BBC Ghosts: Teatime Club

Cake

"Okay clubbies! Today we'll be doing... cookery!"

The class collectively groaned.

"Why? Can't we just order a pizza?" Robin suggested hopefully.

"Um, no Robin, because that way we won't learn anything!"

Robin grumbled.

Pat smiled. "It was actually Mrs Cooper's idea and she said we'd gain extra credit if we undertook this little project so I kinda said yes on behalf of all of us?" he sweatdropped as they all shot him an evil glare. "S-She's so nice, I really can't say no to her."

"You really can't say no to anyone." Thomas noted.

"You're right, I can't."

Mary and Robin laughed.

"Anyway, so, because Mrs Cooper says I'm really sensible... for some reason, she's trusting me to keep an eye on you guys in the cooking room." Pat explained.

Julian groaned. "But cooking is a woman's job!"

"EXCUSE ME?" Fanny stormed out of her seat and gave his face a hard slap. "You take that back, Fawcett!"

"Ow, abuse! Pat, she hit me!" Julian cried.

"You deserved it, mate." Humphrey calmly acknowledged.

Fanny went to hit him again and Julian cowered. "Alright, alright! I take it back! Just don't hit me again."

Fanny harrumphed, turned on her heel and strutted back to her table.

"Serves you right for being misogynistic." Thomas said under his breath.

Julian heard him. "I don't even know what that means."

"That doesn't surprise me."

Pat cleared his throat. "Moving on! Mrs Cooper basically set us a few culinary challenges so we're gonna head over to the cooking room now and take a crack at them. Is that okay?"

"I suppose so." replied Thomas, glumly. "Although I'd rather write poetry."

The squad soon made their way over to the the cooking room and lined up outside, waiting for Pat to unlock the door. Once he did so, the group aproned up and waited in the middle of the room for Pat to designate them to their respective cooking stations.

Pat pulled the apron over his head and tied it at the back. He then looked at his new friends. "Um, okay... who would be the least chaotic when paired together?"

Eight pairs of eyes stared at him blankly.

Pat pushed his glasses further up the bridge of his nose, holding back a laugh. "Yes, that's right, we're all mad."

Cap rolled his eyes and took charge, pushing Pat aside. "Robin, Kitty and Mary can work together in station number one. Fanny, Thomas and Julian in two. Me, Humphrey and you, Patrick, in station three."

Pat shrugged. "Fair enough. Everybody happy?"

Kitty beamed. "Extremely happy! What will we be making, Patrick? This is all so exciting!"

"Um, well, as you can see, the kitchen stations have a bunch of recipe books. We just have to choose one to follow." Pat pointed out.

"That seems easy enough." replied Fanny as she clipped up her hair.

"Can we work in pairs?" asked Robin, excitedly. "Me and Mary make a GREAT team."

Mary nodded in agreement.

"Or threes? I want to work with Mary and Robin! Can I? Please? Can I?" Kitty bounced up and down on the spot.

"Sure thing! As long as you make separate things I guess it should be fine." Pat nodded.

The group ran to their respective kitchen stations and after a few minutes of settling in, the students got to work preparing their food.

At the first station, Kitty, Mary and Robin had already teamed up and had decided they'd be making cupcakes. After distributing what work they'd be doing between themselves, they started measuring out ingredient quantities.

At the second station, things weren't going so well. Julian had snatched up the recipe book and was holding it out of Fanny and Thomas' reach, reading it with the pages askew as the others tried to claw at him and grab it off him.

"Julian..." Pat called over at Fanny and Thomas' complaining.

Julian smirked and yanked one of the recipe pages out of the book before throwing it in Thomas' face.

"You heathen!" Thomas hissed. "Not only do you ruin a good book but you also ruined my train of thought!"

"Neeeerd." Julian drawled, only for Thomas to throw the book back at him.

At the third station, things were a little calmer. Humphrey was getting on with preparing the chocolate for his mousse and was deep in thought as he prepared to melt his chocolate. Next to him, Pat was studying the recipe book hard, not knowing what to choose to do. Culinary tasks were not his strong suit.

Cap walked over to him, arm looped around a mixing bowl as he stirred his ingredients together. "Something wrong, Patrick?"

"All the recipes seem to be dessert or treat based." Pat sighed. "I'm completely useless at making stuff like that..."

Cap let out a little chuckle. "Not to worry, I'll help you. How about we work together and I show you the ropes? You can start by getting a bowl out in readiness for my cream."

"You're making a cake?" Pat looked up.

"Yes. Something I've done thousands of times before."

Pat's eyes lit up. "I didn't know you could bake!"

"There's a lot of things you don't know about me, Patrick." he replied with a twinkle in his eye before turning away, Pat staring at him in awe.

A high-pitched wailing noise entered the room and Pat yelped as it made him jump, covering his ears at the sound. He turned to face the culprits in kitchen one, who had somehow managed to set their microwave on fire. The short teenager ran over to the panicking trio, which had Robin trying to fan the flames with a towel as Mary crouched over a passed out Kitty. "Guys! What happened?"

"The microwave blew up!"

Pat tried hard not to panic as the fire grew a little bigger and started to spread. "Uh... eck! S-Someone get me a fire extinguisher!"

Julian calmly walked over to said item, yanked it off the wall and gave it to Pat. "There you go."

Pat tried lifting the tank but it fell over and dented badly, causing him to squeak in horror. He tried lifting it again but found it was too heavy for him.

After watching the shorter teen struggle for a bit, Cap decided to help him. The taller boy grabbed the extinguisher and sprayed foam on the fire, successfully putting it out. Once it everything was back to normal, he then turned to Pat. "If you're done panicking now, I'd like for us to get back to our cake making."

"But what... eh?" Pat's jaw dropped.

"Keep calm and carry on." Cap smirked.

With wide eyes, Pat took one look at the fire-damaged wall and passed out.