neverjustanutgraph

[neverjustanutgraph]

Inconsistencies in storyline and spaces

[Spoiler warning S3]

Random, but did anybody else wonder why they changed the storyline of how Nurmi's parents died? In season 1 he says they were massacred in their bed while the whole family lived in DRC. In season 3 he tells Karppi that his mom killed his dad while they were living in SA.

I wonder if this change was made to

a) connect his backstory to Karppi possibly killing Jussi or

b) setting up a storyline for a potential movie, in which N would try to investigate what really happened between his parents.

Thoughts?

Also, is anybody else really confused by the inconsistent layout of Nurmi's apartment? Especially his kitchen looks completely different throughout the seasons.

Anything else you picked up on?

[neverjustanutgraph]

A little bit risky (Karppi X Nurmi)

Here's one for the shippers. A little post-S3 fanfic to get us all through the cold winter months.

Plenty of smut [cough] tasteful explorations of consensual adult relationships, of course. Because let’s be honest, we all know what we’re here for…

But ultimately a character study of Nurmi and the way he relates to Karppi, which also fills in some of his backstory.

Hope you enjoy

(3 chapter. 7K words)

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ROUTINE

Karppi cleared the plates off the table and stacked them with the pots and pans already piled up on the counter, waiting to be washed. She couldn’t remember the last time her kitchen had seen this kind of action. It may have been never.

“So can I?” Emil asked, scraping the last bits of desert off his plate. “Can I go play video games?”

“Did you finish homework?”

“Yeah.”

“OK. Half an hour. But then bed.”

He scurried off, eager not to lose precious time.

“And brush your teeth first!” she shouted after him.

In the pile of dirty dishes, her eyes fell on a cheese grater she didn’t recognize.

“Did you bring this from your flat?”

Nurmi, who was busy scraping pasta sauce off the floor where Leo sat, looked up briefly.

“Nope. It’s yours.”

“Really? Who knew.”

He had come over to cook for them, a thank you for another night when she’d helped him through a nasty ear infection – Leo’s not his – picking up medicine and groceries while he tried to distract Leo with choo choo trains and ice cream. Emil had been along for the ride, playing video games and raiding Nurmi’s junk food drawer, while the four of them waited for the meds to kick in and pizza to arrive. Karppi’s kid had become somewhat of a regular at the flat since Nurmi had gone on paternity leave – one of many arrangements that had crept in over the last three months. So now Nurmi made sure he kept a stockpile of Pringles, Emil’s favourites, in the drawer. It had all started with Emil dropping by to check out a new game Nurmi had bought, and now, once or twice a week, he popped over after school and they’d play a level while Leo took his afternoon nap. Twice, Emil had stood in front of a closed door when Nurmi was back late from the playground, so he’d given him a key. It had been years since he’d handed out a key to anyone that wasn’t his cleaner, but it was Emil so it wasn’t a big deal. And besides, he currently had no sex life to speak of that the kid could walk in on, so the arrangement seemed safe for now.

Talking of keys, he remembered he still had Karppi’s from earlier that night.

“Before I forget,” he said, sliding it onto the counter. He’d let himself in when he arrived from the supermarket, bags full of groceries. She had been late as usual, so he’d grabbed it from her super secret hiding place.

“Just put it back under the mat when you leave,” she said.

His face never failed to show his horror over her home security, but he liked to stress the point. “I still can’t believe you’re a cop and you keep your key under the mat.”

“Are we really having this conversation again?” She was behind the counter, fighting with the dishwasher, trying to make everything fit. He imagined the eye roll. “It’s been there for years and nobody has come to kill us yet.”

“That’s comforting.”

Nurmi lifted Leo from his seat, wiped his face and handed him the iPad he’d been nagging about for the last half hour. Somewhere, Nurmi thought, someone was busy deducting points from his parenting scorecard. But he didn’t care. He needed a moment of not being dad tonight. He watched Leo plop down on the couch and flinched when he heard the opening bars to his favourite youtube program, a mind-numbing three-chord ditty Nurmi had heard so often that it had become the stuff of his nightmares. “How about you take that to Emil’s room. Off you go.”

