#rivervale_lodge

She escorts him in, and then goes to retrieve her mug and go upstairs, leaving him to negotiate cheese-chore details with Sally Mae and Gerd.

Gerd has bathed and is clean in new clothes, most o the cheese cleaned. She rushes past the Chieftain to hug Conner "Conner, are you okay? I was worried about you. I can't get a new brother! you know how hard those are to find? don't SCARE me"

He jumps back into the cleaning with gusto but starts with surprise as she calls him that. A shy look over. “You have Oak and Edelweiss.” Sensibly. Still cleaning, and without missing spots or making more mess, for a change.

"They're DOGS, you're Conner." As if that explains it

There's not taht much for Conner to clean up actually. But Sally Mae doesn't intrude

He shakes his head, but doesn’t argue. “Chief said you’re off duty for turkey day. Because that’s fair. And I owe you for doing more cleaning, so you should tell me what your chores are and I can help next time.” He nods. “Especially if it’s cleaning plates after dinner because I’ll even eat the extra vegetables if you don’t like ‘em. They’re all good with peanut butter. And I’m getting a job so I might have to go to work now but I’ll bring home the bacon. And who doesn’t like bacon?” He explains to her seriously.

"But, Conner, we share the load here. You brought the cheese, but I dropped it. We should both do things" Gerd says confused "We're a lodge"

He nods. “But I used UP the cheese. So that’s the extra work that you didn’t earn, so you can’t steal my glory there.” He sponges over the steps once more, his keep nose finding traces of cheese, invisible, that would have had the dogs licking the floor for some time yet. “That’s fair!”

"I don't knooooowww.." She crosses her arms "this is weird. Normally it's when I try to NOT do work I get folks upset"

“You can help supervise if you want. Then if I have ideas you can tell me which are the good ones. And which are the great ones.” A grin at that.

“Like, this one time I was helping Kerri make cookies, and I thought if a little sugar is good, a lot is even better, but then they melted....” a thoughtful look. “But I think that’s Science.”

"Mmm " She says "I do need to practice bossing people around. I might be Hearth myself one day"

“Only if I don’t get there first. It sounds warm and cozy.” Looking around, it looks pretty clean now... “all done?” He asks Sally Mae. “I can go wash now if it’s all done.”

"You did a great job, Conner" Sally Mae ignores the 'Hearths are bossy' talk as she works in that category hersself as a kind of understudy "Go wash up, and you and Gerd can play a board game if you want."

He heads up, and takes the basketball too. Siv might wonder who used some of her fancy body wash, but at least Dagmar will only wonder why her basketball is lilac scented, and not.... cheesey.

Gerd will later break out his choice of Chutes and Ladders, Candy land, or the Fae Board game "Eshumunjji!"

(End Scene)