Cooking By The Book [c]

Fleck's brows shot up. "And how do you know that? I didn't even know you knew what a recipe even was," he teased.

Dick wasn't best known for his culinary expertise.

Fleck pushed off the counter and crouched to check on the cake. After deeming it done, he pulled it out and set it on the counter.

"Grab a straw, Gabriele."

The boy shot off to do as told and returned excitedly clutching a neon pink straw he'd grabbed from the pantry.

"Have at it, kid."

Gabriele began stabbing the hot cake with the straw, over and over.

It was Dick's turn to blush and he threw Fleck a playful glare.

Leaning on the counter, he watched as uncle and nephew interacted. The cooked cake was pulled out and Fleck let Gabriele stab the cake. With a straw.

He honestly didn't get cooking.

Hearing a noise behind him, he turned to investigate. Blue eyes widened.

"Shit."

Quickly, he turned the heat off and watched as the overspilling bubbles died down. Milk dried and burned to the sides, and he didn't even want to think about the state of the bottom of the pan.

Being able to warm milk was scratched off his cooking abilities.

Fleck cringed when the milk bubbled over.

Then he silently thanked God that Dick was, if nothing else, a clean freak that would take care of his own mess.

He hated cleaning up burned on milk.

At the table Theresa snorted in amusement. She had noticed the pan bubbling up a few moments before it had bubbled over, and done the only thing that seemed right at the time.

She'd pulled up her camera and started filming Dick's reaction.

She wasn't disappointed.

"Well... at least it is going to be hot?" He offered to the family.

It wasn't the worst disaster. Even if burnt milk was a pain to get off.

Trying not to get distracted by the child poking holes in a cake with a straw again, he concentrated on making the drinks. Not putting the heat back on, he poured in what he roughly thought would be enough cacao to milk quantity.

Then a bit more to be on the safe side.

Surely it was better to be more chocolatey than milky.

He followed his same theory with the sugar.

Theresa shook her head and finished filming.

That was enough of that. She didn't want too many silly videos of him. She wanted quality blackmail material, not quantity.

Back to her game.

Fleck busied himself with opening up the cans of condensed milk.

Hot chocolate made, he poured it into three different mugs before topping each one off with a handful of marshmallows.

He then set each cavity-causing drink down.

"I hope it is okay," he said as he poured himself his freshly brewed coffee into a fourth mug. He definitely needed it now.

Taking the pan, he took it over to the sink to commence his battle with scrubbing the burned milk off.

When the mug was set down in front of her, Theresa lifted the empty mixing bowl, and pushed it against Dick's chest, letting go of it and letting Dick catch it.

She let her hot chocolate sit, so her marshmallows could melt and the scalding milk could cool down some.

Around the kitchen, the other two did the same, after thanking Dick for making them. Melted marshmallows were superior in hot chocolate to unmelted ones.

Fleck and Gabriele both began pouring the thick milk onto the cake.

Dick held his tongue as the mixing bowl was pressed to his chest and he was forced to catch it. Being the easiest out of the two, he cleaned that first. Then found a stainless steel scrubber and got to work.

Being a vampire came with many benefits - even if they could be a double edged sword. One he was very glad for in that moment was his strength. It made cleaning a lot easier. And his arm didn't tire as it scrubbed the pan over and over as most humans would complain about.

After some time meticulously cleaning it, he held up the shining pan, inspecting.

"Are you both almost done with the cake?"

"We are....done," he said with a flourish as he let the last of the milk dribble onto the cake.

"Now we get this into the fridge and leave it to set for a couple hours. We can do the icing after dinner."

He wrapped the bottom of the tin with a handtowel, then carefully put it in their large fridge. When the door was closed he clapped his hands together. "Okay, everyone out of my kitchen. Go entertain yourselves in the living room while I make dinner."

He shooed everyone out, pausing in his shooing of Dick to wrap his arms around his boyfriend's slim waist from behind. He pressed a quick kiss to Dick's neck. "Entertain them for an hour and I'll be out."

He gave Dick a little squeeze, then shooed him out of the kitchen completely.

"And stay out," he called teasingly as he closed the door on them.

Dick smiled, tilting his head forward as he felt lips brush the back of his head.

"I'm holding you up to that. See you in an hour."

Dick heard the door close behind him and he followed the kids into the living room.

An hour to entertain them. That shouldn't be too hard... right?

Theresa, he wasn't worried about. She had been keeping herself pretty entertained for an hour already. He was sure she could manage another hour.

Gabriele on the other hand?

He wasn't entirely sure how to keep a hyperactive kid entertained for that long.

