Don't Forget to Write: A Novel(24)

“My sister exaggerates,” Freddy said, leaning against the doorpost.

“Your sister? This just got more interesting.”

Shirley looked from me to him. “Oh no.” She turned to Freddy, hands on her hips. “Can’t I have one friend whose heart you don’t break?”

“First of all you have Julia—”

“Only because you said Julia looked like a potato with hair!”

Freddy turned to me. “She does. Very unfortunate girl—I don’t think even your aunt could save her.” He looked back at his sister. “And second, the only heart being broken here is mine. She’s refused to go out with me multiple times now.”

Shirley threw an arm around my shoulders. “I knew I liked you. Come on, Mama and Papa want to meet you. We have cocktails in the living room before dinner.”

Mr. and Mrs. Goldman rose to greet me warmly as we entered the living room. I needn’t have worried about fans—instead I worried my hair would look worse than after a ride along the coast with Ada driving and no scarf.

“Shirley has told us so much about you.” Mrs. Goldman spoke loudly to be heard over the noise of the fans. I shot a glance at Freddy, wondering both if he had mentioned me and if he had made the connection that I was his sister’s new friend before I arrived.

“All lies,” I said. She looked confused. “I’m kidding.”

“Of course,” she said and laughed loudly to punctuate it. And I immediately understood that Ada would never set foot in this house. They didn’t know my family in New York—they were trying to impress me because Ada was Oxford Circle royalty. And Mrs. Goldman’s desperate laugh to prove she got a joke that went over her head was entirely so I would form a good impression. Freddy and Shirley or no, this was going to be a long evening.

Mr. Goldman insisted I sit in his chair, the place of honor in the living room, which was mildly uncomfortable as the whole family sat on two sofas, staring at me.

“Tell us everything about yourself, dear,” Mrs. Goldman said. “I want to know everything there is to know.”

“Goodness, that would be terribly boring.”

“Not at all,” Freddy said with a laugh. His mother shot him a death stare, and he hid his smile behind his glass.

“You’re from New York, of course. What does your father do?”

“He’s a doctor.”

“And your mother is a Heller.”

If you went back to my great-grandparents that was true, but it didn’t make sense to correct her on the branches of my family tree, especially when she was telling me, not asking. So I nodded, taking a sip of an extremely weak sloe gin fizz.

“Do you have any siblings?”

“A brother, Harold.”

“A brother,” she said, looking at Shirley. “How wonderful. You’ll have to invite him down to meet our Shirley. We could have a double wed—”

“Mama!” Shirley interjected.

“You’re right, of course,” Mrs. Goldman said, smoothing her dress. “He could be twelve. How old is he?”

“Twenty-five and married—sorry, Shirl.” It was my turn to hide behind a drink. There was a good chance I was going to start laughing if I didn’t.

Shirley shook her head. “Mama, really. Enough.”

“Marriages don’t always last—do they seem happy?”

“Mama!”

“What? I’m just trying to look out for you, dear.” She leaned in toward me conspiratorially, as if I weren’t there at her daughter’s request. “You’re not offended, are you?”

“Ah—um—no, of course not.”

Mrs. Goldman leaned back in her seat, flashing Shirley a closed-mouth smile of victory before turning back to me. “And you? Are you engaged?”

“Quite the opposite.”

Mrs. Goldman nodded sagely. “Which is why you’re here, of course.” Then she looked to Freddy, who was glaring at her, and her husband, who was making a stop gesture across his throat. “I don’t mean here,” she said, gesturing wildly around the room. “I meant with your aunt. To find you a match.” She wrung her hands fretfully until her husband reached over and put a calming hand on her leg.

“Let the poor girl breathe, Arlene,” he said. “She didn’t come here to be interrogated.”

To be honest, I was wondering what I was doing there at all now. Neither Shirley nor Freddy reeked of the desperation of their parents, so it was no wonder I had accepted the invitation, but it would take a lot more gin and a lot less fizz to get me back here again.

“It’s fine,” I reassured Mrs. Goldman. “But no. I’m not here to find a husband. I have two more years of college left and then—well, we’ll just see what happens. I don’t go in for all that matchmaking business.”

Freddy hid another smile. “No?”

“Not for me.” He winked, and I raised my drink again. At this rate it was probably a good thing that whoever made the drinks had barely waved a bottle of gin over my glass.

A maid in a crisp uniform entered and announced that dinner was served. She stood in stark contrast to Frannie, who wore what she chose. Ada, stickler that she was for so many traditions, seemed to be the champion of workers’ rights.