Sweet Hurricane

Chapter 1

"Please please please," Chahee begs into her cell phone.

On the other end of the line, Jennie continues painting, leaving her cell on speakerphone at the bottom of her easel. "Fine. But you don't get to complain when I bring them back all sugared up."

"I have long since given up on getting mad at you about that because my own children would never forgive me for stopping Cool Aunt Jennie from feeding them cookies nonstop," Chahee says, her tone indicating exactly the opposite of her words. "Please come get them at nine tomorrow okay love you bye."

She hangs up before Jennie can get in another word edgewise.

"Shit," Jennie says, realizing how early she'll have to get up on a Saturday. The weekends are for sleeping. She treats Chahee's kids like they're her own but hauling herself over to the Park house before nine on a Saturday is a true test of love. She drops her paintbrush in a cup.

"Shit."

*

Jennie pulls up in front of Chahee and Alexander's still yawning, but functional thanks to her espresso machine.

She doesn't even have to get out of the car; the Park twins are already barreling out the front door, yelling war cries while an exhausted-looking Chahee waves goodbye. "Thanks Jennie," she calls out, and Jennie just manages to lift one hand from the steering wheel.

The twins open the back door and suddenly her car is filled with noise as two nine-year-olds jam themselves and their equipment bags into the seats. "Hi Aunt Jennie!" they say in unison before their conversation devolves into two separate audio streams.

On the right, Ark is saying something about video games, while on the left, Rosé is rambling about how many goals she wants to score in the game. Jennie has long since learned to just let their combined noise wash over her and to ask for clarification later on anything important.

"Seat belts," she reminds them, making sure they comply before pulling away. They don't stop chattering for a second.

She swallows another yawn just as they pull up to the large community fields, which are filled with swarms of kids and their parents. Ark and Rosé are already pulling off their seatbelts, getting their equipment bags tangled up in their excitement to go.

"Hold on guys," Jennie says, getting out of the car first. She knows all too well how easy it is to lose track of one or both of the Park twins. The Great Grocery Store Panic of two years ago is still fresh in her memory, as is the Great Grocery Store Mess on Aisle 17 that immediately followed it.

She goes around to the back to let out the twins, opening the door like a zookeeper releasing a pair of tigers. The kids burst free, already looking for their field while Jennie pulls her supplies out of the trunk. Cooler in one hand, foldable chair in the other, she guides them into the complex to one of the smaller fields at the west end.

It's still early in the season so the air isn't quite crisp yet; summer lingers in the air and the still-green tree leaves. Jennie is glad to be in khaki shorts and a loose navy scoop-neck top as she trudges along, looking for the twins' soccer coach, some middle-aged guy who volunteers for the youth soccer association.

But as they near the field Jennie can't see anyone familiar. "Where's your coach?" she asks.

"We got a new one this season!" says Rosé, pointing.

Jennie follows her finger to a woman holding a dry erase clipboard at the edge of the field. Her wavy brown hair is pulled back in a ponytail and her eyes are hidden behind aviators but she looks about the same age as Jennie. And fit. Very fit. In her plain black tank top and matching shorts with the YSA logo on them, it's obvious she's physically active and Jennie clenches the cooler handle. "Oh," she says.

Rosé and Ark take off, bags jouncing around at their sides, yelling "Coach Lisa! Coach Lisa!"

She looks up at their approach and smiles and Jennie groans internally at just how attractive she is. Then she pulls her sunglasses up and perches them on top of her head and Jennie doubles her groaning because she does not need to deal with this. She's focusing on her work at the moment and hot coaches who are probably not single are a distraction she can't afford.

Still, she walks over to the area where the parents have started gathering and pops out her chair, setting the cooler right next to it. She knows some of the parents already from last season when the twins begged her to come to their games, and they know her as Chahee and Alexander's family friend who doesn't really know the rules of soccer, but cheers hard for the twins anyway.

Coach Lisa approaches her as soon as she's got her chair set up and holds out one hand, using the other to prop her clipboard against her waist. "Hi, I'm Lisa Manoban," she says.

Her grip is firm and her shake is professional, once up and once down. Jennie's hand tingles. "I'm Jennie. Kim." She points to the twins, who have thrown down their bags and are now kicking a ball between them with gusto. "Here with the destructo twins since Chahee and Alexander couldn't make it."

"They're great," Lisa says, her smile small but friendly.

"You're, uh, new?" Jennie asks.

