I learned so much about baking from writing this chapter! I don't own any of the books mentioned.

"Thanks for coming over. Bianca left before I could get those books for her."

"No problem."

Adam cautiously stepped into the house, taking a good look around before committing to fully entering the hallway.

"It's just us," Becky assured him.

"That makes a change," he remarked as he followed her to the kitchen. "I was starting to think both our families were under house arrest or something."

"At least your family are all nice to me," Becky groaned. "I wish I could say the same."

"C'mon, they've gotten better," Adam insisted, though Becky didn't quite believe him. He stopped when he saw the large pile of baking books towering the kitchen counter. "Whoa."

"My mom really likes to bake," Becky said, climbing onto a kitchen stool and inviting Adam to join her.

"I never realized how much you could write on the subject of cupcakes," Adam remarked, scanning the pages of a particularly thick book.

"Well, there's just so much you can do with cupcakes," Becky explained. "Red velvet, chocolate, lemon meringue - the possibilities are endless!"

Adam smiled to himself before going back to his book.

"What is it?" Becky asked.

"Nothing," he grinned, slamming the book shut and packing up as much of the stack as he could carry in his backpack. "So is this us?"'

"It should be," Becky answered, taking the small remaining stack. "Wait no - I left on upstairs, I was reading it last night."

"Which one?"

"Artisan Baking, it's grey and yellow. It's my favourite."

Adam didn't say anything; he just smiled at her. That sweet, genuine smile that made her feel comforted and exposed in equal parts. She could feel her face get warm.

"Can you get on my bed?" she said before she could process what she was actually saying.

Maybe she didn't actually say it. Maybe it was just in her head.

Adam grinned and raised an eyebrow at her. She so wished he wouldn't look her in the eye. She really just said what she thought she said.

"No, uh, I mean," she stammered, "c-can you get it, it's, um, it's on my bed. The book. It's on my bed."

He jumped off the stool without remarking on her catastrophic malfunction.

"Lead the way."

She let Adam follow her up the stairs and up to her bedroom where she had been pouring over Artisan Baking the night before, fawning over the baguettes and rolls and how they came from nothing to turn into something amazing. She loved to see the artistry and technique it took to get that perfect texture and the satisfying way the raw dough rose on its own before it needed to go in the oven. She admired the sheer patience, practice and understanding of theory it took to make good bread like that. It may have taken infinitely more time and effort than picking up a loaf at the store, but was so worth the wait. Quality would always be worth the wait.

When she finally made her way to the front door of her room, a rush of nerves attacked the pit of her stomach. She couldn't even explain why until Adam pointed it out to her.

"I've never seen your room before."

Oh goodness, he was right. He had never seen her bedroom before. It was quite a personal thing to show someone else. Was he going to think that it was some sort of hint? They had been together for four months, was that around the right time to get more… personal?

"This is it," she said, taking a deep, reassuring breath before opening the door.

Becky had never felt particularly self-aware about her room before. She didn't have as much space in suburban Toronto as she had in rural Florida, but she felt she made do. She was still luckier than a lot of other people and she was grateful for what she had. She managed to get all her belongings to fit in without having to sacrifice any to the trash (or, more realistically, Goodwill.) She was starting to regret that achievement when she looked around.

Her Niall Horan poster adorned with heart stickers. Her white four-poster bed draped with pink chiffon protecting her teddy bears from the low, late afternoon sun. Her unicorn music box with matching ceramic figurines either side of it. It would be childish for a seven-year-old let alone a seventeen-year-old.

Adam thankfully didn't burst into laughter, instead he admired the trinkets scattered around on her bookshelf.

"Cool, you have a Nancy Drew Spy Pen?" Adam asked, picking up the pen and admiring the chunky, flowery, purple-and-yellow handle. When untwisted, small items could be put inside the plastic, hollow tube. Becky used to keep her shiniest pennies hidden away in it. It certainly wasn't "cool" but she appreciated his attempts to make her room seem less infantile.

"I had one of these," Adam reminisced. "Drew and I used to send top secret messages to each other through it. And treasure maps. Actually, mostly treasure maps. I think Drew had it in his head that if you make a treasure map, the treasure will just magically appear there."

"I didn't know they made them for little boys too."

"They didn't."

"Oh."

"Is this the book?" Adam asked, not even skipping a beat before making a seat for himself on her bed and flipping through the copy of Artisan Baking lying on top of the comforter. "That bread looks amazing, what is it?"

He turned the book around for Becky to see the photo of a thick crusty loaf covered in sesame seeds.

"It looks like a filone."

"I need one of these in my life."

"We could try making one some day," Becky suggested.

"And this is one of the reasons I need a Becky Baker in my life."

