Hey! Roxy Goth here. Sorry for not updating for like, 6 months, but I've been busy. Anyway hope you lot are all right.
See chapter 1 for the disclaimer and on with the story!
Christopher was ill. Nothing serious, a bit of a headache, the feeling like he didn't want to do anything at all and an in-ability to concentrate on anything for longer than 30 second seemed to be the main symptoms.
However he must have had a bit of a temperature at least because his father felt his forehead and immediately ordered him to rest all day. Not that the brown-haired boy was complaining, he was in fact lying on the sofa watching a film, perfectly content with only the occasional coughing episode to annoy him. The main thing that sucked was the fact it was cutting into his Easter holiday time.
The doorbell rang and Christopher helpfully threw his head back and yelled. "MUM! THERE'S SOMEONE AT THE DOOR!" before descending into another coughing fit.
"Thank you Christopher, I can hear that." His mother said crisply walking past him. A couple of minutes silence and then he heard the door shut. Clearly whoever it was had gone away then.
"Your mothers gone shopping." A familiar voice informed him. "But she says we can stay till she gets back, seeing as your dads at work."
"Thanks Winnie." Christopher said easily, before doing a double take and turning round to see the blonde smiling in the doorway. "Winnie!? What are you doing here?"
The blonde gave a chuckle and shuffled his feet a bit. "Well, I thought you'd want to hear about Roo. Plus he's ill and whining so we thought we'd get out the house a bit and come and visit you. I've never seen your house before."
"Fair enough. Hold on…we?"
"Yeah, come in everyone!" And the second the sentence left Winnie's mouth the rest of the hundred acre home, minus Roo, came trundling in.
"Whoa, hold on a minute!" Christopher protested before taking a minute to cough. "I could be contagious!"
"I told Pooh we should have rung first." Rabbit was standing in the doorway, looking around Christopher's house like it was a genuine pigsty. "But he never listens."
"I didn't know he was ill!" Winnie protested. "Otherwise I would have!"
"D-do you w-want us to l-leave." Piglet stuttered, who was sitting on the arm of the chair Christopher was lying on.
The ill boy sighed. "No I suppose its fine. But not for long though." He warned.
"It can't be long. Tea's at five. Owl wants us back by 4, o you've got an hour with us at the most." Tigger said, having settled himself in Christopher's dad's armchair.
"Tigger!" Rabbit protested, having moved to the kitchen door. "You can't just sit down in the armchair!"
Tigger looked at rabbit like it was the blonde that'd losthi mind. "That's what armhair are for, cotton-bottom. Sitting on."
"Yes but…but…you…oh never mind. Can I get a drink?" Rabbit asked Christopher.
"Sure, help yourself, they're in the fridge." As Rabbit disappeared and Tigger changed the channel and turned the volume up, Eeyore struck up a conversation.
"So how are you Christopher Robin? Are you alright?"
"Fine thanks Eeyore." Christopher replied, head spinning a little.
Rabbit poked his head out from the door. "You're kitchens a mess." He informed Christopher. "Who cleans it?"
"My mother."
"Well she doesn't do a very good job then." At that the brown-head looked at the door as if expecting his mother to walk in. "Where's you're cleaning supplies?"
"My what?"
"You're cleaning supplies." Rabbit said slowly.
"I don't know…Tigger can you turn it down please?" Christopher begged the flame-haired man.
"Sure thing what to?"
"What do you mean you don't know!?" Rabbit sounded horrified. "Do you not do any cleaning?"
"No, not really."
"Christopher Robin? What should I turn it down to?"
"What?"
"Oh give it to me." Winnie said in annoyance, taking the remote out of Tigger's hand and turning the TV down by half. "There."
"No not really!? Unacceptable, I was cleaning when I was five years old! The nonsense of it…I'll find them myself." Rabbit disappeared back into the kitchen.
Piglet got up of the floor. "I'll help you." He offered following Rabbit.
"But now I can't hear what they're saying!" Tigger was protesting.
"Put the subtitles on." Eeyore suggested, still sitting on the arm of the sofa.
"How do I do that?"
"Like this, give it to me." Eeyore took the remote and showed Tigger how to put the subtitles on, before handing it back to him.
"Thanks pal!" Tigger yelled, causing Christopher to put his hands over his ears and glance at the clock. They'd been here 15 minutes, where the heck was his mother? Then Rabbit's statement sunk in.
"What id he mean he'd been cleaning from five years old?" Christother asked out loud, catching the attention of Winnie.
"What?"
"Has Rabbit been cleaning since five?"
"Yeah."
"What about child safety locks?"
"Parts took them of for him. Don't forget this is still technically a care home, most of the people here are here cause they're parents can't take care of them for whatever reason." Winne explained.
"So what about Rabbit?"
The blond shuffled a bit. "I think that's for him to tell you. I'd ask him when he isn't in the middle of a deep clean though. He doesn't like being interrupted in the middle of a deep clean."
"What about you?" Christopher said, groggily.
Winnie smiled sadly. "My parents died when I was about 3 or four. No other relatives so taken straight in care."
"That's like me." Eeyore said glumly. "Parents died in a car-crash when I was eight, on the way back from taking me to a dancing lesson." He went silent and stared out the window a bit.
Now Christopher was sure he'd stepped on un-marked territory. "You don't have to tell me if you don't want to."
"Nah it's cool." Tigger said. "Wait till you here mine. My…" However he was cut off by Rabbit yelling in the kitchen.
"For god's sake Piglet! What's wrong with you?"
"S-sorry."
"What's he done?" Winnie asked immediately going into the kitchen. Christopher dragged himself of the sofa and followed his friend.
The kitchen was sparkling. Rabbit was standing in the middle of it wearing Christopher's mother's pink rubber gloves and one of her aprons. Piglet was also wearing gloves that came to his elbows and an apron that came down to his ankles. Apart from the fact that Piglets clothes were too big for him Christopher couldn't see anything wrong.
Neither apparently could Eeyore. "What's the matter here then?" He asked in his usual fashion.
"Piglet' cleaning side-to-side instead of in circles." Rabbit announced.
"…So?" Christopher asked, a bit irritably.
"So!? Everybody knows you clean in circles to get the maximum effect!"
Winnie, knowing from experience that this wasn't going to go anywhere good, and noticing Christopher's tired expression found himself saying. "We're going home. Come on you lot, we've intruded long enough, Christopher Robin's about to drop dead. Rabbit, Piglet, put the cleaning supplies away and let's leave. Now."
Five minutes later everything was put away and the hundred acre home lot left. As soon as they did Christopher curled back up on the sofa and fell asleep.
