Who: Marina, Ford, and Nathan. What: Lunch at McDonald's. Where: see what When: Before Nathan got sick most recently. Backdated like woah. Warnings: Cuteness and preciousness.
Ford looked upon the last few months a sudden and unexpected windfall, like a man getting caught in a stormcloud raining gold coins. He had five people who knew him by name and talked to him regularly despite his various shortcomings. The roof he was under was free, and the place had unlimited hot water and no rats. He had two jobs that required only physical labor and nothing nastier, both of which provided a steady income that was slowly stacking up. One or two times the hot guy across the hall talked to him or invited him over, and Ford was absolutely sure that pretty soon March would get better and come back home to his palace in the sky, where Ford would be waiting with a lot of healthy stuff from the greens department in the grocery store. The appearance of a blood relative, a miniature Russell as yet untainted by Ford’s mother was another sunny revelation, and with his usual faith, Ford believed that it would just take Russell a few weeks to come around to the situation.
Out of all of these amazing things, however, it was Sam Winchester that was by far the most fortuitous. While Sam was unable to translate numbers correctly while looking through Ford’s eyes (he said it was something to do with the way his brain processed the information, whatever that meant), Sam could and did offer a second filter to anything written on paper. Ford hadn’t done all that well in school, as any sign of cooperation made almost every teacher try to force him to speak and the only ones that hadn’t usually wanted him to write numbers. He still couldn’t figure out the more complex rules of grammar, like why sometimes the apostrophe was in one place and sometimes not another, and Sam helped with stuff like that.
Sam helped his counterpart get the job at the big box electronic store too, and Ford was wearing the requisite blue shirt they’d given him along with a yellow nametag inscribed with his name as he walked down the street toward the golden arches. On the application, Sam had written that Ford had some medical thing that actually prevented him from speaking, a nearly outright lie, and since the job was for the warehouse and a lot of moving big boxes from here to there, they hired him after he demonstrated a total understanding of what was said to him and did what he was told. Ford and Sam were friends, and though Sam knew a lot more about almost everything than Ford did, he never talked to him like he was an idiot. They had whole silent conversations about Sam’s brother Dean and Ford’s brother Russell. Sam showed Ford what ghost hunting was like and explained the general string of events that had led to the younger Winchester alone in an underground vault inscribed with symbols. They were both getting used to having someone else in their head, and they had a great sock-doorknob thing where one or the other would sort of “turn off” if the other one wanted some privacy. Ford watched Sam’s TV show pretty religiously and kept himself from laughing at Sam’s combined embarrassment and foul language while the show was on. It was like having a buddy that was always around.
Ford didn’t know to be nervous as he pushed through the glass doors and scanned the crowd of vari-sized people crammed up against the front counter, his blue eyes very bright against the thick mess of his dark curls. He didn’t think he could be the slightest influence on anyone, so he was no more concerned about Nathan having some adverse affect to meeting him than he was about spreading a zombie plague. Besides, he couldn’t even say anything. Mostly, he just wanted to see what miniature Russell looked like, meet his mom and see how they were together. Ford knew how moms and their kids were supposed to act, but he could also recognize more than anyone what an unhappy kid looked like. He was hoping it would be the former when Marina arrived.
Marina was easy to spot from a distance; sun bright and loud, jazz era pretty. Her laugh heralded from around corners and she favored tropical colors no matter the season. Citrus notes of tangerine, ruby red grapefruit, and kaffir lime. She was somebody that popped up in peripheral vision just because, as her parents had never taught her how to really blend into her surroundings. She'd never had much of an interest in being low key, and maybe being an FBI informant was a really bad idea for that reason alone, but she wasn't necessarily in a position to be uncooperative.
Marina had long ago perfected the art of carrying a child on her hip while wearing five inch heels. Today, despite the wintery brush with temperatures that qualified as cool for the desert, her sandals were banana peel yellow. Strappy snakeskin that flashed metallic in the sun, calling for a yield as she jaywalked from across the street and advanced through the McDonalds' door with Nathan clinging to the side of her neck and fussing to get down all the while. "Mom," he whined with the word drawn out long like a cultural noose, all-American.
