Confessions of the Sullivan Sisters by Natalie Standiford Page B

jovial way. “I didn’t know you ran with the art crowd, sweet pea.”
    “Who are you here with?” Ginger asked. “Claire?”
    They smiled reflexively at the sight of me, their delightful daughter, but looked a bit baffled as they took in the young man standing beside me and realized he wasn’t Claire in any way, shape, or form.
    “Darling, who’s your friend?” Ginger purred.
    I summoned my manners. “Ginger, Daddy-o: This is Robbie. Robbie, these are my”—gulp—“parents.”
    Robbie shook Daddy-o’s hand. “It’s very nice to meet you.”
    “Robbie who , darling?” Ginger asked.
    “Pepper,” Robbie said. “Robinson Pepper.”
    Ginger accepted his offered hand at last. “Charming to meet you.”
    “What do you think of the show?” Daddy-o asked. “Should we bother braving this mob or simply turn around and head for dinner?”
    “It’s good,” I said.
    “Definitely worth a look,” Robbie said. I was proud to see that he didn’t seem rattled by suddenly meeting my parents. He held his own with them, cool for cool.
    “Would you two like to join us for dinner after we have a look round?” Daddy-o asked. “We’re only going down to the Prime Rib, but I still say they have the best steaks anywhere.”
    Oh no. God no.
    “We can’t,” I blurted.
    “We’re invited to a friend’s for dinner,” Robbie said.
    Ginger raised one of her overplucked brows. “Oh? A friend? And I don’t suppose that would be a Miss Claire Mothersbaugh, would it?”
    “Who?” Robbie said.
    “No, Ginger, it’s a friend of Robbie’s. Don’t worry, I won’t be home late.”
    “Who’s worried?” Daddy-o said. “You can’t stay out late in this town no matter how hard you try. Nothing stays open past two!” He pressed Ginger forward, into the crowded gallery. “We’ll see you in a few minutes.”
    Oh no they wouldn’t. I waved them off and we stepped outside into the chilly night air, pungent with cigarette smoke and car exhaust.
    “Well, that’s that,” I said. “We can’t stay. We have to get out of here.”
    “But Carmen’s dinner doesn’t start for another hour.”
    “We can kill some time, get a coffee or something.”
    “Was it that bad? What did you tell them you were doing tonight?”
    “They didn’t ask. I guess Ginger just assumed I was doing something with my friend Claire. Or maybe one of my sisters told her that, to cover for me.”
    “Are you going to get in trouble now?”
    “I don’t know,” I said. “They could bombard me with annoying questions. Or they might never mention this night again. It could go either way.”
    “I thought they were nice,” Robbie said.
    “They know how to talk to people,” I said. “They’re always ‘nice.’”
    Robbie scuffed the sole of his shoe on the dirty sidewalk. “Well, let’s walk down to Carmen’s. By the time we get there we’ll only be a little bit early.”
    We walked downtown. Robbie took my hand. I was nervous about what Ginger and Daddy-o would say when I got home, but I tried to push that out of my mind because I was also nervous about my ability to make it through a whole evening with Robbie’s friends without looking like an idiot.
    “What are your parents like?” I asked. “I bet they don’t go around calling everybody ‘darling.’”
    “That’s for sure,” Robbie said. “My mother’s a psychiatrist. She’s half Jamaican and half Jewish—she calls herself a Double J—and she’s very cutting and blunt. She wants everyone to be honest and face the truth all the time. It’s brutal. I reallyappreciate people like your parents, who take the trouble to pretend to be nice, even if they don’t mean it. You have no idea what a wonderful thing that is, Norrie. It’s so civilized.”
    I’d never thought of it that way. I always wished Ginger and Daddy-o would stop talking around things and just say what they’re really thinking. But you never have trouble speaking your mind, and I don’t always like that