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| Details |
| Author: | Luridel |
| Summary: | After seeing the squads off to Karazhan, Mordecai returns home to wait. His friend Ismene Hazan drops by for a chat. ~5600 words. |
| Rating: | T for Teen |
Mordecai and Colson’s new home is close to one of Stormwind’s outer walls, and on the left of the building is an alleyway that really ruins the view from the western windows. It is otherwise a very cute little one-story building. Lights are on inside, although the curtains are drawn.
Ismene hesitates outside, tugging her cloak close around her before letting it go to smooth her fingers over the embroidered edge. Her feet shuffle in a manner her mother would disapprove of, a disapproval that would not have gone unspoken. She’s talking to herself, though not aloud. Her mouth moves in partially formed words, her head bobbing left and right and left and right as she weighs some momentous decision. Finally, quickly before she can change her mind, she hurries up to the door and knocks.
She immediately regrets the decision. Pale and wide-eyed, she awaits her fate.
She doesn't have long to wait.
Mordecai opens the door in a matter of seconds. His hair is an absolute mess, and he's dressed in dark pants and a gray woolen sweater rather than the robes he more typically wears outside. His socks are pastel pink and don't match at all. His worried expression brightens immediately into a pleased smile as he recognizes his guest. "Mizzy!" he says happily. "Come in!"
He might as well be waving a flaming sword at her. “Oh, you’re relaxing!” she says with horrified um horror. “You’re relaxing and here I am dropping in unannounced and bothering you! I knew I shouldn’t have come, I just knew it, we should schedule, do you want to schedule, I can schedule then go away quick as anything and you can relax!”
Mordecai starts shaking his head immediately. Manners alone keep him from actually talking over her, but the second Ismene stops to breathe, he cuts in, "No no no, it's really good to see you, I'm so glad you're here, please come in, I would really like the company." He twists his hands together in front of him.
Hey, look at that, her hands are doing the same thing. Only in front of her, because it wouldn’t be seemly otherwise. She takes a step forward, then another. “Only if you’re sure and you’re not just being nice. I wouldn’t suggest it, except you’re a very nice person and you’ve always been very nice to me.”
Mordecai takes a step back as he pulls the door open wider for her to enter. "Yes, I'm sure, please. It's the waiting period. You know? When they're off saving the world or fighting a billion ghosts in a tower and I'm just waiting. By myself. So. I think today I would much rather be waiting with a friend like you."
The living room is large, and a good portion of that is simply an open floor. Immediately to the left of the door is a small table, along with hooks for hanging one's coat; to the right is a place to leave one's shoes, although there's also a little welcome mat to wipe your feet on right inside the door. In the right-hand corner of the room is a little table surrounded by four chairs.
On the far end of the living room is a window that looks into the kitchen. Near that is a beautiful old piano. The room opens up further to the right, and this is where the fireplace is, and a nice armchair near it, and along the right-hand wall there is a sofa with a coffee table in front of it. There's a very large blanket folded and settled along the back of the sofa. Most of the furniture looks old enough to be a little worn, and the place looks rather plain in terms of decoration - except for a glass vase on a table along the left-hand wall that contains several long-stemmed blue roses that are - upon closer inspection - not actual flowers at all, but carved gemstones.
“Oh,” she says, “yes I do hate the waiting. And then he comes home and he always looks so tired and worn out.” She sighs and slips large mother-of-pearl buttons free of dark blue braiding on her cloak, letting her shrug it off. Underneath is a wool dress, long skirts just brushing the tops of her boots. It’s very well-tailored, a soft blue with darker piping around the hem and along corset lines in the bodice. The dress fits over a downy white sweater that must keep her warm and toasty. “I wouldn’t have just dropped by, really I wouldn’t, except I’m trying to find my mother an apartment or something here in Stormwind. Not that I’d let her stay in your neighborhood! I like you and Colson far too much to saddle you with a neighbor like her.”
