Chapter 11: One good deed deserves another, but doesn't often get it.
After leaving Tabby at the bulletin board, I headed down to my house. Originally, I had planned to set up my new furniture and decorate, but as Nook was in a mood, I decided to finish his tasks first. Two down, one to go.
Gooses' house was to the right of mine, right next to the border. I was weary of going to his, I hoped I wouldn't catch his illness. Even before I approached the door and knocked, I could hear horrendous and violent sneeze attacks. Bark-like coughing was booming out of the house too. Goose had a cold.
"Hello." I stuck my head around the door, cautiously. A white chicken was walking around in circles. I didn't see how that would help his cold. Shouldn't he be in bed? Not that I could find one, looking around. He should at least be sat down or laying down on the sofa. Not walking in circles.
He noticed me. Now I could see his face, I noticed that he didn't look ill. Other than the fact that he had a big black swirl, which looked like a rain cloud, hanging above his head, he looked perfectly normal. He didn't seem pleased to see me.
"What are you doing here?!" He squawked, angrily. Charming, don't you think?
I held up the medicine. "For you." I stated, handing it over. He snatched from my grasp, and the next thing I knew, he had taken it.
"Eurgh." He spluttered. I would have felt sorry for him if he hadn't been so mean to me a few minutes before. "That tastes horrible, Buh-kay." He wiped his wings on his shirt, which was dark blue with, what looked like, red flowers on. I stood there and watched, unsure of what to do. He was staring at me, an uncertain look in his eye. "Who are you?" He finally asked.
"Aimee. I'm new." I replied, bluntly. I realized he wouldn't know who I was seeing as he was holed up in his house with a cold. I still didn't want to go through the whole process of explaining who I was, what I was doing etc, though.
"I have to get some rest now." Goose retaliated. No thank you or anything nice like that. I had just done him a favour and this is how he paid me, by kicking me out and being rude!
I left, shaking my head in disbelief. I supposed I should report back to Nook. He smiled at me, the events from earlier all forgotten about. Lets hope he never found out about that letter. He gave me a watering can, on loan, and told me to go and water the dying flowers around town. I had a feeling he had ran out of jobs for me to do and was now just making them up for the sake of it. Before I knew it, I would be catching fish and bugs, just to prove I could.
Lucy came with me. I met up with her outside 'Able Sisters'. She was looking for a new outfit. This reminded me of what Mabel had said about her sister- keep talking to her and she'll come round, or words to that effect. Should I? It couldn't hurt (unless Sable turned physical).
"That's a nice pattern." I observed, looking over Sables' shoulder at the pattern she was sewing. It was a complicated pattern. Almost a tartan pattern, but with random green squares dotted around. Lucy was looking at the clothes, again, probably re-thinking about buying something.
Sable ignored me. She didn't even call for her sister this time. I heard her sigh though.
"I'm Aimee." I tried again.
This time, I did spark a reaction. "I'm busy." She almost growled at me. I could have put her ignoring me down to shyness, but after that comment, I wasn't so sure that was the case. These animals were getting ruder to me. I gave up.
Lucy decided to tell me about each type of flower, as we rambled about town. I stood over every yellow, moulding flower we came across. It appeared that this watering can was filled with an unlimited amount of water, or at least I thought, until I reached the beach and nothing poured out. I walked to the sea and went to fill it up.
"Oh, no!" Lucy cried, suddenly. I looked up, startled. She was running towards me. "Not from there! You have to fill it up from the stream." I didn't bother asking why, I just allowed her to lead me to the stream. Maybe sea salt was bad for the flowers, I didn't know.
A while later we, and Punchy, were in my house. I had been dismissed from work, because Nook couldn't think of anymore chores. He told me to come back tomorrow, bright and early, and that if I had anything to sell, I had to bring it to him. I almost asked, cheekily, if he would give me a discount. I knew he wouldn't. The only things I wanted to buy from the shop today were the shovel, rod and net. Lucy had told me that the museum needed, desperately, donations and that I could find up to three fossils a day by digging. Plus, any fossils I wanted to sell looked good in houses, or were bought for a really good price. She also told me that bugs and fish got more than most furniture too. If I could catch plenty, maybe I could pay off my damn loan that way instead of working.
The three of us were laying the citrus carpet on the floor. It was deep purple, with a citrus fruit, perhaps an orange, displayed, cut in half so you could see the centre. It was better than the stones I had. After that, we put up my new wallpaper. That was a pale colour with a blue trim. It wasn't to my liking, but I preferred it to what I had. Lastly, we replaced the tape deck I already had, with the retro stereo Daisy had given me. It was rather big and looked out of place, but it looked nicer that the tape deck at least. My house was looking nicer.
"Yay, Snooink!" Lucy cheered, when we had finished. Punchy grinned, lazily, setting himself down on the floor. He hadn't helped much, but it was nice to have my friends around me after the day I had. I looked pityingly at the tape deck. I had a feeling that it wouldn't fetch much if I sold it. Lucy had said I needed, roughly, 1,500 Bells if I wanted all three. Where was I going to get that from?
"Sometimes, when I'm low on money, I ask if I can do any jobs for anyone." Punchy informed me. "Or you could sell lots of fruit." Running around doing more chores wasn't appealing, especially as I didn't seem to get on with half of the residents. I guess I had to go around shaking trees till I had enough fruit to sell.
