2 Months 'Til Mrs. (2 'Til Series)

by Heather Muzik

  Catherine’s lips trembled as she imagined this was the beginning of the end. Soon her bodily functions would begin to fail—

  “Sweetie, we can figure this out,” Georgia said placatingly. “There are four of us and only one wedding. We’ll get you married on the 4th—”

  “Or die trying!” Tara announced, as if calling for revolution.

  “You said Vinnie sold it off in pieces. What do we have left to work with? Anything?” Georgia prodded.

  “The location, but we may or may not have any food—he’ll be in touch, he said…. And we have a DJ.”

  “Wait a second, I thought you booked a band,” Tara clarified.

  “Yes, I booked a band,” Catherine snapped. “It turns out that he doesn’t only dissect and sell off weddings, he also takes trades. When I canceled, some stupid bitch snatched up my band and left me with her useless DJ.”

  Tara let out one single inappropriate guffaw.

  “It isn’t funny.”

  “It’s a little funny,” Tara squeaked.

  Friday, February 18th

  -56-

  “Okay girls, we’ve had three days to pull something together,” Georgia said, like she was calling to order a meeting of the Wedding Warriors—not that they’d named themselves. “Where did you get with the flowers, Cat?”

  “No bouquets or boutonnieres, but it seems that my centerpieces were ‘hard to unload’,” Catherine said, air quotes on Vinnie’s exact words. “I guess the whole sundae thing is a bit personalized and—”

  “Total cheese,” Tara offered, a mouthful of Fluffernutter garbling her words, mocking Catherine even further.

  “That cheese saved the centerpieces,” she countered.

  “Too bad we don’t have any tables to put them on,” Georgia noted.

  “That’s not true. There’s a local church that is willing to donate tables and chairs in exchange for a monetary gift to their fundraiser to build a youth center,” Lacey announced.

  “So basically they’re willing to rent them,” Tara asserted.

  “It’s perfect.” Georgia waved her off and checked another item off her list.

  “Plus, I cashed in a favor with a friend of mine who works at a hotel in Philly. We can get plain cream linens from her as long as we pay for laundering and any damage,” Lacey added helpfully.

  “Excellent.” Georgia perused her list. “For my part, I have a woman in one of my moms’ groups whose sister has just started catering. She says she is ready and willing to do an hors d’oeuvres wedding for one hundred twenty people. She’ll even do the mashed potato sundaes.”

  Catherine’s heart began to swell tentatively with hope. Could it possibly be that she’d worried for nothing? This wouldn’t be exactly like the prior plan, but only the four of them would even know—

  Her phone rang and she snatched it up quickly. “Hello?”

  “Hey, Cat.” Vinnie Delrio’s greeting was more attuned to a casual meeting of friends than a swindler calling his swindlee.

  “It’s Catherine,” she said firmly.

  He ignored her iciness. “Listen, I was trying to touch base with you’s about your wedding plans. I have an offer—”

  “One I can’t refuse?” she quipped brusquely. “Believe me, Vinnie, I can.”

  “Still need those centerpieces?” he asked, undeterred.

  “Of course I need them! I need my whole wedding! Don’t tell me you’re still trying to weasel the last of it out from under me. I told you I was still getting married. I told you to cease and desist—”

  “But I got a huge upgrade for you’s. April 8th. Everything’s top-a-the-line, but I’ll give it to you’s at the cost of the last one. Call it a family discount.”

  “We’re not family. And I don’t want an upgrade. I want my wedding.”

  “Babe, seriously, this is a steal! Better everything!”

  “I have guests expecting a wedding on March 4th and I intend to give them one, without your help. If you try to sell off what little is left I’ll—”

  “I’m just sayin’, I got a bidding war on my hands—a bat mitzvah and a sweet sixteen duking it out for flower sundaes. Who knew?”

  “Aren’t you a wedding broker?” she asked bitterly.

  “A smart businessman always diversifies. My E-Hour Events branch does all occasions: birthdays, anniversaries, corporate—”

  “E-Hour?”

