Mel's Arc

Chapter 22 of 36

Nine days out, Mel had a floor and bare walls. She had also placed one order she counted on. A supplier two valleys over had promised her benches, cloth, and a wedding dress cut to her measurements. That order would fill the empty barn and put her in a proper gown. Then the letter came. Ted read it first and passed it to her without a word. The supplier backed out. No reason given, but Mel knew the reason. The Caldwells had heard the barn wedding was real. Their reach had stretched two valleys to shut one more door. "They found him," Mel said. "They found the last man who'd sell to us." Ted set his jaw. "We drive out and buy somewhere farther." "With what days?" Mel said. "There's no time to chase another supplier and wait for a dress to be cut." She pressed her fists to the workbench. Every road out led back to Caldwell money. She was done walking their roads. "We stop buying," she said. "We make it ourselves. All of it." They started that hour. Mel and Ted built benches from the old rancher's leftover boards, plank seats on sawhorse legs, rough but solid. Word spread among the folks who'd clapped for her at the dance. A woman brought bolts of cloth. Two families sent wreaths of greenery and roses. Mel hung garlands across the barn doors and draped the cloth in soft folds down the front. By the fourth evening the plain board room looked festive, warm, ready. But she still had no dress. A woman who had backed her carried in a bundle wrapped in a sheet. "My mother's," she said. "Been in a trunk thirty years. Take it in where you need." Mel unwrapped it and stopped breathing. A wedding gown, ivory, layered lace and delicate flowers stitched through the skirt. It needed taking in at the waist, nothing more. Mel worked the seams by lamplight two nights running. When she pinned the last dart and slipped it on, it fit her like it was made for her. She turned once in the swept barn, and the layers moved with her. Ted watched from the doorway, holding his own outfit over one arm. He had traded a week's fence work for it, a tailored blue jacket and vest, crisp shirt, shined shoes. "Look at us," he said. "Nothing they sold. Nothing they can take." Mel looked at the dressed barn, the benches, the gown on her body. The Caldwells had cut the last supplier, and it had cost her nothing but sweat. She had stopped buying her wedding and started building it. "Eight days," she said. "We're ready." Then she caught herself. Ready to marry, yes. But the whole valley was invited, and half of it still answered to the Caldwells. She had a wedding now. She did not yet know who would dare come.