His hands on her hips were probably the most counterproductive move of the evening, considering how little productive everything was turning out to be. Amelia found that when she felt the warmth of his hands, lightly pressing into her bony hips, her brain shut down for good, neurons dying along the way. Here was hoping it would never happen during surgery, the whole department would be taken away from her in seconds once Bailey saw what a bumbling idiot she turned into at the mere touch of this man. He was dangerous, like kryptonite. Every superhero had their own weakness, Amelia had never thought in a million years hers would turn out to be a man.
Meredith had bestowed upon her the honor of driving the kids – all the kids – home by herself. It was an honor that not even her or Maggie had to that point. Amelia knew it was because Meredith hated her, in a sibling loving way, but Meredith still hated her. It was fairly obvious because the second she picked the two little ones from daycare, Bailey started asking what they were going to have for dinner – something else she was in charge of handling. Ellis had started crying unless Amelia held her, which meant in the car drive to Zola's preschool, the quick ten minutes were underscored by angry baby wails. To add to that once Zola buckled up she started talking non stop about her day, something Amelia should have at least pretended to be as excited about, while she just wanted a little bit of silence.
They were three minutes from the house when Meredith called saying there wasn't going to be any milk for Ellie's dinner at home and she should stop by the hospital to pick up some before they made it there. Amelia was suddenly sympathizing with the woman that drove her car full of kids off a bridge. Her head was about to explode. Between Bailey's monster noises, Zola's incessant talking and Ellie alternating between screaming and hiccupping Amelia was going to sell those kids to the highest bidder. What was worse about the surprise stop, was that she hadn't realized until she parked in her spot at the hospital, that she'd have to walk in with all of them. If not even Meredith did it, why on earth did she think Amelia would be able to? Because she hates me, that's why, Maggie just shook her head, rolling her eyes.
Amelia resorted to calling Meredith, explaining that she'd never make it with three kids inside the hospital without losing at least one, and the best course of action would be to order an intern to just bring out Ellie's dinner and they'd be off. Given the situation, Meredith agreed and Amelia sat patiently in the car, explaining what the silent game was to the kids. The winner would get an extra portion of whatever dinner was going to be, which the kids knew to be waffles, because that's what auntie Amy always made. Meredith wasn't exactly thrilled that her kids ate breakfast for dinner at least two times a week, but she couldn't afford to be picky with all the free babysitting and child minding she had.
Imagine Amelia's surprise when the intern on scut she was expecting turned out to… not be an intern. "Owen?"
He leaned against the window on the passenger side, taking a look inside the car and offering a smile. "Meredith gave me this for you." He said handing out a canvas bag. "Something about dinner, I guess."
Amelia smiled awkwardly, putting the bag under Ellie's seat on her diaper bag. "Oh, that's Ellie's dinner."
Amelia cringed as she saw what it did to his face. The awkward situation had now turned a whole different level of awkward. She looked at him and he looked at her and suddenly Amelia's headache was gone, her impatience, her frustration at handling these terrors faded into Owen's eyes. It was weird. It was definitely strange because all they did was random make out sessions in the hospital and on her front porch, but they had never bothered to talk about that since – well, since he'd come back from Iraq.
The awkward smiles and silences were lost on the kids, Ellie was asleep and Bailey was intent on winning the silent game, a game Zola had participated in for the sake of competition, not really interested in the prize. When her patience had started wearing thin enough, she'd decided to stop it with the nonsense and give her brother an easy win. "Are you coming to dinner too, Uncle Owen?"
Amelia was a little shocked and not at all ready for that, luckily – or not – Owen was much faster than her at answering Zola. "Depends," he joked. "What's for dinner?"
"Waffles." Zola answered and Amelia groaned, knowing the kids too were in touch with her selective cooking abilities.
Owen frowned, focusing his entire attention on Zola. "Waffles? But that's breakfast."
The little girl shrugged and looked at her aunt with a smile. "When Auntie Amy cooks it's always waffles."
With a smile, Owen turned to Amelia, who was avoiding his eyes, desperately trying to keep her blush from spreading any further. "Oh."
"Can you cook, Uncle Owen?" asked Zola, not nearly old enough to know why the two adults were staring at each other with goofy grins on their faces.
A little taken aback by the direct question and not wanting to say the wrong thing before Amelia's nieces and nephew, Owen shrugged. "A little bit, yes."
"So you can teach her, right?"
Noting Amelia's cheeks were bordering on a deep crimson shade he found himself unexpectedly fond of, he nodded. "I could."
Bailey, who had returned his attention to his monsters or aliens or dinosaur thingies he was clashing against each other, perked at the prospect of a bigger, juicier dinner. "You make dinner?"
Owen was now trapped. The Shepherd kids had trapped him – him and Amelia. Owen turned to the adult in the car, only to discover that there was no adult in the car. "So, what are you making for dinner, Uncle Owen? Are you going to show your legendary chef skills to poor, humble Auntie Amy?"
"You're… you're incorrigible." He smirked.
Unable to contain his excitement, Bailey jumped against the restraints of his car seat. "Really? Really, really, really?"
Despite handling herself a little better than her constantly food starved little brother, Zola wasn't any less excited at any dinner that wasn't her aunt's waffles or her mom's cereal – only her other aunt could cook, but was almost never at home for dinner time. "What are you making Uncle Owen?"
"Kids," Amelia tried to placate the mass, knowing that letting them assault him was fun right to the point where it became plain annoying. "Uncle Owen is probably very busy, maybe we can ask him over one night, okay?"
