HAPPY BIRTHDAY ASTRID16! :D This is your other birthday present because I needed to write it and it was easier than doing a full-blown acrylic painting in winter (that's what I was going to do, believe it or not)... It's not about Zane, which you probably would have liked better, but I recall that you were asking for Cheeks, Cole's pet parrot. So... I decided to do one about Cole and Cheeks! I hope you like it!

But just because this is dedicated to Astrid16 does NOT mean you shouldn't read it. By all means, please do. It's pretty funny, actually.

Hope you enjoy!

The Dessert Disaster

It wasn't a big house. It was small, purple, and had the most uncanny feeling about it. It was inviting, yet very grudgingly so.

It was also always making noise.

A soothing hum of piano vibrated through the house, which was hard-floored and purple-walled, decorated largely with plants and leather furniture. The sound was beautiful and mysterious. Lou loved to hear the music that his son made, and spent every late afternoon listening to the gorgeous thrum of piano and reading the newspaper, sipping a cup of hot chocolate and thinking.

The haunting music suddenly broke and missed a count. The result was that the boy became flustered and hit the wrong key, and the song came to an abrupt halt.

Cole gritted his teeth and recounted. "One, and, two, and, three, and, four, and, one, and, two, and..." He hit the wrong key. Frustrated, he looked up at the sheet music and studied the figures. "E, A, E, A - wait, that's not an E, that's a G. So why... Oh."

He only hit the wrong note twice more until the song ended.

"Done!" Cole celebrated. But throwing his hands into the air threw off his balance, and he went toppling backwards off the piano bench and onto the floor, landing on his elbow. He inhaled sharply, clutching the area that had taken the brunt of the blow on the wood floor.

"Are you alright, son?" Lou asked, taking another sip of hot chocolate and adjusting his reading glasses.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Cole mumbled. He brightened suddenly. "I finished. Did you hear it? Wasn't it great?"

"I know, I heard. You're becoming quite good. But you need to pay more attention to the rhythm and the pressure you're putting on the keys."

"Yes, father," Cole replied.

"And you simply must keep your heel on the floor while using the pedal, son."

"Yes, father."

"And next time, keep your back straight."

"Yes, father."

Lou glanced over his newspaper to give him a scrutinizing look. Then he took another sip of his drink.

"Thank you. Now that you've done your piano, have you completed your music theory studies?"

"Yes, I have, father." Cole said promptly.

"What about you key signatures? You studied that, didn't you?"

"Of course, father."

"What about your violin?"

Cole's face fell. He looked away, trying to hide his disappointment. "No, father."

"Your dance practice? And your vocal practice? What about your cello?"

"No, father."

"You've practiced the guitar accompaniment for choir, haven't you?"

Cole's tone was dull, and he spread himself out on the floor listlessly. "No, father."

"Pull down your shirt and hop up off the floor, son. You have a recital tomorrow night as well. Do you have your song prepared?"

"Yes. You just heard it," Cole said distastefully.

"I don't like that tone, son."

"Sorry, father."

"Thank you. Now, I have a concert tonight, and I won't be back until nine o' clock. Do you think you can put yourself to bed before then?"

"Of course, father," Cole said, staring up at the thundercloud purple ceiling. Then it clicked. "Which concert is it?"

"The Christmas concert, son."

"Oh, please bring me back something, father!" Cole pleaded, sitting up. "You're going all the way to NinjaGo city theatre, right? They always have great things in the shop next door! Oh, won't you get me something, please?"

Lou paused and stroked his mustache thoughtfully. "I might," he said finally. "What do you have in mind?"

"Nothing in particular. Just something you think I would like," Cole said eagerly. "And something for Cheeks, too."

"I'll think about it. Oh, yes, while I'm gone you'll have to make dinner, as well. Do you think you can manage that?"

"I think so, father."

"Good." Lou stood up and folded his newspaper, taking a last gulp of his hot chocolate and leaving the front room. "I'll be going, then. Cole, I've already told you to get up, child. Don't lie there so disgracefully."

