Fic : Homesick
Title: Homesick
A/N: Sequel to my ficathon fic and a pinch-hit for the Secret Santa exchange at shitennou_ai. Dear Apsara, I hope you enjoy this!
Freeing yourself was one thing, claiming ownership of that freed self was another.
Beloved, Toni Morrison
***
“Oh, by the way, Una is moving into the free bedroom upstairs.”
Joe laughs. “Good one.” They’re sitting on their small porch in the summer heat, and Joe feels a lot older than his twenty years. But since it’s a good feeling, he doesn’t mind. At twenty, feeling older is good. At forty, not so much.
“I’m not joking. Your Uncle Bob is helping her move in tomorrow.”
“No way,” Joe says, eyes wide. “No way,” he repeats again for good measure, and when Mina doesn’t say anything in response, he gets up, storms inside, and hollers “NO WAY” into the phone.
Predictably, all of his protest is to no avail, and Uncle Bob and Una carry box after box into the house the very next day.
***
Una adds her timetable to the fridge, and joins them for their meals. She sneaks into Mina’s room when the other girl is out and feeds Legolas nuts and hamster treats. Joe shouts at her at least once a day, and Mina soon learns not to mediate between the siblings. Once August rolls around, a tentative truce is agreed upon. Below the schedules on the fridge, the Spongebob magnets now hold a handwritten treaty. The first rule is: “No running to Ma.”
Una and Mina take to painting each other toenails out on the porch, and Joe tries to not roll his eyes so much. One good thing about his sister moving in is that she nags Mina to be cleaner. Una is the tidiest person in the world, which stems from a childhood of being extremely untidy. Their mother had needled her so much that at one point, Una had realised that being tidy was better than being nagged, and she now happily applies the same principle to Mina. Joe is quite chuffed that he no longer has to pluck worn women’s undies from below the couch while watching Criminal Intent.
***
Between his house of crazy women, college, and work, Joe has little to no free time. That also means that his Skype and WoW sessions with Zach are now few and far between. He kind of hates that, and he thinks that Zach does too, so when he comes home one morning, he pauses at the door, and instead sits down on the porch. The summer sunshine is already hot, glaring down on him, warming the back of his head. It feels nice. He sits there and thinks, remembers how he and Zach used to play football on the street, how they hid from the insane summer heat in the clearing in the woods. Something in Joe’s head clicks, and now he’s just waiting for Mina to come out to head to work. She does, not even fifteen minutes later.
If she’s surprised to find him sitting there, next to the blooming rhododendron and on the stairs, she doesn’t show it. “You missed breakfast.”
He nods and stares at his shoes. He’s never really moved away, but the way he feels now is what he imagines homesickness to feel like. He is homesick for his best friend. “Mina, can I borrow your car for the next couple of days?”
To her credit, she only complains a little before handing him the keys. By the time Una gets up, the house is empty, and her brother and her friend are gone. The alphabet magnets on the fridge boldly proclaim: GONE 2 ZACH. Una nods to herself and sleepily goes to make herself some iced coffee.
***
Yale is many things. It’s prestigious, expensive, and sure, the architecture is quite impressive. Above all, it is big. Joe actually has to go and get himself a map of the campus before he is able to locate Branford College, and within that, room 3b. He knocks at the door, and realises just as he is standing there with his hand hammering against the thin wood that he is more than a little smelly after the monumental journey from Colorado to Connecticut right smack in the middle of August.
He drove all day, all night, almost without pause, in a car with no air-conditioning, and now it’s seven-thirty in the morning, and that means that the chances of Zach being anywhere other than his bed are slim. Zach always says that geniuses can only be geniuses when they get enough sleep. Zach’s mother never believed that and kicked her son out of bed at six-thirty every morning save Sundays. On Sundays, Zach got to sleep an hour later. So did Joe because the first thing Zach did after being woken, taking a leak, a shower and brushing his teeth was to walk across the street and pound on his best friend’s bedroom window.
So when he knocks on Zach’s door, sweat still running down his back, it feels a bit like karmic retribution, and smelly or not, he’s grinning from ear to ear. The door opens a few minutes later, and Joe finds himself face to face with his bed-headed, sleep befuddled best friend.
“Wanna play a round of Mario Kart?”
And then slowly, Zach grins, and they do.
