Calling home (spencer)

[callmeemily]

It's purposeful, the time she looks for Spencer. Joel's not home - he's not home on purpose, because Raleigh - she can't forget, right now, about what he said about not thinking about anything that'd happened to her. That's not what he'd said, of course - He'd said I think you need to stop being so hard on yourself for what you have or haven't done, but what she'd heard...

It was very different. It was harsher, because she was harsher on herself than Joel ever would be to her. So she finds Spencer when Joel isn't home on purpose, because she knows that this is going to be hard, that it's going to be hard on her and she's incredibly scared, and she knows that she's not going to be able to hide how difficult it is.

She's grateful, though, for what Joel did for her. That he'd helped her when her leg was messed up, that he'd been there for her more than once. With the letter. She's grateful, oddly, for the reminder that she shouldn't slip, that she's doing the right thing keeping a lot of this to herself; it's probably not what he meant, but she can only think of it that way. But Spencer... Spencer's different.

Spencer's safe. He knows, and he understands. He understands the things with Mark. He understands a lot of what happened, and that's why she knocks - absurdly, she knocks - on the doorframe of the living room, and she's actually wearing a set of pajamas that she only wears when she's not feeling well. It's the ugly sweater he gave her the first day she stayed here and a pair of his old sweatpants; Raleigh helped herself to the pile of old clothes long ago, and Spencer hadn't seemed to mind.

"Hey, you busy? I... was sort of thinking to make that phonecall," she said quietly as Huxley lifted his head from where he'd been curled up against Spencer's leg, and when Raleigh talked his tail slowly started to thump on the couch - he always seemed glad to see her, even though he was still pretty new.

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[callmeemily]

The waves of guilt are so real, they're so heavy that they're unavoidable. There's something with Spencer that she doesn't have with anyone else in the world. Not in this town, not back home. There's a set of people who she trusts explicitly, there's a set of people she trusts implicitly, then.... there's Spencer. There's Spencer, who she worries about and fusses over. Spencer, who she will help lift up as high as he can reach, who has been through so much. Spencer, who seems to understand more than anyone how love and loss work.

There's a fear of hurting him in a way that's giving him more of a burden than he could bear. That's why she wrote that letter to Joel and not Spencer, but there isn't anything she can't tell him. She knows that. There's nothing, because she can't imagine a world where she'd look at Spencer and say please help me and he wouldn't. They're family, and she squeezes his hands in return, grateful for everything he's doing, that he's here for her the way she'd asked him to be.

"How do I make it better?" The question's so faint, and tears slowly drip down her cheeks. She tugs a hand free to wipe them away, and she's not sobbing or overwrought, it's like she just can't control the fact that her eyes are leaking as she takes a deep breath to continue. "How do I make it better, when I've been here for eight months? How-" Her chin quivers. "I made that choice. I made the choice not to tell her, and even after it was over, I didn't tell her, and that's all on me. That's- What kind of person does that, Spencer? What kind of monster would let their mother think they're dead while they- they kiss boys and start a bakery? How do I fix it?"

It's not the same as when she talked about it with Levi, when she said she was a bad person and he just summarily swept it under the rug. It's the same as when he talked to Joel, when Joel implied (to her, because she took it wrong) that she had to just get over the past and not let it impact anything now, to not let things affect her.

It's a struggle, trying to do that. Eventually, she'll realise that's not what he meant; she'll realise that trying to hide the fact that the past has heavily impacted her is a losing sum game for everyone involved, but right now she's mostly trying, except now. Except in front of Spencer.

She loves Spencer; the only person who feels as much like family is her brother. Not her mom, not her Dad, but Matt.

Oh, god.

Matt.

"I... I have to tell my brother..." It's even harder to say than when she said she had to call he rmother. "I do. I just have to tell him, and-" She's all twisted up inside, all twisted and hurting and she doesn't know what to say. "I don't- He's my baby brother, and I- How-"

She can't find the right words, but Spencer's the only one she even feels like she can say this to. That she can talk to him about it, that she can even ask for help in these situations. He doesn't sweep it under the rug, he doesn't give her shining platitudes; sometimes, his answers could be as simple as I don't know, but they won't ever just be no answer or him just trying to make her feel better.

[doublethepain]

"You make it better by doing your best because that's all that you can do," he says, and he knows it's easier to say it, to hear it, than accept it. He knows that in spite of knowing it himself because he most certainly gives himself a hard time for flinching whenever something reminds him of Mark or the lighthouse. He'd given himself a hard time whenever Eli would come around to say something nasty when he knows the bully would only do it to get under Spencer's skin. There's a very fine dividing line between thinking with rationality and thinking with sensibility, and Spencer crosses it far more often now than he's sure he ever has.

