pandaphin (pandaphin) wrote in morningstar_mnr, @ 2009-12-14 00:58:00 |
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Entry tags: | bridget, phin |
Sunday All Day, Bridget & Phin, Panda Apartment & so on
It was rainy outside. Phin could tell before he even opened his eyes, not by the sound of rain on the balcony or windows or anything like that. He could tell by the aching pain in his back and his leg. A nice side effect to the injuries from the collapse was the addition of a shitload of annoying aches and pains with the changing weather. He attempted not to make much fuss over them. They were only really bad if the storm coming in was a pretty big one. Today they were just a nuisance that had woken him up in the morning. He opened his eyes and found himself face to face with a sleeping Bridget. Though the sight made him frown only because it was frustrating how close he got to be to her in bed and yet he still have to be separated by invisible lines. He liked waking up at night or in the morning and watching her sleep for awhile. She didn't know he was watching and he didn't have to see her look at him with that expression that kickstarted his day down a horrible path of guilt. She probably took pride in realizing she'd done that to him. He did deserve it and all.
For a good ten minutes he thought about turning the alarm off so he 'overslept' and wound up late for work, just so he could watch her longer. Then he realized it was Sunday. Carter, and the other workers, were not allowed to call him in on Sundays. If there was something they needed him to do from his home office, they could call him for that but only if it was absolutely necessary. Carter must still be feeling bad for him because so far this arrangement had worked out pretty well. Of course, that didn't really help with giving Phin and Bridget lots of family time. It gave her time to go writing, him time to play with the kids and left just enough time for awkward dinners, forcing smiles at bathtime and then more awkward alone time finding different things to do around the apartment after putting the kids to bed.
Right now was his favorite time of day. One of them anyway. His other favorite was breakfast. He hadn't been going in as early so he really got to spend morning wake up and breakfast time with them, or mostly with the kids anyway since his and Bridget's conversations weren't exactly the most intense conversations anyway...except when they were at the shrink's office...twice a week. Phin like right now the best because Bridget slept deep enough right now, most of the time, that he could hazard touching her face. He did so lightly and sparingly since there was no telling what she'd do is she woke up and every now and then he moved the least amount of weight as possible and kissed her forehead. She'd probably kick his ass if she woke up to him kissing her.
Anyway, thankfully she didn't wake up this morning when he kissed her forehead lightly. He took care in moving to roll off the bed, both to keep from waking her and to keep too many painful joint cracks. Once he was on his feet and steady he stretched his arms and legs out and arched his back to crack it with a slight grimace. He headed toward the bathroom quietly, glancing over his shoulder at Bridget on the bed as he went out the door. He stopped in the bathroom and shut the door so he could wash his face, brush his teeth and use the toilet without disturbing anybody. After that he headed for the kitchen, stopping to look into both twins rooms as he went by.
Twenty minutes and setting up a couple of frying pans later and Phin was finishing up some breakfast - pancakes, scrambled eggs (the twins wouldn't eat them any other way just yet), bacon, toast and oven cooked hash browns from the freezer. He set up four plates - of varying sizes obviously - and covered them with aluminum foil before stowing them in the still warm oven until the others woke up. He was just finishing loading the dirty dishes into the dishwasher when Penny appeared, peaking around the wall with her pacifier in her mouth and her blanket in her hand. Her hair was sticking up all over and she looked awake but still a little groggy. Phin smiled when he saw her, one hand dragging her worn out blanky and the other twirling around in the hair at the side of her head.
"Heyyyyy, little panda bear," He said in one of those sing song tones as he went over to pick her up with a little grunt. He swayed with her a little and gave her kiss a cheek. "Good morning."
Penny smiled around the pacifier and gave him a very muffled, "Hi daddy," That missed a few syllables around the pacifier as she leaned forward and gave him a big panda bear hug. It was all ridiculously adorable. Phin was going to miss it when they were too big to pick up and when they were too old for hugs and kisses from mommy and daddy. And, y'know, when they actually spoke normally instead of half the time perfectly and half the time like aliens. He was gonna miss it a lot. At least not he'd got to be around it more often.
"Let's go see if you're grumpy brother's up, yet, huh?" He bounced her at his side as she agreed and they headed for Jeth's room. Jeth was sitting up in bed, frowning around his own pacifier and scratching his head. He couldn't find Duck. Duck had gotten lost in the middle of tossing and turning last night. After searching for the alligator, Phin, Penny and Jeth headed for the living room. Phin set them up playing and with a showing of Kung-Fu Panda - a favorite in the apartment - and then went to fill up their sippy cups with some juice before sitting down to play with them on the floor.
Bridget remained sound asleep until her alarm went off. With her eyes still closed and a frown on her face, she reached over to turn it off. It took a few moments before she opened her eyes and realized that she was all alone in the bedroom. There was noise coming from outside; she was pretty sure it was the television in the living room. Bridget climbed out of bed and headed for the bathroom to brush her teeth. She exited through the door to the hallway and walked down to the living room. She was supposed to be meeting a friend to go shopping in about two hours, but she wanted to eat before she got ready.
Somehow, nicely playing with their toys turned into rolling around on the floor in a mass of Panda tickle attacks. The kids were giggling and trying to get away but just couldn't seem to evade Phin's tickling, what with him having longer arms and all. The noisy activity was probably why Phin hadn't noticed Bridget's appearance in the living room when she first got there.
Bridget stopped behind the couch and watched them, a small smile on her face. Moments like these made her glad she'd decided to keep the marriage together. The kids would miss out on so much if she and Phin had to keep passing them back and forth. Bridget leaned down against the back of the couch and her smile grew a little wider.
The kids were out of breath and begging for mercy, so Phin wrapped an arm around each of them and pulled them both in for a big hug as his own laughter died down a little. He gave them both a kiss as they tried to catch their breath and Jeth let out a breathless greeting with Bridget's name in it as he reached a hand out in her direction.
Phin lifted his head and turned it around to look over his shoulder. His face fell a little more serious and he cleared his throat as he turned back around so he could pull himself to his feet. "Hey," He said as he moved to walk around he couch. Jeth reached out both hands now for Bridget, so Phin leaned toward her and held his arm out a little to pass him over.
"Hey," Bridget echoed as she straightened up. She grinned at the kids and gave them a wave. "How are you doing this morning?" she asked Jeth in a cheery voice as she took him from Phin. She kissed the top of Jeth's head and then did the same to the side of Penny's.
