My Ex-Best Friend's Wedding Read online

  PRAISE FOR THE NOVELS OF WENDY WAX

  “[A] sparkling, deeply satisfying tale.”

  —New York Times bestselling author Karen White

  “Wax offers her trademark form of fiction, the beach read with substance.”

  —Booklist

  “Wax really knows how to make a cast of characters come alive. . . . [She] infuses each chapter with enough drama, laughter, family angst, and friendship to keep readers greedily turning pages until the end.”

  —RT Book Reviews

  “This season’s perfect beach read!”

  —Single Titles

  “A tribute to the transformative power of female friendship. . . . Reading Wendy Wax is like discovering a witty, wise, and wonderful new friend.”

  —Claire Cook, New York Times bestselling author of

  Must Love Dogs and Time Flies

  “If you’re a sucker for plucky women who rise to the occasion, this is for you.”

  —USA Today

  “Just the right amount of suspense and drama for a beach read.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “A loving tribute to friendship and the power of the female spirit.”

  —Las Vegas Review-Journal

  “Beautifully written and constructed by an author who evidently knows what she is doing. . . . One fantastic read.”

  —Book Binge

  “A lovely story that recognizes the power of the female spirit, while being fun, emotional, and a little romantic.”

  —Fresh Fiction

  “Funny, heartbreaking, romantic, and so much more. . . . Just delightful!”

  —The Best Reviews

  “Wax’s Florida titles . . . are terrific for lovers of women’s fiction and family drama, especially if you enjoy a touch of suspense and romance.”

  —Library Journal Express

  TITLES BY WENDY WAX

  My Ex–Best Friend’s Wedding

  A Week at the Lake

  While We Were Watching Downton Abbey

  Magnolia Wednesdays

  The Accidental Bestseller

  Single in Suburbia

  Hostile Makeover

  Leave It to Cleavage

  7 Days and 7 Nights

  Ten Beach Road Novels

  Ten Beach Road

  Ocean Beach

  Christmas at the Beach

  (enovella)

  The House on Mermaid Point

  Sunshine Beach

  One Good Thing

  A Bella Flora Christmas

  (enovella)

  Best Beach Ever

  BERKLEY

  An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

  1745 Broadway, New York, NY 10019

  Copyright © 2019 by Wendy Wax

  “Readers Guide” copyright © 2019 by Penguin Random House LLC

  Penguin Random House supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin Random House to continue to publish books for every reader.

  BERKLEY and the BERKLEY & B colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Wax, Wendy, author.

  Title: My ex–best friend’s wedding / Wendy Wax.

  Description: First Edition. | New York: Berkley, 2019.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2018059573 | ISBN 9780440001430 (paperback) | ISBN 9780440001447 (ebook)

  Subjects: LCSH: Female friendship—Fiction. | BISAC: FICTION / Contemporary Women. | FICTION / Romance / Contemporary. | FICTION / Humorous.

  Classification: LCC PS3623.A893 M9 2019 | DDC 813/.6—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018059573

  First Edition: May 2019

  Cover art by Focus and Blur / Shutterstock

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Version_1

  This book is dedicated to my aunt Lois, who went to Richmond for a wedding and ended up engaged herself. Her sense of humor was legendary and so was her warmth. I’ve enjoyed and treasured my time with her. (With the possible exception of the day I was engrossed in the novel Heidi and she asked me if a certain character had “died yet.”)

  This portrait of her, in the wedding dress worn by generations of family brides, hung over my grandmother’s bed my entire childhood and inspired this story.

  Contents

  Praise for the Novels of Wendy Wax

  Titles by Wendy Wax

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Chapter Thirty-five

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  Chapter Forty

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  Readers Guide

  About the Author

  Prologue

  Kendra

  What can I say about the wedding dress? I can tell you it’s been in my family for generations. That after all these years it’s still beautiful. And what happened the day I wore it wasn’t the dress’s fault.

  It was designed and created for my great-grandmother’s cousin Lindy’s wedding. She was the only one of my grandmother’s female relatives whose family came through the Crash with most of their money still intact. At the time it was made, THE DRESS, which is how we refer to it, cost more than your average house, a flagrant extravagance at a time when so many had no homes, or jobs, or even food to eat.

