on the table. “I’m an idiot,” she moaned. “It’s nice to meet you, Rob, but in order for me to raise my head from this table you will have to provide me with another margarita.”
“I have much more to lose here than you do,” Rob said. “I’ll buy you as many margaritas as it takes for you to give your approval to Elizabeth.”
Aurora peeked out. “Oh my God, Pepper. He’s ridiculous. I can’t function.”
“I know,” I said. “Over the top.” I squeezed Rob’s knee under the table, grateful for his patience. “Now please sit up and tell him the one about the guy you dated for six months without knowing his name.”
That night, after my father got home from work, my parents, Rob, and I had dinner together. We sat around the dining room table eating my mom’s pot roast—my favorite—and I looked at the scene through Rob’s eyes: the pockmarked oak table where I’d done all my homework, the neatly repaired wallpaper below the sconces my father had wired himself, my grandmother’s collection of romantic Lladro figurines on the sideboard. Was it all too Middle America for him? But I underestimated Rob. He chowed down on the pot roast, asking for seconds as if he’d studied the script on how to win over my mother. I wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d called her “Ma.” He was clearly on his best behavior, and I realized he didn’t just see this as an obligatory meeting. He actually cared about making a good impression on my parents.
For dessert, my mother served frozen Sara Lee cheesecake the way I’ve liked it since I was a kid—frozen.
I scraped away at the dessert, savoring the icy slivers of cheesy goodness. Rob, given no introduction to what was on the plate in front of him, tapped at it a few times, then carved out a cautious bite.
“I wouldn’t ordinarily serve this, I’ll have you know, but it’s Lizzie’s favorite.” My mother, she of the (locally) famous homemade pies, was testing Rob. It wasn’t whether he’d turn up his nose at a grocery store dessert. My father, after all, was a royal food snob. It didn’t matter if Rob ate the cheesecake, made fun of it, or choked on it. What my mother was watching for—instinctively, not necessarily consciously—was how he felt about me.
Rob was staring at me with fascination. “Unbelievable,” he said, shaking his head.
“What?” my mother asked.
“It’s just that I’ve spent the entire summer trying to tempt yourdaughter with various decadent desserts. She turned down the soufflé at Le Meurice in Paris, for God’s sake, and turns out I just needed to call you!”
That was all it took. Mom was sold. All she wanted for me was a man who was attentive to my every need, and Rob was.
But I wasn’t deeply concerned about what Rob thought of our middle-American home, and my mother wasn’t the one I was nervous about. It was my father. Doug Pepper, CEO of Pepper Consultants, knew what was best for me. He always had. And it would be very difficult to move forward without his approval. I’d never forget what he did in sixth grade, when, for the first time in my school career, the students were tested and broken into higher-level groups by aptitude. According to your scores, the administration might place you in advanced composition, algebra, and/or world history with the famously rigorous Mr. Hamilton. On the first day of school I brought home my schedule. When my father saw that I was in regular courses across the board, he grabbed the pink sheet away and shook it at me. “You want to live a mediocre life? It starts right here.”
“But, Dad, it’s fair. They tested us and put us where we belong. The teacher said that people learn in different ways, and . . .”
“And you know what I have to say to that? Bullshit.”
The next day, instead of going to school on the bus, I rode in my father’s car. He walked me to my homeroom classroom. As I hung my backpack in my cubby, I heard him instructing my homeroom
“I have much more to lose here than you do,” Rob said. “I’ll buy you as many margaritas as it takes for you to give your approval to Elizabeth.”
Aurora peeked out. “Oh my God, Pepper. He’s ridiculous. I can’t function.”
“I know,” I said. “Over the top.” I squeezed Rob’s knee under the table, grateful for his patience. “Now please sit up and tell him the one about the guy you dated for six months without knowing his name.”
That night, after my father got home from work, my parents, Rob, and I had dinner together. We sat around the dining room table eating my mom’s pot roast—my favorite—and I looked at the scene through Rob’s eyes: the pockmarked oak table where I’d done all my homework, the neatly repaired wallpaper below the sconces my father had wired himself, my grandmother’s collection of romantic Lladro figurines on the sideboard. Was it all too Middle America for him? But I underestimated Rob. He chowed down on the pot roast, asking for seconds as if he’d studied the script on how to win over my mother. I wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d called her “Ma.” He was clearly on his best behavior, and I realized he didn’t just see this as an obligatory meeting. He actually cared about making a good impression on my parents.
For dessert, my mother served frozen Sara Lee cheesecake the way I’ve liked it since I was a kid—frozen.
I scraped away at the dessert, savoring the icy slivers of cheesy goodness. Rob, given no introduction to what was on the plate in front of him, tapped at it a few times, then carved out a cautious bite.
“I wouldn’t ordinarily serve this, I’ll have you know, but it’s Lizzie’s favorite.” My mother, she of the (locally) famous homemade pies, was testing Rob. It wasn’t whether he’d turn up his nose at a grocery store dessert. My father, after all, was a royal food snob. It didn’t matter if Rob ate the cheesecake, made fun of it, or choked on it. What my mother was watching for—instinctively, not necessarily consciously—was how he felt about me.
Rob was staring at me with fascination. “Unbelievable,” he said, shaking his head.
“What?” my mother asked.
“It’s just that I’ve spent the entire summer trying to tempt yourdaughter with various decadent desserts. She turned down the soufflé at Le Meurice in Paris, for God’s sake, and turns out I just needed to call you!”
That was all it took. Mom was sold. All she wanted for me was a man who was attentive to my every need, and Rob was.
But I wasn’t deeply concerned about what Rob thought of our middle-American home, and my mother wasn’t the one I was nervous about. It was my father. Doug Pepper, CEO of Pepper Consultants, knew what was best for me. He always had. And it would be very difficult to move forward without his approval. I’d never forget what he did in sixth grade, when, for the first time in my school career, the students were tested and broken into higher-level groups by aptitude. According to your scores, the administration might place you in advanced composition, algebra, and/or world history with the famously rigorous Mr. Hamilton. On the first day of school I brought home my schedule. When my father saw that I was in regular courses across the board, he grabbed the pink sheet away and shook it at me. “You want to live a mediocre life? It starts right here.”
“But, Dad, it’s fair. They tested us and put us where we belong. The teacher said that people learn in different ways, and . . .”
“And you know what I have to say to that? Bullshit.”
The next day, instead of going to school on the bus, I rode in my father’s car. He walked me to my homeroom classroom. As I hung my backpack in my cubby, I heard him instructing my homeroom
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