In the kitchen, Karppi kicked the dishwasher door into submission and raised her arms in triumph. “Success!”

“Next time,” she said, “maybe keep it a bit more simple.”

Tonight was another point on the list of things that had snuck up on them. Having dinner together was not a daily thing by any means but it happened often enough lately that they knew their way around the other’s kitchen, though Karppi’s contributions generally consisted of ordering take out.

She’d helped him through his early parenting freak-outs, of which there had been many: Swallowed objects. Inexplicable meltdowns. Mysterious rashes. Just getting out of the house in the morning required an unfathomable amount of steps and items, and he’d learned the hard way that forgetting even just one could be disastrous. Stuffed animals, in particular, were never to be left behind.

The first week at his house, Leo had cried for his mother so much that by the end of it Nurmi’d been close to tears himself just from pure exhaustion. He’d called Karppi in the middle of the night sounding manic, questioning if he’d made the right decision, and when she arrived he’d wanted nothing more than to hand Leo to her and ask her to keep him. She’d taken the child in her lap and sung to him, read to him, but nothing helped, and the episode ended with the three of them slumped on the floor and Leo crying himself to sleep in Nurmi’s arms. “Get used to failure,” she’d said over their first shot of Single Malt afterwards. “There’s going to be a lot more of it. Welcome to parenthood.”

So while she may not have been a baby whisperer, she had his back. In return, he made sure Emil had company when she was working late and he saw to it that she ate a proper meal once in a while. Besides, he was getting bored of not working and eager to hear about her cases. And she liked having someone with fresh eyes to bounce ideas off of.

So here they were, Thursday night dinner at hers. The routine was unspoken but he knew it by heart: Next, she’d bring out the liquor. He’d pour the glasses while she changed into her PJs in the other room. Then, she’d bring out photos from the latest case she was working on and they’d go over it together. Sometimes he would talk about his day with Leo. Funny things he’d said or done. A moment of levity to end the day. Then he’d pick up his newly acquired toddler from Emil’s room and carry him the 500 meters to their house across the river. Their house. It still sounded odd to him, the fact that he was a “we” now. Sakke and Leo.

It was an easy routine they’d fallen into, him and Karppi, and god knows, they both could use something easy in their life right now. So he didn’t question it. He just rolled with it.

“Bourbon?” she asked, from the kitchen cabinet. “Or vodka?”

“Ooph. Definitely not vodka.”

“Bourbon it is.” She put the bottle on the table on her way to the bedroom. “Be right back.”

He found the proper glasses in the cupboard – no doubt relics of Jussi’s, she was savage when it came to stuff like this – poured a generous amount in each, and settled into the sofa. He took a sip and rested his eyes for a minute, the bourbon kicking in smooth and warm.

“Long day?” he heard her ask. She’d re-emerged in sweats with a stack of papers.

“Have a look at these,” she said and slid a photo across the table. He recognized the case, but the picture was new. It was a car accident she’d been working on, an Audi that had gone off the road into the river and the driver had died. It was one of those cases that looked cut and dried and the bosses were eager for her to close it, but Karppi had a weird feeling about it, so she’d been pushing for more time to have a closer look.

“Look at the size of that man.” The picture was the usual morgue shot that left little to the imagination. But they’d long stopped being squeamish about that stuff.

“And now have a look at the size of that car window.” A second picture showed the Audi, soaked, with the driver’s window down.

“How does a man that size end up floating outside of his car?” she asked rhetorically.

“Maybe the body swelled in the water.”

“That much? Seems unlikely.”

And she was probably right. But this was his role now, pushing back against her theories. Making her find other ways to prove them so her case would become stronger.

“What else have you got?”

She produced a couple more pictures and some recent bank transactions that raised more questions, and the two of them debated possible scenarios for a while.

“Be right back,” Nurmi said after finishing his glass, and he disappeared into the hallway. On the way back from the bathroom, he stopped by Emil’s room, which was unexpectedly quiet. The door was ajar and he opened it just enough to look inside. Emil was asleep in his bed, one arm around Leo. Nurmi felt something similar to the bourbon work its way through his chest.

