Work Text:
It is just a normal summer day. It isn’t so hot that only a beach day or eternal airconditioning can salvage the day, but it also isn’t so cold that it’s not really summer anymore. It is also grocery shopping day in the Golden Courtyard.
As it happens however, most occupants are currently out working if only to spite one particular tenant's habit of taking naps.
"Felis, I know you don't want to go, but I'm incredibly busy at this moment and you haven't gone in ages." Sakura barely spares a glance at Pardofelis' pleas to have someone take over the task before returning to her work.
The afternoon sun is at its best and Pardofelis does not want to spend that perfect moment doing tasks.
"But, but, Sakura-nee, you know no one likes me doing grocery shopping, right?" She tries, practically crawling onto the couch to catch the other's undivided attention, "I'm so much better at finding stuff or, like, even cleaning! Oh, wait! What about Hua, she's free, right?"
"With an upcoming deadline, yes." Sakura agrees easily, her voice flat, "However, you do know what will happen when she finds out you're shoving your tasks on her, right? Especially with these circumstances."
Pardofelis shudders then and glances away, "Yeah okay. Umm… No." she deflates then, pretty much resigning herself to her fate.
It is at that point that Pardofelis begins to think about what she can get out of this shopping trip. She gives a slow hum and smiles to herself. No one will complain if I buy all the good snacks.
"Felis." Sakura cuts through with a stern voice even before Pardofelis can make up her heist plan. "Only buy what's on the list, alright?"
"What? Of course I will, Sakura-nee." Pardofelis proclaims, standing straight and placing a hand over her chest, "You can count on both Pardo and Felis."
"Alright, please do then." Sakura calmly returns to her work, already typing away on her laptop again before she adds, "Everyone will be counting on you."
"Aye aye, Sakura-nee." Pardofelis gives a grin before hopping away to get prepared.
This will go wrong, won't it , Sakura can't help but think as she can hear Pardofelis chant a happy cheer of 'shopping trip, exciting shopping trip'.
Elsewhere in the Golden Courtyard, the youngest occupant of the villa is ambling around the house.
"Hmmm," Griseo sighs, "what should I do…"
Griseo has been cooped up in her room for a good while of the day by now—which is most definitely only so because Aponia isn't around to get her to step out for a bit—and as it stands, she's given up on making any sort of artistic progress for the day.
It's also one of the few days where literally everyone is busy around the house and Griseo has nothing to do herself.
You don't get bored easily in the Golden Courtyard, after all. That's something every tenant knew the moment they stepped into the villa.
Still lost in her musings, Griseo almost walks past Hua's room. Managing to catch herself, she stops.
The student is one of the four free people present and so, maybe Griseo can ask her for something to do.
Mind made up, the little artist knocks on the other's door, entering after being given quick permission.
"Oh, Griseo. Do I need to help you with something?" Hua immediately turns her attention to the girl even though, from the looks of it, she must be quite busy herself.
"Hmm… I thought you were free." Griseo mumbles, feeling a bit disappointed.
"I have some school work to finish up, yes. I'm sorry." Hua gives an apologetic smile.
"There's no one else around, right?" Griseo asks, a little deflated. Usually she'd be working on a comic or a commission or tagging along with Kosma, but since the latter isn’t home and she doesn’t have inspiration she simply has to look for something else to do.
"Ah," Hua perks up, bringing her hand to her chin in thought, "If I'm correct, I'm pretty sure Sakura and Pardo should be around." Hua offers after a second of consideration.
"Hmm." Griseo gives a hum, placing a finger to her lips in thought and nods, "Pardo will want to play."
"I'm sure she will." Hua gives a gentle smile in return before she seems to realise something. "Oh, but rather than anything else… It's grocery shopping day. You might still be able to tag along for that if you want to?"
"Shopping?" Griseo considers that and slowly nods her head, "Yeah… That seems fun." A small smile dawns on the girl's face, "Then, I'll go along." she announces before she immediately leaves again, softly closing the door to Hua's room.
It should be Sakura's turn, so… sending Griseo with her should be fine. Hua thinks to herself before returning to her assignment, reassured.
