Page 18 of June Bride
Is she judging me?Brandy honestly couldn’t tell. Sometimes, her mother was such a master of passive-aggression that she put most of these Oregonians to shame. She often attributed Cathy’s mannerisms tomotherhood, incarnate.Particularly a mother of grown women who kept dragging their drama out into the open.Not that you would know anything about that, right, Mom?Brandy could remember those Halcyon days of catching her grandmother scolding Cathy for this and that. Sometimes in public, usually in the middle of their home kitchen. Grandma was dead now, but if Brandelyn closed her eyes and imagined that old woman with blush caked on her face and plastic jewelry hanging from her wrists, she heard the berating tone.
“What are you trying to say?” Brandelyn finally cast her bait, hoping Cathy would bite.
She merely hoped she didn’t catch a wallop of a judgmental fish.
“You keep saying that Sunny put the wedding planning ‘into your hands.’” Cathy shook her head. “You make it sound like she wants no say, or that you two havesuchsyncretic tastes that you could vote to get married by a man in a purple rabbit suit and Sunny would think it the coolest thing since the Model-T. Also, I wouldn’t believe you. Because for a woman to give up that much control of her own wedding, it means one of two things.”
Brandy didn’t ask what those two things were. Her mother would be more than happy to inform her.
“Either she’s a spineless toboggan who can’t stand up for what she wants…”
Lizzie leaped in to finish the thought. “Or you’re such a monster about it that it ain’t worth it, sis.”
Brandelyn slammed her half-empty wineglass on the table. A few yards away, her stepfather declared the burgers almost ready. Did anyone have those plates of veggies for him to throw on next? Anyone? Kids?Grandkids?
“I’m not a monster,” Brandy said, ignoring her stepfather alongside everyone else. “I would greatly appreciate it if you all didn’t run around declaring me a Bridezilla, either. I’ve got enough problems with my fiancée acting like I am one.”
“Because it’s not like enough people saying it’s true actually makes it true, right?” Lizzie asked with a scoff. “You’re something else, sis.”
“What are you talking about?”
The way Brandy barked that nearly brought the backyard to a standstill. Her stepfather looked up from the grill, eyes blinking away the smoke. Her nephews and youngest cousin halted their roughhousing and looked like they were about to be chastised for playing too much. Even the nosy neighbor scurried back down his fence and acted as if he weren’t listening in on Brandelyn’s drama.
“Look, Bran, we didn’t wanna say it…” Cathy uncrossed her legs and leaned forward. For her to abandon her favorite relaxation pose, she was serious about what she was about to say. “Youarebeing difficult. I didn’t know that your fiancée wearing a suit was your idea.”
“How could it not be her idea?” Brandelyn’s defensive nature sprang up as if it had been summoned by pentagram and a few choice words in Latin.A relative for every judgmental point of the star!Even Brutus’s little tail shook as if he prepared for a fight against a summoned demon. “You don’t know her as well as I do,” Brandy continued. “That isverySunny. I’ve only seen her wear a skirt like three times since I’ve known her. The thought of her wanting to wear a dress is absolutely preposterous.”
“Gee, a woman wanting to wear a dress at her wedding ispreposterous.” That was Monica’s grand contribution to the conversation. “What will they come up with next?”
“You guys seriously don’t get it!” How could Brandy get them to understand the Sunny that she knew? How was she expected to wade through the semi-offensive comments born of ignorance? “Lots of women wear suits to their weddings around here. It’s not a big deal.”
“Apparently, it is toyourwoman,” Cathy chided.
Brandelyn looked at the people staring her down like she was an unholy mess. Really? They were doing this? All Brandy cared about was having a nice wedding. Why couldn’t her mother see that she truly had everyone’s best interests in mind?She makes it sound like I’m pushing some selfish agenda on everyone!Shouldn’t her mother be happy that Brandy held the reins on this wedding? She said so herself that she was grateful that Brandy was having a “traditional” wedding. Why weren’t they on the same page?
“Look,” Cathy recoiled from the look on her daughter’s face, “it might be time for you to step back from the wedding planning and check in with your fiancée. She grew a damn spine and tried to put her foot down about something. That’s when you have to listen. If you can’t listen to her now, then what good is it going to be when you’re married, she’s screaming, and you’re pretending you don’t hear anything?”
“Shehasput her foot down about things,” Brandy mumbled. “Why do you think we’re getting married at her house instead of in the church?” She honestly expected her semi-religious family to be aghast that no church weddings were on the docket. Then again, after Lizzie’s city hall affair…
“This sounds much more personal than a church vs. home wedding,” Monica said with a snort. “The woman doesn’t want to wear a suit. Who are you to tell her that she has to?”
“That’snotthe issue!” Brandelyn slapped both hands down on the table. “I would never tell her what to wear!”
“Okay, but, like…” Here came that haughty, snotty tone Lizzie especially loved when she finally got to hold something over her big sister. “It doesn’t sound like you’re holding a gun to her head, Bran. Sounds like you’re making her mad with the assumptions.”
“You don’t take criticism well, so…” Monica continued.
“What does criticism have to do with anything?”
Seriously, what was thisreallyabout? Everyone danced around some truth they were so afraid to tell Brandelyn, as if she were going to explode from thebadcriticism she apparently couldn’t take.This is ridiculous. Since when is everyone ganging up on me? I don’t have time for this.Her wedding was a week and a half away. It was too late to make major changes, anyway. Why was everyone prancing about on their tip toes? Did they really think Brandy was a “Bridezilla?” Brandelyn the Bridezilla. It had a ring to it, didn’t it?
Her stepfather brought over a plate of cooked hamburgers. As if he were about to get yelled at for daring to encroach on sacred, feminine space, he gingerly placed the plate in the center of the table, careful to avoid the glasses and bottle of wine. “Anyone figure out where those buns are yet?” he whispered.
“I’m not a Bridezilla,” Brandy muttered, elbows on the table and hands fisting her hair.
“There’s a bag of buns on the counter,” Cathy told her husband. “Don’t mind my daughter. She’s grumpy because she doesn’t take criticism well.”
“I’mnota Bridezilla.”
