Holy crap, there's a new business in town.

[callmeemily]

Nevermind that it looked pretty run-down. Nevermind that there was a thick layer of dust on everything, that there was peeling wallpaper, that the floors had peeling linoleum.

This.... this was going to be home. Raleigh knew it the moment she and Joel had walked inside; the run-down storefront had been a cupcake shop three years ago before it'd gone bust, and it already had some of the requisite items for a bakery - luckily, a lot of the most expensive ones like a walk-in fridge. It just hadn't had a tenant since 2011, but Raleigh'd managed to cut a deal with the landlord; she'd fix it up, no rent was due until they opened, and she'd have a discounted rate for a year.

It was more than she could have hoped for, although that meant that her days would be full of dust and elbow grease for a while. The doors and windows were wide open, country music pouring out onto the street as Raleigh - in a tanktop, cut-offs, work gloves, and sneakers - perched on top of a tall ladder. She was stripping off wallpaper in big swathes, letting it fall on the floor - not caring that she was a sight, with dirt smearing her bare legs and arms. It felt hot as hell in the tiny store, but that probably had a lot to do with what she was doing.

She's singing to herself as she pulls free more paper, but her glove catches on a nail and she frowns. "Hey!" She leans down a little as she sees somebody passing by, even though from how high she is, she can't see who it is. "Can you pass me that hammer?" It's on the floor, and she doesn't want to have to get down if she doesn't have to.

Comments

Re: TW: Mention of death (?)

[doublethepain]

Burning it doesn't make the letter gone, not by a long shot, but Spencer doesn't say that because it would only make her feel even more unnecessarily guilty about the letter still ending up in Joel's hands. His boyfriend is a strong man, the strongest Spencer has ever known, but Joel tends to be more outwardly emotional than he'd might like to think or admit. Spencer had seen the pain behind his expression, had heard the disappointment and anger in himself in Joel's voice at not having seen that Raleigh was in worse shape than he'd thought--and of course Joel would blame himself for that, Spencer blames himself, too, and they're peas in a pod for being the kind of people who bear the weight of responsibility for other people when they'd been suffering themselves.

Joel couldn't have been expected to notice much of anything with the condition he'd been in, and Spencer... well, Spencer still doesn't think he has much of an excuse. Though the paranoia had lasted, the hallucinations had stopped within the first day he'd been stung, and he'd been heavily concussed with a ringing in his ears that hadn't quite faded until they got home but in spite of all that, Spencer thinks he should have been keeping a better eye on her. He'd been so focused on Joel, on making sure that Joel's leg was okay and that Joel was comfortable, and he doesn't regret that at all but it's clear now that Raleigh had been suffering alone.

That's why he wants to make it so abundantly clear that she won't be kicked to the curb just because he and Joel are going to be starting a new chapter of their lives together. She's not alone, even if she still believes herself to be sometimes, and he wants to work harder at proving that. He's not keen on losing anyone else. His father had been a blow, especially at such a young age, but he thinks he damn well nearly lost his mind after what his mother and brother's deaths. There'd been a few moments when he'd questioned whether any of this was still worth it--this life, one suddenly so void of love and compassion and replaced with disgust and disdain. He'd felt it from so many different directions, so much hate for something he never could have been capable of doing in the first place, and none of those awful feelings could even begin to account for how utterly destroyed he'd been because he'd lost the two people who'd meant the most in the world to him.

They mean the world to him, Joel and Raleigh, and sometimes he'll wake up in the morning to an empty space next to him in bed and his chest will just seize with fear. The notion that he might walk downstairs one day to find Joel or Raleigh's body motionless in their backyard is beyond horrifying, it's an actual nightmare that Spencer has lived through before and never wants to live through again.

"You're a little more okay now," he repeats, and he wonders if his face looks as clammy as it feels as he wrings his hands in his lap. He needs to take his mind off this subject, needs to be able to look at Raleigh right now without picturing her about ten shades paler and drained of her blood, this is an image he wants to erase from his mind's eye forever so he forces a smile.

"I really couldn't tell you," he says honestly, shrugging a shoulder. "We're not exactly in a rush, we just know that someday, that's what we want." His expression softens, his smile becoming more genuine as he thinks back to the night they'd spent in the hot tub, the night that Joel had proposed to him before the cruise had become the trip from hell. He thinks of how they'd told each other the exact same thing, that they'd both make excellent fathers, and Spencer has to admit that he thinks it's true. He has to take a breath before his emotions threaten to overwhelm him, and he blows it back out slowly and gives her hand a squeeze in return. "I suspect that it'll happen when the time is just right, as everything else seems to happen when I'm with Joel."