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“In here, sweetie.” Her voice is warmer than Angelique’s, though I can barely tell them apart except by their outfits. “Will you need help changing?”
“No, I’m okay,” I say quickly. I cast August a nervous glance, but he’s reading something on his phone.
Yep.
We look like a real couple, all right.
The married ones where the husband just wants to get out of here before his wife steps on his last nerve.
The second woman gives me a wry, knowing look as she passes the dress over, then pats my arm. “Don’t worry, sweetie,” she whispers. “Once you put that on, he won’t be able to take his eyes off you.”
Do I want that?
Or do I just want to fit the image August needs?
Stop overthinking it.
Once I duck inside, my inner frustration becomes a second presence in the decorated, highly scented fitting room. I keep asking myself why I’m being so weird over this, but it’s pretty obvious.
Sure, I’m taking this all in stride.
Yeah, I’m calmer about it than August himself is.
But it’s also a lot to take in.
August is a human tornado: dark and broody and destructive, touching down wherever he pleases and tearing up everything in his wake.
He’s spun me completely for a loop, and even if I am keeping my equilibrium, I’m in shock and still trying to process all of this. It makes me wobble back and forth, getting the now all tangled up with those hopeful what-ifs when I first saw him on the plane and my crazy, romantic imagination thought, Wow. I wouldn’t mind starting something with him.
Well, I’ve definitely started something.
A flipping mess.
It’s only been a few hours since he showed up with the ring on my doorstep.
Once I have time to get used to this, I’ll treat it like what it is—a job.
For now, as I look in the mirror with the dress draped over my arm, I linger on the ring, glimmering in the mirror like a dream.
If this were real, if it had been some other girl August loved and who loved him, she’d have broken down in tears and said, Yes, yes, yes!
I’m not her.
So I just smile at my reflection and get busy transforming into the girl August Marshall wants me to be.
I plaster the dress on like I’m handling a gossamer spiderweb. I don’t know how much it costs, but I don’t want to rip it if I’m not going to wear it.
Shoes go too. My clunky shoes couldn’t possibly look good with this.
I’m barefoot as I slide into the delicate dress and gather my hair up off my neck, though I can’t stop a few wavy tendrils from falling into my face and trailing down to my collarbones.
There’s a long, nervous pause before I glance at the mirror again.
Holy crap.
I look pretty.
I look the way I wanted to look that night when I got smashed at homecoming because I spent my birthday money on an ugly dress I thought would make me look grown up.
