Short Story Recycling: The Wedding Dress (Part I)

I’m on vacation – but still thinking of you… Here’s a blast from the past that originally posted in 2011 right around the time of my wedding. I chose it to recycle in honor of my sister’s wedding later this year. I’m pleased to report it is NOT apocryphal, teehee, for either of us!! I am following the original format, and part two will post tomorrow. Enjoy!

Originally posted October 12, 2011
In honor of my recent nuptials, I am going to share a story that I was going to save for future publishing… Here’s part one of two – come back tomorrow for the conclusion. I hope you enjoy it!

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The Wedding Dress

“I’m never going to find one, I just know it…” Jenna sighed. “I’m just not the white dress type, let’s be honest. It’s okay, you can admit it, I know it’s true.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, you are perfect and you will find the perfect dress and we will have the perfect day,” Richard replied with a smile. “And do you know why? Because we are perfect together and the universe knows it. And that means everything about our wedding will be perfect. Including the dress.”

“You always know just what to say. I can’t believe I finally found you!” Jenna said, her smile lighting up her face and clearing away the frown lines that had started to etch themselves into her forehead after yet another disappointing trip to yet another bridal superstore. This was the fourth such store she had visited in the past month – on top of the three boutique bridal shops she had dragged her mother and best friend into in that same timeframe. Well, technically three and a half – the half being a store so expensive and outrageous that Jenna had literally walked in the door (after being buzzed in from the foyer), walked a lap around, and then walked back out. And after each of these oh-so-disappointing trips, she had done exactly what she did today – called Richard. And each time he had done exactly what he did today – made everything alright.

That was what Richard did. Always, and unfailingly. Ever since the couple had met just over a year ago.

Before Richard, Jenna had never been in a bridal store in her life. She never had any reason to. No guy she had ever known had shown even the slightest interest in marriage before Richard. In fact, no guy she had ever known had demonstrated even the slightest potential interest. Jenna had all but given up. After all, she was no spring chicken anymore (as her mother never failed to remind her). At the ripe old age of forty-three (ha, as if anything about forty-three was still considered “ripe”), Jenna had long ago released the collection of wishes and dreams she had so carefully packaged in her head for a husband and family of her own.

Untying the ribbons holding those delicate and fragile plans together had proven surprisingly easy, considering how long it took to piece them all together in the first place. Actually, as she thought about it, Jenna realized she never really untied them at all – she did nothing so active or intentional. It was more like they began to fray and wear out over time, threads pulling out and pieces falling away until there was nothing left but a wisp or two of longing for the things that other women seemed to gather to themselves so easily but that had always eluded her. Well, a wisp or two of longing coupled with a mountain or two of envy for the luck that other women seemed to have which allowed them to gather these things, that is.

And then along came Richard.

That sounds so dramatic. Actually, finding Richard was not dramatic at all. It was completely easy and natural, like breathing. One day he wasn’t there, and then the next he was. From one breath to the next. And all of a sudden, it was like he had always been there, like they had been together forever.

As a girl, Jenna believed in love at first sight. She believed that one day, good luck would place her in the right place at the right time and – BAM! – it would happen, she would fall in perfect love. As a teenager and a young woman, she clung desperately to the belief that this was the secret to life and love – that the reason she was perennially single was simply a matter of logistics. She hadn’t seen Him yet. Therefore, quite logically, she hadn’t fallen in love yet.

But as Jenna’s twenties turned into her thirties and then her forties, this desperate belief began to shrivel a bit – although her belief in the importance of luck actually grew quite a bit. The slightly bitter cynicism of her middle-age beat the cheerful optimism of her youth over the head on more than one occasion. This, in conjunction with the occasional sucker-punch of a particular bad blind date and the realization that not everyone got a fair share of luck, eventually resulted in a new and improved Jenna, a Jenna who no longer believed in fairy tales, a Jenna who believed that some girls were just not meant for happy endings and that this was okay, as long as a girl could take care of herself.

But then, on that one fateful (and yet oh-so-ordinary day) she ran into Richard. Literally. He was standing in line for coffee and, distracted by thoughts of what she would wear to the latest anniversary party she had been invited to attend, she walked right into his back. Fortunately, there was no harm, no foul. Richard simply smiled, accepted her hastily stammered apology, and started talking to her about anything and nothing at all. Richard did that. He had the most amazing ability to talk naturally and easily to anyone.

“And it is a good thing he did,” Jenna mused to herself, Richard’s thoughtful words about the dress and their relationship still ringing in her ears, “because otherwise we wouldn’t be here today. Planning our wedding. Our wedding. My wedding.” Jenna sighed, picturing herself walking down the aisle, dancing with her father, toasting Richard, smiling for pictures that would hang in her house – their house – forever.

And then it hit her. Again. She was getting married in a month. She had been to every store she knew about (and several she had recently discovered) and she still didn’t have a damn dress.

“Oh God,” Jenna thought to herself. “What am I going to do?”

She had tried on every possible style of dress imaginable. Everything made her look ridiculous or old or fat or stupid or ugly. They were too frilly, too lacy, too shiny, too poufy. Too tight, too weird, too prom-dressy, too princessy, too slutty. Too white, too ecru, too cream, too champagne. Nothing was right. In every wedding dream as a child, Jenna realized, she had been wearing The Dress – but she had never seen The Dress. Not in any store, magazine, or online site. She saw countless dresses that looked almost right, that seemed close. But each time she would try a version of one of those dresses on, something (or, even a few times, everything) about it would be wrong.

Jenna was beginning to develop a complex.

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Stay tuned tomorrow for the thrilling conclusion… (teehee – if you are of a certain age, you – like me – may recall hearing that at the end of television episodes; you – unlike me – may never have dreamed about saying/writing those words, but who cares – it’s my blog, my choices. You don’t like it, start one of your own… ;))