Matt

Chapter 7- The Apartment Search part 1

I can't believe it's Saturday already. I honestly didn't think I'd make it this far. Everyday has had its own new set of trials I had to overcome, and although I was able to triumph over them in the end, I'd be lying if I said that I was adjusting to my new surroundings. To be honest, I was actually starting to loose it a bit. I was still able to keep my cool, but internally I was pulling my hair out.

The chores I had to do the last three days definitely were less than fun. First, I had to help Stella with her garden. It wasn't a terribly large garden, but it definitely was the kind of garden only she would want to keep. There were none of the usual plants you'd find in a typical garden. This was not a vegetable garden, or a flower garden. No, this was a carnivorous plant garden. Every plant in it survived by devouring bugs in some way. There were several pitcher plants, plants that caught prey with sticky goo, and of course the famous Venus Fly Trap. To be honest, I actually thought it would be bigger, but the Venus Fly Trap is actually pretty small. I found the pitcher plants to be the most disturbing, seeing all the dead bugs floating inside them. Although Stella told me that her choice of garden was definitely motivated by trying something different, she was glad to find that it had the added benefit of reducing the amount of bugs they had to deal with around the house. She was actually quite proud of it.

There were of course other chores as well, such as cleaning out the basement. There I discovered that John had an interesting hobby that he liked to work on from time to time...wood working. John was apparently easily bored and he needed something to help expend all the extra energy he had. I was amazed a man at his age could be so restless, but nevertheless that pent up energy was there, and it needed an outlet. He made all kinds of things, from dressers and chairs, to whittling animal figures or some other weird folk art. It didn't matter, as long as it was wood. He would eventually put some of his stuff for sale to some small retailers that thought they could make money on his stuff. Anything he couldn't sell usually got stored in the basement...and there was a lot of stuff down there...

John finally decided to get rid of most of it, since it was taking up too much room for him to continue working, and it was my job to remove all that was going out the door. To no surprise, he refused to help me with any of it and made me do all the work, which really sucked since some of the furniture he made was pretty heavy. This of course did nothing to prevent John from reminding me that I needed to work faster. It was really starting to piss me off.

I remembered noticing a turtle that John had carved. It was pretty cute looking, and he had even gone through the effort of putting black marbles in for its eyes. John was going to throw it away, so I asked him if I could keep it.

"Sure, why not. You two have a lot in common anyway. You're both slow!"

After taking another insult to my work ethic, I put the turtle to the side, remembering to bring it to my room when I was done. I couldn't help but notice that John was a little less callous towards me afterwards, even allowing me to have a break. Was he happy over the fact that I liked a piece of his work? Perhaps he does have a shred of humanity...

It took me nearly all day to remove the furniture, wood sculptures, scrap and wood chips from the basement. I had to admit that when I was done, the place looked quite professional. John never did thank me for a job well done though. I guess that would be too much to expect from him. Well, that's not fair. Stella is nice enough to thank me and has done so before, so she's an exception I guess.

Weirdness be damned, Stella was the one thing keeping me going. To be honest, I'm starting to find her quirks rather charming. If Serena were half as sweet as she was, I would have thought about asking her out...never mind that thought. I think the stress is getting to me.

Speaking of Serena, of course she herself had stuff for me to do as well, although she didn't ask that I do them until after her dad was gone to go to work. Pretty much any chore she was supposed to do was now my responsibility. If I made any protest, she would guilt trip me by reminding me of all the favors she did for me during the last week. She even made me clean her room while watching me like a hawk to ensure I didn't see or touch anything that was off limits. I had hoped that I would find something incriminating during that, but Serena was sure to prevent that. Her computer was especially off-limits. Hmm...I might have to sneak in to her room and check it out one of these days. It would be nice if I could extort something out of her for a change, just to give her a taste of her own medicine.