All of Me

Chapter 7

“I am finding a dress today,” Diana promised herself as she walked into the only shop she hadn’t been in that was within fifty miles of her home.

“Good morning,” the saleswoman chimed as the door closed behind her. “How can I help you today?”

“Well, I have less than three months to my wedding and have not found a dress. I am determined to find one today,” Diana told her, exasperation clear in her voice. She pulled her sketch out of her purse and handed it to her. “Do you have anything similar to this?”

The woman smiled as she looked at the sketch. “This is lovely. Yours?”

Diana nodded as she moved to stand next to her. “I drew it when and modified and threw it away.” She laughed. “This is the final product. So am I in luck?”

“Gosh, I wish you’d come in a year ago,” the woman sighed, and Diana sagged. “I’m the owner of this shop, and I create all the dresses. Design them and sew them. The ones you see were personally sewn by me.” She looked at the sketch again. “I could have made this exact dress, and would have loved every minute of it.”

“I kinda want to cry right now,” Diana murmured, cursing herself internally at the procrastination she had allowed to take over her life. “So do you have anything close?” she asked hopefully.

“Don’t cry yet,” the woman sympathized. “I’m Maura.”

“Diana.”

“I have a dress in the back I started working on for a bride who caught her future husband with his boss. Big scandal. His boss is a man,” Maura whispered. “Men. So many of them are cheaters.” She looked at Diana’s face and apologized. “I’m sorry. I see almost as many disasters as I do happy endings in this job.”

“How sad,” Diana mused. She was sure of her relationship with Marty, but felt bad for the poor woman whose dress she might choose to wear.

“Would you like to see the dress? It’s not exactly like this sketch, but with a few modifications, I could get it close,” Maura told her.

“Will it fit?” Diana asked. “And will it be ready on time?”

“When is the wedding?” Diana told her the date, and Maura calculated in her head. “It’ll be close, but I don’t have another commission right now. Within a week of the day.”

“That is close,” Diana muttered as she followed her. “What about fittings?”

“When I make a dress for a specific person, I measure regularly. Should require only one fitting a week before so I can make any required modifications.”

She opened the door and led Diana into the back room. Several mannequins leaned here and there against the walls, some naked, some in dresses in various stages of completion. The dress closest to Maura’s work station was so close to being finished Diana couldn’t tell what still needed to be done. The dress was similar in all aspects to Diana’s sketch except the skirt. This one billowed out Cinderella style, which Diana thought was hideous. The dress also looked about five inches too long.

“So,” Maura began, standing in front of the dress and holding the sketch up to compare, “obviously the skirt is wrong, but that’s an easy fix. What do you think about the top?”

Diana reached for the sketch and smiled. “It’s like you read my mind. So weird.”

Maura chuckled. “I put this together after meeting her. She didn’t look like you, but I’d bet your personalities are similar.”

“That’s funny,” Diana said with a smile as she circled the dress. The back was perfect, the lacing and buttons better than what she had imagined. “The back is beautiful.”

“Thank you. After looking at it again, I’m pretty sure I can finish this with two weeks to spare,” Maura nodded, a smile on her face. “What do you think?”

“I’m in!” Diana exclaimed after a moment of staring at it. She clapped her hands excitedly.

“Oh good!” Maura said. “Okay, what we need to do is take your measurements. I’ll start there, then use the sketch to redo the skirt. We’ll be fitting you into your wedding gown in four weeks, maybe less.”

“This was so easy, I’m starting to freak out,” Diana chuckled warily.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, the original venue we chose was double booked, and the other wedding won because they reserved first. Then, we wanted to get married on the beach but couldn’t get a permit.” Diana’s voice growled. “We finally decided to have it at home, but the renovations are a beating. Are you sure that woman won’t come back for the dress?”

“I’m certain. Her fiancé, well, former fiancé, is in Mexico with his boss,” she explained with a nod.

“Damn.” Diana shook her head. “Okay then. Let’s do this.”

*****

Diana had texted Marty that she’d found a dress, so he grabbed a bottle of champagne to celebrate. He was happy she’d finally found one because it was one less thing he had to hear about the wedding. Celebrating this milestone would make her happy, which was, as he told himself daily, his goal. He loved making her happy.

When he pulled into the drive, he nearly crashed his car. A huge tractor was tearing up the vines around the gazebo, violently and with little care for the surrounding landscape. He parked quickly and jumped out of the car, rushing to the tractor and waving his arms. The man driving it saw him, stopped, and turned off the ignition.

“What are you doing?” Marty called, holding his temper with pure meddle.

The man on the tractor looked confused. “Um, I was hired to plow up the vines in a ten foot circle around the gazebo. Isn’t that right?”

“Plow up?” Marty shook his head. “Can you take a break for fifteen minutes? I need to talk to my wife.” The man shrugged and hopped off the tractor. He walked to his truck with an attached trailer, pulled a cooler out of the bed, and plopped down on the tailgate for a snack.

Marty turned back and surveyed the devastation. The man had almost completed the job he’d been hired to do. His tractor had destroyed more vines and ground than he and Diana had agreed on, and though the vine expert they’d brought in had explained the heartiness of the vines would allow them to withstand the damage, Marty had his doubts after observing the vicious tractor tires and plow.

“Marty?”

He turned at the sound of his wife’s voice, glaring. He spread his arms wide to indicate the mess around him. “What the hell is this, Diana? This isn’t what we talked about at all!”

Diana reached him as he finished speaking, and she looked around them. Her eyes narrowed as she faced him. “Marty, you agreed to this. We did talk about it.”

“This?” he yelled, pointing at the decimated vines a few feet from them. “We talked about a gentle excavation, not a fu*king tractor with a plow. He’s ruining the area completely.”