Chapter 108

July 24th, 2024

"Do you want to know why I came?" Charlie's voice echoed in Finn's head, being in a half-sleep like state, laying next to G who was napping, just like she'd napped with him after his accident. He'd just been getting to know Charlie, and she'd been about to explain her reasons for coming to Australia.

"Honestly - I've been very curious about that the entire time I've known you," Finn recalled himself replying to her question.

"Like I said my career was just like taking off on it's own - everything was going like it was 'supposed to'," Charlie had explained. "I had a fiance, Greg, we'd been together since graduate school, we were talking wedding decor and buying a house…, you know the typical suburban, two point five kids and a dog kind of life…," she'd shared, making it pretty clear already that something had caused that plan to divert.

"So you crashed and burned," Finn finished her thought, seeing her struggle with the rest.

"Kind of…," she replied. "I know this is kind of personal, but I just want to put this out there. This is also something I am trying to do - I'm trying to speak about this without the dread that I used to. Because it's a part of who I am now," she had continued, and then had taken a deep thoughtful breath.

"I found out I can't have kids," Charlie had confessed, Finn recalling her words like it had been yesterday. "And Greg just couldn't handle it. It wasn't the plan... So within a week and a half we were broken up. I was a sobbing mess and a couple of months later here I was," she'd continued, summing up the last part rather quickly as if hurrying up made it easier for her somehow.

"Sorry," had been the only thing Finn had managed to say to that. He could see the pain in her eyes and tone, but he himself had actually been relieved and felt guilty for feeling that right after thinking it.

"It's fine - I mean it's not fine - it's unfair to be taken that kind of major choice away from you like that. But by now this is just something I've accepted and Greg was a jerk for when and how he split but I guess it's better I found that out when I did not some years along the way," Charlie had explained.

That discussion had been followed by him admitting to her the unethical feelings he'd had for the young G and why he'd taken himself out of the picture back then. Charlie had been one of the few people in his life with whom he hadn't needed to hold back and opened himself up like that, perhaps it had just been the desperate need to feel close to someone, in a similar way he'd felt around the 16-year-old G, why he had done it.

"Finn?" Finn recalled Charlie's voice asking him that same night, laying there under the stars on his father's catamaran somewhere on the Moreton bay.

"Yeah?" Finn had replied.

"You okay?" Charlie had asked, sensing Finn wasn't quite through processing their earlier conversation.

That simple question had touched him. She'd really seemed to care - even already then only barely knowing each other, even if just a little. They hadn't known each other for long at that point.

He'd looked over to her, mouthing a weak "yeah".

"Do you think it makes me less of a woman?" Charlie had then asked, looking up to the sky, avoiding eye contact, truly catching Finn by surprise. He really hadn't expected her to ask something like that from him.

"Not one bit," he'd replied.

"Penny for your thoughts?" G asked, having observed Finn stare at the ceiling for a few minutes, having woken up from her nap.

Finn snapped out of his memories, and turned to face her, brushing a stray hair behind her ear, thinking where to start. She was still running a small fever. They hadn't had much chance to talk yesterday, G not feeling really up to it, and they hadn't had too much one-on-one time when she had.

"I'm worried about you. And I am blaming myself…," Finn admitted.

Finn could tell G was just about to object, but he didn't let her get a word in at that point.

"I think it's a real possibility that you having this… this PID, it could be my fault. It was what Charlie had, it was why she couldn't have kids... and I know it was years ago, but I read that it's essentially a bacterial infection and I think I might have given it to you… I'm so sorry. God, I just hope they caught it early," Finn explained, with a deep sigh. He didn't want that possibility taken away from her, not this early in life, even despite everything he knew of her.

"I'm sure it's not," G began, not wanting to believe that. She hadn't read up on it much yet, even if she recalled hearing something about it from one of her college courses. She knew it could be serious, but she wasn't that worried about potential developments at this point.

"You don't know that…," Finn shook his head. "I'm getting checked tomorrow just the same, I'm just so sorry…," Finn said, having already made the arrangements. In the light of this new information the other topics of the past few days had been pushed to the back of his mind.

"Hey," G said, holding his chin in her warm palm. "You didn't know it, you didn't do it on purpose if you did. I'm getting help, and it's now out of our control... It's almost like if there is anyone this could happen to...maybe it's good it's me not someone like Rory or Celeste, someone for whom it could be something tragic," G replied, realizing Finn was worried about the disease leaving a permanent long term effect.

She hadn't expected that, it was not like she knew Finn ever would've wanted that scenario, which the doctors had almost been for a moment concerned about, but she could understand him thinking of the long term, maybe even thinking that she was too young to be sure that she would never want kids. G wasn't going to argue with that, she knew the statistics well enough and she also knew that in these discussions which she'd had both with her mother, her therapist and a few of her college friends, there wasn't really much point as nobody really knew how they were going to feel once certain hormone levels took over the logic in their early thirties. Thinking clear-headedly she believed she could live without kids and be happy, but just like anyone, she didn't want to live alone, feel alone - and she had indeed wondered whether there'd be ever a guy in her life she'd be willing to make that compromise for if it came to disagreeing on that topic. Being with Finn, who didn't crave having kids, was a relief in that sense, it meant that she might never really have to consider that compromise.

"You might feel like that now…," Finn said, sensing her thought process anyways.

"I know.., and that's what I am saying now," G replied, making it clear that from her side the news that she wasn't pregnant had been a true relief.

"It's been a crazy few days… are you doing okay otherwise?" Finn asked, accepting what she was saying. He felt like a betrayer though, having for a split second considered their joint baby to be not the worst thing in the world, but he did know that rethinking everything he'd believed for several decades was probably just the result of an emotional couple of days, not really something he believed in deeply.

"You mean the…?" G hesitated, wondering which part of the past two days he was asking about.

"Any of it," Finn said, not wanting to think the three-some was his main concern. To him it really wasn't.

"With my dad, things are how they are," G shrugged. "Rory wants us to call him, ask our questions… hear him out," she added, having spoken to Rory on their way back from the hospital a bit.

"You don't want to, I can tell," Finn read her, and stroked her hand.

"Not really. I think the dad Rory has seen, even if he wasn't around when she was little much… she still got the best part of him... I think he secretly blamed me for a lot of things he never really admitted - for him and Lorelai not working out, for my mom leaving..." G explained, and Finn could tell G was deeply hurt by Christopher, not just the letter.

Finn wanted to argue, but he didn't know what was going on in Christopher's head. He knew that what G needed right now was not him just assuring that he didn't think so without any real facts. Finn didn't know Christopher well enough.

"I might just tell Rory to call, to get what she feels she needs to do over with. I don't want to really deal with him, I don't want to tell him about this either..," G said, referring to her illness.

"You should do what you feel is right," Finn assured, adding, "but just know that I think it's wrong of him to make you feel like this."

G appreciated his words, letting silence linger for a minute.

"And the rest…," G began, with a hint of a smile. "I quite liked that, actually," she added, looking down and then back up at him, making it clear to Finn that this really wasn't something he needed to worry about.

Her behavior might have been a little reckless, with the drinking and getting a little carried away this quickly, but she didn't regret it. She loved discovering news sides of Finn, and this was certainly one of them. He'd looked hot in her eyes, kissing another guy or touching him. She'd physically felt great, oblivious of her other condition. It hadn't raised concerns for her, after all he was there laying by her side just like she had a week ago, taking care of her not some random guy whom they'd both found attractive. She liked to think they were stronger than that, not to let something like that, some harmless fun, shake them, even if they were new in this.