How to Love

“He wants you to meet his parents?!” Liz exclaimed into the phone when I called her on Sunday afternoon. It was around one, so it was still fairly early. “When?”

“Uh, this evening, actually,” I replied. I was studying the Sunday newspaper, and still sitting in my pajamas and robe, eating cereal. Since it was relatively dead at the funeral home that day, no pun intended, I’d slept an extra few hours.

“Let me guess,” Liz scoffed, “you’re still sitting in your bathrobe.”

“No,” I lied. I hesitantly crunched my Rice Krispies. It was the first thing I’d had to eat since Friday that I was capable of keeping down. I’d had a nasty hangover the day before, having drank way too much at Alexander’s.

“Oh, for shit’s sake.” I could see Liz throwing her hands in the air. “I’m coming over.” She hung up, and I found myself wondering if this was just a pregnancy hormone outburst, or if she was actually going to rethink her overreaction and stay home. But twenty minutes later, the doorbell downstairs rang.

I went downstairs to let Liz in, who was holding onto a bag of mystery items. “Whatcha got there?”

“Today I am teaching you how to do your hair,” Liz declared. “You can’t meet his parents with your hair like you wear it.”

“What’s wrong with it?” I asked, instinctively putting a hand to the back of my head.

“Well, today, you haven’t brushed it yet. But it just hangs in your face,” she said. “There’s no style to it. It’s just…straight. It needs volume, or something.”

“Is this going to involve you cutting my hair again?” I rolled my eyes. “I let you cut the split ends like two or three weeks ago.”

“No, I’m gonna shave it all off.” This time Liz rolled her eyes at me. “I might trim the split ends. But mostly I want you to let me do something to that mop on your head.” She looked me up and down. “I sincerely hope you’re gonna shower and change before you go over there.”

“Gee, do you think I should?” I asked her sarcastically. “I thought I’d go over in my unwashed hair and bathrobe. That’d make a great first impression. I’m sure Jake would really wanna date me then.”

She shook her head and laughed at me. “Come on lady, let’s get you cleaned up.” She put her hands on my shoulders and marched me up the stairs. Liz waited patiently in the kitchen while I showered, and once I’d blown my hair dry and gotten into some underwear, I slipped my bathrobe back on and let her into my bathroom. Liz inspected my hair and remarked that she was proud that I really didn’t have enough split ends for her to waste time cutting, so she started setting up her hair shit again.

She spent probably an hour or so trying to teach me how to style my hair, though I actually paid attention for once. While I was in the shower, I’d started having anxiety about meeting Jake’s family. I’d met his grandmother and his sister sounded like a sweetheart, but he hadn’t had wonderfully nice things to say about his mom and dad. Still, I wanted to make a good impression on them, and if letting Liz do my hair was going to help me with that on any level, I was willing to go along with it.

Liz played with my hair for a while and then curled it loosely, which I had to admit looked nice, though I knew I wouldn’t have the patience to do it every day. She decided to leave her curling iron with me, and she also let me have a can of hairspray. As she checked my hair over, she started asking me about Friday.

“How was the party?” she asked, picking up loose strands of hair and fixing them.

“It ended up being nice,” I replied. I didn’t tell her about the conversation I’d had with Jake. That was between the two of us, and everything he’d told me was done out of confidence. There was no way I was breaking that trust. Instead, I told Liz about the ride home, which was when Jake asked me if I wanted to meet his family. “That wasn’t quite fair, though. I was a little wasted.”

“A little?” Liz scoffed. “Veronica, I called you yesterday and you dad answered your phone to say you were sick. I could hear you throwing up in the background.”

“So I might have under-exaggerated a little,” I shrugged her off. I’d polished off a whole bottle of wine, plus about three mini-bottles. “But Jake was a perfect gentleman. He drove me home and then carried me upstairs and tucked me into bed.”

“I’m gonna have to have a talk with him about taking over my job,” Liz joked, laughing a little. “I’m the only one that gets to tuck your drunken ass into bed.” She stopped in front of the mirror. “Did he at least put a bucket next to the bed?”

