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I didn’t want it.

I liked kids and respected women who became mothers, but that didn’t make me want to become one of them. It was as if the instinct that every other woman possessed was just missing in me.

“I told you, Mum,” I said, fighting to keep my voice calm as I walked in the open door of the garage. The place was blessedly quiet. “We’re keeping things casual. There’s no rush.”

“No rush? No rush!” I looked around in alarm, as if the whole workshop could hear her shrieks. “If you chose one of them now you’d have to have at least a year of being together exclusively before you could even think about marriage. Then there’s the engagement period?—”

“Mum—”

“You’d need at least six months to plan a wedding, but that would be ridiculously hard. You’d have to quit that job of yours.”

My hand clutched harder at my toolbox handle.

“Mum—”

“Then there’s trying to find venues. Perhaps we should start looking around, put in a tentative booking?—”

“Mum—”

“I know what you’re going to say and I realise it sounds ridiculous, but?—”

“Mum!”

My voice echoed through the workshop, declaring to all the cars we had up on hoists that I was having family drama. Thank god the boys weren’t in yet because I’d never hear the end of it. The only girl in a male-dominated workplace meant I was an easy target for teasing. It was only when they realised I could give back as good as I got that they stopped. But with new material…

“Mum, we’re keeping things casual.”

Keep restating your position and don’t give ground, I thought furiously. “I know you’d love a wedding to plan, but you’re going to have to focus on Frankie’s.” My brother had found a gorgeous girl that was willing to put up with him and they had just got engaged. “I’m not in the right place with any of the guys—” Make that any guys at all. “—to be making those sorts of plans.”

“We’ll see.” I’d walked in here thinking I could deal with my mother, but that began to crumble at her words. Majorie had bulldozed over teachers, bank tellers, shop assistants and waiters before, so why would she stop at me? “That’s why I called you. Your father and I are coming to town later in the week. The engagement party is on next weekend, and you’ll need a date. This is a perfect time to meet these men who’re hanging around, see which one is worthy of my daughter.”

A faint ringing sound started up in my head, the same I’d experienced one day when I was an apprentice. Someone had shouted at me and my head jerked up, connecting with the engine bay. After the guys stopped laughing, my boss, Brock, grabbed the dolly I was lying on and dragged me out, looking me over before taking me into the break room to patch up the cut on my forehead.

“We’ll work out which one is husband material,” Mum assured me through the high-pitched whine. “Then we can start making bookings.”

“When?”

That’s all I managed to croak out. Not no, Mum, don’t do that. Not no, Mum, you can’t. Because the problem wasn’t that I had three guys all vying for my attention and I needed to choose one.

It was that I had none.

None of the guys I went out with were worth introducing to my mother, something that made her fuss and carry on, until finally I’d caved. I couldn’t just create one imaginary boyfriend, because she’d be on a plane and flying over here in seconds, wedding bells in her eyes. Two wasn’t really a deterrent either, because she’d initiate a cage fight between the two of them, forcing them to battle for the honour of my hand. Three different imaginary guys meant I had an active dating life, and the possibility that one could become something serious kept her concerns at bay, while never actually moving forward.

Three imaginary boyfriends I needed to produce in a few days.

“Mum, we’re just dating,” I told her through gritted teeth. “Keeping things casual. Meeting the parents is the definition of not casual.”

“Then perhaps it’s a good thing that we’re coming to town,” Mum replied. “If they’re not ready to get serious now, then they never will be. You’ll need to move on from them and find better options. You’ll thank me later.”

I wouldn’t. I really, really wouldn’t, but as she said goodbye, I mumbled an appropriate response back, staring at the phone screen when it went black.

“OhmygodOhmygodOhmygodOhmygod…” I hissed over and over again, then did the only thing I could think of, tapping on the screen and bringing up my bestie’s contact. It went straight to voicemail as she wouldn’t even be up yet, because Millie was the manager of a local pub. “Millie? Mills? We’ve gotta talk. Mum’s coming to town in a couple of days and…” I swallowed hard but that didn’t dislodge the lump in my throat. “She wants to meet my ‘boyfriends.’”

I ended the call then, knowing she’d understand what that meant. When I’d come up with this brilliant plan, she’d made clear that this was gonna come back to bite me on the arse at some point, and now I’m about to get chomped.

Today was going to be a great day, I thought, stomping over to the car I was working on, then popping my earbuds in before grabbing the tools I needed and sliding under the engine bay.

And now it just sucked.