Shadow hated valentines day

 11/28/2022

Shadow hated valentines day. He didn’t understand why everyone had to be lovey dovey on this day. To make it worse, he couldn’t hide in his apartment since Rouge wanted the place for herself and the guardian. 

Shadow considered hiding in Rose’s guest room only to remember that she too would be spending the day even more love obsessed. Shadow turned on his heel as he changed his destination. He knocked on the door of the small house.

A pale older blue hedgehog opened the door. He arched a brow at the young man on his porch. “Hello Shadow. What brings you by?”

“Rouge wants the whole apartment to herself.” Shadow stately bluntly.

Chuck smiled as he nodded as he stepped aside. “Well come in.” He waved his hand. “I was just about to start cooking. So I hope you’re hungry.” 

Shadow nodded as he looked around the small home. He found it odd that chuck only had two big rooms in this place. His kitchen and his lab in the basement. 

“Make yourself comfortable.” Chuck walked into his kitchen. He thumbed through a large old book. He head several different ones on the table. 

“You have a lot of cook books.” Shadow noted as he entered the kitchen. 

Chuck chuckled. “Amazingly I still have them after everything.” He tapped his hand on at book that looked like it would fall apart any minute. “My mom hand wrote all of these.” He moved his hand to another, “My dad wrote this one.”

“So all of these are hand written?” Shadow found himself interested in the hand written recipe books.

“Not all, but most.” Chuck looked melancholy. “It kind of became a tradition for people to gift me cook books at some point.” He pointed at several of the books. “Antoine’s folks gave me that one. It’s in French so I always mess up somewhere. I got that one from a Prower family member.” He shrugged. “The list goes on and on. You’ll find it boring, but feel free to skim through. I can cook most of it.”

Shadow nodded as he eyed the leather bound book with flowers embossed on it. Chuck was thumbing through the pages with great care. “Where did you get that one?”

Chuck glanced up at Shadow. The ultimate life form wasn’t normally this into other people’s lives. He tapped his finger as he contemplated how to answer the question. Tehre were a couple of reactions that could happen. How to answer the question. There were a couple of reactions that could happen. He actually wondered if he would get an amusing one from the stoic hedgehog. “A woman I briefly dated gave it to me.”

Shadow nodded as he took in the anser. Chuck had obviously took great care of the book. It told Shadow that Chuck probably still harbored feeling for the woman. Chuck was a good man and there had been a war during his time. The break up could have been for many reasons. Shadow felt it rude to pry any further into the lady’s identiy. 

Chuck rested his chin in the palm of his hand as he stared at Shadow. “You know most kids your age go, ‘eew. Love gross. Yuck.” He stated in a mocking tone. 

“What am I? Four?” Shadow retorted. 

Chuck chuckled at the angry response. “No.” he straightened his back as he flipped through the pages. “You’re a boy who doesn’t like anything to do with love.”

“I just don’t want it shoved on me or be the only topic.” Shadow explained.

Chuck nodded at his explanation.

“Besides, you’re up there in age. Presuming you haven’t had any sexual encounters would be illogical.” Shadow stated matter of factly.

Chuck paused as he stared at the ruby eyes. “In the future please refer to sexual encounters as Romantic relationships. It makes me uncomfortahble when people younger than me talk about my non-existant sex life.”

“I’m over 50 years old.” Shadow pointed out.

“No. You slept for 50 years. Sleep doesn’t count. How long were you alive on the Ark before you were put in stasis.”

Shadow thought for a moment. “About 7ish years I think. It took professor and the other scientists a while to figure out how to age me up.”

Chuck nodded. “I bet the human doctors had their hands full with a tinier more emotional you. Especially if they didn’t have much experience with hedgehog quills.”

“I had a mobian doctor at one point. She was there for a bit. Maria asked her tons of questions.” Shadow stated. 

Chuck smiled. “That’s good. Questions are a great way to learn.” he paused on a page. “Have you ever had curry?”

Shadow shook his head.

Chuck smiled, “Well let’s introduct you to new food.” 

Shadow found himself helping chuck cook. Chuck telling him how each ingredient helped the dish. Shadow understood the basics of cooking, but he had never done so before. Chuck was patient as he instructed the young hedgehog.

The curry wasn’t the best to Chuck, but he wasn’t adding it to a restaurant menu. The flavors were good and that’s all Chuck cared about.