More Maid!Turnbull

[heuradys.livejournal.com]

When I sat down to write for this challenge, I didn't realize I'd bitten off far more than a flashfic could handle, so what you're getting here is a scene and a fraction which (I think!) stand complete.

Thanks to daughtershade, askye, kiltslave, jonesiegirl, and all the #discourse folks I tortured who prodded me to go with my idea! There will be more to come!



Wig askew, swinging his pumps in his left hand, Turnbull hummed as he padded carefully toward Canada, a trail of bedraggled ostrich feathers fluttering to the ground behind him. He was still fighting the shit-eating grin that kept taking over his face - a losing battle, but a giddy, giggly one. Ray is so wonderfully inventive and enthusiastic! Turnbull sighed in mingled bliss and regret. How could he have forgotten his uniform? Forgotten any clothes altogether? Well, yes, he'd been terribly flustered and distracted by the idea of surprising Ray, but he should have anticipated missing the party; he'd hoped, in fact, that they would.

He fought down a flicker of guilt. He'd left a note, he chided himself, hadn't been crass and left Ray's without telling him at all.

Directly across from the consulate, he looked both ways carefully before crossing the street, feeling a frisson of delighted guilt for jaywalking. So naughty! But hardly bad, he thought, images of Ray and handcuffs and tickling and spanking making him grin delightedly again, since there wasn't another soul on the street and no traffic, either.

The white delivery van screeching around the corner was a complete surprise. He froze, nearly across, his cold, sore feet not up to running. But the van didn't slow, didn't stop or swerve, and he raised his arms in a futile attempt to protect himself, meeting the bloodshot, crazy eyes of the black-mohawked driver a split second before --

THUMP!

Brakes squealed - finally. A rain of feathers pattered to the ground around him as he groaned lowly.

"Help...?" he mouthed toward the sky, listening to the driver and passengers of the van arguing in a burst of loud profanity. He rolled painfully over, then tried crawling toward the curb. He thought hazily that the voice addressed as 'Billy, you stupid fuck! Get back in the fucking van!' might help him, and he stretched his hand imploringly toward it. He pulled back that reaching-out hand when it became clear that the Billy-voice was losing the fight with the other voice; the voice that had to be the driver's, the one called 'Joe, you fucking asshole! You hit this... guy'. The van sped away as he collapsed hard on the sidewalk directly under the limply fluttering Canadian flag.

~~~

He looked around at his small bedroom in shock, sitting down abruptly on his narrow, specially ordered extra-long cot. Everything was covered with a disgusting layer of dust and all his favorite things were missing! Try as he might, he couldn't remember how he'd gotten inside the consulate, either. Dismayed and distracted, he pulled a hard, rectangular object from beneath his sore buttocks, glancing down at it - then staring.

Handbook for the Recently Deceased?

Oh... "Oh dear!"