“No,” I answered. “I didn’t ask him to. And it’s not like my bathroom is that far away.”

“Then I have to talk to him about that too,” Liz continued. “You need a glass of water and a bottle of aspirin next to your bed before you go to sleep, and you need the bucket next to your bed. And you need to have greasy hangover purchased and eaten before you lay down to sleep. Did he have to sit through the drunk babbling?”

“You mean when I start giving my opinions on fifty topics in an hour?” I checked with her. She nodded. “He got the very beginning of that.”

“So that means he didn’t make it to the weepy emotional part,” Liz rolled her eyes. “That’s probably good. You’re not even officially together yet. I’m pretty sure you’d scare him off if you started crying.”

“Hey, it happens like once every six months,” I waved her off. “Now are you gonna help me finish getting ready?”

“Yeah,” Liz agreed. “When is he picking you up again?”

“Five-thirty,” I said. “He told me they eat dinner at six.”

Liz nodded. “That’s perfect. It gives me time to finish up with you and go home and start my The Care and Keeping of Veronica manual before Matt comes over.”

“Please tell me you’re not actually doing that,” I pleaded.

“I might,” Liz threatened. “If he’s gonna take over Drunk Veronica duties, he might as well know the rest.”

Liz and I went into my room and she tore through my closet, finally deciding that I should wear my brown tank top with a turquoise colored sweater and jeans. She let me change and went on her way, wishing me luck with meeting Jake’s parents. When I finished getting dressed, I did my makeup and then went out to the family room to sit with my dad until Jake showed up.

“You look nice,” Dad commented once I sat down next to him. “What’s the occasion?”

“I’m meeting Jake’s family tonight,” I answered. “Sorry, I thought I told you.”

“I may have missed it between all the vomiting you did yesterday,” Dad said with an eye roll. “I thought we could order in from Papou’s or something.”

“You can still do that if you want,” I said, feeling kind of bad.

“Nah, I was planning on sending you to go pick it up,” Dad shook his head. “I’ll just eat one of those turkey dinners in the freezer. Provided I don’t ruin the beans again.”

I laughed and then got up when I hear a car horn beep outside. “I’ve gotta go. I’ll see you later tonight. I don’t think we’ll be too late.”

“Just let me know when you’re on your way back,” Dad requested. “I might ask you to pick up some Burger King or something. And milk.”

I said good-bye to my dad and then headed downstairs to meet Jake. He kissed me cheek as soon as I got in the car. “You look really nice. A definite improvement from the last time I saw you.”

“Ugh, don’t even talk to me,” I groaned. “Yesterday was not fun. By the way, Liz wants to have a talk with you now that you’re taking over her duties of putting me to bed drunk.”

“Oh, great,” he rolled his eyes with a laugh. “Can’t wait for that. Did you ever try the bread thing?”

“Not yet,” I shook my head.

He put the car in drive and pulled out onto the main road. “Used to work like a charm for me if I didn’t want a hangover. Plus drinking a glass of water and taking a few aspirin before you do that usually helps, too.”

“I don’t plan on drinking like that again for a while,” I told him. “I was miserable yesterday.”

“Yeah, I know,” Jake said. “I called yesterday and your dad answered. I could hear you throwing up.”

“I’m so glad everyone was up to date with the condition of my stomach yesterday,” I said sarcastically. We talked a little more on the car ride over to Jake’s place. I wasn’t sure exactly where he lived, but evidently he lived in the nicer suburbs on Seven Hills, not too far from Alexander’s place. His house was a pretty big, and was painted a clean shade of white. If I wasn’t mistaken, I would have thought that someone had picked their house up off a Southern plantation and dropped it in the middle of northeast Ohio.

“So I’m just gonna warn you,” Jake said hesitantly as we drove up the ridiculously long driveway, “my sister’s really excited to meet you. My parents are kind of indifferent.”

“Well, thanks for the honesty,” I scoffed. “It’s not like I wasn’t already nervous.”

