a watched cake never bakes,,open

[MARA ELISE WESTON]

Mara had been into the kitchens at Hogwarts so many times that the house elves all knew her name and they trusted her enough to cook. Obviously, she was not in there to cook meals for the entire school, but she was in there to cook nonetheless, mostly for herself. Because she was a professor and had been for a while—this would be her thirty-third year—she only got two and a half months out of the year to cook for herself, and that was during summer vacation. (Mara never went home for the holidays because there was absolutely nothing at home. Her parents rarely bothered to celebrate Christmas anymore, and her brother and sister were too wrapped up in their own lives to invite her.) For those reasons, she took every chance she had to go to the kitchens and “visit” with the house elves. They knew that, despite her kindness towards them, Mara was there to cook and not visit. They had never said anything to her about it, but she knew that they were disappointed with her primary intentions. Mara had absolutely nothing against them. In fact, she found them to be quite pleasant. But she was more of a cook than a conversationalist. Besides, they already knew every detail about her because she told them stories whenever she went to cook. Now Mara was out of stories, but she was trying to make some up just to keep them entertained as she sat there and cooked whatever she had decided to cook.

Today’s recipe was something she had seen in some random cookbook lying around her house just before coming back to school. She had made it before, but only once, and it had not turned out as she had planned. That was probably because she was young and stupid and had been too lazy to take the yolks from the eggs. The recipe required the use of only egg whites. Mara had learned her lesson since then, though. So there she stood at the counter near the sink, removing the yolk from the whites. A lot of new cooks would not have known how to do that—Mara hadn’t when she first started cooking. It was actually pretty simple, and the act of removing yolks from whites was calming in itself. Whenever Mara separated yolks from whites, she could feel the stress from her day just going into the movements she made with her hands, and her entire body felt relaxed and calm. That happened all the time when she cooked, but today it just seemed surreal, as if she were not cooking at all, but watching the sun go down or listening to Richard, her has deceased-for-many-years husband, singing a quiet tune in her ear. Mara closed her eyes momentarily and sighed to herself, dropping yet another egg yolk slowly into a bowl for use by the house elves in one of their own recipes. She opened her eyes and counted the yolks in the small, white bowl. What was she making again? She knew that a look of confusion passed on her face as she stood there and thought long and hard about what she was making. The house elves seemed to take steps closer to her, and one of them finally tugged on the side of her skirt. She jumped at the sudden movement looked down at the little house elf.

“You waz making a cake, Miz Wezton. And icing, too,” the elf said timidly. Mara opened her mouth but closed it almost immediately. She looked at the things she had taken out from cabinets and off of shelves. The little house elf was right. She was going to make a white cake with vanilla icing, and Mara was currently working on the icing, since the cake was already made and in the oven. Nodding her head, Mara smiled gently. Usually, she would have given the little house elf a pat on the head, but her hands were covered in egg, and she was not entirely sure the house elf would have appreciated that. So she just grinned and thanked her, and the house elf skipped off to do whatever it was house elves did in their free time.

Now that she knew what she was making, Mara could not figure out why she was making it. She thought for another moment as she cracked yet another egg and separated the white and the yolk. Oh, yeah, she thought, I was making a cake because it was the last thing I saw in the cookbook at home. She knew that she was doing that recipe right this time, because everything was going according to plan. Of course, had it not been for the help of some very intelligent house elves, the cake would have turned out, well, bad. Mara could not take all credit for her cooking experiences in the kitchens, because the house elves oftentimes knew what she was making and how to make it. The professor always wondered why these little creatures were made to work in Hogwarts, as literal underground cooks. Everyone knew that they cooked, of course, but nobody ever saw them unless they ventured, without permission, into the kitchens. (No one granted students permission into the kitchens. Ever.)