Little does she know that this is most definitely not the case.
After Griseo leaves the room she tiptoes her way down the staircase, hearing the shuffling in the hall.
"Ah, Pardo."
Pardofelis' head shoots up as she's busy collecting a concerning amount of shopping bags. "Oh, Griseo!" She perks up and smiles at the girl, "Do you wanna join me on the shopping trip? We'll get all the good stuff."
Griseo tilts her head as she completes her descent from the stairs, "The good stuff?" she asks, "what does that mean?"
"Uhh," Pardofelis gives a shrug, "Depends on who you ask, but in this case we'll be getting all the good snacks." she grins then—in such a way that it would make even Sakura drop everything and salvage the coming disaster—and collects the shopping bags after giving a one-over on the shopping list.
"Snacks?" Griseo echoes and smiles, "That sounds great." She picks up one of the bags then to help the Golden Courtyard's freeloader before adding, "But, ah… Mama Aponia said we need more greens yesterday."
Pardofelis gives a considering nod before she steps up to Griseo to whisper to her, "Mmmm, we'll get that too, but the snacks are definitely more important, understand?" Pardofelis points her finger to her lips and smiles.
Griseo gives a nod and echoes, "The snacks are the most important."
"Exactly." Pardofelis wholeheartedly agrees before giving a last check for all the necessities.
"Alright," She proclaims then, giving Griseo a smile, "Let's get this thing done!"
Griseo returns a smile and nods her head with a confirming hum.
And just like that, the two set out to get their shoes and leave.
It is after a while that Hua decides that it'd be a good time to take a break from writing her essay. She's been busy for a good several hours, after all.
As she walks through the corridors of the Golden Courtyard she notices once again just how silent it is in the house. Usually at least one person—mostly either Pardofelis if she wasn't napping or Vill-v—would be causing chaos but it was quiet for once.
It is nothing short of a miracle and yet, it’s more off-putting than anything. In between some probable near death experiences and the eventual hole in the wall or whatever, she'd almost become used to it. The chaos, that is.
Almost, because Hua will always at least try to be the voice of reason before anything else.
Shaking herself out of her musings she treads on towards the kitchen, firstly bypassing the living room.
"Ah," Someone speaks up and stops typing on their keyboard for a second, "Taking a break? Maybe I should as well."
"Hello, Sakura." Hua returns a smile, "I am. I can't really stare at my laptop for hours without a break." She gives the other a shrug and continues towards the kitchen after Sakura gives an agreeing hum before continuing with her work.
It is only as she is reaching for a cup that her thoughts stop.
Wait a second, she pauses and glances in the direction of the living room, if Sakura is here, then… Who did I send Griseo with?
All thoughts of a normal break pushed aside, Hua quickly walks back to the living room.
"Sakura, if you're here," She begins, already feeling something bad tingling in the back of her head, "then who went on the grocery trip?"
"Hm? Ah, I had an emergency with work so I sent Felis." Sakura easily tells her. And with that, Hua's stomach sinks.
"You… sent Pardo on the grocery trip?" Hua asks, a sense of horror creeping up. Sending Pardofelis by herself is already pretty much asking for trouble, but-
"I've sternly reminded her to buy what's on the list so we should at least be good for a while." Sakura offers slowly and slightly apologetically. She then inclines her head as she adds, "Although I can't say anything about what else she'll pull."
"Yeah, okay, that's fair, but… there's a bit of a problem…" Hua hesitates for a second before she adds, "I sent Griseo along because I thought you were doing the groceries."
At that, any sound of Sakura's keyboard is gone in an instant.
"You mean to say…" Sakura starts, a sense of horror creeping up in herself, "That Felis and Griseo are currently doing the grocery run?" The tone alone shows Hua that the thought alone was horrifying enough to Sakura, too.
"Apparently, yes." Hua confirms with a grave nod.
It’s quiet for a bit and everything wrong with this situation can be read from Sakura's face. Hua won’t be surprised if the expression is mirrored on her own face.
