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It all started with a pass code and a whole lot of misplaced trust. And it was all about to end the moment Mark Shepard walked through his apartment door and laid eyes on this absolute disaster that had befallen his livingroom. Johnny stood in the midst of soup bowl wreckage armed with a vacuum and an entire drenched and dripping roll of paper towels that smelled distinctly like beef broth. Well, he wasn't standing so much as he was perching haphazardly with one foot on the arm of the couch and the other on the back, trying to reach the noodles clinging to the ceiling tiles (thankfully only dripping down onto the throw blanket and not on the fabric couch itself.)
Meanwhile, every drell-made towel in this previously spotless home was currently wedged underneath the rusting plant stand in the corner, and keeping the puddle of stagnant water mostly contained for the time being. Well—save for the streak beside the coffee table where Johnny's feet had slipped out from under him and his lunch had gone flying. The fern Johnny had been watering twice weekly the entire six months Mark had been deployed sat there, entirely unbothered by the udon hanging from its fronds like tinsel. Basically mocking him at this point.
It was just as Johnny stretched to his absolute limit to try and suck up the evidence of his epic clumsiness that he heard the door chirp and the lock whir.
Uh oh.
"Baby?" Mark called from the entryway, toeing off his ropers. "You don't need to vacuum."
Oh. Oh no. Not good, not good! This was even worse than that sentient chocolate lava monster cake incident last year.
Mark already sounded dead tired. This was the absolute worst thing he could possibly come home to. Johnny had photos saved on his phone of the entire apartment just so he could put everything back properly where it belonged any time he stayed over. So this? This was basically Johnny's worst nightmare. He wasn't supposed to leave a footprint. All evidence of his presence needed to fit into that one drawer in Mark's dresser so that Mark wouldn't think he was being too clingy or making this more of a thing than what it was.
And then he went and did this.
He would have made less mess if he'd just fragged the apartment instead. Johnny froze. Mark turned and dropped his footlocker by the door.
"Oh…" The resignation imbued in that single syllable drained the blood from Johnny's face.
"I didn't know it was fake!"
"Fake? What…?" Mark shook his head slightly, gazing around in quiet wonder at the full extent of the mess marring his home. "Baby what happened?"
"The plant!"
"The plant?" Mark's brows threatened to disappear right into his hairline.
Johnny jabbed the vacuum hose towards the offending (apparently) plastic fern, dark eyes wide. Mark blinked slowly then walked over and switched the vacuum off, exhaling at length through his nose as a noodle schlepped off the ceiling and onto the floor between them with an uncomfortably loud splat.
"F-f-ferninand, it—"
"Ferninand?"
"Yeah, you know, Ferninand. Oh, right. I named it, by the way. Talked to it. Read somewhere that talking to your plants could make them grow better. Well, more like begged it not to die on me while I was house sitting. M-mark, I didn't know. Honest I didn't!'
"Didn't know what, Johnny?"
Johnny yipped in surprise as Mark picked him up off the couch and slung him on his hip. There wasn't much else to do but let go of the hose and sodden paper towels.
"That it was ff-fake." Johnny admitted, cheeks colouring at his continued fight with his own tongue. It was just another layer added atop this gigantic mess.
"Ah." Mark chuckled. Actually chuckled. Tired as it was. Johnny blinked in astonishment. "And I see you've been very diligently watering it."
Johnny groaned and buried his face in his hands, peeking through his fingers to try and read Mark's face. "It stayed nice and green, so I figured I had to be doing something right."
Mark jounced Johnny on his hip, still taking in the scene with eyes that Johnny knew didn't miss a thing.
"Well that explains the puddle….but why the vacuum, baby?"
"You don't have a s-s-step s-stool."
"Ah. That I do not. Not something I ever needed on hand, I'll admit." Then Mark peppered Johnny's hands with kisses until he broke through and was able to plant them on his cheeks and beauty marks instead. "Accidents happen, it's fine."
"You're not mad?"
"No, baby, I'm not mad. Why would I be mad?"
Johnny gestured widely to the chaos inside his quarters.
"Oh, I can think of a way to make it up to me."
"…After you lift me up so I can reach it, r-right?"
"Mmhm."
"You're really not mad?"
"Really, really." Mark walked them over to the closet where he kept his cleaning supplies. "I'm just glad to be home."