Chapter 1: i
Summary:
Enter Logan, Finn, & their dysfunctional families.
enjoy!
-m
Notes:
This fic will include sexual content. Instead of warning you before each one, this is just a broad warning for the entire fic. If you aren't comfortable with that, then please take care when reading, not only on my fics but on this site in general. Please know your own limits.
If you have questions about specifics, feel free to comment and I'll try my best to answer without spoiling for other readers. I don't like putting content warnings in the chapter notes because it feels like a spoiler, so here are the broad ones for the entire fic:
*sexual content
*slight war content
*main character injury
*hospital atmosphere (marine and people)
*crude languageIf you read this and come across other content you think people should be warned about, please let me know immediately. This is a relatively easy-going, uplifting fic, but triggers can come from anywhere and I'd like to be a safe space.
Thank you,
-m
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
“You don’t have to,” Finn said for the fifteenth time that day.
Logan looked up at him from the ice cream in his hand. The gulls above them chirped, swirling in the air. A shadow from one of them passed over Logan’s tanned skin. Finn thought that was pretty apt for the mood of the day.
“But I am,” Logan replied for the fifteenth time, soft and gentle. Finn was surprised Logan was still being gentle about it, about Finn’s arguments and dread. Usually, Logan would have snapped by now.
Finn stirred the ice cream in his cup. Logan lowered his cone, eyes on Finn.
“Fish,” Logan said gently. “It’s just for six months. I’ll be back.”
“You can’t promise that,” Finn said, turning to look out at the sparkling water of the bay. His voice cracked. And somewhere deep inside, his heart was breaking. Had been breaking since Logan first told him. Since Logan’s trip to boot camp, since Logan’s short return before his first tour. But now it felt truly, fully snapped.
Finn just couldn’t keep seeing it. In his dreams: Logan, burned and torn apart by a land mine. Logan, shot in the chest by enemy fire. Logan, MIA after a night recon.
Logan frowned. “No. I can’t promise. But…” he sighed. “Harz…”
“I’m sorry,” Finn said immediately. “Sorry. Just- it’s your last day. Let’s… we can’t change anything. Let’s just enjoy it, yeah?”
Logan was still frowning when Finn pretended to be interested in his half-melted ice cream.
“Hey, guys!” The whistles and familiar smell of the chlorine pool greeted them an hour later. The meet was over- but they weren’t here to swim. Or to watch. Logan was here to say goodbye, and, well, Finn wasn’t going anywhere until Logan got into a car in the morning and drove away.
Their old teammates rushed them. Most of them went right for Logan, which was normal, even without them all knowing he shipped out tomorrow. Logan was the star. Logan was the one with all the swimming titles. Logan was the one that, last year, still came around and helped coach them in his free time.
They were weird like that- old teams. Finn and Logan had graduated two years ago now, but the juniors and seniors had been their friends. Their guys. Now when Finn looked at them, he saw young kids instead of equals.
Once the guys let Logan and Finn go- insisting on a race in the pool for old times’ sake and only letting up when Logan said, “Not today, boys”- their old coach stepped up.
Arthur Weasley was a jolly man. He treated his boys more like his sons than high school swimmers. So neither man was surprised when Arthur hugged them instead of shaking their outstretched hands.
“You know where they’re sending you?” He asked Logan the moment they parted.
Finn bit the inside of his lip.
“No, sir,” Logan said, that small, gentle smile still on his face.
Arthur frowned. “Well. You take care. I’m going to ask your family for updates every week, you understand?”
Logan gave a small huff of a laugh. “Yes, sir.”
Coach Weasley winked at them. “Well. The army’s getting themselves one hell of a swimmer, that’s for sure.”
“Yeah,” Finn managed, and Logan knocked their shoulders together.
Coach Weasley turned at the sound of his name being called. When he looked back at them, his eyes were kind and wistful. “Take care. Both of you.” As he retreated, he turned around to add, “O’Hara- put on some sunscreen!”
Finn chuckled and raised a hand to press to his cheek. Logan nudged him again.
“You are looking a little pink, Fish.”
“Oh, shut the fuck up,” Finn grunted, rolling his eyes. “We can’t all be tan.”
“Freckle,” Logan heckled him.
“Shortie,” Finn shot back.
Logan glared at him. “That’s just cruel.”
“Well!” A new voice. Finn almost groaned.
Jackson Nadeau, senior and rising star. They all knew it. This year’s top swimmer. Who was this close to breaking Logan’s records. He’d moved in after they’d already been gone- coming all the way from Michigan. Finn hadn’t even been aware they had swimming in Michigan. He’d thought all those boys were raised on hockey.
“Soldier boy,” Jackson chirped, smirking, just in his swim spandex. “And the sidekick. What are you doing here?”
Logan frowned. Anytime they came around, Jackson heckled them. Bold moves for a young kid, but he was proud.
“Just saying bye to coach,” Logan muttered, moving to turn. Finn went to follow, but then Jackson spoke again.
“You know your records are mine, right?”
Logan stiffened. Ever so slightly- but Finn could tell. Finn could always tell.
Logan, collected and calm until someone pushed the wrong buttons. Logan, who was set to go to the Olympics someday, once he finished his stint in the army and got enough money to afford trainers and international tours for practice. Logan, who’s one button was his future.
“Is that a challenge?” Logan asked, looking over his shoulder, still smiling.
“Any time, any place,” Jackson taunted.
Logan just chuckled. “See you around, Nadeau.”
Finn sent the other boy a glare as he followed Logan out of the pool.
“What a dick,” he muttered, rolling his eyes as he hopped into the truck. Logan, getting into the passenger side, snorted.
“He’s certainly full of himself.”
“I thought you might punch him for a moment there,” Finn admitted.
Logan shrugged. “Not worth it. I got bigger shit going on.”
Finn’s brows rose. “Than swimming?”
“Than petty high school boys,” Logan retorted, flipping his sunglasses down. “Now step on it Fish, or we’re gonna be late and our mama’s will kill us.”
Finn smiled and turned on the radio. On the drive, he couldn’t help glancing over at Logan, awash with the sunset, window down, feet up.
Logan was always grinning back at him.
It wasn’t something they talked about- the wanting. They both knew it was there. They both knew they both knew, too. But they didn’t acknowledge it. Finn had tried, once, and Logan had shut him down so fast Finn almost got whiplash. It had been the only awkward moment they’d ever had.
The thing was, they didn’t talk about it. But they did know. And knowing was… torture. Because there had been kisses, and there had been wandering hands, and there had been moments. But they didn’t talk about them. And as far as Finn knew, Logan didn’t even think about Them. Capital ‘T’ Them, which was how Finn had come to think of the two of them.
They’d known each other since… well, forever. Finn had always lived in the house he grew up in. Born and brough home to that house, with his mother and father and older brother, Alex. Logan had moved to the house across the street when he was two. Playdates had been set up. Their moms became fast friends. Their dads were drinking and fishing buddies.
They’d gone to preschool together. Then elementary, when they started swimming. Then to middle school, where their bodies stretched and changed and Finn first started to wonder. Logan got his first girlfriend their freshman year of high school, and Finn, not wanting to seem left behind or lost, had gotten his three weeks later. Double dates. Biking to and from school until Finn got his pick-up their junior year. Swimming. Hotel rooms shared and sleepovers where they both pretended sleeping in one bed was efficient and not something they wanted. Break-ups and more girlfriends. Heckling each other in locker rooms and team dinners and bus rides, where they fell asleep on each other’s shoulders and didn’t mention it when they woke up. More swimming. Small mentions of first times. Comments about tits in the locker room when asked. Graduating high school with two girls under their arms- freshmen in college that the rest of the guys on the team were jealous of. Dinners at each other’s houses. First days of college at the University of Tampa just across the bridge so they could stay home their first years instead of dorm rooms. Sharing an apartment their sophomore years of college. Drinking, swimming, grinning at each other from opposite sides of their second-hand couch. Major changes. Weird hours between working and classes and not seeing much of each other during the week.
And between it all, their first kiss their junior year of high school. Finn laying on Logan’s shoulder as they watched a movie, both of them ignoring it until Logan looked down at him and just… leaned in. Finn had been startled. He’d thought it was just him. Just him who had these weird… feelings. Logan had laughed it off and walked across the street to go home before the end of the movie. The next day, things were back to normal.
Their second kiss, their freshman year of college. They were drunk and flushed, just home from their first party. It happened in the entry hallway of Logan’s house. Finn had needed to walk home and then around the block after- he’d sobered in an instant when his lips touched Logan’s.
Their first make-out, the first day they lived in their apartment. Logan crowding him up to the shut door, his mother just having left, and leaning in. Finn’s hands on Logan’s waist. Logan’s hands in his hair.
Logan had disappeared to unpack for a few hours after that.
The first time Finn’s hands dared to stray lower than Logan’s waist. The puff of breath. The stifled moans. They’d both come in their pants after rutting against each other’s thighs.
High school locker rooms weren’t kind to boys who liked boys. The army wasn’t kind to boys who liked boys. The world wasn’t kind to boys who liked boys.
But they were boys who liked boys, and they brushed it off with comments about being horny teenage boys.
But they both knew.
“Mom,” Logan groaned, shaking his head as she brought out a cake. She’d been alternating between crying and laughing all evening.
“Just blow out the candles, Lo-Lo,” Noelle, his older sister, said with a laugh. There were tears in her eyes, too.
Finn produced a lighter from thin air and lit the candles. He laughed as Logan’s cheeks heated, knowing how much Logan hated birthday cakes and candles and attention like that. Surely that kind of dislike translated into going-away parties.
Logan puffed the candles out before anyone could pester him more about it.
Everyone cheered.
Finn bumped into Noelle on his way back from the shower.
“Shit, sorry,” he managed, huffing a laugh.
She looked him up and down without a word, mouth tight. The party had ended hours ago- Finn thought the rest of the house was asleep, awaiting the dawn when Logan would leave.
But Noelle frowned, studying him.
“What?” Finn asked, a hand going to his hair. Did he have toothpaste on his face or something?
“I think…” Noelle started, then stopped. She sighed.
“What, Noe?” Finn asks, brows scrunching now.
She shook her head and set a hand on his shoulder. “Be gentle with him, Finn,” she said softly. Too softly.
Finn’s blood ran cold. “What?” He managed.
She gave him a too-knowing, sad smile. “Tonight of all nights. Be good to each other.”
“Noel-“ Finn started, but she was already ducking past him toward the kitchen.
“Just promise me,” she whispered, and then was gone.
Logan was sprawled across the bed, belly-down, when Finn got back. They’d shared this bed a million times growing up, but every year older they got, the harder it was. Not because they took up more space, but because it was so difficult for Finn not to each across the lessening space and grip Logan tight.
“Alright?” Finn asks, dropping his small bag of toiletries onto Logan’s dresser, where he always did. There was a couch in the back of the room, but they both knew Finn slept in the bed.
Logan made a non-committal sound.
“Lo?” Finn asked, sitting on the edge of the bed.
Logan rolled over with a small groan. His eyes were… red.
“Logan?” Finn asked, softer, leaning toward him.
Logan opened his arms.
That was all it took.
Finn fell against him. Logan wrapped him up, face buried in Finn’s red hair. Finn pressed his cheek to Logan’s chest, heart racing, eyes wide.
They never talked about it. But they knew.
“Lo?” Finn asked, voice small and hoarse.
“Finn,” Logan started, but stopped at the tears that began instead. Finn lifted his head, pulling his body further onto the bed so he could prop himself up with his elbows.
“Logan,” Finn whisper, touching his warm fingers to Logan’s cool cheek. “Hey… what…?”
Logan shook his head, tears leaking silently down his face. He just blinked up at Finn. His hand came up to cradle Finn’s on his cheek.
“You’re scared,” Finn realized, seeing the flitting way Logan’s eyes went from his left to his right, as if memorizing him. “You… Logan.”
Logan let out a broken huff. “Of course I’m scared, Fish. I’m… I’m twenty years old. Of course, I’m scared.”
“Oh, baby,” Finn whispered, then stilled. He’d let it slip. He hadn’t meant to-
Logan choked out a punched-out sound. Wounded. Broken. Then he lurched up and kissed Finn.
Finn let his elbows give out, dropping onto Logan fully. Logan’s hands were everywhere- on his shoulders, his back, his hair.
“Finn, Finn,” Logan was chanting.
“Shh, Lo, hey-“ Finn tried, knowing Noelle shared a wall with Logan. But with their conversation in the hall, Finn wasn’t sure what Noelle knew and didn’t. Either way, he didn’t want her to hear this.
This was for them.
Logan whined.
“We can’t,” he said, punched out of him, yanking his mouth from Finn’s. “Finn, we-“
“Logan,” Finn whispered, trapping his cheeks between his hands to force Logan to look at him. “Logan, we can-“
“No, no,” Logan said, shaking his head. His eyes flitted, terrified. His lip trembled. “Finn- Finn…”
Finn eased away from him slightly, giving him space. Logan was shaking.
“Lo…” He started gently, “Logan, we can.”
Logan was crying again. “I can’t. I’m not supposed to.”
Finn leaned down and kissed one of his cheeks, then the other. “You can, Lo.”
Logan let out a long, trembling exhale. When Finn tentatively kissed him again, Logan grabbed him to him. Hands on waists and Logan’s knee coming up between Finn’s thighs to rub. Finn groaned.
“Baby,” Finn managed again. He ground down.
“Finn, Finn, mon rouge, Finn-“
Finn almost lost his mind at that. It wasn’t often that Logan’s French came out. His mother and father had met abroad, years ago. And while they spoke both French and English in their house, Logan tried hard to keep his accent and French away from others.
The fact that Logan had just… just called him a pet name in French, something that he didn’t like the world hearing…
Logan’s hand slipped under Finn’s t-shirt. They were really going now- grinding against each other’s thighs, pajama pants askew and tight where Finn could feel Logan’s erection.
Lips on his neck, climbing up to his temple, down to his collarbone, his neckline pulled askew so Logan could scatter bites and kisses there, too. Finn wanted to pull their clothes off. He wanted to touch. He wanted to just… see.
Matching erections. Hands. Panting breaths. Finn’s head thrown back when Logan crawls atop him. Logan’s French slurring into intelligible sounds. Toes curling. Legs wrapped together.
Finn doesn’t make it as far as even Logan’s shirt. Logan’s back arches above him, eyes shutting hard, and Finn can tell by the hand he’s still got pressed to Logan that the soft moan of pleasure means only one thing.
And Finn… he sees it. For the first time- he sees Logan’s face as he comes. Open. Raw. Beautiful.
