⌜ chapter three ⌟

"Alright, I'm gonna do something I haven't done in a very long time." Eric says as he walks down the stairs into the kitchen. "Hold me, Mommy." He then quickly wraps his arms around her, taking her by surprise.

"Eric, you only applied for one job. There's plenty more out there." She tells him as she pats his back, and he stands up straight to look at her.

"It wasn't just any job, it was the GAP." He whines as she walks past him to get to the island counter. "I mean, if anybody should be working at the GAP, it's me. I mean, look, I'm GAP!" He pats his clothes to prove his point. "All GAP! Even when I'm in the shower, I'm GAP!"

Mrs. Matthews chuckles as she looks back at her oldest son. "You didn't put that on your application, did you?"

"No, they said I wasn't qualified. I told them a monkey could work there."

"Mom, it was the weirdest thing." Cory gains their attention as he reaches the bottom of the stairs. "Last night, I'm walking by the GAP — they got a monkey selling jeans." He tells her as he then glances behind him at his older brother.

"I gave 'em that idea!" Eric yells.

"Well, next time you go out for a job, wear a diaper and smoke a cigar." He says as Letty walks into the kitchen.

"You start smoking, and I'm never kissing you again." The brunette tells the older boy, and he glances over at her. "Is Eric still complaining about how he didn't get that job at the GAP?"

"Stop making fun of me." The boy in question narrows his eyes at her before going to sit at the table, and she chuckles as she shakes her head.

"Morning." Mr. Matthews says as he walks into the kitchen, and Letty pulls the juice out of the refrigerator that Cory opened.

"Hey, Dad, I need twenty-five dollars for a class picture." Morgan says as she walks into the room as well.

"Twenty-five dollars?" He questions. "How big is your class?"

"Everyone else paid." She tells him. "The teacher said if I don't pay today, they're going to airbrush me out."

"They won't do that." Letty says as she pats the little blonde's head.

"Fine, fine. Take, take." Mr. Matthews says as he pulls out his wallet and opens it up so that she can take out the money that she needs for her picture.

"Oh, Dad, keep your wallet open. I got pictures too." Cory says as he walks over to his father.

"What grade are you in?" He asks as he quickly pulls his wallet away from his son.

"Eleventh."

"We got enough of you."

"Alan." Mrs. Matthews motions to their son, telling him to give him some money, as Letty laughs at the look on Cory's face.

"Fine, fine. Take, take." He tells him. "What about you, Scarlett?" He asks as Cory takes what he needs as well.

"Who would I give the pictures to?" The brunette questions. "Eric? He has plenty of pictures of me, trust me. Thanks, though." She says as she starts out of the room.

"Shh!" The teenage boy glares at her, and his father shakes his head at him.

"Wait, Scarlett, honey." Mrs. Matthews gets her attention, and she turns back. "You're not getting your school pictures this year?"

"Why would I? I got a mirror, I know what I look like. Plus I have a camera of my own." Letty tells her. "I've actually been practicing a bit, and I've gotten a few good shots of Morgan. I just need to get them printed up."

"Is it that camera you got from J?" Eric asks, and she stills, not saying anything. "I'm not making a snide comment or trying to pick a fight about him. I'm just asking — are you using the camera that you got in the mail for Christmas a couple years ago?"

"Yeah." The brunette nods as she looks over at him. "It's the camera that I got from J."

"You should take pictures more often. You're really good with your camera." He tells her, and she smiles.

"Thanks." She says, and he nods.

After school, Letty's in Eric's room studying because Mrs. Matthews is helping Morgan with her homework, and she needs the quiet to do her own English homework. The girls don't have the space for a desk in their room, so Letty just uses the boys' like she always used to.

Eric walks in just as she's finishing up and he walks over to the headboard of his bed where he starts going through some of his stuff. Letty walks over and hops onto his bed, bouncing on her knees so that she can look at his things on his headboard as well.

"Yes, nosey?" He glances at the brunette as she looks at some of the pictures he has that she's taken.

"You really think that I'm good with the camera? Or were you just saying that because you were hoping I'd make out with you?" She asks.

"Oh, I'm always hoping for that." He smirks, and she rolls her dark eyes.

"I'm being serious here, Eric." Letty tells him, and he sets down the stuff that he was looking through as he turns to face her.

"Yeah, I think you're great with the camera." He tells her. "You've even taken some good pictures of me, which isn't easy because—"

"Because you like to hide from the camera." She nods. "Oh, I know. You're a pain in my ass."

"It's all part of my charm, babe." He says, and she smiles as she looks up at him. "Why are you asking?"

"You think it'd be crazy if I tried to make a career out of it?"

"Out of taking pictures?" He clarifies, and she nods. "No. I think if anyone can do it, it's you."

