Chapter 5 - A vair, vair short epilogue, in which minimal shenanigans occur

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10:02am, having woken up with a bang, a thud, and several choice swear words

I have decided to return home pulling off the hungover model look. I'm wearing my darkest skinny jeans, an old t-shirt, my hair's out, dramatic makeup with dark red lipstick and I am wearing an enormous pair of wrap around sunnies that I accidently pilfered from one of Mutti's mates when she forgot them at our tip of a house.

Jas, it seems, is intending to return home as a cross between sunshine barbie and Snow White. She has already returned the lamb to the flock of sheep (I thought I had been dreaming that the lads were singing Mary Had A Little Lamb), and taken all of our rubbish to be recycled, while smiling beatifically, with her stupid blonde hair shining in the sun.

I on the other hand woke up when started dismantling the tent on top of me.

Rude.

Later

The other's parents have all come to pick them up, since short of tying Sven to the roof of Tom's car to be a bike rack, there is no way we can all go home in one car.

Dave and I ran off for a quick snog in the woods before Rollo's parents got here, only stopping when Rosie scared the life out of us by swinging down from a tree branch to dangle in front of our faces. Sven waved from the top of the tree where he was inspecting a birds nest, and we weakly waved back before walking unsteadily away, legs all jelly-like from the fright. What the hell are they doing up there? Is Sven changing careers from a Viking in training to Tarzan?

Dave eventually left, but not before sticking his head out the window of the car and bleating like a sheep at the rest of us, who of course banded together and baa-ed back, while the parents who were still there looked on in amazement.

Jas's Mutti came to pick the two of us up, which is nice of her, though it was once more a life threatening ordeal to hoist the lovingly made owl paper machè carcass into the boot.

It may have lost a few more feathers, but what Jas doesn't know can't hurt.

It seems to be a boy thing, that they can all live off one small backpack of clothing for several day. It is tres, tres annoying, because once Tom had thrown his bag, tent, and camping equipment in his car (taking all of 10 minutes) he came to help us, and he seemed to find it rather funny. Once we had eventually gotten all the makeup kits, presents, and various bags of clothing into Jas's Mutti's car, he gave her a kiss on the cheek and waved goodbye to her mum, before driving off at a thoroughly sensible speed while Sven hung out the back window and waved, until Tom hit a bump and Sven slipped off his perch and fell back inside the car with an audible crash.

Jas's mum asked several questions about the trip, and smiled over the ring a little before saying that Tom seemed like a very good sort of boyfriend and she was glad that Jas had him. And then that was it! No intrusive questions about what we did or what kind of trouble we caused, just got in the car and drove us home while we chatted, occasionally asking a question about interesting wildlife we might have seen or whether the birthday cake was nice.

Quite, quite amazing. Top mothering skills right there.

Later

Ah, bonjour, my little house with a well-working toilet, it is good to be back!

They dropped me off at my house, and I gave Jazzy a friendly hug and duff to the head and a polite wave to J's Mutti, before hauling all my stuff back out of the car, and into the garden, where no one came to help me.

Typical.

So I threw open the door to make a dramatic entrance and yelled, "I'M BACK!", while dropping my bags with a flourish, only to let out an almighty shriek as a large furry thing flew off the kitchen table with a single bound, and attached itself to my head.

After several minutes of frantic mad shaking I dropped to the floor and rolled, making Gordy detach himself and leap off with a squawk.

"Stupid bloody bollocking lump of fur, I will have your tail for this, you wait and see you flea-bitten mongrel-!" As I ranted on, Angus strolled in like a King overseeing his domain, biffed Gordy sharply on the neck with his paw, and then leapt up into my arms.

The force of suddenly holding a small lawnmower nearly knocked me back down, but awww. At least someone in this house loves me.

After a moment however he got tired, and jumped out of my arms, nearly landing on top of Gordy who had to do an emergency leap to get out of the way, before he was turned into a cat pancake by his dear old dad.

I yelled a bit more, expecting Libby to come out and kick me in the ankle for bullying Gordy, or Mutti to appear and ask whether I was home because I'd set the countryside alight, but no one appeared.

This is of course, because no one is home.

Charming.

Later

After leaving the cat dish in the middle of the doorway for Vati to trip on when (or if) he eventually came back, I dug the Jammy Dodgers out of the cupboard, and went upstairs to have a bath. Had to physically throw Gordy out of the bathroom, and since then he must have used his mad ninja cat skills to crawl across the roof and down the other side of the house, because he's now sitting on the bathroom windowsill, staring at me.

So long as he doesn't hurl himself through the glass, I don't care.

I am eating Jammy Dodgers in an overflowing bubble bath and I am completely free of all mud, sheep poo, ash, baby milk, icing, and more mud for the first time in days, and I really could not care less that the puddle on the floor is beginning to seep out under the door.

2 mins later

Cause a small tidal wave out of the bath in fright, when Angus took a trapeze leap from the tree branch to join Gordy on the windowsill.

I could quite possibly send them both to the circus, where they could be little trapeze cats performing daredevil stunts across pools of electrified water below. Angus could make friends with the tiger and other big cats, and there would be all those stupid poodle-y things they could ride like little horsies, so they wouldn't miss the Next Door's too much, living away from home.

I was mentally planning the little outfits I could make them to wear, that would look best under the spotlights, though the chances were high they would just eat them, when the front door opened, and Vati's dulcet tones sounded from downstairs, along with the crash that accompanied him tripping over the cat bowl.

"WHAT IS ALL THIS BLOODY WATER DOING DRIPPING DOWN THE STAIRS!? GEORGIA? ARE YOU HOME? GEORGIA!"

Libby was thumping up the stairs making small splashing noises as Angus and Gordy mrrowled in laughter from the window ledge, Angus jumping back into the tree as Vati continued to swear and shout from downstairs.

Libby ricocheted off the bathroom door, all while singing "Ginger… it's me Ginger, open the door, naughty boy!", still happily stomping around in the puddle on the floor outside.

Mutti's voice joined the banging and the clamour downstairs and I sunk a little lower in the bath, closing my eyes to relax and letting my ears drop underwater as Libby began to use her head as a battering ram and the bath water trembled.

And then, with an ear-splitting crack, that had me spluttering and coughing up to the surface Angus hurled himself off the tree branch and straight through the bathroom window, which shattered into a bajillion pieces all over the floor, none of which worried Angus as he stalked across the floor, bunched his legs and jumped up to sit on the edge of the bath.

Mutti and Vati shrieked in tandem downstairs and both began running up the stairs, slipping a little in the water by the sounds of it as Libby's battering ram intensified, while Gordy slipped inside the massive hole now in the window and tiptoed delicately across the sea of broken glass to butt his head against the door.

Because of course. What else did I expect? A bird will fly in, in a moment.

10 seconds later

A bird just flew in.

That's it, I'm getting out.

...


AN - Aaaaand, it's finished! I really am so very grateful to those of you who have made it this far, particularly those of you who were kind enough to tell me that you liked this story, which is really the only thing that inspired me to pick it back up and finish it off. I t wouldn't have happened without you. For those of you in this vair small fandom I challenge you - try your own hand at this, however terrible or great at writing you may be. I'm always around for a chat, or to bounce ideas off - though sadly I cannot make the time commitment to collaborate :(

So once more, mon pally's - please leave me a comment to let me know what you thought, as is the way of the truly great, who shall be blessed with flawless eyebrows. Those who don't will be haunted by badgers and stroppy sheep. Xx's, SaintClaire