“Finn,” comes his broken plea, and Finn realizes he’s still grinding up against him, panting. Hands on his cheeks, Logan lets out a soft laugh. “Finn, c’mon, rouge, mon rouge-“ he presses a kiss between Finn’s brows. “For me. For me-“
Finn muffles his cry in Logan’s shoulder as his vision goes white.
It shouldn’t be a thing. They’ve changed in the same locker room a thousand times. Since they were kids. They’ve lived in the same apartment for a year now.
But Logan goes quiet, and Finn doesn’t have the heart to mention how much he wants to do that again, but with his mouth all over Logan. He doesn’t want to spook him.
Finn just lets Logan lay his head on his chest, both of them breathing hard.
After about ten minutes, Logan lets out a huff of disbelieving laughter. He lifts his head and presses a soft- so soft- kiss to Finn’s jawline. Finn feels like bursting.
“I’m… going to get us a towel…” Logan mutters, rolling away. Finn’s fingers trail from him like a thread falling from his fingers.
“Wait-“ Finn starts, voice weak. He’s about to leave. Logan’s not going to talk about it- Finn can’t do this again.
Logan, standing now, leans down and presses another of those gentle kisses to his skin. “Be right back.” Then, in an imitation of Finn, he winks and adds, “Baby.”
Finn splutters as Logan slips out the door.
He does come back. Carrying a warm, damp towel and another pair of pajama pants from the shared bathroom with Noelle.
Logan, quiet and looking suddenly shy, kneels gently in front of Finn, who’s moved to sit on the edge of the bed. Logan’s already changed. His new pants are Finn’s from their freshman year of college. He thought he’d lost those.
Logan tugs ever-so-slightly on the hem of Finn’s pants.
Finn blinks at him. Then nods, mouth slightly open.
Logan shuffles him out of his pants, then- and it’s sweet, honestly- cleans him up and presses a kiss to his stomach. Then he helps Finn into his new pants.
Finn laughs breathlessly. “God. Fuck. Hi.”
Logan tilts his head, his recently cropped dark hair not falling in his eyes like it used to. Finn misses it. God, he misses so much about Logan, and he isn’t even gone yet. But Logan’s eyes glitter.
“Hi.”
“Bon-jour,” Finn tries.
Logan makes a face and shakes his head. “Oh, no, Finn.”
Finn snorts and grabs Logan’s shoulders to fall back onto the bed with him. Logan lets out a surprised grunt, but comes.
In the silence that follows, the dread creeps back in. Finn holds Logan a little tighter than necessary, but Logan isn’t complaining. He just shuffles further onto the bed.
“Who?” Logan asks finally.
“What?” Finn asks, looking over at him.
“Who?” Logan asks again, fingers in Finn’s hair, brows cocked. There’s a little self-deprecating smile on his face.
“Who… what?” Finn asks, baffled.
Logan chuckles and rolls onto him completely, burying his nose in Finn’s neck. “Never mind.”
“What?” Finn asks, shaking his head, but now he’s smiling. “What are you talking about?”
“Nothing, nothing,” Logan says around his own smile. Finn can feel it against his skin.
“No, what?” Finn asks, trying to tug Logan from his neck so he can see his face. But Logan isn’t going anywhere. He just starts laughing. “Lo!”
“Shh, shh,” Logan tries, putting a palm over Finn’s mouth.
Finn kisses it.
Logan is quiet the next morning. The alarm goes off at four. Finn blinks, bleary and exhausted, but Logan rolls away, groaning, and starts pulling on the uniform his mother left on a hanger last night, starched and ready. Finn falls back asleep for long enough that Logan leans down and kisses his cheek.
“Up, mon rouge,” Logan mutters, morning voice hoarse but teeth obviously brushed. “Morning.”
“Lo,” Finn complains, finally sitting up. “I-“ he stalls.
Logan’s standing there, blinking down at him. A small smile dances on his lips. But he’s in his greens.
“Oh,” Finn finishes, feeling his throat close up.
“Oh- no-“ Logan shakes his head, stepping close. “Finn…”
“No, no.” Finn waves off his concern. “I know. I know.
Logan keeps coming anyway. He wraps Finn up. “I’ll be back.”
“You can’t promise that,” Finn reminds him, but he wraps his own arms loosely around Logan’s neck. “No one can.”
Logan kisses his temple. “I’ll be back, Finn.” Finn pulls back to stare at him. Logan’s smile is lopsided. “I have to be.”
Finn lets himself believe it. He’s leaning in for a kiss when a knock sounds on Logan’s door.
“Baby boys!” It’s Alex, Finn’s older brother. He sounds exhausted. Finn didn’t even know he was planning to come over to see Logan off. “Are you awake?”
Logan springs back as the door opens, and when Alex comes into view, Finn is just sitting up in bed and Logan is zipping his bag, back turned toward the door.
Finn blinks at the sudden shift. Alex looks between them. Then he walks over and ruffles Logan’s hair. “Mornin’, Tremblay.”
“Hey, Alex,” Logan says with a small, nervous laugh.
“Oh, lookin’ good in that uniform. Hey, Finn, doesn’t he?”
Finn narrows his eyes at his brother. Alex just sighs. “Love me a man in uniform.”
Logan laughs, ducking away as Alex’s arm comes up to wrap around his shoulders.
“This man in uniform is taken, Al, back off,” Logan chirps, dancing away from him.
There’s a moment of silence as Finn blinks in surprise. Alex scoffs. Logan looks nervous, and red, and twitchy.
“Since when?” Alex asks, regarding Logan. “Who’s the lucky gal?”
Logan just waves him off, muttering something in French that neither O’Hara brother can pick apart. Alex looks at Finn with raised brows. Finn forces a shrug.
He can’t remember a girl. A girlfriend. A talking to girl. A crush. So… did Logan really just mean… him? In front of Alex?
Finn feels like breaking into a smile. It’s four in the morning, and Logan is leaving in less than an hour, and Finn feels like shouting.
Alex claps Logan on the back. “C’mon, soldier boy. Breakfast.”
Logan, sending Finn a shy, tense look over his shoulder, follows Alex to breakfast.
“Be safe,” Logan’s mother is saying, clutching him close. His father is already standing by the car, keys in hand, tears on his face.
“I will, Mom,” Logan says. “Of course, I will.”
Alex whistles as Logan turns to wave at all of them on his way to the car. His sisters are all crying, holding each other tight around the waists as they watch their baby brother backpedal to their dad’s car.
The rest of the goodbyes already happened. Finn feels bared. He hates the tears streaking down his face, but not because of the early grief. He just hates that this is happening at all. That all Logan could do in front of everyone was embrace him hard and whisper, “I’ll be back, mon rouge. I’ll be back.”
Logan is stepping into the car when they make eye contact. Finn tries to smile through the tears.
Logan looks at his dad, already in the driver’s seat. He looks at his sisters. He looks at his mother. Then he looks back at Finn, blinking.
Logan shakes his head. His foot is back on the ground. His dad says something. But Finn- Finn steps forward. Logan moves back around the car door.
And then he’s running. Back to Finn. Back to-
Logan’s arms wrap around his neck, and Finn lets out a brutal, broken sound. And then, right there in front of their families, Logan presses their lips together.
“I love you,” Logan says the moment he pulls back. “So fucking much.”
Finn presses their foreheads together. “Love you. Love you. Come back home to me.”
“I’ll be back,” Logan is already saying. “I’ll come back to you.”
Logan’s dad honks. When they both laugh disbelievingly and turn, he’s smiling at them. But he holds up his wrist and taps it.
Time to go.
Finn nods and grips Logan’s chin, pulling him into one last kiss. “Love you. I love you.”
Logan winks at him, backpedaling again. His sisters are whistling. Alex is crying, laughing, and whooping. Logan’s mom’s hands are on Finn’s shoulders before Logan even gets back to the car.
Finn laughs. He laughs again when Logan blows him a kiss. Alex intercepts it and winks back, jumping onto Finn the moment the car starts to back out of the driveway.
Logan’s dad honks another three times as they go. The Tremblay family. They come in threes.
“This man in uniform is taken, back off, Al,” Alex parrots, rubbing his knuckles into Finn’s hair. “Fuck off!”
“Language, Alex O’Hara!”
“Sorry Mom!”
“Get off, Al- get off!” But Finn is laughing. And crying.
His heart is so, so full.
Notes:
As stated in the fic summary, this fic is based on the 2011 film Dolphin Tale. If you haven't seen it, I would recommend watching it AFTER finishing this fic unless you want MAJOR spoilers. If you're chill with that, feel free to watch it whenever! If you have seen it, please do not comment any kind of spoilers.
Also stated in the fic summary, many of these characters are taken from lumosinlove's Sweater Weather original characters. All rights to them for the character creation and love. I'm just borrowing them for a few chapters.
love y'all <3
-m
Chapter 2: ii
Summary:
A truck revs. Finn turns, hand on the dolphin’s head. There’s a truck, shaped like an ambulance, tearing up the sand behind them. It comes to an abrupt stop and the people hop out.
Some of them begin gathering equipment. The man with his phone comes back over, staring down at Finn and the dolphin. One man- no, a boy Finn’s age, maybe a year younger- comes running toward them.
He stops abruptly and looks between the dolphin and Finn’s open knife. He blinks. “You cut it free?”
“I, well, yeah?” Finn stammers, blinking right back at him. Big, bright, blue, baby doll eyes. Tan skin. Golden curls wisping around his ears in the soft sunset ocean breeze. Tall, long, lean legs.
Notes:
hi loves :)))
this chapter really starts our story... so sit back and enjoy!
-m
Chapter Text
Finn has always been big on biking. He likes it. Loves it, actually. So it shouldn’t be a surprise to Alex, who’s made the executive decision to spend the night at Finn and Logan’s apartment this first night, when Finn waves just before dinner and takes off down the road.
It clears his head- the biking. It helps him focus.
This time, he just thinks of Logan. Logan, all alone with new people. Logan, all alone across the world, somewhere they don’t know and can’t know. Logan, not allowed to contact them for months. Logan, who loves him. Logan, who he loves.
The sunset is bright tonight. Finn is biking along the bay, so he veers. It’s only about a mile to the beach, to the open Gulf of Mexico itself, from here. The peninsula isn’t wide.
Finn turns, taking in the sights and sounds. He thinks of a week ago- when he and Logan laid out in the sand and talked records, talking swimming, talked Olympics. Logan had asked about his book- the one he’d been working on for a year now. Finn had asked about his training plans.
He'd do anything to have Logan back. But he wouldn’t re-do last night. Or this morning.
He-
“Hey!” Finn stops hard, blinking at the man in front of him. Older, probably his dad’s age. “Hey, kid!”
Finn stares at him. “Sorry. Was I…?” Was he about to hit him? Had he not been paying attention?
“A phone!” The man asks, pointing to the beach, now just across the road. “You got a phone?”
Finn blinks. He’s heard all the stories. Don’t stop for strangers asking to use your phone.
But the guy looks totally normal.
“I dropped mine in the water,” the guy says, holding his hand out. “There’s a- I don’t even know who to call. There’s a dolphin-“
Finn blinks. “Oh. Yeah, here. Of course. Fuck.” He grapples for his phone in his pocket and hands it over. “A dolphin?”
“Yeah, yeah,” the man says, but he’s already typing in a number.
Finn leans his bike against the curb and jogs up the sand. There, just as the water breaks over the sand, lays a grey lump.
Finn runs toward it.
For someone who’s lived on the beach his entire life, he’s never had much experience with dolphins. Their family stuck to land, and the beach, pretty often. They weren’t the type for fishing. Finn spent most of his life in swimming pools, not the ocean.
But any sane person would know that ropes wrapped around a beached dolphin were bad.
He pulled out his pocketknife, a gift from Logan four years ago, and begun cutting at the ropes.
“What are you doing?” The man calls from his phone call. “Get away! Wait for the-“
Finn drowns him out and keeps cutting the ropes. A crab trap. A goddamn crab trap, and this dolphin is bleeding everywhere-
Finn whistles. Something he picked up from Alex. He snaps a rope. Whistles a tune. Snaps another.
The dolphin whistles back.
Finn stills. He looks down at the animal, blinking. He whistles. It makes the same tune.
“Smart,” Finn praises. “Hey, we just gotta get these off you…” He makes quick work of the bits tangled over the poor thing’s tail.
A truck revs. Finn turns, hand on the dolphin’s head. There’s a truck, shaped like an ambulance, tearing up the sand behind them. It comes to an abrupt stop and the people hop out.
Some of them begin gathering equipment. The man with his phone comes back over, staring down at Finn and the dolphin. One man- no, a boy Finn’s age, maybe a year younger- comes running toward them.
He stops abruptly and looks between the dolphin and Finn’s open knife. He blinks. “You cut it free?”
“I, well, yeah?” Finn stammers, blinking right back at him. Big, bright, blue, baby doll eyes. Tan skin. Golden curls wisping around his ears in the soft sunset ocean breeze. Tall, long, lean legs.
The boy stares at him for a moment longer. Then calls out, “She’s a female!” over his shoulder.
Finn blinks. He looks down at the dolphin. The girl dolphin.
“Ah. Right. I’ll just- um…” He stands next to the man, who hands him his phone back, and lets the team get to work.
The boy leans down, pressing a hand to the spot just between her eyes. “She’s really shaking.”
The dolphin whistles.
“Careful, Le,” one of the other boys, just around their age, calls out.
“I know, Re,” the first boy, Le, Finn guesses, responds with an eye roll.
Finn glances back at the truck they’re all running from now, carrying bags and equipment. Clearwater Marine Hospital Animal Stranding Team.
Well, fuck. Finn came further on his bike than he meant to.
“Get the sprayer,” someone says, an older woman who can’t be anything but the first boy’s mother. “She’s dryin’ up out here.”
“Got it,” says another boy, this one bespectacled and tanned and dark haired. “Hey, sweetheart, take my water outta my pocket, will ya? Hold onto it for me.”
One of the boys, who looks like he’s doing nothing, reaches over and plucks a water bottle from the guy’s back pocket and takes a long swig, stepping back to let the group work.
“Less flirting more helping,” the other boy, Re, chirps.
The woman laughs. “Leo, honey bunches, keep it sternal.”
“I know, Mama,” Leo, the blonde one, says.
“Could I get y’all to move right over here?” Re asks, tapping Finn’s shoulder. Finn blinks.
“Oh, yeah, for sure.” He and the man move over to stand with the other guy’s boyfriend.
Finn stares at him for a moment. The guy stares back. Straight-faced. Black hair curling around the nape of his neck.
“What?” The guy asks with absolutely no inflection.
