Excerpt: Phoning It In [working title]

I glance over the remaining items on my maid of honor checklist: be available for fittings (not geographically possible), help with the planning of the rehearsal dinner (well, I’m already here, aren’t I?), be selective in choosing the invitations, placecards and other printed materials (no problem — I’m the one creating them). Nothing too stressful. After I’m done with the first sheet, I flip to the next one: a list of items I should make sure to have on the big day. Except, unlike the first checklist, this one has been altered.

“You want me to bring pink hairspray?” I squeak, staring into her open, heart-shaped face. “Pink?”

“It’s going with the look. You’ll see. Just skip the rest of that for now . . .” Sophie reaches out to shuffle the papers in my hands, setting a different sheet on top. “Here’s the list of costume ideas I had for everyone.”

As I look over the list that range from strange to incredible ridiculous, I feel my mouth open — but nothing is exhaled. “So you’re . . . you’re actually serious about this? A Halloween wedding. With Halloween costumes.”

“Yes.”

“At your wedding.”

“Yep.”

I scan the items with a pale fingertip, looking for my name. I’m identified as "Lilah, MOH." And, as I expected, I’m supposed to be a “punk rock goddess.”

“I thought it would be fun,” Sophie beams, wrapping her tiny hands around the porcelain mug on the table. A young man at the table next to us flips through a newspaper, sending a small breeze which ruffles her curls. She looks like a small, happy child. “Lilah the punk rocker. Just like Nate.”

“Nate is not a punk rocker,” I reply disdainfully, quickly looking for his name on the costume sheet. He’s listed as a “zombie groomsman.”

“He’ll be himself, just undead,” Sophie chirps. “I was thinking green face paint, blood coming from the mouth. A gash in the forehead or something. We’ll slick his hair back.”

“That sounds . . .” My brow furrows as I try to come up with something supportive that still manages to point out how insane this plan is. There’s nothing there. “Have you showed this to Bryce?”

“He helped me come up with a lot of them.”

“Like the zombie groomsman?”

“That’s one of them.” She waves a hand vaguely. “I thought it would be fun for everyone to look different. He wanted everyone to be the same.”

Though I can scarcely believe the words are forming on my lips, I say quickly, “Well, I think that if one person is a zombie groomsman, all the men should be zombie groomsmen. Don’t you think? For uniformity’s sake?”

“So what would all the women be?” she prompts, pouting that I haven’t taken her side.

As she seems reasonably serious about this whole sick theme, I make a split-second decision to roll with it. Sophie’s always the boss, anyway. I grin. “Zombie bridesmaids, of course. In matching black dresses and bloodied faces.”

“Yikes.” She lifts her upper lip. “And what would I be?”

“The zombie bride.”

Her entire face lights up, eyes sparkling mischievously. “The zombie bride. And the zombie groom?”

“Exactly.”

Sophie sticks out her small hand dramatically, tightening my fingers in a vice-like shake. “My dear, I think we have a brand-new theme.”