To My Future Cheating Husband

VI. Here Comes the Bride

"You do?"

Her lip curves upward before she grabs the plastic spatula to spread out the cream, "I've had my fair share of...close friendship before your father."

I gasp, covering my full mouth with my hand, "Mother!" I said it in a way as if the information was extremely scandalous.

She snickers slowly before peeking at all the doors to ensure no one entered. "I was young once so-" she shrugged, "I explored the streets."

"What changed?" I asked. Mom had always been so reformed, so elegant. I did not expect her ever to explore the streets.

"When I was your age, I did all the things...kids your age did. I partied, drank, did a little-" she places two fingers in front of her lips, then pressed a finger on top of a single nostril and inhaled, "that."

I fan my face, "Mother!" I continued my exaggeration, never expecting my mom to do that.

"When your grandmother passed." An event that occurred before my time, "I was so...depressed, so I fell in deeper."

I place a hand over my chest, releasing a sigh of contentment knowing the next part of the story. "And then you met dad."

She chuckles a thoroughly amused one, "Oh, no. I met your father way afterward." Well, I'll be darn, I'm wrong.

"So, dad had nothing to do with you cleaning up?"

"Love is a powerful thing, sweetheart, but it's not everything." She smiles dimly, "I met this girl."

"And you experimented!"

She shot me a nasty glare, "If you didn't come out of me, I would expect you to be some else daughter."

"So, you didn't?"

She smiles and shrugs, "Well-"

"Mother!"

We burst out laughing, "A little here, a little there." She decides not to give any in-depth information in regards to her sexuality. "She changed me."

"How?"

"She got married."

I stare at her, still shocked about my mom's past. Previously, I never asked her about anything in her life. Like other teenage girls, I never wanted to probe into my parents' lives, and in return, they shouldn't probe into mine. Right now, the game has changed, drastically.

She places the cupcake down, "Our relationship was an open one. I didn't know about her other relations until she asked me out for coffee one day."

"And?"

"Told me she was pregnant, and she's getting married."

"Wow," I never expected her to hold such a rich history. "So, you love her?"

She shook her head, "There was chemistry between us, but not strong enough to become love. So, no. I don't love her. I love her existence, but that was it." Mom whipped the cream onto her apron. "She even asked me to play the piano at her wedding."

"You know how to play the piano?" That explains the piano in the other living room.

"Oh, goodness, no." She waves it off, "I only know one song - Here Comes the Bride." Her eyes seemingly in the distance, almost as if reliving a nostalgic memory.

"We have a piano." In which neither Trevon and I know how to play. I'm certain dad doesn't either since he has butterfingers.

"Your dad brought it for me." She smiles, sticking the pan into the oven, "He said, he fell in love with me when he first saw me play the piano."

I cover my mouth, "You mean?"

"I met your dad at the wedding-a total loser. Don't tell him I tell you this, but he used to wear these huge glasses and braces. He burnt all the photos we took together and forbidden me to speak of his dark past. But, he didn't know I secretly kept one." We laughed together.

"Can I see it?"

"I'll show it to you later, and you'll see-" She tucked a strand of hair behind my ear, "your beauty comes from mama, not papa."

I continue kicking my dangling legs, "How did she change you?" I asked.

"Her getting married changed me. That day when I looked at her, walking down the aisle towards her future husband, I thought - I want that happiness. I choose to change myself, to obtain it. Sometimes, that's just how it works. No one will be there to pick you up. Sometimes, you have to learn how to pick yourself up."