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bandomstuffsitClick here for Part One, headers and warnings
Monday night through Thursday morning flies by, and suddenly Spencer’s standing outside of the Mend Shop on Thursday evening nervous for some unknown reason. When he knocks there is a tiny twitch of movement in one of the shades as Chester skitters from his perch on the window sill and goes to fetch Brendon. Not even five minutes later, Brendon opens the shop door and steps out into the chilled November weather. He’s dressed in good Sunday clothing, all in shades of earthy tones without even a trace of wheel grease on his cuffs or his face, and Spencer’s chest gets tight for a second before he’s distracted by Links rustling around in her pocket.
She pokes her head out of the pocket and eyes Chester Mouse as he scurries up Brendon’s shoe and begins the quick climb up to the pocket of Brendon’s grey heavy winter coat. Brendon smiles at him and locks the shop door. They end up walking their bicycles most of the way to Spencer’s house instead of peddling. The conversation spans the spectrum of topics, and they’re playfully arguing over day cups as a universal given right of the populace when they finally get to Spencer’s house.
Spencer introduces Brendon to everyone and the twins giggle up at him before running off to their room to play with their dolls. Spencer’s mom somehow cons them into setting the dinner table together while she puts the finishing touches on the turkey and fixings. After that, dinner flies by. Brendon doesn’t accidentally spill his one glass of wine or drop his silverware under the table like Ryan is want to do on accident whenever he’s over. He’s polite, and by the time pie is being served he’s even telling dorky jokes that have Spencer smiling fondly at him.
When they’re finished helping his mom cleanup she pushes them out of the kitchen. They end up upstairs in Spencer’s room, sitting propped up against each other, watching Links chase Chester around in circles while the shiny little mouse taunts her whenever he can. They fall asleep like that.
Spencer wakes up Friday morning with a crick in his neck and Brendon smiling at him fondly. A second after that, Brendon shifts slightly and falls off Spencer’s still made bed. He’s laughing when he stumbles up onto his feet. Chester’s ears twitch from his sleeping spot curled up against Links’ chest. Links mews a slightly irritated little sound before letting a squirming Chester scurry off to climb up Brendon’s now wrinkled pant leg.
Neither of them have the Friday after Feasting Holiday off, so Spencer starts to change the moment Brendon wanders downstairs for a glass of milk. Links grumpily lets him place her in his pocket and he heads on downstairs not wanting to go to the carpentry shop. As the days pass he’s slowly becoming more and more dissatisfied with his apprenticeship, but there’s not really anything he can do about it even though a tiny voice in his head pipes up that he could just go talk to Frank about Links and see where that could lead him.
They leave Spencer’s house together, splitting up when the road forks, left towards the carpentry shop and right for downtown and the Mend Shop. The rest of Friday turns out to be boring and labor intensive. Spencer thinks about dropping by to see Brendon afterwards, but ends up being too tired and instead treads home, passing out on top of his still made covers without even eating dinner.
November turns bitterly cold on the last day and the first days of December are greeted with about an inch of snow. The carpentry shop is drowning in Christmas requests. Spencer’s tired and grumpy when he trudges into the Mend Shop two Fridays after the Feasting Holiday. He fucking hates his job. Ryan had to take two hours with his special fabric tweezers pulling slivers of wood out of Spencer’s fingers earlier and Spencer should just go home, but something’s pushing him to visit Brendon so he goes with the flow and lets it.
Patrick waves at him from the front counter before pointing in the direction of the back workroom when he pushes through the front door of the Mend Shop. Brendon’s humming to himself while he buries his left hand in the innards of an antique bubble lamp. The sight is so normal that Spencer finds himself relaxing slightly. The moment Brendon looks up and smiles at him, Spencer starts bitching about hating wood work and fucking splinters. He doesn’t know why he hates carpentry so damn much now, he just does. There was a time when he didn’t really care too much either way about it but those days have apparently deserted him.
Brendon pulls his hand from the lamp and goes to his unevenly hung grey winter coat that’s precariously draped over the corner of one of the spare parts shelves.
“You really hate working there?”
Spencer nods.
“Yeah.”
“Fucking finally. Come on”
Brendon whispers the first part to himself while he shrugs on his coat and shoves his hands into his bright red gloves. The second part he says louder when he grabs Spencer’s wrist and drags the both of them out of the Mend Shop, waving at Patrick when they pass by the front counter. Once outside, Brendon starts walking in the direction of Tulia, but he doesn’t stop to grab his bicycle which means they’re probably not actually going to Tulia.
Twenty minutes of silence later, Brendon stops walking and Spencer looks up to find that they’re directly in front of Frank’s Mechanical Magic Shop. The place looks closed up for the evening, considering it is around five now and the sun is beginning to slowly hide for the night it’s an understandable assumption to come to. Brendon pulls Chester from the folds of his coat and places the little mouse on the sidewalk at his feet, asking him to go get Frank for him. Chester stays still for a second before zipping through a tiny hole in the brick work near the front door of the shop.
They wait for maybe three minutes in the chill, snow flurries drifting down to melt in their hair, before the shop door creaks open and Frank pops a goggled covered face out into the chill. He takes one look at them and pushes the door open wider, retreating back into the warmth of the shop a second after.
“Well if you’re coming in do it quickly. I think the snow is waging a plot to make me sick again.”
Frank calls to them, pulling off his goggles and tossing them on the nearest shop counter when he passes by, as they step over the threshold. Brendon turns and shuts the shop door behind them. Spencer’s pretty sure he hears the lock click, which is fine by him it is after hours for the shop.
The lighting is dim, the glass globe lights hanging from the ceiling only giving off a slight glow of yellow instead of an intense glare of white, but he can still make out the lay of the shop. There are shop counters lining the whole right side of the space, with an ancient looking register sitting proudly in the middle of the center counter top. Weird contraptions and wing filaments hang from the walls and shelves upon shelves of curios sit in the middle giving the place a cluttered but quaint vibe.
Chester scurries out from under one of the shelves and climbs up onto Brendon’s shoe. Links hears him and pokes her head out. She pays no attention to Frank and scrambles from her pocket to jump down, her metal paws making a thump when she lands on her feet. In an instant she’s slinking towards Chester, who pays her no heed and seems to be mocking her by combing his front paw through the loose wires poking up from the tips of his ears. Brendon laughs, shaking his foot to annoy Chester, who turns his little mouse face up to stare at Brendon before climbing up his leg. Links doesn’t even slow down, she just starts climbing up Brendon’s pant leg to continue stalking after Chester.
Brendon laughs again, this time squirming when Chester decides to burrow under the collar of his button down in an effort to hide from Links. Spencer is so caught up in watching Links try to follow the little mouse that he doesn’t notice Frank until he speaks, causing Spencer to turn around to stare at him.
“She’s yours right? That’ll be why Brendon brought you then.”
Spencer nods, and starts explaining how he found Links. Frank listens, bouncing on the balls of his feet sometimes or asking questions when Spencer says something he wants clarified. Frank walks off for a second and Spencer follows, watching him bend over the shop counter to rustle around in a drawer for something. Brendon shows up at Spencer’s side, Links on one shoulder staring at Chester who’s perched on Brendon’s other shoulder smoothing down the wire hairs of his ears again.
Frank pulls something from the drawer and throws it to Brendon.
“Since you’re here, do you mind tweaking the calibrator for me? I think we might need it in a bit for Charlie if I’m right.”
Brendon almost catches the calibrator but it fumbles out of his fingers, making a metallic thunk when it hits the shop floor. Frank just shakes his head and grins along with Spencer when he notices Spencer smiling at Brendon’s habit of not being able to grab things being thrown at him. Brendon bends down and picks up the calibrator, Links and Chester hopping off of his shoulders the second he’s closer to floor level. When he rises back up he mock glares at Frank.
