I smile to myself, turning away to give them a little privacy. I pop the bread in the toaster and grab two plates, then I cut an avocado in half and wait for the bread to pop up.
Behind me, I hear the kiss finally end and Mom sigh in defeat. “Dammit, why are you so good at that?”
I love Ray. Mom only dated him for three months before dumping him earlier this week because she got spooked, but she was wrong, and I’m so glad he isn’t staying away.
Mom met Ray at a bar. She was actually there to meet someone else for a second date she wasn’t super excited about. Her date was running late so she ended up sitting at the bar alone. Two seats down there was an attractive man a few years older than her. She told me at first glance he looked like Jason Statham, and Mom has a massive celebrity crush on him, so she looked again. When she did, he caught her. Mom being Mom, she made a joke, and Ray being Ray, he liked it. Since she appeared to be there alone, he asked if he could buy her a drink.
They got to talking and she was completely captivated. Seeing as Ray is from here and we’ve lived in this town for most of my life, Mom joked, “I can’t believe I’ve never seen you around before. Where have you been hiding?”
“Prison,” he answered, straight-faced.
Mom laughed, Ray smiled, and they went about having the best non-date Mom had ever been on. When her date finally showed up, she ditched him and spent the rest of the night sitting there chatting with Ray.
When she came home after only that first night of talking to him, she sat down on the couch and just grinned uncontrollably while she told me about how great he was. “I didn’t think they even made men like him anymore,” she told me.
They kept seeing each other; more and more each time, like every hit of each other made them need even more. She fell hard and fast for him. I’ve never seen her so happy.
As it turned out, though, he hadn’t been kidding when he told her he’d been in prison. When it came up again and she realized he was serious, she sobered a little and wanted to know what he was in for. Turned out, aggravated burglary, assault, and a felony firearms charge.
All his charges were from the same incident and it happened when he was a teenager. He’s nothing like that now—he’s a bringer of coffee and the man who causes my mom to walk around the house with a dopey grin on her face—but Mom was spooked. She was torn because she was seriously falling for him, but she felt like it would be irresponsible to bring someone with a violent past around me. She believed him that he’d changed, but she’d been wrong about guys before. She was so afraid she was wrong about this one too—and with much higher stakes—that she broke up with him.
I was heartsick for her. We curled up on the couch and watched movies about doomed love while we ate ice cream and mourned together.
Then the next morning, Ray brought us coffee. He had done that all the time when they were together, just a little thoughtful thing he did, but Mom was more than a little confused that he was still there after she’d dumped him.
“Are you lost?” she had asked, standing there in her PJs with eyes puffy from crying all night.
“Nope,” he answered confidently, holding out a cup of coffee for her. “I’m right where I’m supposed to be.”
Since then, Ray has behaved as if he is still her boyfriend, and Mom has not known what to do with it. She said usually guys are really easy to lose—just say the wrong thing and they’re out of there, but Ray’s different. He found a really strong connection with my mom, and he’s not going to let her disconnect without a fight.
Like I said, I love him. He’s exactly what my mom needs. She doesn’t see it, but she has spent so many years in relationships that didn’t work out, I’m not sure she even knows what to do with one that can.
She needs to get out of her own way because Ray makes her really happy, and I’d hate to see her lose that.
Fortunately, it looks like Ray’s not ready to get lost.
I glance back over my shoulder and see Mom still standing there with Ray’s strong, tattooed arms locked around her as he gazes down at her. I’ve never seen a man tame my mom the way he does, but she’s almost sweet as she caresses the back of his neck and says, “Thank you for bringing us coffee.”