"Don't do that, pile the lasagna sheets on in a normal pan," Mizuhara chided him, and dodged his grabby arms that reached for the ricotta.

"But wouldn't it be fun to roll up a lasagna like a roll cake? With lots of sauce in between the layers, of course," Eda felt incredibly curious, "I mean, we could also brown them in an oven, won't they have that cool crunchy texture?"

"Lasagna is meant to be tender like a layered cake, what do you mean, crunchy?!"

"Awh but imagine lasagna hors d'oeuvres!"

"Pasta is a main dish you imbecile!"

The teacher assigned to Italian Cuisine, Miss Isabella De Niro, has never seen Mizuhara yell at people before, but she supposed there's a first for everything. Also, Chapelle had a host of exasperated horror stories about Shinomiya and Eda's screaming matches.

Thank goodness it's Eda, the nicer one, instead of the notoriously fierce Shinomiya who was well-known as a delinquent around these parts. Especially because of the hair. Definitely because of the hair.

It's probably a good thing. Mizuhara's always been too unsociable and shy for the chef scene— she could probably survive this way, but she'd struggle if there was nothing that could ever bring her out of her comfort zone.

Though, Miss de Niro was very concerned about... whatever they were arguing about. All they had to do was make a lasagna. Why did this happen?

"Then can I just do one batch like that?"

"Sure, and take my name off the fucking dish before you serve it. My ancestors would shoot me on sight and sell my organs to the cartel."

Oh, so Mizuhara could swear too.

"Come on, the texture would be interesting," Eda pouted. "It'd be chewy near the middle and crispy on the edges."

"That sounds like raw pasta to me."

"The middle will be perfectly al dente, I promise!"

"Look, lasagna is cooked its classic way for a good reason."

"...I know, but you know, we could put a spin on it—"

"Enough! It's my specialty, not yours!" Mizuhara finally snapped. "Can't you stop pretending you know a single thing about how to make my dish better? It's not like you can understand why the flavours work, anyways!"

The silence that ensued made the teacher abruptly realize she was too late to interfere. Her stomach dropped with dread, she really should have interfered sooner.

Mizuhara and Eda stared at each other with wide eyes, and it's clear someone stepped on a bomb that shouldn't have, because Mizuhara immediately looked like she wanted to swallow every word that ever came out of her mouth in the future. And Eda looked a little hurt.

"N-Now, you two," she stepped between them, "let's cool down a little."

They were already cooled down. Too cooled down, kind of like a house that's burnt to ashes completely. That's the problem.

She tried her best to salvage the situation. "You have plenty of time to cook your dishes, since you two finished the prep so quickly! I'm sure you have sufficient time— and ingredients— to bake two batches, right?"

Neither of them were looking at her. Or each other.

Finally, Mizuhara let out a dry, "yes, miss. We do." Then, like she was blurting this out, "let's do that."

Eda, recovering silently, reached for the shelves for the lasagna pan.

"Yeah. I'm sorry for overstepping, Mizuhara-san."

Mizuhara simply hummed weakly, and stepped forward, to finish their dish together.

Left in the stranded aftermath feeling like a failure, Miss De Niro wanted to cry. She probably will, after the class, but for now, she had the rest of the class' dishes to judge, so those plans were on hold.

The worst part? Both dishes tasted great, but the way they presented it without even looking at each other made it feel like two people had been making their own dishes individually, rather than as partners.

-

"Minase-sensei listen to thiiiiiss!!"

It's not every day a teacher barges into another teacher's classroom with a clear baggage of this week's exclusive gossip, but alas.

Sena and Haruno were treated to this sight because they stayed back after their South Asian cuisine class to ask their teacher a lot of questions about the recipe. Essentially forcing the teacher to work overtime, but they're in Tootsuki, consideration doesn't exist and lunch break equates to class time.

"The thing is... Eda-kun and Mizuhara-san got into this big fight, and I think it was really bad. I don't know what to do..."

Minase-sensei froze.

"Hold on, did you mean Eda-kun and Shinomiya-kun?"

"Nooo," she seemed ready to cry harder, "Eda-kun and Mizuhara-san."

"Not Shinomiya-kun."

"No, it's Mizuhara-san."

Sena and Haruno had to glance at each other and back, just to make sure they heard right. And sure enough— they had heard the same thing. Double-taking, they whirled to the teacher with a baffled,

"Wait, what?!"

-

It's bad. Like, really bad.

They're on opposing ends of the Polar Star dining table. Fumio's in the middle. Shionimya took one look at them and turned right back around.

