Chapter 4
Chapter Four
FINN
So far, I’ve been able to escape any mention of Oakleigh and our inevitable love story by keeping out of the way while we prepare dinner.
Gus was finally able to meet his future in-laws, though he’d already spoken to Joe over the phone when he was asking for permission to propose to Wren.
He’s doing well, considering how opposed he is to social interactions.
He’s really trying his hardest to be open and as cheerful as he can be.
Now, though, he gets to focus on cooking, something he offered to do for everyone as a token of his appreciation. That is, of course, after the hour-long lecture on the different forms of chopping and dicing.
I decide to stick to the jobs that require one person—setting the table, putting the dishes away, and loading the dishwasher. I’m doing well until it comes time to actually eat dinner. Unfortunately, one can’t really do that by oneself when surrounded by family.
“Is Oakleigh not joining us tonight?” Mom asks Wren.
“Not tonight as she’s working a night shift, but she’ll be by tomorrow,” Wren replies.
I have a piece of lasagna halfway to my mouth when my brain decides to ruin my appetite completely.
What if he put something in there that you’re allergic to?
I frown at my plate.
If you eat it, you could get really sick and end up in hospital. Maybe even worse.
Even though I’m not allergic to anything, I still fucking hesitate. What if I just haven’t eaten anything that I’m allergic to yet?
I shake my head.
I’ve had lasagna fifty million times. I’m not allergic to anything.
You’ve never had it when he’s made it.
I clench my fist under the table and force myself to remember what Dr. Madden told me almost every session:
It only becomes unsafe if you give in to it, Finley. The moment you give those thoughts what they want is the moment they make your actions unsafe.
I try my best to bring the fork to my mouth, but something stops me; something dark and determined.
“Maybe we should send someone to go and pick her up in the morning. She’ll probably be exhausted.” Even though my mind is preoccupied, I don’t miss the way Mom looks over at me as she speaks.
Do it.
Do it
Do it.
“I think that’s a great idea, Mom.” Wren smirks, nudging me with her foot under the table.
Everyone jumps as my fork clatters onto my plate. I stare at it like it’s burned me, like it’s offended me somehow.
“Finn?” Wren asks from beside me. “You okay?”
Concerned looks are watching me from all over the table.
I clear the lump from my throat. “Dropped it by accident. Sorry.”
I pick the fork back up, load food onto it, tap the underside of the table softly three times and shove the food into my mouth. It’s the only thing that bypasses it most times. Three is the magic number.
Gus, completely oblivious to the subtext of the conversation and my own personal battles, helpfully says, “Beckford has Uber.”
Even though Oakleigh would get in an Uber home over my dead body, it’s still nice to know I have an ally on this table.
“Uber is so impersonal,” my mom persists.
I keep my head down, my nose almost touching the plate as I tap under the table three times before shoveling more food into my mouth.
In the corner of my eye, I spot Wren leaning over and whispering something in Gus’s ear.
He looks over at me and smirks before pushing Wren’s curls from her face and planting a chaste kiss on her forehead.
And there goes my only ally.
I glare at my sister who giggles softly.
“What are you two laughing about?” Dad asks.
“Absolutely nothing,” I say through gritted teeth, my anxiety due to my food situation leaving a layer of agitation to lay everything else onto.
Was their obsession with Oakleigh and me always this intense? Was everyone so intent on mentioning it in every conversation? Maybe because I’ve only had to deal with this for a weekly twenty-minute phone call for the past year, I forgot what it was like to deal with it in person.
If only they all knew how painful these conversations are for me; knowing that everyone I love agrees that I would be well-suited to the woman I’m already in love with is a form of torture that I didn’t know would work as well as it does.
The irony is that none of them know how I feel about her.
None of them are aware that when she’s around, my chest feels tight with grief for a feeling I can never receive.
They are blissfully unaware that she consumes my every thought; that the one kiss we shared will forever be branded onto my lips and in my memories.
I wish there was a way to get them to stop.
To just admit to themselves that Oakleigh and I will never be.
“So, Gus,” Dad says, thankfully changing the subject for what will probably only be five minutes. “Wren never properly explained what it is that you do.”
“I’m a farmer,” Gus says simply. “I own a pumpkin farm about ten minutes from here.”
“About ten minutes?” Wren asks with a knowing smile.
He shrugs. “Nine minutes and forty-eight seconds if the traffic light on Main Street is in your favor.”
Wren looks at Gus with pride and my chest constricts. I rub at it pathetically.
“Do you enjoy it?” Mom asks.
“I do. It’s a perfect fit for me, I’d say.”
Mom offers a polite smile. “The story of how you two met and fell in love really is something.”
The table falls quiet and so she follows up with another question. “What made you want to propose?”
Gus shrugs like the answer is so simple. “I love Wren.”
Wren clears her throat, sending her fiancé a look, and he instantly shifts in his seat.
“I love her, and…” he looks as if he’s struggling to find more to say. “Um … and I want to spend my life with her.”
“Anything else?” Mom asks, unsatisfied with his answer.
He shrugs again, a pink tinge lighting up his face. “I’m not … um…” He looks to Wren for help, but I feel bad for the guy, so I step in.
“Gus doesn’t mean it in a bad way,” I say. “When he says he loves her, he means he loves every aspect of her, even the ones that annoy him. Simple words always have complex meanings.” I turn to him. “Right?”
He looks surprised that I understood, but, hey, I pay attention.
“Right,” he replies, a small smile tugging at the edges of his mouth.
He offers me a nod of gratitude before turning back to my parents.
