Chapter 19 Jane
Jane
When our return flight lands two days later, my first notification out of airplane mode nearly makes me drop my phone.
Mom: Your sister and I are in Los Angeles. We’re on our way to your home. I don’t know why you’re not answering my calls, but I’m sending you a schedule of our bridal boutique appointments so you can meet us there.
My neck prickles with foreboding. Wordlessly, I tilt the phone so Keeley can see it.
“Fuck! Did she even tell you she was coming?”
I shake my head. “She hinted she wanted to come to LA, but she works fast.” I can only take my mom in small doses. When I see the marathon of bridal gown appointments that starts in…less than two hours, I want to be sick.
Keeley nudges me to deplane, and I follow her out to the gate, then step to a quiet area and try to return my mom’s calls. No answer.
I leave a message but keep trying every ten minutes with my heart in my throat.
Keeley took a rideshare to the airport, so the plan was for me to drop her at her place, maybe linger for a few hours before I had to head home.
I toss Keeley my keys so I can keep trying to make contact with my mom, but there’s no answer throughout the drizzly gray October ride through traffic.
Just as we’re pulling into Keeley’s driveway, Nora calls me.
My heart lifts. I might have to see my mom without advance notice, but I also get to see my baby sister.
I still don’t know how she feels about me being in her wedding, but the apprehension in my chest doesn’t stop my excitement at hearing from her.
And…well, Riker’s right. I probably should have tried calling her too.
“Nora!” I answer.
Her relieved sigh is audible over the phone. “Jane! Mom and I are at your house, but you’re not here?” Her tone is apologetic. At least Nora’s self-aware enough to realize Mom is pushing my boundaries, and we haven’t even seen each other yet.
“I’m at Keeley’s,” I say. The moment the words escape, I want to snatch them back up. Will my family be able to sense that something is going on? But no, that’s ridiculous. Mom would never assume one of her daughters is queer. That fact is so outside the reality she’s constructed for herself.
I haven’t even spoken to her yet and I already feel so small. Because I don’t want to see my mom. Not so soon after, finally, discovering this wonderful thing with Keeley. I just can’t shake the fear being around Mom will ruin it, somehow. I can’t let that happen.
My parents have taken too many things from me already. I’m thirty years old, damn it, and I won’t let them take this happiness.
And today is about my sister.
“Hi, Keeley!” Nora says, oblivious to my spiral.
I tilt the phone away as Keeley pulls into park. “Nora says hi,” I whisper.
Keeley grins softly. “Tell her hi back.”
“Can Keeley come shopping?” Nora asks. I hear my mom protest in the background, but Nora, expertly, cuts her off. “She has great style. I’d love her perspective.”
“I’ll ask Keeley if she wants to come shopping, but she might be busy.”
Keeley’s eyes widen, and I shrug. “I can,” she whispers.
Our eyes lock. “You don’t have to do that,” I murmur.
“Hang on, Mom, Jane said something about a key back here. You don’t have to walk on the sand in your shoes—I’ll do it!
” Nora lies, so effortlessly it takes me aback.
All I hear for a couple minutes is shuffling and the crunching of sand.
“Okay, it’s windy enough that I’m out of earshot.
I didn’t want to make all of this fuss or fly down at all, but I tried to order a dress online because I couldn’t find one in Seattle, and that really upset Mom.
She’s determined to give me the ‘full bridal experience,’ so I don’t think we’ll get to leave until we find a dress.
We went to something called a sample sale this morning. ”
I blink. “You went to a sample sale?”
How did my mom even learn what a sample sale is? What a disaster.
“It felt like the Hunger Games! I gave up on finding anything, because dress shopping is stressful enough without fighting other people, and I wanted something low-key anyway. I’m so sorry she strong-armed you into this,” Nora murmurs.
“It’s fine,” I say. “I want to be here for you.”
She groans. “I would love that. I just can’t…she’s always around, you know?”
A warning bell goes off in my head. I know all too well what that’s like, but I didn’t know Nora felt that way. “What’s wrong, Nora?”
“Nothing, nothing at all. I just…really miss you.”
“I miss you too.” I’m the worst sister ever, leaving her all alone like this. We may not be close, but I could try harder. I know I could.
“She wants to go to this place that I’m positive we can’t afford, and I don’t know how to stop her. I don’t want a superexpensive wedding dress. Do you know anywhere we can go that isn’t going to be totally awful?”
I frown, glancing over at Keeley as I draw a blank. “Sorry. I don’t know much about the wedding dress scene here.”
