Finnick’s face was stained with soot from the smoke and only his eyes were visible while his hair looked like a bird’s nest.
Knitting her eyebrows together, Vivian took the pieces of wood from him.
“Let me try,” she said lightly. She wasn’t sure how to react or treat Finnick when he looked this strange.
Staring at her, he handed the wood to her and stood over her to see what she was going to do.
He didn’t know how, but Vivian quickly started a fire without much difficulty.
This made Finnick feel somewhat inferior. He was a grown man, yet he was beaten by a woman at a simple survival skill.
But the truth was that Vivian was simply better at him at this sort of thing. And when he remembered that technically, he had only been beaten by his wife, he didn’t feel too bad anymore.
Vivian started to busy herself in the kitchen, and Finnick once again recalled their life together five years ago.
Back then, the sight of her in the kitchen had been a common one that greeted him every day he came home from work.
Getting to see that sight again now was like deja vu.
Before Finnick realized it, Vivian had already finished cooking dinner.
He stepped up and helped serve the food, placing the dishes on the table.
Using his utensils, he cut out a large piece of the omelet and set it on Vivian’s plate. She didn’t refuse, nearly inhaling the food.
“Vivian.” Finnick tried to start a conversation, but she stayed quiet, and only the sounds of them eating filled the room.
“Don’t you think that this situation is just like before, when you used to cook for me?”
Her hands froze mid-air before she slowly lifted her head to look up at him. “Even if it was just like before, we can never return to what we were in the past.”
Her tone was flat and completely devoid of any emotion.
“Please don’t be like that. Come back to me, please?” Finnick pleaded even when he knew that this was not the best time to be having this conversation.
But he just couldn’t help himself—his feelings for her were overflowing and spilling out.
“Can you stop that? Why would I go back to you? To get hurt again? To watch you sleep around with other women?”
Vivian had no idea how Finnick thought he had the right to ask her to go back to him.
If he truly wanted to get back together with her, then why did he do everything that he’d done to her back then?
“I have no idea what you’re talking about, Vivian. Can we please have a proper discussion about this so we can resolve this issue together?” he begged.
But she was in no mood to take a walk down memory lane with him. “No, thank you. We have someone who’s been kidnapped that we have to save right now.”
The most pressing matter currently was to rescue Larry. Without him, nothing else mattered.
“I’m sorry for bringing up the topic so soon.” Aware that he had come on too strong, Finnick finally backed down.
With a small smile, he went back to eating dinner. They both finished their food in silence, refraining from mentioning any other upsetting topics.
At the end of dinner, their full stomachs soothed the fatigue they felt after the long tiring day, having replenished their physical and mental energies.
The night was dead silent. Only their breathing and the sounds of the wind filled the house.
Outside the building, a small shadow moved around, intently observing every single thing that occurred inside.
Under the dim light of the moon and the stars, the two people sat in the house as their minds wandered to memories of five years ago, completely failing to notice the suspicious figure lurking outside.
The tiny figure got down on his knees to peek in the gap between the door and the doorframe, a bright smile growing on his face.
It was none other than the kidnapping victim himself, Larry.
Watching his parents’ movements, Larry felt like there was something missing. He caught sight of a grasshopper moving near his feet, and a lightbulb went off in his head.
He picked up the grasshopper and flung it inside the house, letting it fly all the way to rest on Vivian’s body.
The two adults instantly noticed the abrupt movement, scrambling to their feet. Finnick wondered if it was something bad.
