Today should have been the happiest day of my life. Well, not the happiest—the day Jack proposed to me, that was the happiest day of my life—but today should certainly be one of the happiest days of my life. After all, I love shopping, I love that I’m getting married to Jack, and so therefore, I should love wedding dress shopping. What could be better than combining these two fabulous things together, a la the discovery of the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup? Well, maybe combining shoe shopping with my excitement about getting married would be better, but you get the general point I’m trying to make.
The point is, I should love wedding dress shopping. But, I don’t. So far, it has been a haze of obnoxious and fake salespeople, unwanted commentary on my weight from my mother, and a wave of general dissatisfaction on my part. And that’s just today.
“Are you planning on losing any weight before your wedding?” the salesperson asks me.
“Um, yes?” I say, careful to position my body just so, away from the three sided mirror, which has the effect of thrusting my cellulite directly into the line of vision of my mother, who is standing outside of the dressing room in yet another “Mother of the Bride” dress. The salesperson zips me up, and I turn around to face my mom.
“Oh my God, Brooke,” my best friend, Vanessa, says, “you look so beautiful I think I’m going to cry!” Vanessa is not the type to cry—in the eight years since I’ve known her I can count the times I’ve seen her cry on one hand—so, if she says she’s about to cry, this dress must be really good.
“I hate it,” my mother says, “take it off.” And then, to the salesperson, “do you have anything with capped sleeves? Something to hide the fleshiness on her arms.” She whispers the word “fleshiness” as if, even though I’m standing but two feet away from her, I cannot actually hear her.
“I can hear you,” I say, reaching for the glass of champagne my mother is holding for me, the one given to me when we first arrived at the store. That was back when wedding dress shopping was all air kisses and warm congratulations. Now that our salesperson has agreed with my mother when she called me fat, I could really use something a bit stronger, but I’ll settle for the bubbly.
“Empty calories,” my mother sings, moving the glass away from me and taking a sip. “I’m just trying to find a dress that would make the most of your figure, BB.” I guess I don’t have to mention here that my fifty-two year old mother, a petite size six with a crown of honey blonde hair, looks better in her dress than I do in mine.
“Marilyn Monroe was a size twelve in her heyday,” I say to no one in particular “And no one ever called her fat. I’m only a size ten.”
“Marilyn was a bit fleshy, dear,” my mother says, admiring herself in the mirror. If I didn’t have to work and could take tennis lessons three times a week like my mother, maybe I would be a size six, too. Although, if I had that much free time, I’d like to think that instead of tennis lessons and mah jongg, I’d fill my time with charity work and more important Angelina Jolie-esque type activities. And shopping.
What? You have to get new outfits for all those big important dinners at the UN, don’t you?
“Your figure is perfect,” Vanessa says. Vanessa has to say this because she’s my best friend. It’s in some sort of friendship handbook or something. Come to think of it, I think it may also be in the code of the Girl Scouts. I’ll have to look that up sometime. But, either way, she has to say that.
She especially has to say that I look skinny to me because she’s tall and thin and is a dead ringer for Halle Berry and I’m short and not thin and not a dead ringer for anyone. Yes, Vanessa is tall and thin and gorgeous and she is still my best friend. I really think that says a lot about my character, don’t you think?
“Vanessa’s right,” my mom says, now clearly tipsy from downing my entire glass of champagne in two gulps. “All of these dresses are made for skinny, anorexic girls. We Miller girls have curves. Let’s get out of here.”
“Let’s have a bite to eat before we go to our next appointment,” I say to my mother as I take the empty champagne glass from hand.
“May I ask where you’re going next?” the salesperson asks as my mother and I retreat to our dressing rooms to change back into our own clothing.
