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father. They fell in love and were married six months after. When I was a little girl, I asked my mother over and over again to tell me their love story.
    â€œM om, how did Dad propose to you?” I sat on the couch, watching Roxana slide a black St. John knit over my mother’s head. Roxana, an exotic Iranian woman who wore clunky gold bracelets and bright red lipstick, was my mother’s personal stylist at Saks Fifth Avenue. She always had a Coke and a Snickers bar waiting for me on the coffee table next to the pink lilies.
    Our private dressing area had its own kitchen and powder room, and was filled with racks of couture gowns, tailor-made suits, stilettos, jewelry, and purses for my mother to try on. After I was born, my father insisted he was making enough money so my mother didn’t have to work. She was now serving on the board of directors at the Columbia Hospital for Women, was vice president of Discovery Creek Children’s Museum, and was a member of the Junior League. In her new role as philanthropist, she always needed a rotation of outfits for benefits, meetings, and cocktail parties.
    â€œHoney, you know this story,” my mother said, adjusting her bodysuit underneath the dress.
    â€œTell me again,” I said. I was playing hooky. Mara and Chloe were at school. I often lied so I could spend the day with her, watching episodes of General Hospital , shopping and running errands. I wanted to talk to her all day long about grown-up things. It was more fun than playing with Poggs and Beanie Babies on the playground.
    â€œWell, I have to tell the whole story,” she began, “because of what happened a few days earlier.”
    My father had been late coming home from law school when my mother showed up at his apartment on Nineteenth and R Streets. She began spending most evenings at his apartment, but he hadn’t given her a key yet. My mother was tired and frustrated after a long bus ride home from work and began picking at my father’s lock with one of her bobby pins. Without any luck, she pulled out the key to her apartment, intending to use it to continue picking at the lock. But instead, it slid right in, unlocking my father’s front door.
    â€œLike fate,” my mother said, twirling left and then right in her new St. John knit. After my father arrived home, they had dinner, and when they were reading and lounging on the couch afterward, he said to her casually, with his head still buried in his book, “What do you think about getting married?” My mother had asked if that was a proposal. He looked at her; he was nervous. “Yeah,” he said. “Do you want to get married?” Mom smiled at him. “Yes! Let’s get married.”
    â€œA few days later”—my mother was now standing in her bra and panty hose, waiting for Roxana to bring her an evening gown—“I walked into the apartment, and there was a sock lying in the middle of the living area, which was strange, because your dad always liked to have things clean and neat. I picked up the sock, reached my hand down inside of it, and pulled out a black velvet box. Inside was my diamond ring. But this diamond ring.” My mother gently lifted the small diamond to her gold necklace resting between her collarbones.
    On a trip to Paris, my father had surprised her with a 9-carat-diamond upgrade from Tiffany. She turned her original diamond into the necklace she wore.
    â€œAt the time, your dad didn’t have a penny to his name. He sold his blue Austin-Healey the day after I said yes so he could buy me this ring,” my mother said proudly. “And believe me, he loved that Austin-Healey.” My father wanted to make sure she said yes before he sold it.
    â€œBut he loved you more than the car,” I always assured her.
    M y father started making what he ironically called “real money” in the late eighties and early nineties. We moved from our quaint