"We're… Doomed, aren't we?" Hua tentatively asks.
"Griseo and Felis?" Sakura shudders and immediately grabs her phone to message Pardofelis, sending an immediate message of 'I managed to find some time so I'll be coming your way to help so don't leave yet'.
"Aponia is not going to be happy about this." Hua mumbles. And the fact that the student immediately skips 'student crisis management' and immediately went to 'simultaneous resignation and panic' says a lot about the situation as a whole.
"Ok but… Shouldn't we give them a chance?" Hua then offers meekly. She’s giving a wry smile, desperately trying to think of the chance that things might just go well.
"Do you remember what happened when we sent those two to get ice cream during our beach day last summer?"
Hua pales at the reminder of that very near disaster—and internally thanks Kevin for being a problem solver—and nods, "Okay, fair enough. We're going to have to do damage control."
It is at that moment that Sakura's phone beeps with a message.
"'No need! We're doing super well over here!' that's what it says…" Sakura reads and grimaces.
With Pardofelis, such a sentence can mean literally anything. The worst being that she decided to just… steal things.
Hua grimaces at that thought. Her frown only deepens as she’s reminded of the fact that Griseo is there, too.
"I really don't know what to make of this." Sakura sighs, rubbing her temple, "I don't actually have the time to check up on them like this either."
"You don't have to worry about that, Sakura." Hua quickly reassures her, "I'll reconfirm with Pardo about everything, alright? You can just focus on your work."
Sakura gives the student a grateful smile, "Thank you. I apologise for this, I know you'd rather be working on your essay, too."
"Oh, no. It's fine, really, I can take care of this." Hua gives the pink haired woman a smile and leaves her to her work once again.
Having returned to the kitchen, Hua gives a sigh and gets out her phone to call a certain task-avoiding freeloader.
At least the other is good at picking up her phone.
"Hua? Is something up ?" Pardo easily answers, probably in record time, too. In the background of the line, a lot of chatter and rattling can be heard.
"I apologise for calling right after Sakura sent you a message," Hua lets a slight silence fall, considering how exactly she’s going to word the issue, "but she's a bit worried about how everything's going since Griseo went along with you."
"Griseo ?" Pardo echoes and gives a delighted laugh, " Griseo seems to be enjoying herself. She's helping out with getting stuff from the list ."
The list ? Hua's mind halts for a second, already surprised about the fact that Pardofelis is even considering the list and not just… buying whatever seems like a good idea to buy.
"Oh, that sounds great." Hua can’t help but smile at the fact that Griseo seems to be enjoying herself, "She seemed a little bored earlier so I'm glad she's having fun now."
"Hmhm, she really is ." There is a sense of cheer and calmth to Pardofelis' voice that is decidedly… unusual indeed. Maybe Sakura's reminder worked well?
Even so, this is just what Griseo's doing. Hua can’t help the sliver of doubt that is still in her mind.
There's a reason, after all, that Pardofelis doesn't often do grocery runs.
And Hua likes the other, really she does, but she'll just have to agree on the grocery shopping thing.
And the fact that the banned Pardofelis and Griseo combo is now taking care of the grocery run is just making it worse.
"How are you doing then?" Hua decides to ask anyway.
"Well, I think I may have overestimated the amount of bags I was gonna need, but… We're gonna get a good haul, I'm sure of it ." Pardofelis' cheerful answer comes through and… that really doesn't help.
Hua takes in a very deep breath, holds it for a second, and breathes out again.
"Alright." She calmly answers. "But, are you sure you don't need any help over there? I could come over-" almost as soon as she starts, she gets cut off,
"Ah, no no no no !" Pardofelis immediately rushes to stop Hua, almost with a panicked voice, " Everything's completely fine I swear! We're handling it, really.
"So, like, uh… You can finish your essay !" Pardofelis exclaims and adds, " So you don't need to come over, everything's good ."
That just makes everything sounds so much more suspicious, Hua can only really blink in silence before she catches herself and presses on, “Are you sure?”
