Page 79 of The Hot Shot
“Oh, you mean the part where you invited Britt to stay here without asking me?”
“I can hardly ask, Finnegan, when you don’t answer your phone.”
Zing.
With a sigh, I lean against the opposite counter. “I said I was sorry. I shouldn’t have avoided you. But you can be stubborn as shi... as hell.”
My mom snorts and turns to put the dishes in the sink. “You can say ‘shit,’ Finn. I am a grown-up.”
“Mothers aren’t grown-ups. They are part chaste saint and part eternal nag.”
“Ha.”
I steal a mango from the fruit bowl and go in search of a paring knife. “I’m fine now, okay? Happy even. So, please, let it go with Britt. Let the scab heal.”
“Consider me done with meddling,” my mom vows with a lift of her hand. “A wise woman knows when to say when.”
I let it go that she missed that mark by a few months. Wise men know when to back away slowly.
“So...” my mom says in a voice that is distinctly meddling. “Chess is nice.”
A smile pulls at my lips. “Niceisn’t how I’d describe her.”
“Oh? And how would you describe her? Here, use a plate.”
Perfect. Fuckable. Stunning. Funny. Mine. Mine.
Mine.
“Great.” I put the mango on the plate. “She’s great.”
Mom sighs in exasperation. “Men. None of you know how to properly describe your feelings.”
She makes me grateful for every sunrise. Because I wake up knowing she’s in the world.
I set the knife down and face my mother. “Just... be nice to her, okay?”
“Finnegan Dare Mannus, I am never rude to my guests, and you well know it.”
“That’s not what I meant. She’s had a rough time. Lost her house, her workplace. Her best friend is off in a new relationship. I don’t think her parents are in the picture.” I run a hand over my face. “She needs a little care, okay? It’s important to me.”
Mom’s eyes meet mine. God, she’s welling up again. “Oh, Finn, you’ve gone and done it. You’ve fallen in—”
“Jesus. That’s it. No more heart-to-hearts with you for at least five years.”
“Just remember, Finnegan,” she says, ignoring my protest. “Love with your heart, not your head. Think about things too much and it all turns to shit.”
I grimace, hoping to hell Chess doesn’t hear her. Even so, I fight a smile. “Thanks, Mom, but don’t say ‘shit.’ It offends my delicate sensibilities.”
Before she can snap me with a towel, I grab my plate ofmango and head out to find Dad. And some much-needed testosterone-injected conversation.
Chess
Finn’s old room is not a shrine to all things Finn as I’d expected it to be. There are a few tasteful black-and-white photos of him throughout his career, including a ridiculously cute peewee football shot, where Finn is basically an oversize helmet and pads walking around on tiny legs.
Aside from that, the room is done entirely in ethereal blue and creamy white. The ocean, I know, is just beyond the massive windows that are open a crack to let in the breeze. But it’s dark as pitch out there now.
Finn and I dithered and stalled, talking around the firepit long after dinner had ended and his family had trickled off to their beds.
