Small Problems - White Rose (Patreon)

“There’s just a small problem with the last shipment…”

In Weiss’ experience, there were no ‘small’ problems when it came to her job.  There were big problems, and there were monstrous problems - nothing less.

“What is it?” she asked regardless, even though she already knew she wouldn’t enjoy the answer.

“We...lost it.”

The man standing in front of her, whose name she would conveniently forget so she couldn’t fire him, cringed and waited to be berated or reprimanded for the monumental mistake.  Fortunately for him, she wasn’t in the mood for that today, or any day, really.  What she was in the mood for - as usual - was solving his problem before it truly became hers.

“Let me see.”  She gestured for the report in his hands and skimmed the page as soon as he handed it over.

“It’s probably still in Vacuo,” she surmised before shoving the report back into his hands, grabbing her bag off her desk, and standing up to leave.  “You’re missing an exit request to the port.”

Jaw dropped, he gave the report one last glance before staring after her in surprise.  If she were to guess, he was in disbelief that he just admitted such a colossal error right to her face, only for her to figure it out in a few seconds.

But that was her job and, as annoying as it could sometimes be, she was damn good at it.

“Ma’am!” someone called out as she pushed the button to summon the elevator.  She sighed at yet another issue keeping her from home but turned towards the young man hurrying over.

“What is it?”

“The uh - thing -” he stammered out before pointing in the general direction of the manufacturing center, and Weiss quickly caught on.

“Don’t tell me you broke it already…”

“Um, well…”

Stepping into the elevator, she shook her head and pressed the button for the parking garage.  “Call and get a tech out here as soon as possible.  In the meantime, reconfigure the line to skip that section - leave it sit until the tech looks at it.  Got it?”

The door closed on his hasty nod, and she sighed again while the elevator ferried her down to the garage.  Once there, she got into her car, took a deep breath, and headed home.

Her day should have ended an hour ago, but she got caught up putting out fires.  She didn’t mind solving problems - she was pretty good at it, really - but the ineptitude of her employees sometimes got to her.  Whenever she reached the point where she considered calling it quits for good, she knew it was time to go home and reset.  Besides, Ruby was already waiting, and Weiss hated making her wait.

Before the office disappeared from the rearview mirror, she pressed a button on the center console and gripped the steering wheel when the sound of ringing filled the air.  The call picked up almost immediately.

“Weiss!”

Ruby’s voice made her smile and completely forget the latest fire brought into her office.

“Hi Ruby,” she replied before sighing out the stress of the day.  “Just wanted you to know I’ll be home soon.”

“Awesome!  I’m working on a surprise for you, so...prepare to be surprised!”

Weiss raised her brow at the response.

“Can I have a hint?” she asked, only for her smile to grow when Ruby giggled.

“It will make you love me even more!”

“Not possible,” Weiss said while navigating towards the neighborhood where she and Ruby lived.  “I already love you as much as anyone can possibly love another.”

“That’s what you think,” Ruby replied, making Weiss chuckle and shake her head.  “But I gotta finish a few things - I’ll see you soon, ok?”

“Ok.  Love you.”

“Love you too!”

The call disconnected then, but Weiss’ smile remained as she headed home.  Rather than dwell on work, she tried to guess the surprise Ruby had in store.  Sometimes, Ruby’s surprises were...exceptionally surprising.  Sometimes they were exceptionally romantic.  But they were always sweet and thoughtful.

It was as if Ruby knew the day was hectic without Weiss saying anything.  And she found it difficult to care about a lost shipment of merchandise when she had a surprise and a beautiful wife waiting at home for her. 

By the time she pulled into the driveway, she was more than ready to figure what Ruby had in store.  Her footsteps quickened across the lawn and up to the front door, but she always found herself in a rush to get inside once she was here.  More than anything, she couldn’t wait to see Ruby again.

After unlocking the door and walking into the entryway, she sniffed the air and smiled when she figured out what the surprise was - dinner.

“Ruby?” she called out before leaving her bag by the door and walking into the kitchen.  There, she found the perfect sight for sore eyes, and felt her smile and good spirits return.

No matter what was going on, Ruby had a calming effect on her that still worked all these years later.  

“Weiss!”  After quickly drying her hands on a hand towel, Ruby skipped over and kissed Weiss’ cheek.  “Welcome home,” she added before waving towards her masterpiece.  “Since you had to work late, I’m making dinner - my specialty!”

Ruby’s specialty was the incredibly complicated meal of...spaghetti and meatballs.

Actually, Ruby’s specialty was making Weiss happy, which was exactly what the considerate gesture accomplished.

“You didn’t have to do that…” Weiss replied before gently taking Ruby’s hand and kissing her once on the lips. 

