If The Dress Fits: a delightfully uplifting romantic comedy!

Nikki watched from her desk as Tish, kneeling at the coffee table, shoved the scattered papers into a box file and cringed at the girl’s lack of orderliness. Whilst her haphazard attention to detail was unlikely to have been the cause of their current predicament, she still despaired of the wedding arrangements being perfect. Tish’s chaotic approach to life also extended to her appearance, yet Nikki had to admit she suited the tousled, just-got-out-of-bed blonde curls and not-quite-perfectly-applied blue eyeliner.

‘What about asking Lilac to go with her second choice?’

‘You were there, Nikki. You saw how she reacted to that dress. And you have to admit, it was stunning – totally made for her. I know she’s already a celebrity but she looked like a fairy-tale princess in that gown, didn’t she?’ Tish’s eyes, the colour of liquid sapphires, glazed over as she tumbled into her own fantasy world.

‘Tish, quit the Cinderella fantasy. We have to sort this fiasco out ourselves. We can’t burden Lilac with the problem. She’s got enough to worry about.’

‘So what are we going to do? I’m slammed as it is. I’ve not eaten since yesterday lunchtime. I’ve got the bridesmaids’ bouquets to finalise, the wedding cake topper to chase – you know the confectioner is crazy, don’t you? There’s the champagne still to source and I have a meeting with the printer tomorrow to finalise the wording on the invitations and orders of service. The invitations need to be sent out by the end of the week at the latest, although the whole world knows when the wedding is going to be.

‘The only thing that seems to be on schedule at the moment is the music. The organist at York Minster is sorted and he’s rehearsed the pieces Lilac and Finn have selected for the ceremony. And the band is booked and the lead singer has even written a song especially for the happy couple that he’s agreed to debut at the evening reception. Oh, Nikki, I’m so excited we’re getting to meet The Razorclaws. That lead singer, Theo Drake – what a dreamboat. I hear he’s unattached. Do you think he has come-to-bed eyes? My sister thinks he has.’

‘Good grief, Tish will you calm down with the hearts-and-flowers fixation. You’ll have to squeeze some time from somewhere and it’ll have to be straight away. We promised to inform the designer they’ve won the competition as soon as possible. Everyone who submitted will be thinking their design hasn’t been selected and they’ll start accepting new commissions. There’ll have to be a couple of fittings at least and Lilac is a busy girl. She’s on location in Croatia for three weeks before the wedding which, can I remind you, is just three and a half months away.’

Nikki was used to lurching from one crisis to the next. In fact, she thrived on the daily adrenalin rush. It made her feel worthy of her position as Lilac’s right-hand woman – her Girl Friday. She almost hated it when things went smoothly. But this wedding had proved to be the ultimate headache. Tish was so involved in the romance of it all that, on occasion, she had to restrain herself from throttling her.

Okay, yes, wedding planners had to be in love with everything ‘planet bridal’ to work in the industry, but Tish had taken her obsession to a new level. She was usually to be found floating around the office on the wings of Eros, constantly chattering about diamanté tiaras, personalised confetti (with pictures of the bride and groom printed on it, for God’s sake!), and sugared almonds, which she had the perfect excuse to indulge in. Annoyingly, Tish also seemed to have been blessed with a metabolism that ignored the onslaught of sugar. She, on the other hand, despite following a semi-vegetarian diet, still struggled with losing the extra stone that had crept up on her unnoticed – and it had nothing to do with the cupcakes from the Parisian patisserie that had popped up on the corner in the last three months.

Tish had certainly thrown herself into her chosen career, happy to hunt down the most bizarre of requests as she waited patiently to play the lead role in her own fairy-tale Happy Ever After. Of course the girl had her own wedding day planned right down to the toilet paper she wanted in the ladies’ cloakroom of the Savoy. Only one tiny detail was missing – there was no groom loitering in the wings, or backstage, or even on the auditions list. So, whilst her own personal hearts-and-flowers scenario was on the back burner, she was content to pour all her energies into conjuring up everyone else’s dream wedding.

‘But where should I start?’

Nikki rolled her eyes. ‘Look, make a list of all the designers who were asked to submit. Then go through the dresses that did arrive with the correct paperwork and tick them off. See what’s left. There may be a couple who decided not to submit, but at least we’ll have narrowed it down. I’m late for a meeting with Lilac’s agent, but I’ll be back in an hour and we’ll go through the list together.’

‘Don’t worry, I’ll ring them.’

‘No! You can’t do that.’

‘Why not?’

‘Well, how do you plan on finding out if it’s their dress?’

‘Email them a photo – oh, no, right, I see.’

‘We’ve got to be careful not to disclose the final design of the most anticipated wedding dress this year to anyone. Absolute secrecy – we promised Lilac – nothing until it is unveiled to the world on the steps of York Minster. We can’t go around emailing everyone a photo. Especially the designers whose gowns failed to make the cut. Think about it!’