Chapter Text
The bar didn’t let up enough for any of them to go home before they closed, but Simon let Beth go at midnight instead of staying to clean up like she was supposed to.
“Si I really don’t mind staying, closing is so much easier with 3 people.”
“Go home Beth, it’s the least I can do. I’ll see you tomorrow.” He said it firmly enough that she knew not to argue, and smiled faintly as she slipped out of the door with a wave. Simon texted Ava before returning to the office-
Hey, long shift, I’ll be back by 1. Sorry
Closing was harder with just Simon and Tyler, but they both wanted to get out as soon as possible so moved around the bar quickly and silently, the speaker playing residual LCD Soundsystem as soundtrack.
“I think we’re sorted, head out and I’ll finish up in the morning.”
Tyler emerged from the toilet, mop in hand, “Thanks man, I’ll see you on Friday.”
He went into the office to get his bag then walked past the bar where Simon stood, sweeping the floor. He got nearly to the door before turning slightly, then back to the door, his body stuttering.
Simon looked up from the floor, giving the younger man space to let out what he could tell was brewing in his head.
“A-ar- are you okay dude?” he finally spat out. That meant a lot coming from Tyler, who Simon had observed as having the empathetic range of a toadstool. He was a nice guy, mostly reliable and really funny, but as far as being aware of others' feelings he was as emotionally stunted as any 22 year old man whose biggest concern was supporting his weed and nicotine dependencies.
Simon opened and shut his mouth, feeling like Tyler’s genuine concern deserved a semi-genuine response. “I’ll be alright.”
Tyler nodded once, pressing his lips together and turning back to the door. “Good.”
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Rocky’s phone rang at 12:30am. He reached over to quickly answer it so as to not wake Adrian up. They’d fallen asleep while Rocky was still watching a film - (rewatching Gladiator) and had one arm draped across his waist. He carefully picked their arm up as he put the phone to his ear.
“Hello?” he whispered
“……..I fucked up,” Grace’s voice rang through the phone,
“What did you do?” Rocky murmured, swinging his legs off the bed slowly and placing his laptop on the floor.
“We only kissed. She left before it could go any further but it could have gone further and I probably wouldn’t have stopped her. I gave her the box of her stuff and the Goldfinch book and she kissed me and then I stopped her for a second because I was overwhelmed and she got embarrassed and left. But if she hadn’t left I probably would have…”
“Breathe Grace.” Rocky said calmly, he’d stepped into the hallway while Grace rambled on and sat on the top of the stairs, head leant against the wall. He heard Grace inhale and exhale shakily. “Are you okay? Do you need me to come over?”
“No, no it’s fine,” he could hear his head shaking through the phone, “I just needed to get it out.”
“No worries man, I’m here.” Rocky concealed a yawn and continued listening to Grace’s waffle.
This had happened before, Grace had considered breaking up with her 3 times over his 6 year relationship. The first was a year in, and was purely practical as she’d planned on moving states for a job that ended up falling through.
The second occurred in the 4th year of their relationship, just as they were about to move in together. Grace had called Rocky in a similar fashion, at midnight, and rambled about how he wasn’t ready and he was going to end up hating her if he spent all of his time with her and she’d get annoyed by everything he did. Rocky admitted that Grace wasn’t the easiest to live with (but neither was he), but it was nothing to break up over, especially preemptively.
The third happened 8 months before she’d broken up with him, and was the closest Grace had gotten. After finishing his paper arguing that water isn’t necessary for life to evolve, he’d been invited to a conference, proved wrong and ridiculed.
This sent his career and mental health into a downward spiral, resulting in a long depressive episode. He pushed everyone away and took a brief sabbatical from teaching, and she had taken it the hardest.
Rocky could understand the pain he was going through, as he’d experienced a similar thing in university, which led him to teaching as opposed to full time research. Grace had always wanted to teach, and while he loved doing research on the side, he knew he wanted to inspire children, not adults.
Grace had cried on the phone to Rocky after it happened, talking about how he wasn’t good enough for her and he was a failure to the field. It was hard for Rocky to hear, especially as he knew that she wasn’t making him feel any better about it.
She had been a good girlfriend at times, Rocky always thought, but she always put herself first, which is probably why they worked so well. She prioritized herself, and so did Grace. He had a habit of letting people walk over him, and she took advantage of that.
She couldn’t handle it when he broke down and decided that he needed to put himself and his teaching first, instead of her and his research.
“-And I think that I only stayed with her in the end because I didn’t want her to have to move out. I think I healed myself and started putting the kids first so I thought we’d be okay, but she couldn’t take it.”
It was 2am and Rocky was sitting on the step with his head leant on the wall. Adrian had come out at one point to drape a blanket around his shoulders before sleepily trudging back to bed.
“I think that she could take it when you put the paper first because you were still around for her, but once that had broken you down she couldn’t accept you putting your energy into other people,” Rocky said.
“I don’t think I had enough energy to put into her, the kids, and myself.” Grace responded softly, with a sigh of realisation.
“I agree. I’m glad you put yourself first after all these years.”
“Yeah.”
