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The first time Keith had ever attempted to cook alone was when he was 12. He'd been living with Shiro and Adam for a few months by then, slowly adjusting to the fact that he'd found people who weren't going to abandon him again. He'd already learned that Shiro could not be trusted to run any more than the coffee maker in the kitchen, and that Adam was more than capable of handling the cooking on his own. Keith liked to sit at the breakfast bar with his homework, half working on it, half watching Adam move around the space. It reminded him of when his father had him helping with little things while cooking and explaining what he was doing and why. It was something tiny Keith latched on to and were some of his best memories with his dad, even if he hadn’t set a practical foot in a kitchen since then.
That afternoon, Keith had gotten back from his classes at the Garrison to an empty apartment except for Adam’s cat Astro. He knew he’d be alone for a while after class that day; Adam had faculty meetings, and Shiro was still training for his mission to Ganymede. Keith dropped his backpack into one of the high seats at the breakfast bar and sighed. Realizing one of his humans was home, Astro hopped up onto the bar with a greeting chirp, headbutting Keith’s hand and purring. Absently petting the tabby, Keith looked around the empty room. He liked his afternoon snacks, but he was on his own. Remembering Adam’s three-ingredient mac and cheese recipe, Keith pulled the notebook from its spot on the shelf, the pages falling open to exactly the right spot.
He followed the recipe exactly, not even noticing when Astro left for the sunny spot on the couch. Keith scaled the counter to retrieve the pasta, and then again a few minutes later for evaporated milk. Adam’s neat handwriting stated that this was important and not to substitute, so he didn’t, even if it meant climbing onto the counter to do it. He grated whatever cheese he felt like, not caring what it was only that he had the right measurement. Checking the recipe again, he saw the note to go slow with the cheese so that it didn’t end up a gluey mess. Keith’s impulsive nature would have done just that, but his father had told him as a child that cooking sometimes took patience and not to rush it.
“Y’gotta be careful here. Don’t want it t’cook too fast and burn,” Keith remembered his father telling him in his soft Texas accent. His mac and cheese wasn’t going to burn unless something went very wrong, but it was the same principle, and thinking of his father made it feel like a part of him was still there. It was comforting and it made him feel safer than he had in a long time.
When it was finally done, perfectly creamy and cheesy, Keith dumped all of it into a large bowl that was most likely a serving dish, not that he knew the difference or even cared, and he was fully intending on finishing the entire third-pound of pasta himself, thanks. He even took the time to clean up after himself before settling at the breakfast bar, pasta on one side and his Flight Theory homework on the other. It was where Adam found him an hour later, bowl empty and Flight Theory replaced with Intro Physics. “I’m guessing you won’t be interested in dinner then,” he said, coming into the kitchen.
“Never said that,” Keith answered, not looking up from his homework.
Adam chuckled and took the bowl to the sink. “Alright then,” he started, then looked around, realizing what had happened, that Keith had felt comfortable enough there to do something as simple as cooking for himself without double or triple checking that it was ok like he’d done with so many other things. Adam looked back at that boy, a soft smile of pride spreading. “I could use a hand in here if you want to help out.”
Keith looked up then, dropping his pencil in the crease of the open textbook. “Really? Um, sure,” he said, lighting up for the first time since Adam and Shiro had decided to officially foster him.
“Absolutely, if we’re going to have dinner ready by the time Takashi gets home.”
Keith smiled to himself at the memory of that afternoon more than ten years earlier. He’d found a quiet love of cooking that day, and still found himself calling Adam far more than Hunk when he came across things he hadn’t encountered before. He didn’t have Hunk’s golden touch in the kitchen, but he could follow most recipes and had even been known to improvise occasionally. This one wasn’t an improvisation. This was his no-one-knows-I’m-cheating stir fry. Originally, he’d come up with it one night when he was too tired to make it from the ground up. Prepared vegetables and shredded rotisserie chicken, with the sauces being the only thing he would always make from scratch. Well, almost no one knew. He was reminded of this from sunlight glinting off the gold on his left hand and the warm arms wrapped around him from behind. Keith’s cooking skills were part of what led to him bonding with Lance’s mother. She would drag him into the kitchen whenever they were there and he now knew how to make all of his husband’s favorites that were almost as good as hers.
“Hunk’s almost done setting up in the backyard,” Lance mumbled into Keith’s shoulder.
“And I am just about done here,” he answered.
Separate from the annual celebration of the end of the war that all the now-retired Paladins were expected to make an appearance at, all seven of them, plus a few extra, gathered once a year just for themselves. Lance and Keith always hosted; they had more than enough space at their beach house close to where Lance had grown up in Cuba. Although they were about to have a little less space, and were using this year’s party to announce that they were adopting a pair of non-human siblings orphaned by the war.
They both turned when the front door opened, heralding Shiro and Adam’s arrival. This also meant the arrival of Adam’s grandmother Claudine Willet’s Tarte Tatin whose recipe Adam had promised Hunk would only get on his death bed and not a minute sooner. As it was, Shiro was kicked out, sent off to help Hunk before he could get into trouble in the kitchen. Adam stayed, talking with Keith and Lance before the rest of the crew descended for the weekend.
As he finished, Keith mentioned that one afternoon so many years earlier and how, ultimately, a 12-year-old’s quest for snacks had sparked a love of cooking. Successfully making a fairly fool-proof mac and cheese hadn’t really surprised him. What had surprised Keith in retrospect was how much he realized he liked the process. It was something he’d bonded with Adam over, bonded with Lance’s mother over, and something that kept a piece of his father alive. It was something people the universe over did every day, and something most considered a mundane chore. Keith never did, not after one afternoon when he was 12. And in the very near future, he’d have a new generation to pass that love on to. It was something he was very much looking forward to.