Jeth was in rare form. He was awake enough to have partaken in tickle attacks instead of being grumpy and shoving hands away. He snuggled himself into his mom's embrace and just relaxed there to finish catching his breath. Penny gave Bridget a greeting in an out of breath babble. Phin looked at the kids and smiled a little. He let out a sigh as he finished catching his breath. "Breakfast is in the oven." he said. "I didn't want to wake you..." He shrugged a little.
Bridget smirked down at Jeth and bounced him a little bit. She turned her eyes up to Phin when he spoke. "Really?" she asked, her eyebrows arching up. "I was just about to go make it myself." Phin was really trying hard lately with this redemption stuff. It was nice.
Yeah he was - he even remembered to call when he was going to have to stay late. It might've been nice but he didn't see how it was benefiting them very much, not that he'd ever say that out loud. Anyway, he nodded. "Wrapped it up to keep it warm. The kids were awake so I put their movie on while we waited for you." he shrugged.
Oh, it was a good thing for everyone involved that he didn't voice that opinion. Bridget hadn't been keeping him at arm's length because she wanted to torture him. She was doing it because she still wasn't sure if she was ready to completely move on from what he did.
Bridget's eyebrows stayed up for a few more moments. "Oh. Thank you."
She turned to look at Jeth. "Let's go look at the food daddy made!" she said with wide eyes as she bounced with him into the kitchen.
Phin nodded and gave her a little nonchalant shrug. He adjusted his grip on Penny and followed Bridget and Jeth into the kitchen. After getting Penny situated into her booster seat at her chair and getting her a new juice, he went to the oven to take the plates out and started uncovering them before carrying them to their appropriate spots at the table. The kid's stuff was already cut up and ready to go.
Bridget looked down at the plates as she set Jeth up in his own seat. Phin managed to impress her again when she saw that he'd taken the time to cut up the eggs already. She looked up at him and gave him a small smile before finishing up with Jeth.
After setting the kid's plates down and putting their refilled juice cups in front of them, Phin put his and Bridget's plates down and then went to get some utensils. He grabbed a couple of glasses and poured himself some orange juice. He'd made coffee when he'd made Breakfast so that was still sitting in the coffee pot but he usually started off the morning himself with orange juice. "What do you want to drink?" He asked Bridget as he grabbed the catch up and the syrup and put the utensils on the table with them and the salt and pepper shakers.
"Coffee, thanks," Bridget said, looking down at Jeth's plate and resisting the urge to find any pieces of egg that needed to be cut further. Sometimes she thought she was OCD, but other times she realized it was just second nature for her to want to prove that Phin did something wrong, no matter how trivial the screw-up may have been. She was trying hard to stop that kind of behavior, though. Thanks, therapy.
Phin nodded and dug out a coffee mug to fill up. He brought it to the table with the sugar bowl and his glass of orange juice before he finally went and sat down in his seat. He let out a relieved breath and then looked over at Penny to make sure she was okay with her food since Bridget was looking at Jeth. Penny was eating away, using her spoon half the time and her free hand the other half of the time. It was kind of hilarious so Phin stopped after picking up his knife and fork and watched for a few minutes with a small smile. Half the time he wasn't sure if anyone but Jeth and Penny benefited from his survival of the building collapse. He wasn't even entirely sure that was really true some of the time either. It was a pretty depressing way to live actually. He tried not to think about it so much but that didn't always work. It was another thought he definitely never brought up - especially where therapy was concerned.
It took some encouragement to get Jeth to use the spoon instead of his hands. Eventually he got going and Bridget sat back in her seat. When she saw the coffee on the table in front of her, she pulled over the mug without bothering with sugar. Back when she was in high school she'd decided that real writers took their coffee black. And then she'd gotten used to it. It was a much better habit than developing a writerly drinking problem.
"Thank you," she told Phin sincerely, giving him another small smile.
Phin spent a few minutes after watching Penny, getting her to mimic him in eating with her spoon. He looked up when Bridget thanked him, a little surprised that it was sincere and not some kind of sarcastic remark or anything like that. He gave her a small nod. "You're welcome," He replied in equal sincerity and gave her a small smile as well. He looked down at his food and prepared a forkful. "What time are you meeting Joan?" He asked with glance at the clock on the oven before he took a bite from his forkful and sent a sideways glance at Penny to see if she was still eating with her spoon.
"At noon," Bridget said as she set down the mug after taking a sip. She picked up her fork and looked over at the clock as well. There was still plenty of time to eat and get ready. And hang out with the kids. And Phin, even.
Phin nodded, chewing to keep from frowning. A couple of hours wasn't 'plenty of time' in his opinion. Last time they'd both been home and had planned to spend the day together...and with some family and friends...he'd gotten called into work and their day had gone from good to shitty. Now, in times when he was able to spend more, well, time, with them, Bridget just wound up leaving the apartment. If it wasn't for writing it was for shopping. So instead of actually spending time together as a family, they got mini hour or so long sessions at a time. Phin couldn't decide if this was good or bad. He hadn't exactly asked her to stay home or figured out something for all of them to do for that day, so he couldn't really be, y'know, upset that she had something planned - something he'd already known about - and was only going to be home for a few hours. He looked over at Penny in time to see her smash a spoonful of scrambled eggs half into her mouth and half down the front of her shirt. He smiled a little at her and shook his head just a little bit. He didn't bother cleaning her up since she still had a ways to go before she finished eating.
Feeding both the kids and the adults took a while, but eventually most of the plates were cleaned. Bridget pushed her chair back and stood up so she could collect all the dishes and bring them to the dishwasher.
"I think we should say thank you to daddy for a nice breakfast, right?" Bridget asked the kids as she picked up Penny's plate.
Phin chuckled as both kids thanked him with big grins, Penny from around her juice cup and Jeth, who was reaching out for him with sticky hands that needed to be washed so he could be let out of her booster seat. "You're welcome," He said as he stood and leaned over first to kiss the side of Penny's head and then to unhook Jeth so he could pick him up. he carried Jeth to the sink to grab the rag so he could clean off Jeth's face and hands.
Bridget smiled at their responses. She glanced at Phin before she turned around to load up the dishwasher, glancing back at Penny a few times as she did so. Once she was done and she washed her hands, she walked over to the table and pulled Penny out of her seat.
"Still working on that juice, huh?" she asked her as she carried her out into the living room. Once Bridget got her set up, she was going to take her shower.
