AN: Time for a chapter with some humor mixed in. It's gonna start off serious, but just wait until the seamstress comes in, and the boys get a surprise guest…this is gonna be fun!
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"So…what do ya think?"
Mush didn't answer for a moment- he was busy running his hand down the carved bedpost. His eyes had to be the size of dinner plates. "I..I just…um…wow…" he stuttered, sitting down on the edge of the bed. I laughed, and he looked hurt. "What?" he snapped.
"Oh, nothing."
I sat down beside him. Another awkward silence.
"You already miss him, don't you?" I asked.
"Well, I…yeah. I do."
"I'm sorry."
"It ain't your fault."
"Yes it is. I dragged you here."
"Hey, if I didn't wanna come, I wouldn't have come. It's just…"
"You miss him."
"Yeah."
He stood up and opened his bag, pulling out his clothes and stuffing them into the top drawer of the dresser. I sighed deeply. "Do you think it was worth it?"
He laughed, more of a thoughtful sound than an 'I thought that was funny' sound. "It was worth it."
"Ya mean that?"
"Yep. I don't say anything I don't mean."
"Unless you's-" I stopped dead. I couldn't say it. He put down the shirt he had been messily folding.
"Hawkin' da headlines." He finished gently, a smile on his face.
"Yeah." I managed to choke out.
He was about to speak again when a knock on the door made us both jump about a foot in the air. "Boys? The seamstress is here." Robert said from the other side, and I jumped up and opened the door. A very tall woman that was obviously overweight waddled in, a basket tucked under one arm.
Robert didn't come in- he only smiled and said, "Now you two behave and do what she tells you to, okay?"
The lady slammed the door in his face, and I shot a helpless look at Mush as she looked at me from head to toe.
"Much too skinny. What have you been eating, boy? Bread and water?"
"Well, basically."
She shook her head, then grabbed a chair and dragged it to the center of the room. "Stand on this. You're tall, but not that tall."
I hesitated, and she obviously didn't take well to that, because she exploded at me. "What are you waiting on, the Indians to come back and claim New York? I said get up there! I have a job to do, and one day to do it!"
I didn't hesitate this time. I stepped up onto the chair, and she pulled out a measuring tape, still mumbling about how kids were lazy and never got anything right until you said it five times.
"Where's your waist?" She suddenly asked.
"What?"
"Your waist, child! You know, where you button your pants? Oh, nevermind…"
She lifted up my shirt and grabbed the waist band of my pants, keeping me from jerking away as she hooked the top of the measuring tape on my pants and unrolled it all the way down to my ankles. "These pants are much too short for you. I'll see that you get new ones…ones that don't have dirt all over them." She said as she rolled it back up. "Now take off your shoes and socks and get down off of there. Come on, hurry!"
I did as I was told as fast as humanly possible, fuming at Robert silently for leaving us alone with this mentally disturbed woman.
The seamstress pulled out a metal plate with a ruler taped to it, then grabbed my foot and set it down on the plate, which was freezing cold. "Hold still! It's not going to bite you." She demanded, and I noticed that Mush was trying his hardest to keep from laughing hysterically and almost failing. You'll get your turn, I thought to myself as she did the same to my other foot.
She stood up and unrolled the measuring tape, wrapping it around my waist and muttering to herself about how skinny I was. She proceeded to measure my arms and my chest and even my neck and my wrists- I didn't even want to know what she needed to know that for.
"Alright, your turn. Get up on that chair." She said to Mush, and he knew better than to take his time. "You're much too skinny as well! I hope they start feeding you two!" she said, poking him in the stomach and practically making him topple over backwards.
She proceeded to put him through the same things that she had put me through, and when she was done she left without even saying goodbye, slamming the door and still muttering about speaking personally with the cook before she left. Mush and I didn't even get a chance to sigh in relief before another knock at the door broke the moment of silence. Mush opened the door, and a short, balding man walked in, a huge and kind of scary smile on his face and a brown bag hanging from his shoulder.
"Okay! Let's see what I have to work with!" he exclaimed, and then he pushed Mush back so he was sitting on the chair that the seamstress had us standing on. He proceeded to run one of his hands through Mush's hair, scaring him to death.
"What are you doing?!" Mush yelled, slapping the man's hand back.
"Oh, Robert must have forgotten to tell you that I was coming." He stepped back and bowed deeply. "I am Enrico. I am the family's hair stylist. Master Geoff asked me to come up and do what I can with you."
"A…hair stylist?" I asked in disbelief, raising an eyebrow.
"Yes! The best in Manhattan!" He turned his attention back to Mush's hair. "You really have beautiful hair, wonderful natural curl…it just needs a good scrubbing." He said, inspecting Mush's hair. He then pulled Mush out of the seat and motioned for me to sit down. I did so, a bit nervous about this guy pulling my hair.
He ran a hand through my hair, and then looked at his hand as if it were covered in slime. "What have you been using to wash your hair?"
"Um…water…"
"Just water?"
"What else is there? Mud?"
He scowled a moment, then grabbed me by the arm and grabbed Mush by the sleeve. "Come on, you two. To the sink. You both need a good scrubbing. I'm going to teach you both how to wash your hair, because you obviously don't know how!"
He dragged us into the bathroom and proceeded to scrub our hair with a variety of strange smelling oils, and by the time he was done both of us looked like drowned rats and I had a pounding headache from having my hair pulled at so much, not to mention the strong scent of 'shampoo' killing my sense of smell by the second.
"When your hair dries, you'll both look like a million dollars." He proclaimed as he set out a myriad of bottles on the nightstand. "I want you both using these every other night in your hair. No excuses. Am I understood?"
"Yes, sir." We both answered simultaneously.
"Good. I'll be back to check on you and refill those bottles next week. You boys have a nice day." He walked out, and both Mush and I collapsed backward onto the bed.
"What time is it?"
"I don't know. Feels like we were in there for hours."
Mush lifted his head just long enough to look at the clock, and then he let it fall back onto the bed. "It's almost three. We were in there for an hour and a half."
"Oh my God…"
"Yeah. Me too."
I don't know how long we laid there just catching our breath after all that. I just know that my headache slowly faded, and I was looking forward to dinner. All this excitement left me famished, even more than selling papers all day would've.
AN: Haha…that was fun. I liked writing that chapter. Poor Mush and Skittery…I had a similar experience at a hairdresser. She hated my hair for no obvious reason and decided to 'teach me' how to wash it. Ugh. I ended up with a headache too. ^__^ Anyways…you've read, now review!
