[They're not dating. Seriously, they're not. They're booty calls and that is a perfectly acceptable working relationship if you were to ask him because he isn't interested in a relationship, is too busy for that kind of shit but he doesn't really enjoy going to bars and picking up women there because they're either stupid or desperate or both and he's got like an allergic reaction to those kind of women.
Despite what he says, he knows that Raleigh isn't stupid and she's definitely not desperate and she's a challenge and it just works alright.
Until-- it doesn't.
Until one morning he wakes up and realizes that her shit is all over his apartment. That her shampoo and razor have a spot in the shower, that she more or less has a drawer in his dresser, that she has mother fucking tampons under his sink, that her OJ is in his fridge, her favorite brand of chips are always in his kitchen and he let it all happen. No, worse, he encouraged it because he bought that juice and those chips and oh holy hell.
Fucking fuck, does he love her? He better not fucking love her because that is a serious wrench in the plan. Chuck is realizing all of this while taking a piss by the way, while Raleigh is making breakfast in the kitchen and what a time to slam into this kind of realization. And he knows damn well that if they were at her apartment, his shit would be all over the place, he's been meaning to grab his jacket from her place for like a month now and she's got vegemite even though she hates it.
Raleigh Becket's his girlfriend and he hasn't the slightest clue when the fuck that happened.
Chuck's still kind of in a daze when he wanders into the kitchen, barely even registers that she's wearing his shirt while making pancakes. When did this happen? Does she know? Did she plan it? Oh, that's sneaky, Becket, that is a really conniving plan and you know what he's going to do about it?
Pretend like he has no idea about it. That's what.]
[ It's awesome that you experience such life-altering revelations when your dick's in your hand and you're pissing into a toilet bowl, Hansen. Raleigh, while very much awake and humming quietly to herself, isn't quite at that stage of self-realisation yet; and fortunately is the farthest thing from conniving because Raleigh Becket's sometimes an idiot and obviously hadn't planned for shit to get that far.
She's wearing the dress shirt he wore yesterday before she very nearly ripped it off him, sleeves rolled up to the elbows as she enjoys the simplicity of basking in a lover's shirt, the scent he leaves, clean and earthy, and she doesn't think about the tampons under his sink or the OJ and chips he keeps stocked for her.
When Chuck comes in, she looks over her shoulder and smiles, entirely oblivious to the man's train of thought, and entirely fixated on the fact that her pancakes are going to be the fluffiest, yummiest disks ever. There's already a small stack on the plate beside her, steaming hot, coffee brewing in the coffeemaker; premium beans, and the like. Trust him to have impeccable taste. ]
Hey, get the chocolate sauce, will you? And the whipped cream, too.
[He comes to a lot of conclusions when his dick is in his hand. Pun intended.
But anyway, Chuck spends a few moments just watching her, even though he heard her speak, he doesn't move to do what she asked. He's actually considering just doing it and not starting a fight and what the fuck is wrong with him. Since when does he not fight her on every little decision, since when does it matter that it's easier to just go with the flow sometimes.]
Chocolate sauce for what? [He asks finally instead of just standing there like a moron, just because it's something to do.]
Why is he even thinking of starting a fight over whether to get the chocolate sauce anyway? It's a yummy, yummy thing to add to pancakes and Raleigh's got a sweet tooth, but she likes sharing her favourite food with Chuck and --
-- huh.
When did that happen?
Raleigh pauses for a long moment, momentarily stumped by the fact that somehow, without her knowledge, she'd taken to sharing things with him, to living with him and waking up without immediately living, and look, she's in his shirt and what the fuck is that all about? ]
...Pancakes. [ She says, dazed. How did they let it get this far? ]
[Even if he hadn't just realized that he's dating her and is probably in love with her and all of that girly, touchy feely shit, who the fuck puts chocolate syrup on pancake? That's asking for diabetes.
Better question, how does she eat like shit and still look like that?]
[ Chocolate sauce, you heathen. The one she happened to buy last night when they were on a grocery run, and doing the strangest couple-y shit and it occurs to her that they just went grocery-shopping together and did no one notice that?
How hadn't she noticed that? And she eats like shit and still looks like that because she's a hyperactive half-french mutt who generally likes running around at obscene hours of the morning. Except for, well, today. ]
[Again, what kind of heathen puts something syrup on pancakes. That's normal, Raleigh, why do you have to be so... not normal. Why do you have to be pretty and challenge him and interesting and annoying as fuck sometimes but other times when it's early in the morning and she rolls over to tuck her chin into his shoulder and he-- likes that.
He likes her.
How the fuck did that happen? Fuck you Raleigh Becket for being endearing, what the fuck. Is wrong with you?]