"Yes, exactly," Mordecai agrees. "It's exactly like that. May I take your cloak?" The question is posed like a long-trained polite habit, out of his mouth before he's had a chance to think about it. He glances at the hooks on the wall, which are easily within Mizzy's arms' reach in this particular house.
Ismene looks at her cloak, then at the hooks, then at Mordecai. She is Uncertain. "How kind?" she asks. Politely, she holds out her cloak, then steps away from the hooks so he has a clear shot.
Mordecai laughs, a little embarrassed, as he takes it and hangs it up. "Habit. Sorry. I can't even tell if it's a good habit or a bad habit at this point. I suppose you can consider that 'just being nice', but not in a… that is, it's no trouble, I just wouldn't want to be rude. Um. I'm making this worse." He stops talking and looks around the room quickly for a distraction.
Maybe the room itself is a distraction. "Oh! I have a home now, Mizzy, look." He hurries out into the center of the floor and does a cute little twirl, sweeping his arms around as he gestures to the room at large. "I've got my own kitchen. I mean, it's Colson's too, but we don't have anyone else living here, just us. Do you want to see?"
“I do!” she says, eager and happy. “Is it wonderful? Ben and I haven’t managed it yet; first it was my mother, then even when she came here to stay with friends for the holidays, we still have the babies and…” She shuts herself up. “It must be wonderful. Show me everything!”
"It is wonderful," Mordecai agrees, moving to the kitchen door and opening it. The kitchen is a thin rectangle shape, with a little table and two chairs visible immediately from the open door. "Wait, babies? What babies? Did you two adopt?"
“No, no. We’re taking care o–” She stops. “Well, it’s a very long story but we’re taking care of someone else’s children for the moment. We need to find another situation for them, we think, but it’s hard when we feel so responsible for them. This is so cozy! Ben would love it.” She looks around with every evidence of admiration.
"How many of them? That seems… like a lot of responsibility. Do you have anyone up at the orchards who helps?" Mordecai walks to the window above the back counter of the kitchen and pulls the shade up, revealing a view of the back garden. It's winter, so the garden itself doesn't look particularly remarkable, but there's a little bench out there and it looks like it might be pretty during spring.
Ismene walks over to see the view, going up on her tip-toes. “So pretty,” she says, somewhat wistful. “Two babies, and it is. Rather more than I thought it would be, in a way. We have a housekeeper and now a nanny but with Ben and I going from one end of various planets to another, it’s probably time to find them something more permanent. I daresay I didn’t expect it to be this long. Months, now! Did you plant anything in the garden? When did you even move in?”
"We moved in, um… late November. Everything back there is still from the previous owners - but Colson's excited to take it over when the weather allows." Mordecai speaks about the house with a fond smile, and that nervous energy from earlier seems to be gone. "It's my first time really living in a house without any sort of servants to clean things up." He runs a hand along the kitchen counter. "I never really thought about how quickly dust accumulates before. But I'm happier this way, I think."
Mizzy laughs. “I can imagine. All the privacy, just you and your husband! We have Mr. and Mrs. Barnsby, I should say, plus the nanny. We just hired her, and the Barnsbys have been with my family for ages. I like them better than I liked my parents, if you’ll keep that between us.” She thinks. “And I suppose Colson and Ben. They don’t gossip.
“Besides,” she adds, leaning a little toward him, “I must admit I don’t mind not having to dust or do dishes or pick up. I’m terrible at it, though I do hang up my clothes. Ben never hangs up his clothes, but he’s good at everything else so I suppose it all balances out!”
Mordecai nods and puts a finger to his lips to agree, yes, keeping that between us. He sets a hand on the counter again, smiling at her. "He doesn't? I suppose he gets a lot done. He might be too tired. Colson always—" There's a pause. Loading, please hold. Mordecai blushes as he amends the sentence. "—almost always puts his clothes away. Except once in a while. He's neater than I am, at least."
