It really only took just under an hour of steady, not-unpleasant work, and she had emptied every box for the kitchen, and thirty minutes after that, had her kitchen appliances all plugged in and hooked up. Her coffee maker, microwave, and toaster adorned her counters and she smiled at them like she would old friends. She heaved the now-empty boxes in the general direction of her front-door and decided to unpack her bathroom next, neatly avoiding furniture for now.
By the time she'd taken a break for lunch, her bathroom was unpacked, set-up, and in order. Her linen closet was filled with her bedding and towels, the entryway closet filled with her coats and outerwear, shoe tree assembled within, her shoes ensconced comfortably on it. A sense of pride filled her and she felt quite puffed up with it until she stepped back into the living room and realized it looked like she had done nothing since all the furniture was still around in plastic lumps, surrounded by yet more boxes.
Damn and double damn, she thought angrily, running both hands roughly over her head and yanking on her ponytail. "Well, I've got to start somewhere, right?" She said aloud to herself, ignoring the rumbling of her stomach as she marched towards her plastic wrapped couch. Hannah began to yank and tear at the wrapping and soon was surrounded by a pile of plastic and cardboard, and her squashy couch was sitting placidly in front of her.
"Oh hello old friend," she said loudly, tossing herself down onto the familiar softness. Her whole body moulded to the cushions and she felt a flush of happiness and weariness mingled together. The couch smelled like Seattle, carrying little whiffs of Dylan's cologne, the air-freshener she'd had in her old living room, even a faint smell that she knew was her old dog's fur-smell. Hannah felt her eyes well up a little. She was glad to be in a new life, with a fresh start, but god it was hard to escape the old one. There was still a lot of confused-feeling comfort to be drawn from the familiarity of her old life.
After shedding a few pity tears, Hannah suddenly popped to her feet and wiped at her face, deciding that she was just going to have to force away her feelings for now. Dragging an armload of couch-wrapping to her front hall, she realized that she was going to have to make a garbage-run, the hall was nearly impassable with all the boxes and wrapping sitting in her way. The thought of breaking down all the boxes and then making what would likely be several trips downstairs to the big dumpster in the underground parking garage, exhausted her immediately.
You could always ask Steve for help, her traitorous mind offered in a snide way. Resisting the urge to slap her own face, Hannah clenched her jaw and stuck her chin up a little. I'll do this on my own, I don't need Captain America helping me and making me feel weird.
Her first trip down went well, her second trip as well, but by the third trip she was so tired she took a break in the lobby, leaning against the wall and wondering if someone had turned the temperature inside the building up to match that of the surface of the sun.
"Oh, hi," she heard Steve say, and she actually groaned aloud before she realized how rude that was. "Yes, hi," she replied quickly, pushing away from the wall, and heading for the stairs, giving Steve wide berth. She didn't even look at his face.
"Hannah," he said calmly, "You look exhausted, are you sure I can't help you? I'd be happy to give you a break." Hannah paused at the bottom of the stairs and felt a drop of sweat trickle down her spine inside her shirt. Oh what the hell, just let him help – there's no way in hell this is going to be anything other than neighborly at best, you look like shit warmed over.
"You know what, Steve? I was going to say no, but yeah, could you? I'd really appreciate it," she told him, looking up into his face, which was breaking into a pleasant smile. "I'll even buy the pizza and beer tonight as payment," she added on the offer, the standard moving-helper's payment, without thinking, and then she felt herself immediately regretting it. Don't come crying to me when you make an ass out of yourself on account of the extra time with him, she snapped at herself. Steve only smiled a little bigger and glanced at this watch.
"I was going to run out for lunch, how about you go take a break – I'll bring you back something?" He offered and Hannah was so tired and sweaty and hungry that she just sighed and nodded, a relieved smile on her face. "You're awesome, that would be great," she replied. He left and she waited until he was out of sight before spinning around and racing up the stairs two at a time. She lunged through her apartment door and ran towards the bathroom, nearly breaking her neck when she tripped over boxes and smashed to the ground. She popped back to her feet though and grabbed two towels.
She'd never showered so quickly in her life. She brushed her teeth for good measure before hurrying into her room and digging out a pair of jeans and a clean tank top. She didn't want to dress up, but felt she had to not look like a homeless person in front of Captain America, at the very least. It's your patriotic duty or something. After ripping her hairbrush through her sodden hair, she yanked it back up into a ponytail and made her way out to the living room again, looking around to make sure nothing embarrassing was sitting around. No, the 'special' stuff is in the bedroom, keep him away from that box.
