The Wedding Dress(40)

“Maybe he felt like a treed coon.”

Tim revved the saw without another word, without a sideways glance at her, but their conversation reverberated in her heart.

“Excuse me.” Charlotte disappeared into the bathroom and closing the door, she sat on the lowered toilet seat, unrolling toilet tissue until she could bury her face in a white cloud and cry. Beyond the door, the saw zipped and buzzed.

Emotions surfaced. Longings stirred. The walls around her heart trembled. Tim, her friend, was here, talking to her about her daddy, about the trunk.

But she wanted to talk to Tim, her friend, about Tim, her fiancé. How it hurt. How she missed him. How she didn’t blame him for not being ready for marriage when she held back big pieces of herself from him.

When her tears ebbed, Charlotte blew her nose, washed her face, and combed her hair. By the time she opened the bathroom door, the saw had done its job.

Tim held the hasp in his hand. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“I upset myself.” Charlotte knelt before the trunk. “Let’s see what’s inside.”

Tim gathered his tools. “I’ll be out of here in a second.”

Charlotte hooked her hand over his arm. “Please, stay. Someone has to witness this grand opening with me.”

“Are you sure? I mean, yeah, if you’re . . .”

Charlotte looked at him eye to eye for a moment. “I like having friend Tim here.”

He nodded, a warm smile on his lips. “Friend Tim likes being here.”

“It’s just that my friend Tim looks an awful lot like my fiancé Tim.”

“Maybe friend Tim will have a little chat with him.” He set the drill and bits back into the case.

“Yeah, and what’s he going to say?”

“You’re a darn fool.”

Charlotte grinned. “Okay, friend Tim, but take it easy on fiancé Tim.”

“We’ll see.” He tapped the trunk’s lid. “Come on, open this up.”

Charlotte raised the lid with a ping of expectation. The fragrance of cedar escaped and surrounded them. Peering inside, she started digging through layers of tissue paper. “I think it’s empty. Why would Purple Man want me to open an empty trunk?”

Tim shoved his arm inside and pushed the paper around. “There’s got to be something in here.”

“Like what, lost treasure?” Charlotte ran her hand along the bottom of the trunk. “Gold? Rubies?”

“Sure, why not? Whoa, Nellie, I think I found something.” Tim raised a soft linen bag from the tissue paper. The top was pinched closed with a drawstring.

“What? Let me see.” Charlotte moved with Tim as he carried the large bag to the bed.

“Here, you open it. It’s your treasure.” Tim passed Charlotte the off-white linen sack as if he were handling a newborn.

Gently Charlotte untied the strings and slid a satin bundle free. It appeared to be a gown, a perfectly preserved gown. Stepping back, she held it up, and a lovely A-line skirt with a chapel train fell to the floor.

“Is that what I think it is?” Tim said.

Charlotte swallowed with a quick glance at him. “Yeah, it is.”

A wedding dress.

Tim stood, squinting at the gown. “This is really weird, Charlotte. You bought a trunk with a wedding dress in it? Right before we broke up?”

“Hey, friend Tim, tell feeling-trapped fiancé Tim I didn’t know this dress was in here.”

“I didn’t say you did. But somebody knew.”

“That’s crazy. What makes you say—”

“The auctioneer. The man in purple. I mean, Charlotte, come on, what are the chances of you ending up on the ridge at an auction where you had no intention of buying anything, and you buy a trunk with a wedding dress in it? And what was it the man said to you when he came into the shop today? He had a daughter getting married?”

“What are you trying to say, Tim?” He was killing the glorious moment of discovering this amazing gown. “I’m sorry if this makes you feel trapped.”

“Stop putting words in my mouth. But come on, Charlotte, you don’t find this just a bit freaky?”

“I find it a lot freaky, but get a grip. Your former fiancée Charlotte isn’t going to start crying and declare we were meant to be. Or that we should get back together.”

“I wasn’t anywhere near that assumption.”

Yeah? Then why did he looked so relieved?

Charlotte shoved open her closet door and manhandled out an old dress form she’d stored in there. “Don’t just stand there, help me.”

Tim moved to help, lifting the form over the corner of her bed.

“Put it right here.” Charlotte motioned to a bare section of her room where she’d intended to put a dressing table but never did. “Raise it up to its full height.”

Tim adjusted the height and stepped aside as Charlotte slipped the gown over the form. The soft, swirling, layered swags of the skirt swished down to the floor as if it were glad to come to life.

Charlotte wanted to melt into the gown. The satin-silk blend shimmered in the low, gold light of her lamps. The threads seemed to glow, if she could use such a bold word. A shell of tulle and crinoline held the A-line in perfect shape. Charlotte billowed and fanned the chapel train.