A/N: What's this? A Valentine's day fic posted in the month of January? What manner of sorcery is this? Not even the book of Vishanti holds knowledge of such an atypical phenomenon.

Anyways, the reason I'm posting Chapter 1 of this two-shot now is because, well, I feel inspired to write it. Plus, with me currently working on Chapter 2 of PokéLoud Journeys, I wanted to make sure that I didn't have any obligations gnawing at the back of my head for me to commit to.

So, instead of waiting a few days before Valentine's Day to work on this, I figured to get crack-a-lackin' on this bad boy as soon as possible, yo. You feel me, fam?

Oh, and one more important thing before I let you go on; if you're really entrenched in TLH fandom, you'll know all about the "QT's". They're basically background characters that show up occasionally, usually without saying a single word of dialogue, and are spotlighted and popularized by artists with their artwork. Normally, they're paired up with Lincoln as romantic interests.

"Cookie QT" is such a character. She's affiliated with cookies because of her very brief appearance in "Lincoln Loud: Girl Guru" and she'll have a somewhat prominent role in this story that revolves around cookies…if the title wasn't any indication of that fact.

Now, with that out of the way, onward to the first chapter!

February the 14th; better known as Valentine's Day.

It was a day that everyone young or old, boy or girl (especially girl) knew about like the back of their hand. Next to Christmas, News Year's Eve, Halloween, and Thanksgiving, it was the most prolific and well-known holiday on the Gregorian calendar. It was a day that was meant for loved ones to show their appreciation for one another with gifts of gratitude and tokens of tenderness, usually in the form of flowers, candy, or poems.

Whether they were young couples hitting the town while gazing lovingly into each other's eyes or an old married couple reminiscing on their youthful days as newlyweds, Valentine's Day offered a wide variety of experiences that any willing, enthusiastic partaker could find enthralling and enriching.

Lincoln Loud was by no means a willing partaker, enthusiastic or otherwise.

As he arose from his slumber on Valentine's Day morning, he couldn't help but let out a groan at the inevitable events that were sure to follow; his sisters gushing about endlessly about how they would celebrate the saccharine holiday all day long, his classmates buzzing about excitedly as they exchanged gifts with one another, his chocoholic sisters turning the entire house upside down—fighting each other to the death for the last piece of chocolate and somehow dragging Lincoln into the scuffle…

But that wasn't even the worst of it. Every year, for as long as he could remember, Leni would dress him up in her homemade Cupid outfit, all while commenting on how absolutely adorable he looked once he was forced into the humiliating attire. His other sisters, upon spotting him in a diaper and strapped angel wings, would either point and laugh at him or loudly share Leni's sentiments, much to his ever-growing shame.

All in all, there just wasn't a lot that Lincoln could appreciate about Valentine's Day. Oh sure, he understood that it was all in the name of showing your loved ones that you cared about them, and receiving gifts wasn't all that bad, but Lincoln always thought that if one really cared about their friends, significant others, and family, they'd be going out of their way to express their love every day; not go through the motions for three hundred sixty-four days of the year and bust out all the big guns on one day in a schmaltzy, sappy, starry-eyed, sugarcoated spectacle.

And besides all that, Lincoln just wasn't into the sap; the sighing, the kissy faces, the stuttering and blushing…it just wasn't him. Just the thought of it made him cringe in revulsion.

Thankfully, his girlfriend, Ronnie Anne Santiago, agreed with his anti-Valentine's Day sentiments wholeheartedly. In fact, only a few days ago, she told him explicitly not to bother getting her anything for Valentine's Day, opting to hit up the arcade after school instead of acting like lovesick puppies like 99.9% of the Royal Woods population was sure to do today.

Before he could get up out of bed, Lincoln winced when he heard ten pairs of animated footsteps booming about outside of his bedroom, followed by high-pitched squealing and giggling.

'Just great,' Lincoln commented sarcastically in his head. 'I know we're the Loud family and all but just for once, can't they all just act, I dunno, quieter on Valentine's Day for a change?'

He immediately got his answer as soon as he heard the cacophony come to a grinding halt and a conversation strike up.

"Hey, guys," he could hear Leni ask, "Have any of you seen Lincoln?"

"Nope," he heard Lynn reply. "Why do you ask?"