"I'm not paid for this shit," he declared to the peanut gallery.

The seniors despaired.

And then Nakagawa said, "you can have half the cheese and butter I smoked."

And Shinomiya spun right back around with a gallant fervor and maximum motivation, "alright, fess up ya milksops, who pissed in whose cereal?!"

-

Shinomiya made dinner.

Mizuhara was very hard to convince out of her shell, but she perked up somewhere between the making of the beurre monte sauce. The smell of butter wafting through the dorm was just heavenly temptation. She's never been known to be the greatest of endurers.

"Eda, get over here and fold pasta," Shinomiya snarled. "Mizuhara, decide on the protein already, we don't have all damn night."

"Anyone in the dorm allergic to shrimp?" Mizuhara asked.

"Nope," Shinomiya said, "but Nakagawa-senpai isn't a fan. He's fine with plain pasta though, we don't have to worry about him."

"Then that's it I guess," Mizuhara supposed.

Shinomiya and Mizuhara worked together well, even considering their usual rivalry. They were a stark contrast to when they worked with Eda. Despite butting heads just as often, when it came to cooking, they were nearly always in sync.

"This will be done in a second. You deveining them?"

"I'll be a while. You start on the sauce, but save some of the butter for me. What don't you want in the seasoning?"

"Don't think anything you have will clash... ah, we have a good garlic confit in the fridge, see what you can do with that."

"Got it."

Eda watched from the sidelines, and he couldn't help but sigh. That was, of course, how a normal pair of good cooks worked together in a kitchen. Even though their specialties differed, they understood what each other thought, and delegated the decisions accordingly so they could build a dish together.

Eda kneaded the dough in his hands and considered himself. He was allowed to choose what they were eating— clearly, it was going to be a creamy, buttery sauce, so there were plenty of options here.

But one thought lingered in his head.

(Nakagawa-senpai didn't like seafood, and was allergic to shellfish. Which was a shame, considering how well his dairy specialty went with that whole category of food... It's amazing how he was still able to become an Elite Ten— apparently, his crowning Shokugeki had clams as the main ingredient. He didn't taste the dish once, yet, his clam chowder still won by a landslide.)

(But it's quite a shame indeed. Nakagawa-senpai was like Eda, in that he didn't mind eating anything and judging fairly, whether it was delicious or disgusting or subpar, and he would still finish his food regardless if he enjoyed it. But it still felt odd to serve their senior plain pasta for dinner.)

Eda eyed the assortment of smoked dairy on the table, and wondered.

And then he reached for the cheeses.

"The sauce is so rich already," Mizuhara interrupts. "Eda-kun, I don't think that's a good idea."

Well, she's right.

"Oh don't be a killjoy, Mizuhara," Shinomiya sighed, "let him make his damn cheese pizza spaghetti if he wants to, he's eating the damn thing if we don't."

To which Eda stared at Shinomiya, baffled, and Mizuhara snarled, "it's because you're such a fucking enabler that he keeps messing up you guys' dishes," she groans, "if you didn't save last week's Japanese cuisine class with your chikuzenni, you'd have failed!"

Shinomiya blanched. "Yeah, I can't believe Eda destroyed porridge. I'm... honestly still like, super pissed about that actually," he thought about it, "holy shit, I haven't hit him on the head for it yet. Just thinking about it fills me with unspeakable rage."

"Right?!" Mizuhara snarls, "and unlike you buffoons, I do not have grades to spare taking such crappy risks, okay?"

Eda eyed the underside of the kitchen island, thinking it was such a tempting adversary in these trying times.

He understood. He had little to lose here, and so did Shinomiya, technically speaking.

While they lose it all, they could always start from ground up again somewhere no one knows them, because it's not like they come from inheritance and tradition, or have their family's hopes riding on them like Mizuhara, Donato, and Hinako. Unlike them, Eda and Shinomiya would have a staggered start, but they were always meant to climb an arduous and long ladder to their futures.

But Mizuhara has something waiting for her at home. There's an Italian restaurant she wants her name to be on, and she can't do it with a checkered record in this school. She has much more to risk than they could ever understand, and she's not very interested in partaking in illogical risks just for the fun of the thrill.

She's a very logical and theoretical chef, and Eda understands that painfully so.

Shinomiya, however, simply looked at her determination and sighed. "Damn, you live your whole life with that stick up yer ass or what?"

Eda gasped.

Mizuhara sputtered something incorrigible in his direction, face flushing red, because "do you have no fucking tact, you country bumpkin?!"