“She didn’t put enough in for you to keep going like you did.”
“I made her breakfast on my birthday.”
“I know buddy, I know.” Rocky yawned again.
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The next morning Simon woke up to Evie complaining of a sore throat and a headache. He checked her temperature and her pale face and decided she could have the day off school.
After his night, he needed a good excuse to stay home. He let her sleep in a bit longer and rang Rose, his assistant manager, to ask if she could go in that morning instead.
He wasn’t supposed to work the evening shift anyway, just clean up then do some admin. The admin he could do at home and Rose could afford to go in a few hours earlier anyway.
He then drafted an email to Evie’s school to inform them she wasn’t going in. She wasn’t ill a lot so he wasn’t completely sure how to let them know, so decided to just email her form tutor.
Dr Grace.
Dear Dr Grace
Is Dear too formal? He thought. How do people start emails?
To Dr Grace
Not formal enough. He sighed and shook his head. This was a school email for Evie’s teacher. Dr Grace. Simon didn’t even know his first name- this was a completely professional email exchange.
Dr Grace,
Evie has come down with a cold and isn’t feeling very well, so isn’t going to come into
school today.
If you could send me any work she needs to catch up on that would be great, I hope
she’ll be okay to go into school tomorrow, but I will keep you updated.
Thank you in advance
Simon Fisher
Was it too formal? Maybe but Simon didn’t want to bring up the one casual time they’d met in a school email. This was just a school email. It could be sent to any one of her teachers. He pressed send.
To take his mind off it, Simon made himself a coffee and some toast, and was confronted with the bowl in the sink. When he’d returned the night before, he had been in such a daze that once he’d greeted and said goodbye to Ava and gone upstairs he’d essentially passed out.
But the bowl was still there, cracked down the middle and serving as a glaring reminder of last night.
“I’d hate to fight a cripple.”
It rang in his ears as he stared down at it. It wasn’t even an expensive or even necessarily nice bowl, if anything else had happened he probably wouldn’t have thought twice about putting it in the bin.
“Fuck’s sake.” he muttered under his breath, and turned to the toaster instead. The toast popped up as he turned, making him jump slightly. He pulled a plate out of the cupboard and placed the toast on it lightly. He gathered some butter on a knife and went to spread it on the toast.
It was a menial, easy task, but he knew that the whole plate would shift as he attempted to spread it. He also knew that he owned a support for this exact task, a special chopping board that attached to the counter and held the toast in place for precise buttering.
He didn’t like leaving it out though, saying that it was due to their lack of counter space but part of him was embarrassed. He didn’t want to admit he needed help doing something so easy, let alone having bought a tool to assist with.
He attempted it anyway, dragging the knife across the surface of the bread slowly. It moved with the knife, getting dangerously close to the edge of the plate and the counter.
“Fuck.” he muttered again.
“Do you want me to do it?” a small voice came from behind him. He turned on his heel, embarrassment rising to his cheeks. Evie’s pale face stared at him innocently, she was only trying to help, there was no way she could know about the mental hoops Simon’s brain was jumping through.
He sighed, softening just a bit. “Yes please.”
She smiled slightly, her bedhair sticking up at all angles as she walked up to the counter.
“How are you feeling?” He asked, combing through her hair with his fingers.
“Not great,” she responded, shrugging as she buttered the toast with ease. “My head really hurts.”
“Mmm bless you,” he put his head on hers, arm around her neck in a loose hug, “I’ll make you some tea if you want to go back to bed?”
“Yeah, and some cereal?” she turned to hug him properly.
“Sure, I’ll bring it up.” He kissed her on the head and she turned to go back upstairs. “And thank you. For the toast.”
She shrugged, “No worries.”
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Grace arrived at school 20 minutes later than usual. He was exhausted and felt like he had emotional whiplash.
His midnight chat with Rocky had straightened quite a bit out, but he still felt frazzled. He sat down at his desk 10 minutes before class started, rubbing his temples and squinting at his email inbox.
Some spam, an email from the headteacher, a link from Rocky about some museum exhibit he might be interested in, and an email from Simon Fisher. It only regarded Evie being off sick, which is something Simon should have emailed the school’s reception, but he didn’t need to tell him that.
Dear Simon,
Thanks for letting me know, I hope she feels better!
I’ll send some catch up through at the end of the day, it won’t be too much, and I’ll ask her other teachers.
Thank you
Ryland Grace
He debated putting Dr Grace, but Simon had signed it with his full name and in his exhausted state he forgot every email he had ever sent a parent and how he wrote his name.
He sat back in his chair and scrubbed his hands over his face, basking in the 5 minutes of quiet before the storm. It didn’t last long.
“How are you today buddy?” Rocky came striding in, plonking himself on the table opposite Grace’s desk, his long legs stretching out. Grace took his hands away from his face, ready to send the unnecessarily cheerful man away.
His outstretched hand was holding a coffee however, so Grace shut his mouth immediately.
“Thank you,” he sighed, after taking a sip, “I’m alright.”
“Good.” They sat in silence for a second, drinking their respective drinks.
