When Brant pulls into my driveway, I’m hit by a wave of nerves all over again. I do my best to shake it off and paste on a smile, but everything within me rebels against walking through that door. I don’t know why. Brant already has some idea where I come from, but he’s never met my mom, and I’m dreading that so much.
On instinct, he takes my hand as we walk to the house, but he drops it when we get to the door. It’s too late to back out, so I turn the doorknob and push the door open.
“Hey, I’m home,” I call out as a general warning.
“Rahhh!” My niece comes barreling into the living room, running at me full force and latching onto my leg. “Aunt Alyssa!”
“Hey, baby girl,” I return, reaching down to rub her back.
“Who’s this?” she asks, looking up at the strange man I brought into the house.
“This is my, um—this is Brant,” I offer awkwardly.
“Hi, Brant,” she says, without introducing herself.
He starts to say hi back, but before he can, she turns and runs right back out of the room.
“Wow, she sure has a lot of energy,” he remarks.
Nodding absently, I say, “She’s always pretty high energy, but her attention span is usually not this short unless she’s had too much sugar. I bet she got into the candy when my sister wasn’t paying attention.”
Nodding once, he says, “Keep candy on the top shelf, got it.”
I crack a smile. “You’ll pick up all kinds of parenting lessons at my house, don’t worry. It’s like a cram-style study course, just without any books and probably with a lot more crying.”
“I’m sure it’s not that bad,” he says, adorable in his wrongness.
As if to prove me right and Brant wrong, my mom rounds the corner, hollering back into the room she left, “Just use the paper ones. I haven’t had time to do the dishes, Jesus Christ.”
Swallowing down my nerves, I offer up a little smile. “Hi, Mom.”
Her gaze skates past me to check out the “boyfriend” I said I was bringing home. She does a double take when it’s Brant standing beside me. She was probably expecting someone more like Dirk.
Her mouth opens and a little noise comes out, but then she shuts it again. Shaking her head, she glances past us at the front door. “I didn’t realize this was a whole family affair.” I’m not sure what that means, but she pastes on a much more pleasant smile and offers her hand to Brant. “Hello there, I’m Robin, Alyssa’s mother. I wish she’d have told me you were coming,” she says, looking him over in a truly icky way, her gaze lingering on his biceps and his chest. Cheeks flushing a little, she gives him another coy smile. “We’ll make it work. I can always warm up some chicken nuggets for the kids if we have to.”
Brant glances at me a little uneasily then looks back at my mother. Stubbornly clinging to his politeness, he nods his head at her. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. Thank you for having me over for dinner.”
“Oh, it’s no trouble at all,” she insists, despite the fight she put up when I asked her to come to this.
“These are for you,” he says, offering her the flowers.
My mother clutches her chest, staring at them like she’s never seen any before in her life. Which, to be fair, she hasn’t—not presented like this, anyway. Mom doesn’t exactly date the sort of man who brings flowers to dinner.
“Aren’t you sweet,” she croons, taking the flowers and bending her head to smell them. “That is so—I don’t even know what to say. What a gentleman, thank you.”
Clearing my throat, I look past my mom, wanting to get out of the entryway and into a bigger space. “Do you need any help finishing up dinner?”
“No, it’s all taken care of,” she answers offhandedly. Glancing at Brant, she says, “I didn’t have time to do anything too fancy. I’ve been working all day, and you know how kids are. I told my other daughter we were having a guest for dinner, but do you think she lifted a finger to help? I’m sure you know how it is. I don’t see a wife—are you a single parent, too?”
“Excuse me?” Brant returns, lifting an eyebrow.
Frowning, my mom looks past us at the door, then back to me. “Is your boyfriend getting something out of the car, or…?”
As my mom trails off uncertainly, I begin to realize she thinks Brant is my boyfriend’s father. “Oh my god,” I say, sinking into a pit of embarrassment. “Mom, this is Brant.”
She stares at me, not quite comprehending.
Absently placing a hand on his shoulder and reaching across myself to pat his bicep with the other, I elaborate, “This is the boyfriend I said I was bringing to dinner. No one else is coming. It’s just the two of us.”