“Yes, absolutely! I’m completely sure so don’t worry. ” Pardofelis returns without pause before immediately adding, “ Now, I’ll be continuing the run so I’ll see you later, okay? Okay bye- ”
“Pardo-”
Leaving no room for Hua to cut in, the line was cut. Hua can only sigh in return.
We really are doomed.
Pardofelis immediately cuts the line off and sighs, “Phew, that was very close.” She pockets away her phone and mumbles, “This way, no one will complain that I’m just shoving my tasks onto others and Hua won’t get mad either.”
With Sakura’s reminder of how Hua would most definitely get annoyed with Pardofelis if she attempted to shove her task onto the student, Pardofelis had gotten reminded of the singular case of Hua actually snapping. That sure was a day and Pardofelis would really like to avoid being the reason for Hua snapping.
“What was that?”
Blinking out of the image of Hua chasing Pardofelis down to create Pardo and Felis, she turns around. “It’s nothing.” Pardofelis assures the other, “Hua just called to make sure everything was going well. She asked if she should come to help but I told her we’re doing super well.
“I mean she’s busy with her essay and all and today the groceries are my responsibility.” Pardofelis gives a proud smile at the way she managed the call.
“Didn’t Sakura just now ask the same thing?”
Pardofelis shrugs as she moves to add the spicy sauce Vill-V had requested—also reminding herself to watch out for any odd flavors to her food for the coming while—and adds it to the shopping cart, “I assume they’re worried, or something. I mean, I guess Sakura-nee didn’t really know Griseo was coming along?” Pardofelis questions. An understanding hum followed.
“But to call right after the message?”
Pardofelis tilts her head then, thinking about it. The fact that Sakura had messaged in a rush like that, even willing to drop her work… That wouldn’t normally happen in any normal case… unless…
“Ah…” Pardofelis’ eyes widen just the slightest bit and she gives a sheepish smile, rubbing the back of her head as she reminds herself of that one ‘incident’ (though, frankly, nothing had really gone wrong in Pardofelis’ opinion), “I think they don’t know you went along, Su, and… well, Griseo and I are a banned task combo.”
Su slowly turns to her and gives an agreeing nod, “That is probably the reason, yes.”
It was right as Pardofelis and Griseo had been about to leave, that a voice called out to the two.
“Pardo, Griseo, are the two of you going out?”
Pardofelis quickly turns around, practically jumping in her place, “Su!” She blinks, lets out a breath—she absolutely did not get jumpscared just then, no way—and gives a nod to the doctor, “Yes, Sakura placed me in charge of the grocery run and Griseo’s tagging along.”
“The two of you are doing the grocery run?” Su echoes, already sounding doubtful at best.
Griseo gives a nod and smiles, holding up one of the shopping bags, “Yea, we’re gonna get all the good stuff!”
Su seems to stare at the pair for a good while—and also far more sternly towards Pardofelis—and during that time, Pardofelis turns her head away and gives a decidedly suspicious laugh. “Y-yeah! That’s right. We’re totally gonna make this a good haul.”
“Right.” Su comments. “Do you mind if I go along?” It is quite literally the only solution he can think of. Not only will Pardofelis most definitely be a bad influence on Griseo, Pardofelis is also most definitely not planning to get the proper groceries.
“You’d go?” Pardofelis asks, a bit too excited for Su’s liking, “Then in that case I could just stay here, right?”
Ah, of course. “I’m quite sure Sakura would not be happy if you delegate this task to me since she entrusted you with it.” Su tells her calmly.
“Ugh…” Pardofelis basically sags and sighs deeply, “Alriiiight-” she groans, drawing out her answer. And even though she really, really doesn’t want to be doing any task, she’ll have to admit that it’s not as terrible as it could be considering she’s not alone in it.
And while Pardofelis has to resign herself one last time to having to do tasks, Griseo just seemed happy that she’d have more people to hang out with.
“I’ve found the milk.”
The announcement from the little artist makes Pardofelis and Su turn to the girl. Griseo’s giving a small but beaming smile as she holds up the bottle of milk.