"Yes, father," said Cole, sighing inwardly. He stood up and dusted himself off.

Lou retreated into the master bedroom down the hallway next to the front room. After a moment, he called, "Oh, yes, and what about your homework?"

Cole moaned. "Don't you think that's a bit too much work, father?" he said, annoyed.

"What did you say?"

"Oh, nothing," Cole growled. "I'll get to work."

"Attaboy, Cole," came the pleased call from his father. Cole gave the door to the master bedroom a dirty look, and stooped down for his violin, which lie on the floor to the left of the piano. He unzipped the case, glared at the string instrument for a moment, then picked up the bow and the violin and got to his feet.

Lou appeared just as Cole was lifting the violin to his chin. The father frowned at his son, then came over and corrected his son's posture.

"You must keep your back straight, son. And your thumb goes here on the violin. Don't hold the bow like that, do it like this. There. That's better." Lou looked his son up and down.

Cole let his arms drop to his sides, the violin and the bow hanging limply in his hands. Lou sighed, exasperated.

"Son, you can't play the instrument like that."

"Yes, father." Cole reluctantly lifted the violin to his chin once more, straightened his back, and held the bow and the instrument just as Lou had shown him. Lou gave his son a dangerous look.

"Practice like that, now, son."

"I will."

"Alright." Lou adjusted his suit jacket and walked out the door. "Goodbye, son. Do all your practicing and get to bed before nine o'clock, now."

"Yes, father. Goodbye, father."

"Goodbye."

Cole watched him leave, waiting until the door closed behind the man.

Relieved, Cole took the violin away from his chin and sighed. He was not going to practice music for another hour and a half until bedtime. He planned to retreat to the kitchen the moment his father's car pulled out of the driveway and disappeared into town.

"Oh, and son."

Cole jumped when Lou opened the door again to speak to him, and hurriedly put the violin back to his neck and held the bow to the strings convincingly.

Lou gazed at him for a moment, then said, "Don't forget to practice your recital song three more times before bed, please. Your recital is at eight tomorrow morning, so you'll be skipping school until it's over."

"A-alright, father," Cole said, setting his violin on the couch to get his sheet music and the stand.

"Good." Lou smiled at him, then shut the door.

Cole tried to calm his pounding heart, pretending that he was not as frightened as he was. He grinned.

"Alright," he said, listening to the sounds of his father's car pulling out of the driveway. "Come on, come on." He ran to the window, pulling the drapes open the tiniest crack to watch his father drive down the street. Next to him, a big fat bird in a large silver cage squawked indignantly.

"Sorry, Cheeks," Cole whispered. The bird ruffled its colorful feathers, annoyed.

The silver car rounded the corner at the end of the street.

Cole bit his lip, and ran to set his violin down on the couch, feeling oddly giddy and free, as he always did every time Lou would leave for a concert. He looked to the caique parrot, his eyes shining.

"Wanna come out, boy?" he said. Cheeks recognized the sentence and tone of voice, and flapped his wings impatiently. So Cole undid the latch on the door of the cage and stuck his small hand in - the sizable bird hopped onto it, crawling up his arm and out of his cage. Cheeks flapped his wings, and in an instant, he was perched on top of Cole's head.

Cole giggled. "Cheeks, you're too heavy!" he said. Cheeks clicked his beak, but made no move to get off. So Cole grabbed him around the wings, like a chicken, and brought him down to eyes level, laughing.

"You silly boy, Cheeky," Cole said, rubbing his nose against the bird's beak. Cheeks chirped, and tweaked his nosed kindly.

Cole offered Cheeks his arm, then ran to the kitchen. Cheeks took off flying as soon as Cole started running - it might have seemed impossible that such a fat bird could possibly fly, but he seemed to manage it. His large wings scraped Cole's ear as he came down for a landing on the kitchen counter beside him.

Cole stuck his tongue out at the bird, opened the door to the pantry, and observed everything in it.

Some of the appetizing things the nine-year-old child noticed were the following: goldfish crackers, fruit snacks, chocolate chips, raisins, peanut butter, marshmallows, graham crackers, and potato chips. He took everything out to consider.

