Finny
Me: you know you’re my favorite person, right?
Scottie-girl: You need more hobbies.
***
The wiper blades are doing that slow, rhythmic click-slap against the windshield, clearing away a September mist. Scottie is sitting in the passenger seat with her legs crossed at the ankle, her attention entirely focused on the glowing screen of her phone.
“If the cap management team thinks they can retroactively apply the performance bonuses from the twenty-four season to the current active escrow pool, they are legally brain-dead,” she mutters. Her voice drops into that low, flat hiss she uses when she’s about to shorten someone’s career.
I glance over at her as we stall at a particularly stubborn red light.
“God, I love it when you talk dirty to me,” I say, my hand shifting to rest on her thigh. “Tell me more about the work of an agent.”
“This is your turn-on? We really need to get you out of the rink more, O’Connell. Your bar for excitement is dangerously low.”
“My turn-on is you,” I say, my thumb tracing the hem of her skirt.
The light turns green and we start moving again, the city traffic a blur of taillights reflecting on the wet pavement. I keep my hand where it is, finding comfort in the solid warmth of her beneath my palm.
“I was thinking about your apartment,” I say suddenly, pulling the car into the left lane.
She blinks, looking over at me. “My apartment? What about it?”
“I hate that apartment,” I say.
There is no bite in the words—only a strange, wistful honesty that catches her off guard. She shifts in her seat, her back pressing against the leather of the door as she looks at my profile, her brow furrowed in concern.
“It’s beautiful, Scottie,” I continue, keeping my eyes on the road.
“It’s perfect. It looks like a magazine spread for people who have never spilled red wine.
But it’s quiet. Too quiet. Even when I’m there, I feel like I’m visiting a museum.
I feel like a guest. A very lucky, very well-fed guest who gets to sleep with the curator, but a guest nonetheless. ”
“Finny…”
“My place isn’t much better,” I say, my voice gaining momentum as I pull the car into the underground parking garage of her building.
I put the car in park, but I don’t take my hand off her leg. My hand stays on her thigh for another second before I finally lift it, turn it palm-up, and lace my fingers through hers.
“It doesn’t feel like a home, Scottie. It feels like a holding cell.”
I turn fully in my seat, needing to see her face, to see if she’s reading this correctly.
“Move in with me,” I say. “Or I’ll move in with you. I don’t care whose name is on the deed or who pays the HOA fees. I just want our shoes in the same closet. I want to stop having to pack a bag to see the woman I love.”
She looks at me, her lips parting slightly.
“I want you to have a home. With me,” I say, my voice dropping.
“I want to wake up and see your meanest face before you’ve had your first gallon of caffeine.
I want to hear your heels clacking on the hardwood at six in the morning because you’re already plotting a hostile corporate takeover.
I want the chaos, Scottie. I want the laundry and the groceries and the boring Tuesday nights.
I want all of it. Because if I have all of that, it means I have all of you. ”
Scottie stares at me for a long, breathless moment. A tear—just one small drop—catches the gray light near her eyelash before she blinks it away with a small, frustrated shake of her head.
“Finny,” she whispers. “We’ve been together for what… like five minutes? Isn’t this way too fast? Normal people go to restaurants and argue about movies for six months before they start looking at floor plans.”
The truth was that neither of us had any idea how to measure the relationship anymore.
Officially, we’d only been together a matter of weeks. On paper, it looked reckless. Fast. The kind of timeline that would make normal people raise their eyebrows.
Except nothing about us had happened on paper.
We’d spent weeks tangled up in each other’s lives long before either of us had admitted what this was—long drives, hotel rooms, hospital waiting areas, shared breakfasts, shared disasters.
By the time we finally put a name to it, it felt less like starting a relationship and more like acknowledging one.
Telling our friends had only confirmed it. There had been no shocked silences. No dramatic reactions. No one asking, Wait, since when? Instead, we’d been met with a collective response somewhere between relief and exhaustion.
Nico had actually laughed so hard he nearly choked on his drink. Even Dean—who usually questions everything—had looked at us, shrugged, and acted as though we’d merely announced the weather.
No one was surprised. The only people who had somehow managed to miss it were the two of us.
I look at her for a long, silent moment, feeling the weight of the moment pressing down on us.
Then I shrug.
“So what?”
Scottie blinks. “So what?” she repeats.
