Chapter 23

I should have planned to have you also wear a wedding dress, out of spite.

– Marcella

“It’s beautiful !” Penny squeals when I step out onto the excessive catwalk with an excessive train and locate the excessive display of mirrors. I’d be inclined to believe Penny’s assessment, save that her response has been the exact same every time I’ve pushed the curtain aside and exited in a new wedding gown.

Which, at this point in the evening, must be something I’ve done around five hundred times.

I am hot, sweaty, uncomfortable, and so over touching lace.

I can’t believe I shaved for this.

Who even am I?

“Arms up,” Brigid says.

I look at the itchy sleeves effectively gluing my arms down. If I try to fight the stiff fabric, it may tear, and then what will I do? Buy two several-thousand dollar dresses?

Absolutely I think not.

“Do not ask the impossible of me when I’m hungry,” I mutter.

Brigid arches a brow. “You can’t lift your arms?”

“Is lifting my arms actually mandatory?”

“If you don’t want to be grouchy during the entire wedding, I think yes.”

“Mm.” Mom shakes her head and pushes back a lock of salted brown hair. “I agree with Bridge. If you can barely move, it’s not going to be a fun time for you, and then you’ll be irritable throughout the entire ceremony.”

“These are wedding dresses.” I reference the rows of white puffs surrounding us. “Nothing with long sleeves is going to be particularly durable.”

“Sweetie,” Mom says, lips pinching, “why are you so set on long sleeves? Think about later , after you have some kids and want to fit into your wedding gown again.”

I narrow my eyes. “No. I don’t want to. Getting married is one thing. Getting pregnant ? That’s something else entirely.” I attempt to cross my arms, but guess who can’t manage such a thing in this dress, either.

“It’s true,” my beautiful bud Brigid provides, with amicable coolness. “Children are sticky. You can’t be trusted not to whack anything sticky that touches you into next week.”

Penny giggles, clamping a hand to her mouth. “It wouldn’t even need to be sticky. The last time Marciboo hit a child was embarrassingly recent.”

“That’s true.” Mom pinches her chin. “Okay, I rescind the comment about kids. You should never be a mother, Marci.”

Now I have to be one.

Out of spite.

Which probably means I really shouldn’t be one, now that I’m thinking about it.

The thing is, Finn’s form asked about children, and I did say I wanted a family…stickiness and all.

“I haven’t hit a child for at least a year. And it’s been over a decade since it was on purpose .” Huffing, I turn toward the mirrors and hate everything I’m looking at. “I’d be a good enough mother… Probably.” Straightening myself as I catch my thoughts wandering, I snap, “ But that is not important right now. The only thing I want to think about is that I planned an outdoor wedding at the end of November , and I don’t want to be cold . It’s long sleeves, or I’m wearing my butterfly wing cape. And that’s final .”

Mom sighs. “That is not final. There are more options that you aren’t considering. For instance…” She trails to a fluffy white bundle hanging in the corner beside the attendant who gave up on helping when I told her not to touch me. “…what about this?”

“Is that a dead animal?”

Void of emotion, the attendant chimes in, “It’s faux fur.”

“See? Fake. A fake fur shawl on something sleeveless will give you more mobility.” Mom’s lip juts. “I know it may be difficult for you to understand this, Marci, but I would like you to wear something comfortable enough to smile in.”

My nose scrunches.

She displays a hand. “I know. I know . In a shocking turn of events, your mother wants wedding pictures where her daughter looks happy .”

Guess who can’t put her hands on her hips, either?

It’s me.

Arms straight down at my sides with disapproval, I lift my chin. “You expect far too much of me.”

“Are you really going through with this?” Penny asks, having found her way to a section of blush pink dresses. “You actually want to marry Marshipan?”

Isn’t that just the billion-dollar question?

Brigid snorts and tugs on my skirt. “Of course she does. Do you really think anything less than love would get Marci into this much tulle?”

I look down at the abundant scratchy material and refuse to admit Brigid has a valid point.

My mom smiles. “I like Finn. He was very shy and polite when he talked with your father and I at the bonfire. I think we terrified him, which is an excellent sign given that he was the one with on-site bodyguards.”

