Shawn closed his eyes and tried to picture Finn’s house, sterile and sparse, piles of books everywhere and not much else. Was it weird that no one in the family had ever seen it? Was that their fault or Finn’s? Nicki could hold a grudge forever, and Kate always seemed uninterested in Finn’s life in Toronto, but even still, wasn’t it strange that no one ever suggested visiting her? He had assumed that she wouldn’t want them there anyway – she’d been so determined to leave everything in Thunder Bay behind, including her family. But what if he was wrong? What if she had just been waiting for someone to make the suggestion, to reach out to her across the distance and extend an olive branch? If anyone was going to do it, it should have been him. Another thing that got lost in the shuffle of work, kids, marriage.

“This is different,” Shawn continued. “This is…She’s not herself.”

Finn sighed. “You need to spend less time worrying about Kate and more time worrying about your own family.”

“Kate is my family, Finn. She didn’t even know what Ottawa was.”

“Lots of people don’t really know where Ottawa is.”

“No, Finn, she didn’t know what it was. Like, I said, ‘I got a job offer in Ottawa’ and she said, ‘What’s an Ottawa?’ ”

The typing stopped. “You got a job offer in Ottawa?”

“No,” said Shawn. Shit. He hadn’t meant to say it. Or had he? “Well, yes. But that’s not the point.”

“What’s the job?” Finn asked.

“It’s nothing.”

“It doesn’t sound like nothing.”

“I told you it’s nothing.”

“No, what’s going on with Mom is nothing,” Finn said, her voice growing faint. “Getting offered a job in Ottawa is something. But whatever. Those pancakes aren’t going to flip themselves, I guess.”

“A self-flipping pancake. That’s something I need to invent.” He paused, waiting for Finn to laugh. But she was already gone.