“Monique deVouvray,” Vanessa says and I can practically hear, from inside of my dressing room, the salesperson’s mouth dropping to the ground. I look up and see Vanessa, trying to pretend that she doesn’t notice, as if she goes to the most exclusive dress designer in the world every day, but I can see the edges of her mouth fighting back a tiny smile. Reason number four hundred and thirty-two why Vanessa is such a great friend—she hates this mean salesperson as much as I do for asking me if I was planning to lose weight all morning, while my mother, the size six, fit into every dress in the showroom perfectly. (Salesperson: What a figure! Did you used to dance? Me: I took ballet and tap until I was twelve. Salesperson: I meant your mother. My mother: Well, I do love to cha-cha!)
“Yes, our appointment at Monique’s,” my mother says with a slight French accent, trying to stand up without teetering over. “We really must go.”
My mother was so excited when we got an appointment with Monique deVouvray, wedding dress designer to the stars, that she bragged about it for three weeks at her weekly mah johngg game, which was funny since she was mis-pronouncing Monique’s last name for the first two of them.
“My mother will kill us if we’re late for Monique,” Vanessa says, leading the charge out of the dressing room.
“Your mother knows Monique?” the salesperson asks, doing her best to furrow her Botox-ed brow.
“Yes, she does,” Vanessa says, her right arm linked in my left as she guides me quickly to the elevator. “Thanks so much for everything. Bye!”
As we hit the button for the elevator, I can hear my mother whispering to the salesperson that Vanessa’s mom used to model with Monique.
My mother dashes into the elevator just as the doors are about to close (I was willing to leave her up there, it was Vanessa who pushed the ‘door open’ button) and in moments, we are down at the car.
Vanessa’s dad lent us his car and driver for the day so that we could hop around town to our various appointments. The three of us piled into the backseat of Vanessa’s father’s huge Mercedes (affectionately dubbed the “Nazi-mobile” by my mother) and headed uptown.
“We need to get you a bite to eat before stopping at Monique’s,” I say to my mother. “We don’t want you throwing up all over the couture.”
“There are a million little delis up Third Avenue,” Vanessa offers.
“Let’s go to Tasty D instead,” my mom slurs, “A moment on the lips, a lifetime on the hips!” She’s been saying that my whole life.
“Tommy,” I say to the driver, “would you please pull over here?” I run out of the car and hop into Dunkin’ Donuts, returning with a massive cruller, a delicacy that I know my mother cannot refuse.
“Well,” my mother says, “I suppose I could have just one tiny bite.”
Vanessa rolls her eyes.
By the time we pull up to Monique’s exquisite Upper East Side brownstone, my mother has downed the cruller… and also a stale cup of coffee that Tommy still had up front since this morning.
The brownstone looks exactly like the type of place where Monique deVouvray and her glamorous French businessman husband, Jean Luc—a couple who’s been fodder for the tabloids since before Angelina, Lindsay, and Britney were even born—would live. To call it a brownstone doesn’t even really do it justice. It’s a huge brick house right across the street from Central Park. The ground floor is divided by a gated portico, and if you peek in (never mind those pesky security cameras), you can see straight back to the lap pool. On the left side of the portico is a two car garage and on the right is a white brick stairway leading to the front entranceway—a huge mahogany double door with a big brass knocker, monogrammed with Monique and Jean Luc’s initials. Basically, the entrance to their single family home is nicer than the one in the more-than-we-can-really-afford co-op building where Jack and I live. Actually, the entrance is really nicer than 98% of the buildings I’ve ever seen in New York City. And that’s including Gracie Mansion.
As we walk up, I can hear clicking over my shoulder. I turn around to see a photographer hiding behind a parked car across the street. Only his lens peeks out from the hood of the car. A tiny smile creeps onto my lips. Now that I’m going to the person who designs wedding dresses for movie stars, maybe I’ll start being mistaken for a movie star! Vanessa sees me sucking in my stomach for the camera and says: “No need to get ready for your close up, Brooke, they’re not here for us. The paparazzi is always staking this place out, just waiting for something to happen.”
