Raleigh Harper / Emily Watkins (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
callmeemily) wrote2014-08-23 04:07 pm
callmeemily) wrote2014-08-23 04:07 pm
Entry tags:
Holy crap, there's a new business in town.
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.
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.
no subject
It's the stupidest thing, what she thinks. It's the stupidest thing, and she knows it makes her a bad person. She knows it is.
She doesn't want to go back.
There's no way that she can hide how upset she is, just by those words, even if he wasn't able to read minds.
"I- Uh." She finally nods. She nods, and she's trying just to seem normal even though she's failing spectactuarly. "Could I go to jail?" She pressed her fingers to her mouth after that, like she's trying to stop a slew of words from escaping.
no subject
"Calling them would probably be a good idea," Levi pointed out. Even as much as he didn't care for his family he couldn't imagine letting them think that he was dead when he wasn't, not unless it was absolutely necessary. From what he understood, it was necessary for Raleigh to hide for a while but she could at least let her family know she wasn't dead.
"And no, you can't go to jail. You're a grown woman, you don't have to contact your family if you don't want to."
no subject
Even though she hadn't, really. She hadn't had much of a choice.
"I mean-" She rubs her hand along the back of her neck.
"How do I even know? If there's- I'm too scared to even Google myself," she said quietly.
no subject
"If you had faked your death then that would be a crime. If you just disappeared though? That's not. Just because the police looked for you doesn't mean you did anything wrong. Raleigh, I guarantee you calling your family up and telling them you're alive would be the happiest resolution to this for them."
By this point they might even have given up hope, they might have just started to wish that instead of hearing her voice that her body would just be found. He can only imagine what her family must be going through but he trusts Raleigh that she had a good reason.
"I understand. I've been tempted to try and look up what might have happened to you but I haven't because one, if you wanted me to know you'd have told me and two, if there was some sort of alert on the law enforcement database for your name I wouldn't want to set it off."
no subject
Her face just sort of crumpled and she started to cry, and she shook her head. "I- I'll call them, okay? I'll-" Scrubbing at her cheeks, Raleigh forced herself to nod. "You know, I don't need to talk to you about- I'll call them."
"I just- I just need to... go-" She can't just... be calm, right now. She's tried to just calm herself down; she's tried so many times and it usually works, but this... this wasn't the same, and she shook her head. "Thanks, I just- I need to go." The thought of the pure reason that she'd stayed out here - that she'd not called already, that she has to find some way to tell her mother that she'd left, why she'd left, that she'd stayed away because her life was better here, and it was so incredibly selfish.
And the fact that she didn't want to leave, that the last thing she wanted to do was leave - that was so much worse.
no subject
"Raleigh, if you need to go you can go, but you don't have to. We can talk about something else if you want," he told her. Her mind was a mess, everything jumbled and screaming and making his head ache but he wasn't going to ditch her now unless she really needed to be alone. Generally though she seemed to do better when Levi was around for whatever reason.
"You know I'm here for you, no matter what."
no subject
"I'm a bad person," her voice breaks as she says it. "I know that. I know that, I know that what I did was wrong, but- you don't..." She doesn't know if he'd ever understand, but she tries to explain anyway. "I have never been able to just- have a life, to do what I wanted. I was in med school, I didn't want to be a doctor. I- my leg is because I had to work, and-" She shakes her head, her voice is pitchy mess, and she's just- she's a mess.
There's so much that Levi doesn't know about her, that she hasn't told him because she's scared and ashamed of it. She hasn't even told Spencer or Joel all of it, and she lives with them, but she doesn't know what to do, now.
no subject
"You're not a bad person," Levi said, stepping forward and wrapping his arms around her in a hug. He didn't know why he did it, he didn't really think about it, but he knew when he had felt so lost and confused as a kid he had wished someone would have been there to give him a hug.
"You're not. And you're here doing what I hope makes you happy. If talking to them would ruin that then don't."
no subject
"How can I talk to them? How can I not?" She pulls back just enough to look up at him, to have someone - anyone, give her an answer. "How does it not- You know what must have happened, right? The reason I haven't googled myself? Either everyone noticed and it was a thing, on the news and in the paper and people who I didn't even know were looking for me and now they think I'm dead, or-"
Or.
Or no one noticed.
"I don't know what to do." She said it again, and she shook her head slightly. "I'm... bad. I'm bad because I didn't look, I didn't try, I just- I did what I was told and kept my head down until I got kidnapped, and since then, I've been living this- this amazing thing, and-"
She's not talking about how hard it's been. About how she had to physically recover, that she'd not mentally recovered, yet. That she's literally been tortured, that she's only now found a stable home, that she was on the cruise ship from hell and she's not even acknowledging how that's impacted her.
All she can see right now is her mother, thinking she's dead. Her mother, when she finds out that Raleigh's alive, but then what she's been doing--
The thought is honestly almost paralyzing all by itself.
no subject
"You did what you thought was right at the time," Levi said, glad to be holding her close just so that she couldn't see him wince in pain. His head was killing him, her thoughts so loud and all over the place. He needed one of his pain pills so badly but until she pulled back a bit he'd just have to put up with the pounding in his head.
"And you definitely should not feel guilty about enjoying your life, Raleigh. Not at all."
He wondered how much of it was that, that she was doing things that made her happy and she wasn't used to that. A lot of people grew up in situations where they were taught that if they weren't always trying to please other people they were a bad person.
no subject
"I don't know what to do," she said after a second, and when she does pull back a little, when she looks up at him her eyes are puffy and red. "I guess- I guess I just need to think about it. Really think, and just- I guess see what happens. See what I... what I'm going to do?" Shrugging her shoulders, Raleigh rubbed her hand over her face yet again. "I guess I'll see." Her voice lowered, and she nodded - both to him, and to herself. It wouldn't be an easy choice, she knew that. But still... he wasn't wrong. She should let them know.
no subject
"You'll figure it out," he reassured her. Levi was sure that she would. The truly difficult part of it would be to actually make the phone call or write the letter or whatever it was that she decided to do. But Raleigh was good at doing difficult things, if nothing else. Levi knew that she hadn't had an easy life to far but she didn't dive up.
"In the meantime, we can do something to take your mind off of it."
no subject
Maybe she's not a bad person, but she definitely isn't a good one - what kind of person would do what she did? That's what it comes down to, for her.
What kind of person. And the answer she's got for that isn't a particularly good one.
Still, she smiles, and looks over her shoulder before she finally looks back to Levi, checking to see if anyone in particular actually saw this whole fiasco. "So... what do you want to do?"
no subject
"You like ice cream? I know it's not exactly a baked good but I've always found it pretty tasty," Levi suggested. He could tell that she needed to get her mind off of this, at least as much as was possible. No doubt she was going to keep turning this over and over in her mind.
"Plus pretty soon we'll have more frozen stuff on the ground than we want."