Cole looked at each item with interest, and whittled the options down to peanut butter, graham crackers and chocolate chips, but couldn't decide between the three. He had to keep the black-headed caique from eating the chocolate chips whenever he turned his back.

He decided at last to have the peanut butter. If he was going to eat snacks for dinner, he might as well be reasonably healthy about it. He could cut up an apple to go with it, too.

He put the graham crackers and chocolate chips back. But - what was that?

At the very top of the pantry, and in the back, was the most glorious thing the child had ever seen.

It was cake mix.

Cole stared at it with wide eyes. He looked over his shoulder apprehensively at Cheeks, who was nibbling the lid of the peanut butter jar.

He inched away from the pantry.

He grabbed a chair.

He dragged it over to the pantry.

With growing excitement, he climbed on top of the chair. But being as short as he was, he still could not reach his prize.

"Drat," he said. But he was not giving up - not for something as important as cake mix. He gripped the edge of the top shelf, took a deep breath, moved his feet off of the chair and waved them around in the air until the soles of his sneakers caught on the second lowest shelf. Cole exhaled, relieved.

Until crash! A box of cereal fell from the shelf and spilled corn flakes all over the floor. Cole gasped and nearly lost his hold on the shelf, but managed to keep from falling. Cheeks squawked in surprise, and Cole heard a fluttering of wings, before Cheeks was perched on the back of the chair, looking up at Cole with curious eyes.

Cole glanced over his shoulder at the mess beneath him. He resolved to clean it up after he got down.

He then, slowly and carefully, climbed from shelf to shelf until he reached the very top. Cole was very pleased with himself when he got up there, and with a huge grin, he reached forward and grasped the cake mix.

Cole gazed at it with a wistful expression. "Oh, man," he said.

The cake mix seemed to glow, although it may have just been the light from the kitchen reflecting off the surface of the box. It was chocolate, Cole's favorite, and it looked delicious. Cole was almost unable to contain his excitement as he leaned down to try and regain a foothold on the lower shelf.

Craaack!

Cole felt a heart-stopping lurch. The shelf was falling!

Cole screamed as the shelf tilted, and he slid off the wood into the air. His feet connected hard with the chair, but the legs slid on the wood floor and Cole went tumbling out of the pantry and onto the floor. Cheeks managed to flap out of the way, onto the counter, before his small master landed.

Cole gasped. Pain flooded his senses, and he whimpered. He slowly sat up, rubbing his head, trying to see straight.

"Ow," he said. He clenched his jaw and blinked over and over again.

When he could finally see, the first thing he laid his eyes on was the cake mix, which had made it through the collapse. Then he looked up at the pantry. Not very much food had fallen, but whenever Cole moved, he crunched three more corn flakes, which were everywhere beneath him. The top shelf was cracked, too.

Cole gingerly clambered to his feet and dusted himself off, feeling accomplished, yet still very dizzy. He stooped down to take the cake mix in his arms, wincing every time the corn flakes beneath his feet were crushed.

All the same, he could hardly wait to bake and eat the delicious dessert.

"Look, boy!" Cole said, showing the cake mix to Cheeks and pointing. "I got us dinner! Well, me dinner. You can't eat chocolate."

He gazed at the back of the box, where the instructions were.

Ridiculously Dark Chocolate Deluxe Cake Mix With All Natural Ingredients Recipe

You will need:

1 1/4 cups water

1/2 cup vegetable oil

3 eggs

"Sweet," Cole murmured, and set the box safely on the counter so that he could gather the ingredients without stress. He glared at his parrot.

"Don't eat this," he said, gesturing to the box. "Don't you dare. If you do, I will take away your chew toy."

Cheeks made an odd trilling noise and cocked his head to the side. It was clear that the point was lost on the orange and green parrot.

Cole picked the cake mix up again and shoved it in front of the parrot's beak. "No," he said firmly.

Cheeks bit the edge of it. Cole snatched it away immediately.

"Ugg," he said. "It's useless to reason with you."

