The Right Wedding Gown

by Shirley Hailstock

  Justin and his sister, Deanna, came in. The doorbell rang as they sat down.

  “That would be Micah,” Deanna said. “I’ll get it.”

  She came back on the arm of a tall guy in uniform. Samara had seen many military guys, but his presence was so commanding she thought she should stand up.

  “This is my brother, Michael,” Justin introduced, pumping his hand. “We call him Micah.” Michael stepped forward as Samara offered her hand. His swallowed hers like it was a whale eating a minnow.

  “Justin speaks well of you.”

  Samara smiled and glanced at Justin, wondering what he had said about her.

  “I thought we were going horseback riding,” Deanna said to her brother. “You don’t appear to be dressed for it.” She looked her brother up and down.

  “I have a change of clothes upstairs, but I have to be back at the base by morning.”

  “How about you, Samara, do you ride?” Micah asked.

  “She’s not here for that,” Justin said. “We need to talk to Mom and Dad.”

  “Sounds interesting.”

  “It’s about the painting.”

  “The wedding painting?” Deanna asked.

  “I’m cleaning it,” Samara explained. “During the process we found an indication that it might have been…” She trailed off.

  “She thinks it’s German war bounty,” Justin finished for her.

  “That old painting?” Deanna said.

  “War?” Micah said, simultaneously, his voice authoritative. Samara was sure she saw his shoulders straightened a little more—if that was possible.

  “My father bought that painting,” Lane said. “We have the papers.”

  “That’s what I want to show her,” Justin said. “They prove the painting is ours and Samara won’t have any misgivings about working on it. Where are they, Dad?”

  “I think they’re in one of those trunks up in the attic. We stored a lot of stuff there after my dad died,” Lane said.

  “Why don’t you go change, Micah? I’ll go look for the papers,” Justin suggested.

  “I wanted to talk to you about something,” Micah addressed his brother.

  “Then I’ll help find them,” Deanna said.

  “As I remember, they’re in an envelope with your grandmother’s handwriting on it,” her father said.

  “I’m not sure I can recognize Grandma’s handwriting. What does it say?”

  “Something about a wedding. Probably the title of the painting.”

  “Come on, Samara. It’s just us girls looking for a wedding.” She laughed at her own joke.

  Samara had started to get up, but Deanna’s words cut her at the knees and she fell back into the chair. On a second try she got up, hoping no one saw her reaction.

  The four of them went up the stairs. The guys stopped on the second level and Samara followed Deanna up another flight of stairs.

  “Are you completely recovered from your accident?” Samara asked. “Justin told me you were critical for a while.”

  “I was cleaning windows at my company. I’ll never do that again.” She looked over her shoulder at Samara. “When I fell I cut an artery in my leg. I was lucky I didn’t bleed to death. I still get a little tired, but the doctors said I could return to my normal routine.”

  “That’s good.”

  “It would be if you didn’t have a family like this one. They watch me like hawks, making sure I’m not overdoing.”

  “That’s because they love you.”

  She stopped at the top. “I know. I love them, too, and I’d be sad if they did anything less.” She smiled and turned to open a door.

  The attic was finished and divided into several rooms. The space was clean and dust-free, although it smelled a little musty.

  Deanna looked around pensively. “Where should we start?”

  Samara had no idea. She looked around. “Are there any files?”

  “That’s something we never brought up here.”

  “Your father said there were trunks.”

  “They’re over here.” Deanna moved toward a door. When she opened it, Samara saw more than a few trunks. The room was full of them. Some had names on them. Some were steamer trunks. Samara had never seen a steamer trunk outside of an old movie.

  “We each had a different one when we went off to college. This was mine.” Deanna sat on a footlocker. “That one belonged to Micah. You can tell. It’s still as clean as a marine.”

  They both laughed. Samara looked around, trying to identify the one that belonged to Justin.

  “This one,” Deanna told her. “This is Justin’s.”

