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On a happy little island in the middle of a great blue sea, with bright green grass and fruit trees and all manner of fluctuating turnip prices, a very successful business venture — run by a very successful married couple of professionals, owned by a very successful rich brat, and staffed by various tired students whose success in life has yet to be determined — is having a series of very successful days.
“Gem!” Bdubs hollers. He’s stood on the threshold of the soon-to-be-house, which is currently lacking most of its walls. His hands are on his hips, eyes on the van, which has been pulled haphazardly into the driveway. The side of it reads ‘Happy Hermit Housing’ in brightly painted letters.
“Gemini Tay! What is freakin’ taking so long back there, huh?”
“Oh, no. Not the full name, ” Gem says, popping her head out from around the side of the van, shock of red curls bouncing around her freckled cheeks. She gives him a little mocking gasp, for added cheekiness. “I’m just grabbing the stuff we’re gonna need. I wanna see if I can carry it all in one trip. Impulse, make him calm down.”
“I’m trying, Gem,” Impulse says mournfully. “And at this point, it’s probably faster if you just make two trips.”
“No,” she says, ducking back inside the van.
“We are behind schedule, ” Bdubs shrills.
“That’s fine, isn’t it? That’s a good thing. They’re paying us by the hour.” Pearl is perched behind Bdubs and very high above him. She has climbed herself up onto one of the rafters and doesn’t seem intent on coming down anytime soon. “Doesn’t that make it a good thing?”
“Not how that works, Pearl,” Impulse says with a sigh.
“Not how that — of course that’s not how it works! ” Bdubs’ face is downright red with the force of his screeching. Impulse reaches up to cover one ear.
“Bdubs,” he says. “Bdubs. B-double-down. Hey. Easy on the volume, maybe.” To Pearl he says, “You might want to get in there and help Gem out or he really will bite your head off.”
“Right. On it,” says Pearl, dropping from the rafters with practiced ease that could rival a gymnast’s. Damn teenagers.
Pearl skips on over to the van after Gem. “OW!” Impulse hears Gem yell a moment later, followed by several crashes and then “Pearl, tug on my ears one more time, I’ll tell Bdubs what you did in the lobby last week and he’ll fire the crap out of you!”
“You can say fuck,” Pearl answers. “They don’t mind, you know. And I'm sorry, I can't help it, your ears are cute.”
“Yes, they do, Pearl — I see that hand. Move it away from the ear. I’m warning you.”
“Well — alright, they do, but it doesn’t matter very much. They're not your parents. Or my parents. Or anyone's parents. Do you think they'll ever have kids one day? They'd be bad parents, probably. Gem, what conditioner do you use?”
"What, for my ears?"
Impulse sighs. “We can hear you out here, you know,” he calls. Because he is nice like that, and because he’s not actually all that interested in what else they might start saying to each other if they continue to think he can’t hear them.
Abruptly both girls go silent before devolving into giggling.
“I swear,” Bdubs says under his breath. “I swear to the very high heavens. They’d better be gettin’ to work in the next — two minutes! They have got two minutes left of my patience.”
“Bdubs.” Impulse reaches up to squeeze his shoulder. “Breathe.”
Bdubs does.
The day does round out to a success despite all manner of distraction; they always manage it in the end. This is what Impulse tells Bdubs at the end of every shift, when the kids have gone home: It always works out. Take a breath. We’re doing just fine. Something calming about that man, his voice, the feel of his hands on your shoulders and the look he gets when he’s talking you down — Bdubs could swear there’s some magic to it or somethin’. He’ll find out one of these days.
“So,” says Bdubs a day later, headfirst into another job, hands on his hips. “What are we thinking? Blueprints look okay to you?”
“They look great, ” says Cleo, and he’s kind of surprised to hear how — how genuinely enthused she sounds. None of the dry wit he’s used to at all. “Can you talk me through some of this? Some of these — here, these bits.”
“Right, a’course,” he says, leaning over the table to point at one of the rooms. He tells her what he and Impulse have been thinking, talks about all the different ways she could use each different room, how he’s thinking of painting and decorating once the walls are up good and proper. He can’t help the pride and excitement that slips through his guise of professionalism. Bdubs has got a lotta years of architecture under his belt, and if there’s one thing he really loves, it’s when a client just lets him go wild — just gives him a vibe and tells him to run with it. Cleo’s put a lot of trust in him for this project, and he’s happy as a clam to put that trust to good use.