The woman turned the tap on and washed her hands in the sink with soap and warm water. Once her hands were rid of the egg, she began to add the other ingredients and mix them together, humming to herself as she did so. The aroma of the icing was almost intoxicating, in a good way. It smelled good, and Mara was tempted to take spoon after spoon and just shove it into her mouth. But she did not do that. Someone else might come in and want a piece of the cake with some of the icing. Licking the spoon was not a classy thing to do, though she could not resist the temptation to do it. So, gazing around, the professor put a playful smile on her face and licked the spoon. Well, the icing tasted good. Mara lazily tossed the spoon noisily in the sink and went for another. At least she had the decency, unlike most cooks, to use another spoon after licking the first one. The thought of eating a restaurant with chefs and cooks was a disgusting thought to her, now that she thought about it. What if the cooks did exactly what she did, only they did not trade spoons? Though the thought bothered her, she pushed it to the back of her mind. She was making a good cake, and wanted at least one piece of it. And, aside from that, when was she not hungry? She was always hungry for food, no matter what it was. She would have to wait, though, as the cake was not yet done. While she waited, the woman lowered herself into one of the chairs, a bit of flour on her face from where she had had an itch earlier when making the cake, and relaxed. Now all she had to do was wait. Waiting was the worst part of cooking, because Mara had the patience of a young child on Christmas morning when it came to cooking. She hated waiting for things to finish. She always had to force herself not to look and to not cut the temperature up. Cutting the temperature up meant disaster, and disaster meant no food. She could not let that happen. She knew that she simply could not. And therefore, she did not. Mara stayed in her seat and just looked around the organized kitchen, her blue eyes large in admiration, as if this were her first time in the kitchens.

[black]modified – changed to third-person[/black]

[• SIRIUS ORION BLACK]

Sirius was a hungry growing boy of fifteen, so no one should be surprised to learn that the three meals a day that the school provided simply weren’t enough for the young Black. There would be times between meals that Sirius would feel that ominous bubbling in his stomach, signaling that he required sustenance. Some people may be able to ignore this or simply be able to bare it, but not Sirius. When Sirius was hungry, there was no other option for him other than finding something to eat. Perhaps it was another side effect of him learning to transform into a dog that made Sirius so desperate to find food at times, but it wasn’t as if he would start digging in the trash like a real dog. Luckily, Sirius knew of an excellent alternative; he knew how to get into the school’s kitchens. He and James had discovered it during their second year while exploring the castle under the cover of James’ invisibility cloak. It was simple enough; all you had to do was go down the corridor that lead to the Hufflepuff common room, find the painting of the bowl of fruit, and tickle the pear, then a door knob would appear and you would be in! It was almost painfully easy; Sirius often wondered why they didn’t make it harder to find if students weren’t allowed there. Though, he had to admit, he always felt a little awkward tickling that pear. . .

Once you were inside the kitchens, you were greeted by dozens of smiling house elves, all eager to feed you and bring you what ever you wanted. Sirius’ primary experience with house elves was with his family’s house elf, Kreacher, whom Sirius would love to toss off their roof. The house elf was polite and gracious to everyone in the family, except Sirius, of course. Kreacher seemed to take great joy out of muttering things like “blood traitor” and “filthy mudblood lover” in front of Sirius. There had been many times where Sirius would get in trouble with his parents for locking Kreacher in a closet or tossing him down a flight of stairs. The house elves in the kitchens, on the other hand, were always kind and helpful to Sirius. If he said he was craving a cookie, they house elves would run off and return with a tray of every kind of cookie Sirius could think of! It was like he was a prince or something and that was part of the appeal, other than the food.

Sirius didn’t know exactly what he was craving, but he knew that he was hungry, so it was off to the kitchens. Unfortunately, his partner in crime, James, was off on an adventure of his own, so Sirius was flying solo. Not only did James not invite Sirius on his little excursion, he had also taken the cloak with him. But, Sirius knew that there was no need for the invisibility cloak seeing as it wasn’t after hours, nor would he need to hide from the kitchen house elves; he highly doubted they would have sudden change of heart and turn him in for being there. Because of this, James would be forgiven, but he would still be heavily question by Sirius later about where he’d gone off to in such a hurry. Sirius would have invited Remus or Peter, but without back up from James, Remus would just be a pain in the ass and go on about being a prefect and how he should be doing things like this anymore. And Peter usually just annoyed Sirius in any occasion, so for that reason, he was out as well.