  Samara followed Deanna’s gaze. “It looks like it’s been around the world.”

  “It has. Justin studied in Oxford, Paris, South Africa, the Middle East, Japan. Hasn’t he told you?”

  Samara shook her head. Now she understood why he worked for OEO. “I suppose he’s gotten used to keeping things to himself. It’s an occupational hazard when you work for the government.”

  Deanna opened a trunk and looked inside. She closed it, deciding that wasn’t the one. Samara pitched in and helped. The fifth trunk they opened had old photograph albums in it. Deanna pulled one out. “I’d forgotten about these,” she said sitting down on the floor and opening the huge cover. She pointed to an old photo. “This is my great-grandmother.”

  Samara looked down. The photo was sepia-colored and included a stern-looking man and a woman with the shadow of a smile on her face.

  “From what I’ve heard, she was quite a woman. But look at her husband. What a sourpuss.” Deanna looked up. “In those days few people smiled in photos. Some superstition or other told them to look stern.” Deanna demonstrated, putting a stern look on her face. The action made Samara laugh. “But great-granny here was defiant even on film.”

  Glancing into the trunk, Samara saw another album, one with a photo of a couple on the cover. She picked it up and opened it. Inside she found a photo of the bride alone.

  “What a beautiful gown,” she whispered to herself, but Deanna heard her and turned to see what she was looking at.

  “That’s my grandmother,” she said. “I love that photo. The dress is over there.”

  Samara looked up, but saw nothing.

  “It’s in the other room.”

  They got up and went through the door. Walking through the main room, she opened a door at the end and switched on a light. The gown stood on a dress form inside a glass case.

  Samara gasped. It was almost as if a person was standing there.

  “Sorry,” Deanna apologized. “I should have warned you. When I was little and we used to play up here, coming upon the dress like this would scare me, too, especially when the room was dark.”

  “It’s more beautiful than it is in the photo. My friend Geri would love to see this.” Samara glanced at Deanna. “She’s opening a bridal shop and having a fashion show as a grand-opening event. I’m one of her models.”

  “That’s great. Why don’t you try it on? It looks like it would fit.”

  “No.” Samara stepped back as if she’d been hit. “I couldn’t do it. It’s in a glass case.”

  “That’s just to keep it clean.” Deanna dismissed her reservations. “And to satisfy my mother. She found the case at a going-out-of-business sale and put the dress in it.” Samara opened the case and pulled the gown off the form. She held it up to Samara and looked at her. “It’ll fit. I’ve always wanted to see it on a live person.”

  “I couldn’t.” Samara backed away.

  “Don’t worry, you won’t do anything to hurt it.”

  Deanna didn’t understand, Samara thought. “I’m not modeling wedding gowns,” she explained.

  “I used to love to play dress up,” Deanna said as if she didn’t hear Samara.

  “I must be out of my mind,” Samara muttered as she found herself being helped into a century-old gown. Deanna fastened the line of buttons along Samara’s back. “This is bad luc
k, you know.”

  “How can it be? My grandparents were married for sixty years. And my parents are about to celebrate their fortieth.”

  “My luck is always bad.”

  “There’s no such thing as good or bad luck. You make your own luck. And maybe the gown will change your status.”

  “You understand that is a diametrically opposite argument? Either there is such a thing as luck and the dress could change that. Or there is no such thing as luck. It can’t be both.”

  Deanna smiled. “You’ve a lawyer’s mind. Justin must see that in you.”

  “He’s never said,” she said. “I mean, I don’t have a lawyer’s mind.”

  “Just logical.”

  “I hope,” Samara said. “Justin tells me you run your own company.” Samara changed the subject.

  “I do. And I work damn hard to make it a success.”

  Deanna stood back and looked at her. Then she frowned.

  “What is it?” Samara asked, thinking she must look awful.

