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It had started out as a joke at first, but Sho’s friends had decided to gift him a month of cooking lessons for his last birthday so that he could improve his legendary terrible skills in the kitchen.
They all had a laugh about it at the time, but his friend Jun had made him promise that he would go and Nino had threatened him to make him pay back the money they had spent if he didn’t use the gift certificate within the year before it expired.
When he had gotten to his first lesson, surrounded by women of all ages, he had thought about running away. Even though he loved food, he had always hated cooking, and being the only guy in that classroom had made him feel uncomfortable. He had just turned on his heels, ready to go away, when the cooking instructor, Aiba Masaki, had come in, fulgurating him in place with his smile.
From that day forward, he hadn’t missed a single lesson, and even went as far as booking additional classes to spend more time with Aiba. So this was the reason why he was standing in a kitchen alone with his cooking instructor that night.
Aiba was a patient man, which served Sho just right. As a complete newbie, he was often messing up even the simplest of instructions. But with Aiba’s guide and very hands-on expertise, he had started learning more and more about cooking, improving exponentially. That led him to become more confident when he had to follow instructions, which almost always earned him praise from his instructor, something that Sho craved from the other man.
That day, since Sho had booked a private lesson, Aiba had told him he wanted to spice it up a bit – quite literally it turned out.
“Let’s make a spicy chocolate cake,” he had said, with a spark in his eyes.
Sho, who had never made a cake before, was struggling to keep up. Making cakes was all about precision, which was something that he was very good at; but it was also about practice and skill, and he was very lacking in that area.
“It’s no good,” Aiba was saying, looking at the chocolate in the double boiler. “It seized up, see?” he said, showing him the dry, clumpy mess. “Did water get inside?”
“I guess?” Sho said, looking at the chocolate helplessly.
Aiba put the bowl away and measured some more chocolate for the cake.
“It’s alright, Sakurai-san, we’ll just do it again,” he said, smiling at him.
Aiba put the bowl on the pan again, and turned on the stove.
“Melting chocolate can be difficult if you’ve never done it,” he said. “Here, let me show you.”
He gave Sho a whisk and pulled him in front of the fire. Aiba’s fingers closed around his hand as the whisk dipped in the chocolate. Sho could feel the other man’s breath on his cheek as he positioned himself behind him, and his other hand brushing his hip to keep him in place. Aiba’s hand directed his hand in a gentle motion, so that he could mix the melting chocolate without ruining it.
Sho felt his heart beat a thousand miles per hour, while all of his senses heightened. He could smell the faint cologne Aiba was wearing, and that was inebriating him as it was being imprinted in his brain; he could feel his fingers lightly press on his hips, making him crave for his touch; the hand on his was gentle, but firm, and was making him get goosebumps; the hard frame of his body was pressing ever so slightly on his, making his stomach flutter.
“There,” Aiba said, barely a whisper in his ear. Sho felt his legs become jelly with just that. “You should treat chocolate like you would a lover. With love and respect.” The instructor stopped moving his hand and dipped the tip of his finger in carefully. “Good, it’s melted,” he said, and pulled away to turn off the stove.
Sho, who was already mourning the absence of Aiba’s body so close to him, turned to look at him to ask him for the next step. As soon as he laid eyes on him, though, he regretted it, because Aiba had put his finger in his mouth and was now licking it clean.
“Hmm, I love chocolate,” he practically moaned.
Sho’s brain short-circuited, and he gulped as he tried to calm down. There was no way Aiba wasn’t doing that on purpose. He cleared his voice, trying to keep his thoughts—and his body—at bay.
“I’m not the first you’ve done this with, am I?”
“The first one I’ve done what with?” he asked in an innocent tone Sho wasn’t falling for.
“Come on,” Sho blurted out, “I’m sure you hit on your customers all the time.”
Aiba giggled. “So you think I’m hitting on you, Sakurai-san?”
“That’s not—”
“And what if I were?”
Sho felt his mind become blank as he looked for an answer. His instructor looked at him expectantly, wearing a slight smirk on his lips that told him that he knew exactly what kind of effect he was having on him.
“I wouldn’t be totally opposed to it, I guess,” Sho managed to blurt out before he could think of something better.
Aiba raised one eyebrow. “You guess?”
Sho opened his mouth and closed it again.
“Tell you what.” Aiba got closer to him. “We’re going to finish this cake, and then we’ll eat it together.”
“All of it?” Sho asked, not knowing what to say.
Aiba chuckled, but it wasn’t the usual cheerful giggle. It was rich, and dark, and it sounded like a promise to Sho’s ears.
“They say the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach,” the instructor said, “and I’m sure we can work the appetite for the rest of it later.”