“I hate when you do that. I might be good at mending the things you break with your crazy but I can’t fix something that’s smashed into little pieces. What would Mikey think if he knew you were throwing around Charlie’s heart like it was just a paper weight?”
Spencer tries to pay attention to the back and forth, but Frank hands him a beat up seventh decade tinker toy and everything blurs, breaking apart into funky distorts of prismatic color. He’s vaguely aware of his knees buckling, his back sliding down to rest against the glass of the counter side. After that though, he’s not really sure because his focus is solely on the little tinker toy and even then it’s almost like he’s trying to breathe underwater, everything slow and disjointed.
The soft touch of fingers pushing stray strands of hair away from his face causes him to jerk out of the haze. His first thought is that he probably needs a trim before he realizes that Brendon’s sitting right in front of him, close enough that Spencer could lean forward and. Do something. He’s not exactly sure what though, so he pushes the impulse down. If he doesn’t know what it is then it can’t possibly be important enough. Right?
Brendon sighs and pulls a tiny screw wrench from his pocket. The tinker toy makes a metallic huffing noise before trotting from Spencer’s lap, where it was resting, to bridge the tiny gap in the floor that exists between him and Brendon. It nudges Brendon’s hand with its muzzle and Spencer realizes that the toy isn’t quite right, almost as if it’s weak and dying. There’s no reason he should know that, even if he’s always been aware of when Links needs Brendon to fix a miss-coiled spring or, more recently, when Chester needs a cog replaced.
The scent of Bamburry tea steams up in front of him and he’s belatedly aware that Frank is crouched next to Brendon, holding out a yellow chipped mug for Spencer. Brendon tinkers on the now wheezing toy and Spencer’s thoughts freeze when he mentally gets to the word tinker. Tinkerers can fix almost anything. It would make sense if Brendon turned out to be one, but a tinkerer is never alone because they always have a touched person at their side. Spencer’s never heard of any history where a tinkerer is without someone blessed with the touch. Not one. The thought of Brendon finding someone new to be around all the time makes his chest tighten so he ignores it in favor of accepting the mug of hot tea from Frank.
Bamburry isn’t his favorite flavor but sipping the cloudy, red brown liquid is soothing. Spencer watches Brendon work over the rim of the yellow mug cradled in his hands while Frank bounces up to his feet so he can reach the ledger sitting on the counter above them, muttering something about figures under his breath as he goes.
Fifteen minutes later, Spencer listens to Frank explain imbuement to him, how a small selection of the touched population have the ability to give objects life, not just enchant them to do certain things. A person touched with imbuement also usually has an active yet shy familiar. As Frank keeps talking, things slot together for Spencer in a way that causes the rest of the Bamburry tea to slosh out of the mug.
Brendon laughs, pocketing the screw wrench before jumping up onto his feet. The little tinker toy unicorn makes a disapproving snort and Spencer leans forward to pick it up. Charlie nuzzles into his hand and Spencer stands up kind of wobbly. His left leg is tingly from sleep and he can’t use his hands for balance since they’re both full. Brendon steadies him, a smile on his face that could brighten the whole room and Spencer’s sure he’s missing something important again. Frank shuts the ledger and the moment zips away like a tiny wisp of dust caught up in the wind.
By the time Brendon drags him out of the shop, Spencer’s got a new Apprenticeship and he won’t have to worry about nasty splinters anymore. A very, very small part of him is sad to know that he won’t be a carpenter anymore because it will miss the stability of the position, but on the whole he feels like maybe he’s finally on the right track even if it means he has to start over from the bottom up. Perhaps he should have listened to Brendon earlier.
The cold air is chilling on their walk back towards the middle of town and tiny flakes of snow dance down from the grey tinted night sky. When they get to the Mend Shop, their bikes resting against the rack, Brendon asks if he wants to stay the night. It’s getting far too cold as the hours slip by, so Spencer nods, he’ll send a wire bird to his mom when they get in. She’ll worry if he doesn’t.
There’s a note on the main counter. Brendon reads it to himself while Spencer tries to coax Martin from the ceiling struts. The wire bird is highly wary of Links, who likes to watch the flighty black bird with interest whenever she’s not chasing Chester around. Eventually Links jumps from her pocket so she can slink across the shop floor in pursuit of a smug acting Chester, and Martin flutters down from his perch. After that, it doesn’t take long for Spencer to attach the note to his mom. Martin stretches the wire of his wings twice and then takes off to the small message window high up near the ceiling.
Together they sweep the shop floor, Brendon dancing around all of the displays with the broom while Spencer follows behind him with the dust pan, and tidy up some of the parts displays before Brendon tones down the overhead lighting and they make their way up the stairs to the tiny living quarters over the shop. There’s a cramped sitting area melded with a slip of a kitchen, an array of colorful teacups set on the only counter. They end up propped up on Brendon’s bed, sitting on top of the nest of brightly stitched quilts piled high on the bed, talking about the history of mechanical guild work. Links curls up at the end of the bed with Chester snuggled up close to her chest. They fall asleep like that.
In the morning, he wakes up to the slightly untuned racket of a wire bird squawking from its perch on Brendon’s eighth decade chest of drawers. There’s a note hanging from its neck, so Spencer untangles himself from Brendon and grabs for the piece of parchment. Apparently Frank sent word to the carpentry shop that Spencer’s formally accepting a different guild path, and he’s all clear to start coming to the mechanical magic shop for work beginning on Monday.
Brendon makes a soft snuffling sound behind him, before shifting around and finally waking up. The sunlight peeks in through the blue curtains, painting the worn daisy rug at the edge of the bed in warm shades of gold. They have hot mint tea and Brendon bounds down the stairs while Spencer stays around to clean up their small mess. By the time he’s done, Brendon comes back up to inform him that Patrick’s giving him a free day, so Spencer decides to drag Brendon down to Sews Itself.
Ryan quirks an eyebrow at him when they show up at Sews Itself about an hour later. Spencer just arches an eyebrow in return and Ryan smirks at him, measuring lengths of gauzy lace while he does so. Spencer’s not sure what the smirk is for so he steals the spool of lace right out of Ryan’s left land. Brendon pokes him in the side and the spool shakes in his grip enough for Ryan to snatch it back with a victorious ‘ha’. Spencer turns to glare at Brendon for the dirty trick and Brendon just shrugs his shoulders and smiles brightly.
Ryan’s giving him this weird look when he turns back around but Spencer’s not sure what it means and shrugs it off. Links squirms in her pocket before peeking the tip of her nose out from the folds of his heavy winter coat. It’s the first time she’s ever had any interest in Ryan and before Spencer can think on it she crawls up and out of the pocket and leaps down onto Ryan’s work table. Her paws make a metallic clinking sound when she stalks towards the end of the lace that’s trailing from the spool in Ryan’s hands.
Ryan watches her and the moment he lifts the spool enough to get the lace to wiggle she pounces. It’s actually the best possible way to slide into letting Ryan know that he’s switching his apprenticeship, so Spencer just goes with it. Ryan’s fingers still from petting at Links ears when he finishes.
“Your Mom’s going to kill you for not telling her sooner. I might help her. You can’t just hide being touched.”
Chester somehow worms his way out of Brendon’s pocket and catches Links attention. Ryan watches them bump into his supplies and forgets to stay mad at Spencer for not telling him. There’s no one else in Sews Itself at this hour but as soon as the evening rolls around it’ll be packed with the rest of the staff and towns people wanting their patched clothing before Monday morning. Links butts her head against the side of his hand and Spencer picks her up so she doesn’t have to climb up his clothing to get to her pocket.
