Chapter Text
A quiet evening. The kind with a low sky and the air smelling faintly of fried batter and damp stone. The street hums low, light catching on shop windows, some closed, some not, everything settling down without fuss. Graz’zt and Pazuzu walk side by side, paper-wrapped chips cradled between them. No words needed. They’ve had the whole day for talking.
They pass the crooked sign the first time without pause. A slanted thing bolted into brick above a darkened shopfront, edges frayed by sun and rain, letters peeling at the corners. One of those buildings that doesn’t invite attention, but doesn’t repel it either. Pazuzu doesn’t look at it. Graz’zt might, but only briefly.
They loop round the block, finishing their chips. Graz’zt wipes his hands on a napkin that barely holds together, crumples it in one hand. On the second pass, he slows. Not much. Just enough to shift the rhythm. He glances across the window, the warped reflection of the two of them stretched across glass and shadow.
Pazuzu throws the last chip to a seagull. No comment. Not yet.
The third time, they both stop.
It’s not dramatic. There’s no swell of music, no sudden decision. The street remains the same: bins full, pavement damp, neon in the off-license window across the road sputtering. The shop still looks like it hasn’t been loved in years.
Pazuzu squints up at the sign, brow furrowing.
“Could put a radio tower on the roof," he says at last, tone light. The kind of thing he says when he’s already decided something but doesn’t want to sound like it.
Graz’zt gives a low noise that might be a laugh or just air catching in his throat. He steps closer to the door. The glass panel’s smudged, paint around the frame faded to the colour of old teeth. He presses one hand flat against the timber. Dry. Rough. A bit warped.
They don’t go inside. Not yet.
They stand there a little longer, neither one speaking. Something moves quiet behind Graz’zt’s eyes, and Pazuzu watches him with that tilted sort of smile he saves for moments like this—ones that aren’t big, but still shift the ground underfoot.
Then they walk on.
They don’t take it today. There’s no key in hand, no paperwork. Only a shared glance and a third pass that means more than either of the first two.
The chips are gone. The sky darkens. The shop waits.
It’s awful.
It’s perfect.
They don’t rush it.
The shop sits empty for weeks after that third pass. Graz’zt finds the listing online by accident, though neither of them quite believes in coincidence. He saves the tab, forgets to close it. Pazuzu sees it over breakfast—half a bowl of cereal going soggy beside the laptop—and says nothing, just nudges the screen toward Graz’zt with the spoon handle.
No dramatic conversations. Just a quiet thread pulled tighter.
They visit the place once, officially. A letting agent opens the door and leaves them to it. She talks too much, tapping through her tablet while they drift through the rooms like ghosts.
Graz’zt runs his fingers along every skirting board, every crack in the wall. He steps carefully, listens for hollows in the floor. When the agent jokes about the wiring, Pazuzu laughs. Not because it’s funny. But because it’s his now.
The back room smells like rot. The ceiling in the loo has a water stain in the shape of a boot. Graz’zt points at it. Pazuzu shrugs. They don’t talk about what they’ll do with it. That comes later.
Graz’zt takes the forms home. A short stack of papers that smells faintly of ink and someone else's hands. He reads every line. Not fast. Not slow either. A rhythm, methodical, like sanding down a rough edge.
He circles things. Makes notes. Frowns at numbers. Stares at a clause about ownership for a long time without blinking.
Pazuzu flops beside him at the kitchen table, one socked foot propped against the other chair. He’s already eaten; crumbs still dust the corner of his mouth. He picks up a pen, scribbles his name on a dotted line before Graz’zt even finishes explaining it.
“You don’t want to read it?" Graz’zt asks, not looking up.
“I read faster when I’m not reading," Pazuzu says, leaning back far enough that the chair creaks. Graz’zt doesn’t smile, but there’s a shift in his shoulders. That familiar way his body answers instead. He pushes the next page across. Pazuzu signs that too. It’s not carelessness. It’s trust.
The papers pile neatly on one side. Graz’zt double-checks every page, stacking them just so, clipping them in place. Pazuzu taps out a beat on the table with the pen lid, then flips it once, catches it, spins it again. He doesn’t ask what happens next. Graz’zt will know.
They sit there a while after the forms are done. The kettle clicks behind them. Neither moves to pour.
The light fades outside. Streetlamps flick on without fuss. Something clicks into place that isn’t paper or signatures.
No ceremony. No announcement.
But they’ve bought a shop. Or they’re about to.
Either way, the thing’s begun.
The first time they walk in with the key, the door sticks.
Graz’zt presses his shoulder into it and gives a grunt like he’s moving furniture. Pazuzu holds the keys aloft, smug, jingling them like a trophy.
“Fits like a glove," he says, stepping in behind Graz’zt and nearly tripping over a loose bit of skirting.
The air inside smells wrong. Not foul, exactly, but tired. Wood dust, stale damp, something sweet gone long off. Graz’zt breathes through his mouth. Pazuzu mutters about ghosts and goes poking at the window latch.
They don’t speak for a while. Not from discomfort. More the opposite. There’s a hush that builds inside a space like this, in the stillness that wraps around ankles, tugs at coat hems. Graz’zt crosses the room slowly, running a hand along a dusty shelf that gives under his touch like flour under a rolling pin.
Pazuzu opens a cupboard, finds a dead spider, closes it again without comment.
Floorboards groan like they remember a different life. A better one, maybe. Or worse. Hard to say.
The walls bear traces of old paint jobs and someone’s attempt at wallpaper. There's a spot near the back where someone’s carved a heart into the wood with what must’ve been a blunt key. The heart’s lopsided. The initials inside it are gone.
Graz’zt notices. He doesn’t say anything. Pazuzu crouches near a radiator and winces at the pipework.
“Think the building hates me," he says, tapping one elbow. “Proper Inverness welcome.”
“You insulted it," Graz’zt says without looking up. “Should’ve brought biscuits.”
They do a slow lap. Graz’zt touches more than Pazuzu does: doorframes, banisters, peeling paint, the edge of a cracked tile with his boot. Pazuzu watches instead. Leans on the counter, eyes roaming like he's watching a play halfway through its second act. He speaks eventually. Quiet.
“Gonna be work.”
“Already is," Graz’zt answers.
Neither of them says how much work.
Neither of them says too much.
They don’t bring tools. Not yet. The only thing Graz’zt pulls from his coat is a small notepad and a short pencil. He makes a list without naming it. Nothing has a title yet.
They don’t stay long. A few minutes, maybe. Long enough for their bodies to map out the room, for the place to breathe them in.
As they step out, Graz’zt lets his hand trail along the edge of the doorframe. Pazuzu tugs the sign above the window, testing the bolt.
Crooked, still. Same as ever. He grins.
“We’ll get to it.” Graz’zt nods, locking the door behind them. The key turns smooth.
They walk home with their collars up. The street dimmer now, but not unkind. Neither of them says it, but it’s clear in the quiet:
That place is theirs now. Or will be.
The real work hasn’t started yet. But it will.
Soon.