I GAVE MY GROOM TO HIS MOTHER

My future motherinlaw suddenly insisted on wearing a wedding gown to my wedding, and my fiancé's answer was that I should be the one to give in. "She's my mother.

Would it kill you to give her this one thing?" I smiled and said okay. Then I pulled off my veil and put it on her myself. "Why stop at one gown?

Today's groom—I'm giving him to you too." Chapter 1 Ethan and I had been together two years. This past fall we got officially engaged, and both sets of parents met.

The wedding was set for a month out, and since the weather was good, the two of us went to the bridal salon to shop for dresses. Ethan's mother came along.

The three of us were laughing about something out on the sidewalk, and then we walked in and, of all things, his mother went straight for the salon's signature gown.

At first it warmed me. It felt like she cared.

But before I could step over, she had the gown off the rack and was holding it up against herself in the mirror, asking my fiancé if she looked pretty.

The bridal consultant glanced at me, clearly embarrassed, and asked under her breath if I was there to help his mother shop. What could I say.

I walked over, tugged Ethan's sleeve, and asked him what exactly was going on. Ethan couldn't have cared less. "My mom's just happy about you.

Anybody else, you think she'd make this big a deal out of it?" "But it's a wedding gown." I looked over at her, chatting and laughing with the consultant, and something in me turned. "At our wedding—your mom in that, it's not really appropriate, is it?" "What's not appropriate?

What goes on in your head all day?" Something in what I'd said must have set him off, because he suddenly shouted at me. "If you think my family isn't good enough, just say it.

Don't dance around making up reasons." "What is that supposed to mean?" The shouting stunned me, and my eyes went hot. "What did I say? I didn't say anything!

You're the one who has a problem with me, aren't you?" Every eye in the store turned toward us. Even his mother looked over from the mirror, gown still in her hands.

She came over, gave Ethan's shirt a tug, and frowned at me. "What is this? You have to make a scene in front of everybody?

Danielle, is there anything here that can't wait till we're home? All these people are watching. Can you settle down?" The way the people around us looked at me changed right then.

I could even hear someone murmuring, sizing me up. I felt awful. Today was supposed to be a happy day, and instead I was the one swallowing this.

I was so angry I turned and walked out. Let the two of them try on whatever they wanted.

Clearly neither of them thought they'd done anything wrong, so what was I still doing there—watching her model wedding gowns? I'm not that pathetic.

I told my mom about it when I got home, and she was furious too. But she had more patience than I did. My dad sat there smoking without a word.

She pulled him in, and the two of them put their heads together. Every bit of the smiling warmth they'd been showing went away.

Relatives who came by to congratulate us got the cold shoulder and asked, awkwardly, what was going on.

My mom just said the invitations and the venue weren't settled yet, no rush, no rush.

It dragged on like that for days, until everyone noticed how slow things had gotten at our house, like my family had no interest in marrying me off at all.

That was when the Fenwicks started to worry. I hadn't seen him in days. After we'd parted on such bad terms, I'd figured he would cool off and see what he'd done wrong.

Instead he dug in and waited for me to apologize first. Not one text, not one call. Like he was above it. Chapter 2 That made my whole family angrier.

When he finally showed up at our door with gifts to apologize, nobody paid him any attention. My dad used to clap him on the shoulder and call him son.

Now he left him standing in the doorway and went off with a little spray bottle to water his plastic cactus. My mom was worse.

She ran a mop over the living room floor without the slightest sign of inviting him in.

It was them putting him in his place, and it was a message: a Lockhart daughter doesn't get pushed around.

I watched his face change, watched him swallow it down again and again, and then drop every bit of his attitude and apologize, gently and politely.

At the end he took my hand and told me his mother had regretted it for days, she was just too ashamed to come to me.

He was behaving well, and there was nothing to fault in the way he owned it, so I let it drop.

I only told him, seriously, that if his mom wanted to wear a white bridal gown, he had to tell me ahead of time so I could switch to a champagnecolored dress and stay out of her way.

That way nobody would be embarrassed. And nobody at the wedding would be upstaging anybody. He nodded and said mmhm. And that was the end of our little argument.

