This is more or less random writing as I don’t currently have a Shine story I’m working on; still kind of feeling around for a plot. Ends kind of abruptly, but improvements have to wait till next round, or else I’d never put anything down. :p I think they end up by sleeping outside for a while.

It took us a while before we could save up to rent an apartment, but once we did, things just started turning up all over. Actually having a place to keep groceries really helped kill the expense of eating out for every meal.

I remember the first day — the day we moved in. I threw my pack in a corner of the empty living room and sprawled out on the carpet. “Ahhh,” I said, pulling Jan to me, throwing his shadow to the wall. “The life, babe. How’s it feel to be off the streets?”

I was excited, yeah. But my fox wasn’t.

“Jan?”

He lay across my belly, and his face was as sad as I’ve ever seen it. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s like we’ve got nothing, all over again.”

“We never had anything, really… did we?”

“The whole city was ours. Now we get to be put in boxes all over again. Tiny little boxes…”

I held him.

“I don’t want to be… all cooped up again, like I was before.”