When Steve knocked on her front door, she was just unwrapping the second chair for her tiny kitchen table set and she hustled to the door, dropping the wrapping on the floor on her way over. She opened the door and was greeted with a tall, blonde Steve bearing a greasy looking bag and a drink tray with two huge, cold soft drinks in it.
"Lunch?" He offered, raising it all a little towards her. She smiled in response and held the door open and then Captain America was in her apartment. I feel like I should say the Pledge of Allegiance or something, maybe hum a few bars of the old Stars and Stripes?
Opting against either idea, she led the way into the little dining nook where the two chairs sat next to the well wrapped table they were meant to be paired with and gestured at the arrangement. "I was going to unwrap the table, too," she explained, hurrying over and beginning to pry at the plastic. Steve put everything down on the kitchen counter and came over to her. "Let me," he offered, gently pushing her hands away, "You get plates."
Hannah dished up the food: two burgers and one container of fries and turned back to see Steve balling up the table wrapping. Her table and chairs stood ready for use and she couldn't help but smile. Seeing the pieces of her old life being unwrapped in her new one, made something inside of her deeply pleased and she carried the food over feeling nearly giddy.
"Thanks so much," she told him, putting his plate down at one side of the table. "It's my pleasure," he responded, shooting her a grin, "It's only neighborly, right?" Hannah chuckled and sat down, waiting until Steve joined her before digging in. "Oh my god, this is so good," she mumbled around a mouthful of the best burger she'd ever eaten.
"It's from that place, Burgers Etc., down the block, hands down best burger joint I've ever been too," Steve told her, taking a large bite of his own burger, "And I've got lots of experience with burgers, so I'd know." They ate in relative silence and Hannah began to find that she was less and less nervous around him. She watched him eat surreptitiously and realized that he might be a lot of things, but he was also just a guy, who ate like a normal guy.
"So, what would you like me to help with first?" He inquired, when he'd hoovered down his meal. Hannah was still working on her burger and shrugged. "Maybe we could unwrap the rest of the furniture and you could help me move it?" She began tentatively, not wanting to impose, but beyond pleased at the notion that she wasn't going to have to break her back trying to move the bigger pieces on her own. He nodded and jumped to his feet, urging her to finish her meal. She did, and then cleaned up, listening as her clock radio played some older music she remembered from high school, and behind that, the noise of Steve moving around in the living room.
When she stepped into the living room she stopped in shock. He'd unwrapped everything, and all the wrapping was in a large box that used to contain her TV. Her furniture was arranged in a way she knew she would keep, and he'd even put her TV up onto the entertainment unit, although the cords he'd coiled next to it were not TV cords, but computer cords. Not as if he's likely to really know that though, she thought in mild amusement, really realizing for the first time that the handsome guy carrying her desk like it weighed nothing was actually born almost a hundred years ago. The realization was frankly amazing, and also a little creepy, if she was being honest with herself.
"I thought I'd set it all up a little like my own stuff is," he told her, putting the desk down in the exact corner she'd already determined the desk would live in, "Sorry, is that presumptuous? I can change it." Hannah shook her head immediately. "No! It's great, thank you," she insisted. He smiled again, the sunny expression he had that she was growing used to seeing, and he waved a hand at the box filled with wrapping.
"You get unpacking, I'll get the garbage downstairs," Steve instructed, and Hannah could only nod. The afternoon went by quickly, and despite one embarrassing incident when he was helping reassemble her bed frame, where she knocked over a box and it spilled open, a large amount of underwear and bras pouring out onto the floor, she was growing increasingly more comfortable around him.
It wasn't because he was Captain America, or because he was gorgeous, and it wasn't because she needed a man around or anything. It was because he was pleasant and funny and kind. She needed kind in her life right now. He was offering help and smiles and conversation with no strings attached, and after everything with Dylan, and his emotional-vampire ways, she was soaking up the simple, easy companionship.
By dinnertime, Hannah was ready to call it quits for the day. "Can you order the pizza?" She asked him, when he returned from his last trip down to the dumpster, "I don't know the good places yet." Steve smiled with one side of his mouth. "And you don't have a phone," he added helpfully. Hannah let out a loud, short laugh, and waved her hand in his direction with a flourish.
"Oh ha ha," she said sarcastically, adding in an eye roll for good measure. Steve bumped her shoulder with his own and then turned and headed towards the front door again. "Where are you going?" Hannah called after him. He paused and looked over his shoulder, eyebrows drawn together a little quizzically. "To order pizza?" He responded, a question in his tone.
"Don't you have a cell phone?" She asked. Steve nodded. "I'm not that out of touch," he told her lightly, "It's just upstairs, I have to grab it."
