Trials and Tribulations

i'm writing a fanfic for Howl's Moving Castle, which i fell in love with the moment i started reading it. Patrick, darlin', your letting me borrow it was the highlight of my week. =D i finished it the day i got it and by the next night i'd re-read it. and this fic, i feel like posting here. 'cos it's awesome, if i say so myself.

and no, i'm not capitalizing. 'cos i'm a lazyass. =D it's 1,213 words long, by the bye. i might end up posting it in sections. in fact, i think i'll do that.

***

Calcifer was dozing as a low flicker of flame among the ashes and coals of the fire, when the door opened and the overpowering scent of flowers flooded into the room. The smell was so intense it roused the fire demon; he clambered up the logs with green brows furrowed. He thought Sophie had put a stop to Howl’s going off and courting girls!

But, it was Sophie and Michael who staggered through the door, laden with fresh flowers to sell in the shop that day. Sophie, to have something to do, liked to keep the shop going. And since both Michael and Howl were so busy, and since Sophie was less a woman and more a force of nature when she so chose, they didn’t bother arguing. Calcifer, being in and out frequently since Sophie released him, wasn’t precisely sure why the wizard and apprentice were so busy.

But as it would turn out, he’d soon discover why.

“Hullo Calcifer.” Michael grunted as he heaved a large bundle of flowers after Sophie. He waved a hand and the large tub he’d made and it floated in Sophie’s wake, and the young man flopped down into the chair with a puff.

“Where’s Howl?” Calcifer inquired curiously.

“Dead to the world!” Sophie remarked with a touch of temper as she reappeared, wiping her hands on the apron she’d donned for a day in the shop.

“Asleep in a drunken stupor, due to wake with one mother of a hangover.” Michael explained, jerking his chin upstairs. “Can’t you hear the snoring?”

As Calcifer listened, the uproarious hoots and honks were clearly audible from the still-filthy bedroom. He and Sophie had had a rather spectacular quarrel about that room – Howl remained adamant that it stayed dirty, while Sophie was determined to at least make a dent in the grunge now she was a more permanent fixture in the castle.

“The slippery, slithery brat.” Sophie spat from where she was rummaging around in the food closet.

At Calcifer’s perplexed flicker, Michael sighed in resignation and explained. “Since Wizard Suliman retired, the King appointed Howl the Royal Wizard. For good.”

“That’s good, isn’t it?” Calcifer ventured.

“Not for us!” Sophie growled, tossing aside some unidentifiable insect with a violent flick.

Calcifer was taken aback. “Uhruh… how?”

Sophie whirled around, stomping toward the broom cupboard. She snatched her stick out of it and stalked toward the archway, muttering darkly. She went into Market Chipping in a huff, remarking over her shoulder that she was going to restock the food closet.

“No telling what she’ll do in that mood. Last time she threw a bucket of caustic weed-killer at my face.” Said a mournful voice behind them. They turned to see a disheveled Howl standing at the foot of the staircase, his eyes red-rimmed. With a sigh of long-suffering, Howl stepped into the room and went through the archway. “I suppose I should go make sure she doesn’t blow anything up. With my luck she’ll flay me to bits with that stick of hers. Treat my remains kindly, you two.”

Calcifer picked his jaw up off the log. “Did Howl just go out into town, looking like that?”

Michael smiled slightly, but his face soon fell. He fed Calcifer another log with a morose expression, causing a flicker of concern in the demon. “What’s up?”

“Howl and Sophie, of course. Since Sophie realized her fortune and her happy-ever-after lie with Howl, she’s been badgering him to get married. But you know Howl – he hates being pinned down. She almost had him, but then the King appointed him Royal Wizard and he’s been using it as an excuse to slip out whenever Sophie brings marriage up.”

Calcifer nodded wisely – he knew Howl all too well. That sounded just like him. Even though he was honestly in love with Sophie and not like the pointless romances with those countless girls before, his nature was always to eel his way out of an unpleasant situation. Like having to get married.

