A Compromise by Caitlin Magnall-Kearns

“Do we have to go to dinner with that dreadful woman.” Lois sighed, as she finished applying blood red lipstick to her thin, pensive mouth.
 
“I do wish you wouldn’t say that about my mother.” Jeremy knew he was fighting a losing battle, but persevered nonetheless. He had always been attracted to headstrong women, but it often led to confrontations with his mother, a woman who was the template for the term “battle axe.”
 
“I can just tell she doesn’t think I’m good enough for you.”
 
A familiar tension filled the room.
 
“She thinks I’m stupid.”
 
Jeremy didn’t want to lie, but at the same time calling his highly strung and increasingly irritated girlfriend stupid to her face probably wasn’t the best plan either.
 
“Look, we’ll go, eat, make our excuses then leave. I’ll drive so you can drink.”
 
“Keep talking…”
 
“And she’s making her Lemon Meringue Pie.”
 
“As long as she doesn’t make a comment if I go for seconds...”
 
She was smiling now, despite herself. Her dimples gave it away. It was in moments like this Jeremy remembered why he fell for Lois in the first place. Like a good meringue she was hard and elegant on the surface, but once cracked she had a centre that was soft, sweet and utterly irresistible.
 
“Shall we go then?”