Ismene nods, agreeable. “Your bandages were always very tidy,” she says, championing her fellow healer, “so it’s not as if you’re messy. I should’ve brought you a housewarming present, though. I’ll have one for next time. I think I know just what to get you. Though I suppose you two have everything you need…” She taps a finger on her chin and looks around. “Money’s good for that much, at least.”
"Oh! You really don't have to," Mordecai says quickly. "But if you want to, and you have an idea in mind, then of course, that'd be really lovely." He seems to realize that they're standing in the kitchen and that there are more polite things for a host to offer. "Oh! Would you like anything to drink? We have, um. Tea, coffee, hot chocolate, milk, water…"
“Of course I want to! What fun to have friends to whom I can gift things, instead of people my parents wanted to impress.” She thinks about the drink selection. “I don’t know,” she says. “This doesn’t really seem like a very proper sort of visit so I don’t suppose tea is necessary, is it? Do you like tea? We can have tea if you like it.”
Mordecai smiles at her. "Nothing's necessary, but I do like tea. If you want some, I could show you the blends we've got and you can pick something you'd like to try?" He moves to a cabinet.
Hastily, Ismene says, “Coffee would be lovely.” Then she laughs a little. “Sorry. I used to drink tea all the time, before Ben. Then I found out that I really only like one kind of tea and I’ve grown to like coffee quite a bit. It wasn’t what ladies drank, you see.” She shakes her head. “Well, I grew up with a lot of silly notions. But if you like tea blends, I can send over some of the apple and wildflower tea I like. Niris liked it, too.”
Obviously, Niris liking something is the ultimate in approbation.
Mordecai laughs quietly, changing course to a different shelf in the same cabinet. "Coffee it is. I would like to try apple and wildflower tea, that does sound nice." It soon becomes clear, as he begins to measure and prepare things, that he is making Ismene coffee and he is making himself hot chocolate.
“You usually go, don’t you? To see Colson off safely?” Ismene asks, watching the process of someone else making coffee.
Mordecai nods. "Yes, almost always. Whenever I can. I missed a day once. Why do you ask…?"
“Just wondering,” she says. “Wondering what I was missing, I suppose. I love my orchards but I love Ben and sometimes it feels like I can’t have both.” She smiles a little. “I suppose I’m just envious of what you and Colson have.”
Mordecai glances over at her briefly. "It feels like you can't have both…?" He returns his attention to the coffee maker, but it seems like he's still listening. "What makes you say that, Mizzy?"
Ismene shakes her head. “Oh, just… Well, Outland, for example. He was mostly there, and I was there too but then it was harvest. I had to be at the orchards for that, then I discovered what a snarl the books were in after me being away so long. And the babies. We had taken them to Outland too, once we thought it safe, but with neither of us staying in one place very long, they were constantly being uprooted. It just seemed simpler if I stayed at the orchards while Ben went off to do missions and see to his lieutenant responsibilities.”
"You haven't hired a bookkeeper? Mizzy." Mordecai's back is to her as he transfers hot milk from a small pot on the stove into a mug for his own hot chocolate, but as he takes the mug with him back to the coffee machine, he turns to smile at her. "I… suppose the biggest difference is that we're not going to have any children."
“Well, I can do the books,” she says. “I was taught to, and it’s… I don’t know, it’s nice to take care of the business after it’s taken care of me so long. I just don’t know how to trust it to someone else. You know, for a little bit there, we thought I might be pregnant. I wasn’t, but when we found out, I was a bit sad about it. Ben was relieved. I was so hurt about that for the longest time.” She thinks about it. “I suppose I still am on some level, but he was right to be relieved. It’s just too much. Too much to do, to think about, to plan for, and it’s not like we can just quit Cobalt Company. Or at least, I suppose, he can’t and I’m not letting him go off without me.”
She cocks her head. “But you don’t ever want children?”