  It’s one of a kind. Ivory satin with a scooped neck, flange col
lar, and a cleverly fitted bodice. Long fitted sleeves narrow down to a gentle point just beyond the wrist. A creamy waterfall of satin cascades toward the floor and swirls around the ankles, rounds into a train. It’s clean lined and elegant. No cutouts. No jewels. Its stark simplicity takes the breath away. With its Chantilly lace mantilla it’s the kind of dress meant for a showy, yet tasteful, fairy-tale wedding to a handsome prince. And while happily ever after is never guaranteed, it’s implied.

  After Lindy, my grandmother and her other cousins wore it. So did their daughters and those of us who followed. Somehow it flatters any figure. A satin version of The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants long before it was written. In fact, I bet if you subtracted the alterations that were sometimes required and divided its cost by the number of family brides who’ve worn it, THE DRESS was probably a bargain.

  Every single Jameson bride looked beautiful in it. I know because I studied the family wedding albums a million times when I was a girl in Richmond and imagined myself wearing it.

  The portrait of my mother in the gown hung above my parents’ bed until the day she died. It was part of the room. A touchstone. A reminder that even plain women are beautiful on their wedding day. When reality is suspended and everything, especially happiness, seems possible. When no one is thinking about what it will feel like to deal with sickness rather than health. Or anticipating the till-death-do-us-part part.

  The dress fit me perfectly. A fact I interpreted as confirmation that my marriage was meant to be. That Jake was my destiny.

  Try as I might to forget I still remember every detail of my wedding day. Sipping from a flute of champagne with my bridesmaids at our house on Monument Avenue while we had our hair and makeup done. The way my hands shook when I was helped into THE DRESS. How fast my heart beat on the way to the church. The way my pulse skittered while the 150 guests were escorted to their seats as the string ensemble played.

  I walked down the aisle barely feeling my father’s arm under my hand or the floor beneath my kitten heels. All eyes were on me. In the most beautiful dress ever.

  I smiled at Jake. Saw the love in his warm brown eyes. Let him take my hand. He squeezed it as we turned to face the minister.

  And then, although I’ve been replaying it in my mind for more than forty years now, I don’t really understand what happened. It was as if everything I’d thought, everything I’d felt, flew out of my head. When Reverend Frailey cleared his voice and said, “Dearly beloved,” I was struck with a thunderbolt of clarity, or perhaps it was a thunderbolt of panic, that felt as if it had been delivered directly from above. (And I don’t mean the choir loft.)

  Suddenly I realized that I might be making a mistake. That I’d only just turned twenty-one. That it was 1978 and I was woman, but I had not yet even attempted to roar. That I might not actually be ready to start the family Jake wanted so badly or even commit the rest of my life to another person. Not even Jake.

  Like I said, it wasn’t THE DRESS’s fault. And it definitely wasn’t Jake’s.

  Three months later when the presents had all finally been returned and I discovered that I was pregnant with his child, his family wasn’t speaking to mine and I’d already done far too much damage to tell him. Until then I hadn’t realized that God was into irony. I mean what kind of deity would smite you with a fear of commitment at the worst possible moment and then make you a single mother, arguably the largest commitment ever?

  So there it is. A slight wrinkle in THE DRESS’s mostly unblemished history.

  I’m hoping my daughter will have a happier ending in THE DRESS. If, in fact, she ever wears it.

  One

  Lauren

  Three days to forty

  New York City

  “Oh my God. You’re . . . you’re Lauren James.” The woman looks down at the book on her lap then back up at me. “I’m reading Rip Tide right now. I’ve read everything you’ve ever written. Every single word.” She looks so genuinely excited. As if it’s Christmas morning and she found me under the tree and can’t wait to unwrap me. If her feet weren’t currently soaking in warm soapy water she would be moving toward me, holding out the hardcover of my latest novel for my signature. “I just love your books. I buy them in print and digital. I listen to them on audio while I work out.”

  As other women look up, I thank my lucky stars that I put on makeup and washed my hair today. Writing is not the glamorous profession people think it is. In fact, authors spend long periods of time alone, unwashed, and on deadline. Grooming and hygiene can take a distant second to word count.

  “Ah, so you’re the one keeping me in print.” My smile is real and so is my gratitude. No matter how many times you hear that someone loves what you’ve written, it feels good. It’s like being told that your children are talented and beautiful. Or at least I assume that’s what it feels like since I’ve never given birth. The thing is, if you don’t have enough readers who love what you do no one will pay you to do it anymore.