He’s going to have to tell his parents eventually, may as well get it over with. He says bye to Ryan and decides to head on home. Brendon follows him out of the shop and Spencer doesn’t know why he does it, but he asks Brendon to come with him. It would be good to have the support of someone who has pretty much known for months now. Brendon nods before smiling widely again and linking their arms together, trying to get Spencer to skip to the tune of “My Lady Adala” that he’s singing under his breath.
When they pass the Mend Shop their bikes get pulled from their slots in the rack and they’re peddling down the sidewalk. It’s cold and the sky looks like it wants to try for some more snow, yet somehow that doesn’t make their ride unpleasant. Brendon keeps laughing when he somehow finds a way to pass Spencer and it becomes a game of bicycle tag that ends with the two of them smiling at each other, trying to catch their breath while slotting their bikes into the rack that sits outside of Spencer’s house.
His mom’s in the kitchen checking preserves for freshness when they walk in. His dad’s sitting at the table reading the weekend edition of the local paper. His mom notices the two of them standing in the doorway and she glaces from him to Brendon, a bright smile forming on her face, before she asks if Brendon’s staying for dinner. Brendon looks at him and nods when Spencer smiles at him. It’s not like he’s going to ever be against Brendon staying the night. Plus it would do Brendon good to have solid meals that aren’t cobbled together suppers of dried pastas and seasonal fruits.
Spencer fidgets slightly. He’s not exactly sure how to tell his parents that not only is he changing profession tracks but that he’s touched and been hiding it since right after his birthday. Links stays curled up in the bottom of her pocket. She’s probably keying into his slight unease. Instead of trying to pull her out of the pocket, he goes for the slightly less direct approach and pulls out Frank’s message from earlier.
Brendon presses closer to him and hums something peppy and encouraging into his ear before straightening up when Chester finally finds a way to crawl out from the folds of his coat. Spencer’s never sure why Brendon takes ages to strip off his coat when he visits. Spencer always hangs his up the moment he comes in, and it’s not like this is the first time Brendon’s stayed over. Hell, it’s not even the twelfth time. If Spencer didn’t know any better, he’d think Brendon’s forever waiting for the moment when he has to leave. The thought makes him frown and he almost misses his mom hugging him tightly while chastising him for not telling them.
Links squirms in her pocket and carefully pokes her head out to investigate when his mom releases him. Chester watches from Brendon’s cupped palms, and jumps down to the tiles the moment after Links gains enough courage to leap to the floor, following after Chester the way she normally does. Spencer has to give his parents credit, they don’t even blink an eye at the display, and his mom just goes around the chase and back to her preserves.
After that, she puts them to work rearranging boxes in the attic for the rest of the evening. They end up talking about mass sparks and the history of fantasy tales. It’s an interesting conversation that pulls Spencer in, and by the time his mom calls them down for supper he’s completely lost track of time.
Dinner goes well. Brendon cracks jokes that make everyone smile. Everything’s comfortable and easy and Spencer wonders how he ever existed without this. Links shifts in his pocket and he loses his train of thought and forgets what he was wondering about. When they’re finished, the twins drag Brendon off to play with them and Spencer finds himself helping his mom clean up in the kitchen.
After that night, it’s like most of the proper pieces have slid into place and Spencer feels like he’s finally going in the direction he needs to move in, minus maybe one or two particular puzzle pieces he can’t seem to figure out . Frank’s shop sees a good amount of business and Spencer’s kept busy. He’s not sure if it’s the ramping up of the holiday season or if it’s normal for the shop to be busy from open to close almost everyday, but it’s exhausting and there are nights he ends up just crashing at Brendon’s place above the Mend Shop. They both of them passing out leaning against each other with rumbled covers still made still pulled up over the bed.
When Ryan figures out that he’s staying with Brendon, he stares at Spencer for a moment before asking if they plan on setting a date. Sometimes Spencer has no clue what Ryan’s talking about so he just shrugs it off and asks if Ryan’s going to bring Jon to the family Christmas party.
The days continue to have the same number of of hours populating them, yet somehow Christmas shows up quicker than Spencer expected. Ryan and Jon show up for the Eve, Eve party and Jon sets up his camera set, taking as many pictures as humanly possible. Brendon smiles most of the night. Sometimes he frowns and Spencer does his best to keep the bad memories away. Everyone in town knows that Brendon’s been on the outs with his own family for awhile now and Christmas is kind of a sore spot for him.
Ryan and Jon leave the next morning to catch a cab to Jon’s parents house. Brendon stays with them and sings carols until he leaves the day after Christmas. It makes the atmosphere cheery and bright so no one asks him to stop. After he leaves, Spencer’s cleaning up the tinsel that’s trying to weasel it’s way into hiding in the crevices of the living room floor when his mother corners him.
“Spencer James Smith. You ever going to tell Brendon that you like him, or are you content to just lead him on?”
He drops the dust pan and it clatters when it hits the floor, tinsel and dust bunnies doing their best to scurry away.
“We’re friends.”
His mom gives him the patented I’m your mother I know what I’m talking about look before shaking her head.
“What happens if he decides to ask for placement in Grimal without you? He’s capable of getting approval without having to wait for you. Just think about, ok?”
Spencer’s left to watch her wander back into the kitchen to put up the last of the Christmas cookware while the tinsel does it’s best to blend in with the cracks in the floor. He shakes his head, trying to dislodge the thoughts that are suddenly attempting to bloom in his mind, and goes back to sweeping up the shiny silver tinsel. They’re just friends. Nothing more, nothing else. Right?
That night, his dreams shift and change from bright colors to dreary hues. When he wakes up his heart’s racing and he’s sweating. Links’ blue eyes stare at him from her portion of the pillow, almost as if she hasn’t slept a wink because of his troubled nightmares. The muted blues of his new alarm clock bath his room in the shades of the ocean and Spencer spends the next three hours before the sun rises propped up against his headboard watching the slight glow from his clock ripple and flow across his bedroom walls.
Watching the clock doesn’t exactly calm him down, because it keeps him firmly thinking about Brendon and what little wisps of his dreams that are left lingering around in his waking thoughts. He’s partially confused about things now and pretty sure he might actually have feelings for Brendon, but he’s not really sure where Brendon stands. And what if Brendon’s not on the same page as he is? Spencer shakes his head, and watches the muted blues shift to golden yellows as the sun slowly starts to wake up. He wants to take the clock as a clue because who would build an extremely personalized Hue Clock for someone they don’t care about, but then if Spencer could he’d probably build one for Ryan and Jon, so he’s not sure if his thought holds any validity.
Links butts her metallic little head against his chin and he pulls himself out of his musings, sliding out of bed and changing for work. Frank probably won’t mind if he’s a little late. Mikey always opens the shop up for him anyways, which means Frank won’t amble down from the apartments over the shop till after nine or ten am and Mikey will tousle his hair and poke him before pushing him towards his work. Sometimes Spencer’s amazed at how well the two of them work together. It always makes him wonder if eventually he and Brendon could do the same thing. Until this moment he hasn’t actually put much more stock into that thought than how cool it would be owning a shop in some decently steady town with Brendon next to him fixing anything he might accidentally break. Now though, he’s starting to wonder if there’s maybe a bit more to why he likes the idea of the two of them setting up shop somewhere.
January is slower than December, probably because everyone is still winding down from the Christmas season and starting to think about Valentine’s Day. Like every other major holiday, Valentine’s Day is hugely popular and usually Spencer just pays no attention to it, going on about his usual business, even though his mom tends to frown at him and hint about him finding someone, and several of the older women around town try to set him up with their single children or grandchildren.
This year though, he spends most of January lost in thought, instead of trying to talk people out of setting him up for February. It doesn’t help that Brendon receives a letter the second Monday of the month that makes him smile and bounce until Spencer asks him and Brendon deflates a little and won’t tell him about the letter. By Friday, he’s finally able to corner Brendon and get him to talk about the letter. And by then Spencer wishes he’d never asked because Mikey’s brother, who lives in Morrow, wants Brendon to move out there and apprentice as a junior Tinkerer under him.