[ The Raleigh kind of heathen, of course. Chocolate sauce is great for a good deal of things, but she's hard-pressed to think of any now when the belated realisation of what they've become hits her, and it's fucking scary and wonderful all at once because hand on heart the best mornings are when she wakes up tucked against him, when they curl against each other, affection warm under their skin in the space between heartbeats, between words.
She likes those moments the way she likes his general grumpiness, his bad temper, she likes the times where he smiles, unguarded and bereft of spite and she'd lean in to kiss his cheek, just above that lovely dimple. Chuck's not the only one having a crisis because fucking be less gorgeous, Hansen, what the fuck.
She rubs her hand over her eyes, suddenly terrified. I like you. I like you very much. ] ...I'm flipping pancakes in your kitchen and you have vegemite in my fridge.
[That's just reiterating her point, that they have taken over each other's living spaces (and he can actually pinpoint when that started to happen, when at first they only went back to her place to fuck and the first time they stumbled back to his was the Night of Five Times) but the way he says it definitely equates vegemite with tampons. The tampons are worse, if you think about it because vegemite is a breakfast food and he needs breakfast if he doesn't have time to make it back to his place after spending the night at hers.
But tampons? That implies that she's spending time at his apartment that has nothing to do with sex. And she is. She can sleep in his bed and they don't always have sex and what.]
[ She knows exactly when it happened, in hindsight. When she'd come over and she'd only slept in his bed -- the first night she came over and they didn't have sex, and he held her and she liked it. And tampons are definitely not worse than vegemite because what is that fucking thing?
It happened when she went grocery shopping and went to buy it for him anyway; it happened when he slept the whole night through instead of leaving after, when she sometimes wakes up and admires his sleeping profile, allowing herself to be lulled to sleep by his breathing.
And now, she's living in his fucking apartment and she has tampons under his sink and he knows it and she just -- she wonders what he'd do next. What they'd do next. ] I don't know.
[ She exhales, because she's more than a little bit in love with him and she knows that he's not looking for anything serious and it freaks her out because somewhere they've crossed a line and she's not sure where Chuck stands on it. ]
[Chuck doesn't know what he wants to do about it. Obviously he isn't really that opposed to dating her since he already is and that. Is weird. And should make him really uncomfortable, like an allergic reaction to dating but he's probably more mad that it snuck up on him without him noticing than the fact that they're dating.
Does he want anything to change? No, not really. Can't go back to how it was without it being super awkward or super not what he wants.]
[ There are appropriate things to say to this. Proper things. Adult, mature things; like the attempt to sort this out, or... something similarly inspiring. But those are things people not like Chuck and Raleigh say. Chuck and Raleigh do things differently, the stupid way around, and so she asks this, momentarily distracted from their earlier conversation: ]
You have Facebook?
[ ...What does he even put on his wall? Raleigh's is long inactive because she's hated the idea of posting every little inconsequential thing like it's important, but. Wow. ]
[It doesn't matter what he puts on his wall, it's actually barely used. Unlike his linkedin account but that's different because he uses the latter for his work. But anyway, the point is is that he's not going to go around shouting this development from the rooftops but he doesn't want to change it.]
[ Raleigh's not a big fan of shouting it from the rooftops, either. As far as she's concerned, it's none of anyone's business. She's still processing it, running it through in her head.
Finally, she mutters. ]
...Get the chocolate sauce. We're eating some pancakes.
[ ...This is going to be weird for a long while. Like not quite noticing your nose sometimes then your nose gets pointed out and you can't help notice it anyway.
Still, she helps to lay out two stacks of still-warm pancakes. ]
Get me the chocolate sauce while you're at it, too. And cream.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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Despite what he says, he knows that Raleigh isn't stupid and she's definitely not desperate and she's a challenge and it just works alright.
Until-- it doesn't.
Until one morning he wakes up and realizes that her shit is all over his apartment. That her shampoo and razor have a spot in the shower, that she more or less has a drawer in his dresser, that she has mother fucking tampons under his sink, that her OJ is in his fridge, her favorite brand of chips are always in his kitchen and he let it all happen. No, worse, he encouraged it because he bought that juice and those chips and oh holy hell.
Fucking fuck, does he love her? He better not fucking love her because that is a serious wrench in the plan. Chuck is realizing all of this while taking a piss by the way, while Raleigh is making breakfast in the kitchen and what a time to slam into this kind of realization. And he knows damn well that if they were at her apartment, his shit would be all over the place, he's been meaning to grab his jacket from her place for like a month now and she's got vegemite even though she hates it.
Raleigh Becket's his girlfriend and he hasn't the slightest clue when the fuck that happened.
Chuck's still kind of in a daze when he wanders into the kitchen, barely even registers that she's wearing his shirt while making pancakes. When did this happen? Does she know? Did she plan it? Oh, that's sneaky, Becket, that is a really conniving plan and you know what he's going to do about it?