And it often does. In 1979, Mick Jagger took off all of his clothing in the middle of a cocktail party at Monique and Jean Luc’s brownstone and jumped right into the lap pool. This probably wouldn’t have made news, but for the fact that as he jumped, he dragged Monique with him. Who was wearing a white dress with very little underneath. (Playboy reportedly offered her one million dollars to pose nude after the “white dress” pictures became public, explaining to her that everyone’s already seen it all already. Monique, to hear People Magazine tell it, was unamused.) In 1985, Brat Packer Bobby Highe was caught in a compromising position in one of the guest bathrooms with Monique’s niece. Who was fourteen at the time. He somehow got out of the criminal charges, but later told Vanity Fair that it wasn’t fair—French women were so beguiling that he really had no choice. (Which, strangely, later became the advertising slogan for Monique’s signature perfume when it came out the following year.) In 1998, it was Monique’s husband who was front page news—hosting a very bizarre “business” meeting in their kitchen with various condiments being used and passed around, but no actual food in sight. And on a summer evening back in 2003, you couldn’t get within a ten block radius of the entire Upper East Side since Monique and Jean Luc were hosting an engagement party for Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck. The New York City Police had to block off the entire eastern side of Central Park since photographers and tourists all up and down Fifth Avenue blocked traffic by standing smack dab in the middle of the street.
But I assume that nothing like that will be happening today. Even so, it’s not a bad idea to suck in my gut.
“How do you know they’re not looking to take pictures of us?” I ask, turning my head slightly so that the pap can get my best angle—left side of my face.
“They’re not,” she says. I can feel her eyes burning into the side of my head.
“Yes, but how do you know?” I say, careful not to move, so that I don’t mess up the shot.
“I just know,” Vanessa says, “okay?”
I begrudgingly nod back at her, but I can see her standing a little straighter, no doubt for the benefit of our invisible paparazzo friend.
On the first floor of Monique’s brownstone, we are greeted by a doorman, which is strange for a private single family residence. Even in New York City, only large apartment buildings usually have doormen. But then Vanessa explains the set-up to me: Monique’s studio is on the second floor and she lives with her husband on the top three floors. (Vanessa doesn’t say a word about the lap pool, but I know what I saw.) I should mention here that it is absolutely impossible to get an appointment with Monique—she only designs for movie stars and diplomats and really really really rich people, so she doesn’t have an open showroom that you can just walk into off the street. (That and the fact that the daily’s Column Five gossip mavens are always looking to catch her or her husband in the act of something.) We only got our appointment because of Vanessa’s mom, Millie—she and Monique lost touch for a while after modeling together in the 60’s, but had recently become friendly again when Millie needed a dress for a reception at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute.
“You must be Vanessa,” Monique says as we enter her studio, pulling Vanessa in for a hug. “You’re just as beautiful as your mother. Your mother tells me that you are a big important lawyer?”
“Well, I don’t know how big and important I am,” Vanessa says, “but I am a lawyer. And so’s our bride. We actually used to work together at Gilson Hecht before Brooke abandoned me.”
“You still have Jack working with you there,” I say, smiling at my self-indulgent mention of my fiancé’s name.
“Ah, Brooke, our bride,” Monique says.
She kisses me on both cheeks and I introduce Monique to my mother.
“Enchanté,” my mother says and curtsies. Maybe we should have stopped off at McDonald’s—the woman is clearly still drunk. I look over to Vanessa for some assistance with my mother, but she has meandered over to look at a framed copy of an old Vogue cover with both Monique and her mother on it. The contrast between Millie’s dark skin and Monique’s pale complexion is striking, and I watch Vanessa examine every square inch of the photograph. Millie, who I see frequently at her downtown art gallery, is every bit as gorgeous today as she was then, if not more so.
So is Monique. Who is now seated on a love seat with my mother. Who is drinking yet another glass of champagne.
“A celebration, no?” Monique says in her thick French accent, handing me my own glass. She wears black cigarette pants and a pristine white button down shirt with its sleeves rolled up. On her feet, she wears simple black Chanel ballet slippers. Vanessa is wearing the same pair today in tan. Monique’s hair is pulled into a tight bun, pinned back exactly the same way that Vanessa’s mom wears hers.
“Absolutely,” I say, taking the glass, and trying to push my mother’s drink as far away from her as possible without actually tipping it over the edge of the coffee table.
