Isobel Hughes ➤ Rapunzel (sanslumieres) wrote in musingslogs, @ 2011-04-27 17:40:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | elizabeth bennet, rapunzel |
Who: Eli & Isobel
What: Moving day!
Where: Fifth floor Bathos
When: This past weekend
Warnings: None
“Eli!” Isobel was standing in the stairwell of the fifth floor, leaning back against the wall, huffing and puffing for all that she was worth. Her mattress was wedged in the stairwell, having made it this far with it, but the last bit of maneuvering was proving to be too much for the blond. She gave a kick to the mattress, scowling at it before sliding down the wall, trying to catch her breath. Moving, while fun in concept, sucked in execution, especially when she hadn’t been able to find anyone to help her move on such short notice. The little things weren’t hard, but things like a mattress and box springs? Much more difficult. Isobel was starting to think that a queen mattress was a bit much for just herself, but man, she loved the big bed.
“Eli!” she called out again, a whine in her voice. “I need help!”
Eli was quickly rethinking his decision to vacate the couch in pursuit of his own space. He was, when Isobel’s voice came screaming from the hall, on the phone with a proper moving company that would come and properly move things in a way that would not result in the demise of his spine and hip. Having procured an agreement from the moving company to come right bloody now, if you would he left his old bedroom, giving the wall between his and Preston’s a fond tap, and then stepping out into the hall. “Iso,” he said, already taking the stairs. “There are people en route to move the large items.” He scowled at the progress the mattress had made. “There is a mattress in the stairwell,” he said, as if that required clarifying.
Isobel looked up from where she sat on the floor of the stairwell, giving her cousin a ‘no, really?’ look before pushing herself up from the floor, dusting her rear off. “Yes, there is a mattress in the stairwell. I’ve been dragging it up from the second floor and now I feel like I’m about to die.” She gave it another kick. “You could have told me people were coming earlier. Before I wrangled this up three floors.” Arms folded over her chest, giving Eli an appraising look.
“I made the decision when I tried to move my own dresser, just now,” Eli admitted, glancing at the offensive mattress. “Could this have been any larger?” he asked, as if Isobel could not possibly need so much sleeping surface as it offered. “Kicking it will hardly make it easier to lift, and we can hardly leave it here, in the stairwell,” he said, infuriatingly rational.
Isobel gave him a scowl, huffing just a little bit. “I like big beds. Easier to roll around on. I slept on a twin until I left Estella’s, so you can bite me.” She went so far as to sticking her tongue out at him before unfolding her arm sand grabbing hold of the mattress. “Move, you,” she requested before giving a tug to the mattress, backpedalling quickly to try and go with the momentum she had created. It was perhaps a little too much momentum when she lost her grip and fell flat on her rear, staring up at the mattress in a mixture of shock and anger at the offending piece of furniture.
Eli started laughing, a deep belly laugh. He would have continued laughing, had the mattress not proceeded to slide down the steps to the landing and lodge itself firmly between the wall and the stairs. “Lovely, now one must scale your mattress to reach the third floor and upper units,” he said from the opposite side of the offending item. His hands became just visible overtop, and he peered down at her. “It listened to you, however. It did move.”
The shock faded away into something closer to a pout as Isobel hauled herself back up to her feet, huffing at him. “If you weren’t on the other side of this thing, I’d kick you for laughing at me.” A dramatic sniff and she grabbed hold again, pausing before she moved. “You go from the other side and maybe we can get it up without either of us dying. Or at least, me getting hurt.” Leaning against the mattress for a moment, Isobel waited for Eli to position himself on the other end, and then she started tugging at it, backing up awkwardly on the stairs.
“Isobel,” Eli said with utter seriousness. “This mattress is a potential health risk. It could fall on me. I am a rather thin man, in case you’ve not noticed.”
At that, Isobel stopped, peering around the mattress to the other side to give Eli a look. “You’re serious? I’m smaller than you and I’m playing mattress wrangler. Besides. If you got hurt, I’ve got the magic fingers, so what in the world are you worried about?”
Eli grinned, and it was a playful sort of smile. “I am opposed to manual labor?” he suggested, nothing serious in his expression. His cousin was entertaining to torment, he found. It reminded him of his sisters, of home, and he chuckled as he gripped the edge of the mattress and pulled until it gave.