“Oh- that’s a great job, Griseo!” Pardo grins at the girl as she beams at the praise. “With this, we’ve crossed off the biggest part of the list. That’s amazing!”
“Indeed it is.” Su calmly comments, taking a look at the list—somehow with his eyes still closed—and nods, “The rest of the items on the list should be close to each other, so we should be able to finish up in no time at all.”
“Ohh-” Griseo’s eyes light up, “Did we break the record?” the girl balls her fists in excitement.
At the comment, Su blinks, confused. “Did we have such a thing?”
“I mean, obviously.” Pardofelis comments, placing a hand on her lip and leaning—probably precariously—against the shopping cart before raising a finger next to her head, “The Golden Courtyard grocery run, pun intended,” Pardofelis gives a dramatic cough and announces, “current placeholder are:
“In first place the Sakura and Kalpas team-up, truly a terrifying combination. In second place we have Sakura, Hua and Su through insane efficiency. And on the third place Vill-v and yours truly, although I am legally required to say this is because we were kicked out of the store.” Pardofelis gives a shrug and adds, “I don't think we’ll beat those records, but! We’ve certainly had fun, right, Griseo?”
“Mhm.” The girl nods and gives a satisfied hum, “I had more fun than I thought I’d have. Can we go again sometime?”
“Of course!” Pardofelis immediately answers before realising (again) that there are three of them and turns to Su. The latter sighs before nodding calmly, “I’m sure that can be arranged.”
“Ugh,” Pardofelis groans—pretty much out of nowhere—and the others give her a questioning glance.
“Is something wrong, Pardo?” Griseo asks, tilting her head.
“Ah.” Pardofelis gives a nervous laugh, placing her hand against the shopping cart and glancing away, “It’s nothing, just… you know, we’ve bought a load and… we have to take everything along and clean it up.”
“Of course you’d be worrying about this.” Su merely sighs and shakes his head, “We’ll be finished in no time if we simply do everything right after we return.”
“I mean sure, but…” Pardofelis trails off then, trying to make up an excuse to just not have to do that particular part of this chore.
“Don’t worry, Pardo, I’ll help out too!” Griseo raises her fists to her chest and looks straight at Pardofelis, “and after that we can take a nap on the couch.”
Pardofelis twitches, her attention having been caught as it always does when her favorite afternoon activity is mentioned.
“Alright…” Pardofelis sighs and gives a chipper nod, the corners of her mouth turning up again, “Then let’s check everything out and finish up.”
Delighted laughter can be heard while Hua sits on the couch, her face buried in her hands.
“I’m so sorry but this really is the funniest way you could have messed up.” Elysia’s giggles fill up the empty space. Almost immediately after Elysia returned, the busy duo had to explain why exactly they looked like the universe was ending.
What followed had been, well… Elysia’s laughter.
Next to Hua, Sakura crosses her arms and sighs deeply, “This mistake will not be made again.”
“It isn’t your fault, Sakura,” Hua quickly says, lowering her hands onto her lap and looking at the other, “I should’ve made sure you were actually going to do the groceries before sending Griseo along.”
“Now, now, before the two of you can go on for hours about whose fault this is,” Elysia starts, giving another chuckle as Hua’s cheeks redden and her hands come up to hide it once again, “I feel like there’s a simple solution.” Elysia crosses her arms and points one hand up.
“Oh?” Sakura perks up, “Let’s hear it then.”
Elysia’s smile widens and she winks at the two women, “The two of you will have to buy anything we miss out on because of this later~”
And as a student, as always very eager to get as much as they can for as little as possible, Hua immediately calls, “Objection.” and stares at Elysia, “Pardo is an adult and should be able to normally handle grocery shopping, she has to go along.” At it, Sakura inclines her head while Elysia hums.
“That does seem fair.” Sakura agrees slowly and opens her mouth again, before a door can be heard and a loud voice calls out,
“We’re back!”
Hua grimaces and stands up, mumbling, “please don’t let the damage be too bad…” which naturally only makes Elysia giggle more.
You can say about Elysia what you want, but that woman truly thrives on chaos.
