Muriel’s heart was all a flutter with anticipation as she took a deep breath and held it in while her mother tightened the laces on her bodice. Her mother pulled tightly and grunted as Muriel tried not to exhale. Muriel put on her garter belt and slipped on her stockings and then stepped into the dress. The dress was plain, but beautiful. They couldn’t afford silk, not in the new world, and so it was a lovely white linen dress with long sleeves and a blue rouche trim that flowed around her diaphragm and up around her shoulders. She looked in the full length mirror, beaming, as her mother draped another piece of linen over her face and pinned it in place in her bright red hair with a decorative comb.

This was Muriel’s wedding day, and she looked perfect in her dress. Muriel lived a simple life with her family, her parents were immigrants from England who arrived in America shortly before discovering they were pregnant with her. Having left, not impoverished lives, but by no means wealthy ones, they found things in the new world to be more difficult. Muriel’s father was a farmer who dabbled in leather smithing and she had spent her entire life, having been born here in America, working alongside her brothers and sisters collecting eggs and milking cows. Today that all seemed so far away. Today she married a preacher man. Not a glamorous or well paying job by any means, but a respectable one.

Her fiance, Enoch, was an honorable man who was involved in his community and always cared for those less fortunate than he. He had just started his new parsonage here in Helmuth and Muriel had hardly had time to see him since she came into town a few days earlier from her family farm farther out west. She was both nervous and excited to be leaving her family and the farm to live with her intended. She wasn’t sure she’d make a good preacher’s wife, but she loved Enoch very much and was sure she’d do an excellent job being his wife.

She walked out onto the porch into the sunlight and opened her parasol as she climbed into the carriage waiting to take her to the church. It was a simple carriage, just one chestnut brown horse pulling it and it was driven by her father. A man now pushing 50 with greying hair and large mutton chop sideburns. He was dressed in his old military uniform, which was the nicest suit he owned since moving to the new world. They arrived at the church and Muriel’s heart skipped a beat as she walked down the front lawn into the front stairwell. It struck Muriel how churches always made you step up into them, like you were ascending to some higher plain of existence, and today, she felt like she was. She climbed the steps of the white painted building and walked down the aisle as her uncle played a tune on the piano.

Something struck her as odd, though. Enoch was not waiting for her. Instead, there was a very nervous looking best man who seemed to be pouring sweat. Muriel abandoned the slow pace bride’s are supposed to take and rushed to the front to question him.

“Where’s Enoch?” She asked, anxiously.

“He’s taken ill, I’m afraid.” he said. “He’s in the parish house, if you want to see him.” She ran out the back door of the church towards the small house on the other end of the graveyard that separated the church from the parish house. She flung the door opened and ran up the stairs.

“Enoch?” She called. “Are you alright, Sugar?” she opened the door to his room, hearing him groan as she did and found him lying in his bed, as white as a sheet, and sweating through all of his clothes. He was barely dressed, still in his nightshirt with his dress pants half done up over top. You could tell he had made an effort, but no progress had been achieved. The room was dark as the window shutters were closed.

“Enoch, are you alright?” She asked.

“Darling, I’m not supposed to see you before the wedding…” He said grimly.

“The wedding is happening now, silly.” She said, kissing him on the forehead. “You’re late.”

“I’m sorry, darling. I don’t know what’s come over me.” He said, “I feel so dreadful.”

“Don’t worry, Sugar.” She said, sweetly. “We’ll get the preacher and the guests in here and I’ll marry you right here in your bed.” She called for everyone to come up and they all crammed into the room as tightly as they could.The preacher, who was visiting from another town for the occasion, positioned himself between Enoch and Muriel behind the bed so that he could perform the ceremony. He cleared his throat.

“Dearly Beloved, we are-” He was interrupted.

“It’s so dang dark in here!” said Muriel, “Let’s open these shutters first so I can see my betrothed in a proper light.” Her father and some other guests flung the shutters open and the sun beamed in so brightly it made it hard to see. Just as everyone’s eyes began to adjust Enoch let out a terrible scream as his flesh lit into flame and engulfed him. He tried to beat it out but the more he tried the higher the flames got. Muriel watched in horror as the scent of burnt skin and hair filled the room and her fiance was completely and utterly immolated before her eyes. And she looked so beautiful in that dress.