Chapter Seven
Tabitha
“I HOPE MAMA THOMAS MAKES gumbo!” Steve wishes out loud as he drives us all home in his truck.
“She’s not cooking, you idiot.” Beth nudges her shoulder playfully into his. “We’re meeting everyone for dinner at the roadhouse.”
“Then I hope they have coconut crème pie made. This boy could destroy some mean coconut crème pie!” He rubs his stomach with the hand he had rested on the gear shift a second earlier.
We’re headed back to Monroe to have dinner with our families at the only nice eat-in restaurant in town. We designed it that way, because I wanted a place where I’d be surrounded by a lot of people. Tonight I’m telling my parents and Mathew’s dad, Phil, that I’m having Mathew’s baby. I’m not scared that they’re going to disown me, or anything like that. I’m a little afraid they’re going to be disappointed in me.
When a parent acts like you’re a disappointment, it’s almost earth-shattering. This reaction is the same at any age. I could be sixty years old and all my dad could say he’s disappointed, and I would feel like the worst person in the world. That disappointment not only breaks your heart, but it lingers for long periods of time. I’m hoping to avoid all of that, by surrounding my parents with Phil, Hank, and Steve’s parents. Hopefully one of them will be excited enough that nobody has a chance to be upset. I know I’m being sneaky, but I really want them to be just as excited as I am.
It’s a gamble. They could all be excited right off the bat, and I will have stressed over nothing. It could also backfire in the worst way, and I might be stepping into a firing squad. All of the parents could gang up against me, and I’ll have six disappointments to live with. My nerves are absolutely fried with the ongoing carousel of what-ifs dancing around in my head. It’s why we planned this for tonight. I was driving both Steve and Beth absolutely nuts with my anxiety over telling my parents and Phil.
Monroe is scary close to school, being only like thirty to forty-five minutes away, depending on the roads you take, so we get there in record time. Steve parks the truck, but none of us jump out right away.
“Okay. No matter what.” Steve reaches across Beth’s lap to grab a hold of my hand. He gives me one of this smoldering panty dropper stares that he probably passes for a supportive look. I mean, it probably would if I didn’t know him so well. “If this all goes to hell, you’ll at least have us.”
“Steve, don’t be an ass! She’s already freaking out.” Beth smacks him again as she scolds him.
I giggle. “It’s okay, Beth, it was actually a really sweet thing to say.” I come to his rescue, because Steve has always been such a simple and gentle creature. He does and says things without thinking, but it’s never meant to cause any harm.
“Thanks, Queenie, I always knew you were my favorite.”
“You’re pretty special yourself.”
“Yeah, special, as in Special Ed,” Beth chimes in, but we continue to ignore her. She’s stuck between us, so she isn’t able to go anywhere.
“You see all that hating I gotta deal with all the time?” Steve mock pouts.
“Well, haters do just gotta hate.” I fake a sigh.
“Ugh! You two deserve each other.” Beth crosses her arms across her chest and sulks in defeat from our teasing.
We all take a minute to scan the area and see that all of our parents have arrived, so we step out of the truck and make our way toward the entrance for The Roadhouse.
The Roadhouse isn’t anything too fancy, but it does serve your food on a plate, instead of wrapped. You aren’t required to dress up. In fact, you can pretty much wear whatever you want. I wouldn’t suggest wearing flip-flops, though, because there are peanut shells all over the floor from the bottomless bowls of peanuts that are set on every table. Beth managed to get a peanut shell shoved up under her toenail once in high school, and she had to have surgery done on her toe to get that sucker removed.
We walk in together and stop to take in the energy of the place. It’s almost too dark to be considered real ambience, and the telltale crunch you hear as the servers walk across the floor sets the tone that this place is definitely laid back. Beth flinches at the crunch under her feet, and I have to stifle a laugh. The country music is so loud, you would think it would turn people away, but it doesn’t. The food is worth every possible thing you would normally find irritating about this place.
We spot everyone almost immediately. My mom stands up and power walks toward us so she can be the first one to hug us all. She hugs Beth and me first quickly, but when it comes to Steve’s turn she doesn’t even have a chance. Steve picks Mom up and lifts her off the ground. Mom giggles as he sets her back down and plants a kiss on her cheek, which causes Mom to blush from all the attention.
“When are you gonna dump that old man, so you can get your cougar on with me?” Steve flirts, as my dad walks up.
“You keep moving in on my woman, boy, I’m gonna have to kick your ass. I don’t even care if your daddy is my buddy.” My dad smirks. He walks over and gives Beth and me hugs and forehead kisses, but punches Steve playfully in the arm.
