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chapter twelve, pages turning!
｡.｡:∞♡* WELCOMING A NEW YEAR for some can be troubling. The thought of resolutions, the thought of change, and the thought of the future make some crumble with anxiety at the thought of turning the stone to the next. This anxiety exists deep in the heart of Ryan, as she realizes as 2015 ends, 2016 holds a future for the record store and for her life in general, a future that she doesn't know. That scares her a lot, though she hates to admit it.
When she was younger, her family would always spend New Years in their basement. Surrounded by snacks and drinks, they would watch the ball drop in anticipation, sitting on the furniture and floors in their Christmas pajamas, together like a family. Years went by and that tradition slipped away, and by the time the crash happened, it was gone altogether. Ryan would search for parties to go to on the Eve, wishing to drown her regrets in Vodka Cranberries and drunkenly kiss someone at midnight.
This year, however, there was no searching, because Spencer had invited her to spend it with him and his makeshift family at David Rossi's micromansion, as she called it.
Spencer liked to think of things like lists: many lists compiled in his head and when Ryan came home to cry in his arms that day after Christmas, the list of reasons why he needed to invite her was getting longer and longer. Because she needed something to cheer her up, because her family was in another state, because he wanted to spend the start of a new year next to her. Because Spencer wanted to, more than anything, be by her side for another night.
It was like someone attached a magnet at the core of his spine, and the other end was rooted in Ryan Jennings, because ever since they kissed in the snow, he felt deeply rooted to her, like the vines of a plant. More than ever had he wanted to be next to her when he was away, and being away for a few days at a time made his skin itch in anticipation for when he could finally knock on her door again. It was crazy that he could get attached to her within only four months.
"You know, it's kind of funny," Ryan mentions, placing another plate in the cupboard after drying it off. It's the morning of New Years Eve and Spencer was over for lunch and a movie before they both had to get ready for the night ahead of them.
"What?"
"You have daddy issues," she starts, placing her hands down on the counter and leaning up against the marble. "And I have mommy issues. It's like a jigsaw puzzle."
"Makes sense," Spencer agrees jokingly, setting down his plate into the sink and washing it off, putting it in the cupboard once he finishes. He had been around to Ryan's apartment enough times to know how she liked things done: dishes never piled up in her sink, you washed what you used and put it away. Or else Mochi would lick food residue all night until he made himself sick. Spencer made the mistake once before, where Mochi lapped up too much ketchup and puked red on the floor, causing Ryan to make an emergency vet hospital trip before learning that her cat was, to put it simply, an idiot sometimes.
