“That’s crazy,” he insisted. “I just don’t see why any woman needs an expensive wedding dress.”
“Mark,” his friend hissed at him. “I brought you here to pick up women, not alienate them.”
“You came here to find a date?” I demanded.
Mark glared down his nose at me. “Yes. There are lots of women who are so hung up and stupid about becoming a bride that—statistically; I looked it up—at least twenty-five percent of attendees at these types of events aren’t even in a serious relationship, let alone engaged. You’re selling a fantasy and trying to scam these women.”
My eye twitched. “Or maybe I’m helping them find some joy in life. After all, who doesn’t like weddings?”
“I don’t care for them,” Mark said simply.
We all gasped. Several brides looked as if they were going to start throwing their conference totes.
“I’m sure your future wife is going to want one,” I chided.
“No,” Mark said in a clipped tone. “I’m too smart to waste my money on some price-inflated ego trophy for some woman who didn’t even pay for it. I mean, look at these women. They’re all preparing for when they can legally access the groom’s bank account.”
Mark’s friend pinched the bridge of his nose and shook his head slowly. There were boos from the brides. Mark glowered but didn’t backtrack.
Don’t say anything mean, Brea. Don’t say anything mean.After all, wealthy people like him were the reason I was able to live out my childhood dream of sewing fairy-tale wedding dresses all day every day. I tried to smile at him, but it came out as more of a snarl.
“What’s wrong with spending money on a woman you love?” I said hotly, waving my hands, which still held the pictures of the dress and my coffee. “A wedding is an important occasion. You’re committing to the person you want to spend every day of the rest of your life with!”
“Yes, but none of your statements justifies a wedding dress that costs as much as a car,” Mark said, his deep voice dripping with derision. “You’re ripping people off.”
Now the whole left side of my face was twitching. Ivy clapped a hand over her mouth. Forget having decorum; if Mark wanted to insult weddings and especially wedding dresses, I was going to tie my hair up, then we were throwing down.
Mark looked critically at the pictures in my hand, then his gaze swung back to me.
“The dresses don’t look that special. I bet you could order the same thing from Asia. You know,” he said, his tone on taking that know-it-all drone that let me know a mansplain was incoming, “I bet I could help you get that price way down. You could outsource the decoration or whatever that is called.”
“Embroidery,” I spat.
He nodded. “Yeah, and you could find a factory in Bangladesh and make that dress for a tenth of the price. What you did was nothing special.”
“Nothing. Special?”
Mark nodded smugly.
I hefted my coffee cup and threw the contents on him. Mark cursed and jumped back, glaring at me furiously as the coffee soaked into his suit and the whipped cream dripped onto the floor.
I wagged my finger at him. “I hand sew everything, I use only the best materials, and my gowns are one of a kind. You can display one of my dresses as an art piece when you’re done with it. You cannot outsource what I do; my brides are looking for one-of-a-kind custom dresses. Any red-blooded male would want to see the woman of his dreams walk down the aisle in any of my gowns.”
Mark’s mouth was a thin line as he dabbed at the bespoke suit with a napkin. “Not me. And I’m sure there are other men who don’t want their fiancée wasting tens of thousands of dollars on a wedding outfit.”
“Well,” I declared—like I said, I’d had a lot of caffeine, “I have just the thing that is guaranteed to get any man excited about a wedding!” I winked to the brides then whipped off my shirt.
“Ta-da! Convince your man to give you the wedding of your dreams with these babies!”
Mark slapped a hand over his eyes as my friends shrieked in laughter.
“This is a public restaurant! People can see you!”
“Relax!” I told him. “It’s a corset. You can’t even see my belly button.”
Mark peeked through his hands then went red again.
“You’re—they’re showing…”
