by Lee Hollis
“Absolutely not, Mona! You and Hayley are my best friends! You need to march down that aisle and stand beside me and show your support when I get married! I never ask you to do anything for me, and by God, this time, for once in your life, you are going to just suck it up and do it, do you hear me?”
Mona was taken aback, then nodded, surprisingly docile. After a long pause, she couldn’t resist quietly asking, “Okay, but couldn’t I do all that in a sweatshirt? I mean, not a ratty old sweatshirt with a dirty joke on the front like the ones I usually wear, but a nice, clean one I can pick up at Walmart?”
“Talk to her, Hayley,” Liddy said.
“Mona, just be patient. We’ll find dresses we’re not embarrassed to wear, I promise,” Hayley said.
“What do you mean, embarrassed to wear? You look so pretty in pink,” Liddy said.
“Honestly, I don’t feel pretty,” Hayley confessed. “I feel like one of Cinderella’s ugly stepsisters.”
From behind her, Hayley heard the door to the dress shop open. “Oh, Hayley, you look absolutely enchanting in that dress, like a fairy princess!”
Hayley recognized the voice.
She spun around to see Sabrina Merryweather bounding toward them, looking stylish in a sleek black pantsuit, her brown hair tied back in a ponytail.
Sabrina was formerly the county coroner and a classmate of Hayley’s from high school. They were never especially close back in the day, and once Sabrina founded her own clique, she froze Hayley out and treated her as persona non grata, like a true mean girl. Their friendship never quite recovered. But eventually, a decade and a half past those painful high school years, they did manage to reconnect and establish a professional working relationship as adults when Hayley gained a reputation as a local crime solver and relied on Sabrina’s medical expertise in the course of her amateur sleuth investigations. But then Sabrina abruptly quit her position and moved out of town, and the two of them ultimately lost touch again.
So it was a surprise to see her blow so unexpectedly into the dress shop.
“Please tell me that’s the dress you’re going to wear as the maid of honor at the wedding!” Sabrina cooed.
“Matron of honor,” Hayley corrected her.
“Oh, that’s right. I forgot you were married once,” Sabrina said, pretending not to be bitchy, but coming off as totally bitchy.
“Hayley hates the dress,” Liddy said.
“I didn’t say I hated it. I just think it’s a bit much,” Hayley lied.
“I think it’s perfect!” Sabrina argued.
Of course she did.
Hayley knew the game she was playing. If the dress made Hayley look hideous, then Sabrina would insist it was the perfect choice.
“What is she doing here?” Mona asked loud enough for Sabrina to hear after retrieving her sweatshirt from the fitting room and shimmying into it.
“Sabrina’s my second bridesmaid,” Liddy whispered, almost as if she hoped Hayley wouldn’t hear her.
But Hayley heard every word and couldn’t help but blurt out, “What?”
“Every bride needs a maid of honor, excuse me, matron of honor, and at least two bridesmaids,” Liddy said. “Sabrina has generously agreed to be one of my bridesmaids. Isn’t that sweet of her?”
Hayley and, most shockingly, Mona were both rendered speechless.
The clerk returned with an unexpectedly tasteful cream-colored, sleeveless dress that Hayley actually liked, but before she could reach out and take it to try on, Sabrina snatched it out of the clerk’s hand.
“Oh, this is gorgeous! I’ll try this one on!”
And then she sashayed into Hayley’s fitting room and slammed the door shut.
“I am so over this,” Mona snarled before pounding out of the shop.
Hayley marched over to Liddy and murmured in her ear so Sabrina could not hear her, “Sabrina Merryweather? Really?”
“I know,” Liddy whispered. “It’s an unexpected choice.”
“Unexpected?” Hayley said, a bit too loud.
