The house was very small and very square and very yellow, its paint peeled by sun and salt to reveal the bleached timber underneath. A narrow veranda skirted the front of the house, propped up by dubious-looking poles. The porch sagged dangerously in the middle. Weeds had all but overtaken the yard – the parts that weren't sand or dirt, anyway. The screen door hung slightly off-kilter. The whole house was slightly off-kilter. It looked, quite frankly, like it would fall down if she so much as sneezed next to it.
And it was hers.
Furiosa slammed the door of her ute, pacing back up the length of the dirt driveway so she could assess the house from the street. The early morning sun did little to improve it aesthetically. She wondered if any other property had ever pulled off the "classic Australian weatherboard" look quite so sadly. And yet – she was smiling. Practically grinning, by her standards. Number 9 Green Place might be a fucking disaster, but it was still hers.
The sound of a familiar sputtering engine drew Furiosa's gaze away from the house and over her shoulder, where a dinged-up green Mini Minor was pulling up on the curb. (Furiosa supposed it wasn't technically a curb, given the only dividing line between her front yard and the road was a gradual movement from dirt to gravel.) As she watched, five young women piled out of the vehicle, carrying between them another car's worth of luggage. How they'd managed to fit it all into the little Mini was beyond Furiosa. She wasn't given much time to dwell on it.
As soon as her feet hit the ground Cheedo dumped her suitcase and bounded towards Furiosa. She was still dressed in her waitressing uniform, black skirt and black shirt, her ponytail swinging wildly as she skid to a halt on the driveway.
"Wow," Cheedo breathed, staring at the house. "That's our house. That's really our house." She looked up at Furiosa and grinned, eyes shining. "That's our home."
It was hard not to smile back.
With the paperwork signed and keys in hand, it was finally beginning to sink in. Three years of working their asses off to afford their own place, and suddenly here it was, squatting before them in all its dated glory. Capable had been the one to find it, trawling through local newspapers and online ads until she found a property that was within their budget (and only barely, at that). Furiosa had been initially reluctant about Number 9 Green Place. It would be a task and a half getting the house liveable in-between their various jobs, especially since none of them knew a thing about renovating. Furiosa had done a bit of plumbing on the side, sure, and the odd job here or there, but never anything like this. The sheer size of the task was daunting.
As if she could sense Furiosa's apprehension, Cheedo elbowed her lightly in the side. "It'll be fun!" she said.
Furiosa huffed a laugh and nudged her back. It would be a task and a half, yes, but she had no doubt in her mind that it would be worth it – to get Capable and Toast out of the shelter – for Cheedo to grow up somewhere safe – so Dag could tend her flowers in peace – so Angharad could escape her past once and for all – for Furiosa's sanity.
Underneath several layers of trepidation and tiredness, something warm was growing in Furiosa's chest.
The other girls soon joined them, dropping their luggage in a pitifully small heap on the driveway. Dag curled her fingers around Cheedo's. Cheedo, in turn, linked arms with Toast. Angharad bumped shoulders with Furiosa, her smile soft and proud. Capable leant into Angharad's other side.
Furiosa hadn't used the word family since her mother died, but she didn't think there was another name for what her and these girls had become. You goddamned sap, she thought to herself ruefully, but there was no bite in it, because the sun was shining and Angharad was smiling and they had a home.
"What a fucking dump," said Toast, with her usual faultless timing.
"What a fucking view," said Dag.
They all turned to follow her gaze back across the street. It was one hell of a view, Furiosa conceded – the gentle waters of a sheltered bay lapped at the sand not twenty metres from their driveway. Only the narrow road and a stretch of patchy grass separated them from the beach. In any other town, on any other street, this property would have been absurdly unaffordable. But as it was – the isolated town of Citadel had an excess of beachside properties, and the house was a wreck, and an unsightly transmission tower stood in the empty block directly behind Number 9's backyard. All these factors combined were just enough to put it within their price range. The thought of morning jogs along the beach was almost enough to justify a huge mortgage on its own.
They stood together in comfortable silence for a good few minutes, watching the waves and the distant shape of an oil tanker on the horizon, the occasional gull flying overhead. It was Angharad who moved first, twisting back around to face the house and planting her hands on her hips. "Alright, folks, enough of that" she sighed. "Let's get to it."
Their first day wasn't very productive, if Furiosa was completely honest. They spent most of it roaming from room to room, oohing and ahhing or wincing by turns, making grand plans that started out absurd and were slowly wrangled back into reasonable goals – some extra shelves here, one of Cheedo's murals on the wall over there. Dag cooed over the tiny backyard, Hills Hoist and all, fingers twitching as she pointed out potential flowerbeds amongst the weeds.
The sun was setting before they knew it, rosy light shining in through bare windows to bathe the empty rooms in orange, and the women were piling back into Angharad's Mini sans the luggage they locked inside the house. It irked them all that they couldn't spend their first night in their new home, but they hadn't had time to bring any furniture and nobody was overeager to sleep on the floor.
They agreed to meet back at Number 9 the next morning.
Then the real work would begin.
Alright guys, this is a bit of an introductory chapter, but bear with me! I'm really excited for this fic c:
(I'm not sure how to insert links, but if you Google "old Australian weatherboard" you'll see some houses that look a lot like Number 9.)