Before The Beginning

Chapter 37: Playdate and Dress Shopping

Begin!

~Beatrice's POV

"Do you like long or short veils?"

"I prefer short. I don't see the appeal of long veils," I replied, flipping through my bridal magazine.

"I hear that, long veils are overrated," Sammie replied.

Since we had a lot to prepare for the wedding, we had started looking within a few weeks of us bringing Violet home. And having a kid was everything I had been told it would be: hard but rewarding. But Bertie and I opted to share the responsibilities which made things a little easier. Not a lot, but easier nonetheless. We had even received several gifts from our associates for her once the news got around. (Thanks Karen.) Though my favorite of these gifts was a personal letter from the Duchess congratulating us and telling me that I was on maternity leave until further notice.

Damn near everyone we knew personally had sent Violet either clothes or toys, and it took over 2 hours to open all the presents. Now her once neat bedroom had toys lying around everywhere.

And the other day I had decided to take Sammie's advice and sent Gregor a letter telling him about Violet. I never got a reply, but I wasn't expecting one. He merely deserved to know she was here and that was all I needed. I'll be sure to do the same thing if Bertie and I decide to have a second kid in the future. But that was a worry for another day. At the moment I was sitting with Sammie in my living room, she had taken some shore leave to bring Fiona over for Violet to play with, and she was helping me look through my choices for the wedding dress. Karrie was working today, but I knew she most likely had her dress picked out by now and wanted it to be a surprise. The girls were sitting in our line of sight in Violet's playpen while we did our thing.

"She really likes that teddy you got her," I said. "It might be her favorite."

"I'm glad she likes it, I figured it was too perfect not to give her," Sammie replied. "Oh what about this one." She pointed to a dress in the magazine she was holding.

"It's nice, but the sleeves are too long; I don't want to melt under the summer heat since we're having the ceremony outside."

"Fair point."

"They seem to be getting along," I commented glancing at the girls.

"Well Fiona doesn't get to be around many other kids so she was pretty excited about coming over."

"Oh I'm sure, and she's talking more fluently than the last time I saw her."

Sammie nodded. "And if you pretend to understand Violet, there's a chance she'll learn to talk faster."

"Is that true?"

"Allegedly, I've never seen it work myself."

I chuckled, "Well I'll keep it in mind but I doubt it's accurate. Of course Bertrand would be delighted if her first word was 'daddy.'"

Sammie smirked. "If you wanted to mess with him you could teach her 'mommy' first without telling him."

"Is that what you did with Fiona?"

"Ha! No, funny story, her first word was 'Gleba.'"

I racked my brain for a minute trying to think if that was even a word. "Is that a word?"

"I thought it wasn't at first, and then Fernald looked it up for us. It's the fleshy, spore-bearing inner mass of certain fungi. Needless to say, we were all stumped on that one."

I blinked. "Guess she's gonna be a scientist..." I said before going back to looking through my pages. I didn't give this statement a second thought.

"So who's giving you away at the wedding?"

I smiled, "For me, Ike. And Dewey is gonna give Karrie away."

"And I bet you anything they're gonna be crying."

"As if there was any doubt? You should have seen Ike when I let him hold Violet for the first time. He was scared that he'd drop her and I had to convince him that if she fell onto his lap she'd still be fine-"

Sammie then tapped my shoulder to get my attention and pointed to another dress selection. "Sorry to interrupt, but what about this one?"

I gaped at the choice. It was gorgeous!

"Yes that one! It's perfect! You have really good taste."

"Of course I do, I'm perfect." Sammie laughed, "See I told you the right choice was in here somewhere. I can picture the look on Bertrand's face when he sees you in it too."

I smiled as I proceeded to cut out the picture from the magazine. "I hope he doesn't faint... that would kinda spoil the party."

"If anything it'd be a great story to tell people later if that happened. But you're right, with you and Karrie getting married at the same time it would slow things down."

"...Unless both boys fainted," I added snarkily. (Though I was sure that neither would. They can keep themselves together for our sakes.) "Karrie and I will head over to the bridal boutique once she has some time off. Thank you for helping out."

"Oh it's no trouble." Sammie replied, "It'll be a long time before I can help Fiona with matters like this."

"No chance at grandkids from Fernald," I asked, giggling slightly.

"He's not good with girls. And he works too hard. And even then, getting him and John to agree to let Fiona marry someone, that'll be a chore in and of itself!"

"I can see why that'd be an issue." I put the picture away for later. "I'll talk with Karrie and the boys about everything else we might need. Hopefully people will be able to come, it tends to get dangerous when we get together outside of the headquarters."

"You'll be fine, Bea, I'm sure of it. You guys are gonna have a perfect wedding, ok?"

If you say so, Sammie. I can take your word for it. But just to be safe, maybe I'll ask a favor from the Duchess and have some extra guards on standby... just in case. It's my wedding right? I deserve to have it go my way!

~End of Chapter!

Yes two chapters in one day. I might be crazy, but you're welcome! :)