She didn't know what to expect or who to really look for. Someone Russ-like, but younger? She wasn't sure, but there were only a few people sitting at cramped, colorful tables by themselves. Of that selection, she thought only one could qualify as Russ' brother. Nathan led her into the dining area with an impatient tug on her hand, arm stretched like a leash, eager to play with the nearby kids he saw laughing on their way down a bright red slide in the attached play place. "Go play for a moment," and she let go of his hand with a follow-up warning in French that told him to stay where she could see him.
She watched her son race off, and only then did she pause before the young man's table, eyeing his blue shirt and his blue eyes before closing in on the yellow nametag that confirmed what she'd been thinking. "Ford," she said, like his name was interchangeable for hello. She took a seat and crossed one dark denim knee over the other.
Ford didn’t know what to expect from Marina either. He had a perception of his brother as bold and brave, and considering the mechanic thing and the fast-talking thing he figured Russell probably had his pick of women. That Marina was pretty was not surprising, but he thought of mothers in a certain way, and it would have greatly reassured him if she wore sensible shoes, smelled like soap, and carried a big bag full of arcane childcare products. They were in a Vegas fast-food restaurant and she was still probably the brightest person there, short of the little kids in pink and glitter. Ford was torn between an impression of youth and one of blatant sexual maturity. It was the kind of impression his mother had always gone for but utterly failed at creating, falling short at mature and available. It made him a little nervous.
Ford’s clear blue eyes followed Nathan, but the boy was better dressed than either he or Russell, and it was obvious he hadn’t really had time to form an impression before the little feet were off running. The foreign language (Sam wasn’t around to identify it for him) made Ford even more uncertain, since people who could speak in code often did when they said things they wanted to keep private. Ford stood up and next to the empty table, looking past Marina toward the running figure. There was nothing yet on the table, not even a tray. Calloused pale fingers pressed hard into the tabletop to one side, though he didn’t appear to need to balance.
Ford cast Marina an uncertain look, not sure of what to do, and then he decided to sit because she had sat. He slid two inches into the booth so he could be considered “at” the table, and met her eyes with a weak but earnest smile. He lifted his right hand, top two fingers slightly farther out, and gave her a short little wave, part salute, part greeting. He let his nametag introduce himself (how useful), and looked again at Nathan, then back at her. With one hand he tentatively indicated the third chair to his left and her right, the empty one. Was he going to come back?
Marina sized Ford up while awaiting for him to say something. It wasn't an entirely friendly look, with ginger eyes burning low. The silence boiled honey thick and potentially uncomfortable between them. It was an expression better attributed to large cats that hadn't quite decided if they were hungry yet or not. Aside from noting the movement of his hand with her line of sight, the little wave didn't seem to do much to reassure her. Instead, it was his uncertain smile that relaxed her bit by bit, hot cider brewed against the threat of a cold snap. His eyes were very blue, and she was immediately struck by how similar they were to Nathan's. It made her smile fresh, but the expression seemed a little hesitant. There were no illusions about Russ and chivalry, those hadn't existed even when she'd been with the man. And she was far from convinced that Russ wouldn't stoop low enough to employ his little brother to.. to what, she wasn't entirely sure.
She hadn't quite worked out what it was Ford would want to talk about, or why he necessarily wanted to meet his nephew. Marina's attention strode after Nathan when the man across from her looked that way. The little boy's shoes lit up in neon red and flashing orange with every bouncing step that he took. "Why did you want to see Nathan?" Clarification seemed important, and Marina sat back in the uncomfortable plastic of her chair, eyes squinted as if she could pick the truth out of him like a splinter.