When Brendon tells him that he’s going to write back and decline the offer, Spencer’s elated that Brendon’s not going to leave him, but he also feels mildly uncomfortable because Brendon deserves to have an opportunity like this. However, every time he tries to talk him into leaving his tongue sticks to the roof of his mouth and he just can’t do it. Frank corners him the Monday after and calls him on his bullshit. He tells him to own up and contact Gabe in Morrow to see if he has a position available, because if Gabe’s up for it Spencer doesn’t have to be a dick and he can go with Brendon. After that, Frank stares him down and says ‘for the love of everything good in the world, tell Brendon that you like him. There’s no way he’s going to turn you down. He’s head over heels in love with you and it’s getting ridiculous ’
So Spencer sends a wire bird off to Morrow and hopes for the best while trying to keep Brendon from replying to Gerard’s letter with a hastily scrawled no. It’s not hard to do, mostly because he’s not the only one doing their best to keep Brendon occupied and not thinking about Morrow. Frank and Patrick keep giving him tasks to mull over and Spencer drags him away from both of the shops in the evenings after work. They usually end up either watching the clock work ducks waddle across the faded grass of the park, Brendon somehow coaxing them to eat tiny stripped screws from his cupped palms, or hanging out with Ryan and occasionally Jon, when he’s not off running errands for the Photography Studio.
The last day of January rolls in stormy and mucky, and a wire bird slams into his shoulder hard enough to bruise when he’s walking in the direction of work. The momentum of the impact pushes Spencer to the ground and the bird crumples to the sidewalk, one wired wing twisted and bent at an awful angle and its beak smushed in and dented to the side. It’s seizing and flailing it’s unbroken wing against the sidewalk’s hard surface, a low and pained cawing keen escaping from it’s hollow throat with every thrash, and Spencer scoots forward enough to trail cautious fingers across the rain slick surface of its spasming back. Purple and amber eyes blink up at him, and the bird does its best to not move as he gingerly scoops it up into his hands.
Spencer can calm the wire bird down and ease the pain some, but he can’t fix it so he makes his way towards the Mend Shop. Today is one of the days that Brendon opens the Mend Shop and switches over to Frank’s shop later on in the evening. If there’s anyone that can help the poor thing cradled in his hands it’ll be him.
By the time he shows up, he’s soggy and his hair’s plastered to his face.The wire bird chirps low from where he’d had to bundle it up in portions of his coat so it wouldn’t drown, Links peering out with sad eyes to keep watch while Spencer did his best not to run into any of the few people out and about during the dreary early morning weather. The shop’s warm and dry when he pushes the door open, the bell chiming something muted but happy at his entrance, and the shop’s empty except for Brendon sitting behind the back counter with a cog radio broken apart across the surface of the counter top.
Brendon smiles brightly from his spot at the counter and Spencer smiles back because, ok, maybe he’s finally embraced that he likes Brendon. If only his tongue would decide it’s the right time to ask him out. Ryan had sort of tilted his head and laughed at Spencer when he’d noticed Spencer stammering something out in front of Brendon earlier in the week. He’s working up to it, and maybe he’ll be able to say something before Brendon finally decides to say yes to Gerard and ends up traveling north to Morrow.
The wire bird flutters in the folds of his coat and Brendon’s smile turns down into a frown when he hears the wire bird chirp.
“Hey, Spence everything ok?”
Spencer nods and carefully places the wire bird on a semi clean portion of the counter when he finally walks up. Brendon slides the rest of the radio parts to the edge of the counter, several of the bits and bobs cascading off onto the floor behind the counter, before ever so slowly trailing one of his fingers down the wired joints of the wire bird’s broken wing. Sometimes Spencer forgets how Brendon is around the mechanical animals and it always slams into him, just how much Brendon cares about these mechanical things that most people only see as machines around for their needs or aesthetics.
“What happened?”
Brendon looks up at him, hands scrambling to find the proper tools while doing his best to calm the bird down, soothing words barely slipping out from his lips in a whisper that Spencer can barely hear.
“He flew right into my shoulder when I was on my way to Frank’s shop this morning and must have twisted everything when he fell.”
Spencer shrugs and the motion makes him wince because it jostles the bruise forming across the front of his shoulder and chest. Brendon looks up at the noise and asks him if he’d put up the ‘sorry busy’ sign and lock the door. By the time he’s finished, Brendon’s bundling the broken wire bird up and shuffling to the back work room.
The rain outside pours down, and Spencer listens to it hammer over the tin roof of the Mend Shop while zoning out watching Brendon do his best to help the wire bird not be crippled for the rest of its days. He doesn’t even know he’s talking until the sound of a screw wrench dropping onto the heavy surface of the work table pulls him out of his musings about love and life. It takes him a second to back track through his thoughts enough to figure out what he just said that would be causing Brendon to stare at him with hopeful eyes.
When he figures it out, Spencer wants to bang his head against the wall he’s propped up against. Not out of shame or because he shouldn’t have said what he did, but because he’s been envisioned telling Brendon that he likes him in so many different ways the past couple of weeks, and none of them have included this scenario. If Brendon’s clumsy with his steps then Spencer’s clumsy with his words. Ryan’s going to die from laughing his ass off when he finds out.
Brendon smiles at him and goes back to splinting the wire bird’s fragile wing. Words trip off his tongue as he goes about working.
“I should have know, all I needed to do was get you out of your head enough. You always say what you want to say when you don’t even realize you’re holding a conversation with someone. Just so you know, you could have said something months ago. I like you too and, man, I don’t know if I could have been more obvious. I think your mom was about ready to lock us in a closet and see what happened.”
Spencer starts smiling widely by the time Brendon’s admitting to liking him back, and Links crawls out of her pocket to curl up in his lap, purring happily like everything has finally finished slotting into place. She’s probably right. He scritches her ears and watches Brendon finish up the splint. When he’s done, Brendon sets the groggy little wire bird on a steady shelf to rest while the resin dries on its resculpted beak, and he comes over to Spencer, sitting down beside him in an unsteady motion.
A crumpled letter floats into his lap and Spencer unfolds it enough to read it. The letters flow in eccentric script and it’s a reply from Gabe telling him that May’s a good month if he wants to apprentice with him. Of course the letter isn’t short and sweet like that. It’s chatty and by the time he’s finished reading Brendon’s staring at him with that hopeful expression plastered all across his face again.
“We could always go together.”
Spencer nods.
“I’d like that.”
And suddenly they’re kissing and it’s one of the best things ever, even if the angle’s awkward and it’s apparent that neither of them have any experience with kissing. Links meows happily from his lap and Chester scurries up his pant leg to burrow into Links chest, chittering excitedly as he settles. Spencer smiles and kisses Brendon again.
Monday night through Thursday morning flies by, and suddenly Spencer’s standing outside of the Mend Shop on Thursday evening nervous for some unknown reason. When he knocks there is a tiny twitch of movement in one of the shades as Chester skitters from his perch on the window sill and goes to fetch Brendon. Not even five minutes later, Brendon opens the shop door and steps out into the chilled November weather. He’s dressed in good Sunday clothing, all in shades of earthy tones without even a trace of wheel grease on his cuffs or his face, and Spencer’s chest gets tight for a second before he’s distracted by Links rustling around in her pocket.
She pokes her head out of the pocket and eyes Chester Mouse as he scurries up Brendon’s shoe and begins the quick climb up to the pocket of Brendon’s grey heavy winter coat. Brendon smiles at him and locks the shop door. They end up walking their bicycles most of the way to Spencer’s house instead of peddling. The conversation spans the spectrum of topics, and they’re playfully arguing over day cups as a universal given right of the populace when they finally get to Spencer’s house.
