Chapter 13 Friday
Friday
(Nineteen Days Left)
“It was a rainy May afternoon when Jamie mentioned Ethan to me for the first time. I had just picked her up from eighth-grade track practice, and she looked completely defeated as she slid into the passenger seat of my car, muddying the carpet with her dirty sneakers. I specifically remember trying my best not to chastise her about the mess, because poor Jamie looked like she was on the verge of tears. ‘I’m worried the new kid is going to cost us the four-hundred-meter relay. His legs are too short,’ she said. ”
From behind me, Bethany, the stylist who’s been straightening my hair for the majority of the morning, chuckles. I have at least another half hour to kill in this chair, so I’ve been using this time to practice my maid-of-honor speech.
“Okay, so I’ll pause for laughter there,” I tell her while marking up the speech in front of me with a red ballpoint pen.
I continue, stopping here and there to take note of Bethany’s reactions, and find myself getting choked up when I reach the end. I power through.
“And so, Ethan, you may have lost the middle school track team their trophy, but you ended up with the greatest prize of all: Jamie.”
Bethany dabs at her eyes with the back of her sleeve.
“It’s good, right?” I ask.
“I don’t even know them and I’m crying,” she sniffles.
Excellent.
My speech took months of drafting to finally achieve the perfect balance of funny and heartfelt.
According to Jonathan, my first draft read too much like an “audition for SNL,” while my second draft was an “extreme overcorrection” that “sounded like Jamie’s eulogy.
” But I feel confident that I’ve nailed this final version.
And I made sure to stash a box of tissues under Dad’s chair for the moments I’ve flagged to pause for tears.
“Knock, knock.” A fist raps on the open door behind me, and through the mirror, I see Jamie’s head peeking into the room. “Almost ready?”
“She’s done!” Bethany exclaims, turning my chair around to face Jamie.
“Wow,” the two of us say at the same time, admiring each other’s freshly done hair and makeup.
Though I’ll never admit it to her, the girls Mom hired for glam knocked it out of the park.
And if the band and photographer are anywhere near as good, I may even have to thank her for taking on some of the wedding logistics.
Still, the thought of doing so makes me feel slightly queasy.
I follow Jamie down the hall to the bridal suite, where we change into our dresses. My eyes immediately begin to prickle at the sight of Jamie in her wedding dress.
“Do not,” Jamie says, fanning my face with her hands. “Your mascara will run.”
“How could I not?” I catch a loose tear with my finger before it manages to run down my face and leave a streak in my foundation. “You look so beautiful.”
Jamie’s bridesmaids offer their share of oohs and ahhs as they help her accessorize.
“So do you.” She motions to my dress. “Tonight would be a perfect night for you to meet someone, you know. Assuming you and Finn aren’t exclusive yet.” She smiles. I roll my eyes lovingly. “Ethan has tons of cute friends.”
“And I’m sure I babysat at least half of them.”
“Still…” Jamie says, her eyes lingering on me. “I don’t know, I feel like you might meet someone tonight. Try to be open to it.”
I’ve heard this countless times, at countless weddings, from countless people in relationships. As if my night won’t be worth anything unless I’m coupled up by the end of it.
“Where’s your veil?” I ask excitedly, changing the subject. Originally, Jamie had wanted to forgo the tradition of wearing one, but she changed her mind last minute. I’m dying to see what kind of style she landed on.
“Over there.” Jamie points to an old satin box resting in a chair in the corner of the room. I recognize it immediately.
“Oh.” I walk across the room and lift my mother’s veil out of the box it’s been stored in for the last thirty-one years. I run the delicate lace through my fingers, an old habit from all the years when I used to sneak up to the attic and try it on. “It’s Mom’s.”
“I thought it would be sentimental,” Jamie says with a smile.
And of course it is. Which is why I had always envisioned myself, the older daughter, being the first to wear it.
For a wedding that doesn’t exist. And most likely never will.
Which makes this sinking feeling of disappointment in my gut completely illogical.
“It is.” I don’t let my smile falter. “It’s perfect.”
I help secure the veil to her hair.
“Ethan is going to completely lose his mind,” Laura, one of Jamie’s bridesmaids, chimes in.
“You should go give him a first look before we all gather for photos,” I suggest to Jamie. “In private.”
Earlier, Ethan fell to his knees at the sight of Jamie in her matching bridal pajamas. It’s likely in everyone’s best interest that whatever reaction he has to the sight of Jamie in her dress happen behind closed doors.
