Over the next few weeks, Justine and Toby scoured L.A for houses to rent. They had not expected to find one so soon, but the second house they visited (the first was not appropriate, Toby's exact words being "How the hell am I meant to Heely on carpets?") was perfect. It was in a nice area, not too far from the centre of the city, but not right in the middle of the traffic either; it was detached so there would be issues of being arrested for being too loud; it had enough room so that they could have an office and a decent sized studio; there was a large backyard for the dogs and best of all, the floors were all wooden.
"Yeah, this is definitely going to work" Toby said to no one in particular, kneeling on the living room floor and rubbing his hand over the flooring. "Hardwood" he commented to the estate agent, knocking on it as he stood up. The estate agent looked at him blankly. "So when I roll, it won't mark. Non-marking flooring is essential" he got the same blank expression in response and in true Toby style, decided to elaborate instead of leaving it be. "See, wheels on my shoes" Toby smiled, lifting one foot to expose a wheel.
Justine seemed unaffected by Toby's childlike excitement surrounding the flooring and continued to wander around the large space, picturing where each piece of furniture would go; meanwhile, Toby began explaining why everybody should have Heelys while the agent smiled politely and uncomfortably. Justine had already accepted the fact that she and Toby had weirded out the man without even trying and there was no point attempting to redeem themselves now.
On meeting the estate agent, Justine was mostly recovered; all her bruises were gone, her stitches had been taken out and her ribs felt good, however, she was still wearing a luminous pink cast on her wrist which had been desecrated with "TOBUSCUS" scrawled across it in black sharpie. When the man had attempted to make small talk and had asked "Who is Tobuscus?" Toby had simply unzipped his blue striped hoodie and in the superhero style, shown him his green Tobuscus t-shirt, declaring he was the one and only Tobuscus. There had also been a dance and a brief rap as apparently the shirt was not proof enough.
If this had not freaked out the estate agent enough, they had brought the two dogs; they were well behaved enough but when the man had asked Justine the reason for naming the dogs what they had, she had gone into her unhealthy obsession with Steve Jobs and Apple products. This was supported by the fact she was currently wearing her hair in a side plait, held in with her i-Pod nano, and every now and then got out her camera and began talking to it.
"So?" the agent asked, coming up behind Justine, cutting Toby off midsentence. "What do you think?" he thought he may get slightly more sanity from Justine; he was wrong.
"I'm thinking that if we put the TV on this wall" Justine indicated a large wall to her left "then we could put the X-box underneath and there would still be room to play kinnect, without getting glare from that window" she pointed the patio doors "because it is murder trying to play Dead Space with glare"
"Literally" Toby piped in and the man once again looked at him blankly "If you can't see because of the glare, you'll get murdered"
"And those baby foetuses are fast!" Justine added.
"Erm…so…do you want the house or not?" the estate agent had nothing else to say.
"Yes" Toby and Justine said simultaneously.