How Green Becomes Wood

"Not the worst thing to regret. We'll leave you alone," Alec assured her, backing up. "Oh, and Mama and Ba send their well-wishes, too. Bye, Mr. and Mrs. Applebaum!"

"I'll be waiting for your text," Xander said.

They headed back to their own house to leave Sloan to rest up.
 
"You can thank them from me, and I'll keep you both updated," Sloan replied, hiding a yawn, "See you at school."

After the door was shut, she brought the cupcakes in the kitchen and took one up to her bedroom to eat before going right to sleep.
 
"Hello, Mr. Cooger. I am in need of some information, and I feel you are the quickest way to obtain said information," Ciara said simply, to the point as always. "I am in need of two things. One, a moving service that can be trusted. Two, someone to walk through a rental apartment who knows what to look for in case of poor structure. A building inspector, if you will, but willing to look through a potential rental."
 
Cooger took a bit of time to listen through what Ciara had to say, and then after a few moments said, "Are you looking for names or looking to hire me? For the first one, a proper moving service would probably be better for you, if you want someone to pack up everything for ya rather than just helping to move a couch. For the second, I can do either, I know a guy or I could be that guy."
 
"I desire a name for the moving company, not to hire you for that. You are but one man, after all, and an apprentice," Ciara said. "If you have time and are willing, I would hire you for the inspection. If you do not have time, I would like a name."
 
"Right," Cooger nodded, "I'll text you a name of a few places, in order of who I trust the most, in case the best name on the list is unavailable. All of 'em are good, don't get me wrong, but just 'cause one is good don't mean one can be better, right? And I don't mind helping you check out apartments. Just let me know what dates and days you're thinking, I'll think up what I'd charge for something like that."
 
"Thank you," Ciara said. She quickly listed off several dates that were upcoming, having already established when and where. She gave him the name of three apartments, all of them much closer to Dark and Daizi than her first apartment had been. "If possible, I would like to view them as soon as possible."
 
"Yeah, yeah, no problem," Cooger replied, "Sounds like you've been looking at places nearer to this side. Look, I'll just look through my calendar and see what's what, sound good? I can get back to you by the end of the day, and you reach out to those places and see what their availability is."
 
"Those dates are their availability," Ciara said. "I called ahead to see what their availability was, first. Thank you for considering taking this on. I shall await your text with the list of movers and look forward to your call. I shall consider this a consultation and pay you a consultation fee."
 
"No problem at all! I'll send you all that information as soon as I can, you take care now!" Cooger told her, hanging up and immediately pulling up his calendar so he could text her all the required information.
 
Ciara took all the information given and started making arrangements as best as she could without knowing when or where she was going. She had narrowed it down to three possibilities. The one on Sims Street was the most promising, in her eyes, and perhaps she was being overly cautious, be she had the luxury of time and a bit of extra money. Why not take advantage of it?
 
Come Monday, Sloan was back at school. Her face still hurt, and the bruise had only continued to deepen, but luckily although some people stared, nobody really bothered her about it. This was due partially to how many people in her classes knew she was a gymnast, partially due to being liked enough that people didn't feel the need to bother her, and partially due to, well, who is going to mess around and find out with a girl missing half an eyebrow and stitches in her face? Nobody wanted to risk being the other guy. Frankly, from her perspective, so long as she took things physically slowly and took ibuprofen semi-regularly, she was fine. Purple, green, and fine.

Blair took things a bit more personally. If she was honest, it scared her. Her daughter became an elite gymnast and immediately burst her face open upon bars and was now going to have a permanent facial scar. Sloan was certain it wasn't going to be that bad, but she couldn't help catastrophize. Especially since Sloan had... ideas for how she wanted to look that simply did not make sense to Blair. She was such a beautiful girl, but didn't seem to try to emphasize it at all, and it just did not make sense to her. And she absolutely did not understand not waiting for a plastic surgeon to do their job and do the stitches! It wouldn't have been difficult and it was important. Appearances were important, regardless of what people tried to claim.

She was trying to be supportive, and trying to be understanding. And she was doing her best to take care of her in these days immediately following Sloan's injury, because Sloan was still her baby girl, but sometimes her mouth got away from her.

Which meant, Wednesday after school, Sloan yelled something inside the house, slammed the door, and in a huff started marching towards her car.
 
Xander had just gotten back from running an errand. He spotted Sloan storming off, her face like a thundercloud. She was going toward her car. Something inside him clenched nervously at the thought of anyone, especially Sloan, driving while that distressed.

"Hey! Slo!" He yelled, waving a hand. "Want a ride?" He gestured to his van.
 
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