A/N: *Spongebob narrator voice* Ten years later... I'm finally done with this book!

I've had a blast going back to a story I wrote so long ago - when I was just a freshman in high school - and rewriting it in a different point of view. I hope you guys have enjoyed getting a look inside Christian's head!

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Epilogue

I could feel the sweat building up on my hands as I tightly gripped the steering wheel. The trip to my mom's house was one I made pretty often – but I had Sophia with me this time.

Yes. I was introducing Sophia to my eccentric but well-meaning mother, just in time for the holidays. All of a sudden, it felt like we were in the middle of a two hour trip when in reality it was much shorter.

Feeling like I needed to warn her before she stepped into that house and was taken aback by my mother's fast-paced, filter-less way of life, I said, "I've probably told you this before, but since you're about to meet her... my mom is a bit... well... she's something else. We'll put it that way."

"Have you met Tori? I don't think she'll be more than I can handle, Chrissy."

I suppressed a sigh. "You know, I bet if I started calling you Soapy, you'd think twice about keeping that nickname for me."

She narrowed her eyes. "You wouldn't."

"Oh, you know I would."

She paused. "We'll discuss this later."

I shook my head with a small smile, stopping in front of the cozy blue suburban house my mom lived in. I'd bought it for her when I made it big, but she had picked it out. House hunting with my mom was probably more television worthy than most of the shit I'd done throughout the years. I would have gladly bought her something even bigger and nicer, but my mom wasn't a huge fan of my lavish lifestyle, and I was mostly just relieved when she finally made up her mind. Every other house had something "terribly wrong" with it. The porch was too wide, there were too many windows, the floors looked like they'd be too slippery with socks on, there were too many trees outside and she really didn't want to hear birds hanging in them, chirping all the time, the carpet was a "poop brown" color – the list went on. I think she mostly did it to annoy me, but it also showed where I got my annoyingness from.

I turned off the ignition, pocketing the keys. "Don't expect a traditional Thanksgiving dinner, either. I'm thinking it'll be sandwiches or Hot Pockets."

"Will there be pie?"

"Of course," I said. Our Thanksgiving dinners were never anything fancy, unless she bought a turkey that'd already been cooked or ordered a catered meal, but one thing we always delivered on was pie. Store bought, of course.

With her hand on the door handle, she said, "That's all that matters."

Before I had a chance to jump out and get the door for her, she had already opened it and stepped out. By the time I got out, she was walking around the car to stand by me.

"You make it hard to be a gentleman," I said. "You never let me open your door."

She sounded a little exasperated when she answered. "I'm not going to sit there and wait for you to come open my door when I can move my arm two inches and open it myself."

I grabbed her hand, interlacing our fingers. Her hand was considerably smaller than mine, but it felt like a perfect fit to me. "I'll catch you off guard one day. Or you'll just get lazy and give in."

She squeezed my hand, tugging me forward. "We'll see."

As I trailed behind her, I said, "If she seems weirdly excited about all of this... well, it's because you're the only girl I've brought home. And I'm hoping the only one I'll ever bring home."

Sophia didn't even get a chance to react or answer, much to my dismay. That wasn't the kind of thing you wanted to say before getting interrupted. But as soon as we stepped onto the porch, the door swung open, revealing my wide-eyed, grinning mother. She just stared at Sophia for a few seconds with that expression before bringing her in for a hug. I could pretty much see all of the air leaving Sophia's body as my mom squeezed the life out of her. "Oh, it's so nice to finally meet you! Oh, you're just so beautiful! I'm so glad you guys are here."

Her choked out reply didn't really sound like a formation of words. More like choppy sounds.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I'm not letting you breathe, am I?" My mom finally let go of Sophia. "Come in, come in!"

Sophia took exactly one step forward and stopped in her tracks when she heard my mom gasp.

"Oh, Chris!" My mom reached out and pulled me in for an equally suffocating hug. "Oh, my little boy. You've grown up so much since I last saw you!"

"Mom, I came over here a week ago."

"I know. I was just trying to make our reunion seem more dramatic for our guest. Play along, alright?"

I rolled my eyes, growing more and more positive that this was going to be just as dramatic and traumatic as I had expected. "Soph, this is my mom, Chelsea. I'm sure she'll insist you call her by her first name, so you might as well just start now." When I was sure my mom wasn't looking at me, I mouthed, 'I'm so sorry' to Sophia.

Sophia was a champ, though. She brushed off all of my mom's outbursts with a smile. Then again, like she'd said, she was best friends with Tori, who was pretty much a younger version of my mom. "I'm Sophia. It's nice to finally meet you."

"Oh, Sophia, I know who you are. How could I not? But really, come in, come in. I have dinner ready for us."

I tried to hide the shock on my face but probably failed miserably. "You do?"

"Well... I ordered pizza and bought a pie."

That sounded more like it. I just shook my head in amusement, following her and Sophia inside, heading towards the dining room. I took a seat next to Sophia, while my mom sat in front of Sophia. I just hoped she wasn't planning on starting an interrogation.

