Pam Fields did her best to keep her back straight as she leaned forward on the couch, hoping that good posture would equate to a good impression. She was smiling nervously, and she kept clearing her throat, trying to fill in any lulls in the conversation. She found herself nudging her husband, Wayne, a lot, and over the littlest things; – something that she hated doing. She never wanted to be that kind of wife. But this was an important visit, and she didn't want to blow it.

Marlene McCullers was oozing a confident smile as she set a tray of canapés on the on the coffee table in front of her guests. As she turned aside, she flashed the briefest of smirks at her husband and rolled her eyes. Pam and Wayne were obviously out of their element. Inviting the new neighbors over for a social visit was the correct thing to do, but in this case, it felt almost like an act of charity.

"So, you're in the armed forces?" Nick asked, desperate for something to get the conversation started.

"Yes, sir. Captain, US Army." Wayne's voice was confident and secure, the result of years of training.

"And you moved into the old Grafton house?" Marlene's voice was gruff, giving off the slightest air of superiority. Her voice held the barely noticeable affect of a New England accent around its edges, which made it seem out of place in Rosewood, a sleepy little town in the Philadelphia suburbs. She sounded as if she were slightly tipsy, but Pam would later come to learn that her voice always sounded like that.

The question about the Grafton house was more of an accusation. Marlene couldn't figure out what made Pam and Wayne think that they could afford to live in a town like Rosewood, on an army captain's salary.

"Well, Wayne's kind of handy," Pam said, touching her husband's arm reflexively. "He likes to have a project or two to work on around the house. Don't you, Honey?" Wayne grunted slightly, not feeling the need to impress their hosts. "And we wanted to move to a community with, you know, better schools." Pam crinkled her nose as she spoke. "We've got to do what's best for our daughter."

"Well," Nick mused, staring through the glass of wine in his left hand as he spoke, "You can't do much better than the Rosewood School District."

"So we've heard," Pam said with a nervous chuckle, looking at her husband. She raised her glass of wine gingerly to her lips, as if she had only been given permission to do so by seeing Nick take a sip from his glass. Wayne, for his part, reached for an hors d'œuvre, only to have Pam censure him with a glare, placing a napkin into his hand and mouthing a warning for him to slow down. He shifted his weight on the couch, resisting the urge to check his watch to see how long they'd been there.

Pam cleared her throat again and tucked back her hair as silence descended on the room. Then, she crinkled her forehead and craned her neck as she saw a shadow approaching from the hallway. Tipped off by her stare, Nick and Marlene turned their heads to see what was going on. It was their daughter, Paige, who had just toddled quickly onto the periphery of the living room. Her face was flushed, and she was smiling as if she'd just done something that she knew she wasn't supposed to do.

"Paige?" Pam offered with a welcoming smile.

Paige took a quick look at the four adult faces clustered on the living room furniture and turned, making a quick retreat back down the hallway.

Moments later, she was back, with the same ruddy cheeks and the same guilty smile. Marlene sighed plaintively, as if embarrassed by the bad manners of Paige's interruption. Once again, Paige caught sight of the adults and turned, quickly toddling off.

"I'd better see what's going on," Marlene grunted, standing up and moving towards the television. "Excuse me," she added, reaching for a remote, which she used to turn on the TV and switch it to channel four. "One of Nick's colleagues is an electronics genius," Marlene explained. "Saved us a ton of money on hiring a nan…"

Her thoughts were interrupted as the video kicked in, just as Paige made it back into her bedroom, where she and Emily had been playing. As soon Paige she walked through the door, Emily put her in a headlock, one arm below her head and the other above, and kissed her on the lips, smiling. Paige smiled at her for a second before she made her trip down the hallway again.

"Aww!" Pam oozed, looking into her husband's eyes. When she looked at Nick and Marlene, though, she saw the thinly veiled horror with which they were monitoring the interchange. "I.. should probably go get Emily," she said, apologetically, setting her glass aside and rising to her feet.

Wayne was quick to seize the opportunity, and quick to stand up next to his wife. "Yeah, it's been a long day for her," he quipped. "We should probably get her home." Pam looked at him, pleading. It was too soon for them to bail on the night. The damage had already been done, though. All that she could do was roll with it. "Can we help you clean up?" she asked tentatively.

"Oh, don't be silly," Marlene gruffed.

"Next time, I hope we can stay longer," Pam said moments later, as the three visitors and their two hosts said their good-byes in the doorway.

No sooner was Wayne's truck out of the driveway than Nick and Marlene turned to each other and burst into laughter.

"I guess that's the longest Wayne's been forced to keep a necktie on since… boot camp!" Nick joked. "I mean, did you see that guy? That thing must have been tied way too tight. He looked as if his head was going to explode!"

As they turned to head back to the living room, Marlene caught sight of the bottle on the table in the entryway. "Oh, I should've sent that 'wine' – so called – back home with them!" she lamented. She picked up the wine with two fingers and held it at an angle, as if worried she might be infected by it. "Honestly, I thought wine like this only came in a box."

"Or in a brown paper bag!"

"It probably set them back a couple of paychecks," Marlene muttered under her breath.

"Did she say that she works outside the home?"

Marlene exuded a world-weary sigh. "She'll probably have to, if they want to be able to pay the property taxes on the Grafton house. And he's planning to fix up that old ramshackle place all by himself? Good Lord!" Marlene laid her forearm across her head like a Southern belle with the vapors. "Can you imagine? Lumber piled up on the lawn, some old, rusted pickup truck parked on the lawn, and machinery running all day and all night? Oh, my word!"

"Well, I just hope he knows what he's doing," Nick sighed. "It would be good to have that eyesore fixed up, in the long run, I suppose."


Wayne had his tie off before Pam had gotten Emily secured in the car seat. "I told you that I didn't need to wear this ridiculous thing," he barked accusingly.

"Well, it's always important to make a good first impression," Pam said, slipping into her seat and into her seatbelt.

"A good impression? On those guys? Pam, I couldn't give two sh…"

"Wayne!" Wayne rolled his eyes. "I know," Pam said, placing her arm on her husband's thigh. "I get it, okay? They're stuck up, condescending, rich people, but they're the only ones who made any kind of overture towards us. They invited us into their home, and that has to count for something." Wayne huffed and kept his eyes on the road. "You had fun, didn't you, Emmy?" Emily, too young to answer in words, cooed at the excitement in her mother's voice and on her face. Turning back to Wayne, Pam mused, "I didn't realize it before, but that's the way I kiss you good-bye in the morning."

"Yeah, what the hell was she kissing their kid like that for?"

"Wayne!" Pam slapped his shoulder, both for the language that he had used in front of their daughter and for his tone. "She's a kid! That's what kid's do! They imitate behavior that they see in adults. That's how they learn how to interact with other people." Pam paused, thinking, for a moment, that it was best to let it go, but, in the end, she couldn't keep her thoughts to herself. "My goodness, did you see how confused it made Paige?" Pam shook her head and lowered her voice, half-talking to herself as she continued. "Obviously not a lot of affection being shown in that family, is there?"