"Moved here over the summer," Lisa says. She points to a tow-headed bow running up to join the twins. "That's my nephew, Dennis. I volunteered when he signed up."

"That's so great. The last coach was..." Jennie hesitates, not wanting to badmouth him in front of someone who might consider him a friend.

"I know, he wasn't the most competitive," Lisa says. She swings her clipboard around to hold it in front of her body, bracing the edge against her stomach. "I have to go get them ready for the game. I'll see you later, Jennie." She flips her aviators down and strides off, already calling for her team.

Jennie settles down in her chair and pulls out a chilled bottle of water, trying not to ogle Lisa as she crouches in front of her players, showing them something on her clipboard. When she stands up she has all the kids place their hands in the middle of the circle and pump them until they fly up with a resounding "Nightbloods!" Jennie thinks the team name is kind of macabre, but it's apparently just a reference to the name of the first woman who coached the team back when the league was first started.

Lisa points to six of the kids - twins included - and the other four return to the sidelines with Lisa, waiting for the referee.

Jennie doesn't really pretend to know what's going on, even with this reduced six-versus-six format for the lower age groups. They don't play with full adult rules anyway, and it's enough to know when Rosé scores goal after goal and Ark stubbornly slides into the feet of a player trying to shoot. Jennie claps and whistles, takes video on her phone for Chahee and Alexander, and watches Lisa out of the corner of her eye against her better instincts.

She rotates the kids out to give them all fair playing time, consoling the ones who make mistakes and congratulating everyone for their hard work. At halftime she gathers them under a shady tree some distance from the parents and speaks quietly to them, then leads them in a little cheer before kickoff.

After sixty minutes, the ref blows her whistle. The Nightbloods have won an astonishing seven to one, with Rosé accounting for three of those goals. She and Ark beam at each other, liberally streaked with dirt, grass stains up and down their uniforms. Jennie doesn't know how Alexander and Chahee ever manage to keep either twin clean for longer than a few hours.

"Great job guys!" she says, handing each one a juice box as they trot over to her, still panting a little but with energy to spare.

"Did you see me score a hat trick?" Rosé asks at the same time that Ark says "Did you see me save that one goal going into the corner?"

"I did," Jennie says to both of them. "And I recorded it to show your parents. They're gonna be so proud of you." She glances over to the other side of the field where Lisa is gathering up balls and cones in a large mesh bag. "You guys like Coach Lisa?"

"She's great!" says Rosé. "She showed me how to do this!" She does some kind of maneuver with her feet that Jennie can't really interpret without a ball.

"I didn't wanna be a goalkeeper but Coach Lisa says goalkeepers are special!" Ark says, puffing up his little chest.

"Uh huh," Jennie says, now watching as Lisa bends over at the waist to pick something up. She twitches out of it when Lisa turns around, scanning the field for anything else she might have left behind. This is just so terribly inconvenient and Jennie knows it and it absolutely does not stop her from eagerly standing up when Lisa approaches them, Dennis following behind her.

"Great game today guys," Lisa tells the twins, and they beam up at her. Dennis peeks around his aunt's body, looking shyly up at Jennie. "Dennis, this is Jennie. She's a friend of Mr. and Mrs. Park."

"Hi," Dennis says.

"Hey, do you guys want to go play for a bit while I talk to your coach?" Jennie asks, and the twins immediately drag Dennis away to kick a spare ball.

Lisa smiles after them, obviously happy to see them enjoying themselves. She turns that smile back on Jennie, who feels all resistance to finding Lisa attractive melt away. "You're great with them," she says.

"Oh, uh. Thank you," Lisa says, turning slightly shy, though it's hard to tell under her aviators.

"How long have you been coaching?"

"Just this season. I played a little bit in college but I never coached until Dennis signed up."

"He seems like a great kid. You're a much cooler aunt than me," Jennie says.

"The twins have mentioned you before," Lisa says. "Something about unlimited ice cream?"

Jennie covers her face with her hands. "Oh no. That was one time and it was their birthday." She peeks out at Lisa, who is not quite laughing at her but not bothering to hide it. She defends herself. "That's what cool aunts do anyway. I promised I'd spoil them for their entire childhoods."

They watch the kids run around a little longer, letting their antics fill the gaps in their conversation.

"So are you guys doing anything after the game?" Jennie asks. "You're more than welcome to join us. I'm just taking the twins to eat lunch and then bringing them back home."

