They sat down on the bed, sweaty and with ruddy cheeks after carrying the heavy cardboard boxes up the three flights of stairs to their tiny apartment.
"Holy shit, now I need a beer." Chloe rubbed her upper lip.
"Let's share one" said Max, walking the short way from the sleeping alcove in the room to the tiny kitchen space and fetching a bottle from the refrigerator. "But, Chloe, we need to save a couple for tonight. I think someone has been looting our cache, it's beginning to look a bit thin on the beer front."
"Ah, don't worry Maximus, they will bring their own stuff. And, as the adult around here, I CAN go buy some more if needed." Chloe had turned 21 this spring, something she loved to rub in Max's face at every opportunity. "Gimme that please."
They drank from the cold bottle in turns until it was empty. It felt much better.
"Alright, where do we start?"
—
That morning they had taken Chloe's old truck to IKEA in Portland and brought home their first real piece of furniture together, a three seat FRIHETEN sofa in a ocean green-blue cover. They had looked at numerous models, colors and styles of couches and had both feared they eventually would go back home with nothing at all, when they had stumbled upon FRIHETEN. The couch looked both nice and comfy and it was big enough to have someone sleep in it if needed, which had been one of their criteria.
"If you misbehave," Max had said, squinting an eye at Chloe who answered with indignation, "misbehave? Me?! I would never!" She had wrestled down Max on the showroom sofa and tickled her until she squealed, only stopping when several other customers begun to give them disapproving looks.
"What? Every couch needs to survive a tickling test!" Chloe had told them like it was the most natural thing. "This one will do." And so it was decided; the FRIHETEN it was.
And of course they had also bought some towels, a small carpet, six wine glasses, some serving bowls of various colors and sizes, a big wooden cutting board, three potted plants, a small nifty bedside table, and two foldable outdoor chairs from the sales corner, for the balcony. None of it anything they had actually planned to buy. Now they probably had to live on oatmeal for a long time, but they were both in agreement that it was totally worth it. But the FRIHETEN still had to be assembled. Right now it was strewn all over the apartment like a dismembered sea monster in a sea of ripped cardboard and plastic, staring back at them where they sat together on the bed.
"Let's begin with letting in some air." Max went and opened the balcony door to let in a fresh salty summer breeze from the sea. The sun, now on its way down over the western horizon, shone bright through the newly cleaned windows. The new potted plants had found their place on the windowsill beside Lisa. Max hoped she was happy with the company.
It was a small one-room apartment on the third floor, with a sleeping alcove, a tiny kitchen space, and a small balcony overlooking the town and the ocean behind it. The balcony and it's view was what had convinced them to rent it in the first place. The rent wasn't dirt cheap, but still not much more than Max had paid for her room at Blackwell. They had moved in just when Max's summer leave from Blackwell had started, and they had lived here for just a couple of weeks. Most of that time they had spent painting walls and fixing things up. Now everything looked all right, kind of neat even. And though it sure wasn't perfect it was their first home together, and they loved every inch of it.
Tonight it was time for the late at last housewarming party, and the plan was to get the sofa knocked together in the short time that remained. They had invited a bunch so they needed all the sitting space they could muster. It would be really crowded here even with the bed and the sofa and four chairs. Peeking at the kitchen clock, it was still some hours to go before the first guests would arrive. They counted to at least fifteen persons, including the usual Blackwell posse and some punky friends of Chloe that Max didn't now that well.
Some notable absentees were Frank who had declined respectfully, not feeling he would fit in, but promised to come by another time, and Rachel, who had moved to LA last year. Right now she was acting in some play called 'Fool for Love', in a small theatre called Laterna. The play was minimalistic relation drama with an all female cast, where Rachel had a minor role as Martha, a girlfriend to one of the main characters. It had received pretty good reviews and Max and Chloe would love to go down and see her. They planned to, later in the summer, but now they had other things on their mind.
"I just need to rest my tired bones a bit." Chloe slumped back on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. She reached for the stereo-remote on the bedside table and Leviathan by Mastodon started booming from the speakers. Chloe sighed and begun tapping out the rhythm with her hands against the bedsheet. "Yesss. Come here Megamax, let's lie down a minute first."
"Sure." Max lay down and snuggled up beside Chloe and sighed happily. "Mmm, s'nice… I could lie here all day." She put her nose in Chloe's neck. She smelled of sun, summer and road dust.
"Yeah, maybe we should call the party off." Chloe turned to Max and hooked an arm and a leg around her, kissing her tenderly on the nose. "You know, Max, I have a feeling this summer's gonna be the most awesomest summer in my whole life."
Max smiled back. Last summer had been an awesome summer, especially their road trip down the Oregon coast. But maybe this summer, living together at last, could be even more awesome.
They lay close together, listening to the music while feeling the gentle caress from the soft breeze coming through the open balcony door.
