Phin was still moving around slow but he was a lot more mobile since he could see. He'd been reduced to limping around with a cane and a knee brace instead of crutches. He had some nice scars for reminders now. He was still in physical therapy but according to the doctors he'd be doing that for awhile before he'd lose the limp and to keep him from re-injuring his back. Things were still up in the air with work and he was doing most of his work from home. He didn't want to go back to the site. The idea of doing so made his skin crawl. There were ongoing investigations about the explosion and who set it. He and Bridget were now going to a shrink to try and get through things instead of divorcing. Phin couldn't decide if he was lucky the building fell on him or not, since it made Bridget rethink divorcing him. Oh, and it was also their fifth wedding anniversary. Phin couldn't believe that. He'd decided to try and attempt something nice, just the two of them, in the apartment, for Bridget. He didn't know how well it would go over though.
He'd gotten her a bracelet from the jewelry store in the mall. He'd seen her looking at it when they were pre-Christmas shopping, something Bridget always liked doing before Thanksgiving. He'd gotten Jeth to pretend he wanted a pretzel so he could double back and get it...along with a pretzel for Jeth and for Penny. He was pretty sure she was clueless about it, or he hoped so. Anyway, he'd told the kids that Aunt Layla was going to watch them for awhile for the night and after he'd explained why, Jeth and Penny insisted on helping him make decorations before Layla came to pick them up. So there were now toddler construction paper decorations all over the living room, along with some candles lit on the coffee table, some wine and some takeout from her favorite chinese place. It wasn't severely expensive but their first anniversary dinner had been something similar, and involved eating pizza while sitting at the coffee table because Phin had attempted cooking some fancy dinner and instead had almost burnt their first apartment down. It wasn't great, like his surprise New York trip, or some of the other surprises he'd laid on her but it was the best he could do right now.
He waited, in the hall by the door, for about ten or fifteen minutes before she was expected to be home, leaning on his cane with one hand and with some of her favorite flowers in the other. This was either a really bad move or a possibly sweet gesture. He had no idea which Bridget was going to label it.
The fact that it was their fifth anniversary had been on Bridget's mind all day, even if she and Phin hadn't talked about it much at home before she left for work. A lot had happened in five years. Bridget had changed a lot and their marriage certainly had as well. She remembered their wedding day pretty clearly, how they'd texted one another all afternoon, trying to find a moment to sneak away and see each other. Back then she had been so sure that she and Phin were making the right choice. It was only just about a year later that she first had fleeting thoughts regretting the decision. But they'd still tried to make it work. She did love him and she didn't want to give up on everything just because sometimes she couldn't stand to be around him. They had the twins and things didn't change much for the better. Clearly they hadn't if Phin had felt lonely and needy enough to go sleep with some girl from a bar.
So now here they were, awkwardly trying to rebuild while Phin recovered from his injuries. What happened to him was terrible, but they would probably have been divorced at this point if it hadn't had happened. Bridget would never wish that kind of physical pain on Phin, so she was loath to think of it as a 'blessing in disguise', but it was something kind of like that.
She was tired when she got home from work. She hadn't had much sleep the night before and working on building the sports schedules for 2010 all day wasn't exactly relaxing. Not to mention the weight of the whole anniversary thing. She and Phin were bound to have some kind of long discussion about it that night, she was sure of it. But she wasn't expecting him to actually do too much in way of celebration. That's why she was a little surprised to see him standing there with calla lilies when she opened the door.
She arched her eyebrows and looked from the bundle in Phin's hand to his face and back again. "Hey."
Phin stood up straighter, as much as he could anyway while still resting heavy weight on his cane, when the door knob turned. He turns his mouth up into a small smile. "Hi," He decided not to say 'happy anniversary' just yet because he wasn't sure how she was taking this. He glanced at the flowers and then took a couple of steps closer, but not too many. He wanted to let her get in and take her coat off and all. "How was work?" he asked, feeling pretty nervous.
