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"Mom, I don't think I'm doing this right."
"What does it look like now?" Scott glances down into the contents of the giant mixing bowl sitting on the counter. He's been stirring for at least five minutes but his cake batter is still lumpy and, weirdly enough, looks almost orange, although he supposes that the color might just be a trick of the terrible kitchen lighting.
(It definitely isn't.)
"Kind of like Play-Doh, actually," he sighs, prodding the mixture with his wooden spoon. "I read the instructions, I swear."
"I believe you," his mom replies. "Did you measure everything properly?"
"I think so." The entire counter is strewn with measuring cups and cutlery, all of it so covered in flour and food that, truth be told, Scott can't really remember what he used for the cake and what he used for the lasagna currently sitting in the oven.
"Maybe I should have just bought one," he groans, dropping the spoon into the bowl and pushing it aside.
"You probably still have time," his mom says. "Isn't there a Dairy Queen just down the road from you guys?"
"Yeah, I'm not sure if they're..." Before Scott can finish his sentence, he pauses, nose twitching. Something has changed, something in the room's atmosphere and after a second, he realizes that it's a smell, a wrong smell.
More specifically, it's smoke.
"Mom, I gotta go, love you!" he says in one breath, ending the call and tossing his phone onto the kitchen table as he whips around. There's thick, acrid smoke creeping out of the oven and when he opens the door, a cloud of it hits him right in the face. He buries his face in his sleeve and yanks the pan out of the oven. He can feel the skin on his palms blistering and burning but he manages to hold on long enough to open the balcony door and toss the whole pan outside. One quick glance is all it takes to determine that the pan is probably ruined; it looks like there's cheese literally embedded in the sides and there are some nasty scorch marks dotting it.
Scott groans, wincing as the skin on his palms begins to heal. Of all the days for him to screw up so spectacularly, it would be on his and Stiles and Isaac's anniversary.
The apartment is flooded with smoke and Scott opens every window before he peers back in the oven, using a dishtowel to wave away more smoke. It looks mostly undamaged, although there's some cheese melted onto the bottom rack. He groans again and grabs his phone to check the time. He's pretty sure that the Dairy Queen closes at seven. If he jumps a few fences and hops a few rooftops, he might be able to make it before-
"Stiles, do you smell smoke?"
The voice is coming from the hallway and before Scott can get to his feet, the door flies open. There's a sharp crunch as the doorknob collides with the wall, creating a hole to replace the one that they just patched.
"Scott?" Isaac yells, coughing slightly. Even over the smell of smoke, Scott can catch the sharp scent of fear coming from the living room.
"In here!" he calls, just as Isaac slides into the kitchen.
"What happened?" Isaac asks. "Are you alright?" His exact words are echoed by Stiles a few seconds later. He sounds slightly out of breath and his arms are laden with a number of large plastic bags.
"I'm fine," Scott says with a shrug, holding up his palms to show off the almost healed skin, still pink around the edges. "I tried to cook." Both Stiles and Isaac turn to look at the mess strewn across the counter. After a moment, Stiles starts laughing. He slides the bags off his arms and onto the floor before he presses himself against Scott's side, forehead resting against Scott's shoulder.
"Man," he says, pointing at the oven, "how did that happen?"
"Is that batter meant to be orange?" Isaac asks, frowning down at the mixing bowl.
"It's the lighting," Scott says quickly. Isaac simply raises an eyebrow before he dips his finger into the bowl, bringing up a lump of batter. As soon as his tongue brushes it, he shudders slightly.
"You didn't have to go all out for us, you know," Stiles says. "Right, Isaac?" Isaac nods and crosses the kitchen, pressing himself against Scott's front, slinging his arm around Stiles' waist.
"I know," Scott says. "But I wanted to do something special. Seemed right, for four years."
"Maybe we should save the real special stuff for five years," Isaac says, dropping his hand to Scott's hip. "Or for tomorrow, at least."
"Isaac and I got takeout from that awesome Italian place by the school," Stiles murmurs against Scott's neck. "And a cake from Dairy Queen. Will that work for tonight?" Scott nods, breath hitching as Isaac leans down and presses a kiss to the underside of his jaw.
"Yeah," he says, smoothing one hand down Isaac's chest and hooking the other into Stiles' belt loops. "Maybe we should put the cake in the freezer first. Just for now."
"Food should probably go in the fridge too," Isaac says, words hot against Scott's ear. "Might taste like smoke otherwise."
"We might taste like smoke," Stiles says, pulling away and yanking the cake out of one of the plastic bags, "unless we get away from the kitchen ASAP. Like, now."
As it turns out, their bedroom has (mostly) escaped the deluge of smoke.
By the time they make it back out to the kitchen, the cake batter is hard as a rock and the apartment almost smells normal again.