“Owning five corgis is a whole personality trait,” Julia says. I’ve just finished telling her about Maxine and the very part-time work I’m starting next week. There’s something I can focus on instead of Tarek, and I vow to redirect my anxieties as best I can.
“I wouldn’t even want five cats. That’s five animals thinking they’re better than you,” I say between licks of salted caramel. “My self-esteem is touch and go as it is.”
We manage to find a patch of grass that isn’t being used for badminton, fetch, or slacklining, which is a real feat on an eighty-degree day in Seattle. As we sit down, my phone buzzes, and I push away the hope that it’s Tarek. I glance at it, groan, and shove it into my bag. Julia lifts her eyebrows.
“Victoria,” I say, then fish my phone back out. “I should answer this. Sorry.”
She texted my mom and me, and while I’m sure my mom is on top of it, I feel compelled to make up for the fitting a couple of weeks ago.
My future MIL isn’t a fan of the hair comb. She wants me to wear her veil, which is so 80s it’s practically singing “Take on Me.” Help?
We’ve handled plenty of pushy in-laws. I can hear my parents’ voices in my head as I type back, First, make sure she feels like she’s being heard. Then, calmly explain to her that this is what you want to wear. We’re happy to chat with her if you feel you need an intervention.
Exactly what I was going to say, Mom writes a minute later, and I hate the spark of pride it gives me.
Julia attacks a chocolate river dripping down her cone. “I take it you haven’t told your parents yet.”
“I’m working up to it.” That’s true, isn’t it? What I’m doing with Maxine has to be a step in the right direction.
“Quinn. I’m going to say this in the nicest way possible. You cannot draw this out. The longer you do, the more upset your parents and Asher are going to be. This thing is making you miserable, and you’re making me miserable.”
Even if she didn’t mean it to, it rubs me the wrong way. “Wow, sorry I’m not nonstop fun to hang out with.”
“Hey.” She reaches out to pull on my arm, as though shaking me out of a literal funk. “You know what I mean.”
I do. I think. And she’s not wrong; I just haven’t decided how to broach the topic with my parents. I’m not ready for the consequences yet.
“Let’s talk about something else,” I say.
So Julia tells me about the roommate she picked on her school’s matching site and how you can sort based on how tidy you are and how tidy you’d like your roommate to be, and I smile and nod along like I’m supposed to.
The whole time, I can’t help feeling like she’s moving on—moving up—without me.
15
I may have done something bad last night,” whispers a bride through a crack in her suite door.
Next to me, Asher goes pale. “Oh god. You didn’t—”
“No!” the bride, Kaci, says quickly. “Nothing like that. I just… well, you’re going to see it eventually.” With that, she pulls the door wide, revealing her once-blond hair tinged mint green.
“You went swimming,” I say, recognizing the hue from when Julia and I went to a party at the house of the one person in our grade who had a pool and she emerged with green hair. There was always that one person with a pool, and they were always popular.
Kaci nods miserably. “We have a bunch of family in town, right? So I went over last night to hang out with some cousins I hadn’t seen in forever, and we were in the hotel pool until they kicked us out.”
In two hours, Kaci is marrying Mariana in an outdoor ceremony on the grounds of a sprawling estate outside of Seattle. Three hundred guests.
“I can’t have green hair in our wedding photos,” Kaci continues, teary-eyed. “I thought about cutting it off, but I really wanted to have long hair for the wedding, and I’ve been growing it out for ages—” She breaks off with a sob.
And even if the idea of accidentally dyeing your hair green before your wedding is kind of funny, those tears aren’t. This is a big deal to her, which makes it a big deal to us.
Asher makes this calming sound, a kind of tutting under her breath. “Kaci. Listen to me. I am not going to let you get married with green hair. Okay? But right now I need you to calm down. Breathe. Because I don’t think you want puffy red eyes in your photos either, do you?”
Kaci shakes her head and lets out one last sniff.
It’s interesting, the differences between Asher and Mom, who asked us to check on Kaci while she helped Mariana because the brides didn’t want to see each other until they were at the altar. Asher is nurturing where Mom is no-nonsense, but my sister can be intense when she needs to be. It makes me wonder, if I stuck this out, what kind of planner I’d be. If I’d fall somewhere in the middle between Asher and Mom.
The thought of it snags my lungs in a viselike grip, reminds me what I’d be losing if I gave all of this up.
You’re making me miserable, Julia said.
When I give all of this up. As soon as I figure out how.
Kaci lets us into her suite, which is all done up in white and rose gold, and Asher the wedding wizard unzips her emergency kit. “I know I have a little bottle of
