My Family Said My Wedding Was Too Far but Traveled for My Sister Until Weeks Later My Father Needed Something From Me

and had forty-five thousand dollars in student loans and a dry wit about the kinds of books people claimed to have read. By our third date I had already decided I was going to marry him, though it took him longer to understand that. He met my parents early, and afterward he said, with the careful neutrality of a man choosing his words, that they seemed distant.

I told him they were busy with Madison.

He pointed out that Madison lived in Des Moines and we were literally sitting at dinner with them right now.

I said I knew.