Two drabbles for the price of one!

[ficsbydeenas]

madam_minnie and tqpannie are evil bitches and gave me prompts.

Title: Bubble, Bubble, Toil and Trouble
Prompter: tqpannie
Words: 394


"Pour the peanut oil into the cooker and slowly submerge the turkey into the oil. Cook in the oil for one hour."

Harry looked at the large jug of peanut oil and nodded.

"I can do this."

"What's that, Harry?" came Ginny's voice from just outside the kitchen.

Harry looked up and shook his head. She had mentioned three days ago that he would be unable to manage putting together a dinner for them, Ron and Hermione. Harry, being the proud and stubborn man that he was, took it as a challenge and vowed to make dinner the next time the four of them got together. As it turned out, the next get-together was sooner than he'd hoped.

Harry saw a commercial on the telly for a turkey deep fryer and promptly went out and bought one without telling Ginny about it. He'd got home with the fryer, a large turkey breast and a gallon jug of peanut oil. He had it all planned out. While the turkey was cooking, he'd make mashed potatoes and asparagus. He could do this, he'd told himself several times and prepared the turkey cooker.

"Nothing, dear!" he answered in an overly sweet manner, receiving a snort laugh from her before turning his attention back to the task at hand.

Harry lifted the turkey and placed it into the submersible basket. With a sigh, he slowly lowered the turkey into the bubbling oil. Several things then happened at once.

The oil bubbled significantly higher than he'd expected it to.

Steam rose up in huge clouds.

A high, wheezing sound came from the hot oil.

Harry barely had enough time to back away before the turkey carcass flew up out of the oil and exploded all over his kitchen, sending turkey bits hither and yon. The sound of the explosion reverberated throughout the small room and he shielded himself with his arms as boiling oil fell from the air, landing on the worktops, cupboards, table, chairs, every other flat surface in the kitchen as well as onto Harry himself. He howled in pain and fell onto the floor.

Once the shower of oil stopped, he looked around; every surface was covered in oil and pieces of turkey; Ginny stood in the doorway, looking both amused, angry and worried all at the same time.

"You didn't thaw it out, did you?"

Title: Always Stay Free
Prompter: madam_minnie
Words: 481


Bloody, fucking hell, that was the worst experience of my life. I hope I never, ever have to do it again.

What, you ask, could drive me to sit in the back garden with two bottles of Firewhisky?

Well, let me tell you.

Ginny and our son James just arrived home from St Mungo's the other day and things were going well, for having a newborn in the house, that is. Molly had agreed to stay for about a week to help us get settled and once I go back to work in a couple weeks, she'll stop by a couple times a day to help Ginny out.

That wasn't the bad part.

The bad part was Ginny's request.

During her pregnancy, I was sent out on numerous errands to fetch odd food requests for my lovely, if not temporarily insane, wife and did it with happy aplomb. She was bearing my first child and I was all too willing to do anything to make her happy.

This time, however, it was much, much different.

"Harry?"

"What is it, love?"

"Could you go to the store for me?"

"What do you need?"

"Just some stuff."

"Why can't your mum do it?"

"She's asleep."

"Fine, what do you need."

"Some…pads."

"Pads?"

"Yes. Because I'm bleeding."

"Why are you bleeding?"

"I just had a baby, remember?"

"Shouldn't that have stopped?"

"Not right away, Harry. I could bleed for three weeks."

"You're joking."

"No, I'm not."

"Is that normal?"

"Uh…yeah. Didn't you pay attention to the mediwitch?"

"Guess not."

"Figures."

"Hey!"

"So can you go?"

"But…but that's…woman stuff."

"Glad you noticed. Please?"

"Fine."

"Make sure you get the kind with wings."

"They fly?"

She threw a pillow at me once I said that and I bolted out the door and headed straight for the apothecary in Diagon Alley. That was my first mistake.

I headed toward an aisle I had seen Ginny stroll down several times, hanging my head to avoid being spotted. That was too much to hope for.

"It's Harry Potter!" came a shrill voice at the end of the aisle.

I looked up, my second mistake, and saw a throng of teenage girls run toward me squealing like pigs.

"Can you sign my chest?"

"You're so gorgeous!"

"Can I touch your hair?"

"You've got a great arse!"

"I'm dying, can you kiss me before I die?"

"Your arms! Merlin, your arms!"

The girls surrounded me and started touching me, pulling at my robes and giving me claustrophia. When one of them yanked on my sleeve and ripped it from its seam, that was enough. I whipped out my wand and Petrified all of them, sending them tumbling to the floor in stiff heaps. I Levitated twelve boxes of pads and started to walk away before turning around and getting eight more.

There's no way in hell I'm buying these things again.