Phin set the rag down after he finished cleaning Jeth up and then stopped by the table to grab his juice to give to him. He bounced Jeth a few times and headed to the living room as well. He stopped behind the couch this time and watched for a little bit.
Bridget was down on the floor in front of the television with Penny. She pulled over one of the wooden puzzles with the handles on the backs of the pieces and took them out to spread on the carpet.
Bridget picked up one, which had the head and neck of a zebra painted on the handle-side, and held it out to show Penny. "Where do you think this one goes?" She arched her eyebrows up and made a show of looking at the piece herself before showing it to Penny again.
Penny looked at the piece as she held her juice cup in one hand. She studied the piece and then the board and reached out to move Bridget's hand, to the wrong space.
Phin grinned a little bit as he watched. He looked at Jeth. "Wanna go play with mommy and Penny?" he arched his eyebrows up as he asked it. Jeth nodded and agreed that yes, he did so Phin set him down and Jeth went a running around the couch.
Bridget looked up and caught Jeth before he came barrelling into them. She sat him down on her leg and gave him his own piece to put down, which was the butt and tail of an elephant.
"I don't know if that fits there," she told Penny. Once Jeth had his piece, Bridget reached down and pushed Penny's piece to the side of the wooden indentation. "See? It doesn't fit on the sides. Try pushing it around to see how it can fit." She demonstrated and then let Penny do her thing.
Jeth was a little less elegant with his piece than Bridget and Penny were. He tried jamming it in a few spaces before it finally fit and then he let out a cheer and put his hands in the air before he started clapping.
Penny tilted her head as she looked at the piece and the space she picked. She frowned a moment and then tried a new place. That one worked and she grinned and picked up her cup for a drink. Phin just chuckled at the two different reactions. He stretched, cracked a few joints and went to sit on the end of the couch.
Bridget congratulated both of them with a round of high-fives and kisses before they moved onto to the next pieces, which again took some time to place. Finally there was only one empty slot left and one puzzle piece. Bridget leaned over and picked it up.
"Where does this one go?" she asked both kids.
Jeth pointed to the last open space enthusiastically, Penny did so a little lazily, and Jeth let out a, "There mama!" as well. Phin smiled, maybe a little sadly. He wanted to sit with them and hug them all and all that but he mostly stayed close but a little ways away when Bridget had the kids, so he didn't wind up creating an awkward situation. It sucked.
"That's right," Bridget nodded. She handed the piece to Penny to let her place it, as Jeth had been the alpha puzzle-piecer since he'd joined in. After turning the piece around a few times to get it to fit, Penny set it in the right spot. Bridget grinned and gave Penny a kiss, and then had to give Jeth one too to make sure he wasn't left out. "You guys did a great job!" she praised.
Phin smirked a bit. Penny was better at the running, jumping, coordinated sports type things and Jeth was better at the talking, singing, shouting and puzzle-completing things. It was kind of awesome how different they were sometimes. A lot of the time. Penny smiled at the kiss and after Bridget kissed Jeth, Penny did too. Phin just laughed a little. Too bad he didn't have a camera handy.
Bridget glanced back at Phin when she heard him, and smiled at him briefly before looking at the kids. "And now Mommy has to take a shower. So hang out with Daddy for a little bit until I come out, okay?"
Phin smiled a little when she looked back at him. He moved to the floor with a tiny grimace and then smiled at the kids and opened his arms. Penny stood up nd walked right over, Jeth crawled over to the map and flipped it over to get the pieces free. He turned the board back over and laidd down amongst the pieces to start assembling it again. Phin started talking to Penny about what she wanted to play with.
Bridget watched them for a minute before she got up and headed for the bathroom. She took a quick shower, thinking about the nice morning they were having and that she wasn't too eager to end it. She realized she didn't have to. She and Joan could go shopping later on in the week. The odds of the Pandas having another nice Sunday morning like this again soon were pretty low, and were even lower if she didn't stick around.
After drying off and tying the towel around herself, Bridget plugged in the hair dryer and looked into the mirror above the sink. After a few moments of thought, she unplugged the dryer once again and picked up an elastic to tie her hair back. She wrung what little bit of water she could out her ponytail and walked into the the bedroom. After making a short phone call, she put on some comfy loungy clothes and headed back out to the living room, confident that she'd made a good call. Patching up their family required sacrifices and effort on her part as well, after all.
"What are you guys up to now?" she asked as she walked around the couch.
Phin, Penny and Jeth had moved on to playing with some large blocks. There was giggling, and banging together of blocks and some expert construction going on. Jeth lifted a big yellow block into the air and waved it for her since he was the closest to her.
Phin arched his eyebrow when he saw her post-shower appearance. He blinked and then answered the obvisous. "We're playing with blocks." he nodded and handed a new one to Penny to add to her pile. She had to stand up to be tall enough to add it to her tower. "You're not in your normal shopping attire.." he added curiously. She hadn't even dried her hair after all.
Bridget smiled at Jeth and sat down on the floor next to him. After looking over the towers, she turned to Phin. "That's because I'm not going shopping anymore," she said.
Phin moved to his knees and was lifting Penny up a little so she could add another block without standing on her toes. His eyebrows arched higher as he set
Phin moved to his knees and was lifting Penny up a little so she could add another block without standing on her toes. His eyebrows arched higher as he set Penny downand she went to go get more blocks from one of the toy chests. Phin looked over at Bridget as he rested his hands down on his thighs as he waited for Penny's return. He smiled, a genuine smile at that, at what she said. "Really?" he couldn't fathom her passing up a shopping trip but he was excited, to a possibly dorky degree.
Bridget really couldn't help but grin at his reaction. It wasn't too often either of them had smiles like that directed toward each other and not the kids. "Yeah," she nodded. "I figured it was a nice day to stay home."
Phin was a little caught up in his shock, which may have been why he leaned over and kissed the side of her head before he could stop himself. He blinked and moved back a moment later before he cleared his throat. "That's awesome," he said before Penny reached him and dumped a bunch of her blocks in his lap for safe keeping.
Not expecting a kiss, Bridget stilled, but only for a moment until Phin sat back again. "It is," she agreed, giving him a look that was warmer than most she'd given him after they'd come in Phin-initiated physical contact lately.
When Penny dropped the blocks, Bridget looked down at them and chuckled.
