Hi! I've been reading BMTL again and I have quick q- in BMTL, how did Dan and Amy 'plan' their wedding? Was it a spur of the moment thing? Was it Dan or Amy's idea to do it during Jonah's announcement? :)
Hey! I'm so glad you are rereading and thank so much for sending in an ask! I love BMTL asks!
Dan and Amy's wedding is one of those things I made up in the super early days of writing--like literally when I was thinking of article scraps for that first chapter--and I knew I wanted their wedding to be very untraditional and kind of spontaneous...and then later I was like "sh*t, how does this actually work in practice." So I've spent a lot of time thinking about their wedding, haha.
The way it goes in my mind is that Dan and Amy (and Cassie) are on their way to court an eccentric lumber multi-millionaire in Maine who demands that people who visit him arrive in the most eco-conscious way possible (he's one of those rich people who get very rich off some exploitative industry and then feels "bad" about it)
So Dan and Amy are driving up in an electric car instead of flying and their car has some sort of malfunction (it's probably a Tesla ☠️) and they get stranded in some cute little touristy town on the coast of New Hampshire. The car can't be fixed quickly and they find themselves on the town's main street, feeling very annoyed and wondering what to do. Dan and Amy are in the middle of bickering, of course - maybe they're sitting on a bench in the town square or something. Dan takes a look at their surroundings and sort of processes how picturesque it all is, and then he looks at Amy and Cassie who are probably both ignoring him and has a genius idea that he and Amy should get married. It's partly driven from the fact that they are stuck and (unusually) don't have anything else to do in the moment, but also from the deep, abiding knowledge that even if they both drive him crazy, there's nobody he'd rather be stranded with anywhere than Amy and Cassie (plus, they've been "engaged" at this point for quite some time). He doesn't remember until later that Jonah is going to announce his presidential campaign on Youtube or whatever, but it's an extra cherry on top of the whole day.
So they are able to pull the whole thing together really quick - they get a marriage license and Dan sends Amy to the local shops to get a white dress and he rustles up a photographer and a ring and Amy gets a bouquet from the florist and voilà! They get married and take many photographs. Amy is relieved they get the whole thing done in an afternoon and also that she doesn't have to deal with her family, but of course she also finds it secretly romantic that Dan had the idea so spontaneously. Cassie enjoys getting to wear a white dress and tearing Amy's bouquet to pieces afterwards.
(I just looked at the first chapter and apparently I specified Portsmouth, NH as the place where they get married, which is not really a small town but probably feels small to cosmopolitan Dan. The Portsmouth courthouse is hideous though so they definitely do not get married there. Maybe Dan gets someone to marry them somewhere more picturesque...I could see him showing up at the local party headquarters and hounding some volunteers. Or maybe Portsmouth is where all the local reporters rush because they don't necessarily know where to go. Maybe I need to update that part of the chapter a bit, haha.)
also, right before they get married, Dan tells Amy he killed a dog. she's just relieved that he's not confessing to being a serial killer.
and they all lived happily ever after!