“I’m really excited,” she confesses. “ Really excited, Bdubs, you — I don’t have words, honestly, I’m looking forward to this so much. I’m so glad you and your team are on this. I’ve wanted a school on this island for — I don’t know how long, honestly.”
Bdubs grins, big and bright. That’s what it’s all about, isn’t it? That’s what it’s all about.
Another day, another job — this day is cold, a little stormy. Impulse and Bdubs stand side-by-side in the sand, hands on their hips, staring at a house that looks like the next burst of wind might topple it right over.
“Oh, this thing.” Bdubs stares. “This thing is — no way. No freakin’ way, Impulse, we are not doing this. We’re gonna get sued.”
“We’re not gonna get sued.” Impulse flicks him — flicks him! The audacity! — on the temple, then continues trudging on up the sandy property toward the stairs. “Companies like ours do renos all the time, Bdubs. We’ve done renos. Come on — let’s get a better look at the property.”
“A better look at the — oh, for the love of — yeah. Yeah. Alright. Fine. A better look at the property. I’ll get a better look at the property with ya. ‘Renos’, he says. Like this is just your average — average renovation — a better look at the property, he says! Oh, I’m comin’. I’ll get one alright. And the property will get — will get a better look at — your big, stupid face when I—”
Bdubs sets off on rambling, and Impulse knows well by now that when Bdubs sets off on rambling like this, he doesn’t stop for anything. He goes on about Impulse’s stupid face and the property they’re getting a better look at and oh, he’ll yell once he gets inside — oh, he’ll yell, are those termites? Does this place have termite damage? Well, yes, it does. And then he’ll yell about how he’s going to kill Impulse, and he’ll move on to many very comical threats of violence. All very comical. Bdubs — he’s a comical guy.
“Bdubs, it cost us barely ten grand. Waterfront property. You realize it’s a waterfront property?”
“This thing is barely standing, Impulse. What am I — what am I supposed to do with a house that’s barely standing? We gotta tear out everything. Freakin’ everything! The walls, Impulse, the walls have termites in ’em!”
“That’s generally where termites tend to like living, yeah. Walls. They like walls.”
“Everything about this — we’ll have to tear out everything. ”
“Well, then we’ll tear out everything,” Impulse says, a little more gently. “We can start from the ground up if we have to — demolish the whole thing. I didn’t want to go ahead on that without your permission.”
“Oh, but you’d sign a contract without my permission,” says Bdubs. “You’d buy a house without my permission. A fallin’-apart ramshackle house, Impulse! We’re in debt! We’re swimmin’ in debt, crawling our way out of it with our bare hands and you buy—”
“A waterfront property, ” says Impulse. “Which we can do whatever we want with and sell for the very top dollar, Bdubs, and come on. You can’t tell me this is a bad business venture. When Scar finds out about it—”
“SCAR DOESN’T KNOW?”
The beach really is beautiful. It’s early March, not far into springtime yet — not springtime at all by Tango’s definition; Tango has been railing against the cold since October and probably will not judge the weather warm enough until June — the lingering chill of February hasn’t let up, but the rains have started, thick and heavy, and the coast is windy as all get out. The blustering winds beat the palm trees to one side, whipping their fronds up into a frenzy, and the waves are large and wild, white caps cresting and rolling and crashing up onto the sand. The tide must be coming in, Impulse notes after watching a little while.
The dunes, too — the dunes are beautifully intact, not built over with miles and miles of commercial properties. It’s a nice bit of land. Even in the storm — especially in the storm, maybe — the ocean is beautiful. And someone’s going to love this place, once they get done fixing up the ramshackle house planted on it.
Or tearing it down and starting over completely — that is probably also a valid option. Uh. Might be the one they’re forced to take, if the exasperated yelling from up the front stairs is any indication.
“Impulse!” Bdubs yells, muffled through the walls. “You’d better get your ass in here!”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m coming,” he says, and he’s rolling his eyes but he’s grinning, too.
They go through the property, take some notes. Grian’s hard at work talking with the clients; Gem and Pearl are probably off canoodling somewhere, knowing them. Damn teenagers.
Back in the van, there is yet more to discuss. They gather in the back, on the floor, cross-legged in a circle — except for Bdubs, who has built himself a makeshift throne out of throw pillows, and Etho who is asleep on the couch. Lots of throw pillows back here, most of which are currently composing a throne, the rest of which are being cuddled by Etho.
“You know,” says Bdubs, “it surprises me all the time that the only canoodling I’ve ever caught anyone doing in this van is Etho and the throw pillows.”