"It was tiring," Bridget said, eyeing the flowers for a few more moments before looking back up at Phin with a small smile. "We're starting the new schedules." She put her bag down by the closet and worked on unbuttoning her coat.
The smile made his shoulders relax a little. Her comment about the schedules made him think about back when he actually coached at the rec center. It had been a long time since he'd done that. He stepped down as coach a few months before they'd moved into the Manor. "Yeah...can't believe it's time for that already," He said, unsure how he wanted to steer the conversation. He watched her work on the coat and waited until she had hung it up to shuffle a couple feet closer again to hold the flowers out. "These...are for you." He stated the obvious.
"I had a feeling," Bridget joked gently with a half-smile. She took the bouquet and looked down at it once it was cradled in her arms. "Thank you." She was quiet briefly before adding, "Five years, huh?" without turning her head up.
Phin watched her, nodding when she thanked him. His features tensed a bit when she asked the question. "Kind of hard to believe," He replied. He was pretty astonished and partially elated, that they were actually still together on their fifth anniversary. He would gladly have the building fall on him all over again if given the choice between that and being divorced from Bridget and juggling the kids around. It wasn't something he thought Bridget would want to hear him say though. "The kids are with Layla and Neil." He told her. "I wasn't sure how hungry you'd be, but...I ordered from Panda Express." He shifted his weight around on his cane and shrug his shoulders a little sheepishly.
She looked up and past him into the apartment. "Oh. I was wondering why it was so quiet." A night for just the two of them. Talk about awkward. But there wasn't anything Bridget could really do about it at this point. There was nothing she should do either. It was their fifth anniversary, after all.
"Food sounds great," she said once she brought her eyes back to Phin. "Is it here already?" She lifted the flowers. "I'll put these in a vase."
Phin turned his head to glance over his shoulder into the apartment. He looked back at her and tried to study her face. He wasn't sure how to go about telling her that he obviously wasn't expecting anything from her, but he didn't think it was appropriate. "It got here a little bit before you did," He told her. "I set up in the living room." He told her, though he was kind of regretting getting Layla to take the kids now. Bridget probably preferred them as a buffer.
Bridget turned and looked at the coffee table in the living room where, sure enough, all the Chinese food boxes were sitting. She smiled again, just a little bit, at Phin. "That works out nicely. Sit down and get off your leg while I put these away." She walked toward the kitchen, and called over her shoulder, "What do you want to drink?"
Phin nodded. "Okay." At least she smiled. So that was good, right? "Just a water is fine. I wasn't sure if you'd want to drink or not," He said as he turned to start limping toward the living room. "So I set out some wine, but I haven't opened it." Because she might not want to drink, and he technically shouldn't drink because of his medication. He moved slowly to the couch and sat down carefully before leaning his again against the end table next to the couch.
"Oh, good, I was going to get some wine for myself," she said before the sound of the faucet drifted in from the kitchen as she filled one of the vases they had received as a wedding present five years before. She arranged the flowers inside and set the whole thing down on the bar. She stood there, looking at it for a while, and then went to retrieve the water for Phin and an empty wine glass for herself.
"Nothing goes better with Chinese than fine wine," she joked lamely as she returned and held out Phin's glass.
Phin smiled a little bit. Okay, she didn't completely hate what he'd done. That was good, he'd decided. "Only the highest of classes for you," He attempted to joke back as he reached out to take the glass she was holding out, which of course caused some hand brushing in the process. He tried not to do it but he wasn't exactly sad it happened.
Bridget hesitated briefly, staring at their hands, before she pulled hers back and switched the wine glass to it. If she wanted to sit here and think about how sad it was that a slight hand brush gave them pause on their fifth anniversary, she could. And she would be both depressed and angry. But she didn't really want to, not tonight.
She walked over to the wine bottle and poured some out into her glass. "How's your leg today?" she asked.
