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Home Now
Something is sizzling in the pan when Finn leaves the kitchen. Beef or lamb; some kind of red meat and Grace feels her stomach rumble. She tucks her feet under her bum and settles further into the couch.
“So your mom tells me you’ve gotten on the soccer team,” Finn’s hands are in his pocket as he practically swaggers towards the couch. Grace can’t hide the smile that blooms across her face at his deliberately casual manner.
“Yeah. I used to play when we lived in Highland Park.”
Finn’s eyebrows don’t shoot up like most people’s do when she mentions her old address and she likes that he still doesn’t really know anything about Chicago. The sound of rhythm guitar bounces out from the kitchen. Grace looks over to see her mom subtly moving foot to foot in time with the strums as a blues song fills the house.
It smells like pastry instead of pizza for once.
Finn takes the seat on the right angle to the couch facing the television and Grace sits back wondering if he knows how much he’s changed their home. The only music she’s ever heard her mom play on the stereo is classical, especially when people were over.
“I used to play, back in college.” Finn tells her, watching her face for a sign of acceptance or validation or something. “See these knees?” He tugs up the leg of his trousers to reveal woollen socks and a hairy, very skinny shin. “These are football knees.” He wiggles the muscle and Grace can’t stop herself from laughing.
“My sister used to come to every game, even when Mom and Dad couldn’t make it.” Finn drops the crisp material of his suit pant’s leg and his tone is affectionate but Grace feels the weight of it. He’d told her about Leah about a month ago when they were watching Casablanca and she’d mumbled something about wishing she was loved like Ilsa. Turns out not all Ilsa’s are let go, sometimes Rick Blaine makes her stay and it’s never like it was before. Grace can still picture Finn’s face when he’d mouthed along with Bogart, “Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon and for the rest of your life.“
“Do you miss it?” She asks and they both know it’s a loaded question.
“Yeah,” Finn’s voice is thick and his gaze flicks over to watch her mom dancing slowly in the kitchen as she cooks dinner. Something in his eyes changes and Grace smiles quietly to herself. She wishes her mom could see it too.
“We should play next weekend.”
Finn tries not to look to hopeful but his hands have clamped over those ‘football knees’. “You sure?”
“Yeah!” Grace throws the remote over to him. “I need the practice anyway. I barely made the team to be honest.”
Finn flicks through the channels looking for something they’d both like, skipping the news, a fishing show, and reruns of the Brady Bunch. “Great.” He’s smiling and Grace knows she’s done something right.
He settles on a British cooking competition they’ve seen a couple of episodes of before and her mom calls out from the kitchen. “Dinner’s ready in twenty. I’m not setting the table.” And Finn dutifully rises from the couch, leaving the remote in front of Grace.
He’s useful, Grace thinks. She tucks her hands under her knees and smiles as she hears her mom giggle quietly into what she guesses is Finn’s shoulder. There’s more murmuring in the kitchen before another round of soft giggles and Grace watches a man with a thick Manchester accent fluidly ice a cake with a growing smile on her face.
He rests his elbow on the door and feels the wind against his face. Lightnin’ Hopkins is playing softly under the sounds of kids playing in cul-de-sacs, lawnmowers and hoses on perfectly landscaped gardens. A dog barks, greeting a neighbour as his owner walks him down the footpath.
It’s a little hazy in the distance, it hasn’t rained for almost two weeks and it keeps a warm undertone to the blue sky above. Grace is rolling the football in her hands, he can see her in the rear view mirror, her head lolled against the car door in a daze.
Alicia has her arm out the window, her hand catching the air as it moves through her fingers.
Finn takes a moment just to smile. That deep blues voice is sinking into him and he finds his fingers matching the slow beat on the steering wheel. He takes a right and Alicia suddenly pulls her hand in.
She’s sitting up a little straighter as they continue down the road and Finn watches out for a couple of kids tossing a Frisbee. He’s slowing down and crossing through a four-way stop sign before he notices Alicia is scanning each house with a look he’s never seen on her face.
“What? What is it?” He makes another right and they’re heading towards the city proper now. Alicia sinks back a little again and something like a sigh escapes her.
“It’s nothing,” She says.
He looks at Grace in the rear-view mirror and she’s looking out the window still. “It’s not.” She turns to see him watching her. “We used to live near here.”
Grace explains before propping her arm on the open window and cupping her chin with her hand. She’s done, she’s tired and she’s mad at her mom, he can read it all over her. If she could stick her head out the window or open the door and step right out she would.
“Oh.” Finn concentrates on the car in front and wisely decides to keep it at that.
“You won, you get to choose.”
“Really?” Grace taps her hand against the back of the couch as she thinks. She’s twisted round to face the two of them standing in the kitchen and the television is on mute.
“Can we get Indian?”
“Sure.”
“Wait,” Finn plucks the phone from her hand and punches in some numbers, moving off to do that short walk he does when on the phone outside of work.
