Epilogue
THERESA
I ran my hands down the front of my ivory silk dress, trying to convince my stomach to settle.
“Mom, Austin took my crown!” Paris burst into the bedroom, her junior bridesmaid dress already sporting a smudge that looked suspiciously like chocolate.
“I didn’t take it!” Austin yelled from the hallway. “Rome hid it!”
I took a breath, counting to three. “Paris, honey, we have three backups. Remember? We planned for exactly this.”
Paris crossed her arms, her almost six-year-old face scrunched in righteous indignation. “But I want my crown. The one with the blue ribbons.”
Shelly appeared in the doorway behind her, already dressed in her matron of honor gown, holding the missing headpiece. “Look what I found hanging in the bathroom.”
Paris’s face lit up. She grabbed the crown and jammed it onto her dark curls. “Thanks, Aunt Shelly!”
As Paris skipped away, Shelly closed the door and leaned against it with an exaggerated sigh. “That’s crisis number seventeen averted. We’re still two hours out.” She looked me up and down, her expression softening. “God, Theresa. You look amazing.”
“I feel like I’m going to throw up,” I admitted, pressing a hand to my stomach. The slight curve there was still my secret—one I planned to share tonight at the reception. Only Shelly knew.
Shelly crossed the room and took both of my hands. “Wedding day nerves or morning sickness?”
“Both. Plus, the realization that I’m about to be responsible for twelve kids.”
Shelly laughed. “Fourteen sometimes.”
“Not helping,” I said, smiling despite the nausea.
Building a massive ten-bedroom house in San Ramon had been practical.
Patrick’s rental was too small for our combined families, and my house held too many memories of Marco.
We needed fresh ground—neutral territory where we could build our new life together.
San Ramon was a wonderful place away from the big city. And a great school district.
Patrick had insisted on handling the purchase himself. “Consider it a wedding gift,” he’d said, shutting down my protests about contributing. “You saved the company. Let me save our family.”
Our family. The phrase still sent a thrill through me.
Before I could dwell on it, the door banged open again. But instead of a child, a cloud of acrid smoke rolled in, followed by my mother, Willow. She was wearing a dress that looked like it was made entirely of recycled hemp and optimism, waving a burning bundle of sage the size of a baseball bat.
“Clear the chakras, clear the path!” Mom chanted, coughing slightly as she waved the smoke toward my ivory silk dress. “I felt a disturbance in the aura downstairs. Very jagged energy near the catering tent.”
“Mom!” I swatted at the smoke. “Please don’t smoke-damage the place. And the jagged energy is probably just Mrs. Kowalski reorganizing the silverware for the third time.”
“That woman has a very blocked heart chakra,” Mom observed gravely, extinguishing the sage in a potted plant I didn’t know I owned. “I offered to align her crystals, and she looked at me as if I’d suggested ritual sacrifice.”
“Theresa?” Michael appeared in the doorway, looking sharp in his tuxedo but slightly watery eyed from the sage smoke. “Is something burning?”
“Just negative energy, Michael,” Mom said, patting his cheek. “You look stiff, darling. Have you been doing your grounding exercises?”
Michael ignored her, shaking his head with a bemused smile before looking at me. He was pulling double duty today. Walking me down the aisle and standing as one of Patrick’s groomsmen. He stopped dead when he saw me.
“Wow, Tess,” he breathed. “You look great.”
I blinked back sudden tears. “Don’t start. Lisa spent forty-five minutes on my eyes.”
Michael grinned. “No crying. Got it.” He crossed the room and took my hands, squeezing them gently. “How are you holding up?”
“Nervous. Happy. A little terrified. Excited.” I laughed shakily. “All of the above.”
“That sounds about right.” Michael’s expression turned serious. “Marco would be happy for you, you know. He’d want this for you—for all of you.”
I nodded, not trusting myself to speak.
Michael squeezed my hands tighter. “Patrick’s a good man,” Michael continued. “The way he looks at you... it’s the real thing, sis.”
“I know,” I whispered.
Another knock on the door, louder and more insistent this time. “Mrs. C!” It was Alec, Patrick’s oldest, his voice urgent. “There’s a problem with the cake!”
“What kind of problem?” I called back, already moving toward the door.
“Eoin and Rome decided it needed upgrades.”
I closed my eyes briefly. “Please tell me they didn’t—”
“Toy cars,” Alec confirmed. “The ones with the detailed treads. They made tracks across the frosting.”
Shelly was already halfway out the door. “I’ll handle it,” she said over her shoulder. “You stay put.”
“I’ll go too,” Mom announced, grabbing a bag of crystals from her purse. “The cake obviously needs a vibrational reset.”
