Angel of Fire - the Breath of Immortality - Book One #Wattys2014

Angels Are Not Ghosts...but sometimes they act like it.

Chapter 17 - Angels Are Not Ghosts...but sometimes they act like it.

For some strange reason I decided to pay more attention to what I wore, even though I was supposed to be the girl who didn't care.

I had a horrible thought. Was I finally caving in to peer-pressure?

Nah!

I blamed it on the fact that Carmen always appeared so chic and put together. I was tired of looking like a total wreck compared to her. Surely it wouldn’t kill me much to put forth a little effort.

Carmen's words echoed in my mind. “Wear something cute.”

I stumbled to my closet, yawning in the process and flipped on the light. I decided right then and there I seriously needed to go shopping. Any decent thing I owned had already been worn a million times.

Burrowing under a mountain of clothes I'd long since outgrown, I finally scavenged a pair of skinny jeans that had been shoved deep in the back of the closet. Surprisingly, they didn't have any holes in them whatsoever. Probably why I never wore them. Other than being hopelessly wrinkled, they were already a big improvement.

All of my shirts were either dark patterned flannels or dark colored T-shirts, purposefully bought so everything I owned matched. I didn't like to put a lot of thought and effort into getting dressed in the morning.

At least, not until now.

Resigned to a narrow selection, I grabbed a black and gray flannel shirt off the floor that wasn't too horribly dirty. I threw everything on and checked my reflection in the mirror. I definitely didn't look anything close to cute.

Oh well. This was as good as it was going to get.

I combed my hair as usual, but today, instead of letting my bangs hang in my face like heavy red fringe, I decided to part them a little off center. Taking a bobby pin, I pulled back and secured a small section, leaving the rest of my hair down and checked the mirror again.

Great. Now that I could finally see my face, I desperately needed to wear makeup. Otherwise I was going to scare everyone. Not that I minded the pallid color of my skin tone, of course. Anything was better than having a fake tan and looking like I'd rolled around in a bag of Doritos.

I opted for my usual raccoon look, and then applied some of my mom's lengthening mascara to my puny lashes. I finished by adding peachy blush to my cheeks, and a clear coat of lip gloss.

The transformation was incredible. But even I had to admit I was a far cry from one of those glamor-puss model types you always see on the covers of fashion magazines. Hell, I wasn't even a model citizen. For once I didn’t look all deathly pale, but I did look a little less hateful for a change. If the Dark Ones got their way and I didn't live to see another day, at least I'd make a cute corpse.

Smoothing out my wrinkled clothes, or attempting to anyway, I headed downstairs – trudging into the kitchen like a zombie with my arms stretched out in front of me. “Must...have...coffee.”

I fixed a cup of steaming hot beverage just the way I liked it, and folded myself in a chair at the kitchen table.

“That was fast,” mom said with a laugh. Turning around from the stove, she narrowed her eyes. “Are you wearing makeup?”

I groaned into my favorite purple mug. Why do parentals insist on asking stupid questions they already know the answers to?

“Only a little,” I murmured.