The brunette's smile widens. "Yeah?"

"Yeah." He nods. "Nobody believes in you as much as I do, babe."

"I like when you call me babe." She says, intentionally trying to sound like him when he says stuff like that to her.

"Yeah?" He asks, and she nods.

Letty's still smiling as he leans down and presses his lips to hers. She reaches toward him to grab his shirt, and her fingers curl around the dark blue fabric as he moves closer to her. He rests on his knee on the bed for support as he deepens the kiss, then as he continues moving forward, and she lays on her back so that her head's resting at the foot of his bed.

He keeps himself propped up on one elbow as his other hand rests on the side of her face, and her hands move up his back. One of his legs is resting between hers, and her fingers tangle in his hair as the two continue to kiss. Eric starts down to her neck, and she tilts her head to the side.

"Eric." Letty suddenly places one of her hands on his shoulder, and he pushes himself up so that he can look down at her.

"What's wrong?"

"You know what's wrong." She says, and he sighs.

"Right. We're not technically together, and therefore we shouldn't be doing this." He nods, and she moves her hand to rest on the side of his face.

"I'm trying to be fair to you." She takes a deep breath as she looks up into his beautiful light brown eyes. "I really don't want to hurt you, Eric, so this has to stop happening."

"Not being with you hurts me, Letty. I love you, and I know that you love me, even if you can't say it." He says, and she sighs.

"But I don't know if I'll ever be able to say it, and I've tried." She tells him. "I mean, you've seen my friends. Dean loved Hope, but then he left them and he hasn't looked back; and Melissa loved Jason, but she hasn't even tried contacting him since she left with her dad."

Eric shakes his head as he rolls to the side and gets to his feet. "We are not them." He argues as he turns back to face her. "Just because their relationships didn't work out, doesn't mean that ours can't."

"No, you are not them, Eric. I am." The brunette says as she stands as well.

"Why are you so convinced that this is never gonna work?" He questions.

"Because how can it?" She shakes her head. "There's so much about me that..."

"That what, Letty?" He demands. "I don't care about you hustling pool, or your dad's credit card scams. He's not you, and you're never gonna be him."

"No, but I was raised by him, and he was a loveless monster." Letty argues. "I'd never seen a loving, healthy relationship before I met your parents. The closest thing that I had to look up to was Mr. and Mrs. Hunter, and you know how that turned out."

"I don't care! I didn't learn a thing about being in love from my parents. I learned it from being with you!"

"But you learned what it looked like by watching your mom and dad — by watching the way that your dad treats your mom. I didn't have that. My mom, Shawn's mom — they both just up and left everything that they ever loved behind." She says. "You and I, Eric — we grew up watching two entirely different ends of the spectrum...and I honestly don't know that we can make this work."

"What are you saying?" He questions. "You want to break up?"

"We're not together."

"You want to stop...whatever we are?" Eric asks, tears filling his eyes. "I can't be around you and not want to be with you, so we'd have to stop being friends. Is that what you want?"

"No, that's not what I want..." She sighs.

"But that's what you're saying we should do."

"I'm never gonna be able to give you the kind of relationship that you want, or that I know you deserve." Letty tells him. "So, yeah... I think that until we can both move on—"

Eric turns around and walks out of the room, unable to listen to anymore of this conversation, and she takes a deep breath to ease her nerves. She closes her eyes as she pinches the bridge of her nose, and then she hears footsteps moving toward the room. When she looks back toward the door, she sees Mrs. Matthews standing just inside the room.

"Hope's on the phone." The older woman tells her, and she nods.

"Okay." Letty says, her voice barely audible.

"What happened?" Hope asks immediately after hearing Letty answer.

She scoffs as she sinks to the floor, her back resting against the couch. "Truth be told... The inevitable." She shakes her head. "He can't be around me and not want to kiss me. I can't kiss him and act like a couple and still figure out why I'm so screwed in the head about all this... So we can't be friends."

"That's insane." She says. "You've been friends with Eric longer than you've been friends with me. Do you two even know how to function without each other?"

"I need to figure out my life, Hope." She argues. "All of this is driving me crazy, and I don't know what to do. How do I... I mean, how do you..."

"What's this about? Love? Being in love?"

"That's part of it." Letty sighs. "It's also about trust."

"And you don't trust Eric?" She asks, eyebrows furrowed.

"With all of me?" She asks. "Or with just the parts that are easy to handle?"

"No one is entirely easy to handle." Hope tells her. "We all have baggage."

"Yeah... And you know what my baggage is."

"Monsters and hunting aside — what is the issue here?" She asks. "What is it that makes trusting so hard for you?"

