Gingerbread Cookies
By Sonic Jules
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Disclaimer: Doctor Who and the characters of said show do not belong to me, no matter how hard I've wished for it. Even now I am writing a letter to Santa with high hopes. No infringement meant to the owners and associates, nor BBC. :o)
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A/N: Happy holidays to everyone. This is from me to you.
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Chapter One:
A Burning Desire To Bake
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Sweat trickled down her back as the thick smoke dissipated within the little kitchen, Rose waving a cookie sheet to swoosh it out the window she'd opened. She coughed, then fought the tears threatening to fall. This was all going so very, very wrong.
Cookies. He'd spoken of a fondness for those gingerbread cookies with grinning faces just once in passing. But she'd latched onto the idea and held it ever since. Next trip home, she was determined to fix him home made biscuits just like he described. She'd even use those edible ball bearings he was so fond of for buttons.
Now he was out in the TARDIS, working on the ship's maintenance issues and all alone, while she was supposed to be visiting with her mum, "vacationing" - his word, not hers - and catching up on the local gossip whilst planning the holiday that he dreaded participating in. It wasn't that he didn't enjoy Christmas. But Christmas with Jackie and Mickey and the many yakking neighbors who talked too loud with liquored breath was not something he was looking forward to. But he'd do it, for her. So making him the cookies? It was the least Rose felt she could do.
She'd come home only to find a note on the table, Jackie leaving it on the off chance that her wayward daughter would show up, explaining her trip to the country to take care of the aunt who'd broken her leg and ...
Rose huffed in frustration, sitting down none too gently in a kitchen chair. She threw her dish towel down on the table, watching a puff of flour rise in its wake. The blackened third attempted batch of gingerbread cookies were still spiraling thin lines of smoke toward the ceiling; a mild contrast now to the flour dust. Not only had she emptied her mum's cupboards by mixing ingredients many times over, but she'd also managed to make a royal mess of things, not to mention using the fire extinguisher (though only once) as her cooking techniques failed time and time again.
Tears threatened to fall once more, and this time she let them.
Soon realizing her pity-party was getting nothing accomplished, and having a vision of Jackie returning home and finding the place in the mess she'd created, Rose shoved up from the table and stepped to the counter, pulling the lid off from the cookie jar. She reached deep down, her fingers scraping the bottom, removing her hand only when she had grasped what she'd been rooting for. Unfolding the currency, she straightened and counted it at the same time. There was enough to replace the ingredients she'd all but used up and to get a few extra cleaning supplies as well. She sighed. This was indeed the worst 'vacation' she could recall. Bloody hell.
OoO
The Doctor walked cheerfully into Powell Estates, pleased to have finished his repairs ahead of time, though dreading the thought of Jackie's wicked pout as he came to take Rose away again. They'd be back for the coming holiday though, he'd promised Rose as much.
Knocking calmly on the door, he listened, expecting to hear Rose and Jackie carrying on about something or another, or at least hear the sounds of approaching footsteps in answer to his knock. Hearing neither, he knocked louder, confusion crossing his face at the continued silence greeting him.
Waiting was not nor had never been a virtue of the Time Lord, and all too soon he retrieved his sonic screwdriver and let himself inside the apartment. The first thing he noticed was the smell of something burning.
"Hello in there? Jackie cooking again?" he hollered too cheerfully toward the kitchen. When silence was the only response he received, he quickened his steps. "Bit rude, me knocking and no one letting me in. Good thing I don't take offense very easily," he said as he continued, He stopped just before reaching his destination, his attention drawn to a large note taped to the wall. He pulled his reading glasses from his jacket and put them on, then took the memo down to read it.
"Mum," he began, reading out loud. "Gone to replace what I used. PLEASE DON'T GO IN THE KITCHEN! I'll explain everything when I get back, and I'll clean it all up then, too. Love, Rose."
So, Rose had been experimenting in the kitchen, not Jackie, and it hadn't gone well, he imagined. Well, the note said for Jackie not to enter. It said nothing about him staying put.
Taking off his specs and replacing them in his pocket, the Doctor stepped into the kitchen, a look of concern mixed with utter disbelief crossing his handsome features. Oh, this ... this was ... well, it was what it was. There was flour on nearly every conceivable surface - but no, hang on a tick - he knelt to the floor and passed his index finger through what looked to be whipped cream. Lifting the digit to his lips, he tasted it.
"Hmm. Potassium bicarbonate," he said to himself. "Ah! Of course! She used a fire extinguisher. Oh!" He looked around the room a little more, seeing the cookie tray on top of the kitchen table. Within its raised edges were blackened bits of something, but even he could not hazard a guess as to what they were meant to be. Beneath the pan was a pot holder, its corner sticking out slightly. Beneath that, he saw what appeared to be another note.
Pulling out his glasses once more, he looked it over. "Ah," he said to no one, realizing that Jackie was out of town. So why hadn't Rose simply returned to the TARDIS? What was all this mess about, anyway?
The Doctor looked around the room and sighed. Wherever the notion to make this cooking attempt came from, Rose would surely be in no mood to clean up the aftereffects when she returned. And since he had nothing to do at the moment, the least he could do was help. Taking off his coat and jacket, then rolling up his shirt sleeves, he found a ruffled apron hanging on the back of a chair. Donning it, the Lord of Time admired his reflection in the window before he began the very domesticated task of cleaning the kitchen.
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OoO
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