Super Crush (BxB)

A Train Across Tuscany (S2)

Welcome to Season 2! Thank you for joining me on this journey. I am so excited to continue the adventure. Let's see what Noah and the guys are up to, shall we? ;)

As the bullet train barrels through the Tuscan countryside, I can't help but think about the past few weeks.

***

The day I received the drive from Tiptoe, I jumped out of my desk chair and ran to my bedroom door to run down to the park. When I opened it, Mom was standing on the other side.

"Where do you think you are going, mister?"

The hallway outside my room was the place where she'd taken up residency. In my excitement, I had completely forgotten that she was my new shadow. Though she denied it, I even accused the woman of sleeping outside my door to keep guard of my whereabouts.

But it was no surprise when Mom saw me on every news outlet she said I wasn't allowed to leave her side. I blamed it on the overly dramatic take the reporters delivered the life-or-death situation in Times Square I had survived. Okay, I don't blame Mom for being protective. In my normal, emotionally unhealthy way, I told myself many times that the superhero showdown was no big deal, but really I knew it was the biggest deal. It could have ended in so many other ways.

I thought Mom's feelings went deeper, though. I had a theory that some of the reason she was being so clingy was her realization that she hadn't been around much in the past six months. This hypothesis hurts my heart.

It was weird seeing my face plastered all over the internet and TV. But it was worse seeing the others'. Each time Abe's or Clay's pictures popped up my stomach would flip. I was stuck in my apartment when they were both out there on their own. I knew I had to get to Balto and the message Dad left for me.

With Mom taking my Winter Break off from work to spend every minute of the day with me, she quickly became my jailer. The first week seemed like house arrest. She asked that I stay home and watch every Harry Potter movie with her, cook every meal as a team, and put six puzzles together. Six! She was insane. This made it nearly impossible to stride down to the statue for a quick visit.

This camel's back broke when she made me share my location on her stupid parenting app. In anger, I told her she had that option forever and she never used it before because she didn't care where I was.

This didn't go over very well. Mom said all three of my names with fury. Normally I would say hers back, Danielle Rose Holderman Brasso, but I couldn't get them in this time. She was already threatening to chase me down and spank me with the wooden spoon. After all these years I knew it was just an empty threat she had recycled from her own childhood, but this time she had real spoon-swinging fire in her eyes, so I told her how to turn on the tracker.

Later that night, I saw her silently crying while stirring the spaghetti noodles for dinner with said wooden spoon. I knew my comment was weighing on her, but I wasn't quite ready to apologize yet. A part of me couldn't help but think that I would not have gotten so wrapped up in the fight of good versus evil if she was mothering me more. She would have pulled me back. Stopped me from doing stupid shit.

Okay, no one could stop me from doing stupid shit. I was sure I would have snuck around, lied to her. I would have still gotten myself as deeply entangled in Abe's mind control or Clay's vigilantism if she had been a helicopter mom.

I cleared my throat and asked if she needed my help with the pasta sauce. She wiped her tears and said she had it under control tonight, but I was on cleanup duty.

"As you wish," I said throwing myself to the ground and rolling across the kitchen floor.

Any onlooker would have thought I lost my mind. Not Mom. She burst out laughing because she knew I was quoting her favorite movie, The Princess Bride.