Girls in White Dresses

happened. Maybe it was hard for El en to be around them, since she knew they didn’t approve of her marriage. Maybe their lives just went different ways—Lauren and Shannon both moved to New York and El en moved to a house in the suburbs. Sometimes they thought that Louis was behind it, that he had forbidden El en to see them. In the end, Lauren thought it was probably a combination of everything, but she knew they would never real y know.

Lauren talks about that summer a lot. It has a point, a moral of some kind, but she’s not quite sure what it is yet. When people tel her that their friend is marrying a guy they hate, she says, “Have I got a story for you.” When she gets a Christmas card from Sal ie and Max with a picture of their two little boys on it, she shows it to people and says, “You’ve got to hear about this wedding.” And whenever she’s at a party and someone serves summer sausage, she says, “Did I ever tel you about my friend El en?” and if the person she’s talking to shakes their head no, she says, “Wel , let me tel you. We had this friend. And our friend El en, wel , El en dated ugly boys.”

I sabela didn’t want to go to the wedding.

They were Ben’s friends. She had never met the bride or the groom, and besides, she was fairly certain that she and Ben were going to break up any day. While she was getting ready that morning, she sat down on the bed and said, “My head hurts.”

“You don’t have to go if you don’t want to,” Ben said. He was tying his tie and not looking at her. She knew he real y wouldn’t care if she didn’t go and that pissed her off.

“Your tie is crooked,” she said, and stood up to finish getting ready.

They were early to the church, which never happened with them. Ben hated weddings. During the ceremony, he’d rol his eyes or sometimes say,

“Oh God, ” if the couple read their own vows or started to cry.

They sat in the pew and Isabel a paged through the program. “You know who’s going to be here?” Ben asked. “Mike’s girlfriend. You know, the one that looks like JonBenet.”

Isabel a had been hearing about this girl for months but had never met her. A while back, Ben caught her lying on the couch watching E! True Hollywood Story: JonBenet. “Why are you watching this?” he asked.

“There’s nothing on,” Isabel a said. Little girls marched across the stage with their faces ful of makeup. JonBenet stood in the middle of them, twirling an umbrel a and smiling.

“This is real y creepy,” Ben said.

“I know.” Isabel a couldn’t take her eyes off the screen. They were such little girls, but their hair was so big.

“I know a girl who looks just like her,” Ben said.

“Like who?”

“JonBenet,” he said.

Isabel a turned to him. “You know a little girl who looks like her?” she asked, and Ben shook his head.

“No,” he said. “You know my buddy Mike? His girlfriend looks just like her. It’s fucking creepy.”

Isabel a didn’t believe him. “Ask my friends,” he said. “I swear, she looks just like her.”

Al of his girlfriends confirmed the story. “She’s a dead ringer for JonBenet,” they said, and then they laughed. “Plus,” they told Isabel a, “she’s crazy. She’s obsessed with getting married and talks about it al the time. She introduces herself to people as ‘Mike’s girlfriend and future fiancee.’

She sends him pictures of engagement rings constantly. She buys bridal magazines and carries them around with her!”

Isabel a wasn’t sure she believed al of it, but she stil couldn’t wait to meet her.

She looked around the church for someone who fit the description. “Is that her?” she whispered to Ben, and pointed to a smal blond girl sliding into a pew in front of them.

He shook his head and smiled. “No,” he said. “When you see her, you’l know. And you’l die.”

Ben hadn’t official y moved in, but he was in between apartments and his stuff was overtaking Isabel a’s place. When the lease was up on his old apartment, she’d told him he could stay with her until he found a new place. They hadn’t talked about it since. That was three months ago.

“I can’t believe he’s stil staying with you,” Lauren said one night. “You only let me stay with you for two weeks.”

“I never kicked you out,” Isabel a said.

“Yeah, but you made me sleep on the couch after the first two days,” Lauren said.

“That’s because you licked me in your sleep,” Isabel a said.

“I told you, I was having a dream,” Lauren said.

“That doesn’t make it okay,” Isabel a said. “Anyway, I’m sure Ben wil find a place soon.”

“Maybe you should ask him,” Lauren said. But Isabel a didn’t want to, which she knew probably meant that she real y should. Instead, she decided she wouldn’t worry about it for a while.