Who: Laura, Caitlyn, & Finn What: Sunday Picnic When: Sunday, June 30, 2019, afternoon Where: The Elysian Field Rating: Mid - talk about death, emotional stress Status: Complete
Holding her daughter’s hand tightly, Laura walked slowly toward the bright green area. The last thing she wanted to do was leave home and venture off around the island again. But staying cooped up was no good for Caitlyn, and staying home was just a reminder that Caspian was not there. Finding a place for them to settle, Laura laid out a blanket and encouraged her little girl to sit and read with one of her new books. She sat close by, unpacking the small picnic lunch they’d brought, although her stomach turned at the thought of food. Trying to act as though everything was fine was a struggle, but Laura was doing her best for her child. That’s what Caspian would do if the tables were turned.
--
Despite popular belief Finn was not actually surgically attached to the library, most people liked to joke that he was as that was when he spent a great deal of time but the reality was that just like any job, he still got some time off every week. It was the weekend and although the library was opened for a few hours Finn wasn’t working today and with Riley was out and about with one of his many friends their apartment seemed boring so he made himself a couple of sandwiches and headed out, might as well enjoy the sun while it was shining.
It seemed like he wasn’t the only one who was thinking about having a quiet Sunday lunch, all of his usual places that normally were quiet and sparse seemed to be filled with people. So he decided to try somewhere else - The Elysian Field. There would be people out playing sports on a day like this but there was plenty of room around the outside of the fields where he could sit quietly and enjoy the ham and salad sandwiches that he had prepared. He followed the path through the trees to the field and once there looked around, not as many people as he thought but for some reason his attention was drawn to the brunette lady sitting with her daughter on a picnic blanket nearby, it took a moment to recognize her - Laura. He had noted her name down after their first meeting as someone who might be interested in joining The Faction. Cautiously he walked closer, hoping he wasn’t interrupting. “Laura? Hi.”
--
Hearing her name, Laura looked up and met the librarian with a faint smile. Seeing the stranger approach, the little girl tensed a bit and moved closer to her mother. Laura took her daughter’s hand and squeezed it in reassurance. She knew she was naturally an anxious person, but she hated to see that trait in her child who was normally so outgoing. Turning back to the man, she tried that smile again. “Hi, Finn. It’s nice to see you again. This is my daughter, Caitlyn.”
She looked to the girl, “This is Finn, he’s very nice. He works in the library.” Caitlyn looked to Finn and relaxed a little, but still remained close to her mother as she offered him a wave in greeting.
--
Finn remembered the trepidation when he first arrived on the island, the nerves and anxiousness that he felt whenever he met anyone new, he could see it now in the young girl’s face and it broke his heart a bit, childhood should be filled with innocence and not fear. He squatted down, hoping that by making himself smaller he seemed like less of a threat. “Hello Caitlyn, it’s nice to meet you.” He said, giving the girl a smile. “I hope I’m not intruding.” Finn lifted his head as he spoke to Laura.
--
Laura shook her head no. “Would you like to join us?” She motioned to the empty space on the blanket. She wouldn’t normally have invited someone she only met once, but circumstances were not normal, and it made Laura feel a little better to be sitting with someone who at least seemed nice. And she wanted Caitlyn to see that not everyone here was bad.
Caitlyn relaxed a little hearing her mother’s invitation, knowing that it wouldn’t be offered on a whim. She gave Finn a little smile in return, then turned her attention back to her book as she leaned lightly against her mother.
--
Finn’s small smile widened at the invite, the introvert in him always worried that he was interrupting or intruding when he met other people in a context outside of the library. “It would be my pleasure.” He knew that the island was pretty safe, but still there was the odd bad egg out there who might think that a woman and child alone would make an easy target, just by his presence there Laura and Caitlyn would be that bit safer.
He looked down at the little girl as she returned to her book, for a moment seeing himself in her actions. “I’m glad that Washington has turned on the good weather for you, we don’t usually get a lot of rain until winter but we get quite a bit of cloud cover which cools things down.” At least it was a nice day for a picnic.
--
Laura nodded slightly, looking up to the sky before looking back to Finn. Small talk about the weather was something that she could manage. “It is nice out. A lot milder than it would be in New York this time of year. It’s probably sweltering right now.”
