Wedding Belles

A bride getting ready for her wedding, but with a sinister undertone. Go to http://andrewhenleywriting.wordpress.com for more of my writing.

I stare into the mirror and practise “I do.”

In my head, ‘Do you take Bobby Hughes to be your lawfully wedded husband?’

Out loud, “I do.”

 

The mirror is one of those light bulb mirrors, illuminated around the edges. The kind supermodels use. I could be a supermodel. Some of the bulbs fizzle and crackle dimly, some are just broken. In the mirror I see my unmade face resting on the lace V-neck of an unflattering wedding dress. My face ready to be painted. Created. A car chassis. An undecorated room.

 

Sitting here, hair done, it still feels like I’m inside the wedding dress rather than wearing it. Preparing to put my make up on feels new and familiar at the same time. The big white dress makes all the difference. And I do mean big. Two sizes too big. But the big fat bride is no more, now there’s just skinny little me.

 

I flip open my black leather brief case and remove a pink fabric make up bag and purple box tied with red silk. Unzipping the bag, I lay two make up brushes, a tube of foundation, eyelash curlers and mascara on the table in front of the mirror. Flipping open the box, I take out a black plastic eye shadow case, a big red lipstick box and a small polyvinyl sachet with several sets of earrings inside.

 

In my favourite, most elegant red high heels, my foot kicks something underneath the table. I squeeze a slug of foundation on my larger, blue bristled make up brush and apply. My face is now cast in an attractive porcelain tone. Like those beautiful blue eyed dolls with curly hair that used to live with me in my pink childhood bedroom.

 

I open the eye shadow box. Swapping the big blue brush for the smaller lilac one, I hover the brush above the open box, twirling it over the Crayola rainbow of colours. I look away and allow it to fall. It chooses a light blue shade called Turquoise Skyline. I close my eyes and dust my eyelids. I open them and see two sexy, Turquoise Skyline flared eyes looking at me from inside the mirror. I wink and the shadow powder puffs, like a toxic mushroom exploding. I giggle.

 

Shifting my feet under the table, I give the blockage a heavy thump. I smile and my lips look bare and plain. Finish with the eyes first though. I’m always doing that. Losing focus, forgetting things. Scatterbrain! Heehee! Anyway. With the eyelash curlers gripped between my thumb and forefinger, I squeeze and crush the thin spiderlegs of my eyelashes up into tidal waves. The mascara volumizes and I am irresistible. I. Am. Irresistible.

 

I suck in my pale lips and pop them out into a perfect circle. My lipstick box has two distinct tiers. The bottom tier is fun, foxy and sexy. Like me when I wear it. Glosses. Glitters. Pearlescents. The kind I’ll wear tonight to smear and smudge all over the grooms face and chest. That damn thing under the table! Right in the way. I lift up my red high heel and dig the stiletto point into the squishy mass. I wish I could hear it screech out in pain. But it’s lifeless. It doesn’t feel pain. The top tier of lipstick is sophisticated and chic, like me when I wear it. The sorts of colours my lips are all those times I’ve imagined myself standing at the altar telling my Bobby, my one: I do.

 

I narrow my lipstick choices down to three colours. Chargrilled Cherry, Marshmallow Picnic and Miami Sunset. I take the three of them out, remove the caps and twist up the waxy stems, just so the tips of them protrude. Miami Sunset is the purple of a spy movie femme fatale. But it’s a lot more glittery than I remember, and therefore belongs on the other tier. Back it goes. Mental note: Reorganise lipsticks. Nothing should be out of place. Just two left in the running for the honour. Marshmallow Picnic is the kind you’d imagine Barbie would wear on her Wedding Day to Ken. Barbie & Ken. Me & Bobby. The picture perfect couples. We could double date, if only they were real. Chargrilled Cherry is a full red, more to the tastes of models in necklace and earring adverts. I could be a model. I can’t choose. I twist the two of them up fully. Both are well used. I press my tongue against both to taste them. I can taste the depth of red in Chargrilled Cherry and decide against it. I don’t want to look like trashy, or worse, like a clown �" just one bug unfunny joke �" when I’m up there saying my rehearsed “I do,” to my Bobby.

 

Dress, hair, make up. All that’s left now is the garter. I look down at the lump between my legs. The corpse of that boyfriend stealing b***h of a bride. I tug the garter off her cold, chubby leg and slide it up mine. I have to have it much higher for it to be tight enough to not fall down. Bobby Hughes is mine. He was mine first. My one. She stole my one. You only get one one. And she stole it. She deserved to die.

 

And when Bobby Hughes sees me standing at the altar in his bride’s wedding dress looking gorgeous, he’ll realise I’m the one. His only one. And then he’ll have no choice but to marry me.