I figured she wouldn't do anything like that again. Besides, I'd given them a solution, reasonably, without a fight. A decent family would never make the same mistake twice.

Who could have known… There was a lot to get through on the day of the wedding.

I sat on the edge of my own bed in my own room, in my wedding gown, white from head to toe, smiling, waiting for Ethan to come get me.

My bridesmaids sat around me chattering, every one of them grinning. The older relatives laughed and carried on, marveling that I'd grown up and was getting married just like that.

My mom hid in the study and cried and cried, holding on to my dad's hand and refusing to let go.

And my dad, who never said much, gripped my hand hard as he watched me about to step out the front door. "You have a good life, you hear me?

Anything makes you unhappy, you come home. Dad will take care of it." That last part was aimed at Ethan. He made Ethan swear—swear that he would be good to me.

If Ethan ever made me unhappy after the wedding, ever treated me badly, my dad would come pounding on their door and bring me home, whatever it took.

I cried until I couldn't speak, and I cried my makeup off in the car.

The hairandmakeup artist fixed it again and again and still couldn't keep up, and finally gave up and told me to cry it out first and we'd deal with it after.

Ethan, though, had no expression at all.

He was somewhere else the whole ride, fiddling over and over with the boutonnière on his lapel. "What's wrong?" I took his hand. "Nervous?" "A little." He said it slowly. "Danielle, we're basically husband and wife now, right?

And a wife backs her husband up in public, right?" "Why are you bringing that up?" I gave him a mock glare. "I'm going to make you look good, obviously.

Don't worry about that." "Good." He seemed to let out a breath, and quickly wiped his palms on his pant legs. It was a strange thing to do, and quietly, it put me on edge.

Thankfully nothing went wrong before we got to the hotel, and I was taken to the bridal suite to have my makeup redone and my gown straightened out.

To see if anything had been missed. A few bridesmaids crowded in to help, and one of them had the sense to run out and get me water so I could wet my throat before I walked out.

But when she came back her face was red all over and her shoulders were shaking with anger. "What happened? Did somebody on the hotel staff give you a hard time?" I was annoyed.

We'd paid them a fortune. They couldn't even hand over a glass of water? What kind of hotel was this. Chapter 3 I got up to go out and settle it for her myself.

She caught my arm. "It's not that, Danielle. I'm not mad at the staff." Her face got redder and redder, and her heel came down hard on the floor. "Goddammit, what is this!

I have never seen—never seen a family with so little shame!" "What is it?" A chill went through me, especially when her eyes went red with hurt as she talked.

She held my hand and kept telling me not to get angry yet, afraid I'd make myself sick. Nobody else spoke.

The room went quiet, everyone waiting for her to say it. "Danielle, that future motherinlaw of yours…" "She's wearing the same wedding gown as you!" The girls held me up and told me to sit down on the bed and rest.

One fanned my face, another poured me water. Every one of them was out of her mind with anger. Their faces were burning, and they held it in. Because I was crying.

I cried without a sound, tears just falling. The makeup I'd only just had redone was ruined again. But I wasn't crying because I was hurt, or because I was humiliated.

It was a physical reaction to pain. I couldn't hold back the rage about to erupt out of me, and all I could do was pinch my own thigh to keep myself calm. "What do we do, Danielle?

This is disgusting!" The youngest bridesmaid spoke up, unsure of herself. "Do we take it? I don't want you to take it!" "But right now all anybody can call it is disgusting.

Danielle hasn't gone out there yet, so nobody knows what's behind it. What if people say it's just a misunderstanding?

Then Danielle's the one who ends up embarrassed." The oldest bridesmaid was much calmer. We all talked it over, and in the end we decided to send for Ethan.

He was the groom today, and he was the son of the woman out there parading around in the same gown as mine. One way or another, he owed us an explanation.

I had told him plainly that anything like this had to be discussed with me first, and he still hid all of it and let his mother wear the same gown to spite me.

What was going through his head!

The more I thought about it, the angrier I got, and the second Ethan came through the door I went at him and slapped him hard enough to knock his face sideways. "What did you tell me?" I screamed it. "You told me your mother understood it was wrong to wear a wedding gown and stand up there with me.

