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The evening hum of New York City is a familiar, comforting white noise outside your apartment window. Sirens wail in the distance, and cars honk down on the damp streets below. Inside, however, your apartment is a warm, golden sanctuary. A CD mix plays from the boombox on your kitchen counter, its mellow acoustic melodies filling the space.
You hum along, wiping down the countertops with a cloth. It’s a quiet Tuesday night, the kind of night where you usually curl up with a book or watch a movie until you fall asleep. But then comes the tap.
It’s a distinct, rhythmic pattern against the glass of your fire escape window: tap, tap-tap, tap.
You smile, tossing the dish towel over your shoulder, your heart doing a fluttering little jump in your chest. You walk over, undoing the latch before sliding the glass pane upward. A rush of cool city air sweeps in, bringing with it the scent of rain. But all you’re focused on is the figure crouching on the iron slats of the fire escape.
Mikey beams at you, his bright, infectious grin instantly lighting up the shadows of the alleyway. “Delivery!” he announces, his voice a boisterous, energetic stage whisper.
He steps through the window with the grace of a trained ninja, though the number of things he is carrying makes the entrance a bit more chaotic than usual. In his arms, he holds two bulging plastic grocery bags that rustle with every movement. Tucked under his chin is a stack of printer paper, and—most notably—he’s wearing an apron.
It is blindingly neon-yellow, tied securely around his neck and wrapped around his waist. Emblazoned across his chest in bold, bubbly pink letters are the words: KISS THE COOK (AND BRING HIM PIZZA).
You stand there for a moment, blinking at the sheer absurdity of the sight.
“Mikey,” you say, trying and failing to suppress the massive smile taking over your face. “What on earth are you wearing?”
“What, this?” He looks down at his chest, popping his plastron out proudly. “Found it. Figured if I’m gonna be a master chef tonight, I gotta dress the part. Plus, it’s a very clear instruction. I expect you to follow it.” He shoots you a playful, exaggerated wink that makes your cheeks heat up, though you quickly roll your eyes to cover it.
“A master chef, huh?” you ask, stepping aside as he marches into your kitchen, setting the bags onto your counter with a thud. “And what exactly are we cooking at …” You glance at the digital clock on the microwave. “Nine-thirty at night?”
“Not cooking. Baking!” Mikey corrects you, holding up a finger.
He drops the stack of papers onto the counter, and you immediately recognize the formatting. The text features a pixelated, blocky font and includes URL lines at the bottom.
“Did you steal these printouts from Donnie’s old desktop?” you ask, leaning over to inspect the pages.
“Borrow is a much better word,” he says defensively, waving a hand. “And I had to! Donnie is always hogging the good bandwidth, and I needed the absolute best recipes the World Wide Web had to offer. Behold!” He dramatically gestures to the printouts. “A multi-layered, ultra-deluxe cake. Or, you know, a small army of cupcakes. Whichever we don’t mess up.”
You look at the recipes, then at the bags. He begins pulling items out of the plastic bag like a magician pulling rabbits from a hat: a bag of flour, a carton of eggs, a gallon of milk, two boxes of powdered sugar, and a bottle of vanilla extract. Then questionable jars of food coloring.
The parade continues: a shaker of rainbow sprinkles, a jar of silver sugar pearls, star-shaped sprinkles, chocolate flakes, tiny candy eyeballs, and finally a cloud of neon-colored sugar dust.
“Mikey,” you say, staring at the growing mountain of sugar on your counter. “That is an aggressive amount of sprinkles.”
“There is no such thing as an aggressive amount of sprinkles,” he replies, completely serious for a fraction of a second before breaking back into a grin. “Okay, here’s the game plan. I want to do something nice for the fam. They’ve been super stressed lately. Leo’s been doing extra katas until he’s ready to drop, Raph’s been brooding harder than a gargoyle, Donnie’s been pulling all-nighters. And Master Splinter … well, he’s always zen, but he deserves a treat.”
He leans his elbows on the counter, looking at you with those expressive eyes. “So, we’re gonna try making a customized cupcake for everyone. Blue ocean-wave frosting for Leo. Red, spicy cinnamon-flake frosting for Raph. A deep purple galaxy swirl for Donnie. A traditional, elegant matcha swirl for Master Splinter. Oh! And something totally chaotic for April and Casey. Like, chocolate chips and sugar-dusted eyeballs mixed together.”
Laughter bubbles up from your chest. You look at this incredible, giant, mutant turtle wearing a ridiculous apron, standing in your kitchen with a heart so big it could swallow the entire city. You feel that familiar pull in your chest, that warm, sticky sensation of falling for him.
