Mitchie stared at her clipboard, stress lines etched on her face.

Shane came up from behind Mitchie, tugging gently at her clipboard. "So, what do I have to do to pull you away from this clipboard?" He asked playfully, moving to stand in front of Mitchie.

Mitchie couldn't help but to give him a playful closed-mouth smile while tugging back at her clipboard, turning it into a tug-of-war game.

Suddenly Connie Torres stomped out of the kitchen. She held a deep glare of frustration and directed her attention to her only daughter. "Mitchie, I just rolled 100 pounds of raw hamburger all by myself," She told her, pointing at the kitchen with her hand, trying to hold back her full anger. She continued with, "I told you, honey, I needed help."

Mitchie's face turned into shock as she snapped the clipboard to herself and started overlooking the schedule. "No, no, no, that, that's impossible. I know for a fact that I scheduled—" She flipped through the pages and her face fell, crushed. "Absolutely nobody," She said, looking up at her mom with disappointment in herself present in her eyes. "I'm so sorry," She apologized, knowing that it wasn't enough.

Shane looked back and forth between them, his eyes staying on Mitchie, wishing he could just hold her in him arms but something held him back. Try as he might to deny it, he was slightly afraid of Connie. He was pretty sure he didn't leave the best of impressions with her.

Brown walked up to the trio with his eyebrows scrunched slightly in worry. "What's going on?" He asked, looking around at their faces.

Connie just shook her head, turning her eyes to Brown's, letting out a deep sigh, her frustration getting worse. "This isn't working," She stated, her anger bubbling up slowly with each statement. "The kitchen is a disaster. Yesterday, I ordered 50 pounds of black beans and they delivered 50 cases of beach balls instead!" She gestured over towards Sander and Barron, who busied themselves with blowing up said beach balls. Shane was almost certain that if left unchecked, Connie was due to burst out into an explosion any moment.

Mitchie contorted her mouth some while giving her mom the awkward side glance, shrugging her way. "Well, you gotta admit, Mom, you don't have the best handwriting," She murmured loud enough for the four of them to hear. Connie's eyes opened in annoyance and shock at her words.

Before Connie could give any kind of response or retort, Brown made calming down motions with his hands and chimed in, "Whoa, whoa, whoa. Okay, it's rock 'n' roll, right? It's gonna be a little chaotic. He looked towards Mitchie and gave her a nod of encouragement before continuing, "I think you're doing great. We'll just make some adjustments to the schedule, yeah?" Mitchie shrugged as her mom put her hands on her hips and nodded tiredly. Brown grinned at them, pleased with their responses. "Perfect. Shane, help Connie with the hamburgers." Brown knew about Shane's trepidation with being around Connie, but he couldn't resist giving the boy a metaphor heart attack from his teasing.

Shane's eyes went wide as he looked at his uncle, pleading for help. "Actually, I've- I've got this thing—" Shane started to say, stuttering on accident. Brown knew it was evil, having to keep his back to his nephew to be able to prevent bursting out in laughter.

Connie narrowed her eyes, grabbing hold of Shane's left arm and gesturing him towards her and the kitchen with her free hand. "Oh, really? Well, come on, pretty boy," She said, pulling him towards the kitchen.

Shane started to get more nervous and kept stammering over his words, still trying to come up with an excuse. "No, but…" He turned to Mitchie for a last ditch effort, his plans to spend time with her that night slipping through his hands, his face falling some as Mitchie laughed and waved at him as he disappeared behind the kitchen doors.

He has no idea what he's got in store for him with my mom, Mitchie thought to herself, turning on her heel to continue figuring out the schedule to accommodate everyone better. She couldn't hide her grin at Shane's face while being dragged by her mom.

As they entered the kitchen, Connie released Shane's arms and moved over to the sink. "Wash your hands and put on those gloves next to you," She guided, washing her own hands first. "We've got a lot of burgers ahead of us," She stated with a hint of warning in her voice. Her frustration and stress was starting to lessen with having someone else helping, even if it was just one person. Especially since her helper was her daughter's boyfriend.

Shane did as he was told, heaving a shallow sigh of disappointment, a pair of downward lips on his face. He went through the motions with no emotions on his face, making Connie pick up on his mood.

She put one hand on her hip, staring at Shane until he noticed, his face showing his nervousness plain as day. "So you're the one my daughter can't stop talking about," She said simply, stating a fact, not asking for any commentary. Shane just nodded, his eyes still wide open. Connie nodded her head, deep in thought. "Don't you date ever hurt her," She said, lifting her eyes to glare at him. "Trust me, you'll never make it out alive if you do," Her threat scaring Shane even more.

Finally Connie shook her head and gave a quick chuckle. "Come on, let's get this over with," She said, motioning her head to the tables. "We've got a lot of burgers to make," She stated.

Shane gave a half smirk, walking up to the table covered in hamburger meat. "Mitchie's told me that this was her least favorite thing to do," He mused to himself, but loud enough that Connie could hear him.

Connie raised one eyebrow while making patties out of the meat she rolled out. "So she told you that." She shrugged, smiling. "Maybe you could think of this as a way of relieving her of her most hated thing," She suggested, her good nature coming back again.

Shane gave a small chuckle of his own. "I guess that's probably the best way to take this, instead of my uncle trying to kill me…" He stopped talking and his face went white. "Not that, uh, you'd do that, no…"

Connie gave him a fierce glare before cracking up. "I was about ready to drag anyone back here and tell him to hurry up, but…" She looked up at his face, his sincereness evident on his face. "I guess you've got a way with the Torres' girls, hon," She teased, unable to hide her smile anymore.

Shane rolled his eyes and laughed. "I just need the one; no other is needed," He said quietly.

Connie smiled genuinely for the first time. "Just remember that when you're apart and we'll be ok," She said bluntly, taking a quick break to watch for Shane's reaction.

Shane shook his head lightly, trying to focus on his hands than looking at Connie again. "That'd never happen, I promise." And this was a promise he'd fight the hardest to keep.

Here's chapter 8, whoohoo! =] hopefully it's alright. This is the chapter that I had to re-type and try to remember what all I included the first time around. Ah well, such is life. It happens, right?

Anyways, this goes along with the last chapter, where Shane mentioned that had to make patties and he was already sick of burgers.

Thank you for everyone reading this 3. You mean the world to meeeee.