Alicia shrugs and Grace just rolls her eyes, turning back to the TV. It’s a simple matter of pulling out three bowls and three side plates and a bottle of wine (wine goes with Indian doesn’t it? Who is she kidding, wine goes with everything) and Alicia sets them in a line across the kitchen island counter.
“Who wants rice?” Finn’s at the front door when he asks and she laughs to herself.
“Me!” Grace shouts.
“Me too.” Alicia leans over the counter to smile at him but he’s already watching his feet pace back and forth as he orders a large rice. There must be a deal because he says “Yeah, that one. Great. Okay, perfect.” Finn pulls the phone from his ear and hits the red circle before sauntering back towards her.
“Dinner is served… in about twenty minutes.”
“Thanks,” She holds out her hand for her cell.
“Thanks, Finn,” Grace calls out from the couch. Alicia tries to smother her smile when he crosses round to drop the phone beside the wine and a kiss on her jaw. He takes her open hand in his and spins her into his arms to dance goofily about as Vivaldi’s strings crescendo on the kitchen stereo.
“Ugh,” Grace complains from the couch.
“Yeah I know, your mom’s dance moves are terrible.” Finn quips over his shoulder until he spins Alicia so he can watch Grace over her shoulder. “I’m still trying to get her to take lessons.”
Alicia laughs and the track ends.
Finn’s hand slides up her arm as he draws her closer to the wall, leaning in. “Everything alright?” His breath is on her cheek and he’s deliberately being quiet so Grace can’t overhear them in the lounge room but he can see goosebumps rise up her arm.
Alicia smiles gently and nods just once. She’s got more to tell him about Highland Park he guesses but it won’t come out with Grace within earshot.
“Fair enough,” he says, and he feels a little half-hearted but she understands; Alicia’s hands are on his waist.
Finn bends down a little more and presses a kiss to her lips. She tastes like butter chicken and garlic naan. He smiles when she deepens the kiss, a hand moving into the short hair at the back of his head. Her tongue is skirting the miniscule gap between them and he can’t believe how good she feels when he accidentally backs her properly into the wall.
“You played good today,” she says when they part and his eyebrows are somewhere in his hairline. That was some kiss. Finn reminds himself that Grace is in the room next door – he can hear the cop show she and Alicia love blaring through the speakers that haven’t been hooked up right since Zach last visited.
God was that a month ago? I should fix that, Finn thinks absently to himself, trying anything to distract his body as he takes a step back from the woman currently biting her lip. Sometime’s Alicia can be cruel, Finn decides. He tugs his sweater back down to fit his hips again. Somehow she’d snuck the other hand under, how had he missed that?
“Thanks,” he nods slowly, still trying to clear his head. He runs his thumb over his lip. He can still taste her. Or is it the Indian food?
Alicia’s eyes are so dark they’re almost black when she reaches a hand past him to open the door.
“Thanks for coming,” Her voice is practically purring and he wishes more than anything in the world that he could take her now.
“You’re evil,” he says, stepping backwards into the hall.
“I know,” Alicia smiles. “Goodbye, Finn.” She says a little loudly.
“Bye, Finn!” Grace calls out from the living room and he has to laugh.
Finn’s eyebrows rise one last time as he turns to hit the elevator button. He has to laugh because he’s amused and still aroused despite his best efforts.
“Bye.”
“He doesn’t have to go home every time, you know.” Grace is holding a cushion to her chest and they’re watching a late-night rerun. It’s Sunday night and she should make Grace go to bed soon but it’s nice to have some time alone with her daughter.
“Who doesn’t?” Alicia asks distractedly. When was the last time she watched The Golden Girls. Were they all dead now? She’s wondering when Grace throws the cushion at her.
“Mom. Finn.”
“Oh… sorry,” She smiles sheepishly, tucking the cushion under her own arm and lowers the volume with the remote between them.
“He can stay over. I mean, if you want.” Grace can’t seem to make herself look at her but Alicia’s gaze is fixed on her. She tilts her head until she finally catches Grace’s eyes.
“Where’s this coming from?” Alicia shrugs a little although she’s asking the question and Grace furrows her brow, staring at the remote.
“He’s nice.”
“Well, yeah, but he’s always nice.” The way she says it makes Grace laugh for some reason.
“Yeah, he is. But I mean, it doesn’t bother me.”
“Finn being nice?”
“No, Finn staying over.” Grace shrugs and picks up the remote to turn the sound back on. Sophia is in the middle of a story and neither of them have any idea what’s going on anymore.
“Are you sure?” Alicia’s voice is quiet but Grace hears her perfectly well.
“Yeah, Mom. I am. He makes you happy.” She shrugs again and Alicia wonders if her daughter learned that from her or if she learned it from Grace.
It may be selfish but she embraces Grace anyway. “I love you, you know.”
“I know,” her daughter’s arms never waver around her. “I love you too.”
“Thank you, Grace.” She whispers into long brown hair. Grace smells like the floral shampoo Jackie gave them for Christmas. The open window blows in the cold night air and Alicia settles beside her daughter as Beatrice Arthur hugs tiny Sophia with tight hands.