“You don’t need to be,” Jake assured me. He parked just outside of the garage and then opened his door to get out. When he looked back and noticed that I didn’t seem too reassured, he leaned back in and kissed me. “It’s fine. I promise. If they don’t like you, we can just run away to Vegas and get married.”

I laughed at that. “Okay. But only if you buy me a ridiculously big diamond. Like so big that I can hardly lift my finger.”

He chuckled. “Deal.”

We climbed out of his car and headed up the walkway, climbing the porch to get to his front door. He let us in, and the inside of his house was just as impressive as the exterior. It continued with the whole Southern royalty vibe that they had established outside, but for as nice as it was, it didn’t feel all that homey. We lived pretty humbly at my house, and we didn’t have anything that was that wonderfully nice upstairs, though when my grandparents were still alive and living there, the living room had been photographed for some uppity magazine.

I barely had any time to take in the rest of the house before someone came walking towards me excitedly. “Hi! I’m Michelle. It’s so nice to finally meet you!” I’d hardly gotten a glance at her and she pulled me into a hug. I had no choice but to hug back. I wasn’t big on strangers touching me, but she just gave an instantly warm and friendly vibe that made it feel like you’d known her forever, so it didn’t feel as weird as I thought it would. She pulled away after a socially appropriate amount of time.

As I introduced myself to her officially, I realized that Michelle was not what I had been expecting at all. I’d pictured someone ridiculously good-looking, with perfect facial features and a disgustingly nice body, sort of like a female Jake. But looking at her, she was very average. She had a good balance of pretty features and imperfect features, though they enhanced her face nicely. She was also very plain body-wise. She had some curves, and she was a little on the heavier side, but she was still beautiful in an understated way. Michelle gave off such a positive energy, it was impossible not to like her.

We all sat down in the family room for a little while, and Michelle and I mostly talked to each other, while Jake had his arm around the back of my seat. She asked me a lot of questions about myself, and then offered similar information about herself. It was an incredibly even exchange. After a little while, Jake had to excuse himself to use the bathroom, and Michelle had to help her mom with something in the kitchen, who I had yet to be introduced to. This left me alone in their family room, so I stood up to check out their mantle place and look at their pictures. On opposite ends were Jake and Michelle’s senior pictures, and I noted that Jake’s older brother was missing completely. Even in the family portrait in the center, he wasn’t present. I looked at the picture a little closer and then realized that I recognized one extra person in the photo.

“Hey, you okay?” Jake asked, coming back and placing a hand on the small of my back. “You look like you just saw a ghost or something.”

“I know your mom,” I practically whispered. “Jake, there’s no idea that I can eat dinner across from her.”

“What are you talking about?” he shook his head, confused. “How do you know her?”

“She’s my gynecologist,” I replied, still speaking quietly. I felt a little light-headed.

“I’m not understanding the severity of the situation here,” Jake said, continuing to shake his head.

“Jake,” I said in a hushed tone, “your mother has seen my vagina. Your mother has touched my vagina. With medical instruments. Your mother knows what kind of birth control I take and has seen medically enhanced photos of my uterus.”

“So?” Jake raised his eyebrows. “Veronica, she sees tons of lady parts a day. I highly doubt that yours stuck out to her.”

“Jake,” I said again. “You’re not getting it here. She has seen my vagina.”

“If it’s not hideously deformed, I don’t think she’d remember,” he insisted.

“That’s not the point,” I told him. “Imagine if my dad was a urologist, and he’d seen your penis. Now would that or would that not make dinner awkward?”

“Not really, I’m proud of that thing,” Jake smirked, causing me to smack his shoulder.

“It’s not funny!” I complained. I felt stupid for not even connecting Jake with his mom. I hadn’t even thought about it until I saw that stupidly perfect family picture.

He laughed at me and then put his hands on my face. “Veronica, it’s fine. I promise. Look, I can guarantee that she won’t even remember you when she sees you. Don’t get yourself all worked up about it. Dinner’s gonna go fine, and we can laugh about it later.”