"I wanted to ask him if he wanted to go with the white Cupid wings or with pink ones this time. I know white is, like, more traditional, plus it matches his hair color, but I wanted to do a little experimenting for once."

"Hmmmm," he picked up Lori mulling thoughtfully, "I'd go with pink. Oh, and to make it match, give him a pink diaper, too."

Lincoln frowned. He swore he heard a snicker at the end of that sentence. Seeing how it was Lori, he knew that his ears weren't playing tricks on him.

"Lori, you're a genius! I can't wait 'til I see him in it! He's gonna look totes adorable!"

With that, the squealing and giggling resumed, much to Lincoln's chagrin.

"More like totes ridiculous," Lincoln grumbled to himself as he slid lethargically out of bed to start the day.

Lincoln found that school, although swarming with sickeningly gooey sentiment, if the endless stream of hallway and classroom decorations and various PDA's were any indication, was still somewhat of a safe haven. At least at school, no one would try to get him in a diaper and wings, at least without severe provocation on Lincoln's part.

But, there was still one source of mild annoyance that had been laboring his patience all day. Much like everyone else, his best friend, Clyde McBride, was bitten by the love bug and as Lincoln sat across from him at the cafeteria table at lunchtime, listening to his Shakespearean soliloquies about the beauty of his older sister, Lori, for the hundredth time this hour, he realized that he could only take so much before he'd lose his mind.

Slamming a fist onto the table in an instinctive twitch, Lincoln's sudden outburst snapped Clyde out of his doe-eyed daze.

"Something wrong, Lincoln?" Clyde asked, eyebrows furrowed in concern.

Lincoln sighed. "No, Clyde, please continue droning on about how Lori is an angel with an endless bounty of bodacious brilliance and dazzling delight. I was very interested," he replied, dripping with snark.

Missing the obvious sarcasm, Clyde remained undeterred as he took a sip from his milk carton.

"No thanks. I'd rather show you what I made for Lori for Valentine's Day instead. I put as much effort into it as I know she put into mine."

'So, none at all then?' Lincoln thought as he shook his head at his friend's admirable but misguided optimism.

"For the last time, Clyde, Lori's not getting you anything for Valentine's Day. I thought you'd get the message after the last three years that she's brushed you off."

"Oh, Lincoln," Clyde remarked condescendingly as he reached across the table to pat Lincoln on the shoulder, "Sweet, innocent, naïve, Lincoln…that's exactly what she wants you to think. She just didn't want all the hard work, that she's poured into my gift, to be discovered. Why, I bet she's written out the most heartfelt, loving Valentine's Day message ever written, just for me."

"Clyde, I hate to break it to you but the only piece of paper that Lori would ever give you is a restraining order," Lincoln remarked with a chuckle. "Besides, even if she was into you, I don't think Lori's the type of person who cares much for macaroni art. Remember how well that worked last time? You made her a macaroni bracelet that wouldn't come off her wrist until Lana had to use a power saw to cut through it. It took her months of therapy just to be able to look at another bracelet without fainting on the spot."

Clyde, ever the romantic visionary, only had visions of success on his mind.

"I was but a boy in those days," Clyde said as he reached into his pocket and grabbed his phone, turning it on and fiddling about until he found what he was looking for in his photo gallery.

"Luckily for her, I've upped the ante this year," he proclaimed as he held up the screen closer to Lincoln's face.

Lincoln's jaw nearly dropped at what he saw. There, leaning against Clyde's bed, was a painting of Lori from the neck up. The portrait was something to behold; the level of attention to detail and craftsmanship was something that Lincoln only found in works of art at an art museum.

Still, Lincoln couldn't help but find the dedication a little...uneasy. He could admire devotion but this was taking it a tad too far for his liking.

"Wow. That's both amazing and…" Lincoln bit his tongue before he could say "creepy". "You know what? Never mind. I'm sure Lori will love it."

"I know she will," Clyde stated proudly as he put his phone away. "I spent nearly an entire year putting it together. Hard work like this doesn't just go unappreciated. I'd like to see Santiago top that."

Clyde returned to his lunch, eating a spoonful out of his fruit cup before he spoke to Lincoln again.

"Speaking of Santiago, did you get anything for Ronnie Anne?"

