Page 25 of Rachel Weiss's Group Chat
“Women should know better than to ghost other women.” Amy tutted.
I polished off my food, dabbed my mouth with my napkin, and announced, “We’re going out. Let us be your wingwomen, Eva.”
“Yes!” Amy clapped. “I could really use a night out. I’ll leave my wedding ring at home and pretend to be single. For wingwoman purposes.”
“Amy!” Eva looked scandalized.
“I’m kidding!” Amy rolled her eyes before mumbling under her breath, “Sort of.”
Amy and Eva’s dilemmas aside, love was in the air as spring approached. On my lunch break, I was browsing for a dress to wear as Stephen’s wedding date when Jane called me.
“Are you in a public place?” she asked.
“Why?” I shiftily glanced around the Nordstrom dress department. “You’re making me nervous. What’s wrong?”
“I’m going to text you a picture and it might make you scream.”
“Did you injure yourself? Because, as you remember from the time you shut your thumb in your car door, I can’t handle gore.” I had a feeling I knew what was coming, and it wasn’t a picture of a thumb injury.
“No. Shush and look at my text.”
It was a photo of her manicured hand wearing a gleaming, emerald-cut engagement ring. I shrieked, paying no mind to the shoppers and salespeople nearby.
“He asked you? You’re engaged? Tell me everything!”
“He took me to seePride and Prejudiceat the Seattle Rep last night, and when the lights went down after the first half, he got down on one knee, so when the lights came back up for intermission I was like, ‘Where are you?’ until I looked down and saw him kneeling in the aisle, holding the ring. He said, ‘Jane, will you be my bride?’ and I said, ‘Yes!’ and everyone started clapping! We’re going to have a New Year’s wedding!”
“Oh, Jane. I’m so happy for you. You deserve all of it. The perfect proposal, the perfect husband. Everything.”
“Thanks, Rach. You know, none of this would have happened without you.”
I inhaled sharply, feeling a tad emotional.
“What you said to me when I was dating Robbie,” Jane continued. “No one else was brave enough to say anything like that to me. But you were.”
“I had to try, you know? If you’d wanted to stay with Robbie, I would’ve shut up about it. But it felt like I had to say something.”
“‘Are you sure he’s enough for you?’” Jane quoted my own words back to me, her voice thickening with emotion now. “‘Funny enough?Funenough? Because if he is, I’m happy for you. But I don’t think he is.’ You called out something that I felt deep down but was trying to repress. And if you hadn’t had the guts to say that to me—even though I was hurt at the time—I would never have met Owen. My life would have turned out so different. I love you, Rach.”
And now I was wiping away tears in the middle of Nordstrom.
“I love you too. And I love Owen. I’m so happy for both of you.”
“Okay, I have to call Mom.”
“She might die of happiness.”
“I know.”
I stashed my phone back in my purse and found my attention drawn to the far corner of the dress department. The wedding dresses. Before I knew what I was doing, I had crossed the floor and told the salesgirl, beaming, “My sister just got engaged.” She smiled indulgently at me as I caressed creamy silks and petal-pink tulle. I oohed over a few chic, elegant dresses that would look spectacular on Jane. And then I stopped, my heart swelling, to gaze at a different sort of gown. It was a lacy column dress with a long train and a gently plunging neckline. It was like my childhood princess dreams had married my adolescent fashion dreams and given birth to this confection. Instantly I was off, picturing myself walking down a grassy aisle, holding a simple bouquet of pale pink peonies, a veil blowing around my face in a gentle breeze, and—what?
Why was I doing this? Since when was I a woman who stared longingly at bridal gowns? So I liked princesses and fashion; I had never pictured my wedding day. I didn’t even know if I wanted an outdoor wedding, or a veil.
Rachel Weiss, get a grip on yourself.
Besides, who was I going to walk down that aisle toward? Stephen Branson? I’d have to see how things went as his plus-one before I started picturing myself as his bride.
Before I knew it, we were halfway through April. The gray clouds cleared long enough for us to catch a glimpse of sunrays and blue skies. On Saturday afternoon, Stephen picked me up from my apartment like a true gentleman in his VW Golf.