Ford was used to people looking him over and about fifty percent of the time they didn’t find what they were looking for, so he wasn’t exactly uncomfortable in the glare of her incessant gaze. He shifted a little on his seat, pulled at a curl behind his ear in an obviously uncertain fashion, and then sat back. His eyes were very intent, and seemed to grow bluer the longer he left them directed at the same angle, as if the object of his study inevitably made them grow deeper and brighter, an ocean in sunlight.
Ford’s expression was perfectly transparent, that ocean as clear as blue glass, and he was obviously troubled by her question. He’d explained that he wasn’t going to say anything in advance, and it worried him that she was going to sit there and expect him to say something. Ford desperately did not want to say anything, and his anxiety went up several notches at the idea of impending conversation. His mouth compressed still closer together as he grew more determined not to embarrass himself by trying to talk.
Instead he hesitated and took out Sam’s notebook, a somewhat ragged old thing held together with a lot of love and weak spirals. A blue pen was hanging off the pages, one end somewhat well-chewed. He scribbled, in recognizable handwriting, and then showed her, abbreviating for the sake of speed. Meet.Tell me about him??
She watched on with eyes gone to crystallized ginger when Ford dragged the notebook into light. Her conversations with Russ consisted of more shouting these days than attention to detail, and she couldn't recall if he'd explained to her why his brother didn't talk. That is, if he'd said anything much about Ford at all. Really, he'd seemed pissed at her for even writing to Ford, and it was beginning to make sense why. When Ford had told her that he wasn't going to say anything, Marina had taken that to mean that he had a proclivity for meek stretches of quiet. She hadn't really considered until now that maybe the boy couldn't really talk. It seemed like something that she would rather ask Russ than ask now, if she ever spoke to him again.
She knew that whatever Russ' intentions, he wouldn't have employed a mute little brother to do any kind of dirty work. As much as she could hate Russ, she'd once liked him enough once to know that he had some good qualities. He didn't hide behind people, and he was far too stubborn in hard won independence to ask for help from anyone, ever. Marina had no doubts that he'd come kick in her front door if he ever wanted to know something badly enough, Russ didn't need anybody to spy for him. Reassurance warmed her, and the tension seemed to drain mostly away when she pinned her elbow to the table between them, palm up with her chin cupped inside so that she could observe at an angle as Ford wrote in the book.
"He's just turned five," she explained. "He likes dinosaurs and robots and Spiderman, like most five year olds, I suppose. He wants a dog, but our apartment is small. That's why he likes to go to the dog park more than the playground." She smiled, goldfinch gaze lifting to catch sight of her little boy when he hopped out of a miniature spaceship structure and started for their table once more when Marina motioned for him to come along.
It was safe to say that Ford wasn’t going to do any shouting. He put the plastic end of the blue ballpoint in the corner of his mouth when she spoke, watching not her, but the flickering lights of toddling shoes flashing out in the plastic chaos of the playground. A pleased little smile fluttered on his generous lips, soft pink things that would keep him looking young for a very long time to come, especially considering the corkscrew curls. He did not much resemble his brother, if only because he smiled too much.
Ford worked his teeth out of the plastic and looked back at her when she paused, catching her smile, and that was all it took for him to burst out into a full-fledged grin, a blinding thing full of wonder and cheer. You could stab him right through the heart by shutting down that smile alone, and Ford’s open vulnerability breathed in his face, in time with his lungs. How Ford approved of dinosaurs, and robots and Spiderman, and also dogs and small apartments and playgrounds. Everything was wonderful. He smiled and pressed the pen down to the page again, making a little hum of understanding and pleasure with the edge of his tongue on his teeth.
The sound flexed in his mouth, moving up into happiness and new questions. Ford was clearly not mute, capable of making sounds if he so chose. He didn’t want to parade out any broken sounds, so he made a little chuckle to himself and wrote, “He gets lots of time to play?” Ford obviously didn’t think this was a given thing when you were five, and he gave her an eager, expectant look, waiting for an answer. The blue eyes transferred immediately to the boy again when he got close enough. Ford nervously drummed his fingers against his pen.