"I trusted my mom. I trusted Alec. There was a time that I trusted my dad. I trusted Shawn's mom, and Mr. Hunter... Hell, Shawn isn't even speaking to me right now." Letty tells her. "The people that I trust always end up leaving me."

"We haven't." Hope argues. "Jason and I may not be in Philly right now, but we haven't left you at all."

"It's not about proximity, er..." She shakes her head. "It's who we are, Hope. We don't stay, we leave. One day, one way or another..."

She takes a deep breath as she realizes what's going on. "You don't trust you."

"Can you name one of us who hasn't turned tail and run at one time or another?" Letty asks, tears welling up in her eyes. "Alec was gone for ten years. Where's Mel? And what the hell happened to the Winchester boys? I mean... Where's..."

"He hasn't called?"

"I haven't spoken to Miller since he left Philly with John." She tells her. "He knows the kind of shape I was left in after my dad beat me, after he left my stuff in the dirt...after he killed himself."

"Eric is not Miller, and neither are you."

"And how are we different?" She asks, knowing that Hope can't give her a good enough answer, not to this question. "We are two sides of the same coin."

After talking to her best friend, Letty walks into the kitchen from the living room and her eyebrows furrow when she notices a figure outside the backdoor. The brunette walks over and stops in front of Mrs. Matthews beside the island counter, immediately gaining her attention.

"Mr. Matthews is standing outside, and he doesn't look happy." The teenager tells her, her voice low.

Mrs. Matthews looks past her and then walks over to the door as Letty goes to sit in the open seat beside Morgan. The brunette's careful to avoid looking at Eric, who's sitting on the other side of his younger sister, and Cory clears his throat as he pushes his food around on his plate.

"You didn't get it." Mrs. Matthews says, continuing a conversation that she and her husband had this morning.

"No, I got it." He tells her. "I walked in. I said to Pete, Pete, we gotta talk. He said, Alan, nothing to talk about. How's five-thousand dollars?"

"Five-thousand?" She smiles. "Come inside. Sit in the nice chair." She says, and he walks into the kitchen.

"Amy, I think I could have gotten even more."

"Then sit in the nice chair, and use the nice phone. Call Pete and ask for it." She tells him as he sits in the empty seat beside Eric.

"Well, actually, I don't think calling Pete would make much sense." He says as she starts toward the phone, and she stops to look back at him.

"Why not?"

"Because I don't work there anymore, Amy. I quit." He tells her, and everyone's expressions fall as he looks at Letty. "Would you pass the potatoes?"

The brunette pulls herself out of her stunned state and picks up the bowl before passing it over to him. He takes the bowl, and Letty glances at Eric before looking at Mrs. Matthews, who froze with her hand still on the telephone.

"Dad, you quit your job?" Eric asks, just as surprised as everyone else.

"We're gonna be poor." Cory says, and Letty kicks him under the table. "Ow."

"We're not gonna be poor." Mr. Matthews tells him as he gets out of his seat.

"Alan, how could you quit your job without even discussing it with me?" His wife questions as she walks over to stand beside him.

He shrugs. "We're discussing it now."

"Oh, so, no decision was actually made?"

"Uh, no. A decision was made." He tells her. "Now, it's time for the very important discussion that follows the making of the decision."

"Alan, if we had discussed this before a decision was made, I might have gently pointed out that we have children to feed and bills to pay." She tells him.

"Bye-bye, car." Cory says from where he's now standing by the backdoor, staring outside.

"Amy, I would never put this family at risk." Mr. Matthews says as he looks up at his wife. "We have a little money saved up, and one day I hope to go into business for myself. That way Eric and Scarlett can come work for me."

"Hey!" Eric smiles. "You hear that? I'm going to be responsible for the well-being of this family."

"Bye-bye, house." Cory lifts his hand and waves, and Letty shakes her head at his theatrics.

"You see, Amy, nothing to worry about." Mr. Matthews says as he looks up at her again. "I made a good decision."

"Fine, fine." She shakes her head. "I made one too." She says as she sits down in the chair beside her husband.

"What? What decision did you make?"

"Well, that if you're allowed to make a unilateral decision about something which affects this entire family, then so am I." She tells him.

"Well, what- what decision are you going to make?" He asks her.

"I don't know yet. But one day, I will make a decision which affects this entire family because you did, and our relationship is an equal partnership, isn't it?" She asks, and Letty looks down when she hears her question.

Mr. Matthews hesitates for a moment before answering, sounding a bit nervous. "Yes."

"But don't you worry." She pats his shoulder. "Because I'll talk it over with you afterwards." She then gets up and walks away from the table.

Letty takes a deep breath as she sticks her fork in her mashed potatoes. Now, she feels like she has even more reason to find somewhere else to live. One other than the fact that Eric just told her that they're no longer friends.