Morgan

Chapter Twenty Seven- Family Dinner

"I have a really big ask" I say looking to Mia with large puppy dog eyes.

She laughs a little, looking up from her swim roster she was hard at work on whilst we sat for our lunch break.

"What is it" she asks, tucking a stray white blonde hair behind one ear, her hair up in a short pony tail.

I hesitate because this was an awkward ask but a favour I needed all the same. It was Wednesday and I had the family dinner tonight. I needed to take a human shield with me to save me from Julia and Harry Keaton and their million questions. If I brought Mia and passed her off as a date, they wouldn't ask about Leah, they would assume I had moved on ages ago. I couldn't talk about Leah, let alone hear her name. It was far too lethal to a heart beating at only ten percent.

"Are you free tonight" I ask.

She squints at me curiously "why" she replies.

I smile "I will take that as...you are. So you know you love me right and I'm your favourite colleague" I begin.

She shakes her head with an amused smile.

"Will you still be my favourite colleague once this question is asked.." she questions.

I bite my lips in anticipation of how ridiculous I was about to sound and what a teenage dilemma this sounded like. Please hide my failing love life from my parents.

"So I have a family dinner tonight... they still think I'm casually dating Leah. They don't even know I ever met up with her but they assume I am still seeing her. Mia I cannot live through a dinner with the Keatons and the questions that will attempt to assassinate me over the dinner table. Would you come and be my adorable human shield?" I ask

"Adorable you say?" She asks.

I bump her arm with mine and take a bite from my Apple, nodding with the puppy dog eyes.

She watches me closely, smiling. "I don't have plans... and believe it or not but it's not such a chore to be presumed your date... nor to be fed for free this evening. All I have at home is a frozen pizza"

"I can't tell if you were flirting with me or just telling me you're up for a free meal... but either way thank you" I say, squeezing her arm lightly and taking another bite of my apple.

The faculty lounge heater was bust, only discovered Monday when we all came back to work. I was now sat beside Mia in a huge winter coat, wishing I had worn a sweater today and not just a long sleeve t shirt. She finds it terribly amusing as she is not cold in the slightest having come from a country that often gets snow in winter, not the balmy winters of Arizona. The look Mia throws me as I shiver and clutch the coat shut at my belly makes me want to laugh.

"Morgan I do worry about you surviving a real winter when you wrap up like we are in the tundra. I could happily run out in a t shirt and shorts and do track right now without so much as a goosebump"

I raise my eyebrows in time with the raising of my jacket collar right up to my cheeks in defiance "good thing I won't be leaving Arizona any winter soon then"

She shakes her head and looks back to her paperwork.

"I was going to invite you to Sweden on spring break to help you avoid another run in with Annie... but I think you would perish stepping off of the plane" she suggests, making notes on the paper in her lap.

I drop the collar and sit up a little straighter "you were... really?" I ask surprised.

She smiles. "Yes of course... if you were alone or without the kids or thought you would have another crappy one. I don't like the thought of a friend spending time alone... and at home it's pretty near perfect if I don't say so myself. I think you would like it"