“Everything OK?” I ask her tentatively.
“Just hungover.”
I mean—probably true. She and Dan drank a swimming pool’s worth of alcohol last night. But she looks as airbrushed as always. If you put Shannon and me side by side and offered a stranger a thousand bucks to guess which one of us was hungover, they’d choose me every time.
“I can’t wait to see this dress,” I tell her, trying to bring the mood up. “I keep picturing the dress fromCinderella,but I don’t know. Maybe that’s a bit over the top?”
She gives me a tight-lipped smile.
The sales associate returns. “Here it is,” she says to us, holding a gown over herarm.
Shannon nods. “It’s perfect.”
Would we go so far as to call it perfect? I’m not, I admit, an expert in the field, but it just looks like a heap of fabric to me. Maybe we just need to see iton.
My sister hands me her flute then slips off behind the dressing room curtain. I flop down on the sofa, sipping at my champagne. Shannon is giving me nothing here. But I chant my mantra.Be the bigger person.We will have fun at this dress appointment if it killsme.
To that end, I pop back up and start browsing the rack of dresses.
I’ve just identified the most elaborate one when the velvet curtain swishes open and Shannon hobbles up onto a raised platform, clinging to the woman’s hand for balance.
OK, wow. That’s a dress, all right. It’s strapless, with a huge plume of fabric that’s cinched at the waist and shoots up pastthe neckline, like a big pleated fan. It’s sleek, and highly structured, fitted tightly over her hips and then kicking out into a wider train. The entire thing screams high fashion; I can more easily picture it on a catwalk than I can at a wedding reception.
I come to stand beside her. We stare into the mirror. “What do you think ofit?”
I won’t tell her I hate it until she asks.
She examines herself, tilting her head from one side to the next.
“It looks different than the picture,” is all she says.
The woman who hoisted her into the dress immediately steps forward to explain why. The dress is a sample; the lighting in the photograph gives it a different sheen. If she cocks her hip to the side,yes, like that, exactly,you get a better sense of theline.
I stare at it skeptically. “Will you even be able to walk in that thing?”
It’s so tight over the hips and legs that she can’t do more than shuffle her feet.
“It’s not about walking. This is the look I’m going for.”
Um, OK. I mean sure, yes, she looks good—Shannon looks good in everything. But it can’t possibly be comfortable. And she’ll be wearing that thing forhours.Honestly, it’s giving expensive flower vase.
“Hey, Shan,” I say, wandering back over to the dress rack. “How about this one?”
The dress I hold up to her is the antithesis of the one she’s wearing. It has a sparkly, corset-style bodice, with a big, flowing skirt made of layers of chiffon. Very suitable for moving, and dancing, and laughing, and all the other things you’re supposed to do at weddings.
She flicks a glance at it from the mirror. “No.”
“Come on,” I wheedle. “YouknowMom says it’s always good to try a few different shapes, for comparison. Just to be sure.”
Playing the mom card has its intended effect. She begrudgingly agrees to try on the dress.
A few minutes later and she’s stepping back onto the plinth, gathering a huge handful of skirt as she climbsup.
Nowwe’re talking!
She looks like she could be on the cover of a bridal magazine. Everything about this dress is softer: the fabric, the shape, the color. The skirt gently swishes when she moves, and the bodice makes her seem like a princess. It’s romantic, and dreamy, and very Shannon—or at least, the Shannon she used tobe.
Even the sales assistant is bowled over, telling her how gorgeous she looks. I snap dozens of pictures from every angle.
