Eligible. Curtis Sittenfeld

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       Chapter 18

      “I’ve got a question that you need not repeat to any of your sisters,” Mr. Bennet said. He and Liz sat in an exam room at the orthopedist’s office, waiting for the removal of the cast on his arm, a duty Jane had told Liz she didn’t think she could sit through. “I’m afraid I’ll throw up,” Jane had said, and Liz had said, “Because of the saw?” Jane had shaken her head and said, “Because of the smell.”

      “This business about Mary being homosexual,” Mr. Bennet continued. “Do you think there’s anything to it?”

      Surprised, Liz said, “Why?”

      “Your mother wouldn’t like it, of course. But what’s the old saying about people going about their business as long as they don’t do it in the street and frighten the horses?”

      “Wow, Dad,” Liz said. “Have you become a Democrat?”

      Her father shuddered. “Scarcely. But where does Mary go on Tuesday nights?”

      “You could ask her. Where she goes, I mean, not if she’s gay. Well, you could ask her that, too, although I don’t know if I would.” Liz had concluded some years earlier that Mary wasn’t interesting enough to be gay. All the gay people Liz knew in New York, both men and women, were a little more something than average—a little more thoughtful or stylish or funny—though perhaps, Liz reflected, it was New York itself rather than gayness that accounted for their extra appeal.

      “If Mary has a friend she doesn’t think she can bring to dinner, that’d be rather a shame,” Mr. Bennet said. “Her significant other deserves to suffer as much as the rest of us.” He was looking at Liz directly, and she tried not to squirm. Was he talking about Mary, or was he actually alluding to her and Jasper?

      “She must have her reasons,” Liz said. “You did just say yourself that Mom would be horrified.”

      “Your mother is horrified many times a day.”

      “At least now Mom has Chip Bingley to pin her hopes on. Did you know he and Jane went out for the second time last night? They went to a movie.”

      Before Mr. Bennet could answer, the door opened, and there appeared a male nurse in aqua-colored scrubs, carrying the plastic saw with its round blade at one end; the entire contraption wasn’t much larger than an electric toothbrush. “Fred!” the nurse said, though they had never met. “How are we today?”

      Reading the nurse’s name tag, Mr. Bennet replied with fake enthusiasm, “Bernard! We’re mourning the death of manners and the rise of overly familiar discourse. How are you?”