[new house smell] Rob & Julian

[bloodaholic]

It was a lovely little house by anyone's standards: a respectably middle class red-brick semi-detached two-up-two-down that was only a few minutes from Oxford city centre. The neighbours on the attached side were students - three Oxford Brookes second years who spent most of their nights on the town rather than making any kind of effort in their

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posted on my upgraded account so I can edit any wonky html

[scissorbite]

“S’fine, come in,” Julian waved a hand, gesturing for Rob to come in from the door. Already he could feel the life literally returning to his limbs, an odd sensation that he had never quite gotten used to in one hundred years. Julian stepped away from door frame with a hand extended Rob’s way. “Do you want, uh, a hand with that?”

“Oh, don’t worry about it.” His smile turned a little lopsided. “Did you choose which bedroom you wanted?” Glancing at the stairs, Rob took a moment to generally survey the house again. It really was a lovely place; he had to commend Julian for finding it. It certainly wasn’t the sort of place that Rob had ever imagined for himself, mostly because he had never considered the possibility of leaving his old apartment. How strangely life was starting to work out. Not only does he meet a vampire, but he moves in with him too. It was definitely a story for the grandkids.

“Oh, yeah, I did!” Julian leaped forward with a grin and started padding up the stairs barefoot. “Hope you don’t mind but I took the one on the left ‘cause I kind of wanted the window facing east,” he explained as he reached the top of the stairs and gestured at Rob’s new room. “But that means you get the double bed!”

“Are you sure you don’t want the double?” Rob asked, a little uncertainly. He sort of understood why Julian would want an east facing window, but nonetheless he sort of hoped he would get the smaller room. It still felt as though he was imposing on Julian, even after his insistence that they go ahead with the move. Then again, it struck Rob as unlikely that Julian would actually do that much sleeping. Rob haphazardly removed his shoes by the door and then followed him up the stairs, tugging his little suitcase along.

[bloodaholic]

"Yeah, it's no problem," Julian said, nodding dismissively. With one hand in his pockets he switched on the light and led Rob in to his new bedroom, pausing at the dark window. "It's not like I need the space. Take that how you will," he added with a quiet smirk, looking at Rob's reflection in the window. He extended a finger to flick a bead of condensation from the corner of the glass pane before turning around to face Rob. "Is it warm enough for you?"

[woahnotouchie]

"Yeah, yeah, definitely." It certainly was pleasantly warm in the house, which was a pretty significant change after the days of draughts that Rob had been suffering since the door broke. In fact, for once he was actually inclined to remove his jumper. He stepped into the new room a little nervously, glancing around it. How long had it been since he lived somewhere with stairs? The room was so spacious - far more spacious than the one he'd had, with barely a metre either side of the bed between the wall. This one actually had a bit of room to move about in. Room for a wardrobe.

Again, Rob was lacking in possessions to put in a wardrobe, but all the same, he was warmed by the idea, and without thinking about it, he smiled. "It's a nice room," he murmured, for once in his life looking so genuinely pleased that it made him look considerably younger all of a sudden.

[bloodaholic]

“Yeah?” Julian grinned, taking the compliment as a personal reflection on his own room-picking skills. “Yeah, it is pretty nice.” He took the liberty of crossing the room to perch on Rob’s new bed with his hands tucked under his legs. “Shame you don’t have much stuff to put in here yet,” he added with a pained expression as he remembered the only downer to the whole adventure.

[woahnotouchie]

"I'll have more eventually," Rob said, trying to be reassuring. He carefully placed his suitcase in the corner before wandering over to the window, shoving his hands into his pockets. In the past week he had been very self-conscious of habitual motions, such as clasping his hands behind his back or hiding them in his pockets - mostly because for once he was spending time with someone who actually knew why he did these things. "Have you had much of a chance to look around the garden yet? I mean, I know it's probably kind of hard to do in the dark, but..." he trailed off stupidly, the second sentence having struck him only after he spoke the first.

[bloodaholic]

“Yeah, you could get… posters or something,” Julian suggested, pulling out a hand and gesturing vaguely at the expanse of pale eggshell that made up the vastness of the bare walls. The idea of a twenty-something getting posters to brighten up his walls was a little ridiculous but Julian didn’t want to retract the point just yet.

“Uh, no, I haven’t been out there yet.” He leaped back on to his feet and paced back across the room to join Rob at the window. He reached out to wipe a larger patch of condensation from the pane and stare out of the gap. He cast Rob a sidelong look and grinned. “Want to take a look?”

