Okay so maybe it didn’t come as much of a surprise to them. All of them had volunteered when it was mentioned to them that we were moving into the new house the next day.
Besides between my parents, my Grandfather, my Gruncle, and me all having enhanced strength, it was hardly like anyone else had to do any heavy lifting.
The new house was done in what I learned was called the Tudor style, which meant it looked about halfway between a cottage and a castle. It was far from the standard suburban house we had lived in with large but plain rooms.
While discussing what they were going to build, with my Grandfather pushing for something fancy, it was the tower, even a short stubby looking tower that woke up my Mom’s inner Disney princess. Her eyes sort of glazed over. “A tower…”
After that, it wasn't hard to get her to give in to the studio space, the fireplaces on three floors including a basement, and the indoor greenhouse. She did finally put her foot down on the secret passages, hidden staircase, and the escape tunnel all the way to Grandpa’s house.
The tunnel only went eighty feet.
Also to appeal to her inner cheapskate, Grandpa offered to pass down some of the old furniture from his house that had been passed down from his parents, and even his grandparents.
That appealed to my Mom, not only because no money was involved, but family ties were important to her.
Which meant I got to keep the fake brass bed, the creaky hand carved wardrobe, and the beat up red velvet couch from the attic room at Grandpa's.
All of which I loved. The bed had been Graunt Lois’s when she had been a little girl, the wardrobe had belonged to my Great Grandmother of the green and yellow eyes, and the hideous but super comfortable red couch had been passed, and sometimes forced from family member to family member no one was sure anymore who had owned it in the first place.
I was also up in the attic again in this house. What had originally been planned to be a storage room or emergency guest room up there had instead been claimed by me and Ami.
Ami because she wanted to have the upper floor of the tower as her study room. Mom and Dad’s room had the tower room on the second floor. While I had just gotten used to having a sloped ceiling and a flight of stairs between me and my parents.
Ever since I had demanded to learn how to fight they had been playing pranks on me in a game of what they called Kato and the Inspector on me. Now they had warned Ami that she got to play by making wards to warn her when they had broken into or were sneaking up to her room. A flight of stairs was going to benefit both of us.
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Aran got stuck on the second floor with the parents and what was now the two guest rooms.
Despite only being a quarter of a mile away from Grandpa’s house, we still ended up loading everything in all of the various vehicles and taking three trips to get everything over there. With cousins Charles and Pete heading out to pick up pizzas for lunch.
After which everyone left us to settle in until dinner.
We ended up all standing in our kitchen where our Mom was making a list of things she needed to pick up so she could start preparing all of our meals again. My Dad was idly picking at the topping embedded in the melted cheese in the pizza boxes.
About the only thing that was left was half a hamburger and veggie pizza that had been ordered for the Jewish side of the family, of which only Graunt Lois's husband and her husband had been the only ones to limit themselves to. It seemed that their children and grandchildren were fine with pepperoni.
Pete had explained. “We try to avoid pork, but it’s pizza. You got to have pepperoni.”
Ami finished off her soda and raced out of the kitchen. “I’m going to set up my room.”
My Dad nodded at her with a grin, but looked a little sad, then her drifted over to hug Mom from behind, as she clutched at his arms.
I straightened up in my chair. “Are you two okay?”
My Mom turned to look at me, her eye’s looked a little wet. “It’s okay Sara. It’s just hitting me that we can never go back to our home. The house we bought for our family is gone forever, along with everything else we ever owned, and this place is going to take a while to feel like home.”
I looked down at the table. “Would it help if I made a mess, dropped something on the carpeting that would make a stain that will never come out?”
That got Mom to laugh and shake a fist at me, “You better not!”
Saku had finished off the puppy chow that had been put in the clear mixing bowl for her to eat to keep her from begging. Of course, she hadn't touched it until everyone was done with pizza. So my puppy happily followed me up two flights of steps before proceeding to consistently hinder all of my efforts to set up my room.
Pulling at my sheets when I tried to make the bed, then jumping on it when I tried to spread out the blanket. Digging into the boxes of my clothes as I tried to unpack them, and running off with one of my shoes.
I finally had to stop and play with her for a solid ten minutes before she started to get tired out and just laid down to watch me with an occasional tail way when I looked over at her.
My room had about a five foot wide flat seven foot ceiling painted white and made with a bumpy surface which I was told was called Popcorning. It had a light fixture with a fan in the middle.
Then the ceiling sloped down to about four feet on each side, with dormer windows large enough to climb out of on either side. I had another set of three windows on a three sided extension on the outer wall of the house with a padded bench seat built into it that flipped up for storage.
The short walls also had slide out drawers and bins, all of which along with the wall had been painted a pale green, with a dark green paint on the frame around the bedroom doors and the bits on the bottom of the walls.
In addition to the wardrobe, I had a decent sized closet over the top of the landing on the floor below.
The floor was hardwood with a clear stain, but it was dominated by a huge dark green area rug with a pale green pattern running around the edge.
Ami meanwhile got a tower room with windows all around it coming off the corner of her bedroom and even had a tiny little fireplace that she was forbidden to use until she was fourteen and had at least one parent in the house and informed that she was using it.
But I liked my room and after I had packed away or placed all my stuff, I headed downstairs to help Aran, then my parents.
We had everything about halfway done when it was time to walk over to Grandpa’s for the last supper before people had to start heading home on Sunday.
Tonight we were going to find out what everyone had decided as far as becoming a Werewolf or staying Baseline Human.
I hadn’t shared that term yet with anyone, but I figured it was better then Normal Human, Muggle t or Great Grandmother's term, Mere Mortal.