geek pride - the sims - starting a fire while cooking
398 words by gdocs
Ginny can't cook. It's been well established in the Potter household that unless Harry is the one cooking, all cooking has to be done by magic. There kids, for their credit, aren't old enough to do any real cooking. Albus likes to play with his pretend kitchen set, and he's pretty good at that, but none of their three kids are allowed to go near the stove.
Neither is Ginny, really, but not because of her age — because she cannot cook. Harry's tried to teach her, but every single thing she's tried to cook has resulted in burning.
Still, her ten year anniversary with Harry is tonight. She wants to do something special, and not just making a dinner with magic. Cooking everything by hand takes longer, and to Ginny it feels more personal. It's filled with more love.
So Ginny convinces Harry to take James and Albus out for the day so she can surprise him, and Harry agrees. She decides to make him steak. It's fancy, but how hard can it be? It seems more simple than any other recipe she had found.
The rub seems pretty simple. Ginny's not sure if she got the ratio of all of them right, but even if it's wrong, how bad can it be? It'll all taste the same. The recipe says to leave it in the oven for 90 minutes on low to slow cook it, and Ginny thinks that there's no way she'll mess it up. She doesn't even have to do any real cooking.
After Ginny places the meat into the oven, she decides to go check on their baby, Lily, who's been napping. As Ginny comes into the room, Lily wakes up and fusses a little. Ginny picks her up and goes to the big rocking chair at the corner of the room. Slowly, they both drift off to sleep.
…
When Ginny wakes up, she doesn't know how long it's been. She thinks it's been a while, because she smells smoke. Quickly, she gets up and peers into the kitchen. It takes a while to realize what's going on, because she has to peer through a bunch of smoke.
Her steak's on fire.
Quickly, holding Lily tightly, Ginny exits the house.
Harry comes back to a charred house. It's okay. They'll fix it with magic and order something in.
Ginny's done with cooking.