"Beth," James strode up and sat on the other side of her from Sirius. Beth and Sirius were relaxed in front of the fire with no concerns about homework on a Friday afternoon. "I need your opinion."
"Really?" Beth looked so pleased, Sirius rolled his eyes. She needed to up her standards. When he told her that, she grinned. "But then I wouldn't be able to hang out with you."
"It's Lily's birthday on Monday." James ignored their banter and reached in his pocket to pull out a box. "Do you think she'll like this?" He extended it towards Beth.
Beth opened the box and her smile grew wider. It held small gold emerald earrings, the colour the same as Lily's eyes. "She'll love them," Beth told James confidently. He grinned as he accepted the box back.
"Let's make Lily a cake!" Beth clapped her hands in excitement. "We'll have time to do it on Sunday."
"Why make a cake?" Sirius frowned. "We can just order one from the house elves."
"Because it will be fun!" Beth turned to James, her eyes alight with anticipation. "What kind of cake does Lily like?"
"Chocolate," James replied thoughtfully. Sirius could tell by the look on his face that he was seriously considering Beth's idea.
"I have an awesome recipe for chocolate cake. It's rich and fattening." Beth shook James' arm. "Can we get ingredients and access to the kitchen?"
"Yeah," James smiled. "Make me a list of the ingredients. I'll pass it along to the house elves and ask for an area to work in."
"Perfect." Beth turned to Sirius. "Do you want to help too?"
Sirius pretended to think about it for a minute but he knew he wouldn't miss this for anything. "Sure, alright," he muttered off-handedly. Over Beth's beaming face, he saw James shake his head at him, not at all fooled.
They met on Sunday after lunch in the Entrance Hall. "Luckily Lily had plans to help Marlene with her Potions homework," Beth told Sirius and James as they headed towards the stairs to the kitchen. She was lugging a bag on her shoulder. "I'm an awful liar. My face gives everything away."
"You could have told her you were helping James and I with a muggle project," Sirius pointed out. "That's pretty much the truth."
"Yeah, but she might have asked what the muggle project was," Beth huffed. "Seeing as she has insight into muggles herself."
James pushed open the door to the kitchen and turned right. A baking area had been left prepared for them. There were mixing bowls, utensils, various sized pans and all of the ingredients sitting on a long counter. "Perfect!" Beth proclaimed as she pulled a piece of paper from her pocket. "They gave us lots of extra ingredients. We can double the recipe since there are two Bundt pans." She set down the large bag she had brought.
"What is that for?" Sirius asked.
"I brought my video camera," Beth said. "I'm going to set it in the corner to record some of this." Sirius raised an eyebrow at James as Beth set up the camera on a strange-looking three-legged metal contraption that seemed to be designed to hold it up.
"So, how do we start?" James asked once Beth had turned on the camera.
Beth set down the recipe. "First we cream the butter with the sugar. This recipe needs a lot of beating until the consistency is right."
"Oh," James looked at the recipe to see how much butter to use and frowned, puzzled.
"Sorry," Beth said. "It's in American measurements. Let me convert it for you." She showed him where to cut the block of butter for the correct amount. As James put the butter in the bowl, Beth told Sirius how much sugar they needed.
"It's kind of like potions," Sirius said as Beth poured the sugar into the measuring cup he held for her.
"Exactly!" Beth had heard a great deal about potions from Lily already. "Except we don't have to be quite as precise."
Beth grabbed a large spoon and gave it to James to cream the butter and sugar. After a few minutes, he took out his wand. "Too much manual effort," he explained to Beth who was cracking open walnuts with Sirius. James twisted his wand and the spoon began beating the butter and sugar.
"That's even better than using an electric mixer," Beth said. "It's much easier than doing it all by hand."
While James oversaw his own version of an electric mixer, Beth and Sirius measured and brought ingredients to slowly add to the batter. Every time she turned around, Sirius was so close she bumped into him. Evidently hot Sirius was in the kitchen. Beth knew it was on purpose when his hands continually grabbed her waist to steady her. Her heart was beating faster than normal and she could feel her cheeks were warm.
"The walnuts get mixed in last," Beth said when the cake batter was smooth after all the other ingredients had been added. She carefully stuck a finger into the edge of the bowl as it spun and put it in her mouth. "Mmmm," she sighed, pulling her finger out slowly. She saw Sirius staring at her and her face heated up. "Do you want to try it?" She babbled hastily to him."Sampling the batter is the best part of baking."
James quickly put his finger in the bowl and happily tried it. "This is really good, Beth," he rubbed his stomach. "Is there enough extra batter so we can eat some now?"
Sirius' eyes were still fixed unblinkingly on Beth, who began to feel uncomfortable. Without breaking eye contact, he reached around her to get to his hand to the bowl. He sucked a huge dollop of chocolate batter from his finger, his eyes holding Beth's the entire time. "Delicious," he grunted as he watched her face redden. James swiftly turned away to keep from laughing.
