Welcome to Gaia! ::

“Oh. That’s okay then.” He vowed silently to somehow get those shorts back, definitely needing all the help he could get. Nothing was working.

Efflo moved back to the drawers, ignoring the offered pants. A moment more of searching, and he came up with a pair of longer khaki shorts, quickly pulling them on and looping his belt around his waist. He turned around, smiling broadly at Gabby. “All done! …Now where do you want to go?” His eyes settled on his folded pants still in Gabby’s hands, and he took them from him graciously.

“Oh, sorry, thank-you,” he said and, as he looked at the mess that was his drawers, he set them gently on top of the dresser.

“Yeah, but you have a lot of opinions, so I thought I would ask first.”

He followed Gabby’s gesture, tilting his head in confusion, “May you what?”

Oh,” he said again, clueing in. “You don’t have to! But if you want to… Thank-you.”

Efflo smiled, wistfully wishing he could drape his arms around the dragon, and lean into him while he worked. Instead, he flopped onto his straw pile with a huff. He fidgeted around until he was laying on his stomach, chin resting on his hands so he could watch Gabby work.

“You fold it so neatly. Mine never turn out like that,” he admitted, impressed.

Efflo knew what that was like. Though he couldn’t imagine spending all of that time indoors, and especially not folding clothing. Judging from the state of his wardrobe, that was pretty obvious. Instead, the horse had come to learn the campus grounds nearly off by heart, knowing all the little places to go when one wanted to escape the world for a little while. He smiled; he hadn’t felt the need to use them since he’d found Gabby.

“I might wear them!” he argued. Might was a very strong word, however and having discovered shorts, Efflo had no real intentions of covering up more. If it were up to him, he wouldn’t wear anything at all. Clothes were so annoyingly restricting. “Well… Maybe. They’re probably good to have anyway, just in case.”

He rolled over, stretching out on his straw pile. “Are you gonna fold my underwear too?”

Efflo stared, oblivious to the shirt hanging lopsided over his head. He never could have imagined that it was possible be jealous of his undergarments but there it was. Stupid bet.

Pulling the shirt off of his head, he sat up and slipped it over his arms. “Happy?” he asked, buttoning it up.

The boil blushed and murmured a quick thanks, wondering if he could get away with hiding underneath the straw. But he was sitting up now, and it looked as though Gabby was finished folding, so he got to his feet, blush and all.

“I think so,” he answered, heading towards the door and away from the temptation of Gabby. Unlike the dragon, Efflo didn’t have a lot of fashion sense. Clothes were a bare necessity and that was it. So he’d neglected to fix how his shirt was caught messily in the waist of his shorts, half tucked in and all bunched up. In fact, he hadn’t even noticed it.

“Except I still haven’t thought of anything to do. I guess we could go for a forest walk, or something? I know it’s not flying but…”

Efflo glanced over his shoulder; oblivious to Gabby’s pain yet wondering why he kept making weird sounds. He gave him a curious stare before shrugging it off when Gabby agreed to a walk. That made him happy, he really enjoyed going for strolls. The forest was sure to be pleasant this time of day, even if he couldn’t walk too close beside Gabby.

His shirt didn’t budge as they made their way outside, refusing to dislodge, mocking Gabby with every jaunty step the undead boil took. Once they reached the forest, Efflo halted at the entrance, motioning for Gabby to wait.

“Hold on, I’ll get us some good walking sticks,” he grinned. Less temptation to hold hands that way. “I know the perfect tree!”

Though he made a rule not to climb trees, the one he bounced over to was rather short and definitely very sturdy. It had gnarled branches that made it easy to hoist himself up, to reach the long dead branches that made perfect walking sticks. He snapped two off and hopped down, proudly carrying his prizes back.

The front of his shirt, in addition to its disheveled appearance, was now completely covered in brown streaks from where he’d braced against the tree, the old rotting bark having been covered in dirt. Efflo didn’t seem to notice, and happily held a stick out to Gabby.