“Good idea.”
And like the former track star she is, Jamie takes off running down the hall. Toward the kid with the short legs.
The familiar sound of my mother’s heels clicking against the hallway floors gives me a few seconds to prepare for her arrival. As casually as possible, I place my right hand on my left arm, covering my exposed tattoo.
This morning, Jana, the makeup artist, had reached toward my arm with a beauty blender coated in a thick foundation.
“What’s that for?” I had asked.
“Your tattoo,” she replied. “Your mom mentioned you wanted it covered up.”
I had told my mom no such thing, of course.
“Five-minute warning for pictures,” Mom announces as she enters the bridal suite. I don’t even have time to compliment her dress before her eyes drift to my arm. She sighs. I drop my hand.
“You look too beautiful to have that thing out today,” she says. “Imagine the photos, Phoebe. Do you really want to look back on this day and have that giant squid be the center of attention?”
I take a deep breath and firmly plant my heels into the carpeting, standing my ground. “First of all, it’s not a squid. It’s a giant Pacific octopus. Her name is Bev. She can solve a puzzle engineered for humans. Does that not inspire you?”
“No,” she answers without missing a beat.
“Well,” I sigh. “I’m sorry to hear that. And it’s not going to be the center of attention. It’s barely bigger than a quarter.”
“And can you imagine if I taped a quarter to my arm?”
“You would have my full support.”
She looks off into the distance, narrowing her eyes in thought.
“Fine. But I’m asking the photographer to edit it out of the photos.” She backs away through the door.
“No, you aren’t.” I follow her out of the room and down the hallway, in the direction of the outdoor garden where we’re gathering for photos.
“Yes I am.” She picks up the pace, and in response, I slip off my heels, gather them into my hand, and break into a full-on sprint.
“Phoebe!” I hear her shout from behind. I turn each corner of the hallway with expert precision, and fly down the stairs like I’m weightless.
My hair flies behind me like Wonder Woman’s cape in the wind, and I feel like a superhero as I charge through the large wooden doors that open into the garden, stopping as I scan the crowd.
I spy the photographer across the way, his back facing me as he fiddles with the lens of his camera.
Through the open doors, I can make out the faint sound of my mother’s heels coming down the stairwell.
I put my shoes back on and march to the other side of the garden with all the confidence in the world.
“Excuse me.” I tap the photographer on the shoulder, and he turns around to face me.
Time stops.
The jet-black hair that sweeps just below the rim of his glasses, the dark circles under his eyes that I find so inexplicably cute, the camera that’s always dangling around his neck…
the features that I’ve spent almost a year studying through the screen of my phone have suddenly materialized in front of me.
And they’re more perfect than I could have ever imagined. My mouth hangs open.
So does his. And then it closes.
His eyebrows knit together in confusion. “Phoebe?”
My mouth has gone dry.
“Matthew,” I croak. My stomach has turned to jelly.
He pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose.
Adorable.
“What are you doing here?”
What am I doing here?
Steps approach from behind me.
“Phoebe Lorraine!”
My mother’s screech snaps me out of my fog. I remember now. I came here to talk to the photographer. Matthew is the photographer. And I am supposed to be in LA.
A cold sweat breaks out across my brow.
“Matthew, correct?” My mother reaches for his hand and shakes it. “I’m Jodi, we spoke on the phone. I don’t know what she’s told you….” She glares at me. I’m fighting with my mother in front of Matthew. Like a teenager. “But let’s move forward with editing the squid out of the final photos.”
She gestures to my tattoo.
His eyes wander to the small spot on my left arm. “It’s a giant Pacific octopus,” he says softly. He keeps his eyes focused on my arm. I keep my eyes focused on him.
Mom looks back and forth between the two of us. A small smile creeps across her face. “Do you two know each other?”
Matthew says, “Yes” at the same time I say, “Kind of.”
He frowns slightly.
“We went to high school together,” I add.
“Well, isn’t this a fun reunion! Did you know Jamie?” she asks. “Well, I guess you wouldn’t have overlapped. Jamie was still in elementary school when Phoebe started high school. Would you believe Jamie’s the one getting married today?”
I watch Matthew begin to put the pieces together as he squints in my direction.
“Your sister is…the bride?”
“Yeah.” There’s no point in trying to lie myself out of this. “My sister is the bride.”
“I’ll give you two a minute to catch up.” Mom turns toward me. “He is cute,” she mouths before she walks away.
It’s just the two of us now.