Phin missed the contact in general. A lot. He was surprised that she hadn't just given him a dirty look for the kiss. He reached a hand out to Penny's back when she stood up on her toes to add another block, looking rather proud of herself. Jeth just liked banging the blocks together and making mutant crazy angled blobs of connected blocks.
"That's a nice tower you've got going there, Penny," Bridget said, leaning over to check out the tower from all angles. "You must be taking after daddy." Hopefully not to the point where the tower would collapse on her, of course.
Penny considered her tower for a momen, staring at it intensely with a rather proud look on her face. She grinned at the praise from her mom and then picked up a bright red block and brought it over to her so she could help with the construction.
Phin was quiet, mostly, just attempting to enjoy the moment before it wound up going sour, which tended to happen all the time with them. Jeth picked up his creation- a mound of block with what looked like five wobbly leg, or maybe a bright, neon multicolored sun with crazy waves protruding- and toddled over to Phin for inspection.
Phin widened his eyes as he took the creation from Jeth who had a big grin on his face. "This is the coolest..." whatever it was! "thing I've ever seen Jeth! Good job!" he held a hand up to get a high five from Jeth before he handed the blob of blocks back.
Jeth took the mound back, still grinning, lifted it over his head and sent it clattering to the ground. It broke into tons of blocks as Jeth let out a very loud, "KABOOOOOOM!" declartion. This shout startled Penny and caused to spin around, elbowing her tower in the process and knockingit over. The blocks shattered apart as it landed.
Bridget cringed at the sudden noise and held out her arms to pull Penny away from her falling tower.
"Jeth! We do not throw blocks!" she chastised as she held Penny close, hoping to keeping her from crying before she might get a chance to start.
Penny's chin quivered as she looked at the rubble and her eyes filled as she pointed at it and then looked up Bridget as she let out a pathetic, choppy, sad, "Mama..." And thats about when the tears started down her cheeks.
Jeth frowned at the scolding. "It go boom," he hand mimed an explosion, lookin between Bridget and Phin with a confused expression on his face.
Phin frowned at Penny's reaction, but also at Jeth's terrorist block bombing. "Hey," He reached out and cleared a pathway in the blocks. "That wasn't very nice Jeth." he scolded. Jeth hung his head - he got scolded twice. Phin nodded and pointed to Bridget and Penny. "You go apologize now for hurting Penny's feelings." he instructed.
Jeth turned around, looking rather timid now that he'd done something wrong. He trotted over toward Penny and his mom after Phin gave his back a little pat to get him going.
"Sssh, ssh, it's okay," Bridget assured Penny as she rocked back and forth with her and moved her hand up and down her back. "You're such a good builder that you'll get another tower up in no time."
She looked up when Jeth came over and loosened her grip on Penny so the kids could look at each other.
Penny stayed huddled against Bridget but peeked around at Jeth when she loosened her grip.
Jeth picked up a discarded block from the rubble and held it out. "I sorry, Penny." his R's still needed work and he tended to mix up M's for N's but it was a pretty clear apology.
Penny let out a big sniffle and buried her face back into the crook of Bridget's neck. Jeth frowned and gave his mom a confused looked. Now what?
Bridget took the block and wrapped her arm back around Penny. "You're going to have to give her a few minutes," Bridget explained to Jeth as she swayed with Penny. "She still all worked up, but she'll forgive you," she assured with a quick glance in Phin's direction.
Yeah there was a Panda metaphor in all of this and Phin was frowning. It was kind of gut-wrenching when the kids cried. He would have thought that stuff like that would phase him less by now but it didn't.
Jeth frowned and knelt down in the blocks. He picked out all the blocks he could that were orange since Penny liked those ones the best and started building the base of a tower for her since hers got exploded thanks to his ninja block bomb.
Bridget watched him work with a faint smile on her face. Once the base was really built up and Penny's crying had calmed down a little, Bridget turned her toward the beginnings of the tower. "Hey, look what Jeth's doing for you. He's helping you build the tower again. Isn't that nice of him?" she asked, rubbing Penny's back with her hand.
Penny was quiet for a while, leaning back against her mom and watching Jeth warily. Eventually she slipped down out of Bridget's embrace and headed over to Jeth to help with the building. Phin smiled a little. Why couldn't his and Bridget's issues be work out so damn easily?
Bridget smiled as she watched the two of them working together. As Jeth handed Penny another orange block, Bridget reached her hand over to Phin's without turning to look at him.
Phin's eyes landed down on his hand when Bridget put her hand on his. He curled his thumb around the tips of her fingers and smiled just a little, barely managing to resist the urge to lean over and just kiss her. He knew he was supposed to wait for her to initiate all kinds of contact but it had been a long time and he missed actually being touched by the only one o his immediate family members above the age of two. Hugs too. He missed those a lot and they hadn't even happened that often before this whole mess so, yeah. He was hopeful, with the hand touching and the looks she'd been giving him lately but he was still cautious and guarded. Any day she could yank the rug out from under him, tell him she wanted a divorce and send him packing after all.
Bridget laced her fingers lightly between his as she continued watching the kids. She missed contact and closeness too. It may have seemed like it was easy, but being cold so much of the time was incredibly exhausting. Bridget felt like she'd been tense for months. She couldn't help it, really. She tightened her fingers around Phin's hand and let out a short laugh when she saw Penny help Jeth arrange his blocks a little better when they were in danger of tipping over.
Phin smiled at the kids but he turned his attention to Bridget when she laughed. He got a little caught up, first with with curling his fingers around hers when she went and laced hers in his, then with just studying her face for a little while. He was more than a little grateful that he'd regained his sight. He would've missed her eyes a lot, even when she was giving him those horrible looks that made his insides twist all up. He decided to take a chance since she'd put her hand on his first and laced her fingers up with his first. He lifted her hand and kissed the back of it for a moment before he set their hands down against his leg again and then turned his attention to the kids again as Jeth started working on a new building to accent the first building, but only under Penny's instructions, so it wouldn't fall of course.
Bridget finally turned to look at Phin when she felt him kiss her hand. She kept her eyes on him for a few moments after he turned back to the kids before she followed suit. She gave Phin's hand a small squeeze as she watched the kids work together.
"She could be an architect," He mused with a tiny smirk. "Supposing your brother doesn't set her down a baseball-playing path," His smile was a little sad that. Even if Bridget forgave him, her family was never going to. At least he was confident that that wouldn't trickle down to affecting the twins. Or he hoped it wouldn't anyway.