“Karppi,” he whispered down the hallway. “Come check this out.”

They leaned on opposite ends of the door, taking in the scene, and smiled. He wanted to slip his arm around her, touch her in some way that fit the moment, but he let the moment pass. “Emil’s been great with him,” he said instead, with gratitude.

“He used to lobby me and Jussi for a little brother,” Karppi remembered. Nurmi watched her mind go somewhere else and waited for the thought to pass.

“Let’s leave them,” he said finally, and he reached to close the bedroom door. “I’ll sleep on the couch tonight.” When he turned back and faced her, her eyes were waiting for him.

She took the lead, as she always did, moving towards him slowly but decisively, her eyes fixed on his, like she was daring him to a challenge. She had always been the braver one, he thought, more willing to take risks, unafraid of the consequences. That trait often scared him when they worked together. But right then, and all those times she’d kissed him before, it made him feel secure, like she knew the road trough rocky terrain and she was going to take him by the hand. But maybe it wasn’t her bravery at all. Maybe it was her uncanny ability to see things that lie beneath, which let her know there was no risk at all, taking away any fear of rejection, any doubt that this was what he wanted too and he needed her to take him there.

She softly put a hand on his chest as she leaned into him, pausing halfway, teasing him, like what she wanted was inevitable and she could take her time. And of course she was right. She let her nose touch his and for a moment they both closed their eyes.

He kept them closed even when he felt her lips on his, savouring the sensation. He only opened them when she stopped. He found her looking at him, biting her bottom lip like she often did when she was pensive. It always made his head spin. He patiently waited for her next move. Because he wanted more – he always wanted more of whatever she had to offer him. So he was relieved when she kissed him again, softly, just once. Then she whispered: “Do you want this?”

The question surprised him and put him off balance. It was like she suddenly let go of his hand and he didn’t know whether to go forward or backward. He knew she wasn’t just being seductive – she was making him take responsibility for his desire. It was her way of saying: I got us this far, now I need you to show me you’ve got skin in the game too. If she’d waited a minute longer, her question would have been moot. Certain parts of his body would have outright dismissed any objections his head may have made. But he was sure she knew that too. Her timing, no doubt, was deliberate.

Instead, he felt that familiar warm flood of anxiety. Fight or flight. Her eyes were fixed on his again. Those big daring eyes. He’d learned to hold their gaze. He no longer got uncomfortable with her looking at him in that way, like he once did. But now she’d ambushed him and he had to will himself to keep looking. Part of him wanted to break away, to go somewhere where he didn’t feel so exposed. But it also felt exciting to be exposed, to have someone look at you in that way.

He rushed forward to kiss her with a force that startled her and that landed them both against the wall. For a second he thought this was going to be the point where the kids wake up and all would stop, like it had before. But the room stayed quiet and they kept exploring each other, in new ways, in new places. The release of fear mixed with desire was intoxicating and he had to be careful not to make them fall as they spun and stumbled their way to her bedroom. She closed the door, locked it and stood before him. She took a moment to study him, like she was contemplating what to do with him. Then she slowly lifted his shirt and pulled it over his head. When he freed himself from the sleeves, he wanted to reach for her, touch her, but he held back. Not because of fear but because she was in control again and she wanted it this way. He let her. He held his breath when she kissed his chest. He sighed when her hands moved down to his belly. It was all he could do to keep from picking her up right then and dropping her onto the bed, but he didn’t. She held his gaze when she undid his belt. And when she pushed his pants to the floor, he stepped out of them nonchalantly, giving her the slightest of smiles. He was not afraid of her. Not anymore. He was getting comfortable being exposed with her, thrilled to feel her eyes on his body now – not because he wanted to be admired, but because he wanted her to know him, and he wanted to know all of her.

When she undressed in front of him it felt at once new and familiar, exciting and comfortable all at the same time. He wanted to tell her how beautiful she was, but it seemed trite, almost irrelevant in that moment. He felt a pang in his chest when he watched her slowly shed the layers of her clothes: the slouchy black t-shirt she always wore around the house, the flannel pyjama pants that were frayed at the bottom, the colored cotton undies that looked like they might have come from the teen’s section of H&M.