Phin had trouble keeping his eyes off of people lately but after having been unable to see anyone for so long he couldn't help it. He wanted to take in as many details as possible, in case it ever happened again. He shrugged a little and glanced at his knee as he took a drink from the glass of water. He set the cup down on a coaster and leaned forward to start opening up the takeout boxes. "It's okay," He said. "I think it's gonna rain later." he added. "It's achy." He really hated the whole rain-achyness that was for sure. Especially since it tended to be in his leg, his back and his shoulder all at once. "I was thinking of trying to make something fancy...but didn't want to risk burning the place down," like he had before. His cooking skills had much improved over the last few years.
Bridget shook her head with a sad smile as she sat down. "This is fine. No need for anything fancy." That would have been extra-awkward, after all. They were past the point of fanciness at the moment. She took a quick sip from her drink and nodded at his knee. "At least you'll never be caught without an umbrella again."
Phin almost frowned then. Did the bracelet count as fancy? It probably did. Maybe he should wait until the very end of the night to give that to her. He smiled a little at the umbrella comment. "Always look on the bright side of life." He agreed as he picked up one of the containers and started dumping pork fried rice onto his plate. He cleared his throat a little and gave her a sideways glance as he put the container down and then moved on to another. "Make sure you take a good look at the decoration. I don't think the kids will let us take them down anytime soon." He told her with a small smile.
Bridget laughed and took a look around as she reached for the lo mein. "Yeah...I was just about to ask if you had done them yourself. The kids did a nice job." She turned her eyes to Phin for a moment or two before looking back down at the container in her hand.
Phin smiled a little more. "They wanted to know why Layla was going to watch them." He gave her a sheepish shrug. "And then we had to make pretty decorations. Penny said so." he gave a firm couple of nods. "She concentrated very hard on her construction paper. Jeth too. I think he even gave himself a headache - he wanted to take a nap." Which was rare for Jeth.
Bridget laughed a little louder that time. She looked at the decorations again. "We're lucky we have such nice kids," she said, still chuckling. Stories like that made her very glad she'd let Phin move back home.
Phin let out a small sigh and nodded. "I guess I shoudn't mention that they tried decorating the hallway wall when they ran out of construction paper then, huh?" He replied, smiling more now that she'd let out one of those laughs.
"God," Bridget shook her head. "They were busy." She pointed at the decorations. "But are any of them your work?"
Phin bounced his eyebrows a couple of times. "Oh, of course." He nodded. "But I can't tell you which ones. You'll have to figure it out on your own, I'm afraid." He grinned.
Bridget studied a few of the construction paper pieces for a minute before she pointed at one to Phin's left. "That's all you. I don't think Penny has that steady a hand." She looked at Phin to see if she was right.
Phin smiled as he pulled his plate in. He watched her study the decorations before she picked one out. He chuckled a little and nodded. "One down," He answered, but he didn't tell her how many of them were left that were his. He just smiled and bit a forkful of food as he sat back and stretched his leg a bit.
Bridget guessed a few more correctly before she finally dug in to her food. She downed her wine pretty quickly as she ate and soon she was getting a refill. Her conversation with Phin had tapered off to silence, but at least they had eating to do so it wouldn't be too awkward yet.
After they finished eating, and had put their plates back on the table for now, Phin decided that tonight was going to wind up awkward regardless and that he might as well give her the gift he'd gotten her. He hesitated though as he looked over at her. "I have a gift for you," he admitted. He glanced down and then looked back up at her. "I know this isn't really how you'd want to spend our anniversary, let alone the fifth one," he glanced down again and frowned. "And I know there's a lot we obviously still have to work through. But," He cleared his throat and leaned over to open the drawer on the end table. He pulled the obviously shaped, gift wrapped box out and then shut the drawer and sat back. He looked at the package a moment before he held it out to her. "I saw you looking at it in the mall." He told her. "So, I wanted you to have it." He decided to stop talking there before he started rambling any further.
