It was just before midnight when he heard the car pull up into the driveway, seeing the headlights dance through the window.
Yes, he was well aware that it was a Friday night and they were seniors in high school; he also knew that they were legal adults who were in a serious, committed relationship; but that doesn't mean he wouldn't have given them hell for being out past midnight had that been the case.
He heard the car doors open and close, he went to stand at the edge of the room to be slightly hidden when they came in, since all the lights were off.
He stood there for a few moments, knowing full well what was currently happening on the outside of the door, not entirely happy about where he was sure the current location of his daughter's tongue was.
He heard her insert the key and twist it, opening the door.
The front door was wide open, she was standing in the doorway while he stood on the front mat; neither looked ready to say goodnight to the other.
Ally reached up and wrapped her arms around Austin's neck and pulled him into a kiss.
Austin's hands went to grip either side of her hips, tilting his head to deepen the kiss.
What started out as an innocent kiss goodnight was quickly heating up and Lester would have no such thing.
He reached over and flicked the light switches so that light suddenly flooded the room, startling the couple and breaking them apart.
They turned to see Lester standing near the doorway of the room, his arms folded with a dry expression on his face.
Austin and Ally looked down sheepishly.
"Hi dad." Ally said awkwardly.
"Hey Mr. Dawson." Austin said in the same awkward tone as Ally.
Lester looked at the two teens with the embarrassed expressions on their faces, each refusing to make eye contact with either other person in the room.
He didn't know what it was, but suddenly a wave of nostalgia overtook him.
They were graduating soon, so they didn't have many nights like this left.
Sure, Austin and Ally have the rest of their lives to make out late into the night, but this may be one of the last times where Lester catches them and tells them off.
Not that Lester enjoys watching them kiss, but he is going to miss them being teenagers in his house.
Soon they would move out and just come back to this house to visit him.
He suddenly feels a pang in his heart for how much he is going to miss not only his own kid, but the boy who caused a ruckus in his music store all those years ago and eventually, fell head over heels in love with his daughter.
Lester realized he had zoned out and sighed.
"I'm just glad your home before midnight." Lester told them.
"Austin, you're welcome to stay for a little while; just keep it down, I'm going to bed." Lester said, making his way up the stairs.
"Night." Austin and Ally said to him in unison.
"Night kids. Oh and no funny business." he told them sternly, causing them both to blush.
Once he got up to the top of the stairs, he looked across the balcony to see Austin and Ally cuddled up on the couch. He smiled.
If he had to deal with his daughter making out with a teenage boy on his doorstep every Friday night, he sure was glad it was this teenage boy.
It was a Saturday night, Mike and Mimi were snuggling on the couch after a long day of selling mattresses.
Austin still hadn't returned home yet. He and Ally had gone out on a date. She had driven.
They had a tradition: he would drive every Friday night date night and she would drive every Saturday night date night.
It was just after midnight when they heard Ally's car pull into the driveway.
Both Mike and Mimi knew that just because they were home, did not mean the date was over yet. They knew that there was at least a good 10 minutes solely reserved for "saying goodnight".
They returned to their cuddling, ignoring the sound of the car doors opening a slamming shut; knowing full well that they still weren't done "saying goodnight".
A few more minutes passed, when they heard a loud thump against the front door.
Both parents knew exactly what was going on the other side of the door, but neither wanted to be the one to stop it.
"Should we go check on them?" Mike asked, turning to his wife. "I don't think Lester would be happy if they conceived our grandchild on our front porch when we could have stopped them."
That comment earned him a playful hit on the arm from his wife.
"No, let them be." Mimi said. "They graduate in just a few weeks, they don't have many nights like this left."
Mimi felt tears begin to well up in her eyes. The reality of her baby boy graduating high school and growing up kept hitting her over and over again the closer they got to the day.
"Honey, it's ok." Mike said, comforting his wife. "Sure they may be graduating soon, but I know there's no way this is the last time they'll be making out on our doorstep, so you won't have to worry about missing that."
