My Boyfriend Is A Geek ✔️

13: One step away from grabbing a walking stick

“Awww, that’s cute,” Hawk mused, a teasing tilt in his voice.

“Shut up,” I chirped between laughs, giving his shoulder a gentle shove before returning to finish the writing on the cake which read: Happy birthday Carla Bear.

After recovering from the shock of  his newfound online stardom, Hawk had offered to help me finish working on the cake. In his words: “it's the least I can do after all the trouble I caused last night.”

However, he soon added that it was also because he wanted an apron. That boy – I could never understand him. 

Now, though, I’d finished the final touches on the cake, beaming in satisfaction at the result. 

“And we're done,” I announced, reaching for Hawk’s hands in a double high five.

“I can't believe I actually made a cake, like an actual cake,” he remarked proudly.

“Well….” I trailed off, sporting a sly grin.

“Fine, I know I just gave moral support,” he admitted between chuckles, with me echoing the sounds alongside him.

“Well, you weren't all that bad though,” I mused. “To be honest, I wouldn't know shit about baking if it wasn’t for Carla. She loves baking – she says it gives her this sense of joy to be able to create so many things from something as simple as flour. 

She taught me everything I know. As a kid, I always enjoyed watching her in the kitchen. Many times, she'd try to send me away, but of course, I never listened,” I finished with a soft chuckle at the memory.

But wait, why did I even tell all of this to Hawk? I was the one who said we didn't need to know too much about each other's lives, and yet here I was, dishing out the ‘stories of my life.’

But if Hawk minded, he definitely didn't show it. “You must really love her,” he mused, a small smile on his face.

I wanted to tell him that she was the second most important person in my life; of how she was the only person I could turn to after my parents’ divorce; of how after my mom moved to Louisiana, she would sit and listen to me go on about how much I missed her; of how she was always ready with soothing words after another of my arguments with my dad.

To me, she was what I’d come to associate with stability. Many things had changed in my life over the years, but she’d stayed the same – and it was comforting to say the least.

But I didn’t voice any of this.

Instead, what came out of my mouth was: “it’s hard not to love her. And besides, compared to what she does on my birthdays, this is pretty much nothing.”

My face lit up just thinking of the mountains of treats and delicacies Carla always had prepared for my birthdays.

“On my tenth birthday, she made a chocolate fountain so big that Beck, Kent, Shay and I were half-passed out after we finally succeeded in finishing it,” I recalled, chuckling fondly at the memory.

“Lucky you. I got a T-shirt from my Uncle Bob for my tenth birthday. And it had this big writing on it that read: ‘always be a good kid Hawkie.’” 

“Awww, that’s pretty cute,” I cooed, giving him a playful nudge.

He simply chortled. “Yeah, I guess. Only problem is that I've got eight more shirts like that.”

“How?” I asked, interest truly piqued. “Did other people give you the same gift?”

He shook his head in the negative. “I got the same T-shirt from him for my eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth...well, let's just say for every birthday since my tenth one. And they all have the same thing written on them – always be a good kid Hawkie.