My Brother's Best Friend - LGBT, boyXman

23

We arrived home to find a massive pile of flat-pack boxes outside the front door, sat on a scrap of tarpaulin.

“Is that our furniture?” I asked in disbelief. “That’s fast.”

“They did promise same-day delivery for items they had in stock,” David said, picking up the inventory list. “This is everything we ordered, except for the sofa. That’ll be delivered tomorrow, apparently.”

He looked at me and smirked at the expression on my face.

“Let’s just get the stuff inside, and we can deal with it tomorrow. Except the beds. We need those to sleep on.”

“You don’t say.”

We unlocked the front door and carried the tins of paint and bags of cutlery, towels and bed sheets into the kitchen, before hauling box after heavy box into the living room and stacking them against the walls.

“Right. These ones are furniture for the office, these two for the two bedrooms, this one for the living room, and this one for the dining room,” David said, taking control. “We’ll get the bed upstairs and get it in the master bedroom and put that one up first. Then we’ll get the mattress up.”

“Right…” I eyed the bed doubtfully.

Carrying it inside was one thing, but getting it up the stairs was another thing entirely. The box was about as big as me.

“Come on, Spud,” David said. “We’ll get this one up, and then you can eat and sleep.”

“Alright.”

Somehow, God knows how, we managed to haul the flat-packed bed upstairs and into the master bedroom.

We ripped open the boxes, sorted out the screws, nuts and bolts and got to work.

David mostly held things in place while I screwed them together with various bolts.

“If this falls apart, I’m blaming you,” he said grimly, struggling to hold the heavy headboard in place while I fastened it into securely.

“What’re you planning on doing on it?” I asked, glancing at him.

I saw him wiggle his eyebrows and blushed.

“Never mind,” I said quickly.

David laughed, making the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

“Go and fetch the mattress,” I grumbled, screwing the last bolt into place.

I fetched some bed sheets and two pillowcases while he hauled the mattress up the stairs, and we made the bed up.

I looked at my watch and sighed.

“Do we have to put up the other bed tonight, or can that wait until tomorrow?”

“It can wait if you don’t mind sharing,” David said.

“At this point, I’d share with a squirrel.” I yawned.

“Alright. I’ll order pizza for dinner. The phones should be back up and running by now.”

I heard him go downstairs and ring for our dinner.

I flopped down onto the new bed and closed my eyes. I was bone-tired.

A while later, I heard David coming back upstairs.

I opened my eyes when the scent of warm pizza flooded into the room.

David handed me the box and I opened it eagerly.

I moaned softly as I took the first bite.

We ate in a companionable silence, before David went to throw the box away.

We washed our hands and brushed our teeth before climbing into bed, exhausted.