Her family don't know about her 'super status'. That is something that she pushes into him very early on. It starts with a throwaway comment about being unable to talk about their adventures to anyone else, but soon he learns that she is lonely in her power. For him, becoming super had given him a greater sense of himself, he was stranger literally and mentally and just knowing he had powers, even if he couldn't use them in day to day life, gave him confidence which replaced his former alienating arrogance. For Lizzie, it had been the opposite. She was close to her sisters and best friend and having to conceal her power, even before she'd started to use it, had driven a wedge between them. She felt guilty because she was concealing something, they knew she was concealing something and were first offended and then worried by her silence.
He supposed it explained her reluctance to talk to him when they had first met. She had been bound to silence for so long and suddenly there was someone who she could tell everything to. He remembered the first time she had told him anything personal – he had felt a shot of warmth shoot through his body because he knew something about her. He can't even think of what it was, probably a comment about her favourite colour, but he felt so privileged to be let into her complex and private world.
Now they were on their way to meet her family, six months after their official first meeting in the café and he was under strict instructions to keep anything super-related under wraps. It was going to be difficult, mostly because it was such a big part of his life with Lizzie and a part of his life in general. He hated the stigma attached to being a super and he hated having to guard his identity – by nature he was an honest person and he knew Lizzie was too. He just hoped that having a boyfriend who could share and understand her secret would help.
She'd warned him about her family, told him detailed horror stories, but nothing could have prepared him for the terror that is her mother. She falls on him as soon as he walks through the door behind Lizzie. Sparing no time to greet her middle daughter, she clasps his arm to her generous bosom, pulling him down uncomfortably close to her face as she shrieks delightedly about 'how handsome and desirable' he is. Shaken by this encounter, he only gets through the introductions because of his well-trained manners. Later Lizzie tells him she was amazed he hadn't turned tail and run, especially when her younger sister grasped him in a manner reminiscent of her mother and let out a loud squeal of approval at the size of his biceps.
Being referred to as a 'man-cake' is a new experience. He is aware that he is considered good-looking, but Lydia's terminology alarms him. She is a strange mixture of teenager and adult, hyper aware of any sexual content in a conversation but immaturely amused by it at the same time. He is reminded of his sister around the age of 15, before she'd had to grow up, when she'd still believed in romance. Lizzie's older sister seems nice though. She smiles a lot and is very pretty. Lizzie told him that it was Jane who she'd missed seeing the most and the tow do seem very close for siblings who haven't seen each other for about a year. He knows that Lizzie writes emails to Jane and sure enough, Jane is the most clued up on how they supposedly met, which is, of course, the topic of conversation at the supper table that evening.
Lydia starts it after an intolerably long discourse from her mother on how glad she is that Lizzie has finally brought someone home. To hear her talk, you would think that Lizzie has never had a boyfriend before. Pondering this, he almost misses Lydia's opening question.
'So… Will, how did you two meet?'
He glances at Lizzie. In their rehearsals of the story, she'd always put most of the details in, he couldn't remember enough to make it convincing.
'Well, we met at the café where Lizzie was working. I… umm,' at this point his voice softens involuntarily and the family lean closer, all except Lizzie who frantically wonders why he is diverting from the script.
'I noticed her immediately, even before she came to our table. Her hair and her smile and,' he paused and smiled himself 'She laughed. That was the first thing I noticed.'
'Oookay,' Lizzie laughed uneasily, 'So anyway, he asked me out and I said yes.'
At this point Jane interjects. 'But that wasn't what you told me. You said that there was this man who kept asking you out and you kept saying no. Then one day you said yes for no reason at all. That was when I-'
Lizzie cut Jane off. 'Well yes, there was a little bit more to it but you don't need to know all the details. Mum, what's for desert?'
She is trying to distract everyone frantically and it almost works. Lydia had lost interest anyway and was mucking around on her phone, Mrs Bennet merely looked annoyed at the idea that Lizzie had ever rejected a man's advances and Mr Bennet had only looked interested when he had asked Lizzie if she was happy. He seemed to be in his own little world most of the time and Will couldn't blame him, his wife must be difficult to cope with at the best of times. Only Jane looks a little bothered about being cut off and he wonders what she was going to say. Perhaps he'll be able to weasel it out of Lizzie later.