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The plane ride back from Finland left Scott’s back twisted and his mouth dry, and the only thing he wanted was to go back to his apartment and sleep for approximately eleven years and six days. He rolled his back a few times as he stood from his seat and grabbed both his and Tessa’s suitcases, wordlessly setting hers down in front of her before making his way off the plane. The smell of dusty airplane carpet and exhaust made his head pound for a moment.
“You coming with me?” He threw some peanuts into his mouth as he and Tessa deplaned, rolling their carry-ons behind them. Swallowing the last of his in-flight snack, he reached across Tessa and threw the empty foil in the garbage.
“Hm?” Her head was bowed, nose buried in her phone, scrolling through and clacking quick texts. “Say that again?” He laid a hand on her back to guide her to baggage claim, so consumed was she with her phone.
“Driving. Tonight. Home. Coming?”
He watched as she pocketed her phone in her jacket and rubbed a hand over her makeup free eyes. “I did tell my mother I’d be home to visit this week, but I think I’ll pass on the ride. I’ll probably head home tomorrow instead – I have a few things I want to get done before I leave.” They stepped onto the escalator that would take them downstairs to baggage claim, her one step above him. He tilted his up to look at her. “Sure?”
“Yeah,” she sighed as they stepped off, “I feel like I need a day. I don’t know how you’re about to jump in a car and drive home, I feel like my limbs are about to melt off.”
“I might leave early tomorrow morning, I feel the same way.”
Gathering both of their suitcases from the carousel always seemed to be a bit of a project, as both of them continued to only buy black suitcases – “coloured suitcases look so tacky” according to Tessa. Apparently, the rest of the world had the same mindset, round and round did the black suitcases go.
They got recognized more often when they were together, but today no one seemed to be paying any mind to them. Scott took a minute to survey the people who were on the plane with him, each looking about as rumpled as he felt. Passengers were covering yawns with their hands, hair messy and frazzled, coats jumbled and scarves askew. So many people, he thought, returning to Canada from Finland, so many people going home or going on, grabbing suitcases full of belongings, stories in everyone. He watched a blonde couple inconspicuously, the female tiny and pretty, leaning against her boyfriend? Fiancé? as they waited for their bags. She was using his chest as her own personal wall as she tucked her chin in to scroll through her phone. He had his arms wrapped around her neck, trying and failing to look awake.
“Mm, Scott,” Tessa jerked him from his stare and he shifted his eyes down to her, “are those yours?” She pointed to a predictably black suitcase and he shuffled forward to take a closer look before grabbing it, hauling it off the carousel.
“T,” he said, as another familiar looking suitcase passed,“is this- ”
“Yeah, grab it. And the fourth one down –“
“Mine, yeah.”
They settled their bags between them, stowing them on carts before making their way to the lot and loading them in Tessa’s car. “You want to drive?” She reached into her purse for her keys before throwing them at him.
They got in and slammed doors behind him, Scott sticking the key into the ignition. Breathing out a sigh, he leaned his head against the steering wheel for a minute. The flight had been long, and the week had been even longer. Inside the darkness of the underground parking lot, he felt himself slowly begin to unravel. His forehead pressed into the leather of the steering wheel as he took a big breath inwards and slowly let it out, eyes closed.
He felt a familiar hand lay itself between his shoulder blades, but she didn’t say anything. He gave himself ten seconds – ten, nine, eight, - before heaving a last breath and picking his head up and starting the car. Tessa’s manicured nails scratched briefly through his sweater before reaching down to change the radio station to link to her phone. They were silent as Scott steered the car towards the exit, Tessa landing on something calm that he recognized as a very old Norah Jones record. It was not his usual style at all, but he knew she liked it and it suited his mood just fine.
The streets were dark and lined with lampposts, and he was grateful that it was April and that meant that most of the snow had melted. The car ride was quiet, and he almost had no memory of it as he turned into their underground parking lot at their complex.
He turned off the car and made to take the key out of the ignition, but Tessa laid a hand over his.
“Hey,” she said, quiet and soft, green eyes piercing his as he met her stare.
“Hey,” he replied, a twitch of a smile. She lifted the corner of her mouth in response, before her expression turned serious again. She opened her mouth has if to say something, then firmly shut it, as if thinking better of what she was about to say. She moved her hand to his jaw instead, and pressed a firm, lingering kiss between his eyebrows.
