2019-07-06 - it's fine, they're not ACTUALLY related

Life has been pleasantly quiet around here the past few weeks. Sure, there was that one big storm, but that was a blip in the radar of tranquility that is life without monsters. Emily hasn't had to work since summer vacation started, and - excepting what we can chalk up to 'normal Emily bitchiness' - she seemed pretty okay for the past couple weeks, reading on the porch a lot, sometimes tagging along after Logan when he's working in the yard (too bad she exchanged that gardening skill for eye rolling, come to think of it), mostly just trying to get some sunshine when and where she can. Because while it's nice that they're finally coming out of the basement sometimes? She still kinda side-eyes that house as often as not.

Today's not such a good day, though. It started raining in the middle of the night, and Emily checked the fuck out pretty much first thing in the morning. She went out on the patio, and that's where she'd been sitting for, like, three hours straight, alternatively pretending to read and just staring across the street at the fucking neighbor and his fucking rosebushes. Till about ten minutes ago, when she walked across the street with Logan's garden shears and, in the rain, hacked the fuck out of those rosebushes. Thankfully, the guy is at work and doesn't call the cops on her right away or anything.

Now, she comes back to the house, finds wherever Logan is and, damp-and-bedraggled from her efforts, announces, "I cut down the rosebushes across the street." And hands him back the garden shears.

It's always good until it isn't, but at least the good's been lingering. The lack of bad made Logan try a little harder - it wasn't always overt, but there's been an effort made, small things that seem bigger in the picture that is their fucked up life - a few Saturday trips to the big bookstore in Hoquiam, nights out at the movies instead of renting something on Amazon, quiet picnics in the park. It was enough so that they weren't always in the house, enough so that there was some kind of normalcy around them; and through it, slowly but noticeably, Logan wasn't looking for the ghost as much anymore, he wasn't talking to the air in the quiet hours before midnight, he wasn't opening bottles when he thought Emily wasn't looking just to catch a whiff of bourbon. It wasn't perfect, he wasn't perfect. But since the big storm, things were just ... different.

But it's always good until it isn't, and today it isn't. The rainstorm's set them both in moods; she's staring at the neighbor's rosebushes and he's fussing with the pantry door that just. won't. close. right. By the time she comes around, damp and with the shears, he's cussing up a storm and thisclose to punching a hole through the stupid door. "You're getting fucking mud on the floor," he grouches the second she comes through, and then furrows his brow when he's handed the garden shears. He looks down to them, then up to her, and stares. "You what?"

Emily gets more mud on the floor when she stomps off - YES STOMPS - to get the broom from wherever the broom lives. She brings it over and hands that to Logan, too, like this is a perfectly acceptable solution to her having made a mess. Only after she does all that does she heel-toe off her sneakers and leave them on the floor. In the middle of the mud. "I cut down the rosebushes across the street," she repeats with a nod, 'cause yes, she knows exactly how abnormal a thing that is to have done. Now that she has nothing in her hands, she helpfully wiggles the handle of the broken pantry door, rattling it and clattering it noisily. "No one saw me do it."

Logan's eyes narrow as she stomps - STOMPS! - to the broom house, but he looks rather dumbfounded when she thrusts the broom into his free hand, and there he stands, staring at her, shears in one hand and broom in the other, irritated and confused as fuck. "You cut down the rosebushes across the street," he repeats, his jaw tensing with each word. There's a beat of silence, just enough time for her to fill it with the noisy rattling of the door, which just makes him grit his teeth. "Okay," he says slowly, and then snaps: "Stop that, with the fucking handle, you're going to make it worse," he moves to toss the shears down onto the table; they hit with a clunk and a clatter, before he turns to shove the broom back at her.

"I can't deal with this shit right now. I've gotta fix this fucking door, and the toilet's leaking again, and if I don't re-grout the shower today, I'm gonna lose my fucking mind," he has already lost his fucking mind. "You wanna cut down rose bushes? Fine, cut down all the fucking rose bushes. Go on a rose bush cutting spree! But don't get fucking mud on the floor."

"No," says Emily of the broom, and pushes back on the handle with the flats of her palms, leaning all her weight into it. Granted, he has nine inches and fifty pounds on her, so it takes real effort on her part to keep that broom over there where it stays his problem, but she grits her teeth and digs right in against it. She could just make it stay over there, being his problem, but her brain is busy making the door handle rattle a few more times, enough that the knob falls off and lands on the floor with a very satisfying lot of racket. Right in the middle of the mud.

She looks at where the knob bounces around before it finally rolls to a stop against the door frame, twitching her brows upward in surprise. That was obviously a little more violent than she intended it to be. "You have to quit being crazy for a minute. It's important." Oh Emily, with the hypocrisy.