"Lost most of that in my ma's womb, and the rest got taken by the monsters of the corn fields when I was six," Shinomiya didn't even miss a beat, which made Eda wonder how long he's had that answer prepared. "Look. Our dish? It's gonna be good, but his dish? It's either going to be fucking great, or it's going to end with him getting food poisoning from the consequences of his own actions. I don't know about you, but when it happens I want a front row seat to point and laugh."

Mizuhara's jaw dropped. She turns back to Eda, who's blank-faced in honest resignation, and she's bewildered, "seriously? You have nothing to say about this?"

Eda once heard, sometime in another lifetime, that when someone is more agitated than you, you suddenly feel calm in comparison. He understands how that feels now.

Eda simply responded, defeatedly, "it's okay, my sister's worse."

"Eda-kun," Mizuhara invoked, more sincere and genuine emotion emboldening her eyes than he had ever seen before, "are things, like, okay? Wanna talk about it?"

Eda wondered if he should cry.

They came by Sumiredoori last Winter, when Tamako wasn't around, so they've yet to meet her. Eda had a feeling they would find utmost temperance in the entire ordeal. Sena might find joy in it, he's weird like that.

Mizuhara cannot believe this is her situation right now, "you two..." frustration leaks into her voice, "you're so easygoing, it makes me sick. It must be nice to never have to worry about anything, huh?"

Shinomiya falls silent at that.

Both of them can't pretend to know what it's like to have society's pressure put on them, expectations lined up for what you're supposed to be— and they don't have the right to sympathize.

Everyone had their own variety of these invisible chains tied to their wrists and ankles, and it's up to them to find their own way to move onward despite it all.

"You know, Mizuhara-san," Eda began, carefully, cradling the mark on his wrist contemplatively, "you're serious about your work, and that always pays off for you. But... one day, it's all going to end."

Shinomiya and Mizuhara turn to him with such abruptness when he says that.

That was not what they had expected him to say.

Eda reaches for the smoked cheeses, and peruses his options, "no matter how hard you work, how hard you get it... no matter how much you've achieved, one day, something is going to put a stop to it. Something will try and take it all away from you, like some kind of sick joke gone wrong. And... well, what's next?"

(You could have the world, and the world will abandon you.)

(You could have everything, and lose yourself instead.)

"I admire you, Mizuhara-san. You can put your heart into everything, you cook much better than I can ever hope to. I wish I could be like you," he said. "But I can't do that anymore."

Because I can't taste anything I make. I can't cook like you two, because I'm just fundamentally lacking something that I can't fix.

Because I'm tired of having my world collapse around me once I'm comfortable.

"I'm still here, aren't I?" he supposed. "I don't know what I'll do in the future. I don't know if I'm ever meant to have one," the idea of a future scares me, because the future I used to have haunts me, "all I want is to enjoy what I have now, to the fullest. And if trying my luck with fate is what I have to do, then I'll do it. It's not like dramatic irony has ever done me any favours."

He's just messing around until the other shoe drops. He knows that.

(It always happens. He enjoys himself, he finds his place, and then fate cruelly tears it away from him. He knows already. He's expecting it already. He's not so naive as to think things will just go smoothly forever. He knows this feeling of safety and it terrifies him more than anything else.)

(Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me three times, and let's see how long we can play in this circus of freaks.)

When he finally gained the courage to look up at Mizuhara and Shinomiya again, he saw Shinomiya giving Mizuhara a glare. And Mizuhara looked as if she wished the ground would swallow her up.

Finally, she breaks, stepping over, "FINE!" she snapped, marching toward Eda with such vigour he flinched and expected to be hit, "what the hell are you trying to do, anyways?"

"Uhm. I was thinking either stuffed pasta or baked..."

"Not this one," Mizuhara takes a bite of the cheese as Eda cuts a slab, "I think Nakagawa-senpai smoked this one with applewood... it doesn't go well with our sauce. Oh, this one's made with sheep milk!"

"Eh, you can tell?" Eda's surprised. "Even what wood it was smoked with? Wait, does that change the flavours too?"

Mizuhara winces. "Of course I can tell the difference. Who do you think I am? And of course it changes the flavours, that's the whole point of the smoking process— Christ, you're a lost cause."

Eda chuckled awkwardly at that.

But Mizuhara affixed, almost hastily, "I guess you'll just have to rely on me before you do things from now on, I suppose!" she snapped, "hurry up, the damn shrimp isn't going to fucking devein itself so I don't have a lot of time."

"Oh, I can do that," Eda said, "I'm good at prep work because of the diner."