“Oh, yeah,” says Gem. “Don’t worry. We’d never let you catch us.”
“Gem,” Impulse sighs.
Grian’s sat particularly self-importantly in the circle, his feathers all puffed up, though unlike Bdubs he has not forged himself a throw-pillow throne; he is cross-legged on the floor with everyone else. He has a light-up bouncy ball in one hand. This is supposed to be the ‘talking ball’ which one holds when it is one’s turn to talk, but in practice it is discarded basically out of the gate. (Meetings never really go the way Grian wants them to. It doesn’t help that Bdubs and Impulse, who are very firmly in charge of the whole venture, respect the talking ball least of all.)
“So,” says Grian. “Let’s talk people. People, people, people — the couple who’s commissioned us.”
“Oh, people,” says Bdubs, nodding along, and Gem perks up.
“A couple?” she says. She is not holding the light-up bouncy ball. “Aww, that’s so sweet. A nice little old couple — are they little and old? I bet they’re little old ladies — with a beach house! I bet they’re retired. Retired little old ladies with a beach house. I want to paint all their rooms blue.”
Grian blinks. “I really do wish you wouldn’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Write fanfiction in your head about our clients, Gem. And you’re not holding the bouncy ball. Anyway — their names are Martyn and Scott.”
“Martyn and Scott! Weird names for little old ladies. Good for them, though. Live your best life, little old ladies on the beach.”
“They’re not little old ladies, Gem.”
“Well, how do you know?”
“I talked to them, Gem.”
Pearl takes this as her cue to grab one of the throw pillows and shove it onto Gem’s face. “Not to worry, Grian,” she says, giving him a thumbs-up with one hand while Gem struggles under her other hand. “I’ll smother her for you. Won’t bother you again. Please continue.”
From the couch, Etho groans. “Pearl, I was using that.”
“Good morning, sleepyhead,” she says. “We have a meeting at 11 am.”
“Wake me up at 11 am then,” he grumbles, grabbing another throw pillow from the floor and rolling over.
“It’s 11:15, Etho. We’ve been meeting right here on the floor of the van for fifteen minutes.”
“Sounds like a you problem,” he grumbles back, muffled against the couch cushions, and then he’s asleep again.
“We should get rid of the couch,” says Grian. “It barely fits back here in the first place. And he can’t sleep there anymore if there’s no couch.”
“Where will he sleep, then?” Pearl asks.
Grian stares. “I don’t… know? At his house? ”
Finally managing to shove Pearl and the pillow off, Gem says, “Yeah, well, I dunno if he has one of those. I think he just lives here in the van. He showers with the hose when we’re not looking.” She’s still not holding the light-up bouncy ball, but neither is Pearl or Etho or anyone except Grian, and they’ve all still decided it’s talking time. This is a case in point for discarding the bouncy ball entirely, Gem thinks; she’s started to get the sense that Grian only uses it for evil Gem discrimination purposes.
“Works for a house-building company, doesn’t even have a house. Sad, really.” Pearl shakes her head.
“I have a house,” Etho grumbles from the couch. Aha! Not asleep, then.
“Can we please get back on topic?” Bdubs says with a sigh. “Martyn and Scott — Pearl, tell us about Martyn and Scott.”
Grian gapes at him, aghast. “Pearl? Pearl tell you about Martyn and Scott?”
“Yeah, that’s what I said. You talk too much.”
“I’m — Bdubs! I’m the one who’s done all the backgrounds on our clients! I have always done this, Bdubs, I have the folder right here and you are looking at it!”
“Yeah, well, I’m tired of listenin’ to your voice,” Bdubs says. “Just give Pearl the folder. Then she’ll have the folder. There, problem solved.”
“Give Pearl the—”
“He’s gonna strangle you, Bdubs,” says Gem. “I dunno how he hasn’t already, honestly. You antagonize him too much.”
“Antagonize him— me? Me , Gem? I antagonize him too much?”
Still sprawled out on the floor, Gem shrugs. “I call it like I see it.”
“Freakin’ teenagers,” Bdubs says. “Judas priest. No respect for their elders.”
Impulse’s head is in his hands. His shoulders are shaking with laughter; he hasn’t said anything in several minutes. Pearl stands up and plucks the folder right out of Grian’s hands, sets about flipping through it and nodding with an air of importance. The folder and all its contents are upside-down.