Liddy gestured with her hands for Hayley to lower her voice. “Look, I’m aware I’ve spent years despising her with every fiber of my being. But let’s face it, Hayley, other than you and Mona, I don’t have a lot of close friends, and my mother insisted I have two bridesmaids, which is what she had at her own wedding. I’m already on thin ice with her for not wanting Lisa to bake the cake. So when Sabrina saw on Facebook that I was getting married and reached out to me to offer her congratulations, I thought that was so sweet, and I was honestly touched by the gesture. We started sending messages back and forth, and she seemed so interested in the wedding, and the next thing I knew, I was asking her to be a bridesmaid.”
Hayley understood the pressure Liddy was under.
As much as Liddy might fall under the category of a bridezilla, Celeste was perfectly suited for the role of overbearing, controlling mother of the bridezilla. The best course of action was to just appease her as much as was humanly possible.
But Sabrina Merryweather?
Hayley seriously wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt. Maybe Sabrina had mellowed now that she was older and no longer in a position of power. Besides, Hayley’s job as matron of honor was to make sure the bride remained calm and was not subjected to any undue stress.
So she vowed to herself at that moment to make this unexpected arrangement work.
Sabrina was now going to be a part of the wedding party.
For better or for worse.
Sabrina sailed out of the fitting room, looking ravishing in the cream-colored number that accentuated every curve of her well-rounded, toned body. “What do you think? I think it could work. It’s very understated. The last thing in the world I would want to do is outshine the maid of honor—wait, sorry, matron of honor.”
Hayley stared at her glumly. “You look beautiful.”
That was going to be her dress, and now it belonged to Sabrina, and she looked stunning wearing it.
And Hayley, in her pink frilly assemblage, felt as if she had just walked off the pages of a Mother Goose nursery rhyme. There were other dresses in the store, but Hayley’s heart sank because she knew this was the one the bride-to-be wanted her to wear. She was stuck with it.
Chapter 3
When Hayley arrived at her brother Randy’s bar Drinks Like a Fish after the dress fitting, she found her Island Times coworker and current boyfriend Bruce Linney sitting on top of a stool, drinking a beer, engaged in a very intense discussion with Randy, who stood behind the bar, nodding. On the other side of Bruce, Randy’s husband, police chief Sergio Alvares, was out of uniform and off duty, enjoying a straight bourbon. They all appeared to be in a jocular mood.
Sergio spotted Hayley coming through the door first and gave her a wink as she sidled up next to Bruce to steal a sweet peck on the cheek.
Bruce turned and smiled at her. “Oh, good, you’re here. I’ve been telling these guys you’d agree with me.”
“About what?” Hayley asked, nodding to Randy, who was trained to fetch Hayley her usual happy hour cocktail, a Jack and Coke, so off he went.
“How long Liddy’s marriage is going to last. Now Randy says it’ll be over in two years, and personally I think he’s being way too optimistic, right? I mean, you’ve known Liddy since you two were kids. I say the whole thing blows up in six months, nine months maximum. You’re on my side, right?”
Hayley’s mouth dropped open. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “Are you serious?”
“Of course I’m serious. I got twenty bucks riding on this,” Bruce said matter-of-factly, taking a generous chug of his draft beer.
“You guys are betting on how long Liddy’s marriage is going to last?” Hayley asked incredulously.
Sergio leaned forward and smiled. “Liddy hates to admit when she’s wrong, so I think she will hang in there and try to make it work as long as she can. You know, try to make it through at least their first wedding anniversary to make a p
oint. But after that, I see the whole thing sliding right into divorce court, so I’m betting a year and a half tops.”
“This is unbelievable. I’ve never heard anything so cynical in my life,” Hayley said as Randy returned with her drink and slid it across the bar in front of her.
“Well, how long do you think it’s going to last?” Randy asked.
“I’m hoping forever—like the vow says, till death do them part!” Hayley declared.
They all laughed.
“No, honey, be serious, really, how long do you give the marriage?” Bruce asked.
Michelle, Randy’s bartender and manager, sailed past them on her way to the kitchen. “I say they crash and burn on the honeymoon.”
More laughter.
Except from Hayley.
She took a deep breath and tried to remain calm. “I am not going to participate in this discussion. I think you’re all being incredibly callous and insensitive. Liddy is one of my best friends. She has finally found the happiness she so richly deserves, and here you all are treating the whole thing like some joke.”