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“I’ve never been to New York but I imagine that all that concrete and asphalt would retain the heat pretty well, the weather he’s a lot milder, even in winter there isn’t a lot of snow compared to what you’d get back on the east coast. The Cascades get some but down here, not so much, at least that’s one good thing about this place.” He couldn’t imagine if they had decided to make the ‘quarantine area’ in the middle of the desert or something, he probably would’ve melted the first year. “I just wish the water was warmer sometimes.”
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Laura just nodded, watching Caitlyn for a moment before looking back to him. “I never really thought much about it before coming here. Then again, I spent most of my life out there so..” Maybe small talk wasn’t as easy as she thought.
“You… you know a lot about things here, don’t you?”
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Small talk was never easy, especially with people who he didn’t really know all that well. “Maybe not know but I tend to pick things up - from books, people and all over the place really. ” Finn said with a little shrug, getting out one of his sandwiches out of the bag that he had brought along with him. “I’m a wealth of useless information… and occasionally useful stuff too. I’m not too bad at quizzes.”
--
Laura set some of the food in front of Caitlyn, encouraging her to eat. She also offered some to Finn, despite him having his own. She wasn’t feeling up to eating and she didn’t want the food to go to waste. “Do you know anything about a man named Roman Skye? He’s supposedly a liaison between us and the government.”
--
He did have his own sandwiches but he took a bit of the offered fare, it would be rude not to. As Laura asked about Roman Finn's brows creased, the supposed 'liaison' officer. He had a few run ins with the man and definitely didn't have a good word to say. "I wouldn't piss on him if he was on fire." He said with a soft snort. "He says he's on our side but I think the only side he's interested in is his own."
--
Laura smirked, the idea of seeing that man on fire was something she could easily make happen. But for now she had to bide her time. She shifted toward Finn, lowering her voice a bit so that maybe Caitlyn would be too distracted by her reading to overhear. Not that any of it was a secret, she just didn’t want to upset the girl again. “My husband was attacked, dragged from our home, and detained two days ago. I was in the Marketplace, but Caitlyn witnessed the whole thing. Roman said he’d help release him.”
--
Finn could summons water to put out any fires but he wouldn't waste his time or energy on someone like Roman. He got along well with most people but it took all of his willpower to not want to drown the arrogant prick. His eyes softened as Laura whispered that her husband had gotten attacked and detained, he had heard about it through the Faction grapevine but no one there knew who had actually gotten detained. "I'm sorry." He said softly, he couldn't imagine he'd be so calm if it was Riley. "He might help release your husband, but I'd be asking at what cost, what does he want in return."
--
Laura nodded slowly in understanding. She was worried what Dorian had talked to Roman about, but as much as she wanted to protect the young man, he was an adult who made his own choices. Misguided or not. Laura glanced back to Caitlyn with a sigh before turning to Finn once more. “I just want Caspian back home and safe. Sooner, rather than later.”
--
Although he had never met Laura’s husband - Caspian, Finn hoped that the man would be returned soon and not in the state that others had come back in, he worried about Daryn as they had done one hell of a job on her and she was definitely not the woman that he remembered. “I’m sure he’ll be back soon, he’s not the first to be detained this month.” Or so he had heard, working in a library he overheard a lot of things, plus there were his Faction grapevine. “He sounds like a strong man, but he’ll be wanting you both when he gets back.”
--
Laura sighed and nodded. “We need him back.” She suddenly regretted all the time she’d wasted arguing with Cas, all the back and forth when they could have just been a family together. “Do you know if there’s anything else I can do? Anyone else I can talk to?”
--
Finn could definitely understand that, a wife needed her husband and a child needed her father. He knew that some guards - the real asshole ones - liked to detain people for no real reason and make up some excuse for doing it, hopefully this was all that had happened to Caspian, hopefully. "I'll put some feelers out, see if there's word out about him, I can't make any promises though." He wished he could but like virtually everyone else here he held no power over anyone or anything, he could only make some enquiries with the people he knew.
--
“Thank you, I really appreciate that.” Sighing, she tucked her hair behind her ear. “How have you been?”