Plenty of women had undressed for him before. Beautiful women, sexy women, some whom you might call perfect: models, exotic dancers, entry-level socialites with outsized beauty budgets. But when they undressed for him it moved him only in the predictable places – none above the belt line. If he was ever nervous in those moments, it was usually ego, the desire to perform some porn-like ideal of sex that affirmed his masculinity.

In comparison, the nerves he was feeling now were almost boyish, like he was about to kiss his high school crush for the first time. There was nothing self-serving about it, just pure anticipation. Of course he was a man now and he wanted her in every way. He wanted to feel her, taste her, satisfy her. But those were all just new ways of knowing her, learning more about her, feeling closer to her.

When she stood naked before him, he placed both hands on her cheeks and pulled her in, like he’d done back then by the waterfront, just softer. The warmth of her skin against his made him kissed her with an urgency he didn’t know he had. And when her hands explored his body, he finally lost whatever control he had left. He guided them onto the bed, the two of them a flurry of hands trailing backs, touching breasts and probing areas all together more new and exciting.

He kissed his way down her belly, taking his time. When he reached his ultimate destination, she grabbed onto the bed sheets and exhaled. “Oh god... Fuck.”

He took it as a sign he was on the right track and carried on exploring. But she was impatient. “Come here," she said, her hands in his hair, and softly urged him back up. The message was clear: This could wait. Right now she wanted something else from him, and he was more than willing to oblige.

When he lowered himself to kiss her, she pulled him in closer, eager hands reaching for shoulder blades, reaching for ass cheeks, urging him to find her. She made no secret of the fact that she wanted him and neither did her body.

It was an overload of senses. Her scent, her touch, the little noises she made when he moved inside her. Her kisses were raw and her touch was urgent. Her fingers greedy for his skin, greedy for his hair, greedy to guide him to parts of her body she wanted him to explore. And the way she moved below him said she wanted even more of him.

He wasn’t sure what he’d expected but he wasn’t quite prepared for the intensity of her. Or perhaps it was the intensity of them. Three years of foreplay coming to this. For a second he thought he was going to lose it right then and there, and he tensed up. She must have felt it too, because she stopped and sought his eyes, checking in. In years on the job, they’d learned to say a lot with their eyes.

He looked up at the ceiling and exhaled, catching his breath. She cupped his face and he leaned into her, eyes closed, seeking out her touch. They studied each other for a moment. Then suddenly, and inexplicably, she stuck out her tongue and grinned.

Good god, who was she? Who was this woman who clawed at him one moment like she was possessed and then did the most unsexy thing he could think of, taunting him like some five-year-old on the playground?

There, she did it again! He was trying not to laugh, but he couldn’t help himself. He shook his head, incredulous. But then he did it too, just once, and they both laughed.

“Hi,” she said, as if she’d just found him in her bed.

“Hey.”

Her hand caressed his temple, then his neck, down to his shoulder. He felt his body relax. There it was again, that innate ability she had to know what he needed and reach out to him. It was a childlike desire, wanting someone to reach out to you like that, meet unspoken needs. It was an unrealistic expectation to have in adulthood, but it was still what people wished for who hadn’t learned to ask for things, and that, he supposed, included him.

He moved his palm along her thigh. She smiled and threw her arms behind her head, a gesture so free and careless that it made him think of kids making snow angels.

He brushed a strand of hair from her face and studied her. God, her breasts were magnificent. He’d spent many hours in their company and possibly even more hours imagining what they looked like under those woolly sweaters. So it seemed rude not to at least introduce himself properly.

“Well, hello,” he said kissing his way down her right one, while his hand explored the left. He could feel her belly moving when she giggled.

He loved how they responded to his touch, to his kiss, his tongue. He bit down a little, teasing her.

“Ou! Bastard.”

He looked up mischievously. “Sorry.”

As a sign of apology, he placed a soft kiss on her left boob. She pretended she was still offended.

“I’ll report you to HR for inappropriate conduct.”

“If you think this is inappropriate, wait till I’m done with you.”

He positioned himself so their eyes were level, staring down at her, making her wait.