“Don’t be mad, Hayley, we’re just having a little fun. Everyone in town’s doing it,” Randy said.
“I’m not,” Hayley said, pushing the untouched Jack and Coke back over to Randy. “I don’t want this anymore. I’m going home.”
And then she stormed out the door, jumped into her Kia Sportage, and roared away.
Hayley seethed with anger the whole drive home.
She knew in her gut Liddy and Sonny’s marriage would surely have its challenges, given their age difference, but having observed their on-again, off-again romance over the last couple of years, Hayley clearly saw the genuine affection the couple shared for each other. In her mind, their marriage had just as many chances of working as anyone else’s. It bothered her that anyone, especially those closest to her, like her boyfriend and her brother and her brother-in-law, not to mention Michelle the bartender, was belittling this pivotal, joyous event that meant so much to Liddy. If poor Liddy ever heard what they were saying at the bar, how derisive they were being, she would be hurt and devastated.
When Hayley pulled into the driveway, she saw her children, Gemma and Dustin, in the kitchen window, having an intense conversation. Both were adults and living on their own now, Gemma in New York City and Dustin at a visual arts school in California, but she was thrilled when both of them had agreed to come home to Maine for the summer wedding.
Hayley was still steaming when she slammed through the back door, but as her dog, Leroy, happily raced to greet her and her kids welcomed her with big smiles, she felt the tension in her stiff neck finally start to melt away.
“What smells so good?” Hayley asked.
“I’m making chili-rubbed steak tacos,” Gemma said. “I hope you’re hungry. Is Bruce going to join us for dinner?”
“Not if I can help it,” Hayley found herself saying.
“Uh-oh, trouble in paradise?” Dustin asked.
“No, he just ticked me off when I went to meet him for a drink after the dress fitting. Can you believe he said—?”
“By the way, Uncle Randy called just before you got home,” Gemma said as she mashed some avocados in a mixing bowl with a fork to make guacamole.
“What did he have to say?” Hayley asked, folding her arms.
“He said he was sorry, and you were right to be mad at him for only giving Liddy and Sonny’s marriage a year and a half before it falls apart,” Gemma said absentmindedly as she concentrated on preparing the perfect guacamole for her tacos.
“I can’t believe he said that,” Dustin remarked, shaking his head.
Hayley beamed with pride. At least her kids understood how cruel and hard-hearted people—her own flesh and blood—could be!
Dustin chuckled. “A whole year and a half? Wow, what was he thinking? We all know it’ll be over in a few months.”
“Six,” Gemma said, chopping cilantro. “I say six months.”
“Whoa, that’s way too long! How much do you want to bet?” Dustin asked.
Hayley threw her hands up. “My God, am I the only optimistic person left in this whole town?”
Her children stared at her blankly, and Hayley finally gave up and marched out of the room, refusing to backslide in her belief that this improbable marriage could work, and praying Liddy and Sonny would have the mettle and resolve and love to prove her right.
But deep down inside, Hayley wrestled with a nagging fear that, in the end, she might be the one who was proven dead wrong, that the skeptics would prevail, and the marriage would be a disaster from the start, maybe before any rings were exchanged, before the bride and groom even had a chance to say their “I do’s.”
She had no idea at the time just how prophetic her feelings would turn out to be.
Chapter 4
Hayley quietly picked at her prosciutto-wrapped chicken Florentine with lemon butter sauce and glanced at Bruce, who was busily cutting into his grilled filet mignon of Black Angus beef while Liddy and Sonny, both ignoring their Maine lobster pies, argued at the table at the Bar Harbor Inn’s restaurant, the Reading Room. This was only the second double date Hayley and Bruce had been on with the couple since they had announced their engagement, and also the second time the evening had dissolved into a barrage of incessant bickering.
“I just thought you’d be more involved,” Liddy snapped before picking up her glass of chardonnay and taking a healthy swig.