“That sounds amazing,” you say softly. “But there’s one tiny problem.”
“What’s that?”
“Neither of us actually knows how to bake.”
He scoffs, waving off your concern. “Pfft. Details. It’s just chemistry, right? Donnie does chemistry all the time. How hard can it be to mix some powder and liquid together and throw it in a hot box? We got this.”
His determination is infectious, and you roll up your sleeves. “Alright, Chef Michelangelo. Let’s get to work.”
The first twenty minutes are a masterclass in blind confidence. You find your largest mixing bowls, your measuring cups, and a wooden spoon. Mikey takes charge of reading the printouts, squinting at the faded ink.
“Okay,” he says, holding the paper up to the overhead kitchen light. “It says we need two cups of flour. And … one TSP of salt. What the heck is a TSP?”
“Teaspoon,” you say, grabbing the flour bag.
“Oh, cool. And then it says we need one TBSP of baking powder. What’s TBSP? Tiny-Big-Spoon?”
You snort. “Tablespoon. It means it’s bigger.”
He reaches into the grocery bag and pulls out a small orange box. “Got it.” He grabs a tablespoon and scoops a hefty mound of white powder out of it, dumping it into the bowl of flour.
You glance over just as the empty box hits the counter, and your eyes widen. “Wait. Mikey, that says baking soda. The recipe called for baking powder.”
He blinks, looking from the box to the recipe, then down at the bowl. He scratches the back of his head. “Uh, what’s the difference? They’re both white, powdery, and have ‘baking’ in the name. It’s probably fine. It’s a conspiracy by Big Baking to make you buy two boxes, anyway.”
“I’m pretty sure they do completely different chemical things!” you laugh, trying to scoop a little bit of it back out, but it’s already lost in the sea of flour. “Whatever. We’re rolling with it. Give me the milk.”
“Milk, coming up!” He grabs the heavy gallon of milk. “It says we need one cup.”
He holds the measuring cup over the bowl. You go to pour, but the plastic handle of the jug slips slightly in your grip. A big glug of milk splashes down, filling the measuring cup, overflowing it entirely, and dumping a waterfall of liquid directly into the dry ingredients.
“Whoa!” you yelp, pulling the jug back.
You both look down at the bowl. It’s a swamp of flour and a very, very large puddle of milk. You definitely poured in at least two cups instead of one.
He stares at it for a moment, then looks at you, completely deadpan. “It’s going to be very moist.”
You burst out laughing, leaning against the counter. “This is a disaster!”
“No, no, we can save it! We just need to mix it really well so it gets, you know, fluffy!” He looks around frantically and spots your electric hand mixer. “Ah-ha! The ultimate weapon.”
“Wait, Mikey, be careful with that—”
Without even attaching the beaters, he grabs the mixer. He fumbles with the metal prongs, jamming them into the slots until they click. He plugs the cord into the wall outlet.
“Stand back,” he says heroically, holding the mixer aloft like a broadsword. “I’m about to whip this batter into submission.”
He lowers the beaters into the bowl. The mixture of flour, excessive milk, and questionable baking soda is sitting there, a lumpy, precarious mess.
Now, anyone who has ever baked knows that you start an electric mixer on the lowest possible speed and gently fold the ingredients together. Mikey, however, operates on a single gear: maximum effort.
His thumb slides the speed switch all the way up to ‘Turbo’.
The mixer roars to life like a motorcycle engine.
Before either of you can even gasp, the beaters catch the loose flour sitting on top of the milk. The sheer velocity creates a miniature tornado inside the bowl.
Poof.
A blinding white cloud erupts upward like a volcano. The force of it blows back into your face, coats the cabinets, rains down on the floor, and completely envelops the two of you in a thick fog of all-purpose flour.
Mikey instantly drops the mixer. It clatters against the side of the bowl, still spinning and throwing wet batter across the backsplash before you blindly reach out and yank the plug from the wall. The roar of the motor dies. Silence descends upon the kitchen, save for the soft strumming of the indie song still playing from the speakers.
Slowly, the dust settles. You keep your eyes squeezed shut for a moment, feeling the fine, powdery grit on your eyelashes, the bridge of your nose, and your lips. You take a slow breath, coughing slightly as a puff of flour escapes your mouth.
You open your eyes.
Standing across from you is what looks like a ghost shaped like a ninja turtle. Mikey is absolutely coated from head to toe. A thick layer of white mutes the yellow apron. His green skin looks as if someone dusted it for fingerprints. But the most striking thing is his face. His orange mask is the only speck of vibrant color stark against his flour-caked face.