Spencer introduces Brendon to everyone and the twins giggle up at him before running off to their room to play with their dolls. Spencer’s mom somehow cons them into setting the dinner table together while she puts the finishing touches on the turkey and fixings. After that, dinner flies by. Brendon doesn’t accidentally spill his one glass of wine or drop his silverware under the table like Ryan is want to do on accident whenever he’s over. He’s polite, and by the time pie is being served he’s even telling dorky jokes that have Spencer smiling fondly at him.
When they’re finished helping his mom cleanup she pushes them out of the kitchen. They end up upstairs in Spencer’s room, sitting propped up against each other, watching Links chase Chester around in circles while the shiny little mouse taunts her whenever he can. They fall asleep like that.
Spencer wakes up Friday morning with a crick in his neck and Brendon smiling at him fondly. A second after that, Brendon shifts slightly and falls off Spencer’s still made bed. He’s laughing when he stumbles up onto his feet. Chester’s ears twitch from his sleeping spot curled up against Links’ chest. Links mews a slightly irritated little sound before letting a squirming Chester scurry off to climb up Brendon’s now wrinkled pant leg.
Neither of them have the Friday after Feasting Holiday off, so Spencer starts to change the moment Brendon wanders downstairs for a glass of milk. Links grumpily lets him place her in his pocket and he heads on downstairs not wanting to go to the carpentry shop. As the days pass he’s slowly becoming more and more dissatisfied with his apprenticeship, but there’s not really anything he can do about it even though a tiny voice in his head pipes up that he could just go talk to Frank about Links and see where that could lead him.
They leave Spencer’s house together, splitting up when the road forks, left towards the carpentry shop and right for downtown and the Mend Shop. The rest of Friday turns out to be boring and labor intensive. Spencer thinks about dropping by to see Brendon afterwards, but ends up being too tired and instead treads home, passing out on top of his still made covers without even eating dinner.
November turns bitterly cold on the last day and the first days of December are greeted with about an inch of snow. The carpentry shop is drowning in Christmas requests. Spencer’s tired and grumpy when he trudges into the Mend Shop two Fridays after the Feasting Holiday. He fucking hates his job. Ryan had to take two hours with his special fabric tweezers pulling slivers of wood out of Spencer’s fingers earlier and Spencer should just go home, but something’s pushing him to visit Brendon so he goes with the flow and lets it.
Patrick waves at him from the front counter before pointing in the direction of the back workroom when he pushes through the front door of the Mend Shop. Brendon’s humming to himself while he buries his left hand in the innards of an antique bubble lamp. The sight is so normal that Spencer finds himself relaxing slightly. The moment Brendon looks up and smiles at him, Spencer starts bitching about hating wood work and fucking splinters. He doesn’t know why he hates carpentry so damn much now, he just does. There was a time when he didn’t really care too much either way about it but those days have apparently deserted him.
Brendon pulls his hand from the lamp and goes to his unevenly hung grey winter coat that’s precariously draped over the corner of one of the spare parts shelves.
“You really hate working there?”
Spencer nods.
“Yeah.”
“Fucking finally. Come on”
Brendon whispers the first part to himself while he shrugs on his coat and shoves his hands into his bright red gloves. The second part he says louder when he grabs Spencer’s wrist and drags the both of them out of the Mend Shop, waving at Patrick when they pass by the front counter. Once outside, Brendon starts walking in the direction of Tulia, but he doesn’t stop to grab his bicycle which means they’re probably not actually going to Tulia.
Twenty minutes of silence later, Brendon stops walking and Spencer looks up to find that they’re directly in front of Frank’s Mechanical Magic Shop. The place looks closed up for the evening, considering it is around five now and the sun is beginning to slowly hide for the night it’s an understandable assumption to come to. Brendon pulls Chester from the folds of his coat and places the little mouse on the sidewalk at his feet, asking him to go get Frank for him. Chester stays still for a second before zipping through a tiny hole in the brick work near the front door of the shop.
They wait for maybe three minutes in the chill, snow flurries drifting down to melt in their hair, before the shop door creaks open and Frank pops a goggled covered face out into the chill. He takes one look at them and pushes the door open wider, retreating back into the warmth of the shop a second after.
“Well if you’re coming in do it quickly. I think the snow is waging a plot to make me sick again.”
Frank calls to them, pulling off his goggles and tossing them on the nearest shop counter when he passes by, as they step over the threshold. Brendon turns and shuts the shop door behind them. Spencer’s pretty sure he hears the lock click, which is fine by him it is after hours for the shop.
The lighting is dim, the glass globe lights hanging from the ceiling only giving off a slight glow of yellow instead of an intense glare of white, but he can still make out the lay of the shop. There are shop counters lining the whole right side of the space, with an ancient looking register sitting proudly in the middle of the center counter top. Weird contraptions and wing filaments hang from the walls and shelves upon shelves of curios sit in the middle giving the place a cluttered but quaint vibe.
Chester scurries out from under one of the shelves and climbs up onto Brendon’s shoe. Links hears him and pokes her head out. She pays no attention to Frank and scrambles from her pocket to jump down, her metal paws making a thump when she lands on her feet. In an instant she’s slinking towards Chester, who pays her no heed and seems to be mocking her by combing his front paw through the loose wires poking up from the tips of his ears. Brendon laughs, shaking his foot to annoy Chester, who turns his little mouse face up to stare at Brendon before climbing up his leg. Links doesn’t even slow down, she just starts climbing up Brendon’s pant leg to continue stalking after Chester.
Brendon laughs again, this time squirming when Chester decides to burrow under the collar of his button down in an effort to hide from Links. Spencer is so caught up in watching Links try to follow the little mouse that he doesn’t notice Frank until he speaks, causing Spencer to turn around to stare at him.
“She’s yours right? That’ll be why Brendon brought you then.”
Spencer nods, and starts explaining how he found Links. Frank listens, bouncing on the balls of his feet sometimes or asking questions when Spencer says something he wants clarified. Frank walks off for a second and Spencer follows, watching him bend over the shop counter to rustle around in a drawer for something. Brendon shows up at Spencer’s side, Links on one shoulder staring at Chester who’s perched on Brendon’s other shoulder smoothing down the wire hairs of his ears again.
Frank pulls something from the drawer and throws it to Brendon.
“Since you’re here, do you mind tweaking the calibrator for me? I think we might need it in a bit for Charlie if I’m right.”
Brendon almost catches the calibrator but it fumbles out of his fingers, making a metallic thunk when it hits the shop floor. Frank just shakes his head and grins along with Spencer when he notices Spencer smiling at Brendon’s habit of not being able to grab things being thrown at him. Brendon bends down and picks up the calibrator, Links and Chester hopping off of his shoulders the second he’s closer to floor level. When he rises back up he mock glares at Frank.
“I hate when you do that. I might be good at mending the things you break with your crazy but I can’t fix something that’s smashed into little pieces. What would Mikey think if he knew you were throwing around Charlie’s heart like it was just a paper weight?”
Spencer tries to pay attention to the back and forth, but Frank hands him a beat up seventh decade tinker toy and everything blurs, breaking apart into funky distorts of prismatic color. He’s vaguely aware of his knees buckling, his back sliding down to rest against the glass of the counter side. After that though, he’s not really sure because his focus is solely on the little tinker toy and even then it’s almost like he’s trying to breathe underwater, everything slow and disjointed.
The soft touch of fingers pushing stray strands of hair away from his face causes him to jerk out of the haze. His first thought is that he probably needs a trim before he realizes that Brendon’s sitting right in front of him, close enough that Spencer could lean forward and. Do something. He’s not exactly sure what though, so he pushes the impulse down. If he doesn’t know what it is then it can’t possibly be important enough. Right?