Lisa folds her arms and a subtle distance springs up between them. "Oh, I don't..."

The kids, who somehow sense that they're the topic of discussion, run up in a happy mass. "Aunt Jennie, can Dennis come eat with us?" Rosé asks.

Dennis looks to Lisa hopefully.

Lisa caves. "Sure, if it's fine with Jennie."

"It's definitely fine with me," Jennie says, giving Dennis a big smile.

Lisa loosens up, but not by much. "Just let me make sure everyone's parents have picked them up," she says.

"All right," Jennie says, holding her hands out for low-fives from the twins, then offering them to Dennis as well. She gets three sets of good slaps. "Great game, great game, great game. Now who's ready for pizza?"

The twins immediately start chanting "Pi-ZZA pi-ZZA pi-ZZA," one on each side of Dennis, jostling him until he joins in. Jennie can see that he's quieter without their influence, but doesn't mind being drawn out of his shell judging from his little smile. And with Lisa coming back to them, biceps flexing nicely from the equipment bag slung over her shoulder, it's turning into a much better Saturday than she could have hoped.

*

The twins want to run off again immediately after they arrive at the family pizza joint where Jennie brings them after soccer games sometimes, but even a place that caters to children has its limits, so Jennie makes them sit in the booth with Dennis and talk amongst themselves.

Lisa sits opposite the three kids, next to Jennie, and fidgets with her folded aviators on the table top.

"So, what do you do when you're not leading kids to overwhelming victory?" Jennie asks.

Lisa pauses in her fiddling, then resumes. "I just started as the P.E. teacher at Saint Rebecca's this semester."

"Oh my god, I went to Saint Rebecca's," Jennie says. The school is fairly posh, as schools go, and Jennie had spent seven long years there rebelling against the dress code and strict rules, enabled the entire way by Chahee and Jisoo. She looks at the kids and lowers her voice. "Is it still really..." She makes a face.

Lisa smiles. "I think they relaxed a little bit. Girls can wear pants now, that sort of stuff. New principal a few years ago got them to be less..." She imitates Jennie's face. And then, as if sensing they're having a moment, she goes back to her sunglasses, occasionally glancing in the direction of the kitchen. "What do you do?" she asks eventually.

"I'm an artist," Jennie says. "Mostly oil paints, but I work in other mediums."

"That sounds nice, being able to do something creative with your life," Lisa says.

"Sometimes it still feels like a dream. Except when the student loan bills come in the mail," Jennie says. Another small smile goes between them. "So where did you move from?"

Lisa's face drops and her answer is mechanical. "Baltimore," she says, and the way she says it implies to Jennie that there's much more to the story, but it's far too soon to press her for an answer.

"Oh, that's not too far," Jennie says. "I guess you got to see Dennis pretty regularly before you moved then?"

Lisa is outright fidgeting now. "I had to travel a lot for work, so not really."

Jennie is perishing of curiosity at this point but she doesn't want to make Lisa even more uncomfortable, so she changes topics. "That game was really something though. Seven to one?"

And it works; Lisa's shoulders go down and her fingers still against her sunglasses. She turns towards Jennie a little more so they can look at each other while they speak. "The team is great. All the players are really talented." She knows the kids can overhear her and slyly ignores that they've started to listen in. "I think if we work really hard this season we could win the entire league."

"We didn't even win half our games last season," says Rosé, but in the defiant way of her mother, the one that says challenge fucking accepted.

"That was last season," Lisa says, meeting Rosé's stare. "Every new season is a chance to do better."

"I bet I score the most goals anyone has ever scored in the league!" says Rosé.

"I'm gonna get the most shutouts!" says Ark. He nudges Dennis. "You're gonna help us win the league, you're the fastest player on the team."

"I bet I'm faster," says Rosé, and then they're devolving into an argument that nearly has them going into the parking lot to prove it until Lisa shoots her arm out, barring the booth exit.

"Okay," she says. "I love the fire, but part of being a good competitor is knowing when to save it for another day."

They settle down then, just in time for the pizza to come out, and then they're distracted by the food.

"I've never seen Rosé back down that fast," Jennie says, lowering her voice.

"Probably because you don't control whether she gets to play or not," Lisa replies, a hint of banter in her voice. "I was a competitive kid too. You just have to learn how to channel it without turning into an asshole." She winces, eyes flicking towards Dennis. "I mean, a jerk."

