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Hugo shuffled out of their bedroom in just his boxers, punching fingers into the painful crick in the side of his neck. They’d been in their new place above the House of Shields, the local pub, for one week and had so far spent that one week sharing a single old mattress on the floor of their bedroom. It made for convenient sex but fuck awful for any type of real rest, but today was ‘supposedly’ the end of that. Walking into the kitchen to the smell of coffee and burnt toast Hugo was greeted by the sight of Archie sitting at the pathetic folding card table that was acting as their kitchen table.
"Its here!" Archie exclaimed in a voice far too perky for this early in the morning. His eyes were lit up in a way Hugo had only seen in response to tea, film and sex. They were expecting the delivery of their furniture this morning, something that Archie's mother had been nice enough to help them pay for, enabling them to make this one bedroom flat their own.
"Vhere? I dont-" Hugo started, looking around the kitchen slightly puzzled and finally to their small living room before eating his own words. What he saw wasn't a pile of furniture, no, what he saw was a pile of boxes.
"Shicht."
***
Three hours later, Hugo was sitting on their living room floor staring at a gargantuan schematic of what looked like a spaceship.
"Archie, vhat ze fhuck did you ghet?" He asked for the eighth time that morning, screwing his eyes in concentration.
"That is the Cherry Wood MARKÖR TV unit." Hugo paused, turning the schematic upside down, then right side up again, before looking at Archie, who was situated in the middle of his own pile of parts.
"It’s ze vhat?"
"Its the Cherry Wood MARKÖR TV unit." Archie repeated again, not missing a beat.
"Vhat is it fhor?"
"We're going to put the TV on it."
"You mean dhis dhing is just a table?" Hugo looked around him at the scattered bits of metal, wood and plastic and the occasional packing peanut.
"No. Its not just a table, its the Che-"
"JA JA its ze Cherry vood manatee fhuck yhourself dhing-" Hugo mumbled, turning back to his schematic and wondering how the hell circular piece 'A' was supposed to fit into triangular hole 'B'.
***
One hour and forty five minutes later and the Cherry Wood MARKÖR TV unit was successfully assembled and sitting at the far edge of the room, a wall of boxes surrounding it to protect it from the small pieces Hugo was flinging about the house.
"Hugo! Don't step on that! You'll ruin the couch!" Hugo stopped mid step to look down at a plastic wrap sealed cushion.
"Archie. Dhis is not a couch. Couches do no come in boxes. Dhis is....vell fhuck. I hafve no idea vhat dhis is."
"This is the Winter patterned EKTROP full length and double deep couch."
"Dhis is a pile of metal bits." Hugo snorted, riffling through a small pile of sealed plastic baggies, each containing inconceivably small pieces. He picked out a baggie and held it up, carefully examining the pieces in the light before comparing it to the picture in his other hand. "Who ze fhuck comes up vit dhese fhucking pieces? I svear to Gott-"
***
Another two hours later, and Hugo has exiled Archie from their flat. He was at his breaking point, determined to take this boxed Ikea furniture and fuck it into submission, and Archie's continual critiques and suggestions were giving him a headache. So Hugo told him 'Take a valk, a very very long valk, and dhon't come back until it's dark,'.
He had managed to put together the TV stand, their couch and their kitchen table. This was the last time Hugo ever left Archie in sole control of anything. He sat on the kitchen counter, cigarette hanging out of his mouth as he tried to stick the leg of a chair onto the seat, using a small screw and the most pathetic and useless screw driver he had ever seen. Not surprisingly it had come in one of the plastic baggies of 'small bits from hell'. His brows furrowed in concentration,
"-Just like dhat-c'mon, you fhucking piece of-vait....vait, did you?...Ja?...JA!" Hugo laughed triumphantly, holding the two pieces that he had just made into one up to examine, "Take dhat you fhucking piece of shicht!"
This meant that he had one leg of one chair attached. Archie had ordered 4 chairs, 4 legs each. He had 15 more legs to go, but hell if that wasn't better than 16.
***
"Hugo?" Archie knocked on the front door, peeking his head through cautiously, expecting a hellstorm of cardboard boxes, baggies, and possibly blood. That, however, was exactly what he didn't see. Their living room was completely put together, complete with couch, TV on its stand and coffee table, rug rolled out, and even a few of Archie's framed pictures on the walls. He pulled back and check the number on the front door, making sure that he wasn’t peering into the wrong flat before continuing forward.
"Hugo?" He called again, looking around. All the lights were on and their radio was going quietly in their kitchen, which was also completely furnished. All four chairs had all four of their legs attached and were sitting neatly under their table. Every step he took into their house made it feel more like home, but every moment of silence that passed made him that much more worried about weather Hugo had thrown himself out the window or not.
"Hugo, are you in here?-" He pushed the door to their bedroom open, and spotted only Hugo's ass in the air as he banged at the underside of their new bed frame,
"Fhucking shicht-don't fight it-just-let-me-fhucking-screw-you-in" Each word was punctuated with another rattling ‘bang’ before Archie heard something slide into place and Hugo laughed triumphantly, more into it than was probably healthy.
"Perhaps I should come back later-" Archie muttered from the doorway. Hugo's head popped up from the other side of the bed over the mattress and smiled.
"Archie, ich liebe dich, but I svear, if you ever buy another piece of shicht from Ikea again, I ville personally throw it out ze vindow." Pushing up from the ground, he took a step back to admire his handiwork.
"I still hafve ze nightstand and ze chair to put togedher, but ze most important piece is finished-" he said, patting the edge of the bed, cocking an eye at Archie suggestively "-vhy don't ve try it out, make sure it's sturdy enough, ja?"
Archie smiled before kicking off his shoes and tacking Hugo to the messy bed.
***
"Fhucking hell Archie, dhis Ikea shicht it stronger dhan I thought."
"Does that you mean you like it now?"
"Do you like it?"
"Yes."
"Dhen I like it. But don't expect me to put together anyzthing else, ever again. I svear to Gott...."