Wedding Dresses
A Danny Phantom FanFiction by Cordria


At twenty-three years old, I was fresh out of college and busy setting two feet firmly into the 'real world'. I'd just landed an excellent job as a regional animal shelter advertisement manager and everything was going perfectly. Except, of course, for the present moment. This wasn't so much fun, but I suppose it was was part-and-parcel to agreeing to be the Maid of Honor at my friend's wedding.

I looked up from my boots when I heard the rustling of fabric and my friend swept into the room. We'd ended up going to college together and had found, to both of our surprise, that we actually had quite a bit in common. After a local rights protest freshman year, we'd been friends ever since. I'd gotten her to be a little less 'cheerleader' over the years and she had, to my parents' delight, gotten me sort of interested in fashion and other more female-oriented things. While I'll admit that Star has a decent fashion sense, at the moment she was swathed in a hideous collection of white silk, lace, and tiny fake roses, poofed out like a ballerina. It was, quite frankly, enough to make me forget about the past few years and run back to my gothic teenage likeness.

Star had been a stick throughout most of high school, but her genes had caught up to her in the end. She'd gone from a willowy reed to a full-figured young woman by the time she started college. When she'd gotten engaged, Star was, shall we say, 'well endowed' and curvaceous. Normally fitting happily into size sixteen or eighteen clothes, this particular wedding dress she'd chosen to try on looked to be about six sizes too small. She was bursting out of every seam.

Fighting back a smirk, I pushed myself to my feet to survey the dress from up close. My first impulse was to scream and run in the other direction, but the bright lights shining in my friend's eye cut off my words. With a small sigh, I lied through my teeth. "It looks really pretty, Star. It's got the flowers you wanted."

"It's too small," she shot back, twisting and turning to attempt to see every side of the dress in the mirror. "I'm going to have to go on a diet to fit in it properly."

This time, I couldn't stop the reaction. A small smile and an eye roll showed my thoughts at her statement. Star had been on (and off) diets constantly since she'd hit one hundred eighty pounds… and had never lost an ounce. "Maybe you should just make it to fit you," I offered.

"Nonsense. Do you know how much extra they charge you to make the dresses bigger?" She sucked in her stomach, causing more to bulge out of the top of the strapless dress. "My dad's already complaining about how much this wedding is costing. I'll lose the weight. You'll just have to be meaner in getting me to exercise."

Nothing got her to exercise. I could get Tucker, the king of the couch potatoes, to exercise, but none of my tricks worked with Star. "That's worked so well in the past," I muttered.

She ignored me, like she usually did when I fell into sarcasm. "I bet I could be your size again by the time of the wedding," she murmured to herself, running her hands up and down her sides, "but what would this dress look like on someone skinnier?" She brightened. "I've got it!"

I looked up, arching an eyebrow at the look she was giving me, a bad feeling curling around in the pit of my stomach. "What?"

"You try it on for me! Then I could see what it'll look like after I lose the weight!"

The dress seller started a little, glancing from me to Star and back. I looked down at my own waist, then flicked a glance at Star's. I wasn't the skinniest person in the universe… but I was about ten sizes smaller than Star. She'd have to lose something north of sixty pounds to fit into a dress that was my size. "You realize the wedding is in four months, right?"

"I'll just stop eating," she said simply, nodding her head as if that were the greatest plan in the world. "Come on, Sam. Please?"

With a skeptical look, the dress seller stepped forwards. "Maybe we should see what other dresses you'd like to try on," she offered, obviously not enthused about me trying on dresses since I wasn't going to be buying one.

"I don't look good in white," I stated in quiet agreement. I did not want to try on the dress. Me, flowers, poofy, and white... it was Hell on Earth.

"Yeah, but aren't you going to wear white at your wedding?" Star poofed the tulle on the skirt a little more.

I laughed, shaking my head. "I'm not engaged. And I'm not wearing white. I never wear white, you know that."

Star smiled vaguely. "You've been dating Danny for five years. Besides, I saw him at the jeweler's yesterday when I was getting my rings fitted."

"So?"

"So…" Star looked over at me. "Are you seriously that oblivious? God, the two of you are made for each other. Danny's totally in love with you and he was looking at engagement rings. He's so going to propose."

"Maybe you should try it on," the dress seller suddenly said, stepping into the conversation. Having sniffed out a potential future sale, she switched sides of the argument on me.

"You're not going to lose that much weight." It came out mean, but Star didn't seem to notice.

"Please, Sam? Just one dress. I just want to see what it would look like if I lost the weight. It'll motivate me."

I shook my head sourly, but when Star grabbed my hand and started to drag me back to the dressing room, I didn't fight her. Really, it would be some sort of motivator for her to lose the weight. Besides, I had an ongoing bet with Tucker about Star's weight. If she could get it down, I was set up to earn quite a bit.

