A/N: Something a little different than my usual fare... This story is for Man of Faith, who wanted to see Carey Martin's feelings for Bailey. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: None of these characters belong to me, and I am making no profit from the writing of this story!
Carey Martin knocked softly on the door of her sons' old bedroom. "Everything all right in there?"
"Everything's great." Came the soft reply. "I'm decent, you can come in."
Carey opened the door slowly and tears came unbidden to her eyes as she took in the sight of her future daughter-in-law, standing in the middle of the boys' room in her wedding dress. The white beaded bodice of the dress emphasized her slim figure, and a diamond necklace (a wedding present from her maid of honor) sparkled at her throat, but the beauty of Bailey Pickett's attire was outshone by the radiant expression on her face.
"Decent?" Carey repeated around the lump in her throat. "Honey, I've never seen a more beautiful bride. And I've done my share of weddings."
Bailey beamed. "You have to say that: I'm marrying your son." she teased. "But thank you, Carey. And thanks for letting me get ready up here. I love my family, but nine sisters rushing around is a little much to take when you're worrying about the most important day of your life."
"Of course." Carey said fondly. "This day is all about you and Cody, and I'm honored to be the one helping you get ready. Speaking of which, what can I do?"
Bailey looked in the mirror and ran her hands over her hips, smoothing her dress in a nervous motion. "You might need to help me find my veil." she admitted. "And then, if you can try and talk me out of a panic attack? I'm getting married in... fifty nine minutes!"
Carey came over and took Bailey's hands. "Sweetie, everyone gets nervous on their wedding day. Don't you worry about a thing. Everything is going to go off without a hitch and it will be the most special day of your life."
"I know." Bailey's smile was genuine despite her nerves. "I'm really excited." she confessed happily.
They heard the outer door to the suite bang open and Zack suddenly pushed into the room, out of breath, dressed in his tux, the bow tie hanging undone around his collar. "Big problem! We can't find Cody..." Seeing the stricken look on Bailey's face, he quickly amended his statement. "...-ne. Codeine. The minister's war injuries are acting up and all we have is regular Tylenol."
Bailey froze. "You can't find Cody?" she repeated in shock.
"You," Zack pointed to her, turning on the charm. "Look beautiful, Bailey."
"What do you mean you can't find him?" Bailey cried. "We're supposed to get married in... fifty-six minutes! What-? Where-?" She turned to Carey with a distressed expression on her face. "Okay I was joking about the panic attack a minute ago but now I think I might really be having one."
Zack and Carey each put an arm around the distraught bride and led her into the living room, sitting her down on the couch and sitting on either side of her. "Everything's going to be okay." Carey said reassuringly, quickly getting up to fetch her a glass of water. Bailey took it and stared into it, but didn't drink it.
She turned to Zack with wide eyes. "When did you see him last? Did he say anything to you? Doesn't he want to marry me?"
Zack kept his arm around his brother's fiancée, rubbing gentle circles on her back while he waited for her breathing to calm. "About an hour ago, no, and of course he wants to marry you! He was so excited this morning! Said the wait was killing him."
"If it doesn't, I'm going to." Carey vowed under her breath. Cody was always so calm and stable- if he chose now of all times to freak out...
Bailey sighed, putting her face in her specially-manicured hands. "Then why did he run?" she asked finally.
Carey smoothed back the girl's hair. "I'm sure he didn't, Bailey. Cody loves you too much to do that. This must be some kind of misunderstanding." she glared at Zack over Bailey's head. "Zack?"
"I don't know!" Zack protested. "I was with him in Dad's room an hour ago. I realized I had the wrong jacket for my tux so I went up to London's room to switch it. When I got back he was gone, nobody's seen him since. I got Maddie and Woody and Marcus and Esteban to help me look but we haven't been able to find him anywhere in the hotel."
"Did you try calling his cell?" Carey suggested.
"You know, I didn't think of that." Zack said sarcastically. He pulled Cody's cell phone out of his pocket. "He left it in the room. Geez, I know everyone thinks he's the smart one, but..." he trailed off at a look from his mother, who had just seen the tears pooling in Bailey's eyes.
"Honey, don't cry." Carey said, taking Bailey's hand and holding it.
"I know, I know, I'll ruin my makeup..." Bailey said, the joke coming out as a sob. A few tears squeezed out of her eyes and trickled down the sides of her face, sticking her eyelashes together in wet spikes.
"No..." Carey murmured soothingly, pulling Bailey's head to her shoulder and rocking her. "I mean, yes, you will, but there's no need to cry. I've seen the way my son looks at you, and there is nothing on earth that would stop him from marrying you today."
Bailey sniffed. "Really?" She lifted her big brown eyes to Carey's face and her expression of hopefulness nearly broke Carey's heart.
