Nate returned home from his afternoon with Ben and Samantha to find his Mom preparing dinner. He walked into the kitchen and sat down on one of the stools that sat alongside the counter.
"Hi honey," said Martha as she worked chopping some broccoli. "How was your day?"
"Fine, how was yours?" replied Nate.
"Good. I got to spend some time with Samantha Twist today." She walked over and dropped the broccoli into the pot to steam it.
Nate couldn't help but perk up when he heard that. "Oh yeah? What did she have to say?"
"We had a nice chat. I'm not quite sold on the whole idea of this town yet, but I think I'm warming up to it. If everyone is like her and her wife Frances, maybe this will be alright for us." Martha walked over to the counter and started working on cutting up some cauliflower to go with the broccoli.
"Well, that's good." Nate was glad to hear his Mom was warming up to Moon Lake.
"Heck, I could even see myself becoming friends with her and her family. And I hear you've become quite chummy with their son Ben." Martha gave Nate a coy smile.
Nate couldn't help but blush a bit. "Well..."
Martha stopped and reached over and took her son's hand. "Whatever you want to do I will support you, you know that right?"
"That's good to hear, because I already agreed to it today." Nate looked at his Mom's expression to see if there was any sign of disappointment, but there was none, to his relief.
"It's funny, the roads life take us down aren't always the ones we imagined." Nate's Mom gave him a reassuring smile and went back to cooking.
"That's for sure." Nate stood up and stretched. "Anything I can do to help?"
"Sure. Check on the chicken. It's on the grill outside."
"No problem." Nate walked outside, shutting the patio door behind him. He let out another deep sigh. He couldn't believe how radically his mother's tune changed in the short time since they found out. He wondered what Samantha had said to her to make her change her attitude so quickly. He then shrugged it off, figuring it was just reassuring her how the town wasn't populated by bloodthirsty monsters.
* * *
William grabbed another piece of chicken off the platter with his fork. "This is really quite delicious honey. Thank you."
"You're welcome," replied Martha. "Nate helped."
"So, I was talking to the Dean today and he was explaining a bit more about how it...you know...is." William turned to his eldest son. "Your mom tells me you've decided to go through with it."
Nate's heart leaped in his chest. He looked up at his Dad and nodded. "Yep, I sure have."
William nodded. "Well, you'll have to let us know what it's like."
Nate looked in disbelief at both his parents. Apparently, they were both warming up to the town now. Then, his brother piped up.
"Some of the kids were telling me about this guy, Morgan, on the track team. Apparently he's super fast and a werehorse. He's the star of the team. A pure black stallion. So that's pretty cool, I think." finished Eric.
Nate sat there in shock. His entire family was onboard. Maybe things were going to be okay after all.