My husband let go of me in the middle of our first dance to take his mother’s hand, and I watched him waltz with the other bride at our wedding.
He had told me I was overreacting. He’d called her dress “eggshell.”
I’d shown him the texts weeks before, begging him to see the five-alarm fire he insisted was just a flickering candle. But he just kept asking me to be the bigger person, to keep the peace on his big day.
So I did. I walked down that aisle, I smiled for the pictures, and I said the vows.
She didn’t count on an architect’s ability to edit a flawed design, and soon I would present her with a perfect album, a cheap manila envelope, and a pile of her own dissected image.
The First Crack in the Foundation: An Unsettling Swatch of Fabric
The blueprint for our wedding was perfect. I’d designed it myself, not on drafting paper, but in a series of color-coded binders that Mark lovingly called my “operational command center.” I’m an architect. I build things that last, from foundations of concrete and steel. I thought I was doing the same for my life.
The first tremor hit three weeks before the wedding. It arrived in a text from Evelyn, my future mother-in-law. It was a photo, taken in what looked like a department store dressing room. She was holding a swatch of fabric against her cheek. The fabric was a lustrous, heavy satin. The color was, under the unforgiving fluorescent lights, unmistakably white.
The caption read: *“Found the perfect material for my mother-of-the-groom dress! What do you think, sweetie? So elegant! Xo”*
My thumb hovered over the screen. My heart did a little trip-hammer beat against my ribs. I typed, deleted, and retyped my response three times. Finally, I settled on something I hoped was breezy. *“Looks lovely, Evelyn! Is that a pale gold? The lighting is tricky.”*
Her reply came back instantly. *“Oh no, it’s cream! A very sophisticated, creamy ivory. It will be stunning.”*
Creamy ivory. My own dress, hanging in a garment bag in my parents’ closet, was a shade of white you could only call diamond. There was no mistaking it. I walked into the living room, where Mark was trying to teach our ten-year-old daughter, Lily, how to shuffle a deck of cards. Cards were spilling everywhere.
“Hey,” I said, trying to keep my voice light. “Your mom just sent me a picture of the fabric for her dress.”
“Oh yeah? That’s great. She was stressing about it.” Mark didn’t look up, his focus entirely on a rogue seven of spades.
“Mark. It’s white.”
He finally looked at me, a slight frown creasing his forehead. “What do you mean, white? She knows she can’t wear white.”
“She’s calling it ‘creamy ivory.’ Which is a fancy way of saying white.” I showed him the phone. He squinted at the screen.
“Eh, it looks kinda beige to me,” he shrugged. “Babe, you know my mom. She’s all about the drama. She probably just likes the word ‘ivory.’ Don’t borrow trouble.”
“I’m not borrowing it,” I said, a knot tightening in my stomach. “I feel like she’s having it delivered to our front door.”
He finally scooped up the cards and smiled his easy, disarming smile. The one that usually worked. “It’s just a color, Sarah. It’s going to be fine. She wouldn’t.”
But the words hung in the air, a question, not a statement. She wouldn’t, would she?
The Rehearsal Dinner Dress Rehearsal
Evelyn, it turned out, was a master of plausible deniability. At the rehearsal dinner, she didn’t wear white. She wore red. A brilliant, siren-red sheath dress that clung to her like a second skin. In a room full of people in muted cocktail attire, she was a fire engine in a parking lot of sensible sedans.
She swept into the private room at the restaurant, air-kissing everyone, her voice a theatrical boom that silenced all other conversation. “Am I late? The traffic was just dreadful! Mark, darling, you look so handsome! And Sarah, my dear, you’re glowing. Absolutely glowing.”
She pulled me into a hug that smelled of Chanel No. 5 and hairspray. Her embrace was tight, proprietary. She was marking her territory.
Mark, of course, was oblivious. “Mom, you look amazing,” he said, beaming. He loved it when she was the center of attention. He’d grown up in her spotlight, and I think he found its warmth comforting. I found it scorching.
We sat down to dinner, and Evelyn held court. She regaled the table with stories of Mark as a toddler, Mark in his first school play, Mark on his first date—a story I had explicitly asked her not to tell. Each story ended with her dabbing a perfectly mascaraed eye and sighing, “They grow up so fast. You think you have them forever, and then one day, you’re just the mother of the groom.”
My maid of honor, Jess, kicked me under the table. I gave her a look that I hoped conveyed both amusement and a desperate plea for a cyanide capsule.
Later, while Mark was talking to his uncle, Evelyn cornered me by the bar. “That little dress you’re wearing is sweet, dear,” she said, gesturing to my navy blue A-line. “Very… appropriate.”
“Thanks, Evelyn,” I said, sipping my wine.
She leaned in closer, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. “I do hope you’re not nervous about tomorrow. A wedding can be so much pressure. All those eyes on you.” She patted my arm. “Don’t you worry. I’ll be right there in the front row, smiling for both of us.”
It wasn’t a promise of support. It was a threat. She was telling me that tomorrow, she wasn’t just going to be a guest. She was going to be a co-star. The red dress wasn’t the main event; it was the dress rehearsal.
About the Author