Bridget's brow furrowed as he spoke. When he held out the jewelry box, she looked down at it for a few long moments before she took it. "Phin..." she began, even though she didn't have any follow-up. On one hand she wanted to chide him for getting her a gift and on the other hand she realized it was a nice gesture and the guy was willing to do anything at this point.
"I didn't think we would be exchanging gifts," she settled for admitting as she set the box down in her lap.
He shook his head. "I didn't get it because I thought we'd be exchanging gifts." He said as he glanced at the gift and then back up at her. "And I don't expect anything for giving it to you, either." He added because he thought that was pretty damn important to note too. Whether she believed it or not, that was a whole other ball game. He shifted a little in his seat. "I told Jeth to say he wanted a pretzel." he tacked on at the end there.
Bridget remembered that day. The corner of her mouth curled up a little bit and she looked at Phin. "Sneaky," she said before she turned back down to the box. She certainly hoped he wasn't expecting anything in exchange for the gift and yeah, she didn't really think he was. She knew him better than that. She opened up the box and pulled out the bracelet. It was a delicate little silver thing. She hadn't even bothered trying it on in the store, but she did spend quite a bit of time looking at it.
"Thank you," she said quietly as she put it on now.
Phin shrugged a little and gave a really sheepish little half smile. He turned his head to watch her look at the bracelet and was more than relieved when she put it on even. "Happy anniversary." he said in response. Then he turned his eyes away. It was probably stupid to say that, since it was more like 'awkward anniversary' than 'happy'. It was somewhat happy for Phin though, since he was actually alive to see it and it was actually taking place, sort of. He felt bad always making everything so awkward.
Yeah." Bridget turned her eyes up to him with a small smile, but he wasn't looking at her. She took the took her left arm, the one wearing the bracelet, and reached out to put her hand over his. Just lightly, though.
Phin looked over at her and gave her a small smile after she put her hand on his. "Do you think we'll get past being awkward?" He had to ask.
"I don't know," she said, looking down at their hands. "Sometimes I think we will and other times I don't." She looked up again. "Right now I think so, though."
Phin was a little relieved at her answer, mostly because he was glad he wasn't the alone in worrying about it. He nodded a bit. "You're not upset or anything, that I set up tonight without telling you, are you?" These were the things he worried about all the time now.
"Upset? No. Surprised? A little." She took her hand off his and reached over for her wine glass. "I didn't know what we should have been doing about today."
Phin always fought not to frown whenever she pulled away from touching him in some way. "I wasn't sure either. I think I was about half a minute away from breaking into a sweat while I was waiting in the hallway." he admitted. He really was trying to be more open about things with her so she wouldn't think he was keeping anything secret from her, but he wondered where he was supposed to draw the line.
"You weren't standing there waiting for me to get back, were you?" she asked once she lowered the glass again. She'd left work a few minutes later than usual that evening. She figured he had just hobbled to his feet when he heard the door.
"For a few minutes." Actually it was more like twenty. He didn't want her to feel bad about it or something.
Bridget shook her head with a light sigh. "You shouldn't put that much pressure on your leg," she said, smiling slightly.
Phin shrugged again and shook his head. "It wasn't that much on my leg. Mostly on my arm, and the cane." He gave her a small smile. "No undo pressure." he gave a firm nod.
Bridget's smile widened. "Good." Things got quiet again after that, but Bridget didn't look away from him just yet. She just smiled and studied his face. She hadn't been giving him a lot of lingering looks since he regained his sight.
Phin smiled at her while she looked at him. He took a moment to look her face over since she was actually looking at him. He didn't say anything though because he wanted the moment to linger as long as possible.
Bridget began to feel the awkwardness creep back in after about five seconds (it felt like thirty, though). So to combat that she did the logical thing and leaned in to give him a quick kiss before pulling back. She wanted to show her appreciation somehow, but didn't want to linger too long with the physical contact just yet.
A quick kiss was more than enough to calm him down some and to combat the awkwardness in Phin's opinion. It made him smile too. He leaned back some in his seat and lifted his hand to look at his watch. "Well, we officially have a little over two hours before Layla brings the kids back." he looked over at her. "What should we do with our temporary freedom?" he hadn't planned out the entire time because he didn't want her to feel trapped.
