put his own.

“Are you ever gonna tell him about that night? With the strawberry wine?”

Riku glanced back. “How did you—”

“I know everything,” Kairi said, finishing off her own glass and sliding it over. “Which means… I know that Sora may remember that night more than you think he does…”

Riku felt his heart drop. “No he doesn’t. He can’t he— He would hate me if he did.”

“No I wouldn’t.”

Sora’s voice was quiet, but clear. Shocked, Riku turned, finding Sora standing at the corner, fiddling with the hemline of his chef coat.

“I could never hate you Riku. But especially not for that.”

Riku stared at Sora for a long moment, barely daring to breathe incase the spell broke and he woke up in bed after yet another disapointing dream.

Sora stared back, eventually taking a deep breath and realeasing it slowly, his hands no longer fiddling with his shirt.

“I’m gonna… uh…” Kairi’s voice interrupted, and they turned to look as she picked up her purse. “I gotta call, uh… I gotta call Olette about a… yeah. I’ll just leave you guys here for a moment.”

She ran out the door, though they could still see her as she peered in through the windows. She quickly turned back around when she noticed them looking.

“Um…” Sora said, looking significantly less tipsy than he had earlier. “Riku… I uh… I remember that night. With the strawberry wine. I thought… maybe you didn’t? Or you… regretted it. Or—”

“I didn’t,” Riku took a step forward. “I thought… Well… I was scared. That you’d hate me. Because I— I kissed you and—”

“And I liked it,” Sora took a step forward as well. “And I’d be lying if I hadn’t thought about kissing you again these past few years.”

“Yeah?” Riku asked, stopping when they were practically chest to chest. “Do you uh, still think about—”

“All the time,” Sora whispered. “You?”

“Every time you smile.”

Sora smiled.

And Riku was no longer able to resist.

He leaned in, gently capturing Sora’s lips in a slow, gentle kiss. Sora gasped and kissed back, raising his arms to wrap around Riku’s neck, tangling his fingers in Riku's ponytail. Sora kissed with just as much enthusiasm as he did everything else, leaning up onto his tiptoes and nearly losing his balance. Riku’s arms wrapped around Sora’s waist, supporting him and holding him close.

This time, their kisses tasted like peaches, sweet and juicy. Riku pulled back a bit, just to breathe in that pleasant scent of peaches and Sora before Sora pulled him back in for another kiss. It was just as soft and slow and perfect.

Slowly, Sora pulled away, breathing heavily. “Stay… don’t run away this time.”

“I won’t.” Riku leaned in to kiss Soras lips, then his forehead. “I promise.”

“Good… cause I’m still gonna need some lessons in tasting wine. And a taste tester for my food… and maybe to explain the wine at my final project presentation, you know how I am with speeches.”

Riku laughed, pulling Sora in for a tight hug. “Whatever you want.”

Sora hummed. “What ever I want huh? Then can we get more of that peach wine and go back to your place?”

With another laugh Riku nodded. He could get used to peach flavored kisses and wine.

Next up is knittenkitten. Last words are "He could get used to peach flavored kisses and wine." 

Comments

[mousapelli.livejournal.com]

oh nooooo they're so cute it's ridiculouuuuuuuuuuuus