  “Catchy, huh? Eleventh Hour. Kids think anything “E” is hip. It’s all in the marketing,” Vinnie said proudly. “Anyways, like I said, I got two families chomping at the bit for your centerpieces. You’s could make some extra dough on this. A nest egg for—”

  “Stop. Just stop. Please. You’re killing me.”

  “We could be making a killing—”

  Catherine hung up on him and gave the evil eye to Tara, but Georgia quickly stepped between them as a barrier. “So, Tara, how is the photographer coming along?” she prompted.

  Tara pulled out a crumpled ball of paper, part of someone’s lost dog flyer, an entirely different method from Georgia’s tried-and-true journals in which she proudly ticked off her to-do’s and done’s. “I’ve narrowed it down to prom guy, porn guy, and pet chick.” She counted them off on her fingers.

  Catherine’s phone rang yet again and she picked it up, immediately blasting Vinnie. “I said no. I don’t have time for any more games. I don’t care how much they offer.”

  “Excuse me?” The melted butter oozed into her ear, the one un-crazy person in her life on the line.

  “Oh, sorry, I thought you were someone else.” She felt like she was just caught red-handed.

  “Is this about the promotion?” Fynn asked warily.

  “No,” she said quickly. “It’s nothing.” She fought to put a smile in her voice so as not to betray that it was indeed not nothing; it was DEFCON-1 in regards to their wedding.

  “If you ask me I’d choose porn,” Tara said definitively.

  “As a career?” Lacey asked, confused.

  “As a photographer,” Tara clarified.

  “You are supposed to be looking for wedding photographers.” Terror was luminous in Georgia’s eyes that she had left anything so important up to Tara.

  “Pickings are slim with such short notice, oh fair leader,” she mocked. “So I’ve narrowed it to three willing and available choices.”

  “What kind of porn—hardcore or softcore?” Lacey asked.

  “What does it matter?” Georgia’s tone was righteous indignation that they would even discuss such a thing in regards to the occasion.

  “Gay, straight, hard, soft—it’s a big difference,” Tara said expertly. “This guy is hard but not fetish hard.”

  “What is going on there?” Fynn asked, a bemused smile in his voice.

  “Same old thing,” Catherine said evasively.

  “Sounds like you girls are planning a dirty bachelorette party,” Fynn dug.

  Catherine was frozen, unable to think quickly enough to remove herself from the middle of the conversation that was broadcasting clear to Minnesota. “Um… you got us. That’s what we’re doing. Porn and… Pico de Gallo… and Pinot Grigio.” She’d thought she could be cute and think up something catchy, but other than piñatas and pillows and assorted paper products, those were the only “P” words she could come up with quickly.

  “What?”

  “Don’t worry. It’s not important,” she said quickly, making violent hand motions toward the others in the room to stop the conversation—or at least for God’s sake stop saying porn every other word. “Listen, Fynn, can I call you back later? They aren’t going to let us alone to talk.”

  As soon as she hung up she whirled on the group. “He doesn’t know what we’re up to, remember? Do you want him to find out?”

  “I don’t really—”

  “Let me answer that for you,” Catherine growled, shutting Tara up before she could finish. “You don’t want him to find out. You want me to go happily off into the sunset
as Mrs. to his Mr., got it?”

  They all nodded their heads like reprimanded children.

  “Good. So, Tara, you were saying about the photographers…”

  “Well, they’re all totally legit. Not just some Joe Shmoe types with cameras. Real businesses. Now prom guy only does stills, but formal is his trade—stiff and awkward formal. Pet chick is good with the hard-to-capture motion stuff like dancing… and she’s a wiz at the unexpected extreme close-ups—good for drunk uncles and whatnot. And porn guy… well, he does it all.”

  “I’m sure he does,” Lacey quipped.

  Catherine felt like she was going to faint. This was a multiple choice question with no right answer.

  “What exactly do you mean?” Georgia asked.

  “I mean photos. Get your mind out of the gutter,” Tara chided. “Still, action, candid—you name it. Ooh, and another plus for him, he can do video too. The guy even worked with—”

  “I don’t think we need a rundown on who he worked with,” Georgia warned.

  “I’m just sayin’ he has a lot of movie credits.”

