Page 14 of Brad & Finn
“Goodnight, Finn.”
“Goodnight, Brad,” Finn said as he stepped forward to take the door out of Brad’s hands. He held the door open just long enough for Brad to step out before softly shutting it and sliding the security chain into place.
The shaking that had started in his hands had spread down his legs, and he pressed his back against the door and slowly sank to the floor. He should probably text the group chat he had going with Chloe and Kendall–or at the very least, he should text Chloe. She would need to be updated on the situation, since they would be seeing Brad the following evening.
His phone was uncomfortably pressing against his tailbone, but he couldn’t find the energy to pull it out. Instead, he curled his knees up to his chest and thunked his head back against the door.
There genuinely hadn’t been much of a plan for this weekend—but this sure as hell hadn’t been part of it.
3
BRAD
Brad likedto think he was a rather adaptable person.
What had he done when the general store owner lowered his mom’s hours, and Brad could no longer afford to go on the wildly popular freshman school field trip? He’d taken himself on his own trip out to Yellow Branch Falls, and it had been fine. After all, he liked hiking alone!
What about when his career in sports medicine ended because the doctor he was shadowing was slapped with a malpractice lawsuit? He’d treated it as the kick in the pants he needed to finally begin pursuing his dream of being a coach.
Now, the somewhat aloof co-captain of the cheerleading team, who Brad had always had a tangle of feelings about, reappeared as a gorgeous, still somewhat aloof, yet also open and warm trans man?
Brad tripped over a root in the sidewalk and just barely managed to stifle a string of curse words that would have ruined the day of an elderly couple walking by.
Everything was fine.
After his brain kept him up until 5 am, dissecting a running loop of every memory he had of Finn, he’d still managed to get alittle over three hours of sleep. Sometimes when he had to travel overnight on a recruiting trip, he’d run a full day of school visits on less than two hours of sleep.
So what if he’d woken up to some R-rated thoughts about the man across the hall? It just made him take a cold shower, and now he was better prepared for the day!
See? Adaptable.
The Roll, the cafe he was meeting his mom at, had some of the worst coffee this side of the Mason-Dixon Line, but their cinnamon rolls had been voted Best in State for the past twenty years. The sugar was bound to help him, and if it didn’t, he could always go back to his hotel room and try for a nap later on. Finn was most likely going to be with Chloe for the day, so at least his proximity would no longer be a distraction.
Brad nearly ran face-first into a low-hanging branch. He dodged around it and executed a perfectly calculated, not at all abrupt stop right in front of his mother.
“Hi, honey,” she said, laughter and affectionate judgment evident in her voice and the curve of her smile.
He bent his head down to receive the mandatory cheek kiss, and—because she had definitely witnessed his near-decapitation—he also received a gentle pat on the cheek.
“Hi, Mom. Does it look like there’s a wait?”
“Of course it does. You know they’ve only had those same few tables and booths since you were a boy,” she said, which was the same thing she said every time they ate here.
Brad held the door open for her, and the smell of cinnamon and burnt coffee nearly bowled him over.
When Brad was around twenty-five, he’d had his first real relationship with a guy. His name was Enzo, and he sold candles at the local farmer’s market. While candles weren’t really Brad’s thing, even he could recognize the guy had a raw talent for it. He told Brad a story from his childhood, about makingpasta with his nonna, and spending evenings pressing tomatoes for canning with his nonno. He’d made a candle called “My Summers in Brooklyn,” and Brad could have sworn he could smell the powdery flour and taste the sweet tomato pulp.
Enzo hadn’t asked, and Brad hadn’t volunteered, but he was pretty sure he knew what his childhood candle would have smelled like. It would have smelled like this cafe, with the funk of teenage boys pressed too closely into tight corner booths and the sharp tang of the football grass still clinging to their jerseys. The perfume his mom had always worn would have tied it all together, and he would have called it “Home.”
As he stepped up behind his mother, he could almost pick out the soft notes of lilac underneath the cloyingly sweet smell of the cafe. That is, until the door opened behind them, letting in the crisp morning air, as well as a brief flash of a fruity perfume and something a little darker, almost oaky. There was something familiar about the smell.
“Ms. Willson! It’s been too long!” a bright feminine voice said.
Brad turned around and felt the bottom drop out of his stomach. Standing less than a foot away was Chloe, in a flouncy sundress and jean jacket, and Finn, looking tired but sharp in a blue canvas jacket over a magenta polo. He couldn’t help but notice that they matched almost too perfectly.
His mom turned to exclaim excitedly at Chloe, and Finn met Brad’s eyes for about the length of three of Brad’s stuttered heartbeats before looking away. He wrapped his arm around Chloe’s shoulders, and she leaned into his side like she belonged there.
Brad stared at the line their bodies made, pressing together like pieces of a puzzle, completely missing whatever his mom was saying to Chloe.