Mimi let out a laugh and cuddled up to her husband.
Just as Mimi had calmed down, they saw headlights flash through the window and heard the car pull away.
They heard the door unlock and open, reviling their son, who didn't seem to notice that his parents were sitting right there.
Austin closed and locked the door quietly behind him, then leaned his back against the door and let out a content sigh, a lovestruck expression on his face.
Mike and Mimi took in their son's appearance: his hair was messy and all over the place, his shirt was wrinkled, his face and neck were covered in lipstick marks, his lips were swollen and he had a number of hickeys decorating his jaw, neck and collarbone.
When Austin didn't move for like 2 minutes (no doubt replaying what had happened between himself and Ally on the doorstep just minutes earlier), Mike took it into his own hands to break him out of his trance.
Mike reached over and turned on the lamp on the end table next to the couch, illuminating the room and startling Austin.
Austin looked over to see both his parents on the couch, the blush forming on his cheeks matching the shade of lipstick Ally had been wearing that covered his face.
"Hi Mom, hi dad." Austin said quietly, giving his parents a small wave. The embarrassment taking over his entire body.
"Hey Austin!" Mike said, ignoring the awkwardness to make it more awkward. "Did your date go well?"
"Mike, look at his face. Of course his date went well." Mimi said, playing along with Mike in one of their favorite games: "let's see how much we can embarrass Austin".
"Oh yeah, duh, of course it went well." Mike said." What did you say her name was again?"
"It's a pretty name isn't it... Ummm... Sally?" Mimi said.
"Hallie?" Mike said.
"Callie?" Mimi said.
"You guys are the worst." Austin said, shaking his head while making his way up the stairs to his room.
"GOODNIGHT MOON!" Mike and Mimi said simultaneously as Austin walked upstairs.
He shot them a wave of his hand without even turning to look at them.
"I think we played that off quite well." Mike said to his wife.
"Yes, one of our best performances I do think." Mimi said, laughing.
The couple high fived for their victory, then settled down in each others arms again.
Yep, they sure are going to miss nights like this.
Lester was out of town at another convention while Penny was visiting. So while he was gone, Penny stayed at the house.
She had been staying at a hotel, but it seemed silly to have Ally have to take care of the whole house by herself on top of going to school and working on her and Austin's music.
There's only one thing, Lester and Penny seemed to have forgotten to tell Ally that Penny would be staying at the house.
Lester left for his convention on a Sunday, meaning Penny would come to stay at the house Sunday evening.
Ally wasn't home when Penny arrived at the house. Penny assumed she was either working or out with her friends.
So Penny had a quiet night in. She made herself dinner, took a nice relaxing bath, fixed herself a cup of tea and sat down in the kitchen to enjoy a book while drinking her tea.
It was getting late and Ally still wasn't home, Penny was growing worried, but she told herself not to. Ally was 18 now. She was an adult. She can make her own decisions.
That's one thing Penny hated about her job, she never got to properly raise Ally.
She and Lester got divorced when Ally was only 8 years old, and she moved to Africa shortly after.
She missed all the moments she was supposed to be there for in her daughters life.
Since she moved to Africa, Lester got full custody of Ally in the divorce. Of course Penny had unlimited visitation rights, but it wasn't the same.
Whenever she came to town it was a special occasion, so she never really played the role as Ally's mom.
She never told her to clean her room. She never asked her to do the dishes. She never grounded her (which Lester had only done a handful of times, but still).
She remembers distinctly when she came to visit when Ally was 10, they went and had a picnic at the park.
Ally fell and skinned her knee and immediately called for Lester's aide.
"Daddy! I want daddy!" she cried.
She never even thought to call for her mommy. Because her mommy was never there for her.
Penny and Ally had always had more of a friendship than a mother daughter relationship, which both were fine with.
Now that Ally was older, she really loved and valued being able to be friends with her mother and not have her get mad when she revealed a personal problem or asked for more grown up advise.
