I was looking back on this chapter to try and find a reference for a later chapter, when I realized I had completely skipped over uploading it! So yeah, read this one, because there's a massive gap.
Arianna, Spring 3, 12:50 p.m.
"Are you finished yet?" Lily asked exasperatedly, knocking on the bathroom door for the millionth time.
I got up from the floor, where I had been crouching over the toilet, and opened the door slowly.
"I…think so," I replied.
"You'd better be," Lily said. "I'm going to have to redo your lipstick. Oh, and have a mint or five." She took a small tin out of her purse, and put it in my hand.
"Jesus, Lil," Flora said, getting up from the couch in the back room. "Have a heart! She's nervous, that's all."
"It is not normal to throw up three times from nervousness!" Lily protested. Flora put a hand on my shoulder.
"Don't listen to a word she says," Flora said. "Just take a deep breath, relax, and then Lily will redo your makeup. And…the mint might be a good idea."
I sighed, and quickly popped a mint in my mouth while Lily got the lipstick. She was absolutely right; it wasn't normal for me to get sick that many times. I was nervous, but not that nervous!
Lily started putting more lipstick on me, when someone knocked on the door.
"Everybody decent?" Dad asked from behind the door.
"Yeah," we all replied. The door opened.
Dad smiled.
"You all look great," he said.
"Thanks!" Lily exclaimed.
"He wasn't talking about you," Flora said, rolling her eyes.
"Arianna!" another voice cried. Ella and Raina came running in, but Ella promptly stopped in front of me and gasped.
"Oh…Oh my God," she stammered. "You look…so beautiful! I'd give you a hug, but I'm afraid I'll mess up your dress or something!" Raina raised an eyebrow.
"Yeah, you're pretty," she said. "So how did you end up with Gunie?"
Flora laughed.
"You've got a pretty awesome flower girl, Arianna," she said.
"What's it to you?" Raina said.
"Are you picking a fight with me, tiny?" Flora shot back.
"Who are you calling tiny?" Raina demanded. "I'll kick your ass!"
"Raina!" Ella cried. "Go…get your basket or something!" Raina ran off.
"And don't start throwing the flowers yet!" I called.
"If you don't mind," Dad said, sounding hesitant. "I'd like to have a word with Arianna before she-"
"We get it, Leonel," Flora said. "Come on, let's leave them for a second." They left the room, smiling at me.
"Did you know," Dad said. "That when a person is born, the only part of their face that stays the same for the rest of their life is the eyes?"
"No," I replied.
"I remember the first time I got to see yours," he continued. "It was just after you started breathing on your own. You cried for quite some time. Actually, you cried all night. Your mom and I thought that it was probably painful for your lungs to grow to a normal size. You were so loud that nobody could sleep. Your mom was trying to keep Tristan from crying, so I picked you up. It was dark in the room, so I couldn't see you too well. Of course, you were screaming so much that it was pretty easy to find you."
"I figured," I said.
Dad smiled, and I could tell that he was thinking back all those years.
"For some reason," he continued. "I took you over to the window, trying to see if I could calm you down. We were still in the capital, and they have lights everywhere. I could see your face then…you were obviously in a lot of pain, so over your screams, I talked to you. 'You're strong, Arianna,' I said. 'You're strong, and we love you.' And then, you stopped crying. You looked up at me, and I saw those beautiful green eyes for the first time. And every time I look at your eyes, they're the exact same as they were that night." He paused. "But now, you're all grown up, and even though you'll be leaving the place we brought you home to, I'll still have that memory. I'll still have baby Arianna."
At that point, I had to start fanning my eyes with my hands, in order to keep the tears away so they didn't ruin my makeup. I gave Dad a bigger hug than I had ever given him in all my life.
"You'll have grown-up Arianna, too," I told him.
"I know I will," he said. "But Gunie's waiting for you now."
My heart leapt as I heard Trampoli's traditional wedding music being played on the organ.
"We'd better go," Dad said. I quickly put the front part of my veil over my face, and hurried out, or at least as quickly as I could in the floor-length dress. We walked to the back of the church, and started down the aisle. I tried not to look at the faces in the pews, but I knew they were all there, because the pews creaked as everyone turned to look at me. However, when I heard a collective cooing sound, I realized that they had been looking at Raina and her basket of flowers. Then, they turned to look at me.
My eyes widened as I looked toward the front. Standing there next to Tristan was a tall, well-built man with perfectly combed brown hair, and eyes that were the most beautiful shade of blue. If he hadn't been wearing the wedding robe, I wouldn't have thought for a second that it was him.
"Gunie," I whispered.
Gunie, Spring 3, 12:58 p.m.
My heart was pounding incessantly. There was no denying that I was nervous as hell.
"Hey," Tristan said. I jumped. "You look like you're going to get sick."
"I'm not," I said quickly. He raised an eyebrow, and normally, I would have laughed and told him he looked like Arianna.
"You're about to marry my little sister," he said. "You shouldn't be nervous at all."
"That's why I'm nervous," I replied.
Suddenly, Helena, the only other person besides me who could do so, started to play the church organ. I couldn't take my eyes off my feet. Then, I felt something hit my arm.
"Look," Tristan said. He pointed toward the back of the church, and I couldn't believe my eyes.
Of course, my soon-to-be father-in-law, Leonel, was there, but…who was that next to him? I adjusted my glasses just to make sure I was seeing things correctly, and I was. Through her thin veil, I could see red hair, pointed ears, and green eyes, but that was the only familiarity I saw in that beautiful woman, who I knew then was…
"Arianna," I whispered.