The Wedding Project 💍

'Crashed The Wedding' - The Bridesmaid (@JABrownOfficial)

The dress hung on the wardrobe doors on a pretty padded coat hanger. I narrowed my eyes and glared at it wishing it could drastically improve the colour and the style of it before

tomorrow. I felt as if she couldn't have possibly picked a worse colour for me. I ran my fingers through the material as they slipped down the pleats of pure polyester. Cheap. Tacky. Just like her.

The colour was a shade very similar to vomit, the tiny floral details that ran across the neckline only added to the sickly feel. It was a mix of cream and red, I thought it was called peach, but I'd never seen an item of clothing so horrible. It made me feel uncomfortable like someone had given me the worst dress in the shop just to be a bitch. But that was her all over. Knowing most of my friends were due to be there as well made it unbearable. The sleeves puffed out as if my arms grew out of the mouth of some awful puffer fish, all puffed up and nowhere to go. I thought back to the night my brother asked me to be a bridesmaid for Cruella.

We were sitting in the pizza place with our parents and sister. The mouthwatering smell of the soft dough and meaty scents filled the room. My stomach groaned and rumbled loudly. My mother's eyes narrowed as she gave me the look. We found a table near the window and took a seat. I sat on the dark navy comfortable armchair style chair and rested my bag on the floor by my feet. Halfway through my first slice and I couldn't help but notice that he looked a little uncomfortable. He must have checked his phone ten times within a minute. I felt like grabbing it out of his palms. Family dinner bro!

Eventually, I'd had enough. Enough of his uncomfortable expression and him shuffling around in his chair like he had bees buzzing around in his boxer shorts.

"Spit it out!" I demanded.

Dad looked at Mum, and then at me.

"Mia." My father issued a stern warning not to cause a scene.

"With Fruitcake and I getting married in a few weeks," he started, and I saw beads of sweat seep from the pores of his skin and cover his forehead in a shiny wet sheen. I suspected I knew what he planned to ask me, and had my answer ready and waiting.

"Will you be our Bridesmaid?" There. He said it.

"Over my dead body!"

"Do it for me..." my brother's pleading voice whined in my direction, "come on sis, you'll make a lovely bridesmaid."

I'd told him no. I had told him the same answer on more than one occasion almost every day until two weeks running up to the day itself. My refusal to become a bridesmaid for Cruella caused tension in my family that grew and grew until someone had to give way.

"I can't take it anymore!" Mum shouted a fortnight earlier over supper, "Mia Annabelle Wallace, you will be a bridesmaid for your future sist-in-law, and you will wear a nice pretty frock and be on your best behaviour."

"How much?"

I watched her mind ticking as she tried to figure out her next move. Her chest rose and fell quite quickly which gave me the impression that something nice might be heading my way.

"Twenty," Mum replied.

My eyes narrowed and I shook my head. If I had to spend unlimited time in the presence of my brother's new wife, twenty was nowhere near enough.

"Eighty."

Mum shook her head and quickly folded her arms. "I'm not made of money, Mia! Forty?"

No way! I had my eye on a new handbag and that was sixty. If she wanted me to be a sodding bridesmaid that badly it was sixty or I'd fake illness on the day. Period pain was a good one or food poisoning. Her choice.

She ran her fingers through her hair and she moved flame-red strands back behind her ears. Mum sighed again.

"Fifty. And that, my girl, is my final offer."

I looked Mum dead in the eyes, and knowing I could always sell one of my sister's tops online for a tenner, I decided to accept.

I felt sorry for my brother. If he was going to marry someone else, then I would have happily worn whichever ridiculous-looking bridesmaid frock and played the happy sister. But something inside me struggled to recognise the man he was now compared to the laddish boy he used to be. The spark that always glinted in his blue eyes was nowhere to be seen. She'd seen to that. He'd stopped drinking, which wasn't a bad thing, but his whole character and demeanour had changed beyond all recognition. My brother had inherited Dad's style, shirts with waistcoats, smart but with a hint of geekiness. His black heavy framed spectacles sat on the bridge of his nose.

No girl wanted a man in specs. No girl wanted a baldie. No girl wanted him. Or so he thought.

My brother was (past tense) a fun and carefree lad who'd listen to my problems and make both my sister and I laugh so much we often wet ourselves.

His sense of humour was now something of the past. She'd made sure of that. He smiled on cue, spoke when spoken to and only saw the friends she allowed him to see. As for us, his family, parents and sisters, I was surprised we'd even been sent an invitation with the correct date and time on it.

As the clock ticked on my bedroom wall and the time edged closer to eleven at night I knew it was time for bed. The more I stared at the dress, however, the more I wanted to make an improvement or two.

Maybe if the sleeves weren't so puffy. I thought

Maybe if the skirt was a bit shorter?

Maybe if it wasn't peach?

Right! That was it! I couldn't take it any longer. I pulled the dress off the coat hanger and with my huge heavy dressmaking scissors I made a small snip in one of the puffy sleeves. Snip. Snip. I was quick but careful as I chopped off the excess peachy-coloured polyester fabric that scattered across my bedroom floor. I sat on the chair and moved around to the sewing machine as I trimmed off a good six inches from the skirt. With the ugly pleats now gone, my new creation looked quite cute. Well, it would if it wasn't for the fact it was still a hideous shade of peach!

I'd kept a stash of fabric dye in a box in my bedroom in case my teacher wanted me to dye something and the correct colour was out of stock or no longer available. I went through the many different colours and tried to pick something that was more me instead of the peach. It didn't take me long to find the perfect shade. It was perfect and would show the whole congregation how I felt about the stupid wedding.

Within two and a half hours I'd transformed the ugliest bridesmaid dress in the world into something I would wear and I felt so good. I'd removed the sleeves, lowered the neckline to more of a plunge than a high neck, and hacked off at least half of the skirt.

I placed the dress into a large bowl that contained the perfect coloured dye and waited. I couldn't help wondering how people would react when they saw my sexy black mini-dress!