Chapter 8: Solace.
Luckily, the lights were still on in the 'Able Sisters'. Despite the fact that it was rapidly approaching nine o'clock at night. Nook had sent me home, promising more tasks for the next day, as long as I posted the letters I had written first. I planned on sending them alright, just not right now. Before I went to work tomorrow, though, definitely.
I pushed open the door and squinted through the bright light that met my eyes. It was so much more radiant in here. The walls were patterned with green and pinkish wallpaper, not murky brown wood and it was so much more inviting. This was how you designed a shop, Nook should have taken notes.
"Can I help you?" I looked round. A blue hedgehog, wearing a green and white check apron, was edging towards me, shyly Check was the design in this place, it seemed. "Welcome to Able Sisters, where you are the fashion designer!" I looked around, there were eight shirts placed in the middle of the room, all had unique and intricate designs. I made my way past them, to the back of the room. There was another hedgehog here, brown in colour, wearing a pink and white check apron, working, sewing a pattern on the sewing machine. I tried not to let that amaze me.
I was struck by the clothes at the back. I wondered why they had separated them, rather than keep all the clothes together. The blue hedgehog seemed to have picked up on this. "Would you like to design something?" She pointed to the cluster of shirts in the middle of the room. They were designs chosen and created by the villagers. "Or would you like to buy something?" The ones for sale were the clothes at the back. That included the umbrella, hair accessory and face accessory (the ones available at that time were a crash helmet and 3-d glasses.).
"I'm just looking." I mumbled. I edged closer to get a better look at the other hedgehogs' work.
"Mabel, can you take care of this customer here?" She snapped. Whoa, I hadn't done anything!
"What. Sis?!? I'm busy too, you know!" Standing around doing nothing seemed to pass as busy in this town. Maybe I should use that excuse on Nook sometime. So far, I had found out that these hedgehogs were sisters. And one of them, the blue one, was called Mabel.
The other one decided to reply with a sharp, irate exhale. She was probably counting to ten in her head. For the millionth time today, I felt like coming up with some snappy retort. These animals were intriguing, I'll admit that, but they sure as hell were screwed up. And aggravating. And most were rather unpleasant.
"Sorry about Sable." Mabel whispered, following me as I headed towards the door. "She keeps to herself. Keep talking to her everyday and she'll come round." I wasn't sure I wanted to. If she snapped at me just for looking, what would she do if I talked?
Eventually, I arrived at my house. I had snaffled a few apples on the way, by shaking the fruit trees, and had decided that they would have to do for dinner. My alternative would be banging on doors, scavenging for a spare meal. Not appealing. I still had the letters to post, but first I wanted to write a letter of my own. I wasn't sure that this idea would work, but it was worth a try. I tore a sheet of paper off the wad Lobo had given me (who would have thought it would have come in useful huh?) and started to write.
'Mum. I know you're probably worried, but I'm fine. I ended up in some other world, strange, but true. Animals talk here, I know you'll think I'm lying, but I'm not, honest. I miss you. I'll try to get home as soon as I can, but it seems I'm stuck for now. Don't worry, I have food and I've been provided with a house that I have to pay off by working. You'll be pleased with that, you're always banging on about me getting a job. I'll write again, as soon as I can. Provided that this letter, along with the others, get to you, that is. Love you. X'
I addressed the letter and then set back off again to post them. As soon as I got back, I collapsed, exhausted, on my bed and slept soundly.
*
I awoke early, and munched on an apple for breakfast. I was surprised that it filled me up instantly. Magic, I thought. I was disgusted to find, however, that I had fallen asleep in my work shirt, and that I was still dirty. I needed a shower, and fast.
I arrived at Nook's, contemplating jumping in the stream, earlier than, I think, he expected. He lumbered me with another heavy bag, though, and gave me another list.
"Not so many deliveries today." He grumbled, clearly set on making me work extremely hard to pay off this loan. I wondered how much of it he had deducted for yesterday. Did I have any other miniscule jobs to do today? "Just three." I think Nook was talking about the deliveries still, I hoped. I set off out of the shop. It was another cheery day, mid-September was usually like this though. Well, in my world. I realized that it was my birthday was soon. Hopefully, I would be home by then.
The first house to deliver to, was the house near mine, the one by the stream. I had noticed, last night, that it was very looked after. The garden was full of flowers, tended to regularly, by the looks of things. There were two trees, newly planted, behind the house, the owner had clearly been planning on making a orchard or something.
I knocked loudly on the door. It creaked open just a tiny bit, and a white pig poked its head round. I smiled tentatively. "Oh!" She squeaked. The next thing I knew, the pig was standing on the doorstep with me, smiling broadly and gripping my hand. "I'm Lucy! I tend to say Snooink when I'm happy, but you can ignore that! My birthday is June 2nd, so that makes me a Gemini. I like to garden and catch bugs." She paused, I think she was thinking of what to add to that, almost biographical, account. "You're the new girl everyone's been talking about." She added. Everyone had been talking about me? It was a wonder I didn't have them all banging on my door to see me. I was grateful for that, though.
"Yeah." I didn't want to pour through the same old speech. It was dull. It struck me, however, before I started, that I had explained all this in those four letters I wrote. Lobo, someone named Punchy, Dotty and… Lucy. She was one of the recipients. Phew, saved.
Right on cue, she stated brightly; "Aimee. You wrote me a letter." It wasn't really a letter, so to speak, but if she wanted to think that, then so be it. "It was…intriguing." I took that to mean that she liked it. She did. She had also warmed to me, quite considerably. She asked me all sorts of questions about myself. I decided, seeing as I didn't have much to do, that Nook wouldn't mind if I stayed and chatted to Lucy for a while. There was nothing he could do about it anyway. He wasn't about to leave his shop, not to drag me back, if he couldn't even be bothered to handle his own deliveries. What's more, I found myself liking Lucy too. Wonders would never cease.
She had asked me how I got here, and about the world I came from. That took me by surprise, none of the others had asked that yet, not even Pelly or Tortimer. "I'd like to travel one day." She replied, dreamily, once I had answered her question. "Oh! I almost forgot!" She took out a pen and a notepad, that already had notes scribbled upon. "I'm no good at remembering birthdays, I write them down, so that I don't forget. When's yours?"
"September 29th."
She noted it down and then paused. Today, if time had remained the same, was the 15th. "That's two weeks away!" She exclaimed, excitedly. "The day after Kodys'!" Great. If I stayed here, I would have an athletic bear organizing horrendous exercises for his birthday treat, the day before mine. Ok, I may have been imagining the worst, but I had no idea what this bear was capable of.
