Jurassic Wedding

By R. L. Nguyen

Whoever declared August National Family Fun Month must not have been a bridal consultant. Tiny cousins visiting with the bride are superb; peak wedding season is superb; enthusiastic dinos are superb. All three in the Daydream Bridal Boutique at once?

Think Jurassic Park if the jungle was made of fluffy petticoats.

“Here are those high-necked silhouettes you asked for.” I raise my voice and pull a flared off-white specimen from the wall bar. Bridal consultants don’t normally holler in the shop, but we don’t normally have three chattering micro-pachycephalosaurs running laps in here, either. Emerald scales and long tails rocket around my peripheral vision.

“That’s lovely.” The bride tilts her head, crowned with spikes destined to pose problems for a veil. Her scaly face wrinkles. “Do you have anything with more embellishment?”

A toothy head bursts out between two ballgowns. “Try this one, Marcie!” The dinosaur giggles and vanishes into the cavern of organza.

“Dora, come out, please! I’m sorry, Mary.” Marcie covers her face with a claw.

“It’s no trouble.” I give my best Consultant-of-the-Year grin. Where are you, Eugenia?

When we invite brides to bring their relatives for Family Fun month, our manager usually swoops in with books and toys to keep rowdy children entertained. This time her video conference with a designer rep is going overtime, the other consultants and their clients are steering clear, and I’m starting to feel like the obligatory ill-fated security guard who gets eaten in the first half of any monster movie.

But I’m a professional. I refuse to yell at tiny dinosaurs.

Squeals erupt on the other side of the showroom. I whirl as a metallic screech cuts through the laughter and an entire dress rack crashes over in a white, glittering heap.

No! Choking on a yelp, I rush forward, dodging coworkers’ stares.

“We found a dress for you, Marcie. We found one!” Two lumps, tangled in chiffon that resembles melting fondant, hop across the floor.

Understatement of the millennium. I snatch up the delicate hemline, filtering it through my fingers for rips.

“Addy! Clara! Out now, please!” Marcie bellows. Dinosaur roars are exponentially louder in person than in the movies.

Addy and Clara hop out of the chiffon swamp as I scoop up the dress. It’s not torn, but three-toed dust marks stand out against the white.

The dry cleaners will have questions.

“Would you girls like to go sit in the foyer? We have”—I grasp for anything that might interest a herd of miniature reptilian wrecking balls—“peppermints on the corner table.”

“Girls, do you want a mint?” Marcie turns back to the entrance, but Dora, Addy, and Clara bounce deeper into the showroom.

“We want to look for dresses!”

“That’s Mary’s job.” Sighing, Marcie trails after them. “We have to let her do it, okay?” Her amber eyes widen at the dirt-smudged skirt I’m carrying. “I’m so sorry; I didn’t think they’d be this much trouble. Can I pay for the dry cleaning? Dora, don’t!” She scoops her cousin up before she careens into the glass jewelry counter.

“Marcie, you said we could help!” Feet in midair, Dora arches her back and wriggles.

“I know, sweetie, but we can’t make a mess in the store.”

“You said it would be like dress-up.” Dora’s miniscule front arms pull closer to her chest. “What are we going to do when you move away and we can’t play dress-up any more?”

In a flash of crystal and sequins, the mayhem makes sense.

Weddings are always hard on someone. The single sibling left behind. Parents who’ve always had their children within driving distance. Or in this case, the cousin squad about to lose their leader.

There’s a reason we keep tissues on the foyer table beside the mints.

“I have an idea.” I drop the dusty dress into a corner chair. “Marcie put me in charge of dress-up for her wedding, but you three know her best. Would you like to help me pick what she’s going to wear?”

“Yes, yes, yes!” Tiny dino chirps flood the room as they scurry back to me.

“Let’s go.” I clap and lead them to the wall bar. “Marcie said she wants something fancy.”

“Like jewels?” Clara bounces on her clawed toes.

“Yes! Or lace, or flowers. Do you think you can find that for her?”

“Over here, over here!” Addy hops up and down, craning her neck at a gown hanging from the end of the bar. Lacy ruffles cascade from the rhinestone belt like jungle flowers.

“Good work!” I slide it out. “Marcie, what do you think?”

“I love it!” The bride’s eyes dance. “Can I try it on?”

“Girls,” I say, casting a glance at Marcie’s spiked head, “do you think she needs a tiara?”

“She has to have a tiara!” Clara pipes up like I was suggesting otherwise.

Waving the posse over to the jewelry counter, I unlock the cabinet door. “What do you think? The silver one, or the gold one?”

“Princess tiaras are gold,” pronounces Dora. Gold it is.

Somehow, I install my three helpers on the bench outside the dressing room long enough to lace Marcie into the gown. They tumble down as she emerges, train sweeping the floor. She bends over to let me set the tiara on her head. Her spikes cup it in place—no need for clips—as she stands back to look in the floor-length mirror.

Dora’s mouth falls open. “You look like a princess!”

“Doesn’t she?” I stand back to let Marcie spin.

“It’s perfect, girls!” Marcie twirls, ruffles fluttering and rhinestones glittering.

All over the shop, my colleagues break out in applause.

Dora, Addy, and Clara bounce. “We did it! We did dress-up!”

We did it. Not me. We. Memories will stay long after the wedding is over, and we made Marcie’s last dress-up with her cousins one for the books.

Apparently all a tiny dino needs to be happy is a little bit of sparkle.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

R. L. Nguyen is a child of immigrant parents who found her place to belong in fictional worlds. Her classical education and studies at the Author Conservatory feed her quest after truth and beauty. When she’s not writing magical characters finding victory in darkness, she can be found reading Shakespeare, singing opera, and training her dogs in rural South Carolina.

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