“He’s right. There is not a single thing about her that I don’t love.
When I say that I love her I don’t mean that in a shallow way.
I am obsessed with your daughter. I would do anything for her.
When I say I love her, I mean that I love every part that I get to see when I wake up, go to sleep, see after she’s back from a trip, all of it.
I proposed because I love her enough to argue with her for the rest of my life. ”
Well, fuck.
I did not expect the pang of sadness racing its way toward my already aching heart.
I didn’t expect the feeling of longing and anticipation to run across my chest like horses at a race, each hoof thumping against me and reminding me why I’m alone.
I’ve been so busy with work, I never even thought about anything along the lines of what Wren has found with August.
Now that I acknowledge how he looks at her when she’s unaware and the way she smiles to herself whenever he touches her, I think to myself that maybe it wouldn’t be so bad having someone who makes me feel like that.
Maybe it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world to come home to something other than an empty house.
My parents look impressed with Gus’s amended answer. I think it’s a comfort to know that your daughter is loved as much as she possibly can by someone.
By the time we’re done with dinner, I’m already up and offering to clean all the dishes alone. Unfortunately, my mother decides that dishes will forever be a two-person job.
We begin washing in silence, her drying the dishes that I pass to her. She hums softly to herself as plates turn to bowls.
“You should go and pick her up,” she eventually says, ruining any thoughts I had of getting off scot-free.
I heave out a heavy sigh. “No, I shouldn’t, Ma.”
“Why not?” She whines, sounding like a petulant child.
Because I’ll be alone with her and will probably kiss her again.
Cliff—Wren’s golden retriever—trots into the kitchen looking for either some attention or some leftover food. He sniffs around my feet before licking my wrist. He spends most of his time on the farm so I barely see him, either.
“Mama, why are you so set on believing that Oakleigh and I are supposed to be together?”
The question makes her pause. She continues drying the dishes as if in a daze. She takes the bowl from my hands before answering.
“I can’t explain it,” she eventually says. “It’s like looking at two pieces of a puzzle that just … fit. There’s no one thing or no one reason, it just works.” She offers a teasing smile. “I’m your mother, I’m supposed to know these things, you know.”
“Did you know when you looked at Gus with Wren today?”
She waves me off. “Oh, I knew long before today. I knew they were right for one another the moment she told me that he flew to Charleston to join her the first time she went away for work.”
I watch her as she dries the last bowl.
“Aaron never gave her even half of what Gus does, and sometimes, it seems as if Gus doesn’t even try. It’s almost like doing things like flying to Charleston are the absolute bare minimum to him, as if they’re the least that’s expected of him and so it’s so easy for him to do it.”
“I genuinely think it is to him.”
“I want that for you, as well. Not just someone to love you like that, but also for someone for you to love like that, too.”
“What do you mean?” I throw the sponge and gloves down by the edge of the sink. I move to start putting the dishes away, but Mom stops me, placing a hand on my chest.
“You have so much to give, Finley. In some ways, when I look at Gus, I am reminded of you. You’re both men who have this contained form of love within them.
It fights and it fights, and in the end, it makes you feel as if you aren’t worthy, but sweetheart that’s because it’s not meant to be contained.
It’s supposed to be free and chaotic and unstoppable.
I have your father, Wren has Gus, it’s simply your turn. ”
Oakleigh’s brown eyes and sharp features fill my mind and I hesitate.
“Does it worry you that I’m not with anyone?”
Her head shakes. “No, baby boy, no. That’s not what worries me.”
“Then what does?”
“Sweetheart, I’m not worried that you don’t have anyone. I’m worried that sometimes when I look at you, it’s as if you’ve given up on wanting it.”
I don’t want my mom to worry. Part of the reason I’m stuck with these ridiculous intrusive thoughts in the first place is because of my obsessive need to be easy, to not have anyone worry about me or want more for me.
My brain works a million miles a minute to think of something—anything—that can make my mother’s worries disappear.
I need her to know that there’s nothing to worry about.
I need her to not think I’m a burden. And in my haste to do just that, my brain does the only thing it can think of …
it blurts out a whole bunch of shit faster than I can process it and filter out the secrets.
“You’ve got nothing to worry about, Ma. I haven’t shut anything out; I’m merely waiting for the right person to come along.
Besides, it’s not like I haven’t been doing anything, you know I go on dates, I talk to women.
Dating nowadays is just really hard, ya know, especially when you’re surrounded by small towns like this one and nothing else.
But no, I like to date. I mean, it’s tedious don’t get me wrong, I mean, seriously some people are just, wow, but I still do it and I still do …
stuff, ya know? I have sex and stuff. You didn’t need to know that.
But rest assured, I am being safe. You didn’t need to know that, either.
The point is that I’m doing stuff and putting myself out there.
Hell, even last year I ended up making out with Oak—”
Fuuuuuuuck.
Mom’s dark brown eyes widen slowly.
“Finley Jonathan Southwick,” she squeals. “Are you trying to say that you’ve been spending time with Oakleigh … alone?”
My shocked silence seems to be confirmation enough for her. I have to shush loudly over her scream to get her to quieten down.
“Sorry, sorry, sorry!” She changes her scream to a quiet squeal. “Oh, Finley! Why haven’t you told us sooner?”
“Um…”
“Oh, now I can’t wait for lunch tomorrow!”
She jumps around the kitchen as I hold my head in my hands.
This is bad. This is really bad. My mom is terrible at keeping secrets normally, but a secret in which I’ve implied that Oakleigh and I are dating? I am so fucked.