A Pleasant Surprise-SC

I walk in the front door of my house and see Eric sitting in the living room, talking to my mom. I shut the door, and I guess they heard it, because they both looked in my direction. "How is he, Sweetheart?" My mom asks me.

"Yeah, just dehydration. The doctor says he'll be fine," I reply, almost forgetting that Eric was there. I turn to him and say, "Hi Eric, what are you doing here?"

"Well, after you left, I noticed you dropped your book, so I looked inside and found your address in it. I noticed that your house was right next to the house we were at, so I came over and knocked on the door. Your mom answered and I explained what happened, and she invited me in," he explained. I sat down next to him and my mom looked at me with a suspicious look on her face.

I must be sitting too close to him, I thought, as I scooched over a bit, better. Her face still looked at me like I was going to marry this boy.

"Mom!" I say, and she stops looking at me that way.

"What?" She asks, all innocent-like.

"You know what!"

"No, I don't know, what?"

"Smart-ass," I say, smiling a bit.

"Where do you think you get it?"

"Anyway, Eric. I believe there is something you would like to tell Stacy?"

"What do you mean?" he asks when I look at him.

"You know, the thing you told me?"

"Right. Um, Stacy? Um, I like you," He said.

"That's a lot of ums," I say, trying to avoid the situation, because the truth was, I liked him back.

"Yeah," he says with a chuckle, "But I really do like you, Stacy, and I was hoping you liked me back," he adds, and my throat starts to close up.

"Uh, maybe we can do this another time?" I ask, and seeing my mom's face, I quickly corrected it, "But I guess right now is a good time, so um, yes I like you back, now I'm going to my room to take off my shoes and coat. When I left, I heard my mom tell Eric that it was normal for me to try to avoid situations like this. I didn't wait for his response before entering my bedroom. I took off my coat and shoes and went to the kitchen to get some hot cocoa. When I returned to the living room, Mom looked at me with expectant eyes.

"Well?" she asked.

"Well, what?" I replied.

"Is that it? You like each other and that's the end of it?"

"What do you want me to do, Mom, kiss him?"

"No, a hug will do," she said in such a hopeful way, that I actually thought she wanted me to kiss him. I hugged him and sipped my cocoa. A few moments later, Mom was in her room and Eric and I were playing video games. I went upstairs to go to the bathroom, and heard my mom on the phone with someone in her room. She sounded upset, so I listened in.

"Oh...really? You're sure it was him?" I heard her ask. It sounded like she was about to cry, "Oh, okay, thank you, Ma'am," she said and started to walk towards the door. I ran quickly downstairs and picked up my controller as if nothing happened, trying not to shake in front of Eric. Mom came down and looked at me with tear stains on her face. She did her best to pretend she hadn't been crying, "Sweety, there's something I need to talk to you about. Can you come here, please?"\

I followed her into the kitchen and she said, "Remember when I said that your father was in the Army, helping the country?"

"Yeah, Mom, why?" and then it dawned on me, he died in the line of duty, "oh," I added without her having to say anything.