She nonchalantly ran a foot along his ass, giving him that smile that said, “show me what you got.” He held her gaze and cupped her cheek. Then he kissed her, delicately. First her lips, then her neck, then her collarbone, his lips barely touching her body. The softer he caressed her, the more charged he became, not in his groin but all over his skin, like static energy that built not from friction but the absence of it. So when he finally buried his hands in her hair and kissed her deeply, he felt the jolt in his shoulder blades and tingling down his spine. His fingers found hers on the bed, spreading them, clasping them, holding them firmly in place. Right now, she was his, and he was going to take his time. She closed her eyes and arched her back, and when he finally gave in to her, she clasped his hands tighter. This, he thought, was a drug he’d have a hard time shaking.

They found a rhythm and he gradually returned to exploring her body, less rushed this time. There was time to caress thighs and study ears and trace the contours of her hips. And when she reached to wrap her arms around him, holding him tight like she’d done so many times before, he savored the sensation. It grounded them.

He complied easily when she moved him onto his back, one hand firmly on his chest, taking charge of her own pleasure. And what a sight she was. He watched pearls of sweat run down her breasts and meet in her belly button, and when she threw back her head to tame her wild blond hair, he swore she was the most erotic thing he’d ever seen.

Have your way with me, he thought, I’ll be here enjoying the view. He liked how she used his body for her own desire, and he took mental notes of all the sounds and sensations, all the things that made her feel good. He loved being the source of her pleasure. And in that moment he vowed to make it his mission to find out everything she liked.

When she leaned down to kiss him she had that devilish smile on her face and he knew he was in for a ride. “Ohh fuck,” he whispered, when she began to move against him more forcefully. She giggled and bit his lip.

They played like this for a little longer, teasing and turning their way around her bed. And when they finally released all the energy that had built up between them – first she, than he– and he collapsed into her arms with a force that made her laugh, he felt something that had been absent from his life for a while. Joy

He’d often wondered what sex with her would be like. Would she be rough? Would she be soft? Would she dominate? Would she submit to him? Of course, the answer – as so often with her – was, all of the above.

_________________________________________________________

RESTLESS

He took a drag from her cigarette and looked up at the ceiling, his head resting on her belly, then he handed it back to her.

It was still dark outside and the cherry of the cigarette gave a faint orange tint to their little still life.

“Look at us,” she said. “We’re already turning into a cliché. Cigarettes after sex.”

“Does this mean I should buy more?”

“That depends,” she said. Her free hand was running through his hair, strong fingers grabbing big strands and releasing them again. “How many do we have left?”

“Maybe five,” he guessed.

“Well…” He could already hear the smirk in her voice. “That should bring us through the night.”

She caught his eyes and they laughed.

“’A’ for enthusiasm. But I’m not sure I have it in me anymore. You wore me out.”

“Let’s see your famous scar then,” she said mischievously, pulling at his blanket. He pretended to be annoyed but he’d always liked her teasing him. So he gladly played along and ceremoniously revealed his ass.

“Ah, that looks serious. Do you want me to kiss it better?”

“No, but I can think of other areas you could kiss better.”

He loved to make her laugh. It was loud and unstudied and he lived for it.

She handed him the butt of the cigarette, he took a last drag and put it out in the ashtray on the nightstand. Then he lay down next to her and pulled her close so her head would rest on his chest, her wild mane all his to play with.

She was out like a light in 5 minutes, but he lay awake for a long time – an hour, maybe more.

So they had transitioned from being friends who occasionally kissed to now being friends who occasionally fucked. Predictable? Maybe. But still, it warranted some reflection. If you wanted to get technical, they were colleagues who were also friends who now also occasionally fucked. What could possibly go wrong?

Three years ago, this level of complexity would have caused his brain to melt. But then again, if somebody had told him then that he’d be a single dad to a child that wasn’t technically his, he would have run for the hills too. And yet, here he was, one foot firmly outside of his comfort zone, finding his balance.