Every time Sirius had gone to the kitchens, the only people he had run into there, were of course, house elves, but today was different. Had Sirius not already miraculously made it across the kitchens, he probably would have quickly turned and left when he noticed he wasn’t alone; Professor Weston was there as well. In all honesty, Sirius rather liked the Charms professor; in fact, she was one of his favorite teachers. She was quite lovely for an older woman, Sirius wasn’t afraid to admit that. Why else would he be so attentive in charms? Still, she was a professor and Sirius was somewhere that he wasn’t supposed to be. What type of Hellish karma had caused this to happen? If a professor discovered him there, Sirius wasn’t sure his wit and charm would be enough to get him out of trouble. Weston was a kind woman, but Sirius wouldn’t put it past her to punish him for this. On the other hand, he had somehow managed to sneak past Weston without either one of them becoming aware of the other’s presence, which was odd because the house elves always loudly greeted him. Maybe it was just Sirius’ good fortune that kept the professor concentrated enough on her own cooking not to notice the house elves bringing donuts to the Gryffindor boy or his wander around the kitchen.

With his arms full of donuts, Sirius began to sneak and slide around the kitchens. The place really was a maze with all the rows of overs, stoves, and cooking supplies. At one point, Sirius used a pile of pealed potatoes for cover, but in the end, it was a stray pan on the floor that did him in. Sirius was so concentrated on watching Weston to make sure she didn’t see him, that he didn’t even notice the pan on the floor, until Sirius accidentally kicked it, causing the pan to hit the side of an over with a loud crash. The sound startled even Sirius; he jumped into the open, very close to the professor and let out a small yelp.

“This isn’t what it looks like!” said Sirius quickly with his arms full of donuts and his face looking like he was a young boy who had just been caught with his hand in the cookie jar, “. . . ok, this is exactly what it looks like. Well, what can I say? I was hungry.” Sirius shrugged, gave the Professor one of his most charming smiles, and took a bite of one of the donuts he was carrying. Why try to lie? It was obvious he was in the kitchen to get food, why else would he be there? Could he really be reprimanded for being hungry? He was a growing boy! He needed constant nourishment.

“Whatever you’re making, Professor, it smells really good and I’m not just saying that to get out of trouble.” He wasn’t, it really did smell very good. At that moment, Sirius’ stomach made a very audible rumble

[MARA ELISE WESTON]

It was not long before impatience got the best of the aging professor. Shortly after she had seated herself in one of the small seats, she was back on her feet at the oven, pulling the cake out to see if it had finished cooking. When the toothpick came out unclean, she pushed the tray back into the oven and closed the door. Maybe she would feel better if she just stood at the oven in case the cake finished cooking a little sooner than expected. As she stood there, she stirred the vanilla icing absentmindedly, but soon stopped as the temptation rose to put another spoonful in her mouth. She cleared her throat and moved the bowl to the other end of the counter. The idea was that the bowl was far enough away that she would not be tempted to reach for it, but it was close enough so that she could see it. If she had to move to get the bowl, she would be away from the oven. That was the last place she wanted to be, away from the oven.

Mara crossed her arms over her chest and turned so that her backside was against the counter. She looked around the kitchen at lack of décor as well as the lack of organization. The house elves, while they were great cooks, were probably the worst housekeepers. They did, of course, clean the entire castle, but they never did clean it. They did their best, though, and that was all anyone asked of them. Of course, they could have done better in the kitchens, since they spent most of their time in there. The least they could have done was put the pots and pans away, and not leave them lying around on the dirty floor. Of course, the professor really could not criticize anyone for cleanliness, though. While she liked keeping things clean, she was not the best housekeeper in the world. There were always items stuffed in random places or tossed into corners. The only room in her entire house that remained clean was the kitchen, and that was because she took pride in her kitchen and cooking. Cookbooks were lined nearly on a small shelf above the stove, and dishes were stacked neatly away in cabinets. The only thing in her entire kitchen that was nor organized was the pantry, because she had no desire to organize it as most people did. She just tossed things in there. Half the time, macaroni and cheese boxes were laying on their sides, and cans were put in upside down.

The woman sighed quietly and turned to face the oven yet again. With a swift motion, she pulled the oven door open and peered inside. Again, she poked a toothpick into the cake. Again, it came out unclean. She sighed heavily and closed the oven door again, a bit harder than she probably should have. A few of the house elves jumped at the noise of the oven door closing loudly, and the professor offered an apologetic gaze. One would think that after all this time the house elves would be used to her impatience in cooking. A few of the older house elves would tell her—as if she did not already know—that patience was important in cooking. Mara had been cooking for how long? Forty-five years? Longer? Either way, she had been cooking for longer than any of the house elves, yet they were the ones giving her hints. She mentally scoffed at the idea and looked at the watch on her wrist, blinking a few time as she moved her arm away from her. Her eyesight was going like an old lady—but then again, wasn’t she an old lady? The cake had been in the oven for about twenty-eight minutes. This recipe required thirty to thirty-five minutes. Surely it was almost done?

