Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
Ava
N ot gonna lie—I was a little intimidated by Lynnette’s Bridal Boutique.
Lynnette herself was amazing and I instantly adored her, but for all I’d told Tori to chill about the sticker shock, I was having some second thoughts.
Did we even belong in a place like this?
Aunt Lacey and Cousin Ginny had sworn this was the place to buy a wedding dress, and I’d taken them at their word without remembering that they had, shall we say, a taste for the finer things.
Tori and I weren’t what I would call butch by any means, but we also weren’t fancy . And everything here—even the stuff in our price range—was fancy .
While Lynnette and Tori went through some details, I was still scrolling through the tablet.
As I scrolled and scrolled and scrolled some more, I felt more and more like a fish out of water.
One of our friends had worn a white pantsuit to her wedding last spring, while her wife had gone for the full-on princess gown.
Neither of those were my style, but the more I looked at these dresses, the more I wondered if maybe the pantsuit wasn’t such a bad idea.
I’d worn them before and felt fine. I also wore dresses without issue.
But I wasn’t so sure I was a wedding dress girl after all.
Is that part of Mom’s dream, though? Seeing me in the white dress?
I chewed the inside of my cheek as I thumbed through some more photos of dresses.
I knew she’d never want me getting married in something I wasn’t comfortable in, and I should focus on making this the wedding I wanted, even if it was fake.
Mom would be horrified if she thought for a second that I was doing anything—including getting married at all—just to make her happy.
So if I wanted to wear a white suit to my wedding, she’d support that. Hell, she’d support me going full goth if I wanted to, and knowing her, she’d go all in with the black dress and eyeliner as the goth mother of the bride.
The thought made a laugh bubble up in me, which turned Lynnette and Tori’s heads.
“Nothing.” I shook my head and buried my gaze in the tablet. “Sorry.”
Tori gave my foot a playful nudge with hers, and I nudged it back. Then she and Lynnette went back to discussing skirt lengths while I continued through the endless catalogue of styles.
We could still do a fitting if I got a suit, right? Like do the whole mini fashion show, trying on a few different styles, saying yes to the suit—right? Then Mom could still enjoy the experience of helping her daughter shop for what she’d wear as a bride. We could totally?—
Oh. Wait. What was this?
I tapped a photo that looked closer to a sundress than a wedding dress.
From there, the tablet took me to more photos of similar styles.
They looked… light and airy. Comfortable.
No big bows. No head-to-toe bedazzling. Just simple white dresses in what looked like lightweight fabrics.
Not so thin they’d be see-through, but they wouldn’t be too hot, too heavy, or too suffocating either.
A few had straps, and others had sleeves of varying lengths and styles.
Okay. Okay, I could work with these.
“So before we start the fitting…” Lynnette looked at each of us. “Are we keeping each other’s dresses out of sight before the wedding? Or are we not worrying about that?”
I turned to Tori. She met my gaze and shrugged.
Then a memory flashed through my mind from Ginny’s recent wedding.
We’d been watching through a window as Ginny and her husband did their first look photos.
His reaction upon seeing her had been amazing.
He’d broken into a huge smile and very nearly started crying.
The resulting photos and video were beautiful too.
“I know times have changed,” Mom had said softly. “But I wish more couples would wait until the wedding like they did. There should be some surprise—some big reveal—of seeing your bride in her dress for the first time.”
“Isn’t it a superstitious thing?” I’d asked.
“It can be.” She’d shrugged. “But I think it’s just a shame to lose that moment, whether they do it at the ceremony or”—she’d gestured at the happy couple outside—“a first look.” With a fond but slightly sad smile, she’d added, “Why miss out on a moment you only get one time?”
She had a point.
In the present, I cleared my throat. “I’d, um… I’d really like to do a first look at the wedding.” I turned to Tori again and offered a half-shrug. “If you’re okay with that?”
“Sure, we can do that.” She smiled. “Those are always the best photos.”
“They really are,” Lynnette agreed.
“Is that doable?” I grimaced. “I mean, maybe we should’ve come separately for?—”
“Oh, we can make it work, don’t worry!” Lynnette folded her hands on the desk.
“We have a screen we can set up so you can both come out of the dressing rooms without worrying about running into each other. You’ll be in full view of your entourage, but nobody here is getting any sneak peeks. Does that work?”
“That sounds great,” Ava said.
“Yeah, perfect.” I grinned. “Let’s do this!”
I was a lot more curious than I thought I would be about what Tori was trying on. I’d been so far up in my own head while she’d gone over ideas with Lynnette, I hadn’t even paid attention to what she was thinking about getting.
But every time she came out of the dressing room, the reactions from everyone—our entourage, as Lynnette had dubbed them—made me want to peer around the end of the screen. I was so curious!
Maybe it was because I’d always assumed—even if I’d never really thought about it—that when Tori bought a wedding dress, I’d be in her entourage.
