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“Was he pissed about it?” I asked.
“Oh, your father got many phone calls from his parents,” Mom laughed, pressing the flattened dough into the pie pan.
“What’d you say, Dad?”
“I told them they could go back to making his decisions for him, or they could let me work this sense of entitlement out of him. No matter how great he was, I wouldn’t have some spoiled brat playing for me.”
“And what happened? Did they agree?”
“Hell no, they didn’t agree,” my dad laughed. “They were worse than their boy.”
“Tell her about the cake,” my mom added with a smile.
“Oh, yeah,” Dad chuckled. “The mother baked me a cake after one of the big games when her son had been benched.”
“That was nice,” I answered, somewhat confused.
“Until your Dad cut into it after dinner and saw it was filled with wet dog food.”
“What the hell?” I said with a laugh.
“Mm-hmm,” Dad rolled his eyes. “Parents can be so childish when their precious babies don’t get their way. Instead of allowing them to learn that life doesn’t always go your way because you want it to, they pull some immature bullshit.”
“I guess Abbie got a good dinner that night,” I said.
“You know how much that hound dog loved a free meal,” he said, smiling at the memory of his favorite dog. “I would’ve loved to laugh at it all, but it irritated me how some parents could behave when their kids didn’t get their way. That boy never learned his lesson, I’m afraid.”
“Do they still live here?”
“No,” my mom answered. “They followed that boy around from city to city, following one third-string quarterback job after another until the NFL cut him loose entirely. I think they ended up in Houston or somewhere.”
“The moral of the story is this,” Dad said. “It seems your fellow has parents who might be like the Johnsons. The next thing you know, you’ll end up with a dog food cake from his mother.”
“I guess Mom told you about his family,” I said.
“You know how it goes when your mother is on the phone. It’s hard to hear anything else,” he teased as my mom arched her eyebrow at him playfully. “But I am proud of you. Make him work for it. I just hope Mommy Dearest doesn’t get in the way again if you know what I mean?”
“Well, he seems like he’s on a mission.”
“Yeah, well, we’ll find out once the family is together tomorrow for the Fourth, won’t we?” Mom said.
“Hey, if the guy still wants a relationship with me after he meets everyone tomorrow and sees where I come from and what we’re all about, we’ll know whether he’s a keeper.”
Chapter Fifty-Seven
John
I didn’t care what Mickie said about me learning my lesson; I knew in my heart that there was still a chance to get my girl back. I didn’t care if I had to walk barefoot through hell on hot coals with the devil shoving a poker up my ass, I was going to do whatever it took to get my Mickie back.
“Thank you, sir,” I said when my Uber driver approached Mickie’s parents’ place. I came straight to the house from the airport after Mickie gave me the address and said the barbeque would start at two o’clock sharp.
I was pulling in at half past two, but that’s only because the driver got mixed up with the directions and sent us the wrong way out of Memphis Airport.
“Have a great Fourth of July,” the man said, then backed out of the cobblestone driveway onto the quaint, tree-covered street.
I waved the man off and then glanced around at my charming surroundings. This was the epitome of country charm, and being in such a beautiful place was almost surreal. The house was pristine, and the landscaping and lawns were impeccable. From what I could tell, the brick house stood at least two stories tall, with white shutters and dormers lining the six windows facing the street.
I instantly thought of Mickie spending her childhood in this home. I could imagine her stepping out of this home as a teenager, walking out to go to high school with her backpack slung on her shoulder, or walking out barefoot to get the mail.
