As soon as we’re situated in the Tesla, I bend down to pull out a binder-clipped stack of multicolored flash cards from my shoulder bag. To counterbalance my anxiety about spending over a week with his family, I created flash cards to help us get to know each other better. It takes about an hour and a half to drive to his parents’ cabin, and that’s a little too much prolonged silence between us for my taste. I pull out the first card, green for Andrew. Across the front it says the words My parents. I answer as prompted.

“Katherine Kim and Alan Prescott,” I recite. “Your dad comes from a long line of wealthy WASPs and grew up here in Portland. Your mom’s family is from Korea, but she was born in Los Angeles. They met in Harvard Business School in the early eighties.”

Andrew hits me with an impromptu follow-up question: “Careers?”

“Alan is the current CEO of Prescott Investments, which he took over from your grandfather two years ago when he got the pancreatic cancer diagnosis. Katherine used to work as a professor at Portland State University, but she took a break when you and your sister were born, and eventually resigned to become a full-time mom. She now serves on the boards of four different nonprofits.” I list those nonprofits in alphabetical order.

“Impressive. You’re good at this.” Andrew gives me an approving nod. “Your turn.”

I don’t bother reaching for a new card. “Same question to you. My parents.”

He squeezes the steering wheel in concentration. “Um. Uh. Jed and… Lauren?”

“Lindsey,” I correct. Andrew is not good at this. “And what’s noteworthy about my parents?”

This, at least, he can recall. “Your parents were sophomores at Ohio State when they got pregnant with you. Like good, guilt-ridden Ohio Catholics—your words—they got married, dropped out of school, and got jobs at the local Dairy Queen to take care of you.”

“And how old was I when that genius life plan failed, and they got divorced?”

“Three? Sixteen?”

“Definitely in between there somewhere.”

Andrew throws his head back against his seat. “This is hard.”

“You went to Stanford. I think you can remember I was nine when my parents divorced.”

“Yeah, well, I mean… I had help at Stanford,” Andrew grumbles sheepishly.

“I’m sure there was no shortage of cute girls who were willing to do your homework while you were judging wet-T-shirt contests.”

“Excuse you. I would never objectify women in that manner.” He smirks. “I was competing in wet-boxers contests.”