He blinks. Once. Twice. The movement sends a little cascade of powder falling from his mask tails. He looks at you. You can only imagine how you look: hair completely white, face covered like a mime. For a long, tense second, neither of you moves.
Then, the corner of Mikey’s mouth twitches. A tiny, muffled snort escapes his nose, blowing a little cloud of flour into the air.
“Don’t,” you warn, pointing a flour-coated finger at him.
But it’s too late; the dam breaks.
He throws his head back and bursts into laughter. He doubles over, clutching his stomach, his shoulders shaking as tears of mirth prick at the corners of his eyes. “Y-You!” he wheezes, pointing at you. “You look like a—like a powdered donut!”
“Oh, really?” you say, narrowing your eyes. You look down at the counter. The arsenal of sprinkles is still sitting there, relatively untouched by the flour bomb. Your hand darts out, grabbing the open container of star-shaped sprinkles.
“Hey, what are you doing?” he asks, his laughter hitching as he notices your movement.
You don’t answer. Just pull your arm back and launch a handful of hard, tiny candy stars directly at his face. They pelt harmlessly against his plastron and his flour-covered cheeks like colorful hail. He gasps, his eyes widening. Slowly, he wipes a star off his cheek, staring at it on his finger. He looks at you, a playful glint in his eyes.
“Oh,” he whispers, his voice dropping into a dramatic, cinematic register. “It is on.”
He reaches for the rainbow sprinkles.
“Mikey, no!” you shriek, turning to run.
A barrage of sprinkles hits you in the back. You scramble around the kitchen island, your socks sliding dangerously on the flour-slicked linoleum. You grab a handful of pearls and toss them over your shoulder, hearing Mikey yelp as they bounce off his shell.
“You can’t outrun the sprinkle master!” he shouts, leaping onto the counter, dual-wielding the flakes and the sugar dust.
“That’s cheating! You’re a ninja!” you laugh, ducking behind the open refrigerator door as chocolate flakes rain down on the floor.
“All is fair in love and baking!” he declares.
You poke your head out, grabbing a rogue bottle of blue food coloring and threateningly hold it up. “Stand down, or I’ll turn you into Leo!”
“Never!”
He jumps off the counter, sliding across the kitchen floor, trying to flank you. You toss another handful of stars. He dodges, throwing a cloud of neon pink sugar at you. It catches you right in the chest, dusting your shirt in vibrant pink.
You are both laughing so hard that you can barely breathe. Your ribs ache, your lungs are burning, and your kitchen looks like a unicorn exploded in a bakery. The floor is a hazard of flour, milk droplets, and crunchy candies. You try to make a break for the living room, but your foot catches on a dense patch of sugar pearls. Your legs fly out from under you.
“Whoa!” Mikey drops his sprinkles and dives, catching you by the waist before you can hit the floor. His momentum carries you both down, anyway. But he twists his body so his shell takes the brunt of the impact against the linoleum, keeping you safely cushioned against his chest.
You land with a heavy thud, tangled up in his arms, gasping for air amidst the giggles. “Truce!” you wheeze, clutching his apron, your face buried in his plastron. “Truce, truce. I surrender!”
He’s panting beneath you, his chest rising and falling rapidly. He lets out a long, exhausted sigh that turns into another chuckle. “Victory is mine. The Sprinkle King reigns supreme!”
“The Sprinkle King is going to help me mop this floor,” you mutter, finally pushing yourself up to a sitting position.
He groans, sitting up alongside you and resting his elbows on his knees. He looks around the kitchen. It is a disaster zone. But then he looks at the bowl on the counter. Miraculously, there is still batter inside.
“Come on,” he says, nudging your shoulder with his. “Let’s at least bake the casualties.”
It takes ten minutes of careful maneuvering, but you somehow salvage the batter. You whisk it by hand this time, ignoring the clumps, and pour the questionable mixture into a cupcake tin. You shove it into the preheated oven, say a silent prayer that they actually rise, and set the timer.
With the baking actually underway, the adrenaline finally leaves your system, replaced by a heavy, cozy exhaustion. You slide down the front of the lower cabinets, sitting directly on the floor. Mikey joins you, stretching his long legs out over the linoleum. Between you sits a bowl of green vanilla frosting that you had managed to mix up during the truce.
He sighs, leaning his head back against the cabinet. He dips a single finger into the bowl of frosting and brings it to his mouth, swiping it over his tongue. “Not bad,” he murmurs, his voice quieter now, the manic energy bleeding away into something soft and peaceful.
You turn your head to look at him.
The overhead kitchen light casts a warm glow over his features. The flour is still heavily caked into the fabric of his mask, highlighting the sharp contours of his face. He has a smudge of bright green frosting right on his cheek, just below his eye.
