𝕖𝕞𝕖𝕣𝕪 𝕣𝕒𝕓𝕓𝕚𝕥

     carter grunted as emery rolled his hips against him, immediately standing upright, letting emery slide out of his lap with a smirk in place. he would do what the other said, even if emery had mostly been teasing him. their fingers intertwined as carter guided him towards the stairs, making his way up them, skipping a step or two on the way. as soon as they entered his room, carter shut the door behind them and pushed emery down onto the bed, quick to climb on top of him, kissing from his mouth, to his jaw, to this throat.

      “ you keep me on my toes plenty, emery, ” his lips curved into a smirk, his hands slipping up emery’s sides, a chuckle rumbling in his throat as emery worked on ridding him of his clothes, apparently they both had the same thought. carter pulled back briefly, “ not here, ” he cupped his jaw, “ I want you in my bed, over — and over, ” carter’s lips slipped down his throat, his hands dropping to grip at his hips. 

       “ proposing already? I expected you to be a hard ass, ” and he was, he’d proven that to carter twice already, and it was part of the reason he appreciated the kid so much. well, among other things that was. he welcomed him into his lap, instantly lifted his hands to cup his jaw, looking him over at close proximity and smiling, more so to himself, as he brought their mouths together again. 

      carter hummed as the other spoke, brows knitting together, though emery didn’t exactly give him much time to respond before their lips pressed against one another. he let out a sharp sigh, coaxing him back into another kiss and cupping emery’s jaw, “ no — - you deserve nice, ” carter kissed him again, and again, “ I wanna be nice. ”

Avril can’t help but laugh, it’s a genuine thing; a little embarrassing really and she pushes herself to sit straight as if suddenly interested. Maybe she was finally gearing up to get her butt in gear. “Sure I have, I’m an old hand at it–but that kind of statement isn’t the sort of thing that someone says looking to be ignored,” what an odd part of an interaction to focus on “But if you want to be ignored…I can do that.” 

Easy to switch off, easy to let things fall to mere background noise. Though she snorts by way of reply to his question “Hardly,” her hands return to her pockets, toying with the contents in a vain attempt to keep them from being idle “I work too damn much to be up on the town gossip, sure I hear shit in the ER but if it’s not relevant to a patient’s case then I just don’t care.”

She used to. Once upon a time. But then that got exhausting, her job was hard enough as it was and now she looks at him with renewed interest “…You look a bit young to be a father of five.”

       he expected it to just be that. he thought she would have went about her day ignoring him but then she spoke again and emery rolled his eyes. ‘ i have siblings. five of them. i don’t have kids. or at least none that i know of. ‘ that was more or less of a joke. emery didn’t need to shell out money for another mouth to feed and had always been careful when it came to the people that he slept with although that hadn’t been many. ‘ so yeah. when you’re poor and working for tips then scamming and stealing is the best way to go. ‘

        emery clenched his jaw as he looked down at the next text. he knew he should have called. maybe he should have done what was being demanded of him but the more he looked down at the text message the more he felt stupid. he didn’t know who this person was. for all he knew it was someone in town wanting to fuck with him and he had to weigh the possibilities let alone his options.

he took in a deep breath, not bothering to response as he shoved his phone into his pocket. fuck it. he wasn’t going to go down as a snitch and he wasn’t going to let some random ass person dictate what he was going to do.

Pursing her lips at his reply she waivers on just what to say in return, she could of course just…leave it at that but, well– “I’m sitting here…minding my business…I don’t see a phone or headphones to indicate a mic…” she trails off letting that speak for itself–this town was full of decidedly odd individuals, how she’d yet to learn not to question was beyond her.

But, talking to him was still easier than getting up and closing the distance between herself and the taco truck so as she reclines her head back she shoots him another look “You regularly talk to yourself in public then?” the sky was remarkably overcast, as if it too couldn’t make up its mind on what it wanted to be today–rain or shine, maybe just keeping up with the depressing grey cast “There are easier ways to go about making yourself hard to approach you know.”

Like headphones, she mentioned headphones didn’t she? “So, you’re poor and you’re an ace at scammin’ and stealin’,” she says continuing the conversation like any sane individual would “Must not be very good at it if you’re still struggling,” while the words weren’t entirely kind there’s no venom to be found in them, more so a simple statement “Not interested in something more…I don’t know, stable?”

      ' you realize there’s this cool thing called ignoring a person, right? ‘ was this chick new? maybe she was. most people were used to emery’s antics by now or at least knew a rabbit when they saw one but clearly that wasn’t the case and he almost had a hint of amusement on his face as she continued to go on. ‘ you mean the look on my face isn’t enough? ‘ he raised a brow glancing in her direction before looking ahead of himself.

‘ you new? ‘ he couldn’t help but ask. ‘ and a little bit of a dick apparently. ‘ he wasn’t going to apologize for calling it like he saw it. ‘ yeah, sorry, when you got five mouths to feed that doesn’t really leave a lot of money to rise to the top. ‘ something told him she didn’t know much about that life but he wasn’t going to assume that out loud. ‘ i’m a bartender but if i wanted advice i’d get a therapist. ‘

       and there is was. another bing to let him know that he had a response. when emery read through the text message, he found himself almost scoffing. snitches get stitches were something that people said to each other often but that was a reality for emery especially in the neighbor he lived in.

emery: starting to think you want to get me killed.

god, why was he entertaining any of this? no one typically cared what the next person did and maybe that was why emery was taking the leap of believing this person would actually do something. granted, there was always the chance that they were just blowing smoke but what if they weren’t? no amount of hard work or busting his ass was ever going to convince someone from cps that he was capable of taking care of his siblings.

emery: fine.

