Work Text:
Murphy Residence: 5:52 am
Brigette woke up to the sound of a glass shattering on the floor somewhere in the house. She might not have woken up to it at all if it wasn't for the fact she was already beginning to stir, as she'd gotten used to sleeping through weird sounds. Early morning light was filtering through the shredded curtains (rogue blender, hadn't had time to replace) signaling that it was in fact time to wake up. Martin was snoring softly. Through the dim light she could make out the shape of the closet doors, hanging precariously off its hinges, threatening to knock them out. A small hole in the wall, the size of Diogee’s head, sat just next to the window.
Brigette scanned the room for clocks. The wall clock had fallen to the floor (again) and seemed to have cracked. The alarm clock on Martin's nightstand appeared to have a rock smashed into the top of it, (That explained the hole in the wall), and rolled to the side of the table (probably knocking a water glass to the floor in the process). A few feet to the right and it would have been Martin's head (or hers). Murphy's Law was strange that way, it never really seemed to go all the way at night. It'd damage property, come precariously close to crushing them in their sleep. But only rarely did anything serious (relatively speaking) happen while they slept.
Despite the uncertainty as to the exact hour, Brigette figured she could spare a few minutes before she got going on her day. She sat and watched her husband, still obliviously snoozing away. It may have been risking certain injury to share a bed with him, but she wouldn't have it any other way. Martin was a heavy sleeper. This had once surprised her, that he would just sleep through catastrophe, that he wasn't constantly aware, always prepared for danger and never vulnerable to it. But she quickly realized that he had to sleep soundly, or he'd never sleep at all.
But still, it was probably time for her sleeping beauty to rise, and so she began to shake him gently, "Martin, dear, it's time to wake up,"
Martin groaned, and turned away from her, burying his face in his pillow, "Murphy's Law was pretty light last night" she continued.
"Does this alarm clock have a snooze button,” he grumbled rolling back towards her.
"The one that did was of last night's few casualties," she informed him.
Martin pulled himself up and looked at his nightstand, a sparking mess of an alarm clock atop it, "I don't know why I even bother,"
"I thought that's why you married me."
Martin chuckled, "To be my alarm clock? I thought I married you because you’re pretty handy with a screwdriver, helps keep the house in one piece," and leaned in for a kiss. Brigette moved in close to him, and the outlet the alarm clock was plugged into began to spark.
"I'll go flip the circuit-breaker" Brigette said practically flying out of bed towards the basement.
"Thanks Honey," Martin said, flying out of bed himself (off the foot of the bed, avoiding the glass shards) and towards for the fire extinguisher on their wall. Just in case.
"Maybe next time we should try battery powered" Brigette suggested.
"Why do that when I have you?" Martin said. Brigette gave him a smile and left the room.
However, before she could make it down the stairs she heard the familiar sound of something collapsing from Milo’s room. Circuit-breaker momentarily forgotten; she knocked on Milo’s door.
"Come in!" he called.
Brigette opened the door, to find Milo digging through his closet, which looked as though it had a tiny tornado rip through it (which was perfectly plausible). Milo already being awake wasn’t unusual, as he liked to prepare for the day.
"Good morning, Mom,"
"Good morning, Milo, just making sure you're awake,"
"Yep, just looking for my rubber boots!" he said, backpack open beside him.
"Alright then, I better get moving too before the house catches on fire,"
"What’s on fire?"
"Nothing yet, broken alarm clock its sparking?"
"Okay," Milo nodded unfazed.
Brigette began to leave, but quickly stuck her head back in, "Oh, and I just bought granola bars, be sure to grab some,"
"Oooh, s’more?" Milo asked.
"Yep,"
"Thanks mom,"
"Of course, anything for my favorite son,"
“Moooom,”
Brigette started leaving for real, but before she could close the door behind her, Diogee ripped through beneath her feet.
"Diogee!" Milo exclaimed, "Good Morning Diogee, but I..."
Diogee started digging through Milo's closet making the mess worse.
"Come on Diogee!" Brigette called. Diogee reluctantly left, but as soon as he was out in the hall made a beeline for the Master Bedroom. Brigette carried on downstairs towards the circuit breaker.
"Diogee?" Martin asked, as Diogee leapt onto his bed, and began burying himself in his sheets.
"Hey, you know you're not supposed to be on our bed," Martin said shooing him off and away from the still sparking wall outlet and alarm clock.
DIogee whined.
“Oh you want breakfast do you?”
Diogee barked in affirmation.
“Yeah, yeah, give me a minute,” Martin said, digging through his closet for anything suitable for wear in a professional environment sorting through holes and stains.
The sparking stopped, and the lights went out in his room.
“Looks like I can take care of that now,” Martin said, grabbing a pair of rubber gloves from a drawer, and then pulling the plug on the Alarm clock. He left the alarm clock standing on the charred (from a completely unrelated incident), nightstand.
