Nice night for a white wedding!

[callmeemily]

Years. It felt like years since they'd all gotten together like this -- there had been a while that it was parties and cruises and monsters and--

You name it, and it happened. It had been a lot. Just a lot, for everybody. They'd all sort of drifted apart, after a while; something shifted, and life became less volatile. Less... fraught. You didn't have to worry about your friends dying every day, which, if you asked Raleigh? Definite improvement.

When things quieted down, Siren Cove slipped back to where it started. A little town where tourists came to visit, it was quaint. The local bookshop, bakery, and grocery were open year round, but as soon as it got warm, the knick-knack shops and lobster shacks opened their doors.

Now, everyone had two reasons to get together: the first was a Town Emergency, which Raleigh was more than happy to assume Would No Longer Happen, although she knew full well it may be wishful thinking. The second was a more mundane, but happier reason: Weddings.

Amber, the manager of The Orchard House, was getting married. She and James had been dating for years, and finally she'd popped the question -- and so here they were. The summer night made a perfect backdrop, and they'd invited all of their nearest and dearest -- and as her boss, Raleigh both made sure to be there, and the bakery was closed tomorrow, just so they all could keep their mine on what was important. The wedding was formal enough that the venue had approved catering from Portland, and, to quote the bride, 'Everyone had better show up looking fancy.'

So... here she was. Hair curled, new dress -- and no idea who most of the people here were. The ceremony had been touching (crying may or may not have taken place on Raleigh's part), but it had been dark for everyone who wasn't in the wedding party. Now, the immediate families of the bride and groom, the wedding party -- all of them went off for pictures, and Raleigh picked her way between the seats over to the cocktail area. She was more careful than she usually was, given the dark and the uneven ground -- so much so that she didn't realise that she should actually know some of the other attendees after all.

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[coopdetat]

Coop tugged at the knot of his tie for what was almost definitely the eight trillionth time since he'd arrived at the ceremony--fashionably late, of course, but only by a couple minutes and he'd managed to sneak into a seat in the back without causing much of a stir. The bride had noticed, because of course she had, and Coop at least had the humility to look properly chastised when Amber immediately called him out on it as soon as he'd gone in for a hug.

Now, he was loitering by the open bar, exchanging pleasantries with vaguely familiar faces he hadn't seen for years now.

Packing up his practice and his dogs and hauling ass out of Siren Cove had seemed like a great idea at the time, and Coop remained sure it was ultimately the right decision, considering the alternative involved a constant barrage of bullshit like demons and fucked up cruises and ex-fiancées. Well, just the one ex-fiancée but even that was one too many.

Still, now that he was back at the beck and call of an old friend, he had to admit it was nice to be here, even if he'd let himself fall out if touch with some of the people he'd once called his closest friends. His house was still his own, at least, he rented it out on Airbnb during the peak season but had kept the next couple weeks reserved for himself the minute he'd gotten the invite. If not for the fact that he was five years older and tired much earlier than he used to, Coop could almost trick himself into feeling like he'd never left.

A flash of blonde hair beneath the soft gleam of the fairy lights caught his eye as he took a sip of his beer, and it only took another half second to recognize her.

"Raleigh." He murmured her name under his breath, almost as if he was testing it out, testing the way it felt to say it again did the first time in a very long time. Smiling to himself, he made the choice to step forward, reaching out as she passed him and just managing to graze her fingers with his own.

"Raleigh," he said again, this time out loud. "Hi. It's been a long time."