"Mhm." The combination of tilted nod and smile was specific to mothers with something to be proud of. Even when she watched Nathan slam toy trucks around in make believe wrecks on the carpet, she had to marvel. How he could start out as nothing and suddenly become something in the blink of an eye. She could see now why her mother would sigh and talk about how they grow up si vite. There was reassurance in her smile when Nathan stepped closer, lights in his soles blink-blinking with no rhythm whatsoever. Marina knew she would teach him that too one day. He would know how to dance the steps and read Haitian Creole, which weren't necessarily useful talents to take on, but it was really all she had to give him. She thought that he would learn all of the other important things at school, although she couldn't quite remember that working out too well for her. Which was why he needed a better school, a private school with their check in the mail.
"Nathan, this is Ford," she explained while drawing the little boy in against her knee. He chewed on the side of this thumb in curiosity and a shyness that would be grown out of, for it surely was not inherited. "Hello," he said with a backward glance that came from tilting his head way back to gather reassurance from a glimpse of his mother's face. She smiled, he smiled back.
Intellectually, Ford was aware that he shouldn’t be judging a person based on ten minutes of interaction, but at the same time, he couldn’t remember his mother ever smiling at him quite like that. She had a drunken smile and a sweet smile, the latter used as a potent weapon when she was trying to wheedle her way into something and encountered resistance, the former the default, as beautiful and as mercurial as spring clouds. Ford loved his mother despite her faults, and therefore all mothers were measured by her performance. Fortunately, 95% of females had absolutely no trouble overcoming Lou’s example.
Ford met Nathan’s shy gaze with one of his own, remarkably similar in the way he held his head slightly back, as if he wanted to be sure it was out of reach. He looked nervously at Marina’s face when Nathan ventured his own greeting, but it was so important that this meeting go well, Ford was willing to suffer a little tentative embarrassment. “H-huhhaiy,” he said, drawing the vowel out in an attempt to smooth them and keeping it very soft. He accompanied the barely audible noise with a tentative little wave, of his fingers, but obviously could think of nothing to do afterward. He hung there, suspended on the molded plastic, uncertain. He wanted to see what Marina and Nathan were like, but he only had access to what they would show him, since he couldn’t (wouldn’t) actually ask more than he had.
Ford searched Nathan’s face for hints of his brother, and stared a little too long, not moving. He twitched after a moment, and looked around, bewildered. Right, McDonalds. Ford looked over his shoulder at the counter and made a little move of his head, expression questioning. Hungry? usually at places like these he just pointed at what he wanted on the counter menu or indicated a meal with his fingers. He didn’t actually like coke, but it was the first thing they suggested so he always nodded.
That same reassuring smile was extended to Ford went he ventured into vocalized hellos. Small and tight-lipped, but unintimidating. Nathan seemed fleetingly aware of the fact that he was being stared at by a stranger, and the boy's blue eyes oscillated between Ford and his mother, silently asking what he was supposed to do. Then, when anxiety nested in the warm familiarity of a young belly, he climbed into Marina's lap with small hands that gasped like carp mouths, gimme gimme. She heaved a sigh and hoisted him, wincing at the pull that came with lifting a child that seemed to be inexplicably more grown each and every time that she tried to pick him up. "You're getting too big," she groaned while adjusting in the unyielding plastic of the chair.
"Nu uh," Nathan argued. Although some element of concern had him glancing across the small table to Ford, as if hoping the other grownup might confirm that he was still small enough to be picked up if and when he wanted to. When Ford motioned to the food counter, Nathan's eyes widened with excitement at the prospect of being allowed to eat the kind of food that his mother otherwise labeled as 'junk'. He immediately declared that he wanted chicken nuggets with the kind of vigor that made chicken nuggets seem like some ambrosia for five year olds. Marina nudged the back of his darkhaired head in a wordless demand for manners. He quickly added, "Tanpri souple," as if not supplying the please might negate the entire deal.
