Drowning

Hal's eyebrows rose and he sat back in his chair as a grin tugged at the corner of his mouth. Sam was gonna make him ask her outright, wasn't she? "Alright... I'm asking."

His grin turned into a full smile. "Saturday is supposed to be nice. We could catch our supper... I could show you how to clean a fish." Though that wasn't necessarily the most pleasant thing in the world, he had a feeling Sam could handle it way more than most women. At the same time, it sounded horrible when it came out of his mouth.

He took another sip of coffee instead of rolling his eyes at himself like he wanted to. "Or we could catch and release and do something else for dinner." He didn't know. Whatever. He didn't care. Did he sound as much like an idiot as he thought? He glanced over to catch her eye again and gave her a little smirk. "Just tell me what you wanna do 'cause I'm drowning over here and you're enjoying watching it way too much."


Startled by Ryan, Hunter jumped, then grinned. "Real mechanics, huh?" He slipped his arm around her shoulder and kissed her forehead. It felt like forever since he'd seen her... even though it had just been last night. 

"Yeah, she's right." Eli didn't even argue. He looked over to Axel and smiled. "Hey. You decided to join us."

"Eh... couldn't let you guys have all the fun." He wandered over and looked in the engine before he grimaced. "This is gonna take some work. Looks like Zan's already got a good start though." He reached inside and fiddled with something, nodding. "He knows how to make old parts work, I'll give him that."

Eli chuckled and pointed between him and Ryan. "You two... unstoppable. Get to work. I'm gonna get this fender off so I can work on that. And Hunter..."

Hunter quirked an eyebrow, waiting. "Yes...?" With still no answer, he smirked. "I'm not that useless. I can at least be a go-fer." 

"Good. See this?" Axel pried a broken part from the side where the car had been hit. "We need another one. Go scavenge."

Hunter grinned and gave Ryan a squeeze before letting her go. "Guess I got my orders."


Jason pried open his eyes, seeing sunlight streaming into the bedroom. He'd slept the night through - no surprise with as tired as he'd been, but it had at least been a peaceful rest, too. And it looked like he'd been allowed to sleep into mid-morning. No one had kicked Katie out of his room either, letting them just stay together as much as they wanted or needed to. 

Curled on his side with Katie in front of him, he tucked her in a little tighter and sighed, letting his eyes fall shut again. He kissed the back of her head and wriggled his foot around hers.
Feel like getting up for some fresh air?

Even though he was tired, something felt... different this morning. He wouldn't say he had more energy, but... he didn't feel like he was struggling to keep his emotions at bay. As if they'd settled even more. Were they... flowing more easily? He hardly dared hope. Was Katie recovering from their incident? Had it... actually helped?