Mara grabbed one of the potholders and started to open the oven door again. However, her grip on the door was released when the sudden banging of a pan against one of the empty ovens startled her. The oven door slammed shut loudly, and the professor dropped the potholder on the floor near the oven. She put both of her hands over her chest where her heart was and looked at the source of the noise: a supposedly innocent Gryffindor fifth year, Sirius Black. The woman looked at him with wide eyes and opened her mouth.

“You scared the shit out of me!” she told him with a laugh in her voice and a smile on her face. There was no anger in her voice, but there was a slight amount of amusement. “What are you trying to do, put me in an early grave?” The woman leaned over as she posed the question and picked up the dropped potholder. She tossed it atop the stove and recomposed herself by brushing her hair back from her face and tugging at her loosely fitting shirt. She grabbed a damp rag from nearby and wiped off a small section of the already clean counter.

The boy immediately denied that he was doing anything wrong, but the professor knew better than that. He was Sirius Black, and he was one of the infamous marauders. Of course he was doing something wrong! That was made apparent simply by his presence in the kitchens. What really proved that he was doing something against the rules was the fact that he had snuck in and had been walking out with an armful of donuts when he accidentally kicked a pan across the room and broke all peace and quiet in the kitchens. The professor locked her sapphire gaze upon the boy and looked at him. Yes, this was typical Sirius Black. He had a dirty shaggy dog look and was smuggling food to the Gryffindor Common Room. She wondered if he was going to eat all of that himself or share with his three best friends, James, Remus, and Peter. Those thoughts were pushed to the back of her mind as the boy stated simply that he was hungry. She nodded her head. Well, that was alright. He was hungry. Everyone got hungry. Hell, Mara was hungry all the time.

“Whatever you’re making, Professor, it smells really good and I’m not just saying that to get out of trouble.”

The woman chuckled lightly through her nose and let a broad, close-mouthed smile appear on her face. Her cheeks rose even higher on her face and flushed slightly red, as did her ears. She bit down on her lower lip and shrugged her shoulders lightly. What else was she supposed to do? Thank him? Well, that would have made obvious sense to anyone, but Mara never knew how to reply to compliments.

“I’m making a cake,” she stated, “With vanilla icing.” She took the potholder into her hand against and opened the oven. Again, she poked the cake with a toothpick. This time it came out clean, which was a clear indication that she could remove it from the oven. She turned to oven temperature button so that it clicked and showed ‘0’. Once she had done that, she pulled the round cake tray out and placed it on one of the back burners of the stove to cool. Once it was cool, she would transfer the cake to a plate and add the icing. “I’ll share if you don’t mind waiting. I can’t put the icing on it ‘til it’s cooled down a bit, but it shouldn’t take too long.”

[• SIRIUS ORION BLACK]

So, Sirius did feel bad about scaring the living day lights out of the professor, but that feeling quickly went away when he heard what came out of the woman’s mouth. Did Professor Weston just say ‘shit’? Sirius’ eyes widened out of a mixture of shock and glee; first of all, he’d only been in the kitchens for five minutes and he could tell that this was going to turn into a story worthy of tell the guys. Secondly, a professor just swore in front of him. A professor! Yes, school professors were human too, Sirius knew this, but it was still weird to see them doing normal people things like shopping, drinking, or, most bizarrely, cursing. It was like seeing a pig walking on his hind legs and wearing a top hat or seeing Snape with clean hair.

“I. . . I, er,” stammered Sirius, still flabbergasted by what he’d just heard. He gave his head a little shake to snap himself out of it! This was simply unacceptable; Sirius Black never stammered and was never lost for words! “I’m sorry Professor, I didn’t mean to give you a fright,” he said, flashing the woman his famous smile, “Aside from the obvious of not wanting to get caught out of bounds, I also didn’t want to interrupt your baking, but it seems like I’ve been foiled by a stray pot.” What the bloody Hell was that pot doing on the floor anyway? Didn’t the house elves constantly keep the place tidy? Sirius was suspecting that there was possibly some foul play afoot.