“Of course I’m involved! I’m the guy you’re marrying,” Sonny growled, both embarrassed and annoyed that they were having this conversation in front of Hayley and Bruce.
“You haven’t expressed any interest in planning the details,” Liddy said. “You’ve left everything for me to decide.”
“That’s because you’re a type A control freak,” Sonny muttered before catching himself and quickly adding, “which is what I love most about you.”
“Have you even bothered to be fitted for your tux yet?” Liddy asked.
Sonny sighed. “I have an appointment next week.”
“And will you come with me and Hayley to pick out the cake at that stupid, awful ogre Lisa’s bakery tomorrow?”
“I can’t, honey,” Sonny said. “I have to be in court.”
“You’re always in court!” Liddy wailed.
“I’m a lawyer! That’s what we do! We go to court! Look, sweetheart, we shouldn’t be doing this in front of Hayley and Bruce,” Sonny said.
“It’s nothing we haven’t seen before,” Bruce laughed.
Hayley shot Bruce a look stern enough that he shut up and went back to cutting his steak.
“We’re supposed to be having a good time tonight, not arguing about the wedding. Can we put a pin in this for now and discuss it later?”
“You’re always putting a pin in it, Sonny, and we never discuss it later,” Liddy groaned.
Liddy did have a point. Most grooms would do anything to get out of participating in the wedding preparations, leaving all the decisions to the bride and her mother, but Sonny’s utter lack of interest from the very beginning had sent up a red flag in Hayley’s mind. Sonny wasn’t even going through the motions of pretending to care about the invitations, the flowers, the menu, the dress, the cake, or anything, and Hayley feared he might be coming down with a case of cold feet. They were all barreling full steam ahead toward the big day, and it was getting harder for everyone, especially the bride-to-be, to ignore the groom’s obvious lack of enthusiasm.
Sonny tried changing the subject. “How’s your steak, Bruce?”
“Delicious,” Bruce said with his mouth full.
“Bruce, if you were the one getting married, wouldn’t you at least want to know about some of the wedding details?” Liddy asked.
Bruce gave a noncommittal shrug. “Maybe, I don’t know. I’ve never come close to getting married.”
Liddy, unsatisfied with Bruce’s answer, turned back to Sonny. “I went to the wedding website today, and
not one member of your family has RSVP’d for the ceremony or reception.”
Sonny shrugged.
“Doesn’t that strike you as odd?” Liddy said, looking around the table, hoping to garner some support from Hayley and Bruce.
She didn’t get any response, so she turned to the young, cheery waitress, who was refilling Liddy’s wineglass with an open bottle she had picked up from the ice bucket next to the table.
“What about you? Don’t you think it’s odd?”
The waitress clutched the bottle of chardonnay, eyes wide open, like a deer caught in headlights, suddenly nervous about being dragged into any customer drama. “A little.”
Then she dropped the bottle back into the ice bucket and scurried away.
“See, even the waitress agrees with me,” Liddy said.
Sonny finally dug into his lobster pie, and everyone ate in silence for a few moments, except for their clinking silverware.
“It’s just very odd,” Liddy said, feeling the need to reiterate her point.
Sonny set his fork down. “Listen, I’ve told you a dozen times I’m not that close to my family. In fact, I’m barely on speaking terms with any of them, so it really shouldn’t come as a surprise to you that I didn’t invite them to the wedding.”
“You didn’t invite them?” Liddy gasped. “But I gave you a stack of invitations that were addressed and stamped! You said you would mail them!”
“I don’t see any reason why those people should be a part of my wedding day when they’ve been miserable to me my whole life.”
“You lied to me,” Liddy whispered.
“I didn’t lie to you. I changed my mind.”
“And you didn’t tell me!”
“That’s not lying,” Sonny mumbled.
“I think it is.”
“What do you think is in this demi-glace?” Bruce interjected as he chewed on a piece of his steak.
“I don’t know, but you have to try this Parmesan basil risotto,” Hayley said, scooping some onto her fork and feeding Bruce.
“Man, you’re right,” Bruce said after swallowing. “De-lish.”