“That when the Andersons were building the Gingerbread House, like the building itself, they knew Great-Grandpa was getting ready to open a fruitcake shop, and so all of the construction lining under the stucco hadfruitcake suckswritten all over it to taunt him.”
“Would our great-grandpas have used the wordsucks?” I ask.
“No,” Esme and my mom answer in unison.
They share a look.
And then hesitant smiles.
Lorelei meets my gaze, and I can see the smile she’s hiding while my own eyes get hot.
More progress.
“Aww, don’t cry.” Lorelei smushes me in a hug.
“I’m just so happy,” I reply honestly against her shoulder.
I still feel bad about lying. But it’s working. And Iamhappy that it’s working.
“Well, let’s make you happier with a wedding dress,” Mrs. Briggs says. “This one’s on the house. Seeing a Silver marry an Anderson ... knowing I might never again have to intervene in a fight about whose car is blocking whose in at a committee meeting ... that just makes my whole life.”
“Mrs. Briggs, I cannot—”
She interrupts me with a dismissive noise and moves to the racks, where she starts pulling dresses out. “Yes, you can. Come, come. I want to see you in this dress. And this one too.”
Before I know it, I’m buried under a pile of gowns in my size. Some are pure white. Some are white with green-and-red trim. One’s a true red velvet Mrs. Claus dress, which would be brutal in this heat.
Mrs. Briggs ushers me into the changing room in back after setting Mom, Lorelei, and Esme up with champagne and Lorelei’s tea cookies in the viewing area.
And I try on dresses.
And more dresses.
Andmore dresses.
This one’s too frilly. That one doesn’t fit right. This other one is too simple.
I feel like a picky asshole.
But more—it’s notmyopinion. Not mostly. It’s Mom agreeing with Lorelei about that dress beingjust not you. Or Mom agreeing with Esme thatthis dress will be too much to handle for bathroom breaks during your wedding.
And then it’s Mom discovering that she and Lorelei both have a love of the fried shrimp balls that were taken off the menu at Elf’s Landing for being unpopular. Or that she and Esme share a love of punny jokes.
Dane and I didn’t explicitly discuss what “let’s end the feud” would look like—we both agreed it’ll be complex but we’ll recognize progress when we see it. Wrangling more people from each of our families to get along is pretty awesome from where I’m standing.
Definitely progress.
Mrs. Briggs is huffing and puffing by the time she gets back to the dressing room with what she’s declared to be the final gown in my size in the entire store.
“So I guess this one’s it no matter what,” I joke.
But once I get it on—no.
No, it’s no joke.
I’ve watched that wedding dress show on occasion with Yazmin. I know what’s happening right now.
And what’s happening is me staring at myself in the mirror, wearing the wedding dress of my absolute dreams.
