Tiny Little Fractures

Just My Imagination

The freezing air of a cold and cloudy Mid-November morning blew into the Pie Maker's face as he opened the doors of his beloved, pie-shaped bakery for another day which seems to come to no end. He had felt quite lonely since Olive wasn't working for him anymore. He had visited her in her new restaurant once, it was a warm and cozy place and the whole atmosphere suited Olive's character almost too well. Ned had never seen her eyes shine like this in her Pie-Hole days, so he surely was happy for her, but still, she simply missed working with bubbly Olive.

Ever since Emerson's daughter had found her way to him, he appeared to be a completely different human being. Ned definitely missed his dark sarcasm which he now found was one of the most loveable things about Emerson. Probably even the most loveable one of all of them. But his daughter seemed to have brought a huge bowl of ice cream, sunshine and rainbows into the private detective's life and he had, without a doubt, no fear of eating it all up, just to spread a jolly aura all across the planet.

Not that that was a bad thing, oh hell no. Ned really liked the new Emerson, as well as his daughter but he felt like all the memories he had with him were somehow surreal, lost and worthless now.

Still, Emerson wasn't the biggest problem of the Pie Maker, he still visited him whenever he could or when he came across new tricky cases, preferably with corpses.

Neither didn't the unpaid bills really bother Ned, nor the fact that the only company he had around him was his dog, Digby, that he couldn't even touch.

Or well, actually that was a part of his problem.

The Pie-Maker felt alone and every day seemed to be endless – just because someone very special wasn't there by his side.

He was missing Chuck.

It had been 4 months, 19 days, 6 hours, 48 minutes and 52 seconds since the last time he saw the girl he had had his very first kiss with and whom he had awakened from death again, an action which he sometimes considered as incredibly selfish.

Chuck had gone off to finally travel around the world, without being killed, of course, as she had desired since her teenage years and frankly, he would have loved to stop her, to tell her to stay here with him because he needed her but he also knew how much all this meant to her and how she had suffered when he wouldn't let her tell her aunts that she certainly wasn't dead anymore, so he really didn't want to keep her here with him, just to watch her suffer once again.

Even though this cold and cloudy Mid-November morning seemed to be just like all those other cold and cloudy Mid-November mornings he had already experienced, Ned had no idea how drastically his life would be changed today.

Suddenly, a female voice he knew very well broke the silence surrounding him: "Oh, Ned! Hi!"

And another female voice he knew just as well came from the other side: "Hello, Ned."

He turned around to find the woman who had spoken first coming from the left, rushing towards him while on the right, the second woman was standing a little more distant, smiling a smile that made him want to melt.

Unsure how to react, he looked from one girl to the other with a confused look on his face: "Olive – Chuck – Uh, hey."

He quickly tried to decide whom to hug first – until he realized that there was only one option, so he wrapped his arms around Olive while flashing a smile to Chuck who was finally walking up to the others.

When Olive was done squeezing Ned like a cuddly toy, he quickly caught his breath again, still really confused: "So, I am – surprised – very surprised to see both of you here. Uh, who want so tell me their story first, while eating a piece of fresh made pie?"

Ned smiled and opened the door for Olive and Chuck to get in when a figure in the shadows on the other side of the road caught his eye.

"Ned? Everything alright?" Chuck asked, following his absent stare.

"Oh, yeah yeah. I – I just thought I saw someone who... but that was just my imagination, I bet"