Moving Forward

Chapter Eight

"I thought you didn't like Uber drivers?" I tease.

"Hey, it's not my fault!" She slams the menu against the table. "Nobody explained what the service was. I thought people were hitch hiking in random cars."

"Okay then." I giggle.

Mum reopens the menus and continues to browse through the items.

"Should we order food or are you leaving too?"

"No, I'm not leaving."

"Great." She sighs happily. "Can you order me the waffles and a green tea?"

"Sure, no worries."

Without looking, I step out of the booth and turn to face my mother. A heavy force collides into my body, knocking me to the cold hard ground. My head hits the ground sending a sharp pain trickling through my body.

"I'm so sorry, I wasn't paying attention," I mumble.

As I scamper to my feet, I find Axel standing before me, a lopsided grin on his face.

"Hey, Ava," he cheers. "I didn't expect to bump into you here."

"Yeah, so strange," I mutter.

My eyes avert to the curious gaze consuming my mother. The excitement is practically dripping from her face. Axel smiles at me and then turns his attention to my mother. In the many possible ways I see this working out, none of them are good.

"I'm Axel, Ava's –"

"Friend, and this is my mum," I explain.

"Nice to meet you, Ava's mum." Axel chuckles.

My mother shuffles across the length of the booth so that she's closer to us. Her peculiar gaze flickers to Axel as I see the cogs turning in her mind. Whatever she's plotting, it can't be good.

"Are you here for breakfast too?" she questions.

"Just a quick bite, actually." He shrugs.

"You know what, that's what we were doing too. We should –" Before she can finish that sentence, I step in to cut her off. There's no way she's inviting Axel to have breakfast with us.

"I'm sure Axel is busy." I shoot her a glare.

"I mean, I was just leaving, so you two could have breakfast?" Mum explains.

"No, I'd really hate to mess around with your plans," says Axel.

"No, I promise you'd be doing me a favour."

Before Axel has the chance to debate her sentence, Mum reaches for the fifty dollar note in her bag and hands it to me.

"You don't have to leave." I frown.

"Have fun," is her response.

Mum tugs me into a tight hug before stepping back and smiling. She briefly waves goodbye to us and heads outside. I see her linger around the front staring at her phone before she wanders off. At least we don't have to have breakfast, but things feel awkward now.

I don't want to brush either of them off but at the same time, things would be too weird.

"I'm sorry about this," I apologise. "I feel so awkward."

"Is there something wrong?" Axel nervously laughs.

"No, I just thought eating breakfast with my mother might be weird considering the circumstances." My cheeks flush at the thought of Axel.