Tracy had been hoping for this day for as long as she had been dating Ted: just not quite as early as this. When he had proposed to her, she felt so much joy that it was like her body couldn't contain it. He couldn't even finish popping the question. He'd managed to get out the words "will you" before she interrupted. She was just so happy. She was ready to fully start her life with this beautiful, silly man. She had long given up the idea of ever having a wedding before she'd met Ted, so now that the opportunity was in front of her to start planning, she'd been going crazy with ideas.
Who knew that years of watching romantic comedies would have given her tons of ideas, without her even realizing it? She'd been hoping for something tasteful, elegant, and with a reasonable amount of family friends, but nothing too elaborate. She'd always felt that simplicity spoke more than extravagance, and that if an event or gesture was too complex it spoke more of the person responsible overcompensating for what they felt was lacking.
Ted had always understood that about her, and she loved him all the more for it. They had both come to prefer spending quiet evenings at home to loud nights out, and maybe that said they were becoming like an old married couple, but if that was the case she was okay with it. Being like an old lady was okay, if she was an old lady with Ted. They didn't need to be young and stupid, because 1) they weren't young anymore and 2) it wasn't a good idea to be stupid when you were expecting the birth of your first child.
Oh God… how was she going to tell Ted? She was sure that he was going to be ridiculously excited to be a dad, considering he practically was one already. But they had already poured so much time and money into their wedding. There was no way she was going to be pregnant on her wedding day- she just couldn't do it. She just had to think of the positives. She'd always thought being a mother would be an incredible experience, even when she thought she'd never be one. And she couldn't have asked for a better father. So why was this so hard? She figured it had to be true when they said that timing was a bitch, but she could never have expected it would hit her this hard again. It was like a slap in the face. It was her birthday. Her 31st birthday, and that meant it was the 10th anniversary of her losing the greatest love of her life, other than Ted. It was strange that on the anniversary of someone leaving her life for good, she was to discover another person who would be with her for the rest of her life.
So maybe it was right, that from the ashes new life would rise. Everything happened for a reason, and she had to accept that things wouldn't always be perfect in her life with Ted: too much of a good thing, after all. And who needed perfect? Perfect wasn't real. Perfect was an illusion. Perfect was a lie. She knew if she could do it as planned, the reveal would be something a bit more discreet, possibly with a jokey card, but she was going to have to tell Ted about their child before he got too carried away with planning the wedding. He had a lot more opinions than her- sometimes, if it had been left up to her, she thought they'd be married on a weekday afternoon she happened to take off of work (but that was just a bit too simple, wasn't it? A bit too casual?). But this wedding was his pet project- she'd taken to calling it his baby but that was slightly ironic given the circumstances- she'd have to tell him about his real baby now…