“Nothing,” Finn blurts, but he’s a little breathless. Sweetheart. Out in the open. Less flirting, more helping spoken right there. In front of strangers.
“Careful now,” Re is saying to the rest of the team. Two other guys hoist a big blue sack-type thing.
“Watch the fin, Leo,” the guy next to Finn chirps.
“I know.”
“Hey,” the glasses guy calls over to Finn. “How long has she been here?”
“Oh.” Finn looks over at the man. He was here first. “I don’t know. I… I don’t know. I’ve been here for maybe ten minutes.”
The guy nods, frowning, and goes back to spraying the dolphin’s body with his water. The dolphin whistles.
“Tweety-bird,” Leo muses, digging sand out from under her.
“Bring the stretcher over,” Leo’s mom calls. The other two guys hustle over.
It takes a couple minutes. The sun is almost set. The guy who Finn had been standing with has produced a flashlight and it holding it over them all as he drinks water from his boyfriend’s cup.
“Don’t drink it all, Reg,” his boyfriend complains as they all move to hoist the stretcher with the dolphin inside. He’s still holding his little wand and spraying her down.
“I’ll leave just enough for you, James,” the guy, Reg, replies with a sickly sweet, innocent smile.
Re snorts. Then says, “Okay. On three we lift. One, two, three!” His three is a little grunted. They all hoist the animal onto their shoulders.
The man claps Finn on the back. “Well. Our job is done. Come on, kid. Lets make sure your bike is still around.”
“You go ahead,” Finn says, a little breathless. “I’m… I’m gonna stay ‘til they go.”
“Her eyes are clenched,” one of the stretcher guys says, sounding tense. But they’re all moving away now, toward the truck with the dolphin in tow. But not Leo.
Leo is picking up all the equipment in a rush, frowning. He looks up at Finn. He blinks.
“Nice job with the knife.”
Finn blinks. “Oh. Thanks?”
“My side drop your poles just a bit,” Re is saying. “Other side lift…”
Finn’s phone is ringing.
“Dude,” his brother’s voice says. “I thought maybe you biked off the pier, where are you?”
“You’ll never guess what I just did,” Finn says immediately. “Also, I need a ride.”
Alex groans. “Send me your pin.”
“This has got to be some kind of breaking and entering.”
Finn reached over and waved his brother off, earning a bark of protest when he accidentally-maybe-on-purpose smacked him in the lips.
“I’m telling Mom,” Alex hissed, yanking on the back of Finn’s hair.
“Shh!”
Finn reached out and tried the last door. It opened.
“Huh,” he said, pulling it further open.
“Probably for employees, not for weirdos off the street,” Alex chirped, but he followed him in anyway. Of course he did.
If you’re going to break into a marine hospital to check on a dolphin, I’m coming too!
They made it three steps before a pelican landed in front of them and squawked. Alex yelped.
“Um… hi?” Finn told the bird. Before he even finished, it lashed out and nipped at his toes. “Hey! Shh! Quiet!”
“Go away!” Alex whisper shouted at the bird, making shooing motions.
“You’re going to get us caught,” Finn told the bird, like it could understand.
“Too late for that,” said a slightly familiar voice. Deep. A bit like waves crashing to the shore.
Finn looked up from the pelican.
The boy from the beach, Leo, was standing there with a cooler on his shoulder, regarding them with raised brows.
“How did you even get in here?” He asked, stepping closer.
“We’re, um…” Alex searched for an answer.
“The door’s unlocked,” Finn said, pointing at it.
Leo’s eyes widened and he stepped the remaining feet toward them to lean- a bit too close- over Finn and turn the lock in its place.
“Shit. My fault. Don’t let my mama hear about that, yeah?”
He stepped back then, looking down at them. It was strange. He was taller than both Finn and Alex but looked so clearly unthreatening that Finn wasn’t sure what to do with himself.
The pelican pecked at Leo’s toes, and Leo jumped back, other hand coming up to steady his cooler. “Shoo, stop it, Rufus! Stop!”
With a little kick that was clearly meant to shoo and not harm, Leo got the pelican, Rufus, apparently, to hop back and glare at them all.
“Some guard dog,” Alex said weakly.
“He lives on the roof,” Leo said with a sigh. “He’s not actually supposed to be inside, but our doors are always open up top…” he watched the pelican trot off with a look of fond disdain, if that was possible. He turned back to them, “And he knows not to eat the fish in the tide pools down here.”
Leo hefted his cooler higher onto his shoulder and said, “Well, come on then.”
“Um… what?” Finn asked as he turned and started walking up the stairs.
“You’re here to see Winter, right?”
“Winter?” Finn questioned, falling into step behind him only when Alex gave him a gentle shove.
“The dolphin,” Leo explained. “We’re into season names right now. Summer and Autumn just got released back into the ocean last month, so Talkie thought it’d be good luck to name her Winter last night.” Leo stopped, pursing his lips. “Sorry, I’m babbling. I do that when we have a new patient. Come on.”
Leo led them up a few flights of stairs and out onto an upper deck, where most of the people were.
“We don’t usually let people back here, but since you found her… well.” Then he eyed Alex. “Except I don’t actually know why you’re here.”
“I heard my brother wanted to go to a marine hospital that was closed,” Alex said with a huff. He crossed his arms. “Of course I came along.”
“You’re twins?” Leo asked, looking between them.
“No,” Alex said with a groan.
Finn laughed. “He’s two years older than me.”
Leo blinked. “Oh. Sorry.”
“Everyone always thinks we’re twins,” Alex grumbled as they followed Leo around another corner.
“It’s cause you’re short, Al.”
Alex shoved him into the wall.
“Yo, Le!” A broad-shouldered, dark-haired guy that looked vaguely familiar came by and tapped Leo on the ass on his way past. “Nice shoulder workout you got goin’ there.”
“Arrête de faire ça, Sirius!” Leo yelped.
Finn blinked. Alex choked.
The other guy, Sirius, cackled and continued on his way. He turned, walking backward. “Have you seen my boyfriend around?”
“He’s probably hiding from you,” Leo grumbled, dropping to cooler to the ground.
“Ouch.” Sirius put a hand to his heart. “I’m gonna tell him you’re being mean to me.”
“He’ll kiss it all better,” Leo chirped, sticking his tongue out.
The other boy from the beach, Re, came around the corner on his phone and almost bumped right into Sirius walking backward.
“Oh, hi, baby.” Re stood on his toes and kissed Sirius’ cheek. Sirius blinked, turning to look down at him, before breaking into a smile and throwing an arm around his shoulders.
“Hey, chérie. Is my brother here, too?”
“Dunno,” Re said, taking the bag Sirius held out for him with a grateful smile. “If he is, he’s downstairs with James working on Bella.”
“Ah. Did you figure out what’s giving her indigestion?”
Re blinked at him before rolling his eyes. “I’m the dolphin guy, Sirius. James is the turtle guy.” He leaned up and kissed Sirius quick on the lips. “I’m gonna tuck away in my office to eat this. Thanks so much. Love you. Go find your brother if you need him. I’m okay.”
“Non, non,” Sirius complained, catching his hand as he tried to leave. “I’ll come with you. Reg can wait.”
They disappeared, bickering as they went.
“Was that… Sirius Black?” Alex asked, staring.
Leo turned back to them from where he’d been grinning after his friends. “Oh. Yeah. Sorry. We always forget he’s a big deal like that.”
“The Sirius Black?” Alex squeaked.
“The hockey guy you’re obsessed with?” Finn asked, looking over at his brother.
Alex had never been into swimming. No. His thing had been the Pensacola Ice Flyers. Then his thing had been the Tampa University hockey. Now, his senior year, he was hoping for a call-up. Finn went to every game he could. But… well, really. He’d never been good at hockey. But he liked watching it. But only if Alex was the one playing.
“He’s the youngest captain in the league,” Alex hissed at him, poking his shoulder. “The guy’s a legend. Pulled at seventeen to the NHL, won a Stanley last season, did-“
“Okay, okay, jeez. Forget I asked.”
“He led Tampa Bay to a Stanley, and you don’t even know.” Alex groaned. “I need to educate you more, little bro.”
Leo scoffed. “Nah. Here he’s just Sirius. Always has been. Well, since he started dating Remus, that is. What was it… two years ago now?” Leo gestured after them. “We go to his games, though.”
“Well, yeah,” Alex said, like this was an obvious choice. Then he covered his cheeks. “Oh my god. Sirius Black has a boyfriend. My life is complete, Finn. Pinch me.”
Finn blinked at him. Leo turned a little sharply, as if trying to detect any disgust in those words. Finn just shrugged at him, then said, “Ignore him.”
Leo snorted. “Come on. Winter’s over here.”
“Hey, Kase,” Leo said as they got closer to the giant pool. “How’s she lookin’?”
“Not good,” the guy, Kase, replied from inside the pool. Finn recognized him as one of the guys who’d helped them with the stretcher the night before. He was holding one side of Winter’s body, as if keeping her afloat. On the other side was the other stretcher guy.
“You’d think with a hot-shot name like Winter, she’d be golden by now,” the other guy mused. Then he looked at Kase. “Guess your name only has so much power, Winter.”
Kase grunted. “Her tail’s infected, Walker. Even my name can’t protect from that.” His hand came up to stroke Winter’s tail. “Come on, girl, you got it. We believe in you.”
“Wait.” Finn held his hands up. “Hold on. The number of names I’ve heard is… just… wow.”
Winter chirped then, giving a series of those tweety-bird like sounds. She opened her eyes.
“That’s the most noise she’s made since she got here,” Kase muttered.
“Who are you?” The other guy (Walker?) asked, looking at him with scrunched brows.
“Actually, I don’t know that either,” Leo said, turning to him.
Finn blinked at the full force of those baby doll eyes on him. Alex clapped him on the back. “Well, I’m Alex, the older brother, and this is-“
“I’m Finn,” Finn said, holding out a hand. “The younger brother, apparently.”
Leo shook his hand, but there was something stilted about it. He winced and said, “Your name is Finn?”
“…Yes?”
“And… you found Winter?” Kase asked, wincing too. “I mean, that was you yesterday, right?”
“Um… yeah?”
“Oh, man, that’s just cruel,” Walker said with a frown looking down at Winter’s tail. She tweeted again.
“What?” Finn asked, biting his bottom lip.
“Her tails infected,” Leo explained. He pointed, and both boys in the pool turned so her tail was closer. “See those white spots? The ropes were cutting off her circulation for too long. She hasn’t even moved since we got her here. Like she can’t feel it anymore. And that’s not even including the infection on the cuts. My mama and Remus say we’re probably going to have to amputate it.”
“But…” Finn looked back down at Winter. “But… that’s how they swim. Right?”
Leo nodded, his eyes hooded. “Yeah. Yeah, it is.”
“I’m Kasey Winter, by the way,” Kase explained. “That’s why Walker keeps making jokes.”
“Thomas Walker, at your service,” Walker said. Finn liked him instantly. He had a certain… chaos to him. “But if you hear someone yelling for Walkie, or Talkie, or Walkie-Talkie, that’d be me.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you called by your first name before,” Leo mused. He turned to Finn. “I’m Leo Knut.”
“Knutty,” Kasey coughed as they shook hands.
“Peanut!” Walker said more clearly.
Leo sighed. “Hockey nicknames are big here. Sirius has a lot of influence.”
“Yo, Snowstorm, think we can switch sides again?” Walker asked in the silence. “My right foot’s fallin’ asleep.”
Fifteen minutes later, Alex was leaning against the side of the pool and watching as Leo pointed out little bits of Winter’s tail and explained them to Finn.
“See that white bit there? It’s infected. But up here is healthy, see?”
Finn would just nod along, watching Leo’s long fingers move over the grey skin. There wasn’t anything he knew less about than marine animals and their health. But he was willing to learn, he supposed. For Winter. Obviously.
“Shift change, boys,” came a voice behind them.
Finn turned to see Sirius Black and Re coming toward them. Sirius grinned, wearing swim trunks now. “It’s my time to shine.”
Re snorted and shoved his shoulder. “Just get in the pool, Black. Kase and Talker need to eat something. They’ve been in with her all night.”
“Yes, please,” Walker complained. “C’mere, Black.”
Sirius snorted, but hopped over the side of the pool and splashed Walker in the face on his way. “Oops.”
“Oh, you dick,” Walker groaned, eyes closed and spluttering.
“And who are you?” Re asked, turning to look at them and raising his brows at Leo all in one motion.
“Finn and Alex,” Leo answered for them. “Finn found her yesterday, remember? He’s just checking in.”
“Mmhmm,” Re hummed slowly, brow still raised at Leo. The other boy shuffled on his feet. Re nodded. “Sure. Okay. Whatever.” He held out a hand. “Remus Lupin. That one over there’s Sirius Black.”
“Oh, we know,” Alex said, looking starstruck.
Sirius looked up at him. He narrowed his eyes. “Winger.”
Alex gaped at him. “How did you even…?”
Sirius shrugged. His accent was heavy. He was French, then. “I know things.” Then he looked over at Finn. His brows furrowed. “But not you.”
“No, not me,” Finn said with a small smile. “I was a swimmer. Now I’m just in college.”
“What’s your major?” Leo asked.
Was Finn imagining it, or was Remus nudging Leo in the back with his toes as he climbed over the ladder into the pool to take Kasey’s spot?
“Oh. Um… business,” Finn answered lamely. “I don’t really… know what I want to do.”
“Hey, that’s fine,” Kasey said as he climbed out of the pool. “Everyone takes their own time.”
“I don’t know what I want to do,” Alex parroted in Finn’s voice. It was scary how good they both were at that. “He’s a writer. He writes for The Minaret.”
“The paper?” Walker asked as he dried off. “Cool, dude. I’ve always wanted a journalist friend. Make me sound cool in the media or do those weird social media interviews with me.”
“Oh, we’re friends?” Finn asked with a grin.
Walker held out a fist for Finn to bump. “We are now.”
Sirius grinned and looked at Alex. “And you?”
“Oh. I play for UT. Major in business, too. But just because it leaves more time for the ice.”
Sirius nodded. “I know that feeling.” He nodded to Walker. “Get his number for me, will you?”
“Watch it, Black,” Remus chirped, grinning and not even looking up from where he was poking at Winter’s tail.
Sirius just leaned across the dolphin and kissed his cheek before telling Alex, “Allez, give Walkie your number. I’ll get it from him. Take you for a tour of the stadium someday. Bring your teammates.”
“Are you-“ Alex’s mouth fell open. “Fuck. Are you serious?”
Remus laughed. “He’s always Sirius.”
Sirius grinned at his boyfriend before turning to Alex and nodding. “Toujours.”
“Oh. Um…. I don’t…?”
