Jody cocked her head to one side. “Must be a long wedding.”

“Don’t know how long it is exactly, but Mother said we’ll be there from eight in the morning to midafternoon. The wedding is at ten. I don’t know why we can’t just show up at nine thirty.” Tabby opened a box and slipped her feet into a pair of shoes with kitten heels no more than an inch high. “I might be able to stand these. If not, I’ll embarrass everyone and kick them off. We can still do our toenails in a horrid color, Dixie.”

“I vote we do every one of them in a different color,” Dixie laughed.

“Yaaas,” Tabby said. “Bright neon colors with polka dots on them.”

“Y’all sound like you’d make real good little hippies,” Jody said.

“Yep, we would, only we ain’t little. We’d make real good big hippies,” Tabby agreed.

“I could stay here all day and visit with you kids, but I need to get back to work.” Jody pulled a small drawer full of beads out from a container and carried it out of the room with her.

Paula glanced down at the sketch Mitzi had drawn. “You’re going to love this design for your dresses. It’ll be so comfortable you’ll feel like you’re wearing a nightgown. And the color will be beautiful on you both with your skin.”

“You really think so?” Dixie asked.

“I never lie, especially not to kids. They can smell a lie a mile away,” Paula declared.

“You’re a smart lady.” Tabby set the shoebox on the table. “I want this pair—in pink, not burgundy. That way if I want to take the bow off the back and wear the dress to church later, they’ll match.”

“I’d say you’re pretty smart.” Paula pulled out a drawer and removed a zipper, measured it against the bodice, and then exchanged it for a longer one. “Maybe I’ll see you in church. I go to the same one your aunt Alice does. She’s a friend of mine.”

“Then I’ll tell her I met you. Paula, right?”

“That’s right. Paula Walker. See you Sunday, if not before.” Paula carried the top of the dress and the zipper out of the room.

Dixie chose the same shoes in a size smaller. “And pink for me, too. I’ve got a floral pashmina scarf that would be pretty with this dress for church.”

“Well, ladies, that just about does it,” Mitzi said. “We’ll let y’all think about this style overnight. I’ll figure up an invoice to give to your dad, and we’ll do measurements and make any adjustments tomorrow if that works for you.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Dixie said. “And you’ll have some flowers for us to work on, right?”

“If it’s okay with your dad,” Mitzi reminded them.

“He won’t care. He don’t get home until at least six, and you close at five. We can throw a roast in the slow cooker and be home in time to put supper on the table,” Dixie said. “This has been so much fun. I’m glad we get to come back tomorrow.”

When they’d gone, Mitzi went back to the sewing room and slumped down in a chair. “Paula, can you put a spell on something so that I can have those girls? They’ve stolen my heart in only an hour.”

“All kids steal your heart. You’ve always been drawn to them, from babies to teenagers,” Jody said. “If you’d been smart, you’d have three or four by now.”

“I haven’t met the right guy,” Mitzi said.

“Honey, you don’t have to be married to get babies. Do I need to tell you about the birds and bees?” Jody teased. “Me and Lyle’s been livin’ together for fourteen years, and we ain’t married.”

“And you don’t have kids,” Paula said.

“That’s by choice,” Jody declared. “Mine, lately, not his. He says that we’re getting to the age where we’d better be making a final decision on that. I told him we got five more years.”

“How’d you come up with that number?” Paula asked.

Jody pushed her chair back from the sewing machine and headed toward the kitchen. “I need something to drink. Y’all want a glass of tea?”

Paula followed her. “Just water. You didn’t answer me.”

“We’ll all be thirty-seven in five years. Now add in a year to get pregnant and deliver, and that’ll make us thirty-eight. That’s pretty close to forty, so we’d have to hustle to have a second one. Forty might be the new thirty, but after that age, having babies can get kind of tricky,” Jody said.

Mitzi had been too busy to think about a final date for having children, but now she could almost hear the proverbial clock ticking in her ears. She loved Jody and had always supported her decision to live with Lyle without a marriage license, but that wasn’t the lifestyle Mitzi wanted. She wanted the whole thing—the romance, the engagement, the big wedding, and, most of all, a husband who’d love her just the way she was. She’d thought maybe the last relationship she’d had could develop into something lasting, but he had wanted to change her.

“Think about it,” Paula said. “Even then, we’d be almost sixty by the time our child gets through college.”

Mitzi opened the fridge and got out a root beer. “Don’t you know sixty is the new thirty? I’ll still be designing and making wedding dresses when I’m eighty.”