He shifts so he can put his hands on her shoulders, steadying her and making sure that their eyes meet before he speaks again. "Raleigh, I know that it's difficult right now, but I want you listen to me. Really listen to me. You are not a monster. I know monsters, I've seen them and I carry them with me, and you are not a monster. You did make a choice, you're right, but you've just made another one. You told her and it doesn't matter anymore that you didn't before, you've told her now. Whether you waited this long to do it out of fear or because that's not a life you want to go back to or because you simply didn't want to is nobody business but your own. The fact is that these are decisions you've made and you're going to have to deal with whatever consequences they bring, and I don't think anyone can tell you that you've done the right or wrong thing, but I can tell you that none of it makes you a bad person."

He brushes a thumb over the stream of tears staining her cheeks, though it doesn't do much good, and gives a slight shake of his head. She's young, incredibly young, and with her red-rimmed, pleading eyes, she looks it.

"You're starting a bakery and kissing boys and being a beacon of bright light for someone who's been lost for such a long time," he continues, searching her eyes for any glimmer of acceptance or understanding. "You're not a monster, you're just... human. Like me. Flesh and blood and feelings, that's what we are."

He isn't saying any of this simply to make her feel better, though he hopes his words are soothing her distress even if just a little bit. He's saying this because he believes it, truly believes that Raleigh would never set out to intentionally hurt anyone. There's a reason she hadn't told her mother about being alive, but Spencer doesn't need to know what it is to know that it's good enough. He's more sympathetic about the fact that she's going to tell her brother, to be honest, because for most of his life, Dane had been the only one who could have really caused any deep pain within Spencer. It's like it is with Joel now, his husband could destroy him so easily if he ever decides to leave, and Spencer knows it's not going to happen but it had been a little frightening at first to realize such a thing.

He'd spent so much time worrying that one day, Dane would turn on him. Whether it be at school or at home or both, Spencer had known it would have broken him in an irreparable way. It had never happened; but in the end, Spencer had lost him anyway.

"If your relationship with your brother is anything like what mine was with mine, I promise you that he's likely to never feel more relief in his life then he will when he hears your voice again. Think of what it would be like to see him again. To touch him, hug him, talk to him. To not have to wonder if he's doing okay because you can see it for yourself." He gives her a sad smile. "If you want me to be with you when you tell your brother, I can be there, too. But I do agree that he needs to hear it from you."

[callmeemily]

Raleigh's spent so much time beating herself up over this, she nods when Spencer says all she can do is her best. He's right, it's all the can do; no matter what she wishes she could have done, and no matter what she would have done differently, all she can do now is her best.

It somehow sits better than what Joel said even though it's the same thing; it's possibly because he wasn't telling her explicitly that she has to ignore the past. She's too wrapped up in it to forget it, and right now she's too caught up in all of it to be objective. But she can do her best. He's right, and the weight of his hands on her shoulders grounds her enough that she can take a deep, shuddering breath. She listens to every word, and when he says she's not a monster her chin quivers, and she presses her hand to her mouth as she hiccups back a sob and can't help but nod.

He understands. That's the thing, that's always been the thing. Spencer understands. He's in a unique position to understand her, to understand the situation, and she knows he's in the position where her mother and Matt are. The fact that he is the one who's told her she's not this horrible person, she can believe it instead of it just being what you say to a friend. "I thought-" She has to stop and clear her throat because her voice is raw. "I thought that the police would come, because if they had looked for me and they- and they found out I was okay, that's got to be- I was so scared when I left, but who would believe me? Who would believe me that I just- I just ended up here, and that it wasn't me running away?"

Shaking her head, she pulls in another thick breath as his thumb smooths her cheek and she tips her head towards his hand for just a second, before she nods again, sniffling. "I'll just- I'll try my best."

It's so clear in Spencer's voice that he's not just talking about Matt, he's talking about himself, and Raleigh can't talk with how much her throat hurts. It's like there's a lump of pain, just keeping the words in, keeping it all in, but he's right. He's right, and Raleigh moves. She moves up onto her knees and to hug him as tight as she can, and she's crying into the shoulder of his shirt, but she doesn't care.

It's just a little bit until she gathers herself, until she pulls back and scrubs at her eyes, taking a deep breath. "I don't know what I'd do without you." She shakes her head as she says it, like even thinking of that is completely incomprehensible. She can't imagine what it would be like, anymore. "You are such a good person, and- and I am so lucky-"

She has to stop, she has to stop talking because she can't find the words, but she takes another deep breath to center herself. "I'm so lucky that you're here."

