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Miranda glanced up briefly when Andy entered the study, but quickly went back to studying the card samples in front of her with a critical eye. Heavy-weight, subtly textured, off-white—they all looked more or less identical to Andy, but she would happily defer to her fiancee’s judgement on that. If she were being honest, the same could be said of the majority of the smaller decisions regarding their wedding, though lately she’d been tempted to lay claim to some firmly-held opinions regarding calligraphy and table favours just to give Miranda a break.
“I thought the point of hiring a wedding planner was that you don’t have to plan the wedding,” she said softly, leaning over the back of Miranda’s chair to kiss her temple. “Maybe it’s time to take a break for the night?”
Miranda hummed distractedly, attention still on the luxurious paper stock.
“Wouldn’t it be better to see those in natural light, anyway?” Andy tried again, perching on the edge of the desk.
“I did earlier, but they have to look right under artificial as well,” the editor murmured. She clearly wasn’t planning on calling it a night any time soon, and Andy decided it was time to pull out the big guns.
“Guess what? After thorough research and many hours of introspection, I have found the perfect first dance song.”
That got Miranda’s attention, and she looked keenly at Andy over the top of her glasses. “Really? What did you choose?”
“I’ll play it for you.” She pulled her phone out of her pocket, the song already queued up in preparation for just this eventuality.
The descending guitar riff pierced the air and Miranda immediately pursed her lips. “Absolutely not,” she said over the opening lyrics.
“But—”
“No. No, anything but that.”
Andy paused the song and tried desperately to keep a straight face. “You specifically said I could choose anything I wanted.”
“I’m not having our first dance be a song from an animated movie about a stupid green troll,” Miranda said severely.
“First of all, he’s an ogre. Second of all, don’t pretend you don’t know his name.”
The older woman scowled. “Do you have any idea how many times I’ve had to sit through that movie? I hate it, Andrea. ”
“Well, this isn’t about the movie. You have to focus on the lyrics, Miranda, they’re perfect—”
“Do not start singing.” Miranda sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Does it have to be that version? Can’t it at least be the original?”
Andy couldn’t help herself any longer—she burst out laughing, Miranda’s baffled look only adding to her mirth.
“Now what?”
“Miranda, I promise I don’t actually want to use a song from Shrek for our first dance,” Andy said, still chuckling.
“Did the girls put you up to this?” Miranda asked with a scowl.
“No, I just wanted to persuade you to take a break for a while.” Miranda scoffed, and Andy frowned gently. “You know you don’t actually have to do everything yourself, right? I can help if you’ll let me.”
“I know that,” the editor replied with a frown of her own. “I don’t mean to exclude you from the decision-making—”
“I don’t feel excluded, that’s not it. I know that if I had a preference between”—she squinted at the luxurious paper stock Miranda had discarded—“ecru and ostrich egg, you would take it into consideration. The truth is, my perfect wedding only required two things: the first is that you’re there—”
“That’s reassuring,” Miranda quipped.
“—and the second is that you’re happy with everything. The table decorations, the placeholders, the flowers—I don’t really care beyond the fact that you care. Something I care about a great deal, though, is you working yourself to exhaustion over the next six months making every single decision yourself.”
“Not every single decision,” Miranda said with a slightly forced roll of her eyes. “You’re choosing the song—”
“The song, and the cake flavour, and the primary colour scheme—it’s like you’re giving me the big, fun decisions and keeping all the little stressful ones for yourself.” Miranda looked vaguely guilty at that, all but confirming Andy’s suspicions. “I’m not saying I can choose the perfect off-white stationary on my first attempt, but I used to be pretty good at guessing what you would choose in any given situation. Why aren’t you asking for help?”
Miranda pulled her glasses off with a sigh, fiddling with them for a long moment before speaking. “Last time I did this, my assistants dealt directly with the wedding planner. I had oversight, of course, but they made all of the small decisions on my behalf.” She smiled wryly, adding “You would probably have done a much better job than they did.”