“I don’t think we’re getting anything done this morning,” says Gem with a performative sigh, and this is ridiculous, coming from her, but Impulse is inclined to agree.
This job comes together as all the others had — at the end of it Gem is lying on the sand in the sun, catching her breath. Happy and tired, by the look of her. It’s a good job. She likes this job — Grian’s glad he was able to get her hired here. Pearl is sitting in the back of her van and swinging her feet of the edge of it, and Grian is crouched by the cooler full of drinks, and Etho is —
“What is that?” says Scott, sounding… vaguely disgusted.
Grian blinks. Etho is sitting in the shade of the front porch steps, water bottle in hand.
“Is it… homeless? A homeless person? On our property?” Now Scott sounds downright queasy.
“Scott, babe, we’ve talked about this,” says Martyn, leaning over to peck him on the cheek. “That’s classist. Homeless people are people too.”
“That’s Etho, ” Grian sighs. “He works for us. He’s the one who put all your nice windows in.”
“Oh. They are nice windows,” Scott says. “I guess that’s alright then. He can stay?”
“I have a house,” Etho grumbles from his spot under the stairs. His water bottle is empty now. Grian reaches into the cooler to grab him another one.
“He doesn’t, but don’t worry, he sleeps in the back of the van,” says Gem. “We have a couch back there.”
“Etho is not a homeless person,” Grian says. “He is not — you know what. Moving on. To other topics — business topics. When Bdubs and Impulse get back, we’ll need to talk about—”
“You sound real official,” Pearl says. “Talking like that. Don’t be fooled, Martyn and Scott of the beach house. Grian is about as far from real official as a person can get.”
“That’s true,” says Gem. “He’s my brother, so I would know best. Known him his whole lame-ass life. I’ve even seen him n—”
“ Gem! ”
“Oh, don’t worry,” says Martyn. “I wasn’t fooled.”
Bdubs, thankfully, chooses just this moment to step out of the front door, leaning down to dust his jeans off with calloused hands, then straightening up tall. “Alright!” he barks. “You hooligans can get out of here, clock out or whatever it is you do these days. Inspection complete, good to go.”
Gem and Pearl throw up whoops and cheers, Gem with jazz hands for emphasis. Her tail is wagging again, which Grian finds almost unbearably cute. (Most things about his baby sister are unbearably cute, but if he tells her this it’ll go right to her head.)
“You did great,” Impulse says, coming down the front porch stairs behind Bdubs. “Proud of you all. Now scram, get on home. Drink some water.”
“Etho’s had three bottles already,” says Gem. “He’s like a water cryptid.”
“He is well-hydrated is what he is, and you will be, too, if I’ve got anything to say about it. Your parents will have my head otherwise.” Strolling by, Impulse ruffles Gem’s hair with one hand, then plunges his hand into the cooler and starts tossing water bottles around.
“So,” says Bdubs, to Martyn and Scott of the beach house. “Time for the tour, and assuming all goes well you’ve got some papers to sign. What do we think? First impressions — like what you see?”
“We love it,” says Scott.
“We are living our #cottagecore life,” Martyn adds, clutching at his chest, and Scott kicks the back of his knees.
“Sorry about him,” Scott says, turning a sweet smile toward Bdubs and Impulse. “It’s beautiful — it’s really beautiful, honestly, we can’t thank you enough for all the work you’ve done. It looks exactly like the concept photos.”
“Yeah, I’ll bet,” says Bdubs, proudly puffing out his chest. “It sure is beautiful. Imp and I do great work, and so do the kids. C’mon — you just wait till you’ve seen the inside.”
The lobby floor of the Happy Hermit Housing headquarters is as immaculate as everything else about the place — as immaculate as everything, really, attached to the name of Mr. Goodtimes — and while it’s not Gem’s favorite place in the entire world, she certainly doesn’t mind spending her time here. There are worse jobs she could have.
Grian had made absolutely certain they arrived early, because, as he puts it, If you’re early then you’re on time, and if you’re on time then you’re late. That’s how these things work. I learned that in college.
Okay, she’d said. Cool. What if I’m like, late-late? Really late? Then what?
Then you die, he’d said without missing a beat. A painful death. Lateness incompatible with continued life. You will learn this when you go to college.
Oh. Fascinating , she’d said, clobbering him over the head with a throw pillow.