She wanted to kiss him, but wondered if it was appropriate. He was sitting on her bed. Part of Becky reasoned that sitting was sitting whether you did it on a sofa or a bench or a bed. But it seemed more adult somehow. It was where she slept. Where she dreamt. And Adam, a featured player in many of her dreams, was sitting there; blurring the lines between her safe, comfortable reality and the fantasies that made her blush furiously when she was awake.

He started to slowly take off his hoodie. He was taking off his clothes. In her room. On her bed.

"Man, it's hot in here, huh?"

Becky didn't think so, but she didn't have the best grasp on was constituted "hot" in the Toronto climate.

"You want me to take your cardigan?" he offered.

"I'm fine," she insisted. How could Adam stand being in just a t-shirt? Toronto summer was not the same a real summer. But maybe it felt warm to a more established Torontonian? Even in the middle of summer her parents had to bump the heating up, still not out of "Floridian mode" when it came to adjusting to the temperature. Maybe Adam really was genuinely hot.

But taking off his clothes on her bed? Asking Becky to join in? Was he being suggestive or just Canadian?

He tilted his head at her. He had the most amazing angles; the perfectly straight lines that separated his jaw line from his neck and his neck from his shoulders looked like they could have been drawn by a ruler with faultless precision. Like God had worked overtime just to make them perfect.

She loved to stroke his neck when she kissed him, feeling her hands brush up and down the perfectly straight line of his jaw. Letting her fingers rise and fall over the sharp contours in a seamlessly rhythmic way, feeling her wrist turn in an exact ninety-degree angle when she got to his shoulders. Those shoulders. They could double as a spirit level they were so straight and precise. There was something so militant and obedient about them, like he was ready to face anything at all times and it made her feel so incredibly safe with him. She never realized such perfection could exist in real people.

She never dared allow herself to move further than that, down his torso, sliding her hand to his back and down to the base of his spine-

He was on her bed. Craning his perfect neck.

She reminded him of the love interest in every terrible vampire film she had ever seen; lifting their necks, exposing their jutting collarbones - letting themselves be exposed. Wanting that intimate touch from their... well, their lover.

He caught her in his stare. "Is everything okay?"

"Yeah," she gasped. Her own neck felt terribly itchy. She didn't dare look down, fearing how red and blotchy it had become. Her mouth suddenly felt bone dry, thirsty for something she couldn't pinpoint, but she knew she wouldn't find it in the kitchen.

It was in her bedroom. On her bed.

She wished that she could be bold like Bianca; that she could show Adam just how much he meant to her without stumbling over her words or fumbling with her hands. Telling him was nice, but there were only so many times you could tell someone how great they are before it stops having the same shine. She wasn't fluid and relaxed, she was gangly and awkward.

She wanted nothing more than to have it come effortless to her. To be able to flirt and sway and attract Adam's attention as easily as he could attract hers or Bianca could attract Drew's. She wanted to be able to wrap herself around him and kiss his neck while he grabbed her hair with one hand and her waist with the other. She wanted to be able to drive him crazy.

But she couldn't do that. She was the girl, it wasn't the right way to do it; it wasn't proper. She wouldn't even know what to do with herself!

She had to get him to want to do that. If Adam took the lead, she could just follow along without having to worry so much about what she was supposed to do with herself.

She had to make him want her.

"So…," she tried. "Do you like my bed?"

She bent over, stroking her hand over the pink satin comforter, just making it up as she was going along and hoping for the best.

"Uh, sure," Adam answered, bouncing up and down a few times for good measure, "it's comfy."

"It's also very… soft," she said, trying to make her voice sound low and seductive. "Do you know what else is soft?"

"Uh, what?"

"Um," on no. She hadn't thought it through that far. What else was soft? What else was soft?!

"This, uh, this pillow," she said quickly, sitting down beside Adam, picking up the pillow and presenting it to him. "Do you want to…. touch it?"

"It's very nice," Adam said, petting it a few times whilst pulling a bemused face. "Are you feeling okay? You sound like you've got a sore throat."

"I'm so fin-ugh-," she spluttered, choking back the sensual "growl" she was attempting. "I'm fine, thank you."

"You sure?"

She didn't think it was possible to fail so drastically so suddenly. It was all so far out of her realm. She had to try a different avenue, something she was more familiar with. She looked over to Adam's hands, still holding the book that was causing this whole situation.

Bread. She knew plenty about bread.

"You know," she whispered, "if we're going to make some bread, I'm going to have to teach you how to handle the dough."

"Cool," Adam smiled. "Sounds like fun."

"You have to really get your hands into it," she said, reaching her hand up and grabbing his upper arm. "Like this."

"Okay," he said slowly, staring at the hand she still had around his arm, kneading her fingers into it.

