PART 2
There was no graceful way to describe it.
I started crying right there at the altar.
Aaron grabbed my shoulder.
My mom stood so quickly that her chair scraped against the ground.
Claire looked toward her.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”
My mother shook her head, already crying too.
“How did you get it?” I asked.
Claire looked back at me.
“I called your mom months ago.”
I turned toward Mom.
She pressed both hands over her mouth.
Claire continued.
“I asked if she had anything of your dad’s that I could somehow include in the wedding. A handkerchief. A piece of fabric. Anything.”
My mother was nodding now.
“I gave her the suit,” she said.
“I asked her for something of your dad’s to include in the wedding,” Claire said.
“I gave her the suit so that she could have something made from it.”
Claire gave a weak laugh. “That was the plan.”
My mom looked at her outfit. “Clearly, the plan changed.”
People around us laughed softly.
It relieved some of the tension.
I wiped my face.
“And now you’re wearing the whole thing?”
Claire’s voice shook. “Because a little piece didn’t feel like enough.”
That nearly destroyed me all over again.
She reached for my hand.
“Your mom told me your dad wore this when he married her.”
I nodded. I’d seen the pictures.
Dad had been 28, with far too much hair and a mustache that my mother spent decades mocking.
Claire continued. “She said I could use the fabric for anything. I thought about making a hair ribbon. Or lining my bouquet with part of it.” “So what happened?”
Claire glanced down at herself.
“I decided to put it on.”
I almost laughed through my tears.
“You just put it on?”
“About two weeks ago. Your mom had already given it to me, and I was trying to decide what part of it I could use without ruining it.”
My mom called out, “I told her she could cut it.”
Claire looked horrified. “It just didn’t seem right to do that.”
That made everyone laugh again.
Even me.
Claire squeezed my hand.
“I put it on as a joke at first. It looked ridiculous.”
“It still does,” Aaron muttered.
Claire pointed at him. “Thank you, Aaron.”
Then she looked at me again.
“But when I saw myself in the mirror, I thought about you.”
Her voice softened.
“You’ve spent this entire wedding pretending you weren’t sad your dad couldn’t be here.”
I swallowed. “I wasn’t pretending.”
“Really?”
“Okay. Maybe a little.”
“You barely talked about it.”
“I didn’t want everything to become depressing.”
“I know.”
She took a breath.
“And I know nobody can replace him. I wasn’t trying to do that.”
I looked again at the writing inside the cuff.
Richard’s Wedding Suit.
Then the little stitched Danny beneath it.
“I just wanted one part of him to walk down the aisle today,” she said.
That was the moment my mother completely lost it.
She sat back down and began crying into a tissue.
I couldn’t look at her because I knew I’d start crying again too.
The officiant, who had patiently stood beside us through this entire emotional disaster, finally leaned toward me.
“I’ll give you two a minute.”
I laughed. “We’ll probably need several.”
Claire smiled. “I’m sorry.”
“No.”
“I should’ve warned you.”
“No, you shouldn’t have.”
Her eyebrows lifted. “Really?”
I looked at the suit again. “If you’d told me, this wouldn’t have hit me the same way.”
“But you looked horrified when I came down the aisle.”
“I was.”
A few people laughed.
I added, “I thought you’d lost your mind.”
Claire laughed too. “I probably have.”
Then I touched the lapel.
The fabric felt old.
Soft from decades of use and storage.
I took a long breath.
Then I turned to Claire.
“Okay.”
“Okay, what?”
“Let’s get married.”
The ceremony continued.
Claire stood beside me wearing my father’s wedding suit while I tried not to cry through the vows.
I failed. She failed too.
When it was her turn, she looked at me and said, “Daniel, I promise to love the person you are.”
“I promise to honor the people and experiences that made you who you are.”
“I promise to never let you pretend you’re not emotional when you clearly are.”
Everyone laughed.
I shook my head. “You added that.”
“I did.”
When it was my turn, I’d prepared vows.
Good ones too.
I’d written them down and practiced them.
Then I looked at her in that ridiculous suit and forgot half of them.
So I told the truth.
“You have this way of seeing things I don’t say.”
Claire started crying.
“I think sometimes you know what I need before I do.”
“And apparently, sometimes what I need is to see you wearing my father’s suit and walking toward me.”
She laughed through her tears.
I continued. “I love you. I love how much care you put into people.”
“And I promise I will spend the rest of my life trying to give you the same kind of love you give me.”
We exchanged rings.
Then we kissed.
The photographer captured a picture of us immediately afterward that is now probably my favorite photograph from the entire day.
Claire is laughing.
I’m crying.
My mother’s crying behind us.
Aaron looks like he’s trying not to.
And Claire is absolutely swimming in my dead father’s suit.
After the ceremony, we took pictures in it before she changed.
My mother insisted on getting one alone with Claire.
She stood beside her, touched the sleeve, and said, “Richard would have thought this was hilarious.”
Claire smiled. “I hope he wouldn’t be mad.”
“Are you kidding? He would’ve told everyone it looked better on you.”
Then Mom looked at me. “He’d be proud of you, Danny.”
Claire changed into her actual wedding dress before the reception.
When she came out, I finally got the traditional moment I’d imagined.
She wore a simple white dress with a fitted waist and lace along the back.
She looked incredible.
She turned in a little circle. “Better?”
I walked over and kissed her. “Different.”
“Good different?”
“Very good different.”
She smiled.
“So you’re not divorcing me over the suit?”
“We’ve been married for 45 minutes.”
“So that’s a no?”
“Ask me after the cake.”
At the reception, people kept asking about the suit.
Most of them hadn’t heard what Claire had said at the altar.
My mother ended up telling the story at least six times.
Eventually, Aaron mentioned it during his speech.
He raised his glass and said, “Most brides try to make the groom cry by looking beautiful. Claire decided to take a more aggressive approach and dress as his deceased father.”
The room exploded.
Claire nearly choked on her drink.
Aaron continued, “But seriously, I knew Richard. And if he were here, he’d be the loudest person in this room. He would also be incredibly happy about the woman Daniel married today.”
I looked at Claire.
She reached under the table and squeezed my hand.
Later that night, after dinner, cake, speeches, and several terrible attempts at dancing, we finally had five quiet minutes outside.
The venue had little lights strung through the trees.
Claire leaned against me.
“Can I admit something?”
“Sure.”
“I almost didn’t do it.”
“Wear the suit?”
She nodded.
“This morning, everyone thought I’d completely lost it.”
“I can confirm that impression.”
She elbowed me.
“Jenna kept asking if I was sure. My mom kept saying, ‘Claire, you have a perfectly good wedding dress hanging 10 feet away.'”
“Reasonable people.”
“I started wondering if I’d turned something meaningful into something ridiculous.”
“You didn’t.”
“I should’ve told you.”
“Maybe.”
She pulled back. “Maybe?”
“I was embarrassed for about 20 seconds.”
Her face fell slightly.
I squeezed her hand.
“Then I read the label.”
She nodded.
“And I understood.”
I looked through the glass doors toward the reception.
My mother was dancing with Aaron.
Dad should have been there.
Nothing Claire did could change that.
But somehow, the day no longer felt as though it had a hole in it.
It felt as though we’d made room for the absence instead of pretending it wasn’t there.
“I spent months thinking about him not being here,” I said.
Claire rested her head against my shoulder. “I know.”
“I never told you how much.”
“You didn’t have to.”
That was Claire.
Sometimes annoyingly so.
A few weeks later, we got our wedding photos back.