It’s an absolutely beautiful morning, sun beaming right down on every beautiful building on the island — some of which Gem is responsible for the beauty of! The van’s parked outside, Etho crammed into the back of it, as usual, along with the many materials they’ll need for today’s jobs. Gem is looking forward to getting this meeting over with so that they can get started on those jobs — she’s really raring to go this morning — so she is very pleased when Scar makes his appearance at two minutes to nine.
He strolls right down the stairs and onto the beautifully tiled lobby floor, a wide smarmy grin on his face, cane in hand and dressed as always to the nines. His suit is immaculate, his hair is immaculate, his twitchy cat tail is immaculately groomed, and honestly Gem has no idea what Grian sees in this man. No idea at all.
“Well, hello there, my happy little home designers!” Scar announces, tossing his cane up to catch it and then sweeping his arms out to the sides.
Ridiculous.
“So glad you could make it,” he continues, oblivious to Gem’s private thoughts — naturally; this is how private thoughts tend to work — and content to continue his act. She’s sure if she looks over she will see Grian utterly content to listen to this act, just happy for the attention. He’s hopeless. Absolutely hopeless.
“Glad to be here,” says Impulse. “How’s it looking, boss?”
“It’s looking excellent,” says Scar, and he sounds really genuine about it, but like — that’s Scar. He always sounds genuine. “Absolutely excellent, my happy little home designers, you have been everything I could have asked for! And more — you’ve been more! Our ratings are through the roof. Happy clients, happy clients everywhere. Now — I did just have one small complaint. One teensy, eensy, weensy, itty-bitty little complaint.”
Here it comes. Gem rolls her eyes, cheek in hand where she sits on one of the lobby couches. She’s got a magazine open in one hand that she’s spent the last four minutes half-heartedly paging through. (It is all about homes and home design and the latest trends, and she has been privately making fun of every single suggestion its many authors offer to their audience. White concrete? Who — who builds with white concrete? How minimalist does a person have to be for some of these designs to actually appeal? ‘Modern’ has never ever been Gem’s personally preferred aesthetic, and whatever these magazines are touting under that name is sure not about to sway her over to it.)
“Alright, hit me with it,” says Impulse.
“It’s two complaints,” says Scar. “It’s two complaints, actually. Two complaints that seem as though they just might be connected.”
Gem freezes.
On the opposite couch, so does Grian.
“I thought — I thought you paid him off,” Gem hisses, leaning forward. “Grian. You paid him off, didn’t you?”
“Well, I — I was going to,” Grian hisses back. “I offered. He wanted a lot of money, Gem! I’m not exactly swimming in cash, am I?”
“You told us you paid him off, ” she says.
“This is not strictly true! I told you that I would make an attempt! An attempt was made! I have student loans, Gem and last I checked you’re the one who caused the problem in the first place—”
Oh, for the love of god. Gem doesn’t turn around, wills Impulse not to pay any attention to the totally normal and unsuspicious sibling bickering going on over the coffee table full of stupid magazines. If she turns around, she has the dreadful feeling that she may see him glaring at them suspiciously, so she simply does not turn around.
“You showed up late the other day,” Scar continues, and he sounds genuinely apologetic. “Very late. Two entire hours late, in fact, to a job that should’ve only taken two hours to start. Our clients were not extremely happy about this.”
“Oh, yeah,” says Impulse, sounding equally apologetic. “Yeah — that did happen, and we are really sorry about that. Very busy, that was — Monday, wasn’t it? We were all booked up, and Gem and Grian and Pearl had that one to themselves. Apparently they showed up at the wrong address. Plugged it into the GPS one letter off, had to circle all the way around to the other end of the island. I can assure you it won’t happen again.”
“ Right, ” says Scar, slowly, very slowly, and Gem is — Gem is going to die. Right now. She is going to die. “Right. Yes. About that. That does confirm my suspicions about these two complaints being connected.”
“Scar.” Impulse does not sound excited about whatever’s about to come out of Scar’s mouth.
“Mr. Goodtimes,” says Scar, puffing his chest up a little. “You can call me Mr. Goodtimes. Or you can keep calling me ‘boss’, I liked that.”
“Scar,” Impulse repeats, because Scar is approximately half his age. “What is the second complaint?”
“Your teenagers painted someone’s house,” says Scar.
“Hold on,” says Grian. “Hold on, I am — I am not a teenager. Scar, we’re almost the same age.”
“We are not! ” Scar insists, affronted. “You’re fresh as a daisy out of college. I’m running a business. My very own business, which I own. Very different categories that we are in.”