The bird blinked, and began preening his feathers. Cole made sure the bird wasn't watching, then hid the cake mix behind a potted orchid on the counter.

"First thing we need is a big bowl to mix it in," Cole said. "And those are down here."

He leaned down next to the oven, which was near the pantry. On either side of it, there was a cupboard. Cole opened the one on the left side and withdrew from it a large, red, plastic bowl. He set it on the counter.

"And a stirring spoon." Cole opened a drawer over the "big bowl" cupboard, took out the biggest spoon he could find (a soup ladle), and set it down next to the plastic bowl.

"Alright. Then we need..." Cole checked the back of the box again. "One and one-fourths cups of water. Okay, easy."

Cole reached up to another cupboard, this one resting above the stove. He pulled from it two plastic drinking cups (not measuring cups). Then he rushed to the sink and filled the orange cup full of water until it was nearly overflowing, and dumped it into his mixing bowl.

Cole looked at the other cup. How was he supposed to get one fourth out of that thing? The boy pondered for a moment, listening to Cheeks ruffle his feathers and click his beak.

"I know!" he said. His exclamation startled Cheeks, who looked up at him inquiringly.

Cole rushed to the counter beside the stove, and reached across it, to a tin can full of markers. He grabbed a black permanent marker. Then he drew back and grabbed the other cup, a blue one, and divided it into fourths with the permanent marker. The irreversibility of what he was doing didn't even occur to him - it solved his problem, didn't it?

"There," Cole said. He leaned over the sink and filled the drinking cup up to the crooked one-fourth line and dumped it into the mixing bowl. For good measure, he stirred the water with the soup ladle, only splashing the bird who sat next to him once.

"And now we need," Cole continued to himself. He checked the cake mix, which was still in its hiding place behind the orchid. "One half cup of vegetable oil."

Cole paused. He scratched his head.

"What the heck is vegetable oil?" he said finally.

The boy was muddled. He had heard of peanut oil. And olive oil. And car oil. But never just straight vegetable oil. Would it be okay to just skip it? He didn't even know if they had vegetable oil.

He decided to use olive oil. He knew they had that. Whenever their aunt and uncle came over, they would always have pizza, and olive oil was what Uncle Brookstone would use to slather the pizza stone.

Cole went to the pantry again, ignoring the crunchy corn flakes on the ground. He reached for the olive oil, which, fortunately, sat on the shelf beneath the one with the spilled cereal. He took it to the sink, where he filled the blue cup halfway full - or to the slightly-above-halfway halfway line. Then he dumped it into the water.

He was astonished to see the oil gather in what he perceived to be bubbles. "Woah!" he said. He wondered if oil usually did this when you added it to water.

The black-haired boy grabbed the soup ladle and began stirring it around, to see if it would mix with the water. It only split into smaller bubbles.

"Weird," Cole muttered. Cheeks stuck his head in the bowl, transfixed by the oil bubbles spinning round and round in the water.

"No, Cheeks," Cole said, pushing his feathery head out of his concoction. "I don't want bird germs in my cake. You can't even eat it."

Cheeks sneezed indignantly.

Cole shooed him back to the table, where he fluttered, looking as cross as a parrot without expressions could look. His squawk definitely sounded annoyed.

Cole furtively checked the cake mix. "And now three eggs," he said. He hid the cake mix back behind the potted plant and went to the refrigerator.

The boy pulled out a carton of a dozen eggs. He took out two and set them on the counter, when the first one rolled off and cracked on the floor. The other egg quickly followed.

"Aww," Cole said, disgusted. He edged around the yellow mess, deciding he would clean that up later, as well as the cereal all over the floor. Cheeks chirped loudly.

"It's not funny," Cole snapped. "Don't laugh... These are disgusting. I can't believe these slimy things are in cake." Cole eyed the eggs on the floor.

Cheeks squeaked again.

Cole changed his strategy. He took one egg out, cracked it into the bowl, threw away the eggshells, and then got out another one. He repeated this four times before he remembered that he only needed three eggs. "Snap!" he said.

