Well Played, стр. 28

“For real,” April echoed.

Emily flushed pink, and when her smile turned slightly wicked, I knew she was already thinking ahead to her wedding day. Maybe even the wedding night. Nope. I wasn’t going there.

She twirled for us one more time, then went back into the dressing room, emerging a few minutes later in her jeans and T-shirt. Fashion show was over, apparently.

“Next!” She clapped her hands together while, behind her, our assigned shop attendant cleared the dressing room of rejected wedding gowns. “April, your dress is in there. The green. Stacey, you’re after April.”

I kept a smile on my face while my anxiety spiked. This was exactly what I was nervous about. I wasn’t terribly self-conscious about my body. It was mine and it was healthy, even if it was a little rounder than the glossy women’s magazines said it should be. I knew how to dress myself, and I knew what looked good on me.

But that didn’t mean Emily knew. She was tiny. She was thin. In her wedding dress, once we put a crown of flowers on her head, she would look like a fairy princess. Her sister was built much the same, so Emily wouldn’t have any problem finding something that would work on her. But on my completely different body type? This could be a disaster. Sure, I’d given her input on dress ideas—our shared Pinterest board was impressive. But I hadn’t seen any of her real choices before today. Those first two wedding gowns had been garbage, so I didn’t trust her taste anymore. What was she making us wear?

Sure enough, a few minutes later April came out of the dressing room looking like a model. Well, a model who was a foot too short to actually walk a runway, with no shoes on, and still wearing the baseball cap she’d worn to the shop.

“Seriously?” Emily plucked the hat from her sister’s head, and April snatched it back.

“I’m not wearing it in the wedding, calm down.” She stuffed her hair back inside her hat, threading it through the back, then smoothed her hands down the dress. “This works. I mean, we have to take it in, but they’ll do that, right?”

Take it in. I’d never had that problem. I tried not to roll my eyes while I surveyed April’s dress. Then I pursed my lips and turned to Emily. “You were trolling us with those first two dresses. I knew it.” April’s dress was a riff on Emily’s gown: simpler lines and in pastel green, but the same lacy handkerchief hem, this time with a sleeveless, high-necked bodice that called attention to April’s well-toned arms.

Emily grinned. “Okay, maybe a little. But I wanted to be sure, you know?” She nudged me. “Your dress is in there too. The pink. Go try it on; I can’t wait to see.”

I didn’t want to. April’s dress looked perfect on her, but if I wore it I’d look like a sausage in a too-small casing. My boobs would distort the lace, and the high-neck sleeveless cut would make my very not-toned arms look like Christmas hams. But I trudged into the dressing room anyway, because that was what you did for best friends. You wore awful dresses and your biggest smile while they got married.

Inside the dress was waiting for me. A perfect soft pink, but I couldn’t tell much about the shape of it from how it draped off the hanger. I stepped into the dress and pulled it up over my hips. It cleared them, and I blew out a sigh of relief. One hurdle down. One to go: getting it zipped up.

As I stuck my arms through the sleeve holes, I realized there was far too much fabric for this to be a high-necked dress like April’s, or a halter-top like Emily’s. I got the dress settled on my shoulders and reached behind me for the zipper. It went up a little more than halfway but stopped under my shoulder blades. No amount of jumping around the dressing room and stretching my arms behind me would get it to go up the rest of the way. Finally I gave up and turned back to the full-length mirror.

I looked amazing. Well, there was still the issue of the dress not zipping up all the way, so it distorted the way the neckline fell, but otherwise it looked like it was made for me. The draped neck was both revealing and modest all at once, and the dress was topped off with fluttery cap sleeves. The pale pink was the perfect shade: warm against my skin, it made me look brighter somehow, the way a good blush brings dimension to your cheeks. My dress was different from the others, but it looked the same too: all three dresses had the coordinating handkerchief hem. Modern dresses with almost period detail. Appropriate.

I was in love with this dress. If only it fit. My emotions were all over the place as I joined the other two outside, where Emily and April both proceeded to coo over my dress.

“But it doesn’t fit.” I turned around to show them how it was only zipped halfway up.

“You just can’t reach it. Here . . .” April stepped up behind me to try the zipper, but it only went up another inch or two. Embarrassment rushed through me in a hot wave, and my insides clenched in a full-body cringe. I opened my mouth to apologize, but Emily dismissed it with an impatient wave.

“Bridal dress sizes are bullshit. We’ll order it bigger and have them take it in at the waist.”

“Exactly,” April said. “They’re gonna have to alter mine too, so it’s no big deal.”

My cringe eased at not only her words, but her nonchalant attitude about it. Like fog disappearing when the sun came out, my discomfort dissolved. They were right. Dresses got altered all the time. There was no shame in ordering a few