My eyes roll as I shuffle back into the dressing room to get out of this disaster. “Finn is a good person. A really good person. It’s telling that the things I hate most about him are all stupid. Like, wow. I really need to grasp for reasons, don’t I? He’s just a genuine, kind person.”

“Who is very, very hot,” Brigid calls.

Penny adds, “And who has very nice hair!”

“Which adds to the hotness.”

“It adds to his fluffiness,” I mutter. “He has very fluffy, bright, bonkable hair.”

Penny giggles. “It is as pretty as a wiggly duck butt.”

My lips tug into a sardonic smile. “I agree.” The second I’ve squeezed the dress down to my hips, my mom throws the curtain back.

Squeaking, I cover myself. “ Mom! I’m naked .”

“Just like when I birthed you, idiot. Here.” She shoves something silken, sleeveless, and splattered with autumn colors at me. “This is the one.”

“Isn’t this a bit—”

“Perfect?” Her trim brows rise. “Yes. It is. There’s a cape that will cover your shoulders waiting for you out here. And there’s a matching reception dress. So we can go straight to dinner after you’re done making sure they fit.”

Without letting me get another word in, my mother pulls the curtain closed, and I listen to her heels click her back to her seat at the end of the runway.

Getting dinner does sound better than sobbing over five hundred more dresses.

Never let it be said my mother and I aren’t related. The genetics are loud.

After I change into the autumn gown, I glide from the dressing room and make my way down the cat walk, feeling exposed. “This is really expensive.” I wrap my bare shoulders in a hug and scan for the previously mentioned cape.

“Boohoo.” Mom twirls her finger. “What was the budget Finn gave you for this wedding again?”

I do my daughterly duty and spin, grumbling, “Half a million dollars…was mentioned…not really budgeted, exactly, though…”

“And how much have you spent so far?”

Less than a hundred thousand. Closer to fifty thousand. Because, honestly, who the heckish frick is spending half a million dollars on a wedding ? I came distressingly close to having Taco Bell cater. Thankfully, my mother smacked me upside the head and told me to get Olive Garden instead. “I…do not want to tell you.”

“Hm.” She death stares at me. “Telling.”

“You look like a princess !” Penny clasps her hands together and shines at me, eyes turning into literal stars.

“I agree,” Mom declares, smiling brilliantly. “Is it comfortable?”

“It’s about an inch too long.”

“If only we hadn’t started this endeavor by providing your measurements. Oh. Wait.”

The sarcastic apple did not even roll when it fell from the tree.

I sigh, defeated. “It’s comfortable, enough.”

Mom crosses her arms and shakes her head at me. “I know, darling. It’s so sad to be marrying into wealth.”

My face heats as Brigid hands me the reception dress to try on. Gripping the padded hanger, I mumble, “I’m not marrying him for his money.”

“And you love him, too? Well, that’s just depressing .” The woman pulls her purse into her lap and begins searching the pockets. “Let me see where I put my tiny violin. I thought I might need it again today, after I played it for your father, who was so sad he couldn’t come to this fitting.” She chuckles, evilly. “Sucks to be a boy.”

I gape. “Wh—” I scowl. “You told Dad he couldn’t come? He absolutely could have come. I wouldn’t have cared.”

Savage, Mom lifts her phone, presses a button, and overlaps the classical music whispering through the room with slow violin notes.

My arms fold, proving this dress’s mobility far outranks that of the last monstrosity I was in. “You should be ashamed of yourself.”

“And, yet, I’m not.”

The apple.

It dropped dead on the roots.

Heaving a sigh, I march myself into the dressing room. “Mom. Invite Dad to dinner.”

She turns the violin music up louder.

“If your father’s coming, can I invite Cody?” Brigid asks.

“Yes.” Sighing, I say, “Also, might as well tell Finn.”

While I change, Penny sings “Alone Again (Naturally)” beneath the cacophony of classical and violin music, Brigid on the phone with Cody, and my heart trying to hammer its way out of my chest.

In two weeks…

I’m getting married to the man I love.