Chapter 14
Chapter Fourteen
THE STARS REWRITTEN
LOUISA
I’m standing here, in my wedding dress. Although, not a wedding dress, technically.
The woman at the vintage shop never called it that.
It had no tag, no provenance, no record of what occasion it was originally made for, or who wore it, or whether she was nervous when she slipped it over her head.
(Because why would someone be nervous in a beautiful cream-colored dress? ! Don’t ask me!)
It's a short, structured satin cocktail dress in a soft ivory, and yes, the cream may just be age, but it's beautiful because of it, and right now, against my skin, it’s perfect. Even Hudson thought it was ‘good’ when I showed him.
The back drapes low, gathering into a cascade of fabric that looks like it is meant to be cradling my shoulder blades, because while from the front it is high at the base of my neck, the back is low and deep.
I bought this dress not just because it was forgotten on the floor, but because the hem has humor and beauty at the same time.
The details trailing off as they climb the same way I sometimes just wander off midway through a sentence once I’ve said all I need to or get distracted.
It wasn’t born to be a wedding dress. And I don’t think I was born to be a wife.
But here we both are.
Being the thing we need to so we can exist in the world rather than stay hidden.
A string of pearls sit at my throat, another purchase from the vintage shop, this one an impulse buy at the counter.
(Makes sense for an impulse wedding.) A simple strand that’s luminous from having absorbed decades of other people’s happiest occasions.
(I hope they don’t absorb too much of this one.) They match the detailing at the hem of my dress in a way that feels less like coordination and more like the dress and the pearls already knew each other in a past life, like they are old friends who planned this reunion and I’m just lucky to be part of it.
I certainly didn’t plan it. I’ve never, in the history of my life, planned anything that went this well by accident (or even on purpose), which means it is most definitely a sign. And I absolutely love signs, especially when they are conveniently on my side.
I swipe another coat of mascara over my lashes.
My hands are steady (which surprises me) and my heartbeat is not (which does not.) I place my hands flat on the marble counter of his (well, my) bathroom sink and in the silence of his space, I can hear him without him even being here.
Just somewhere knocking on the door of my mind, getting it to settle.
‘In through your nose.’ I take a slow breath, filling my lungs and holding it there as I count to four in my head.
‘Out through your mouth.’ I round my lips and exhale.
A much easier, much more doable in public way to counteract the anxiety that creeps in more often than I like to admit.
But I don’t think I can break into the choreography from The Greatest Showman while standing in front of the Justice of the Peace.
Right now, the anxiety is telling me that this ruse will have us both found out.
It will result in a fine I can’t pay, and being returned to the rainy land of Yorkshire puddings.
And for him? He agreed to do this for his own reasons, and if I mess this up before I’ve completed the end of the bargain, not only can he be arrested, but he’ll lose his dream apartment. (Priorities, Lou. Priorities.)
His text had arrived as soon as he left this morning. The plan had been to meet at the courthouse for our wedding appointment this afternoon, but something changed.
Angry Neighbor?
Meet you at the apt. We’ll go together.
(I really, really need to change his contact info.)
I had stared at my phone for minutes, typed and deleted multiple responses but just sent ‘okay’ instead.
Because I have learned that arguing with Hudson Ellis results in me saying more than is helpful, him saying exactly as much as he intends, and the gap between those two things is where I find myself in the most trouble.
I pick up the small beaded clutch with my lipstick, my phone, a tin of cinnamon Altoids, and the folded piece of paper I’ve been carrying around since the city clerk’s office with the list of things I need to remember about him as if someone could quiz me at any second.
I check my phone for the time, I have a few more minutes before I have to leave, my shoes already by the door.
(Learned that lesson the hard way, I’ll put them on before I walk out.) But in the breath before this big thing, before I slip my feet into satin and head out to sign my name on the dotted line for my future, I find myself walking through this apartment with a different lens.
There’s no music, not really. Just something soft and cinematic playing in my head as my fingers trail over cool marble countertops, skim the backs of chairs, trace the edges of carefully curated, monochromatic art lining the hallway.
