“Mom didn’t mention that?”
“No, she didn’t.”
“How long have you two been together?” I asked.
“Three months.”
“Three months?” I repeated incredulously.
“Yeah… so you have a brother… how old is he?”
“Twenty-nine,” I replied. I had to admit I was kind of enjoying myself.
I knew mom would probably be annoyed with me, but I just couldn’t help myself. I had stopped believing in her relationships a long time ago. It might have been different if she had brought home respectable, age-appropriate men who looked like they were actually interested in more than casual sex. But as it stood, none of the men I had bumped into in her kitchen had left much of an impression.
Cliff seemed all right compared to some of mom’s other boyfriends, but I didn’t know squat about him at the moment. I would need to reserve judgment for a while longer.
“Fuck!” he gasped. “Twenty-nine?”
“Yup.”
“No… that can’t be—”
“Cliff!” mom said, appearing in the kitchen suddenly. She looked between Cliff and me nervously with a fake smile plastered across her face. “You told me you were heading out?”
“I meant I was heading to the kitchen to find something to eat,” he replied. “But there’s nothing in your fridge but… cupcakes.”
He pulled out a cupcake with pink frosting and bit into it. Mom didn’t address that, however; she was more concerned with what we had just been talking about.
“Uh, I thought you’d have left by now, Zo,” mom said, looking at me. “You told me you wanted to make an early start today.”
“I just wanted to practice a little before class,” I told her. “But I guess I overslept. Good thing too, otherwise I wouldn’t have had the pleasure of meeting Cliff here.”
He was sitting at the kitchen table, tearing into that cupcake completely oblivious to the fact that he was still half naked. In fact, he seemed perfectly at ease.
“Margot,” Cliff said. “You didn’t tell me you had another kid.”
Mom widened her eyes at me. “Oh… didn’t I?”
“And he’s twenty-nine,” Cliff continued. “I mean… fuck… that’s like… six years younger than me.”
Mom glared at me, and I sent her my most winning smile in return. “I was a teenager when I had Seth, ok?” she said, somewhat defensively.
“But you were not a teenager when you had Zoey… like you told me?” Cliff asked, with a coy smile playing on his face. “I guess that means you’re not really thirty-eight.”
I burst out laughing, and mom sighed in frustration. “You know what? I think you should head into work now,” she told Cliff.
I laughed and polished off the last bit of cupcake. “Should I guess your real age?”
“Get out,” mom said, blushing a little.
He went over to her, grabbed her suddenly and kissed her before I could turn away. “That’s ok,” he told her. “I’ve always had a thing for older women anyway. See ya, Zo.”
Then he headed towards mom’s room to get changed, and I shook my head at her. “You know what? I kind of like him.”
Mom rolled her eyes and sat down. “This is the thanks I get for letting you sleep on my couch.”
“Why didn’t you tell me you were seeing someone?”