Two large pizzas were laid out on the table for us, which meant it was time to dig in. Turns out stressing over your girlfriend meeting your mom worked up quite the appetite. I was probably going to eat one of those by myself.

Sophia looked over at me like she wanted to make a comment but was holding herself back.

"Don't look at me like that," I said. "No judging."

"Hey." My mom looked at me sternly. I stared up at her wide-eyed, with pizza in my mouth and a slice in my hand, hovering near my mouth. "Don't screw this up with her by being rude. You worked so hard to get to this point." She looked over at Sophia, her stern look instantly disappearing. "Well, I helped a little, too."

A smile spread across Sophia's face. I really had gone to some pretty drastic lengths to get her to forgive me. "I remember that."

"Christian came to me, completely distraught, and said he didn't know what to do. He said, 'Mom, I think I'm in love, but I screwed up and she hates me, and I kind of hate myself right now.' So I smacked him and told him to calm down. Then I had him talk it out and tell me what happened."

Oh, god. Did we really need to relive this? "Mom..."

"I wouldn't have helped him if I hadn't believed him, though," she went on, ignoring my discomfort. Thanks, Mom. Thanks. "He's had a lot of girlfriends, but he's never come to me for help. That's how I knew he really meant what he was saying. Oh, and he was crying."

Sophia looked over at me. "You were crying?"

I could feel heat creeping up onto my neck and face. It took a lot to make my face turn red like that, but I'd say this was a qualifying moment. "I wasn't crying, Soph."

She just laughed and gave me a comforting look, but it was clear she wasn't buying it.

"I wasn't," I insisted. "I'm a man, Soph. I didn't cry."

"Really?" she said, still looking too amused for my liking. "That's too bad. I think being open with your emotions is a sign of strength and personally, I think only real men cry."

"I cried."

Damn it. I was a sell-out.

"He did cry." My mom nodded. "I know I must seem a little too excited, but you're the first girl he's ever brought home. He's really the only family I've got."

I was just about to bring up my aunt Sheri – her sister – but she beat me to it. "Don't tell my sister I said that. She'd kill me," she said to Sophia.

My mom and my aunt Sheri were too similar for their own good. As much as they loved each other, they clashed when they were in the same room and for their own good, they only dealt with each other in small, sporadic doses.

"Uh... I won't tell her."

My mom chatted away with Sophia, sticking to mostly safe topics as we ate. We had barely made it to dessert when my mom jumped up from the table, shouting, "Oh, the baby albums! I have to show you the baby albums. Christian had the cutest, chubbiest little cheeks!"

She was already halfway up the stairs when my fat-ass changed my train of thought from "pie" to "avoid embarrassment" and processed what was going on. I shot out of my seat, running towards the stairs. "Oh, god, Mom, no!"

"I've never had one of your girlfriends over, Christian," she screamed from wherever she was. I followed the sound of her voice to the empty room she kept random shit in – such as, apparently, my old baby album. "This is your fault. I'm just going with what I see in the movies."

"Mom," I said, swiping at the album she was holding in her hand. She held it behind her back and shook her head before dashing to the side and making it out the room.

I don't know how long I chased her around the house. There wasn't a whole lot of room to run, yet she managed to elude me for at least a few minutes. I might have been tall and athletic, but she was also fairly tall and was sneakier than I was. I only gave up when she threatened to show Sophia "The Picture" if I didn't stop trying to take the album from her.

"Not The Picture," I told her. "Anything but that."

"Then I'm showing Sophia the rest of these pictures." My mom smiled triumphantly, marching over to the living room for her very own show and tell. She and Sophia sat down on the grey couch at the end of the room to begin flipping through the album.

"This is the very first picture I have of Christian," my mom told Sophia with a proud beam. It'd be sweet if it weren't so embarrassing. I knew there had to be some shit in there I didn't want anyone to see. "It was taken right after he was born. Wasn't he just the cutest shade of purple?"

I resisted the urge to slam my head onto the coffee table and sat down next to Sophia, doing my best to stay quiet and get through this afternoon.

"There's Christian when we got home from the hospital. There's Christian taking his first drink of breast milk. There's me changing Christian's first diaper all by myself. There's Christian sleeping in his old crib. There's Christian sleeping in his new crib. There's Christian taking his first bath."

She kept flipping through the pages, that same proud smile on her face. As much as I didn't want to be sitting here witnessing this right now, it was clear it made her happy, and Sophia seemed to be enjoying herself. I guess that was all that mattered.

"There's Christian and my sister. There's Christian with his favorite toy. There's Christian at his half-birthday party," she went on.

"You were so cute, Chris," Sophia said, nudging me teasingly. "What happened?"

I just rolled my eyes. Get me out of here.

"What, you don't think my son is cute?" my mom asked with a grin.

"Well..." she trailed off like she was actually thinking about it. There were only so many blows to the ego a guy could take in a day. She must have seen my thoughts written all over my face because she followed that with, "I'm kidding. I think he's adorable."

Oh, that was even worse. "I don't want to be adorable," I said, exasperation filling my tone.

Her tone matched mine when she responded. "Then what do you want to be?"