"Oh man, do Dennis's parents get on you about the cursing?" Jennie asks. "Alexander practically made me swear a blood oath I would try to curse less around the twins after they dropped an F bomb at their fourth birthday party."

And there it is again; Lisa clams up, withdrawing almost completely. She focuses on her food and mumbles "Not really."

So Jennie keeps it casual from that point on, just her job and coaching the team and the twins. She know when someone is hurting and doesn't want to make Lisa feel worse. There's clearly a lot more going on here than Lisa just moving to D.C. from Baltimore and volunteering to be her nephew's soccer coach.

Jennie pays for lunch - Lisa tries to split the bill with her but she demurs with something about her kids eating twice as much - and they part ways in the parking lot. Dennis waves goodbye to the twins, looking pleased to have spent time with his friends. Lisa shakes Jennie's hand again, but it feels formal and perfunctory, the kind of handshake business partners give each other before leaving a meeting.

"So did you guys have fun today?" Jennie asks on the drive home, trying not to think about Lisa and all her mysteriousness.

More doubled chatter, Rosé holding up three fingers and waving them at Jennie in the rearview mirror, Ark making diving motions the best he can constrained by his seatbelt.

"Maybe Dennis can come over to our house for sleepover," Rosé says.

"You'll have to ask your parents about that," says Jennie.

"Dennis says he doesn't have a mom and dad," says Ark. "He should spend time at our house cause we have a mom and dad."

"Oh," says Jennie, and a lot of things suddenly become clear. She catches their attention in the rearview. "Guys, I'm glad Dennis felt comfortable enough to tell you about his parents, but just remember he might not want other kids to know that, ok? That's his information to tell."

"What about mom and dad?" Ark asks.

"You guys can tell your mom and dad anything," Jennie says.

"Like the time you let us use a blowtorch in your studio?" Rosé asks.

"NO," Jennie says immediately, at which point the twins exchange a glance, and she knows she's about to have to make yet another bargain to keep herself from getting into trouble with Chahee.

*

Jennie spends the rest of the weekend thinking about her father. She sketches what she remembers of him: his strong hands, his kind smile, the way his hair would flop into his eyes when he was working. It's been over a decade since he passed and she can still feel his absence from her life. He would have loved her work, would have embarrassed her at all her exhibits walking around and crowing about his daughter the artist. He would have seen her graduate from college, would have been proud of the way she refused any help from her mom as she struggled to establish herself and work two jobs at the same time. He would have been the first person to buy a painting from her.

But time has at least ground down the sharpness of her feelings, until she can remember her father without much more than a dull ache. She even smiles, thinking about how she would sit in his lap and play around with the modeling programs on his computer, or cooking weekend brunch together.

On Wednesday she and Chahee meet up for lunch as a thank-you for taking the twins to their game.

"The twins want you to come to every game this season," says Chahee over their food. "Apparently the three games you attended last season weren't enough."

"They just want pizza after every game," Jennie says, although it always brings her a spark of happiness that the twins like her so much.

"They also told me about the little pizza date you had with Lisa," Chahee says, sipping her iced tea and staring at Jennie over the rim of the glass.

"Pretty sure I made her deeply uncomfortable by asking a lot of personal questions," Jennie says ruefully.

Chahee leans in. "Yeah, what's the deal there?" she asks.

"I mean, Dennis told the twins his parents are gone. I assume Lisa takes care of him," Jennie says, remembering the advice she gave Rosé and Ark in the car. Lisa's story is hers to tell and her extreme reticence to share any of it makes Jennie protective of what little she does know.

Chahee squints at her. "You like her."

Jennie nearly gags on a french fry. "Excuse me?"

"You think she's hot. Admit it. You asked her out for lunch."

"The twins asked Dennis to lunch."

"Jennie Kim I've known you since before you had boobs. I know you have a type, and I know you probably took one look at my kids' soccer coach and thought about how you haven't dated anyone in over a year." Chahee isn't smug, just matter-of-fact, and Jennie is mad that she can't even rebut her in good faith.

"Yes, she's hot, but she's totally emotionally unavailable," Jennie says. "I mean, I can guess why."

"Well then just be friends with her," Chahee says. "Don't let her tragic past stop you from leaving your studio more than once a month."

"I go out," Jennie says defensively. "I do stuff. I'm out with you right now."

"I don't count, we're family. You have to see me," Chahee points out. "Jennie, all you do is work. Jisoo agrees with me."

"Since when do you discuss my social life with Jisoo?" Jennie asks.

