Shortcake

by Watson, Lucy

  Rebecca gestures with the grace of a prima ballerina to a hallway accented with dark wood paneling. “We have a Grooms Lounge if you’d care to wait.”

  The thought of Ben being under the same roof while I try on dresses for our scam wedding is just too much.

  I jump in, eyes on Ben. “You don’t have to wait,” I rush out with a forced smile, feeling the pin-prickle of eyes on me. “I’ll get a ride from the ladies.”

  Ben holds my gaze for a breath, then turns back to Rebecca. “You’re the one taking care of her?” He takes a step forward, his body partially blocking mine.

  A small tingle of worry forms at the base of my spine as I sidestep for a better view.

  “We all are,” Rebecca answers with a proud smile as she motions to her Stepford salespeople, their faces brightening on cue.

  “Good.” He holds out his black card for Rebecca. She takes it, her eyes flicking to me with a new appreciation.

  My eyes go wide. What is he doing?

  I’m about to ask him just that, when his rich voice fills the air. “Those blue eyes light up at a dress, buy it,” he orders, then directs his gaze to her team. “She asks the price, don’t tell her, or you’ll be here all day.”

  This earns genuine smiles from the sales team. Not sure if it’s because they think he’s funny, or they see dollar signs—probably both.

  I plaster a nothing-to-see-here smile on my face while I grab Ben’s arm, pulling us back a few feet for privacy.

  I keep my smile steady as I grind out, “Stop. Whatever it is you’re doing, just stop.”

  “No,” he says, low and slow, with a bit of humor crinkling the corner of his eyes.

  “No?” I frozen-smile-hiss at him, my cheeks starting to burn with the effort it takes to keep it in place.

  “Have fun, Shortcake,” he says, before he does the one thing that I didn’t even know would be the end of me.

  Benjamin Crawford reaches his rough and manly hand up to my head and… ruffles my hair. Like he just bought me a Happy Meal.

  Ruffles. My. Fucking. Hair.

  I’m dead.

  Here lies Emelia Anderson.

  Friend to one. Mother to none.

  Died from an unfortunate hair ruffle.

  While wearing a puffer vest.

  20

  Say Yes to the Dress

  It’s hard to maintain a perfectly indifferent mask while trying on some of the most beautiful gowns you’ve ever seen. Really hard. Whatever the Royal Guard at Buckingham Palace makes, it’s not enough.

  I do it, like a freaking champ, giving nothing away. Not even the teensiest glimmer of interest graces my face as I stand on the platform with the oohs and ahs of the Wedding Brigade sounding off behind me. Their enthusiasm seems to grow with each bottle of champagne. And let’s just say, they are pretty darn enthusiastic.

  Me? I’ve had one glass. Which I mostly sip while trying to find a way to answer the million well-meaning “Ben” questions thrown my way.

  Thankfully, Mrs. Baker is too busy filling her glass and stuffing her face with strawberries and cheese to add anything to my crafty stories. Especially the one about my sunset proposal, where Ben got down on one knee in front of a few of our closest friends, at the place where we first saw each other. Yeah, that one’s a doozy.

  Just when I think I’m in the clear, finished telling my last tall-tale of the day, I’m hit with the first-dance-song question, which is asked by Stepford #3.

  If I hadn’t finished my glass of champagne, I probably would have answered “Halo” by Beyonce—my first dance song with Greg—or any of the hundreds of reasonable wedding songs, and not the song that comes out of my mouth, which Rebecca, after a long pause, calls cute and unique (which we all know is code for weird). A song, I’m pretty sure has never graced a Spotify First Song Dance list.

  I blame dehydration. I totally forgot what a freaking workout trying on wedding dresses is. It’s like the Barr Method meets Pilates meets every time you’ve shimmied into skinny jeans while PMS-ing.

  I’m more than ready to call it quits. I’ve tried on dozens of dresses suitable for an outdoor wedding. The finish line is near. One last dress and I’ll walk my crazy ass out of Monique’s Boutique with a gold medal hanging around my neck and my hands victoriously empty.

  I know the moment Stepford #3 hangs the final dress in my room that I’m in trouble.

