Meg Cabot - Queen Of Babble: In The Big City

“Well, sometimes it’s easier to help other people with their problems than deal with your own,” I say in what I hope is a soothing voice. “Have you talked about all of this with Chaz? I mean, maybe if you told him what was bothering you—”

“Oh, right,” Shari says sarcastically. “You want me to tell my boyfriend that he’s too perfect?”

“Well,” I say. “You don’t have to put it quite like that. But maybe if you—”

“Lizzie, I am perfectly aware that I sound like a lunatic. There’s something wrong with me. I know it.”

“No,” I cry. “Shari, it’s just… it’s hard. It’s my fault, really. Maybe you guys weren’t ready to move in together. I should never have bailed on you like I did and moved in with Luke. I deserved to have beer poured on me. I deserve to have a lot worse than that done to me—”

“Oh, Lizzie,” Shari says, looking up at me with her dark eyes filled with tears again. “Don’t you get it? It has nothing to do with you. It’s me. There’s something wrong with me . Or at least with the concept of Chaz and me. The truth is… I just don’t know anymore, Lizzie.”

I stare at her. “Know what?”

“I mean, I look at you and Luke, and how perfect you two are together—”

“We’re not perfect,” I interrupt quickly. I don’t want to remind her about the woodland creature thing. Or the fact that I’m pretty sure Luke’s mom is having—or was having, anyway—an affair, and I haven’t told him. “Seriously, Shari. We—”

“But you seem so happy together,” Shari says. “The way Chaz and I used to be… but for some reason, it’s gone.”

“Oh, Shari.” I chew my lower lip, frantically trying to think of the right thing to say. “Maybe if you two got couples counseling… ”

“I don’t know,” Shari says. She looks—and sounds—hopeless. “I don’t know if it would even be worth it.”

“Shari!” I can’t believe she would say that. About Chaz, of all people!

“Lizzie?” Someone bangs on the door. A woman’s voice calls my name again. “You’re up!”

I realize it’s the waitress and that my song’s waiting to be played—and performed.

“Oh no,” I say. “Shari, I… I don’t know what to say. I really think maybe you and Chaz are just going through a weird phase right now. I mean, Chaz is a great guy, and I know he really loves you… I’m sure things will get better with time.”

“They won’t,” Shari says. “But thanks for letting me unload on you. Literally. Sorry about the beer.”

“It’s okay,” I say. “It was kind of refreshing, in a way. It was getting hot out there.”

“Are you coming?” the waitress demands. “Or not?”

“Coming,” I call. Then I appeal to Shari. “Will you sing with me?”

“Not a chance,” she says with a smile.

Which is how I find myself all alone on the stage at Honey’s, assuring the bachelorettes, who are drunkenly catcalling me, the dwarf, who is glaring at me angrily for robbing him of yet more time in the spotlight, and Chaz, Shari, and Luke that young girls do get weary of wearing that same old shaggy… and that when they get weary, it would behoove everyone to try a little tenderness.

A piece of advice that, sadly, Chaz seems to have already employed… with less than satisfying results.

Fittings

Ensuring that your gown fits properly is one of the many duties of your certified wedding-gown specialist. You can help by bringing with you to your fittings the shoes, the headdress, and the kind of support or undergarments you plan on wearing on your special day. Too often a bride has not tried on her gown with the bra or shoes she plans to wear at her wedding, only to discover her straps are showing or that her gown is too long or short!

It’s important as well to be at or very close to whatever weight you want to be on your wedding day at your first fitting. Gowns can of course be taken in… but the less your seamstress has to do so, the better. And don’t even talk about letting gowns out… that’s a whole other story, and you don’t want to go there.

Generally only two fittings are necessary, but of course more can be scheduled if necessary… so long as you don’t wait too long! Not even the most brilliant certified wedding-gown specialist can work wonders overnight. Plan on having your last fitting about three weeks prior to your wedding day—and lay off the Krispy Kremes!

LIZZIENICHOLSDESIGNS™

“So what are you doing for Thanksgiving?” Tiffany wants to know.

Even though her shift doesn’t start until two, Tiffany has been showing up every day at noon, and hanging out with me at the reception desk until I go home… sometimes even bringing lunch for both of us to nibble on surreptitiously beneath the desktop, since food is banned in the reception area (“Highly unprofessional,” is what Roberta called it the day she caught me innocently nibbling on a bag of microwave popcorn I filched from the office kitchen).