"Really really." Carey said with a smile. "I knew from the day I met you that you were special to him."
The day was warm, and the sea breeze ruffled her hair as Carey walked the Sky Deck of the S.S. Tipton leisurely, scanning the crowded area for any sign of her twin sons. She was excited to see her boys, it had been months since they'd boarded the S.S. Tipton as members of the Semester at Sea program, and after fourteen years of constant supervision as a single mother, she wasn't used to spending so much time without them. She smiled as she spotted a familiar blond head at one of the tables, nose buried in a book. Cody.
As she crossed the deck to get to her son she saw him lift his head and say something to the pretty, straight-haired girl sitting beside him. They bent close as she read something out of his book, an odd intimacy appearing in such an innocent gesture. She said something back to him, and they both laughed before he leaned in and kissed her quickly on the lips.
Carey paused, eyebrows raised. It wasn't like Cody to participate in such public shows of affection- that was more Zack's area. She watched as the pretty girl giggled and blushed, but approached their table before either teen could do anything more.
"Mom!" Cody leapt out of his seat with a grin, pulling her into a hug. Was it just her, or was her son shooting up like a tree? He must have gained three inches since the last time she'd seen him.
"Cody!" she returned, hugging him back. "I've missed you so much!" Before she could ask: who's your friend?, Cody had pulled away and was gesturing to his brunette friend, who had also stood and was tucking her hair behind her ear in a nervous manner.
"Mom, I want you to meet someone. This is my girlfriend, Bailey Pickett." Cody said, looking fondly at the girl and placing a gentle hand on her back. Carey had to admit that they made a very sweet couple, but Bailey's name was ringing a bell in her head that she couldn't quite put her finger on...
"Hi, Ms. Martin. It's nice to meet you." Bailey said shyly, reaching out a hand.
Carey took her hand and shook it. "It's nice to meet you too, Bailey." Suddenly she realized where she had heard the name before. "Wait a minute. Bailey Pickett? Zack's roommate?!"
The girl's face turned tomato-red. "No! Well, yes, I was, but... it was a... there were only boy spots left and... we all fell in the hot tub and... I turned out to be a girl... so I'm not anymore. Zack's roommate, I mean... I'm still a girl, I always was..." she turned to Cody, eyes wide, and whimpered, "Oh god, help me!"
Cody was watching her inarticulate struggle with a warm gaze, and blushed when she turned to him. He chuckled, dropping a kiss on her temple. "Actually, Mom, it's a pretty funny story." he said smoothly.
"It sounds it." Carey agreed, one eyebrow raised in interest.
Bailey laughed, blotting her tear-smeared mascara with a tissue. "I wanted so badly to make a good first impression on you, and then I practically tripped over my own tongue."
Carey squeezed her hand. "I don't know what you were so afraid of!"
"Yeah," Zack chimed in. "Cody's the one who should have been afraid- that Mom would embarrass him until you dumped him."
"I'm not that embarrassing!" Carey protested.
"Well..." Bailey pretended to think. "You did bring out the naked bathtime pictures before our senior prom..."
"You've seen those?!" Zack yelped.
Bailey grinned wickedly. "Yep."
"You can go back through them any time you want." Carey promised. "And we haven't even scratched the surface of embarrassing childhood memories- we've still got a ton of home videos and-"
"Mom!" Zack cried. "Now, I realize you're trying to distract her, but-"
"Shouldn't you keep looking for your brother?" Carey shot back.
"Don't bother." Bailey pursed her lips. "If he wants to marry me, he knows where I'll be in... forty seven minutes. If not, I'm going to break out a pint of ice cream and that photo album and look at..." her voice wavered as she began to tear up again. "every... naked picture... Oh, he has to come! He just has to!"
"Aww, sweetie..." Carey rubbed Bailey's knee, once again glaring at Zack. "He will. He hasn't thought about anything else but this wedding for months!"
Zack smiled at his future sister. "Hey Mom, remember the night Cody decided to ask Bailey to marry him?"
"Oh, it's so nice to have my boys home for the holidays." Carey sighed, reclining back against the couch and looking around the small but festively decorated suite. A handful of friends from the hotel- Arwin, Moseby, Nia, London- were coming by for dinner tonight, as was their usual holiday tradition. The tree was up, the snow was falling, her sons were home from college and crammed in the tiny kitchen, getting in each other's way... it felt like Christmas in Boston. "Cody, roasting the turkey, Zack, liquoring up the eggnog..."
"Hey!" Zack acted offended as he meted a generous portion of rum into the punchbowl. "If you're not nice you won't get any!"
"And I'm not roasting this turkey, Mom." Cody opened the oven door and pushed the turkey inside. As he straightened up something fell out of his pocket. A square box.
