In Love With a 1D Fangirl

Part 5

Colin’s mother pulled into the driveway of an opulent, well kept house. Colin slouched in the back seat, silent and trying to will himself to stop sweating. Compared to the BMW parked in front of the garage, their Toyota couldn’t have looked more out of place.

“Nice digs,” said Colin’s mother.

 “I guess,” he said.

 “Well...?” She turned around in her seat to look at him.

 “What?” This was a terrible idea. Turning around and going home sounded like a much better idea. At least then he didn’t risk meeting her parents. What would he say?

“Aren’t you going to go get her?”

“Can’t you just honk the horn, or something?” It wasn’t possible to slouch any lower, so Colin turned to look out the window.

 “Sweety, I’m going to say this as nicely as I can.  I am your mother, and I love you very much, but If you ever just pull up and honk and expect a girl to come out, I will assist her with any beating she wishes to administer. Now, get your butt up there and ring the doorbell.” His mother smiled in a mirthless, matter-of-fact way. Colin no longer felt safe in the car.

 “Alright. I’m going, I’m going. God.” The air felt cold on his clammy skin. He took a deep breath and approached the front door. The horrible numbness that came over him when he asked her out returned, only worse. Ridiculous images of a man with a shotgun answering the door filled his head.

 Colin swallowed hard and counted to three under his breath. Just knock alreadyl. The door whipped open as he extended his arm.

"I’ll be back in in while! Hi Co―” There wasn’t enough time to react. In slow motion, Colin watched as his arm reached the end of its extension. He felt the terrifying, overwhelming panic as his fist knocked gently on Zowie’s breast a single time. The look of shock and confusion that spread across her face slapped him harder than her hand ever could have.

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry. I was getting ready to... I mean the door. I was about to knock, and― I’m such an idiot. It was an accident.” His face flushed bright red and he ran a hand through his hair repeatedly. An overwhelming urge to throw up overcame him and took everything to keep it from happening.

Colin got so worked up it wasn’t until Zowie grabbed his arm that he noticed that she was laughing.

“It’s okay. Calm down. OMG, you’re face. It’s fine. Accident, right?” She smiled, stifling further giggles as best she could.

 “Yeah. Accident. You ready?” What a stupid question. Of course she was ready; she had answered the door. The date hadn’t even started yet and Colin was pretty sure he couldn’t screw things up any worse.

“That depends? Are you going to punch me in the boob again? Joking. It was a joke.” She snickered, cutting Colin off before he could answer.

Not sure what else to say, he turned and headed back to the car.

“Is that your mom?” Zowie asked.

“Yeah,” he replied. At least she wasn’t driving a station wagon with wood panelling. It could be worse.

“Oh. For some reason I thought you had a car.”

“I, uh, don’t even have my license yet, actually.” Another lie, but he wasn’t about to tell her that he couldn’t afford a car.

“Whatever. It’s overrated, anyway.” Colin did a double take. That was not a response he had been expecting. He rolled the words over in his mind as he opened the car door to let her get to the back seat.

“From the land of the ice and snow, from the midnight sun where the hot springs flow.” Panic rippled through Colin like water immediately following a cannon ball.

“Christ, Mom, what is that? Turn it down.”

She did so, but not without giving him a the kind of look only a mother can give when she wants someone to know that she didn’t appreciate the tone, but she’ll address that when the date isn’t around.

“Since when do you not like Zepplin?” she asked as he climbed into the car.

 “Since ever,” he mumbled.

 Colin’s mom didn’t respond, instead choosing to stare at him in the rearview mirror for a moment before backing out of the driveway.

The drive to the restaurant passed in awkward silence. For the most part, Colin stayed silent, thinking desperately for something to say that would simultaneously be interesting to Zowie while at the same time not draw ridicule from his mother later. These thoughts were only interrupted when his mother tried her own hand at starting conversation. Between embarrassing himself or his mother doing it for him, Colin much preferred to take matters into his own hands. He counted a small mercy that the drive only lasted about fifteen minutes.

 “I’ll call you when we’re done,” said Colin as he opened the door for his date.

 “Your chauffeur a--” His mother didn’t get to finish before the door slammed shut.

Barlycorns wasn’t the fanciest restaurant in town. Self-described as a family friendly sports bar, it was the kind of place that worked much better for social gatherings, or drinks after work, than the setting for a first date. The inside reeked of cigarettes despite switching to completely non-smoking a year ago. Flat panel T.V.’s lined the walls and hung above the bar, broadcasting everything from baseball highlights to football games.

An overly enthusiastic girl greeted them and took them too a booth directly below one of the many televisions. The cranked volume made it nearly impossible to hear anything. Colin glared up at the screen in frustration and sighed when Zowie reached into her purse and pulled out her phone.

He was starting to think things couldn’t get much worse when he noticed movement out of the corner of his eye. Glancing up, he noticed a boy about his age in an orange and blue Barlycorns uniform. His mouth was moving, but whatever he was saying was buried under the recap of the Red’s game earlier that afternoon. A plastic name tag indicated his name was “Lance”. Despite being sure that Lance was going over the night’s specials and asking for drink orders, Colin couldn’t help but notice that the waiter’s eyes kept landing on the hint of cleavage Zowie’s v-neck provided.

“I’ll just do water!” Colin blurted.

For the first time, Lance seemed to notice that he was there. He quickly jotted something down on a notepad before looking back to Zowie. Her mouth moved and Lance wrote something else down. He flashed a smile and shot Zowie a wink before walking away. Colin sneered at him, even after he disappeared into the kitchen.

Tucked away in his front pants pocket, Colin’s phone buzzed to life. Why did his mom have to text him now? He told her he would call her when they were done.

“what a tool.” Colin re-read the sentence a couple times before looking up at Zowie.She grinned.

“He was totally checking you out,” Colin texted back. He could just barely hear her laughter over the T.V.

“lol. no shit. except he forgot my eyes are up here.” A quick glance up showed Zowie pointing at her face, eyes opened wide.

“so why’d you pick here?” In the midst of the noise and smells, Colin found himself wondering the same thing.

“They have 1D’s favorite foods.” He felt his cheeks flush as he sent the message. The stupidity of moment hit home.

“lol. i do like other things ya know?”

“I guess. You just hadn’t mentioned anything else.”

“you never asked.”

 “Well, no time like the present. So, what do you like?”