"Since we met you," Chahee says, as if it should be obvious. "Look, come to the game this weekend. Me and Linc'll be there to deal with the kids so all you have to do is show up, cheer, and be charming."

"I'll think about it," Jennie grouses, but she already knows what she's doing that Saturday.

*

This game is even earlier than the weekend before, and Jennie grumbles all the way to the soccer field. She carts her camp chair and a bottle of water to Field 3 as instructed by Chahee's email and lets out an oof when the twins collide with her in a simultaneous hug.

"Hi Aunt Jennie!" comes the stereo greeting.

"Hey guys," she says, readjusting her sunglasses from where they'd been jostled almost off her face. "Good luck today. You're gonna kill it."

They're off again just like that, joining their friends as they practice passing and taking shots. Across the field, Lisa seems to stare at her, once again half-hidden behind her aviators. Jennie plays it cool, relaxing in her chair, sipping her water, enjoying the last of the warm season.

Alexander sits next to her, watching as Chahee paces back and forth, clapping for everything but otherwise keeping her mouth shut.

"She's better this season," Jennie notes.

"We got an email from Lisa asking for...less sideline coaching," Alexander says. He sounds incredibly amused by the notion.

"How'd Chahee react to that?" Jennie asks, already imagining the scene.

"Well, she threatened to ban Chahee from games if she didn't comply, so..." Alexander is nearly outright laughing now.

"And she's still alive?" Jennie watches Lisa with renewed interest.

"She also pointed out it was making Rosé nervous to have her mother so invested in her performance at a young age," says Alexander. His mouth twists. "I wish we'd seen it sooner, but Rosé's a lot happier playing soccer now."

Jennie watches as the girl flies past, her face stretched in an exultant grin while she dribbles. "What about Ark?"

"You know Ark. He's always happiest doing whatever Rosé is doing."

True enough, Ark is in goal, yelling encouragement at Rosé.

For the rest of the game she switches between watching the twins wreak havoc, Chahee pacing but behaving herself, and Lisa managing her players. Lisa always has a pat on the back or a kind word for players she subs out, with an extra ruffle of the hair for Dennis.

The final whistle blows at six to nothing, yet another crushing victory, although Lisa is quick to have her players line up and shake hands, as well as cheer for their opponents.

Rosé goes running to Chahee, crashing into her arms and getting swung around. Ark does the same with Alexander and Jennie watches them with overwhelming fondness, her little extended family. Nothing can replace her father, but she has so many new people to love that her heart feels even fuller than before sometimes.

"Can Dennis come over this afternoon?" asks Rosé, staring up at her mother. Both twins know that Chahee is the one to ask for sudden favors and Alexander is the one who responds to carefully thought-out requests.

"Sure," Chahee agrees easily. "If it's ok with Coach Lisa."

The twins take off, yelling for Dennis to ask his aunt if he can come over.

"They're gonna corrupt that poor kid," Jennie says.

"Maybe he'll get them to stop making so much trouble," Alexander points out with far too much optimism for someone who has actually lived with the twins for nine years and counting.

Chahee shakes her head at Jennie, asking her not to disillusion her husband.

Ark runs back over, barely able to get the words out between excited panting breaths. "She...said...yes!"

Chahee double-checks with a look and Lisa gives her a thumbs up before resuming what looks like a serious conversation with Rosé and Dennis.

Jennie helps with the packing and picking up any stray litter from the field and walks back to the parking lot with the Parks, three happy, sweaty kids in their wake. Lisa is still with them, patiently answering questions from Rosé about the game.

Once at their cars, she hugs Dennis and slips him some cash, then confers with Chahee while Jennie tries not to eavesdrop. Today she looks even better than last weekend, wearing another tank top that shows off her collarbones and the cut of her triceps. Jennie can see faint tan lines around the edges of the straps and wonders what it would be like to watch Lisa play soccer properly, not just milling around with kids.

"Good game, coach," Jennie says, watching Lisa dump her equipment bag in the trunk of her car.

"Thanks," she says. She leans against her car, arms folded, aviators glinting. "You're pretty close to the Parks."

"Yeah, me and Chahee go way back. Like..." Jennie counts off the years in her head. "Nearly twenty years now."

Lisa's eyebrows pop up.

"And I guess I'm technically godmother to her kids. One of the godmothers," Jennie says.

"That's a pretty big technicality," Lisa says. She seems to hesitate. "One of the godmothers?"

