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Sometimes Liam is content in what he does and confident in his abilities - and sometimes really doesn’t know what he is doing with his life.
Ever since he moved out, his knowledge of basic adult tasks grew with each day passing, cleaning, taxes, grocery shopping, cooking.
But apparently his mum Jenna doesn’t have much trust in his nutrition plan because she gifted him a cooking class. For his birthday, nonetheless. Liam would be offended if he didn’t love cooking either way.
So now he sits on an uncomfortable little wood stool, listening to the instructor ramble on about the three course meal they will be making today. Boring.
Letting his eyes wander, his gaze falls upon a guy roughly his age, sitting in the row in front of him, who intensely listens to the teacher, even making notes in a little notebook. Nerd . Liam snorts; apparently louder than intended because the guy hears him.
Smiling innocently, Liam averts his eyes, focusing on the chef again only to catch the last sentence of his lengthy introduction.
“...row one and three turn around, those are your partner.”
Liam looks up only to fall into angry grey eyes. Shit.
Theo chops the herbs with such aggression that Liam would fear for his fingers if he wasn’t busy stirring the soup currently simmering on the oven.
They haven't exchanged a word so far and Liam only knows his partner's name because everyone is forced to wear a name badge on their chests.
Someone can hold a grudge... Liam thinks while examining the chunks of tomato in the pot he is supervising. All that over a little giggle...
But because Liam is a very social creature and he feels like he will likely suffocate soon on the many comments and clever remarks he has been suppressing, he decides to be the bigger person and apologise. Doesn’t mean you have to mean it... floats through his head, a voice that sounds suspiciously like Stiles, his old babysitter.
“Hey Theo...”
The knife comes down onto the chopping board with a threatening clonk. Liam swallows hard.
“Never mind.”
But as longer as they stand next to each other, working in silence, as harder it becomes for Liam to keep his mouth shut; and then he finally cracks.
“Look, I am sorry I laughed at your notes but I really need you to stop ruining our meat with those herbs.”
“What?”, Theo's gorgeous ( wait. what? ) eyes are merely slits by now but it seems to be more confusion than anger, “those are exactly the herbs the chef mentioned. We need to follow the recipe.”
“Yes, yes", Liam impatiently waves his hand, “but trust me on this, I tried this kind of steak before and it tastes way better when we leave out like half the stuff he mentioned and just take pepper, salt and garlic instead!”
Theo still looks nervous but he nods.
“I never really cooked before, you know?”, he offers with an almost shy smile, “my sister will make so much fun of me if I fuck this competition up.”
Liam perks up. He really should have listened better.
“Competition?”
It turns out that Liam's mum knows him after all, cooking skills, competitiveness and everything.
This is not an ordinary cooking class but a real contest on which team can make the best food.
A quick look around the room has Liam assessing the competition. Two teenage girls, an old dude with an annoyed housewife as partner, a couple who's workstation already looks like a bomb exploded and a middle aged pair of girlfriends cooking their hearts out. Those will be the ones to beat, he decides before turning back to Theo.
“Alright. We got this. I need you to do everything I say and we will wipe the table with those guys.”
He claps his hands together, “now go, I need those biceps of yours to make the steak butter soft!”
Theo blushes at the mention of his muscular arms but Liam really can't allow himself to get distracted by cute boys right now. He has a golden stew pot to win!
When he is not busy murdering innocent greens Theo is a surprisingly capable kitchen help.
He takes on the tasks Liam dictates without complains and he seems genuinely interested in the changes they make to the recipe, even asking questions about the salad dressing variation Liam found in an ancient Greek cook book once.
The longer they work, the more comfortable Liam grows and the more comfortable he gets, the more his thoughts begin to wander. Which is... dangerous. Because Liam is not here to ogle cute guys but to win and he can’t win if he is busy drooling over the way Theo's shoulders look when he is handling pots and pans. So many muscles moving. I wonder what they would feel like under my fingers...
“Uhm... Liam?”
“Hm?”
“Is that supposed to look so dark?”
Fuck .
Quickly Liam grabs the hoodie he discarded as soon as the temperature rose a little and practically throws it at Theo.
“We need to concentrate. So please put that on.”
Theo, almost letting go of the badge with potato wedges he just cut, trying to catch the hoodie, wrinkles his nose in an adorable way, “Why? It’s like 100 degrees in here?”
Think quick, Liam!
“To protect your white shirt from the tomato sauce? Seriously, who wears a white shirt while cooking?”
Theo blushes, “well, I just like it, okay? Now concentrate on our dessert!”
“Being bossy, are we? I like it”, Liam almost purrs which intensifies Theo's blush but he can see that the girlfriends two tables over have already started their plate decorations and so he hits his inner flirt over the head with a metaphorical frying pan and gets to work.
They are just finishing up the salads when a deafening clatter, accompanied by two panicked screams sounds through the kitchen.
Theo's eyes are wide when he turns around, his whole face and chest sprinkled with tiny red dots. Tomato sauce. The teenagers’ pot toppled over, now laying on the ground, its content all over the kitchen and the cooks.
They burst out into laughter at the same time as the chef starts yelling at the culprits.
Liam steps closer to Theo, who still impersonates a statue with measles, and wipes carefully over his cheek, “tastes too salty, they should be glad it's spilled”, he comments while absentmindedly licking his finger, Theo's eyes glued to his lips. Liam smiles.
“All of you! Get back to work! You have 15 minutes to finish plating!”
Ripped out of their bubble they quickly finish their meal, placing it on the heating pad to keep the food hot until the jury (consisting out of the chef and two other men Liam forgot were here about until now) can try it before leaning back.
He feels Theo's eyes on his face, then a soft thumb rubbing on his jaw, “you still had some sauce there.”
Liam smirks, “Sure.”
“You know, next time you want to get your hands on me, you could just ask.”
Theo stutters but thankfully a loud clapping cuts him off as the chef announces the end of cooking time.
“And the winners are... Theo Raeken and Liam Dunbar! Congratulations gentlemen! You won a 200$ coupon for a candlelight dinner at the ‘Seaside Shells'!”
Liam's mouth drops open. The ‘Shells' is a five star restaurant, booked months in advance. But... “Candlelight dinner?”
“So... what do you do next Friday?”, Theo asks, almost timidly, “unless you want to split the prize money, that is? I don’t want to assume-"
Liam can’t take it any more. He surges forward, cutting Theo off with a kiss.
~♤~
“And here I thought my son would treat me to some nice dinner as thank you for my amazing gift – and the boyfriend, might I add! But fine... I will just pester your father until he takes me out...”
Jenna's fake pout is audible even through the phone and so Liam only rolls his eyes, “mum, you don’t even like sea food. Plus, it's a candlelight dinner. For couples.”
Theo next to him chuckles and tries to stifle the sound with hiding his face against Liam's neck. The hot breath on his skin is distracting, to say the least, just like Theo's fingers, sliding over his exposed waist.
“Listen mum, we need to go get ready so I will call you tomorrow, okay? Love you!”
Barely hearing Jenna's answer he hangs up and let’s the phone fall out of his hand.
“You know it's only 3pm, right?”, Theo asks, still curled up against him, “we don’t have the table until 8.”
“I know", Liam says, then he surges down to meet Theo's lips with his own.
Time to indulge in the distraction.