Mordecai pours Ismene's coffee into a nice plain coffee mug and leaves it on the counter for her as he stirs cocoa powder into his hot chocolate with a spoon. "That's not an unusual feeling - wanting something and knowing you're not ready for it yet, and still feeling disappointed that you can't have it right now. It's difficult. But no, I'm very certain that I never want any children."
Ismene approaches the coffee. Coffee is good, coffee is life. “Well, I hope you don’t mind being an uncle to ours, then. You can make their birthday cakes and I won’t even make you stay for the parties.” She grins.
Mordecai smiles back. "I do like making birthday cakes. I… like children, in general. I just don't want any. Careful, it's very hot." That would be the coffee. "I suppose the second-biggest difference is that Colson's father is managing the vineyards, whereas you… inherited very suddenly."
She perks up (coffee pun). “Do you suppose Colson knows a good accountant who understands farm books? Goodness, I mean… not if it’s an imposition, I didn’t… That’s not rude, is it? I’m never sure. It doesn’t seem rude.” She thinks about it and takes a concerned sip of coffee.
"That's not rude at all. Um, I'll have Colson send you a list if there's anyone… he definitely knows people. The Aspenwoods have people. Um. I don't think there's anything wrong with you wanting to manage the business yourself, except, well, free time. You'll want people you can lean on to keep things running when you're away."
She sighs. “Yes. I’m not very good at delegating, it seems. I’m afraid I was a terrible busy-body at harvest and at the cider pressing. Maybe that’s a healer thing? Ben said it was a healer thing.”
"It's a skill you learn over time." Mordecai sips his hot chocolate. "I don't know, I think I'm good at delegating as a healer? I think?"
“We’re good at telling people what to do,” Ismene says with a laugh, “but I know I, at least, still like to be in control of what’s happening with my patients.”
"And your orchard." Mordecai nods. "You grew up there, right…?"
“Yes,” she says, nodding too. “It’s home. It always will be.” Then she grins. “Ben says his home is wherever I am, which is dreadfully romantic, of course, but I’m afraid he loses out to my orchards. At least, in the ‘home’ scale. He can come in second, though. That’s not so bad.”
"Colson said something very similar," Mordecai says, grinning at her. "I do get attached to places though. I liked Telredor a lot. And Telaar. And now here." He drinks some more hot chocolate. "I can't say I have much attachment to the houses I grew up in, though."
Ismene looks down at her coffee. “I love the orchards. The house, maybe not. Ben says we’re tearing the closet out of my old room.” She takes a sip and colors slightly. Non-sequitur much?
Mordecai unfortunately latches on to that part of the sentence. "The closet?"
“It um…” She debates something with herself, but evidently comes down on the side of truth. “It’s where my parents used to put me when I was bad. It doesn’t really belong,” she adds hastily. “My parents had it added on when they were doing other renovations. It’s mostly ghastly. The renovations. They had money, but not much taste I’m afraid.”
Mordecai blinks as he mentally translates that. He gives Ismene a soft look of understanding. "You said you're trying to find your mother an apartment in Stormwind. Does she… is she… I wonder if she's very much like mine. Does she treat you like you owe her something?"
Ismene considers that. “She mostly treats me like an appendage,” she decides. “Or… I don’t know, a child who must do as she is told and behave as she expects me to behave, as though I haven’t any ideas of my own. That’s getting better, though. Ben doesn’t tolerate too much of that, even if I do.”
"Ben was really impressed with how well you were managing the orchards. He told me you had more business sense in your little finger than the Trade District of Stormwind." Mordecai smiles. "I think getting your mother out of there will be good for you. Is there another house on the grounds that the two of you could move into, perhaps? Or… renovations of your own?"
“Renovations, definitely!” Ismene says. “I was thinking of bringing someone in from Ironforge; there’s rather a lot of it, and undoing some of it without making the whole thing collapse won’t be easy. But selling all the marble will help defray the costs. Did you have any renovations done?”
