The girl blinked. “So these ones aren’t going to work for you?”
“No!” Eliana let out a frustrated yell, and then turned on her heel and stormed out of the store. She didn’t remember that Asher was with her until he got into the car beside her, shutting his door considerably less hard than she had.
She closed her eyes and tipped her head back against the headrest, her face tilted toward the car roof.
“I’m sorry.”
“Why?” Asher asked. His tone wasn’t judgmental, just curious.
“For losing my cool. For making you drive with me all the way out here. For wasting your time.”
She peeked out of the side of her eye at him when he didn’t respond. He was on his phone, and she peered over to see that he was looking up other fabric stores.
“You’re not wasting my time. I chose to come, and I like spending time with you.” He shook his head. “Besides I don’t blame you for losing your cool. That was a frustrating experience overall.”
“Right?” she said, feeling justified. But then she deflated again. “Still. What if someone had caught that on camera and tagged me in it? It would be that easy to lose my career. One wrong video, and I’m done.” She thought about Sienna and her caffeinated beverage. She’d completely disappeared from social media since.
“That seems like a lot of pressure. To never make a mistake in public.”
“It can be. I’m not complaining though. I love my job and my platform, and getting to make videos that reach people and help them, you know? I’m pretty lucky.” She groaned. “I should have been nicer. It’s just this wedding. It’s getting to me.”
“Why are you so stressed about making your sister’s wedding perfect?”
“Because I love her.”
“Does Julia expect a flawless wedding?”
Flawless. He hit on the exact right word, arrow to bullseye. The thing she’d chased her entire marriage. Corbin had wanted her to be flawless—her appearance, her behavior, everyone’s perception of her.
It had proved to be an impossible task, one she found herself clinging to this many years later. It seemed so pointless sometimes, and yet the thought of letting go of attempting perfection made her feel like she was riding on Asher’s motorcycle without holding on.
Asher had seen her soaked. Without make-up first thing in the morning. Throwing up and lying on the bathroom floor. And now losing her cool in a fabric store. And he still hadn’t written her off as a completely worthless mess, so maybe she could attempt to explain.
“My wedding was a disaster.”
“What happened?”
“Nothing was good enough for my mother-in-law or my ex. I scheduled the flowers to be delivered too early and they wilted. The shade of red I chose for the bridesmaid dresses clashed with my sister-in-law’s skin. I picked out a chocolate cake when almond is the traditional wedding flavor. At the reception, I teased people I should have ignored and spoke too briefly with people I should have fawned over. And don’t get me started on the hugging.”
“What happened with the hugging?”
“My ex, Corbin, did not appreciate how many people I hugged that night. He thought so much physical affection with acquaintances was low class.”
Asher’s jaw tightened. “I love that your family are all huggers.” His words warmed her more than they should. “It sounds like you planned the wedding you wanted, and not the wedding your mother-in-law wanted. And that your ex is a tool.”
She let out a short, surprised laugh. “I think you’re right. But sometimes I wonder, if we’d had the perfect wedding, maybe our first year of marriage wouldn’t have been as hard as it was and ended like it did. It put a strain on our relationship right from the beginning, and I don’t want that for Logan and Julia. I want it to be magical.”
“Logan is nothing like Corbin.” He took her hand in his, holding it like he didn’t quite know what to do with it, but the effort was enough. “For them, their wedding is one day in a long line of days together.”
She wanted to believe him, but whenever she thought about all the many, many things that could go wrong, her breath caught in her chest and she felt like she might pass out.
Her phone lit up wildly in the center console.
Those tears she thought she’d managed to hold back sprang to her eyes. She blinked wildly, not wanting to add “crying basket-case” to imperfections Asher had witnessed.
“Is everything okay?” He indicated the phone and looked at her too closely.
“It’s nothing. Just my agent and publisher moving my date up on my book.”
