Friend Of The Dead

The Silence Before The Storm

I knit my eyebrows together in discomfort, wincing as Alice's hands pulled back my hair to braid. Today was the day, today was graduation, and I couldn't be more uncomfortable. Since apparently you only graduate once, as Alice said, you have to look your best. I gave the yellow robes laid across my bed a look of distaste, yellow was too bright, and it stood out too much. If it wasn't for the fact that everybody else would be wearing it too I wouldn't have even gone to graduation.

"Stop wincing, I'm barely pulling." Alice scolded in her tinkly voice. True, she'd only taken the loose hair framing my face and pulled it back to braid, but I still felt uncomfortable with her cold hands touching my scalp.

"I'm surprised she's stayed still for so long," Bella said with a smirk, "Whenever mom did her hair for parties she's fidget around like she was being poked with a hot rod."

"Felt like I was being poked with a hot rod," I mumbled back, playing with the end of my dress. Alice bought the dress, Alice picked out the dress, Alice tried on the dress, and Alice realized that the dress would look good on me. I was planning on wearing jeans and an extra nice shirt for graduation since absolutely no one would see it under the canary yellow robe, but when I relayed this to Alice who came over to get ready with Bella, she was absolutely mortified.

"You only graduate high school once!" True, I will only graduate high school once; her graduation tally has probably reached triple digits. I didn't even know that Alice was helping us get ready until she handed me a bag filled with my dress.

"Done!" Alice said, her usual satisfied smile painted on her face. I brought my head closer to the mirror to inspect the intricate braids that went towards the back of my head where they braided down. She'd left some loose hair to frame my eyes, and left the rest of my hair down. It wasn't bad, it was kind of simple, so I didn't really mind it.

"Now," Alice clapped her hands. "Time for makeup."

Bella and I shared a single look.

"Not happening." We both said at the same time.

Alice pouted, and then she batted her eyelids sadly, and in the next ten minutes both Bella and I had a coat of mascara and lip-gloss on. Alice would not let up.

I bit my lower lip anxiously, the dress that Alice brought was beautiful, it was a V-neck pleat dress, tea length and light blue, she paired it with silver shoes with two-inch heels. But despite the fact that it was beautiful, it was a bit too much for me. We were going back to the Cullens for Alice's graduation party, and there we would shed the gowns so that, again, as Alice said, people would see the dresses. I wasn't too excited for that, a party in a house filled with vampires and drunk, hormonal, ecstasy filled humans? It was a recipe for disaster.

"Stop fussing, you look beautiful." Alice scolded, stopping me from fisting the fabric of my robes.

"Edward and Jasper are here," Bella said as she entered the room, adjusting her cap. I tugged on my white lace gloves one more time before following Alice and Bella, the former rushing out with an excited squeal.

Charlie was standing at the bottom of the stairs, camera in hand.

"Dad," Bella groaned, but Charlie was busy taking pictures. He looked really handsome in his tux.

"Your mother asked that I document every moment of your graduation since she can't come and do it herself." Charlie reasoned as he took another picture of Bella, turning and taking one of me by surprise, therefore making me look doe-eyed and put on the spot in the snapshot.

Bella sighed but said nothing, there was a hint of longing in her eyes, ever since she went and travelled to visit mom a few weeks ago with Edward, she's been quieter and sadder than usual, she looked at everything with a certain glint in her eyes, a sad finality that made it seem like she was saying goodbye.