“So, Brooke,” Monique says, “Tell me a little bit about yourself. I want to know everything. Tell me about what you like, what you don’t like. Everything.”
“She wants something with sleeves,” my mother says, reaching across the bowl of candy that Monique has placed on the table, in a play for her champagne glass. Hasn’t that woman learned her lesson?
“Mom,” I say, trying to appear happy to be here with my skinny lush of a mother.
Monique intervenes: “Let us do this,” she says, “Mother, you will look at mother of the bride dresses while I go with daughter to look at some dresses for her. Yes?”
“Well, I don’t want to steal my baby’s thunder,” my mother says as Monique guides her to a rack of beautiful dresses. Monique only does couture, so every dress is put together entirely by hand, with extensive beadwork and exquisite seams and workmanship. She has a few samples on hand for my mother to study and, like a baby with something shiny in her hands, my mother is mesmerized. We leave her at the rack.
Monique and I walk over to another area of the showroom where she has a number of muslin garments in different styles.
“First,” she says, “we put you in just a few things to see what styles you like best. What works best. Yes?”
“Yes,” I say.
“Is there a style that you know you want for sure?”
“I’m pretty open.”
“Very good,” Monique says, “Then we try. Off you go.”
I go into the dressing room with Vanessa and she zips me into the first dress, an A-line with a sweetheart neckline.
“So, are you okay with all this today?” I ask Vanessa.
“Of course,” she says, smiling as she smoothes out the dress for me, “I’m having a blast. Why wouldn’t I?”
“Because,” I say, looking at myself in the mirror, “well, you know. I just don’t want today to bring up any bad memories for you or anything.”
“I’m okay,” Vanessa says, still smiling, “I’m just happy for you.” I turn to face her and I notice that she’s still wearing her wedding ring. I wonder if she was wearing it all day and I just didn’t notice it, or if she put it on in the car so that she won’t have to face any questions about her impending divorce from an acquaintance of her mother.
“So, what do you think?” I ask as Monique comes into the fitting room.
“Beautiful,” she says as she picks up an enormous sketch pad and starts to draw. “How do you feel?”
“Pretty good,” I say.
“This next,” she says, gesturing with her pencil. Next up: a spaghetti strap bodice with a huge ball gown skirt.
We go off to dress and I turn to face Vanessa as she zips me up. “Do you want to talk about it at all?”
“No,” she says. “But I have an appointment next week to meet my divorce lawyer for the first time. I was thinking that maybe if you weren’t busy….”
“Of course,” I say, “I’ll be there. But, am I coming as your lawyer or your friend?”
“Friend,” Vanessa says with a smile and I smile back at her.
“Now that we don’t work at the same law firm anymore, I could represent you, if you want,” I offer.
“You’re a commercial litigator,” Vanessa points out, “so if I want to start a copyright action, you’ll be the first person I call. For this, though, you can just come as my friend.”
“Done. So?” I ask, twirling around like a little girl trying on her mother’s dress. “Do you like this one?”
“Too princess-y,” Vanessa says, as I walk out of the fitting room for Monique to take a peek.
“Beautiful,” Monique says again as she looks up from her sketch pad. “How do you feel in it?” She asks the same thing for each of the six other muslins I try on for fit.
After the scoop neck with a straight skirt, Monique has me change and come back to the love seat. First, she tells Vanessa and I about how she makes each individual wedding dress. To demonstrate her point, she takes out some of the dresses she is working on to give us a sense of her workmanship. Each one is more beautiful than the next—miles of lace, tons of tulle, and acres of silk—I’m almost afraid to touch the pristine white fabric. One dress in particular catches my eye. It’s got a deep V down the front, ending in a gorgeous crystal broach, with a flared trumpet skirt. The detail is absolutely impeccable. As Vanessa and I ooh and aah over it, my eye catches a tiny ink stain at the base of the dress. I look at Vanessa to see if she notices it, too, but she’s already on to a cowl neck with an A-line skirt.
