Page 86 of The Fiancée Farce
Gemma (8:52 p.m.):Ha, U-Haul. Look at us. Doing sapphic stereotypes proud, moving in together after less than two months. Go us.
Tansy (8:55 p.m.):There *are* some extenuating circumstances around the timeline of our moving in together.
Gemma (8:56 p.m.):True.
Gemma (8:57 p.m.):I’m thinking whoever coined the term “marriage of convenience” did *not* have to bubble-wrap this much Baccarat crystal because let me tell you, it is *anything* but convenient.
Gemma (8:58 p.m.):Not that I’m complaining, mind.
Tansy (9:00 p.m.):Tell me about it. I’ve been sorting through my books trying to figure out which to part with.
Gemma (9:02 p.m.):Excuse me?! Books? Why in God’s name are you getting rid of your books?
Tansy (9:03 p.m.):Not all of them! I’m just... condensing. I’ve been using the spare room for storage. An overflow of sorts.
Tansy (9:04 p.m.):It’s kind of gotten out of hand, and unless you’re looking to sleep on a bed of Harlequin Presents, downsizing is a necessity.
Gemma (9:10 p.m.):I’m going to assume you have a perfectly decent bed in your room, don’t you?
Tansy (9:12 p.m.):I do...
Gemma (9:13 p.m.):Perfect. I’ll just bunk with you.
Gemma (9:14 p.m.):Assuming you’re agreeable?
Gemma (9:14 p.m.):Also assuming you don’t snore.
Tansy (9:16 p.m.):To sharing a bed? With you?
Tansy (9:17 p.m.):Yeah! Sure. That’s cool. And no, no snoring.
Gemma (9:18 p.m.):Good. Cover hogging I’m amenable to, but snoring I just can’t abide by.
Gemma (9:18 p.m.):So, Saturday?
Tansy (9:20 p.m.):Sunday would be better, but if you’re set on Saturday, I can probably make it work.
Gemma (9:24 p.m.):Sunday it is.???
***
“There’s someone here to see you.” Kat poked her head into the office. “Want me to take over?”
“If you could, that would be fantastic.” Tansy was nearly finished transcribing personalization requests from printed order forms to sticky notes, placing them inside their respective books for a local author to stop by and sign tomorrow. “Did you happen to catch their name?”
“Um, yeah, Caleb something. McCrory, I think? He said he had an appointment.”
Tansy capped her pen and stood. “An appointment with me?”
The name didn’t ring a bell. She leaned forward, sliding the mouse across its pad, waking up her monitor and quickly navigating over to her calendar. She frowned. “That’s odd.”
She didn’t have anything written down, but she’d been so scattered lately.
With the wedding fast approaching, unexpected appointments had been cropping up left and right. Their wedding planner was a blessing, a paragon of organization, the perfect wedding planner, but Katherine,oh Katherine.
She’d dropped by every other day for two weeks, dragging Tansy away from the store, fromwork, for a hair and makeup trial, to have her dress tailored, to buy a dress for the rehearsal dinner, to go over the seating chart, to buy wedding shoes, tobreak inher wedding shoes, to change the seating chart once RSVPs started rolling in.
Because heaven forbid Katherine’s stepdaughter have a less-than-perfect day. How would it reflect upon Katherine if everything wasn’tjust so?
