Knight of Converse

Knight of Converse - Chapter eight

Knight of Converse

Chapter eight

“Mom, Dad… we need to talk.” I said in the most serious voice that I could muster. It was time that I tried to convince them about letting the ‘exchange student’ (aka Duran) stay over here. My plan of attack was to tone down the sarcastic retorts (I would try) and remain as mature about this as possible. They were generally nice people, so if I made it out like Duran was homeless… which he was, I’m sure a negotiation would be possible.

I had my fingers crossed.

Dad looked up from his paper and cocked an eyebrow. “Why do I feel like you’re about to break up with us?” Could this man ever be serious? No. The answer to that was no.

I physically had to stop myself from rolling my eyes. “It’s not you, it’s me.” Oh come on! So I couldn’t hold in one smartarse retort. That didn’t make me a criminal!

Just a dumbass.

“You sound just like your mom when she broke up with me.”

Wait wait wait. “You broke up with dad?”

“Chris, is it really necessary to bring up that tiny misunderstanding?” Mom asked the same time as me.

“Hey! I wanna know this!” I shot in.

“Well considering Sol would have never been born if I—”

“What?! You almost sabotaged my conception?! Mother how could you!”

She rolled her eyes at me. “It wasn’t that big of a deal.”

Dad scoffed. “You made me cry!”

I put on an incredulous expression. “Wait, dad… you can cry?! You can feel human emotions?!” I gasped.

He gave me a dirty look.

“Your mom tried to break up with me because I lived to far away. You see we met—”

“In a farmer’s market in Shannon, yeah you’ve told that a billion times, get on with it.”

He ignored me. “I was on a—”

“Business trip,”

“And I accidently—”

“Spilled nasty fish parts and guts all over mom,”

“It really wasn’t my fault—”

“Yes, it was Chris.” Mom insisted.

“If you weren’t so short…”

“You bought the guts to scare your colleges and they ended up on me. It’s your fault.”

“Oh come on! It was hilarious!” Dad chuckled.

Mom swatted his arm. “You try being the one covered in fish guts!”

“Aha, no thanks.”

“Will you just get to the breakup part?!” I cut in.

Mom leaned her elbows on the kitchen island and rolled her eyes. “I wasn’t sure what would happen after he left to go back to the USA.” She enunciated softly in her Irish accent. “I did love him… I just… well I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“Honey, you were delirious from my dashing good looks.”

She gave him a dirty look. “Plus ma parents though he was an arrogant loud-mouthed American. Which he was.”

Dad genuinely looked shocked then narrowed his eyes. “You never mentioned that.”

Mom put on a fake innocent look. “Did I not? I must have been delirious from your dashing good looks ‘en.”