And now?" "The same gown as mine! What is your mother thinking?" "If you don't want this wedding, then we don't have one! I'm not begging you!

Why would you do something this disgusting to me?" I went to slap him again and he caught my wrist. "Are you done making a scene?" He shoved me hard, and the bridesmaids rushed in and caught me, scrambling, so I didn't trip over the gown and go down. "So she wore a wedding gown!

You think it was easy, her raising me? What does a gown prove?

How can you be this unreasonable?" "I'm unreasonable?" I got up and went right at him. "Which one of us is unreasonable?

Did I say it or not—if she wanted to wear a white bridal gown, I'd switch to a champagne dress ahead of time!" "I'd stay out of her way, so everybody could have a happy day!" "What did you promise me?" "So everything you said was just bullshit?

Or was it on purpose, your mother, your whole family?" "You had to humiliate me today, is that it?" By then there was nothing left to save. I couldn't care about anything else.

I gathered my skirt, shouldered past Ethan, and headed for the door. Screw the wedding. I'd taken enough humiliation for one day. Chapter 4 Ethan saw it differently.

The second he realized I meant it, he panicked and came after me, grabbing hold of me, telling me not to leave.

Telling me to give him some dignity on the biggest day of his life and stop losing my temper over every little thing. By then I saw him for exactly what he was.

Even now, he thought I was the one making trouble over nothing, throwing a fit, trying to wreck everything. Everything was my fault. Everything was me nitpicking. What could I say.

I told him to get the hell away from me and stop standing between me and home. The bridesmaids saw I meant it and closed in around me.

They packed in tight on all sides, kept Ethan back, and hurried me toward the front of the hotel.

The hairandmakeup artist and the photographer had no idea what was happening, and when they saw me leaving they called for their people to follow.

A whole crowd of us came streaming along behind. There were so many of us that we pulled in a lot of curious eyes.

Even over at the head table, where people had already been seated, someone got up to come watch.

And our crowd ran straight into her and a few of the Fenwicks, greeting guests at the ballroom doors. Gown versus gown. The bride and the groom's mother, in matching white.

Right away people started to feel that something was wrong. With only her in it, guests had stared, but nobody had said it out loud.

Now that I was standing here too, it meant something much uglier. And she still had that innocent face on, asking me why I'd come out when it wasn't time yet.

I laughed, cold, glanced at Ethan and all that pleading on his face, and raised my voice. "It must have taken you a while to get into that gown today." "So?

Was it everything you wanted?

Is everybody telling you how beautiful you look?" "You're the center of attention today, aren't you." "Danielle Lockhart!" The longer I talked, the worse it sounded, and Ethan came running to drag me away.

The bridesmaids stepped in and blocked him. The whole place was in an uproar. Everybody was there for the show.

I'd already lost every shred of face, so what the hell did I care now. Watching that family stand there playing dumb made something in me burn.

I reached up, pulled off my veil, walked against the crowd until I stood in front of her, and put it on her. "A gown isn't enough. You need the veil to really sell it!

Otherwise people might wonder who the star is today!" "Danielle Lockhart, that's my mother!

Who does something like this to somebody?" Across the crowd Ethan was still roaring at me. "The wedding isn't even over and you've got no respect for anyone. She's my mother.

Would it kill you to give her this one thing?" "Ethan…" The woman in front of me went instantly frail, gazing at her son, pitiful.

If I hadn't seen it myself, I wouldn't have known she had a victim act like that in her—one second, and she was the tragic heroine of her own sob story.

Just as well she showed herself early, before I married in and had to regret it. So I stopped caring altogether, raised my hands, and started to clap. "Give?

Of course I'll give!" "Today I'm giving up the groom too!" The guests who'd heard us went off like a bomb. The room got louder than a flea market on a Saturday.

I laughed and led the applause, and my bridesmaids happily clapped along with me.

And in that one satisfying moment, Ethan took his chance, rushed me, grabbed me by the throat, and slapped me. "That's for upsetting my mother!

That's for upsetting my mother!" I never saw it coming. I took it full on.

The bridesmaids froze for one second, and the next they were on him, furious, nails dug in, dragging Ethan down and shredding his face