It seemed that even the professor wasn’t immune to Sirius’ charm, considering the way she reacted to his small compliment. Sirius had to admit that Weston really was quite pretty for an older gal; her smile and her blushing only seemed to emphasize her beauty. If only Weston was younger or Sirius was older. Or, at the very least, if she wasn’t a professor. It only took Sirius a few moments to realize how creepy this thought process was. Still, if given the opportunity. . .

When Professor Weston opened the over, the smell of the cake became even stronger, so strong, in fact, that Sirius’ mouth began to water and his stomach let out another loud growl. Jesus Christ, was he really that hungry? The smell of the cake was almost as good as his favorite scent; the scent of a woman. Normally, the first thing Sirius would pick up on about any woman, professor, student, or otherwise, was how she smelled. He’d had an increased knack for doing this ever since he started learning how to turn into a dog; his increased sensitivity of scent was a side effect of sorts. But, in this situation, all Sirius could smell was the cake. He liked to think that Professor Weston would just smell like baked good all the time, having never sat close enough to the front of the classroom during Charms to know for sure.

Even when there was baking going on in the Black home, it never smelled as sweet as Professor Weston’s cake. It never held the same pleasant feeling that Sirius was sensing that moment either. Sirius’ mother never placed her hand on a pot or a mixing spoon; that’s what the house elf was for, as she would say. Kreacher, although he could turn out a decent lunch or dinner, had never quite mastered the art of baking. Most of the house elf’s attempts at cakes or cookies always turned out dry, sour, or burnt. Until now, most of the smells Sirius could relate to baking were that of burnt cakes and cookies.

Not only did professor Weston curse and not give Sirius detention, she was offering him cake! Basically, Weston was the coolest Professor ever. Sirius was considering asking her to adopt him, or at the very least if she would accompany him to the Halloween ball.

Sirius wasn’t used to having an older woman treat him with such a playful and maternal manner. His mother, the all mighty bitch that she was, treated Sirius as if he was some grotesque mold growing in the house rather than a son. Even the Head of Gryffindor house, Minerva McGonagal was rather cold and stern toward Sirius, though he had to admit that she usually had good reason for it. Professor Weston had always been remarkably passive about Sirius shenanigans in class when compared to other professors. Even now, when Sirius was out of bounds and had just nearly given her a heart attack, she wasn’t reprimanding him. He almost wasn’t quite sure if he should trust it; were professors capable of such niceties? Apparently they were capable of cursing, so why not?


“Well, I have nothing better to do and I can’t pass up an offer like that after standing here and smelling it!” said Sirius. After these words had left his mouth, suddenly a thought hit him; was he actually about to share a cake with a professor? Sirius Black, troublemaker extraordinaire, was about to spend an afternoon eating cake with a teacher? In this situation, his hunger had completely out weighed his pride and his sense of reality. No one must ever know about this or Sirius would surely be in for some mocking. Aw Hell, even if people did find out he could talk his way out of it!

Sirius put his pile of doughnuts down on the counter; he planned to ask a house elf to wrap them up for him so he could take them to his dorm and have them for later, then he sat down on the counter next to his pile of sweets. He didn’t know how long it took a cake to cool, so why not get comfortable in the meantime? Now he had to think of a way to pass the time with Professor Weston that wasn’t completely awkward.

“Professor,” Sirius began, “Why have you never baked anything for our class? I’m sure your popularity among the students would become even greater if you were to do that.” Why not butter her up more?

[MARA ELISE WESTON]

The house elves did not seem to be busy. Most of them were just standing around, doing nothing. A few of the younger ones were curious to see the professor and student communicating back and forth, and they watched in amazement. Mara caught their large eyes watching her and the Gryffindor boy, but she said nothing. She just listened to what he said about the stray pot. Her eyes gazed around the kitchen floor in search of the pot. When she saw it, she called out to the nearest house elf. “Mamo, can you pick that up and put it away, please?” The little house elf nodded and scurried to do the task that had been asked of her. She picked the pot, which was probably half her size, and tucked it away with the rest of the pots and pans. Mara nodded her head in thanks, and the little house elf, Mamo, scurried off into some remote corner of the room. The professor looked at Sirius Black with her sapphire eyes.

“When I bake, I don’t mind interruptions,” the woman stated simply. “I get impatient waiting for things to finish cooking. Having someone to talk to keeps my mind off whatever I’m doing and doesn’t have me pulling my hair out waiting for things to finish.” The woman knew that what she admitted would probably make little sense to Sirius. He probably had never baked a day in his life, being a teenage boy and all. Not only that, but being impatient over something such as cooking probably seemed frivolous to him. But who knew? Maybe he would understand her impatience, though it was doubtful.

