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Thanksgiving Week became a blur of roasted turkeys, stuffing, baked pies and buttery biscuits. As though the food at home wasn’t enough, the Frosted Delights bakery was a flurry of activity, with hungry home-comers meeting for donuts and coffee and conversation. Jennifer sucked down copious cups of black roasted coffee and forced herself through a grueling schedule of four a.m. bakery-start-up followed by several mid-afternoon hours at the social media firm.
Thanksgiving Thursday and Black Friday, Jennifer closed the bakery in pursuit of something she hadn’t had in quite some time: days of R&R. That said, Jennifer was never one to lounge around at home. When Olivia suggested the Sisters meet Friday for a bout of Black Friday shopping at the numerous boutiques across Oak Bluffs and Edgartown, the girls jumped at the chance. For some of them, Thursday had been fraught with family tension— something often served alongside the stuffing and yams at the Thanksgiving table. Friday would heal them.
It was decided that they meet at Tiffany-Ann’s Boutique in downtown Edgartown at one in the afternoon on Black Friday. It was strangely warm despite the lateness of the year, and Jennifer stood in only a dark green trench, a pair of skinny jeans, a black turtleneck, and a pair of booties, poised at the edge of the sidewalk and trying her darnedest not to glance at her phone during these moments of quiet. She was the first to arrive, which was normally Amelia’s thing. These days, Amelia lagged a bit due to her pregnant belly.
“There she is!” Olivia stepped out from around the corner and wrapped Jennifer in a big hug, bringing with her a new brand of perfume Jennifer didn’t fully recognize.
“Wow. What’s that?”
Olivia stepped back and waved a hand around herself to boost the aroma. “Chelsea got it for me from a perfume boutique in Manhattan. What do you think?”
“You’re a classy city lady these days,” Jennifer returned. “I can’t possibly compete with that.”
“Chelsea keeps me young,” Olivia beamed, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.
Amelia parked her car directly before them, aligning it parallel with the sidewalk with perfect precision. When she stepped out, her pregnant belly ballooned in front of her.
“Just so you know, girls, I can’t keep up with you as well as other Black Fridays,” Amelia grumbled. “And I’m mostly here for whatever snacks we get ourselves into. Maternity clothes are like bags of fabric, and my feet don’t fit any shoes I like.”
“I see you’re in a good mood today,” Jennifer teased.
A few minutes later, Andrea dropped Camilla off on the corner and gave a sturdy wave. Camilla grumbled as she waved back.
“The girl’s wedding is going to kill me,” she said through clenched teeth.
“Just one more week! And then it’s over! Trust me. I feel a huge weight lifted now that Nick’s wedding is done with,” Jennifer told her.
“We have to do another dress fitting today,” Camilla announced somberly. “It’s at four p.m. and I can’t tell you how many adjustments that dress has taken so far. It seems like a never-ending journey to perfection.”
“Oh well,” Amelia offered. “I’d love any chance to sit down.”
“You’ll go with me?” Camilla asked.
“Of course I will. You don’t have to go through this alone,” Olivia offered. “Plus, I have the feeling Chelsea’s enjoying her new life in the city too much to ever get married, and I want to leech up some of your mother-of-the-bride joy.”
“Take it,” Camilla said sarcastically. “I don’t want it anymore!”
The girls cackled together as a wind ripped off the Nantucket Sound and cut through the strange humidity of the overly warm day.
“Weird weather,” Jennifer affirmed as she pushed her hands into her trench coat pocket.
“Where’s Mila, anyway?” Camilla asked.
“I don’t know. It’s fifteen past,” Olivia breathed. “Maybe we should call her?”
Jennifer dialed Mila’s number for the millionth time in her life. As was Mila’s custom, she didn’t answer but immediately texted back.
MILA: Sorry! Got held up with something.
MILA: I’ll call you in an hour and see where you are.
“Guess that means we should get started without her,” Olivia stated. “Too bad for her. She’s the most fashion-obsessed of all of us.”
Mila had always been the group’s in-the-know fashionista, delivering sterling advice as they’d gone through the season of life and the seasons of trends. They couldn’t dress like they were twenty-two any longer— but Mila allowed them to look chic and poised regardless of the situation.
They stepped into Tiffany-Ann’s Boutique and set to work at the sales’ rack as a mumbling clerk asked them if they needed any assistance. She also informed Amelia where the maternity section was, which made Amelia grumble inwardly before thanking her.
“The world is so excited that I’m as huge as a whale,” she announced as the clerk rushed off to help someone else. “But who am I kidding? Not like my body will pop back to its pre-baby shape like before.” She snapped her fingers.
