Chapter 1 - The Microphone at the Altar
The chandeliers were still lit and the string quartet had just stopped when I lifted the microphone. I stood at the altar in a dress that wasn't mine, heavy with crystals that caught every warm light in the ballroom and threw it back onto the marble floor, onto the guests in their dark suits and pale dresses, onto the gold balconies above us. The weight pulled at my shoulders. Underneath it, smooth and cool against my skin, was the other dress. The one I'd ordered, paid for, fitted three times, and hung in its garment bag myself. Behind me the projection screen glowed huge and white with an invoice for IVORY SATIN WEDDING GOWN and my signature at the bottom, and the contradiction between what they saw on my body and what they saw on that screen was so sharp you could hear the room stop breathing.
Victoria sat in the front row in her silver beaded V-neck with the sheer sleeves, her blonde hair waved exactly, her diamond bracelet flashing when she folded her hands. She looked composed, pleasant, the perfect mother of the groom. She didn't look away.
My name is Claire and I was standing at my own wedding holding a wireless mic that shook just once in my hand.
It was just after four. The officiant had stepped back. My groom was beside me in his black tuxedo with the white rose boutonniere pinned straight, and the big screen behind the altar was supposed to be showing our photos. Instead it showed the invoice, then the approval email with the same words again, IVORY SATIN WEDDING GOWN, dated and initialed. I hadn't cued it. My planner had. I'd asked her that morning to hold it ready until I said so. I watched the light from the projector cut across the chandeliers and fall on Victoria's face and I made the choice to speak before my hands could change my mind.
I brought the mic up. I could feel my own breathing, slow, and the faint click of the pearl in my chignon against the microphone. I said, "There's something everyone should see."
The words went out through the speakers and hit the back wall. The screen didn't flicker. It held on that invoice. Beside me, he turned his head so fast his boutonniere brushed my sleeve. His mouth opened before any sound came out, and his eyes moved from the screen to the crystals on my skirt to my face.
"What happened to your gown?" he said.
It wasn't loud. It was the kind of confused, quiet question you ask when you think you've missed something obvious. His eyes were still searching the beaded layer like it might explain itself.
My hands found the front of the dress. The center clasp was hidden under the beadwork, a small jeweled piece I'd felt for every time I'd tried on the crystal gown in the private dressing suite and told them it wasn't what I wanted. I let my pink manicure rest right on it without opening it. The room was that kind of silent where you hear the air conditioning through the wall sconces.
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Victoria didn't stand. She kept her hands folded. Her smile thinned just enough that I saw the tension in her jaw. Lila, just behind her in her light beaded dress, went still with her hands tight on her clutch.
I could feel the cool satin underneath waiting at the seam. I kept my fingers on the clasp and didn't pull. The screen stayed frozen on INVOICE, the mic stayed live in my hand, and everyone waited for what would happen next.