—
Finn took another bite of the offered fare as Laura talked to him, he was definitely going to go back and put some feelers out as soon as he finished here, even though it was his day off at the library it wasn’t uncommon for him to go in anyway.
“I’ve been pretty good, working hard as usual but I’m enjoying the weekend off and a nice, sunny Sunday, we all need some downtime.”
__
Laura nodded in agreement and sighed. “I’d gone to the Marketplace, looking for a job at the places you’d suggested. But, then things happened at home so I’ve put all of that on hold for a bit.”
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Family was more important than work any day. "Well I'm sure there'll be a job out there when you're ready. It took me almost six months before I got the job at the library." As everything was pretty much supplied working was more to save sanity and do something than for monetary gain. "But let me know if you need a hand with anything, sorting out how things work here can all be a bit too much to take in."
--
Laura gave Finn a faint smile. “Thank you. I appreciate that. You’re the first person I’ve met here that seems nice. Like someone I could actually talk to.” She was sure there were others, but Laura was still working on putting herself out there a bit more.
--
That comment made Finn smile, a really big and happy smile. He wasn't the social butterfly that Riley was and it took some time to warm up to people but to hear from Laura that he was the first nice person she had met. "You'll find some of the residents are nice and others are far from it. If you ever head to the Marigold Arts Center look for Dani, she's an absolute gem and I think you'd like her."
--
Both Laura and Caitlyn perked up at that and the little girl chimed in. “I take dance classes there. Miss Dani is very nice, but Mummy is shy.” Laura smirked and shrugged, leaning in to kiss the top of her daughter’s head. “She’s not wrong. I’ve heard good things about the Arts center though.”
--
There was a soft, almost silent chuckle as young Caitlyn chimed in, saying that Laura was shy, that was pretty obvious to Finn but he wasn't the most outgoing person either. "It really is a great asset to the island, having everything in a centralised location. I play the piano and before Marigold I used to have to play the old thing in 'multi-religion house of worship', and it had a few keys that didn't work." Those were the days. "Now there's a decent piano, guitars and just about every other kind of instrument there we well. Not to mention the dance studio and creative arts section too. My old home town didn't even have half of those things!"
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Laura nodded with a little smile. “It sounds nice. I’ll have to go watch Caitlyn’s class sometime soon. I’ve never been very creative though, so I don’t know if there’s much I could do there besides watch.”
Caitlyn listened to the adults talk as she began to help herself to some of the food her mother had set out. She handed a half of sandwich to Laura, hoping she would eat it, and added to the conversation some more. “That’s not true. Mummy is very good at baking. She makes the best cookies ever. Even better than the fancy bakeries at home.”
Taking the sandwich, Laura took a small bite but shook her head to her daughter. “I think you’re biased, but thank you baby.”
--
Finn was going to say something about creativity can manifest itself in the most unusual of places but his attention turned to Caitlyn as she spoke about cookies. "Maybe your creativity is in baking. I'm definitely not good in the kitchen unless I cheat and put everything in a slow cooker, they do all the hard work for me." He smiled, Riley definitely was the primary cook in their household.
"Does Mommy let you help? That's what I used to love when my Mommy baked cookies." He leaned closer to the girl and whispered, be it loudly. "Especially when I was allowed to lick the mixing bowl clean." What kid didn't love that bit?
--
Caitlyn grinned at Finn’s questions and nodded. “We used to bake together every week back home. It was our special time.”
Laura sighed, her smile fading a little. They did have nice mother-daughter time together back then, but things were better in a way now. Caitlyn was no longer being ushered back and forth between her parents, and they were all much happier together as a family. Laura just wished they didn’t have to be on this island. Refocusing on the moment, she managed a little laugh. “Cooking, well, I’m still working on that. I am better with the sweets but I’ve figured out how to make a few edible meals, thankfully.”
--
“That sounds very special to me. I loved spending special time with my Mommy too. “ Although it was different, he would play music for her and she used to sing, not that she was an opera singer or anything but it was their time together and he cherished it.
Finn nodded, cooking in the real world was so much different than cooking on the island, back in the real world it was easy to go to the store and pick up groceries when they were needed but here on the island you had what you were given and had to make that last for the next two weeks until the next delivery, swap it for something else or use up the small amount of money given on food all the time. “There should be an Island Cookbook, how to make the most of our rations and turn them into tasty and exciting meals. I’ll ask my fiance about that, he’s a bit of a chef.”