  She laughs at the very idea of being my only fan, because I’ve been successfully published for more than a decade and hit the New York Times bestseller list on a satisfyingly consistent basis. In fact, I’ve been dubbed the “Queen of Beach Reads.” Which means I write the kind of books that those who want to appear literary like to sneer at, but that sell hundreds of thousands of copies. And allow me to own an apartment in a really great building on Central Park West.

  “Thank you. I’m so glad you enjoy my books.” I shoot the woman a last smile then turn my attention to my manicurist, Hanh. After a few words of greeting and a couple of polite questions about her children, which is about all we manage given my lack of Vietnamese and her gaps in English, I settle back into the big leather seat. I close my eyes and try to focus on the warm water swirling around my feet, but I’m careful to keep a pleasant smile on my lips so that none of the women who are currently Googling me can interpret my silence as diva-ish or carry tales about how rude and unappreciative I am.

  My breathing evens out as Hanh’s small, competent hands massage my feet. I attempt to visualize a bright-blue sky with puffy white clouds floating through it. Like the ones that used to form over the Atlantic Ocean in the Outer Banks, where I grew up.

  I’m not very good at meditation, and although it’s not supposed to be possible, I failed yoga. My brain refuses to slow down or follow instructions, and no matter how hard I try to shut down, I’m inevitably thinking about all the things I’m thinking about but shouldn’t be. Then I think about not thinking.

  At the moment, all I can think about is that I’m going to be forty in two days, twenty-two hours, and thirty-five minutes whether I’m ready or not. Then I think about how old that is. How not like my body my body has become. Hanh lifts one foot out of the water and I think about how unattractive my toes are.

  I take a conscious breath, counting slowly to seven then holding it before I exhale to a count of ten. This is supposed to clear your mind and help you turn your thoughts in a more pleasant, affirmative direction. I’m not any better at this than I am at not thinking, but I finally manage to pull up an image of Spencer, the man I’ve been dating for almost a year now, three months longer than I’ve dated anyone since I came to New York. He’s a successful playwright and songwriter with a string of hit Broadway musicals to his credit. He understands what being on deadline means and he’s every bit as driven as I am, only way better at disguising it.

  I let myself try to imagine the surprise birthday dinner he’s planning. I inhale again, even more slowly this time. I’ve spent more than a few birthdays alone since I arrived here just after my twenty-first and am beyond glad to have someone to face down forty with.

  I was supposed to come to New York with Brianna, my best friend in the world; a friend who felt more like a sister from the day we met in kindergarten and discovered we were born on the same day. (We were both wearing paper crowns at the time.)

/>   We practically lived in each other’s houses while we were growing up. When we were in high school her grandmother died and her archaeologist parents went on yet another dig on yet another continent and never really came back and she moved in with us.

  Bree and I inhaled books and dreamed of being writers. We wrote our first illustrated fairy tale together in second grade and turned it into a graphic romance novel when we were fourteen. We brainstormed and wrote part of a work of historical fiction while we were in high school and plotted out a contemporary novel set on our favorite beach in the Outer Banks in college. We planned to move to New York right after we graduated from college and find an apartment to share, and we were both going to get jobs to support us while we wrote the novel we’d plotted.

  Two days before we were supposed to take the bus to New York, Bree pulled out without warning or any real explanation. It was a betrayal of everything we’d dreamed and planned our entire lives and all she said was, “Sorry, I changed my mind.” Like she’d decided to order iced tea instead of Coke or thought she’d pass on dessert. I didn’t know a soul in New York. I climbed onto the bus with wobbly knees, scared to death.

  New York City is intimidating in its own right. Alone and without money it can be hard, cold, and inhospitable. A place to be survived through sheer force of will.

  I was barely hanging on by my fingertips three months later, when I heard that Bree was dating Clay Williams, my boyfriend all through high school and most of college.

  Six months later they were engaged. Even though we were barely speaking I tried to warn her that Clay was nowhere near ready to settle down; something I did out of the remnants of friendship and that she interpreted as jealousy. Then, although she’s not a blood relative, she wore THE DRESS that’s been in my family forever. And my mother forced me to be her maid of honor, because of some stupid promise and a pinky swear we made each other in kindergarten.

  If that’s not a novel, I don’t know what is.