"No? No?? Are you fucking kidding me right now? Take the fucking broom and clean up your goddamn mess, Emily! I have shit to do," it was kind of a ridiculous moment, him pushing the broom into her while she pushes the broom back to him, and he had every intention of winning this goddamn game of tug-of-broom while she drives him up the wall with the constant rattling of the doorknob. And then it falls, and it bounces onto the floor, and the broom handle snaps though that was less awesome mind powers and more the result of Logan's grip suddenly getting so tight that he bends the plastic. "Great. Fucking great," he grunts, and throws the ruined broom to the floor, letting that clatter to the ground in the mud, too.

"Fine, whatever," he throws his hands up and jerks away, stomping over to the fridge to throw open the door. "Have it your way, we'll just live in filth and let everything fucking fall to shit. I get it, you fucking hate this house, so why not just let it crumble around us?" He snags a bottle of orange juice from the fridge's guts, on such a rant that he almost, almost misses her quip about how he needs to quit being crazy. Almost. His eyes narrow as he cracks open the orange juice jug, glaring at her. "You gonna quit being a bitch first?"

So this is normally where Emily gets tired of him and walks off. Or says something super mean and then walks off. But she falls back on the other outcome to 'yay! just started a big fight with Logan!' and watches him wordlessly for a minute, tucking her now empty hands into her back pockets and turning to put her back to the broken pantry so she can keep an eye on him. An eye-roll answers his glare. "You're about feel like such an asshole."

It's fine. She'll wait till he gets his OJ. "I'm pregnant. And I know I said I'd stay here with you, but I'm not going to do that anymore. I'm going to leave instead," which, in Emily-speak, means like ANY SECOND NOW, "because I really don't want to raise my brother-in-law's little bastard in my dead sister's house. That's just taking too fucked up. Even for us."

"Wouldn't be so sure about that," Logan remarks about feeling like an asshole, only because there are a lot of times when he probably should feel like one and doesn't. Besides, he's pretty sure she never feels like such a bitch, even when she's CLEARLY BEING ONE. So up goes the container of orange juice, and he hikes his brows at her while drinking directly from the jug. The expression is clear: get on with it.

And she gets on with it.

The word 'pregnant' gets out and Logan snorts on his gulp of orange juice. Some of it goes right up his nose, the rest of it chokes down his throat and sputters back out of his mouth. It's a near classic spit-take, sort of unfortunate that neither of them had a camera so they could put this memorable moment in the new baby's scrapbook for later~. She gets the rest out but he's pretty focused on those last two words, though thankfully he wipes away the juice dribbling down his unhinged jaw. "You're what?" he sputters, and before she has a chance to repeat what she just said with a roll of her eyes attached, he sets the orange juice on whatever flat service he can find and propels himself forward towards her.

At least he forgets about being mad about the floor (even though he has to walk around the mud to get back to her, fucking whatever). "You're pregnant?" It's not an accusation, there's no harsh heat to the words, it's just a statement based upon disbelief (and frankly, a bit of confusion). His sunken eyes bulge, and he looks down from her eyes to her stomach, then back up to her. "What.. how.. It's not.. how's that possible?"
%At least he didn't ask if it was his~

Does Emily ever feel bad about being a bitch when she's CLEARLY BEING ONE? Let's find out! Re: How's that possible - "That's a stupid fucking question."

Nope, not feeling even a little bit bad about it. If anything, his whole 'coming back over here' thing makes her look to the broken broom-handle like she might start using it to hit him. In the face. Repeatedly. Or the next best thing, leaning away from him with a persistently half-wary, half-fitey look, "I got my job in Tacoma back in September. So I'm going back there."

Okay, maybe sometimes she feels a little bit bad about it since, after those words fall out of her mouth, her brows pull together and wary-fitey shifts into disturbed blinking at him, like 'oh yeah that sounded really bad, come to think of it.' Frowning, "You should come with me."

"It's not a stupid fucking question when you said you were on the pill," is Logan's knee-jerk response, spoken suddenly, sharply. She did say she was on the pill, right? He was 99.9% effectively sure she said she was on the fucking pill. But even as the words come out of his mouth, his brain does a quick race through all the times they tumbled into bed, and had that conversation ever even happened? Had they ever even talked about it? At least he almost immediately regrets the tone, and then proceeds to immediately thereafter feel justified when she says she's gotten her old job back in Tacoma.