The room is quiet. The boombox on the counter has now cycled through the CD and is playing a slow, acoustic track, filling the silence with gentle guitar plucks.
You look at the smudge of frosting. You look at the flour in his mask. Look at the way his chest rises and falls, the ridiculous apron still tied around his neck. You feel it again. The glue. The invisible, sticky, wonderful force that has been binding your heart to him for months.
Without overthinking it, you reach up to the counter and grab a paper towel you had left out earlier. “Hold still,” you say softly.
Mikey pauses, his finger halfway back to the frosting bowl. He turns his head toward you as you lean in close. You press the paper towel to his cheek, gently rubbing away the smudge of frosting. The moment your hand touches his face, something shifts.
The goofy, boisterous, energetic Mikey—the one who throws sprinkles and talks a mile a minute—melts away. The transformation is instant and breathtaking. His eyes lock onto yours, and suddenly, they do not crinkle with laughter. They are wide and incredibly intense. Soft.
He doesn’t pull away. Just watches you, his breath hitching slightly in his chest. You finish wiping the smudge, but before you can pull your hand back, he moves.
He reaches up, his hand gently wrapping around your wrist. His skin is rough with calluses from years of holding nunchucks and fighting in the shadows, but his grip is as gentle as a feather. He stops your hand, keeping it suspended near his face.
Your heart does a massive, terrifying backflip.
“Hey,” he says.
His voice has dropped. The inflection, the loud bravado, it’s all gone. He uses this tone so rarely. Hearing it directed at you, so quiet and intimate, makes a shiver run down your spine.
“Hey,” you whisper back, unable to look away from his eyes.
His thumb slowly strokes the inside of your wrist, sending sparks of electricity up your arm. “Thanks for doing this with me,” he murmurs, his gaze flickering down to your lips for a fraction of a second before meeting your eyes again. “I know I’m a disaster in here. I ruined your kitchen.”
“You did,” you agree breathlessly. “It’s a war zone.”
A tiny, self-deprecating smile touches the corner of his mouth. “I just … I really wanted to do something nice for them. My brothers. Splinter. April. They do so much.” He pauses, swallowing hard. You can see a faint dusting of pink creeping up his neck, visible even under the flour.
“But honestly?” he continues, his voice barely above a whisper, “I really just wanted an excuse to spend time with you.”
The world stops. The hum of the refrigerator, the distant sirens, the timer on the oven—it all fades away into nothingness. There is only him. Only his hand on your wrist, the smell of vanilla, and his beautiful eyes.
You feel a sudden rush of courage. You turn your hand over within his grip, tangling your fingers with his. He gasps softly at the movement, his grip tightening just a fraction.
“You didn’t need an excuse,” you tell him, your voice trembling slightly, but laced with a certainty you didn’t know you possessed. “I’ve wanted an excuse to be close to you, too.”
Mikey’s eyes widen. For a second, he looks almost shocked, as if he had prepared himself for rejection, as if he couldn’t fathom that someone like you could want someone like him.
But then, realization dawns. A smile breaks across his face. Not the loud, clownish grin he wears for the world, but a beautiful, genuine, blindingly radiant smile meant only for you. It transforms his entire face, radiating a warmth that rivals the sun.
He leans in, his hand moving from your wrist to cup the back of your neck, his fingers tangling softly into your hair. He closes the distance between you, pressing his lips to yours.
The kiss is sweet. Soft and hesitant at first, as if he’s afraid he might break you, before melting into something deeper and incredibly sure. You let your eyes flutter shut, leaning into his touch, your free hand coming up to rest against his plastron, right over the letters of his apron.
And it’s messy. Flour still covers your faces, and sugar still dusts your clothes. But as his thumb strokes your cheek and his lips move against yours with tender affection, it is absolutely perfect.
It’s the feeling of coming home. The feeling of a puzzle piece snapping securely into place.
When he finally pulls back, just an inch, he is breathing heavily, a dazed, euphoric look in his eyes. His forehead rests against yours, a soft, happy sigh escaping his lips. “Kiss the cook,” he whispers, his voice thick with emotion, a playful smile tugging at his lips. “You followed the instructions.”
You laugh softly, a sound filled with pure joy, and lean in to kiss him again, sealing the deal right there on the sprinkle-covered floor.
The cupcakes in the oven might be a disaster. The kitchen might take hours to clean. And the flour might be in places you’ll never get it out of. But as Mikey’s arms wrap securely around your waist, pulling you tightly against him, you know with absolute certainty that you don’t care.
You’re stuck by the glue.
And you wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.