I’m completely paralyzed—what should I do? Should I dare tell the Monique deVouvray that there is actually something wrong with one of her gowns? One of her masterpieces? Someone’s dream dress? What if this woman’s wedding is this weekend and there’s no time to fix the dress? I don’t want to be responsible for ruining someone’s dream!
Worse yet, Monique could have a ‘you break it, you buy it’ policy. And let’s face it, if my mother thought I looked fleshy in a simple gown, I’m quite certain she won’t approve of all of the flesh that would be on display in this number.
Okay, this is fine. Be cool, be confident, and act like you didn’t even notice this little mistake. Just move on to the next dress. I covertly check my hands for blue ink.
“Brooke, I see you’ve noticed my blue good luck ribbon!” Monique calls out.
“I didn’t touch anything!” I say. I was never quite good at playing it cool.
“Flip over the fabric,” she says, walking over to me. “It is a tradition that when you are making a wedding dress for someone by hand you sew in a blue ribbon for good luck. I do that for each of my dresses. So, now let us see the sketches I have drawn up. Just to give you idea of what I will do for you.”
Monique has created six fabulous sketches for me—each one incorporates different details that I mentioned as being my favorites and the styles that flatter me most.
The second I see it, I know. I just know. The sketch jumps off the page and practically speaks to me. Although it’s a rough black and white drawing, I can practically see my face in the scribble where a head should be.
The bodice has an off the shoulder sweetheart neckline, fitted tight to the body with bones inside of the thick silk. It has capped sleeves that flow naturally from the neckline and give the dress an air of romance. The bottom of the dress is an elegant A-line, not too princess y—just the right amount. The final perfect detail is a beautiful silk ribbon that ties around the waist. It is elegant and understated and everything I could possibly hope for in a wedding dress.
“That’s it,” Vanessa says, pointing at the sketch.
“I know,” I say, turning towards her and smiling.
“Ta da!” my mother says as she comes out of the dressing room in one of Monique’s gowns. I am immediately concerned about this for two reasons: the first is that Monique did not tell my mother to try on any of the sample dresses. Rather, she merely brought her to a rack and told her to start looking. The second is that it’s not a mother of the bride dress at all. It is one of Monique’s wedding dresses.
“Did Monique give her more champagne?” I whisper to Vanessa. Vanessa laughs out loud and then quickly covers her mouth with her hand.
Now, if I were Monique, I would have screamed, “Take that dress off right this instant, you drunken deranged idiot!” But, Monique is far too classy for such things. Instead, she says, “Ah, yes, Ms. Miller, what a gorgeous figure. You look good in everything I create. Let me help you out of that and we can discuss your mother of the bride dress.”
My cell phone rings as Monique and my mother are walking back to the fitting room. I look at my caller ID and see that it’s my fiancé, Jack.
“Jackie,” I say. Just seeing his number come up on my caller ID makes me smile uncontrollably.
“Brookie,” he says. “How’s it going?”
“Fabulous,” I say, fantasizing about how perfect we are going to look together on our wedding day. Even if Jack showed up in a paper bag, he’d look great—all shaggy brown hair and gorgeous baby blue eyes—but I’m sure that he’ll wear an actual tuxedo. A brown paper bag wouldn’t really match my couture.
“That good?” he asks. “So, I guess your mother is behaving herself?”
“Well, no,” I say, glancing over at my mother who is now dancing by herself to the soft jazz Monique has playing, spinning in tiny circles like a little girl at her own birthday party. “But, it doesn’t matter. Jack, I found it.”
“Found what?” he asks.
“The one,” I say, barely believing it as the words come out of my mouth.
“I thought I was the one?” he asks. “Don’t tell me that you found another guy to marry?” He pauses dramatically. “Well, even if you did, you found him at a bridal boutique, so I’m sure I can take him.”
“No, I mean,” I say. “Okay, yes, you are the one, you know that. I didn’t mean that.”
“What did you mean?” he says and I can practically see his devilish little smile through the phone lines.
“I mean, I found it! I found the perfect wedding dress.”