“Glad I didn’t need you, you’re expensive to replace.” Martin patted the fire extinguisher in satisfaction, but the Fire Extinguisher, seemingly had other plans, and exploded, widening the pre-existing hole into a Diogee sized hole.
“Never mind then,” Martin said, and turned towards Diogee, “So how about some food Diogee,”
"Oh, looks like your almost out of food... should have added that to the grocery list yesterday... oh well, I'll pick some up on my way home"
Diogee barked impatiently, unconcerned with Martin's musings.
“Alright alright, here you go,” Martin said pouring the food into Diogee’s bowls.
“Good morning dad!’
“Morning Milo!”
Milo went over to the fridge and pulled the milk out, unscrewed the cap and gave it a whiff.
"Hey, it's still good!" he told Diogee.
Diogee barked.
"Cereal for breakfast!" He said, grabbing the cereal supplies on the counter.
"Has the fire been averted," Milo asked his dad.
"Yep, it was an alarm clock"
“Did it at least wake you up this morning?”
“No, your mom did. Well Milo, An alarm clock is only as useful as it's defenses.”
The fire alarm suddenly went off.
"I stand corrected,” Martin said, grabbing the fire extinguisher from beneath the kitchen sink.
Sara woke up to the fire alarm, like she did almost every morning. The only reason she set an alarm, was because she knew the day she shut it off the fire alarm wouldn't go off. If she had it her way she'd sleep for another half hour.
Technically she didn't have to wake up so early due to the high school's later start time, and the fact she didn't have a bus to (attempt) to catch.
She may not have had Murphy's Law, but that didn't make her lucky. Especially not lucky enough to counteract her brother and father.
So when the fire alarm went off, she just lied in bed, listening for someone yelling for her too evacuate, but when that never happened she just rolled back over. But it wasn’t long before she rolled out of her Dr. Zone themed comforter, shuffled out of her room, and towards the kitchen, messy hair and all.
"Oh, Sara, Good Morning" Martin said, running his hand under the faucet, his sleeve lightly scorched.
"Good morning," she returned, scanning the morning chaos, and noticed Milo munching away on his cereal unbothered.
She grabbed a bowl from the cupboard, and went to the counter to get the cereal. She set the bowl down, and leaned over to plant a kiss. By the time Milo realized what she was doing it was too late.
"Ew, Sara!" Milo cried, wiping his head.
"Just showing my little brother how much I love him, besides you were overdue,"
"I wasn't aware kisses were something that were on a schedule" Milo was complaining more on principle than actually upset at the unexpected display of affection.
"Big sister kisses immunize against loneliness," Sara said, pouring herself a bowl of cereal.
"I aware that was something I was at risk for,"
"Can never be too safe,"
"Can never be too safe," Milo grumbled in return, shifting his backpack on his shoulders, "If you excuse me I actually have places to be," Milo downed the last of his cereal.
"Well unfortunately for you the fire alarm woke me up,"
"Just because Murphy's Law is annoying doesn't mean you need to be,"
"Hey," Sara said in mock offense, "I'm delightful, you are so lucky to have a big sister like-"
Suddenly a sound of crashing came from the stairs, startling the siblings from their petty argument.
"I'm okay!" Martin called. No one bothered to respond.
Milo picked up his dishes and set them in the sink (they had a dishwasher, but it rarely worked), and headed to the bathroom.
Milo pulled a brand-new toothbrush out from under the sink (last night his brush had been dunked in the toilet). He grabbed the half-used tube of toothpaste from the cabinet and went to place some on his brush. It didn’t come out.
Milo, with great familiarity began to shake and squeeze the tube and poking at the opening, hoping to unclog it. Ultimately it ended with a giant glob of toothpaste on his hand. Milo scooped a tiny bit of it onto his toothbrush and shook the rest down into the sink. He brushed his teeth, hand still sticky with toothpaste and spit into the sink. He turned the sink on, and water splattered everywhere. Milo managed to get the sink off quickly, through the spray of water to his face, his toothbrush and mouth rinsed off in one go, but the bathroom was sopping wet.
“It’ll dry,” Milo said to himself, “But pulled a pen and sticky note from his backpack and scribbled a note on the sink “Sink broken”.
“Sara will have to brush her teeth in Mom and Dad’s bathroom,” he said to himself, and went back upstairs to change into dry clothes. A rogue breeze blew the sign into the trash.
“Sara, can you grab me some anti-bacterial ointment, I just used the last here…” Martin said.
“Sure,” Sara said, heading to go fetch some from their large supply in the basement,
Diogee barked at Martin.
"What is it buddy, I just fed... oh," Martin said looking at the flaming pile of dog food Diogee was holding in his mouth, "Diogee put that down before you burn yourself,"
Martin took the water that had been soaking the last bits of last night’s burnt to dinner off the crock pot and splashed it onto Diogee and the food. Diogee yelped and shook off the water. But didn’t seem too perturbed. A proper bath was in his future.
A small screech sounded from Milo’s room room upstairs but no one downstairs paid it any mind.