He closed his eyes at her touch, breathing in and out. She rested her forehead briefly against his, swiping hair from his eyes gently, before turning to open her door.
“An undefeated season, Moir,” she winked as she exited. “Nice work.”
His lips curled up despite himself.
XXX
He ended up leaving the next morning, his bed looking too inviting when he crashed through his front door. A forgettable amount of hours and coffee cups later, he let himself through the door of his childhood home.
“Mom,” he called, dumping a bag of his clothing and toothbrush by his shoes at the entrance. “You home?”
“Kitchen,” he heard her reply, “and so help me if you leave that bag by the front door; bring it to your room please.”
Sighing, he hoisted his bag over his shoulder before finding his mother stirring something at the stove. “Look,” he said, dangling the bag in front of her, “going straight to my room.”
“That’s what I like to hear,” his mother grinned, “thank you. This is almost ready; unless you want to wait for your father. He should be back in an hour.”
“Are you kidding, I’m starving,” Scott ran up the steps to his room to drop off his bag before bounding back down. “Also, hi,” he said, kissing her cheek. Considering she had traveled to Finland to watch him compete at Worlds, he had just seen her, but she had taken off right after the competition to be home earlier than him and Tessa.
She turned off the stove to give him a proper hug. “How are you doing? Did you have a chance to breathe yet? An undefeated season – I’m so proud of you.”
“Yeah,” he sighed, slipping into a kitchen chair, “undefeated.”
“Scott,” his mother said warningly, “it was one fall. Your recovery was quite impressive, one of the quicker recoveries I’ve seen from you. Your blade control was exactly how it should have been. Your edges were actually deeper after your fall.”
“My edges have never been a problem, you and I both know that,” he responded as she stuck a bowl of soup in front of him. “It just doesn’t feel like a win. This whole past year –“ he breathed over his spoon, “I just – I dunno. I’m tired of having to pick everything up and rebuild.”
“This is more than just the fall, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, I – I’m tired. This win – it didn’t feel exactly like a win.”
“Hm.” His mother sat down across from him with her own soup. “Did you expect it to feel better?”
“I expected something to feel right,” Scott replied, around another mouthful of soup, “but everything just felt like – like it was hanging on by a thread.”
“Sometimes, a lot of life can be found on that thread.”
“What does that even mean?”
His mother stirred her soup counter clockwise, thinking before speaking. “I’ve told you this too many times to count, Scott, but I’m your mother and I birthed you, so I reserve the right to say it as many times as I want. But there are more important things in life than winning. I want everything for you – all of your dreams and hopes and happiness – and I think in hindsight, you will remember this competition fondly.”
He snorted. “I’ll call you when that happens, and let you speak with my friend the Easter Bunny.”
“I’m serious, Scott.”
“Yeah, so am I.”
His father returned home an hour later, wondering aloud when he was going to get rid of the old green truck from his youth, the one with the High -C orange stain on the passenger seat.
“Hey, that would kill Tess if I got rid of it, I’m trying to spare her,” Scott said, over the sounds of the hockey game on the TV. His father looked over at him with an eyebrow quirked. “Oh yes, son, I’m sure you’re only sparing Tessa’s feelings by not sending it off for parts and keeping it stuck in my driveway.”
“It’s true,” Scott replied uselessly, hugging a pillow to his chest.
“It’d kill you, more like.”
He was saved by having to answer his father by the phone ringing. “Scott, it’s for you!” His mother chucked him the landline on her way to the laundry room. “It’s your brother.”
“What’s up, man?” Danny’s voice floated through the phone.
“Why you calling?”
“Wow, little bro, love hearing from you too. Mom told me you were home; I didn’t know you were. I phoned to talk to her about her birthday plans. How’s it going? How’s Tess?”
“Fine and fine.”
“Saw the competition. Nice little slip of the blade, I’m proud of you. Way to show everyone that you can fuck something up and still be a World Champion.”
“Shut up, Danny,” Scott laughed. “You’re such a dick.”
“I’m serious!” His brother’s reply was insistent. “I used it as a great analogy with one of my kids the other day. It was one of my top ten parenting moments. Something about failing and picking yourself up. Your fuck-ups are great for me.”
“Which kid?”