"Yes," she said, wondering why she thought that this would ever be a good idea, "this is the way to do it. Good."

She was just sitting there, kneading one of his arms for a reason she couldn't justify or explain, but it had something to do with bread, apparently.

Bianca DeSousa would never ever do something so insanely awkward.

"Or, you know," Becky said, clambering over the bed to sit behind Adam and placing her hands on his shoulders, "this is good too."

Massaging. That had to be more alluring than ballroom dancing. It was certainly a step up from arm squishing. Any second now, Adam would turn around and pull her into a passionate kiss and he could take over. Any second.

"What did I do to deserve the spa session?" Adam asked.

"Oh, you know," Becky said, even though she didn't remotely know.

She sat there, pressing her hands into those perfect shoulders, feeling every curve and jut of the bone. Feeling her hands press into his skin. It felt so good. She pressed in harder, bypassing the skin and muscle to feel the structure of those wonderfully exact shoulders. She wondered if she would be able to feel that small piece of bullet still inside of him is she pressed in hard enough.

"Wow," Adam gasped, "you have very, uh, strong fingers."

Her brain felt like it was tangled in knots; like English wasn't her first language, but rather something she had only heard bits and pieces of from bad movies and cheesy songs. Like the meaning of the phrases were totally alien to her and she wasn't sure about the smaller words in-between, but she as going to take a stab at speaking it anyway.

"Your shoulders are nice to my hands to feel."

What? What was that even supposed to mean?!

She tried to blink herself smart again, but it didn't seem to be working. More and more of her brainpower seemed to be abandoning her, jumping ship as she made more and more of a fool of herself.

She didn't stop, even though part of her was becoming more and more convinced that the whole thing was a terrible idea, she was sure that if she suddenly stopped then it would become weird and awkward.

She tried to focus on what she was doing, moving from Adam's shoulders to his shoulder blades and down the muscles in his back. She could feel the structure and curve of the vertebras of his spine. She never realized how satisfying it could be to press her fingers against it; to touch someone so closely you could feel the outside and inside of their body at the same time. It made her head reel to think about how all those part connected to make this one whole person, sitting on her bed while her hands explored all the tiny details of his body. She wanted to know everything about it; all the ins and outs. Every freckle, every dip, every protrusion, every angle. She wanted every part of her body to touch every part of his.

Her heart was beating very fast. She had never touched him so much – she had never touched anyone so much. She never knew how gratifying touching someone could be or even if she was allowed to feel so gratified. She wondered if the pulse she could feel vibrating down through her fingers was just her imagination.

She was getting dangerously lower. She would have to work out what she was supposed to do once she ran out of spine. Becky would be forever grateful that Adam couldn't see the look of blind panic on her face. She had no idea what she was doing. What was she supposed to be doing?

She couldn't just end. That would be so pathetic. There had to be some sort of smooth transition into whatever was supposed to come next. Eventually Adam would step in and she wouldn't have to feel so completely clueless.

"Is-is hot still how you're feeling?" She managed to say. It least it was decipherable.

"Uh, yeah, it's pretty hot in here."

"Allow me to cool you."

She wrapped her fingers around the hem of his t-shirt. She hoped the tugging in it's own would be enough to make him turn around to face her, but apparently she wasn't doing enough. She swallowed down her nerves and began to slide it up higher.

She felt herself jump as Adam snatched himself away from her.

"That was great, thanks." He said, springing to his feet, tightly clinging on to the book they were supposed to be retrieving. "I'm so relaxed now, woo."

Reality suddenly slammed back into her body, like going from one extreme in temperature to another. Like moving at the speed of light and coming to a sudden halt. What was she doing? She was taking off his clothes. Two feet away from her parent's bedroom. In front of Niall Horan and all her teddy bears!

Of course he wasn't going to think it was sexy.

She could feel herself fishmouthing as her vocabulary flung itself back into her brain and sorted itself into something resembling sense.

"I," she stammered, "I, uh."

"I should probably jet before you parents get home," Adam said, grabbing his hoodie off the bed beside her. "I don't want to get you in trouble."

He kissed her on the cheek like she was a preschooler. She probably did seem like that to him in that moment.

"Call you later?"

"I, uh," she threw out. "Yeah, sure."

"Right," Adam nodded curtly. "I'll let myself out."

As soon as he disappeared into the hallway, Becky threw her head down on the bed. A frame of cuddly toys surrounding her like a fluffy halo.

She couldn't even flirt with her own boyfriend without acting like a huge dork.

He was going to think she was the biggest loser on the planet.

She was so out of her league.

She was going to need some serious help.

I must admit, I'm not particularly well versed on my 1D members. Would Becky like Niall the best? Or would she like one of the other ones? Feel free to let me know, Directioners!