“Let’s get you some more food,” Martin said preparing to dump the remaining food in Diogee’s spare dog bowl when a raccoon burst through the window and hauled the meager bag of food away.
"Huh... I guess you got lucky today Diogee... I think we have some leftover bacon..." Martin said, looking through the fridge.
"Martin are you feeding Diogee human food again?" Brigette asked, appearing from downstairs, seemingly fully prepared for the day.
"The dog food got destroyed again, I'll pick some up on the way home,"
"Are you sure we're out of food?" Brigette asked.
“Last of it was stolen by that damn raccoon,”
“I thought we had another bag,”
“Not that I saw,”
"Kids, did any of you grab dog food and stash it somewhere," Brigette called.
"No," Sara called, returning with the requested object, and Milo from having changed his clothes.
"We're out of dog food food," Martin announced.
"Alright, Diogee you are one lucky dog," Brigette said.
"That's what I told him, you better appreciate it Diogee," Martin said.
Diogee barked happily.
“and thank you Sara,”
“No problem,”
"Hey my lunch survived!" Milo said, digging around the freezer.
"Oh, really?" Martin said, reaching in and grabbing his own paper bag... which proceeded to rip open and drop his lunch to the floor,
Milo’s lunch then proceeded to rip as well.
“Maybe not,”
“Oh... its all wet!” Sara said, grabbing her own.
We could get actual lunch bags, but you know they'd rip just as easily. Brigette notes, grabbing her own soggy lunch.
“Ah yes, the cheaper option,” Martin said.
"Do we have any lunch meat?" Sara asked.
"I bought a fresh container yesterday?” Brigette said taking it from the freezer.
"This is frozen,” Sara said.
"Well, it is the back up, it should melt by lunch?” Brigette suggests
“I can’t make a sandwich like this,”
"Heat it up in the microwave.” Brigette said.
“Remember the last time we did that,”
“Right…” Brigette said, “Well that can’t happen every time,”
"Well, my chips survived,” Martin noted, and then handed them to Sara, “I’ll just eat out,”
“You took the last of the chips!” Sara cried accusatorily.
“And now I’m giving them to you,” Martin said placatingly, and grabbed his bag, and headed towards the door. Martin tried pushing the door open.
"It’s not like its locked," Sara said. Really almost none of the doors in this house had locks. They had a hard enough time with these sort of situations without adding locks to the mix.
"Maybe its swollen?" Milo suggested.
"Did something block it outside?” Sara asked.
“Yeah, like a really big block?” Milo asked
“or maybe a stick,”
“A stick? Ohh, because it’s stuck,”
“Thank you, I’ll be here all night,”
"Remind me why that door opens outward again?" Milo asked.
"The last time it was replaced the guy put it on backwards." Brigette said
"and we haven't fixed it?" Sara asked.
"It's on the list," Brigette sighed.
"I guess I'm going out the back door," Martin says, "Well, goodbye. Hopefully this time for real,"
The back door opened without little issues, and Martin disappeared around the side of the yard.
"Well, I better get going too!" Milo said.
"Have fun going to school,” Sara said.
"Have uh, boring going to school,"
"I think the term is relaxing,"
"Tomato tamahto" Milo said with a shrug, hand on the back door.
"Bye Mom"
Bark
"Bye Diogee!"
"Bye Milo," Sara said.
Milo looked Sara straight in the eye, struggled to keep a smirk off his face, and shut the door behind him.
A picture fell off the wall.
"Rude!" Sara announced, sitting back down for her breakfast.
"Stop antagonizing your brother," Brigette said, kissing Sara’s forehead, "and you better get ready yourself,"
"Well, I'm going to head out, can you get yourself to school," Brigette said,
"No I don't think I can remember how to get there so I'm going to stay home and watch Dr. Zone instead."
“Oh, and you and Milo have dentist appointments this afternoon, so remember to pick him up from school,”
“I remember,” Sara said, “at 4:00,”
“It is so convenient to not have to drive you two around. What am I going to do when you leave?”
“You’ll be teaching Milo to drive.”
“Oh, don’t remind me,” Brigette said with a sigh, “Have a good day honey,”
“I will, bye mom,”
With everyone else gone Sara got ready in (relative) peace. She got dressed, brushed her hair, attempted to brush her teeth, got sprayed with water, changed clothes, brushed her teeth in the other bathroom, and remade her lunch before finally she too was ready to set out.
"Bye Diogee" Sara said as she slipped out the door, carefully as to not let Diogee out, "Be good,"
Diogee barked wildly trying to slip by.
"Stay home boy". Sara said, before she shut the door behind her.
Diogee barked for a minute more, but with Sara good and gone he quieted down.
The house, for the first time, since around 3:30 PM yesterday, was quiet, save the sounds of Diogee sniffing around.
Diogee scarfed down the last of his food, and made his way to the master bedroom, where he found the hole in the wall. He got a running start, hopped on the bed, and launched himself towards the wall, where he squeezed through the hole, and set off for the day.