Human names used:
Hong Kong – Leon
Canada – Matthew
USA – Alfred
Seychelles – Shelly
Australia – Kyle
England – Arthur /Artie
France – Fran / Francis
It is late at night as Arthur steps into the bedroom. It has already been made comfortable even if some card boxes are still lying around. The lamps are providing a comfortable yellow light. He sees his husband standing at the window, looking out, seeing Pierre jumping and running in front of their window, barking without an end.
"Man I'm fried…" he states, closing the door.
"Something's in the way with Pierre," comments Francis.
"I don't know what his problem is. Couldn't get him to come inside," he explains as he steps at his lover's side and shoving the yellow curtains more away to have a better look.
"We can't leave him out there."
"He's going to be alright, I got him on a chain." He opens the window and begins to call their dog:
"Pierre! Hey… Be quiet."
Pierre growls lightly but stops barking. Arthur wraps his arms around Francis waist and steps even closer to him. But Francis turns around and lays his hands around Arthur's neck:
"Thanks for making this work. I know it's a lot to pay off. It's gonna be great isn't it?"
Arthur, his hands still lying on his husbands waist answers with a slightly arguing voice:
"I think it's great already!"
"Ja" whispers Francis and looks into the emerald eyes before leaning into a soft kiss.
Arthur strokes Francis side as they slowly separate.
"You're still too fried to Christen the new house?" asks Francis suggestively.
"Who said I'm fried?" Arthur pushes him towards the bed. "Nobody here is fried!"
Francis chuckles and obliges his lover.
The next morning Francis gets woken up by birds singing in the trees and a bug flying around with a disturbingly loud buzz. He turns around and sees that Arthur already left the room as his side of the bed is empty. He groans softly as he sits up and puts on the slippers, which are waiting at the side of his bed. Thereby he notices a dark blue and violet spot on his shin. He touches it gently with his finger and tries out how much it hurts. Then he strokes with his whole hand over it and sighs.
He walks around to look into the rooms of his children. As he opens the second door he spots Alfred still lying in his bed.
"Fran?" he murmurs.
"Hey…" Francis steps in "How did you guys sleep?" He looks at the second bed in the room in which Matthew sleeps in.
"It's cold," complains Alfred and pulls his blanket over his chin.
"It's chilly isn't it?" agrees Francis."
"Do you think we could have bought a house that has a toilet that actually works?" asks Leon sarcastically who just stepped out of the bathroom behind Francis, still in boxers and his sleeping tee-shirt, a toothbrush in his hand. Francis turns around and leaves the room, heading for the stairs.
"Tell Arthur."
"And there was this really funky smell in my bedroom last night, reeked like something died." Leon adds.
Francis begins to walk down as he asks back: "Is it still there?"
"No."
"Problem solved." And Francis is downstairs. Leon just rolls his eyes and gets back to brushing his teeth.
Francis strokes his bed hair out of his face as he walks down the last steps and stops suddenly. He notices something strange on the grandfather clock in front of him. He steps closer. It shows the wrong time and thus seemingly stopped working in the night at 3:07. Francis makes a note to himself to remind Arthur to look at it as he sees the door to the newly discovered cellar open. He walks closer, tilting his head to the side. Arriving he calls down:
"Arthur?" As he gets no answer he steps in.
"Roger?!" He sees a light moving downstairs and to his relief Arthur answers:
"Down here honey."
Francis follows the voice down the stairs, still covered in spider webs.
"Morning!" greets Arthur and looks at Francis with a light smile as he turns in a new light bulb into the holder. As a morning person he is already dressed and looking fully awake. He turns to a dresser covered under a blanket and throws the latter behind it.
Francis sees now the cellar for the first time and laughs out in amazement:
"Woh! This is gonna take some serious elbow grease."
Arthur chuckles.
The cellar is filled with old furniture like chairs stapled on each other, wooden basket, chests, desks, couch cushions and many things more. And all covered with a thick layer of dust and cob webbed.
