Heya who's ready for a Cute as FOOP chapter cause this bad boy -smacks roof of car- is chuck full of cute content for your hearts to enjoy.
Song Suggestion: 2002 - Anne-Marie
Disclaimer: I own nothing~ CapCom please don't suuue. or well anyone please don't sue really. ovq
Emma parked her car outside of a small suburban home that was decorated in streamers and balloons. While it was sunny outside the last remaining chill of winter could still be felt in the air as She and Chris got out of the car. he had to work the last two weeks of February and most of the first week of march but he made it back just in time. "So, am I a bad driver?" Emma asks teasingly as she goes to get a gift wrapped in colorful paper out of the back seat.
"Had me clutching my pearls a few times but, suppose we made it here in one piece," Chris replied with a small smirk which caused Emma to laugh.
"You're full of it," She replies recognizing the joke.
"Fine, you're not that bad." He replies as he walks over to her side of the car while she closes the back door. He waits until she finishes adjusting her hold on the present before putting an arm over her shoulders. It was important to stay warm after all.
"Thank you, I take that as high praise" she replies with another short chuckle as they walk up to the house. "I think she's going to love this." Emma says while glancing down at the gift. "you know she's going to torment you with it though right? Are you sure you're okay with this?"
Chris shrugs "can't be that bad." he replies as they stop in front of the door.
"Alright then," Emma says before knocking on the door. Chelsea opens the door with a smile though it fades slightly upon noticing Chris's arm over Emma's shoulders.
"Hey, you guys made it, good to see you both" Chelsea says all the same "Come on in, Summer's excited to see you." She adds while mostly looking to Emma. The two walked into the house and were lead to the basement where a cacophony of screaming children were running around. They were likely the only two adults to receive an invite as the others were parents of the munchkins that were playing with various home party games. It was honestly a bit awkward since most of the parents that approached them to try and have some form of conversation would start off by asking 'so which one is yours'. That would lead to a repetitive explanation that Emma was their Aunt and they didn't have children.
Before long mercy was offered at least in part as Jack walked over to the two "Hey Chris, Do you mind helping me out with something in the kitchen?" He requests and gets a short nod.
"Sure," The two walked back up the stairs to the main floor of the house and enter the much quieter kitchen.
"That's much better..." Jack says with a sigh. "you wanna beer?" He asks with a chuckle.
"Did you need my help?" Chris asks confused.
"Yep." He says with a nod as he gets two beers out of the fridge. "Needed your help with an excuse to get out of the scream box for a few minutes," he adds shaking his head with a smile which caused Chris to give a short laugh.
"Fair enough" he replies accepting the offered drink.
"Thanks again. The kids are great, where there are just 3 of them, not 20 that are full of sugar," Jack says and the two clink their cans before drinking.
"Heres to that" Chris agrees shaking his head. It was really loud down there.
The two enjoyed a good 15-minute break from the chaos before bringing the Pinata back down with them. That was promptly destroyed by the sugar-high tiny tots. Cake and soda later and they were on to gifts. Dolls, action figures, movies, trading cards, and plush toys later, Chel finally put the gift from Emma and Chris in front of the small child. "Can you read the tag?" Chel asks and summer nods.
"From Chris and Auntie Emmy" she reads proudly before opening it. "It's a plastic box?" Summer asks confused causing Emma and Chelsea to chuckle. While a bit confused she opens it and gasps before jumping around excitedly. Inside was an oversize children's sketchbook and an assortment of drawing supplies. They had looked at the sets that came in those fancy-looking wooden briefcases but the actually supplies looked cheap and frustrating to use. So instead they went with a cheaper case and hand-selected some nicer supplies to put inside with some help of an employee at the craft store. Nothing excessive but it was a tiny step up from Crayola crayons and scrap paper.
She quickly runs over and gives each of them a hug. "You guys are the best," she says with an ear-to-ear grin before hurrying back over to pick up the box, reverently close it up and put it aside, and continue opening her gifts. By the end of the day, she was already hard at work trying to fill every page of the book.