Zack picked it up. "What's this?" he opened the box. "Is this what I think it is?" Zack breathed.
The sparkle of the diamond ring inside attracted Carey's attention even from across the room. "Oh my god." she gasped.
Cody shoved his hands in his pockets. "If you think it's an engagement ring, then yes." he answered Zack, a hint of a smile playing on his lips. "I want to ask Bailey to marry me."
Carey rose to her feet and crossed to the kitchen. "Honey...!" she was at a loss for words, and so she settled for pulling her son in for a tight hug.
"Don't you think it's a little soon?" Zack asked tentatively, tilting the ring box back and forth to make tiny rainbows scatter along the walls.
"We've been dating for almost seven years." Cody pointed out. "We graduate next semester, and after we do, I want to marry her. I love her."
"Well, yeah," Zack said. "But... one woman, for the rest of your life? You've been dating Bailey since the tenth grade. Don't you want to, I don't know, play the field a little?"
Cody took back the ring, looking at it contentedly. "No." he answered simply. "Where am I going to find another girl as perfect for me as Bailey?"
"Wow." Carey said, finally releasing her son. "I can't believe you want to go off and leave me! My baby's getting married!" Tears welled up in her eyes as she looked up at her younger son, who was now taller than her.
Cody closed the box and put it back in his pocket. "Slow down there Mom. I haven't even asked yet." he grinned. "She might not say yes." The grin faded as he realized what he'd just said. "She might not say yes! What if she doesn't say yes?"
Carey reached out and rubbed his arm. "Of course she will, honey. She'd have to be crazy to say no."
Zack rolled his eyes. "Oh please... if you love him so much why don't you marry him?"
Cody glared at him and Carey patted his cheek. "That's my sweet boy." she deadpanned, walking past him and out of the kitchen. On the way out she took one of the two cups Zack held out and tasted the eggnog. "And that's enough rum." She purposefully ignored the exchange that went down between her two boys as Cody tried the eggnog and gave Zack the thumbs up- to add more.
Nursing her little cup, she walked over to the window, staring at the falling snow and thinking about Cody's plan to propose to Bailey. It was hard to believe her sons were so old; it seemed like just yesterday they were twelve, sliding down the laundry chute and skateboarding in the lobby.
"I should have seen it coming." Carey said, smiling in remembrance. "Cody was always the serious, mature one, huh, Zack? And everyone could see how serious he was about you, Bailey."
Bailey patted her face dry with a tissue and clasped both of Carey's hands. "He's going to show up. I know he will." she said with a smile and a deep, cleansing breath. "Thank you so much, Carey."
"Call me Mom." Carey requested, feeling tears come to her eyes once again as she folded Bailey into her arms, mindful not to wrinkle her wedding dress.
"Mom." Bailey repeated obediently, her voice cracking with emotion. After a long moment she pulled away, eyes slightly misty. "Well, I guess I better go redo my makeup. I'm getting married in thirty two minutes." she said brightly, standing.
"Hey, I was here too, don't I get a thank you?" Zack spoke up.
"Oh, right." Bailey leaned down and kissed him on the forehead, leaving pink lip prints. "Thanks for losing the groom."
Just then London entered the room, wearing the elegant blue dress Bailey had picked out for her Maid of Honor, not to mention the white veil she had picked out for herself. "I can't believe someone put me in charge of the flowers and the suits!" she complained. "I've barely had time to make myself look as stunning as I do!"
"Aren't you supposed to be helping me look stunning?" Bailey pointed out.
London looked at her and smiled. "You already do." she said, her usually-shrill voice uncharacteristically warm.
"Aww!" Bailey wailed, lifting her skirt to cross the room and meet her high school roommate and best friend with a hug. "That may be the nicest thing you've ever said to me... but don't think it's going to make me let you wear my veil. Fork it over, sister."
"What?" London's eyes widened innocently. "But this is my veil!"
Bailey folded her arms over her chest. "Then how come it matches my dress?"
London sighed, reaching up to unpin the veil from her head. "When you're right, you're right." She handed the lacy veil to Bailey, leaning in to examine her face. "I know it's your wedding day, Farm Girl, but, did you have to let a chicken do your makeup?"
Bailey didn't take offense, used to London's good-natured teasing about her country background. "Actually, I was hoping my Maid of Honor would help me fix it." she said softly.
Carey stood by and watched as London gently sat Bailey in front of her and set to work fixing the bride's tearstained face. It was hard to imagine a more unlikely friendship than the spoiled heiress and the spunky farm girl, but somehow, even after years of no longer being roommates, their bond remained strong. Carey had grown to love both girls after years of knowing them, watching them grow and change and get into all sorts of scrapes, and she couldn't help but think it had worked out perfectly when Bailey, unable to choose one of her numerous sisters to be her Maid of Honor, chose London- her best female friend- instead.