  “You need something else.” Deanna turned back to the glass case. She moved to a chest next to it and opened a drawer. Pulling out a box, she opened it and removed a veil. She shook it out, then draped it over Samara’s head and positioned it in her hair.

  “What’s this?” someone asked from the doorway.

  Samara turned. Lane and Katie Beckett had come up the stairs and were standing in the doorway.

  “I—” Samara began, feeling as if she’d been caught doing something wrong. She and Deanna had come up to find records, not try on someone else’s heirloom.

  “Doesn’t she look gorgeous?” Deanna stated.

  “Yes,” Katie Beckett said, her voice sounding awestruck. “She does.”

  “If I didn’t know better,” Lane said, “I’d swear you were my mother on her wedding day.”

  Samara heard the crack in his voice.

  “Dad, she’s in a wedding fashion show. Maybe she could model Grandma’s dress.”

  “Oh, no,” Samara protested. “I’m only modeling bridesmaids gowns. And Geri has them already selected.”

  “Samara, look in the mirror,” Deanna said.

  Samara had seen herself once in the gown from her own trunk. She turned toward a full-length mirror that sat behind the door. The gasp that came from her when she saw her reflection was audible. She wore the entire ensemble, not just a white dress and bare feet. The veil added an ethereal quality to the reflection. It seemed that time stood still. No one said anything. She wasn’t even sure they breathed. She was unaware of anything except the woman in the mirror.

  It was her.

  “What’s going on up here?”

  Justin joined the small group that parted to allow him access. He stopped as if suddenly frozen to the floor when he saw her.

  Samara didn’t see the other Becketts leave the room, but after a moment she realized she was alone with Justin.

  “Your sister—” she started, then stopped.

  Justin moved toward her. Time, which had stopped, started up again, but slowly. His steps where measured and easy as he moved toward her. An eternity began and ended before she was looking through the veil and into his eyes.

  He lifted the veil, flipping it over her head and watching it float back over her shoulders. Her eyes followed his movements. He said nothing, only looked at her, his eyes tender and adoring. His hands reached for her shoulders and slid down her lace-covered arms until they reached her fingertips. He raised her hands and looked at her empty fingers.

  “A bride should have a ring,” he said in a hushed tone. He kissed her fingers.

  Samara shuddered. A new emotion shot through her, something that was different from anything she’d ever felt before. Justin looked up. She cupped his face with her hands and brought it level with hers. For a moment they stared at each other, their breath mingling, their mouths only a kiss apart.

  Justin’s hands touched her waist. He stepped forward and kissed her. Like a groom kissing his bride in front of a congregation, his mouth touched hers in honor. His arms caressed her as if he were holding a precious artifact. But their touch was incendiary and in no time it flared into a conflagration that had them clawing at each other. Hands, arms, legs, mouths, every inch of them battled with the other as both pleasure-seeker and pleasure-giver. Ecstasy gripped her as hard as Justin’s arms held her.

  Never had a man affected her the way he did, taking her breath away and having her willingly give it. Never had she continued a relationship when her heart became entangled. But with Justin she kept putting it off. And this was why. This feeling. The way he made her feel, loved, protected, whole. The way his mouth felt on hers, the way he tasted, the excitement that went through her when she saw him. She liked the feel of his hands, the alignment of his body, the fire that danced through her as if some hyperactive elixir ran through her blood.

  His mouth was madness on hers. She had to be mad, too, to feel so lightheaded, so alive and so good.

  Their heads could have bobbed and weaved back and forth, their tongues danced and tangled for a moment or a lifetime, she didn’t know. She only knew that her body was filled to the brim with rapture when his mouth moved from hers and they held each other, panting breaths as if they hadn’t taken one since the time when the dress she wore was still only a bolt of fabric.

  “We’d better get back downstairs,” she said, her voice level, low and breathy.

  “We’ll have to get you out of this dress first.”

  Samara jumped away from him as if someone had come in and found them naked.

  “You’re right,” he said. “Too dangerous. If I get you out of your clothes, I’m not stopping there.”