“My boy stirring up trouble again?” Steve’s dad says, as he wraps his arms around Beth’s and my shoulders.
“Just working way outside his league,” my dad teases, as he wraps my mom up in his arms and plants a borderline inappropriate kiss on her neck that makes her giggle.
It was kind of gross, but that’s my parents. You can’t take them anywhere, if you aren’t willing to put up with some obnoxious public displays of attention.
“I’m afraid that’d be my fault,” Steve’s dad says proudly. “Snagged me a girl who was way out of my league, so he aims to do the same. But if ya gotta defend your territory, have at it.”
“Gee, thanks, Dad.” Steve pouts, with an eye roll.
“You never mess with another man’s woman, son,” his dad teases.
They all laugh and joke some more, as we finally head back to the table reserved for our large group. Steve’s mom, Phil, Hank, and Beth’s brother never left the table when we arrived, because they were already deep in conversation. When we make it to the table, the three of us walk around finishing up our hellos, then we all sit down. Beth and Steve sit on either side of me, just in case I need their support for the big news I plan to break later.
The waitress looks impatient, but she knows not to let it show too much, if she expects a decent tip. She doesn’t know that her tip isn’t in jeopardy, whether she’s good or not. All of us tip well, no matter what. My mom says it’s because you never know what a person’s story is, so you should never judge them based off their first impression.
We all order our food and eat while we catch up and toss around more jokes. After we order dessert, Beth and Steve each take one of my hands in each of theirs under the table. I tell them that I’m pregnant, and the table goes quiet. My parents ask me if I’m going to stay in school, and I promise I have no plans to leave. That seems to be enough for them, because in the next moment, the entire table erupts in excitement.
Brandon tells us he has to leave shortly after that, and then Steve disappears to the bathroom, for a pretty long time. It goes unnoticed, though, because baby fever is in full swing for the rest of the table. Even the dads are excited. Phil looks absolutely proud, and it makes this entire night worth it. Phil really is the sweetest guy. I am so lucky that my baby gets him for a grandpa.
“Was that Jane?” Beth asks as she cranes her neck toward the bar.
We look over to find Steve headed back from the restrooms, and John’s little sister, Jane, trying to sneak off in the other direction. Beth refuses to let that happen.
“Hey, Jane! Over here!” she hollers across the restaurant.
Jane blushes but slowly makes her way over to our table. Steve sits back down on my other side, but he’s looking away when Jane gets closer.
I lean over toward him. “Please tell me you aren’t messing around with John’s little sister,” I say, low enough that only the two of us can hear.
He shrugs but flashes me a shush face. I shake my head, but I know you can’t really tell Steve not to do something. I just hope he doesn’t get himself in trouble. John has always been fiercely overprotective of his four sisters. Jane is a year younger than us. John’s other three sisters are older.
Jane makes it to us and immediately hugs her brother’s girlfriend. “Hey, Beth, we missed you last night. John told us you felt under the weather.”
Beth wasn’t sick, and I’m pretty sure she didn’t even know that John even made the trip down. He didn’t come by our dorms, so it looks sketchy, but Beth doesn’t let it show. “Yeah, I stayed up too late studying, and I caught a twenty-four-hour cold from exhaustion,” she lies.
I feel bad for my friend, and I don’t want to intrude on this awkward situation, so I tune out the rest of their conversation. I’m sure Steve and I will have to listen to a pretty heated phone conversation on the way home.
Twenty minutes later, everyone says their goodbyes. Hugs and kisses are thrown all over the place, and the three of us get lectured about staying out of trouble and studying hard. We get out to Steve’s truck and climb in. We all look at each other and let out a big collective sigh of relief.
I sit in the middle on the ride back, because I get the feeling that Beth needs a little space. I feel so bad for her, because something fishy is going on with John. I hope it works out, though, because they’ve been together so long. They may be exact opposites, but their love always almost rivaled Mathew’s and mine.
The ride back to campus was silent, and it seemed like it went on forever. Beth sat as close to the passenger side window as she possibly could. I thought I saw her wipe away tears a time or two, but I wanted to be supportive but also respectful of her privacy. The last ten minutes of our trip, I reached over and took her hand in mine and gave it a little squeeze. She turned and gave me an appreciative smile, before scooting over and resting her head against my shoulder. I rested my head on hers, and we finished the silent ride home.
I think Steve was ready to escape the tense mood we had going the entire ride back, so when he finally pulled up in front of our dorm building, he didn’t ask to join us. He climbed out to open the door for us, gave us hugs, then crawled back in and drove off. It was almost comical how fast the drop-off actually was. I couldn’t blame the guy because he can’t take sides in this situation.