“Not sure. One of them that’s under five feet.”
“They’re all under five feet, Dan.”
“When you have kids, you’ll understand. They all look the same. They just ask me for snacks and extended bedtimes. I hardly remember their names half the time.”
Right on cue, Scott’s nieces and nephews came shouting through the receiver. “Who are you talking to?” The muffled voices shrieked through the phone, “can we have some Skittles? Did you ask Mom if we can watch a movie?”
“Hang on a sec,” his brother said, “can’t you see I’m on the phone, guys? Could you keep it down for one minute?”
“Who ya talking to? Who ya talking to?” A little voice made its way through the receiver to Scott's ears, making him grin. He strained to make out which kid was pestering his brother, but they all sounded the same through the phone.
“The King of England,” Danny answered, sounding far away, “go upstairs and wash your hands for dinner.”
“Is it World Champion Uncle Scott?”
“No, I told you, it’s the King of England. Go! Scott?”
“Still here.”
“Listen, I’ve got to supervise hand washing, otherwise they’ll flood the bathroom and start sending animals through the ark two by two. But hey, don’t forget, we don’t give a shit of you’re a world champion or not, as long as you bring us sweet presents at Christmas. Tell Big Hands I say hello, eh?”
Scott grinned as he hung up the phone, setting it back on the cradle.
“Good conversation?” His mother snapped the towels into neat folds as she stacked them into the laundry basket. He looked over to his father, who was gently snoring on the couch, the hockey game flickering blue light through the now darkened living room.
“Yeah,” he said, snuggling further into the cushions, “good conversation.”
His mother hummed non-committedly in the back of her throat as she continued to fold the towels. “Do me a favour, Scott, and wash the pots in the sink?”
Long ago, his teenaged self would have grumbled at such a request, but now, at thirty, he was grateful. That this was home, that these were his people; grateful for the living room and the mundane hockey game, for folded towels and phone conversations with his brother, that one minute he was falling and winning a World title, and the next he was washing vegetables out of a dirty pot.
XX
“Scott,” his mother said as she passed the kitchen table the next morning, “your phone is ringing.”
“Who is it?” He was up to his elbows in pancake batter, whisking the mixture rapidly. The grill was heating up as he abandoned the batter to spread butter on it.
“Tessa. Can I answer it?”
“Go for it,” he responded distractedly, adding chocolate chips to the pancakes as he doled even amounts of batter onto the grill. The day outside was proving to be a nice one; sunlight streamed through the curtains. He stretched his back, pain-free, and padded to the fridge to put the milk away. Tightening the string on his black Nike sweats, he returned to his pancakes to flip them over.
“Sure, why don’t I put you on speaker- he’s just making breakfast.” His mother set the phone down next to the grill before punching the speaker button and giving his shoulder a rub, before moving to start the coffee.
“What’s up, T?”
“So listen,” Tessa said, her voice tinny through the speaker.
“I always do,” he said, flipping a pancake. Some leftover batter splattered onto the side of the grill, making the perfect circle decidedly unperfect. “Shit,” he muttered, attempting to scrape the pancake back into shape.
“Yeah, I can tell,” came Tessa’s reply, delivered dry as a desert.
“Don’t worry, Tess, he hardly listens to me either,” his mother said jokingly as she poured herself a cup of coffee and moving around him to get the milk from the fridge. “It’s taken me a long time to get used to it.”
“Why are you all against me?” Scott mumbled, flipping another (perfect this time) pancake.
“How much time do you have?” was Tessa’s reply, earning a quick laugh from his mother. He turned off the grill and slid the pancakes onto a plate, handing it to her and placing the maple syrup on the table. He gratefully took a mug of coffee from her before turning his attention back to his phone.
“Ignoring you.”
“What a contradiction from a minute ago.”
This time, he laughed, relishing in her voice. It was strange, every time the off season began, to go a few days or weeks without seeing her. Each year he forgot how it felt to be without her, each year he forgot that it took a few days to adjust to being simply Scott again.
“Don’t you guys get sick of each other?” Their mothers used to ask when they were kids. They would just shrug. After awhile, Scott supposed, they got used to each other, the way it was with family. A permanent fixture, a constant presence.
“I’ve got to drop off some forms for you to sign; Air Canada has some promotional social media contracts for the Olympic season. Are you home?”