Brendon sighs and pulls a tiny screw wrench from his pocket. The tinker toy makes a metallic huffing noise before trotting from Spencer’s lap, where it was resting, to bridge the tiny gap in the floor that exists between him and Brendon. It nudges Brendon’s hand with its muzzle and Spencer realizes that the toy isn’t quite right, almost as if it’s weak and dying. There’s no reason he should know that, even if he’s always been aware of when Links needs Brendon to fix a miss-coiled spring or, more recently, when Chester needs a cog replaced.
The scent of Bamburry tea steams up in front of him and he’s belatedly aware that Frank is crouched next to Brendon, holding out a yellow chipped mug for Spencer. Brendon tinkers on the now wheezing toy and Spencer’s thoughts freeze when he mentally gets to the word tinker. Tinkerers can fix almost anything. It would make sense if Brendon turned out to be one, but a tinkerer is never alone because they always have a touched person at their side. Spencer’s never heard of any history where a tinkerer is without someone blessed with the touch. Not one. The thought of Brendon finding someone new to be around all the time makes his chest tighten so he ignores it in favor of accepting the mug of hot tea from Frank.
Bamburry isn’t his favorite flavor but sipping the cloudy, red brown liquid is soothing. Spencer watches Brendon work over the rim of the yellow mug cradled in his hands while Frank bounces up to his feet so he can reach the ledger sitting on the counter above them, muttering something about figures under his breath as he goes.
Fifteen minutes later, Spencer listens to Frank explain imbuement to him, how a small selection of the touched population have the ability to give objects life, not just enchant them to do certain things. A person touched with imbuement also usually has an active yet shy familiar. As Frank keeps talking, things slot together for Spencer in a way that causes the rest of the Bamburry tea to slosh out of the mug.
Brendon laughs, pocketing the screw wrench before jumping up onto his feet. The little tinker toy unicorn makes a disapproving snort and Spencer leans forward to pick it up. Charlie nuzzles into his hand and Spencer stands up kind of wobbly. His left leg is tingly from sleep and he can’t use his hands for balance since they’re both full. Brendon steadies him, a smile on his face that could brighten the whole room and Spencer’s sure he’s missing something important again. Frank shuts the ledger and the moment zips away like a tiny wisp of dust caught up in the wind.
By the time Brendon drags him out of the shop, Spencer’s got a new Apprenticeship and he won’t have to worry about nasty splinters anymore. A very, very small part of him is sad to know that he won’t be a carpenter anymore because it will miss the stability of the position, but on the whole he feels like maybe he’s finally on the right track even if it means he has to start over from the bottom up. Perhaps he should have listened to Brendon earlier.
The cold air is chilling on their walk back towards the middle of town and tiny flakes of snow dance down from the grey tinted night sky. When they get to the Mend Shop, their bikes resting against the rack, Brendon asks if he wants to stay the night. It’s getting far too cold as the hours slip by, so Spencer nods, he’ll send a wire bird to his mom when they get in. She’ll worry if he doesn’t.
There’s a note on the main counter. Brendon reads it to himself while Spencer tries to coax Martin from the ceiling struts. The wire bird is highly wary of Links, who likes to watch the flighty black bird with interest whenever she’s not chasing Chester around. Eventually Links jumps from her pocket so she can slink across the shop floor in pursuit of a smug acting Chester, and Martin flutters down from his perch. After that, it doesn’t take long for Spencer to attach the note to his mom. Martin stretches the wire of his wings twice and then takes off to the small message window high up near the ceiling.
Together they sweep the shop floor, Brendon dancing around all of the displays with the broom while Spencer follows behind him with the dust pan, and tidy up some of the parts displays before Brendon tones down the overhead lighting and they make their way up the stairs to the tiny living quarters over the shop. There’s a cramped sitting area melded with a slip of a kitchen, an array of colorful teacups set on the only counter. They end up propped up on Brendon’s bed, sitting on top of the nest of brightly stitched quilts piled high on the bed, talking about the history of mechanical guild work. Links curls up at the end of the bed with Chester snuggled up close to her chest. They fall asleep like that.
In the morning, he wakes up to the slightly untuned racket of a wire bird squawking from its perch on Brendon’s eighth decade chest of drawers. There’s a note hanging from its neck, so Spencer untangles himself from Brendon and grabs for the piece of parchment. Apparently Frank sent word to the carpentry shop that Spencer’s formally accepting a different guild path, and he’s all clear to start coming to the mechanical magic shop for work beginning on Monday.
Brendon makes a soft snuffling sound behind him, before shifting around and finally waking up. The sunlight peeks in through the blue curtains, painting the worn daisy rug at the edge of the bed in warm shades of gold. They have hot mint tea and Brendon bounds down the stairs while Spencer stays around to clean up their small mess. By the time he’s done, Brendon comes back up to inform him that Patrick’s giving him a free day, so Spencer decides to drag Brendon down to Sews Itself.
Ryan quirks an eyebrow at him when they show up at Sews Itself about an hour later. Spencer just arches an eyebrow in return and Ryan smirks at him, measuring lengths of gauzy lace while he does so. Spencer’s not sure what the smirk is for so he steals the spool of lace right out of Ryan’s left land. Brendon pokes him in the side and the spool shakes in his grip enough for Ryan to snatch it back with a victorious ‘ha’. Spencer turns to glare at Brendon for the dirty trick and Brendon just shrugs his shoulders and smiles brightly.
Ryan’s giving him this weird look when he turns back around but Spencer’s not sure what it means and shrugs it off. Links squirms in her pocket before peeking the tip of her nose out from the folds of his heavy winter coat. It’s the first time she’s ever had any interest in Ryan and before Spencer can think on it she crawls up and out of the pocket and leaps down onto Ryan’s work table. Her paws make a metallic clinking sound when she stalks towards the end of the lace that’s trailing from the spool in Ryan’s hands.
Ryan watches her and the moment he lifts the spool enough to get the lace to wiggle she pounces. It’s actually the best possible way to slide into letting Ryan know that he’s switching his apprenticeship, so Spencer just goes with it. Ryan’s fingers still from petting at Links ears when he finishes.
“Your Mom’s going to kill you for not telling her sooner. I might help her. You can’t just hide being touched.”
Chester somehow worms his way out of Brendon’s pocket and catches Links attention. Ryan watches them bump into his supplies and forgets to stay mad at Spencer for not telling him. There’s no one else in Sews Itself at this hour but as soon as the evening rolls around it’ll be packed with the rest of the staff and towns people wanting their patched clothing before Monday morning. Links butts her head against the side of his hand and Spencer picks her up so she doesn’t have to climb up his clothing to get to her pocket.
He’s going to have to tell his parents eventually, may as well get it over with. He says bye to Ryan and decides to head on home. Brendon follows him out of the shop and Spencer doesn’t know why he does it, but he asks Brendon to come with him. It would be good to have the support of someone who has pretty much known for months now. Brendon nods before smiling widely again and linking their arms together, trying to get Spencer to skip to the tune of “My Lady Adala” that he’s singing under his breath.
When they pass the Mend Shop their bikes get pulled from their slots in the rack and they’re peddling down the sidewalk. It’s cold and the sky looks like it wants to try for some more snow, yet somehow that doesn’t make their ride unpleasant. Brendon keeps laughing when he somehow finds a way to pass Spencer and it becomes a game of bicycle tag that ends with the two of them smiling at each other, trying to catch their breath while slotting their bikes into the rack that sits outside of Spencer’s house.
His mom’s in the kitchen checking preserves for freshness when they walk in. His dad’s sitting at the table reading the weekend edition of the local paper. His mom notices the two of them standing in the doorway and she glaces from him to Brendon, a bright smile forming on her face, before she asks if Brendon’s staying for dinner. Brendon looks at him and nods when Spencer smiles at him. It’s not like he’s going to ever be against Brendon staying the night. Plus it would do Brendon good to have solid meals that aren’t cobbled together suppers of dried pastas and seasonal fruits.
