The Girl behind the Throne (Editing)

The Girl behind the Throne Chapter 25

My head finally started to process this making my mouth form back together again, I looked over to jasper who was sitting on the chair to my right pretending he was looking at my sketch pad but judging by the angry set expression on his face, either he was pissed off about my one of my ball gowns or that he had heard something that he didn’t want to. He noticed me looking at him and shot me a grin as fake as Joan rivers nose, I narrowed my eyes at him letting him know that I was onto him, but couldn’t bear to question it further, I got the strange feeling that it was something that I wouldn’t exactly want to hear.

The door opened then and my father burst into the room, followed by my grandparents who had enough flowers in their hands to sink a small country.

“Hello sweetheart, it’s good to see you awake”. Dad said making his way over to the bed and sitting in the seat that jasper had artfully evacuated when he saw them come in, he took a hold of my hand giving it an emotional squeeze. I shot him a weak smile, he looked awful, Like Jamie he had bags under his eyes making his vivid blue eyes looks tired and drawn. Poor old dad, I could tell by his expression that he had been worried sick; he was relieved to say the least. He jumped up no longer content with a mere hand squeeze and grasped me in a bear hug. “I was so worried; I couldn’t lose you, not after your mother. I wouldn’t survive it if I did” he said in a choked voice, and I hugged him back greedily.

He let go of me then, probably afraid of hurting me, I had just come out of a coma after all, whether I felt like it or not. At the moment I just felt overwhelmed and underdressed, not one of the best situations to be in when there are like a gazillion people present.

The awkward silence struck, something that always confused me, how is it in a group of large people you all go silent all at once, and then the next person to speak always ends up talking over another person and they struggle to talk over one another causing this big battle that only lasts for a short amount of time until the dreaded silence takes place again.

“Awful weather” said my grandfather trying to start a conversation at the same time as Andrew piped up with “Hamish really is terribly ginger”. The strange thing is, the awkward curse was broken when he said that, there was no yelling to talk over one another, just a more awkward silence that lasted until my grandmother let out a giggle that wouldn’t be unusual on a five year old with bubblegum, and then they all started laughing. That is everyone except me and Hamish, I was just still too stunned to take it all in and Hamish who was glaring at him and murmuring something about him ‘being strawberry blonde’ to which Andrews reply was a loud snort that officially started the awkward silence again.

Everyone stood in silence for five minutes, all picking up the courage to be the next one to speak and face even more blank faces and weird looks, Andrew especially. My heart rate was returning to normal and I was looking around the room trying to hold in hysterical laughter, my grandfather was looking at Andrew like he just offered him a strip tease dressed as Liza Minnelli, and Sloane was pretending to read a leaflet on erectile dysfunction.

“Oh for god sake, just go” I said in a huff after five more minutes of total silence, I could practically feel the tension reach new levels.

Jasper, Sloane and Andrew looked at me hopefully, all standing up quickly but turning around to give excuses when they realised just how rash and hopeful they had seemed.

“I have to go and take my hay-fever medication” said Sloane with an angelic smile, that made my grandfather smile readily back making grandmother elbow him and whisper something about ‘being a pervy old man’. She shot out of the room quickly, like she was on fire.

Jasper was up next to bat and was wearing his most charming smile. “I’ve just realised that I parked my car in long term stay instead of short term, I better go and move it”. He said shooting grandmother a warm smile making her go all fluttery and her eyelashes bat more that humanly possible, making grandfather shoot her a resentful glance. Right now the whole situation resembled a miss world pageant.