  I breathe in through my nose and out through my mouth, in long steady breaths, while slipping it on under Rebecca’s keen eye, giving her the same polite smile I’ve given each dress for the last two hours. Two hours of perfectly executed stoicism that would make Zeno of Citium proud.

  I avoid the mirrors and hold my breath as I walk past the Brigade who gasp in collective agreement that this is the one.

  I exhale and step onto the platform and reluctantly face the giant angled mirrors. What I see reflected in them rips the remainder of breath from my lungs.

  Standing in the curve-hugging lace and satin sheath dress is someone I don’t recognize. Someone with youthful deep blue eyes that shine bright, not with a light that has faded over the years to a street lamp on a foggy morning. Someone with wild chestnut hair that belongs on Aphrodite, not Emelia Anderson. Someone with skin that looks like crushed pearls with rose petal cheeks, not a pasty complexion in desperate need of bronzer.

  A foreign feeling clogs my throat.

  This someone is… beautiful.

  In a way I never thought was possible for me.

  There can only be one explanation for the goddess reflected in the mirror: this is a magic dress. The good kind of magic. Not the witchcraft fuckery kind.

  A magic dress that makes me feel beautiful.

  A stampede of emotions charges through me. It’s a miracle I’m able to keep my mask from slipping. I steel my spine and turn to Rebecca, ready to give her another polite not-the-one smile—

  “Ha!” Mrs. Baker barks, shuffling up to me and stepping onto the platform. “Ha!” she repeats, pointing an arthritic “gotcha” finger in my face. “I see that look in your eye, girl. No sense in trying to hide it—it’s there plain as day. You got a sparkle for that dress.” She turns to Rebecca. “She’ll take it.” She shuffles off the platform toward an unopened, chilled bottle of champagne. “Now let’s go. I got a bridge game tonight, and I need my beauty rest.”

  Rebecca and her teams’ collective Stepford gaze fixes on me, their bodies ever so still. The excited murmur of the Wedding Brigade rises in the background to a fever pitch at the prospect that this might be the one.

  “Is this the one?” Rebecca asks, hope shining in her brown eyes.

  Yes. Yes, this is the one.

  “Can you just tell me how much it is?” I ask on a whisper.

  If it’s not crazy expensive maybe I can pay Ben back for it. I may never wear it down the aisle, but if there’s a chance I could ever feel this beautiful again, even if it’s when I’m alone, toasting myself with a glass of champagne, it’ll be worth the cost.

  But Mrs. Baker isn’t done. Turns out, besides being rude and annoying, she’s also part bat. She turns from the refreshment table and bellows, “That boy’s mama left him more money than he knows what to do with. Get the damn dress.” With that proclamation, she turns back toward the table and tries to stuff the bottle of champagne and accompanying cheese plate into her purse.

  I file her bit of information into my chest of all things Ben.

  “Is it the one?’ Rebecca turns her hopeful eyes to mine.

  Cannons go off in my brain as it battles Civil War-reenactment style, the North logic, the South a magic goddess dress. Guess which side wins?

  “Yeah, it’s the one,” I say barely above a whisper.

  The background erupts in cheers like we’re standing in a Chicago Wrigleyville bar when the Cubs broke their 108-year losing streak.

  Before I can fully register what I’ve just done, Stepford #5 signals something to Stepford #4, and in the next breath “Staying Aliv
e” is blasting from the overhead speakers—my “unique” wedding song.

  Do I smile through a few tears while standing on the platform, thinking about my friend, and the fact her inappropriate funeral song is now my unique wedding song? I sure do.

  After Rebecca hands me back Ben’s credit card, which doesn’t feel awkward at all, I leave my magic dress behind to be express altered for an even more magical fit, and climb into the Redi-Wheels van with the Brigade and Sam.

  Sam who is kind enough to stop at the grocery store after dropping Betsy and Josie off, so I can buy Ben a birthday cake.

  Sam who then waits an hour in the van because Mrs. Baker decides to go in with me, so she can pick up a few things. A few things that turn into two shopping carts full of crap, which I’m pretty sure she only buys because she has a wallet full of coupons that are ready to expire.

  Sam who lugs Dottie’s (aka Mrs. Baker’s) lucky card table to nearly a dozen rooms in her house before she decides on the first room we tried.