Rocky exclusively drank tea- herbal, green, breakfast, anything. Grace usually drank black coffee, but when Rocky brought him one it usually had milk and some sort of syrup to make it a bit sweeter- vanilla or caramel or something.
Rocky knew Grace drank it black but made the executive decision to make his life a bit more whimsical when he could. It was appreciated.
“Thank you. For last night.”
“Always.” Rocky nodded at him over his blue takeaway cup.
The moment was disrupted by a sudden crowd of children gathering at the door.
“No! Get back ! I’ll let you in at 9am!” Grace pointed to the clock that read 8:59.
Rocky scoffed and slid off the table, “I’ll see you later.”
“Thanks bud.”
The day went smoothly despite his lack of sleep- he was used to functioning on less when he was writing the paper.
Third period rolled around and at the end he asked Harry to hang back.
“So I’ve looked at your timetable and you have a study period tomorrow. How would you feel about taking the test then? Or is it too soon?”
“No! No, that's chill with me, it’s all up here.” Harry put a finger to his head and smiled, “Thank you Dr G.”
“No problem Harry, I’ll see you then.”
Harry sauntered off and Grace let himself exhale. This kid was going to be fine. He just got overwhelmed and put on the spot.
He wanted to ask him about his home life, check in to make sure everything actually was okay, but he restrained. If Harry wanted to talk, he could, and if there was nothing to talk about and Grace pushed, it would be uncomfortable for both of them.
He sat back down at his desk and started putting together the work that Evie had missed, from his class and others, ready to email back to Simon. Simon Fisher. Grace looked at the name on the email.
It felt very familiar, he’d definitely heard it somewhere. Before he could dwell any longer, Adrian knocked gently on the door. “Hey Ry,”
He looked up over his glasses at them suspiciously, “You only come here at lunch if-”
They produced a blue lunchbox from the other side of the door, “Okay you saw straight through me. But did you bring yourself lunch today?”
Grace opened his mouth to protest, but couldn’t. “Fine. Thank you.”
They smiled and swished into the classroom. They were wearing a long green skirt and a grey button up which moved like one mesmerising piece of clothing. “Here.”
The lunchbox was plonked onto his desk. He moved his laptop and opened the lid, revealing a chicken sandwich, some chopped carrots and a bag of crisps.
“How’s your day going?” They asked, perching on the same bit of table their husband had that morning.
“It’s alright,” Grace looked over at his computer, “Actually you can help me with this, Simon Fisher, that name ring any bells?”
“Mmmm I’m not sure, is that a parent?” They pulled out a bag of crisps and started eating them.
“Mmm, Evie’s uncle.” He responded, mouth half full of sandwich.
They raised an eyebrow.
“No, not like that, I recognise his name from somewhere.”
“Yeah I’m not sure, maybe you’ve just seen it on a form somewhere.”
“Yeah maybe.”
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Simon and Evie spent the day on the sofa, Simon showing her classic films he thought she’d enjoy while he organised drink orders and shift rotas for the bar on his laptop. They started with Top Gun, which Evie loved, then she put on High School Musical while he made some food.
He made soup for lunch, blitzing tomatoes and onions and other cooked veg and splitting it into two bowls. He went to ask her for help making toasties, but thought against it, admitting he had enough pride to use a tool made for his disability rather than rope a sick 11 year old into buttering a grown man’s toast. For the second time that day.
He wordlessly got the tool down, eyeing it up. He slid it onto the counter and began buttering the toast, sighing at how easy that really was. He finished the toasties and began bringing each bowl and plate through to the other room, balancing them carefully on his arm.
He had a lot of practice at this, especially from the bar, so did it flawlessly, which improved his mood and he sat down next to Evie smugly.
After they finished eating, Evie helped him bring the plates into the kitchen to wash up. She started putting them in the sink but stopped before they hit the bottom.
“Oh.” She put the stack of plates next to the sink instead, “What happened here?”
Embarrassment returned to Simon’s face, but he tried to play it off, reaching into the sink to pick up the big parts of the broken bowl. “I dropped it into the sink earlier, forgot about it.”
She shrugged in return, opening the bin for him. “Go finish the film, I’ll clean up in here.”
“Thanks!” She beamed, then remembered how very ill she was, “Can I have some more tea?”
He smiled and nodded, dropping the bowl into the bin and releasing his shame with it.
He boiled the kettle and took a spoonful of yuja-cha to stir into it. It’s a ginger and yuzu tea with the consistency of honey that he made and kept in the fridge for when one of them was ill. His mother taught him to make it when he was a child and caught a cold from staying outside for too long training in Eden.
He poured the water then stirred the mixture in, the smell making him feel like a child again, Evie’s age and shivering at the door, nose red and eyes watering. He exhaled with a smile and brought it to her, sinking onto the sofa as her film finished. She thanked him and he reached for the remote, turning on Stand by Me.
“This is one of my all time favourite films, I can’t believe I haven’t shown it to you yet.”
She smiled up at him, cupping the tea in her hands.
He fell asleep instantly, the sound of the tv acting as white noise as he curled up in the corner of the sofa.