Title: Cakemate
Rating: PG-13
Pairing/Character/s: ChikagexOno, Deko, Tachibana, Eiji
Word Count: 931
Warning/s: Spoilers for the third volume of the manga, I guess.
Summary: Ono can't compete with a ten-year-old.
Dedication: pyrefly- sorry this took so long!
A/N: Theme was "bake-off with a twist…" I don't know if this fulfills it at all. ;; Also, I've come to discover that I really can't write this fandom. But it was good to um, discover that, I guess. XD

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When Deko asks him to teach her how to make a great, great cake for Chi's birthday, Ono of course, can't help but agree to it, though it disrupts the fact that he'd been working on a special new cake recipe for the same occasion. Two cakes would be too much and really, he wouldn't want to make it a competition for Chikage to have to choose a favorite between a cake made by a daughter and a cake made by the coworker who might incidentally want to one day become his lover. Given the circumstances Ono was pretty sure there wasn't even any competition to speak of. Deko would win with or without the pastry chef's help—love makes everything taste better after all.

He supposes he can find something else to get Chikage for his birthday then, maybe a book or something nice for his apartment.

"Are you going to make him a cake too?" Deko asks when they're measuring flour, and he blinks and wonders if she takes after her mother more than she lets on.

He smiles at her. "No, I think this one cake will be enough for everyone, don't you?"

She beams. "It's going to be a great, great cake!"

He chuckles a bit. "Yes. Your first as a great pastry chef, ne?"

The little girl nods enthusiastically and finishes measuring the flour exactly like Ono had said to. "So whatcha gonna get him?"

He blinks. "Well… I…" he trails off, running his hand sheepishly through his hair. "I guess I don't know yet," the patissier admits after a moment, laughing a bit helplessly at the thought.

Deko's smile broadens. "You know… Chi likes you soooooo much I bet even if you just gave him a big hug he'd be really happy!" she declares very matter-of-factly. Ten-year-olds know everything there is to know about the world, after all.

He blinks again. "Um… haha, I'm sure a hug would be nice too, but I probably ought to get him something else too, don't you think?"

He thinks his cheeks might be a little pink.

"How about a kiss?" she suggests, and watches the mixer take the flour up into the batter. "Kisses are better than hugs, ne? Chi likes kisses lots."

He turns a little bit redder and clears his throat. "Can you get the baking powder, Deko?" he asks.

"Sure!" she responds, and does just that.

She comes back and he hopes that's the end of that conversation.

"You should kiss him with your tongue!" she happily declares instead, and hands him the baking powder.

He nearly drops it. "E-excuse me?"

She tilts her head to the side. "Mama says if you did that everyone would be happy! So it would be a present for Chi and for everyone else! That would be nice."

Ono stares at her, and wonders what the poor girl's mother is thinking, speaking about those types of things to a ten-year-old. "She says what?"

"She says that if you did that everyone would be happy because they're tired of seeing you run around each other." She pauses and looks thoughtful at that. "But I dunno—I've never seen you two do that! I think it would be funny."

Ono pales. "Ahaha…yeah."

She stares at him.

He stares back.

She tilts her head to the other side. "How much baking powder?"

"Two tablespoons," he answers automatically, and feels oddly numb.

She pads off to get the measuring spoons.

Ono stares at the box of baking powder in his hands until she gets back.

At Chikage's birthday celebration the cake is unsurprisingly, the highlight of the whole night.

"It's delicious, Dei," Chikage tells the little girl, and genuinely means it.

"O-chan helped me make it!" she declares happily, and Chikage turns to Ono then. He looks really, really happy.

Tachibana rolls his eyes and Eiji looks to be in relative agreement.

Ono wonders if that statement about everyone being happier was truer than he gave it credit for. Deko's mother is rather sharp. She's an author after all.

Tachibana's present to Chikage is a word of the day calendar and one of those key chains you put on your keys so that if you lose them you can beep them until you find them. Chikage loses his keys a lot.

Eiji gets him a more stylish pair of sunglasses. "You look like the secret service sometimes," he explains, and thinks the pair he got with the rectangular lenses and the tortoiseshell frames look cool in an older-person type of way.

Deko gives Chikage a card from her mom and says that "Momma's too busy with the next book deadline to come today, but she says hi!"

Ono takes a deep breath when it's his turn and hopes that even though he hadn't made a cake or anything (the competition was too steep), that his present will still be acceptable.

He leans down and touches his lips to Chikage's quickly and clumsily. "Happy birthday."

"Thank you," Tachibana sighs under his breath, like it had been a present for everyone after all.

Eiji looks very mildly relieved too.

Chikage blushes and starts crying.

Ono feels mortified at the reaction right up until the moment Chikage crushes him into a hug and continues to sob into the patissier's stomach with the birthday cake on the table in front of them.

"Chi's really happy!" Deko announces, and asks Tachibana for seconds on ice cream, please.

Ono pats Chikage's hair and can't help but feel relieved that he hadn't gone ahead and made a cake after all.

END