"All the marble…" Mordecai makes a face and shakes his head. "I see what you mean by 'ghastly'. Um, we haven't yet. The couple who used to live here kept this place in good shape."
“Yes! You should see it before I get it all taken out.” Ismene shakes her head. “You can see the house under all the embellishing, but not very well. It’s like someone glued white velvet all over a plow horse, then added gold wings and told everyone it could fly. Ghastly and embarrassing.”
Mordecai laughs at the description. "Oh, no. Well, you definitely have better taste than that."
“Maybe you could come over when it’s time to tear some of it out! You and I will organize and sort materials, and we’ll make Ben and Carson work with their shirts off as they do heavy labor.” She grins and wrinkles her nose.
Mordecai nods. "I'd be happy to help." He finishes his hot chocolate and puts the mug in the sink. "Would you like to see the rest of the house?"
“Yes, please.” She also places her cup in the sink, though there’s still some left. “I’d even love to see the gardens, if you don’t mind the cold.”
"Oh! Of course." Mordecai exits the kitchen. On the same wall as the kitchen door is another door, which Mordecai pushes open to say, "Bathroom." The bathroom is long and narrow and includes both a tub and a shower, separate from each other.
She nods soberly. Yes. Yes it is. “Isn’t indoor plumbing nice? Some of the inns I’ve stayed at didn’t have it, but of course nothing would do but the house have it put in. For once, I’m not complaining about a renovation.”
"It is," Mordecai says a little dreamily. "I spent years with the army. Here there's even hot water." He shuts the bathroom door and moves on along what becomes a little hallway with another door on the right that opens out into the garden itself. It is chilly out there, and Mordecai isn't wearing shoes, which he seems to notice right about then.
She can’t help it, she giggles. That is how you know she likes Mordecai. She never giggles. “Well, maybe we can just look from here. What do you think you’ll put in?”
Mordecai blushes a little and shuffles his pink-socked feet on the floor. "I mean, um, you can go out if you'd like, I promise not to lock you out of the house. Or - or I could get my shoes. Um, Colson wants to plant violets, they're his mother's favorites. And things to cook with. Basil?"
“You’d do better to ask Ben about cooking things. I can tell you herbal things, and there’s a bit of overlap but that gets dreadfully tricky.” She tugs at his arm as she backs up. “You’ll get cold, and then what will Colson have to say to me? It’s all right, there’ll be other visits so I can see the garden.”
Mordecai closes and locks the back door, allowing Ismene to tow him away. "You should come back in spring, it'll be a lot nicer then."
“I’d love to. And you must come to the orchards in spring. We’ll picnic under the apple trees!”
"Oh! I'd like that." Mordecai nods and returns to the living room. As he passes by the vase of flower-shaped carved gemstones, he smiles down at it. "Colson made these for my birthday," Mordecai says happily, lowering his voice a little like maybe one shouldn't speak about their birthday presents too loudly. He opens another door that opens inward into what is obviously the bedroom.
Like the rest of the house, it is very sparsely decorated, but clean. The bed is almost directly across from the door, up against a wall, underneath a window with a shade pulled over it. Above the window hangs a string of draenei-style crystal fairy lights that glow a soft purple.
“I love those lights!” Ismene says. “Ben would probably suffer them in the bedroom if I asked, but maybe I could get some for my study. I picked up so many crystals in Un’Goro crater hoping to make lights of them, but it didn’t work and I took them back.” Sad sigh.
Upon closer inspection, the crystal in the very middle of the string of lights is a little dimmer than the others, and it's shaped like a little heart.
"Colson made them," Mordecai says proudly. "Um, I've seen them sold in Shattrath, though. I'm not sure if you can use any kind of crystal or just some kinds. Those are shadow draenite."
There’s something weird about being more impressed by a string of lights than of gemstone flowers, but here we are. “Goodness. I wonder what such an item would cost at market…” She gives the lights another, more measured look.