Spencer fidgets slightly. He’s not exactly sure how to tell his parents that not only is he changing profession tracks but that he’s touched and been hiding it since right after his birthday. Links stays curled up in the bottom of her pocket. She’s probably keying into his slight unease. Instead of trying to pull her out of the pocket, he goes for the slightly less direct approach and pulls out Frank’s message from earlier.
Brendon presses closer to him and hums something peppy and encouraging into his ear before straightening up when Chester finally finds a way to crawl out from the folds of his coat. Spencer’s never sure why Brendon takes ages to strip off his coat when he visits. Spencer always hangs his up the moment he comes in, and it’s not like this is the first time Brendon’s stayed over. Hell, it’s not even the twelfth time. If Spencer didn’t know any better, he’d think Brendon’s forever waiting for the moment when he has to leave. The thought makes him frown and he almost misses his mom hugging him tightly while chastising him for not telling them.
Links squirms in her pocket and carefully pokes her head out to investigate when his mom releases him. Chester watches from Brendon’s cupped palms, and jumps down to the tiles the moment after Links gains enough courage to leap to the floor, following after Chester the way she normally does. Spencer has to give his parents credit, they don’t even blink an eye at the display, and his mom just goes around the chase and back to her preserves.
After that, she puts them to work rearranging boxes in the attic for the rest of the evening. They end up talking about mass sparks and the history of fantasy tales. It’s an interesting conversation that pulls Spencer in, and by the time his mom calls them down for supper he’s completely lost track of time.
Dinner goes well. Brendon cracks jokes that make everyone smile. Everything’s comfortable and easy and Spencer wonders how he ever existed without this. Links shifts in his pocket and he loses his train of thought and forgets what he was wondering about. When they’re finished, the twins drag Brendon off to play with them and Spencer finds himself helping his mom clean up in the kitchen.
After that night, it’s like most of the proper pieces have slid into place and Spencer feels like he’s finally going in the direction he needs to move in, minus maybe one or two particular puzzle pieces he can’t seem to figure out . Frank’s shop sees a good amount of business and Spencer’s kept busy. He’s not sure if it’s the ramping up of the holiday season or if it’s normal for the shop to be busy from open to close almost everyday, but it’s exhausting and there are nights he ends up just crashing at Brendon’s place above the Mend Shop. They both of them passing out leaning against each other with rumbled covers still made still pulled up over the bed.
When Ryan figures out that he’s staying with Brendon, he stares at Spencer for a moment before asking if they plan on setting a date. Sometimes Spencer has no clue what Ryan’s talking about so he just shrugs it off and asks if Ryan’s going to bring Jon to the family Christmas party.
The days continue to have the same number of of hours populating them, yet somehow Christmas shows up quicker than Spencer expected. Ryan and Jon show up for the Eve, Eve party and Jon sets up his camera set, taking as many pictures as humanly possible. Brendon smiles most of the night. Sometimes he frowns and Spencer does his best to keep the bad memories away. Everyone in town knows that Brendon’s been on the outs with his own family for awhile now and Christmas is kind of a sore spot for him.
Ryan and Jon leave the next morning to catch a cab to Jon’s parents house. Brendon stays with them and sings carols until he leaves the day after Christmas. It makes the atmosphere cheery and bright so no one asks him to stop. After he leaves, Spencer’s cleaning up the tinsel that’s trying to weasel it’s way into hiding in the crevices of the living room floor when his mother corners him.
“Spencer James Smith. You ever going to tell Brendon that you like him, or are you content to just lead him on?”
He drops the dust pan and it clatters when it hits the floor, tinsel and dust bunnies doing their best to scurry away.
“We’re friends.”
His mom gives him the patented I’m your mother I know what I’m talking about look before shaking her head.
“What happens if he decides to ask for placement in Grimal without you? He’s capable of getting approval without having to wait for you. Just think about, ok?”
Spencer’s left to watch her wander back into the kitchen to put up the last of the Christmas cookware while the tinsel does it’s best to blend in with the cracks in the floor. He shakes his head, trying to dislodge the thoughts that are suddenly attempting to bloom in his mind, and goes back to sweeping up the shiny silver tinsel. They’re just friends. Nothing more, nothing else. Right?
That night, his dreams shift and change from bright colors to dreary hues. When he wakes up his heart’s racing and he’s sweating. Links’ blue eyes stare at him from her portion of the pillow, almost as if she hasn’t slept a wink because of his troubled nightmares. The muted blues of his new alarm clock bath his room in the shades of the ocean and Spencer spends the next three hours before the sun rises propped up against his headboard watching the slight glow from his clock ripple and flow across his bedroom walls.
Watching the clock doesn’t exactly calm him down, because it keeps him firmly thinking about Brendon and what little wisps of his dreams that are left lingering around in his waking thoughts. He’s partially confused about things now and pretty sure he might actually have feelings for Brendon, but he’s not really sure where Brendon stands. And what if Brendon’s not on the same page as he is? Spencer shakes his head, and watches the muted blues shift to golden yellows as the sun slowly starts to wake up. He wants to take the clock as a clue because who would build an extremely personalized Hue Clock for someone they don’t care about, but then if Spencer could he’d probably build one for Ryan and Jon, so he’s not sure if his thought holds any validity.
Links butts her metallic little head against his chin and he pulls himself out of his musings, sliding out of bed and changing for work. Frank probably won’t mind if he’s a little late. Mikey always opens the shop up for him anyways, which means Frank won’t amble down from the apartments over the shop till after nine or ten am and Mikey will tousle his hair and poke him before pushing him towards his work. Sometimes Spencer’s amazed at how well the two of them work together. It always makes him wonder if eventually he and Brendon could do the same thing. Until this moment he hasn’t actually put much more stock into that thought than how cool it would be owning a shop in some decently steady town with Brendon next to him fixing anything he might accidentally break. Now though, he’s starting to wonder if there’s maybe a bit more to why he likes the idea of the two of them setting up shop somewhere.
January is slower than December, probably because everyone is still winding down from the Christmas season and starting to think about Valentine’s Day. Like every other major holiday, Valentine’s Day is hugely popular and usually Spencer just pays no attention to it, going on about his usual business, even though his mom tends to frown at him and hint about him finding someone, and several of the older women around town try to set him up with their single children or grandchildren.
This year though, he spends most of January lost in thought, instead of trying to talk people out of setting him up for February. It doesn’t help that Brendon receives a letter the second Monday of the month that makes him smile and bounce until Spencer asks him and Brendon deflates a little and won’t tell him about the letter. By Friday, he’s finally able to corner Brendon and get him to talk about the letter. And by then Spencer wishes he’d never asked because Mikey’s brother, who lives in Morrow, wants Brendon to move out there and apprentice as a junior Tinkerer under him.
When Brendon tells him that he’s going to write back and decline the offer, Spencer’s elated that Brendon’s not going to leave him, but he also feels mildly uncomfortable because Brendon deserves to have an opportunity like this. However, every time he tries to talk him into leaving his tongue sticks to the roof of his mouth and he just can’t do it. Frank corners him the Monday after and calls him on his bullshit. He tells him to own up and contact Gabe in Morrow to see if he has a position available, because if Gabe’s up for it Spencer doesn’t have to be a dick and he can go with Brendon. After that, Frank stares him down and says ‘for the love of everything good in the world, tell Brendon that you like him. There’s no way he’s going to turn you down. He’s head over heels in love with you and it’s getting ridiculous ’
So Spencer sends a wire bird off to Morrow and hopes for the best while trying to keep Brendon from replying to Gerard’s letter with a hastily scrawled no. It’s not hard to do, mostly because he’s not the only one doing their best to keep Brendon occupied and not thinking about Morrow. Frank and Patrick keep giving him tasks to mull over and Spencer drags him away from both of the shops in the evenings after work. They usually end up either watching the clock work ducks waddle across the faded grass of the park, Brendon somehow coaxing them to eat tiny stripped screws from his cupped palms, or hanging out with Ryan and occasionally Jon, when he’s not off running errands for the Photography Studio.