Phin was surprised, all around, at the entire day thus far. Breakfast was good. Bridget gave up a shopping a trip - a shopping trip! - to spend the day. They'd successfully navigated a toddler terrorist block bombing. Not only had Bridget initiated some hand holding, but she hadn't protested or pulled her hand away after he'd kissed her hand. This was the best day in...a really long time. Truly. He broke the silence first, quietly so he didn't break the kids' concentration, leaning over some as well to keep his voice low enough. "What do you want to do for the rest of the day?" Seeing as it was rainy out and all so that negated a possible park outing, at the moment anyway.
Bridget turned back to Phin. "Just hanging out here sounds good," she said. They could make up for that Sunday they didn't get to spend together a few months back. "There's enough stuff in the fridge that I don't have to go out to the grocery store or anything."
Phin smiled a little more at that. He looked over at Bridget and grinned a little more as he gave her a grateful little look. "Okay," he nodded, glanced at the kids and moment and then looked back over at her. "Thank you," He added. "For staying home with us." He said to clarify.
Bridget shrugged her shoulders up and gave Phin's hand another light squeeze. "It's not often we get to do this," she said before she turned back to the kids.
Phin nodded his head in agreement. "Yeah," He looked at the kids again and couldn't help smiling a little more, and squeezing her hand lightly as well. So today was going to be good. Phin looked pretty hopeful. He didn't want to sit around being cautious all the time but at least today was going to be good and that was something. It was definitely something he was focusing on. He let out a little sigh as he watched the kids.
Things continued going pretty smoothly into the afternoon, which was when the kids started getting pretty tuckered out thanks to all the playtime. Once the kids fell asleep, Bridget and Phin each took one kid and put them down in their respective bedrooms. Bridget had Penny, and before she headed back out into the hallway, she took a deep breath to prepare herself. Now that the kids weren't there to play the middle boy or girl, the real challenge was about to start.
Bridget closed the door most of the way behind her and leaned against the wall across from the kids' bedrooms. No more avoiding. Bridget had been doing it less and less lately, but it was still a little awkward. And stupid.
When Phin was finished tucking Jeth in for his nap, he headed for the living room. He detoured to the kitchen though, to get himself a drink and to take some aspirin because his back was bothering him after all that play time and all. He reached up to the cabinet over top of the sink - the furthest out of reach of the kids and sometimes Bridget - to get the medicine and then put it back in its place. He grabbed his orange juice glass and used it to wash the pill down before he started for the living room. He did wonder how the next couple of hours were going to play out until it was time to start making dinner and wake the kids back up and all. He put his drink on a coaster on the end table and sat on the couch and put his head back, not bothering to put the TV on since he was waiting for Bridget.
It took Bridget a minute to realize that Phin was already out of the bedroom and she didn't have to wait in the hall. Blinking, she pushed herself off the wall and walked into the living room.
"Hey," she said quietly as she walked around the couch.
Phin opened his eyes and lifted his head, sitting up straighter to get his feet out of the way so she could pass them. "Hey," He echoed, unsure of whether or not he should try and start a conversation of if she wanted to do the awkward thing as per usual. "They're totally out cold." Not that he could blame them, he felt like taking a nap too after all that play time, sheesh.
"I think we more than exhausted them," Bridget nodded as she sat down next to Phin, pretty close, too. "They haven't had a full morning like that in a while. They should be out for a few hours."
Phin smiled, he looked over when he felt how close she sat down to him. He hazarded lifting his arms up to rest them along the back of the couch on either side of him, so it wasn't around her shoulders but it was close to a gesture of the sort. It was a bold move considering he was usually pretty cautious about that stuff anymore. He smirked a tiny bit. "I'm sure if we passed out right now we would be too." Not that he could, with her all close like that, or closer than she'd been in a long time, except for that short period right after the accident anyway.
"Probably," she nodded. She opened her mouth to continue, but paused as he moved his arms. Once she realized he had them up on the back of the couch, she went on, "I'm not too tired, though."
Phin noted the pause and waited moment before he moved to fold his hands behind his head so there was no chance of him putting one around her. It was a step back but whatever. He didn't want to make her too uncomfortable and then ruin the rest of the day. "Me either," He shook his head and looked over at her. "What should we do with our relative freedom?" He arched an eyebrow.
Bridget turned and looked at him. She glanced back at his arms before bringing her eyes back to his face. "I don't know," she said, which was a lie. She'd been thinking about kissing Phin for a few hours now, but had yet to do anything about it. She still worried that she would be letting off the hook too easily, even though there had been nothing easy about Phin's life since Bridget found out about what he did. "Do you have anything in mind?"
Today had been pretty easy to be honest. Almost every day before today hadn't been very easy at all. Plus there was that whole business about recovering. He was still going to physical therapy twice a week too. That was certainly fun...if you liked pain. But he was still here and even without any of it being easy at all. That said something didn't it? A little something a the very least. He gave up on the hands behind his head thing since that wasn't really fooling anybody and let his hands rest in his lap. he fidgeted with his hands and looked down at them, shrugging a little. He could think of a few things on the short list of what he would like to do but all of them were things he was positive at this point Bridget either didn't want to do or wasn't ready to do or a combination of both. That fact still made him both sad and also angry at himself. He really did wish he'd stayed home instead of going to Carter's stupid ass bachelor party. He would honestly pick a night home with colicky twins and his wife all pissed off at him than go...anywhere with pretty much anyone really. Why he couldn't have figured that out before he'd gotten so wasted and done stupid shit was anyone's guess.
"I don't know," he glanced over at her. "Been a long time since we've done anything on our own." Except drive to the shrink's office, or simple, awkward, quiet times like that. Not that it was a bad thing or anything. They just hadn't and he was sure that was because of the awkward stuff but he figured that was to be expected. So now they were kind of stuck twiddling their thumbs he supposed.
"Yeah," Bridget nodded. She reached over to pull one of his hands out of his lap. "That's probably not helping us much," she continued as she laced her fingers in his, just like earlier. "Thanks for making breakfast this morning. And helping out. Other times."
Phin looked at his hand again when she grabbed it like before. He nodded to all of her comments as he curled his fingers around hers. "You're welcome," He said with a shrug. "Really." He said. He watched her for a moment and then let his eyes rest back down on their hands. Was it okay to be hopeful about this or was he just stupid if he was hopeful about it? He wasn't sure, which was why he wasn't sure what he should say to her.
