The Wedding Tiara

Prologue

A/N: This is inspired by the Hallmark movie trilogy, The Wedding Veil. This particular story draws primarily from The Wedding Veil Unveiled as I found Emma and Paolo to be the closest to Robin and Regina. (Also, they're my favorite of the three couples featured in the trilogy). You do not need to watch the movies to understand this story as I only took inspiration from them and am not doing scene-by-scene recreations. However, if you haven't seen the movies, I encourage you to watch them. They're pretty good! And if you've seen them, you might find similarities to The Wedding Veil and The Wedding Veil Legacy in this prologue.

I've been working on this since those movies came out in 2023. I had hoped it would be completed by now but real life keeps getting in the way. But since it's Valentine's Day, I thought it would be nice to at least share the prologue you today and the first chapter (hopefully tomorrow). Hopefully you enjoy it and will be excited when the rest of the chapters are ready.

Happy Valentine's Day!

-Mac

Prologue

They say all good stories start with "Once upon a time" so...

Once upon a time, five young women ended up assigned as roommates in college. They were all very different but slowly became friends as their freshman year unfolded. All-nighters, movie nights, shopping trips, shared classes and even their fights forged a bond that stood the test of time and distance once they graduated. Life took each woman on their own path and the friends were scattered. But they all took time each year to reunite in a different city. When they got together, it was like no time had passed at all. They hugged, laughed, cried and created new memories as their bond was strengthened yet again.

During the trip celebrating their tenth anniversary as friends, they encountered a small antique shop. They explored its treasures before coming across a beautiful tiara meant for a bride. Noticing the small group gathered around it, the owner came over to talk to the friends. She told them there was a legend associated with the tiara – whoever possessed the tiara would meet their true love and wearing the tiara at their wedding guaranteed the couple a long and happy marriage.

The friends were split with two dismissing the story, two skeptical but enchanted by the story and one who believed the story. She convinced her friends to buy the tiara as the other four agreed it would be nice to have something they shared, another way to remain connected. And though none were even close to being married, they bought the tiara and agreed to a customary schedule before their trip ended and they parted yet again.

Mary Margaret Blanchard, the one who believed the legend, took possession of the tiara first. She brought it home with her to Storybrooke, Maine, where she met new sheriff deputy David Nolan. They had a rather bumpy beginning as he thought she was engaged after seeing the tiara. She also was helping a colleague, Ariel, with her wedding which added to his confusion. And Mary Margaret had been told he was married to a woman named Kathryn, so she thought he was off-limits as well. They soon cleared the air – she was not engaged, he was divorced – and they began dating. Within a year, the other four friends travelled to Storybrooke to serve as bridesmaids when Mary Margaret married David, her late mother's veil affixed to the tiara.

After the wedding, Mary Margaret gave the tiara to the next friend scheduled to care for it – Ruby Lucas. She flew home to San Francisco where she worked in an art museum. Ruby hoped to put together an exhibit on jewelry as art and feature the tiara with her friends' blessing so she decided to have the tiara professionally cleaned. Fate brought her to Dorothy Gale and a friendship developed between the two women. Their friendship soon blossomed into love and they were married the next year as Ruby wore the tiara, deciding not to display it after all. Once again, the friends gathered to support the bride as her bridesmaids.

Ruby had been one of the two friends hesitant to believe the legend about the tiara though enchanted by it. Now a believer, she passed the tiara to one of the skeptics, Emma Swan. Emma took it back to Boston and her private investigation business. A client was waiting for her, eager for Emma to prove whether her husband was having an affair or not. Hitting the ground running, Emma locked up the tiara in her safe until things calmed down enough for her to take it home. Just as she was about to do that, Killian Jones burst into her office – nearly colliding with her and the tiara. He was a rival PI who realized he was trailing the same target as Emma, hired by one of the man's girlfriends, and suggested they should work together. Emma reluctantly agreed and as their target's relationships fell apart, theirs grew into a romance. The friends attended their third wedding in as many years as Emma married Killian while wearing the tiara. She was still hesitant to say the legend was real but she admitted at the reception that there were no such things as coincidences.

The tiara then went to Belle French, who took it with her as she went to do research on ancient myths and legends. She hoped to find out more about the tiara's history while traveling from city to city along with a guide arranged by her university in Chicago, Will Scarlet. Love followed them across the continent and Belle had a whirlwind romance like the ones she always read about. Like Ruby, she had been enchanted by the legend of the tiara but hadn't fully believed it. But when Will followed her back to Chicago and proposed, she came to fully accept the legend.

Once Belle married Will, the tiara had one last journey to go on with the final friend and skeptic.

Regina Mills.