I relented and tried to let it go, but it was clear as soon as Jake took me into the kitchen before dinner to introduce us that he was very, very wrong.

“Oh, Veronica, hi,” his mom greeted kind of coolly. “How have you been?”

“I’ve been fine,” I told her, shifting awkwardly next to Jake. “How have you been Dr. Damon?”

“Hannah, please,” she waved me off. She ignored my question. “Have the birth control pills been working out for you? You’re getting your period regularly?”

I could feel my cheeks flush. “Uh, yes, so far it’s been working out.”

“That’s good,” she said. She started stirring something on the stove, and Michelle gave me a curious look while Jake gave me an apologetic one. “That ovarian cyst should be cleared up by now.”

“Mom,” Jake said harshly, warning in his voice. “Do you mind? We’re not in your office.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said, though her apology was clearly fake. “By the way Veronica, it looks like you’re doing well with the weight thing.”

Michelle looked horribly embarrassed for me and she mouthed an apology to me from across the kitchen. Jake was tensed up beside me, his arm feeling protective around my waist.

Not knowing how to respond to this, I muttered, “Uh, thank you.” I didn’t think the situation could get much more awkward, but it only progressed over dinner. Jake’s dad joined us a few moments before we sat down to eat, and actually attempted to make small talk with me, but once he found out that my family owned a funeral home, he didn’t make much of an attempt to engage me in conversation. I was used to that from school, but those were teenagers that gave me that kind of reaction. I generally received nicer treatment from adults, so that was a little surprising. Jake’s parents mostly ignored me after that, but Michelle made an effort to keep a conversation going between the two of us, since Jake was busy being berated by his dad for what he called a “lack of direction.” Dinner couldn’t be over fast enough.

Michelle and I traded numbers to hang out again, since she had to run off and meet a couple of friends. Jake grabbed my hand when we finished eating and led me down into the basement, which he told me served as his bedroom. He closed the door behind us as soon as we were down there and went to go sit on his bed. I joined him and leaned my head against his shoulder.

“Looks like I owe you an apology and a ridiculously huge diamond ring,” he tried to joke, giving me a lop-sided smile.

I put one hand on his back, rubbing it up and down. “It’s fine. You don’t owe me an apology.”

“See, I just don’t know why they have to be like that,” he continued, semi-ignoring me. “I didn’t think my mom was going to act like such a bitch, and I didn’t think my dad was gonna be such a snob.”

“Well, Michelle’s nice,” I added, trying to make him feel a little better. “I liked her a lot. And your mom was always nice to me when I had to go see her.”

“She didn’t need to bring up any of the stuff you went to see her for, either,” he went on. “I don’t need to know any of it. I’m curious now, but when you tell me about it, you tell me about it. And I don’t know what the hell the weight comment was for. You’re perfect the way you are.”

“Well, thank you,” I kissed his cheek. “But really, it’s fine. My feelings aren’t hurt. I didn’t expect much from what you’ve said about your parents before, so it’s not like they shattered some illusion that I had about this being the perfect dinner.”

“Don’t take it personally,” Jake said, putting his hand on my knee. “They’ve never liked anyone I dated. They don’t even like Dayna.”

“I thought you told me you didn’t date much,” I said, frowning slightly.

“I really didn’t in high school,” he said. “But on the rare occasion I liked a girl enough to let her meet my parents, it never went all that well. They’ve just never been that outwardly rude to anyone before.”

“I inspire hate and irritation,” I kissed his shoulder. “Every girl’s dream. I should be flattered.”

He shook his head, chuckling. “Yeah, well, congratulations on that one.” He leaned back on his bed against the headboard, pulling me with him. “I really am sorry.”

“It’s okay,” I told him. “It might get better eventually. Maybe when your mom forgets about my lady problems and my weight issues.”

“I can’t believe she even brought it up,” Jake said, shaking his head again in irritation.