“Or maybe I’d have subconsciously sabotaged the whole thing,” Andy countered. She mulled Miranda’s words over for a long moment, considering what had been left unsaid. “Who chose the first dance?”
“I did.”
“The cake?”
“I did. The colour scheme, the type of catering, the venue, the honeymoon. I chose all of those things,” Miranda confirmed.
“I see. How did Stephen feel about that?” Andy asked without judgement.
“I’m honestly not sure how he felt at the time,” the editor said ruefully. “He certainly wasn’t jumping up and down to involve himself, but he was happy enough to bring it up with the divorce lawyers. He saw it as something of a pattern, apparently—I made the decisions that mattered, my assistants made the ones that didn’t, and he was expected to just accept both.”
“You have never made me feel like I don’t have a say, Miranda,” Andy said firmly.
“I certainly hope not, I just—I wanted this time to be different, especially because—”
“Because I used to be the assistant making the decision you didn’t have time for?” Miranda nodded. “I understand that, and I love that you’ve thought about it, but it doesn’t change the fact that you still don’t have time to do everything. You’re working yourself too hard.”
“I know,” Miranda sighed. “I just… I want it to be perfect.” She looked apprehensive, and it wasn’t hard to guess why: Andy knew how much Miranda worried that a third marriage would end the way the first two had, no matter how much she tried to reassure her.
“That’s totally okay, but it’s not just down to you to make it perfect. I’d rather we make all of the decisions together, big and small, no matter how long it takes.” She brushed that iconic silver forelock back gently, meeting Miranda’s eye with a smile. “And for the really boring decisions, I know two teenagers who are doing a really bad job of pretending they’re too cool to want to help.”
Miranda gave a slightly choked laugh. “We’ll see how long that lasts when they’re comparing twenty shades of napkin. Just don’t tell them that Shrek song was an option, or we’ll never hear the end of it.”
“Well, there’s always the processional—”
Miranda swatted at her arm and Andy darted out of reach with a laugh. “Be honest, you wouldn’t really have let me choose that, would you?”
“I did promise you could choose the song, but—“ Miranda paused with a smirk. “I might have vetoed that awful cover.”
“Not a fan of Smash Mouth, got it,” Andy grinned.
“That should go without saying, darling,” Miranda said, feigning a haughty look which morphed into a genuine grimace. “We should choose a song soon though—you know Philippa is already talking about dance rehearsals.”
“It just so happens that I anticipated your rejection of the aforementioned hit, and I do have a backup suggestion if you’d like to here it?”
Miranda looked a little skeptical, but humoured her nonetheless. “I’m listening.”
“You have to stand up first.”
“Why?”
“So we can get a head start on those rehearsals.” Andy held out a hand, and Miranda took it without hesitation, allowing herself to be pulled to her feet and led around the desk.
Andy fiddled with her phone and left it on the desk, placing one hand on Miranda’s waist and pulling her close as the first saxophone notes played. Miranda smiled, recognizing the song immediately, and followed Andy’s slightly clumsy lead in a slow waltz around the study.
“I love you baby,” Andy sang when they reached the chorus, “and if it’s quite all right—”
“I need you baby, to warm a lonely night,” Miranda joined, eyes sparkling.
By the end of the song, they were both flushed and breathless from a few overly exuberant spins and Andy had lost count of how many toes had been stepped on, but Miranda was carefree and laughing and the most beautiful sight Andy had ever seen.
“Frank Sinatra,” the editor said at last, still pressed closer than strictly necessary. “A much better choice.”
“Ol’ Blue Eyes for my blue-eyed baby,” Andy replied with her cheesiest grin. “Seemed fitting.”
Miranda rolled her eyes purely for show, her blush speaking for itself. Andy knew she’d picked a winner—and that the many, many hours of dancing lessons looming in her future would be more than worth it.