Prompted One-Shots

Culinary Arts

Barry was at Kara's apartment. He managed to leave work early to surprise her with a home cooked dinner date. He was hard at work stirring eggs to baste celery in, pouring flour over ground beef, and preheating the oven to 490°F. He didn't quite understand the recipe, but he figured he could do it.

He chopped up the celery and dipped the pieces into the eggs. He proceeded to plant the eggy celery into the floured beef. A timer dinged signaling it was time to turn the hot dogs.

He could hear a key clicking into her lock and froze. It was five fifteen, she wasn't supposed to be home yet. He looked all around her apartment to find some way to avoid being caught, but all he could conjure was a blanket.

That blanket he used.

Kara had a long day at work. She was looking forward to getting home, ordering a few pizzas, and winding down on her TV. When she got to her apartment building she could almost swear she smelled smoke.

  "Barry," she greeted her boyfriend, "what are you doing here?"

  Barry looked taken aback by this. "Well I love you too," he put a hand over his heart and glared.

  "I didn't mean it like that," she rolled her eyes and gave him a kiss. "I meant 'what's the meaning of this surprise?'"

  He looked upwards to think of a reason. "I, uh, came to tell you that, um, you're, uh, out of milk," he started to shove her back to the door. "Yeah, that's it, you're out of milk, so you should probably go buy some, so goodbye!"

  "Whoah, Barry," Kara turned her head, "I don't even have my pur-"

  Beep beep beep beep

  The oven began beeping.

  Barry stopped dead in his tracks. He was done for. The secret was out.

  Kara turned around. "Barry," she asked calmly. "What was that?"

  He opened his mouth but no excuses came out. So, she marched forward.

  "Oh, Kara, please, I wouldn't," he waved his hand to her back, but he was far too late.

  Her eyes went wide.

  "What did you do," she asked menacingly with an off-putting smile.

  "I cooked us a meal?" He gave her an uneasy smile to lighten the mood, but it appeared she had already lost it.

  She looked over at his blackened chicken nuggets and celery lettuce concoction, and ran to the oven to relieve whatever could've been burning in there. It wasn't burning. It was an entire chicken and it was still frozen.

  She panted back over at him. "Barry, baby, I love you from the bottom of my heart, but I don't trust your cooking. Stay out of my kitchen."

  He hung his head in shame. "I'm really sorry about this," he spoke honestly.

  "Don't be," she gripped his shoulder. "It was a simple mistake, coming in here and using my kitchen. But, I swear to god, if you do this one more time, I will cook you and burn your house down."

  Barry had never been more terrified. He'd never been more in love.