Bridget pulled her legs up on the couch and turned to face him a little more. She leaned her shoulder against the back cushion and took a slow breath, wondering what to say. "Phin..." she began after a few moments.
Phin looked over at her, and looked over the way she was sitting. He turned his body a little towards hers but not too much since he didn't want to go sending her signals that would set her off or anything. He wasn't sure he liked the way she said his name, or what she was going to possibly say afterward. "Yeah...?" He might've sounded a little worried too. He couldn't help it.
Bridget frowned a little. She really hated the fact they were to the point where she was always aloof and he was always skittish. She scanned his face for a few moments and decided she ought to just go for it, since she was now the one with the power to make things better. So she leaned in quickly and kissed him, squeezing his hand for a second before she let go to lift it to the side of his face. She could probably count on one hand the amount of times she'd done that since the accident. Or since she'd found out about the bachelor party, actually.
Phin had about enough time for his eyes to widen a little before she was kissing him. Holy shit! She was actually kissing him and it wasn't because she thought he was dying, blind for life or possibly crippled forever. He was more than a little caught off guard so it did take him a couple extra seconds before he could properly kiss her back. He was too afraid to move his hands anywhere though, at least at first. After another second or two he lifted his hand up into her hair since it was sort of a reflex, albeit a reflex he hadn't used in a long time. His pulse was kind of racing too and somewhere in the back recesses of his still partially functioning brain he was sure it was going to suck when she realized she didn't want to do this anymore but right now he was ignoring that. He hadn't been able to kiss her in a long time so he was going to attempt to keep this going as long as she'd let him.
Bridget didn't make any move to stop. In fact, the only moves she made were to keep going, as she kissed him a number of times more and lifted herself up off the couch so she could lean in farther. She hadn't realized how much she'd missed doing this until just then, so she wasn't planning on stopping anytime soon. She wasn't even thinking about the cheating at the moment, something that she'd been unable to do whenever she got close to him in the past.
Phin was curious about that actually, whether or not she was thinking about the cheating. He didn't have much time to think about it really though, because he was a little too elated that she had actually not only initiated a round of kissing but kept it going. His free hand moved to her side for lack of anything better to do and so he could lean over closer to her too. He really, really, hoped the kids stayed asleep for a couple of hours and didn't just get restless and wake up. They were going to need air soon. The inevitable always sucked. Right now was awesome though.
Bridget involuntarily broke apart from Phin to catch her breath. She kept her forehead against his so she wasn't too far away and moved her hand back to run through his hair, taking some deep breaths because she didn't want this little break to last very long.
Phin took a few good deep breaths as well. He stared at her, eyes still a little bit wide with shock, as he tried to catch breath quickly. "Bridge..." He said, breathlessly of course. He decided not to say anything else though. He just moved his hand to the side of her face and smiled a little. He moved forward some but then stopped himself from initiating another round of kissing and settled on bumping his nose a time or two with hers. He wasn't really supposed to the initiating and all that.
Bridget leaned in when he did, and blinked when he stopped and went for the nose bump instead. She realized why he had held back and after the second bump, pulled him closer by the back of his head and went back in the for the kissing.
Phin hadn't felt this relieved since...well no, he actually felt more relieved now than he had that day when he opened his eyes and the damn bedroom lights burned they were so damn bright. He moved his hand back into her hair as he returned her kisses and he moved his other arm around her further so he could maybe hazard pulling her a little closer.
Bridget was close enough that she lifted her leg to straddle his lap without really thinking about it. She didn't really have a problem being there once she moved to that position, though, and she'd been doing way too much thinking lately. So this was good. She wondered for a moment what their next therapy session was going to be like, and then moved on to more important business as she moved her free hand down Phin's arm.
Phin tensed for just a moment, expecting their little make out session to stop as soon as she realized she was in his lap. He relaxed, mostly, when he realized she wasn't going to and instead moved his hands down to her waist, where they usually resided in moments like these. He sat up to get a little closer to her now that she was in her lap and all. Therapy sessions were the furthest thing from his mind right now, honestly.
"Kids better...stay asleep," Bridget mumbled in between kisses after their makeout had progressed to the point where her hands where under Phin's shirt. She grabbed the bottom of it and started tugging it up, fully aware of what she was doing this time.
"Don't...jinx." Phin murmured breathlessly between kisses. Kids? Asleep? Right, yes. He was focused mostly on the hands under his shirt and, more importantly, the fact that she was trying to get his shirt off. He was more than happy to help her out with that, even though it caused a break in the kissing. He leaned forward again and took a break so they could both catch up on breathing again, and started dotting her collarbone, neck and jaw with kisses. He'd ventured to move his hands up under her shirt but he wasn't brave enough to go trying to tug her shirt off.
Bridget helped him out by doing it herself, though she was loath to put a temporary stop to the collarbone kisses. She dropped the shirt next to them on the couch and moved her arm around his neck to kiss him again. And a few more times, as she totally forgot about the collarbone stuff. It was easy to be distracted right now, especially since it had been a long time since the two of them had some shirtless moments together.
Phin was definitely distracted by this fact, and also more than a little excited, the obvious kind of excited. Shirtless moments meant he sent his hands freely roaming, mostly across areas he knew always got to her. Once the kissing needed to be broken up again for stupid necessary breathing, he just filled the void with random kiss trail again. He was pretty sure that he was never so glad she'd canceled a shopping trip than he was right now. He'd tried to keep himself from getting too hopeful, but it was a little difficult to turn that off when they were only a few pieces of clothing away from being completely naked and were heavily making out.
Stopping now would have been just about as torturous for him as it would have been for her, so barring unforseen, most likely kid-related circumstances, Bridget wasn't planning on stopping any of this anytime soon. Which was why things progressed from mostly-naked to totally-naked and went on from there. All with out kid-ly interruption! Today was a magic Sunday.
At least the couch provided adequate support for such activities. Eventually, once he'd caught his breath enough and come back to some possible form of proper sense, Phin moved so they could just rest on their sides. He grabbed the blanket from the back of the couch and settled it around them, in case any kid interruptions happened from here on out. And then he finally settled into wrapping his arms around her and pulling her closer. He wasn't quite ready o give up the random kisses yet though so he worked on some of those, back along her collarbones, and the crook of her neck and what not, dragging his nose there every now and then too. He wasn't sure exactly what this meant for them, but he was a total chicken about asking things like that lately, so he didn't and just focused on the other stuff at the moment while they finished catching their breath and cooling off.