Lincoln shook his head. "Nah, she told me she's not into the whole 'Valentine's Day' scene and told me not to bother getting her anything."

"That so?" Clyde asked. "Heh, guess it makes sense. She doesn't seem like the type who would go crazy for this type of occasion, unlike the rest of the girls here."

As soon as the last word of his sentence was uttered, Clyde looked past Lincoln and spotted a girl with long brown hair approaching them. From the looks of things, she was hiding something behind her back. As she walked over to them, she stopped and looked back behind her shoulder at a group of girls that stood some distance from her, gesticulating for her to keeping moving while giving her thumbs up's.

"Hey, speaking of girls, looks like one's coming our way right now," Clyde noticed but immediately, his eyes widened in terror. "Oh no! What if she wants to give me something for Valentine's Day?! If Lori found out-"

"Trust me, Clyde," Lincoln interrupted as he turned in his seat to look at the girl that Clyde was talking about, "I'm sure Lori won't mind you getting attention from a girl our age."

In a matter of a handful of seconds, the girl stood before them, her shy gaze focusing solely on Lincoln. Rather than look her in the eye, though, Lincoln briefly scanned the girl from top to bottom, trying to get an idea on who she was. Her purple jacket, her lavender dress, her black belt, the heart-shaped clip in her brown hair, her lavender stockings…Lincoln knew he had brief associations with this girl before and her ensemble was familiar but for the life of him, he just couldn't remember her name.

"Um…hi, L-Lincoln," the girl spoke quietly and shyly, prompting Lincoln to snap out of his contemplation and look her in the eye.

The minute he did, however, a raging blush covered her entire face, something Lincoln couldn't understand the reason behind. Rather than dwell on it, Lincoln decided to press on with the conversation this girl clearly wanted to have with him.

"Hey. How's it going?" Lincoln greeted as the girl looked at him expectantly.

He worked his brain into overdrive, trying to quickly get her name right before she caught onto his ignorance and get hurt. Mercifully, what he thought was the answer came to him in a flash.

"It's, uh, Cookie, isn't it?" Lincoln asked and crossed his fingers, hoping that he had hit the mark.

He sighed in relief when her face lit up as she nodded her head enthusiastically.

"Y-yes! Yes! T-thank you for remembering me!" Cookie beamed.

'Phew. Dodged a bullet on that one. Nice work, brain. I knew I could always count on you.'

"Uh, anyways, is there anything you want with me?" Lincoln asked.

"Well, a-as you know, t-today is February the 14th, also known as Valentine's D-day," Cookie stuttered, eyes looking about the cafeteria but then, dread filled her to the brim at the realization of her words.

"N-not that y-y-you wouldn't know! I wasn't t-trying to call you stupid or anything! P-please don't hate me!" Cookie begged frantically while having her head bowed.

In a heartbeat, Lincoln shot up to his feet and grabbed Cookie by the shoulders, shaking her lightly until she timidly looked up at him, though, Lincoln noted, her eyes could only meet his briefly before she looked at the floor.

"Cookie, relax. I don't hate you. I just wanna know what you're doing here. That's all."

"Oh," is all Cookie can mumble before she tries to get to the matter at hand.

"S-so anyways, my Mom owns this bakery a-and well…s-she taught me a thing or t-two around the kitchen a-and I was just thinking t-that you deserved s-something nice for Valentine's Day so…"

Cookie paused and took a deep breath before she shoved the object, she had been hiding behind her back the whole time, into Lincoln's chest rougher than she intended.

"I baked these for you!"

At the word "bake", Lincoln looked down at what Cookie had unceremoniously presented to him. Taking it out of Cookie's hands, Lincoln realized that it was a purple basket, one with a pink bow tied at the top of the handle.

His mouth started to water slightly at what was inside of it. There, in a pile, was the tastiest looking assortment of cookies that Lincoln had ever seen in his entire life. Not even the cookies at "Pete's Palace of Pastries" could compare to these heavenly treats. Even though the cookie pile was covered in plastic wrapping, that couldn't prevent the pleasant scent of Cookie's sweets from wafting into Lincoln's nose.

There was chocolate chip, oatmeal raisin, macadamia nut, sugar cookies, and…no way! Could it be? It was! There was even a cookie with marshmallow bits baked into it!

