AN: Hey guys! I'm off all week so expect quite a bit of writing these next few days! I just posted a new chapter of MDBC reading book 4 so take a look at that!

Part 4. Wedding Prep.

Megan, Emma, Cassidy, Becca, and Savannah are meeting me at this dress shop. We made an appointment to just find bridesmaids dresses because Megan is making my wedding dress.

"How can I help you gorgeous girls this morning?" A guy with high heels and a really cute suit walks out. He has a rainbow band around his wrist and an awesome fedora on his head. His name tag says Joey. Megan steps forward and smiles. "We're looking for bridesmaids dresses. I made an appointment last week." His eyes widen. "I had no idea THE QUEEN of Fashion, Megan Wong, was in my presence. Or according to People magazine Megan Berkley now. I would've put on some foundation!"

She laughs. "Yeah but this is for my friend Jess. She's getting married in two weeks." I give a wave and Becca shoves me up front. He looks me up and down.

"Ooooooooo guuurrrllll you're GORGEOUS! Can I touch that Rapunzel hair of yours?" I nod. "Oh my god, who's the lucky guy!?" I unlock my phone and show him a picture. He whistles. "Are you both models because…WOW"

Savannah throws her hands up. "Exactly! I told them they should but noooooo.."

He laughs. "So, when's the wedding?"

"One week. December 15." I reply.

Joey's eyes grow wide. "You're just looking for a wedding dress now?! "

"No, Megan's making it. We're just looking for bridesmaid dresses."

"Of course, sorry I forgot. Okay so what are we looking for? Any dress types you have your heart sent on?"

"Blue."

"That's it?" I nod. "Well gurl you just made my job a whole lot easier." He walks in the back and gestures us to follow. It's a huge room filled with all kinds of dresses.

"This is our bridesmaid room." We weave our way through to the blue rack that's filled with all kinds of dresses. Some long, some short, some sparkly, some plain, it's endless.

"So, looking at these, what do you like?"

I gesture to Megan and everyone behind me. "Ask them, they're the ones wearing it."

They protest. "It's your wedding!"

I run my hand over the dresses. "I don't know. I like these light blue ones."

"Awesome!" Joey grabs all of them and brings them to the dressing rooms.

"Okay, so what sizes?" They all tell him they're sizes, and he searches through the pile and finds each of them a dress that will fit. I sit on a chair and wait for them to come out. The dress is a A-Line, Scoop Neck, Floor-Length, Chiffon Lace Dress. I don't know what half those words mean, but that's what the guy said so I went along with it. Megan is the first one to come out. "What do you think?" She twirls around. "I love it but you're the fashion guru." Becca and Savannah come out and then Emma. "I think it's classy, and the long sleeve is perfect for winter." Cassidy finally comes out. "How do you people change so quickly?" We laugh. I tell them to get in a group so I can take a picture and send it to Darcy, to see what he thinks. He sends back a thumbs up.

Joey rolls his eyes. "Straight men, they just don't understand."

Darcy sends a picture of 5 ties laid out on a table. "What tie?"

Megan says the groomsmen should have light blue ties to match the dresses, but that Darcy should just get a black tie. I text him what Megan said, and then put my phone away.

Joey stands up. "So is this what we want?" We all agree, and he goes to the register. I talked to Darcy earlier and asked if I should pay for the dresses or not. He said if they were cheap then yes, but if they were pretty expensive then pay for a portion of each. I agreed. Of course, that sparked some arguments.

Savannah shakes her head. "You are not paying for all of these, Jess."

Becca and Cassidy laugh. "You're joking, right?!"

"You're already generous enough, I'm not letting you and Darcy pay for this." Megan replies. Emma nods in agreement.

"Fine, but your purses are over there," I point to the dressing room. They all head over there and I quickly hand Joey my card.

"You're paying for all of these?" I nod. Each dress cost 70, so the total was 350. Not as bad as I thought.

He puts dress covers on each and then hands them to me. They come back and I hand them each their dress.

"You didn't! Jess!" Savannah yells.

Becca scowls. "We let Megan pay because she's rich but you both are teachers!"

"Why do you have to be such a good person!" Emma frowns. I laugh, say thank you to Joey, and then leave. They run to meet me outside.

"Thank you, Jess. But you really didn't have to do that." They give me hugs and then get in their separate cars and drive home.

I walk in the front door. "Darcy! You home yet!?"

He runs down the stairs. "Hey, how'd it go?" I take off my big winter coat and he takes it and hangs it up in the closet.

"Good. The dresses are really pretty. Are you mad I spent that much?"

He shakes his head. "Nope. I think that's fine. They weren't too expensive, and thanks to Megan we don't have to pay for your wedding dress."

"Yeah. You talked to Kelly about those days off, right?" We decided to have our wedding right before Christmas break, so since our honeymoon is a weeklong, in Fiji, we only have to take 3 days off of work. We'll be back, December 23, just in time for Christmas eve the next day.

"Yeah, she thinks that Mark can probably sub my classes, and then she's going to try to get Shannon or someone to sub yours."