Penny loved being able to have such a good friendship with Ally, but she did wish that she had been around more when her daughter was growing up.
Penny was pulled out of her trance when she saw lights flash through the front windows, indicating that Ally was home.
Penny did not get up to greet Ally at the door (even though she wanted to). She had to remind herself that Ally had a very busy career and had been working all day.
Penny sat at the table, returning to her book, when she heard the front door fling open, two people stumble inside clumsily, then the door slam shut again.
Curious, Penny got up to see what was going on in the other room.
To say she was shocked to see what she saw would be an understatement.
There, in the living room, was both Austin and Ally kissing fiercely, hands roaming all over each others bodies.
Penny had no idea what to do. Should she stop them? Should she just sneak past them and ignore them?
She watched as Ally reached up and began unbuttoning Austin's shirt, moving her hands over his bare chest, Austin moaning as she did so.
Austin began to move the two of them backwards, falling back onto the couch taking her with him.
Ally was now on top of Austin, their lips still kissing fiercely. Austin's shirt was now totally unbuttoned, Ally moved her hands up to his broad shoulders and pushed the shirt completely off of him; balling the shirt in her hands and tossing it carelessly across the room.
Austin's hands were now exploring all different parts of her daughter's body and Penny wasn't sure how she felt about it.
He reached up and cupped one of her breasts in his hand, Ally moaning as he did so.
Penny still didn't know what to do. What could she do?
Austin's hands moved down farther so that now one was resting on her rear end and the other was resting across her upper inner thigh.
Penny was so frantic while trying to figure out what to do, she ended up accidentally flinging her book across the room where it hit the wall loudly.
Austin and Ally finally tore their lips apart and looked around when they heard the sound.
Ally looked up and saw her mother standing in her kitchen.
"Oh hey mom." Ally said loudly, moving so she wasn't straddling Austin's waist.
"Hey guys..." Penny said awkwardly.
Austin's eyes widened when he heard Penny's voice, turning around to see her standing right there.
He blushed deeply and went to retrieve his discarded shirt.
"Umm..." Ally said standing up and walking to her mother as Austin continued looking for his shirt.
"I didn't think you'd be here." Ally said to Penny.
"Well, actually... I'm watching the house while your dad is gone." Penny said.
"That would have been helpful information to know." Ally whispered harshly.
And that's when Penny realized what was going on.
Lester left town today, Ally was going to have the house to herself, Austin was going to come over, and... Well... You know the rest.
"Oh! Ally, sweetie, I am SO sorry! I should've told you I'd be here! God, this is so embarrassing." Penny said.
"It's fine, mom." Ally said, smiling. "You just startled us."
Penny sighed in relief, glad her daughter was not mad at her. Because she knew if this had happened between herself and her own mother, she would have been furious.
Austin came into the room, now wearing a shirt, his hands deep in his pockets. He was looking down, a sheepish expression on his face.
"Sorry Ms. Dawson." Austin said, reaching his hand up to the back of his neck, a nervous habit of his.
"Austin, sweetie, it's ok. You don't have to be embarrassed. It's MY fault. I should've told Ally I would be here." Penny told Austin.
"Whew." Austin said. "I'm glad it was you that was here Ms. Dawson, because if Mr. Dawson would have caught us like that I don't think I'd life to see graduation."
"No, it's fine kids. Really. You are grown up and you are in charge of your own lives. I'm hardly the one who should be stopping you." Penny said, looking at the kids in front of her.
"Austin, you're welcome to stay the night. I'm sorry for not telling you both I would be here." Penny said. "Now if you would excuse me, I'm going to bed."
"Goodnight mom!" Ally said.
"Night Ms. Dawson!" Austin said.
"Night kids!" Penny called out, before going upstairs.
Penny was almost ready to go to sleep when she remembered she needed to text Lester, asking for something very important.
Hey, where do you keep the earplugs?
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