Before Lincoln could savor the collection of cookies, his grasp on good manners spurred him into gratitude. He looked up at Cookie, who was gazing upon him with an expectant, pleading stare.

"All of this for me? Wow, Cookie, I…I don't know what to say. These must've taken you ages to bake."

"I-It wasn't a problem at all. I promise," Cookie smiled. "Y-you can try one now i-if you want."

Not needing to be told twice, Lincoln dug his hand past the plastic until his fingers gripped that marshmallow cookie that caught his eye. He pulled it out and quickly took a bite…

…and nearly melted into a puddle as the chewy, soft, and gooey texture of the cookie sent his taste buds to the moon and back. If the smell of the cookies was enough to make him swoon, it was a miracle that the taste didn't knock him out cold.

"Mmmmmmmm!" Lincoln moaned as he swallowed down the last bit of treat left in his mouth before shoving the rest of the cookie into his mouth to devour.

"Cookie, these are to die for! Thank you so much!"

Cookie's face brightened like a tomato at the high praise she was getting and told him, "D-don't mention it. I'm r-really happy y-you liked them."

With that, Cookie turned on her heel, skipping away from Lincoln with a pep in her step that Lincoln hadn't bothered to take notice of. Grasping on his cookie basket tightly, Lincoln sat down and faced Clyde…

…only for him to be met by his best friend glaring at him disapprovingly.

"What?"

Clyde simply raised an eyebrow and tapped his foot on the ground expectantly.

"What?"

"Seriously, Lincoln? You don't see the problem here?" Clyde asked irritably.

Clyde looked on as Lincoln pondered the dilemma that he apparently missed out on. He swelled with relief when the answer seemed to hit Lincoln like a speeding Mack Truck.

"Oh wait! Of course! What was I thinking, Clyde?! I'm glad you brought me to my senses!"

"Sure thing, buddy. After all, what are friends fo-"

"What's a cookie without some milk?!"

Clyde facepalmed as Lincoln took his milk carton and opened it up. Then, fishing into the cookie basket, Lincoln pulled out a chocolate chip cookie, preparing to dunk it into his milk. Before he could, Clyde reached over the table and slapped it out of his hand.

"Hey! I was gonna eat that!" Lincoln said.

He soon forgot his annoyance when Clyde grabbed him by the collar and yanked him slightly across the table.

"Forget about the pastries, man! Don't you realize what you've done?!"

"Pssh," remarked an unfazed Lincoln, "you're just jealous that you didn't get any cookies for Valentine's Day."

"No, you cookie craving clod, Ronnie Anne will be furious when she finds out that you accepted a Valentine's Day gift from another girl! And trust me, I'm not talking 'hanging you off the school's flag pole by your underwear' furious, I'm talking 'punting you into the next century' furious! You cannot, I repeat, cannot tell her about them!"

Lincoln blinked. Was Clyde serious? That's what had him so freaked out? Apparently, Clyde didn't know Ronnie Anne well enough to understand that he wasn't in any imminent danger from her.

"Clyde, Clyde, Clyde," Lincoln lightly chided as he freed himself from Clyde's lax grip, "didn't I just tell you that Ronnie Anne doesn't care about Valentine's Day? Who cares if she finds out? Besides, Cookie was clearly trying to be nice to me, and I can't exactly throw away her gift after all the time she spent making it, right?"

"But, Lincoln-"

"In fact," Lincoln interrupted when he saw someone approaching them from behind Clyde, "here comes Ronnie Anne right now. I'll tell her all about the cookies and by the end of it, I'll still be here in this century, un-punted. Just you wait, Clyde."

Before another word of protest could be said on his end, Clyde immediately shut up when Ronnie Anne was in his line of vision. She took the empty seat next to Lincoln, smiling at him all the while.

"Hey, Ronnie Anne," Lincoln welcomed.

"'Sup, Lame-O?" Ronnie Anne answered back before turning to Clyde. "And best friend of Lame-O?"

"Eh, I've been alright," Lincoln said casually. "Personally, the only thing I've been trying to do is not lose my lunch at all the mushy-wushy, wuuvy-dovey antics I've been seeing around school."