Cole grabbed the ladle and stuck it into the eggs. He scooped the yoke of the extra egg out and put it in the garbage, which was right next to the edge of the counter. Then he mixed the three eggs, the water, and the oil up together until it resembled something a lot like the mess on the floor.

"I think that's it," Cole said, checking the box again. "Yep. Now I add the cake mix!"

Cole broke the box open and opened the package of chocolate powder mixture inside. Grinning, he turned the package upside-down and dumped it on top of the egg-water-oil combination.

"Awesome," he said. Then he coughed when he inhaled some of the stray powder in the air.

He grabbed the soup ladle and started mixing, reading the cake mix box simultaneously, like he had seen Aunt Brookstone do before. It made him feel professional to do two things at once.

"Preheat the oven to three-hundred fifty degrees. Okay." Cole left the bowl to preheat the oven, which was easy to figure out. He returned to the bowl and started mixing again.

"Grease the bottom of a large nine..." Cole struggled. "Nine to nine... nine by nine or nine to nine?... uh... A big pan." Cole was going to go with "a big pan" for now. "Let's get a big pan then."

He got a big pan from the "big bowl" cupboard, where apparently everything big was kept.

But what was he supposed to grease it with? Butter? He bit his lip and thought. Then he shoved the curious Cheeks out of the bowl with the end of his ladle.

"I said no, Cheeks," he said. Cheeks chirped, pecked Cole's finger, and flapped off to the table.

He decided to use butter. What else was there to use?

Cole turned around to head to get the butter, when he slipped on the eggs. Cheeks yelped in surprise along with the boy when he hit the ground hard.

The boy was knocked windless. "Owwww," he moaned. His head throbbed.

He sat up. To his dismay, he was now covered with gooey, raw eggs. "Oh, sick," he murmured.

Cheeks clicked his beak and fluffed his feathers nonchalantly.

"You sound like Dad," Cole said, grabbing the counter to stabilize himself as he stood up. "'You alright, son?'. 'It was your own fault, you know, son'." Cole regained his balance. "Sheesh, I already have one parent, I don't need two."

The nine-year-old noticed that there was now raw egg on the higher cupboards. How did egg get up there...? It might have been splashed there by his fall. But that wasn't important right now. He needed butter.

The butter dish was near the tin can full of markers from earlier. He grabbed it and brought it over to the big pan that he was going to grease.

It took a minute for him to decide how he was going to go about greasing the pan.

Then he turned the butter dish upside down and shook it until the whole stick of lukewarm butter landed with a splop in the middle of the pan. Cole stuck his hands in the butter and started coating the inside of the pan with it.

He didn't stop until the entirety of the stick of butter was thickly spread over the inside. Satisfied, he went to wash his hands. The butter didn't come off very well in the water, so he used a dry towel instead.

Then he took the red bowl full of cake batter and poured it in the pan, a little quicker than he meant - it splashed his cheek with chocolate mixture. He ignored it.

The oven beeped.

"Yay!" Cole said. "It's done heating up!"

He grabbed the pan full of cake mix and brought it over to the stove. He set it down to open the oven, then, carefully, he put it back in.

How far in does it need to go? he wondered. He pushed it some more, then his right hand touched the metal oven rack. Cole drew back sharply, inhaling.

"Oww!" he said. He sucked on his burn while he shut the oven door, then ran to the sink and put it under cold water.

"Oww, that hurt," he moaned. "But the cake's in now. We wait..." he checked the box, which still lie face-down on the counter beside him. "Fifteen to twenty minutes."

He looked around at the kitchen.

Corn flakes, eggs, and cake mix powder was all over. Cole guessed he had left the lid of the permanent marker off, and when he slipped on the eggs he had flipped it or something, because there was now permanent marker making a stripe down the white refrigerator. There was egg on the cupboards, not to mention in his hair and clothes. The peanut butter was still out, and he had apparently accidentally spilled olive oil on the floor beneath him, under the sink.

"Oh, snap," Cole said miserably.

Cheeks puffed his chest out and sang a song, sitting in the middle of it all with what could only be called a triumphant air. "It's not my fault for once," he seemed to say.