“Pas de François?” Sirius looked scandalized. When Alex just blinked at him, he laughed and shook his head “No French. Got it.”
Finn chuckled. “No.”
“His boyfriend does, though,” Alex said suddenly, nodding in Finn’s direction. “You’ll love him.”
Finn felt the sudden drop in his stomach. Logan. Logan. Logan. Who was gone. Who had left only a day ago. Logan, who spoke French and debated hockey with Alex. Logan, who loved dolphins.
Was Logan his boyfriend? They hadn’t discussed it. He felt his cheeks aflame.
He coughed. “Um, yeah. Yeah, he does. Logan’s French Canadian, so… yeah.”
“Oh?” Sirius looked between Alex and Finn. “He plays?”
“No.” Finn shook his head. “No. He swam, with me. Growing up. Now he’s overseas for a few months.”
“Swimming?” Leo asked, voice smaller. His eyes caught everything, it seemed.
“No,” Finn said, voice cracking a bit. “No. He’s, um… he shipped out yesterday. Army.”
Leo looked sympathetic. “Oh, shit. Sorry. That must be hard.”
Alex was studying him, too.
“But yeah, when he comes back, I guess. If… I mean, I can bring him around. He’d love this.”
“Of course,” Leo said instantly.
“Ouais,” Sirius said. “Bring him.”
“I’m sorry,” Remus said, looking up at him with a twist of his lips. “Since when do you work here?”
“Non, non,” Sirius said with a laugh. “I-“
“Nom, nom,” Walker chirped from where he was pulling on a sweatshirt and disappearing into the building. “Nom nom nom, Sirius!”
“Va te faire foutre!” Sirius called after him.
“He said kiss my ass!” Remus translated.
“Only after midnight, baby!” Walker called back, voice receding.
“Idiot,” Leo laughed.
“Kase used to play for UT, too,” Sirius said, nodding to Kasey, who was struggling to pull his own sweatshirt on.
His head popped out just as he said, “Way to sell me out, Black.”
“Goalie,” Alex said immediately. “I can tell. Also, you’re on our wall. Blizzard.”
Kasey grinned. “That’s me.”
Finn wanted to ask. He wanted to know if Kasey just hadn’t gotten called up, or if he’d simply not been as into it. But one look at the brace around his knee told Finn enough. Injury, he supposed.
An athlete’s worst nightmare.
“Four years, one call up,” Kasey said. “To Tampa Bay, no less.”
Sirius groaned. “We got him for one game. He got a shutout. So good.”
Remus shot Sirius a look. “Sometimes I wonder if your biggest turn on is hockey.”
“My biggest turn on is you, amour.”
“You went NHL?” Alex asked Kasey, eyes wide.
“’til my knee gave out.” Kasey shrugged, like this wasn’t a big deal. Maybe it wasn’t anymore. He tapped his brace. “This old thing isn’t in the best of shape these days.”
Alex frowned. “Oh. Sorry, man.”
Kasey gave him a long look, then grinned. “Forgot what that was like. You, Cap?”
Sirius grinned back. “Young love.”
“What?” Alex spluttered.
Kasey patted his shoulder on the way by. “There’s more to life than the game, Alex.” Then, to Finn, “Get Regulus your boyfriend’s name, will ya? We’ll put him up.”
“What?” Finn asked, blinking.
“On our wall,” Leo said, smiling. “Come on. I’ll show y’all.”
Finn grew up in Florida. He knew all about the love of the recruits. The joy at having them home again. The lines of people cheering.
He’d never seen it as plainly as on the walls of the Clearwater Marine Hospital. He’d never been to a museum. He knew, of course, and he was proud- so damn proud- of Logan. But his family hadn’t ever been… involved, you could say.
Until now, he supposed.
And there, on the wall of the marine hospital, where names. Every single recruit who ever visited the marine hospital. Some of them had messages. A few- very few- had photos.
“What are the… pictures?” Finn asked, running his fingers of the names. They looked well-loved. Like people had been running their fingers over them for years.
Leo swallowed. “They’re our people. The ones we know. The ones we love.”
Alex whistled. “There are… so many.”
“Yeah.” Leo smiled sadly. “My mama started it a year after I was born. My dad… he was a lieutenant colonel with a thousand soldiers under his command. They got hit bad behind enemy lines. He got through the brigade with his team, hit the ground running, and managed to get his entire battalion out with minimal loss.” Leo smiled sadly again. “But he didn’t come home.”
“Oh.” Finn swallowed, his throat harsh. “I’m sorry.”
Leo smiled again. “We’re proud of him.” Then he nodded up at the wall. “And we’re proud of all of them, too.”
Later, in the truck, after Leo invited them back whenever they wanted and Regulus- who turned out to be Reg from the beach- got Logan’s name from him by the door, Alex turned to him.
“Wanna talk about it?” He asked gently.
Finn just shook his head. He could already feel his eyes burning.
“…Finn?”
“Fuck,” Finn managed, wiping at his face as the tears started. “Fuck, ‘lex.”
“Was it… was I too pushy? Saying he was your boyfriend in front of all those people? They… they seemed like they’d be good with it. With Sirius and Remus and… well, you know. I didn’t even think, honestly. Just said it.”
“No,” Finn gasped out. “No, God, no. Sorry. It’s not even- fuck.”
Alex waited. Let him collect himself.
“I miss him,” Finn managed. “Fuck. It’s been a day. We’ve gone a day without seeing each other before.”
“Yeah,” Alex whispered, “but then, you knew when he was coming home.”
Finn dropped his head into his hands and let out a sob. It wasn’t whether or not he knew when Logan was coming home. His tour was only six months. It was if.
“Can I… can I ask, now?” Alex asked, watching him carefully. “Because, I mean, I always assumed. But you never said anything. And then, well, yesterday you both just seemed so sure. And then… well, I always just assumed that if it was really happening, you would have said something to me…”
“Shit,” Finn said around a broken laugh. “Fuck, Alex.”
“I’ll back off if you want me to,” Alex promised. “Just, I didn’t think you wanted me asking yesterday. And now… well, I’ve gone and announced to literal strangers that your boyfriend is Logan Tremblay. ‘cause I can’t keep my mouth shut. And, well, I’m curious, and…”
“Two nights ago,” Finn cut him off, voice more even now that he had something to focus on that wasn’t Logan’s name on that wall, Logan meeting the same fate as Leo Knut’s dad. Logan all alone somewhere overseas.
Alex was quiet for a long moment. “Are you serious?” He asked, breathless. “The night before he left?”
“Yes,” Finn said, laughing incredulously. Then, “No. I mean… fuck. It wasn’t… we’d… it’s complicated. It’s a long story. The real, true story goes all the way back to… to fucking middle school.”
Alex coughed. “No way. Really? So, what, you guys have just been… sitting on it this whole time? Pretending to be straight best friends?”
“We used to just… make out and not talk about it,” Finn admitted, feeling ridiculous at the look on his older brother’s face. “Fuck, Alex, I was…” Finn raked a hand across his face. “I was so scared of losing him. He was… he was way more afraid about the response than I was. Not of you guys, I don’t think. But Logan wants to go to the Olympics one day. What if they decide they don’t care how good he is at swimming, as long as he’s got a boyfriend? What if the army finds out and the guys give him shit? What if… fuck. It’s just… he’s got so many more reasons to be terrified.
“I always knew you guys would be great about it. You think I don’t know about that time you made out with your roommate last year? Come on, Alex. I knew his family would be great. But… but the world?” Finn’s voice broke on the last word. “We… talked. Sometimes. He would always shut down. I stopped pushing.”
“And then… what? Alex asked, brushing over the mention of his college roommate.
Finn let out a breath. “We… you know, I don’t even know. But I do love him. I know he loves me. He’ll come back.”
Alex gave him a very long, pressing look.
“He has to,” Finn breathed, finally putting the truck in drive. “He promised.”
Halfway back to Finn and Logan’s apartment, Alex asks into the silence, “Are we not going to talk about how that blonde lil’ beauty has an obvious crush on you?”
“Are we not going to talk about your hard-on for Sirius Black?” Finn quips.
Neither of them answer each other for a long moment. Then, Alex says, “You know, professionally speaking, yes I have a hard-on for Sirius Black. But can we talk about his hot goalie friend who used to play for my team?”
Finn choked. “Are we really going to do this now? Talk boys?”
Alex groaned. “Finally. Two bisexual brothers who finally know they’re both bis-“
“I’m gay, Alex,” Finn cuts him off, looking over. A small smile plays on his face, and it’s soon matched by Alex.
“Fuck yeah.” Was Alex’s only reply. Then, “Thought you’d never get that out.”
“Oh, fuck off.”
Chapter 3: iii
Summary:
“Can’t sleep without him anymore, Reg?” Leo teased from where he was holding Winter.
Regulus turned to Finn. “Can you get in so my boyfriend can take me to bed?”
“Regulus!” Leo said, laughing through it. “Jesus.”
“No, just me,” James chirped.
“Um… okay,” Finn decided, climbing the ladder up and over. Once he was in the water- saltwater, he realized (duh, Finn), and cold- he waded over to James’ side of Winter.
“Hi,” he said when James and Leo just looked at him.
“Hi,” Leo said.
“Hello,” James said with a wide grin.
“Allez!” Regulus chirped from the edge of the pool.
Chapter Text
Two days later, Finn is back at the marine hospital. It’s open this time, so he has no problems coming in through the front door.
“Hey, Finn,” says a slightly accented voice behind him. It makes his name sound something like Fean.
He turns to find Sirius Black standing there with a small smile on his face. He points to the wall. Finn turns to look.
Oh. Oh. He hadn’t noticed when he first walked in.
There, on the wall, is a photo. Logan, his senior year of high school, grinning broad and happy, holding up his state records and medals for senior photos.
“Oh,” Finn says, eyes going soft and misty. “Oh. Hey… there he is.”
“There’s your boy,” Sirius says, clapping him on the shoulder. “Our boy, now, too. Allez, allez, Remus saw you coming in from the top. He and Le were talking. They have an idea.”
“I don’t know what al.. aliz… I don’t know what that means.”
Sirius barks a laugh. “Come on.”
“Can you swim?” Is the first thing Leo says when they walk out onto the top deck. He doesn’t even turn. He’s standing at the edge of the pool, watching Thomas and the bespectacled boy from the beach carry Winter in circles.
“Um, yeah?” Finn says, thinking he’s already told them he used to be a top swimmer. Maybe he didn’t.
Leo turns with a smile. “We have to ask anytime we let someone else into the pool. Go get you a pair of trunks from the gift shop. Mare knows to let you comp them. We’ve got an idea.”
Finn has no idea where the gift shop is, so Sirius waves him over and they tromp down the stairs together.
“You… you come here a lot,” Finn guesses, watching Sirius wave to everyone they pass, even the lady dusting in the corner.
Sirius chuckles. “Re is the dolphin specialist. Any call they get, he goes. Any practice I have, any game, I go. He comes to every single game he can. I come here whenever I can. Balance, non?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Finn agrees as they pass a father laughing with his son as they hold a slimy slug creature in the tide pool exhibit.
“Plus,” Sirius says, turning a grinning, “I like swimming with dolphins for free. And watching Remus cry on release days. Perks for me, loving a marine biologist.”
Sirius leads him into the shop and watches as Finn grabs the nearest pair in his size. The woman at the counter waves, grinning at them.
“I was told to let the red-headed, slightly sunburned, cutie-pie comp his shorts,” she coos.
Finn flushes. Sirius laughs and says, “I know for a fact Walkie must have used those exact words.” He tugs Finn away. “Allez, Finn.”
“How did you and Remus meet?” Finn asks as they retrace their steps.
Sirius laughs, running a hand through his hair. “Fuck. It feels so long ago now. Three years already.” He grins over his shoulder at Finn. “Beach day with the team. There was a turtle. Remus was in the truck. He was an assistant then, but I was the one that called it in. So he had to come ask me how long it’d been there, you know. He got four words out before I just…” Sirius laughs, running a hand down his face. Finn notices the beginnings of a beard starting. “I blurted out, ‘You’re beautiful’. He got the funniest look on his face. Then he blushed and just asked, ‘How long has the turtle been here?’.”
Sirius breaks into a wide grin as they start up the stairs again. “I wasn’t out, then. I was so… oh, quel est le mot? Scared? But more?”
“Um…” Finn tries to think. “Terrified?”
Sirius shakes his head. “More.”
“Mortified? Like, embarrassed, too?”
“Oui. Mortified.” Sirius laughs. “James was there, too. He and Remus were both the assistants then. I guess he’d heard or something-“
“James?” Finn interrupts to ask.
“Oh.” Sirius blinks. “Oui. James. In the pool. Glasses.”
Finn makes a sound of recognition, and Sirius continues. “So he came over to me once they’d loaded and told me Remus got coffee at this one place every morning on his way to work. And then he gave me his number- James’ number, not Remus’- and told me to call him if I needed a little extra push.”
“So you went to get coffee at the same time as him and you just… bumped into each other?” Finn asks, raising a brow. “That sounds a little…”
“Stalkery?” Sirius asks, his accent making the word twist. He shakes his head. “Non, I didn’t go to the coffee place. I called James. He invited me out with them one night. Remus was there. We actually had a conversation. In which I literally conveyed nothing. Back then, I was just a hockey player. Youngest captain in the league. I wasn’t about to… just… in public, you know?”
Finn nods. “Yeah, yeah. I know.”
He must have put a bit too much feeling into that, because Sirius looks back at him with a sad expression. “Yeah. I bet you do. Anyway, we became friends, first. For a year. Until finally I just kissed him one day.” Sirius flashes him a grin. “We got coffee the next morning. Took him to his favorite place and held his hand on the table. In broad daylight. Best feeling of my life.”
“And… I mean, the league… no one ever said anything?”
“Oh, people say things. People will always say things. But it doesn’t matter, does it? I’m good at hockey. One of the best, if the media is to be believed. They can’t deny my point streaks. It’s hard facts. So is the fact that I’m in love with a man. A man that works at a marine hospital.” Sirius shrugs. “The things people say aren’t important as long as you love each other.”
Finn laughs lightly. “Yeah. Yeah, I know.”
Sirius grins. “How did you meet your boy? Logan?”
“Yeah.” Finn lets out a long breath. “Logan. Um… his family moved to the house across the street when we were two.”
Sirius barks out a laugh. “Shit. You’ve known him that long?”
Finn tries to bite back the grin growing on his face. “Yeah. Yeah. He was my best friend for a long, long time before he was ever anything more. But, yeah. Logan’s my boy.”
It felt so weird to say that out loud after all this time.
Sirius was looking at him funny.