The last day of January rolls in stormy and mucky, and a wire bird slams into his shoulder hard enough to bruise when he’s walking in the direction of work. The momentum of the impact pushes Spencer to the ground and the bird crumples to the sidewalk, one wired wing twisted and bent at an awful angle and its beak smushed in and dented to the side. It’s seizing and flailing it’s unbroken wing against the sidewalk’s hard surface, a low and pained cawing keen escaping from it’s hollow throat with every thrash, and Spencer scoots forward enough to trail cautious fingers across the rain slick surface of its spasming back. Purple and amber eyes blink up at him, and the bird does its best to not move as he gingerly scoops it up into his hands.
Spencer can calm the wire bird down and ease the pain some, but he can’t fix it so he makes his way towards the Mend Shop. Today is one of the days that Brendon opens the Mend Shop and switches over to Frank’s shop later on in the evening. If there’s anyone that can help the poor thing cradled in his hands it’ll be him.
By the time he shows up, he’s soggy and his hair’s plastered to his face.The wire bird chirps low from where he’d had to bundle it up in portions of his coat so it wouldn’t drown, Links peering out with sad eyes to keep watch while Spencer did his best not to run into any of the few people out and about during the dreary early morning weather. The shop’s warm and dry when he pushes the door open, the bell chiming something muted but happy at his entrance, and the shop’s empty except for Brendon sitting behind the back counter with a cog radio broken apart across the surface of the counter top.
Brendon smiles brightly from his spot at the counter and Spencer smiles back because, ok, maybe he’s finally embraced that he likes Brendon. If only his tongue would decide it’s the right time to ask him out. Ryan had sort of tilted his head and laughed at Spencer when he’d noticed Spencer stammering something out in front of Brendon earlier in the week. He’s working up to it, and maybe he’ll be able to say something before Brendon finally decides to say yes to Gerard and ends up traveling north to Morrow.
The wire bird flutters in the folds of his coat and Brendon’s smile turns down into a frown when he hears the wire bird chirp.
“Hey, Spence everything ok?”
Spencer nods and carefully places the wire bird on a semi clean portion of the counter when he finally walks up. Brendon slides the rest of the radio parts to the edge of the counter, several of the bits and bobs cascading off onto the floor behind the counter, before ever so slowly trailing one of his fingers down the wired joints of the wire bird’s broken wing. Sometimes Spencer forgets how Brendon is around the mechanical animals and it always slams into him, just how much Brendon cares about these mechanical things that most people only see as machines around for their needs or aesthetics.
“What happened?”
Brendon looks up at him, hands scrambling to find the proper tools while doing his best to calm the bird down, soothing words barely slipping out from his lips in a whisper that Spencer can barely hear.
“He flew right into my shoulder when I was on my way to Frank’s shop this morning and must have twisted everything when he fell.”
Spencer shrugs and the motion makes him wince because it jostles the bruise forming across the front of his shoulder and chest. Brendon looks up at the noise and asks him if he’d put up the ‘sorry busy’ sign and lock the door. By the time he’s finished, Brendon’s bundling the broken wire bird up and shuffling to the back work room.
The rain outside pours down, and Spencer listens to it hammer over the tin roof of the Mend Shop while zoning out watching Brendon do his best to help the wire bird not be crippled for the rest of its days. He doesn’t even know he’s talking until the sound of a screw wrench dropping onto the heavy surface of the work table pulls him out of his musings about love and life. It takes him a second to back track through his thoughts enough to figure out what he just said that would be causing Brendon to stare at him with hopeful eyes.
When he figures it out, Spencer wants to bang his head against the wall he’s propped up against. Not out of shame or because he shouldn’t have said what he did, but because he’s been envisioned telling Brendon that he likes him in so many different ways the past couple of weeks, and none of them have included this scenario. If Brendon’s clumsy with his steps then Spencer’s clumsy with his words. Ryan’s going to die from laughing his ass off when he finds out.
Brendon smiles at him and goes back to splinting the wire bird’s fragile wing. Words trip off his tongue as he goes about working.
“I should have know, all I needed to do was get you out of your head enough. You always say what you want to say when you don’t even realize you’re holding a conversation with someone. Just so you know, you could have said something months ago. I like you too and, man, I don’t know if I could have been more obvious. I think your mom was about ready to lock us in a closet and see what happened.”
Spencer starts smiling widely by the time Brendon’s admitting to liking him back, and Links crawls out of her pocket to curl up in his lap, purring happily like everything has finally finished slotting into place. She’s probably right. He scritches her ears and watches Brendon finish up the splint. When he’s done, Brendon sets the groggy little wire bird on a steady shelf to rest while the resin dries on its resculpted beak, and he comes over to Spencer, sitting down beside him in an unsteady motion.
A crumpled letter floats into his lap and Spencer unfolds it enough to read it. The letters flow in eccentric script and it’s a reply from Gabe telling him that May’s a good month if he wants to apprentice with him. Of course the letter isn’t short and sweet like that. It’s chatty and by the time he’s finished reading Brendon’s staring at him with that hopeful expression plastered all across his face again.
“We could always go together.”
Spencer nods.
“I’d like that.”
And suddenly they’re kissing and it’s one of the best things ever, even if the angle’s awkward and it’s apparent that neither of them have any experience with kissing. Links meows happily from his lap and Chester scurries up his pant leg to burrow into Links chest, chittering excitedly as he settles. Spencer smiles and kisses Brendon again.
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Date: 2010-12-31 03:51 am (UTC)Thank you so much for writing this! <3
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Date: 2011-01-08 02:44 am (UTC)LINKS...everyone should have a Links of their own.
♥
*hugs and spins you*
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Date: 2010-12-31 04:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-01-08 02:45 am (UTC)♥
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Date: 2010-12-31 06:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-01-08 02:45 am (UTC)the mechanical animals are so much love*grins*
♥
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Date: 2010-12-31 10:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-01-08 02:46 am (UTC)Links is made of awesome...and metal of course:D
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Date: 2011-01-01 08:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-01-08 02:50 am (UTC)but TADA!!!:)
You know me and world building. I just can't help it*grins*.
and Dude their relationship was interesting for me to write because I had to toe this line of giving foreshadowing but not really dropping over the edge
no subject
Date: 2011-01-01 06:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-01-08 02:47 am (UTC):)
♥
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Date: 2011-01-02 12:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-01-08 02:48 am (UTC):)
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Date: 2011-01-08 07:59 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-01-13 05:59 am (UTC)I have vague plans for a sequel(which would have more action and intrigue) but I don't know when that will happen because I have all of the ideas in the world sitting in my head it feels like.
The world here is just sooo quaint and warm that it's totally cool that you want to live there:):):):):)
♥
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Date: 2011-01-10 02:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-01-13 06:01 am (UTC)they are in loveeeeeeeeee
I know I hope to write a sequel but I don't know when that will be. And dude just imaging Gabe in this is a hoot.
*hugs*
♥
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Date: 2011-01-16 04:27 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-01-27 07:02 am (UTC)totally the SLOWEST OF SLOW....
♥
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Date: 2011-01-18 03:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-01-27 07:03 am (UTC)the familiars are awesome and kick ass in their own cute little mechanical ways.
I'm not good at writing a story without those glimpses. I feel like I have toooo many holes if I don't try to at least allude to things that I know have or might happen.