At first I just thought this was an odd habit of Tiffany’s—showing up two hours early to work every day, I mean. Until Daryl, the “fax and copy supervisor” (he’s in charge of making sure all the office fax and copy machines are fully stocked and in working order, and the faxes delivered promptly to their addressees), informed me that I had only myself to thank for Tiffany’s new and improved work ethic.

“She likes hanging out with you,” he said. “She thinks you’re funny. And she doesn’t have any friends except that nasty-ass boyfriend of hers.”

I was touched but surprised when I heard this. The truth is that Tiffany and I have little in common (save the desk chair we sit in, and a love for fashion, of course), and her potty mouth can be a little alarming at times. And I have never, for instance, seen her outside of work… hardly surprising, since we work completely different shifts. But not exactly what I’d call a true bond.

On the other hand, we’re both regularly screamed at by Peter fucking Loughlin. And that’s something that scars someone for life and therefore cemented our friendship.

Still, when Tiffany asks the Thanksgiving question, I’m afraid. Afraid that she’s about to follow it with an invitation to join her and the “nasty-ass boyfriend” (so called by Daryl for no other reason—that I can ascertain, anyway—than that he is keeping Tiffany from being available for Daryl to date) for their holiday meal.

Which I’m sure would be fun and all of that, but not something I think Luke is quite ready for—to be subjected to my coworkers, I mean. So far, I’ve managed to keep him a safe distance from both Monsieur and Madame Henri, and the fine folks of Pendergast, Loughlin, and Flynn.

Although, considering that I still haven’t told my family he and I are living together, you might say I’m keeping him from my family, as well.

“Luke’s parents are coming to town,” I say truthfully.

“Rilly?” Tiffany looks up from the nail she’s filing. “They’re coming all the way from France?”

“Uh, no, Houston,” I say, after a slight pause during which I pick up, answer, and transfer a call for Jack Flynn. “They only spend part of the year in France, and the rest in Houston, where Luke’s from. They’re coming here for Thanksgiving so his mom can do some holiday shopping and his dad can go to some Broadway shows.”

“So they’re taking you out for Thanksgiving dinner?” Tiffany looks impressed. “Sweet.”

“Uh,” I say. “Not exactly. I mean, I’m cooking the dinner. Luke and I are. For the two of them, and Shari and Chaz, too.”

Tiffany stares at me. “Have you ever cooked a turkey before?” she wants to know.

“No,” I say. “But I’m sure it won’t be hard. Luke’s a really good cook, and I printed out a bunch of recipes from the Food Network’s Web site.”

“Oh yeah,” Tiffany says, her voice tinged with sarcasm. “That’ll work out great, then.”

But I don’t let her negativity get me down. I’m convinced our Thanksgiving is going to work out great. Not only will Luke’s parents—whom we’ll be giving up our bed to, since it is, technically, his mom’s bed—have a great time, but so will Chaz and Shari. In fact, if everything goes as planned, Chaz and Shari will be so moved by the example of loving bliss Luke and I (and his parents) make, that they’ll start getting along again.

I’m sure of it. More than sure. I’m positive.

“Your own family must miss you,” Tiffany says casually. “Are they mad you aren’t coming home for Thanksgiving?”

“No,” I say, glancing at the clock. Four more minutes before I can leave… and be rid of Tiffany for another day. Not that I mind her that much, she’s just… well, wearing. “I’m going home for Christmas.”

“Oh? Luke going with you?”

“No.” I’m having to hide my annoyance now. Luke’s parents spend Christmas and New Year’s at their château in France. They’d asked him to join them this year.

And yeah, I was disappointed about this. Not that he hadn’t asked me to come with him. He had. Although he’d preceded the invitation with the words, “I suspect you’ll want to spend the holidays with your own family, but… ”

Which he had actually suspected wrongly.

But not completely. I DID want to spend the holidays with my own family… and with Luke. I’d wanted him to come back to Ann Arbor with me to meet my parents. This didn’t seem like an unreasonable expectation to me, either. I’d met his family, after all. It seemed to me that if Luke really wanted to make a long-term thing out of our relationship, he’d want to meet my family.