“Maybe it is fast,” I say, my thumb brushing across her knuckles. “Maybe if we’d met at a coffee shop and gone on three polite dates and spent six months pretending we weren’t obsessed with each other, I’d agree with you.”
A reluctant smile tugs at her mouth.
“But that’s not what happened,” I squeeze her hand. “I’ve seen you at your worst, Sharky. I’ve seen you angry, exhausted, scared, stubborn, impossible, and running on two hours of sleep and pure spite.”
“Pure spite is a renewable resource.”
“I know.” I grin. “And somehow, all of that just made me love you more.”
The playfulness fades from her expression, leaving only a terrifying sincerity.
“I’m not asking because it’s convenient, Scottie,” my voice softens. “I’m asking because every time something happens—good or bad—you’re already the person I want to come home to.”
For a second, she just looks at me. Then she lets out a shaky breath and shakes her head.
“You are unbelievably difficult to argue with when you’re sincere.”
“Is that a yes?”
She rolls her eyes, which is answer enough.
“God, you’re annoying.”
“Scottie-girl.”
Another sigh. Another eye roll. Then she leans forward and presses her forehead against mine.
“Fine,” she murmurs. “One home.”
***
Three weeks later, after one ruthless weekend of apartment viewings and exactly seventeen disagreements about natural light, parking, and whether a kitchen island counted as a “non-negotiable,” we signed the papers on a place that belonged to both of us.
Moving in together should be easy.
That is the lie everyone tells you.
We’re taught to believe that love, once it has been established and named and dragged into the daylight, naturally settles into something calm and manageable.
We are led to think that combining two lives is merely a matter of logistics—boxes, keys, toothbrush placement, and deciding whose turn it is to buy the paper towels.
But of course, it isn’t easy. Because Scottie is involved. And when Scottie is involved, “easy” is a myth.
I arrive at the apartment first.
She’s late—not in the irresponsible sense, but in the specific, high-stakes Scottie way. That means she has likely solved three problems that weren’t hers to begin with, intimidated a GM into sudden competence, and only then realized she still had to physically exist somewhere else.
The apartment is quiet in that hollow, expectant way new spaces often are. Every footstep I take echoes against the floorboards, waiting to see what kind of people we are going to be inside these walls.
I’ve already started the process. My hockey bag is dumped in the corner. There’s a duffel of protein bars and recovery shakes leaning against the wall. I have one box labeled FLANNELS in aggressive black marker, which I intend to defend with my life.
I pull one out—the red and black one that feels like a second skin—and drape it over the back of the couch like a territorial flag.
I’m elbow-deep in a box of miscellaneous cables when the front door swings open.
I turn around and there she is.
Her red hair is mussed from the wind, her suit jacket slung over one arm, and her clipboard tucked under the other like a temporarily disarmed weapon. Her gaze stops abruptly on the red flannel.
“The flannel, Cash? Already? It’s been twelve minutes.”
“It’s an anchor, Scottie. Every room needs one.”
“It’s a rag, O’Connell. It looks like it was attacked by a bear.”
We start unpacking, and it becomes immediately clear that we are not compatible in the traditional sense of “logistics.”
We argue over the couch. I want it angled toward the TV like a normal human who enjoys sports and sanity. She wants it positioned for “flow,” a concept she appears to have invented on the spot just to exert dominance over the living room.
“It disrupts the energy,” she says, dragging one end of the heavy furniture a few inches to the left.
“It blocks the outlet, Scottie. The outlet powers the TV. That is a requirement for my lifestyle.”
“The outlet is a suggestion. Energy is a mandate.”
“Energy doesn’t show me the highlights from the Western Conference.”
She tilts her head, challenging me. “You’re very brave for someone standing in my living room.”
“Our living room.”
“Semantics,” she mutters.
By the time we reach the kitchen, the chaos has multiplied. I’m holding a box of glasses while she’s inspecting the stove.
“Gas or electric?” she asks, crouching down to get a better look.
“I think it’s gas.”
She drops fully to the floor, peering into the oven, muttering about flame control and heat distribution.
I lean against the counter and simply watch her.
This is the part no one warns you about—the moment when love stops being the big, dramatic confessions and starts being this: someone in your space, making it theirs without asking, and somehow, that’s exactly where you want them to be.
I love the way she takes charge. I love the way she hums a low, distracted tune when she’s thinking too hard.
