They never tire of their routine. She plays the fearless leader, corralling her unruly husband, the good-natured fool. Although I spent much of my adolescence irritated by the monotony of it, particularly when I had friends over, I have come to appreciate it in recent years. There is something comforting about the sameness of their interaction. I am proud that they have stayed together, when so many of my friends' parents have divorced, remarried, morphed two families into one, with varying degrees of success.
My mom points to a plate of cheddar cheese, Ritz crackers, and red grapes. 'Eat,' she says.
'Are these seedless?' I ask. Grapes with seeds just aren't worth the effort.
'Yes, they are,' my mom says. 'Now. Shall I throw something together or would you rather order pizza?'
She knows that I'd prefer pizza. First, I love Sal's pizza, which I can only get when I'm home. Second, 'throwing something together' is an exact description of my mom's cooking-her idea of seasoning is salt and pepper, her idea of a recipe is tomato soup and crackers. Nothing strikes fear in my heart like the sight of my mother strapping on an apron.
'Pizza,' my dad answers for us. 'We want pizza!'
My mom pulls a Sal's coupon off the refrigerator and dials the number, ordering a large pizza with mushrooms and sausage. She covers the mouthpiece. 'Right, Rachel?'
I give her the thumbs-up. She beams, proud to have memorized my favorite combination.
Before she can hang up, she is inquiring about my love life. As though all my phone updates informing them that I have nothing going on were just a ruse, and I've been saving the truth tor this moment. My father covers his ears with feigned embarrassment. I give them a tight-lipped smile, thinking to myself that this inquisition is the only part of coming home that I don't like. I feel that I am a disappointment. I am letting them down. I am their only child, their only shot at grandchildren. The math is pretty basic: if I don't have children in the next five years or so, it is unlikely they will see their grandchildren graduate from college. Nothing like a little added pressure to an already stressful pursuit.
'Not one boy out there?' my mom asks, as my dad searches for the ideal slice of cheese. Her eyes are wide, hopeful. The probe might seem insensitive, except she truly believes I have my choice of dozens, that the only thing keeping me from her grandchildren is my own neurosis. She doesn't understand that the simple, straightforward, reciprocated love she has for my father is not so easy to come by.
'No,' I say, lowering my eyes. 'I'm telling you, it's harder to find a good guy in New York than anywhere.' It is the cliche of single life in Manhattan, but only because it's true.
'I can see that,' my dad says, nodding earnestly. 'Too many people caught up in that rat race. Maybe you should come home. At least move to Chicago. Much cleaner city. It's because Chicago has alleys, you know.' Every time my dad visits New York, he harps on the lack of alleys; why would they make a city without alleys?
My mom shakes her head. 'Everybody is married with babies in the suburbs. She can't do that.'
'She can if she wants to,' my dad says with a mouthful of cracker.
'Well, she doesn't want to,' my mom says. 'Do you, Rachel?'
'No,' I say apologetically. 'I like New York for now.'
My dad frowns as if to say, well, then there is no solution.
Silence fills the kitchen. My parents exchange a doleful glance.
'Well. There is sort of someone…' I blurt out, just to cheer them up a bit.
They brighten, stand up straighter.
'Really? I knew it!' My mom claps giddily.
'Yeah, he's a very nice guy. Very smart.'
'And I'm sure he's handsome too,' she says.
'What does he do?' my dad interrupts. 'The boy's looks are beside the point.'
'He's in marketing. Finance,' I say. I'm not sure if I am telling them about Marcus or Dex. 'But..
'But what?' my mom asks.
'But he just got out of a relationship, so the timing may be… imperfect.'
'Nothing is ever perfect,' my mom says. 'It is what you make of it.'
I nod earnestly, thinking that she should cross-stitch that nugget of wisdom and hang it over my twin bed upstairs.
'On a scale of one to ten, how much do you dread this baby shower?' Darcy asks me the next day as we drive to Annalise's shower in my mom's '86 Camry, the car I learned to drive in. 'Ten is total, total doomsday kind of dread. One is I can't wait, this thing will be really fun.'
'Six,' I say.
Darcy makes an acknowledging sound and then flips open her compact to check her lipstick. 'Actually,' she says, 'I thought it'd be higher.'
'Why? How much do you dread it?'
She closes her compact, examines her two-point-three-carat ring, and says, 'Mmmm… I don't know… Four and a half.'
Ohhh, I get it, I think. I have more reason to dread it. I am the one going into a room full of married and pregnant women-many of whom are fellow high school classmates-without so much as a boyfriend. Only one of us is thirty and totally alone, a tragic combination in any suburb. That is what Darcy is thinking. But I make her say it, ask her why she supposes that I dread the shower by a full point and a half more.
Shamelessly and without hesitation to consider a tactful wording, she answers me. 'Be-cause. You're single.'
I keep my eyes on the road, but can feel her stare.
'Are you mad? Did I say something wrong?'
I shake my head, turn on the radio. Lionel Richie is wailing away on one of my mother's preselected radio stations.
Darcy turns the volume down. 'I didn't mean that that was a bad thing. I mean, you know that I totally value being single. I never wanted to marry before thirty-three. I mean, I'm talking about them. They are so narrow, you know what I mean?'
She has just made it worse by telling me that she didn't even want this whole crazy engagement. She would have preferred another three-plus years of bachelorettehood. And lo and behold, it all just fell in her lap. What's a girl to do?
'They're so narrow that they don't even know they're narrow,' she continues.
Of course she is right about this. This group of girls, of which Annalise has been a member since the day she left college, lives like women in the fifties. They picked out china patterns before their twenty-second birthdays, married their first boyfriend, bought three-bedroom homes within miles, if not blocks, of their parents, and went about the business of starting a family.
'Right,' I mumble.
'So that's all I meant,' she says innocently. 'And deep down inside, they are so jealous of you. You're a big- time lawyer at a big-city firm.'
I tell her that is crazy-not one of those girls longs for a career like mine. Most don't work at all, in fact.
'Well, it's not only the career. You are free and single. I mean, they watch Sex and the City. They know what your life's all about. It's glamorous, full of fun, hot guys, cosmopolitans, excitement! But they won't let you see their insecure side. Because it would make their own lives that much more pathetic, you know?' She smiles, pleased with her pep talk. 'Yeah. Your life is totally Sex and the City, '
'Yes. I am a lot like Carrie Bradshaw,' I say flatly.
Minus the fabulous shoes, incredible figure, and empathetic best friend.
'Exactly!' she says. 'Now you're talking.'
'Look. I don't really care what they're thinking,' I say, knowing it is only half true. 1 only care to the extent that I agree. And part of me believes that being thirty and alone is sad. Even with a good job. Even in Manhattan.
'Good,' she says, slapping her thighs with encouragement. 'Good. That's the spirit.'
We arrive at Jessica Pell's-a fringe friend of ours from high school-exactly on time. Darcy consults her watch and insists on driving around for a few minutes, to be fashionably late.
I tell her it's not necessary to be fashionably late to a baby shower, but I oblige, and at her request, I take
