“That’s—perfect,” Caryn said, clearly not knowing how to fix the situation, but also unwilling—or maybe unable—to stand up to Caroline. “Let’s—let’s try a different dress. Maybe—are there other styles that go with this one? We can mix and match.”
“Mixing and matching is tacky,” Caroline said. “Besides, the rest of us are good in the same dress, so it would just be her in a different one.”
I balled my fists involuntarily. I had never actually been in a fight, but this might be the time to jump in the ring.
Caryn stood and put a hand on my arm, but didn’t say anything.
“Maybe something a little higher cut,” the saleslady suggested, flustered. “I think I have one that might work for everyone.”
Caroline muttered something that sounded like “cheap,” but Caryn shook her head at me and mouthed that she was sorry. My anger evaporated when I saw how sad she looked. She told me when she asked me to be in the wedding that her friends were awful. And how miserable did your life have to be when you didn’t even like your friends?
“No, I am,” I mouthed back. I wasn’t going to say it so Caroline could hear it, however.
I thought the next dress made me look pregnant, but it contained my boobs better, so I no longer looked like I was channeling the ghost of Anna Nicole Smith. The other girls looked willowy and ethereal in it, and while Olivia and Caroline huffed that they liked the earlier ones better, Dana said she was happy in whatever made Caryn happy, and Caryn said it was her favorite of the dresses, which was a lie that even Caroline couldn’t effectively argue against.
As I peeled it off in the dressing room, I looked at the price tag, then did a double take. Five hundred and eighty-five dollars for a dress that made me look like I had chewed Willy Wonka’s gum and was turning into a gigantic blueberry? If you factored in the money I had spent on a strapless bra, then added the cost of Spanx and a minimizing bra, I’d be spending over eight hundred dollars before shoes on clothes for Caryn’s wedding. I sat down, still in my straightjacket bra and underwear, and pulled my planner out of my bag. I could put it on a credit card, but that was significantly higher than the two-hundred-dollar maximum I had planned on for each bridesmaid dress. In fact, that was eighty percent of my dress budget overall. For just one wedding. I threw my clothes back on and poked my head out of the dressing room, gesturing wildly for Caryn to join me.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“I—” I stopped myself. She looked so defeated. “Nothing. Sorry. I’m good.”
“You don’t hate the dress?”
I did. I hated it. But I loved Caryn and this was a stressful situation and I hadn’t been any actual assistance when the whole reason she said she needed me as a bridesmaid was to help when the wicked bridesmaids of the west created scenes like this.
“It’s great,” I lied. “I’ll totally wear it the next time I’m a guest at a wedding.”
She hugged me and I mentally tallied which credit card could handle the load. “Thank you, Lily.”
Caryn, Olivia, and Caroline had all driven together and parked on the first level of the garage, Deanna and Mia were both parked on the second level and exited the elevator in a flurry of air-kisses, leaving me alone with Dana as we rode to the third floor. I watched her from the corner of my eye as she dug through her Prada purse for her keys.
What the hell? I shrugged.
“Does Caroline always suck that much?” She looked at me in surprise as the elevator doors opened, as if she had forgotten I was there.
“I don’t—” She stopped herself, took a deep breath, and then replied, “Yes.” I started to laugh. “What’s so funny?”
“You,” I said. “You’re a real person!” She looked confused. “I thought you were all Stepford robots.” She didn’t seem to get the reference. “All perfect and no emotions.”
She looked down. “Oh. No.”
“Sorry. It was a joke.”
“No, I know.”
“Why do you all put up with her if she’s always like that?”
Her face was drawn when she looked back up, as though she was suddenly exhausted. “I don’t really anymore. I try to avoid her as much as I can now. But this is for Caryn. So I’m here.”
“Were you in her wedding?”
“I was.”
“What was that horror show like?”
That elicited the ghost of a smile. “You don’t even want to know.”