"Shut up, you fat old bird," Cole snapped. Cheeks went right on singing.

It took Cole about as long as it took for the cake to bake to clean the kitchen. He first wiped up the eggs and the oil and changed into his pajamas. He also stuck his head in the sink and got water all over it, making it super wet, trying to get the egg out. Then he came back and cleaned up the corn flakes, adjusted the shelf, hid the cracked top shelf with bags of potato chips, hid the line of permanent marker on the refrigerator with a caterpillar of magnets, and mopped up the cake mix powder.

By that time, the cake was done and his burn on his hand felt a little bit better.

"Alright," Cole said, nearly unable to contain his excitement. "Time for dinner."

He got hotpads from the cupboard above the sink and took the cake out, carefully. Ohh, man! It looked so good! Cole couldn't wait to eat it.

He debated making frosting, then finally decided against it, because he didn't really like frosting, and besides that he didn't want to make another huge mess in the kitchen.

So he ate it plain. Six or seven minutes after it came out, he was tired of waiting for it to cool, so he brought it to the table with a fork and ate it.

And it was so good. It was probably the first (and last) time he would ever make a cake that delicious. It was so moist and so perfect - warm and crumbly, baked to perfection, and the chocolate flavor was indescribable. Cole was lost in a dreamlike trance in which all he could think about was the mouth-watering scent of chocolate and the texture of heaven in his mouth.

And that was when the silver car pulled up in the driveway.

"Snap!" Cole said, when he heard it. He looked at the clock - nine forty-five. Past bedtime. He stood up abruptly. "Cheeks, come on! Get back in your cage!"

Cheeks looked at him inquisitively, but made no move to do so.

Cole growled. "Oh, come on, stupid bird," he said, and offered his arm quickly. "Come on, boy!"

Cheeks flapped onto his arm, and Cole rushed him to the front room, quickly shoving him in the cage. He glanced out the window - his father was getting out of his car.

"Go, Cheeks!" Cole said desperately when the bird struggled. Cole shut the latch on the cage door. Cheeks ruffled himself, annoyed.

The boy ran to the violin that still sat on the couch. He put it in its case hurriedly, then scrambled to the kitchen, where the cake was still sitting, half-eaten, on the table.

Cole grabbed it and ran to his dark bedroom, which was down the hall on the other side of the master bedroom. He shoved the cake underneath his bed and then jumped under the covers, pretending to have been asleep.

Just in time, too. He heard his father come inside from the front door. His heart was pounding, and his breathing was hoarse, but he tried to slow himself down so that it would sound like he had been sleeping.

There were a few moments of tense silence, when his father opened the door to the bedroom.

"It smells really good in here," was the first thing he said.

Cole opened his eyes a slit, as if he was tired and could barely open them. "Hi, dad," he said.

Lou grinned. "Hey, son," he said, and sat down on the bed next to Cole. Cole smiled sheepishly.

"I got you something," he said. "But you can't have it until Christmas. Okay? Trust me, it's worth waiting."

Cole nodded.

Lou smiled at his son in the dark, ruffling his hair. Then he stopped. "Why is your hair wet?" he said curiously.

Cole bit his lip. "Uh... I was playing in the snow," he fibbed.

"Oh. Well, that explains it. I guess that's why it smells like chocolate - you made some hot cocoa?"

"Y-yeah."

"Okay. You seem really tired, son."

"You do, too," Cole said.

Lou chuckled. "I am," he said. "I think I'm going to go have a snack and get to bed. Goodnight, son." He leaned down and kissed Cole's forehead, then stood up to leave.

"Goodnight," Cole said, making his voice sound weary.

Lou shut the door behind him.

Cole waited. Then he breathed a sigh of relief. He did no music, plus he got cake. Not a bad night.

Then he heard a loud crash from the kitchen. It set Cole's hair up on end and goosebumps down his arms. His father yelped.

"Cole!" came an angry shout.

Uh...

Whoops.

See, not half-bad.

Happy birthday Astrid! I really hope you like it!

Please review, it means the world to me.