"Two hours gives us enough time to watch a movie," Bridget suggested with a shrug.
Phin nodded. "DVD or on demand?" he asked as he grabbed his cane and stood up. He picked the remote up off the table and held it out to her. "I'll put this away and be right back." He had to take some medicine too now that he'd eaten. He piled their plates then started to piled the take out containers on the plates. "Want anything while I'm in there?" he had one last surprise left, in the form of a few chocolate covered strawberries in the fridge too.
Bridget sat up higher, about to protest him moving, but he got up before she could stop him. "I'll help," she still said, putting the remote down on the coffee table.
Phin glanced at her and protested, just a little because he thought he should. "It's okay really. You worked all day. Just relax." He said with a small smile.
"C'mon, it's hard to balance all that stuff. It's not like I have an injured knee." She got up quickly and took the plates out of Phin's hands. "You set all this up. Let me take care of this."
He glanced down at his empty hand and arched an eyebrow. "Okay," He said. "But I have to go to the kitchen anyway," He added as he limped along behind her toward the room in question with his empty glass and a takeout container hanging by its metal hook on his finger as he went. They could set the movie up when they got back to the living room. He figured he'd let her find the container of strawberries when she opened the fridge to put the takeout away.
"All right," Bridget said, giving him another smile. She walked ahead of him and started cleaning up. Plates were put in the dishwasher, empty containers were thrown out, and leftovers were sealed for later. Once the food was all in separate containers, she walked over to the fridge to put them away.
"What's this?" she asked, pulling out a container that took up some space. She lifted the lid and arched her eyebrows.
Phin sauntered over to the medicine cabinet, which was above the fridge and well out of toddler reach. He grabbed the pills he needed before he shut the cabinet, complete with its child lock, and shuffled over to the sink to refill his glass. He looked over as he swallowed the pills with a big few gulps of water. "Dessert." He answered with a small sheepish grin. "Since Chinese food just makes ya hungry a half hour later anyway."
Phin was just full of surprises tonight, which was kind of funny since he was kind of known for them when it came to special occasions. Bridget pulled the container out altogether and after putting the Chinese away, took the lid off the of the strawberries. "Did you make them yourself?"
Phin shook his head and grinned. "No, no, I left that to the experts this time."
"That's probably for the best," Bridget said, actually grinning this time. She pulled out one of the strawberries and took a bite. It definitely was tasty and she made a hum of approval to that effect.
Phin chuckled, just a little at her reaction to the strawberries. "I dunno, you tell me," He smirked. "Tasty?" He arched his eyebrows.
"Very," Bridget nodded after swallowing. She held out the container toward him. "Want one?"
"Sure," He stepped closer to take one of the strawberries by the stem. He looked it over for the best spot to make his first bite attack and then finally went in for the bite.
Bridget arched her eyebrows as she finished off her own. "Hm?" she asked as she closed the container again. They could wait a little while longer before they were ready for dessert officially.
Phin took a couple of quick big bites to finish off his strawberry, which resulted in some chocolate smudging in the corner of his mouth. He at least had the decency to wait until he'd swallowed to answer her. "I know how to pick 'em," He smirked.
"Yeah," Bridget said, her mouth turning up on the side, "so do I." She reached out with her free hand and wiped that bit of chocolate away.
Phin blushed a tiny bit when he realized she was wiping food off of his face. He gave her a small grin though to match hers. He wasn't sure how to respond to her comment so he asked. "We should set up that movie, before we run out of time." He really wanted to do much more than watch a movie with her, but he would gladly settle for that over her not wanting to be near him.
"Yeah." Bridget held her hand to his face for just a moment longer and then dropped her arm down and turned to head back out of the kitchen, taking the strawberry container with her. "I'm sure there's something On Demand for us to watch," she said as she went.
