Chapter Three
Cliff
“Mom?” I called when I walked through her front door.
“Upstairs!” she shouted back.
I ascended the steps to the second floor.
She was standing in front of a full-length mirror across from her bed, checking out her outfit.
My mother was fifty-five. But Keller had been correct about her.
She could pass for twenty years younger, thanks to the plastic surgeries, facials, Botox, gym memberships, and benefit of using my personalized grooming team.
Whenever I took her somewhere outside White Pines, people mistook her for my wife. I knew better than to correct them.
“Does this dress send off a vibe?” she asked, pressing the fabric against her hips.
It was a lowcut black cocktail mini-dress, which accentuated how fit my mother was.
Keller’s comment that my mom was ‘fine’ made me grimace again.
Apparently, I could add my former students to the list of men who found my mother hot.
If I had my way, she would tone down the overtly sexy clothes she often favored.
“Yes. It sends a message that you don’t want to wake up alone tomorrow morning,” I quipped.
She ignored me. “Zip me, will you?”
I walked over to raise the zipper while she held up her hair. “Where are you going dressed like that?”
“The corner of Main and Townsend Streets in Hopsborough. I read that’s where the other hookers hang out,” she replied sarcastically, before turning to face me.
“Honestly, you’re such a prude and so judgy.
I should never have sent you to Sunday school.
That’s what I get for listening to your grandmother.
I should have known to ignore her advice after she told me your father would be a great catch. ”
“I should probably call Grams. I don’t think I’ve spoken to her in like three weeks.
” Calls with my grandmother weren’t pleasant.
They usually consisted of her criticizing my mother, just as my mother often brought up her beefs with my grandmother.
Still, I didn’t want to one day reckon with having ignored Grams while she’d been alive.
“Honestly, Cliff, you always stray off topic,” my mother pointed out, not for the first time in my life. “Get to the point. I don’t want to keep Clem waiting.”
“Clem? The owner of Central Diner?” I asked.
They had known each other for years. Although it had been clear to me for a long time that Clem found my mom attractive, she had never shown interest in return.
He was older than her, rather average looking, and made a modest income.
He was a nice guy and respected in the community, but I didn’t see what was in it for my mother.
Typically, she was drawn to younger men who’d give her a good time in ways I didn’t want to envision, or older rich men who’d bring joy to her life in other ways, like providing gifts and trips.
“What’s wrong with Clem?” she asked as she walked to her cabinet to rummage through her jewelry.
“Nothing,” I answered. “I just didn’t think you liked him that way.”
She glanced back at me like I had said something confusing. “What way? He has tickets to an off-Broadway production of Moulin Rouge in Burlington. He asked me to go. It beats staying home and darning socks.”
“Darning socks? What is that?” I wondered.
Mom shrugged. “Beats me. Maybe it’s screaming ‘darn’ at one when its match mysteriously disappeared in the washing machine. Are you going to tell me why you’re here or not?”
“I stopped at the diner this morning. Imagine my surprise to see a sign asking people to support me on a show I haven’t signed up for,” I informed her.
She smirked. “Ah. So, this is a yell-at-your-mother visit. Well, make it quick. I need to leave within five minutes.” She held up two different pairs of earrings. “Which do you think goes better with this dress?”
I exhaled in frustration. “The dangling ones.” She put the other pair back on the dresser and began to fasten the jewelry I had chosen. “But if you thought the others looked nicer…”
Mom caught my reflection in her mirror. “Darling, only a foolish woman disregards fashion advice from a gay man.”
“That’s a stereotype,” I mumbled.
“Maybe,” she replied. “But I get more compliments when I listen to you, so in your case, it’s a fact.” She moved on to the other earring. “Clock is ticking.”
I huffed, then tried to hide a smirk. “Well, there’s no entertainment in shouting now that you’re prepared for it.”
After fastening the other earring, she shook her shoulder-length brown hair, then patted it in place.
