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“This looks delicious, Mom,”I say as I dig into the lemon-pepper chicken that is courtesy of Georgette.

“Delicious, Elise,” my father echoes.

I look over at Sasha, waiting for her to offer a compliment, but she just frowns. Finally, she says, “The cook did a great job.”

I almost smack myself in the head. How could she have said that?

“Do you cook much, Sasha?” my mother asks her.

Sasha is toying with her food, shifting her mashed potatoes into a little pile. “I used to. For my father. But now I live alone. I mostly eat TV dinners.”

As Sasha finally takes a bite of her mashed potatoes, I want to yell at her, Elbows off the table! I don’t know why I care so much. When I’m at school, I eat with my elbows on the table about one hundred percent of the time, and Abe eats with his feet on the table most of the time. But right now, I’m seeing Sasha through my parents’ eyes. And they’re not impressed.

I don’t know what I was thinking, considering asking Sasha on a real date. Yes, she’s smart and hot and… well, a lot of things. But she doesn’t fit into my life here. I can’t have a girlfriend like Sasha. I have to project the right image, and Sasha honestly just isn’t that special. At least, not in a way that anyone but me can appreciate.

On top of that, she isn’t even American. She’s Russian or Slavic or something like that. She may have been born here, but it’s pretty clear from her name that her ancestors didn’t come over on the Mayflower like mine did. If my mother heard her last name, she’d probably have a stroke.

It’s fine that I’ve been hooking up with Sasha, but how could I have invited her home with me? It’s embarrassing.

By the end of the meal, Sasha is barely speaking at all, just staring down at her plate, absently moving her food around with her fork. In fact, nobody is talking very much. I can’t wait to get the hell out of here.

“Your girlfriend seems… nice,” my mother says to me at the end of the evening.

“She’s not my girlfriend, Mom,” I say, and relief floods my mother’s features.

The drive home is tense. I barely look at Sasha and instead keep my eyes pinned on the road ahead of me, watching the headlights of oncoming cars flashing by. Why did I bring her tonight? What a dumb mistake. She’s not my girlfriend—she’s not even my friend. I should have let our relationship stay what it was instead of trying to turn it into something it could never be.

“I didn’t realize you were so rich,” Sasha says, breaking the silence.

“I’m not rich,” I say.

“Oh sure.”

“My dad’s a surgeon. What can I say?”

“Have you ever worked a day in your life?”

What a bitchy thing to say. Who is she to judge me?

“Flipping burgers? No.” My grip on the steering wheel tightens. “But I’ve worked hard in school. It’s not like I paid off my teachers to get good grades.”

Sasha doesn’t say anything for a long time. Finally, after several minutes, she speaks while looking out the window.

“You better never screw up, Mason,” she says. “They’ll eat you alive.”

For some reason, I think of the Magnum still in my pocket.