"Yeah, our friend Jisoo. We met her in high school and we kind of just stuck together since."

Lisa is momentarily distracted by Dennis climbing into the Parks' car; she bites her lip and frowns, as though anxious to see him leaving.

"Don't worry," Jennie says, following her gaze. "He's gonna have a great time. If Chahee and Alexander can raise the twins, they can definitely handle one more kid, especially one as well-behaved as Dennis."

"Oh, I'm not worried, it's not..." Lisa's voice trails off, seeing how unconvinced Jennie is. "I don't like to let him out of my sight," she admits.

"I get it. I lost the twins in a supermarket once and it was probably the worst ten minutes of my life," Jennie says. She leans against the car too, balancing her hip against the trunk lid while she faces Lisa. "What are you doing now? We could get coffee, take your mind off of it."

"I..." Lisa seems to stop herself from an automatic rejection, an indecipherable look coming over her face. She pushes off from the car. "Okay. Sure."

Jennie was expecting another deflection, so she's momentarily caught off guard. "Okay? Okay. I mean, great, I know a place. Follow me in your car?"

Lisa agrees, so Jennie leads her away from the suburbs and back towards the city, avoiding D.C. proper and bringing them down to Arlington, which is closer to the Parks' house. The coffee shop where she parks is a favorite of hers; it has a quiet back room with a table that gets good natural light where she can draw without interruption, and the baristas all know her and bring her refills of tea without asking.

"This place is nice," Lisa says, settling in an overstuffed armchair on the other side of a small coffee table from Jennie.

"I spend a lot of time here, whenever I'm doing prep work for a show," Jennie says. The barista is already bringing her a pot of tea and Jennie gives her an easy smile.

"Thanks for bringing me here. It's good for Dennis to make friends. I'm just...I worry about him." Lisa shrugs.

Jennie takes a risk, hoping to get enough out in the open that they can talk a little more freely. "Dennis told the twins about his parents, and they told me. I hope you don't mind."

"No, it's ok. I'm glad he can talk about it with someone." Lisa lets out a slightly shaky breath. "It was a car crash this past spring. They were on their way to pick up Dennis from school and the other driver veered into their lane."

"I'm so sorry," Jennie says. She wants to lean forward to touch Lisa, put a soothing hand on her knee, but something tells her Lisa would react badly to the touch. They're not even really friends yet, but Jennie has thought about her every day for a week, and that's not nothing. She hopes it's not nothing.

"Anyway, I'm just glad he's coming out of his shell a little bit. It's part of why I signed him up for soccer," Lisa says.

"And volunteered to coach. That's really admirable," Jennie says.

A tight smile from Lisa, but not much else.

"So, uh. What can I get you. My treat," Jennie says.

"No, you got the pizza last time. Let me," Lisa says, already standing up to head back to the counter. "What kind of tea is that?"

"Jasmine," Jennie says, accepting that Lisa wants to get back at least a little control in their conversation. Her phone chirps while Lisa is gone, and she pulls it out of her jeans pocket to find a text from Chahee.

Big Park (11:02 AM): Hope you're having a good time with coach :) :) :)

Jennie smiles at Chahee's relentlessness, holding on to it until Lisa returns with a cup of something sweet-smelling. Jennie once again tries to keep their conversation light, especially after such a heavy revelation. Lisa is in pain, and all of Jennie's instincts want to help soothe her, to try and be there for someone who seems to want nothing but the best for her nephew.

Even skimming the surface of their lives, it's easy to talk to Lisa. She's interested in Jennie's work, even if she professes not to know much about art, and asks great questions and pays real attention. With her elbow on the arm of the chair and her chin propped in her hand, afternoon sunlight painting her light gold, she looks like Jennie is the only other person in the world while she listens. She only pulls out her phone to check the time, eyes widening when she sees it's been nearly two hours.

"I'm sorry I kept you so long," Lisa says, moving to gather up her now-empty cup.

"No, you're a great listener," Jennie says. "I don't have anywhere else to be today. Unless you..."

"Me neither," Lisa says. And then looks down at her lap, as though she shouldn't have admitted it to Jennie.

"I'm hungry. You hungry?" Jennie asks, realizing she's going to have be the one to take the initiative if she wants to build an actual friendship. When her father died, her friends were the ones who got her out of the house, who kept her moving forward until she could stand to take a few steps on her own. She knows how easy it is to just stay inside a bubble of grief until it becomes normal. "You're new in town so how about I show you the best burrito place the tourists don't know about."

