The Salinger house was not a home; it was a museum dedicated to mid-level affluence. Everything was beige, pristine, and aggressively tasteful. The air smelled faintly of lemon polish and passive aggression.
Louise, however, did not smell of lemon polish. She smelled of Dior and fresh rebellion.
She and David stood in the entryway. David, stiff in his suit, looked nervously between his parents and his fiancée.
David’s father, Robert Salinger, was a man whose personality could be accurately described as ‘tax bracket.’ His mother, Ella, was a gaunt woman with the judgmental stare of a hawk peering at a field mouse.
The moment Ella and Robert saw Louise, they both froze.
Ella’s mouth, already a thin, disapproving line, dropped open slightly. Robert, however, achieved a level of speechles
