Raleigh Harper / Emily Watkins

"Look, so, I got your message," Raleigh started the second that she opened the door to her apartment and Joel was there. There wasn't even hesitation, and she didn't say hello, either. Honestly, she doesn't even care, but she just assumes that Joel's very normal sounding voicemail just checking in was related to the fact that his name was on lease for the bakery, and it hadn't even been open in two weeks.

Really, she didn't care. She was just so tired. Every day was a little worse, and she just was sleeping all the time, wrapped in an old t-shirt of Spencer's and a pair of oversized sweatpants she'd gotten from Goodwill. "Don't worry, I'm making the lease payments, I've got money saved up." Not a lot, and way less now than she had, but she'd not gotten around to canceling the autopay.

"I'm not feeling great, so it's nice that you checked in, but you don't need to-" Raleigh stopped in the middle of her sentence, because that's when she realised that Joel wasn't alone. "What's going on?"

She opens the door a little more - not on purpose, not to let them in, but so she can see into the hall. They can see into her apartment, too, and where Raleigh's in front of them with greasy hair, dark circles under her eyes, and a tinge to her skin that says not-good things, her apartment's worse. There's old pizza boxes, clothes everywhere, empty mugs, paper plates-- not weird for a bachelor pad, but even at the worst of times, Raleigh kept wherever she was neat and pulled together. Worse still is her aura-- it'd been brown before, with almost all of the bright bits gone, but now it was more grey than not, even the brown was leeching away. All that she knows is that she wants to go back to bed, to tell the truth.

"Yeah, I don't care." Raleigh was standing in front of Orchard House, her hand on the open door as she nods towards the sidewalk. "I don't want to be open today, so we're not."

"But- Raleigh, we've been closed three days this week, and I have to pay my rent." Amber, the college student who was home for the summer who Raleigh had working the cash register most days stubbornly stood in the shop.

Raleigh's brows shot up, and she smiled sweetly. "Honey, you must be under the assumption that I actually care about your lack of preparedness. Do I look like I care? I said I don't. You should have saved some money or something, it's not my problem. Now, out. I have to lock up."

Staring at her boss, Amber slowly started to gather her stuff. "What is wrong with you? I can't- I can't just not have work. I mean, I love your bakery, and I used to love working for you--"

"Used too?" Raleigh paused, and her lips pressed into a thin line. "You know what? Here. I'll make it easy for you. You're fired. Now get out of my store before I call the cops." Plastering on another smile, she shrugged her shoulders like Look what you made me do, before she cleared her throat.

"What?"

"I said you're fired. Are you bad at English, too? Here I just thought it was your basic math skills. Out." Raleigh watched her go, her lips quirking up into a tiny smile as she tugged the door closed, humming as she locked it. She just doesn't feel like working today - this evening she's meeting Joel about her leg, and that means she just wants to sort of... soak it all in, before maybe he'll actually be able to fix it. Nevermind that she's got an audience to what just went down - she honestly doesn't care.

OOC: Open to everyone! Her last post before ppl figure out What Is The Something That's Really Wrong. :D