Emma watches Summer as she draws and chuckles a bit "Birthdays are fun"
Chris nods "for kids yeah."
That got Emma's attention. "Too macho for birthdays?" she asks jokingly.
"Eh, after a while they're not that important. not much of a difference between 83 and 84" Chris replies with a shrug.
Emma shakes her head at that but the conversation got a few gears turning. His birthday was coming up, wasn't it?
'*'*'*'*'
A few weeks had passed since then and another quick mission came up but it was only a few days in Romania over a false alarm and things were back to normal within a week. Chris looked at his phone to check the time. Monday March 22nd 7pm. he gave a quiet sigh as he looked over at the stack of paperwork from the false alert. time to call it a day. it would be there tomorrow. With that, he got up and walked out to the elevator, went down to the main floor, and stared outside where it was pouring rain. great... a streak of lightning crossed the sky followed by a crashing boom of thunder. it was cold out but not cold enough for rain. he pulled up the collar of his coat and hurried over to his car to try and make his way home.
Meanwhile, Emma had quietly been scheming. Chris had been sent away for a week on another mission so she was worried it wasn't going to work out. She looked over at the calendar on the fridge. March 22nd a Monday but luckily for her she usually got home before Chris. She looked over at the Island that had a small cake with a single candle ready to be lit, a brown paper gift box tied shut with colorful string, and an envelope sitting next to plate settings for two. He said birthdays weren't important so she didn't want to make a big deal about it but she at least wanted to show she remembered. It was simple and it was small but it seemed just about right. She smiles as she cooks as she hears footsteps in the stairwell that walked past her down the hall followed by the opening and closing of a door. She'd give it a few more minutes.
A rain-soaked Chris had just in fact entered his apartment. Stupid thunderstorm followed him the whole way home. he grumbled a bit at that as he hung up his coat flicked off his shoes and when to the bathroom to get a towel to try and soak up some of the water that caught in his hair. with that taken care of he went over to the fridge to see what he could wipe up for dinner only to hear a knocking at the door. Hmm 3 guesses who that was. He chuckled a bit at that and shook his head but went over to open the door all the same. "Hey Emma." he says in greeting with the beginnings of a smile on his face.
"Hey, I was trying out another one of Mrs. Russo's recipes and it made a fair bit more than I was expecting." Emma says with a chuckle "have you had dinner?" She asks returning the smile.
She really needed to work on quartering the recipe instead of halving it. "Sure, I could eat" It's been a while since she invited him over to eat instead of just, him showing up at her door after a mission. this was kinda nice.
The two walk back over to Emma's apartment and right as he walks in a flash of lightning and crash of thunder could be heard as the power went out. Emma drops her head "And of course..." she gives a tired sigh but looks back up at Chris with a sheepish smile "Surprise" she adds with a partially defeated tone while gesturing to the kitchen island. at least the food was already cooked?
it took a second for his eyes to adjust but the light of the tiny single candle was enough for him the see the small cake, card and box. "Really?" he asks with an amused tone.
"Happy birthday?" Emma says with a short chuckle. "In the dark..." she adds with a sigh.
he shakes his head but closes the door and walks over to the Island to take a seat. "you really didn't have to do anything."
"I know" she replies with a shrug "that's why I wanted to." She replies before turning on her phone. 20% battery life... dang it. all the same she used her phone as a flashlight to make her way into the kitchen to move the food over to the island.
"Well, you went a bit excessive on the mood lighting," Chris says as she does so.
"Ha. ha. very funny," Emma replies with a small smirk as she put a serving bowl of Pasta carbonara on the counter. "There we go, dig in." she says before heading to the sink to turn it on. "right... no power... no water." She says shaking her head and goes to the fridge and opens it while Chris serves his plate. "Want anything before it gets warm?" she asks curiously? "Because I might have maybe failed to fill the glasses before the power went out..."
