For the Right Reasons by Sean Lowe Page A

Bachelors or Bachelorettes had tied the knot. The original Bachelorette, Trista Rehn, married season 1 winner Ryan Sutter, while season 7 Bachelorette, Ashley Hebert, married J. P. Rosenbaum. No Bachelors had ever tied the knot with the girl they selected on the show.
    “I want to go on a shopping spree with you,” Shay said, taking the papers from my hands. “Where’s the part about your clothing allowance?”
    “Yeah, you won’t find anything about it,” I said, feeling my throat tighten. “I’m responsible for buying all of my own clothes.”
    “What?” Shay was incredulous. “That’s going to be a lot of money.”
    When she stated the obvious, I took a deep breath. Anxiety crawled through me until I thought of my wonderful Granddaddy. He was raised in Alabama, poorer than dirt. His father was very abusive physically and drank a lot. Granddaddy used to tell me the story about how when he was fourteen years old, he tried to get a job to take care of his family. He applied at the movie theater, and the manager told him he’d like to give him a job. He didn’t get the position, though, because they didn’t have uniforms back then. The manager told him, quite frankly, that his clothes weren’t nice enough. The thought of my Granddaddy as a fourteen-year-old kid having to support his family really put things into perspective.
    “I’ll figure it out,” I told Shay.
    “You can’t just hope for the best.” Andrew held up his hand. “You need a new suit. A good one. Let Shay and me get you one as our gift.”
    I was deeply touched by this kind gesture. It was an offer I couldn’t refuse.
    “It’s only because we don’t want you to make us look bad,” Shay said. “We’re the ones who sent in your application, after all.”
    “And speaking of hideous,” Andrew said. “What’s up with your hair?”
    Shay punched her husband in the arm.
    “Weren’t you wondering too?”
    Instinctively, I reached up to my head and ran my fingers through my hair, which was longer than usual.
    “The producers wanted me to grow it out,” I said. In one of my previous conversations with the producers, they told me to work on my look by growing out my hair. Maybe my All-American look was too boring for a prime-time television show.
    Shay looked at my head skeptically. “I don’t think your head is the right shape or . . . something.”
    The next day, I continued my show preparation by e-mailing the producer, breaking the news that my hair wasn’t looking as good as they had hoped, and getting it cut back to its normal, short, boring length. Then I went to the mall and filled up several bags of clothing—T-shirts, shorts, socks, sandals, tennis shoes, everything. But the suits were harder to figure out. Not only were they more expensive, but it was more complicated than simply picking one up at the mall. Apparently, my brother-in-law is the kind of big shot who gets all his suits custom made, so he sent his seamstress to take my measurements. Within weeks, I had a navy blue, perfectly fitted suit. My parents also kindly bought me a couple of suits, which completed my wardrobe for the show.
    Emily’s season was not going to begin in Hollywood. Because she didn’t want to disrupt her daughter’s life too dramatically, ABC agreed to bring the show’s production to her hometown. On the morning of my flight to Charlotte, North Carolina, I placed my new purchases on the table and began stuffing them into my bags.
    “Wait, wait,” Andrew said. He and Shay had come over because they agreed to take me to the airport. “Fold your shirts like this, and hang them up as soon as you get there,” he said as he situated my clothing in the bag.
    “There’s just not enough room.”
    “Well, you can’t show up looking like you slept on the street,” he said. By the time I had to leave, I threw five bags into the back of Andrew and Shay’s Tahoe. Yes, that was more than I was supposed to be allocated, but there was no way