"Whoa whoa whoa wait a fucking minute, what do you mean you already got your job in Tacoma back? How long have you known about this? You can't just.. you can't just leave me. You can't go and take my fucking kid up to Tacoma!" It was immediately defensive, his own brows falling in a not-so-subtly panicked furrow, as his hands lift to rub vigorously over his face in frustration. "We gotta talk about this, you can't just up and walk out, you made a fucking promise, you told me.."

And then the other shoe falls, and Logan drops his hands, his breathing sort of sputtered. "Come with you?" he breathes the words, his expression falling, anger giving way to deeper emotion. Fear. Loss. Uncertainty. "To Tacoma? To.. Jesus fucking Christ.." he sucks in a breath and it comes out in a tremble, and she might be leaning away from him but he's going to take another step towards her anyway, obvious tremors in his hand as he reaches across the void of space to put it on her stomach. The next words are softer, filled with disbelief, but more than just a small touch of astonishment. "You're pregnant. We're gonna have a baby."

Whether or not she ever said she was on the pill, Emily lives in constant fear of the men with the butterfly nets FOR A REASON: she's un-fucking-stable, so taking a pill every day is probably a lot of pressure and sometimes she has other shit on her mind like how the neighbor's roses are GETTING OUT OF CONTROL and she needs to go DEAL WITH THEM. All of that being the reason she doesn't even crack that argument open, but wow, she's quick to ball up her fists where they're in her back-pockets still, and he's about a second away from getting clocked when he catches up to the thing she forgot to mention till the last possible second, about how he should come with her.

She does still shove him in the shoulders with her knuckles, but there's no velocity behind it, just enough to suggest that this is still her personal space, beware, but he can put his hand on her stomach, she can give him that much at least (and her arms are shorter than his, so it's not like she can really stop him). "Yeah. Well. Before that. I have to go sign a lease. If you're coming with me, then you should probably sign it, too. And if you're not - well. I guess we'll figure that out later." Read: she will at least try to make it to his funeral.

Logan may never know how close he came to getting socked in the face, but he does flinch when she shoves at him, rolling his shoulders back and purposefully hunching towards her after. "Em. Stop," it was as close to pleading as she'd get; a voice that's raw, aching, a simple request - stop fighting him. His jaw tenses as she talks of signing leases, of alternatives, but he doesn't move his hand from her stomach, traveling his palm around a small space where he's decided the baby is.

They had never tried, him and Lucy. They had talked about it, he had dreamed about it, but they had never made an attempt. He had spent several months of his then very limited free time putting work into this house in hopes of something in the future, but it had never come to fruition. Not by choice. Certainly not by accident. And now here Emily was, with a possibility for life he hadn't ever considered would even be a possibility. Not with her, not with them, not in this town, not in this house. This house, with the ghost and the memories and the blood that soaked into the floorboards. This house that was so important to Lucy, this house where dreams had died.

"Jesus," he whispers again, his focus slipping down to her stomach where his hand moves so carefully, like the slightest wrong move would ruin this. He couldn't keep her here, he couldn't keep them here. And he had so many reasons to hold onto this place, didn't he? And now two reasons to let it go. "Okay," he swallows the lump in his throat, his hand maneuvering off her stomach to slide his arm around her waist. It's simple acceptance, no argument, no fight. Just 'okay'. "Okay. We'll just.. have a baby in Tacoma." shit. "What the fuck am I gonna do in Tacoma?"

Emily should stop. Like, she really ought to not twist uncomfortably against his arm, but she does for a second. At least it's not paired to a 'god i hope you die soon' look, more just a 'this is very intense and not really super' crumpling of her features. She's a little mixed up, hence attack on the neighbor's yard and then blurting all this out in the muddy kitchen. Quickly, so she can get it out there and then be over it, "I'm really sorry, this isn't a thing that I did, just so you know. And I want you to come with me, but I know you have this Thing with the house, so I get it. Really, we can figure it out. Like before? I used to come down here to see you and Lu all the time - except you'd have to come to the city, 'cause yeah. I don't feel like it's safe here for, y'know, this other person."

She stops and inhales and yeah. Hugs him. Tightly. Really just burrows in against his chest and breathes a little bit. Muffled, "It would be better if you came with me." Obviously, she doesn't GET that he already said he would, 'cause this was a way bigger argument in the rehearsal in her head.

She really should stop, because every uncomfortable twist was like a knife to the gut for Logan. Every single movement, every little tic of her features, every single word that comes out after he's already agreed to go ... little by little, she was breaking his heart. "God dammit, Emily, stop," he utters as she burrows into him, but it's not mean, he's just hurting; and his other arm comes around her and hugs her with the kind of fierceness that should make it evident he wasn't going to let her go.

