“Hard to forget, Mama.”
I had graduated high school when Mama and Daddy finally remarried after far too many years of “living in sin.” The rumor somehow started again that this wedding could be “the one” to free our favorite author, but Mama swore it wasn’t her doing this time. I believed her. I think it was the head librarian, Esther Coyne, who knows how much Mama loves Jane Austen’s novels, and she’s seen with her own eyes the hours Mama spent poring over the microfiche in the archives section, looking for any and every extra little clue about the legend. And Esther just wanted Mama to cash in on her passion. I think she thought it would be fitting if my mother, with all her flaws and bad luck in love, would prove out to be the queen in the story after all.
Logan came to the wedding alone. So did I. And when Mama and Daddy danced to their song, Logan and I kissed on the dance floor. Ginny and Dave saw us and started cheering, so Logan pulled me outside, and we made out under the oak tree on the pavilion. My back got sore from leaning up against the bark of the tree trunk, but I didn’t notice till the next day.
I didn’t ever want to let go of that evening. My parents together in wedding outfits and Mama so beautiful in her white gown. She’d been working out all winter to be in shape for the day, and you could tell. She looked ten years younger than she is, and I told her so. She told me to hush up and not say such lies, but then I overheard her telling everyone what I’d said.
“Oh, Macey’s such a card. Telling her old mother she looks twenty-seven. Can you imagine?”
“That was a beautiful day.” Mama smiles and looks off into space.
I continue to stand with my hand on my hip until she refocuses on the present. “Helena invited me. She thought it would be fun for all of us to get dressed together.”
“Girls,” Eloise says. “Come up to the front of the shop where the three-way mirrors are so I can look at you and make you even more beautiful. And Macey, head to the back, and I’ll be down to help you get dressed.”
Mama claps her hands. “Oh, this is so much fun!”
I shoot her a look. “This ain’t my wedding, Mama.”
“Isn’t,” she corrects me. “Isn’t.”
Ten minutes later, I’m standing next to Ginny at the very front of the store, up on the platform with my back against the wall-length windows that face the street. Meagan is blasting “Sweet Home Alabama” out of her iPod while she and Lily dance around the store and thoroughly piss off Eloise. But Meagan could always do pretty much whatever she wanted in her family, and Mrs. Rattles just smiles and even joins in for a moment.
“Dance, Gin.” Meagan claps her hands. “Come on, this is your wedding! Happiest day of your life!”
Ginny’s sour face can’t be masked, so I grab her by the hand and spin myself around.
“See, Macey’s in the spirit!” Meagan says. “You look beautiful, Gin—you’re hardly showing at all. Although, I don’t agree with the idea of fireworks before the wedding. Dave will see you in your dress!”
Mrs. Rattles isn’t pleased with Meagan’s comment.
“The fireworks were my idea,” she says to her daughter. “I thought it was lovely and original.”
I give an enthusiastic nod. “I think it will be fine. Dave and Ginny are having a baby together—a lot of things don’t go in the order of tradition, but that doesn’t make them wrong.”
“Now let me look at you both.” Eloise turns her focus to Ginny and me. “You’re the last two down the aisle, after all.”
“Oh, that’s who they’ll remember.” Mama winks at me.
I swipe at her with my hand, but I miss. Mama laughs, and so do I, and I pull her up onto the platform with me. “Sweet Home Alabama” is one of our favorite songs, and Mama joins me in dancing to the chorus. My hair is loose as Mama and Ginny insisted I should keep my “eye-catching” waves undone, and it swings wildly off my shoulders as I loop my arm through my mother’s and twirl her around.
Then my gaze catches in one of the mirrors.
Logan’s outside the store window.
He’s standing completely still, and he’s staring at me.
I stop dancing and turn around quickly, too fast for him to cover. Our eyes lock through the glass, and my stomach drops at the obvious heat in his gaze. His whiskey eyes are smoldering, and the emerald flecks flash in the sunlight.
I cross my arms over my chest self-consciously. My boobs feel too exposed all of a sudden; in fact, all of me does. The dress may be floor-length, but it’s fitted to my figure, and I’m not used to dressing up, especially not in front of Logan.
Mama tells me not to hide myself, that I look beautiful, but when I ignore her she turns and looks out the window.
“Well,” Mama says. “Look who it is. The about-to-be-married Logan Wild, who can’t take his eyes off another woman.”
I shout-whisper at her to shut it. She waves to him then, forcing him to acknowledge her, and he comes inside the store awkwardly.
“Logan,” Eloise says curtly. “I see Gigi went in another direction with her dress, did she?”