"How about... hunkalicious?"

Okay, no, that was pretty bad.

"I'm going to go make myself some coffee. I'll let you guys have a moment alone to decide which adjective, uh, best fits," my mom said, winking at us before walking over to the kitchen.

As much as her suggestive tone made me cringe, I couldn't help but feel a wave of relief when she left the room. I slid closer to Sophia. "Well?"

"Okay, fine. You're hunkalicious."

"That's what I like to hear." I grinned and leaned in to press my lips against hers. I pulled away for a second to add, "Just for a record... you're pretty hunkalicious, too."

"Uh, that doesn't sound like a compliment, but okay."

Maybe I should've called her something else. I was just going to kiss her again and wow her with those skills so she'd forget that I was an idiot, but my mom - of course - decided to pop back in just as I was leaning back in. We both looked over at her and pulled back.

"Sorry. I'm not stopping you guys, but I think we all know that would be awkward."

"And moment ruined," I said, slouching back onto the couch.

"Oh, shush," she said, sitting down on the recliner in front of us and violently blowing on her cup of coffee to cool it down. It seemed like we were actually going to have a moment of relative quiet, besides her dramatic coffee cooling, but I thought wrong. She soon broke the silence by placing her coffee cup aside and screaming, "Random question time, okay? Go, go, go!"

It was her favorite way of getting to know someone new. It was also completely alarming for those on the receiving end of the game.

Sophia was so startled that she elbowed me in her efforts to sit up and answer with the questions.

"Ow," I muttered, rubbing the spot she'd slammed with her elbow, but Sophia was too preoccupied with my mom's outburst.

"Favorite color!" my mom screamed. I cringed on behalf of everyone in the room. How much longer before it was socially acceptable to run out the door?

"Purple!' Sophia screamed back. I didn't blame her. The only thing you could really do when dealing with my mom was match her energy.

"Favorite food!"

"Pizza!"

"Favorite band!"

"Paramore!"

"Oh, I'm so sorry," my mom said, collecting her breath and laughing. She'd actually worn herself out screaming questions out at my girlfriend. If anyone ever wondered why I turned out the way I did, they just needed to spend a day with my mother. "I don't know why I'm screaming. I'll speak normally now. Well, I'll try to. What's your favorite movie?"

"Anything with Batman in it," Sophia said. "Preferably the Christian Bale versions. He's hot."

I looked at her. "Should I be offended?"

"He's married. You're good."

My mom nodded like she was mentally putting each answer away for the future – which she probably was. "If you could have se—"

"Mom," I yelled, giving her a pointed look. I didn't know exactly where she was going with that, but I already knew it was going somewhere it didn't need to go on Day 1 of Meet the Parent.

"What?" She rolled her eyes at me. "You're such a bore, Christian. What is your favorite plant, Sophia? Is that a safe enough question for you, Christian?"

I just shook my head, muttering a few more complaints in such a low voice I doubted either of them could hear me.

"Um... I don't have a favorite plant," Sophia said.

"Well, then, what is your favorite tree?"

"... I don't think I have a favorite tree, either."

"You are so strange. Who doesn't have a favorite plant or tree? Okay, what is your favorite flower?"

I didn't think I needed to clarify that Sophia wasn't the strange one here. It was pretty evident all on its own. Okay, we would stay for 30 more minutes, and then Blake was going to have an emergency meltdown that we needed to go deal with.

"I like lilies," Sophia said. I could've answered that. It was one of the first things I'd really bothered to learn about her.

"What is your favorite quote?"

Sophia paused. "'It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live.' Albus Dumbledore. I'm a nerd."

"I didn't know you were into Harry Potter," I said.

She shrugged. "I feel like everyone likes Harry Potter, at least on some level."

Not me. Well, I'd never gotten into the books and hadn't seen the movies, so I guess I was just neutral. "I've never seen the movies or read the books, so –"

"What?" Sophia exclaimed. "Okay, we're fixing that tonight. I can't date someone that uncultured."

"Hey, I'm not uncultured!"

I had culture. Kind of. I liked art and shit. I had a few paintings on my wall. I watched some movies that weren't blockbuster hits. I listened to a wide variety of music. I had culture, okay?

"One last question and then I'll let you guys go so you can force him to sit through a movie marathon," my mom said, rubbing her hands together like she was trying to think of the perfect question to end the night with. "What's your favorite word? Just one word that stands out to you."

Sophia paused and looked straight ahead, momentarily lost in her thoughts. She looked at me before looking back at my mom. "You know, not too long ago, my answer would've been an easy call. I would've said revenge. That's all I really cared about. But now..." She looked over at me again and grabbed my hand, giving it a squeeze. "Well, now I'm gonna have to get back to you on that."

I squeezed back, placing my other hand over hers and running my fingers along her hand. After everything I'd done to her, she'd still managed to look past my many flaws and let go of her thirst for revenge in favor of forgiveness. I didn't think I was that big of a person. I'd proven plenty of times that I wasn't. And while I still thought she deserved better than me, I knew I'd gladly spend the rest of my life by her side helping her fill in that blank.