Chapter 8

Settling In

(Wooo another chapter up! We're on a role! Hope y'all enjoy this one! ^^)

As soon as the two coltfriends had told their golden friend of the news she had immediately began to squeal in glee and proceeded to jump about the room. Mainly off the walls, literally. "Oh my gosh oh my gosh oh my gosh oh my gosh!" The mare cried, flapping her wings in excitement, which caused them to appear to be a gold and crimson blur. "This is the best day of my one thousand and twenty-three years of life!" Adhesive blinked in confusion, blue eyes wide. Circuit turned to him to calm him. "It's chill, she's half changeling, some kind of genetic thingy. Don't think too much about it, gives you a headache."

Ebony stopped for a moment to look at the mail stallion with a smile. "Eeyup! Genetics are weird, stuff canceled out and other things were created. Thanks mom and dad~!" Stamp blinked again. "Will you ever tell me about this weird stuff Circuit?"

"Nope."

Circuit sighed as he nervously sat on his couch, tapping his hooves on the coffee table nervously. He had no clue why he was so nervous. After all, he'd already gotten the hard part of actually asking Adhesive to move in, so he shouldn't still be worried about it, right? Wrong. He was terrified of actually moving the other stallion's stuff in. Not only was he worried about them living together, after all Circuit was kind of a mess when it came to actually taking care of himself, but he was worried he'd judge him for the state of disrepair his house was in. It wasn't his fault! He didn't have time to take care of himself, let alone his house. He'd done his best to make things look decent while he waited for the other stallion to arrive with his things, including shoving the rather embarrassingly large collection of dresses he owned into a dark corner in which Adhesive would never find them, but it still did nothing to calm his nerves.

Ebony on the other hoof, was busy in the kitchen once again, making lunch for all of them as they moved Adhesive's stuff in. "You know, it's funny, I spend more time here than I do at home most days. But, if I didn't, you'd never eat and probably starve." The mare chuckled, stirring some alfredo sauce for the spaghetti she was cooking. "Come on Circuit, relax, you've already shoved those rather expensive dresses in a heap in your closet. What else do you need to do hmm?"

"Burn them so he'll never discover my shame." He let out a groan, dragging a hoof down his face. "What am I gonna do if he finds out Ebs? He's gonna think I'm a big perv…" The stallion whined, flailing one of his hooves in the air. Ebony let out a sigh and clicked her tongue at the spoon, which was enveloped in magic and continued to stir the sauce. The mare then walked over to her friend and looked him in the eye. "Circuit, he won't care, do you really think I'd approve of him if he would do something like that? Besides, worst case scenario is you could just say they're mine and I needed extra closet space okay?"

"But they're not your size Ebony he'll knoooow!" He wailed, dragging out the last word as he rolled off of the couch. "Why did I think this was a good idea…? This place is falling apart, what if he hates it here..?" The 'pegasus' groaned as he pushed himself to his hooves. "Do you think I have enough time to tear down the entire place and rebuild it before he gets here?"

The mare let out a chortle, her green eyes shining with mirth.

"Sorry Circuit, but I don't think that'll work. Either way, remember when you had your first movie date here? You freaked out and all this other stuff, but he liked it here all the same. Do you know why? Because Adhesive was spending time with you." The crimson maned mare put a hoof gently on his shoulder to comfort him. "He's gonna like it here, I know it okay?

"Ughhhhhhhh why do you have to be right all the time?" The green eyed stallion whined, though he didn't actually sound all that upset by Ebony being right. He lightly batted at one of her ears as he flopped back onto the couch, covering his eyes with his free arm. "What time is he supposed to be here again..?" A knock on the door was his answer and Ebony smirked.

"Right now apparently, I'll get it~!" She said, her voice making a vibrato motion which made her voice sound sing-song. Ebony flapped her wings and flew up the stairs to open the door where Adhesive stood with a box in his arms and more at his hooves. "Hey Ebs, uh, can I come in?" She let out a chortle and nodded, enveloping half the boxes on the ground in magic making them levitate inside.

"Well duh, this is your house now too!" Circuit quickly scrambled to his hooves, pushing down the wave of nervousness that rose in his chest. He shot what he hoped was a warm smile at Adhesive, quickly grabbing one of the boxes.

"Here, let me help you guys with this. We can just pile everything in the living room for now and figure out where it'll go later." Adhesive nodded and hauled his box down the stairs, setting it by the couch. "Thanks, I don't have too many so it shouldn't take too long. I can pick up some little bits and bobs as we go on. Besides, the faster we get this done the faster we can eat!" He smiled warmly, his blue eyes shining. Ebony laughed and nodded. "We're having spaghetti and alfredo sauce for lunch, no meat I swear!" Circuit chuckled softly, grabbing another box before carrying the two downstairs to put next to the rest. With all three of them working on it, it wasn't long before they'd brought all of his boxes inside.