Everything about this place is so him. Controlled, intentional, and just a little cold.
I never noticed how little of him actually lives here.
(Maybe I never looked closely enough.) Even as I moved myself in, there was space for me because the deepest parts of a person’s life that should be here aren’t.
And I wonder if he keeps them anywhere, or if Grams is the real keeper of who he is.
My feet carry me, of their own traitorous accord, stopping just short of his bedroom door. The one he always keeps shut, the one boundary in an apartment that otherwise feels like a showroom. The secrets of my soon-to-be husband sit just on the other side of it.
This is a line, isn’t it? He’s welcomed me into this space, formally, for purpose.
Like everything else he has, functional.
And the guest room I’m in (whether he fully admits it or not) I know he updated it for me.
Not just white linens, but something that he looked at and thought would make me happy.
(Or at least might make me stay.) But before we say ‘I do,’ my hand holds on the black doorknob, because if there’s one thing we’ve been painfully, meticulously clear about, it’s lines.
The marriage is fake, the whole thing temporary, that means the terms are clean and absolutely no personal entanglements. ‘That would be too great a liability.’ A liability for him maybe, but I don’t think of feelings as a liability. Especially not curiosity.
“Of course,” I mutter to myself, fingers more tightly gripping the brushed handle. “No problem committing fraud, why draw the line at a bedroom door.”
The handle turns too easily. Completely unlocked and feels like a mistake by someone who I don’t think could make one. Or, if it’s a pre-marital test, I’ve failed anyway. So I push the door open just enough to slip inside, as if opening it any more would be greedy.
His bedroom is a more relaxed space than anywhere else in this apartment.
It’s still minimalist, but there is warmth here even in the neutrality of the space.
Pausing at the bookshelf, the photographs of parts of his life he never talks about, tucked away here in the most private of places.
A young Hudson at what looks like a debate podium, too serious for his age.
(That tracks.) He and Grams at a table somewhere, mid-laugh.
(That feels familiar.) One I don't recognize of a woman with his jaw who must be his mother, younger than I imagined her.
These are the things he keeps in the most private room.
The things that only make it as far as the place most people never see.
Like something he only reserves for people who make it past the deepest level of trust.
I stand in front of the shelf for longer than I should. I’ve narrated a hundred scenes set in rooms like this, the private space of someone who doesn’t let people in, the moment the protagonist finds the hidden self of the person they’ve been misreading.
Standing in his bedroom in my wedding dress, I think, ‘I'm working on it, Roma.’
I can hear footsteps in the apartment. My heart (and stomach) lurch.
He must be here already, waiting. And about to find me in his room.
Two things that would seriously aggravate him.
(Not the vibe for my wedding, no matter how fake it is.) But if he’s here, I must be late.
Slipping out of his bedroom, running towards the front door.
And much like the first day, I crash right into him.
This time, without any beverages or boxes, but my arms land around him as he catches me in his chest.
I peel my face back from his jacket and look up.
Hudson is dressed in more than something from his usual grey or navy work-suit rotation.
Not a tuxedo, but a crisp black suit with a stark white shirt unbuttoned at the collar.
Which is a detail I will recall once I put some distance between myself and this moment, when I am not standing in this hallway looking at the man I spent so many months tangled with in this personal-grudge match.
His neck isn’t tied in some large knot in a silk noose.
I can feel his eyes on me as he sets me back on my still-bare feet. He looks surprisingly relaxed standing very still. But his expression isn’t normal, and as his gaze crawls across my body it does something I’ve never seen before. He doesn’t manage it back to neutral.
“In a rush?” Hudson asks in a way that is not the usual condescending, but dipped in the smallest humor.
Recognizing, perhaps like I do, the irony that if this were a real wedding, if any of this were real, it would be a full circle moment.
So reminiscent of our first meeting, disheveled, contentious, that it would bring a smile to both of our faces.
“Being late is a terrible way to start a marriage,” I say as I straighten myself.
“Good thing, this is just a wedding.”