The dress looked like it had floated out of my dreams, shimmering and beaded with everything from crystals to tiny starfish. Nancy wasn’t a less-is-more designer; she was more of a fuck-yeah-let’s-add-more-beads designer, and she made it work.
After a few moans of wordless appreciation, I finally said, “That is so fucking gorgeous, I could eat it. Sorry about my language, but you’re a genius. Get me a fork and I will eat this dress.”
Nancy laughed and called over her shoulder, “You’re right D-man, I do love her already!”
“That’s why I’m locking it down,” he replied.
Nancy rolled her eyes again. “Locking it down?” she whispered. “Please tell me the proposal didn’t include that particular phrase.”
“Hard to say. The whole thing happened so fast.” That wasn’t entirely a lie.
She backed away, still smiling. “This is where I leave you, my dear. Gwendolyn and the others will see to your needs, and as far as I’ll ever know, you love everything. But you must be honest with the girls about what you like or don’t like, and don’t worry about my feelings. This is your dress, for your special day.”
Nancy disappeared, and the tall woman took her place and officially introduced herself as Gwendolyn. At her beckoning, I took off my clothes, down to my underwear. She lightly patted my face with a tissue to ensure my makeup didn’t transfer to the dress, then she was joined by another girl and they lifted the gown up, over my head.
To my relief, this dress wasn’t a tiny-sized sample. It was actually too big, and they used plastic clamps to take up some space at the back.
The dress was so breathtaking, I could barely look at myself in the mirror, for fear of bursting into tears and flooding the whole corset.
“Show your fella,” said Gwendolyn.
I walked out of the changing room slowly, trying to pretend this wasn’t a big deal. The staff assured me that it wasn’t that unusual these days to have the groom be part of the dress-selection process. Bulldoodle. They were humoring me, but they were so nice about it.
Dalton looked me up and down, and he didn’t say anything at all for several minutes. I started to worry, and sweat, and worry about sweating, then worry-sweat some more. Was he getting cold feet?
Finally, he shared his thoughts, his voice husky and cracking. “The mermaid of my dreams is real.”
“He likes the dress,” Gwendolyn said, translating helpfully.
“Me, too,” I whispered, wrapped up in Dalton’s adoring gaze—his cool, green eyes the water for my mermaid dress.
Gwendolyn said, “Not so fast. We’re not going to take it easy on you just because we like you. Now get back in that change room because you have at least ten more different dresses to try on.”
“Like hell! Not until I get a glass of champagne.”
Laughing, she agreed to this, and they brought me a glass in the changing room. I got back down to my underwear to cool off, tossed the champagne back and said, “Gown me up!”
~
After a dozen gorgeous wedding gowns and almost as many glasses of champagne, I walked out of the boutique feeling like royalty.
“Did you pick the mermaid dress?” Dalton asked. “Or the one with the pink ribbon thing?”
“Not telling.”
“You seem really into your dress, for someone who keeps using the word fake to describe our wedding.”
In response, I zipped open the fanny pack he wore right under his belt buckle and started rifling around in the contents. “Got any gum? You should keep gum in here.”
“Keep looking.”
“You don’t have any gum, you pervert.”
He made a silly face, sticking his tongue out to the side. “No need to stop looking.”
After a few moments of furtive digging and face-making, I noticed people were staring, so I stopped. I zipped the little bag closed and linked my arm with his, resting my head on his shoulder as we meandered down the sidewalk.
For the rest of the afternoon, we wandered in and out of stores, including an enormous Bloomingdale’s.
Every time I looked at something for more than a second, Dalton tried to buy it for me. It took a while to convince him that sometimes I was looking just because I was curious, and I didn’t actually want a diamond-encrusted gold and pewter egg.
I did, however, find a watch that was so pretty, it made me want to wear a watch. Dalton had his credit card out before I’d even finished dropping my first hint.
I wore the watch out of the store, admiring it in the bright sun.
“That watch will go perfectly with your ring,” he said.
“You’re right.”
“You haven’t even looked at the ring.”