Ford watched, fascinated. This demonstration of maternal affection he remembered, in the vague smudges of childhood. His mother had held him up like that, he was pretty sure. He didn’t remember her saying anything, and it was a sensation rather than a visual memory, and he certainly didn’t recall her face looking down at him. It was a warm feeling, and in about twenty seconds the way mother and child traded gazes convinced Ford, for good or for ill, that Marina was a good mother. It was a very total conviction. He had no idea or experience in the actual manifestation of good motherhood, no real thought as to what it could look like outside of that single moment, and he didn’t feel he needed it. He decided that Nathan was happy, and that was what he had come to see.
Ford’s grin tamed into a subtle smile of combined happiness and soft regret. Hints of jealousy made warm trickles of water sting the acid blue of his eyes, and he blinked twice to clear it. He was in time to meet Nathan’s questing look with a little nose wrinkle and a shake of his head to indicate his complete agreement with whatever Nathan thought was true. The foreign language swept past him and he simply assumed everything was a happy compliment because that was what he wanted it to be, and corporate McDonald’s was not going to fucking disagree. Ford beamed at his nephew, pushed some of his curls out of his face, and stood up.
To Marina, he said, “Yuh-y-y-you s...s-suh-seem like a n-n-nuh-n-n-ice… nice mom.” And then, raising his eyes up from the enforced study of the tile, he got out of immediate conversational area without waiting for her reaction.
There wasn’t much of Russell to Ford except when he stood up at full height, and some of that canine grit showed up in the width of shoulders and the cut of his eyeteeth when he looked around at the crowd. He loped away, forgetting to ask what Marina wanted, and showed up again five minutes later with a tray of four meals, picking out a chicken sandwhich and a second Big Mac so Marina could choose something she liked. He picked the Happy Meal with default everything for Nathan, and stared at them both hopefully, as if both of them suddenly smashing their faces down into the food would indicate total acceptance of everything he was.
Marina's attention strayed away from Nathan's excited chattering about french fries, her eyes followed Ford as he went for the ordering counter, watching momentarily as he pointed items out. When Nathan tapped her shoulder in search of an answer to a question she hadn't heard, Marina blinked back down to her boy with a small smile. By the time Ford returned, she was shushing her son and pushing him into the open seat beside her so that Nathan could eat while getting ketchup only on himself and not her, as was inevitably to happen.
"But why?" Nathan tugged at the back of her sleeve, blatant curiosity making him loud, as if his mother's refusal to answer him was only due to her not quite hearing him. "Poukisa, mama?" The boy tugged again, bright blue eyes sliding up to Ford's face when he returned with food. And then, upon deciding that his mother was not going to answer him, Nathan released her sleeve and dropped fully into the plastic curve of his chair. He pushed some overgrown dark hair out of his eyes, going right to the source with his question. "Why do you talk like that?"
Marina made a sound, motherly annoyance that bloomed in the valley between a hex and a hiss. She glanced down at him, the tight curve of her mouth sidling to the left. She hoped that Nathan's determination to do the complete opposite of what she requested had everything to do with being preciously five, and nothing to do with patriarchal genetics. Marina promptly nudged the happy meal his way and looked back to Ford with a sigh and a mouthed, but unvoiced, sorry.
Ford had always looked forward to the prizes inside the fast food boxes, as his Christmas list was nonexistent and the tiny cars and useless catapulting robots were the only toys that made it into the household when he was a kid. He’d had a shoebox full of them under his bed, all purple, his favorite color (until someone had told him that purple was a girl’s color and to stop being a girl), or blue (in the years following). He had not bought himself a Happy Meal™, and now he was regretting it, further adjusting Nathan’s in front of him with the flourish of a master chef presenting the pièce de résistance as soon as Marina pulled her hand away. After a final prod to one end of the box, Ford picked up his drink, watching idly as the first ketchup packet went sliding across the table.