There’d been a lot of that recently, and not just with her. More than anything, becoming a father had brought out a buffet of complex feelings that were often more than he could chew, but he was getting better. There were levels of fear he’d not felt outside of his job, and shades of love he’d never felt at all. There were also sudden moments of sorrow for Leo’s tainted childhood, and deep anger over his own. It left him feeling raw and bruised. But somehow things had not fallen to shit yet, so he kept going.

And now he was here, in her bed, studying her naked body curled against his. Noticing his own. Unusually relaxed. For once, he didn’t feel like he had somewhere else to be. Didn’t have to measure his touch, as he lay beside a stranger in a state of post-coital politeness. And he wasn’t busy contemplating what lines to deliver next to stress nicely, but firmly, that there wouldn’t be a next time. There was always a next time with Karppi.

An image crossed his mind and he recoiled. A vague memory of another night. Another naked body by his side. God, how long had it been? Five months? Maybe Six? He’d picked her up at some bar in downtown Helsinki. Emma. Or maybe her name was Elli? He couldn’t remember. It was just before Leo came to live with him and he’d figured there might not be opportunities for a while, so he’d been proactive about it. The process followed the usual script. They’d eyed each other across the bar. He’d gone over and said hi. They’d flirted. A scene from a million bad Hollywood movies. They’d left together clear about what they wanted from each other. The sex, too, was as expected. Not bad, per se, but mechanical and a little awkward. He’d been fine with it. The goal was to scratch an itch, and that’s what he got. He’d secretly hoped she’d be gone when he woke up so he could skip the pleasantries. Instead, he’d found her in his kitchen making coffee. But he had a script for that, too.

There was no script for what was next for him and Karppi. But tonight they’d done something irreversible and there was something oddly calming about that. Like that split second after you pulled the trigger of your gun – the decision was made and you had to live with the consequences.

He felt his shoulder falling asleep under Karppi’s weight and repositioned himself, careful not to wake her. She found the crook of his arm blindly and nestled into it. It was easy to think they should have done this sooner, found comfort in each other in this way. But of course, there had been plenty of reasons not to. And there still were. But that point was moot now.

Did she have randoms after Jussi, like he did? The question had often crossed his mind. But he was never sure what he wanted the answer to be.

For a long time, his way of dealing with the tacit turmoil that was their relationship had been to not acknowledge it at all. It had been the proverbial elephant as long as he could remember – sometimes a large one, sometimes small – and he had grown used to living with it. Sometimes he’d engage with it, but more often than not it was just there, and he’d learned to make space for it without feeling the urge to do anything about it. And besides, he secretly liked the company.

But that was also where it became complicated. He had often feared that the steady progression of their relationship was inevitably going to run them off a cliff. Like lemmings merrily underway to committing mass suicide or those small marsupials that fucked themselves to death: they just couldn’t help themselves. He’d had a taste of what his work life would be like without her as a friend and partner and he didn’t particularly want to go back there. So the thought of risking this one point of stability in his life by adding another layer of complexity did still make him uneasy.

That was not the only reason, though, that he’d been passive with her before. Plenty of times it was simply that he felt like shit. Sometimes it was physical, but more often than not it was self-loathing. And recently there had been no shortage of opportunity for it. When he thought of the day he arrested Henna and the way Karppi looked at him then, a hand appeared to be grabbing his insides and tightening around his throat – shame. Or that time he fessed up he’d been picking up 17-year-olds and shooting up “a little heroin” to get through his day. Later that night, on her balcony, he’d wanted to kiss her, but shame over Nea had been riding shotgun. Of course, he should have known better – Karppi never punished failure, only betrayal.

The biggest reason he held back, though, was because he worried what would happen if he actually got what he wanted. He already knew he’d want more of it, and eventually he’d need it, and that was dangerous. It was like the heroin: he could take a little bit to dull the pain. But if he allowed himself to take even just a little more, he’d be on track for self-destruction. Measuring himself was a matter of self-preservation.

Or at least, that’s how it had felt to him for a long time. Now he was going through he achy process of reassessing his instincts. Karppi had never taken advantage of him when he let his guard down. Never kicked him when he was down. To the contrary. She had always reached out for him. Always rewarded him for being vulnerable. So he’d gradually allowed himself to relax a bit. It still felt risky, a little unsafe, to give someone that kind of power over you. But he’d long entrusted his safety to her, physical and otherwise, and he was still here. So there was that.

