Denying the Inevitable

As the months wore on, the snow was replaced by green grass and gorgeous flowers in every colour of the rainbow. I had worked extremely hard to push Luke Schenn and the past Christmas into the very very back portion of my mind. Doing so had been hard. I had to pick up the pieces again, but this time i had to do so on my own. Brayden was on the opposite side of the continent in another country. I had to learn this time how to be my own support system.

I had thrust myself into planning my wedding in order to keep Luke from my thoughts. If I kept myself busy enough then I wouldn’t have the time to think about him. He had called me numerous times for the month after wards, but eventually his calls and texts stopped coming. It saddened me to have Luke out of my life again, but in order for me to move on and find happiness I had to get away from him.

I never told Nathan what happened back home at Christmas time. He knew something went down, but he never asked and I was not about to tell him. The minute I got back we started looking at flowers, cakes, fabric samples for table cloths and listening to songs in the effort to pick the song for our first dance. With the wedding in two weeks, we had every detail locked in; every detail except my dress.

I must have tried on every single dress in the city of Toronto and not one of them was right. Either they weren’t the right shape, the right shade of white, the right material or they didn’t have the right details. As I approached the doors of Bella’s Bridal Shop I felt discouraged. The dress is the first thing 99% of women have when they start preparing for their wedding. I have never even heard of a woman not having her dress two weeks before her big day. It’s completely unheard of.

Truth be told, I was one of those little girls that had every detail of her wedding day planned by the time I was nine. I knew that I wanted a bouquet of deep purple roses. I wanted my bridesmaid dresses to be pale purple, almost lavender. They were going to fall just below the knee. I was going to wear my hair down with a tiara in my hair, and my dress was going to be the most beautiful thing anyone had ever seen. It was going to be a princess dress; stark white, strapless, skin tight until it hit my hips and then poufy. Why, then, has it been so hard to decide on the details of this wedding when I knew exactly what I wanted? Because when I planned that wedding...I had planned on marrying someone else. That was the wedding I had planned for Luke and myself.

“Miss. Daniels!” The bubbly store manager exclaimed as I walked through the door.

“Good morning, Claire.”

“Your dress arrived this morning and it is gorgeous! I think that this is going to be the one!” She told me with a smile as she grabbed my hand, guiding me through the boutique towards the back. “I have it all set up in the dressing room for you.” She told me as she motioned to the room. “If you need anything I’ll be right here.” She told me. I thanked her and stepped inside the dressing room. As my eyes took in the dress that I had sent away for I immediately found myself dissecting it; picking out exactly what was wrong with the dress. It was a beautiful dress...it just wasn’t mine.

I put the dress on and stepped out of the room. Staring at myself in the mirror I felt detached. Detached from myself, detached from the dress and detached from this wedding. “OH!!!” Claire squealed. “Miss. Daniels you look...you look...you look phenomenal!” She declared as she began pinning at the dress.

“Are you sure? I mean...do you think this dress is me?”

“No.” My head shot up and my eyes stared into the mirror at the man behind me. “It’s not you.”

“Sir!” Claire shouted. “I’m sorry but unless you have an appointment, and I am one hundred percent sure that you don’t, I am going to have to ask you to leave.

“I’m not going anywhere.” He declared stubbornly as I could do nothing but stare at him; my heart beating wildly.

“I’m so sorry Miss. Daniels. I am going to go get..”

“It’s okay.” I whispered. “Give us a minute, would you Claire?” Claire looked from Luke to me and then nodded, leaving in order to give us some privacy.

Luke stepped closer to me; taking me in further. It was the first time I had seen Luke since Christmas, and even though it had only been four and a half months it felt like a lifetime. I had pictured the day that Luke would see me in a wedding dress a million and a half times. Never once had I dreamt that he would not be the man at the end of the aisle that I would be walking towards. “Hi.” I mumbled as I felt that familiar sting prick my eyes. If I wasn’t careful I was going to turn into a basket case right here.

“Hey.” He replied with an added toothy grin. “You look beautiful.” He told me, and that was it. That’s all it took for the tears to start flowing. Three words. I frantically wiped them away and stepped off of the platform I was standing on. “You look beautiful, but Brooklyn that’s not the dress you’ve always wanted. You don’t look happy in that dress. It’s gorgeous, but it’s not for you.”

“How did you find me here?” I questioned.

“My mom told me.” Of course she had. For the past few months she and I had talked weekly. She helped me with details of the wedding, but she was never shied away from telling me exactly what she thought of everything. She told me many times that I needed to think long and hard about this wedding before I went through with it. She told me time and time again that the reason this wedding was so hard for me to put together was because I was fighting it. Of course she had sent Luke here.

“Brooklyn please, please don’t do this.” Luke pleaded. His face was pale as he begged me not to marry Nathan and he eyes were glazed over. He was just moments from his breaking point and I knew that if I saw him fall apart I couldn’t handle it. “Don’t marry that guy. Please! Just...don’t do it!”

“Luke, I..”

“Take a little more time. Please just wait a little longer before you..”

“I am getting married in thirteen days.” I told him, putting on my best happy face. “Claire!” I called out. She popped her head into the room so fast that I knew she had been listening just outside the door. “I’ll take the dress.”