"Sounds good." I start to walk to the living room, but Darcy grabs my arm and pulls me back. "What?"

"Close your eyes." He put his warms hands over my eyes.

"Whats the point of you telling me to close my eyes if you're just going to cover them anyways?"

"Shush, don't question my logic." I laugh as he leads me to what I think is the living room. "Okay, so I know I didn't talk to you about this first…-"

"Oh no."

"But…" he continues. "I thought it was necessary, and we just couldn't wait any longer."

I run through ideas of what he could be talking about and come up with nothing.

"3,2,1…" he gently removes his hands. I gasp at the sight of a full lit up Christmas tree in our living room. It doesn't have any ornaments, or a star, but there are lights strung up.

"How did you get this set up all by yourself?"

He grins. "You underestimate my strength, but seriously, do you like it?"

"I love it." I hug him and he kisses the top of my head.

"That's good because I really don't think you can return a tree." I laugh. The entire room smells like pine.

"I'm glad you saved the ornaments for me, it would be a tragedy if you tried to decorate it yourself."

"Hey, give me some credit, I did string the lights up, and they don't look half bad." They look perfect, actually, but I don't want to fuel his ego.

Later that night, Darcy goes to his parents' house, to get some ornaments that they don't want anymore. He also swings by Target to get some pretty new ones. I put my plaid wintery pajamas on, make a batch of hot chocolate, and put on Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. Darcy comes through the door with boxes of stuff.

He sets them down and takes of his coat. "Hey! You're watching Rudolph without me!"

"Don't worry, it just started." I hand him a mug of hot chocolate and he inspects my pajamas.

"We're going all out, I like it." I smile at him and go through the boxes of ornaments.

"Awwwwww!" I show Darcy one with a picture of him as a baby and My First Christmas above it. He laughs and I go to hang it on the tree.

"Wait!" I turn around. He points to the ornament in my hand. "The first ornament has to be special."

"This is special. It's of cute little baby Darcy."

He rolls his eyes. "No, wait here. Don't hang anything on the tree yet." I watch as he grabs the ornament out of my hand, and then runs upstairs. After a few minutes of hearing the sound of slamming drawers, "Jess!" He calls. "Where's those pictures you printed like last month?"

I frown. "What do you need those for?"

"Just answer the question!"

I shake my head. "Fine, they're in the office, in that little desk thingy. Second drawer down."

After a few minutes, he comes back down. "Now you can hang this." He puts it in my hand. The little picture of baby Darcy is gone and instead, is replaced by a different picture. This one was taken by Simon in New York City three years ago, when Darcy visited me. I'm laughing at something he said, while he's behind me with his hands around my waist and his chin is rested on the top of my head. He's got a huge smile on his face, and behind us is the Rockefeller Christmas tree. It's one of my favorite pictures. On the ornament, Darcy crossed off the My in My First Christmas and replaced it with Our.

"What are you talking about? We've practically spent every Christmas together since I was like 4."

He looks at me like I just said the world was flat. "Yeah, but by the time Christmas comes around, it'll be our first Christmas married."

I cross my arms. "It won't be, if you keep getting surprise Christmas trees."

He grins. "Fine, what can I do to make sure you won't run away from me at the altar."

I know he's thinking I'm going to say a kiss or something, but I'm taking the advantage of this opportunity. "Well… my family used to wear matching Christmas sweaters every year if you remember. So…"

He raises his eyebrows. "You want us to wear matching Christmas sweaters?" I nod and hang up the ornament as he processes this information. "Like what kind?"

I search up Christmas sweaters and click on the picture. "This one." One of them says Mrs. Clause, with candy canes all around it, and the second one says Santa Clause, with little Christmas cookies all around it. And of course, the patterns are ugly, and the entire thing is tacky. In other words, they're the most perfect Christmas sweaters ever.

"Tristan, Stewart, and Cassidy will mock me mercilessly."

"Oh definetly! Everyone will." I smile and start hanging more ornaments.

He grins. "You're evil."

I take a sip of my hot chocolate. "Is that a yes?"

He wipes the whip cream off the tip of my nose and then kisses me. "Sure."

I cheer and then quickly order them off of Amazon before he changes his mind.

We spend the next hour making our tree look gorgeous. Darcy can't decorate to save his life, so all he does is hang the stuff where I can't reach. Which is practically the entire top half of the tree. We take a break three quarters of the way through, so Darcy can do his Charlie-in-the-box impression. It's perfect and hilarious, like always. After we're done, he picks me up so I can put the star on the tree. I always complain when he lifts me up, but he says I weigh less than a feather. We take a step back to survey our work.

"I think it looks good." He says.

"Oh wait! We forgot the lights!" I run over to the extension cord and plug it in. I walk back over to Darcy. "Now, it looks good."

He shakes his head. "No, now it looks perfect."

I tilt my head. The tree is lopsided, there's a big clump of ornaments on the top left, some of the bulbs on the lights aren't working, and the star is slowly tilting forward.

"I don't know…"

He grabs my waist and pulls me toward him. "It's perfect."

I smile and take a picture of our perfect Christmas tree.