"I need to go get a different size, I'll be right back," the dress seller said quickly, vanishing off into the bowels of the store, leaving me to untie my boots in silence. Star and I took separate booths, me to undress and Star to get into some 'normal' clothes for a moment.

"You going to say yes?" Star asked suddenly as I was unbuttoning my shirt.

I looked up, startled. "What?"

"When Danny asks you to marry him. Are you going to say yes?"

"Um…" Of course I was going to say yes. I would have said yes years ago… but I wasn't going to tell Star that. Sure, Danny and I had been 'dating' for five years, but it was an on-again, off-again sort of relationship. There was no way Danny loved me enough to ask me to marry him. "I don't think he's going to ask, really."

"Of course he is."

I was going to retort, but the sales woman was back and I didn't feel like arguing in front of her. "Here you go," she said brightly, rapidly taking a dress out of a bag and helping me to zip it up. "It's a slightly different style – not as fluffy – but the other didn't come in your size."

The lack of a mirror in the small dressing room was a bit disturbing. As the woman helped me step into the mass of white material, I knew the dress wasn't just 'slightly' different from the one Star had tried on. This one had long sleeves and much cleaner lines, but I couldn't tell what it looked like without a mirror.

When it was finally pinned together, the sales woman helped me out of the room. Star was waiting, her hands on her hips, but her mouth dropped open when she saw me. "Oh… my…" she whispered.

"What?" I asked, suddenly wanting to back into the dressing room and tear the thing off of me. I knew it wasn't a good idea for me to wear white. "Do I look that bad?"

"Come see in the mirror," Star said softly, grabbing my hand and towing me to the front of the store.

I tore my hand out of her grasp just before she pulled me in front of the giant three-way mirror. Taking a deep breath, ready for the worst, stepped onto the tiny platform, and looked into the mirror. And gasped.

The dress was, as I had thought, completely different from the one Star had tried on. Completely Gothic, the dress had dagged sleeves, a medieval-looking style, and bits of lace that looked a lot like spider webs draped around the skirt. And… I looked… nice…

I could see myself, right then, standing at an alter with Danny by my side. Something small, maybe in the back yard of my parents' house, with just close friends and family. Purple, blue, and green flowers – all in pots rather than cut flowers, of course, so they could be reused.

It was kind of creepy. Me, Samantha Manson, self-proclaimed Goth and complete distain-er of all things mainstream, picturing myself getting married 'I Love Lucy' style. It was enough to send shivers down my back. But I couldn't get the image out of my head.

"Sam?"

I whirled around, my hand jumping to my heart at Danny's voice. "Danny!"

He was standing right behind me, a strange look in his blue eyes. For a moment, he was totally silent, taking me in from head to toe, the tiniest of smiles on his face. "You look beautiful in that, Sam. But I never thought you'd actually wear a white dress."

Forgetting my earlier vow to never wear white, I put one hand on my hip and narrowed my eyes. "White is, I'll let you know, traditional at weddings. I can't go against hundreds of years of tradition, now can I?" At the small shake of his head, I raised my chin a bit and turned away from him, looking at myself in the mirror. "Besides, I'm trying this on for Star."

I could see Danny's eyes cut to Star in the mirror, a smile tugging at his lips. Star, dressed in normal clothes, was lounging in the chair I had so recently vacated. To someone who had just walked in, it looked like I was the one shopping for a dress and Star had been dragged along to help. I scowled at her but Star merely smiled at me and said, "It's a pretty dress, Sam."

"What do you want, Danny?" I asked.

Danny looked a bit startled at the tone of my voice and I inwardly winced. I hadn't meant it to come out so harsh. "I… was… wondering if you had plans for supper."

"What did you have in mind?" I smiled at him, trying to make my tone a bit nicer. I didn't feel exactly comfortable in this beautiful dress with Danny staring at me.

"Um… the Paradiso had an opening for supper. What to go?" Danny shifted uneasily on his feet and I couldn't help the small smile that bloomed on my face. Danny was a superhero, having saved the world on a couple of occasions, and he was still nervous about asking me out on a date.

"Sure."

Danny grinned at me, his eyes sparkling. "Great! I'll pick you up at seven, okay?"

Before I could nod, Danny had retreated out of the dress store and was gone. Shaking my head slightly at the crazy antics of my boyfriend, I turned back to the mirror, studying myself once more. Finally I stepped off the small platform and headed back towards the dressing room.

Star trailed after me with a dumbstruck look in her eyes. "The Paradiso," she whispered. "You can't get reservations there. Especially not same day. You have to book that place, like, months in advance."

"Maybe someone cancelled," I muttered.

"So not," Star said, suddenly starting to giggle. "Dinner at the Paradiso – the most romantic restaurant in the city, caught looking at rings at the jeweler's, nervous about asking you out… oh he's so going to propose tonight."

I looked up at the ceiling, unsure of what to think about Star was saying.

"Next time I see you," she laughed, "you'll be engaged. I just know it!"


Uploaded September 1, 2008
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