That was probably along the lines of why I kept wanting to ask her opinion of different dresses I tried on—it had always been a foregone conclusion that if I were ever in the market for a wedding dress, Tori would be sitting on that ornate couch, glass in hand, giving her two cents along with my mom.
I wasn’t sure how I felt about doing it like this. Like I was still onboard with our plan, but I couldn’t lie—I was kind of sad that we weren’t doing that for each other this time.
This time, Ava. When you get married for real, then you can shop together.
That would probably turn some heads—taking my “ex-wife” to shopping for a wedding dress—but I’d cross that bridge when I came to it.
I came out in a somewhat plain and not terribly comfortable dress my mom had picked out. I thought the straps were too wide and the bodice made my waist look… I don’t know. Weird.
“You’re right,” Mom agreed with a nod. “It doesn’t suit you.”
“See? Told you!”
She rolled her eyes. “Sometimes you have to see how they look before you reject them! You know your grandma convinced me to try on one that I hated, and I ended up buying it. Once I put it on, I loved it!”
“Yeah. Well.” I scowled at what I was wearing. “I definitely don’t love this one.”
I started back toward the dressing room when Tori’s dressing room door squeaked.
“Okay, okay,” she said. “I’m not going to wear this one for real, but Ava has to see it before I take it off.”
I peered at the screen between us, my curiosity definitely piqued. There was some rustling on the other side along with some fast but soft footsteps, like someone hurrying past barefoot.
She stopped suddenly. “Wait—Ava, are you wearing the dress you’re going to buy?”
I looked down at the one I had on. “Nope. Definitely not.”
“Okay, good!” A second later, Tori came around the end of the screen, let go of the mountains of tulle she’d apparently been holding up in order to walk, and struck a pose as the skirt fell into place.
I was instantly overcome with giggles, as we were our moms. “Oh my God!” I said through my laughter. “I’ve never seen that much tulle in my life!”
“I know, right?” Tori fluffed it a little and cackled.
“Can you imagine if I had to use the bathroom in this?” She made a hilariously panicked face and started gathering up the skirt again as she did a rendition of a child’s peepee dance.
“Oh my God! Oh my God! Where’s the bathroom? I’m not going to make it!”
Mom almost fell out of her chair. Tori’s mom was wheezing. I had to lean against the wall.
Tori, of course, started giggling as she let the skirts drop. She spun around. “Look at this! It’s huge!”
It was, and I was amazed she didn’t knock something over when she twirled like that. The ladies helping us didn’t seem worried, and in fact they were laughing, too. All good, then.
Watching Tori strike poses reminded me of all the time we’d spent drawing pictures of princesses when we were little.
We would both draw ourselves wearing enormous skirts, ornate bodices, and tiaras or crowns that would probably break our necks in real life.
It was ridiculous, and it was adorable, and it took me back to our childhood, and prom night, and…
All those memories of my best friend. Silly drawings. Dreams about wearing princess dresses. Shopping for evening gowns for those formal dances in high school.
The dress I was wearing now was too big, so it wasn’t the reason I was struggling to catch my breath.
Right then, Tori’s gaze locked on me, and she looked me up and down, her laughter fading a little as she seemed to take in the sight of me in the wedding dress.
Her eyes met mine.
It was my turn to look her up and down.
Then we made eye contact again.
Holy crap. There she was. Here I was. Both in white dresses. Not the ones we’d wear to our wedding, but still—we were here to try on dresses for our wedding .
Our not real wedding, I reminded myself, but somehow that didn’t help me catch my breath.
Tori cleared her throat. “Okay. I guess…” She looked down at her dress, and her smirk returned. “Guess I should get back to trying on the real thing?”
“I don’t know,” I said, still breathless. “You kind of rock the fluffy pastry look.”
She rolled her eyes and flipped me off.
“Victoria,” her mom said, though she was fighting a losing battle against a smile.
Tori quickly put both hands behind her back and adopted an expression that reminded me of how she’d look when she got caught doing something as a kid. “Sorry, Mom.”
“Sure you are, kid.” Her mom let the smile come to life even as she rolled her eyes.
“The older they get,” my mom said, “the more they stay the same.”
“I know, right? Kids—what can you do?”
Tori giggled. So did I.
We exchanged looks, and then we headed back into our respective dressing rooms to try on the next dresses.
Alone in the tiny room, I leaned against the wall and closed my eyes.
I was just stressed. That was all it was.
I was grateful that Tori was helping me do something for my mom while we still had her, and with everything happening, my emotions were going to be all over the place. It was to be expected.
It didn’t mean we were doing the wrong thing.
It didn’t mean I needed to stop and pick apart all those feelings that rushed through me whenever I saw Tori taking a step toward this wedding.
She was my best friend. I loved her. I was grateful for her.
Seeing her in that dress had just driven home the length she was going to in order to help me give my mom her dream. That was all it was.
And if I told myself that enough times, I might even believe it.