“You know we’ll go to endless spin classes with you in solidarity,” Jennifer told her.
“I, for one, don’t think you should worry at all about your body,” Camilla said as she collected three of the same sweaters in different colors, hanging them across her finger. “You’re bringing a baby into the world. It’s the most beautiful and natural thing you can do. Andrea destroyed my body for a little while. Against all odds, I still love her to pieces, and I ended up loving my body even more through the process.” Jennifer said.
Amelia rolled her eyes playfully. “You always have to say the kindest thing, Camilla. Give it a rest sometimes, huh?”
“Can’t help it,” Camilla returned as she lifted all three sweaters in orange, brown, and yellow. “Which color do you think suits me best?”
“None of them,” Amelia returned as the others burst into laughter. “What? I thought we were all about honesty here.”
“Honesty appreciated,” Camilla affirmed as she snuck the sweater back on the rack. “We’ve been through too much for you girls to let me walk around in an ugly sweater.”
“We would never do that to each other,” Jennifer assured her, then leafed through a collection of black dresses toward the corner.
Around two in the afternoon, they checked back in with Mila to learn that she was still in the midst of a “tumultuous” fight with her daughter, Isabelle.
“Oh gosh. Thanksgiving really brings out the worst in people sometimes,” Olivia said timidly as they stepped out of the first boutique and headed for another down the block. “You should have heard what my mom said to my dad last night over pie. Basically, she insinuated that all he does is sit around the house all day. I mean, the man worked hard his entire life. Maybe he deserves a rest?”
“I sometimes remember when I needled Joel. When I heard myself, I was like, ‘Have I turned into my mother?’ But really, I think picking and prodding at someone like that is more of a reflection of yourself rather than them. Joel was always a magnificent husband. I just wasn’t happy anymore, and stuff like, you know, the lawn not being mowed correctly made me angrier than it should have.”
It was another classic day of seemingly endless girl talk. As they fell into an easy silence at the next boutique, Jennifer thought about how these conversations had shifted over the years. In their teenage days, back when Michelle had still been with them, their conversations had circled around what to wear to prom and which boys they wanted to take them there. They had discussed the best places to drive to make out without being caught. They’d swapped jeans and nail polishes and magazines, the only real currency they’d had. It was the privilege of Jennifer’s life to be allowed such endless conversations with her girls.
“How’s Nick doing, anyway?” Olivia muttered through the hangers in the dress section. “Did he ever confirm what Stacy’s mom thinks...?”
Jennifer had confessed the Stacy pregnancy secret to her girls several days previous.
“Not yet,” Jennifer replied mischievously.
“I didn’t see her take a single drink of alcohol throughout the entire reception,” Camilla confirmed.
“And she has a glow about her. Something more than the wedding glow,” Amelia added. “As a pregnant woman, I have a sixth sense about this.”
“A grandmother!” Jennifer buzzed her lips distractedly. “At the same time, you become a mother for the first time.”
“Maybe the baby can call you Nana or something,” Camilla said playfully. “You’re no, Grandma. Not looking the way you do— barely thirty-five and in skinny jeans.”
Jennifer blushed. “Mila’s esthetician salon has been a real skin-saver.”
“I wish she would get here. She’s missing out on all the good gossip,” Olivia moaned. “And we seem to miss out on each other over the holidays. There are so many things to do and presents to wrap and parents to fight with. Gosh, that reminds me. I heard from Tyler the other day. More apologies for his lack of involvement during Chelsea’s childhood. It seems like his new baby has really triggered a lot of memories for him, especially because nobody’s letting him off the hook this time.”
“Did you tell him you haven’t invented a time machine yet?” Camilla blurted.
Olivia laughed. “Honestly, him thinking about my feelings for the first time maybe ever is revolutionary. It makes me think the world isn’t as lost as I always thought it was.”
“Besides, you have Anthony, now,” Jennifer countered. “Finally, a man who treats you the way you deserve.”
“That reminds me,” Camilla chimed in. “If we’re going to be at Something Blue later anyway...”
Olivia’s cheeks burned red with embarrassment. She pressed a hand over her stomach and said, “I don’t know if I’m up for trying anything on...”
“Come on, Olivia. You only get married for the second time once,” Amelia teased.
Olivia rolled her eyes. “Okay, but I told you, I want something understated. Something that says...”
“That says you’ve finally found you’re happily ever after?” Jennifer finished her sentence. “I think we can figure that out.”
