26 Cooking with the Doll

"Freiheit!" Eternity grabbed the hem of Freiheit's shirt, looking at him with sparkling green eyes. "Now that we have more than enough ingredients, will you teach me how to cook?"

"Of course, my dear Eternity!" Freiheit replied enthusiastically. "I'm still confused that you're asking me, out of all people, to teach you how to cook."

He laughed wearily before pounding his chest with his fist like a gorilla.

"But no worries, you're in good hands because I'm rather skilled at cooking different cuisines because of my travels around the world!"

"Oh, so you're a traveling artist?" Eternity quirked her head to the side. "Evan mentioned that you pursued a career in the arts, but I wasn't sure you were a nomad."

"I am." Freiheit nodded in confirmation, though he looked a bit surprised. "How did you come to the conclusion that I'm a traveling artist?"

"I just assumed that you were since no regular person randomly arrives at Manika unless they're expert travelers," she explained.

"You give me too much praise, Eternity." Freiheit bowed down like an actor at the end of a play. "But as mentioned, I arrived at Manika due to pure carelessness and..."

Freiheit droned on and on.

He was the type who enjoyed talking about himself and was quite a chatterbox ever since they were young. Some said it was unfitting for a man to be as talkative as he was, but Evan thought that Freiheit's skill as a conversationalist was something every person should aspire for.

However, his tendency to never stop talking gets on his nerves occasionally.

That 'from time to time' included his chatter spree right now.

"Eternity, Eternity." Evan had to repeat her name twice, the second time louder, to make Freiheit shut up and get their attention. "Are you sure about that?"

"About what?" she asked, completely clueless.

"Cooking," he said. "I understand that you know the theory behind it, but—"

"You're worried that my application itself would not be able to translate well," she said, already knowing his next set of words. "I know, Evan. Please have a little faith in me. If you're worried about supervision, I have Freiheit with me."

She gestured in Freiheit's direction. Freiheit waved his hands like he was a surprise or something.

"I'm worried because you have Freiheit as your supervisor!" Evan covered his face with his palm, shaking his head in disapproval.

"Ye of little faith!" Freiheit placed his hand on his chest, looking slightly offended. Though Evan knew that he was incapable of such feelings,.

"A person like you shouldn't be quoting the Bible," Evan pointed out. "A sinner preaching—how ludicrous."

"But we are all sinners, brother." Freiheit closed his eyes, putting his hands together as if he were planning to pray. "Because of the Original Sin—"

"Gah!" Evan exclaimed, waving his hand in disgust. "Stop that, you blasphemous fiend!"

Eternity couldn't help but chuckle at her lover and his brother's childish interaction. The ironic thing was that she was pretty sure that both of them were agnostics and didn't care about the sanctity of the Holy Words.

"Anyway," Freiheit said, changing the topic as he offered his hand to Eternity. "Shall we cook, Eternity?"

Eternity took his hand, smiling brightly. "Let's!"

Evan glared at their hands but didn't say anything. Instead, he merely joined them as they went to the kitchen dining room to unpack the groceries from the plastic bag.

Even though Freiheit was the self-proclaimed supervisor in their "cooking show," Evan was nagging them the whole time as if he were the main chef.

It was nice seeing Evan like this. Eternity didn't know the right words at that moment, but she later found that the proper comparison was that Evan was acting like a straight man to Freiheit's funny man in a comedic duo.

But for now, Eternity could only say that Evan was acting unguarded and happy (whether he admitted it or not) around Freiheit. She was grateful to see Evan's hidden side, which he only revealed around his family. She would be eternally grateful to Freiheit for this.

What she didn't know was that Freiheit would be the planter of the seed of distrust in Evan's mind later on.

But she didn't know that now, did she?'

All she knew was that right now, they were happy.

That's all that matters.

***

It had been a long time since Evan cooked with Freiheit, and obviously, this was the first time they had cooked with Eternity in the mix. Evan couldn't believe he'd say this, but he had fun doing the activity with them.

He always found cooking tedious, while cooking with Freiheit was just plain annoying because his brother tended to flex his excellent skills. But cooking with Eternity was… everything he'd ever wanted. He guessed that this was what the Internet was blabbering about when they made doing house chores something special.

"Maybe it is special when you're doing it with someone you care for…"

Freiheit looked at him with a confused expression on his face.

Evan gasped, slapping his hand on his mouth. He accidentally said his thoughts out loud! How humiliating.

"It is," Freiheit agreed teasingly. "I haven't enjoyed cooking in such a long time. Usually, I do it to satisfy my hunger merely. But now…"

Both men looked at Eternity, who was busy working on tasting the food. She blew at the soup before taking a sip from the spoon.

"This is lovely," she muttered.

"So you have a sense of taste even if you don't eat," Evan noted, walking toward her to stand by her side. "How odd."

"So she'll be able to taste the different flavors of cum," Freiheit said, following Evan to stand at Eternity's right side.

Before Evan could scold Freiheit for his vulgarity, Eternity swatted him on the arm with an adorable pout.

"Please stop repeating that." However, her tone implied that it was more of a demand than a request.

Freiheit raised his hands in defeat. "Yes, yes. I don't want to offend the miss."

Eternity positioned her free hand on her waist, posing in her greatest attempt to look imposing.

"Good!"