“What?”
“Nothing,” Sirius said softly, tilting his head. They were walking back out onto the deck. “Just… you look relieved.”
Finn just smiled at him.
Leo was already in the water, Remus gone. Sirius looked around for a moment, obviously searching, before he yelped.
“Wet hands!” Sirius complained, and Finn turned to see Remus pressed against his back, his apparently wet hands under the front of Sirius’ shirt. This seemed to be a normal occurrence, because James called from the pool, “You fall for that every time!”
“Non, non!” Sirius was saying, ducking away from Remus as he shook his hair out. “Re, chérie, non! It’s cold!”
Remus was just laughing. “It’s a hundred degrees outside and you’re upset about my hands being wet?”
Sirius faked a shiver. Remus laughed even harder. “Come on, baby. Lunchtime.”
“Naptime?” Sirius asked hopefully.
“Oh, is that what they’re calling it now?” Leo called from the pool.
Sirius just extended him the finger and let Remus drag him off, back into the building.
“He’s been up all night with Winter!” Sirius called back at Leo. “Of course, it’s called naptime!”
“Sirius, my God,” Remus was saying, chuckling.
“Come on in, Finn,” Leo said, turning to Finn with a smile on his face still. “You’ve been the only person to get sounds out of her, and James needs to get some rest before his surgery this evening.”
“You’re having surgery?” Finn blurted, turning to James.
James snorted. “No. If I was having surgery, I wouldn’t bother being well-rested. No, I need to get a fish hook out of Bella’s stomach.”
“Oh.” Finn chuckled nervously. “You’re… operating.”
James flashed him a grin. “Marine biology, baby.”
“Hey.” A shorter boy appeared at Finn’s side, with the same twisting accent as Sirius. “Don’t call him baby.”
“Sorry, baby,” James said immediately, his smile turning into something blinding.
Regulus Black. Sirius’ little brother and James’ boyfriend. Finn noted that down in his mind.
Regulus yawned. Big and sleepy. “Can we go to bed now?”
“Can’t sleep without him anymore, Reg?” Leo teased from where he was holding Winter.
Regulus shot him a glare. “Non. I can’t. Dépêche-toi, James.”
James shut his eyes hard. “Sweetheart, how many times have I warned you not to speak French in public?”
“Ew,” Regulus said in a flat American accent.
“Ew,” Leo echoed, flicking some water at James.
Regulus turned to Finn. “Can you get in so my boyfriend can take me to bed?”
“Regulus!” Leo said, laughing through it. “Jesus.”
“No, just me,” James chirped.
“Um… okay,” Finn decided, climbing the ladder up and over. Once he was in the water- saltwater, he realized (duh, Finn), and cold- he waded over to James’ side of Winter.
“Hi,” he said when James and Leo just looked at him.
“Hi,” Leo said.
“Hello,” James said with a wide grin.
“Allez!” Regulus chirped from the edge of the pool.
“Okay, okay,” James said with a laugh. This close, Finn could see how tired he looked. He imagined staying up all night just to keep a dolphin afloat, standing in the water, when you have a surgery to perform that afternoon, and knowing your boyfriend wouldn’t go to sleep without you. James looked wiped.
“Here,” James told Finn, guiding his hands to the same spots his were. “Hold her up, but don’t be alarmed if she sinks a bit. Just don’t let her blowhole go under. Re doesn’t want her fully submerged. The infection’s making her breathing erratic.”
“Okay,” Finn said weakly. Winter wasn’t as heavy as he’d thought. At the beach, it had taken four guys on each side to get her to the truck. Here, it was just him and Leo, and it was more like supporting a floating animal than holding her up. Like how Logan would lay across him in the pool, weightless in the water.
“Got her?” James asked as he slipped his hold from Winter completely.
“Yeah, yeah. Got her.” Finn swallowed. “Thanks.”
“Thank you,” James said. Then, to Regulus, “I’m comin’, sweetheart!”
In four long strides that splashed up around him, James bounded out of the pool, hopped the side, and dropped onto Regulus like a stone.
Finn found a bubble of laughter rising up in his chest. True, unhindered laughter. He’d spent almost no time with Regulus Black, but he could already imagine what it was like for a boy like that to be in love with a boy like James Potter.
“James,” Regulus was groaning, trying to hold him up and getting saltwater dripped all over himself. “James.”
“Love you,” James said, smushing his cheek into Regulus’s hair. “Carry me. Fuck, I’m exhausted.”
“Ugh,” Regulus scoffed, shuffling a little. James was a good head taller, maybe a bit more. And definitely more built. Broader. Regulus was all fine bones and aristocratic features. His nose had definitely been broken at some point, but other than that, he looked… angelic?
The pinch he gave James’ side and the glare he sent his boyfriend was very much not though.
“Okay, okay,” James was saying around a laugh. “Okay! Come on, allez, keep up Black!”
And James took off like a shot back into the building, dripping all the way. Regulus gave a startled, happy laugh and took off after him, slipping on the wet tiles and looking a bit like he was skating without blades.
Leo was laughing gently. When Finn looked over at him, he shook his head. “When they first got together, I was so surprised. Like… no way, right?”
“There does seem to be… a personality difference,” Finn admitted. But that laugh. That bark of pure delight, Regulus chasing after James…
“Yeah,” Leo agreed, grinning. His smile was bright, blue eyes unguarded. “But they’re it. If they’re not, I’ll lose my mind.”
“How’d… how’d they even happen?” Finn asked. When Leo raised a brow, Finn corrected, “I mean, if you know that story. And if I can even hear it. I mean… Sirius Black’s brother and James Potter, a marine biologist, don’t seem like they’d cross paths that often.”
Leo gave a soft smile. “Neither do Sirius Black, NHL star, and Remus Lupin, marine biologist.”
“I’ve already heard that story, though,” Finn admitted.
Leo looked a bit surprised. “Yeah? Well. Sirius brought Regulus around when he was visiting from college one day. Before Sirius and Re were really together. He and I hit it off. Same age, you know. Both working through college and trying to get our Masters. Not in the same thing, mind. But still. So he came around a bit more- every time he visited Sirius. He went to school in Michigan at the time. Closer to their home, you know? Quebec.”
Finn nodded. “Ah. Wait-“
“Let me finish,” Leo said, chuckling. “James was like, head over heels immediately. I think it had something to do with Regulus not giving a shit about him. But Reg and I got along great, and one day about… oh, a year and a half ago? Regulus calls me up and basically says, ‘I’m fucked. I’m in love with James Potter’.” Leo lets out a bark of laughter, eyes bright. “Lord, those Black brothers hit us hard. But yeah, he actually asked James to dinner the next time he visited. I thought James was gonna shit himself, clearing his schedule and trying to get dressed here.”
“Regulus asked James?” Finn asks, incredulous.
“You wouldn’t think, right?” Leo grinned. “But, yeah. They’ve been together about a year now. Soulmates, I tell ya. Regulus transferred his junior year- this year- to UT. He’s going for an English masters. Wanted to be closer to his brother, apparently.” The look on Leo’s face told Finn just how bullshit he thought that was. “But, coincidentally, James is the one he moved in with, not Sirius.”
Finn laughed. “Ah.” After a moment, he added, “Can I ask questions now?”
Leo shrugged.
“Okay. What’re you in school for? Are you at UT, too?”
“Yeah,” Leo said with an exhale. “Marine biology, obviously.”
“Oh. Obviously.”
“My parents opened this place,” Leo explained. “My mama stepped back a bit more when Remus and James got their degrees, let them take the reins on our surgeries and stuff. She manages the financials and the meetings and the… not fun side of things. But eventually, I’m supposed to really run this place. So. Marine biology.”
“But it’s… not what you really want to do?” Finn guessed, watching his face.
Leo laughed. “No, no, it is. But I want to be… well, I want to be James and Remus. Not my mama. I don’t wanna be stuck in the board meetings and contacting donors. Either way, I’m minoring in business.”
Finn nodded. “Strange we’ve never seen each other in class, then.”
Leo gave him a weird look. “Yeah. Strange.”
Finn spent the entire afternoon in the water with Leo and Winter. People came and went. Thomas Walker, giving them each a bathroom break. Kasey Winter, standing at the edge of the pool and holding Leo’s sandwich for him to eat right out of his hands. Remus and Sirius, going by four or five times bickering and laughing. An older man in fishing attire, who came by and flicked Leo’s ear from behind before the other boy even saw him coming.
“My grandpa,” Leo explained, rubbing his ear against his shoulder.
And, between it all, Winter. Chirping and whistling at them in the middle of conversation. Wriggling in their grasps. Seeming… lively, almost. Not healed. But… happy? Content?
After a long stream of whistling back and forth between Finn and Winter, Finn noticed the considering look on Leo’s face.
“What?” He asked.
“I think,” Leo told him, eyes sparkling, “you’re going to need a volunteer uniform.”
The volunteer uniform was just a white t-shirt that said volunteer in bold letters across the back, had the Clearwater Marine Hospital logo on the front, and a blue pair of swim trunks.
Finn was handed a schedule by a grinning Remus Lupin. Leo was chatting with the older gentleman- his grandfather- just behind them.
“Oh… wow,” Finn commented when he finished scanning the schedule.
“You don’t have to come for all of it,” Remus assured him, looking amused. “But… however often and as long as you can.”
“But… why me?” Finn asked.
“Because Winter likes you,” Remus explained, looking even more amused now. “Surely you’ve noticed she only makes noises and moves when you’re around. She trusts you. You cut her out of that net on the beach. And then a huge, loud group of people come and take her away in a truck- which must be terrifying for a marine animal. And then you show back up. She likes you. And we’re having trouble getting her to eat.”
Finn looked down at the schedule. Winter was fed seven times a day. The first being five in the morning. It was summer. Finn wasn’t in classes for another three months. And he’d just quit his job at the grocery store before Logan left.
When he got home that night, Finn set his alarm.
Logan was… hot.
The summer sun. The desert. Heavy gear. Two of his team leaned against him, getting some shut eye as the transport carried on, knocking them all against each other in the best of times. His sergeant across the transport, going over the latest radio signals from their destination.
He thought about it sometimes- the lies he’d told Finn. The lies he’d told all of them.
Not a private in the army. Not with his test results at boot camp. Not with his obvious skill.
A private in the hostage and terrorism division, immediately plugged in with two men on their second tours and a sergeant on his third, completing the set of four that they traveled with, their inner circle inside the squad of sixteen that completed the raids with them.
Fifth in command. Immediately.
“You can’t tell them,” his sergeant had told him. Alastor Moody, the madman himself. The decorated sergeant who had turned down a promotion to stay with his men. “They’ll only worry, and our covert terrorism work would be on the line. You can’t even tell them where you’re truly going. It’s an order, soldier.” Then, after a rare, brief smile: “Welcome to the team, Private Tremblay.”
Logan had been breathless at the end of boot camp- unable to even tell the other soldiers he’d been training with.
“What’d you get?” They’d all been asking each other, matching up and shaking hands and patting each other on the back.
“Haven’t gotten my assignment yet,” Logan would lie. He’d gotten his assignment first.
“No idea where they’re sending you?” His family and friends- Finn- had asked.
“No,” Logan had lied.
But there were thirty-three Americans somewhere in this city, on the other side of this hill.
Logan couldn’t afford to doubt himself anymore.
“You shoulda seen your face,” Percy Marshall was saying, laughing as he kicked his feet up on a boulder.
Inside the makeshift hospital back at their headquarters in the desert, the commotion was hectic. Thirty-three Americans in a warehouse. Thirty-one recovered. Twenty-six seriously injured.
Thirty-one to make full recoveries and be on their way home within the week.
Logan was buzzing with it. Percy and Will were, too.
Percy Marshall, Texan, born and raised on a ranch in the Panhandle. Big on nicknames. Had a tattoo on his ass of Tom and Jerry. Has a girl waiting at home for him that he never shut up about- Cassie Baker- not that Will or Logan ever asked him to. Percy Marshall, who had a ring from his grandmother for Cassie on his next rotation home. Cassie, who managed the ranch when he was gone. Percy, who drank like a sailor and rode every mechanical bull they came across on their four day stint at Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas before they shipped out last week. Percy, who met Logan with a broad smile and shook his hand with a, “Hope you’re ready to kick some ass, Canadian boy.”
Will Morgan, New Yorker through and through. Strong accent. Quoted old Vines as if the app was still around. Was in the middle of reading Pride & Prejudice. Will, who grew up with four siblings and three parents in a three bedroom apartment on the Upper East Side. Will, who had a wife and son waiting at home for him, at an estate on Long Island Sound, something that his wife inherited from her grandparents. Will, who carried a photo of his wife and son and siblings and parents in his pockets. His wife, who owned a flower shop. Will, whose son had already sent him a hand drawing of the two of them sitting next to the ocean that he had tucked in his breast pocket next to his radio. Will, who bought Logan a round of shots in San Antonio and, when Logan protested that he was only twenty, said, “You’re old enough to fight for this country, you’re old enough to drink in it”, and held the shot up to his lips.
“Hey, Canada,” Percy chirped, “I saw that picture in your go-bag.”
Logan’s stomach fell through his ass. “What-“
“You’ve really got three older sisters?” Percy finished, grinning.
Logan didn’t let his relief show. The other picture- the one of Finn. Just Finn. His feet up on the dash of his pickup as Logan drove, a photo Logan had gotten in trouble for taking because for fuck’s sake, Lo, focus on the road!
“Oh. Yeah.” Logan grinned. “Careful, Marshy. You’ve got a girlfriend.”
“Don’t we know it,” Will groaned good-naturedly.
Percy flipped them off and sighed, leaning back against the rocks they were sitting on. Their fire crackled.
“How long ‘til Moody gets done, do you think?” He asked.
“Don’t ask me,” Logan reminded him. “I’ve never done any of this before.”
“Right,” Percy said, like he’d forgotten. “Newbie. Fresh meat. Green boy.”
“Not green boy,” Will chided. Then he eyed Logan, eyes glinting with mischief. “Unless you are a green boy?”
“Um… no,” Logan informed them, cheeks aflame.
Percy barked a laugh. To Will, he said, “He sounds so sure!”
“It’s really not that difficult of a question, Tremz,” Will said, putting on his dad voice even though he was only two years older than Logan. “Yes or no. No ummmmm.”
“Fuck off,” Logan said, laughing now. “No.”
“He’s just a baby,” Percy said, reaching over to smush Logan’s cheeks together.
Logan shoved him away, making him topple off his rock. “Maybe I meet Cassie when we get home, and she can tell you how green I am.”
Percy spluttered. Will busted out laughing.
