Their home was an upscale, two-story Spanish style home in a subdivision built around a golf course. As beautiful as it was, I couldn’t help but remember a conversation that Gabe and I once had.
“I’m not so scary, you know,” Gabe had said.
“Said the alligator to the little yappy dog that was standing along the side of the lake before he ate him.”
“There aren’t gators in those ponds, are there?” I whispered to Gabe as we walked to the front of his parents’ home.
“This is Florida and they can be found everywhere, babe.” I could tell by the look on his face that he was remembering the conversation too. Then he leaned over and loudly nibbled my neck, making me laugh and twist to get away from him.
His parents went inside rather than wait on us to stop fooling around. Gabe pulled me to him for a long, lingering kiss before he linked our fingers and led me inside. The ambience of Al and Martina’s home was the exact opposite of Gabe’s in Ohio. His parents’ home was filled with warm colors, inviting furniture, and family pictures were on every surface. Gabe’s home was sterile in comparison and didn’t have a single family photo sitting around.
“You didn’t get any of your mother’s decorating skills, did you?”
“Nope, not even one. I admire a home that’s put together well, but don’t have the first clue how to make it happen. You remind me a lot of my mom,” Gabe said.
I could tell by the reverent tone of voice that he meant that as a compliment, but comparing anyone to your mother is a recipe for disaster. “Babe, that’s just wrong on so many levels.”
“I wasn’t saying that because…”
“I know,” I said, cutting him off. I knew he wasn’t saying that I was feminine in any way. “I meant that our relationship shouldn’t resemble anything you have with a parent. That’s just gross.”
“I was only referring to your effortless cooking and decorating. You make having a warm and inviting home seem so easy.”
“You’re forgiven.” I stood up on my tiptoes and gave him a kiss before we continued to the kitchen.
“Jesus, you two,” Gabe said when we found his mom and dad kissing in the kitchen. “See, what did I tell you?” he asked me.
On our very first date, although I didn’t call it that at the time, Gabe told me that his parents still acted like newlyweds between bites of country fried steak–that I later put to shame. His revelation was the first thing, other than sex, that we had in common. What he thought was gross about his parents, I found completely charming. Of course, I suspected we’d have the exact reverse situation when he met my parents in the middle of the week.
“It’s our house,” Al told him, “and we’ll neck if we want to.” Al gave Martina one last peck on the lips and then waved for his son to follow him out to the garage. “I want to show you the next purchase I’m planning on making.”
I learned from Gabe that Al not only had a successful auto repair shop, he restored and rebuilt classic cars that had been abandoned. Some he kept for himself and others he sold for a considerable profit. I too was curious about the next project, but I could see that Martina wanted some alone time to talk to me one-on-one.
“Do you want to help me fix brunch?” she asked. “Gabe told me what a marvelous cook you are so try not to show me up in my own kitchen.” She winked playfully at me then walked to her refrigerator.
It would give me something to do with my nervous hands, besides look like I had a medical condition, so I jumped on it. Martina pulled a casserole dish out of the refrigerator and set it on the counter. It appeared to be some type of French toast that you make the day before and let sit overnight. It looked scrumptious and I made a mental note to get the recipe from her later, especially if Gabe liked it, because I suspected that swapping recipes wasn’t on her mind right then.
“Do you have any food allergies?” she asked as she pulled fresh produce from her crisper drawer of her refrigerator. “I put a lot of veggies in Gabe’s scrambled eggs and I don’t want to add an ingredient that offends or attempts to kill you.”
“I don’t have any allergies and I like just about everything except liver and onions.” I began washing the vegetables in the sink as she pulled them out. I chuckled as I washed the button mushrooms because I thought of the faces Gabe made every time someone tried to slip one into a recipe. He thought cream of mushroom soup was the most disgusting thing he’d ever seen.
“What’s got you so tickled?” Martina asked.
“Oh, I was just laughing about Gabe’s hatred of mushrooms.” I was still recalling funny memories so it took me longer than normal to realize that Martina was standing as still as a statue. I turned and found her studying me with her head tilted to the side.
“Gabe doesn’t hate mushrooms,” she replied softly.
I realized that I was standing on very shaky ground and worried that my next words could make or break my relationship with her. “Oh, of course he doesn’t. I was confusing him with my best friend Chaz.” I giggled a little bit. “I blame it on my lack of sleep from…um…” I turned back and picked up the paring knife to either cut the veggies, slit my own throat, or defend myself from a marauding mama bear.
Martina didn’t move so I began slicing and dicing peppers and onions. I felt her eyes on me the entire time and I was afraid to blink. “Don’t slice those,” she said softly when I reached for the mushrooms. “Gabe doesn’t like them.” Her voice had a sadness to it that made me look up at her. I felt so bad that I upset her, even if it was accidentally. “I can’t believe I didn’t know that all these years.” Martina shook her head.
“He probably didn’t want to upset you,” I replied. “He made me chicken Marsala for dinner once and put all of the mushrooms on my plate. He picks them off his pizza rather than complain about them if they end up on there by accident.”
“There’s more to it than him just being thoughtful,” Martina said, “but thank you for trying to make me feel better.” The oven beeped to let her know that it was preheated so she slid the French toast casserole into the oven then set about cooking various types of meats. “You care a great deal for my son, Josh. I can tell that so I’m going to let you in on a little secret the way that you did for me just now.”
“Okay,” I said, almost hesitantly.
“Gabe isn’t just a pleaser by nature; a lot of it’s from circumstance or his misguided notion that he needs to be a certain way to be loved. I think that possibly comes from being adopted. He’s told you about his older brother, Dylan, right?” I nodded my head. “Well, Dylan was mine and Al’s biological child. We tried for years to conceive again, but it just wasn’t in the cards. The daughter of a long-time family friend became pregnant when she was a senior in high school and decided to give her baby up for adoption. As difficult as that time was for her, it was the answer to our prayers. We brought little Gabe home from the hospital and our family was finally complete.” Martina smiled sweetly as she recalled the memory.