Mordecai seems happy to just stare at the pretty lights and smile dreamily at them. Conversation? What conversation?
“You don’t have to wait for the spring, you know,” Ismene says, still watching the lights herself. Pretty. “That’s how friends do it, right? They just come over. You can just come over. If you go to Southshore, practically anyone can direct you to the orchards. Then I can wear pink socks and show you around.”
"Oh! S-sure, I can." Mordecai smiles. "I can do that. I have the flight path. Your, um, your mother won't be living with you any more?"
“Not if the Light has any mercy,” Ismene says. Just to be sure it’s listening, she looks up. “I’ll let you know as soon as she’s settled in Stormwind?” She steps back, putting the pretty lights out of her view.
Mordecai nods and shuts the bedroom door. "All right." He looks around the living room. "If you were a ghost in a tower and you had to choose one thing to do forever, what would you pick?"
She blinks because hi, non-sequitur. But then she understands. “I don’t suppose they’d have trees in the tower. In that tower?” She smiles. “Dance with Ben. I taught him a little waltz box step. It feels like the most perfect thing ever, dancing with him.”
Mordecai smiles and nods at her. "Do you know a lot of dances? I know three… three and a half? I only learned one as a child. Which I suppose you saw. At the wedding. Colson's been teaching me. That's why the table's all the way over there instead of in the center here." Mordecai gestures at all the open space. "Dance floor."
Mizzy’s eyes widen. “You… have dance lessons?”
"Sometimes! I don't have an actual teacher in a school like I used to, but Colson's been showing me the ones he knows, and my friend Aze taught me a sin'dorei dance. Um, I can do the box step, it's just the rest of the waltz I'm a bit shaky on. And I always get mixed up waltzing whenever I switch from leading to following, or following to leading."
She’s practically vibrating with excitement. “Do you– that is, are these priv– I mean, I wouldn’t want to impose and if you don– If you’d rather not hav– I was just thinking that I– that Ben could use the practice? And he should really learn more dances, he’s Lord Hazan now and if he ever ends up at some court ball, he’d have to dance or the social st— I mean, of course you don’t need to…”
She trails off. It’s for the best; that’s about the point where Ben starts smooching to shut her up and if she doesn’t do it on her own, she’ll be going for the next few hours.
Mordecai holds a finger up as he tries to parse that out. "Wait, do you want to dance or do you want Ben to learn how so he can dance with you or both?"
“Well of course if Ben is learning then I can come and I can help teach, because I know so very many dances!” she says. “Well, not many I suppose but seven or eight? I can teach! And we can dance.” She’s gone all starry-eyed.
Mordecai nods. "I'd like that. If Ben isn't too shy about it, learning in front of other people. Some people are, when they're first starting. But you know at least double the dances I do, I'd say that's a lot. Um, and I'm kind of a slow learner, but I doubt you'd lose patience with me…"
She almost starts dancing where she is. “Oh no, not at all, even dancing a little is still dancing and you’re not in the least clumsy I’m sure you’ll be very good at it and you’re so smart you’ll pick up on the steps in no time, absolutely no time at all!” GASPing inhale. She smiles. “I’ll go home and ask Ben, I’ll go home and ask him right now, then I’ll write you and let you know and then you can let us know when you’re dancing next!”
"He probably won't be home from the tower yet, remember?" Mordecai reminds her. "But we can definitely… Colson's a good teacher. I am very clumsy. And I am a pretty slow learner, when it comes to dance steps. But I like it."
“You are not clumsy,” Mizzy says firmly. “I’ve seen you in a crowded infirmary with bodies coming and going, and you move smoothly enough through that. If you’re clumsy dancing, it’s not physical.”
"I am. I'm speaking from experience, Mizzy," Mordecai says, waving a hand like maybe that should settle it. "Um, there's one more room if you want to see it. Well, there's two doors, but that one's a linen closet, it's not really. A room." He moves to another door. "This is sort of the sunroom except I think technically to be a sunroom it needs to be all windows, and it isn't."
