SUMMARY: Kyouya's ego tells him that guys can do what girls can. Thus, baking. But what would you expect to a rich bastard who has never set foot on a kitchen before? Disaster, indeed.
DISCLAIMER: Kyouya and I could have been together. But copyright issues tell me otherwise.
A/N: Kyouya in a frilly, floral apron! Who wouldn't want that? And a certain Cool Type covered in a flour and baking powder? Well, I hope you like it as much as I enjoyed writing it (smile). For some reason, I was spelling the word d-i-m-i-n-i-s-h-i-n-g for my younger brother. Don't ask why.
Don't Let Kyouya Bake!
"Are you sure about this?" Natsumi asked as she propped herself on the granite counter, her eyes, heavily lidded as they locked on her husband as he prodded the piece of article on the book he was holding. "It's not as easy as how you've read it in the book you know."
It was bloody four in the morning. And as a novelist with a manuscript due next week, sleep would be beyond your grasp. Kyouya just poked her awake (after fourteen minutes of sleep) and asked where the recipe book was. Alarmed, she ran her hands all over his face and neck, checking if his temperature rose up or he was having hallucinations or something similar to that.
When he left her at peace, she tried to get sleep back on, tossing herself on the bed over and over until she fell flat cold on the carpet. And then, the atmosphere wasn't comfortable anymore. Imagining Kyouya in the kitchen (and knowing he had never set foot on that particular spot of the house ever before), was quite disturbing.
"Of course. Men can do what women can," he argued as he reread the paragraph for the third time. It was a firm statement with some tone of authority in the voice. Egos of men really are unnerving sometimes. They never know when to stop unless they hit a solid brick wall and realize they were wrong.
Seeing your husband go over and tell you that he wanted to bake (and probably ruin the kitchen in the process) would be a rarity. But if your husband was Kyouya Ootori, it was beyond logical to have him make cookies--much less make him wear an apron with bright yellow sunflowers with frills on the hem.
"And don't you have any other apron aside from this?" he asked as he removed his glasses and tugged the ribbon that held the clothing in place.
This time, Natsumi need not to suppress a giggle that ended up as a thigh-slapping laughter.
"But you look cute," she complimented with a mocking smile that made Kyouya raise one eyebrows as if saying, 'You do not call me cute.'
"Go back to sleep," he spoke as he slipped his glasses back on, the authority lingering until the last word. "I don't want a wife with dark bags under her eyes. It's quite scary, really."
She gave out a short chuckle as she made her way over him and pecked him on the cheek. "I'll try. But your mere presence on the kitchen disturbs me."
"I'm not going to ruin it. I promise."
---
(A few minutes later)
Kyouya's brow furrowed as he reread the paragraph on the page of the recipe book beside the bowl of some-mound-of-the-unknown. He'd been doing that for the last fifteen minutes, pausing every now and then to recall where he had gone wrong. He was pretty sure he followed all the procedures on the book, without missing anything and yet, the outcome of the supposed-to-be-a-dough wasn't as pleasing as how it looked like in the photograph. It looked more like a warted, pale-white, frog.
To add more to Kyouya's dismay, he was covered in thick flour and baking soda. His jet-black hair was unruly and graying--he sneezed over the powder mixture and the fine particles covered his entire face, including the ceiling. And then the sweat forming on his slender neck was making it stickier and indeed disgusting. Ootori's never sweat like this! They have never even been covered with a thick layer of powder before! He swore to himself that he would take a long bath later while scrubbing every inch of his body.
The kitchen was also in total disarray. In desperate attempts to look for the ingredients he needed, and for the equipments for baking, he raided the cupboards and threw everything he found necessary on the countertop.
And then, there were the cracked eggs on the floor, messing the marble tiles with broken mixes of yolk and egg-white. Heck, he was one of three heirs of the Ootori zaibatsu and never in his college years had anyone taught him on how to break an eggshell on a baker nor on a chef's point of view.
In short, the kitchen--which remained untouched by him until now--was presently needing an entire renovation.
But he had to do this. He had to prove that he can do it.
A clock read five o'clock. He'd been there for an hour.
'No,' he told himself inwardly. 'I can do this. I'll figure this out.'
"How are you--"
Natsumi was cut short with one short glance of the kitchen as she poked her head on the crack of the door to see how her husband was faring. It has been almost an hour. Surely, he had done something--anything that would not waste that glorious time instead of reading the procedures in the book all over again, trying to memorize it. She knew how much Kyouya treasured time so well that he wouldn't waste any of it.
After she was shunned away from the kitchen, she got back to the bedroom, propped her computer on her lap and forced writer's block out of the way. Her editor, Yakimura Takahashi, had been nagging her for centuries, trying and trying to remind her that her manuscript was due in a few days.
She didn't need reminding though. The ending of the novel was right on the back of her head, awaiting to be written down. But unfortunately, a damn gap was on the way, causing all of her distress and the delay and she can't fill the scene with something much more interesting that would make the book worth flipping one page after another. It was very frustrating.
And then, deciding that she couldn't squeeze anything else from her drained mind, she settled on finding out what Kyouya had already done. He was baking something, and she needed food if she ever wanted the ideas to flow freely back on her brain--not that she was sure that what Kyouya was baking would be as edible as how it should be.
"Uh--I must have entered the wrong room," she sputtered as she stared at the stranger in front of the counter, covered in what she assumed as all-purpose flour.
She was about to turn away, to wonder where the heck the kitchen had transported, but a familiar voice stopped her, saying, "How rude. It's me."
Slowly, she turned her head back.
"K-Kyouya?! You ate my husband?!"
"Natsumi."
It was a sudden warning, saying he wasn't in for any laughter, silly comments and nonsensical puns.
Sighing, she closed the door behind her as she stepped cautiously inside, careful not to slip on the mess on the floor. Reaching for his face with a warm smile, she said, "Kyouya Ootori and the kitchen are a bad combination, don't you think?"
And then it hit her. Ootori Kyouya can make use of one whole hour without wasting any second. That is--making a mess.
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A/N: How did it go? Cute? No? Please do tell.