Owen wasn't beyond noticing how quickly Amelia was trying to dismiss him and the sad looks and pouts he got from the passengers in the back had him smirking playfully. "Actually uncle Owen is free to give Auntie Amy her first cooking lesson tonight." Taking immense pleasure in the way Amelia's eyes bulged out. "I'm thinking lasagna tonight?"
A happy chorus echoed through the entire car, giving him and Amelia a couple seconds of grown up time. "You know you really don't have to?"
Despite her words, he was already climbing inside the car. "I can't let those poor kids starve, can I?"
An elbow in the gut later, Amelia was driving off to the house, while Owen carefully recounted all the ingredients they were going to need and Amelia would nod for everyone she knew they had at home, being the one to be in charge of grocery shopping came in handy for once. They luckily had everything, Amelia was dreading a stop along the way to buy whatever was still missing from the list, even with Owen's help it was going to be quite a feat. They made it home and the kids disappeared to their room and the play room with the promise of lasagne for dinner.
"You can really cook?" asked Amelia meekly as she started picking all the ingredients from the cupboards and fridge.
Owen smiled at her childish fascination with the notion, stepping up to her until they were a hair width apart. "Let's say I can make lasagne, I was very popular because of that in my early days."
Eyes locked with each other, Amelia leaned slightly towards him, careful not to touch him and ruin the moment or turn the moment into something that would not produce anything edible. "Oh, you were, were you?"
The lip bite was completely unnecessary and it did things to him, things like wanting to haul her up, away from the kitchen and away from little curious ears. Instead, he planted his hands on her hips, turning her so that she was facing the counter and stepped up behind her, placing his feet on both sides of hers. He heard her breath hitch in her throat and realized that whatever it was that they were doing, he was doing it right. His hands found hers, wrapping around them and guiding her with his, as if she would learn anything about the art of making lasagne with his hot breath against the back of her neck. It had to be illegal. In public this was illegal. If Meredith saw her, she'd deem this illegal in here as well.
The lasagne was becoming more and more what they would end up eating, but Amelia had no idea how that was. All she knew was that there was a strong defined chest pressing against her back, his hips pushing hers delicately into the counter, his two strong arms wrapped around her like a cage. This wasn't cooking. This definitely wasn't cooking, the dinner was like a side effect of whatever heavenly thing this was and Amelia couldn't even begin to be bothered to figure that out. Owen would scold her from time to time for not doing what he was saying, his voice like a distant echo in her ears, sounding deep and raw and his words were lost to her ears.
About an hour later Meredith and Maggie made their way in, Maggie had waited for Meredith to get out of surgery and they had driven home together. Upon entering the smell of delicious home cooked dinner went to their brains directly, the two had been joking, setting bets on what would be for dinner, waffles, pancakes or French toast. This smelled like actual dinner. The kind of dinner Maggie usually made the few rare times she was home in time. For a second Meredith thought she might have stumbled into the wrong house, had she not lived here for most of her life, the doubt would have been more than a fleeting thought. The house was relatively quiet, she could hear Zola and Bailey playing and she knew Ellie was up in her crib, having seen the lights of her mobile from the driveway. She heard hushed voices from the kitchen, and finally realized someone else was over. That would explain the mind numbing smell of… she couldn't quite figure out what it was. Maybe it was April or Callie or… someone who could cook.
Her thoughts were interrupted by Zola toppling down the stairs, looking overly excited. "Mommy!" she exclaimed as she launched herself in her mom's arms. "There's lasagne for dinner!"
"Oh," her own stomach grumbled. "That's so nice, do you like lasagne?"
Zola nodded enthusiastically. "I love lasagne! Bailey was stealing the sauce earlier, but Auntie Amy let him because he won the silent game in the car."
Meredith groaned at Amelia's entertainment methods, but sympathized nonetheless. "Is your Aunt making the dinner?"
"Yeah! Uncle Owen is teaching her so she can make lasagne all the time. Isn't that awesome?"
Sighing and finally unravelling one of tonight's mysteries, Meredith assured her little girl it was indeed amazing that Uncle Owen would go to such lengths to assure Zola and Bailey had an awesome dinner, leaving out that Owen might not have needed all that enticing if it meant spending time in close proximity to their aunt.
It was a couple of minutes later, after checking in on Bailey, who was in need of replenishing his blood sugar and thus in a distinctively foul mood, that Meredith made her way to the kitchen. She found Maggie standing in the corner outside, the one where you could see inside, but still being hidden by one of the sturdy wooden columns. Owen was standing pressed entirely against Amelia, one of his hands was splayed on her stomach and the other was guiding her own hand with the cheese cubes for the topping. His fingers on her belly were twitching, eliciting giggles from her and with each giggle she would let a few pieces of soft cheese fall everywhere but on the lasagne. They were cute and the way Amelia turned into his neck, whenever he tickled her was endearing, but both sisters were starting to get worried about the edibility of the deliciously looking dinner.
"What are they doing?" asked Maggie, oblivious to the arrangement Zola had explained in the last few details. "What are they supposed to be doing?"
Meredith smirked, letting the irritation at how long they were taking slip. "It's a cooking lesson. They're making lasagne for dinner."
Frowning at the absurdity of Meredith's words, Maggie shook her head. "They don't look like they're making dinner, they look about ready to make a baby."
Meredith shrugged, knowing that Amelia and Owen better not have any intentions of making ay babies at the moment, much less in her kitchen, but little ears behind them weren't so well versed into the miracle of life. hungry Bailey had made his way down the stairs, holding onto the biggest dinosaur of his collection, looking into the kitchen with big, wide eyes. "Who's making a baby?"