"I'm not going to let you do this by yourself, I'm not gonna make you figure it out. This isn't just some other person, this is our other person, and.. just.. no, I'm not fucking staying here," he mumbles through those last couple of words as he nuzzles into her hair, no sharp edges to his tone now, just the shake of a sob he's clearly choking back. "I said I'll go, so I'll go. I'll go to Tacoma, I'll go with you."

Quietly, like it just occurred to her that the house and the third (now fourth?) occupant might be listening, Emily says, "Okay," about all the he'll go stuff. She tightens her arms around him in turn for a moment, fingers knotting up the back of his shirt and everything, and it's at least five deep breaths before she's able to release the white knuckles, flattening her palms against his back with a hard swallow of her own. "Okay," with more resolve, a stern little nod that bobs her forehead where it leans against the center of his chest.

One more time, just in case! "Okay." She smooths the shirt she just wadded up, drags her hands back, pushes hair behind her ears, and decides, "I'm not going to say anything else about the house. Ever again. Whatever you do with it - it doesn't matter, okay? And you can just live off me rent-free for a while till you get a job. Doing whatever it is you're good at." She smiles up at him like that wasn't mean at all. "Cooking? I guess?" While she cups his chin and tilts onto her toes and kisses him.

He didn't change his mind through all the 'okays', he just let her work through his agreement in whatever way she needed to, even if that meant wrinkling up his shirt. Not that it mattered, of course, this shirt was one of his old crappy ones (all of his shirts were his old crappy ones). "Okay," he says finally, on the tail-end of her okay, his own brow as wrinkled as his shirt was before she smooths it back out. The shirt, not his brow; that stays furrowed, as she promises not to talk about the house, and whatever it was he was going to do with it - what was he going to do with it?

Insults aside, he mutters: "Well I'm apparently good at knocking you up but I guess I can't do that for money." And then he is kissed, and he lets his brow relax and smooth away the wrinkles as he leans into her, lingering at her lips, until it was all over with a sigh.

And he leans away, hands dragging to her hips. He puts enough distance between them so that his eyes can drop down to her stomach, and his hands slide in to frame what might someday be a bump. His breath hitches as he stares, as he tries to picture this life. Their life, that life, a life outside of this house. "How long?" he swallows, rolling a thumb across her stomach, just over her bellybutton.

What's gonna be real bad is when Logan realizes he's going to have to DO SOMETHING with all his Lucy-things in the attic. One last hurrah for the monster-house before these two slip through their fingers?

"If you get really desperate for cash, at least you have something you can sell. People pay for that stuff. And you're not ugly, so you could probably get good money." All that after kissing him but before Emily pats his cheeks with both hands. Then fails to approach the baby-thing with even an ounce of romance, just looks down at the business of his thumb for a second then tilts a look back up to him, trying not to roll her eyes but sometimes it just happens, okay?! At least it's only a little roll this time. "How long...? I've known since right around when you and me and Gina rode the Ferris wheel." Which was a month and some days ago, give or take.

Quickly, "You're okay, right? Because I know it's a lot to absorb, and it's not exactly according to plan," lol what did these two ever have a PLAN, "but I'm okay with this, just so you know. I mean, it's weird, but I got this, so it's okay if you're not okay."

Was he okay? It was certainly the Question of the Day. Was he okay that she was pregnant, was he okay that she's known for a month and just didn't mention it? Was he okay with leaving this house that he was ready to die in and go up to Tacoma instead and try to actually live? Was he okay with being a dad, and being a partner, and being somebody that Emily could rely on .. because she's got this, but she shouldn't have to 'get this' alone. There was a dozen things that he wasn't sure he was okay with, another dozen that he definitely wasn't okay with. But his brows twitch, and he drags in a breath and lets it back out, and he lets his hand roam the expanse of her stomach in quiet wonder.

And as he marvels over her stomach, he adds another thing to what he's not sure if he's okay with: her getting fat. LOL jk.

"Yeah," he probably should let her in on what's going through his head, but it didn't matter. It didn't change anything. "Yeah I'm.. okay. We're gonna be okay. I'll... I need a couple of days," he looks back up to her, apologetic and concerned. "Give me a couple of days. Just to.. to get everything in order. Don't leave, okay? Just give me a couple of days. Please, Em."

Dude, whatever. Emily already has a job and an apartment in another city. Hypocrisy may be one of her favorite things, but she's not gonna get all mad at Logan if he wants to deal with this in his own time. So she nods, and she tolerates his hand on her stomach. Even if it means she has to keep standing in the mud in the pantry door. "I can't move in until the fifteenth anyway, so you have some time."

