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“They’ll need to do your measurements,” Alice said.

“So what? Lunch isn’t going to increase my size that much.”

“That’s not what I mean!”

“I’ll take you two to lunch,” Rob said, always the peacemaker.

“I’m really not hungry,” Alice insisted. “You two go so I can get on with my day. I’ve got errands to run.”

Father and daughter went to a local café. They ordered lunch, and Emily fought to stay focused. Decompressing from two hours with Alice had her feeling headachy and out of sorts.

“I’m glad that’s out of the way.”

“Emily, you’re going to be a beautiful bride. I hope you realize that. I’m serious when I said Paul is going to be so proud. You really clean up nicely.”

“The man hasn’t seen me dressed up. I wore a dress when we went to dinner once, but it wasn’t a ball gown. This might be the one and only time we see each other in formal clothes.”

“Is he wearing dress blues or a tux?”

“We haven’t talked about it. I didn’t even know firefighters had a dress uniform.”

“You should encourage him to wear his dress uniform. And what about bridesmaids?”

“Colonel, are you kidding me?” she asked, anxiety mounting. “I never thought of it.”

“Well, you’d probably at least have Kathy. And what about Paul? Does he have any female relatives you should ask?”

“I’ll ask him. What number bridesmaids should there be?”

“I’m no expert, but you should probably have a bridesmaid for every usher he has.”

“I’ll ask him how many he’s going to have,” she said, getting out her phone to text him.

Paul answered right away, and she gasped. “He’s having all his cousins and his brother and two firefighter buddies! This is supposed to be a small, informal wedding.”

“Honey, don’t make an issue out of it,” Rob said.

“You don’t understand. I don’t have that many friends to ask.”

“Just have Kathy, then,” he replied, feeling sad that his daughter couldn’t come up with more than one friend for her wedding attendants. “Forget what I said about having a bridesmaid for every usher.”

“I guess I could ask him about his cousins’ wives.”

“That’s a great idea,” Rob exclaimed.

They ate lunch, not talking for a moment. With hands shaking and a pale face, it was clear that Emily was overwhelmed.

Rob reached out for her hand. “Honey, I’m sorry I dropped the ball when it came to building your self-confidence. I know fathers carry a lot of responsibility for the way their daughters end up feeling about themselves.”

“Colonel, get real! You gave me so much self-confidence. Everything I do, from my job to sports, is because of you.”

“Why do I feel that you’re struggling? There’s just something.”

“It’s my weight! You must know that. Mom’s deal is the worst. But now Paul’s family has jumped on that bandwagon. I fear his coworkers might have something to say about it, too. He’s stopped asking me to firehouse social functions even though I’ve told him how much I enjoy going.”

The effect was as if he’d been swatted in the face. During her childhood, he’d done several tours of duty overseas, usually in war zones where Alice and Emily were unable to accompany him. Alice didn’t say much, but he was diligent upon his return about reading her grade reports and parent-teacher notes, and that she’d been bullied had been a recurrent issue.

“I’m sorry I didn’t protect you from being bullied,” he finally said. “You know I’d give anything if I could go back in time and make sure that wasn’t happening.”

Source: www.allfreenovel.com
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