“And of course Sophie’s really upset about it – she’s awful fond of Howl, you know. As much as they quarrel they’re a good match.”

“Because they quarrel they’re a good match!” Calcifer retorted with a hiss of laughter. “They’re the only ones who’ll put up with each other for extended periods!”

“Well, I don’t know about that…” Michael said with a frown.

“You’re too nice, you don’t count.” Calcifer added with a scathing crackle.

Oof

My lower back is gonna huuuurt tomorrow. -groan-

Had work today. The morning shift - 7 to 11. I think I officially prefer the morning shift, it's not NEARLY as ungodly hot.

We had that big storm last night, right? Hooch scrambled under my bed. I held the door for him to leave, but he stayed under there. So I said "okay. You aren't gonna leave now you'll be stuck in here all night." So he was stuck there all night.

Anyhow. After that huge storm the barn was sopping. Wet. I mean SOAKED. The dust was mud, and everything was damp. There was water in the feeding tubs for the horses that eat outside.

And guess what? There was a HUGE-ASS LAKE in one corner of the arena. I'm serious. The sand turned into quicksand, and there was a puddle of ankle-deep water.
So it was up to Micheal and I to drain said puddle. Which I fondly called Arena Lake.
So we went out there with a hoe, a shovel, and a broom and proceeded to drain the puddle. Trenches had to be dug from the dip in the sand that housed the water to outside the arena - which worked with minimal success because the grass and surrounding muck acted as a screen.
So we spent a good half-hour toiling away. I was raking out the sand from the main channel and scraping away the sand inside the draining puddle to keep the water flowing, while Micheal used the broom to push the water into the channel.
My lower back was screaming at me by the time we finished. The fact that I have a sway-back doesn't help when I have to do work like that. Oy.

And by the end of draining the better part of Arena Lake, my shoes were waterlogged and full of grit. Eew. I rinsed them out before I left - my socks were beyond salvaging.
But it's three and a half hours for which I'm getting paid, so it's cool. A job I enjoy, I can do without too much trouble, and my co-workers are amiable. Better than most jobs, so I'm not complaining.

Cockroach!

Woah.

Okay, so these past coupla days I've been cleaning the wormhole that is my room, right? ((Some of the dust bunnies are as big as Radar - it's scary. O_O))
Well, today I found the notebook that I used as my journal for the Australia/New Zealand PTP trip. And reading through it, it reminded me if this one really interesting incident that happened on the fourth day.

We were at the Couran Cove resort somewhere off the eastern Sunshine coast of Australia, right? It was our second day on the resort, and we were about to go to bed. At that moment we were watching a rugby game.

Well, I was very tired. I just wanted to go to sleep. So I tucked my knees into my UNC hoody and pulled the hood up and started to doze off. And for some reason, to this day I have no idea why - maybe it was a sudden chemical imbalance in my inner ear or something - I fell off my chair. I just started leaning to one side and then bump, I was on the floor.

I dunno what, but I cracked my head rather hard on something on the way down. I was on the last chair in the row my posse had set up, but it was far enough from the wall, so I really have no earthly clue what I hit my head on. But it hurt like hell.

Because I had my knees tucked rather securely into my hoody they didn't come out when I fell, and I landed more or less on my back. One can almost picture what I looked like. My friend Stevie astutely compared me to a roach.
More like she burst into hysterics and repeated over and over the word "cockroach!" through her giggles.

At that point I was very dazed, too much so to wonder if I had concussed myself, which I don't think I did. But I sat there on my back curled into a fetal position for a little while until I figured out WHAT the hell just happened, and got back on my chair trying to ignore Stevie's hysteric giggling.

Needless to say, I had a headache for quite a while that night. And Stevie went on at length about how much like a roach I looked. I accepted the comparison gracefully, since if I hadn't just cracked my head it was very likely I would've been laughing my head off too.

So yup. There's my story from Australia. One of my many moments of spaz.