Now that she could think, Bridget didn't know what exactly to think of all this. She certainly didn't wake up this morning planning on this happening, nor was it her goal when she cancelled her shopping trip. This outcome wasn't necessarily a bad thing. She certainly felt much more relaxed (though as the minutes ticked by now that it was over, her anxiety over it all was starting growing a bit) and you know, kind of happy. Phin probably was too, so that was good. So what was wrong with that?
Bridget tangled her legs in with Phin's and turned onto her back a bit as he went all travelling with his kiss trails. She ran her fingers in a trail of their own along his arm to his shoulder and then down his side. This was so much nicer than staying all cold and distant. That had been getting harder and harder to do lately. She had her eyes closed for a bit, but eventually she opened them to try and look at Phin.
Phin lifted his head to kiss her properly a couple of times, an act he considered bold for him considering how skittish he'd been lately about pissing her off by even brushing against her. He moved to kiss he templed before he leaned up so he could look at her after a quick glance down the hall. "I can't believe they're still out..." He was totally possibly jinxing it but c'mon! Both of their parents were home and they were excitable toddlers. It was amazing they hadn't woken up and interrupted. The corners of his lips turned up a little as he turned his eyes back to Bridget.
"Weren't you the one who told me not to jinx it?" Bridget asked with a small smile of her own. She turned back onto her side and slid her hand around his back. "They're doing us a favor. We should thank them later." She leaned forward to kiss Phin's shoulder.
Phin hadn't felt very content in a long time, and even now he wondered if he should be letting himself feel as relaxed at he currently felt. He closed his eyes and let out a small, quiet, sigh as she kissed his shoulder. He moved to lean his head down next to hers. "We should," He agreed. He hesitated a moment and added, "We should designate every Sunday," He decided. "For us, family stuff I mean." Not necessarily the act of tiring out the kids so they could screw around, literally, in the apartment, although he would have no problem with that, no sir. He was in the office most of the time anyway so his weekends were much freer. "Maybe we can get a standing babysitting schedule with Billie." He went on. "We can spend the day with them and then have her come over so we can go out to dinner - to, fancier places I mean. Like you wanted to," Before all this shit happened and he'd ruined most of her memories or them. And, okay, maybe he was getting ahead of himself but planning out family days and possible dates was a start for them in some way, right? "...If you want, I mean."
Bridget fixed him with a sad smile. She remembered making the date suggestion on their trip to New York, one of the last nice times they'd had before Bridget found out Phin's lie. The trip was definitely ruined in her mind after that, which was shitty because it had been really nice at the time. "Maybe," she nodded. "At least the Sunday family time we could do." Scheduled date nights were more complicated in a variety of ways.
Phin nodded, managing to force himself not to frown at that sad smile. He nodded quickly and switched gears since he didn't want to ruin whatever today had started for them. "Okay," He nodded again, maybe a little too eager. He couldn't help it. At least the Sunday family time was something and it was something to be hopeful and positive about when so much with them was so negative and conflict oriented lately. He smiled and kissed her forehead before lingering there a moment. "Sundays it is," He nodded, a little awkwardly with the forehead stuff.
"That'll be nice," Bridget nodded. She pulled her head back so she could look Phin in the eyes. After a moment, a smile tugged at her mouth just a little bit. "This is nice, too," she added quietly.
Phin watched her, maybe a little nervously, until she smiled and spoke. He exhaled a little more than usual, and grinned. "Yeah it is," he agreed as he lifted a hand free of the blankets so he could run it through her hair and down to trace along the back part of her jaw. It was nice and he'd missed it a lot. He wondered if this was a one time thing, or if she'd change her mind tomorrow, or the next time they had to go to the shrink's office.
Her smile turned into a smirk after he grinned. She leaned in and kissed him a couple of times. She lingered there for a moment with her eyes closed after the second kiss, and then laid her head back down with a sigh.
Phin was still pretty eager to return all of those kisses. He tangled up their legs a little more even though he thought he shouldn't since no doubt the kids were going to wake up soon, or eventually. He rested his head down and moved the blanket to cover them better and smiled a little more. He let out his own sigh and closed his eyes. "I think we deserve a nap too..." He murmured quietly.
"I agree," Bridget nodded. She pulled her arm out of the blanket so she could brush her fingers through his hair. She missed having moments like this with him. It was awful that he'd taken them away from both of them.
Yeah it was, but...they were going to get them back. Or they were working on getting them back right? He closed his eyes when she moved her hand through his hair and he moved to run his around her side and then along her back. "How long you think we can get away with it before they wake up?" He smiled a little and then opened his eyes before he moved to bump his nose with hers.
"I don't know, but we shouldn't worry about it. Just enjoy it while it lasts." She stilled her hand above his ear and just moved her thumb back and forth instead. After bumping his nose back, she leaned back in to kiss him again.
Phin returned the kiss and smile. "You're the brains of the operation." Truer words were never spoken and all that. He kissed her again and let the hand that was moving around her back come to rest at the small of her back. He wanted to tell her that he loved her but he stopped and just decided to enjoy the moment, in case telling her ruined it, which was a fucked up thing to think but he was still skittish. So he leaned in to kiss her a couple more times instead.
Bridget didn't have any problem kissing him back, and the two of them got so wrapped up in it that they didn't hear the sounds of one of the kids plodding along toward the couch until it was pretty much too late. Good thing they had the blanket. Bridget broke their kissing abruptly to turn her head and see who it was.
Phin lifted his head to look past Bridget to see who the interrupter was and it turned out to be Penny. She looked much like Jeth when he woke up in the morning - pouty, grumpy and on the verge of crying. "Uh oh...I know that look..." He scrunched up his face a little. "You have a bad dream, sweetpea?" he leaned over Bridget and found his t-shirt so he could hand it to Bridget as Penny started climbing up onto the couch and right on top of both of them. Phin pulled her in close against his chest with one arm and used the other one to leaned up on his elbow so they could give Bridget room to to put her shirt on. He kissed Penny's forehead as she rubbed her eyes blearly and started babbling about her bad dream in a sad little distressed tone. "Shhhh...it's okay. You're okay now, it was just a dream..." Phin said in the tone he always used when he was trying to calm one of them down. He kissed the side of her head another time or two and moved his hand along her back.