The first to enter the living room to check up on the others is Griseo, who has taken along one of the lighter shopping bags.
“Ah, Griseo. You’re back I see.” Elysia smiles and walks up to the girl as she puts the bag down on the table, “How was it~?”
“It was a lot of fun.” Griseo smiles while in the background, Sakura and Hua pale, “Also, welcome back, Ely.”
“Aww~ thank you, Griseo.” Elysia gives the girl’s shoulder a squeeze before she peers into the shopping bag. She smiles to herself then, “Oh? I see you’ve managed to buy a lot of snacks~”
Elysia just barely manages to catch Hua’s ‘oh no’ and just barely manages to restrain herself from laughing—after all, even if everything did go completely wrong, they’d just be able to order take-out anyway—while Griseo nods.
“Yeah, there are,” the girl confirms, “there were a lot of them on the list after all.”
“The list?” Sakura can’t help but ask, half surprised it had even been mentioned at all by Pardofelis.
“Yeah… Pardo said we had to get all the stuff from the list so that everyone would be happy.” Griseo explains sagely.
“Oh really…” Hua comments slowly, somehow getting even more worried when things seem to have gone at least a little well.
Because doesn’t that mean that she’d have done half a good job so Pardofelis could get away with anything else she’d have pulled.
From the increasing frown on Hua’s concerned face to the resignation on Sakura’s, well… Elysia definitely took a picture right then.
“So… everything went well?” Hua tentatively asks, clearly walking on egg-shells if only to not have to hear any ‘bad news’.
It’s at that exact moment that Elysia can’t hold back her laughter anymore and bursts out in full-blown giggles. The giggles soon turn into full-out laughter. “Oh my, this is just too much-” she giggles again, leaning one hand against the table for support, “Look at you two, so worried about everything going wrong.”
Hua turns a flat look on Elysia as she seems to be getting next to no air with her new burst of laughter. Sakura merely sighs, immediately grasping the other pink haired woman’s delight when two others enter the living room with the rest of the shopping bags.
“I’m so sorry,” she’s most definitely not, “but it was just too funny to see you worry when everything was going well anyway.”
One look and Hua seems to realise the same thing. “I… forgot you were home at all.” She comments, rubbing a hand over her face while Elysia continues giggling. At that, Hua’s eyebrow twitches and she turns on the pink elf, “You could have told us!” She accuses, placing her hands on the table and leaning forward.
“Oh, I would have-” never, actually, “But it was just too amusing to watch, really.”
The student sighs, deeply, and rubs her temple, “Why do I live here, again? I could have chosen a place I wouldn’t even have to worry about any of this.”
Elysia’s smile softens then and she walks over to Hua, putting her hands on her shoulders so she’s giving the other a side-ways hug, “It’s because you love us too much, right~?” and even if a part of the chaos was caused by Elysia, Hua can’t really help but return a smile.
“I’m sorry about this, I thought you knew, initially.” Su comments, then.
In the background Pardofelis seems to be mumbling about this excessive lack of trust in her being absolutely shocking and unfair, but that part gets ignored.
“It’s alright,” Hua sighs, “I‘ll admit to being a little too worried about all of this.” She offers Su a shrug while the corners of her mouth turn up.
“Then, since everything with my work has been handled, why don’t I make a feast for tonight?” Sakura offers with a serene smile.
How the woman manages to be able to calmly handle the chaos in the Golden Courtyard, Hua will never know. But at least, as the woman is an elder sister, she knows how to keep everyone satisfied. There’s a similar caring air to the woman as the one Aponia holds.
Truly, Sakura proves to be the backbone of their sanity.
Hua smiles then while Pardofelis cheers, “Yes, that would be great. And if you don’t mind, I’ll help you out.”
“I won’t say no to any help.” Sakura agrees.
“Then, that means I’m free to take my nap now.” Pardofelis grins, stretching herself out and giving a satisfied hum.
“That’s right,” Su agrees, “but only after we’ve put away the groceries, Pardo.” Su calmly informs the freeloader, who immediately complains,
“Oh, come on-”
Truly, life did not want her to have that nap that day.