He opens the final door. The room itself is fairly small but cozy-looking, like it could be turned into a study. There's a desk, there are gardening tools, and it looks very much like a room in progress that they haven't quite fully settled into yet. There are hooks on the walls and from the ceiling that indicate that planters used to be hung there, but the potted plants themselves are gone, probably property of the previous resident(s).
“I like this,” she says, stepping inside and turning slowly. “This would make such a nice office. Or a little solar, where you could come and do busy work. So much light. Though practicality may mean putting armor in here. I think Ben’s armor is going to have to go in the parlor.”
Better Homes & Paladins staff writer, Ismene Hazan.
"Colson keeps his armor in the bedroom." Mordecai stands by the doorway, looking in. "I think it'll end up as an office, I'm just not sure whose. I don't know if either of us really need one."
“Guest bedroom? Someday you might have someone who wants to stay overnight, or a patient you want to keep a close eye on.” She thinks about that last one. “All right, maybe not that. Still, an extra room can come in handy.”
"It's a little small and thin for… well, I suppose it could work." Mordecai smiles at her. "That's a good idea. I'll consider it. It might be worth getting one of those couches that folds out into a bed for the living room…"
Blink. “One of those…” Ismene freezes. All of her. Well, her eyelids blink but other than that, nope, she’s frozen. Eventually she works her way through whatever mental tangle had gripped her. “Convenient,” she says.
"Mizzy?" Mordecai steps into the room, his voice soft and concerned. "Did you go somewhere?"
Her mouth opens and closes. She looks up and blinks. Some things are hard to find words for. “It’s just… I don’t… Can you do that? Make a guest… What if it’s a… That is, the Aspenwoods are… There are a lot of them, in a sense and… I suppose they’d stay at the house but…” She bites her lips. At least she mostly trailed off instead of stopped mid-syllable. She thinks about it some more. “Though, actually, if I could get rid of the guest room, Ben would have plenty of room to store his armor and arms.” Hm.
“A couch that turns into a bed, really?”
"Well, see, if we don't have a guest room at all, no one's going to try and stay the night," Mordecai says, relaxing a little. "And then if someone really needed it, a close friend or Cressidha, in an emergency, we would have somewhere to put them after all. My sister-in-law Lucy mentioned them once. I don't know if they're mass-produced."
“I’m going to ask Ben about it. Honestly, my mother’s staying in it now anyway and we’ll have my old bedroom for a nursery someday so that room will just go to waste.” She seems pleased. “This has been very productive.”
Mordecai looks pleased. "I hope she finds an apartment she likes and gets out of your house for good as soon as possible."
“From your mouth to the Light’s ears,” Mizzy says. “Mind you, I’ve only spent one morning helping her look and I’m ready to set things on fire. If I didn’t think she’d drive them insane too, I’d hire someone.” She sighs. “But it really is time I got home. I didn’t mean to leave the babies with the nanny this long and the whole reason I only promised her a morning is that I had plenty to do this afternoon. I’m ever so glad I stopped by, though! I may do so again?”
Yes, it’s a question.
"Yes, of course." Mordecai steps in to give her a hug. "Thank you. It's helped. With the waiting. You're welcome to come by whenever you like, even without warning, although we might not always be home in that case."
“I’m definitely coming over if you get one of those couches. This, I have to see.” She hugs him back, maybe a trifle long. “Thank you. I never know how to act with friends. You’re good to put up with me while I learn.”
Mordecai walks her to the door, smiling. He removes her cloak from the hook and offers it to her politely. "You're doing just fine, Mizzy."
She swirls it around her with a touch of drama. “Don’t forget about the dancing,” she says, opening the door and slipping out. She waves at him from the other side.
"I won't!" Mordecai waves back and shuts the door.