Karppi shivered in her sleep and he pulled the blanket up to cover her. When she turned, he wrapped himself around her, tightly. His eye fell on her wardrobe and he wondered what other lives of hers were hidden inside it. Were there sundresses she’d wear on vacation (a titillating thought) or workout gear for gym memberships he didn’t know about (unlikely)? Was there cheeky lingerie she kept for special occasions (he hoped there was), and what about formal wear? Did she even own heels?

“Extreme self-reliance is a trauma response,” a counsellor in university had once told him years ago. He’d stopped seeing her soon after that, uninterested in pursuing her line of inquiry. But the sentence had stuck with him and it occasionally reared its head in random moments, usually on nights like this when he was sleepless.

It didn’t take a psych degree, of course, to figure out why his sense of safety was built on being self-sufficient. When he came back to Finland in high school, he had little in common with anyone his age, least of all the kids in the small rural school where his grandmother lived. It wasn’t so much that they outright rejected him – although they weren’t particularly welcoming either – it was that he rejected them. On his first day at school a freckled kid with a bowl cut had asked him, seriously, if his house in South Africa had running water and a toilet, and Nurmi felt embarrassed for the boy. It set the tone for the next three years.

Growing up in Joburg, he blended seamlessly into the exclusive world of diplomat progenies, heiresses, army brats and humanitarian offspring from more countries than he could count. A world in which kids snuck rare imported liquor from their dads’ gift cabinets, weekend trips involved Jeep safaris, and his parents’ dinner parties resembled mini UN assemblies where guests debated the merits of peacekeeping missions and traded the latest backroom gossip in international diplomacy. So when he was suddenly dropped in bumfuck Finland, it felt like a cruel joke to him and he resented it. For a little while, his tragic story – which was the talk of the town even before he arrived – made him somewhat of an object of desire to the girls in his school. But he resented that, too, and their interest gradually waned. The truth was, he was arrogant and he was angry, and he spent most of high school surrounding himself with books. As a result, he didn’t really start dating until university in Helsinki. But even then he wasn’t making any real connections.

By this time, he had found other ways to create a sense of belonging and order in his life, which had spun so spectacularly out of control. He frequented the same coffee shops, not because the coffee was better there but because the liked the waiter knowing his order and politely asking about his day. “Double espresso, coming right up, Sakke. Ever fix that leak in your bathroom?” A semblance of a relationship for the cost of a hot beverage, no further investment required. It seemed like a good deal.

His actual “friends” in those days were wannabe bankers and finance bros –classmates with aspirations in the financial sector who first became his drinking buddies, then his coke buddies, and together they bounced their way through corporate internships and the Helsinki nightlife.

“Try a little,” they’d said one night when he was studying for a difficult exam. “It will help you focus, loosen you up a bit.” By the time he was 25, he was looser than he cared to remember now and steadily burning through the small college fund his parents had left him. He was also turning into an asshole. On the upside, coke gave him the confidence to approach the kinds of women he was aspiring to then.

For a while in his early-20s, he dated the heiress to a Norwegian oil fortune he had met at a banker’s birthday party and who read his rigid routines as a sign of grit and sophistication. The relationship was serious for a while but ultimately imploded when he realized that a shared love of cashmere and international prep schools did not in fact make a solid foundation for the future.

“What do you mean, you want to become a cop?” she’d said, horrified, when he told her, about a year into their relationship. It was a most undignified use of an economics degree, she’d thought, and she’d spent many hours trying to talk him out of it. But once Nurmi made it clear that he’d made up his mind, that he was not, in fact, going to become an investment broker as she’d always hoped, she and her luxury toiletries had left his apartment in less than 24 hours.

What followed was a series of flings with varying degrees of emotional investment, though the overall mean would fall in the “low” category. He never had trouble getting laid, thanks in no small parts to his looks and a carefully curated reputation as a man who knew about the finer things in life. But even the smart girls he dated in those years he ultimately found provincial and naïve and he lost interest quickly.