“The pilot light is fine,” she announces, standing up and brushing the dust off her knees. “But we are replacing the drawer pulls. These are… offensive.”
“Offensive? They’re just metal loops, Scottie.”
“They are hurting my soul, Finn. Don’t fight me on this.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I mutter, reaching out and pulling her into my space.
“We’re going to be okay, aren’t we?” she whispers, her hands resting on my chest.
“Better than okay. We’re going to be a disaster. A beautiful, loud, disorganized disaster.”
She laughs, turning in my arms to face me. “I love you,” she says. “And don’t you forget it.”
I don’t answer with words. I kiss her until she stops talking about bookshelf vibes and floor plans, until the only thing that matters is the scorching heat between us and the quiet, expectant hum of an apartment that is finally, officially, home.
I trail my kisses down the sensitive line of her neck, and her breath hitches.
“Cash,” she breathes. “The boxes… we have to move the…”
“The boxes aren’t going anywhere,” I mutter against her collarbone. “And neither am I.”
I lift her easily, her legs wrapping around my waist with a familiarity that sets my nerves on fire. Her boots thud against the side of a crate marked FRAGILE, but I don’t slow down.
We don’t make it to the bedroom.
We don’t even make it past the kitchen island.
I set her down on the cold granite of the counter, and the sudden chill makes her let out a sharp gasp. She wraps her arms around my neck and yanks me flush against her.
“You’re very aggressive for someone who just moved in,” she pants, her eyes narrowing. “Is this how you treat all your landlords?”
“I carried three boxes of your ridiculous shoe collection halfway across the building,” I say. “I think I’ve earned the right to skip the pleasantries.”
My hands are everywhere, unbuttoning her blouse with a frantic energy. She’s just as desperate, her fingers fisting in the fabric of my shirt and yanking it over my head, tossing it somewhere near the toaster with a triumphant little smirk.
I kick a heavy box of books out of the way to get between her legs, the sound of cardboard sliding across wood echoing through the empty space.
“I thought we were… negotiating… the floor plan,” she says. “You’re deviating from the plan, Cash.”
“Negotiations are closed, Scottie.”
I slide my hands under her thighs, my fingers splaying wide as I lift her hips, tilting her pelvis up until she’s arched perfectly toward me.
As I find her clit, she lets out a broken, high-pitched moan that echoes off the bare kitchen walls. Her fingers dig into my shoulders, her nails biting deep, leaving marks that will definitely bloom into bruises by morning.
“Cash, please.”
I don’t give her what she wants. Not yet. I lean in, my mouth grazing the shell of her ear, letting out a low chuckle.
“Please what, Scottie? You’re the one who constantly reminds me that you’re still the boss. So tell me… is this how you usually handle your star talents? Spreading yourself out for them on a Tuesday afternoon?”
She lets out a choked, desperate sound, her hips bucking instinctively against my hand. Even completely undone, she finds her teeth.
“You’re an arrogant prick. Seriously. Just stop talking and do your job. That’s an order.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
I sink into her in one deep thrust that stretches her until she’s gasping for air. She’s tight, her pussy clenching around me in desperate, involuntary pulses as she tries to stifle a cry, her teeth grazing the skin of my shoulder.
“Still think you’re the one calling the shots here?” I drive into her harder, my chest slamming against hers.
She looks exposed, her lips swollen and parted, but she stares right back at me, her eyes fierce. “You’re doing exactly what I want you to do, Cash. You’re completely under my control right now and you don’t even know it.”
“Is that right?”
“Yes,” she gasps. “Now shut up and move faster.”
She cries out my name and I follow her a heartbeat later, my vision blurring as I lose myself completely. When I pull out, the sound is wet and heavy in the quiet room. I pull her head into my chest, my hand stroking her hair as the adrenaline slowly ebbs away.
“So,” I clear my throat. “About that bookshelf placement?”
She lets out a weak, breathless laugh against my skin, her fingers tracing the marks she left on my back. “I think… I think we can leave it for tomorrow. I can’t feel my legs anyway.”
The boxes remain unpacked.
The “flow” of the room is a total disaster.
And as I collapse against her, our hearts beating in a frantic, shared tempo, I realize I’m not calculating my next move.
I’m just thinking about how many years I can spend making her feel exactly like this—breathless, adored, and undeniably mine.