Page 117 of Sexting My Ex’s Dad

I nod. “Are you?”

She smiles, but I can tell she’s nervous. Not bad nervous. Big-day nervous. Love-can-make-you-shaky nervous.

“Yeah,” she says softly. “I’m okay.”

I touch the ring on her finger. She still looks at it sometimes like it surprised her by showing up there. “You really get to keep him now.”

Mom laughs. “That’s the plan.”

Maya suddenly appears behind us holding up a box. “Found it. It was under your flower basket, you tiny menace.”

I think about that. “That sounds like bad planning.”

Mom kisses my forehead before Maya can answer.

Then there’s another knock, and Grandma Veronica comes in.

That is still weird. Mom and Grandma are trying to get better at each other. That’s what Mom says. In real life it mostly means they drink coffee and talk in very nice voices that are not actually nice. One time Maya came home after seeing them and said, “Well, nobody threw stuff around, so I’m calling it progress.”

Today Grandma is wearing green and pearls and her careful face. She smiles at me first, then looks at Mom and does that tiny pause she always does before she says anything. “You look beautiful,” she tells Mom.

Mom goes quiet for a bit. “Thank you.”

Grandma smooths the top of my dress. “And you look very grown-up.”

“I’m flower-girl grown-up,” I explain.

“That sounds serious.”

“It is.”

Mom looks at Grandma through the mirror. “We’re mostly on time.”

Grandma looks around at all the pins and flowers and open bags and Maya carrying three bouquets like she’s doing battle. “That feels optimistic.”

Mom makes a snorting noise before she can stop herself.

I hear it. Grandma hears it too.

For one tiny second they almost smile at the same time, and I don’t say anything since that feels like the kind of thing you can scare away.

Then a lady brings in the wedding dress, and everything gets quiet.

Even me.

Mom stands up.

Maya and another lady help her into the dress, and there’s so much white fabric for a second I think she might disappear inside it. But then she turns around, and she looks so pretty I forget how to blink.

Nobody says anything.

Then I do. “Dad is going to lose his mind.”

Maya laughs so hard she has to put the bouquet down.

Mom covers her face with both hands. “Ivy.”

“What?” I say. “He is.”