Of course, there was more to it than just a sense of superiority. There were also deep insecurities. Figuring out where exactly one ended and the other begun had taken him considerable effort over the years, so that even today, at 35, the answer was rarely ever clear to him. Particularly when it came to relationships. And the more he watched his peers move effortlessly through the gears of adulthood, the more he felt like they were all busy refining a language he’d never even heard of.

As exciting as it had been, the Joburg expat bubble was hardly an environment for building stable, lasting relationships. Families moved with jobs and friends would come and go, so he’d learned young to keep it light and not get too attached. His parent’s marriage, meanwhile, remained a mystery to him. One of them was usually away, and whenever they were both at home, their focus was rarely on each other. Looking back now, he suspects they were each using their noble causes as an excuse not do deal with the myriad problems that were piling up in their relationship. And the end, well, spoke for itself.

So here he was, 35 and clueless, and increasingly aware of it. Maybe he lied. Maybe his biggest fear wasn’t about dependence after all, it was about failure. The fear that he was somehow incurably crippled by inexperience, and that in the process of trying to reach for what he wanted, at this late stage in life, he was bound to break things in ways that would sabotage his own happiness, and hers.

He tried to push away the thought. He pulled her closer, so that his face was buried in her hair and he could smell her shampoo mixed with the sweat of their night together. But the thought lingered, and he fell asleep uneasily.

_________________________________________________________

RISKY

The fridge was predictably vacant, but he made due with whatever he could find. And when Emil came into the kitchen, schoolbag over one shoulder, Nurmi already had a pan of scrambled eggs going.

“You want eggs or Cereal?” he asked. “I’m afraid those are the only options.”

“Eggs are fine,” Emil said. “Thanks.” He took the plate from Nurmi and sat down next to Leo, who was already 10 fingers deep in scramble.

Karppi’s kid didn’t seem to question why he was there, but Nurmi still felt the need to offer an explanation. “I slept on the couch,” he lied.

Nurmi thought he caught a flash of side eye, the teenage kind that said, “Yes, and? Why should I care?” and he was relieved.

In the bathroom, the sound of Karppi’s hairdryer stopped.

“Hmm. Something smells good,” she said when she joined them. She walked over to Emil and kissed him on the head. “Morning, sweetheart.” When she ruffled Leo’s hair, he giggled, delighted. “More juice,” he demanded of nobody in particular.

“More juice, please,” Nurmi corrected. He was scraping the rest of the eggs onto two plates.

“I’ll get it,” Karppi said and headed for the fridge to grab a juice box. When she was sure Emil wasn’t looking, she came up behind Nurmi and squeezed his ass. “Morning,” she whispered. He smiled and handed her a plate.

Over at the table, Emil tried to make Leo eat with his fork, but the toddler took it as an invitation to dig his hands in deeper, roaring with laughter.

“What’s on at school today?” Karppi asked eating with her plate in her hand.

“Math test.”

“Did you study?”

“Uhu.”

Karppi titled her head, unconvinced.

“Seriously, Mom. It’s no big deal. I know the stuff.”

“The kid knows his stuff,” Nurmi offered helpfully, like placating him would distract from other things hanging in the air. Why did he suddenly feel 14, sneaking around behind his parents’ back? Thank god, he through, school was about to start.

“Get your stuff,” Karppi said, on cue. “We’re running late.”

Emil disappeared to grab a sweater, and she used the moment to slip her arms around Nurmi’s waist. They stood like that for a moment, smiling at each other, before the sound of Emil’s footsteps made them let go.

“You got everything?” she asked. “Ok. let’s go.” She turned and mouthed a silent “Bye” to Nurmi.

“See you later, guys,” he said.

She was already by the door when he called after her again. “Oh and Karppi?”

“Yea?”

“You’re right.”

“About what?”

“About the guy in the car.”

She smiled and closed the door behind her.

And that was it. They’d made it through the morning after, as humdrum as ever. He finished his breakfast and collected Leo’s toys from around the apartment. Then the two of them set off for home.

In the hallway, he slid the key back under the mat. Still a bit risky, he thought, but he’d have to learn to live with it.