      “ keep being me, huh? ” he chuckled, flashing emery a wink as he stood up to clear away their plates. carter had to laugh at emery’s statement, his own words thrown back at him, it had to be obvious, unless the other was just teasing, both seemed fairly likely. he returned shortly after, sliding back into his seat and tilting his head to the side, deciding to reveal a little more insight, a tiny, insignificant detail, he believed. couldn’t hurt. “ I was a chef, I loved it, but I gave it up in my thirties, and this — - this is a good life. ”

      ' bullshit, ‘ was emery’s initial reaction as he leaned forward, arms folded on the table. it seemed as if carter was in the mood to surprise him tonight. ‘ living on a farm with two dogs is the good life and being a chef is like what? a walk through hell? ‘ emery wasn’t judging, not in the slightest, but damn. no wonder this guy could cook. ‘ so what? your real calling was being a farmer? ‘

Well, it sure was an interesting take. Talk about one hell of an icebreaker, she sits slouched on the bench staring ahead of herself trying to work up the energy to get up and walk over to one of the many social media worthy food trucks and was beginning to wonder if ever there was a task more monumental when the party next to her spoke up. Avril glances sidelong at him, squinting at the young man with something an awful lot like disbelief “And…you just decide to open with that?” she can’t help but ask because…what the hell?

Sure, it was a bitter truth but she could have been anyone. A badge. A fed. Someone who didn’t take too kindly to the prospect of being scammed or robbed. Maybe she was part of the latter party but given that she was still thinking the twenty feet to the taco truck was an arduous task, she wasn’t about to go shanking anybody at this hour “Okay,” she looks frontwards once more, slouching a little more “I’ll bite, you’re an old hand at both then I take it?”

      ' just because i’m talking doesn’t mean i’m talking to you, ‘ emery breathed out. the rabbits had always been hard people to get along with and now was really no different. they always had a sarcastic comment or two that they could let lose and emery was practically notorious for that. he looked over at her with a raised brow, ‘ considering i grew up poor and still am poor -- yeah. ‘ emery had no problem admitting that and anyone who knew the rabbits were well aware that they practically lived in the worst part of town in a house that should probably be demolished versus lived in.

       there was a moment, a brief moment, where emery thought that maybe this was a joke. it was vague enough to maybe be someone just fucking with him and he couldn’t help but glance around in an attempt to see if he could spot someone he knew or someone he was vaguely familiar with near him but he came up empty. he glanced back down at his phone wondering if he should have bothered. it was probably just someone fucking with him, right? right?

emery: i take it not the kindness of your heart.emery: what do you want?

      he shook his head in reassurance, his smile working that bit harder to reinforce his happiness, if you could cal it that. carter was clearly enjoying emery’s company, he’d made no secret of the fact, and although it surprised him, he wanted to keep him around. “ I think I’d like that, ” carter hummed, “ did you enjoy your food? ”

       ' like i said, keep being you and you may never get rid of me. ‘ which came off like a joke but there was some truth to it as far as emery was concerned. ‘ yeah, it was a good. sure you aren’t in the wrong line of business? ‘ emery raised a brow, a grin on his lips.

he nodded his head, “ so I saw, ” and he certainly didn’t put it past emery, after all, his siblings were quick to fall in line, and that kind of thing only really come around with routine. carter breathed out a gentle sigh, bringing his drink to his lips, “ you know more about me than anybody else does, did you know that? not even the people i work for know anything past my name. ”

     he shrugged his shoulders, licking his lower lip and slipping out of his seat, his hand placed gently on emery’s shoulders, before disappearing. carter took out their meal, plated it up and carried them back into the main room, “ table, please. ” carter placed them down and slid into a seat, looking back to emery as he topped up his glass, “ I like having you around, a shouting match at a bar, and a need to protect your family isn’t going to put me off. ”

       emery moved from his seat to instead head over to the table, ‘ looks good, ‘ he spoke, a hint of a smile on his lips as he slid into a seat. ‘ the shouting match was a bit tame for me, to be honest. ‘ but it also didn’t seem to take long for the other to calm emery down which was a rarity for the man. ‘ usually not easily persuaded not to turn an argument into a fist fight. ‘ which he was grateful for. he was pretty sure if it had gotten that far at the bar, emery wouldn’t be sitting here right now.

       “ years to calm down, a year here, specifically, to calm me down, ” carter sighed softly, shaking his head, “ I come from a complicated family, then I found myself a new family when I bailed on my real one. they were worse, they were — a lot like your neighbour, but a lot worse. ” he itched the back of his neck and shrugged, “ you don’t scare me, kid. not a whole lot does. ”

     ‘ that’s shit, ‘ emery breathed out.  he knew there were worst people out there but he wasn’t sure if he wanted to allow his imagination to go wild with that one. emery looked back at carter, expression softening somewhat at his words. ‘ i’m glad, ‘ he spoke, ‘ that i don’t scare you. ‘