"Why the HELL did you not say that sooner?!" Mizuhara snarled, "you do that, then!"

"You gotta grow out of your hate for tedious prep work, Mizuhara-san," Eda sighed fondly. Then, perusing the work so far, he takes a moment before adding, "Mizuhara-san, you destroyed half of these. Why is this one halved and the other quartered?"

Shinomiya laughs, "you should see her with potatoes."

"Why did you give her this job, then?!" Eda's baffled.

To which Mizuhara replied, petulantly, "well that's why I have a damn partner who does the menial work so well, don't I?"

Eda blinked at that. Then he smiled. "Yeah. I suppose."

"The hell do you mean 'I suppose', be damn sure!"

"Ehh, but you said it first."

"I can say it, you can't!" She declared.

"That's not fair now!" Eda whined.

Shinomiya watched from the sidelines, nodding with an exasperated sigh. He supposed things were fine now. Every good relationship with Eda, unfortunately, just has to include hollering from one kitchen to the next.

It's chaotic, perhaps, but Eda was someone that made up for what he lacked with communication. Whatever nonsensical form it took, everyone wanted him to know that they appreciated it.

-

Pasta is always an interesting experience for Eda.

It's easy to make, anyone can do it— but everyone makes it differently. Just a little misstep on the mixing, knead it a little less or more, and it turns out completely different. The temperature of the water you boil it in, whether you salt the water or oil it— it's all going to change the result. There's an equation to good pasta, but there's no one formula to perfect pasta, which is why Eda honestly hates making it, even though he loves working with dough.

But Mizuhara? If there was ever a 'perfect pasta' voting conference, hers would be up on the roster every single time. Getting a perfect al dente isn't a struggle after you get the hang of it, but Mizuhara does it as naturally as breathing.

The conchiglie curled with herbs and ricotta was pleasantly savoury against the rich, overwhelming cream that clung onto his tongue. The breathiness that comes from garlic left a pleasant warmth on the way down his throat, and the butter lingering on his lips drove him toward the clear freshnes so the lemon zest that prickled against the roof of his mouth.

"You added way too much damn cream in this," Shinomiya groans. "All that with the butter? Yeah it tastes real damn great, but at what cost?"

"This meal's going to give me a heartburn," Mizuhara says.

"That's the best part," Eda verdicts.

The fact that he can actually feel each bite filling him up is satisfaction to the greatest degree. He licks his lips, the stickiness of the rich cream coating each spot he goes through, and he can't even be embarrassed about it when Fumio reaches over with a tissue.

"You're going to eat yourself into a heart attack one day," Shinomiya says.

"Well then, let's hope it's not today!" Nakagawa beams, sitting down with his serving and taking that momentous, judgemental first bite.

Everyone waits with bated breath.

Eda honestly wonders about them, sometimes. The food looks amazing, always— rich, buttery cream of your dreams slicked through the webs of pasta, spilling with gemstones of herbs, adorned by the centrepiece of vibrant red shrimps with their pure white, creamy flesh.

Eda doesn't remember what flavours like salty or sweet taste like anymore, but recently, he thinks he's starting to remember, and starting to recognize it through the blurry fog of nothingness that's plagued him for years.

Maybe he didn't lose a complete hundred percent of his taste buds. An actual, technical full loss of a sense is rare, after all. Maybe he's got like, about less than five percent of it left if he really tries to find a number for it. He's not sure, there's no real way to check once it gets that bad. It's not like he's ever gone to a doctor about it after the initial incident, either.

He gulps down the food one after another, not quite tasting more than just the average freshness and very, very mild sweetness akin to drinking water. That, and what he thinks is the sourness of the lemon zest, albeit just as muted and barely recognizable if not for the way it leaves a tangy, rubbery feeling on his tongue. He's not sure if he remembers what salt tastes like anymore. Bitterness dries out his tongue. Spiciness always hurts, though, so that's nice.

But they felt like farfetched concepts to him, at this point.

'Flavour' was just a concept he connected to the sensations, because education didn't quite teach him how to reconcile these feelings any other way.

Flavour's just another part of the formula to a successful cake. That means it's important, but much like fantasy and sci-fi movies, in his opinion it's best enjoyed with his mind far away on a suspension of disbelief.

Eda only cares about how pleasantly creamy it all is, how warm the garlic and butter waft in his mouth, how soothingly the beds of pasta go down, how springy each bite feels in the culminating wonder of each spoonful.

If everyone says something is good, then surely, it must be good.

(And honestly, that's fine.)

(There's so much more than just flavour to enjoy in food, after all.)