“Maybe someone will cut you off on your drive home and you can have fun cursing them while leaning on the horn.” She started past me.
“Call me before you come next time so I don’t need to rush you out. ”
“Wait. At least explain yourself,” I demanded. “Mom, I could make you look very foolish if I wanted to. What if I told everyone that I never agreed to the show?”
“Go ahead, if you really don’t want to do it. I’ll say I was mistaken, and that will be that.” She crossed her arms. “But you won’t do that, because deep down, you wanted me to push you into saying yes.”
“What? Did not,” I protested.
She patted my cheek. “Cliff, you’ll need to change things up a bit if you settle down with someone.
You’re too easy to figure out, and that’s a disadvantage when the person you’re with doesn’t have your best interests in mind.
I say that from experience. The only time I surprised your father was when I walked out on him thirty years ago. ”
“I don’t even know what you’re talking about right now.”
My mother rolled her eyes. “You’ve had this same behavior since you were a child.
Whenever you wanted to try something but were afraid of the consequences, you’d tell me all the reasons you weren’t going to do it.
In the beginning, I’d say ‘okay’ and let you be.
Then you’d mope, wishing you had taken a chance.
Finally, I started deciding things for you.
I signed you up for Little League baseball, football, soccer, and every other sport you ever worried about playing, then excelled in.
You got joy from those things, and you never remembered that you had been too scared to enroll. ”
“I don’t recall…”
“And it was the same for the writing contests, the student council, and which college to attend,” she added.
“I was a kid…”
“And as an adult, when you said you made a mistake when you became a schoolteacher, but you were afraid to leave it to open a gay club in Boston with your buddy. Who gave him your share of the upfront cash that was needed to get the venture going? You or me?”
“You,” I whispered. She had done it without asking me.
“Then you felt guilty that I used my retirement savings, you repaid me like I knew you would, quit your job, and began a career that makes you happy and has made you millions,” she added.
I nodded. She wasn’t wrong. “Okay, but this time is different. There’s lots that I know I will hate about doing the show.”
Mom smoothed her dress again, as if it had wrinkled just by debating me.
“Yes, you will. But you want a boyfriend. It’s just another one of those things you talk yourself out of, worrying it will end badly.
Sweetheart, do you think I don’t hear the sadness in your voice when you tell me about your friends and their families?
That’s who you want to be. Where you got that genetic coding from, beats the hell out of me.
But that’s you, and you won’t be happy otherwise.
Here’s a chance for you to get it.” She grabbed her purse from the top of the bed.
“So, do what we do whenever we want something.”
“What’s that?” I asked.
My mother looked at me like I was an idiot. “Whatever we need to.” She shook her head, then kissed my cheek before exiting the room to make her way toward the stairs.
I didn’t want her to believe she controlled the decision, so I shouted to her descending figure. “I might still say no.”
“Okay, darling,” she yelled back cheerily, clearly not believing me for a second. “Lock up when you leave.”
* * * *
A couple of days had passed since I signed the contract for the program, my attorney at my side.
I had hesitated when the production company’s lawyer pointed out that I needed to sign a non-disclosure agreement which forbade me from sharing private information about the show’s contestants, unless permitted by all parties.
He had claimed it was to protect individuals’ privacy, including my own, as everyone else needed to enter into the same contract.
Though that sounded good in some respects, it meant I was limited in what I could voice on camera regarding rationale for whom I might deselect as a potential partner.
I hoped that wouldn’t somehow backfire and make me look like an ass.
There were a few other conditions. I needed to house the cast and crew, though I’d be reimbursed.
And though the show would be a combination of pre-taped segments and live broadcasts over the course of seven nights, I needed to agree that I and others associated with me would not watch any of it until the finale was over.
The producers didn’t want me to base my final selection on anything that might have happened behind the scenes that I wasn’t meant to witness.
Producers wanted my potential suitors to freely confess their feelings when I wasn’t around.
No doubt, the hope was contestants would be on their worst behavior without me observing them, and drama would boost the ratings.