Perfect
by raile
Summary: It all somehow ends up being the most perfect moment in the world.
Disclaimer: The ones you don't know are mine, the ones you do aren't.
Rating: T, to be safe
Note: have not written in months. This was started today at 10:08 in the morning and ended at 11:12am—the point? Don't expect much. And don't say you weren't warned. The undead and resurrected can only do so much so soon.
-o0o0o0o0o-
It is a mess of chiffon and tulle.
That's what she thought to herself but she didn't dare voice it out loud.
Well, that and the fact with every passing minute, she found herself slowly hating it more and more.
And that's not such a good thing, is it? You aren't supposed to hate things on this day and you most especially do not start hating the one thing in particular that plays a somewhat pivotal role in the whole mess.
The dress.
But then again, it should also be noted that referring to your wedding day as a 'mess' is also not a good thing. She still does though—in her head, at least—and for now, that's enough.
Her hair is brown.
But ask the girl who did her hair and she would insist it's chestnut-something and as good a job as she's done with it, she cannot help but frown at it a little too. Brown is brown and her hair is most definitely brown.
That's definitely not good, yes? The dress, the hair and the name calling.
Honestly, she's not overly fond of it but she'd listened to someone who told her she'd have it easier if she dyed her hair from its natural sandy blonde to the darker brown. Something about being taken seriously but she's no longer sure if that was the best idea.
She's been in her law firm for about nine months and she still has trouble getting people to believe she's actually a lawyer and not a secretary. What made her believe that idiotic notion that hair color could influence that, she doesn't know and on this particular day she wasn't sure whether she wanted to slap herself or the bright bulb who gave her the idea in the first place.
The room was quiet.
Not one sound—nothing. It's the gift of the country, isn't it? Well, at least, to her family Connecticut is country enough. That's about all the country they can do. It's not so bad, usually.
But it seemed on that particular day, the silence was getting to her.
She was almost tempted to yank the bathroom door open and let the sound of whatever there drift into the room just so she could hear something. But then, knowing her mother, she's sure even the most minute details—in this case being the plumbing—has been taken care of and there won't be any stray dripping of a faucet to listen to.
Everything is perfect.
Absolutely perfect.
The lodge was perfect, the church was perfect, the reception was going to be perfect, and, yes, the weather was perfect—she's never quite proven it but she's sure there is something about her mother that controls the weather because that's perfect too. She smiles a little at the idea of a sudden downpour just to see what interesting shade her mother's face would turn into and just how tightly she can purse and screw her lips in the moment of her absolute displeasure.
But then again, it is her mother and she's sure there is a backup there somewhere.
She would not be surprised if a meteor hit the church, she'd have another location waiting in the wings, perfectly made up, an exact duplicate.
Because it all had to be perfect.
That should explain why it's quiet.
Wedding days are often described as stressful. And maybe in films, you see people running in and out of rooms, people rushing, brides crying, her bridesmaids missing one stocking and dresses left somewhere with little flower girls covered in mud.
Not this one.
This one is perfect.
She's ready and her brown hair is perfectly coiffed with diamonds beautifully catching the light in the dark tresses, her nails are flawlessly done made to look like precious pearls, her shoes—though hidden under the layers (again, read: mess) of chiffon and tulle—are overpriced and perfect.
The dress is a dream come alive in white, white, white and, well, white.
And while she may not be witness to any of it, she is sure her bridesmaids are just as perfectly done. So are the two cute little flower girls, the adorable ring bearer and everyone else in the party.
It should all be a study in chaos but chaos has met it's match and it is in the form of her mother. And if there is anyone who can organize chaos and mute it into submission, it would be her.
That's why it was quite, that's why she was standing there in the full length mirror, staring at her absolutely perfect hair, the white dress and pink lips.
Pink.
She scowled a little, turning the soft hues crooked though no less sweet than they were intended to appear. She hasn't worn pink lips since she was paraded around as a debutante and that had been an altogether different mess of white, pink and perfect.
That's when she remembers it had been her mother who told her brown would be perfect on her.
Of course.
She turned away from the mirror—careful not to put a single wrinkle on her dress or whatever it is you can do wrong to the fabrics—and faced the windows.
And before she could even think about it, she found herself wishing to every deity known to man and anyone else who would listen to please make it rain.
She doesn't ask for much, maybe a drizzle here but a storm would be just perfect.
Realizing what she was doing maybe a little too late, she found herself crossing her arms over her stomach, the intricately designed hand-crafted bodice pressing gently against the elbow length gloves that made her fingers twitch a little. Well, that wasn't good either, was it?
The wishing for the rain, that is.
Although the gloves—she's beginning to rethink them. Who made it a good idea to wear gloves during a good weather like this? Her fingers felt like they were injected with a numbing agent. She wanted to feel something along her fingertips but she couldn't. It was an odd sensation, one she wasn't fond of at all.