Chris tries not to laugh but a few escaped. "I'll take whatever you have," he says still amused by their crap luck as of late. Even then, this was still kinda nice. Emma puts two cans on the table before closing the fridge and taking a seat.
"Just don't tell Mrs. Russo on me for not having a pairing for this," she says as she turns off the flashlight of her phone to save the battery life for now, then serves herself. The two chatted as the candle started to slowly melt away.
"Looks like we're about to lose the flame." Chris ends up commenting.
"If you want to save your phone in case you get a call from work I have a larger candle in the living room I haven't used before." Emma offers. that was probably because they're technically against the rules because they're a fire hazard but hopefully, there's an exception for if the power is out. she thought with a wince. "I was kinda hoping we'd have the power back by now..." she admits with a slight frown that didn't really stick around.
"Yeah, must be a pretty bad outage." Chris replies with a nod "might as well," he says with a shrug as Emma gets up to go and get the jarred candle from the living room while using her phone as a flashlight again. 15%. come on... Once she is seated again turns off the flashlight and places the candle on the Island between them. Chris then plucks the remaining tiny candle from the cake and uses that to light the jarred candled before blowing out the nub of a birthday candle. The jarred candle was a fair bit brighter than the valiant attempts of the birthday candle and made it a bit easier for the two to see though not by that grand of a margin.
"Well, at least you'll probably be able to see the card now" Emma says with a tired chuckle. what a mess.
Chris takes the hint and picks that up to open it. It felt unusually thick which was curious. upon opening it he found a folded piece of paper and two cards one in the shape of a 4 and the other was in the shape of a 6.
"The cards are from Summer, she was insistent that number cards are the best and that was her solution since there wasn't a card with a 46 on it." Emma explains while thinking over the rather amusing trip to the grocery store with Chel and the kids.
he glosses over reading the cards since they were meant for a four-year-old and a 6-year-old respectively before unfolding the paper to find it was a page from the sketchbook she got for her birthday. on the page was a familiar red stick figure with a black shirt and blue pants. there were a bunch of other stick figures around it this time along with a few trees and pumpkins and what he assumed was an attempt at a cake though all the lines coming out of the top made it look more like an upsidedown centipede. Notably though, this time the red stick figure was drawn with a smile instead of a frown. on the back of the page it read 'Happy Birfthday Chris - Summer p.s. thanks again for the markers. There really really really cool.'
The message got him to smile a bit. It was spelled They're but close enough. "And the box?" he asks as he kept the picture unfolded and gently places it on the island away from the flames.
"That one's from me." Emma admits "don't expect anything amazing though, it's honestly nothing special." She adds with a week smile.
He curiously unties the string and opens the box only to pinches the bridge of his nose while trying not to laugh. "Alright," he says with a short chuckle as he takes the tiny remote control helicopter out of the box. "Why is there a tiny helicopter in a box."
"Thought you could use a way to practice flying at home," She says with a smirking grin before shaking her head "It's nothing serious, I honestly just didn't know what to get you at this point so." She shrugs while also trying not to laugh so she can take another sip of her drink.
This GD woman. Chris reached over to grab her chair and pull it closer to him so he could kiss her only for any attempt to end with one of them laughing.
"It's not even that funny," Emma says trying really hard to keep a straight face. Okay she could do this. one more quick chuckle and she moved to hold the sides of Chris's face and attempted to give him a kiss only to end up snickering again. "oh gosh dang it all..." she says shaking her head. an idea came to mind that might help. she just needed to get him to stop so she could stop. One last try. She pressed her lips against his and gently bit his lower lip before moving away. That seemed to work as he very quickly went silent which allowed her own chuckling to subside. One kiss led to another and another after that each one becoming a bit more passionate than the last before the two broke away. they both looked at each other for a moment then at the jarred candle before blowing it out.
ufufu~ all the cuteness /o/ no world-ending attacks or drama ladies just birthday cutes with a tiny bit o spice to wrap it up. Hopefully, the treat is enjoyed =v=/ on to the next chapter.