Day 21 - Cooking/baking - Bones teaches Jim how to cook.

Carol Marcus walked into the senior officer's dining room and saw Uhura, Spock, Sulu, Scotty and Pavel sitting at the captain's table. She held her hand up, pointing toward the door that had just shut behind her.

"Why did Denton just leave?" She didn't see dinner on the table. "Who's cooking dinner?"

The Captain and his fiancé, Dr. McCoy, weren't at the table. This dinner had been for them to celebrate their engagement, but they weren't sitting there with the rest of them.

Inside the kitchen, Bones stood behind Jim, helping him put the finishing touches on each of the dishes. Jim hadn't cooked a day in his life, but when he said he wanted to have an engagement party, or rather just dinner with their friends, he told Bones that he wanted him too cook. Bones had other ideas.

"It's about time you learned how to cook," Bones whispered in his ear from where he stood behind him.

Kirk smiled. "I don't believe one meal is going to make me a master chef."

"No, definitely not." Bones kissed the side of his neck. "Which is good. We can have several nights here in the kitchen, just you and me."

"Your arms wrapped around me like this..."

"Mmmm," the air from a soft groan brushed against Jim's ear as Bones turned his head back into Jim's neck. "No better place for them."

Kirk smiled, leaning his head to the side to rest against Bones' head. "How do they look?"

Bones looked down at the plates of duck, shredded savoy cabbage and sautéed potatoes all arranged artfully on the eight plates. He was proud of his student and smiled, kissing the side of Jim's head.

"Beautiful, baby. Now lets just hope it tastes as good as it looks."

"I'm worried about dessert!"

Bones looked over at the strawberry cheesecake sitting on the counter across from them. It looked beautiful, as much as the main course did, maybe more. "Jim, the food looks perfect and I'm sure it's going to taste just as good as it looks. Trust me."

Turning in his arms, Kirk let his lips brush softly across Bones' lips. "More than anyone."

Bones smiled, lifting his eyebrows above his eyes. "Shall we?"

Nodding, Kirk stepped out of Bones' embrace and picked up two of the plates. Bones picked up two as well and they left the kitchen, seeing that Lt. Marcus had just arrived.

"Oh, great! Carol!" Kirk said. "Before you take a seat, why don't you grab two plates out of the kitchen."

She nodded her head and Checkov stood. "I'll help as vell."

"Thank you, Mr. Checkov," Kirk said, placing the two plates in his hands down in front of Uhura and Spock, taking the plates Bones held in his hands. "Could you get the wine, baby?"

Bones grunted. He liked being called baby, but it would still take a bit of getting used to for Jim to call him that in front of their friends. But he wasn't going to say anything about it. He wouldn't.

Everyone was surprised that Kirk had been the one to cook the the meal. Kirk told them that Bones was the master chef in the kitchen and that he was only learning. None of them knew Bones cooked, but it didn't surprise them as much as it did Kirk cooking. Everyone really enjoyed dessert. When everyone was all finished, there were two slices left over.

"Why don't you two take them and go back to your quarters?" Uhura suggested. "We'll clean up in here."

Spock looked as though he wanted to protest, that he had something better to do (those wouldn't be his exact words), but he decided against it. Kirk looked around at his crew, his friends, his family and nodded his head.

"Thank you. Thank you very much."

"Congratulations again, you two," Carol beamed brightly at the two of them.

Everyone else joined in in their best wishes for the couple's forthcoming plans. Bones stood, letting Jim do their thank yous and picked up the cake on their two stood with him, wrapping his arm around Bones.

"Good night, everyone. Have a nice night."

He'd been engaged for a little over 24 hours and he was still high as a kite, drunk on love. They walked into their quarters and Kirk turned to face Bones, pulling him by his arm to the bedroom.

"Let's eat in here."

If there was one thing Bones didn't like, it was eating in the bed, but Jim was always making him do things he didn't necessarily want to do. Kirk kicked off his shoes and helped Bones sit down on the bed, taking the plates from him and placing them on the bed before crouching down in front of him to help him take his shoes off. Smiling up at him, he slid his hands over his legs softly.

"You know, this whole engaged and getting married thing, it's not so bad. Was your head in the clouds when you proposed to Shawna?"

Shaking his head, Bones pulled off his overshirt and sat back against the headboard, picking up his plate of cheesecake. "Being with you is nothing like what it was like with Shawna."

Kirk pulled his overshirt off as well as his pants, curling up on the bed with Bones, leaving his cheesecake on the bed. "You know, when we talked about marriage back at the academy, I knew you were still hurting over the way things ended with her." Bones rolled his eyes. "I want you to know, Bones," Kirk shook his head, "I will never leave you like she did."

Bones turned to look at Jim, staring at him intently. "I know that, Jim. I'm not afraid of that."

"What are you afraid of?" He reached for his cake and took a bite.

"Losing you."

Kirk froze, mid chew. Turning his head slowly back to Bones, he lifted his hand to caress his face. "You're not going to lose me, baby. I promise you that."

But it wasn't enough to soothe Bones' fears. He knew Jim better than anyone and he knew how he lived his life, even though Jim insisted he had lived his life more dangerously before they met, Bones knew how he was still. He had already lost him once, and he wasn't prepared to do it again. He couldn't play God repeatedly.

"Can you do me a favor and try not to threaten that promise?"

Kirk smiled brightly for him. "There isn't anything I wouldn't do for you, baby." He nodded his head shortly. "I promise."

Bones inhaled deeply, nodding his head as well accepting the kiss that Jim pressed to his lips. He could never stop worrying about Jim as long as he breathed, but he'd at least try not to let it rule his life. He was going to be happy with him no matter what.