"So, do you want to watch a film or the TV or something?"

His cheeks puffed out at the idea of sitting down to watch a film.

"I wanna play fruit-eating wolf!"

"We don't have enough people," Theresa shot down immediately. You needed at least five people to play that game. With just three, they were short.

Gabriele whined and threw himself onto the couch, pouting. "I wanna play a game."

Okay, so he couldn't take the easy option.

He perched himself on another seat and tried to rake his brain on games they could play. Thinking back to his own childhood, most games were some sort of tag or being hit by a wooden sword. Neither they could do.

"Do you have any board games?" He suggested.

Gabriele made a long, loud fart noise. "Only the boring adult ones."

The next dozen suggestions on Dick's part were all shot down spectacularly, with Gabriele whining about how they couldn't play it, or he didn't fancy playing it.

It was Theresa who came to the rescue. She slipped off her grandad's big leather armchair and strode to her brother, holding out her phone. "Bet you can't beat my score on flappy bird."

And that was all the encouragement he needed. Gabriele was sat up, in full concentration as he tried to beat Theresa's ridiculously high score. He'd never get as high as her 652, but trying would keep him busy, probably for hours.

With Gabriele sorted, Dick was in for a much worse fate than if he'd had to entertain Gabriele. Theresa turned to him, pulling herself to sit up on the couch next to her brother, and stared long and hard at the vampire, expecting him to entertain her.

The hour was getting longer and longer each time one of his suggestions was being shot down.

Then, miraculously, Theresa knew exactly how to keep her brother entertained by giving up her phone to him. He formed a completely different opinion on them.

Now that Gabriele was busy, Dick thought that maybe he could get through this hour. That is until Theresa sat down opposite him and stared expectingly at him.

He shifted uncomfortably under her unwavering gaze.

"So, what do you want to do?"

"You're the on that's like a thousand years old," she pointed out.

Theresa began kicking her legs slowly. "Your job is to entertain me, so entertain me."

She certainly wasn't going to make this easy for Dick. Oh, no. This was going to be a fun time.

And she knew without a shadow of a doubt that it'd be way more than an hour before Fleck joined them. The lasagna took at least an hour and a half to prepare.

Dick was in for a rough ride.

Alarm bells rang at her words. His eyes widened for a moment. Then he composed himself.

She was a child. How would she know what he is? It wasn't like Fleck was going to go around and tell his family. Not if he wanted them to be concerned for his well being.

"Right," he said, curling a piece of hair behind his ear as he thought.

"That would be easier to do if you told me what you enjoyed doing? Or maybe what Fleck does to entertain you?"

A bright smile lit up her face.

"It would, wouldn't it?" she agreed with a little nod. Her pigtails bobbed on her shoulders.

That didn't mean she was going to do so. Not a chance in hell. She much preferred to keep people on their toes.

Especially new people with fun new reactions to explore.

"Yes, it would."

He sighed. So he wasn't going to get anything out of her.

What did young girls enjoy doing? Dressing-up? Makeup? Dolls?

Theresa didn't strike him as the type to be into any of those things.

Some sort of art, maybe? What kid didn't enjoy being creative.

"Do you want to draw or something then?"

She wasn't here to make his life easier.

Just the opposite, in fact. She wanted to make things very difficult for Dick, and nothing was stopping her from doing so.

If he thought he had trouble with Gabriele, then he didn't know what he was dealing with.

"I can't draw."

She wasn't here to make his life easier.

Just the opposite, in fact. She wanted to make things very difficult for Dick, and nothing was stopping her from doing so.

If he thought he had trouble with Gabriele, then he didn't know what he was dealing with.

"I can't draw."

She wasn't here to make his life easier.

Just the opposite, in fact. She wanted to make things very difficult for Dick, and nothing was stopping her from doing so.

If he thought he had trouble with Gabriele, then he didn't know what he was dealing with.

"I can't draw."

Of course, she couldn't.

"I can teach you?"

Not that he was the best teacher. He had the tendency of getting frustrated when someone didn't get something.

But whether he was a good teacher or not didn't matter. he just needed to entertain her.

Her little nose wrinkled.

"No."

She was a creative person, but she certainly wasn't an artist, and didn't ever endeavour to be one.

She much preferred her dancing.

Dick ran his hand owned his head, pushing back some loose curls, starting to feel more frustrated. He just played this game with Gabriele. Now he was doing it all over again with Theresa and he was getting to his wit's end.

"Okay, your brother turned them down board games, but do you want to play one?"

He wasn't hopeful that she would agree to this.

"Board games are boring when there's only two people playing."

Try again, Dick.

Try again.