RP: Even Cinderella got to go to the ball... Who: Alex Weasley, George Weasley Where: WWW When: 16 July, 2024 | Late afternoon Rating/Warnings: possible waste of pickled Flobberworms. Summary: Finishing off the big project and reporting in, with bonus removal of grounding. Status: Complete
Alex stretched, standing at the top of the ladder, reaching into the corner of the topmost shelf. His rag was grubby, and the water dirtier still, but the shelves were clean. Finally. How long had he been doing this? Felt like forever... He made his way carefully down, picking up other dirty rags off shelves as he descended, finally taking the bucket and dumping the gray water into the sink. He glanced up at his work as he rinsed out the rags, hanging them over the edge of the sink to dry and putting the bucket away.
The room looked good, he thought, satisfied at the job he'd done. He knew his father had meant him to learn something from it, from the boring repetitive work. Alex wondered if he had. Well, to mind his watch, he supposed. But what else was there to learn? You're the grownup, so you can do what you want. There was something he'd learnt.
He headed for the stack of boxes he'd tossed down from the shelves, pulling the first one open and sneezing almost immediately. Damn. Why on earth would his father order seventeen boxes of black pepper? Most of the cartons were damp; they were obviously unusable, and Alex tossed them into the bin with another sneeze. A box of butterfly wings. More? These were crushed, though, so maybe they were different. The jars were intact, so he lined them up neatly on a shelf, tossing the carton. Billywig stings, shelved. Broken measuring phials, tossed. A crate of dried lemon peel, set aside to ask Dad about. Alex unpacked and sorted and tossed, dragging the bin out to the back alley and dumping it, then dragging it back for more.
He eyed the dwindling stack of boxes with relief. He might even finish today, if he kept at it, and then maybe Dad would... Yeah, right. Like Dad would let him help with anything real... He headed for the sink for a drink of water, then headed back for the next crate. Oh great. Pickled flobberworms. Like they weren't nasty enough like they were? He had no idea what they were for, and set them aside in the questionable pile.
And finally, an hour or so later, he was done. Everything was neatly shelved, taking up less than a quarter of the original space, the empty shelves clean and waiting. Alex cleaned his dusty hands and pulled off the ragged WWW robes he'd worn to protect his clothes, then headed through to find his father.
He leaned in the doorway of the office, watching his father bent over a sheet of figures, waiting for his quill to pause. "Dad? I'm done in the storeroom. There's a couple things that I wasn't sure what to do with, but everything else is clean, and back on the shelf."