to make things awkward | fillie

20 | feeling lucky

"Morning." Finn said to Noah who rolled off the couch and started stumbling into the kitchen where he was almost done brewing a full pot of coffee and had bacon searing on the stove.

"The coffee ready?" Noah asked with his palm in his eye socket.

Finn whirled to look at the pot, "Pretty much," he pulled a mug down from the cabinet and handed it to him, "Here, you still take cream?"

"No, I'm a soulless monster who only drinks black coffee." Noah deadpanned.

Finn snickered, reaching into the fridge for the coffee mate creamer he bought primarily for Elsie. After Noah poured in an unhealthy amount, Finn told him to leave it out for her, whenever she decided to wake up. He heard a door down the hall, unsure if it was Lucy or Elsie, but either way, he was happy to have one of them joining him and Noah in the land of the waking. Noah was damn near annoying last night with his constant prodding of him and Elsie. He kept making jokes about them getting back together like they were all in high school and kept trying to get Finn to say he loved her. Surprisingly, Lucy was amused by his antics. Although he really shouldn't have been surprised, Lucy adored almost anything Noah did. Every joke was the funniest she'd ever heard and every facial expression was the most captivating.

Finn had started to wonder if Lucy would have preferred that Noah was her father instead of him. He wondered how long it would take for him to gain the same love Lucy had for Noah which seemed to be genetically ingrained in her cells. As if Millie's love for her best friend had been passed down through her DNA.

"One thing I love about America. . ." Lucy said, striding confidently to the plate with cooked bacon on it, "Your bacon is immaculate."

For a nine-year-old, Lucy never seemed to be at a loss of colorful words.

Finn flipped the bacon in the pan and replaced the splatter mat on top, then rested his hip against the counter, looking in Lucy's direction, "You know I'm not American, right?"

She looked at him, mouth full and chewing and smiling. She knew, but it was a running joke from last night that he didn't fully understand, but was content playing along with because it made her happy.

"But I am." Noah said, "And I appreciate your compliment."

Her smile grew bigger. Finn rolled his eyes in amusement and sighed, turning back to the stove.

More footsteps came down the hallway and Finn looked over to see Elsie in one of his old tees and boxers. Her hair was up in a messy bun and she was yawning wide without any attempt to cover her mouth. Yet, he was struck by her charm that—even in this state—she exuded through her pores.

"Morning, sleeping beauty." he said.

She gave a sneering sarcastic smile, not knowing that he wasn't being facetious.

Noah came up next to Finn to grab a piece of bacon but then he whispered, "Someone got lucky last night."

Finn elbowed him hard in the arm.

"Agh!" Noah cried out, holding his arm, "Such abuse." he whimpered, going back to sit next to Lucy at the kitchen's peninsula. Finn parsed his daughter's expression and assumed she didn't hear what Noah said, and if she did, she either didn't know what that meant, or didn't care enough to react.

But Noah wasn't wrong. Finn and Elsie did get lucky in the colloquial sense. But he also was feeling literally lucky, too. Just a month ago, he was borderline content living his free lifestyle. Never connecting with women for more than a single evening, and in the one case, the morning too. And yeah, maybe with that last woman, with Tessa, he had started to think he wanted a more permanent commitment. A full on relationship. But he realized pretty quickly after that Tessa wasn't anywhere close to the right girl for him.