The Fates (Book I) - 2014 Watty Award Winner!

3.3 - Almost

Dear Readers: Here comes the bride...

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Scene 3: Almost

A.D. 2015

This was the threshold of the darkest downward spiral of her life.

That was what Daddy would’ve said. But Lacey was alone with her reflection now, before the gilded mirror in the bridal suite. She couldn’t let it matter, how her father felt. Nor anybody else.

Her heart had led her down this path. A heart that loved a man more deeply, more devoutly than she’d thought humanly possible, before their paths had crossed. With the ardor of a hundred thousand hearts, as if a lifetime wasn’t nearly long enough. As if she had already lived that many lives in love with him, and needed thousands more.

Here and now, for her, this was the threshold of heaven. The beginning, in sight at the end of the tunnel. The light.

An abrupt knock on the door—Katherine, who did not wait for a welcome before barging in. As per usual.

“Oh, just look at you,” she gushed as she came up beside the bride. “Perfection, perfection, perfection…”

She parroted the proud word in sync with a series of flourishes, starting from the crown of Lacey’s veil down to her sweeping train. Then scanning upwards from the feet, Katherine spotted a speck of lint, which she picked off like a disease-carrying fly.

Perfection achieved, she positively beamed. “You are a dream—even more so today than usual, the wildest dream of any man.”

Except her own soon-to-be husband, a small voice in the bride’s head snickered cynically. She shut it up. Could not afford to doubt that Matthew loved her, not today. Besides, she shouldn’t have to be his dream—she was set to be his reality. That was what mattered, right?

“I am so thrilled that you chose this dress, over that plain sack of a thing,” her mother effused, referring to the sleeker gown that Lacey had initially selected—less extravagant, less expensive, less of an elitist exhibition. In other words, in Mrs. Weaver’s mind, cheap shit. “What’s a few hundred grand in the scheme of things, hm? This is such an investment in your future happiness.”

Lacey wasn’t sure how this dress was an investment in anything other than her mother’s image. No doubt to be featured in tabloids all across America tomorrow. She could picture it already: Former Model Walks Down Aisle Flaunting Family’s Wealth in Frills… Even a headline that preposterous would do her mother proud, so long as the price tag was plastered somewhere on the front page.

“Well,” Katherine sighed through a spotlight-ready smile, “it’s almost time. Rehearse your vows in these last minutes, won’t you? The altar’s no place for a slipup.”

Lacey tended to trip on her words when forced to speak before a crowd. Such as the time she’d tried to call herself a ‘total nerd’ and blurted ‘nodal turd’ instead. That had been part of a statement meant to highlight her scholarly pedigree, against her inevitable popular persona as a dumb blonde—one of the least successful publicity efforts of her entire career. Engineered, naturally, by none other than her mother. Who would never let her live the blunder down.

But this time, Lacey would be speaking from her heart. Not from a script shoved down her throat. That would make all the difference. How could she trip up on truths set to pour straight out from her soul? She wouldn’t. She believed, knew that she wouldn’t.

“Yes, Mother,” she assented, happy to rehearse the vows anyway.

And with that, Katherine craned her neck to lean in for an aerial kiss—an actual kiss was of course out of the question, as that would’ve left a lipstick stain—and sashayed out of the room.