“Why do you hate him so much?” I asked.
My father’s eyes flickered. Just for a second. Something shifted behind them before his expression closed off again.
“Because we know better than you.”
Mom, I’m marrying him.
I drove home that night with my hands tight on the wheel. Something about the way he’d looked at me stayed with me. Too personal. Too sharp.
I told myself I was imagining it. I told myself parents were allowed to be snobs.
I told myself a lot of things back then, so I wouldn’t have to ask what my father was really afraid of.
The morning after Graham’s proposal, I sat across from my mother at her kitchen table with the ring still catching the light on my finger. I’d rehearsed the words for hours.
“Mom, I’m marrying him. I wanted you to hear it from me first.”
