Tears spring to my eyes, and I flap my hands to keep them at bay. I don’t know who to hug first, so I scramble into the bathroom and try to embrace all three of them at once. Sophie is going to be the best mom. I know this with all my heart because she’s practically been a mom to me. I’m so overjoyed for her and Liv, and their newly budding family. You think conceiving babies is the simplest thing in the world until you see someone you love struggle to have one. The good news is almost too much to process. I hear a click behind me; the photographer is either bold enough or crazy enough to catch this moment on camera, too.

“Oh no, don’t you cry, too,” Sophie says, squeezing my arm. “You’ll ruin your makeup.”

I take a deep, ragged breath and try to calm myself.

“I’m just so happy for you,” I say, voice quavering. “You’re getting everything you’ve ever wanted.”

“You, too,” she says with a smile.

Later, once I’ve collected myself and the makeup artist has touched up all our watery eye makeup, my mom helps me into my dress.

“It’s so beautiful,” she says, carefully zipping up the back of the dress. She runs her fingers over the delicate lace sleeves. “You’re so beautiful.”

“You like the dress?” I ask, trying to gauge her reflection in the mirror.

She gently adjusts the hook-and-eye closure at the top of the zipper. “I love it. It’s perfect for you.”

“And you’re not . . . upset that you weren’t there to pick it out with me?” I ask tentatively. I’m afraid to exhale.

She steps around the sweeping hem of my gown to look at me directly. She sighs.

“Do I wish I had been more involved in planning this? Sure, maybe. You’re my daughter—of course, I would want to be there with you. But this is your day, and you’ve always done things your own way. That’s just who you are.”

I melt forward into a hug. I didn’t realize how much her approval meant to me until I wasn’t sure I had it anymore. I’m glad I do.

A high-pitched trilling sound cuts through the moment.

“Your phone alarm,” Carmen says. She turns it off.

“Time to meet Raj for the first look photo,” I say, hitching up my skirt so I can step into my blue satin pumps.

For something old, I dug a scarlet red lipstick out of the bottom of my bathroom cabinet; it’s a kiss-proof formula I bought at the height of my dance-floor make-out phase in college. My something new is obviously my dress. The veil I’ll wear later today was first worn by Sophie at her wedding; it’ll be my something borrowed. And the heels are my something blue.