[doublethepain]

It's not something he hears from people often, that they feel lucky to have him around. Joel says it often, they say it to each other, but it feels strange to hear it from someone else simply because he doesn't really know what he's done to warrant the words. He doesn't think he's doing anything extraordinary, just doing his best to be here for his friend; but then, maybe that is something extraordinary in itself. He hadn't had anyone to sit next to him and hold his hand after his mother and brother had died; he hadn't had anyone to remind him everything would be okay or that it really hadn't been his fault even when sometimes all the gossip would convince even him that maybe he really is to blame.

Raleigh calls him a good person, and it makes something in his chest start to ache because he hopes that she's right. He's never strived to be particularly good or kind or anything that might draw people to him in a way that someone like Raleigh or Coop draw people, he's always just tried to be. The thought that maybe he helps people now, that he has people who are willing to help him in the same way, makes his eyes start to well up, and he has to duck his head so that Raleigh doesn't see.

He manages to swallow down the lump forming in his throat so the silence that's settled between them doesn't stretch on for too long, and he smooths down a wrinkle in his cardigan before finally answering softly, "Anyone who wouldn't believe you isn't worth your time." He knows that from experience, has been stared down by people he and his mother both would help in the library all the time, has been threatened by former classmates and pushed around by strangers and sneered at by police officers; he knows what it's like to feel like he's completely alone, to start to feel like maybe it is better that way because at least if he's alone, there's nobody left to show him how little they think he's worth.

He doesn't think that anymore, of course. One reason for that is the same reason he looks forward to getting up in the morning, another is beside him on this couch. He's not alone anymore and sometimes he has nightmares about having to choose, about losing everything all over again, but when he wakes up to Joel's arms around him, it makes him remember that he can't spend the rest of his life worrying. He doesn't want Raleigh to spend another second worrying that people will think she'd a terrible person, and he knows that's not something he can change with a snap of his fingers, but he can at least make sure she knows he doesn't think it.

"I'm lucky, too," he tells her, "because someone like you decided that she wanted to befriend someone like me. I was nobody's good company, not for a long time, and sometimes it would make me wonder terrible things about myself. But how bad can I really be when one of the most kind-hearted people I know is willing to be a fixture in my life?"

[callmeemily]

Body language is a funny thing. The way that she's curled up in a ball says that she's scared and feeling alone and defensive - but the way she's turned towards him, the way she looks at him - it's more that it's them against the world in this moment. For Raleigh, right now he's the only one that understands, and what she told Joel last week - it's even more true, now. If something happened to either of them because of her, she'd never forgive herself.

She doesn't argue when he says he's lucky, too. She knows he is, of course he is, but when he says someone like you, she actually looks a little... surprised. Especially after today. It makes no sense, with the conversation they'd been having, but she thought he was talking about Joel. He was lucky because he had Joel, but he talks about her, that she's one of the most kind-hearted people he knows, and her brows furrow.

"I just... bake," she says quietly. I just bake, because that's how she looks at her life. She had to leave Boston and ended up here, and stuck her head in the sand and wasn't brave enough to step out of her shell for months. She'd kept to herself, but then she'd gotten- she made stupid choices, because she was lonely. That's why she finally stepped out and talked to people, how she met Spencer and Joel both. "You're not bad, Spencer. You're not." She shakes her head. "I... you have been so kind and generous, I try-" She has to stop for a second, and her chin quivers. She's been trying so hard to be honest, these days. She's been trying so hard, and that's why she'd had such gut-wrenching conversations with Joel.

Joel says it, Levi says it, Spencer, Les, and Coop. They all say it - that she's a good person, but she knows she keeps everything so close to the vest, she is terrified that they'd lift up the rock of who she is and see all the bugs and change their minds. She keeps such a careful facade, and she'd only told Joel.

She's not worried about other people thinking she's a terrible person, to be honest. Raleigh's worried she just is a bad person. That she keeps it hidden, but she is, because she's a coward; because she hid even though it got her anyway. That she hadn't gone to the Siren Cove police, or even told anyone what'd happened for such a long time. She can believe that they believe it, the group of men who had somehow become so incredibly integral to her life. Herself, though...

Herself is another story. "You say it like it's a chore. Befriending you. The moment I met you, you fed me your sandwich, remember? That's not exactly you being unfriendly." She rubs her arms - she's so goddamned cold, so cold all the time. "I... Uhm." Her eyes dart to the clock, and she hesitates, her tongue flicking over her lips because she's nervous. Quiet and raw, her voice wavers as she speaks. "If... If you have a minute- I.. .uh. I talked to Joel, the other day - I don't know if he told you, but-"

She pulls in another breath. "I, uh." She takes a deep breath while forcing a small smile. "I guess I'm having a hard time, right now?" The end of it lilts up in a question, and this... it's apparently her being honest. Her... trying as hard as she can to ask for help instead of just... shoving it all down as far as it can go. "And.. uh. I-"

She remembers, how much she told Spencer right when it'd happened, back in June. How much she'd written to Joel in August, too, but how much she'd told him about her knowing she wouldn't be okay. She's wondered a little, over the last three months, if he's wondered why all the things she said she'd have problems with never seemed to show up, minus the one nightmare he'd actually come to save her from.