She's already standing up, car keys swinging from her index finger, and it works like a charm on Lisa, who stands up with her. "Sounds good," she says.

*

Jennie watches in fascination as Lisa neatly devours a super burrito the size of her forearm. Somehow she manages to take the damn thing apart bite by bite without spilling a drop; it's the most impressive food-related exhibit Jennie has seen since Jisoo built an actual rocketship birthday cake with working engines for the twins.

"I skipped breakfast," Lisa says, noticing that Jennie is watching her.

"You don't need to explain yourself to me," says Jennie. "That was incredible." She's starting to like the way Lisa will dart her eyes away at a compliment, so different from the authoritative woman instructing her players like a battlefield commander.

"You were right, this place is good," Lisa says. She crumples up her napkin and tosses it in her basket, also gathering Jennie's empty plate without being asked. It's still mid-afternoon when they head outside, sunglasses sliding down over their eyes, and Dennis isn't due to be picked up for a couple of hours yet, so Jennie tries one more thing.

"Come on," she says, leading Lisa down the sidewalk at a leisurely pace.

They walk for about fifteen minutes, Jennie pointing out a few shops here and there until they reach their destination, a little hole-in-the-wall gallery with a hand-carved wooden sign hanging over the door and a painting in the window that could be of a sea creature or an abstract of a human face.

"Is this your...?" Lisa asks.

"No, but I got my start here," Jennie says. She opens the door for Lisa, gesturing for her to go first.

Inside, the gallery is pleasantly temperate, with subtle track lighting highlighting pieces along both walls of the single long room. Someone comes bustling out of the back at the sound of the chime above the door, a small middle-aged woman in trousers and a flowing peasant top.

"Jennie!" she says, coming forward with her arms outstretched for a hug.

"Hi Dana," Jennie says, stopping a little to hug the woman. She steps aside. "Dana, this is Lisa. She coaches my godkids' soccer team. Lisa, this is Dana. She put up my first ever exhibit out of art school."

Lisa shakes hands with Dana, that same firm up-and-down she first gave Jennie.

"Let me know if you need anything honey," says Dana. She gives Lisa a very obvious once-over, an even more obvious smirk at Jennie, and returns to the back.

Jennie pretends she didn't notice Dana's lack of subtlety and starts showing Lisa around the intimate space, examining the paintings that are up now. Lisa asks her what she thinks and is as engaged as ever, paying attention to Jennie's informed critiques and her little asides about art history.

"Ok, so if you had to buy one painting in this whole gallery, which one," Jennie asks, gesturing to both walls.

Lisa peers at the nearest price tag. "On a P.E. teacher's salary? None of them," she says with good humor.

"Come on," Jennie says, nudging her shoulder lightly. "If money was no object. Which one."

Lisa takes her time, turning in a circle, regarding each painting very seriously. Jennie likes how deliberate she is, how seriously she takes the question. Eventually she points to one a little ways down the right wall, a self-portrait of the artist, rumpled and half out of bed.

"What do you like about it?" Jennie asks.

Lisa tilts her head just so, examining the painting up close. "It makes you want to know more about this moment. The pose, and the..." She struggles for a word.

"Movement," Jennie suggests, because she feels the same about this painting.

"Yes. Movement. It's a painting but she's going somewhere, or coming from somewhere. I don't know. Does that make sense?" Lisa looks at Jennie earnestly, wanting her feedback as the professional artists of the two.

"It makes perfect sense," Jennie says. She bumps Lisa's shoulder with her own. "I would have bought this painting too."

By then it's time for Lisa to go pick up Dennis, so they walk back to where they parked outside of the coffee shop.

"I had a good time," Jennie says.

"Me too," says Lisa, smiling. But then the smile slides from her face. "Jennie, was this a date? To you, I mean."

"It doesn't have to be," Jennie says. "It can just be two friends hanging out. I think it would be nice to be your friend."

The smile returns, slightly relieved, and Jennie doesn't quite know how to feel about that. "Friends. That sounds nice to me too. Thank you."

On impulse, Jennie finally hugs her, just a brief clasp of her arms around Lisa's body, hands rubbing lightly at the center of her back. "Say hi to Dennis for me."

"Are you coming to next week's game?" Lisa asks.

Jennie doesn't even hesitate to sacrifice her lazy Saturday morning. "Wouldn't miss it," she says.