She could take them off, couldn't she? No, that would ruin it.
Along with the dress and everything in between, three women had helped her into them under the watchful eyes of her mother. Like the dress, they had to be perfect or else they'd be wrinkled or folded somewhere they shouldn't be and god knows what other sacrilegious disasters that could lead to.
White.
They are white too. She's never worn so much white in her life—not even when she'd been a blasted debutante. Her lacy undergarments were white too, including the stockings and they were French because they were, according to her mother, the absolute best and perfect. Even the garters were white and the snaps were white and the bouquet was of white roses and—good god in heaven, if she kept thinking about the whole whiteness of it all, she might just find some way to make her hair white too.
Because the next absolute itch-inducing thing was her hair and that was holding a very close second to the dress—well, actually the dress and the whiteness.
Ruefully, she wondered if perhaps this had been in winter if she might be able to camouflage herself in the snow and just get lost.
And actually, if she was completely honest with herself—though she wouldn't dare with her mother—she shouldn't even be wearing white now, should she? Because wearing white meant something and that wasn't something she's been in quite some time now.
Then, slowly, a part of her began to feel shame and it crept in through the same way her building resentment of it all that started with the dress.
Some brides would be having a crying jag by now, trailing inky black mascara down their cheeks and maybe missing a few good patches of hair on their scalp.
It's all perfect, absolutely perfect and it wasn't accomplished easily.
Everything was made to make sure she had this moment of serenity, this moment of calm before the wedding commenced. Everything was planned to the letter because of her, all for her. Down to the flowers, spoons, forks, dresses and every second of every moment of the whole mess—nothing would be out of place unless God Himself decided to come down and shift the cake a little to the side and make it wobble happily.
Her mother worked endlessly the past six months—or was it for the duration of her daughter's entire existence?—to make sure it all came down to this day. The planning, the arranging, the execution—all her.
Execution.
(Oh, well, that's one word you should not use on your wedding day, if you can absolutely avoid it.)
Then again, maybe that's why pre-wedding preparations were supposed to be high-energy and stress induced. Maybe this was why.
Because it was all in the quiet where she started ripping it all apart in her head.
It was in the duration of the alleged calm where she realized she didn't like white, she despised her hair color and she'd allowed them to paint her lips pink.
She was sure if she'd been allowed her missing bridesmaids, her mud-covered ring bearer and her mascara outlined crying jag, she wouldn't have had the mind to think about everything else.
Because here she was, thinking in the midst of the whiteness and perfection of it all.
And what her thoughts could cobble together—it was not good.
The groom would most likely be on the other side of the lodge. A part of her wondered if perhaps he was hungover or what else a groom could be on the day of. Would he be? Was he allowed? Because her mother wouldn't let it get past her, she was sure.
Not that his own mother was a shrinking violet. There's a reason why this day was possible—their mothers were two of a kind. They changed perfect as the world knew it in one fell swoop and somehow, a part of her always found that somewhat unnerving. It was like her mother times two. The mere thought of it was enough to turn her stomach into an acrobat.
Handsome in an All-American way with a touch of distinctive patrician features, all blue-eyes and clean cut blonde hair—which he'd been allowed to keep—complete with the Ivy League education, the football star backing, the smile that made women instantly want to drop their underwear for and a body to go with it that would put Michelangelo's David to shame. He was taller than her, which was a good thing and he had a nice laugh.
And it was going to be that laughter she would be spending the rest of her life with and, if the books were right, maybe the rest of her eternity.
The dress, the hair, the church, the groom.
It's all so wonderfully perfect.
Which is why it's perfectly understandable when even after months and maybe years, people were still wondering why she burned it all to the ground.
Not literally, of course, but somewhat close to it.
Because it was eighteen minutes before the wedding when Madeline Lockhart walked into the bridal suite and found the dress in it but not the bride it was supposed to be wrapped around on.
Safe to say it went from perfect to almost perfect with just one thing missing.
It was just too bad it wasn't the something old or something blue, not even the something borrowed or something new.
Because if there was one thing they did not have a backup for, it was the bride.
Well, so much for perfect.
—oo00oo—
Blue.
More precisely midnight blue.
It's the deepest kind and it's almost black but not quite so.
And it's by an Italian designer that also graces the tags of her clothes that line her never-too-large closet, clothes she wears every day for work and everything else in between.
Her hair is at its natural state, combed and brushed the way it always is. There isn't a strand out of place but it didn't take four hours to satisfy. Her shoes are expensive and black, and underneath her clothes, her undergarments were dark too, made of French lace, pressed against her and molded like a second skin.
Eyes shielded by heavy sunglasses, her heels clicked against the ground and she had her purse with her—a real purse and not just some tiny little thing that will only permit carrying a compact and lipstick though yes, it's Italian too.
There isn't a sight of pink anywhere near her lips. They are in their daring red, fire engine red and most definitely not sweet and it suits her like nothing ever has.