Francis turns around and sees even more space and old things.
"Oh god…"He discovers a piano, seemingly as old and untouched as all the other stuff lying around in this cellar. He opens it to expose the piano keys and presses one after another down. Since it was really old it did not seem as if it had seen a tuner in the last few years and it produced uneasy sounds. Francis swirls around, opening his arms, pointing roughly at everything:
"What are we gonna do with all this stuff?"
"Well, we probably ought to go through it." Arthur's got a flashlight in his hand and is looking through a dresser. "You know? There might be some antiques down here worth a lot of money."
Francis gets his hands on an old football and weighs it in his hands:
"Yeah, or just a lot of junk the previous owner didn't want."
"It's ours now."
Francis smiles and lifts his hands over his head,the football firmly gripped and throws it at his husband.
"Knock yourself out. I'm gonna make some coffee."
Arthur reacts fast enough to catch the softly thrown ball with one hand.
"Uh...okay, I'll be up in a minute. I'm gonna see if I can get this furnace working."
Francis is already walking up the stairs as he answers:
"Yeah, that'd be nice. It's freezing." Francis crosses his arms and the tee-shirt he's got on wrinkles as it is rather thin.
The kitchen is only enlightened by the light from outside but it provides just enough. Francis sighs as he fills the tea pot with water. His look falls upon the little kitchen clock on the shelf right beside him. The time reads 3:07.
Over the water running he can clearly hear the voice of his only daughter Shelly, calling for their dog. Light footsteps approach running.
"Fran! Fran, where's Pierre?" Shelly enters with messy hair and in her blue pajamas, blue being her favourite colour besides red. She hugs a little plushie formed like a fish.
Francis turns to her and frowns some, trying to remember where he saw their dog the last time.
"Uh...he's outside. You know, I'm sure he's hungry by now. Why don't you go and get him?"
Hearing this, Shelly rushes out of the kitchen, running into her second father.
"Woah!" Arthur manages to catch her with an arm to prevent her running into his knee. She steps aside and looks up to him:
"Morning, dad! Can you hold this?" And without waiting for an answer she shoves her fish into his arms.
"Uh, sure." So he stays there a bit taken by surprise, the fish in his hand.
But Shelly does not get bothered and runs out the front door, letting the screen door falling close behind her.
Arthur lays the stuffed animal on the kitchen table and walks to Francis.
"Arthur…" He points to the little clock "This clock stopped at 3:07, and so did the one in the hallway."
Arthur frowns at it.
"That's weird." He takes it down from the shelf and turns it in his hands. "Maybe it got knocked around in the move."
"Speaking of knocked around, what did you do to me last night?" Francis lifts up his right leg and shows the purple bruise.
"Ouch! I'm sure I didn't do that, did I?" Arthur lowers the clock and steps closer to have a better look, convinced that he could not have possibly done that.
In the meantime is Shelly is running around the house, her hair whipping on her shoulders.
"Pierre!"
She runs behind a little bush right at the corner where she knows her parents had the dog chain. She smiles as she sees through the leaves and branches the dog lying in the sun. She slows down to greet her best friend with a big smile but it quickly vanishes and forms into a scream.
Both of her fathers look up from their kitchen work as they hear the light and shrill scream of their youngest kid. The kitchen work is forgotten in a fraction of a second and both rush out the door, Francis first.
"Shelly! Shelly!" he shouts as he jumps down the steps from the porch.
He runs around the corner and as soon as he sees Shelly he takes her in his arms.
"What happened?!"
Arthur arrives too and frowns at what he sees in front of him.
As Francis leaves his eyes from the girl he sees no need of any explanation. He clasps his hands in front of his mouth.
"Oh Pierre…"
There was the dog lying lifeless in the grass, legs sprawled and the tongue sticking out. Arthur steps to Pierre and strokes through his fur, knowing that he is inevitably dead.