Pretend like he has no idea about it. That's what.]
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She's wearing the dress shirt he wore yesterday before she very nearly ripped it off him, sleeves rolled up to the elbows as she enjoys the simplicity of basking in a lover's shirt, the scent he leaves, clean and earthy, and she doesn't think about the tampons under his sink or the OJ and chips he keeps stocked for her.
When Chuck comes in, she looks over her shoulder and smiles, entirely oblivious to the man's train of thought, and entirely fixated on the fact that her pancakes are going to be the fluffiest, yummiest disks ever. There's already a small stack on the plate beside her, steaming hot, coffee brewing in the coffeemaker; premium beans, and the like. Trust him to have impeccable taste. ]
Hey, get the chocolate sauce, will you? And the whipped cream, too.
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But anyway, Chuck spends a few moments just watching her, even though he heard her speak, he doesn't move to do what she asked. He's actually considering just doing it and not starting a fight and what the fuck is wrong with him. Since when does he not fight her on every little decision, since when does it matter that it's easier to just go with the flow sometimes.]
Chocolate sauce for what? [He asks finally instead of just standing there like a moron, just because it's something to do.]
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Why is he even thinking of starting a fight over whether to get the chocolate sauce anyway? It's a yummy, yummy thing to add to pancakes and Raleigh's got a sweet tooth, but she likes sharing her favourite food with Chuck and --
-- huh.
When did that happen?
Raleigh pauses for a long moment, momentarily stumped by the fact that somehow, without her knowledge, she'd taken to sharing things with him, to living with him and waking up without immediately living, and look, she's in his shirt and what the fuck is that all about? ]
...Pancakes. [ She says, dazed. How did they let it get this far? ]
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Better question, how does she eat like shit and still look like that?]
What's wrong with syrup?
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How hadn't she noticed that? And she eats like shit and still looks like that because she's a hyperactive half-french mutt who generally likes running around at obscene hours of the morning. Except for, well, today. ]
...Chuck. What are we doing?
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He likes her.
How the fuck did that happen? Fuck you Raleigh Becket for being endearing, what the fuck. Is wrong with you?]
Funny, I was about to ask you the same question.
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She likes those moments the way she likes his general grumpiness, his bad temper, she likes the times where he smiles, unguarded and bereft of spite and she'd lean in to kiss his cheek, just above that lovely dimple. Chuck's not the only one having a crisis because fucking be less gorgeous, Hansen, what the fuck.
She rubs her hand over her eyes, suddenly terrified. I like you. I like you very much. ] ...I'm flipping pancakes in your kitchen and you have vegemite in my fridge.
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[That's just reiterating her point, that they have taken over each other's living spaces (and he can actually pinpoint when that started to happen, when at first they only went back to her place to fuck and the first time they stumbled back to his was the Night of Five Times) but the way he says it definitely equates vegemite with tampons. The tampons are worse, if you think about it because vegemite is a breakfast food and he needs breakfast if he doesn't have time to make it back to his place after spending the night at hers.
But tampons? That implies that she's spending time at his apartment that has nothing to do with sex. And she is. She can sleep in his bed and they don't always have sex and what.]
We're dating. When the fuck did that happen?
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It happened when she went grocery shopping and went to buy it for him anyway; it happened when he slept the whole night through instead of leaving after, when she sometimes wakes up and admires his sleeping profile, allowing herself to be lulled to sleep by his breathing.
And now, she's living in his fucking apartment and she has tampons under his sink and he knows it and she just -- she wonders what he'd do next. What they'd do next. ] I don't know.
[ She exhales, because she's more than a little bit in love with him and she knows that he's not looking for anything serious and it freaks her out because somewhere they've crossed a line and she's not sure where Chuck stands on it. ]
What do you want to do?
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Does he want anything to change? No, not really. Can't go back to how it was without it being super awkward or super not what he wants.]
... I'm not updating facebook about this.
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You have Facebook?
[ ...What does he even put on his wall? Raleigh's is long inactive because she's hated the idea of posting every little inconsequential thing like it's important, but. Wow. ]
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[It doesn't matter what he puts on his wall, it's actually barely used. Unlike his linkedin account but that's different because he uses the latter for his work. But anyway, the point is is that he's not going to go around shouting this development from the rooftops but he doesn't want to change it.]
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Finally, she mutters. ]
...Get the chocolate sauce. We're eating some pancakes.
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I'm getting syrup. Like a normal person.
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Still, she helps to lay out two stacks of still-warm pancakes. ]
Get me the chocolate sauce while you're at it, too. And cream.
[ She's going to eat and eat and not get fat. ]