“I don’t see how this has anything to do with our ages,” Grian says. “All it has anything to do with is you being born with a silver spoon in your mouth. This thing would have gone under ages ago without Bdubs and Impulse. And me. And Etho, don’t forget Etho.”
“Etho doesn’t even work here,” says Scar.
“He does too. He’s sleeping in the back of the van right now,” says Grian.
“You say that every time.” Scar shakes his head sadly, tut-tut-tuts at Grian. “Always going on and on about Etho, your coolest new college friend Etho who’s just so cool, cooler than me — I’m starting to think you’re making him up just to mess with me.”
“He’s on payroll. ”
“Anyway,” Scar continues, loudly, “I was talking about Gem and Pearl, seeing as they’re our painters and our teenagers, but luckily for me, Grian has owned up to responsibility for the whole thing, so I’ll just go right ahead and set up his punishment. Thank you, Grian!”
“What is that supposed to mean?” Grian says, aghast.
“Hold on,” says Impulse. “Hold on, can you — can you elaborate on that, please? What house did they paint wrong?”
“It’s not so much that they painted it wrong, ” says Scar. “They shouldn’t have painted this particular house at all. They painted — well, they painted the wrong house. A house that did not belong to one of our clients at all.”
Slowly, very slowly, Impulse turns to face Gem and Grian, who are sitting very still on the lobby couches. There is something very much like murder on his face.
“I can explain,” Grian says in a small voice.
“No, he can’t,” says Gem. “I can. It was all his fault, also. Since he’s the adult and he’s in charge and I am just a poor innocent high schooler. Just doing my very best! Working so hard, painting whatever I’m told to paint! I can’t believe Grian would use me like this for his evil ways! My own big brother! Scar should definitely go forward with punishing him.”
“Really not liking those implications,” says Impulse. “Whatever punishment comes of this will be — will be standard disciplinary action, with a paper trail to match. Grian — the wrong house? Really?”
“You’re not the boss of me,” says Scar, which really does a whole lot for his impression as a grown-up and mature business owner who’s not at all fresh as a daisy out of college himself.
“The law is the boss of you, Scar,” says Impulse. “Not to mention your dad, whose personal phone number I do have. Behave. ”
Anyway, complaints and punishments sorted, Impulse heads on upstairs with Scar to talk real proper business. Bdubs is running late today. Gem is instructed to wait downstairs in the lobby with the boring magazines while they have their meeting and Grian fills out an incident report, since apparently this is an incident in need of reporting. Gem, meanwhile, has lobby-people to bother.
“Hello, and thank you for using the Happy Home Network,” says Tango, his big shiny red eyes leveling Gem with an unimpressed gaze. His goggles are pushed up over his hair. "How can I help you today? Would you like to view some of your recent ratings?"
“Are those goggles, like — allowed? In your employee dress code?” she asks, reaching across the counter to poke him in the forehead. He swats her hand away.
“ No poking your fellow employees,” he says. “Not allowed. Against the rules. And I don’t have a dress code.”
“No dress code?” She blinks. “That’s weird. I’d have thought Scar would have all kinds of rules. He seems like the dress code kind of guy.”
“I mean, he is, sort of. He says I have to show up to work looking cool and sexy. I do my best. Gem-gem, are you actually here to use the Happy Home Network?” Tango asks. “Or are you just here to make my shift longer?”
Gem giggles. “You know, when you say it like that, you make it sound like I have magical time manipulation powers.”
“Oh, you do. I’m like — ninety percent sure. That’s how I talk about you to my friends. I say, oh, have you heard about my most recent invention, shift-doublificator, or perhaps time-stretchificator, who has the magical ability to make every minute feel like two. She’s disguised as one of my coworkers.”
Gem blinks. “You have friends outside of work?”
“Obviously I have friends outside of work, Gem!”
“You’re cheating on me,” she pouts. “Friend-cheating. I can’t believe this. You never even told me.”
“You are in high school, Gem. I am more than twice your age. I built the computer system this whole place runs on. You were born with a computer in your mouth. In what world are you my only friend?”
“I don’t know! I just assumed! What do you even mean, born with a computer in my mouth, Tango, who says that—”
“Back to the point. I’m on the clock, you’re on the clock, our bosses are upstairs and they’ll be down any second. Happy Home Network. What can I do you for?”
“I dunno. I’ve never used it before,” she says. “Impy usually handles that stuff. Do you have games on there?”
“ Gem. ”
Another day, another job — a naked job, in fact. “It’s naked!” Gem exclaims, delighted, the moment the door is open.
