Last Name - Dr. Rebecca Sharp Page 0,64

best.”

Apparently, I was too young to make a lot of the decisions regarding my own wedding… but not too young to be getting married.

“Look, I’m married, so trust me,” she went on, flipping her hand so her engagement and wedding band faced me before wiggling her fingers to make sure she had my attention. “This is your future, Dix. Don’t go gettin’ any grand ideas because those only lead to the kind of trouble you won’t survive.”

I looked away and dragged my fingers through my long brown hair, the magazine clipping my momma picked out for my up-do tomorrow flashing in my mind and almost making me vomit.

And when I refocused on Millie Jean, who hummed as she wiped and ogled her wedding bands before trailing her fake pink nails that were so long they should’ve come with a handicap sign over her stomach, I realized she was what I was destined for if I didn’t do something.

I wasn’t being judgmental. Not down in Alabama—in God’s country. Millie was happy with her life and I was happy for her. But, forgive me, Jesus, I would not be happy with that life.

I wanted to go places. See things. Meet other people outside of Chicktown. And I wanted to have a life for myself.

I choked as air rushed into my lungs too fast.

“I have to go,” I blurted out, dropping a five on the table for my ice cream and darting from the diner.

I couldn’t do this.

Two days later

The Chicktown Gazette (frontpage)—Dixie Winston leaves Benjamin Fulmer at the altar. What was she thinking?

Twenty years old

“How are you feelin’, Dixie?”

I looked up from beneath annoyed eyelids at my momma who was wearing a whole new path in the carpet of my room as my hairdresser, Amy, jabbed bobby pins into my hair, securing the mass of curls on the very top of my head.

“I’m fine, Momma,” I assured her.

“Are you sure, baby? Because you know this can’t go over like last time.” She tried to say it softly, but there was a thread of warning in her voice. “We can’t have another incident.”

She said it as though leaving Ben at the altar was the equivalent of committing an actual crime.

Last time, I’d been eighteen and so lost in my own head I’d made it to the front door of the church, the organist striking up the Wedding March, before I turned and bolted, leaving Ben and ninety-five percent of Chicktown’s residents gaping from their place in the pews.

“Momma.” My tone was just as threatening. “I want to marry Jake. You know I didn’t know what I wanted when I ended things… Ben.”

It was almost two years ago, but leaving your groom at the church wasn’t the kind of thing Chicktown forgot—or wanted to forget—all that easily.

Especially once I accepted Jake’s proposal.

Jake Yarell was from our small town but he was three years older than me, so I hadn’t known him too much in high school. Afterward, he left to join the army and only returned about a year ago. I met him when he came into the flower shop I was workin’ at to pick up roses for his mom.

I knew he must be a good guy then and there.

It was pretty easy to fall for the handsome soldier and the way he still came in for a single flower once or twice a week to send to his mom who now lived in Mobile. Plus, he was still in the army and would be due for a move in the near future.

Even though I’d escaped a premature marriage, I still hadn’t made it out of Chicktown yet, though I’d been slowly and steadily saving.

The thought of moving around the country with him made our relationship even more appealing. New places. New people. I wanted to go anywhere—anywhere away from Chicktown.

“Jesus, Amy!” I swore and jerked my head away as it felt like she’d just pinned a deep brown curl straight into the cortex of my brain.

She was probably planting some sort of device—at Momma’s behest—to make sure I didn’t sabotage this wedding, too.

“Dixie Dorothea!” my mother hissed. “Don’t you dare take the Lord’s name in vain, especially on your wedding day. Especially after last time.”

Especially after last time had become her mantra. And it was just as over-played as Mariah Carey during Christmastime for the last two years.

I huffed and pretended to look for something in my clutch. “Sue-Lynne borrowed my Perky Pink lipstick. I need to go find her,” I excused