At last Max said, "ok girlfriend, time to get up and get on with it." She tried to rise but Chloe promptly pulled her back down on the bed.
"Let's cuddle a bit more first, can't weeeee?" Chloe ogled at her with big blue bedroom-eyes.
"Whoa, Chloe," Max laughed, "I'd love to, you know that, but do we really have the time?"
"Just a shortie?"
"A shortie? Aw, you know me honey, if you get me in the mood I can't stop until we are really finished, and there are no shortcuts."
"Hehe, I love that about you, you little vixen. Always doing things thoroughly. You don't look like it Max, but you are a damn machine when you get going."
"Har har, very funny." Max cheeks started to burn.
"I was going to say you are a fucking machine, but…"
"Oh gawd…" Max tried hiding her face in the pillow, but Chloe whisked it away and grabbed her cheeks between her hands and gave Max a mauling kiss.
They really shouldn't. But Chloe was completely irresistible. Max thought back on the year and a half since they had became a couple, but it was more like a year since they first had sex. Max hadn't really known what to expect. Well, she had known the technicalities of course, but in reality everything was so different from what she had imagined. Or rather, she herself had been so much different than she had imagined. In the beginning Max had been her usual shy and unsure self, but Chloe, being the somewhat more experienced, had encouraged her, taking it slow, and in time she had unlocked a Max that was neither timid nor shy, and in secret Max loved that side of herself. With Chloe she could let everything else just go, and everything just got better with time, making her more and more confident and daring. For Max, sex with Chloe was one of life's big pleasant surprises.
They ended the kiss to take a breath and Max looked back at the beautiful blue-haired girl, her old childhood friend, her lover, her partner in time. She still couldn't believe how lucky she was to have her.
My Chloe.
Max couldn't help getting sucked into those eyes and mouth like a star into a black hole. Flaming, piece by piece and with no means of resisting and no hope of escape.
Oh, what the hell.
—
A while later they were even more red faced and sweaty, lying intertwined on the bed's rumpled sheets, their clothes spread all over the place.
"Not bad Max, not bad at all."
Max smiled. "Now we are in a bit of a hurry, you take the sofa and I take the rest?"
"Why do I have the feeling I'm getting handed the crappy end of the stick here… but, deal."
"You are the grease monkey, Chloe, you are an expert screwing things, I can attest to that."
Chloe groaned, "really Max? Now who's the funny one."
But it was true. Chloe worked as a mechanic now, and has been since a couple of months. She got a job at the AB Mechanics and Truck Stop down the main road after a recommendation from David. Though she had pretty fast gone from smaller tasks to taking responsibility for much of the electronic and diagnostic part of the work. Cars and especially trucks were much more computerised than she had thought, but Chloe was a fast learner and computers came naturally to her, and so for a couple of weeks the apartment had been filed with instruction manuals for various sensors and diagnostics instruments. She liked the work well enough and enjoyed the constant friendly bickering with her colleagues, almost all of who where guys double her age or more, and of course it gave her a much needed income. She wasn't sure how much it would help getting this couch together though.
They dressed quickly and Max started cleaning up and carrying down the parts from the packaging to the trash-bins down the stairs while Chloe begun to organise the pieces and tools for putting together the couch.
"So, where's that damn instruction booklet?"
Max looked around. "Oh, I have no idea, maybe it got thrown out with the trash? Sorry."
"Hmm, well, how complicated can it be?" Chloe sat on the floor looking at the various tools, nuts, bolts and screws that were lined up neatly in front go her.
"You are the genius, you'll figure it out." Max said. "I'll go buy some more snacks and stuff, b'back soon."
"Sure, T minus 60 minutes to party time. Don't forget you have to shower and change too. Splish splash."
"Wait, You are reminding ME to shower? That's a first." Max smiled and kissed Chloe on the nape of her neck, "but sure, I'll be back in time."
—
When Max returned, her arms full of bags, packages and other things, Chloe was almost done with the sofa, and it looked great.
"Piece of cake," she answered to Max's inquiring look. "I hope… no idea where these things would go though." She revealed a fistful of screws.
Anyhow, they didn't have time to ponder that right now, instead they showered quickly, dressed and started putting things in order for their soon to arrive guests. At last they were done, looking around at their party-pimped apartment.
"Nice," Chloe looked satisfied, her hands on her hips. "Et venit ad eos."
"Uh, what? Latin?"
"Yeah, Flavius, old military dude." Chloe shrugged. "'Now let them come' or something like that. Ever heard of the battle of Maurica?"
"Eh, no…"
"Read about it, it's pretty gross. Old time warfare is like, weird. Can you imagine to…"
Max was saved by the bell, literally.
"They're here!" She exclaimed. They both sprang for the door. "Who do you think our first guests are? Kate? Warren and Brooke?"