Levi knows a little, Joel knows a little, Coop knows a little - she'd ended up on his doorstep out of the blue, after all. But Spencer knows the most, and he doesn't even- he's not seen most of it, because she tries so incredibly hard to hold herself together. To pull herself together until she's alone, because she was scared they'd think that living in this house wasn't good for her; to not hurt them more with the way she is. She's done this before, Spencer hadn't, and he was still recovering from what Mark did to him, and the thought of making that worse - it was worse than any hurt.

Raleigh rubs her arms with her hands, and she forces herself to at least look at the couch, even if she can't quite look at him, until she finally speaks. "I... uh." It's the third time she's made that sound, because she doesn't know what to say next. Trying to reach out for help is foreign to her. "I have always been the one in my family who has all of their crap in order," she finally says quietly. "And I've always had to be that, because if I didn't, everything falls part." Her gaze finally finds his, and she swallows thickly, twisting her hands together just out of habit. "But- But I just-" There's too many things, now. There's too many pieces and too much hurt and she's not okay, no matter how many times she says she is. "I don't know what to say," she says after a second, her shoulders hunched slightly. "Just... just that I- I know I'm- I guess I just... can hide it well." She hides how wrong things are, but... he should know, even as she still tries to fix it.

"

[doublethepain]

Joel had made mention of the conversation he'd had with Raleigh, bits and pieces of it that had only become up because that night, Joel had crawled into bed with a groan and collapsed face down onto his pillow before Spencer had chuckled and taken pity on him, rubbing his shoulders that had been aching from the work Joel had done at the bakery. Spencer had been certain Joel would fall asleep easily, in spite of his insomniac tendencies, and Spencer had already been thinking about how he'd turn on the TV to watch some late night talk show or awful infomercial that would lull him into a blissful slumber. But Joel had surprised him by turning on his cheek and stilling one of Spencer's hands with his own.

"You know you'll always be safe with me, right?"

Spencer had known, Joel had explained; but he lets Raleigh talk because he thinks she needs to. It's strange to be on the other side of things, to be someone who isn't drowning on dry land in his own personal pool of tragedy, in the hell he hadn't realized he'd been living until Joel had shown him how much better everything could be. She's struggling with her words but he's patient, he has nowhere to be but here and for her, and he lengthens his arm to invite her closer because he can see how hard she's trying, the way she rubs her arms, and he's not exactly know for his love of physical contact but sometimes it just helps.

He remembers being in the lighthouse, Joel with his back to him as they'd faced Mark Fuller. Joel had held his hand back for Spencer to take, a protective and comforting gesture all rolled into one, and Spencer had curled his ziptied wrists and broken fingers so that he could have that touch. It hasn't dissolved the dread he'd felt but it had helped, and he knows that this is hardly the same situation but it's all he wants to do. Help.

"Nobody wants people to see that they're broken," he tells her. "It hurts enough to know it ourselves, doesn't it? When others start to catch on, sometimes it feels almost like a failure. I know what it's like." He pauses for a moment, staring into the fireplace and watching the flames dance and crackle and pop. "After my mom and brother died, I didn't cry. Everything happened so fast, she was dead and I was in a jail cell and Dane was dead, and I wanted so badly to convince myself that I could handle it all that I didn't cry. After they let me go and we had the funeral, it was... I just couldn't do it anymore, I couldn't keep up the facade. I think I cried more that day than I have in my entire life. It wasn't just fifteen, thirty minutes, it was hours and hours of tears constantly streaming down my face."

He turns back to look at her, though he can't seen to hold her gaze and his eyes flicker between hers and the couch. "After Mark, I locked myself in the house until I looked in the mirror and couldn't see my own reflection without seeing his beside me. I got my hair cut so I wouldn't have to think of him pulling on it every time he wanted to hit me again. It was just another way to hide, to try to forget what had happened, but we can't just forget those things because they're painful or because we're afraid of what people will think of is if they find out we're not the well-oiled machines we want them to believe we are. Raleigh, if there's one thing I want you to remember, it's that you don't have to be afraid to ask for help. The world isn't going to shatter if you stumble or if I fall, it'll just keep going until we can't catch up. We need to stay caught up. But we can't do that alone."

Spencer has no idea if anything he's saying is helpful or useful or any of those things he hopes it would be. All he knows is that he doesn't want Raleigh to feel like she has to put on an act when there's so much more going on underneath the surface.

"You're not alone," he reminds her. "I know you feel like you need to be the strong one for everyone else but... But you deserve to be taken care of, too."