Chapter 5
Chapter Five
FINN
The lab felt different on days when Miguel was there.
A little more chaotic. Finn tried to focus on the screens in front of him.
He was combing through the new set of patient data.At the far corner table, Miguel hunched over his math homework.
Every so often he muttered under his breath.
Then he let out a sigh, drawn out for attention. Finn pretended not to notice.
Just as he regained focus, a loud scrape sound interrupted him.
Miguel repositioned his chair. If he were honest, the kid wasn’t so bad.
He was quick for a twelve-year-old. Not just in math, but in the little psychological games kids played to get attention.
Finn suspected Miguel made his teachers’ lives difficult.
The second sigh, louder and more theatrical, was impossible to ignore. “Something wrong?” Finn asked, eyes still on the screen.
Miguel answered without looking up. “Chair’s broken. It wobbles.”
“Try a different one,” Finn offered.
Miguel made a show of examining the remaining chairs. “They’re all worse. This place is pathetic.”
Finn stifled a smile. “I can put in a maintenance request.”
Miguel grunted, accepting this olive branch.
Peace lasted for six minutes. “The lights here are weird,” Miguel mused.
“Fluorescents,” Finn said. “Not ideal, but better for visibility.”
“I know what fluorescent lights are, Doctor.”
Finn turned to find Miguel already looking at him. And creepily closer than he was before? A mini stare-off between Finn and Miguel began. After ten strange seconds, Miguel snorted and looked away, but it was not an admission of defeat.
By seven o’clock, he had exhausted all academic grievances and moved onto the business of life. “She always makes me come here,” he said, not quite to Finn but not to himself, either. Finn said nothing, waiting. “My uncle doesn’t care if I do homework. He says school is a scam.”
“He is incorrect.”
Miguel shrugged, unconvinced. “He also says Mom is obsessed with work.”
Finn kept his eyes on the brain scans filling his monitor. “Your mom is the lead researcher of this lab. That requires dedication.”
Miguel switched tactics. “You’re obsessed with work, too. You might be more obsessed than she is.” Then he added under his breath but intentionally still audible, “Psycho.”
Finn had no response to that. A quiet tension settled over the room. After several minutes, Miguel spoke again, voice pitched lower. “Is it true that you never sleep?”
Finn paused, surprised. “Who told you that?”
“My mom. She said you’re always here when she comes in. Even on the weekend.”
Finn considered the statement. “I don’t mind working extra hours. And we have an important deadline coming up.”
Miguel nodded. Another silence as he continued to study Finn with no sense of boundaries. “Do you have a girlfriend?” Miguel asked.
God, when would this end? “No,” Finn said.
He felt Miguel judging him. Finn waited, hoping to move on from this conversation.
“My mom asked me to stay out of her office when she is working.” Miguel complained.
Gee, I wonder why?
“It just seems like a waste of time. The treatment doesn’t even work.”
Finn’s hand stilled on his mouse. He didn’t intend to reply, but that hit a nerve. “You’re right. It doesn’t work. That’s why we’re here. Your mom is trying to fix that, and maybe if you stopped—” Finn stopped himself, realizing he was about to say something he’d regret. But it was too late.
Miguel stared him down before he struck back. “At least she has a life outside of this depressing lab.”
ELENA
Elena was so focused, she did not notice the silence at first. Miguel and Finn were locked in a stare-off that showed no signs of ending anytime soon.
Miguel’s cheeks were glowing red, his pencil held like a knife in a stab-ready position.
Finn looked a bit worked up for once. “Everything okay?” she asked, feigning ignorance.
Neither responded. Miguel blinked first. He closed his notebook with unnecessary force, the covers slamming shut. “Can I go to the lobby?”
Elena nodded, and he was gone. She waited until the echo of footsteps faded, then turned to Finn, who had not moved. “What happened?”
He hesitated. “I may have been too direct,” he said at last. “I corrected a misconception.”
She suppressed a sigh. “Which was?”
“That your research is a waste of time and doesn’t work.”
The bluntness hit her harder than she expected.
She imagined how this new deadline had been affecting Miguel.
One parent was on the other side of the country, and the other seemed to spend more time in a lab than with her son.
She shook her head. “He’s been… difficult lately.
But it’s not your job to discipline him. ”
Finn nodded, but did not apologize. “That was not my intention. I just thought he should know the truth.”
She studied him. Finn’s usual stillness seemed to be a bit shaken. She wondered why this particular interaction would cause that. He didn’t seem to be bothered by uncomfortable conversations until now. "I can handle my kid," she said.
"You’re right. I’m sorry." He looked away, focusing on the computer screen she'd abandoned. "The numbers from the last group are showing a wide variation," he said. "We might need to change the way we're approaching this."
She almost laughed at how quickly he switched topics, but her heart wasn't in it. “We can look at it tomorrow,” she said, already reaching for her bag.
Later, when she found Miguel curled up with his phone in the empty lobby, she sat beside him on the cold bench. “Is everything okay, mijo?”
He shrugged, staring at the phone. “It’s fine. I’m just tired.”
She resisted the urge to dig further. Sometimes it was better to let the moment pass. “Ice cream on the way home?” She offered.
Miguel looked up, failing to suppress a smile.