[woahnotouchie]

"Yeah, maybe," Rob said, letting out a little huff of laughter. It was a cute idea, but he wouldn't even know where to start when it came to posters, unless someone made posters for fanboys of Vivaldi and Pachelbel. It was at this point that it occurred to Rob that his interests were sort of amusingly geeky. It wasn't an entirely absurd idea, though, if he could find something to his tastes. He would keep it in mind.

The suggestion to explore caught Rob a little off guard, and he stared at Julian questioningly, as if he didn't understand what he had just said. He finally replied in an equally baffled voice, his voice randomly faint. "What, right now? I- it's a little co-" he stopped himself, swallowing and nodding. "Alright. Why not?" With he stepped back from the window, and wandered back towards the stairs, hands still casually stuffed into his pockets.

[bloodaholic]

With a satisfied grin Julian traipsed Rob and followed him down the stairs and out through the kitchen in to the garden. It was a frigid night with only the faintest scattering of cloud cover between them and the black stretch of limitless space above them. Dew was starting to frost over the grass but Julian was perfectly happy to wander around with bare feet, impervious to the cold dampness that seeped between his toes. He trailed a hand over a few waist-high shrubs before plucking a sprig of half-dead leaves from its depths.

"There aren't many flowers," he pointed out dubiously as he squinted into the depths of the nearest flowerbed.

Suddenly the security lights flickered into life and flooded the tiny garden with a sickly light. Julian blinked in surprise and averted his eyes, waiting for his eyes to adjust.

"Oh!" Julian pointed to a metal structure at the far end of the little plot and stared at it blearily as his eyes adjusted to the light. "What's that?"

[woahnotouchie]

Rob was going to suggest some shoes for Julian, but in observing the ease with which he wandered over the soggy grass, he changed his mind and stayed silent. It wasn't exactly the prettiest looking garden in the world, and needed quite a bit of work (Rob vaguely lamented having never picked up his mum's green fingers, though upon hearing the phrase in his head, a consciousness of his disasterous fingers set into his mind). He blinked uncomfortably as the security lights came on, but adjusted fairly quickly, peering in the direction that Julian was signalling in.

"Looks a bit like a bench of some sort," Rob finally answered, a little uncertainly. He couldn't really tell in the combination of pallid light and darkness.

[bloodaholic]

Julian crossed the little garden and hesitantly reached out a hand to touch what seemed to be a metal frame overrun by firm tendrils of creeping bindweed and wild dogrose. Rusted paint crumbled under his fingers but the structure stood solid even as he gave it a curious little push. Amidst waist-high thistles and wild grass a swing seat began to shift lazily in response.

"No, it's a swing!" Julian exclaimed, immediately beginning to tear away the clinging weeds that wrapped around the frame. "The landlord didn't say we had a swing," he added in a tone of voice that clearly said that Julian thought it would be one of the most attractive sales point of the whole building.

[woahnotouchie]

"It looks a bit... worn down," Rob began, hesitantly, edging just a little closer. The swing definitely looked a bit worse for wear, but even covered in greenery and weeds it seemed to possess some kind of strange charm. It looked like it belonged in the garden. He stared at the swing for a moment, quiet and thoughtful. "Do you think we can keep it?" He asked, again stepping towards the swing. He wondered how Julian had even noticed it. Even with the security light, Rob doubted that he would have taken notice of the swing so soon.

[bloodaholic]

"It's only worn down because nobody loves it! We can't get rid of it," Julian replied quickly, looking mock-scandalisd at the suggestion. He patted the frame in between pulling strands of bindweed from it. "I reckon we should do it up. It could be a project or something. You could get some paint from Homebase during the day and we can paint it together!"

[woahnotouchie]

"I wasn't suggesting that," he murmured quickly, still staring at the swing as if was some exciting light show that had captured his attention. He wondered if his sudden sense of attachment was born from Julian's reaction? Ironically enough, Julian seemed to make various aspects of life more breathable for Rob, including the idea of restoring some strange old swing that looked like it was hanging onto life by the last few threads. Or the last few rusty nuts and bolts, in this case. He was silent for a little while before glancing at Julian almost a little timidly, smiling. "Have any colours in mind?"

[bloodaholic]

"Umm," Julian replied helpfully as he reached up to grab the top bar of the swing with both hands. He gingerly picked his feet up off the ground, testing the strength of the frame as he carefully let himself hang by his arms.

Julian had always been drawn to the colour yellow; he supposed it was out of longing for the warmth and colour of the sun. It was a happy colour. It reminded him of the seventies for some reason. "Yellow?" He suggested after a few seconds of silence as he continued to hang suspended from the frame.