Phin watched her a moment before he limped after her. "Definitely a great invention." he said as he moved to the living room and settled in next to her. "Just so long as we don't stumble onto Kung-Fu Panda..." He smirked.
Bridget tipped her head back a bit and let out a groan before sitting down on the couch. "No way in hell would I ever voluntarily watch that at this point." She shook her head and picked up the remote as she started reciting lines from the movie word-for-word.
Phin grimaced and let out his own groan as he rested his head against the back of the couch. "Now you're just being cruel," He shook his head and then rolled it to look over at her, with a small smile on his face. Were they having a good night?
"Hey, you brought it up," Bridget shrugged with a smirk in his direction. She held the container out for him as she turned the television on.
"This is true," Phin agreed with a jokingly defeated sigh. He reached out for another strawberry, which required scooting over a little on the couch. Actually, it didn't, but he took the excuse. He sat back and lifted his strawberry for a bite. "I can't decide if chocolate covered strawberries are better than chocolate covered cherries." He said as she searched for a movie.
"Strawberries, no question," Bridget replied right away.
He looked over at her. "Just like that? No question at all?" He asked. "You like strawberries that much better than cherries?"
Bridget turned to him and arched her eyebrows with a nod. "Don't get me wrong, cherries are fine, but nothing beats a strawberry. On its own, dipped in sugar, dipped in chocolate...any way it's better."
Phin arched his eyebrows as she spoke. Then he tilted his head a bit and let out simply a thoughtful, "Huh..." before he lifted his strawberry to take another bite.
"They don't have pits, that's another plus," Bridget smiled, her eyes on his mouth as he took that bite.
Phin chewed his mouthful thoughtfully. "Part of the fun is spitting out the pits," He reasoned. "Kind of like watermelon seeds."
"Yeah, you would say that. You are your son's father, after all."
Phin grinned after he swallowed. "Hey, that kid has a real chance at winning some world record money in watermelon seed spitting distance, height and arch." He defended with a grin.
Bridget snorted back some laughter. "Oh, good. Now we don't have to worry about him," she said with a feigned sigh of relief.
"Hey, they give you a couple hundred thousand dollars for each record you earn," Phin said. "I haven't looked this up, nope." He added with a couple bounces of his eyebrows. "Kid can pay his own way through college and proudly tell everyone about his bitchin' world records."
Bridget looked at him with an incredulous laugh. "You're making that up. You did not research watermelon seed spitting contests." Because surely those things did not really exist.
Phin shook his head with a chuckle. "No I'm not! The current record holder spit a watermelon seed sixty-eight feet and nine and an eight inches," He said just to prove it. He grinned. "And there's a World Championship contest for it in Texas." He nodded.
Bridget laughed. "Sixty-eight feet? Really?"
"And nine and an eighth inches," Phin confirmed with a nod.
She snickered a bit. "Jeth is good, but I don't think he's that good. I wonder what the velocity is of a seed traveling that far."
PHin held his finger up. "Yet," He said. "With the proper training...." He trailed off and grinned.
"So what you're saying is that the people down below in the gardens better watch out when watermelon season rolls around again," Bridget smirked.
"Exactly." He grinned and nodded a few times. "I'd say we'll give proper warning when practicing but where would the fun in that be?"
Bridget looked at him with a smile that verged on dopey. She nearly leaned over and kissed his arm, but instead she lifted the remote to go to the On Demand menu. "What son needs catch when he has watermelon-spitting?" she mused.
"Not Jeth," he grinned. "Penny though, she's all about catch." He hesitated but finally reached up to stretch his arm along the back of the couch behind her so it wasn't quite around her shoulders but in some capacity it kind of still was. He turned his attention to the TV after watching her face for a moment.
"Yeah, she is." She opened up the movie options and moved through the menus. "If you see anything you want, just shout."
Phin nodded. "I have no preference." He wasn't a big TV watcher unless sports were involved. "So whatever you want to watch is fine with me," He smiled.