Beth hastily grabbed the walnuts and handed them to James to pour into the spinning bowl. After they were folded into the batter, James pulled out his wand to send a spell that would remove the spoon and lift the bowl over the pans to pour the batter into them. Still flustered, Beth turned away hurriedly, intent on checking the temperature of the oven. Sirius was close behind her and she bumped into him and stumbled. Sirius reached out to grab her but in doing so smacked James' wand arm just as he cast the spell. His wand clattered to the floor and the spell shot the bowl of batter away from the waiting Bundt pans and over the three bakers' heads. Before James could pick up his wand to shoot out a counter-spell, the bowl carefully poured the batter over Sirius, Beth and then James.
Beth, Sirius and James stared at each other as the thick batter slowly dripped down the back of their heads and on their foreheads. Beth took a swipe of thick batter off her forehead before it could run into her eyes and stuck it in her mouth. "Well, this is one way to have more batter to eat."
The three all burst out laughing. James grabbed a spoon, filled it with batter from his hair and hurled it at Sirius, hitting him on the neck. Sirius retaliated by flinging a gob of batter at James' stomach. "Looks better on the outside than on the inside of your bloody stomach." Beth was bent over double witnessing their antics, her laughter making her too weak to do anything but clutch her stomach.
"You're not getting off that easy," Sirius told Beth with a leer, easily grabbing both of her wrists in one of his hands. With his other hand, he took a healthy blob of cake batter from his cheek and smeared it over her chin, using his thumb to outline her lips. Beth's heartbeat sped up as she tried to twist out of his grasp, giggling.
Beth managed to wrest her hands free and called "Take that!" as she grabbed the ends of her hair and flicked it toward Sirius so that the batter from her hair splattered him. Sirius lunged at her, but James caught him from behind.
"Gotcha Padfoot!" James grabbed Sirius in a headlock and rubbed batter into his shirt. Beth took advantage of Sirius' helplessness to paint a chocolate moustache, beard and eye patch on Sirius while James held him captive. "You look like a pirate," she chortled at him, surveying her handiwork.
Sirius shoved James away and the three collapsed on the floor, fresh laughter erupting each time they looked at each other.
"Shit, what a mess," Sirius said when he was able to talk. "It looks like I should clean it up as James is obviously fucking inept with spells."
"Let's see how well your spells work when some git rams your wand," James snorted. "How the hell did you bump into me anyway?"
"Beth's fault," Sirius tilted his head toward her guilty expression.
"I didn't know you were right behind me," Beth's laughter had subsided to giggles. "I was just going to make sure the oven had preheated long enough and was ready."
"I'm pretty sure it's ready now," James said and they broke out laughing again. Sirius took out his wand and cleaned up the batter once they had calmed down and they stood looking at the empty cake pans.
"I think I understand now why the house elves gave us extra ingredients. Round two?" Beth asked and they started again. This time they successfully made the cakes without mishap though Sirius still got in Beth's way several times. Beth wasn't sure if she was being seduced or teased but she had to clench her fists to keep from grabbing him back.
While the cakes baked, they pulled up some stools and Beth taught Sirius and James three-handed pinochle with cards she had brought in her camera bag. "We can teach Lily and play it with partners later," Beth said smiling
"I call dibs on Beth as my partner," Sirius told James, amazed at how well she counted cards when playing for tricks.
James nodded patronizingly. "Understood. You need her to compensate for how shitty a card player you are."
"Remind me who crushed you at poker last month." Sirius gave James a cocky grin.
They left the cakes cooling with instructions for the house elves for when they would pick it up. Beth packed up her video camera and slung the bag on her shoulder as they started out of the kitchen. Sirius surprised her when he grabbed her bag and put it over his shoulder. "Let me carry that for you," he said with a strange look.
"Thanks," Beth said quietly. Over her head, James grinned and gave Sirius a mocking thumbs up.
"Ohhhhh," Lily sighed when she took her first bite of her cake the next day. "This is decadent! Did the house elves get a new recipe?"
Beth, Sirius and James exchanged pleased grins. "We made it for you," James burst out. "It was Beth's recipe."
Lily looked touched. "You made it?" Her head swiveled between the three of them. "That's so sweet!" She jumped up to hug Sirius and Beth and kiss James. "Have you two ever baked a cake before?" She asked James and Sirius.
"No, Beth had to teach us," Sirius grinned. "The finished product is good, but she's a sloppy baker."
Beth smacked him in the chest. "Hey," she warned. "No ratting out the teacher."
"It was quite an experience," James nodded. He had Lily in stitches as he told her the details of their making of the cake. "I wish I could have seen that," she said when he finished, wiping her eyes.
"In a way, you can," Beth told her. "I set up a video camera in the corner. It was set so it will show the action in fast motion. I figured I could use it for my muggle studies class to show how muggles bake. I didn't realize we'd have to utilize so much magic."
Later, after Lily complained her abs hurt from laughing too hard over the video and made a muggle comparison about the three bakers that only Beth understood, Lily cried when she opened the earrings from James. Watching her and James, Sirius felt a stab of jealousy over what they had. He looked at Beth, happiness for Lily radiating from her face. This girl was having too strong of an effect on him. It disturbed him how much he wanted a real relationship with Beth.