In the mid-morning, there was a bit of traffic that left the driver taking the side streets, the routes ever changing and the busy roads ever crowded. She heard the blaring of horns and an ambulance passed them by on the way, the din it carried with it drowning everything else in its wake.
She had decided to forgo stopping at a flower shop on the way and instead, pinned a dragonfly brooch onto her dress instead, exchanging soft fragrant petals with something shiny and solid. Brooches do not wither away and die into nothingness to be forgotten like flowers, after all.
Besides, she remembered dragonflies from her childhood. They were fast and hard to catch, taking every ounce of effort to seize and hold on.
Only the most determined could actually ever succeed in capturing the flittering little things because it required focus and the strongest yearnings to fulfill such a goal, no matter how insignificant it may seem to others. Capturing them held the truest of desires, endurance mixed with relentlessness, because the chase could take a lot out of anyone who dared it. You have to want it badly enough to exert such effort for and make it worthwhile.
It seemed appropriate enough, for her and him, of both of them.
Under the sun that was notably making its presence known, she took the steps that led through the doors. Through there and into the halls she walked in on were the same halls she has been walking in and onto for the last few decades and they are riddled with remnants of both wins and losses. Her past, present and future are painted on those very walls, imbedded deep and coated with time, one layer after another.
It isn't a church or anything of the sort though in all honesty, it might as well be for her, which made it appropriate too, in a way.
Because that was her holy ground, that was the house that upheld the things she considered to be sacred, where the things she believed in were consecrated. It was different but nothing else could ever be as right as that place.
She was eighteen minutes late and counting and the closest thing she had to a bridal party was the girlfriend of the best man who, to be honest, she wasn't even all that sure she was remembering right. Her name alone somewhat escaped her but that was most likely due to the confusion of having too many women and too many questions—and yes, a touch or so of jealousy and possessiveness—on the night they met.
The presence of the probably wrongly named bridesmaid-that-really-isn't was even unexpected.
But that was alright. She didn't need a bridal party, she never had, not even then, not now.
The groom is not clean-cut and a different kind of All-American. He is older—but then so is she—though still managing to seem both distinguished and rugged with his lengthy rebel hair, graying and paling at the edges. He is scruffy but enticingly so—scruffier than when they first met but she won't lie by saying she doesn't like it.
He is not the man who taught her what it feels like to feel stubble—and more—brush against her skin in a kiss.
But he is the man who got her to like it and even learn to crave it.
He is the reason why she wants it now and nothing else because everything else would just feel different and completely wrong simply because it isn't him.
He is the same man who has shattered many beliefs that has been ingrained in her since even before she could walk. He is also the man who made her see that she could learn to live with having them shattered. He is the man who made her remember what it felt like to not always be so strong, to let go and believe that even when she's not the one in control, things can somehow still end up okay.
This is the same man who gave her a safe place to crawl into when things were far from okay, when things were shattered, when she was shattered.
And he is the same man who put her back together and would again, if he had to.
She did not doubt for one moment he would do it again and again, however many times he had to. And he is the only one she trusts enough to see her that way and he is the only one who has figured out how to fix her in ways that even she can't even figure out herself.
He is the man who loves her, though sometimes she still cannot imagine why. He is devoted to her, patient with her and while she can't even begin to think of what she'd done to deserve it, she's stopped questioning it and accepts it for what it is. And she is thankful.
He is the same man who is there in the mornings, alive and warm in her bed and she is constantly amazed by this though she doesn't say so. A part of her thinks and decides that she should—tell him, that is.
He is that man pacing down the hall, calm and collected, but pacing nonetheless. She's late to her own wedding, but when she apologizes, he's the same patient man he's always been.
He has been waiting for her, as he has always waited for her, but she's putting a stop to all the waiting.
Because he is the man who brings her flowers even when she decided she doesn't want them and for that alone, she does end up wanting and loving them anyway. Not because they are flowers but because they are from him.
And she doesn't even mind that they are white.
He is the man she kisses at the threshold, the man who holds her close and he will be the last and only man who will ever hear her say she loves him.
And try as she might, though she can't imagine ever wanting to, she cannot take her eyes off of him.
He is the kind of man she never thought she would ever want, but has somehow turned into her everything.
This is also the same man who gives her a wedding that went against everything that would be deemed perfect, he is the man she wears the darkest of blue for and the reddest of red.
Everything in that wedding is different, unconventional and so very much different from what had been left to burn to the ground in the past. It isn't even close to the kind of perfect people would imagine—she was late to her own wedding, after all.
But with a single touch, with a single kiss on the lips of the man who, in another life, might have been completely wrong for her—
It all somehow ends up being the most perfect moment in the world.
Perfect for her, perfect for him—for them, at least.
And in the end, that is the single best kind of perfect anyone could ever ask for.