--
Caitlyn smiled and leaned against her mother for a hug before going back to her reading. Laura hugged her gently and looked back to Finn. “That is a good idea. I could always use some more recipes.” One of the first things Laura had done after their first night on the island was work out a way to ration their food so that it would last as long as possible. She was very used to having little and making do with what was available, so she wanted to be prepared. The last thing she wanted was for Cas and Caitlyn and Dorian to go hungry along with the other stressors of being displaced to the island.
--
Finn and Riley had lived here for so long that they knew the routine, when the food delivery would be taking place (weather permitting) and pretty much what they’d be getting each time, some things changed depending on the season and availability but it was usually the same standard stuff. “I’ll get him to write some tried and true ones down, but he’s a Texan so there might be a few spicy ones.” Though Finn would be sure that Riley didn’t write down too many spicy ones, Caitlyn probably wouldn’t like that. The idea of an Island Cookbook was now firmly planted in his head and he’d start asking around for contributions from regular visitors to the library, well from those who he knew were pretty good in the kitchen.
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Laura smiled faintly and nodded. “That would be very nice of him, and you. I’d appreciate it, maybe some others would too. Recipes from a chef are probably amazing.”
—
“I’ll start gathering some recipes tomorrow, it’ll give me something to do when it’s quiet in the library. Plus there’s some pretty good and simple ones in those cooking magazines that occasionally come through with the shipment of new books.” It was only every month or so that they got some new titles come in and it was like Christmas for Finn, what would they be getting? Sometimes he was able to put in requests for additional copies if something was popular or if one somehow got damaged.
--
She nodded, studying Finn curiously for a moment. “How often do you get shipments in?” She glanced to Caitlyn, who had become re-absorbed in her book. “Just wondering when the new titles come in, she goes through books quickly.” Which was true, but not her driving motive.
—
“Book shipments? Every three to four weeks. Rations are every two weeks as they would’ve told you, but there’s boats going back and forth on a more regular basis. Meats can be brought over frozen distributed but vegetables don’t keep as long.” He was grateful that at least he was able to tell Laura these things, get her used to the whole thing. “What kind of books do you like Caitlyn? Maybe I can put in a request when we do the next library order.” Finn always liked to hear what kind of books the kids wanted to read, so much had changed since he was young, so many authors now were writing for younger readers.
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Laura listened intently, taking it all to note for later. Boats came and went far more often than she would have guessed, and that wasn’t even counting the boat that she and her family were brought here on. Shifting to lean on her hand, she watched Caitlyn carefully consider the question. While she did, Laura tried to help a little. “Since we’ve arrived, Cas and Dorian have found things for her. I’ll have to bring her by to make her own choices soon.”
--
“Whenever you’re ready Caitlyn, there’s plenty of books there. I’ve seen lots by Roald Dahl, Alice in Wonderland, Anne of Green Gables and I know there’s The Chronicles of Narnia.” They were actually all books that he had read and enjoyed, even though Alice and Anne might be seen more as ‘girly’ books Finn would read just about anything he could get his hands on, they were also titles that Laura might have read when she was younger as well and sometimes the classics never went out of style.
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Laura didn’t have the luxury of reading for pleasure as a child, she was lucky to have the necessities and occasional safety. She didn’t discover her love for reading until her teen years, and even then she had limited exposure to the classics. And only one really stood out in her mind: The Island of Dr Moreau. She planned to keep that story away from Caitlyn if possible.
Hearing Finn rattle off the titles, Caitlyn brightened, “I want to read them all!” Laura watched her with a smile and then looked back to Finn, “I think she’s going to want to go to the library a lot more often now.”
—
Seeing Caitlyn brighten and smile widely at the mention of all those books made Finn’s day, that was the kind of response that he liked to see from anyone, but there was something innocent and pure about the excitement of a child who loved reading was like no other. “I look forward to seeing you there, I’m going to give you the special tour that only fellow bookworms get.” He said with a grin.
--
Caitlyn smiled excitedly, already looking forward to it. Laura smiled, watching them, and looked to Finn. “I think she’ll love that. Thank you.”