All for a Song by Allison Pittman Page A

of the store. For more than an hour, they had been pulling bolts from the shelves, setting free rippling brooks of material to run along the cutting counter. Darlene and Mrs. Lorick seemed to think that the fate of the marriage itself rested in the drape and length of the wedding gown.
    Dorothy Lynn might have been ignorant about fabrics before, but she could by now identify a crepe de chine in her sleep, blindfolded, with both hands tethered by bric-a-brac. Never had she imagined that there were so many shades of white: ivory, eggshell, ecru. But all the conversation and planning washed over her, much as the waves of fabric wafted over her ever-slumping shoulder. She felt no connection to any of it. Every interwoven thread called to mind the image of Sister Aimee, a towering voice on the stage bringing an audience of a thousand to their feet for Jesus. His bride.
    And try as she might to flick the thought away, she couldn’t forget the impeccable white linen suit, or the man who wore it.
    “Oh, she’s thinkin’ about her future mister,” Mrs. Lorick said.She was a soft, plump woman with eyes the size of quarters swimming behind thick eyeglasses. Besides the measuring tape draped across her shoulders, a pair of sewing shears the length of her forearm hung in a jewel-encrusted holster at her waist, and she wore a lavender-colored pincushion like a corsage on her wrist. “You just tell me all about him, love, and then we’ll know exactly how to proceed.”
    Then, in an unexpected move, Mrs. Lorick came to stand right in front of her, putting one chubby hand over Dorothy Lynn’s heart and the other over her own, saying, “Speak of him.”
    Having a clear line of vision over the woman’s head, Dorothy Lynn cast a desperate glance at her sister, but the look of serene acceptance promised no hope of rescue.
    “She did the same thing when I needed a gown for the Chamber of Commerce New Year’s Eve ball,” Darlene whispered, “and it was fabulous.”
    “The ball or the gown?”
    “Both.”
    “Speak of him,” Mrs. Lorick insisted again.
    Not knowing the length to which the woman might use her shears to encourage obedience, Dorothy Lynn licked her lips and spoke. “He—his name is Brent, Brent Logan. He’s tall. . . .”
    Mrs. Lorick encouraged more.
    “He’s twenty-five years old and a pastor. At my father’s church. He went to college for it in Chicago. So he’s very smart. He wears glasses when he reads. And he has a deep voice. . . .”
    Mrs. Lorick pressed the heel of her hand into Dorothy Lynn’s rib, backing her up into the cutting counter for support.
    “Deeper,” she said, her voice almost trancelike.
    In the back of her mind, Dorothy Lynn heard the quivering violins from the movie the night before, as they had playedduring the young rajah’s psychic visions. The thought of it made her giggle.
    “Ah,” Mrs. Lorick sighed. “He makes you laugh.”
    Dorothy Lynn scoured her brain trying to single out a time Brent had made her laugh, and while she couldn’t recall any particular joke, she answered that yes, he did, sometimes. Often.
    “And he makes you feel safe?”
    She thought of his broad shoulders, his strong arms that could wrap around her twice over. “Yes.”
    “And you love him.”
    She could feel the warmth of his shirt beneath her cheek during those moments they stole away together. Perhaps there was something to Mrs. Lorick’s touch, because she suddenly felt very warm, a flush rising to her cheeks at the thought of Brent’s embrace. The pounding of her heart bounced off the woman’s palm as it doubled its pace.
    “I do.”
    “And when you are ready to go to him, to walk down the aisle to be joined to him, this man who makes you feel so safe and loved, this man whom you love, this man you are prepared to have at your side for the rest of your life, wouldn’t you love to be wearing a headpiece trimmed with artificial-pearl-beaded lace?”
    The question did nothing to jar