Page 2 of A Storybook Wedding
“What is that smell?”
I look up from the ground. “You know Joshie? The blondie with the beagle?”
“Did he pee himself?”
“Worse. His puppy mistook me for a fire hydrant.”
“Oh my God, seriously? Someone’s having a Monday,” Ramona giggles.
“And, to add insult to injury, I’m pretty sure he stole one of my brand-new rice shakers.”
“Aggravated assault and robbery?”
I drop the rug, having rolled up most of it, and grab the hand sanitizer off the shelf behind me. “You have no idea what it’s like over here. It’s pure mayhem.”
“Please. Plenty of nonsense goes on in the adult section. Remember, I had to deal with the flasher?”
“Ew, yes. But you had actual police assistance. This is not a real 911 kind of emergency.”
“True. My point is you’re not the only one,” she says. Then she extends her hand to offer me an envelope. “Anyway, this came for you.”
I take it from her.
“I’ll go ask Jeff to bring you a mop and a garbage bag. But that looks important,” she continues. “Maybe like something you’ve been waiting for,” she sings.
Ramona winks at me and hightails it out of there. I examine the business-size envelope. It’s from the Northeast Library Association. I set the rug down so I have two free hands available to open it.
Dear Ms. Allerton, it reads. Congratulations! After careful consideration, your application has been selected to receive an award from the Northeast Library Association’s Future Leaders Scholarship Fund. We are pleased to offer you a one-time grant of $20,000 toward your pursuit of an MFA in Creative Writing.
Holy shit.
I got the scholarship.
I look around. Shelves of colorful children’s books smile at me, delivering silent praise. After all these years, laden with scores of weddings and babies and more weddings and more babies, I know better than to expect that my parents will get excited at the prospect of me going back to school. I sometimes imagine the utter chagrin my poor family must face on a daily basis, knowing that I have grown into a twenty-nine-year-old spinster who reads storybooks aloud to neighborhood kiddos on Monday mornings at the Forest Hills branch of the Queens Public Library. Month after month, I recklessly allow my menstrual cycle to fall short of my mother’s aspirations for my womb. Surely, a scholarship for $20,000 as I approach my thirtieth birthday will mean just as little to her as the $500 prize I won half a lifetime ago.
I force myself to ignore my knee-jerk reaction to call her and share this exciting news.
After all, this is the beginning of my happily-ever-after, not hers.
CHAPTER 1
Cecily
It wasn’t supposed to be like this.
I came here toting a backpack filled with hopes, dreams, and Sharpie highlighters. Like a true first-day-of-school experience, I laid out my outfit the day before and tossed and turned all night from the eager anticipation. I was going to get to be around authors—real authors who’ve published some of the very books we carry in our library! I would meet other writers striving toward publication. Lovers of literature! People like me!
Kindred spirits.
Unfortunately, I’m beginning to think I may have misjudged this whole experience based on the promotional materials. In fact, it’s possible that I may have inadvertently broken cardinal rule number one: Don’t judge a book by its cover.
“I appreciate the attempt to create a world fraught with emotion, but the drama seems a little thin overall. I mean, I get the whole ‘what’s at stake’ for the narrator—sure, high school is hard and she wants to be accepted—but it’s not quite hitting home for me. This story, in my opinion, just feels trite.”
Whoa. Ouch.
As I listen to the criticism, tears spring to my eyes. I blink them back, busying myself by frantically scribbling notes onto the first page in my brand-new mint-colored spiral notebook, now sullied by the word trite written under the heading Workshop with Nate Ellis—Day One. I read online that MFA workshops can be brutal, but jeez. I wasn’t expecting to hear a nasty word like trite in my first moment out of the gate.
Breathe, Cecily. It’s not like this random guy is your target audience.