Scott sighed. “Already?”
“Yeah, they contacted me yesterday. It’s pretty standard, but they want them within the next few days.”
“I’m not changing out of my sweats for this.”
“Wouldn’t expect you to. I’m on my way – save me a pancake.”
Scott sat himself down with his own plate of pancakes, his mother resting comfortably in the corner of the cabinets. “I’m actually glad she’s coming over, I have some things I want to give her. A few old photos I dug up I think she could use for her social media account, she texted me awhile back and I forgot to send them to her.”
He cut into a pancake drowned in maple syrup. “Old photos?”
“Yeah, of the two of you. I always forget how small you were when I find them. You were so cute.”
“We’re still cute, aren’t we?”
“Who’s cute?” Tessa announced her presence by asking, letting herself in through the back door. Her hair was loose and undone around her shoulders, an old sweater drowning her frame. So different from the Tessa who flashed megawatt smiles in front of cameras and won competitions. That Tessa was glamourous and shiny. This Tessa was Tess. “Hi, Alma,” she smiled, removing her shoes and sliding through the kitchen in her socked feet to hug his mother. “So good to see you.”
“You too, honey. You want some coffee? I just made some.”
“Love some,” Tessa replied, as his mother set about pouring her a cup. “Did you get my text about dinner on Friday? My mother says she wants to get everyone together.”
“Oh, yes, I’ve been meaning to give her a call actually,” she said, handing her a mug, as Tessa set about cutting into the pancake Scott left out for her on the countertop. “These are good,” she complimented, slicing her fork through the pancake, making herself comfortable standing at the island.
“Hello to you too, partner.”
Tessa rolled her eyes at him. “It’s not even been forty eight hours, I’m sorry – did you want a hug too?”
“Not really.”
Tessa breathed a laugh. “You’re impossible.”
“Oh, Tess, those pictures you requested – I have them upstairs, let me go run and grab them.” His mother set her mug down in the sink before excusing herself and heading off to find the pictures. “Thank you!” Tessa called after over a mouthful of pancake.
Scott finished with his plate and pushed it aside, focusing on his half-full mug of coffee. Tessa had pulled out her phone, no doubt doing a perfunctory scroll through social media. He stopped for a moment, oddly sentimental as he regarded her. Maybe it was being here, in this kitchen where he grew up, surrounded by the smells of his childhood, and seeing her, still standing in front of him. Maybe it was last night, surrounded by family and dirty pots, his father’s nagging about the green truck and his brother’s humour and the sounds of his nieces and nephews. Maybe it was the voice of his mother in his head, about winning and rebuilding. Or maybe he was just sleep deprived. Whatever it was, he felt himself scrape his chair back from the table.
“T,” he said. She lifted his head up to meet his gaze, swallowing her last forkful of pancake and putting her phone down. “Come here.” He patted his lap, inclining his head towards her.
She quirked an eyebrow at him, but moved to set her plate in the sink before taking a seat on his lap. Sitting across his legs, she wound an arm around his neck. She was warm and familiar, his hand grasping his coffee mug. He pressed his forehead to her temple for a moment.
“You okay?”
He nodded. She uncurled his fingers from his mug, and raised it to her lips.
“Don’t you have your own mug?”
She shrugged. “Yours tastes better.”
He rolled his eyes, squeezing her in a hug until she squealed. “Breath, Scott, I need it!”
His mother came down the stairs at that moment, and they turned to her, Scott’s mug still clutched in her hands. If she was fazed by their position in the kitchen, she didn’t say anything.
“This one’s my favourite,” she smiled, sliding a photo in front of them, tapping the old photograph with her nail. “You were so tiny.”
“I don’t even remember this day,” said Tessa, holding up the photograph by the edges. Scott rested his chin on her shoulder to get a better view. “Do you?”
He shook his head. “Sometimes I hardly recognize the kids in the pictures.”
“Me too. I know it’s us, but it’s just.. weird.”
“Yeah,” Scott said. He wound his arms around her waist. “I know exactly what you mean.”
“I was thinking about taking a walk today, it’s beautiful outside. After you look over your contracts, would you two want to join me?” Scott’s mother began loading dishes in the dishwasher, lining them up row by row.
“Sure,” Tessa replied, “that sounds lovely.”