With his help, it went much easier, and even though Isobel was sure she’d have bruises tomorrow morning to show for all the work she was doing today. “Yes, well, sometimes we all have to do things we’re opposed to.” She laughed as another tug brought the mattress up into the fifth floor hall, and with a sigh, she shoved it to rest against a wall for the moment, leaning against it in exhaustion. “I’m never moving again,” she declared, closing her eyes and sliding down to sit, legs splayed in front of her. “Guess you’re stuck with me. Forever.” Opening one eye, she looked up towards Eli, trying to hold back her smile. It was nice, being like this; she grew up around Estella and the few adults she brought over, but never anyone even close to her own age. Eli made her wonder what it would have been like to have a sibling.
He sat beside her, leaving the mattress leaning against the hallway wall. “We’re leaving it there for the movers,” he told her, his tone brooking no argument. He glanced over at her, instead, forearms on his knees and blue eyes inquisitive. “You want to do this?” he asked her. “It occurs to me that I have not asked, not really and properly.” He smiled. “I’m prone to making decisions without consulting others,” he admitted.
“Yes sir,” Isobel said with a roll of her eyes, though it was all in good-natured fun at Eli’s insistence at leaving the mattress for the movers. Her place on the floor was comfortable, and she had no inclination to do anything more at that moment. When Eli voiced some concern over her moving, she looked over towards him, eyebrows lifting. “Eli,” she started, closing her eyes and leaning to the side, her head finding a home on his shoulder. “I was going to ask you if I could move in more permanently, actually. Right before you brought up finding a bigger place.” Her smile was faint, far away. “I don’t think I can live on my own. Not right now. Not for a while. I need someone close.” She paused, just a heartbeat of silence. “I need family close. You’re all I’ve got.”
Eli draped an arm over her shoulder, and he pulled her closer. “I miss my sisters,” he admitted. “I often regret leaving home,” he confessed, staying quiet for a long string of minutes after. “I, too, like having family nearby,” he admitted, smiling over at her. “Shall we do well together, do you think, you and I? I must admit, our neighbor - Preston - we tend to yell through the walls at one another, or we did once. Perhaps that has passed, but we were quite loud at times. And we were prone to smoking on the fire escapes and climbing in one another’s windows, not that he would do that if I did not live alone. Though I might, still-” He paused. “I’m babbling.”
Isobel hummed softly as he pulled her closer, shoulders hunched in slightly as she listened to Eli. “I think we’ll do just fine. And yell as much as you like. And he can come over. He shouldn’t stop on account of me.” She shifted, tilting her head back to look up towards him. “I like the commotion. The sounds of other people. It’s so different from home. It’s good.” Tucking back down, she released a breath, gazing across the hall to the other wall, a distant smile on her face.
“Tell me about your sisters? My... they’d be my cousins too, wouldn’t they?” Stories of family were entrancing to her, given how little she knew. “I want a big family some day. Tons of people that I love. Surrounded by them.” Isobel let out a sigh at that, just imagining. “Maybe I should get to making babies?” There was a grin then, wondering what Eli would say to that.
“Do find yourself a non-criminal husband first, if you would?” Eli requested. “My sisters- the eldest was my best friend. She was kind, sweet and beautiful. The youngest was a terror. She ran away and disgraced us all, and I was a teenager and felt that was the worst thing that could possibly be done to me. The others fell between like different colored butterflies. One smart, one naive.” He smiled, a sad smile of remembering. “You would have liked them all, I think.”
“Oh, you mean I have to have a husband first?” she teased, then settled down to listen to him talk of his siblings, trying to imagine having so many family members around her. “Maybe. It’s nice to pretend that someday I could meet them,” she said softly. “Guess I’ll just have to stick with you, for now.” Tilting her head up, she gave him another grin.
He kissed the crown of her head, even as the sound of the movers reached them, loud and vulgar at the bottom of the stairs - the best he could do on short notice. He stood, and he held a hand out to her. “That you will,” he told her, his smile entirely genuine. “Now, come along. Let us allow someone else to do the work for us, shall we?”
Isobel looked up at the sound of the movers approaching them, taking Eli’s offered hand to pull herself up. Dusting her rear off, she gave him a nod, a smile pulling at her lips. “Sounds like a plan to me.” And then she gave him a friendly little bump as she moved past him into their new apartment, flashing him a grin before disappearing into the room.