He had no idea what the insistent questioning was about until the soda was already halfway down his throat. He immediately tried to breathe, and the coke went sliding up his esophagus and then down again in a disastrous, stinging plunge toward his lungs. He started hacking, and put the coke down immediately. Blinking through tears of surprise and still coughing, Ford gave Nathan a mortified, red-faced look, and then for some reason looked at Marina in some sort of appeal. Her apology was met with an immediate soothing shrug, an it’s okay sort of thing, but he still seemed to expect her to somehow provide an answer that she didn’t have.
He looked back at Nathan, swallowed as if the boy had just grown claws and vicious incisors, and then lifted both shoulders and hands in a very theatrical shrug so comically transparent in I don’t know meaning that the spontaneous audience of other customers who had looked over in anticipation of the next big lawsuit could read it from their plastic seats at the other end of the restaurant.
Nathan had an intense sense of wonder, the same unblinking attention to bright colors and tiny details that made children his age perfect for memorizing cartoons and repeating bad words at inopportune times. It was fueled by an incessant need to know things like why crickets made lots of noise but grasshoppers didn't, and why the planets were different colors, and whether or not sheep liked to have haircuts, and now the bank of inquiry included this new need to know why Ford talked like that. Big blue eyes watched on expectantly for something more detailed than a shrug, but impatience won over after a few moments of silence. "Why do--" he said.
Marina pulled open the little paper hatch of the happy meal with urgency, "Nathan."
"Mais," he frowned even as his mother pushed a trio of french fries into his hand, but in that moment, the introduction of food made for a perfect distraction. He promptly stuck some into his mouth with a smile that showed rows of little teeth, not a one missing yet. Silence befell the table like a miracle, and Marina carefully unwrapped her own sandwich as if she thought any quick movements might disturb the moment like a rock hitting a pond. She opened some ketchup for Nathan, and he executed his fry-dipping with the extreme caution of a child who knew they were being monitored closely due to past condiment finger-painting transgressions. The toy inside the box was a little green truck, and that soon held more fascination than the fries or the ketchup, however. It gave Marina a chance to speak without worry that she'd drag Nathan back onto the same talking points they'd just abandoned.
"He's just curious," she explained with more gentleness than anybody who knew her would have believed possible. "He doesn't mean anything by it." She took a sip of coke, watching thoughtfully as Nathan began to 'drive' his new truck along the edge of the table, narrowly darting in between stray french fries. She glanced back to Ford, voice going just a bit quieter. "He looks like him, doesn't he?" Nathan vroomed the truck up the side of the happy meal box, oblivious. The hair was a dark mop that couldn't be denied as her own genetics at work, but she thought the face was all Campbell.
Ford looked down at his own fries and became suddenly extremely occupied with arranging them on their paper bed, swirling the ketchup from the packets with absolute and total attention. He noticed that Marina was trying to distract Nathan from his questions, and it was simultaneously a relief and worsened the embarrassment, which crawled cold up the back of his neck. He didn’t dare open his mouth again, knowing any chance of full untouched words was impossible now. It always got worse whenever he thought about it, and if he tried to get to the end before he started the beginning, he never got there. It was like a horrible footrace with both legs tied and everyone else going backward just as he stumbled forward.
Ford didn’t need to know the language to understand Nathan’s objection to his lack of answer. He had thought “mais” was some kind of corn in English, but he couldn’t be perfectly sure, and he wasn’t going to ask, even if he wanted to. He sort of wanted to explain to Nathan about him not talking very well, because it was Nathan and he was an adorable kid who wasn’t going to hate him for it. He watched him with the truck, which kept defying gravity on various surfaces, and his embarrassment seem to melt off his face. He didn’t know why he couldn’t talk, anyway. There wouldn’t have been much to explain. How do you tell a kid something like that? You’re just broken, like an old toy?