And she's not a romantic person, but here's something nice for them. That she can share. Since she went about sharing this news in the opposite of an awesome way. "It's January twentieth. Which is, like, three days after your birthday, so that's kind of neat. I guess? Anyway, that means it was probably right around when you decided to break into the carousel in the park," and say he looo~ooved her, "so that's the story I'm gonna tell it when it's born. That the only reason it exists because its dad is a delinquent." And its mom is un-fucking-reliable, but we covered that already.

Logan was swiftly settling into a state of shock, so the fact that she's given him less than 10 days notice hasn't yet sunk in well enough to piss him off. Maybe it would later, when he's processed all of this, when he's made sense of this sense of all of this. For now, he just drops his head, touching his forehead to her own, and skates another touch across her stomach as she speaks, her talk of him being a delinquent making him snort loudly. "Yeah? Well I'll tell it that it's mom is.." he starts, and he was really trying to come up with some kinda insult, maybe a good backhanded compliment.

Instead? He swallows, he furrows his brow, and he smooths his hand across her stomach. ".. You're gonna be a mom," he utters, as though it's just occurred to him. "I'm gonna be .. I'm gonna be a dad. I'm gonna be somebody's dad." And he blinks as he pulls back, and lifts his gaze to hers. And she can't be romantic even if it kills her, so he's gonna have to do it for the both of them. "God I love you, Em. I'm gonna make this okay, all right? We're.. the three of us. We're gonna be okay. I promise."

They can argue about the short notice later. It's not like it takes more than ten days find a realtor or buy some gasoline and matches, for chrissake. At least she wasn't like 'actually here's my new address so hit me up when you get to town!'

Hold on. Emily takes his hand off her stomach and, walking in her sockfeet through the mud, drags him out of the kitchen by that hand. And out of the living room by that hand. And out onto the porch by that hand. She'd probably go all the way out of the yard but for the rain (and also the neighbor just pulled up and is looking at his rosebushes like WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?!) So the porch is where she stops, and where she winds her arms around his neck and says honestly, "I love you, too. And I believe you. We kept each other safe, and I think we got better?" Ish. "So we can do this, too. Be parents, I mean." She smiles at him and everything, but also makes sure to keep him so his back is to the pissed off neighbor. Whups.

"What.." Logan starts when she removes his hand, when she yanks him so that he's dragged through the house. Out of the kitchen, through the living room, onto the porch where the rain patters down and the neighbor worries over ruined roses. He doesn't see that last part, of course, because she adjusts him just so and puts her arms around his neck, and confusion melts into understanding as he puts his arms back around her waist. "Yeah," he agrees, his smile far more subtle, but he nods his head with firm assurance. "Yeah, we can. We will. Do this. Be parents, move to Tacoma, be.." he stalls, swallows the lump in his throat.

"Emily.." He shifts, unwinds his arms from around her, and takes her by the wrists to slide her own hands off of him, so that he can clasp them. He raises her hands to his lips, kissing her knuckles, and squeezes her fingers with his own. "I wanna do this. All of it. I mean that, I do. You gave me a reason to wanna live again," another kiss, softer across her knuckles. "And now you're giving me another one. And it's just.. it's time. It's really past time. To let this go," he looks back to the house, to explain what he means. "You mean everything to me, Emily Harris."

Somewhere, some monster is like - hold up a minute, they're not supposed to leave, THAT'S AGAINST THE RULES. And Emily would give that monster the finger, but her fingers are being kissed right now, and probably that's the only thing in the whole world that would take precedence. If she was a melty person, this would be her melty moment, but she's more just the glassy-eyed, stubborn nodding person, so she does those things instead of melting. "Thank you," she says genuinely, dragging the backs of her fingers across his lips a couple times. "For coming with me. And being my family. And apparently having, like, really stubborn sperm." She rolls her eyes at herself this time.

"Um. This is a really nice moment. And I don't want to ruin it. But we have to go back inside. 'Cause the neighbor is about to come over and," she's not a mind-reader, so this is just a guess, "ask if we know what happened to his roses. And I really don't want to talk to him."

It was a really nice moment. And she absolutely ruins it. Logan throws a glance over his shoulder, rolls his eyes this time, and groans aloud. "I swear to fucking God, Emily," he utters as it becomes his turn to drag her back into the house, shut the door, and ignore the aggressive knocking when the neighbor comes up to the porch (I know you're in there! I WILL NOT BE IGNORED!).

"The place in Tacoma better have a fucking basement for me to lock you in," he mumbles, but it's softer, as he puffs out a sigh. "Go sit down. I'll bring you food. Just as soon as I sweep the fucking kitchen."