Page 86 of Call You Mine
One more thing to add to my list of what I’m avoiding addressing with him, right below the hair-washing incident.
When we returned from dinner, I got ready for bed in the bathroom, and then Anderson took his turn. I was asleep before he came out. But he kept his word and slept on the couch—I found him there when I woke up this morning.
Once again, I was thankful to be so tired I could sleep.
I don’t know if I would’ve been able to if I weren’t.
Rumi’s voice brings me back to the moment. “Okay. No ruffles. No satin. Minimal drama.” She pauses, scanning the rack. “But you’re not walking into a Vegas chapel looking like you borrowed a lab coat either.”
Despite myself, I laugh. “ThatI can agree with.”
“Deal,” Emerson says, already digging again. “But if you hate everything we pick, you’re actually going to have to tell us what you want.”
I sigh and turn back to the rack, flipping through stiff lace and yellowed hems—until something stops me.
It’s short. Simple. A little white dress with clean lines on a corset-style bodice and a subtle sweetheart neckline. The fabric is structured but soft—still. As if it were waiting for someone who needed it. I grab it from the rack and hold it up against me.
The white heels I packed for the concert tonight flash in my mind—sleek, rounded, just high enough to feel dangerous. They’d match perfectly.
Emerson turns to me, her expression shifting, “Oh.”
Rumi follows her gaze, her mouth falling open. “That’s the one.”
I smooth my hand down the front of it, imagining the moonlight, the neons, a quick signature, and a kiss that’ssupposed to be pretend. “It’s not too much?” I ask quietly, more to myself than to my friends.
“It’s exactly enough,” Emerson replies.
Rumi suddenly gasps from the accessories bin by the register. “If we’re doing ‘exactly enough,’ then you need this.” She triumphantly lifts a simple fingertip-length veil, sheer and soft, the comb slightly bent but fixable.
I laugh, nervous and breathless all at once. “Absolutely not.”
Rumi grins, already stepping toward me. “Absolutelyyes. You’re gettingmarriedin Vegas. Let us have one dramatic accessory. Please?”
“For us?” Emerson adds.
They both look at me with puppy-dog eyes, their lips jutting out dramatically.
I groan, and they take it as a yes.
Before I can protest, Rumi perches the veil carefully on my head, the thin layer of tulle falling around my shoulders, her hand lingering in my hair as she looks at me. She nods toward the mirror on the end of one of the metal racks.
“Well?” Emerson prompts, as I meet my reflection in the streaked glass.
The dress works. The heels will match. The veil flutters when I breathe.
And for just a second—there’s no playing pretend, no mask I’m holding over my face, no need for me to fake it.
For one terrifying, fragile second…
I’m a bride.
The longer I stare at my reflection, the tighter everything inside me begins to wind. Heat crawls over my skin, the walls seeming to inch closer with every inhale. I ache to start counting—sorting, straightening, anything that gives me the illusion of control.
“Are you guys done?” Jack’s voice booms from the other side of the thrift store, and I’m thankful for it. It gives me amoment of reprieve to get out of my head before I lose myself. “Sonny has his suit, so we’re good to go.”
Emerson grabs the dress and veil as Rumi yells to Jack that we’re done too, but to make sure Anderson stays out of sight, adding that it’s bad luck for him to see my dress.
I can’t help but laugh at just another silly tradition that there really isn’t any need for.