“Gem, you need to stop saying that,” Impulse sighs.
“I do not,” she says, skipping inside. The shop-to-be is, indeed, naked. That’s their job, that’s what they’re here for! They’re gonna make it nice and real and non-naked, fill it up with appliances and furniture and paint all its walls. She does not know details yet, but she will once they’ve met with the client — (who is here, and has pink-hair, and is a fish lady with pretty fins around her ears and scales down her cheeks and her arms, and is giggling at Gem’s many exclamations) — and had their usual meeting in the back of the van with the light-up bouncy ball.
It shares a building with a bakery upstairs, and the aromas of freshly-baked goodies keep drifting down and taunting Gem, who maybe shouldn’t have skipped breakfast this morning. Gem’s caught a glimpse of the man who runs it. He’s a little bit creepy — something strange about his eyes? — but he has a nice smile.
Bdubs and Impulse are chatting with the nice pink-haired fish lady — Lizzie, Gem learns her name is — about what she wants to do with the place, what she’s seeing in it. Her vision. Vision is very important to Bdubs and Impulse.
After poking around the weird naked empty floor for awhile, Gem meanders over to sit by the wall with Pearl, listening in to the chattering between Lizzie and Bdubs and Impulse. Very professional chattering happening. Gem’s job is not professional chattering; Gem’s job is manual labor and PAINT. She’s excited about this. She’s excited to do a lot of manual labor and painting in the naked shop-to-be.
Fish-shop-to-be, apparently, she realizes as she listens in. This sounds normal for a second, and then she remembers that their client is a fish lady, and she is promptly horrified.
“A — a fish shop?” Gem echoes, her voice cracking a little.
“Yeah, that’s what she said,” Pearl whispers.
Gem swallows. “Isn’t that — isn’t that, um, you know…?”
Pearl elbows her. “Gem,” she hisses. “Don’t be rude.”
“She is a fish, Pearl,” Gem hisses back, distressed.
Lizzie laughs. She has apparently overheard them. Gem freezes, now terrified of the pink-haired fish lady. “I sure am! And it sure is,” she says, winking. “I believe we needed to talk budget, next?”
“Right,” says Bdubs, unfazed. How is he unfazed, Gem would like to know. Fish-girl with a fish-shop. Fine. Great. “Budget — let’s do that. Where’s Grian with the folder, huh?”
“Oh, I’m sorry, I wasn’t aware I was back on folder-keeping duties,” says Grian. “You know — since you apparently like it better when it’s Pearl doing that.”
“Impulse, he is givin’ me sass,” Bdubs says. “Are you hearing this? Sass! I don’t appreciate sass from the whippersnappers.”
“Understandable,” says Impulse, nodding sagely. His hand tightens a little around Bdubs’ waist.
“This is why Pearl reads me things. You’re still on folder duties forever, G-man.”
“Good call. Very good call,” says Impulse.
“Oh, you two are cute,” says Lizzie.
“ G-man? ” Grian echoes, horrified. (Gem makes a note to start calling him G-man as much as possible.) Impulse laughs, leaning over to press a kiss to Bdubs’ temple.
“Are they being professional?” Gem whispers, leaning over toward Pearl. “Are they, like — supposed to do that on the job?”
“I mean, they aren’t making out,” says Pearl. “They probably shouldn’t make out on the job. This is fine though. I think it’s probably good for business. Look. Lizzie the fish cannibalism lady thinks they’re cute.”
“Yeah,” says Gem. “Yeah, that’s true.”
“I think people like the whole couple-owned business venture thing. Got a real nice aesthetic to it. Makes us all look like one big happy family.”
“They don’t own it, though, Scar does.”
Pearl blinks.
“Right,” she says. “I always forget. He’s not that good at business-owning.”
“Naw, he’s great,” Gem says, because she’s learned this from Grian. (Grian talks a lot about Scar. Gem used to think his Scar-obsession was a normal part of a normal close friendship, but then Grian brought his new friend Etho home from college — Etho whom he does have some semblance of a normal friendship with — and Gem quickly realized that the whole deal with Scar was in fact exceptionally abnormal and probably had been the whole time.) “He makes you think he’s bad at things, that’s part of how he works. He was raised, um — he was raised different than we were, but you don’t notice that, do you? But the business works great and he makes sure we keep great contacts, and… he still seems like just a guy. You know? Just a silly guy. He’s not, though.” She pauses, thinking for a moment, then adds, “Grian says he’s actually a little scary.”
