Marinette hummed softly to herself as she rolled out the pie crust dough. After Chat Noir told her about the near-fiasco of preparing for his kwami's birthday, she had asked Tikki when her birthday was. She had wanted plenty of time to get ready.
Tikki's birthday was today, and she was mostly prepared. A handmade card and a little, kwami-sized pillow were both hiding in her closet, behind a pile of old sketchbooks. And now she was working on the most important part, the only one that couldn't be done in advance: making a birthday treat.
Of course, she knew Tikki would be happy with ordinary chocolate chip cookies. But that wasn't the point. Marinette didn't want it to be ordinary; she wanted it to be special. So here she was, making a pie.
She carefully placed the crust in the pie tin, trimmed the edges, and pricked it so it wouldn't shrink in the oven. Then she got to work making the strawberry glaze. She mixed together sugar, water, cornstarch, strawberry pureé, and a little bit of vanilla, and slowly brought it to a boil. Once it had thickened, she took it off the burner to cool and pulled the crust out of the oven. She chopped up strawberries into small pieces and checked to make sure that there was enough whipped cream. Perfect. All that was left was to assemble the pie.
She dumped the strawberry pieces into the pie crust, then poured the glaze over them. Once the crust was filled, she covered the top with the whipped cream.
Tikki loved the card ("This is so sweet, Marinette! Thank you!"). She loved the pillow ("It's so soft! And fluffy!").
And she absolutely loved the strawberry cream pie.
this wasn't supposed to have a sequel, but the thought jumped into my head and wouldn't leave, so here it is.