Chapter Text
“Gosh Charlie, I still can’t thank you enough for all of this...” Pim said, huffing out a quick breath as he slammed a heavy box on the floor. “If there’s any way I can make it up to you, make sure to let me know!”
“Eh, don’t mention it man. What was I going to do? Let my best friend be thrown out on the streets? Not a chance in hell, I’m not THAT much of an asshole.”
Pim looked around Charlie’s apartment. It was smaller than his used to be, but he could care less about that. He was just thankful that Charlie was willing to allow him to move in despite such a short notice. Pim’s former landlord had made some out-of-nowhere-deal with a new local property developer, and sold the apartment building Pim was renting in. He said he sold the property for a decent sum of money, and that all tenants were given a month to pack up and leave. Pim and his neighbors were of course outraged, but legally there wasn’t anything they could do, given the fact that the building was still the landlords property to do with as he pleased.
The legality of the situation of course didn’t make getting evicted any less easier. Pim remembered crying his eyes out over the written notification he’d received in the mail, and how his hands were shaking intensely as he desperately tried to call the landlord to beg for more time. He already knew there was no way in hell he could find and rent a new place in such a short amount of time, especially at a location that was within a reasonable distance from his workplace. He was panicking at the thought that he might even have to move back home, and that was NOT going to be an option. Pim would rather be homeless than go back to that fucking place for any extended period of time.
Pim’s train of thought was interrupted when Charlie set down another box roughly against one of the counters. He looked over to see him opening his fridge and pulling out two small cans of flavored beer. “Well, all your shit’s officially all in. Let’s crack these open to celebrate.”
Pim chuckled sweetly as he took the can and popped it open. “I think it’s still a little too early to be celebrating just yet. I still have to unload most of my things.”
It had already been decided that a good chunk of Pim’s items would stay in their boxes for a while since there wasn’t enough space to hold everything. Obviously all of Charlie’s things were already living comfortably in the available storage spaces. This was HIS apartment, after all.
“We’ll get to that later, it’s break time. We did a lot already, we’ve earned some cold ones.”
“I guess you’re right. It’s funny, I never realized how much stuff I had.” Pim took a quick sip and set the can back down. “Thanks for helping me out, it would’ve taken hours if I’d just done it myself.”
“Well, duh. Your so tiny dude! You could only carry one thing at a time!” Charlie couldn’t help but laugh, “Obviously I mean that in a nice way. Even though it would probably be funny, I’d be such an ass if I didn’t lend you a hand.”
The two of them sat in silence for a short while, enjoying their beer until the small cans were a little more than half empty. Then, they went back to work. Pim sorted the boxes into two piles, one for his important items, and the other for what could be put away in storage. As charlie looked at the piles, the ones marked “for storage” greatly outnumbered the one’s that would be getting unpacked. He felt a little guilty, seeing how much Pim was willing to store away. He shook it off.
“Alright, I cleared this closet out for ya.” Charlie said as he pulled open the door. “This door is kinda crappy by the way so you really have to yank it, but it works. Fit in what you can, and we’ll think of something for anything you can’t.”
“Thank you, Charlie. I really appreciate it. Maybe I can buy a cheap dresser somewhere and just shove everything that’s left over into it.”
“Just shove stuff in? I always thought you were Mr.-Neat-And-Organized. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you just pile shit up in places before.” Charlie was already unloading the box full of the bare essentials.
“I prefer to stay organized, yes...” Pim started, already stacking boxes from the ‘store’ pile into the closet with a quick grunt. “But I do what I have to when I need to. If I need to just cram things willy-nilly somewhere for a while, I’m not going to lose any sleep over it.”
The process took a little over an hour, but it went by fairly quickly. The two of them talked the entire time, stopping occasionally to share a laugh or two. Before long, the closet was full and shut away, and Pim moved all the other boxes to the furthest side of the room, where they wouldn’t be in the way of anyone or anything. Pim let out a long sigh as he plopped down on the couch, wiping beads of sweat from his forehead. “Let’s order a pizza.” He said after a pause, “We can’t live on beer alone.”
Charlie caught himself staring a little as Pim stretched his arms and let out a yawn before speaking again. “I mean, I’m definitely getting hungry. I worked up quite the appetite!” Charlie found himself passing glances at Pim a lot lately.
“On it.” He said quickly, grabbing his phone and walking over to the drawer that had all the menus and phone numbers. He ordered two of his usual, which consisted of a large double cheese pizza with wings, and walked back over once he’d hung up. “Should be here within about 45 minutes, they said they’re a bit short-staffed so it might take an extra 15 minutes. No big deal right?”
When he looked up from his phone, he was shocked to see that Pim was wiping tears away from his eyes quietly, as if he was trying to quickly hide the fact he was starting to cry.
“Woah, uh, hey Pim...What’s the matter? It’s only an extra 15 minutes, man!” Charlie knew damn well he wasn’t crying over the extended pizza-waiting time, but he didn’t know what else to say. Maybe he was trying to lighten the mood already or something. “Pim?”