“Fuck, Canada,” Percy said around a wide smirk. “I think you’re gonna be fun to have around.”
“And I’m from Clearwater!”
“At least she’s eating again,” Leo said, but there was a frown tracing his face as Finn pulled the bottle away from Winter before she could chuck it across the pool like she had the first three.
“No,” Finn warned her, eyeing her. “I’m not swimming back over there just to pick up your dishes.”
“You know she has no idea what you’re saying, right?” Regulus asked from the ladder, where he was sitting with his feet dangling in the water. Behind him, Remus and Sirius were walking back up, Sirius frowning and Remus studying a sheet of paper.
“I don’t know,” Leo said, smiling faintly now. “Some people think dolphins are smarter than we are. Maybe she does know.”
Regulus scoffed. He opened his mouth to answer, but it turned into a yelp as his older brother reached out without even looking up from his boyfriend’s face and shoved him off the ladder. Regulus went down in a splash of saltwater with a shout.
James poked his head out from where he was organizing the shelves on the other side of the pool, saw what had happened, and wisely ducked back behind them, biting his lip to hold back a laugh.
Regulus spluttered, standing and wiping his hair back out of his face. “Oh, fuck you,” he spat at his brother.
“Language!” Chirped Leo’s mum from the other pool, where she was standing with Thomas and Kasey as they worked with another dolphin with whistles and hand motions. The dolphin twirled and waved, copying Kasey as he moved in the water.
“Yeah, Reggie,” Sirius mused. “Language.”
“I’m going to fucking murder you,” Regulus muttered under his breath. Finn let out an involuntary chuckle. Winter whistled.
Remus just grunted, sighed, and held out the paper to Leo.
Leo didn’t bother trying to dry his hands before reaching one up from where he was holding Winter in the water and taking it. He scanned it, frowning more now. He looked up at Remus.
“Did you show my mom?”
Remus shook his head, looking over at Eloise Knut and finding her already looking back at him, face tight.
“Make the call, boys,” she called to them. “You’re grown.”
“Eloise…” Remus said, looking back down at the paper. He looked… reluctant.
Sirius put an arm around his waist and kissed his cheek. “You’ll get it right. You always do.” When Remus just pursed his lips and kept his eyes on the list, Sirius didn’t seem put out. “I gotta run, Re.”
Remus finally got his eyes from the paper and leaned up to meet Sirius in a kiss. “Okay. Go ahead. We’re good. Have fun, don’t do anything stupid.”
Sirius grinned as he backpedaled from them. “Never.”
James let out an actual bark of laughter at that, and Regulus seemed to realize he was there.
“James,” he whined. “Sirius pushed me in the pool!”
“I know, sweetheart,” James said, poking his head back out. “Do you want me to get him back?”
“He has a meeting!” Remus warned.
“Yes, please,” Regulus said forlornly, the water still dripping from his soaked curls to his nose.
James nodded solemnly and sighed. “The things we do for love.”
“James, don’t you dare,” Sirius warned, turning to run now.
“Don’t trip on the stairs!” Remus yelled as James lunged and Sirius dodged, laughing, and took off. “You can’t afford an injury!”
Sirius and James were already gone, off like bullets, laughing and swiping at each other.
Regulus frowned after them, his arms still lifted fully out of the water like he was in sky-diver position, his long sleeves dripping off of him. “That didn’t seem very revenge like.”
“No,” Remus agreed fondly, “it didn’t.” But then he looked back down at his paper, frowned, and walked away again.
The next day, when Finn walked up to the pool decked out in his volunteer uniform, it was to see Remus wrapping gauze around a stump where Winter’s tail had been.
Finn’s stomach fell out of his ass.
“What?” He asked, rushing over before he could even think. “What- wait. What happened? Did- I didn’t know- I thought-“
“It was too infected,” Eloise Knut said before Leo or Remus could even turn. “It had to go.”
“But… but that’s how she swims. How can she live if she can’t swim?”
When Leo turned, his face was pale. But he didn’t have an answer for Finn.
None of them did, apparently.
The shifts became more frequent after that. They switched out more, instead of taking seven or eight hour stints of holding Winter up. But she only ate if it was Finn holding the bottle. And she didn’t move anymore.
“She’s depressed,” Leo explained. “Even more so than she had been. She’s on pain meds, for her amputation. But…”
Everyone looked so bleak these days when it came to Winter.
“What can we do?” Finn asked, watching the dolphin as James and Regulus guided her around.
Leo had only shrugged. “Well… there’s only so much we can do. She’s gotta make a choice on her own.”
A week later, Finn found himself alone with Winter as she floated on a pool bed. His feet dangling in the water, her nose between his ankles as she tweeted.
“I don’t know if you know this,” Finn began, “but I found you the day my boyfriend left.”
Winter just tweeted.
“I thought I’d spend the next six months while he was gone just… lounging around and waiting for him to come back,” Finn admitted. Something he hadn’t told anyone, not even Alex.
He hadn’t planned on doing anything this summer. And past his classes come fall, he’d planned on only managing to cook without Logan. Their apartment felt so empty. There was no one singing in the shower, no matter how off-key Logan’s voice was. There was no one jangling keys as they entered and dropping them into the metal bowl that Finn always ignored. There were no shoes to trip over in the hallway. There were no muffins waiting, fresh out of the oven (the only thing Logan ever cooked), when Finn got home. There were no sounds from the TV, no familiar re-watches of episodes they’d long since sat through together, something Logan was prone to do just to listen to the sounds as he worked.
“But now I’ve got a dolphin that only eats when I feed her,” Finn said, chuckling a bit to himself. “Which is like, insane. I’d never even touched a dolphin before you came along. I don’t know if I’d ever seen one other than the breaching ones in the bay from the bridges. We’re not big on fishing, you know.”
Winter made a noise like she approved of this. Finn laughed.
“Did you know,” Finn went on, “when I was in high school, I was the second-best swimmer in the nation? Probably could have beat you, back then.”
Winter chirped in disapproval.
“You’re right,” Finn admitted. “Probably not. Maybe Logan could have.”
Winter chirped again. And it sounded… curious.
“He’s set for the Olympics someday,” Finn told Winter. “Did you know that? Once he gets back from a tour or two. Hopefully only one, but I guess I’m not the one to make that decision.”
Finn shut his eyes hard, the burning in his throat coming on sudden and fierce.
“Winter?”
A chirp. Maybe dolphins could understand people.
“Did you… I’m sure you’ve noticed, but… we had to take your tail. It was too hurt. It was hurting the rest of you. I’m sorry.”
Winter made a low, long sound.
“I bet you miss the ocean,” Finn guessed. “I bet you had a whole group of friends. And a lot of fish to eat.”
A short, high note.
“Remus says you can’t ever go back to the ocean. I’m sorry, Winter. But… but while you’re here, we’ll take good care of you. This is a hospital. Did you know that? Did anyone tell you?”
A short, sharp note.
“I’ll take that as a no,” Finn said, feel a laugh bubble up in the tightness of his chest. “Well, it is. Remus is your doctor. Leo, too, I think. Did you know that?”
Winter just opened her mouth once, and then shut it. Finn poked her side with his toe. She chirped.
“Sorry,” he lied, smiling a little when she seemed… well, a bit like Regulus when Sirius poked fun at him, honestly. Like Logan when Noelle fussed with his hair.
A long silence, then. Just the sounds of the water fussing around the edges of the pool, Winter’s breathing, and the city around them. The sun was going down. Finn had been here all day.
“Leo told me you’re sad,” Finn said at last. “I… I am too, kind of. I miss Logan. I have no idea what I’m going to do with my life after I graduate college. I don’t even know what I’m going to do with it now.”
Winter hummed, sort off. Low in her belly.
“And the worst part is that the only constant that’s ever been there in my life is overseas right now, and I can’t even text him. I could write letters, but he can’t respond. So it just feels… cut off. Like a lung, kind of. Something I needed and didn’t realize it until it was gone.”
Winter shuffled on her pool bed.
Finn blinked. “Or, a bit like a tail, I guess.”
Another of those low hums.
“Sorry,” he said again. Winter just chirped.
“Winter….” Finn trailed off, letting his fingers drop from the ladder to her head. “You gotta start moving, girl. You’ve gotta start living while you can. There’s only so much Remus can do to help you when you don’t want to help yourself. If you don’t… if you don’t, we can’t do anything.”
Winter was silent.
“Please,” Finn begged the dolphin. “Just… can you please? I think… I think I’d like Logan to meet you, one day. One fish to another, kind of. Do you think you could do that?”
Winter put her nose in the water, away from his ankles. Finn watched her.
“They can’t really understand us,” said a woman’s voice behind him.
Finn jumped, almost falling into the pool. The others had all cleared out for a staff meeting. He’d thought he was completely alone up here with Winter.
Eloise Knut was watching him carefully. She smiled gently at him.
“There’s science that’s looked into it,” she explained. “They recognize emotion. Not words. Feelings. Not the meaning. So, maybe she gets you. Maybe she doesn’t. But… but I like that you’re trying, nonetheless.”
“Hi,” Finn breathed. He hadn’t spent much time with Leo’s mother. She’d always been in and out, a kind of in-between as they swam with Winter.
“Hi, Finn,” she said, smiling a bit wider as she leaned her elbows against the pool and watched Winter nose at the water. “I wanted to come up here while James and Remus were finishing the meeting to talk to you.”
“…Okay,” Finn said, feeling cornered.
“Nothing bad,” Mrs. Knut assured him. “I wanted to say thank you. It’s not often those who find the animals get involved. And even when they do, it’s not at the level you have. I’ve heard great things from the staff. They seem to like you.” A nod in Winter’s direction. “And she really does. It’s a good mark in a marine biologist’s book, for a dolphin to like someone so obviously. They’re excellent judges of character.”
“Like… dogs?” Finn asked, wincing.
Mrs. Knut laughed. “Sort of. A lot of people say the ocean’s dogs are the dolphins.”
“You sound like you don’t agree,” Finn pointed out.
She shrugged. “I think the ocean’s dogs are the sharks. The scary ones get a bad rep, but they’re not actually that dangerous to humans unless you corner them, or scare them, or find an injured one. And sometimes they get confused, and sometimes they bite a person. A lot like dogs, yes?”
Finn considered that. “Well, yeah, actually. So, what are dolphins, then? Cats?”
She grinned. “The kids.”
“The… kids?” Finn blinked.
“Dolphins are the ocean’s children,” Mrs. Knut said in a kind tone. “Don’t you know the story?”
“Um… I’m gonna admit something to you that I think everyone here has managed to figure out about me,” Finn told her seriously. “I know absolutely nothing about anything here.”
She laughed again. “I see why Leo speaks so highly of you,” she said around a laugh, and for some reason, that made Finn’s chest squeeze in a different way than thinking of Logan had.
When she finished laughing, she turned, facing Finn more than Winter now.
“In California, there’s an old Chumash legend,” she began. “Hutash, their Earth Mother, brought humans to life by planting seeds on the barrier islands, away from the mainland. The people were happy there. They had plenty of fish to eat, and the sun shone on them every day.
“One day, Hutash realized there were too many people on the islands. They needed to get some of them to the mainland, so they could continue growing. So she built them a bridge- because the waters were too large for them to swim across. But she built the bridge from rainbows. And the people were so amazed. So enchanted. And the children were dancing and singing- you know, being kids. And they were playing as they walked across the bridges to their new homes.
“But then the children played and danced too close to the edge of the rainbow, and some of them fell. And their parents were so worried that Hutash would punish them for letting their children fall, and that she would let them drown. There was so much ocean around them, you see. And the people began to pray to Hutash, terrified.
“But the moment the children touched the water, Hutash transformed them into dolphins to save them. Because she loved the way they played. And the parents were amazed. The dolphins began play in the waves, and their sounds sounded so much like the children singing.”
Eloise Knut smiled at Finn. “Hutash saved them so they could play forever, beneath the rainbows and in the waves. Between two homelands, in the ocean. Dolphins are the children of the sea, Finn.”
She held out a hand- one Finn hadn’t realized was holding something. He raised his own so she could drop the little piece into his palm.
A tiny dolphin figure, looking carved from some kind of shell. A leather cord secured it in a necklace.
The dolphin was missing her tail fin.
“Thank you,” Finn rasped.
And as he slipped the necklace around his neck, Winter began to thrash. Finn fell into the water as her nose whipped around and unhooked him from his perch.
He came up spluttering. “Winter!”
Mrs. Knut yelped, calling for Leo and Remus. “Finn, get out!” She said, reaching for him.
Winter slipped from her little floating bed, sinking into the water.
“But-“ Finn tried, thinking he was supposed to hoist her back up. He wasn’t supposed to let her stay under-
“She may be Winter, but she’s still a wild animal,” Mrs. Knut told him. “We don’t know what she’s doing, get out!”
Winter thrashed, sending water everywhere. Running footsteps on the deck. Leo and Remus emerged, James, Kasey, and Thomas right behind them.
“Finn!” Leo called. “Get away from her!”
“Get out, get out!” Remus was chanting, reaching for him and helping Finn haul himself back onto the ladder.
“What happened?” James was asking Mrs. Knut.
“She’s just-“
“Wait!” Leo shouted, his hand darting out and grabbing Finn- on the thigh, as he climbed over the ladder. Leo didn’t even seem to notice, his eyes pinned on Winter as she thrashed in the water. “Wait! Everyone stop shouting!”
Everyone quieted. Finn had trouble keeping his focus on Winter and not the long, slender fingers gripping his thigh.
“She’s…” Leo trailed off.
Finn realized what he was seeing a moment later.
“She’s swimming,” Finn breathed.
“Oh my fuck,” Remus muttered. Eloise Knut didn’t even reprimand him.
“Go Winter!” James called, laughing incredulously.
Winter was in the water, moving back and forth like a snake, or an eel, rather than up and down like a dolphin. Her stub where her tail had been moved through the water sideways, where her tail would have slashed.
And… and it was working. She was swimming.
She popped out of the water and chirped, loud and high. Over and over. She ducked back under and swam an entire lap around the pool, popped back up, and chirped and chirped.
“Good girl, Winter!” Finn cheered, laughing with James. “Go!”
“Swim, Winter!” Remus said, pressing himself agains the boards of the pool, eyes bright.
Leo was just standing there, laughing, eyes glittering.
“She’s doing it,” Finn kept saying. “She’s doing it!”
Mrs. Knut set a hand on his shoulder. “She heard you, Finn,” she whispered to him. “She heard you.”
Finn didn’t even try to hide the tears that ran down his cheeks.
