When Natasha arrived home that evening after running a few errands that included a trip to the post office to finalize her change of address and some grocery shopping, her mom was in the kitchen preparing dinner.

“Hey Mom.”

“Hi Hon,” she answered, turning around and wiping her hands on a kitchen towel. “Did you have a great day at work?”

“Yes, it was super slow today. According to my boss, that’s normal for the end of the week. Most orders come through on Mondays for us to process.”

“That’s good. You need the break anyway. You and your father both. I made one of your favorites for dinner.”

Natasha inhaled the hunger-inducing aromas and dropped her bags on the counter just as her belly began to rumble. “Mexican lasagna.”

Mom chuckled. “You got it.”

“I can’t wait,” Natasha said. “I’m going to put these groceries up and then go get changed. I’ll be back down to help you with the rest of dinner.”

After getting settled into something more comfortable, Natasha went back downstairs to help her mom with the rest of dinner as promised.

“Your dad should be home any minute now. He thought I’d be a good time for all of us to have dinner together,” her mom said, rinsing the salad leaves. “We haven’t done that in a long time, which is really awful since we’re all together under the same roof now.”

“Yeah.” Natasha shrugged. “I’m either studying or job searching.”

“And your dad is always out of town, I know,” Mom added.

“In light of what happened, I’m glad I can spend some time with you two now.”

“Speaking of…that…your father says that you went on a lunch date with a male friend at work.”

“He did?”

“I had no idea you’d met someone new already,” mom replied.

“Yeah. We just went out for lunch. It wasn’t really a date.”

“He says that you’ve been seen around the building with this male friend a lot.”

Natasha shook her head, not believing what she was hearing. Obviously, Mom and Dad had had a quick talk sometime between lunch and the moment she got home about her “lunch date”.

“How would Dad know that I’ve been around Jacques a lot?”

“Jacques? Is that his name?” She began slicing into some tomatoes. “Well, there are security cameras all over the place for the safety of employees, right?”

“So he viewed the cameras to spy on me…?” Natasha frowned in disgust.

Mom sighed. “It was probably just to make sure everything was okay.”

“What do you mean everything was okay? Of course, everything’s okay. Jacques works at Reverie. Why would he not be okay?”

“People aren’t always what they seem, honey. I’m not just saying this because he’s a shifter. It’s just that—”

Natasha held up her hand. “Okay, I’m done with this conversation. I don’t think it’s okay that my every move is being watched while I’m at work. I knew it was a bad idea for me to accept a position there with Dad. He’s too suspicious over everything I do.”

“No, honey. It wasn’t. Jacques—your male friend—is under investigation. Your dad didn’t say exactly what for, but he insisted we have a talk together over dinner to discuss it. We don’t want the same thing to happen to you here like it did in Miami. This is a relatively safe town. We look out for one another here. It’s nothing like Miami, but if you get caught up with the wrong people while you’re living here, you could put yourself at risk.”

“I’m an adult. I take full responsibility for what happened to me in Miami. My lesson is learned, but I think I’m just as qualified to make my own decisions without you and Dad snooping into my affairs. If this is about me living under your roof, make no mistake, I’ll do whatever I need to move into my own place as quickly as possible.”

“You don’t have to do that.” Mom sighed and rushed over to Natasha, putting an arm over her shoulder. “I’m sorry. Maybe I judged too soon. Your dad and I talked briefly this afternoon about it. He didn’t have enough time to explain then, but he was really worried about this whole thing, which makes me really worried about you. I’m sure we’ll get to the bottom of this when he gets home and he’ll tell us why this Jacques person irks him so much.”

“It’s not about what irks him. This is my life,” Natasha said. “But you’re right. I want to know what he says. I’m sure there’s an explanation for it. Jacques’s a good guy.”

Mom visibly swallowed. “I hope so.”

After helping her mom with prep and cleanup, Natasha took the stack of letters she’d retrieved from the post office and headed upstairs again to rest before dinner.

She thought things couldn’t have gotten any worse…but it did. Among the pile of junk mail and suspicious mailings, she discovered a past due bill from the old apartment she had shared with her ex-fiancé. A quick call to the leasing office revealed that Stephan hadn’t moved out when the leased expired and had been living in the unit month to month without paying rent. Since the lease was in both their names, apparently she’d been deemed equally responsible to settle the bill.

“Unbelievable!”

Natasha grasped her cell phone. She was ready to curse him out. Yet, she’d had enough of him. She wanted nothing to do with him. Didn’t want to speak with him, hear his voice…didn’t want to be associated with him in any way. What she did hope was that karma ran its course and gave Stephan what he deserved. She wasn’t going to stress over this.

Half of her paycheck was supposed to go to a savings account set up specifically for a down payment on a new place, but to keep the past due bill from going on her credit and wrecking it any further, she paid the arrears over the phone.

By the time she got through with balancing her checkbook and estimating the number of paychecks it would take her to become solvent again and out of her parent’s home, she wasn’t hungry anymore. She grabbed a bag of chips and a candy bar from the junk food stash in her room and buried herself under the covers.

When Natasha woke up, she realized that it was pitch black outside. A quick glance at the clock near her bedside confirmed that she’d been asleep for several hours. On the nightstand was also a note from her Mom: I didn’t want to wake you. I told your dad to let you sleep. I know you needed the rest. Your plate is in the kitchen. There’s cheesecake in the fridge.

She swung her legs over the bed and went downstairs in search of the lasagna. Lucky for her, Mom and Dad had already gone to bed. She didn’t want to talk to them about her friendship with Jacques anyway. It seemed that her dad had already made up his mind about Jacques. But so had she…