  Sam who helps put away her groceries and unclogs her kitchen sink while I get suckered into changing Ron’s litter box upstairs because she has a hard time bending down, which I know is bullshit since I’ve seen her literally lunge for a quarter on the floor at Bingo.

  Her cat, Ron, is evil by the way. And not just because he looks like Church from Pet Sematary. He’s evil because as I’m busting my ass cleaning his freaking litter box, he walks up and poops by my foot while hissing at me, which in cat-speak is the equivalent of the Corleones putting a horse head in your bed. Yeah, I’m pretty sure Ron’s going to follow me home and smother me in my sleep while smoking a cigar.

  I always thought it was super creepy that Mrs. Baker’s cat was named after her late husband, but walking around this vast house—full of stuff but still feeling empty—it just feels sad. And lonely. Really lonely. My heartstrings tug a little at the pictures lining the walls, capturing a time when this house was full of laughter and love when Darth Vader Dottie was still Anakin Skywalker.

  We never really know how the rushing water of life will shape us, or what landscape it will leave behind.

  All day I’ve watched Sam do Mrs. Baker’s bidding without one word of complaint, and with even sincere a “thank you” when she hands him a crumpled five-dollar bill as a tip, which is why I formally christen him Saint Sam, patron saint of crabby and cheap old ladies.

  Me? Not so much.

  I don’t know what pisses me off more, the fact that I have a permanent cat litter smell in my nose, or the fact my good magic-dress feeling is gone. Like Cinderella after midnight, gone.

  Thanks to Dottie Baker.

  Who made me say yes. Yes to the fucking dress.

  Which I’ll have to confess to Ben before it shows up on his credit card.

  * * *

  My hands start to sweat as I close in on the farmhouse, carrying a “Happy Birthday, Ben” chocolate cake that feels weirder with each step. Not sweet. Not thoughtful. But weird. Especially since the only ready-made cake available was decorated in balloons. Bright pink balloons.

  As the farmhouse comes into view, my feet stutter a step. My gaze swipes the shiny black Ford truck, rusted Volkswagen bug, and BMW parked in front. I know the Ford belongs to Winston, the bug belongs to Nick, but the snazzy BMW’s owner is a mystery. A mystery I’m in no mood to solve.

  I’m also in no mood to be the outsider at Ben’s birthday party. Turns out, I’d rather relive the day I started my period early while wearing white shorts on a sailboat with no tampons or toilet paper, suffering from the worst case of motion sickness ever known to man, in front of someone I thought might be my forever person and his nautical family. I’d prefer that to walking into Ben’s birthday party with a pink-balloon cake.

  Just as I decide to scrape off the Ben inscription and leave it at the ranch for Derek, the front door swings open and Nick walks out, looking his usual dapper self, with his signature black T-shirt creating the ideal backdrop to his neon tattoos.

  His smile widens, and his eyes light up as he sees me. On anyone else, it would be a welcoming look. On Nick, it means trouble. I force a picture of fuzzy puppies playing in my mind to calm my heart rate because I’m pretty sure Nick can smell fear.

  Nick jogs down the stairs. “Well, if it isn’t Ben’s little lady.”

  Yep. That’s my new name.

  I like it about as much as Ben likes Emmy’s old man.

  “Hey.” I try to keep my smile neutral, tucking the cake a little closer to my body. The pink balloons feel like a Batman-signal of my stupidity.

  My body relaxes as he jogs to his car, relief that there’s a chance they’re all leaving making my steps feel lighter. I continue toward the stairs and decide to make a bee-line for the den with the cake. A cake I will then eat. By myself. In the bathroom while soaking in a hot bath. While watching an episode of 90 Day Fiancé on my toilet-perched laptop. Then I’m going to pull my big girl panties on—not pink parachute panties but a cute lacy pair—and go out with Mara. Where I will dance and keep dancing until all this life bullshit melts away.

  And maybe I’ll kiss someone.

  Maybe not.

  But one thing I know for sure is I’m going to have fun tonight if it kills me. Which considering the amount of alcohol I’m going to need to consume to get to my “fun place,” there’s a pretty good chance it might do just that.

