After dinner Stephanie pulled into her driveway and immediately frowned when she saw her Mom's car there, she had no idea why she was here as she hadn't called to say she was coming by, "looks like Grandma has come to say goodnight Mikey."

His eyes widened with excitement as he scanned the drive for her clapping his hands when he saw her climb out of her car, "yay. Cans she gives me a baff?"

Looking in her rear view mirror at him as the car came to a stop she smiled softly, "if she has time. She might have to go home to see Poppy so we can ask her."

Banging on his window Mikey waved at his Grandma, today had been full of surprises and he was full of energy.

Having seen Stephanie pull into the drive Linda climbed out of her car and watched her waving at Mikey as he banged the window to get her attention, at least one of them seemed happy to see her. Watching as her daughter got out of the car and let Mikey out she could see the confusion from where she was stood, "you don't mind me coming by do you Steph?"

Shaking her head Stephanie shut the car door after Mikey, "no it's fine. I'm just going to put the car in the garage a minute and then we can go inside."

Running into his Grandma's arms the first words out of his mouth was, "cans you gives me baff please?"

Kissing the top of his head as she hugged him she nodded her head, "I sure can, if your Mom is okay with it."

"She is. Fank you Gramma."

"My pleasure Mikey."

Standing back up Linda talked with Mikey for a minute whilst she waited for Stephanie to join them after putting the car in the garage. A couple of minutes later and Stephanie was opening the front door for them as Mikey pulled her inside.

Sighing softly as Mikey pulled her Mom towards the stairs she shook her head, "slow down Mikey, your Grandma needs both of her arms to be working please."

Slowing down he started walking instead of practically running as they all made their way upstairs.

Thirty minutes later and Mikey had had his bath and was currently in his pyjamas laying on the couch watching a cartoon before bed.

With Mikey occupied by the TV Linda took this as her opportunity to grill Stephanie, "so how are things? You seem stressed."

Sighing softly she nodded her head, "I am a little, there is a lot going on right now so there is a lot of pressure and I'm trying to juggle everything and trying to get it all perfect."

Frowning she shook her head at her daughter, "don't worry about things being perfect, just do the best that you can be."

Just then Stephanie's cell phone started to ring again so she pulled it out of her pocket immediately frowning when she saw Hunter's name on the screen and rejected the call before she tossed it somewhere to the side to deal with at another time.

Having looked over her daughter's shoulder as her phone rang Linda saw Hunter's name and saw first hand how she was avoiding him, she only wished she knew why.

As soon as the cartoon was over Stephanie moved to turn the television off, "come on Mikey, bedtime for you. Say goodnight to your Grandma."

Reluctantly climbing off the couch he went off and hugged his Grandma, "night Gramma. Loves you."

Kissing the top of his head she smiled softly, "I love you too. Sleep well and I'll see you soon."

Nodding his head he turned and took his Mom's hand as she led him towards the stairs.

Once Stephanie and Mikey were out of the room Linda turned and grabbed Stephanie's cell phone to do some investigating to find out exactly how many time she had avoided Hunter's call today. As she lit up the phone she saw that there were about ten missed calls so going into the call log she was surprised to see all calls from Hunter were missed calls but there had been other calls that she had accepted. Shaking her head her daughter would have a lot to answer for in a few minutes.

After reading a couple of pages from the book to him Mikey was fast asleep so getting up she pressed a soft kiss to the top of his head before she made sure he was tucked in tightly and then left the room to go back downstairs. As she walked back into the lounge she saw that her Mom was holding her phone and she knew that this was not going to go well, "what are you doing with my phone?"

Lifting her head when she heard her daughter enter the room again she shrugged, "how about you tell me why you are rejecting all of Hunter's calls and why there was like ten of them here."

Frowning she snatched the phone from her Mom's hands, "you shouldn't be snooping in my phone."

Shrugging her shoulders Linda didn't care, "I was curious as to who you were avoiding so I snooped but now I want to know why. I thought you had a good time Friday night? Did he do something wrong?"

Sighing softly she shook her head, "no, I wish he did though because then I would have a good excuse to avoid him."

Surprised by how easily her daughter was being honest with her she pushed her for more details, "that doesn't really make a whole lot of sense. If he hasn't done anything wrong why are you avoiding him?"

She knew she was clutching at straws but she didn't know what else to say, "he told people he was on a date on Friday night."

Confused by why that had anything to do with it she raised her eyebrow, "and? Did he say it was with you? Is admitting to being on a date some sort of crime these days?"

Sighing she shook her head, "no and no. Trish told me that he was really happy and he wouldn't say who the woman was even when he was pressed on it but I don't know Mom."

Having an idea about what was truly going on Linda decided to push her a little, "the thought of him being happy about the date scares you doesn't it? The thought of him actually wanting this to work and him having been completely honest with you makes you feel guilty because you know you haven't been completely honest with him. You think that if you cut yourself off from him then magically it will all go away and he will just give up and you can go back to living your quiet life with your head buried in the sand and living the rest of your life alone. Am I right?"

Looking at her Mom with wide eyes she didn't know what to say as that had a lot to do with it.

Receiving nothing but silence from her daughter she wanted to give her some reassurance, "you do know it's normal to be scared right? Despite you having been married in the past you've both changed so this entire thing is new and as you haven't been on a date since you split with Hunter so it will be doubly scary as you have Mikey to think of too. You don't have to tell Hunter that Mikey is his son yet, not until you're sure that it is the right thing to do and you don't have to tell Mikey that you're on a date with Hunter, you can keep the two parts of your life entirely separate until you're ready for them to be joined together."

Shaking her head to her her Mom was talking crazy, "yeah because that would work right?"

"Why wouldn't it? To Mikey you can just be having an adults only evening and you can be up front with Hunter and tell him that you don't want Mikey to know what is going on between the two of you because you want to see where things go first."

Sighing softly her Mom made it sound so easy, "well that is a lovely fairytale but life doesn't work like that."

Her daughter wasn't normally such a defeatist so she was not best pleased, "how do you know it won't work unless you try it? Call Hunter, talk to him and see if you can work something out between the two of you before you spend the rest of your life simply ignoring him. You owe him an explanation and yourself an opportunity to see where things can go between you."

"But . . ." As much as she wanted to argue with her Mom and reply with a 'but' she just couldn't think of one, "okay you win, I will give him a call."

Smiling at how easy it was to get through to her daughter she gave her a quick hug, "good girl. I'd better get home and get your Father some dinner now but let me know how it goes."

Nodding her head Stephanie hugged her Mom back before she pulled away, "I will."

Showing her Mom out of the house Stephanie wished she just hadn't come home tonight because she had been doing perfectly fine ignoring Hunter but now she had to find out how serious he was.

Once she was back in her car Linda took her cell phone from her handbag and sent Hunter a quick text before she went home:

I've talked to her, she should call you but please be gentle with her. Linda