"You know they're portable right? Meant to be carried around on your person?" She shot back, calling after him as he moved through the doorway. He waved a hand at her without turning back. "They're small and annoying! I always forget about it," his voice carried back to her and she had to chuckle. The strangeness of what it must be like to be Steve kept hitting in her waves, over the smallest things. Most pop culture references went right over his head, like quotes from movies and television shows that were ingrained in most people as normal conversational pieces. He had stared at her DVD collection like it was something magical, and even something simple like the multiple earrings in each of her ears had him staring when he first noticed them.
"Didn't those hurt?" He'd finally blurted out. Hannah had placed a hand gently on her ears and then laughed a little, shaking her head slightly. "Not really, it was over so quickly," she'd explained. Steve had quirked up an eyebrow like he didn't believe her.
"But why?" Steve had asked after a moment of silence, "Was the first one done wrong? I see so many people with things like that, and it doesn't make any sense." She could sense that this was something he'd been dying to ask someone for a while and tried not to laugh again, managing to smother the urge with a smile.
"It's a looks thing, I guess," she tried to explain, "Lots of people get them, and when I was younger it was sort of a way to express myself."
"By punching holes in your earlobes over and over again?"
"I pierced my nose too, although I've taken that one out."
"Your nose?!" He seemed horrified, so Hannah had stepped a little closer and pointed at the side of her nose, where the tiniest little scar remained. He leaned down, ridiculously close to her face, making her catch her breath as he examined her nose.
"Was this also to express yourself?" He'd asked skeptically. Hannah had shrugged and taken a step back, his closeness making her feel sweaty and awkward. "Mostly to look cool, I think," she said laughingly, trying to remember the reasons 18 year old Hannah had for getting the piercing, "But now, I just don't love it anymore, so I took it out." Steve had shaken his head and turned back to the box he was unpacking.
"I also pierced my belly button," she mentioned casually, watching him out of the corner of her eye, genuinely interested in seeing his reaction. He turned to her, a completely gobsmacked look on his face.
"No," he said in disbelief. Hannah smiled and laughed at him this time, lifting her shirt up enough to expose her belly button and the small, delicate piercing she still wore there. He stared at the piercing and then turned wide eyes to her. "Was this also to look 'cool'?" He asked, hooking his fingers in the air to place quotation marks around the word.
"Nope," Hannah said, pulling her shirt back down, "This was to impress a guy – a stupid reason, but I think it's cute, so it stays in." Steve chuckled quietly and turned back to his unpacking.
Hannah shook her head, pulling herself from the recent memory of their afternoon, and went to the bathroom, washing her hands and face, and applying some more deodorant. She went into her bedroom and pulled open a drawer on her newly set up dresser and yanked out a t-shirt, changing from the slightly grubby top she'd been wearing all afternoon.
She smoothed the fabric down over the top of her jeans and looked around her transformed room. It was put together now, at least in terms of the big things. She felt a settled sense of rightness seeing her possessions laying around in clusters on the dressers, or in opened boxes, just waiting for her to organize them. Hannah strolled over to her bedroom window and looked outside, the day was still bright and warm, but her curtains kept it muted. She trailed a hand down them and smiled. No more early mornings, she thought in satisfaction.
Hannah decided they needed to at least have entertainment while they ate, and went into the living room, taking the few minutes to hook her TV up to her DVD/Netflix player. The cable box had been waiting in her apartment for her, a perk of renting in this building, and so she hooked that up too and took a couple minutes to sync everything to her universal remote. She was again deeply pleased to have the basics back and couldn't keep the smile off her face as she pushed open her curtains and then opened several windows, creating a cross breeze (god I love an end unit). She watched her little slice of DC enjoy the summer night below her and jumped about a foot into the air with a shrill cry when Steve suddenly spoke from right behind her. She'd been so wrapped up in watching the street, she hadn't seen or heard him come in. Heart racing, she turned around to see him making an apologetic face.
"I should've knocked," he said immediately. Hannah smiled wanly, and internally assessed that she was likely not having a heart attack, before she gestured at the couch. "It's ok, I wasn't paying attention," she croaked, "Let's sit down?" He nodded and stepped aside in an obvious way, letting her pass him and approach the couch first, before him. She paused before sitting on "her" side of the couch and looked over at him, slightly quizzically. It had been an oddly chivalrous gesture and seemed completely out of place.
"Why did you let me go first?" She blurted out, genuinely curious. Steve blinked at her and then frowned thoughtfully for a moment. "Ladies first?" He replied, "It's your couch, just letting you find your seat first – you do have a favored side, right?" Hannah nodded, appreciating that level of insight from him.
"You're a thinker, Steve," she replied lightheartedly, casting a brief smile his way, again truly happy for the company, "When's the pizza getting here?"
