"What the hell did you do!"

Dougie looked from Tom to the burnt saucepan to the milk all over the floor to the mangled mess on the table, and shrugged.

"Pancakes?"

"How the-" Tom shook his head and tried again. "What the- Who the- What-?"

"Pancakes."

"That- what-"

"Pancakes...?"

"Pancakes."

"Yes. Pancakes."

Tom took a deep breath and pinched his nose between his fingers. "Dougie."

The blonde looked at him expectantly. Before Tom could decide which part of the scene to question first, Harry strolled in. Ah, Tom thought, good. Harry can back me up, with the added bonus of his actually having enough braincells to form an articulate conversation.

"Lawks. Did the gingerbread man return for his revenge?"

Or not.

Harry looked at Dougie, the amused smirk playing at his lips. "Whatcha doing, Pugsley?"

"I was trying to make pancakes."

"So what happened then? Eggs exploded, yeah? Common mistake. Happens to the best of us."

"No. No, the eggs were actually relatively unexplosive today." Tom begged to differ; yolk was hanging from the cutlery draw. "The problem, Harry, was that I realised something."

"What's that?"

Dougie rubbed his nose with the air of one done a great injustice. "I don't know how to make pancakes."

"Well you really should have thought of that before you ruined my kitchen." Tom snapped.

"I didn't ruin it." Dougie said mildly.

"It's a mess!"

"It's an organised mess."

"How the hell is this organised?"

"You see, the milk is now on the floor, the eggs in the sink, the flour is in the cutlery draw-"

"Listen to yourself!" Tom was beside himself with borderline OCD. "It's a shit hole!"

"That word's crude. I prefer to look at it as a change of arrangements."

"It's not a holy fuck why are the Frosties all over the table?"

Danny chose to enter at this point; unlike Tom's shocked halt at the door and Harry's amused stance a step away, he just sauntered in,seated himself at the table, picked up a few Frosties and dumped them in the milk on the floor before eating them one by one. Harry rolled his eyes and Tom nearly fainted.

"Daniel Alan David Jones, what in God's name are you doing?"

"Eating."

"Off the floor?"

"For lack of a more glorified way of phrasing it, yep."

"That's disgusting!"

"It's an abomination against cereal." Harry stated.

"Yeah, I'm sure Tony the Tiger is rolling in his grave." Danny muttered, looking around at the kitchen for the first time. "Dude, it really is like I'm back at home."

The others waited patiently for an explanation.

"When my mum was angry at my dad," He told them, licking his fingers before sticking them in a pile of sugar on the chair next to him, "She'd throw food at him. If he was lucky it was only flour and shit, but once she got a pineapple, and it hit him square between the eyes." He demonstrated by poking himself between the eyebrows, leaving behind a milky fingerprint. "He fell over, blacked out in the salad drawer and woke up with peas up his nose and carrots in his ears. Vicky said it was 'modern art' and he chucked a ball of romain heart lettuce at her. It hit me, though, and mum flipped shit on him, pulled out the big guns and lobbed a pumpkin at him, yeah, and we didn't see him again for three days. Salad drawer was broke and all. There was nowhere to keep the Pak Choi what Vicky's rabbit ate, so it lived off Fabulous Kibble for days and lost weight, and Vicky tried to sue Dad."

Silence, in which the other three attempted to make any form of sense from this particular part of Danny's family history.

"Wh- what?" Harry managed.

"Weren't you listening?" Danny said flatly.

"I was, yeah, but I lost a few braincells in the process."

"So did my dad! Well, I think it was the pineapple, but mum blames it on the pumpkin."

Tom decided to interrupt the charming anecdote before it went to far. "Dougie, you have to clean this up."

Dougie turned on him a look not unlike that of an injured puppy. "I was only trying to make you pancakes. I don't see why I should have to slave for that."

"Dougie! You turned my kitchen in to a battlefield!"

"Ah, yes. We all remember the great war of 1992. The 'Battle of the Baking Soda', as I recall, was the reason for the collapse of eggy economy everywhere." Harry said drily.

Danny nodded sombrely. "I heard that the deaths tallied up to fifteen thousand cracked eggs and four hundred bags of spilt sugar."

"Not to mention," Harry added, "The assassination of Mrs Betty Crocker."

"She was drowned in a vat of her own chocolate icing, wasn't she?"

"Indeed she was. Horrible story."

"Truly sickening." Danny agreed. "Almost as sickening as the icing itself, as I recall."

"Enough!" Tom's face was turning an exceptional shade of red. Harry assumed it was something to do with the fact that, as they spoke, egg and flour mix was drying on Giovanna's Best China.

Tom continued, face aglow. "Dougie, clean it UP. NOW. And then, then, then, because I do not want your flourey footprints tracked all over my rugs, you will have a bath."

"My God, is it that time of the year already." Danny remarked. Dougie glowered at him.

"And when was the last time you had a bath?"

Danny snorted derisively. "Bath? Real men shower."

"Real men do not wear pink shower caps." Harry said mildly. Danny turned an interesting shade of pink.

"That was a dare!"

"DANNY! HARRY! ENOUGH! DOUGIE! CLEAN UP! NOW!" Tom turned and stormed out. The other three gazed after him, then turned to the oven as a timer 'ping'ed in a tone all too chirpy for the current atmosphere. Dougie skipped to the oven, flung it open dramatically, and stumbled back as a wave of hot air hit him.

He turned, eyes streaming, to Harry and Danny. "Pancakes are ready!"

"You baked them." This wasn't so much a question as a statement, and not so much a statement as an attempt to kick start logic into action. Logic, however, was failing to make an appearance. Dougie was taking full advantage of this fact as he crouched down and peered into the depths of Tom's oven.

"I think I left them in for to long," He said sadly. Danny joined him.

Dougie sighed. "When do you think I should have taken them out?" He asked.

Danny considered. "Well, probably about a second before you put them in."

Harry sat down on the other side of Dougie and shook his head. "Nice try, Dougs." He said. Dougie pouted.

Danny's eyes gleamed as he turned to Dougie. "You know," He began, "I have an idea. Tom needs cheering up, and while the kitchen is a mess already you might as well, ah, take full advantage of the fact and prepare his favourite meal..."

Half an hour later, Harry and Danny stood outside the kitchen window and looked on in fascination as Dougie wrestled with the rice steamer on the kitchen floor.

"What did Tom ever do to you?" Harry wondered out loud, as Dougie's foot caught a packet on the side and a spaghetti apocalypse began in the Fletcher kitchen.

"Actually," Danny replied, as powdered chilli exploded in an orange- tinted shower over the table, "I was in the mood for Indian Take away, you see."

"Ah." Harry nodded, watching as the kitchen door opened and Tom walked in. "You sly dog."