Page 72 of Fireworks
Finlay squinted against the sunlight. “I feel like I’m in an interrogation.”
“Good. You should. You have a lot to prove.” She hugged her legs tighter, heart finally calming when she saw Brook and Sky tugging Saffron along to look at some pigeons on a nearby bench. Happy. Only, how much did that really have to do with Finlay? They could smile just as much in Mum’s back garden.
“I was let go from my last job a couple months ago,” he admitted. “But I got back on my feet quickly. Had to, to keep paying the bills.”
“And are you still paying them? Because …”
“Bloody hell, Eiley. Those card readers are always faulty. I told you I’ve got enough money to support them.”
But he wouldn’t meet her eye as he fidgeted with his wristwatch.
She didn’t believe him. Not one bit.
“Why’s Sky still not talking?” he demanded then.
She froze, the hair on the back of her neck rising. “He’s still in speech therapy. He communicates in his own way.” Recently, they’d been relying more on sign language, sometimes creating their own symbols to make it easier. He’d already given her his symbol forhomeonce today, when they’d nipped to the loo around the corner. It had made her feel wobbly, wondering if she should give him what he wanted or try to ease him into this.
She was starting to wish she’d done the former.
Finlay said nothing, but she saw the displeasure curve on his lips all the same as he watched them play. Sky jiggled and shook his head when Brook tried to throw fallen leaves over them, and Brook stopped. Just like that. Because she’d made sure, before anything else, that the three of them knew how to listen to one another’s boundaries. To care about one another. They squabbled like all siblings, but they also taught one another about unconditional love every single day, and it was her biggest source of pride.
“Go on. Tell me what you really think,” she bit out. “Tell me how to take care of our son properly, since you’re clearly so knowledgeable about it.”
“I just think you baby him too much, that’s all. He should be pushed to make more progress. He can’t be like this forever.”
“He’sautistic. It isn’t something you grow out of.”
“I know that, but there are lots of bairns with autism that can still speak and act normal.”
That word,normal, left her recoiling, nausea thickening her throat. It had always been Finlay’s weapon: with Sky, yes,but also with her. She wasn’tnormalwhen she didn’t want to spend her weekends getting drunk at the pub with him. She wasn’tnormalwhen she felt anxious in busy spaces. She wasn’tnormalwhen, instead of having the magical postpartum glow they depicted on TV shows and social media, she’d sunk into the worst depression of her life, living in her pyjamas for months.
Even with Brook, Finlay hadn’t approved of his interest in theatre.He should play football or some other sport, like the strong lad he is.
It was bullshit, especially now, when Finlay didn’t have the slightest clue about anything regarding his children. Didn’t know when Saff had started walking, or what Sky’s first day at forest school had been like, or the name of Brook’s teacher.
Before Eiley could even formulate a reply, Finlay raised his hands cautiously. “I didn’t mean it that way. Don’t get upset, aye?” He looked around, as though more worried about what other people would think.
“I’m sorry.”
He wasn’t. She could tell. She could always tell.
And though it was wrong, visions of Warren in the fire truck with Sky littered her mind. Sky’s laughter. The careful ease with which Warren had kept his focus. He hadn’t worried about treating him like he was normal, because he’d known that hewasn’t.Normaldidn’t exist.
Yet the man in front of her, who was half Sky’s, who shared his blood, just couldn’t get it.
“You won’t speak like that in front of them anymore,” she warned. “If you do, we’re gone. The only reason I’m not onmy way home right now is because they’re happy, playing. The second that changes, Fin …”
Finlay picked at his bottom lip, ringed fingers gleaming in the light. “Understood. You call the shots now.”
She wasn’t done, still seething. “Get to know your kids before you tell me how to raise them.”
It wasn’t enough.Hewasn’t enough.
She didn’t know why she’d ever expected that to change.
32
Finlay’s house resided on the outskirts of the city, in the innermost nook of a cul-de-sac not far from the River Clyde. A white-bricked home with bay windows and a lush green front yard, she couldn’t help but wonder how it was he’d managed to afford the place – nor how it was fair that, while she’d struggled to get out of her mum’s house for almost a year, he’d been living comfortably.
