Disclaimer: I do not own nor do I claim to own any characters or concepts related to The Princess and the Frog. This is a nonprofit work of fanfiction.

Thank you so much to everyone for your kind words! And, of course, thank you so much simply for reading. :) (And haha, oh, thank you, Willofthewisp! Tiana's friendship with Charlotte is one of my favorite things from the movie, and yet I never seem to do anything with it. Erk.)

This story is set after the film.

Steady

What junk the Misters Fenner had left to rot on the second floor of the mill: boxes and boxes of it sequestered in the far corner, draped in cobwebs, layered with dust. The wan light streaming through the jagged holes in the roof wasn't much help, illuminating little more than the dust motes drifting aimlessly about them.

Naveen muttered something in Maldoniz that sounded suspiciously like an oath. She let it slide.

"Well," said Tiana. She squared her shoulders. "We'd best start clearing this out."

Grimly, Naveen rolled his sleeves higher yet upon his arms. Swamp water didn't much vex him, but dust did: he complained about the cobwebs in his hair and the dirt on his shoes, and the first time she'd handed him a broom he'd stared at it like he thought maybe the handle would tell him what to do. But for all his grousing he got it done eventually, tackling every challenge like he had something to prove. She supposed he did.

"I'm going to go get the brooms," she said.

She touched his shoulder, slid her hand down his arm. He turned reflexively into her touch. He smiled, the dust in the air swirling like a halo about his head.

"And I," he said, his smile souring, "will get started with this." He jabbed his thumb back at the boxes.

"Don't try to carry too much," she said. She rose briefly, to peck his cheek, then back down the creaking stairs she went.

The brooms she retrieved from the corner. She shook the cobwebs off the one -- no sense in dragging more of the stuff upstairs -- and when she turned around again, she spotted Naveen on the stairs, a box cradled awkwardly in his arms. He stepped carefully down, feeling for the next step, and she smiled; she smiled as his foot slipped and he staggered, falling against the railing. The aged wood groaned, relenting.

She ditched the brooms and lunged up the stairs, three steps, four steps, five.

"Tiana," he said, drawing out each syllable: a series of notes, rising in panic. The box teetered in his arms; it hauled violently to the left.

Seven steps and she was before him. She caught the falling corner of the box hard against her shoulder. The rest of the box followed shortly: she planted her feet and took the weight into her arms, let it settle against her chest.

"Tiana," he said, panic still thick in his voice. "Tiana, are you all right?"

She shifted her grip, adjusted her feet. "Just fine," she said, a little breathless. "Don't worry about me. I'm all right. You okay?"

"Yes, I am fine as well, but Tiana--" The step complained: he leaned forward.

"No, no, I've got it," she said. "Just let me get turned around."

Seven steps back down with the box heavy in her arms. Her shoulder ached where the corner had struck it and her heart pounded still, not so much against the stress of the box as the fleeting image she'd had of the railing splintering beneath him, of the wood caving and cracking and Naveen falling through that dusty air. One last step.

She dropped the box; a thin cloud of dust rose around it. She looked to Naveen standing yet on the stairs: not at all sure what she was going to say to him, not at all sure what she was going to do but maybe grab onto him and pull him down to solid ground and hold him against her.

He stepped down beside her. "Do you know," he said, wondering, "I could barely lift that? And yet you carried it like it was nothing. Like it was full of air instead of whatever it's full of. Rocks." He smiled at her. "You have a very strong arm, princess."

She wasn't in the mood to appreciate that echo or the sentiment that laced it. She said, "It's not that hard. You just have to know how to balance it." She gripped the front of his shirt.

"Ah," said Naveen, "another lesson."

"I thought you were going to fall," she said. Her fingers tightened.

"You would have caught me," he said. He covered her hands and leaned down, pressing his forehead to hers. "But I will be more careful next time."

This story was originally posted at livejournal on 01/22/2010, for livejournal user magpieinthesky, who purchased fic from me at help_haiti, a fandom auction to raise donations for Haiti in the wake of the earthquake disaster.