Housemates

Chapter 18

They all moved boxes for a while. Mostly, Ellie did what she always did when she helped people move. She carried boxes sometimes, and put things in other boxes occasionally, and felt like she was helping, but really, she did a lot more standing around than she did packing and carrying, while other people decided what had to go, and in what order.

It was like helping anyone move, just with more fighting.

Most of the decisions seemed to require an argument, or a snide comment, or someone getting upset and leaving the room. An awful lot of them needed a half-packed box to be set aside until the other one could decide what needed to go into it.

Ellie felt uncomfortable. It awkward being there, trying to act normally, while Rose and Amanda bared their souls, and their pain, to each other.

In the end, to Ellie’s relief, Rose and Amanda stopped fighting, and just started avoiding each other. Rose did a lot of carrying, so she was outside, and Amanda did a lot of packing in one of the other rooms, just bringing boxes out to the pile near the door, then disappearing again. That seemed to work better for everyone, except when they ran into one another. Then there was usually another fight.

It would have been exhausting if Mia hadn’t been there too, grinning, acting like everything was fine, and it would have been exhausting if Rose and Amanda weren’t perfectly, impeccably, calm and polite to both Mia and Ellie. Even while they were being horrible to each other.

There also wasn’t that much to move, Ellie noticed. Mostly already-packed boxes. Most of the furniture was Amanda’s and was staying. Rose only had a desk, and an office chair, and some kind of antique dresser thing that had to go.

Mia and Rose started moving the desk, and Ellie followed along, rolling the chair, asking if they needed a hand.

Mia kept saying no, and telling Rose what to do, and Ellie couldn’t quite work out if Mia was showing off or just being useful.

She wasn’t sure that Rose knew either.

Rose let Mia micromanage lifting the desk into the back of the ute, even though all morning she’d been reacting very badly to Amanda telling her what to do. Even when it was something sensible like there’s a box behind you, don’t trip, which happened once. Maybe Rose was just angry with Amanda, Ellie thought, but maybe Rose was letting Mia have her moment, too, because Ellie was watching.

As if Rose was treating Ellie like Mia’s new girlfriend, who Mia needed to impress. Ellie thought that was quite interesting.

Mia and Rose went back inside, and got the dresser, and Ellie followed them again, this time with a lamp.

She’d wasn’t going to stay in the house on her own. Not when a fight could start and finish in the time it took Mia to go to the ute and back. Even when Rose was outside with Mia, Ellie wasn’t staying inside, in case Amanda started talking to Ellie about Rose. Which would almost be more awkward.

Ellie was getting used to how Rose and Amanda were, though. The squabbling still made her a little uncomfortable, but after a while she started becoming resigned, like Mia seemed to be. After a while, whenever Rose and Amanda started snapping at each other, Ellie just picked up the nearest thing and took it out to the truck, no matter what it was, then stayed out there for a couple of minutes, fiddling with the boxes in the back, sliding them around, arranging them more neatly.

It actually worked pretty well.

Sometimes she had to take whatever she’d carried out back in, because Mia looked, and said she thought it was Amanda’s, and then Ellie did. But Mia seemed to realize what Ellie was doing, because she always said it with a grin, and half the time Mia was carrying something back inside as well. Often enough that Ellie was pretty sure Mia was doing the same thing.

She was noticing Mia more today, watching Mia a lot. More than she ordinarily did when Mia was around.

She was looking at Mia as Mia went past.

While Mia was walking around.

With her legs.

Mia’s legs, that did what Mia’s legs did.

After a while Mia took her hoodie off and just wore her shorts and a tee-shirt. So Ellie took her own off too, just because.

So Mia could look at Ellie, like Ellie was looking at Mia. If Mia wanted to.

Ellie did, so she looked.

Once, when Mia bent over, Ellie looked down her top for a moment. She saw breasts, like she expected to see, but she didn’t see them quite the same way she always had before. She saw, and she got interested. She looked down Mia’s shirt, at the smoothness of Mia’s skin, and the curve of her chest, and the purple color of her bra.

She looked down Mia’s top, and suddenly realized she was seeing breasts as something interesting, something she wanted to look at. It was a surprise to her, because she’d never thought of them, though of anyone’s, as at all interesting before.

She hadn’t thought of them as anything other than just there, and a bit of a nuisance.

She didn’t know what was happening to her.

She looked away, before Mia noticed, and went back inside for more boxes. She carried them outside, quietly, unsure what to think.