hi loves!! i'm so sorry it's been forever since i last updated, but i've been working on a really long project for several months now... i'm still working on it, but i wrote this little drabble (which may or may not have ended up being nearly four thousand words) about bill and carn in college! i hope you guys like it bc i think it turned out really well.
warnings: swearing, probably a sexual reference or two, verbal fighting
"You're kidding," Carn whispers aloud as she pulls the electricity bill out of her mailbox. With a sigh of grief, she puts her forehead against the cool metal of the slots. "Happy birthday to me."
The self-pity-party is short lasting, as she needs to get upstairs to the two people who'd comfort her. She's sure to lock her mailbox before jogging up her four flights of stairs. Wafting from the door is the smell of her favorite, veggie burgers.
What a relief, Carn thinks with a smile, fishing out her apartment key now. Hastily shoving it into the keyhole, she nudges open the door and tosses her bag and mail on the floor.
"It's official... I'm quitting the broke college student teen mom life."
"Mama!" Claire leaps from her post of doing some sort of contortions on the sofa.
"Hello, my love!"
"Y-y-you're home early," Bill smiles from his place at the stove. "What are your puh-pains?"
Giggling at his Shakespearean language (Shakespeare being his favorite class of the semester), she goes over to give him a kiss, holding Claire's hand all the while.
"So guess what came in the mail today?"
"A b-b-birthday cuh-card from your mom?"
"Not quite as abhorrent."
"Wh-what is it?"
"Wait, are you wearing an apron to cook? You're so cute."
He puts down his spatula to squish her cheeks together. "Don't tr-try to ch-ch-change the subject, H-Holland."
She places her own free hand on his face, gently tracing it up through his copper locks.
"Carnation..."
"The electricity bill."
A flash of worry crosses his eyes, but he shakes his head. "Well... let's worry about th-th-that after your b-b-birthday dinner, yeah?"
She forces a tiny smile, knowing that they're really going to have to scrounge for this one.
This isn't the first time they'd had to scrape around for money; there were a few other incidents their freshman year of college where it came to selling old clothes to a secondhand shop and temporarily going without air conditioner in the late spring heat. It was either that or no diapers for Claire... they could sacrifice some comfort for her.
Then summer came round and they were able to pick up a lot more shifts at Starbucks, rotating every other day so the other could take care of the baby. Unfortunately, summer could only last so long, and it's back to paying for daycare and working weekends. They haven't even been back at school for an entire month, and they're already suffocating.
"I should have picked up a shift tonight," Carn says, gently placing her daughter in her highchair.
"Maybe... but it w-w-wouldn't be fuh-fair for you to sp-spend barely anytime with your family to-today."
My family.
The phrase makes her release tension in her shoulders. It's been a year and a half of the three of them against the world, and she still can't wrap her head around the fact that she started a family with Bill... and though there are times where she finds herself sad over the loss of a formal goodbye to childhood (no prom, senior week, or spontaneous pre-college adventures with friends), she wouldn't bargain any aspect of her life right now.