  “I think they’re called flicks,” Lacey chirped.

  “Great. My grandmother can be shot by the same guy who shot Cum a Little Closer,” Catherine said facetiously.

  “I don’t know if he did that one.” Tara checked her crumpled list, scratching her head.

  Catherine rolled her eyes, wondering if she just so happened to have stumbled onto the name of an actual flick.

  “I’d like to know who didn’t make the cut… you know, considering,” Georgia challenged.

  “My-ass,” Tara said.

  “No need to get snippy.”

  “If you must know, my neighbor Tom got cut.”

  “Let me guess, Peeping Tom?” Georgia asked, resigned.

  “Don’t besmirch Tom. It’s just healthy curiosity,” Tara noted. “He’s actually great with a camera, but I figured you wanted creds.”

  “Creds would be nice.”

  “So that brings us back to porn guy,” Tara said simply.

  “Speaking of porn, what if he forgets what job he’s on and starts calling for it?” Lacey asked.

  “He did want to know about doing video in the dressing room of the bridal party…” Tara admitted, “… but I think that people do those things all the time—”

  “Pet chick it is.” Catherine shuddered. “And make sure she knows what the traditional wedding shots are—wedding party, father-daughter dance, the cake feeding—”

  “Which I forgot all about,” Georgia said, adding to her list. “Is the cake gone too?”

  “Probably,” Catherine groused. She couldn’t even wrap her head around all of the things that were gone. And it wasn’t like Vinnie had given her a deposit receipt when he handed her the wad of cash, so who could be completely sure of anything anymore?

  “I’ll talk to Vinnie about the cake,” Tara assured them. “My cousin is getting married this weekend. Vinnie is the best man and the planner.”

  “Seriously, how many friggin’ cousins do you have?” Catherine demanded.

  “As many as I want to have.”

  “What’s that even supposed to mean?”

  “Delrios are loving people. What more can I say?”

  “I can say that we need to get back to the real issues here. Lacey and I will handle the bridesmaid dresses,” Georgia said certainly. “We’ve worn enough of them and had our own bridesmaids to dress. Plus, we’ve done the whole pregnancy thing, so I’m sure we can find something suitable for Drew too.” Then she turned to Catherine. “So all you need to do is make sure you can fit in that dress of yours in two weeks’ time.”

  “That’s all I need to do?” she said dubiously, wondering how anyone could intimate that was the easy part.

  “I can handle the rest of the flowers,” Lacey offered.

  “And Tara, promise you’ll talk to Vinnie about the cake,” Georgia warned.

  “Didn’t I already say I would?” Tara countered.

  “It’s the one thing that Fynn picked out,” Catherine said wistfully. “Everything else he left to me… but the lemon cake was his choice—”

  “We need to have that cake,” Georgia stressed again.

  Wednesday, February 23rd

  -57-

  “Aren’t we going to lunch uptown?” Catherine asked, suddenly feeling like perhaps she’d been conned, a little girl beckoned into a car with the offer of candy. They were heading straight for the bridge to Jersey.

  “Lunch,” Tara chuckled wickedly.

  “Where are we going then? Is it a surprise wedding shower?” Catherine asked, rubbing her hands together deliciously, thinking of tiny finger sandwiches and petit fours and all kinds of other showery types of foods that she would just have to eat as the polite bride of honor—which was fine because everyone knew that tiny things hold fewer calories and therefore little harm.

  Tara said nothing.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll act really surprised.”

  “I’m sure you will,” she said under her breath.

  Catherine watched her at the wheel, feeling slightly possessive of the old sedan that had done her well for years. But it was just one more thing to muck up the move when Fynn had two trucks and a motorcycle waiting in Minnesota for them to share. The old girl belonged in New York anyway, fighting to the end against traffic and battling it out for parking spaces, so she’d bequeathed it to Tara and was now at her mercy to get around if it was beyond public transport.

  Signs for the Jersey Turnpike appeared up ahead and she cried out, “Wait, are we going all the way to Philly? … But I need to finish packing!”

  “It’s only a couple hours out of the way. Don’t be so melodramatic.”