*** The End***
A/N: Sequel to my ficathon fic and a pinch-hit for the Secret Santa exchange at shitennou_ai. Dear Apsara, I hope you enjoy this!
Freeing yourself was one thing, claiming ownership of that freed self was another.
Beloved, Toni Morrison
***
“Oh, by the way, Una is moving into the free bedroom upstairs.”
Joe laughs. “Good one.” They’re sitting on their small porch in the summer heat, and Joe feels a lot older than his twenty years. But since it’s a good feeling, he doesn’t mind. At twenty, feeling older is good. At forty, not so much.
“I’m not joking. Your Uncle Bob is helping her move in tomorrow.”
“No way,” Joe says, eyes wide. “No way,” he repeats again for good measure, and when Mina doesn’t say anything in response, he gets up, storms inside, and hollers “NO WAY” into the phone.
Predictably, all of his protest is to no avail, and Uncle Bob and Una carry box after box into the house the very next day.
***
Una adds her timetable to the fridge, and joins them for their meals. She sneaks into Mina’s room when the other girl is out and feeds Legolas nuts and hamster treats. Joe shouts at her at least once a day, and Mina soon learns not to mediate between the siblings. Once August rolls around, a tentative truce is agreed upon. Below the schedules on the fridge, the Spongebob magnets now hold a handwritten treaty. The first rule is: “No running to Ma.”
Una and Mina take to painting each other toenails out on the porch, and Joe tries to not roll his eyes so much. One good thing about his sister moving in is that she nags Mina to be cleaner. Una is the tidiest person in the world, which stems from a childhood of being extremely untidy. Their mother had needled her so much that at one point, Una had realised that being tidy was better than being nagged, and she now happily applies the same principle to Mina. Joe is quite chuffed that he no longer has to pluck worn women’s undies from below the couch while watching Criminal Intent.
***
Between his house of crazy women, college, and work, Joe has little to no free time. That also means that his Skype and WoW sessions with Zach are now few and far between. He kind of hates that, and he thinks that Zach does too, so when he comes home one morning, he pauses at the door, and instead sits down on the porch. The summer sunshine is already hot, glaring down on him, warming the back of his head. It feels nice. He sits there and thinks, remembers how he and Zach used to play football on the street, how they hid from the insane summer heat in the clearing in the woods. Something in Joe’s head clicks, and now he’s just waiting for Mina to come out to head to work. She does, not even fifteen minutes later.
If she’s surprised to find him sitting there, next to the blooming rhododendron and on the stairs, she doesn’t show it. “You missed breakfast.”
He nods and stares at his shoes. He’s never really moved away, but the way he feels now is what he imagines homesickness to feel like. He is homesick for his best friend. “Mina, can I borrow your car for the next couple of days?”
To her credit, she only complains a little before handing him the keys. By the time Una gets up, the house is empty, and her brother and her friend are gone. The alphabet magnets on the fridge boldly proclaim: GONE 2 ZACH. Una nods to herself and sleepily goes to make herself some iced coffee.
***
Yale is many things. It’s prestigious, expensive, and sure, the architecture is quite impressive. Above all, it is big. Joe actually has to go and get himself a map of the campus before he is able to locate Branford College, and within that, room 3b. He knocks at the door, and realises just as he is standing there with his hand hammering against the thin wood that he is more than a little smelly after the monumental journey from Colorado to Connecticut right smack in the middle of August.
He drove all day, all night, almost without pause, in a car with no air-conditioning, and now it’s seven-thirty in the morning, and that means that the chances of Zach being anywhere other than his bed are slim. Zach always says that geniuses can only be geniuses when they get enough sleep. Zach’s mother never believed that and kicked her son out of bed at six-thirty every morning save Sundays. On Sundays, Zach got to sleep an hour later. So did Joe because the first thing Zach did after being woken, taking a leak, a shower and brushing his teeth was to walk across the street and pound on his best friend’s bedroom window.
So when he knocks on Zach’s door, sweat still running down his back, it feels a bit like karmic retribution, and smelly or not, he’s grinning from ear to ear. The door opens a few minutes later, and Joe finds himself face to face with his bed-headed, sleep befuddled best friend.
“Wanna play a round of Mario Kart?”
And then slowly, Zach grins, and they do.
*** The End***