The professor placed one of her aged hands on the side of the pan. It was still a little warm, but nowhere near as hot as it had been previously. She let it set for a few more seconds before deciding that it was cooled off enough, even though it probably wasn’t. She reached into one of the cabinets and pulled out a plate large enough for the cake. In an almost professional manner, she put the plate, face down, over the cake pan and tipped it. When she lifted the pan from the plate, the cake rested neatly on the plate. Steams floated from the top, and the professor inhaled its sweet scent. The smell of the cake was intoxicating, and the professor could not wait to have a piece of it. But first she had to put the icing on it.

She reached across the counter for the bowl of icing and stirred it around a little bit more. She then used the back of the wooden spoon and began to spread icing across the fluffy cake. She was not an expert icing spreader by any means, but she did try to make it look presentable. It took her several moments of silence to cover the cake with vanilla. Once she was done, she looked into the bowl, which still had some icing left. She was tempted to eat it by the spoonful from the bowl, but she did not want to be rude in front of the student. So, instead, she walked over to small group of house elves and offered it to them. They took it gladly and started eating it, with the spoon and their fingers. She watched for a moment and smiled. Well, someone was enjoying her homemade icing.

The woman returned to the counter, pulled a knife from one of the drawers, and retrieved two more plates. She carefully cut into the cake and placed a piece onto each plate, all the while responding to the boy’s question regarding her baking. “No time.” The woman shrugged. “Between teaching and trying to keep you all out of trouble, I don’t have much time to come down here and bake.” The professor left out the part about grading papers. Sirius probably knew her well enough to know that she lost more papers than she graded. She had the tendency to place them somewhere and forget about them. When she cleaned up in her office, she ended up throwing them out and never grading them. Of course, she never blamed her students for that, and she never failed them for her lack of organization, or memory for that matter. You would think that she would have learned her lesson by now, but not Mara Weston. Oh, no. She was one-of-a-kind, her very own person. Doing what most normal people would do—it just wasn’t her. She assumed her students rather enjoyed it, though. If she graded their essays like she graded their tests, most of them would probably be failing her class. Of course, her lack of effective grading did not take away from the fact that she was a good teacher, despite her tendencies to misplace or discard of her students’ work. As long as everyone knew it was unintentional, she was fine. (Her students were probably starting to wonder if she threw the papers away on purpose, because it did seem kind of strange that she did it almost habitually.) “Even if I did, do you really think you’d deserve any of my baked goods?” Her voice still carried the same tone it had before, and it was obvious that she was playing around with him. She would have posed the same question, even it another student had asked her.

The woman carried both plates to the table. She placed the plate gently on the table, but that did not stop them from making a light clanking noise against the wood. “And she said: Let them eat cake.” Of course, Mara was quoting the infamous Marie-Antoinette and her idiotic quote about the British eating cake. How could they eat cake if they didn’t even have any bread? Mara lowered herself into a seat near Sirius and took her fork in her left hand, cutting off a small piece and putting it in her mouth. She chewed it slowly. Once she swallowed, smacked her lips together in an odd fashion. “It’s fluffy, that’s for sure,” she commented of her own cooking. “Might need some milk.”

She stood to her feet and wandered over to the large refrigerator, which held a little bit of everything inside. She removed the milk from the shelf and walked back across the kitchen. She removed one glass from the cabinet and spoke loud enough for her company to hear. “Would you like a glass?” She tipped the milk jug over into her cup, filling it a few centimeters shy of the rim. She waited for him to respond, keeping her right hand ready in case he wanted a glass. She figured he would, especially if he bit into the cake and found that it got thick as he swallowed it. The cake’s fluffy goodness was all part of it, though. It was supposed to be thick and fluffy; that’s what made it taste delicious.

[• SIRIUS ORION BLACK]

While watching Mamo gleefully put away the stray pot, Sirius just couldn’t get over the difference between the Hogwarts house elves and Kreacher. The house elves in the kitchen were just so pleasant and obedient. If Sirius would have told one of them to dive in a pot of boiling water, they’d probably do it. Not that Sirius would ever do that, unless it was Kreacher he was ordering, but the elf would never listen to him anyway. For a moment, Sirius wondered what would happen if Kreacher were mixed in with the Hogwarts house elves. First, he’d probably poison the food for everyone who is not in Slytherin, pure-blood or not, then he’d probably lock up all the house elves that didn’t follow his ideals. Basically, he’d be the Grindlewald of house elves. He imagined Kreacher with a cape and a curly mustache, tying a female house elf to a set of train tacks while a train is speeding toward them like in one of those old muggle silent films. Sirius was abruptly thrown out of his daydream when the professor confessed to not minding the interruption.