"Phew….Alright, why don't we eat first and then we can start on unpacking everything?"

"Sounds good to me!" Adhesive said happily before following Ebony to grab plates while she grabbed the food. After coming back, they sat down in the designated 'dining room' which was pretty much a small room next to the kitchen that had a table and four chairs. That was literally it, well, there was a light, that's all there was. "Ebony, why do you always say that there's 'no meat' in your dishes?" The blue eyed stallion asked, the golden mare went rigid.

"Uhhhh…. well, you see…" She was quickly interrupted by one 'pegasus'.

"Don't worry about it." Circuit quickly grabbed one of Adhesive's hooves, tugging him over to sit down next to him. "Just one of those quirky little Ebony things you don't need to concern yourself with. Let's just enjoy our meal, yeah?" His coltfriend nodded and then sent Ebony a 'we'll talk about this later' look. Said mare sat down and began dishing out portions of the food with a smile. "Anyway, since you two live together now, I'm guessing you'll be sharing Circuit's room, and his, bed?" Of course, right as the mare spoke Circuit had been in the middle of taking a drink. He let out a slightly strangled sounding noise, spitting water all over the table.

"E-excuse me!?" He spoke through his coughs, quickly grabbing a dish rag to clean up the mess he made. At the same moment, Adhesive turned bright red, his blue eyes wide. The pegasus smiled at the two's reactions. "Why yes, sleeping with a loved one is very calming, besides, who doesn't like cuddles at night?"

"O-oh..Right...That's what you meant I ah.." The dark coated stallion coughed a bit, his face reddening. "I knew that…" He quickly finished cleaning up the water, settling back down in his chair again. "I ah...I guess I'd be fine with that if you are Adhesive…" The stallion in question shook his head to clear it before nodding. "Y-yeah, I'd like that very much Circuit." Ebony just sat across the table with a smug, triumphant look on her face. "Hehe, I win."

"Yeah yeah whatever...Just eat your food woman." Circuit let out an embarrassed huff as he picked up his fork, twirling some of the pasta around it before shoving it into his mouth. He fell silent as he ate, too distracted with the food to bother holding up anymore conversation.

After the group ate, Ebony began to clean up in the kitchen while Circuit and Adhesive began moving labeled boxes to areas so that they could be unpacked. Currently, Adhesive was carrying a box labeled 'clothes' to Circuit's, well their, bedroom. "I'll just put this on the bed, do you mind if I start putting stuff in the closet? I have some extra hangers so you don't have to worry about that." He reached for the closet door and began to open it.

"Wait no!" Circuit leaped forward, quickly shoving the closet shut before he could open it any further. "I'll um...I can do that. W-why don't you uh...Go unpack something else?" The dark coated stallion stood in front of the closet, trying to give him his best innocent smile. The white stallion blinked before giving his coltfriend a look of confusion.

"Circuit, what are you hiding from me?" He took a tentative step forward and put his hoof on the closet door gently.

"Nothing! Why do you ask I'm not hiding anything why would I hide things from you?" The blue eyed stallion babbled slightly as he batted him away. "L-look it's not important okay why don't we just go unpack things elsewhere and not open this closet?" Stamp nodded and Circuit let out a sigh of relief and began walking to the door to grab another box. Without a word, the green maned stallion threw open the closet to reveal all of the frilly and girly dresses that Ebony had bought Circuit over the years.

Adhesive blinked. "This is what you were hiding from me?"Circuit immediately dropped the box he'd been holding, darting over in an attempt to shut the closet again.

"No no don't look at it!" He nudged Adhesive away before slamming the closet shut. His coltfriend shook his head in amusement before looking at Circuit in the eyes. "Babe, you don't need to hide this kind of thing from me, if it's something that makes you happy I'll support it. That's what love is, a-and I love you Circuit. I really really do."

"I…..I love you too…" Circuit smiled shyly at the other stallion, a light blush spreading across his face. The smile however, was quickly replaced with a pout. "A-and I don't like this for your information! Ebony make me do it!" He huffed, unwilling to admit that he sorta, kinda, just maybe, enjoyed the whole cross-dressing thing a bit. Adhesive let out a laugh, his eyes scrunched up in mirth.

"Seems like something Ebony would do!" At that moment, said changeling hybrid poked her head through the door. "What's something I would do? Oh, I see you found the dresses, eeyup, though you gotta admit all of the colors do work well with his eyes~!" She commented before disappearing once again to who knows where in the house. Circuit just let out a soft snort, rolling his eyes as he picked up the box he'd had earlier again.

"C'mon, let's just get this packing done…"