Disclaimer: I do not own any of these characters. Monsterkind is the property of Taylor C.
"And that should be the last of it Mr. Foster," the mover announced as she placed a table against a wall. Wallace, trying not to be a bother as the movers moved all of the heavy furniture, emerged from the hallway with a smile on his face.
"Finally! You know, I've been sleeping on the ground these last few days, and let me tell you how glad I am to finally-" Wallace began but stopped as he saw that his sleeping corner was still as empty as ever. He looked over at the mover for an explanation.
It took a full minute of intense staring before the mover realized that she was supposed to actually supply an explanation before inconspicuously disappearing into her truck. Sheepishly, she began rubbing the back of her head. "Yeah, about that Mr. Foster, well, there was an incident on the road about a river back in District B, and one of our team mates decided that we should ford it, but you know how those things go, right?" she began laughing, "And you know what the funny thing is? Your bed, and a few of some other stuff, decided to just, you know, fall out! But you know what else is great, we all got here and most of your stuff all safe and sound!"
Wallace honestly did not have a response, mostly because he was still grieving over his bed that was apparently floating a river in District B. The mover took this as her chance to run out before she would be held to give even more explanations. She yelled out as she was running that the bill was a company expense, so do not worry about anything and the last thing Wallace heard from her were tires screeching as they made their escape.
Collecting himself, the social worker looked around at his room. It looked nice at least. The furniture, while generic and plain, looked nice with the apartment and certainly looked friendlier than an empty room with some sheets and pillows in a corner. He could always sleep on the couch for the time being, he supposed. It would probably take another week to order in a new bed, but he was just going to have to make do with what he got for now. Nobody ever said that this was going to be easy anyways.
"Wally! I just saw that your furniture came in and I was wondering if you needed any help moving some of the stuff!" a familiar voice called in from the doorway.
"Biv! How are you?" Wallace greeted and motioned for his friend to come in.
"Wow! I love what you did with the place! It looks so much better than our apartment. Kip always says that it's the minimalist look that looks the nicest because he's a bit of a hipster and such, but I think you can never go wrong with thirty or forty knickknacks hanging from the walls and such. Ooooh! This is so cute!" Biv commented as he picked up a small paperweight from his coffee table.
"Thanks, it's a present from a friend at work," Wallace informed with an attempt to smile, but it still came off a little sorrowful.
Biv immediately caught on and carefully placed the paperweight down. "What's wrong Wally? I'd thought you'd be excited with bringing a little more of home here."
Wallace fell into his sofa and sighed. "I was excited. It's just that I haven't been sleeping well lately. Probably because of the new area and stress of moving, but I was really hoping that having my bed here would solve that. Except, the movers apparently lost my bed in some kind of freak accident."
"OH NO!" Biv exclaimed and immediately checked Wally's bedroom to confirm the facts. "But if you don't have a bed, where are you going to be sleeping?"
"Well, I had my sleeping corner for a while, but I suppose that my couch will be a good substitute for now until I can order in a new one," Wally answered. He calculated that if the furniture took three days to get here, then shipping one from District A would take at least a week provided there weren't any strange river accidents on the trip here.
However, Biv was not hearing any of it. "This is unacceptable Wally! You need a good night's sleep on a real bed, not on some sofa!" Biv stood up and began pacing around the room for an idea. He couldn't stand the thought of his new friend sleeping without a proper bed, especially if he's going to start work soon. There had to be something they could do.
"Ah Ha! Wait right here Wally," Biv exclaimed and ran out of the room. Before Wallace could even say "I'm sorry?" Biv had returned with his two roommates in arms.
"Furniture Shopping!" Biv began chanting. Molly's eyes suddenly got big and eventually joined Biv's chant. All that was left was for Kip to approve, and it wasn't like the hipster was going to refuse his friends' innocent request. He doubted that Biv would have even let him go back to his blogging if he said no.
The monsters cheered and Kip nodded and ushered Wally and Kip out of his apartment to the nearest furniture store, which just so happened to be a twenty-minute walk away. Along the way, Biv and Molly to introduce a few more landmarks and interesting places within District C. Wally carefully noted each and every one of them seeing he was just horrible with directions. Kip also added a few tidbits about some kind of memory system on how not to get lost in this city, but it kind of flew over Wallace's head. Despite that, Wallace was just happy that Kip lost some of that initial awkwardness and was just talking to him like a friend would.
"We're here!" Biv announced and quickly ran into the store. Molly, sharing in Biv's excitement, ran forward as well, not really sure of what to expect of this store.
"They seem really excited. Do you guys do this often or something?" Wallace asked as he pulled the door open for Kip.
Kip scoffed at the notion. "I don't believe in crowded areas. The minimalist look is not only neat and tidy, but it's very cost effective and efficient."
"Bet ya that's not what Ben thinks," Wally joked and followed Kip through the door.
The store itself was roughly divided into three sections: a bed section, a kitchen section, and everything else. However, the bed section seemed to have come from some kind of horror film as the beds were stacked upon each other and reached the impossibly high ceiling as well. Then there were the bed frames that were hung on the wall in some kind of intimidating fashion that was somehow possible through inanimate furniture. A pit of pillows seemed to have also been installed, but Biv didn't seem to notice and just fell in.
"Help guys!" Biv screamed as the pillows began to over take him. Molly did her best, but it took the three of them to pull the giant back to safety.
Deciding it was best to travel together in this dungeon of sleep, the four of them examined the beds to see the best fit for Wallace. It was about two and a half hours later filled with confusion ("What in the world is a Hurdal?" "It's one of those things in races Kip!"), terror ("I swear this place is endless"), and a few naps that Wallace finally picked out the bed right for him. The salesman, who seemed to come out from the pillow pit, made the sale and told them that due to the time, the mattress would have to be delivered tomorrow morning. Wallace assured him it was fine, knowing that there were no weird rivers between the shop and his apartment.
It was roughly eight o'clock when they all exited the store, so they decided to head out to grab a bite to eat. As they walked, it occurred to Wallace that during the adventure that was furniture shopping, he hadn't had the chance to express his gratitude.
"Hey, guys?" Wallace asked tentatively and waited for all of them to pause before continuing, "thanks a lot for all of this."
Biv smiled and was about to give his human friend a hug when Molly beat him to it.
"Aw, you're adorable Wally!" she complimented. Biv threw his arms around the two of them and began laughing. Kip stood to the side smiling. The three of them eventually continued walking to some restaurant Biv knew that was nearby. Molly and Biv, excited with the prospect of a hot meal, ran ahead of the other two, leaving Kip and Wallace alone in an familiar and comfortable silence.
"You know, if you keep this up, Molly isn't going to let you go out on your own anymore. She has strong mother-hen tendencies you know," Kip commented out of the blue as he and Wallace walked together.
"Haha, well, maybe that should be a good thing. My friends do believe that I'm a bit of klutz at times," Wallace responded and laughed. "But really Kip, thanks a lot. You guys didn't have to talk me out."
Kip paused and reflected on this. After a moment or so, he shrugged and began walking at a faster pace to catch with the other two.
"Everyone deserves to feel at home, right?" he asked.
Wallace smiled brightly, nodded, and quickened his own pace so that he could catch up as well.
A/N: I have no idea what came over me when I wrote this, but hey it's 5 in the morning and you haven't had any sleep. Inspiration is bound to strike at some point, right?
By the way, the WIP title for this was Jumping Hurdals since Hurdal is a type of bed from IKEA. Unfortunately, I was unable to think of anything clever with Monsterkind and IKEA, so we got the title Home for now.
Thank you for reading!