“Really? I mean, how long does it take a cake to bake? Like, ten minutes or something?” Sirius said with a slight tone of confusion. Weston was right; Sirius had never baked or cooked anything in his life, unless you could count that time that he put a vomiting solution in his brother’s soup, so he had no perspective of how long it took things to cook. At home, Kreacher would just announce when meals were read and at school, the food was just waiting for him at the table. For all he knew, the cooking of food could have been instantaneous when using house elf magic. For all Sirius knew, Professor Weston could have used magic to bake her cake, or maybe she was doing it the muggle way just for fun.

Sirius watched the professor finish preparing the cake with surprising interest, his mouth slightly opened. He’d never watched anyone cook before so he didn’t know the steps one would do to finish a cake. It was oddly mesmerizing watching the professor transfer the cake from the pan to the dish using a type of flip-flopping technique, or at least that was the only Sirius could think to describe it. Releasing the cake from the pan cause more of its scent spread through out the kitchen. As it hit Sirius nostrils, his mouth began to water. He could have found instant relief for his mouth water desire by eating one of the donuts next to him, but he wanted some of that bloody cake!

It felt like it took the professor FOREVER to cover the cake with icing! All he could do was watch with a slightly glazed over look in his eye while trying not to drool. He almost felt like the Professor was taking her time just to be a tease!! It was like some sick twisted form of culinary foreplay! (Of course, he would relate everything to sex). He WANTED a piece of that cake. He WANTED it inside him, NOW. Sirius envious watched the group of house elves eating the leftover icing with a yearning and almost hurt expression on his face. Why didn’t he get any leftover icing? WESTON WAS A TEASE! A bloody, cake baking, icing giving away, TEASE!

If Sirius had been in dog for just then, his tailed would have started wagging when Weston began cutting into the cake. For all he knew, he would have been shaking his ass slightly mimic the action, but he was so preoccupied with getting that cake that he had no idea what the rest of him was up to. His was, however, well away of the woman’s talking, so he wasn’t as caught by surprise like the last time she spoke.

“I absolutely think that I deserve your baked goods, Professor,” Sirius said seriously. He actually wasn’t quite sure what he would have to do to be ‘deserving’. Would he have to perform tricks like a dog? At this point, if Sirius had to transform into a dog and roll over to get that cake into his belly, he would have done it. Or, he could be ‘deserving’ by simply doing well in Weston’s class, which he did. Most people did actually; she was an easy grader and when she lost papers, it benefited the student. One time, Sirius wrote an assignment for Charms the night before it was due and he knew he was going to get a poor grade on it, but then Weston lost it and he didn’t have to worry about it! He could see a situation like that sucking for someone who had actually written a good paper, but those were the type of people who obviously had no life. Sirius had better things to do with him time than constantly working on assignments for class. At least Weston admitted it when she lost a paper; in the past, Sirius had had professors who would blame the students when they, the teacher, had been the one to loose the paper. What were they, as students, suppose to learn from that? How to lie and blame another person for something that’s their own fault?

The plates had barely touched the surface of the table when Sirius was launching himself off the counter and toward a chair. The professor had barely sat down when Sirius was halfway through his slice. The cake tasted even better than it smelled and the fact that the cake was still warm only enhanced the experience. It was like there was a delightful sugar land of love dancing in his mouth! It was like a warm fluffy bunny made out of cake was hugging his tongue! It was just DELICIOUS. Had it not been frown upon, Sirius would have ditched his fork and just went into his cake face first like the dog he was.

“Professor,” said Sirius, his mouth half full of cake, “I don’t know who this chick telling them to eat cake is, but I do know that this is, debatably, the best thing that I’ve ever eaten EVER.” Sirius continued to devour the rest of his piece of cake as Weston went to get a glass of milk.

“Yes please,” Sirius said to the offer of milk, “and, er, can I have another piece of cake?” He showed the professor his clean plate and gave her one of his charming smiles.