A phone rang in London's purse and she quickly abandoned Bailey's eyeliner and fished it out. "Zack, you left your stupid phone in the pocket of that suit jacket and it's been ringing for the past hour." she said, tossing it his way. "I have better things to do than be your secretary, you know."
Zack caught the phone and gasped. "Why didn't you answer it? London, that was probably Cody calling!" he flipped open the phone. "Hey, bro! Where the heck are you? We all thought you were skipping out on Bailey!"
Though unable to make out the words, Carey, London, and Bailey could all tell from Cody's impatient tone that he had been trying to reach Zack for quite a while. "Oh... Chef Paolo had a catering question for you and you went downstairs to help him?... Well you could have left a note... Well is everything okay now? You gonna be ready for this thing?... All right, man... Yeah, see you there."
Bailey stood up, ignoring the brush London was dusting over her cheeks. "Zack! Wait! Let me talk to him!"
Zack jumped up on the couch, out of her reach. "Sorry Bailey. Groom's not supposed to talk to you before the wedding! Bye Cody!" he snapped the phone shut and grinned at her.
"Zack!" Bailey cried. "It's, the groom's not supposed to see me before the wedding!"
"No, I'm pretty sure you're not allowed to hear his voice, either." Zack said infuriatingly.
"He sounds the same as you, yet I have to hear your annoying chattering!" Bailey fired back. "I just wanted to... Just tell me, is everything okay? Did... did he say anything about me?"
"Everything's fine." Zack reassured her. "Cody just took a little detour down to the kitchen... I swear, if Chef Paolo hadn't been around my brother would have tried to cater his own wedding! And..." Zack rested his hands on Bailey's shoulders, "He said to tell you that he loves you, and that he can't wait to see you in nineteen minutes."
Bailey melted a little at just the thought of Cody's words. "Oh, Zack..." she sighed blissfully. In nineteen minutes she would be standing in the Tipton Ballroom with Cody, having the wedding she'd always dreamed of.
"Whoaaa." Zack jokingly stepped out of Bailey's reach. "None of that now. Sorry Bailey, you chose the geeky twin, he's the one you're stuck with. Forever."
Bailey rolled her eyes at Zack's teasing. "You know, I think I'm okay with that." she said. There was irritation in her voice, but her eyes were sparkling with happiness.
London folded her arms and turned to Carey. "Aren't those two just the cutest?"
"Adorable." Carey agreed, watching the easy banter between Zack and Cody's fiancée. It might not be official for another eighteen minutes, but Bailey was definitely part of the family.
"Yeah... Now..." London said softly, then abruptly changed to a commanding tone. "Get out of here, Zack! Don't you have Best Man-ly duties to be doing right now? This girl is getting married in less than twenty minutes and her makeup is not ready!"
"Not to mention her veil." Carey added.
"All right, all right." Zack said, holding up his hands in a gesture of surrender and exiting the room. "I'll see you fine ladies in... sixteen minutes." He shot a last wink at Bailey. "Welcome to the family, Bails."
Bailey rolled her eyes again, but Carey saw the proud glow in her face. The beaming bride held still as London put the last touches on her makeup. Finally, she picked up the veil from the table where London had set it down and smoothed it lovingly before turning to Carey. "Would you help me put this on, ...Mom?"
Carey pressed her lips together in a bittersweet smile. "Of course." She led Bailey to the mirror and stood behind her, taking in their image in the glass as she slowly positioned her daughter-in-law's veil.
Carey came home tired from a late evening of singing. Entering the lonely, darkened suite, she flipped on the lights and kicked off her strappy heels, giving her aching feet a much-needed reprieve. She crossed to the fridge and poured herself a glass of water when she saw the light on the answering machine blinking red. Padding over to the phone, she pressed the button to hear the message.
"Mom, it's me." Cody's voice issued through the speaker, bursting with emotion. "She said yes! Bailey and I are getting married!" Carey sank onto the couch, her face broken into a smile. At the same time, a thick lump formed in her throat. "She said yes! I can't believe it. I'll call you tomorrow- I have to call Zack! Love you! Bye!"
"It's perfect." Carey declared of the veil, meeting Bailey's eyes in the mirror. "Just one last thing." When the girl turned to face her, Carey gently draped the front of the veil over her face. "There we go."
Bailey looked in the mirror once more, running her hands over the front of her dress in a familiar nervous motion. "We're getting married." she whispered.
"With seven minutes to spare." Carey said, resting her hand on Bailey's shoulder.
London came over and hooked her elbow through Bailey's other arm. "Ready to do this?" she asked brightly.
"Ready." Bailey confirmed.
"Ready." Carey agreed.
Arm-in-arm, the three women left the suite and closed the door behind them.