DEPTH OF FIELD/ #ONC2024

FIVE

FINN

2009

"It's good here," I say. "The soup, I mean." 

My. tongue feels too big for my mouth, and my voice sounds foreign, even to me.

"Yeah?" Finn pushes his dark hair out of his eyes, and for a brief second, I see a hint of a smile. But then it's gone., as though he thought better of it and changed his mind.

I nod. "It's split pea. I had it yesterday. Big chunks of ham. I... I mean ... it's good unless you're a vegetarian or something."  

Or something? What the hell? 

"I'll have some if you have some," Finn says, looking awkward. 

I don't really want soup. I had a cheese scone earlier that was the size of a grapefruit. But I say, "OK," before I can stop myself.

"Gotcha," James says, smoothing his hands on the front of his apron. "Coming right up."

Finn and I look at the empty chair beside me. Then we look at each other. And I feel that surge of... I don't know... SOMETHING, again. Like I've been winded and for a brief moment I'm worried I might actually pass out.

"Can I?" Finn says.

"Sorry?"

"Sit down."

"Oh," I say. "Yes. Of course."

Finn sits. 

I try to breathe.

We both stare at nothing.

And neither of us says a word. Because he knows I saw what just happened here. And I know he knows it. So exchanging pleasantries like "The coffee is so good here" would seem superficial.

Finn pulls the container of sugar packets across the table toward him and begins to arrange them in neat rows.

I stir my sugarless coffee with a teaspoon.

"I guess you must feel pretty shitty," I finally say, because, what the hell. It would feel stupid to talk about the weather. "So, don't feel like you have to make conversation or anything. It's OK to just feel like crap, I think."

Finn's fingers freeze on the sugar packets, and he stares at me with those soft hazel eyes, this time allowing the smile to happen. Just a little. "Thanks," he says. "And, yeah. I've had better days."

"I'll bet."

He looks out the window and frowns. Shifts a little in his chair. Rubs the side of his jaw with the palm of his hand. "Thing is," he says. "I knew. I knew she'd been cheating on me for weeks. And you know what?"

"What?"

"What really bugs me isn't that she was sleeping with some other guy; it's that I knew, and I didn't call her on it. I just let it happen." He stares at the sugar packets and sighs. Shakes his head.

Instinctively, I touch the arm of his jacket, then draw it away quickly as if I'd been scorched. "No., you didn't. Maybe you were just hoping it wasn't true."

He looks at me and blinks slowly. "You're right. That's exactly what I was hoping. That somehow I was just being paranoid, and it would all be okay, you know?

"Sure," I say, but I don't know. Outside of the year I dated Lewis, I have always been pretty much on my own. "You're just a human."

And for some reason, this makes him laugh. Which makes me laugh, and there we sit,  staring at a container of white sugar packets, both of us absurd.

"You should write about it," Finn says. He points to my open laptop, and I am mortified that the lyrics of REM's Everybody Hurts, written multiple times, still fill my screen.

"Umm ... I... " I stammer.

"You're a writer, yeah?"

"I ..."

"I've seen you here a lot. You're always writing."

"I'm sort of working on something," I tell him. "It's fiction, but it's pretty rough."

"A book?"

I nod, suddenly embarrassed, which is infuriating because why am I embarrassed about my novel? Where did that even come from? 

"You're blushing," Finn says, his hazel eyes lighter than they were a few minutes ago. "Do you write Lesbian erotica or something? "

And then we're laughing again, the manic edge to it just slightly removed from hysteria. To anyone else, would would look crazed.

"Do you think I'm a freak for sitting down at your table ten minutes after I broke up with my girlfriend?" Finn asks. "For telling you all this shit?"

"Maybe," I say because he does have a point. "A little?"

"Fair enough," Finn says. "But just so you know, I'm not an axe murderer or anything."

"I know."

"You do?

I nod.

"How do you know?"

"I don't think axe murderers wear pea coats."

"Or eat pea soup?"

"Or eat pea soup."

"Do you want to get out of here?" Finn says.

"What? Now? What about the  soup?"

"James can toss it back in the pot. He won't mind."

I look over my shoulder at the counter and see James standing in the kitchen. He gives me a thumbs-up and nods. He's heard our entire conversation.

"Where would we go?" I say, hating the quaver I hear in my voice. A quaver that's there because I'm Fenna Bakker--a girl who doesn't just get up and leave a diner with a strange boy in the middle of the day without any plan. 

Finn stands up, buttons his jacket, and then extends his hand. "Let's walk," he says.

So, we do.