  My heart jolts when a car door slams behind me, followed by Nick’s raspy voice. “Hold up.”

  Freakity. Fuckity. Fuck.

  I pretend not to hear him as I hurry to the stairs—approximately four hundred steps away from chocolate-cake/bath bliss.

  “Hey, wait up.”

  The sound of his feet crunching gravel behind me jolts my heart into overdrive. Why? Because it’s Nick, the maker of my engagement video, the creator of chaos, the crayon-eating Diablo, and now the potential killer of my bliss.

  Nick slings his lean, but surprisingly heavy, arm over my shoulder with a sly smile tugging on his pink lips. “Is that cake?”

  He smells like cloves and beer. It’s a good smell. Not as good as eau de toilette, à la Ben, but I like it.

  Him, on the other hand, not so much… He’s like one of those deep belly laughs that hurts, but the pain somehow makes you laugh harder even though your stomach muscles are squeezing with fire. Yep. That’s Nick. A squeezing, fire-belly laugh.

  “Yes,” I answer, knowing nothing good is going to come from this conversation.

  “For Ben?”

  “Yes, Nick. For Ben.”

  His face melts into a bright smile that sets off warning bells, and he says, “Awe, that’s so sweet.”

  “It’s just a cake.”

  “With balloons.” We clear the last stair. “Pink balloons,” he tacks on like it code for something.

  “It’s the only one they had left,” I say with a little too much bite in my voice.

  “Mmm-hmm.” He gives me a you’re-full-of-shit grin.

  I scoff and step out from his arm to swing open the front door and hurry inside, leaving Nick to follow, which he does, close enough to be me my freaking shadow. Maybe I should get him a book on personal space because it’s obviously a foreign concept to him.

  The sound of deep voices coming from the kitchen, followed by a few feminine laughs, sends an unwanted zing up my spine. My steps automatically turn toward the den, until Nick’s arm slings over my shoulders again, guiding me toward the kitchen.

  “Come on, I want you to meet my sister.”

  “You have a sister?” I picture a poor beat-down woman who’s twenty but looks sixty, like someone who lived during the Dust Bowl.

  “Why do you look so surprised?”

  “I just feel sorry for her, that’s all,” I say with a teasing smile, even though I’m totally serious.

  He chuckles. “I’ll grow on you.” He cocks his brows. “Watch, before you know it, you’ll be calling me to chat about life.”

  I can’t help but lau
gh at that one.

  “I’m pretty sure that will never happen.”

  “Never say never, Blue.”

  That was another one of my nicknames, one I sort of liked.

  Closing in on the voices, I know one thing for sure: tonight’s going to be a Tequila night.

  He keeps me tucked under his arm and walks me, and my stupid cake, into the kitchen.

  “Look who I found,” Nick says in that way people do when they think they’re being clever.

  All eyes turn to me, which of course makes me feel totally at ease. Not. My plastered smile wobbles as my gaze jumps to the familiar and not-so-familiar faces until it lands on Ben, who’s leaning against the counter with a beer in hand. Our gazes lock for a second before my eyes skip to the blonde woman standing at his front.

  Kate. Angel Kate. Looking long-legged in her skinny jeans and soft, form-fitted V-neck white sweater. She gives me a tight-lipped smile that I think I return, but who knows.

  I’m suddenly thankful I’m tucked snug against Nick’s side. The weight of his arm and his warm body helps to shield me from the coldness of Ben’s glare as it slides from Nick to me.

  His gaze locks with mine as he tilts his beer back, taking a long pull. My stomach drops, knowing that glare means he’s seen the bill for the wedding dress. The wedding dress I bought myself with his money on his birthday. The wedding dress which is currently number eight on my list of stupid shit I’ve done. My fingers itch to call Rebecca and cancel before the alterations.

  Nick’s voice cuts through my thoughts. “This is my sister Katie. Katie this is Em.”

  His sister?

  It’s not lost to me that he doesn’t add Ben’s Little Lady or Mrs. Crawford or Feisty Fiancée, or any of the other annoying names he’s called me over the last few weeks.

  “We’ve actually met,” Kate says in her church-bell voice, her pink-bubblegum smile warming around the edges.

  The look she gives Nick says that he already knew we met, which means he’s messing with me.