Gracie looked at Edie and wondered why Edie looked so miserable and then she realised these were the roses from Theo, the ones he’d brought for Edie.
‘Oh,’ said Gracie, ‘these are all the roses that you didn’t want, Edie.’ Gracie ran her fingers along the jars on the lowest shelf. Her fingers tingled. ‘They are beautiful, Bethie,’ she whispered. ‘It’s like being in another world, isn’t it?’ she said. ‘A world where everything is made of surprises.’
Beth unclipped the lid of one of the jars and carefully lifted out the rose as tenderly as if it was the newest thing that had been born in the world, then she shook it and the petals fell into Gracie’s flower basket.
‘No,’ cried Gracie. ‘No don’t — you’ll let the magic escape.’
‘No, we’re taking the magic with us,’ said Beth and Gracie knew that Beth needed that magic. She couldn’t be without it or her fairytale would stop. Beth opened another jar and another and shook them into Gracie’s basket. Gracie looked at Edie but Edie was just standing there, her mouth open, and Gracie thought she saw tears in her sister’s eyes.
‘They do make you want to cry, don’t they?’ she whispered to Edie. ‘With happiness.’
But Edie didn’t answer.
With her basket full of Beth’s rose petals and Beth now dressed and holding her bridal posy and Papa with a full dried rosebud pinned to his lapel, they set off for the church — Gracie, Edie, Papa and Beth. Papa stopped at the letterbox and looked at the sky.
‘It’s going to rain later — it’s building up to a spring storm.’
‘Will we get to the church in time? I can’t get wet,’ said Beth.
‘We could take a cab,’ said Edie.
Gracie looked at Papa and said, ‘I think we should walk,’ because it was Beth’s day and she knew Beth would want to make it last as long as possible.
‘No, we’ll be fine, it won’t rain for a good hour yet,’ Paul decided. ‘But I can smell it in the air.’
The November sun pushed back the grey clouds that threatened to undo their happiness and it warmed their skin and their hearts and sparkled off the shine of the silk on the dresses as they walked. Feeling generous, the sun let its glistening rays halo around them, making their walking together a perfect moment that could last forever.
As they passed the end of the street, the children who had accompanied Theo each week were gathered waiting for them. They cheered and waved as the bride, the flower girl, the father and sister walked past and then the children fell in behind them, forming a procession like a brass band, the boys pretending they were trumpets and snare drums, the girls pretending they were flutes and cymbals or extra flower girls as they clutched daisies torn from gardens. The women stood at their front gates and held their hands on their hearts or threw flowers from their gardens at the wedding party and the men clapped. When the procession was out of earshot, the men made obscene jokes to each other about what the groom had to look forward to after all was signed and sealed, and the women wondered what magic Beth had used to capture Theo when his heart had belonged to Edie.
Gracie couldn’t look at anyone in case they were laughing at her dress. She was absolutely sure they were. She studied her feet in her best shoes. She saw the cracks in the road and fiddler beetles flying off to safety as her feet landed near them. Finally they reached the church; it was the longest walk to church she had ever had. Edie left them then and went inside and Gracie heard the music start and right after that first note the clouds opened and dropped a deluge of spring rain on the town. It was so furious that Gracie put her hands to her ears but when she stepped into the church, with its high ceilings and stone walls, the rain was silenced and all she could hear was all the eyes in the congregation watching her.
Gracie still couldn’t look at anyone as she walked up the aisle, carefully placing one foot in front of the other, trying to stay in time to the ‘Wedding March’, just like Beth had made her practise. Beth and Papa would be behind her, she knew that from the practice. Beth would have her arm through Papa’s. When Reverend Whitlock said, Who gives this woman to this man?, Papa was going to say I do in his big booming voice that he used at work but never at home. Beth’s dress was exactly the same as hers only bigger. Beth thought their dresses were wonderful, she was so proud of what she had created. As Gracie walked slowly up the aisle she wondered what their house would be like without Beth living in it any more. She wondered if they would miss her or if it would soon seem normal not to have her there. But she reminded herself that Beth said she wasn’t really leaving because she was going to come each morning at nine and leave each evening at six. Gracie scattered the dried rose petals ahead of her hoping they would work their magic just like Beth needed them to. She didn’t want to tread on them and break them so she threw them to each side of her instead of in front. Sealed in glass jars they had kept their aroma and as she scattered them perfume filled the air and everyone in the congregation breathed in their magic and breathed out an audible ‘Ahhhhh,’ as if they now had all the contentment they could hope for