“It’s okay,” I repeated. “I gained a lot of weight after my mom passed away. Your mom put me on birth control and had this diet set for me or whatever, and I lost like fifteen pounds. So I can’t really complain about that.”

“I don’t really understand why you’re on birth control,” he said. “It’s not like you’re presently banging anybody.”

“Birth control’s not just birth control,” I laughed slightly. “It’s for other stuff.”

“Like regulating periods,” he clarified after I hesitated to continue.

“Yes,” I sighed and then buried my head against his shoulder. “I can’t believe we’re talking about this.”

“I told you about what an asshole I used to be,” Jake said. “I think we can talk about this. It’s not like I’ve never heard any of the terms. My mom’s a doctor, I have a sister, and I took health in high school. I know how it works.”

“It’s embarrassing,” I said. “And again, it’s only stuff I’ve ever told Liz, since she was the one running me around to my doctor appointments and stuff.”

“Well, then don’t go into detail,” he shrugged. “Just give me the short version. If there is one.”

“Fine,” I finally agreed after a few moments of silence. “I wasn’t getting my period, so Liz took me to see your mom since I’m seventeen and that’s weird, and I hadn’t had sex in over two years. So your mom thought that was weird too and I had to go see all these different doctors and have blood tests done, plus I had to get an ultrasound of my uterine area done. Apparently I had a cyst on an ovary, and it was making it possible that I could never have kids, or that it would at least make it very difficult. Evidently the solution to that was birth control and weight loss, and everything’s fine now I believe, but I’m still terrified of not being able to have kids. That’s it.”

“That was very rushed,” Jake said slowly when I was done. “And I’m not sure I understood all of that, but okay.”

“Liz has got a better handle on that than I do,” I said. “I don’t really understand it either. But I’m sure Liz will put it in her manual about taking care of me, so who knows?”

“She’s making a manual? Why?” Jake asked, confused again.

“I don’t know,” I shrugged. “She’s pregnant. She’s allowed to do what she wants. It’s not my place to question it.”

He laughed again. “That’s probably best. Anyway, do you wanna hang out down here for a little while, or do you want me to take you back?”

“Whatever you wanna do,” I told him. “I’m fine with whatever. But I’m just pretty sure I need to stop and get dinner and milk for my dad.”

“Your dad and that fucking milk.” Jake shook his head, running a hand through his hair. “We can go, then. I’d rather hang out at your place anyway. Your dad’s a lot cooler than my parents.” He stood up, dragging me with him. “Are we stopping for dirty titty milk or are we buying a normal brand?”

“I don’t understand the problem you have with the milk,” I said. “You’re not even gonna drink it. It’s gonna be gone by the next time you come over anyway.”

We continued teasingly arguing about the milk on our way out, neither one of us bothering to say anything to Jake’s parents, who were still in the kitchen. As we walked out to the car, I felt better just knowing that I wasn’t under parental scrutiny anymore, though the worst of it was all over. We drove off towards my house, and Jake seemed to really ease up as well, though he still seemed a little bothered. He didn’t say anything more about his parents, especially about his dad. Clearly, he was uncomfortable with the memory of the whole dinner, particularly the part where his dad was needlessly criticizing him. I wondered if that happened a lot, and if it ever got any worse than that. I’d always had a better relationship with my dad than with my mom, but even at her worst, my mother was never anything less than supportive of me in whatever I wanted to do. She had been stricter about things and sometimes put me under a lot of pressure, but she’d never told me that she thought my life was going nowhere. I couldn’t even imagine how bad I’d feel if either one of my parents had ever said that to me, though I knew it would definitely rattle me. So for the rest of the ride home, I let my hand rest on Jake’s knee. He flashed me a glance after I did this, like he was trying to figure out my motives behind the gesture, so I just gave him a small smile, and like that he seemed to understand. At a red light, he lifted my hand from his knee and kissed it, setting it back on his knee.

“You’re pretty great, you know that?” he said, smiling.

“Maybe,” I said. “I don’t know what I did to deserve you, though.”