It was five more minutes before Leo and Finn sharply turned to each other, realizing Leo’s hand was still on Finn’s thigh at the same time. Leo ripped his hand away and a bright, brilliant flush filled his cheeks. He’d turned before Finn could decipher if it was the sunset washing his face with color, or if Leo had been just as affected by that touch.
And, where neither of them could see, Eloise Knut and Remus Lupin shared a long, curious glance.
Chapter 4: iv
Summary:
“Go on,” Percy says, snagging the photo from across the tent- Logan’s bedroll is less than an arm’s length away. He waves it in the air. “Tell me all about your carrot-top. Was it love at first sight? How many times have you done the dirty? Have you ever had to bring him a leaf to wipe his ass with, or is that something we can hold over him? Do you jerk off to that photo when Morgs and I are asleep? Am I better looking? Is-“
“My God, stop,” Logan laughs out. “You’re terrible.”
Chapter Text
“So, this is what you do when you’re not at the hospital,” said a voice behind Finn.
He whirled, finding Leo holding a coffee, standing just behind him, a shy smile on his face.
Finn broke into a grin before he could contain it. “Oh, hey!”
Leo nodded to the chair on the other side of Finn’s table. “Can I?”
“Sure, sure. Yeah. Of course.” Finn cleared his throat. Leo shot him a look before pulling the chair out and sliding into it.
“Should I be concerned that you’re drinking an espresso at… six in the evening?” He asked, checking his watch.
“Should I be concerned that you’re holding a cold brew at the same time?” Finn challenged.
“I have night lectures tonight,” Leo explained.
“Oh.” Finn blinked. “I didn’t realize you were taking summer courses.”
“Just two night classes.” Leo waved him off. “If I want to really graduate a year early, it’s necessary.” After eyeing Finn’s cup, he said, “So, the espresso?”
“I was up all night last night,” Finn admitted. “I need it if I’m going to get through family dinner that I have to leave for in…” he checked his own watch, “ten minutes.”
Leo grinned. “Alex is your only sibling?”
“Oh. Well, yeah. But Logan’s family, too. We always do a Sunday dinner thing. His sisters are like mine, honestly. I think Noelle’s actually going to pick me up on her way home from work. I walked from the apartment, but it’d be nice to not have to walk to Logan’s house.”
Leo nodded. “Right. Heard anything from him? Is he okay?”
Finn swallowed hard. “Um… he’s like, completely no contact for the next…” he did his math. “Five months.”
Fuck. Fuck. It had already been a month. And Finn had been so caught up in Winter, in spending his days filled with new friends and a dolphin that the time had just passed.
Everything was so new to him right now. He wondered if it would start setting in that Logan was really gone for the next five months soon. He hadn’t really had time to breathe, to let it sit. He kind of wanted to throw himself back at the hospital this very moment to stop thinking about it.
“Oh, shit,” Leo muttered, and took a long sip of his drink. “I didn’t realize there weren’t even letters he could get out.”
“Yeah,” Finn said on a sigh. “We don’t even… we don’t even know where he is.” His voice broke, and he tried to cover it by clearing his throat.
Leo eyed him. “You know, if you miss him, it’s okay to act like it.”
Finn shook his head. Then said, “Obviously, I miss him. So much. But… if I let myself think about it, I’m going to dissolve.”
Leo frowned slightly, considering. “Well, maybe that’s okay. It’s healing just a bit, you know?”
Finn said, “What classes are you taking?”
Leo didn’t even reprimand him for the obvious avoidance. “My summers are devoted to my dolphin and turtle concentrations on my degree.” He let out a long breath, his cheeks puffed out. “Which means I’m basically going in just to learn shit I already know from home.”
“Home?” Finn blinked. “Oh- do… do you guys live at the hospital?”
“Basically,” Leo said on a laugh. “No. You haven’t seen the two houseboats in the marina behind the hospital?”
“Houseboats?” Finn echoed, thinking hard. “Oh, yeah. No, I mean, I did. But I don’t think I put those pieces together.”
Leo grinned. “Remus and Sirius’ is the one on the right. Ours is on the left.”
“Remus and Sirius live together in a houseboat?” Finn questioned, brows raised.
“Well, when Regulus moved to town, James left the houseboat and moved into Sirius’ old apartment with him. Sirius took James’ spot in the boat.”
“Ah.” Finn nodded. “I was wondering. So, have you always lived on a boat?”
“Yeah,” Leo admitted. “When my mom was little, my grandpa and her sailed around the world in that thing. When my mom and dad opened the hospital, they parked it.”
“So your grandpa lives there too?”
Leo nods. “Obviously, I never did the whole moving out thing. Don’t know if I could sleep without the rocking, honestly.”
Finn wondered about that. He’d always wondered about those houseboats and yachts. He’d never known anyone who lived on one full-time, though.
“That must have been a cool way to grow up,” Finn commented. “Not just the boat, but the hospital, too.”
Leo nodded again. “Yeah, I guess it was. I was homeschooled, you know. So it was all boats and fish for me.”
Finn laughs. “Jesus, I can’t imagine. My family doesn’t spend much time at the water.”
“You live on the beach!” Leo protested.
“I know, I know,” Finn said, laughing.
After a moment, as Finn finished off the dregs of his espresso, Leo says, “So. Are you going to make me ask about the research you seem to be doing?”
“Saw that, did you?” Finn asks with a little smile-wince thing. Leo just smiles at him.
“I... I was curious. It’s interesting.”
“Dolphin calls and their meanings,” Leo said, nodding. “It is. Every chirp can mean something specific. Mainly, Winter’s high chirps are happiness, you know. That’s when you’re around.”
“Yeah.” Finn lets out a breath, moving his cursor so the page pops back up. “I noticed that. But… I’ve been looking at all the stuff. Like, dolphins in general. I even found out how long sea turtles live. Most range between eighty years and a hundred, right? I wouldn’t have thought that. I thought they were like… dogs, I guess. Only lived to fifteen maybe.”
“Damn,” Leo comments, “when you said you really knew nothing, I didn’t think you were being serious-“
“Fuck off,” Finn laughs. “I’m learning.”
Leo’s eyes are strangely bright as he says, “Yeah. You are.”
When Noelle shows up two minutes later and shouts from her parked car, visible from the porch of the coffee shop, Finn groans and gathers his things.
“Logan’s sister,” he explains, after realizing he’d mentioned Noelle but not the relation.
Leo nods. “Tell her we say hi, I guess. Have fun.”
“Hey, you too, scholar.”
Leo rolls his eyes.
“Bring your cute friend!” Noelle shouts from the window of her car. “I wanna meet him!”
Finn groans, looks to Leo, who’s face is a pretty pink, and drags him along.
“This is Leo,” Finn says as he tosses his bag into the floorboard of the passenger seat.
“How do we know Leo?” Noelle questions, eyeing him over her sunglasses. “He’s a beaut, Finley! Where have you been hiding him? Does Logan know him? I can’t imagine Lolo not talking about a cute friend.”
Finn considers her for a moment. “Logan never once talked to you about cute boys and I can confirm that,” he says after a moment.
Leo looks even pinker at that. It takes Finn a moment to register that he just called him cute. Then Leo says, “Your name is Finley?”
“No,” Finn groans as Noelle cackles and says, “Yes. Absolutely. Please carry that on.”
“Leo’s from the marine hospital,” Finn explains, he and Leo standing there in the open passenger door. “You know, Winter.”
“Ah, yes, the infamous, amazing, cute dolphin I have yet to meet and think you and Alex are making up to make me jealous because you know how much Logan and I love dolphins,” Noelle said in one breath.
Leo lets out a little surprised laugh. “You can come by with Finn anytime.”
Noelle beams. “Why, thank you Leonardias from the marine hospital.”
Leo shakes his head. “Absolutely not.”
“Leonardo?”
“Nope.”
“It’s really just Leo?”
“Yep.”
“This one’s a beaut and a killjoy,” Noelle comments. “But I’m still coming to meet Snowflake.”
“Winter,” Finn corrects.
“Whatever,” Noelle says on a sigh. “No one likes my humor anymore. Logan was the only one who laughed at me. Now I have to wait for him to get home-“
“I laugh!” Finn protested.
“Sometimes,” Noelle lamented.
Leo chuckles at them. “I gotta run. But it was nice to meet you, Christmas.”
Noelle’s face lights up. “Oh, wait, actually, I like him. We’re keeping him.”
Finn laughs and gets into the car. “See you tomorrow, Leo.”
“See you,” Leo says on a chuckle, and disappears back into the coffee shop. When Finn turns, Noelle is eyeing him over her sunglasses this time.
“What?” Finn asks.
“If I didn’t know how absolutely and terribly gone you are for my baby brother,” she says, as if this is nothing out of the ordinary, “I would think you have a fat crush on that one.”
“Leo?” Finn blurts.
Noelle hums. “Alex said the same thing.”
“What?” Finn splutters. “When did you and Alex talk about this?”
“Alex and I talk about everything, Finn, when will you catch up?”
“I don’t have a crush on Leo,” Finn mutters. “Please drive.”
Noelle shifts the car into reverse. “Whatever you say,” she says on a singsong tone. “But I’m coming to the hospital to meet your dolphin anyway. I wanna pet her.”
“That’s Nessa and Greg,” Finn says, watching as Noelle’s eyes go big and round. She presses her nose to the glass, palms flat against it too.
“This is what you do every day?” She asks, her breath fogging up the glass.
“Well, I don’t actually see the otters often,” Finn admits.
“They’re adorable,” Noelle beams, nose still pressed there.
“Yeah, they’re cute,” says a voice behind them. Finn turns to see Thomas walking toward them, hauling his usual buckets of fresh fish and clams mixed with a strange array of sea urchins toward the stairs that would take him back to the sea otters feeding area. “But if you put your fingers too close to their mouths, they’ll bite them right off.”
Noelle peels her face from the glass and turns to look over her shoulder. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
Thomas stops, blinks, and Finn thinks he sees something like panic in the look his friend darts to him. “Oh,” Thomas says finally. “Hello.”
“Hi,” Noelle says, and Finn thinks there may be an amused tilt to her lips.
“I’m, ah- I’m Thomas,” he says, and Finn almost snorts.
“Thomas?” Remus asks, walking past behind him with a starfish in his palm that he’s examining. “I’ve literally never heard you introduce yourself as Thomas.”
“Shut up, Re,” Thomas hisses. Noelle is watching Remus go by, eyes wide at the starfish he just plops back down into the tidepool as he goes by.
“Noelle,” Noelle introduces herself, holding out a hand. That, she realizes after doing so, Thomas can’t shake with two buckets of reeking otter food in his hands. She takes it back immediately. “Actually, don’t shake my hand.”
“Probably best,” Finn comments, leaning back to watch the exchange. Noelle shoots him a look, now.
“Hey, O’Hara,” Thomas finally greets.
“Hey, Walkie,” Finn says, grinning. “Feeding time?”
“Want to come help this time?” Thomas asks, looking back behind Noelle’s shoulder to peer at his charges.
“Absolutely not,” Finn hedges. “Not after last time.”
“Last time was a fluke.”
“What happened last time?” Noelle asks.
“We don’t talk about it,” Finn informs her.
“He got a sea urchin thrown at him and he fell into the bucket of octopus arms,” Thomas admits. “I had to peel them off his back.”
“Fuck you,” Finn groans. “That was our secret.”
Thomas shrugs. “It’s not a secret anymore. Eloise saw it on the security cams last night and showed Leo. Leo showed Regulus. Regulus laughed his ass off and James demanded to know. And you know James can’t keep a secret.”
As if on cue, a voice calls from the upper deck, “Yo, Octopus is here!”
Finn feels his mouth drop open. An accented voice calls right after James, “Pots, we agreed to call him Sucker!”
“Sirius knows too?” Finn questions, wincing.
Thomas nods solemnly. “You’re never living it down.”
Noelle covers her mouth to hide a particularly loud chortle. “Oh, Fish,” she says, shaking her head.
Thomas’ eyes light up. “Fish?”
Finn points at him. “Don’t you dare-“
But Thomas is already using the walkie-talkie all of the employees carry to chirp to the others about his new discovery.
“I want to help feed the otters,” Noelle announces.
Thomas blinks at her. “Oh. Yes. Of course. Yeah. That’d be-“ he clears his throat. Turns off his walkie, that Finn can now hear Kasey laughing into. “That’d be great. I need all the help I can get in there, honestly.”
“You’re in charge of the otters?” Noelle asks, eyes wholly on him.
“Well, they’re not as complex as the turtles and dolphins, so even though I’m a year out from my masters, Eloise lets me lead on them. We also don’t get as many, you know, since they usually don’t end up near here. And-“ Thomas breaks off, realizing he’s rambling. Finn smirks at him.
Noelle points at Thomas as she turns to tell Finn, “I’m going with him. After, I want to pet your Winter. Find me.”
Then she bounces over and takes one of Thomas’ buckets. He stares down at her for a moment before pointing her toward the stairs and, over his shoulder as she leads the way, he mouths to Finn: help.
Finn just shrugs and turns to head up to the decks.
“Ah, the fish himself,” Kasey says from the ladder he’s perched on.
“Don’t you start,” Finn warns, knowing how easy it would be to shove him into the pool he’s sitting next to.
“Finley the fishy,” Kasey coos.
Finn shoves him into the pool.
There’s a disposable camera pointed at him. Leo, next to him on Winter’s waterbed, looks up at the sound of a click.
“Paparazzi alert,” Sirius yelps from the other side of the deck. “Cameras, people! We’ve got cameras!”
Noelle waves it in the air and yells at Finn and Leo (somewhat threateningly), “Smile!”
Leo says, “Um…”
Finn laughs.
The camera clicks.
The parcel comes right on the heels of a brutal day.
Logan has received letters- of course he has. His parents, his sisters. Even some from Finn’s mom and dad. He keeps watching for that loopy, slightly rushed handwriting.
It hasn’t come yet.
Percy and Will wolf whistle when he moves to go back into his tent to open it. Moody gives him a nod, but he eyes the package like there might be a bomb hiding somewhere in it.
Logan just tucks into his bedroll and rips at the layers of tape haphazardly applied by (very obviously) his sister Noelle. Her flower and wave doodles are all over the folder.
He dumps it unceremoniously in his lap. The envelope lands on top.
It’s… pictures. He can tell that much now. A pile of photos. He can see a shock of red hair in more than most of them. When his eyes snag on the topmost one, praying to see that smile, it’s just Alex and Noelle sitting on the edge of the O’Hara dock, feet in the water, tossing bread to the ducks.
Logan grits his teeth and forces himself to reach for the envelope. He rips it open and is met with Noelle’s cursive.
Hey baby bro!
