Zack took a deep breath and opened the door, walking inside the house. "Mom? Dad?" he called out.

"Zack?" Alicia said in surprise as she came out of the kitchen and saw her son there with his duffel bag. "What are you doing here?" she asked as she gave him a hug.

"Um, I'm on vacation, so I thought I'd come home for a while. Where's Dad?"

"He's puttering around in his shop. I'm almost done with lunch, why don't you go put your bag in your room and clean up, by that time it should be ready."

After Zack went upstairs, Alicia wondered why he hadn't called like he usually did before he came for a visit. She put it out of her mind and hurried outside to the workshop.

"Jonathan!" she yelled to be heard over the power tools.

"What is it?" he asked, not too happy to be interrupted in his man cave.

"We've got a special guest for lunch and you're a mess, get all that grease and sawdust off you and be in the kitchen in five minutes or else!" Alicia said before rushing back to the house to finish cooking.

Jonathan stood there bewildered, but just shrugged and started cleaning up. Once he decided he was clean enough, he went back to the house, stunned to see their Zack sitting at the kitchen table.

"Son, what are you doing here?" Jonathan asked as he sat down.

"I'm on leave." Zack said, looking down at the table and blushing. He was glad that wasn't a total lie, but he wasn't going to tell his parents that he was on unpaid leave because he got caught after hours in the training room having sex, which meant he was not only fraternizing, since they had tripped the security alarm, there was also the question of if he and Elena were breaking and entering. Plus it had interrupted their bosses' evening plans to have to drop everything and come back to headquarters to catch them in the act.

For dinner, Alicia insisted he wear something nice because she was cooking all of his favorite foods in honor of his visit. He wasn't happy when he came downstairs and saw Lucy sitting at the kitchen table next to his spot. His mother never quit trying to reunite him with his childhood sweetheart, who was now the postmistress for Gongaga village.

"Hi Lucy." he said as politely as he could manage.

"Lucy just happened to drop by with some mail that got sent to the wrong address, isn't that so thoughtful?" Alicia beamed to see Zack and Lucy sitting together. "I thought dinner with us would be a good way to repay her."

Jonathan hadn't missed Zack seeming to be uncomfortable, and his unencouraging response to Lucy's attempts to chat him up. Alicia noticed as well that her son was almost rude to Lucy, and after dinner, she confronted him.

"Why did you treat Lucy like that? She's a nice girl, and you and she-" Alicia started to say.

"Mom, that was a long time ago. Lucy's the past, and…" Zack paused. He had been about to say that Elena was the future, but he wasn't sure if what they had was even a relationship, or how they really felt about each other.

"And?" Alicia prodded, looking intently at her son. "Do you have a lady friend you haven't told us about? You're blushing! Who is she?"

"She's just someone I met at work." Zack admitted reluctantly.

"Call her and invite her for a visit, I need to meet the woman who can make my First Class son blush like that. You owe me for your disrespectful attitude towards Lucy anyway." Alicia stated, giving him an angry look.

"Yes, mom."

Elena was just about to take a relaxing bath when her phone rang. Wondering who could be calling her, she was surprised to see it was Zack. Despite how upset she was at being suspended from the Turks for an indeterminate amount of time, she involuntarily smiled as she answered the phone.

"Hello." Elena said.

"Um, hi. Are you busy next week?" Zack asked.

"I am quite free next week, you should know that." Elena snapped, her smile turning into a frown at his idiotic question.

"I'm just asking because my parents would like you to come for a visit." Zack said in a conciliatory tone.

"What?" Elena was dumbfounded. "Um, let me think about it and get back to you."

"Sure, just um, lemme know as soon as you decide." Zack said nervously as he hung up.

Elena stared at the phone, still stunned. Zack wanted her to meet his parents? What kind of relationship did he think they had? Then Elena frowned as she realized she had just referred to it as a relationship. The only reason she had started up with him was to get back at Aerith. All the men she knew suddenly acted like that flower girl was the second coming once she got close to the legal age of consent, and Elena was just dirt. So she had invited Zack to the training room to get some of her own back from Aerith, but after a while she had started enjoying their time together more than she thought she would.

It wasn't just that sex was good, it was that he had a personality trait she both despised and desired, the ability to accept failure. In her family, failure wasn't tolerated. When Zack failed at something, he just shrugged and kept trying til he succeeded, considering it only a setback to him, not a personal failure. She kept pushing herself to be better than her sister, but she never felt good enough.