All the girls had put their bags in their rooms. Karen had left with Mal so they wouldn't be late for their movie. Take-out was ordered because M'gann wasn't up to cooking dinner; the Team understood that so they substituted Chinese food for the regular homemade meals.
The food was delivered and everyone flocked to the kitchen to get their share before Bart did. Plates, cutlery, and cups flew to the table, courtesy of M'gann. Everyone grabbed their own plate and went about the open Styrofoam containers, grabbing what they wanted.
Once everyone got their share, some (Bart) more than others, they sat around the dining table. It vaguely reminded Avery of a family. A very rowdy and young family, but a family nonetheless.
Conner, who was sitting to Avery's right, nudged her with his arm. "Getting adjusted well?"
"It is a lot to take in if I am to be honest. I like it though," She amended and looked down at her plate. Three pieces of orange chicken were missing.
To her left, Bart sat minding his own business. The only sign of his lack of innocence was the slight bit of orange sauce on the corner of his mouth and not a bit of orange chicken on his own plate.
"Did you steal my food?" Avery asked.
"Nope." He grinned and plucked a piece of beef from his own plate, making a show of popping it in his mouth.
"Liar." She let it roll off her shoulders though.
The rest of the meal went without too much of an incident. There was, of course, Bart still nabbing food off of other's plates, but that was counted as normal behavior. Everyone put their plates in the dishwasher and it was turned on.
Before leaving, Nightwing made an announcement. "Black Canary's coming for training tomorrow at noon. Everyone be ready."
Mumbles of agreement rang through the kitchen as everyone went off to do their own thing for the rest of the night. Superboy went straight to watching static while everyone else headed off for their rooms. That earned a head turn from Avery but no question about it.
Avery went off to go start putting her new clothing away and take all the tags off. That took almost an hour in and of itself. Her closet was extremely organized when she finished though. Once that was done, she opened up the bag that held the bedding and sheets bought earlier in the day. As a rule of thumb she decided to wash all of that before sleeping on it. That would involve asking someone where the washer and dryer were.
So with her mission in mind she set off from her room to see if anyone was still awake. There wasn't any light coming from under any of the doors in the hallway. A good sign everyone was asleep.
"And off on my journey I go," Avery muttered to herself.
After wandering around for a while and getting veritably lost Avery found her way to the kitchen. Conner was in the living room, still watching the static on the television.
Avery cleared her throat to get his attention. "Excuse me?"
"Yeah?" He asked, eyes still on the television screen.
"Do you know where the washer and dryer are?"
He pointed to a small hallway without turning his head. "Through there."
"Thank you," she chirped and went to go see if she could even operate the machines.
With one glance at the controls on the washer she knew she was doomed. Modern technology is most defiantly not one of Avery's strong suits. It didn't help that this machine looked like something out of a movie based in the future.
Avery poked her head out of the door to the laundry room and could see Conner still sitting on the couch. "Can you help me, please?" she asked.
The Boy of Steel chuckled like he expected that. "Sure."
With a few swift steps he was in the room and in front of the washing machine. He pointed to a dial with three colored settings: cold, warm, and a mixture of both, "Water temperature." Then multiple other dials, "These control the amount of water put in, considering the amount of stuff you want to clean, the duration of the wash, and the speed of the cycle."
"That seems oddly simple for a machine that looks like it could take over the world as we know it," Avery mumbled under her breath.
"It's custom made at the least," Conner pointed out.
"Who custom makes a washing machine?" Avery had to ask that question.
"Batman," came the answer.
The younger teen shook her head, "That explains a lot."
"Usually does," Conner agreed. "So do you need any help with your stuff, or are you good?"
"Considering the possibility of ruining my bedding before I even sleep on it, yes, I would like some assistance. Let me just grab it quickly."
With that Avery ran from the laundry room and down two hallways to get to her room. There she quickly collected her sheets and bedding that got tossed in the corner when the realization that she wanted to wash them hit. So with all the bed covers in her arms she dashed back to the laundry room where Conner was still waiting.
"Is this all of it?" Conner asked jokingly.
"Yes," Avery's head nodded, although it could barely be seen due to the large pile of bedding that obscured her top half in general.
"All this can be done in one load, considering the colors," He said with the appraisal of the black sheets and the black and white bedding. He took laundry detergent off a nearby shelf and poured it into the machine. With that he put it on a cold, large load, with a quick spin cycle. "This should take about an hour."
"Thank you again," Avery said as she loaded the fabric into the machine.
"No problem, ready for a lesson in how to work the dryer?"
"Ready as I will ever be."
"This one is simpler." He pointed to a knob with numbers encircling it. "This is the duration of the drying time." He then pointed to a knob with words marking various speeds, "How fast the dryer spins." Finally a knob with more temperature designations, "And this one controls the amount of heat."
"Batman should start a Laundromat if the super hero gig does not work out," Avery mentioned off-handedly.
Conner shook his head with a smile on his face, "Just make sure to get some sleep, we've got training tomorrow."
A/N: This entire chapter is inspired by how much I need to get my laundry done. That and go grocery shopping. Well, I'm gonna go fail at basic life skills like usual. So while you read I'll be tripping up stairs or cleaning out my fridge of old food. Honestly, I never expect to be a rolemodel at this point. Enough of my ranting. Training chapter comes next.
Read. Enjoy. Review.