When she spoke, Ford’s eyes jumped to meet Marina’s across the table. His smile, if possible, softened even further, because she couldn’t have said anything better to win Ford’s high opinion. He lifted both hands and touched his cheeks as if to demonstrate that Nathan’s youthful pudginess was something shared with Russell. Then, going slightly more serious, he tapped the corner of his right eye with his right hand and then drew it across his cheekbone. Then he tapped his chin. “Ehl-l-like h-h-his.” He said it very, very quietly, and immediately gulped at coke, spontaneous thirst being an excellent excuse for stopping a sentence short of full meaning. After a few seconds for recovering, he added, “N…n-n-n-not… not like…” He ran out of breath trying it and finally tapped his chest to finish the sentence. Ford didn’t have a face like Russell’s, it was all too pointed, more fox than wolf.
Marina managed to talk Nathan into taking three more bites of food in between the epic laps that the little truck was making around the happy meal box. The toy held a significant amount more interest than adult conversation, which was a little comforting to his mother due to the subject matter. When Ford spoke up again, Marina's smile was once more a small reassurance. The bow of her smile hesitated, as if she thought anything too zealous would wound him further. Then she took some fries for herself in a bite and a shrug of nonchalance. She talked around her chewing, "He's got pretty eyes like you." She'd always thought that the blue would dull out when Nathan got older, become something colder like Russ'. The brightness of Ford's eyes reassured her that maybe the pretty would stay.
She glanced aside to her son again as the playing slowed, and Nathan looked up at her with patient curiosity. "You bout ready to go, bebe? We got to go pick up your new soccer jersey from the Y." Nathan wasn't able to run all that good due to his occasional bouts of asthma, but soccer for five year olds had a whole lot more to do with standing around aimlessly in the sunshine than it did aggressive running. The doctors were insistent that exercise would strengthen him over time. Being around the other kids was good for him, besides.
Nathan lit up instantly at the mention of soccer and clutched his drink closer. "Can Ford come to my first game?" Marina shrugged, collecting her purse from the floor. Then he looked across the table, "Will you?"
Rather than beaming, Ford gave her a surprised look, not expecting a compliment on his eyes to come from any quarter that wasn’t blatantly trying to get into his pants. He realized it was crude as he thought it and shot Nathan a guilty look, but when he glanced back at her his expression held only curiosity. Mothers were supposed to be warm and kind and think everything was wonderful about their children, but it was a theory to Ford, not anything he had actually seen in person. Assured of Marina’s warmth, Ford bounced back to Nathan once again, staring at his eyes as if unwilling to believe he might see his own face there, as well as Russell’s. That would be an incredible thing.
Ford managed to stop staring after that, not forcing himself to say anything else, just sitting there and cleaning up the food with an absent-minded intensity that was probably closer to young dogs or enthusiastic vacuums than grown men. He picked up after both of them, crumpling wrappers and plucking up stray fries to toss onto his tray in preparation for leaving.
Ford smiled warmly at the idea of soccer, his knowledge of which extended as far as the shape of the ball and the idea that one was meant to get it in the net to make goals. If Nathan was interested, however, Ford was interested. He grinned his canine grin at Nathan and nodded enthusiastically for several seconds before he thought to glance at Marina for permission, a questioning look as clear as day without the need for speech. Uncle Ford wanted to go watch his nephew kick ass at soccer.
Marina didn't say no, which was all of the assurance Nathan needed to believe his wish was granted. Marina wasn't the soft edition of mother that didn't know how to say no to an only heir. Marina said no all of the time, in every language. It seemed to be her favorite word at times, and so the absence of it seemed as much of a yes as an actual, outspoken yes could have been. Nathan stretched to standing on his colorful chair then leapt down to the floor in a show of fearlessness, still beaming.
Marina plucked a paper napkin from the tabletop and used its edge to wipe some ketchup from Nathan's grin. Napkin crumpled, she dropped it onto the thin tray that was the work site of Ford's clean-up. With Nathan's hand in hers, Marina tugged with some murmured instruction in Haitian. Nathan responded cheerfully on their way to the door, "Bye, Ford!"