Hope you’re keeping the country safe. We miss you lots. I figured letters can only do so much, so I’ve taken up photography. It’s one of those disposables Mom’s kept in the kitchen drawer for years but never uses. Isn’t it weird she always buys these and they never make it out of their boxes?
Anyway, there’s explanations on the back of all of them. A picture can mean a thousand things, after all. Wouldn’t want you to have to figure it all out.
I love you, Lo. And we’re very proud. Come home safe.
Noelle
(P.S.: If there’s more photos of a certain carrot-top in here, don’t blame me. I know you’re probably wanting to see all of your boy that you can. And while I definitely won’t be sending you the kind of photos of your boy I know you probably want, here’s what I can scrape together in the PG category.)
Logan huffs a small, broken laugh. When he reaches for the first photo, there’s still blood caked under his fingernails. Dirt on his wrist.
A hand pressed to a man’s chest. Yelling into his transponder. Percy and Will on the other side of the compound. Moody offline.
Five Americans saved. Seventeen lost.
Sitting on a rock pressed between Will and Percy. Will scrubbing the man’s blood from Logan’s skin with water from his canteen. Percy humming Chicken Fried.
Logan grabs the first photo.
His sisters, all in a line, high kicking in their old cheerleader uniforms. On the back, Noelle has written: Reliving the glory days!
Logan chokes on a laugh.
The next is a photo of Alex, Noelle, and- fuck. There he is.
Finn, sitting on his bike, one foot on a pedal, already in motion. He doesn’t even seem to realize there’s a camera pointed at him.
He’s glowing. Mid-laugh and sunglasses on.
O’Hara vs. Tremblay race. (Finley won. Can you believe that?)
Logan moves through the pile, staring at Finn. Bright. Laughing. Smiling.
Finn, wrestling with Alex on the floor of the O’Hara living room. Finn, in his trunks, mid-cannonball into the community pool. Finn, laughing his ass off at Alex, who’s wearing a bright blue wig.
Logan’s hands are shaking. A tear hits the latest photo, smearing Noelle’s writing: Alex is considering drag.
Between them all, there’s a constant. Finn, Finn, Finn. Finn, who he hasn’t been able to see in weeks, Finn, who hasn’t written to him. Finn, who’s whole and happy, somehow.
Logan is torn between hoping he stays that way and wishing Finn looked a bit wrecked. It makes him feel horrible.
A long range of the coffee shop Finn loves, just down the street from their apartment. It takes Logan a moment, but there he is, sitting and pointing at his screen with a blond boy leaning over to look. On the porch, in the Florida sunshine. The photo obviously caught from Noelle’s Jeep window.
I finally met Leo! He’s a cutie pie. We love Leo.
Leo? Logan can’t remember a Leo.
A sideways shot selfie of Noelle with a boy Logan doesn’t know in the background, dumping a bucket into a… pond? There are brown creatures crowding the boy’s feet. He’s giving a thumbs up.
Thomas showing me how to feed the otters. Can’t believe it took your O’Hara so long to bring me to the hospital!
Hospital? Logan doesn’t know a Thomas. He doesn’t…
Finn sitting in a pool on a deck, that blond boy next to him. This close, Logan can make him out better. He’s… cute. No. The blond boy, Leo, is… well. He’s attractive, for sure. Logan isn’t sure how he feels about that. There’s a dolphin poking its nose into Finn’s lap- Leo is holding a whole fish by the tail up for her.
Noelle has written: Feeding time for our Winter girl! (Alternatively called Finn’s baby). Isn’t she adorable?
Logan feels his brows creasing. Finn has a new necklace on. Logan can’t make out the pendant, but… Finn doesn’t wear jewelry. Never has. Logan’s the one with the fleur de lis necklace.
He should have left it with Finn.
Finn and the boy laughing, people moving in the background, running over. The fish’s top half is in Finn’s lap now.
Winter wanted Finn to take a bite. Our Finley was not amused.
But Finn looks plenty amused, laughing with half a fish in his lap, that Leo boy’s arm coming up to toss around Finn’s shoulders.
“Canada!” He hears from outside the tent. “Dinner!”
Logan brushes the photos off his lap and leaves them there, in a pile, for him to think about later.
Later.
The night shift is calm. Finn wasn’t expecting that, with Thomas and Leo. He’d expected it to be more… chaotic, for sure. But now that Winter doesn’t need someone to hold her up, the three of them are sprawled next to her pool on sleeping bags with tacos between them. There’s a notebook in Finn’s lap, a pen in his hands, an addressed envelope by his knee.
The paper is blank. Like it has been for weeks.
“Want some siracha?” Thomas asks, half a taco in his mouth as he waves the bottle in Finn’s direction.
“Careful where you point that shit, Talkie,” Leo grumbles, protectively covering his own taco plate.
“I’ll get you on the dark side eventually, Le,” Thomas promises him.
Finn accepts the siracha bottle, if only to keep Thomas from spraying them all with it.
“Whatcha writing?” Thomas asks, still with a mouthful.
Leo looks up from the taco he’s artfully arranging, studying Finn. Like he already knows. Of course he does- Leo’s like that, sometimes. Always noticing the things Finn doesn’t say.
“Um…” Finn clears his throat. “A letter. Well, it’s supposed to be.”
“Ah.” Thomas swallows. “To your boy?”
Finn looks back down at the blank page. “Yeah.”
Thomas cranes his neck to see and says, “It’s blank. Invisible ink or something?”
“I haven’t started yet, dick.” Finn tosses the bottle back at him. Thomas chuckles.
“Why not?” Leo asks, finally picking up his own taco. He’s trying for casual, but his voice is too soft. Knowing.
Finn rolls his shoulders, if only for something to do with his limbs. Then he shrugs. Then he runs a hand through his hair. “I don’t know what to say.”
“Cause he can’t write back?” Thomas asks, settling back on an elbow. “That’s kinda weird, I guess.”
Finn shrugs again. “I don’t know. I guess that’s why. I just… I don’t know.”
“Just write what you would say if he was here,” Leo urges, reaching over to tap a finger to Finn’s notebook. “It doesn’t have to be profound. What have you written him before?”
A drop in Finn’s belly. “I haven’t,” He admits, his stomach turning over and over.
The change in Leo’s demeanor is instant. Thomas fills his cheeks with air and slowly releases it, eyes wide.
“Finn,” Leo says quietly.
“I know,” Finn groans.
“Finn,” Leo says, more stern now. “It’s been months.”
“I know.”
“He’s probably worried sick,” Leo chides. “Stuck somewhere unfamiliar. With people he doesn’t know all that well. Thinking about you all the time. Fighting for the country. And you haven’t even written to him?”
“I know,” Finn snaps. Leo’s mouth snips shut, lips a thin line. “Sorry,” Finn manages. “It’s just… fuck. I don’t know. But I know. I mean- sorry.”
Thomas’ eyes flit back and forth between them as if watching a tennis match.
“It’s okay,” Leo says eventually, eyes studying him. He reaches over again, a bit more tentatively, and taps the paper. “Write to him, Finn. Then eat your tacos.”
Thomas breaks the pause by whistling and finishing off the rest of his own taco in one bite.
“Well. Anyone want to check on the otters with me?”
“Sit down and write, Finn,” Leo chirps.
Percy finds the photo two days later.
Logan’s got it pinned next to his bedroll in their tent, and it’s been there for two days. But with the blurry vision they’ve all been experiencing that Moody calls grief and dread and guilt, no one’s noticed Finn O’Hara’s smiling face yet.
“Who’s that?” Percy asks, nodding at the photo.
Logan, who’s since given up on pretending to be the straight, All-American swim boy turned soldier that he’s been playing, looks over at the photo and allows himself a small smile.
When Will and Percy stopped to wash blood off his skin, and when Will talked about his sister’s wife, Logan decided he didn’t much care if they knew. It’s not like they were suddenly going to send him home. He’s already here. They’ve already killed for each other and fought through the night to make sure they were all still breathing.
And sure, Logan has no idea who this Leo boy is. He’s a little worried, in the pit of his stomach, about that arm tossed over Finn’s shoulder in so many photos. But he loves Finn. Has loved him. For years. Logan Tremblay knows Finn O’Hara, down to his bones.
And he doesn’t think Finn would do something like that. Not to him. Not in clear view of their families. Not after that night- Logan’s last night.
“My boyfriend,” Logan says. He aims for casual, wanting to just toss the information out there and be done with it, like something he wasn’t purposefully not telling them. But his voice isn’t with the program. It comes out shaky, a bit torn. A bit grief-stricken, too.
Jesus he misses Finn.
Percy stops ruffling through his duffle and looks up sharply. His eyes take Logan in- the sunken shoulders, the tone, the eyes stuck on the photo. Logan doesn’t see the emotions playing across his face. He’s too busy looking at the only solo shot of Finn that was in that stack of photos. Finn, grinning and beautiful. Finn, holding up a flower from the side of the road through Noelle’s Jeep window. Finn, windblown and washed in Florida sun. Freckled. A bit sunburned. Eyes alight.
What Percy quietly asks makes Logan finally tear his eyes away.
“You miss him?”
Logan just nods, letting out a long breath. He blinks hard. Fuck. He’s going to cry. He’s just-
“Whoa, hey, Canada.” Percy purses his lips and pats his bedroll next to him. “Come sit.”
“Fuck,” Logan says aloud. He laughs a little, the first time in days, and rubs his eyes. “Fuck.”
“C’mon, kid,” Percy says softly.
“You’re a year older than me, Marshy,” Logan manages, falling to his ass on Percy’s bedroll. His friend throws an arm over his shoulders, squeezing.
“It’s okay to miss your people,” Percy says after a long moment of Logan’s heavy breathing. “I cry every day over Cassie.”
Logan hadn’t known that. But he’s not particularly surprised. Percy talks about Cassie every minute of the day.
“You’re not gonna…?” Logan trails off, leaving the question open-ended. Lets Percy piece it together.
Percy laughs. “So what? You’re gay. Okay. You’re a hell of a shot, too. And the other night you found me something to wipe my ass with when we were on patrol. If you ask me, we’re as close as brothers now. Nothing can break the bond of finding desert leaves to clean your shit with.”
Logan groans, dropping his head into his hands. “We agreed not to speak of that ever again.”
Percy laughs and jostles him. “I’ve always wanted a brother. Now I got a little one.”
Logan lets himself smile. “Me too.” Alex has always been like a big brother, but Will and Percy will always be something special to him. Moody, too, against all odds. Something like a father, something like a teacher.
“Go on,” Percy says, snagging the photo from across the tent- Logan’s bedroll is less than an arm’s length away. He waves it in the air. “Tell me all about your carrot-top. Was it love at first sight? How many times have you done the dirty? Have you ever had to bring him a leaf to wipe his ass with, or is that something we can hold over him? Do you jerk off to that photo when Morgs and I are asleep? Am I better looking? Is-“
“My God, stop,” Logan laughs out. “You’re terrible.”
“Mail’s here!” Will burst through the tent flap, waving a handful of letters around. “We all got people lovin’ us apparently. Though, Marsh, I think yours is your electric bill.”
“Fuck off,” Percy says around a smile, yanking the pink envelope from Will. Pink for Cassie. Always.
“You alright, Canada?” Will asks, plopping down on Logan’s bedroll next to him. “You look a lil’ heartsick.”
Logan takes a deep breath. Well. Isn’t that apt.
“Someone break your heart? Did Florence Pugh get married and I missed it?”
“He misses his boy,” Percy announces, tearing open his letter.
Will pauses. Logan shoots Percy an exasperated look.
Percy looks up in the silence. “Oh. Wait. Was that a secret?”
“No,” Logan breathes out, feeling a bit like breaking into deranged laughter. “No, not anymore, anyway.”
“Was it before?” Percy asks, looking up from his letter. That makes Logan feel special. Usually, only dinner can make Percy stop re-reading Cassie Baker’s letters.
“Um…” Logan shrugs. “I mean…”
“Jesus, stop quizzing the kid, Marshall,” Will grunts, handing Logan two letters. “Is your boy’s name Finn? Cause if it’s not, he’s gonna be real upset about this other boy writing to you.”
Logan goes completely still. “What?” He breathes, looking down at the letters.
One with his mother’s neat handwriting. The other addressed in that heartbreaking loopy scrawl he’s been praying for.
Oh, God. Oh God.
“He looks like a Finn,” Percy guesses, still holding the photo of Finn.
“He wrote to me?” Logan asks, disbelievingly staring at the envelope.
Percy looks up. “Well, he’s your boyfriend, right? Who were you expecting, the queen?”
Will narrows his eyes and, after a moment, asks, “Has he… not written before?”
“No,” Logan breathes, still staring at the letter.
Percy’s face goes a bit soft. “Oh. Oh. Oh, fuck, well, now I feel like a dick for pestering you earlier.”
Logan waves him off. “I’m, ah, going to step out for a moment. I gotta…”
“No funny business!” Percy calls after him as he rushes out of the tent, obviously over feeling guilty about pestering him.
“Fuck off, Marshy!” Logan yells back.
Lo,
Fuck, I miss you.
I couldn’t decide what I wanted to say, so this is about to be a jumble and terrible, and you’ll probably want to strangle me for not getting to the point. I know how much you hate reading.
I miss you. A fuck ton. Every day. Noelle said she’s written you like a dozen letters, and I know I should have I haven’t been able to.
In all honestly, I don’t know what to say if I’m not saying it to your face. I miss you so much that I just can’t face it and I’m so sorry. I love you so so so much, Logan Tremblay. I should have written you a hundred times by now. I’m so sorry.
And I know you can’t write back, so I’ll just be here, wondering what you’re up to. I hope there’s a pool or lake or ocean somewhere near wherever you are.
I found a dolphin. Did Noelle tell you that? I bet she did. Anyway, her name is Winter. She was tangled in some nets on the beach when I was biking. Now she’s at the marine hospital. And I’m the only one she trusts to feed her most of the time, so, well. I guess you could say I have a dolphin, now. She kind of adopted me.
I want you to meet her, at some point. When you come home. Because you will come home, Logan. That’s an order.
Fucking hell, I miss you so much. I love you. Love you love you love you love you love you love you. Come home to me. Please. Just come home.
Love you,
Finn
The next day, Logan, Percy, Will, and Moody packed up to move camp. Percy chirped at him, Will chiding them both, and Moody was a calming, fortifying presence as they loaded their rucksacks and bedrolls.
Logan tucked Finn’s photo and letter in his front pocket. Right above his heart.
Then they set off across the desert, heading for twenty clicks from their current location.
“I gotta piss,” Percy announced five minutes in.
Even Moody groans
Ktpillar11 on Chapter 1 Fri 09 Aug 2024 12:06AM UTC
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