Bridget took the shirt and pulled it over her head quickly before she moved to sit up a little. She watched Phin and Penny as she reached over for her underwear and tugged that on as well. She lifted her arm out from under the blanket and moved in close to them so she could cuddle in and stroke Penny's hair. She murmured some reassurances and glanced at Phin.
Phin leaned back down to bring them closer to the couch and Bridget once she was done with the shirt and her underwear. He smiled a little as Pennt snuggled in between them and kissed the side of her head again and looked at Bridget before quietly saying. "Seals with clown noses again." He shook his head. Penny wedged herself in between them and rolled over so she could burrow herself into the crook of Bridget's neck.
"Again?" Bridget turned her head to try and look at Penny, but it was hard to see her from her snuggled in spot. Bridget moved her hand up and down Penny's arm instead and said, "Don't worry...they're all gone now. We'll take care of you." It was nice to be parents again instead of just parent and parent.
Yeah it definitely was nice. "Again," Phin replied with a nod. He leaned over and kiss the back of Penny's head. He was about to try leaning around to find his own underwear when Jeth's head appeared around the edge of the sofa. He was rubbing his eyes and looking grumpy, as usual when he woke up. "Looks like its a full Panda party," He said as Jeth stumbled closer. "You want to come lay down too?" He asked as he reached out to run his hand through Jeth's hair and get it out of his face.
Bridget lifted her head up and spotted Jeth. "We really lucked out with our timing," she said quietly to Phin.
"Did you have a nightmare too or are you just upset that you're not asleep anymore?" Bridget asked Jeth with a slight smirk. She dropped her head back down and moved her arm more around Penny.
Phin gave her a little half smirk and stifled a chuckle as he nodded in agreement. Jeth was definitely the latter of that question. He was a total grump when waking up. He started climbing up onto the couch and Phin reached out to help him so he didn't fall. "We need to invest in a wide couch." Phin smirked as Jeth climbed in and settled in with Phin since Penny was hogging Bridget. "Do you want to go back to sleep?" He asked Jeth. Jeth just let out one of those discontent sounds and dropped his head into Phin's collarbone. Phin scrunched up his face because the dude had a hard head, and moved his arm around him. "Guess that's a yes..."
Bridget let out a quiet snort of laughter at Jeth's flopping. "Or we could just move to the bed." That would require getting up though, and she was still pretty tired out from earlier activities.
Phin rested his chin down against the top of Jeth's head and rocked a little bit as he ran his hand along Jeth's back. He smiled a little bit over at Bridget and shrugged up a shoulder. "We could," He reasoned. "Or we could just hang here awhile." He said. "I'm okay with whichever." Except he totally needed to put some form of underwear or pants on first. He was kind of pinned though with all of them on the couch and the blanket and all.
Bridget was well aware he was still naked under that blanket, and she found it pretty amusing. "I feel lazy. Let's stay here until someone falls off the couch. Then we'll know it's time to move." She smiled at Phin as she ran her fingers through Penny's hair.
Phin nodded. "That sounds like a good plan to me." He decided. And yeah, sure, him still being naked under that blanket was plenty amusing, until Jeth started trying to kick it away. "Ohhhh, no you don't, dude. No kicking on a couchful of Pandas." He reached out to still Jeth's legs. Jeth frowned at him and gave his collarbone another headbutt, this one purposeful though. "That's not very nice," He said to Jeth as he moved the blanket as far away from Jeth as he could without moving it any further than his waist.
Bridget snickered a little bit, which she tried to stifle so she wouldn't disturb Penny and encourage Jeth. "Hey, we don't headbutt," she warned, unable to sound as stern as she wanted to be.
She looked at Phin and added quietly with a smirk, "I think I might have tossed them behind the couch." She added an innocent, "Whoops."
Phin dropped his jaw in exaggerated shock as he shook his head at her. "Well, I guess that just means you're gonna have to toss them back over the couch when its time to get up." He smirked at her as Jeth settled down by wrapping himself in as much of the blanket as it could, what with Phin holding the bottom of it in place at his hip.
"I guess so," Bridget shrugged with a smirk, looking down at where Phin was holding onto the blanket. "It was in the heat of the moment. You can hardly blame me."
Phin chuckled. "That's right, I've only got myself to blame," He grinned. He leaned over the kids so he could kiss her. "That and your well honed throwing arm." He grinned as he sat back. Jeth was still struggling around to get comfy. He stared pushing away from Phin, which made his back bump up against Penny's.
"Nooo, Jeth!" Penny whined out tiredly when it woke her up. She started pushing back from Bridget to regain some space on the couch and a shoving match ensued.
"Hey, no, we don't have room to keep shoving," Phin reluctantly let go of the blanket so he could pulled Jeth back in. "We're sharing the couch. You want to share the couch with mommy and Penny don't you?" He asked.
"Just because you're cranky doesn't mean everyone else has to be," Bridget informed Jeth as she moved further against the couch cushions. She pulled Penny over to give her a little more breathing room and shushed her quietly as she tried to get her backt to sleep.
Jeth continued to struggle around. Phin frowned. "Hey...if you don't want to stay here, we can bring you back to your room by yourself..." He warned, well aware that Jeth didn't want to miss anything with all of them out here and him back in his room.
"Daddy, noooooooo!" Jeth whined, moving closer to him and latching on so Phin couldn't make him leave.
"Okay, okay." Phin reached down to fix the blanket and then moved his hand along Jeth's back. "Let's settle down then, okay?" He asked and Jeth nodded this time as Penny settled in again against Bridget.
Bridget waited a few moments, and then when there was no more shoving or movement, she let out a little sigh. The arm she had trapped under her and Penny was going numb, so she tried to wiggle her fingers a bit in an attempt to stimulate blood flow. She ended up poking Phin in the temple with her nail. "Sorry," she said with a small half-smile.
Phin scrunched his eyes up but managed not to make any jerky movements that would wake either of the kids. "S'okay," He smirked his own pinned arm had gone numb awhile ago, but he didn't think there was much he was going to be able to do about it.
Bridget smiled a little more and stretched out her fingers so she could move the backs of them lightly over the same spot she poked. It was pretty much all she could do from this position.
Phin smiled a little. He turned his head as much as he could to kiss the closest part of her hand a couple of times. He hadn't felt very content at all in a long time and he'd been more than skittish and on edge lately. It was nice to finally get at least a little break and relax a little...even if conditions were a little cramped at the moment.