“I know, but I wanted to.”  With a big smile, Ruby led Weiss over to the stools by the island and motioned for her to sit.  “And I’m doing the dishes!” she added while motioning towards the dishwasher, which was currently humming along.  A pot of boiling water held the noodles, a saucepan held the homemade spaghetti sauce, and it smelled like there was garlic bread in the oven.

“Pretty sure you’re too good for me,” Weiss joked, and Ruby giggled as she went back to tending the food.  

“I just wanted to do something nice for you.”  Pulling a noodle out of the water and biting off the end, she nodded and turned off the burner.  “You have to deal with messes at work all day long...the least I can do is make dinner.”

Weiss had thousands of reasons why she married Ruby (literally thousands - she’d made a list during her nearly nonexistent debate as to whether or not they should get together), and this was one of them.  Not only was Ruby the sweetest person Weiss had ever met, but she was also so incredibly thoughtful and somehow knew exactly what to say or do to turn a crappy day around.

“Ok,” Weiss admitted when her heart grow with fondness.  “You might be making me love you more.”

“Told you!”  After flashing an unabashed grin, Ruby drained the noodles in the sink and returned the empty pot to the stove.  “Pretty sure we haven’t reached maximum love yet.”

“Something to look forward to,” Weiss mused while watching Ruby move around the kitchen.

If anyone wanted to know why Weiss liked being at home so much, it was this - the comfort of being with the person she loved more than anything in the world, and freedom to let go every once in a while.  The problems here were her and Ruby’s - and they felt much different from the problems at work.

Noticing a slightly different smell in the air, Weiss sniffed and searched for the source.  

“What’s that smell?” she asked at the same time, and Ruby furrowed her brow before turning to the side and squealing.

“It’s nothing!”  Racing across the room, Ruby hastily pressed buttons on the dishwasher, which had soap suds growing out of every crack.  “Don’t worry,” she added before scooping an armful of suds into the sink - and more kept coming, even faster now.  “Got this totally under control.  And I’ll clean it up, so you just sit there!”

The amount of soap suds was quite large now, and Weiss seriously wondered if it would stop growing or if their entire kitchen would be overtaken by white foam.  But Ruby got the dishwasher turned off, which seemed to help…

Except now there was another smell.  This one worse than the first.  Almost like something was burning…

“The bread!” Ruby yelped at the moment Weiss pinpointed the smell.  Grabbing an oven mitt and racing over to the oven, Ruby opened the door only for dark, acrid smoke to billow out.  “Ok, that’s done,” she said, pulling out the baking tray holding several charred pieces of bread and dumping it into the sink.

“Open the -”

“Got it!”  Once the tray was out of her hands, Ruby reached over and pushed open the kitchen window to help the smoke dissipate.  

And a pigeon flew right through the open window. 

Ruby shrieked and raised her hands as the bird flapped its wings in her face trying to get away.  Briefly unable to see where she was going, her elbow knocked over the flour jar and sent a trail of flour right into the flame heating the spaghetti sauce.  The flour immediately caught fire, which quickly spread to the hand towel left on the countertop.

Sensing that now might be the time to intervene, Weiss jumped up, grabbed the fire extinguisher from beside the stove, and quickly put out the fire.  Next, she grabbed their uncharred hand towel and waved it towards the bird still flying around the kitchen.  After several minutes of shooing him around the room, she managed to coax him outside and quickly shut the window behind him.

As soon as that was done, she spun around and searched for any other fires that needed putting out - literal fires this time.  When she didn’t find any, she looked at Ruby and, upon seeing Ruby’s dismayed expression, laughed.

Ruby quickly joined in - first with a hesitant chuckle before breaking into uncontrollable giggles at what just happened.

“I’m so sorry!” she added in the midst of her laughter, but Weiss shook her head at the apology.  It took a few more seconds before she gathered herself enough to reply but, once she did, her cheeks hurt from smiling so much.

“It’s ok.”  Looking at the mess on their countertop and still spilling out from their dishwasher, she huffed in amusement.  “It’s ok,” she repeated before giving Ruby a kiss.  “That took quite a bit of skill.”

“I’ve been practicing,” Ruby replied before motioning towards the window.  “I even trained the pigeon.”

When Weiss laughed this time, she felt the entirety of her stress melt away.  Even though the amount of cleanup they had to do should be frustrating, she didn’t see it that way at all.  It was trivial, actually.  With the two of them working together, it was nothing more than a small problem.

Their kitchen could catch fire, their dishwasher could explode, they could be attacked by pigeons, and it hardly bothered her at all.

That’s how she knew Ruby was the one.

“I’m surprised you didn’t get the fire alarms to go off too,” she joked while grabbing a roll of paper towels to clean up the soap suds growing out of the dishwasher.

“Next time,” Ruby replied with a grin, and Weiss smiled.

“You know what...I do love you more.”