Pearl hummed a tune under her breath as she pulled out the wet clothes from the washer. Steven had been so responsible, separating whites from darks and what clothes had to be hand-washed or dry cleaned. It filled her with a certain pride, different from successfully solving a puzzle or felling an enemy.

Pearl pulled out the last of the laundry, curious when she grabbed a strip of damp aquamarine fabric. She looked inside the washer and gasped. There were more strips of fabric, torn apart and jagged.

"Oh, no, no, no..." Pearl reached inside and gathered up the cloth.

Steven must have accidentally put the skirt in there, or maybe it didn't have a tag to instruct what to do with it.

"Oh, Steven, he'll be so disappointed..."

Unless...

"Of course! I must locate a loom and recreate the skirt to the smallest detail!"

Thinking of the cost of fabric and where to possibly find the material made her triumphant smile soften.

"Perhaps I could fix it..."

She clipped the fabric onto a coat hanger and left them to dry. She hid the hanger in a crowd of other clothing.

When the fabric dried, Pearl hid them in her gem and fled to her room.

She rested in the middle of one of the fountains and drew out the fabric and necessary materials. There was some admiration for humans who did this, as she accidentally jabbed the needle into her fingers or thumbs more than once. Perhaps since their lives were so short they put their all into the skill.

When she was finished, the repaired skirt was a little crooked on one side but otherwise perfect.

She hung it up with Steven's other clothes and left a note reminding him to ask if he didn't know what to do with certain clothing, along with some Pearl Points.

Now to figure out how to heal her reddened fingers...

A/N: Originally posted on Ao3 on November 29 2016

When I first started doing my own laundry I would be scared about accidentally destroying my clothes. Though now I have so few white colored clothes I just throw them in with the regular colors.