Normal [Serenity]

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Mathew scratched his chin thoughfully and retreated back to the fridge and rummaged around a few moments.
"Maybe you were right... your mother clearly has little confidence in your cooking ability." He poked his head over the top of the fridge and showed her a pound of raw cookie dough freshly bought and unopened. "I should have known... well she is your mother after all. Serenity, could you............"
Mathew screwed up his face in apology before he even said it. "put that bowl back while I put these ingredients back?"

Serenity burst out laughing and she glanced at the cookie dough and changed the dial on the oven by thirty degrees. "Wow I'm giving her ten points for this one." she chuckled and put the bowl back in the front of the cupboard. She would want it in a few days anyway so there was no point in digging for it again.

"Oh do you want to pull out the brownies she prepared as well?" she asked as she got up and tied her hair back. Rule number one of the kitchen, keep your hair out of your food.[/size]

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Mathew worked quickly, having finished putting everything away and putting on an oven mitt by the time she fished speaking. The brownies certainly didn't smell like brownies and Mathew screwed up his face in horror when he lay eyes on them. He couldn't help but think: whats with the green chunks.....is that.... brocolli?
Mathew set them on the other side of Serenity, and was happy and bright as he was before he found out just how bad her family actually was at cooking.
"Do you guys have christmas cookie cutters? If not, I can make some easily enough." He began sprinkling flour onto the surface of a cutting board with the impression he knew what he was doing.

Serenity rolled her eyes and tried not to laugh, did they have cookie cutters. Seriously, "Mathew you have seen my family's cooking skills, you think we actually have cookie cutters for different holidays?" she asked pointing at the brownies that really didn't look appetizing, "The short answer's no." she said taking a bit of the brownies and liked her finger.

"Their not that bad actually. She out did herself." she said with a shrug. She and her mother did have the ability to tell if something would turn out well or not so that always worked if they were really desperate. But usually they weren't desperate. The truth was not only were they really bad cooks but they weren't big fans of it either.[/size]

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Mathew almost went in for a taste himself but thought better of it. Just because she outdid herself didn't mean that they were good, just better than usual. As for Serenity, he could tell she was no fan of cooking so had decided he would let her do all the fun stuff like rolling out the dough and cutting out the shapes. Dissapointingly the small package of dough did not contain much and he figured they would only get about 20 cookies out of it.
"Have you ever operated something this big before, little lady?" he asked jokingly as if he were about to give her helicopter lessons instead of handing her the rolling pin he was holding.

Serenity smiled and took the rolling pin with one hand and spun the center part with her other hand. "Why yes I have, It's used to hit someone over the head with right?" she joked sadly she hadn't actually used the rolling pin for cooking before. Other things like hitting a certain dove over the head yes. But Cooking no. She didn't cook.

"How hard can it be?" she asked with a chuckle and went to work. This was a lot easier than she had thought it would be. "So where did you learn to cook, first anything about oriental culture and now cookies." she said with a smile, he really was full of surprises.[/size]

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"Yeah, I guess I am sort of a grab bag aren't I? Well, when my cash flow was cut off and I first had to resort to the drug trade, I had to make do with what little provisions I had. So I learned to cook." In an attempt to not be depressing he said "you know, when I was small, my family made a tradition out of making cookies like these and decorating them before giving them to the neighbors. I haven't done this in like five years. We stopped when... my mother, she sort of changed when my dad died."
He bit his lower lip realizing that he had failed in the 'not depressing' factor. He stuck his hand in the freezer for ice but pulled out tin cookie cutters after a sound like a frizzle. The offset of the mood change didn't last long and Mathew exclaimed happily, "Alright, I made a gingerbread dude, a tree, a dove, and a star"

Serenity stopped with her rolling and glanced over at him. One parent dead and the other lost to the claws of grief. "Well you at least knew your dad." she said glancing at the cookie cutters, she'd never decorated a christmas cookie. She loved eating them but this would be a lot of fun.

"I call decorating the dove." she said with a smile. Sorina would hate her when she was done with decorating it.[/size]

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Mathew didn't see any pam or cooking spray so ran a bit of butter on the cookie sheet he pulled out from the lower cabinet. "go ahead and press the cutters into the dough; its thin enough now. I'll be over in a second"
The oven sounded to let the two know it was ready, but Mathew ignored it. Instead of circling back around Serenity to his original working place, he stood to her side, ready with a spatula to transfer the shapes.

Serenity pressed the cookie cutters into the dough making extra room around it so she could pull up the excess without destroying the cookies themselves. She smiled up at him, "You know I do know what will taste horrible and can see what to do." she joked removing the excess dough and rolling that out to cut shapes into it as there was a large bit of it. "So you bake cookies and know everything there is about oriental cultures, anything else I should know about you?" she asked with a smile as she started to cut cookies in the excess dough.[/size]