Characters not mine.
(Originally written for a free-for-all challenge on comment_fic. Prompt was "Readjusting to human bodies.")
It was amazing how many things they had forgotten about being human. Cogsworth had forgotten how amazing thumbs were, although possibly he simply never appreciated them, until he had handles instead of hands for comparison.
He'd at least still had legs, as stumpy as they had been, as Lumiere tended to point out whenever Cogsworth said anything about it. The candlestick hadn't even had those, and to him the ability to race down the hall on long legs once again was far more amazing than the ability to easily hold a pen.
They'd forgotten so many things. The castle seemed so much smaller, now that they were taller than the tables, but also so much more accessible. Cogsworth remembered papers and lists and means of organization he'd let slip from his mind for twenty years when the shelves and drawers they had been kept on became all but impossible to reach, and Lumiere remembered private corners he'd forgotten when climbing stairs became more like climbing a mountain, and dance steps he'd been unable to do without legs.
The things they remembered weren't always so helpful, of course. Lumiere had forgotten how tall he was, when he was human, and he'd spent more of the first few weeks than he liked to admit walking into ladders he'd recently been able to walk under the rungs of, or on his backside in the pantry because he'd forgotten to duck. Cogsworth had forgotten how much feet of flesh rather than of wood could ache when one spent most of the day chasing after a master who was still very bad at pausing to listen. Lumiere could never remember, even months afterwards, that he now needed matches in order to light the dining room candles, and Cogsworth was so used to having the time written across his face that he often forgot to check it.
They laughed at each other a lot. All those little mistakes that came from things they weren't used to any more - or things they had been used to that they no longer had to compensate for. Every little frustration was amazing.
Because they'd forgotten, too, how soft Cogsworth's mustache had been before it was hammered metal, or the feel of Lumiere's hand clapping his friend on the back, now that he was no longer afraid of setting the wood on fire. They'd forgotten a time when their banter didn't have to be strictly verbal, and the clock and the candlestick welcomed every little foible that came from that came from the majordomo and maitre d', because it came with remembering the warm hand of a friend grabbing them to tug them back to their feet.