Keeley’s eyes brighten with that spark that tells me she has a brilliant idea. “I do! Put me on speaker.”
I have no idea where this is going, but I do as she asks.
“Hi, Nora, it’s Keeley. How do you feel about a superchill boutique that specializes in secondhand designer and vintage gowns? They have a huge bridal section, and my stylist knows the owner. I bet they can totally get us some private shopping time. There’s also a huge variety of price points.”
We both hear Nora’s audible exhale. “That sounds amazing. I just don’t know how to sell Mom on a thrifted gown. Normally she’s all about using restraint, but it’s like she has something to prove with this wedding. I don’t get it.”
I glance at Keeley, but she’s already texting Rowan, her stylist friend who helped Glitter Bats with a few shoots last summer. If anyone has the connections to hook us up with a last-minute appointment, it’s them.
And I do know how to get Mom on board.
“Just remind her that you want to be a good steward of the financial resources you’ve been blessed with.”
For a moment, I wonder if I sounded too sarcastic on that last bit, but Nora just laughs softly. “Oh my gosh, that’s brilliant. Text me the details?”
“As soon as we hang up. And I’ll meet you there.”
“Thank you! It’s going to be so much better with you there,” Nora says, her voice strained before she hangs up. I wonder if she was on the verge of tears.
I don’t like the sound. I’ve been worried about this wedding from the start, and now I’m more desperate than ever to see my baby sister and make sure she’s okay.
Part of me wants to try to talk Keeley out of coming—the whole afternoon promises to be painful—but I’m glad I won’t have to face Mom on my own.
“So…” Keeley trails off, her hand falling to my knee. She gives me a light squeeze, and I want to tug her inside, sink into her warmth, let the real world fall away again.
Instead, I raise my chin. “So we’re going to hang out with my family…” I trail off, realizing that I have to make an unfair request of Keeley. “Today, we can’t…”
“I know,” Keeley says. “God, I know. I can control myself for one afternoon.”
She looks at me so earnestly that I can’t help but pull her into a soft, sweet kiss, even though I’m gross from the plane and sitting uncomfortably in the passenger seat. After we break the kiss, I lean my forehead against hers. “I’m not sure I can.”
Her cheeks flush. “And I adore that about you, but I’ll try to keep you in line.”
I let my gaze linger down the column of her throat, to where her hoodie is falling off her shoulder, revealing just a bit of skin. “And what do I get if I’m good?” I murmur.
Keeley’s eyes flash. “Whatever you want.”
My heart races at that. But there’s no time to follow through.
After I send Nora the details, we barely have time to go inside to change before we have to leave again.
We avoid traffic and make it there in record time, which feels like a miracle itself.
For a moment, I think it’s all going to be fine.
It’s a cute little shop. The place is bright and airy, with spacious windows letting in plenty of natural light, and rich wood floors polished to shine.
One side of the space is clearly devoted to bridal, with gowns in every shade of white—and some not so white—stuffed together on racks.
On the other side, there’s a rainbow of jewel tones, pastels, and metallics, all of the pieces meant for other occasions.
Toward the back, there’s an elevated platform facing a three-way mirror, with a few dressing rooms on either side, and a smattering of overstuffed, mismatched armchairs.
I’m stunned out of my observation by a happy shriek.
“Keeley!” Nora barrels past me into Keeley’s arms.
“Hey, kiddo,” Keeley says, squeezing her tight with only the slightest surprise on her face. Unlike Caleb’s little sister, Carrie, Nora never really hung around the band much, because our parents would rarely let her. But she’s still known Keeley for a long time.
Nora releases Keeley and pulls me in for just as tight of a hug. My little sister is a bit taller than me now, but I still hug her back as fiercely as I did when she was a toddler. I squeeze her tightly, and if I’m not mistaken, I hear her sniffle quietly into my shoulder.
“Are you okay?” I murmur.
“Fine, fine!” Nora says. She pulls back, blinking rapidly, and I’m blown away by just how mature she looks.
Her hair is lighter than mine, closer to strawberry blond, and today it’s pulled into a neat bun at the base of her neck.
She’s wearing a modest enough blue jersey dress with cap sleeves, but it’s on the short side of acceptable for a church girl.
Just then, Mom inserts herself between us and pulls me into a stiff, perfunctory hug. I squeeze once just to signal her to let go, and she does without complaint. Like the hug was just for show anyhow, and she didn’t actually want to hold on to me.