“Thanks,” I called after them. I turned back to Michael with a helpless laugh. “And this is why we’re getting married in the backyard instead of a fancy venue.”
“Smart call,” Michael agreed.
Another knock. “Mom?” Austin’s voice this time.
“Come in, sweetheart.”
My oldest son entered. In his junior groomsman suit, he looked so grown-up it made my chest ache.
“Patrick wants to know if you’re okay,” Austin said. “He says he has a bad feeling you might have climbed out the window.”
I smiled. “Tell him I’m still here. Just dealing with the usual wedding day madness.” I pulled him closer, pressing a kiss to the top of his head. “When did you get so grown-up, hmm?”
He shrugged, suddenly self-conscious. “I gotta go. I’m supposed to be helping Brody with his tie.”
As he reached the door, he paused and looked back at me. “You look really pretty, Mom.”
“Thank you, sweetheart.”
After he left, I stood and walked back to the mirror, studying my reflection.
The dress was simpler than the one I’d worn for my first wedding—clean lines of ivory silk flowing from a sweetheart neckline, no elaborate train to trip over.
My hair was swept up in a loose chignon, with a few curls framing my face.
Around my neck hung a simple gold pendant—a gift from Patrick this morning. Inside was a tiny photograph of Marco, a companion to the one of Shannon he wore in his own matching pendant. Our way of acknowledging the past was not forgotten but carried with us into this new future.
I placed my hand over the slight swell of my stomach, still small enough to be hidden by the careful draping of the dress. “What do you think, little ones?” I whispered. “Ready to join the circus?”
The discovery that I was carrying twins had been a shock. Last week, I’d suspected I might be pregnant—late period, unusual fatigue—but the doctor’s confirmation of two heartbeats had left me speechless. Patrick didn’t know yet. No one did, except Shelly.
Another knock, gentler this time. “Theresa?” It was Mrs. Kowalski. “It’s nearly time.”
I opened the door to find her standing there in a pretty dress, her silver hair arranged in an elegant bun. She looked softer somehow, less severe than usual—though she was eyeing the lingering sage smoke in the hallway with deep suspicion.
“You look wonderful, Mrs. Kowalski,” I said sincerely.
A faint blush colored her cheeks. “Thank you. And if I may say so, you look... lovely.” Her sharp eyes dropped to my midsection for a split second, and I wondered if she suspected my secret.
“The children are all assembled,” she continued. “Mostly clean, though I make no promises about how long that will last. And Mr. McCrae is waiting at the altar.” Her expression softened further. “He’s very eager to see you.”
“I’m eager to see him too,” I admitted.
Mrs. Kowalski reached out and straightened my necklace with gentle hands. “I want you to know,” she said, “that I am very glad you found each other.”
The words coming from this woman who had once seemed so determined to dislike me, hit hard. “Thank you, Mrs. Kowalski. That means a great deal to me.”
She nodded briskly, as if embarrassed by the moment of sentimentality. “Well, then. Shall we proceed? The musicians are ready, and people are waiting.”
I took a deep breath. “I’m ready.”
The walk downstairs felt dreamlike. Our home, usually a war zone of toys and noise, had been transformed.
White roses and greenery adorned the banisters.
Through the French doors that led to the backyard, I could see the rows of white chairs, the flower-covered arbor where Patrick waited, and the sea of guests all turned expectantly toward the house.
My father, Jerry, was waiting at the bottom of the stairs next to Michael. He was wearing a tuxedo, but he’d refused the dress shoes in favor of his worn leather sandals, and instead of a cummerbund, he was wearing a hand-woven sash he’d bought in Peru in the seventies.
He was already weeping openly into a batik handkerchief.
“Look at you, Starshine,” Dad sniffled, pulling me into a hug that smelled of patchouli and expensive red wine. “You radiate power. You are a goddess of the harvest.”
“Thanks, Dad. Please don’t get tears on the silk.”
He pulled back, blowing his nose loudly.
“I’m just so proud. And proud of myself for not fighting the system.
” He gestured to Michael. “I told your brother he has to walk you. The idea of a father ‘giving away’ his daughter like cattle? It’s archaic, Tess.
It’s the patriarchy manifest! But Michael?
Michael represents the sibling bond of shared trauma and survival. It’s much more spiritually sound.”
“Plus,” Michael whispered to me, “he’s afraid he’ll trip in his sandals.”
“I heard that!” Dad said, but he hugged Michael anyway. “Go on. Break the chains of tradition, you two.”
Michael offered me his arm. “Let’s go make you a Mrs. again.”