i'm not crying, you're crying

"Huh?" Mingyu responded, taking a moment to realize he was being spoken to. Perhaps it was because he wasn't used to Fletch voluntarily engaging with him, or because he had been too busy trying to plan what he was going to do once his workday ended. It was one way to try and pass the time without going insane, as every shift at the bowling alley truly felt like a lifetime. He had grown numb to the screeching of children, the sounds of pins being knocked over and the loud cheering of people hitting a strike. While working at a bowling alley had once sounded like a dream job, it had turned out to be quite the opposite and it took all of his mental power to stay positive about the occupation.

Fletcher rolled their eyes at Mingyu's response, already regretting trying to start some sort of conversation with him. Most of the people who worked at Starstrike got on Fletch's nerves merely because of the association between them at work, but Mingyu seemed to be the worst culprit of them all. Fletcher leaned against the counter on both elbows, considering slamming their head down against the glass in the hopes of feeling something other than the mind-numbing boredom that was the norm at the bowling alley. Fletcher had thought it would be fun, but they forgot when they applied: they fucking hated bowling.

Copper was at the deli part of the grocery store, looking at the various cheeses - Copper liked cheese. The problem was that they were all out of imported provolone, and he was trying to decide if he wanted to settle for the blah domestic kind of if he wanted to try to find it somewhere else. While Copper wasn't a food snob by any means, he was a bit of a cheese connoisseur, especially provolone because his Italian father had talked often about how only authentic Italian provolone was worth eating. And the truth was that Copper saw his point. So he was looking into the cheese display trying to make his decision when he saw the reflection in the glass of someone approaching. That looks like Fletch, Copper thought, though he didn't really think it was; what would they be doing in Shrike Heights? He remembered meeting them at the bar, at how easily she worked into their group, like it had been meant to be. And then suddenly she was gone, though Copper had always pegged her as a bit of a rolling stone. He'd missed his friend, but he hadn't taken it personally. But still, Copper had known them back in Seattle, so why would they be here now? The deli worker watched Copper, clearly perplexed by why he was staring so hard at the glass, but Copper didn't care because holy shit, it was Fletch. Turning around, he looked at them and beamed. "Hey!" he exclaimed, genuinely glad to see her. "What are you doing here?" This was the last place he had expected to see his friend, and he wasn't even thinking about the fact that he'd have to tell her about Deacon. Right now he was still just feeling shock at their presence. "I think this is the last place I expected to find you," Copper stated, hugging them.

Fletcher never expected to see anyone they actually knew when they moved to a new place. It was bizarre, feeling the twinge of nostalgia for a place they had once called home and they wondered if staying power in their life was meant for people, not places. It was a shock in the moment, this shift in their thinking, but they pushed it aside for the moment and instead tried to remember that not everything needed to be dissected and analyzed down to the molecules. Fletcher easily accepted the hug with one arm, the other arm still carrying a basket of groceries, and she rubbed Copper's back once, warm and friendly, before pulling back to look at him once. There was something about him that seemed different, sadder, somehow. She couldn't quite place her finger on it. Fletch was good at reading people, at knowing what they were going to say before they said it, though there was no way they were going to be able guess what Copper would say about Deacon. "I think this is the last place I expected to find anyone," Fletch replied, glancing around at the small grocery store and thinking how peculiar this town already was. It seemed like there was a convergence of some kind here, some overlapping of energies that had made it so Fletch was stuck here, but also made it so that Fletch ran into one of the few real friends they had ever made. "What brings you here?" she asked, cocking her head to the side.

Jo had never necessarily been a motherly person, she'd never wanted kids of her own, or anything, but somehow she did have a habit of taking people under her wing - more in a way where she was the cool, queer aunt then a mom, though. With Grace, she hadn't liked watching her walk home all by herself, so had tried offering her rides if it was raining, or just someone to walk with if it wasn't. She took the sandwich - she had forgotten lunch, so it was actually perfect timing, really. "Wow. Well.." She wasn't actually sure what to say - she definitely hadn't been getting kissed by girls at college parties when she was nineteen, she'd been more one to stay in her dorm, writing sad, gay poetry at that age. "Maybe now you'll be able to tell next time, right?"

"God, I hope so," Grace replied, still pouting into her PB&J. She took another bite. She had spent the last year deciding wholeheartedly to throw herself into life, feet first. This was one of many experiences she had promised herself, but it wasn't magic like she hoped it would be. In fact, it was kind of hard to find capital-M Magic in Shrike Heights, especially in the face of the killers. Grace had been trying and trying, but she was starting to realize that the things she wanted, what she lamented missing out on through high school...that was just life. And it wasn't going to fix what she felt was missing. She didn't know what would, but she was going to keep trying different things until something, anything, filled the hole. Grace crossed her legs compactly, kicking her leg lightly. "I gotta ask," she said, pursing her lips. "Do you feel like it's been too quiet lately?" She dropped her voice low. "I'm kind of afraid of saying it and jinxing everything."