some kind of madness is swallowing me whole

part 10

When Bella arrived at school on Monday, everyone had questions for her. People she vaguely knew and people she never talked to. The questions seemed to follow a theme of "Where do you live?" and "Am I invited to the afterparty, too?" She couldn't answer everyone's questions but she figured the news got out about her having an afterparty at her house.

When she saw Mike in their homeroom he looked sorry for everyone crowding her, he even mouthed "Sorry" to her because she couldn't get through the door without someone asking her about the party.

"Mike, I thought you were waiting for today to tell everyone the plan?" Bella confronted him.

"I was going to but Eric kept talking about going to La Push so I had to set him straight. I didn't think he would say anything to everyone."

"I'm sure he only told one person who told one person and it spread," Bella assured him. "It's okay, I'm sure I can handle a whole party."

"I have a sort of way to fix it," Angela said. Mike and Bella looked over in her direction. "Sorry, I didn't mean to listen, but I do have an idea. Since homecoming is for everyone, and just about everyone has heard about this you could make rules for the party. Say everyone must show up in their homecoming attire or bring their ticket because not every single person who has heard about the party is going to homecoming."

"Yeah, or you could do donations or something," Jessica added.

"Or you could have a password. All of the cool clubs always have a password," Eric suggested. I don't know how he gets some of his information.

"All good suggestions, but honestly there aren't many people here so I'll just have it," Bella said. Plus this wouldn't even be half the size of the biggest party I've been to. I went to a huge party at the Palace of Versailles that had more than 1,000 people there and it lasted 5 days.

"Okay, well we don't want you to take on the burden of throwing this party by yourself so Saturday morning we can all come help set up your house before we get ready for the dance," Mike said before clearing it with everyone else. Jessica scoffed.

"That would be great actually," Bella said, ignoring that Jessica did not want to help out.

Bella continued to get questions about the party throughout the day she ignored all of them. Somehow, sophomore Steven Graves and his freshman date Emily Russel would have to hear from someone else where Bella lived.

"Seems like you are yet again another hot topic of conversation for this school," Edward said in the cafeteria at lunchtime. Bella knew that he wasn't sitting with his family, without even looking, from past experiences trying to listen to him during lunch. There was too much noise from Bella's usual table to the Cullens' table across the room. She looked around and saw an almost bare table behind her. They locked eyes.

"Yeah, I suppose I am," Bella whispered back.

"Come join me for lunch today," Edward said.

"I'm sorry guys," Bella said standing up. "I was just invited to lunch over there," she said pointing her head in Edward's direction. Everyone was confused about how she got invited to sit over there when he never verbally asked her.

"You know, you have given them a lot to think about with that sentence. They're all wondering how you were invited if I never asked you," Edward said once Bella sat down at the table.

"They'll figure something out."

"So I heard through the grapevine," he said, tapping his head. "That you're having a party this weekend."

"I told you I was having a party," Bella said.

"Not one of this scale."

"Do you ever feel like you have to constantly live up to everyone's expectations?" Bella asked out of the blue.