"Preachin' to the choir on that one," Ronnie Anne commented with derision. "Like, earlier, I saw Rusty Spokes and Polly Pain holding hands and looking all shy and junk in the hallway. If I had stared at that a second longer, I'd have thrown up."

"Right?" Lincoln agreed with a laugh, one that Ronnie Anne joined in on.

Meanwhile, Clyde squirmed and fidgeted about in his seat, hoping that Lincoln wouldn't dare do what he cautioned against doing.

Once their laughing fit ended, Ronnie Anne finally took notice of the purple basket that Lincoln had in his hands.

"Hey, what'cha got there?" she asked, pointing at the basket.

Lincoln looked down. "Oh these?"

He then turned to Clyde and gave him a quick wink before turning back to Ronnie Anne, holding up the basket for her to get a better look.

"These Ronnie Anne, are the best cookies that have ever been baked in the history of humankind. Even the culinary gods themselves bow before these delicacies of dynamite."

Ronnie Anne looked down at the cookies and had to admit, based off their scent alone, they did look rather promising.

"That good, huh? So, what, did your sisters bake 'em for you?" she teased, hoping to get a rise out of the boy.

Rather than blush and object profusely like she wanted, Lincoln merely shook his head, all while having a satisfied grin on his face.

"Actually, no. Y'know Cookie, right? The quiet girl in our Home Ec class? Well, she baked 'em all for me for Valentine's Day! Am I lucky or what?"

Lincoln, not taking any notice of how silent Ronnie Anne had gotten, jabbed his thumb at Clyde and told her, "Oh, and get this, Ronnie Anne, Clyde thought that you'd be mad at me if you found out that I accepted them. Can you believe that?"

Lincoln laughed, fully amused at what he thought was a complete misstep on Clyde's part. After all, it had been at least ten seconds after Lincoln told Ronnie Anne about the cookies and he was neither crying "Uncle!" at the top of a flagpole, suspended from his underwear, nor had he received a swift, painful kick on the butt. As far as he was concerned, he was in the clear.

"I mean, seriously, what's to get upset about? You're the coolest girl, like, ever and you already said that you didn't care about Valentine's Day, right? What's a couple cookies from another girl supposed mean to someone like you? Right?"

Lincoln wiped a tear from his eyes, his laughing dying down to a few snickers and giggles. With his focus now fully on Ronnie Anne, Lincoln expected to see her as amused and entertained by his story as he was.

Instead, Lincoln found the girl's expression to be quite…unsettling. From his time with Ronnie Anne, he had gotten to experience a lot of her emotions and feelings: sadness, joy, anger, amusement, disgust, timidity, happiness…but this…this was completely undiscernible. She didn't look very pleased but she didn't look angry, either.

It was as if she was trying to decide how to feel about the cookie ordeal. Whatever it was, Lincoln wished she could give him some clues so he'd know how to approach her.

"R-Ronnie Anne, tell me I'm right," Lincoln prompted nervously.

He jerked back in surprise when Ronnie Anne slammed her hands against the table, standing up from her seat and visibly tremble and quake as she bore holes into the table with her heated glare.

Now that was an expression that Lincoln knew far too well; the calm before the storm. Whatever it was that Lincoln did to set her off, he needed to get to the bottom of it and fast.

Before he could say another word, Ronnie Anne bolted off, not minding all the people she bumped into as she left the scene in a huff.

"Ronnie Anne, wait!" Lincoln yelled as she saw her disappear behind the cafeteria's entry doors.

His heart told him to give chase and apologize but his brain told him otherwise. Lincoln sided with his brain on this one. He didn't know what he said that made Ronnie Anne upset. He knew it couldn't have been about the cookies. Like she told him, she couldn't care less about Valentine's Day, which to Lincoln, meant that she wouldn't be bothered by some friendly gift from another girl.

Right?

Lincoln looked to Clyde for concord but found a stern look instead.

"Told you," he said with folded arms.

Lincoln just sighed and rubbed the sides of his temples with his fingers. Valentine's Day had always been stressful for the boy, but this made the prospect of parading around in a diaper and wings a cakewalk in comparison.

A/N: Sorry about all the s-stuttering in this fic. I hope I didn't annoy or offend anyone…at least, more than my writing usually does. :V

Expect Chapter 2 to be released on a more traditionally accepted time.