Read Novel Full Chapter 2331 A Friendly Visit Part 2
Chapter 2331 A Friendly Visit Part 2
--- Sylvie --- Currently STILL at Alice’s House.
The house was done! Though, if Sylvie was being honest, it felt a lot like they were just watching Alice. Now she wasn’t bad or overbearing, she didn’t simply hold Penny and Sylvie’s hand through every moment of the process. Clearly she was emulating her dad in how to properly teach stuff like that... but she also wasn’t just waiting around for them to get it completely correct.
Alice would give them a section to work on, do a quick demonstration without glue, and then ask the pair of them to make a copy of the structure to go into the final house while she worked on different bits. Even with the two of them working as best they could, one Alice was still faster then a Penny and a Sylvie. That wasn’t even accounting for the times they messed it up. Usually in minor ways, but Alice would just politely point them out and then get them to either do it again, or fix up that little bit... and often fixing stuff would take the longest. A series of back and forth revisions.
By the end of it, Sylve and Penny had, both together, worked on three walls and the roof. Which might sound like a lot of ground... but Alice had done the entire front, which included a little deck and stairs, a bunch of fake plants, and the top could be removed so that you could add furniture inside. Which Alice did. All made from toothpicks. It was, technically, possible that Alice had done less work if you considered the volume of things or the amount of toothpicks used... but she’d left the simplest stuff for the other two and they’d still just barely managed to finish that before Alice had finished adding a kitchen table to one of the rooms.
They were all a bit sweaty, with glue on their hands. Penny was currently picking the stuff on hers off while Sylvie tried to ignore the feeling. She’s been quite careful, so she hadn’t gotten too much glue on her, but what was there happened to mostly still be undried. Likely from the sweat and constant motion, so you could just... feel it and removing it wasn’t going to be easy.
Penny on the other hand, had a bunch of glue on her. Not having really cared that much about getting dirty and that meant the lower layers of it in most places was all dried and she could just peel the whole thing off if she was careful. Penny also seemed to be quite amused by this, maybe even more than building the house.
Alice on the other hand, was similar dirty but seemed completely unconcerned about it. Bits of glue clung everywhere... including some that had ended up on her safety glasses somehow? When did that happen? Sylvie started to pat around her face with the cleaner of her hands to try and feel out if she’d let any glue splatter near her eyes or something but her face... seemed clean.
"So! Did everyone enjoy that!" cheered Alice as she popped up out of her chair and down an entire glass of water, before carefully using the jug to pour herself a second one and downing that just as quickly. The glass was small, only half the size of an adult cup, but it was still a lot of water. Especially as she poured a third glass, struggling a bit with the jug as the adrenaline wore off.
Then again, earlier they’d needed to work in pairs to pour out the water at all. Clearly her father hadn’t thought that through all that well. Though at least it was a plastic jug. Those were much lighter than the glass ones Sylvie knew some people had, and would be far worse to drop.
After going through all of this, Sylvie’s brain reminder her that she’d been asked a question. "Yeah it was fun," she said, hoping it sounded true. If she was being more honest, Sylvie wasn’t entirely sure what she thought of the exercise but at the very least it was nice to spend some time with her friends and she didn’t hate the activity.
"Yup!" agreed Penny far more cheerfully. "I’m not sure it’s quite up to the level of knitting but Sylvie’s right it was fun. I don’t think I’m really ready to design a whole second thing on my own though... that seems... a bit much I think."
Alice nodded, "Yeah... I thought you guys would get the hang of things a lot faster but I guess I sort of had practice with other similar stuff before I did any toothpick building. Still, we can make something much cooler than a house!"
Sylvie glanced at the completed project and... wondered how true that was. Sure it was ’just’ a house but Alice had gone through and added a shocking amount of detail in all sorts of places while still sticking to just using toothpicks. Sylvie didn’t even know you could make plant-like structures from toothpicks at all. Alice had done so mostly by snapping bits off and then pulling on, but not separating, the wide fibres to give off a more organic appearance.
Some extra detail here and there, and some of them even looked like flowers. Not necessarily ones Sylvie could name, but certainly they gave off that feeling... and yet Alice seemed to think they could do better? "Well, what were you thinking? And do we need to stop for lunch first?" asked Sylvie.
"Oh, I was going to let you guys choose and... hmm... it might be lunch time? I’m surprised Mum hasn’t stopped by, she normally does when she gets home, especially if she knows I’m in the shed... hmm... and Dad left earlier so she would definitely check on me..." Alice was starting to look concerned now as she glanced at the door. "Oh, hmm... we... should we go check? Like the clock here is broken. Got sawdust in it and we haven’t cleaned it out. It’s in that box over there... but like..."
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"We can go look," confirmed Sylvie. "And if there’s anything wrong I knew Callisto’s phone number, so we can call her!"
Alice perked up a bit at that. "That’s good! I... I don’t really remember my parents numbers. I should, I totally should be I just kinda don’t. It hasn’t been that important yet and it’s not like I need to call them... but yeah maybe I need to write it down or something so I can remember."
Penny shrugged and said, "I was never told what there phone numbers were but I likely would remember if you told me. So if you want, you can share them after you find them out."
"Sure," agree Alice as the group made for the door. The backyard was quiet, the neighbours weren’t doing anything that they could hear... so the three of them carefully made their way back to the house proper. If anything, it felt spookier now, even with the sun shining down on them.
Alice open the backdoor and stepped inside, looking around the kitchen area. "Hmm... yeah mum likes to leave her stuff here when she gets home but..."
Sylvie nodded and pushed her friend along. Not wanting to linger too long. No reason to let Alice work herself up into a worry. Though Sylvie suspected they wouldn’t find anything calming. They made their way down to the garage door and pushed it open but... no cars. Alice was visibly upset now so Sylvie pulled her back out of the room. "It’s fine, I’ll just call Callisto."
Penny gave a firm nod as she pulled Alice’s hand into hers and Sylvie made her way back to the kitchen. Grabbing the phone took a bit of climbing to get up to the kitchen bench, but it wasn’t too hard. Soon Sylvie was putting the number in and... "Hello? This is Callisto speaking, is something up with the girls?"
"High Callisto! We’re fine... but Alice’s Mum is missing, she was meant to be home earlier and she’s not here so we were getting worried," explained Sylvie.
"Ah, of course. Let me just poke around online for a bit... see if I can find anything. I would not want to call her if she was driving..." explained Callisto. "Do you need me to come out?"
"Um... I guess it depends on what you find?" answered Sylvie.
"Yes well... I think I have found the problem. I cannot be certain but seems there was a car accident on the road not too far away from Alice’s house. Nobody has posted any pictures yet but the incident occurred a few hours ago. I am sure that everything is fine and that Shannon is fine and she is just stuck behind some traffic. Would you like me to try and call still? If the traffic is not moving it would be safe to talk to her," offered Callisto.
"Yes please, I think Alice would feel a lot better," requested Sylvie.
"Alright, I’ll ring you back shortly,"