Pearl ruminates on this for a moment.
“Huh,” she says at last. “Yeah. I think I see what you mean.”
“There is evil stored in those little cat ears,” Gem whispers, and Pearl giggles.
It comes together perfectly, over the course of the next few days, as Gem has come to count on: bickering gets in the way of work until Bdubs yells a lot, and he straps more and more watches onto his wrists as a, like, a — an indication of his worsening sanity? She’s not sure what it is, come to think of it, with Bdubs and the watches and the clocks. Anyway, he yells a lot and everybody does the work they’re supposed to do and Gem ensures that Grian is blamed for almost every mishap. And it comes together — it really, really comes together.
Gem likes this job a lot.
“Oh,” says Lizzie, the first time she sets foot in the nearly-done dining section. She hasn’t even seen the kitchen yet, and her eyes are wide and shining. “Oh, it’s — it’s beautiful. Oh, I love it so much.”
She actually turns and spins there in the middle of the floor, pink hair swishing around her, a shiny waterfall down her back. She looks enchanted. Really enchanted.
“It’s — it’s everything I could have wanted,” she confesses, turning and taking Gem’s hands in hers. Gem can’t fight the smile that spreads across her face. “It’s perfect. I really didn’t think — I mean, I don’t know. I shouldn’t say that. You all just seem so…”
“Disorganized?” Impulse offers, grin turning a little bit apologetic. “Yeah — yeah, trust me, I know. These kids seem like a bunch of idiots. My husband’s not exactly much better—”
“I’ll kill you,” Bdubs says absently, paging through paperwork.
“—but they really know what they’re doing,” Impulse finishes. “Talented bunch.”
“It’s incredible,” Lizzie says again. “Really. Thank you so much. I can hardly believe it’s real.”
The golden glow of the bedside lamp casts big, soft shadows on the wall. It’s dark outside. It’s raining again — springtime, and the daffodils will be blooming soon, all around the island. Nothing like a nice, soothing spring rain to fall asleep to.
Bdubs has got work on his mind, still. Impulse is always saying that’s something he should work on, but he doesn’t really think so. He likes his job. It’s, uh — fulfilling, that’s the word. Is it so bad if it’s on his mind past the nine-to-five grind? He lies back against the pillow, the nice soft silk pillowcase that’s very kind to his curls, and he stares up at the ceiling.
Normally Bdubs doesn’t have a problem with all the work that’s always on his mind, because he loves his job. He really does. Tonight, though, it’s stressin’ him right out, and he’s not sure why.
The sound of the rain, though — now that’s nice. That’s calming.
Bdubs rolls over, mouth open to say something, and he’s startled to find Impulse staring right at him. Impulse flushes a little.
“Sorry.” His throat bobs. “Sorry, I just — didn’t mean to startle you. You just look — nice. Beautiful. Like this, I mean.”
Oh, now it’s Bdubs’ turn to flush, from his face all the way down to his chest. “Oh,” he says, caught off-guard for a second. “You’re just — just starin’ at me? Huh? While I listen to the rain?”
“Staring,” Impulse echoes, shaking his head and grinning, “not staring, no, I was — admiring. You move real fast, Bdubs. Lots of things, they move fast. It’s nice to see you still. I like these moments. I think — this is the thing I fell in love with about you, you know? This was the moment. I started seeing you slow down, and I liked that, and I wanted to see it more.”
“Jeez,” says Bdubs, swallowing past the lump in his own throat. “Jeez — jeez, Impulse, that’s — you’re a sap. You know that? A real freakin’ sap. I’m — come here.”
This is all the warning Impulse gets before Bdubs is grabbing him and dragging him into his arms.
“You’re getting cuddles now,” he says, with all the authority he usually reserves for work. “Cuddles. That’s right. Mandated — mandated, mandatory cuddles, I’m mandatin’ ’em.”
“Mandated,” Impulse says, laughing. “Oh, well, alright then. Guess I’d better not argue with that.”
“No, I guess you’d better not,” says Bdubs, and that’s that.
There’ll be more work in the morning. Things will move fast again — Bdubs will have a clock in hand and at least one watch on each arm, because it makes the kids laugh, and he likes making them laugh. And he’ll be going on and on about the schedule, and there’ll be clients to please, foundations to lay and walls to paint and lots and lots of blueprints. And Bdubs really loves his job. Right now, though, there’s just this, just the two of them, and it’s nice.
It’s real nice.