  Patchett’s was in full swing when Samara got there. The place was usually crowded and noisy, but tonight a party appeared to be going on in one of the private rooms. The main room was having its own party.

  Everyone was there when she took her seat.

  “You’re losing your reputation, Samara,” Diana said. “We could set a clock by your actions and now look at you. Late.”

  “Sorry, I was held up.”

  “From what I hear the hold up was by a gorgeous-looking guy.”

  “I don’t know what you mean.” She feigned innocence. The truth was it wasn’t Justin that made her late.

  “Come now, tell ‘Mama’ all,” Diana said.

  “We all want to know,” Carmen prompted.

  “Don’t I even get to order a drink first?”

  A waiter set a glass of white wine in front of her. “We’d already ordered it. Now talk,” Shane ordered.

  “You can start with ‘Justin Beckett is his name.’”

  “That is his name. The last time I brought it up, you all were thinking I should drop him.”

  “Not all of us,” Geri defended.

  “Except Geri,” Samara conceded. She brought them up-to-date ending with the painting she was restoring. She left out the World War II bounty, and the donning of a wedding gown, although they knew she’d been to Cumberland and had dinner with his family.

  “All of this isn’t over a painting. Are the two of you a couple?”

  Samara felt as embarrassed as a thirteen-year-old. She nodded. “We’ve been out a few times.”

  “And you’ve met his family? Did they like you?”

  Even in the twenty-first century, it was still important that the family of the groom approve the bride and vice versa, she thought. But she wasn’t a bride and there was no talk of a wedding between them.

  “I wasn’t there as his date. We went to look for papers.”

  “Did you find them?”

  She shook her head.

  “So what did you find?”

  “Something Geri would be interested in.” She was glad to change the subject, especially when she saw everyone perk up.

  “What?” Geri asked.

  “An old wedding gown.”

  “Another one?” Carmen said. “That’s two wedding gowns. Someone i
s trying to tell you something.”

  Samara turned her head away from Carmen and looked at Geri. “The gown belonged to Justin’s grandmother. They keep it in a glass case. It’s beautiful.”

  “Do you think they would loan it to the fashion show?” Shane asked. “You could wear it.”

  “Actually, I was thinking of asking Geri if she’d mind me doing that very thing.”

  Four pairs of eyes stared at her in stunned silence. Samara lifted her wineglass and with a smile, saluted them.

  Her gown was new. Justin had told Samara they were going to the Tennis Club. It wasn’t a place that had anything to do with the game of tennis. It was a restaurant where people still dressed elegantly for dinner and dancing. Justin was picking her up at eight and she was putting the finishing touches on her makeup.

  Her gown was purple, the strapless bodice made of horizontal folds, the skirt hanging straight to the floor. Her sandaled heels matched the dress in color. Her radiant cheeks had their own inner color.

  Justin hugged her as soon as she opened the door. “You look wonderful,” he said.

  So did he. This was the second time she’d seen him dressed in a tuxedo and this time she was just as breathless as she had been the first time. He helped her with the wrap that matched her gown and she thought how great they looked together as they left her apartment and he helped her into his car.

  The Tennis Club was nothing like Patchett’s. While Patchett’s was a lively, fun place, the Tennis Club had a more sedate atmosphere. It was a place for lovers and Samara felt as if she fit the bill.

  After the waiter left, Justin set a small package in front of her. It was rectangular, wrapped in black velvet paper with a gold ribbon tied around it.

  “For me?” she asked, rhetorically.

  He nodded.

  Pulling the ribbon free, she opened the paper and then the box. Inside was a postcard. There was a huge moon window on the cover. Samara recognized it immediately.

  “The White House,” she said, looking up at him and then down again at the card.

  The window was on the second floor of the White House, a place that was not on the public tour, but was often seen in tourist postcards and White House calendars. This one again had the vintage overtones she’d become used to associating with Justin.