  But that’s what I’m good at, she thought. “I mean it, Tara. I don’t have time for detours. I want to be on the road first thing Friday—nothing left behind.”

  “Except your youth,” Tara pointed out.

  “Lmao,” Catherine growled.

  “I’ll help you pack when we get back.”

  “Whatever.”

  “Hey, do you want some company on the ride to Minnesota?”

  “I’ve heard there’s a radio in the truck.” Catherine jabbed.

  “I’m serious. I’ll come with you if you want.”

  “How do you even have the time, working girl?”

  “I quit.” Tara shrugged.

  “You quit?”

  “It just isn’t fun without you there.”

  “Aw, isn’t that sweet.” And Catherine meant it. “But remember, you’re subletting my apartment until the lease is up. You better be able to pay your rent or I’m in deep shit.”

  “Oh, I can pay the rent.”

  “What are you going to do, turn tricks at night?”

  “I have money, bee-atch. Plenty of dough.”

  *****

  “Wait, I thought we were doing something fun,” Catherine stressed, as they pulled into the parking lot of a bridal dress shop where Lacey and Georgia were already waiting for them. “This isn’t another intervention….” She could feel the dainty finger foods she’d had on the brain for two hours slipping out of her imaginary grasp. “Is this where you guys say that I’m never going to fit my dress and I need to face up to it now before I end up doing The Emperor’s New Clothes bit down the aisle?” She’d really hoped her friends would have more faith in her. She’d been starving herself for days, down to just two sensible meals and a seven-M&M chaser after each of those, and she was starting to believe she just might be able to squeeze into the dress by the 4th. Especially if she only had to wear it down the aisle and for pictures, and she didn’t have to twist or bend or breathe too much. She could always change for the reception part.

  “You think I want to be here either?” Tara asked plainly. “They made me do it.”

  Georgia opened Catherine’s car door with a chauffer’s flourish and Lacey pulled her up out of her seat. “We picked out the perfect bridesmaid dr
esses,” they said in unison, absolutely beaming.

  Tara rolled her eyes practically right out of her head at the thought that they could pick out anything perfect for her.

  Catherine breathed a sigh of relief. At least this was Tara’s hell that she was visiting and not her own. She didn’t have the money for a new dress. Or the patience for finding one. And she was really rather attached to the one that she already had, seeing as how it was her constant apartment companion, more of a roommate really, gently reminding her what she was shooting for. And after she was married she could put it in storage or sell it or donate it, and gorge herself on fried things and baked things and frosted things and fatty-fat-fatso things.

  She followed Lacey and Georgia into the shop with Tara lagging behind. As she waited on the couch to be wowed, she noticed a dish of Jordan almonds perched next to her on the end table. Such boring candy! Why they were so intrinsically attached to weddings was a mystery hardly worth considering. What was worth considering, as her mind wandered to where her stomach was, was how many of them she could fit in her mouth at one time… and her purse… and her pockets for the ride home, too.

  “Ta-da!” Tara announced with a dramatic B-rate flourish, twirling around in front of her.

  “That’s the dress?” Catherine gazed upon her in awe.

  “What? You don’t like it?” Georgia asked, rushing out from behind curtain number three, half-zipped; followed by Lacey from number two, panic in her eyes.

  “No, not at all.”

  “You don’t?” Lacey eked out, crestfallen.

  “No, I mean it’s so… perfect.” Everything else had been such a nightmare so far that she had only imagined that the bridesmaid dresses would be just as awful—a horrible compromise dress no one liked or looked good in that was purely chosen because it was halfway between too many buckles and peekaboo cutouts on the one end, and too stuffy and conservative on the other.

  “Lacey actually found them,” Georgia noted charitably.

  “Wow, Lacey,” Catherine breathed, “you have great taste.” The deep purple would be striking against her just-off-white gown. The tiniest cap sleeves, square neckline, and princess seaming and waistline, made them elegant and beautiful in an old-world style that conjured European castles and royalty. The formfitting silk bustline gave way to a chiffon skirt that would flow softly and lightly even over Drew’s burgeoning body. The overall effect was a subtle two-tone as the purples in each material were offset the slightest in texture alone.