The four of them retreated from the second boutique with only three bags between them. They hadn’t made many big purchases yet; rather, the clothes and the shoes and the jewelry seemed more like decoration around their companionship. On the way to the bridal shop, Jennifer paused in front of a shoe store for two terribly strained minutes as she gazed at a pair of three-hundred dollar heels in the window. “They’re screaming my name. I could hear them saying, ‘Jennifer! Hey!’ from all the way down the block.”
“But where are you going to wear them?” Camilla asked.
Jennifer blushed. “I don’t know, especially because I might be a grandmother soon. No grandmother would be caught dead in heels like that.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Amelia teased. “You work hard. If you want those shoes, you should get them.”
Mila called them just then, right in the nick of time. Jennifer lifted her phone in excitement.
“Are you coming? I’m trying to decide about these shoes and I need you here as the devil on the shoulder.”
“Still not out,” Mila grumbled. “I hate it. I hate missing out on quality time with my girls.”
Jennifer turned as another wicked yet strangely warm wind cast itself across her cheeks. “You know we understand. It’s just sad, is all and I have no idea when we’ll all be together again.”
“Until your birthday, of course,” Mila affirmed.
Every year on December 15th, the five of them always gathered to celebrate Jennifer and Michelle’s birthday. They made all their favorite greasy-delight foods from high school and had a sort of conversation with Michelle, telling her all the events she’d missed from the previous year and how much they still missed her (so much that it still hurt).
“That’s almost three weeks away,” Jennifer moaned.
“Oh gosh. You’re not going to give me attitude, too, because I just can’t handle it.” Mila teased.
“No, no. We’re just teasing you, honey. Take care of what you need to take care of. In the meantime, we’re taking Olivia to look at wedding dresses!”
“You’re kidding. That’s totally unfair,” Mila countered. “Tell her not to pick something for sure until I’m there. I know you girls. You get all in your heads about fashion decisions sometimes and I have to swoop in and save the day.”
“Someone’s a little high and mighty,” Jennifer returned.
“You know it’s true. Olivia could walk out of there wearing a Cinderella ballgown.”
“Oh ye of so little faith,” Jennifer said with a laugh.
When they reached Something Blue, it was three-fifteen, which gave them a full forty-five minutes to hunt for a dress prior to Andrea’s arrival for her fitting. Olivia cowered in the corner while Jennifer explained to the store clerk that Olivia planned to marry sometime next year.
“But I’m old! I’m forty-one!” Olivia cried.
“Don’t be silly,” the clerk told her. “You deserve a dress as much as anyone else.”
As Olivia explained her style to the clerk, Charlotte Hamner and her sister, Claire, entered the boutique, each wearing vibrant smiles. Claire operated her own flower shop in Oak Bluffs while wedding-planner Charlotte had several more weddings over the span of the next weeks after a particularly wild year post-Ursula Pennington’s celebrity wedding. Since then, Jennifer had taken Ursula on as a social media client and had been privy to her socialite world.
“Hi there,” Charlotte greeted brightly. “Your son’s wedding went off without a hitch. It was such a beautiful day.”
“So many thanks to you for that,” Jennifer returned. “We’ve got ourselves yet another bride if you can believe it.”
Olivia rolled her eyes flippantly mid-way through her conversation with the clerk.
“It’s so exciting! Oh, you must have it at The Hesson House when it reopens,” Charlotte said.
“That’s the plan. A perfect way to start the next era of the hotel,” Jennifer affirmed.
“Nothing like a wedding to bring about enough hope to keep going,” Charlotte offered dreamily. “But don’t mind me. I’m just about the biggest sap in the world.”
“We need that kind of energy around here.” Jennifer beamed as the clerk led Olivia toward a small selection of vintage-looking, classical gowns.
“Seems one of your group is missing today,” Charlotte noted as she scanned across the foursome.
“Mila couldn’t get away from her kids,” Jennifer explained. “But she’ll join us later. Most likely for the wine and complaints about whatever Isabelle and Zane put her through. They just started at college and, well, I think there are growing pains on all fronts.”
Charlotte puffed out her cheeks. “I dread the day my Rachel heads off to college. I keep teasing the idea that she just stays here with me to work on the business. She already knows so many of the ins and outs, considering she’s been my helper since she was maybe ten or eleven. She’s certainly got the wedding genes. I hope she never tries to actually get married, though. Not sure my heart could take it.”
“Tell me about it,” Camilla returned as her own daughter breezed through the door, delivering a sterling, bride-ready smile. “I think my heart might just explode into a million pieces. Joy is painful like that.”