Never a Bridesmaid by Janice Thompson

Author:Janice Thompson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: ebook
Publisher: Zondervan
Published: 2015-03-01T05:00:00+00:00

I pressed the last gift box into the backseat and shut the door, then turned to face her. “Did you enjoy the shower?” I felt a little sad that I had to ask, but the somber expression on her face made me wonder.

“It was beautiful, Mari. You did an amazing job.” She climbed into the driver’s seat and put the key in the ignition, but never looked my way. Very strange.

I had no choice but to press the issue. “Crystal? What’s going on?”

She shook her head, then started the engine and pulled on her seat belt.

I know my sister pretty well. Something was very, very wrong here. “Crystal?”

“You were amazing, Mari. I mean that. You always are. But the gifts?” She gestured to her backseat. “It’s pointless to load them in my car. Pointless to take them home. They all have to be returned.”

“I’m sorry . . . what?”

“They have to be returned.”

“Are you saying you already have all these things? These are duplicates? If so, I had no idea. I—”

“No. I’m saying that I’ve changed my mind.”

My stomach felt like my heart had dropped straight into it. “Changed your mind about what? The things you registered for?”

“No. The wedding. I’ve changed my mind about the wedding.” A lone tear trickled down her cheek.

“W-what?” Surely I’d misunderstood. “Are you saying you’re not getting married?”

She looked over at me, her eyes brimming. “I don’t know. Maybe. I’m just saying that I’ve had what Mama calls a ‘Come to Jesus’ meeting.”

“With who? Phillip?”

“No.” She sniffled. “With myself.”

“You had a ‘Come to Jesus’ meeting with yourself?”

“Yes. About what I want, I mean.”

“In a husband?”

“No, not that.” Crystal brought her hand down on the steering wheel with a thud. “I know what I want in a husband. I adore Phillip. It’s just . . . the wedding.”

“What about it?”

“It’s not what I want. I mean, I don’t want a big fancy wedding reception at a country club. I don’t want a thousand-dollar, five-tiered Crème de la Crème cake. I don’t want Dad to spend his life’s savings paying fifty-five dollars a head for guests to eat some chicken dish they won’t even remember the next day.”

“Um, sixty-five.”

“Sixty-five.” She paused. “I want something normal. Something I’ll want to tell my kids and grandkids about.”

“Are you saying you’re changing the plan for the reception? Changing the venue?” Surely not. “The wedding is in less than a month.”

She sighed and turned off the engine. “I know. It doesn’t make any sense, does it? But Mari, I just don’t think I can justify a show-offish wedding. I’ve never been that sort of girl. I’m the ‘Let’s go to a third-world country and take care of orphans’ kind of girl, you know?”

“True.”

“When I went to Haiti last summer, I saw all those kids living in poverty, and it broke my heart. I promised myself I’d come back a different person. I don’t like being a spoiled-rotten brat.”

“You’re not. That’s not you.”

She sighed. “I know. I’m just weak. I can’t say no to Phillip’s parents.

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