John knew what Maddox did with women on dates. He used his trust fund to wine and dine them, promptly fell in mad, out-of-control love with them, got bored and either dumped them or sent himself spiraling on a bender of the first degree.

It was one of the many reasons that John was actually glad he hadn’t grown up in Maddox and his father’s world. He might not be the smoothest when it came to women, but at least he wasn’t reenacting The Wolf of Wall Street whenever he found one he liked.

“Everything all right?” a nervous-voiced Tilli asked as she slid back into her seat, shaking her napkin out primly.

John looked up, his eyes focusing on his dinner companion. It all went painfully clear. Like HDTV on a sportscaster’s rosacea type of clear.

Tilli was a nice woman his mother had met at the Crown Heights branch of the Brooklyn Public Library. She was slight and shy and had laughed nervously at almost everything that John had said tonight. They had less than zero in common with one another, besides the fact that John had grown up in Crown Heights and Tilli currently lived there. This date had all the explosive chemistry of milk stirred into flour. There was not a chance in hell that his mother had actually thought this would go well for John.

All the while she was setting Mary up with Maddox.

Sammy at the block party. Elijah Crawford. Michael Fallon. Maddox Whitford. The freaking tacos. He finally understood the game. And was beyond frustrated that it had taken him damn near two weeks to catch on to the sly scheme of his mother’s.

“Ah. Yes. I just sort of realized that my mother was up to something.” He put his phone away and directed his attention back to Tilli.

She seemed to immediately wither under his gaze. “Is it very important?” she asked timidly. “Because I don’t mind if you have to go deal with it. That’s okay. It’s getting a little late anyhow.”

It was roughly eight fifteen on a Friday night, and another thing became painfully clear to John. Tilli didn’t want to be here any more than he did. “Um, right,” he tried to say gracefully. He lifted up and pulled out his wallet, leaving cash on the table for the burritos they’d both eaten. His mother really needed to stop figuring out ways to get him to waste cash on food he could barely afford. “I’ll walk you to the train.”

Looking like she had absolutely no idea how to say no to that, Tilli nodded meekly. The two of them walked quietly to the train, John’s mind traveling inexorably back to his devious mother.