Alice was sitting in Jimmy’s car, on the driver’s seat, with the door open and was talking to Jimmy comically.
“Hey Alice. Missed you today”, I said, coming to stand beside Jimmy who was sporting a confused look.
“Hey, Bells. I was busy, you know tomorrow. They get nothing done without me. So I had to skip school today”
“Yeah. Yeah. I know”, I sais stealing a glance Jimmy and daring him to open his mouth.
“Okay. Actually, I was waiting for you. I have a surprise for you. Guess what?”, she smirked.
Humans were not allowed in their pack house or even in their territory. Because of that, I’ve never attended one of their birthday parties. But, for every birthday, we would all hang around together, just the three of us and sometimes Nora, at our place. We would rent a movie, bake each other’s cake, take millions of pictures or just get wasted and sleep throughout the day and they would go back to their pack house, to their parties in the evening. That’s how it has always been for us.
So when she said she had a surprise for me, I was confused.
“Surprise for me? Well. Are there any parties for just us this year?”.
“No honey. It’s better than that. Youarealsoinvitedtothepartythisyearalphagavepermission”, she finished in a single breathe and looked at us excited, biting her lip.
“What?”, Jimmy asked her and I was pretty sure he heard her the first time.
I stood there and was pretty sure I made a dent in my college parking lot floor when my jaw dropped. I opened and closed my mouth, not sure if she was joking or not. She didn’t have to be dramatic to get this reaction out of us. Just the message would have just sent us gasping for air.
And from the look on Jimmy’s face, I was pretty damn sure that this was the first time he was hearing about this invitation too.
How can she expect me to want into a party house full of werewolves and be fine with it. I would be the only human. No…..
“Alice. Are…. are you kidding? You are kidding. Right?”
“No. Bella, I am serious. I’ve been threatening and pleading with our Alpha for months to let you come and he is not an easy guy to convince. He thinks it would not be safe if you came”
“Well he is not wrong, is he?”, I asked her, rolling my eyes. We were speaking about the Alpha who almost sent a search party after my ass when he knew that I knew about them. How she convinced him to go with her plan, only God knew.
She pouted.
“Wow”, Jimmy whispered after a radio silence of five minutes, which says something when it comes to him. He looked at Alice and slowly shook his head.
“I don’t know how you convinced Alpha, but I have mad respect for you woman”, he said. From the looks of it, he was pretty shook from his Alpha’s decision and that was enough to put a smile on Alice’s face.
“Please, Bella. Come. You’ll be safe with us. I’ll be there. John and Jimmy will be there. Please”, she was flexing her puppy dog eyes at me. If it worked on his Alpha, who was I, a puny human to resist it.
I sighed. “Fine. I’ll come”.
She laughed and hugged me, now that her plan has worked, and walked back to her car.
“Jimmy will pick you up. Tomorrow evening, 5 o’clock. Alright?”
I nodded and waved her bye as she drove away. Jimmy left shortly after her, still barely speaking a word.
This was going to be my first visit to her pack house. I didn’t know what was waiting for me there. Not yet.
I went to my apartment and made myself some sandwiches. I was a terrible cook but Nora taught me how to make the most basic things so I wouldn’t ‘die from Doritos poisoning’, her words not mine.
I heard the main door and close and Nora walked in. She threw her purse on the coffee table, and plopped down on the sofa kicking off her shoes, clearly exhausted.
“Hey Nora. Made some sandwiches . Want some?”, I yelled from behind the kitchen counter.
“No thanks. I don’t want to die young”, she quipped back, not lifting her head.
“Rude”, I mumbled with a mouth full of food and joined her on the sofa. “I have to do some shopping”, I said.
She lifted her head up so fast I wondered how she didn’t get a whiplash.
“Shopping? Did you just say shopping or am I hallucinating?”, I rolled my eyes at her.
I would rather sit in my room, in comfort, and go through tons of dresses online than walk around a mall, dragging my feet up to every shop and boutiques and feel like death at the end of the day.
“Drama queen”, I rolled my eyes at her, “Tomorrow is Alice’s birthday. She invited me. So, I want to buy me a decent dress and also a gift for her or something. I’m running out of underwear too.”
“That’s new. You guys never had birthday parties”.
“Um.. she had her house all to herself this weekend. So, she took the chance, I guess”, I smiled, suddenly interested in my sandwich.
“Thatta girl”, she smiled and got up, “Okay. Get ready soon”, she grabbed her purse and walked away.
“What? Now? Didn’t you just come in? Aren’t you tired?”
“Not for shopping. No”, she yelled and slammed her door shut.
Guess I have to get ready too.
I went to my room and took some money I was saving up and changed into a jean and a pullover.
And came down and waited. She came in shortly and we both drove to the nearby mall. After the nightmare that was parking, we went in.
Alice loved jewelries. She once used to collect rings with a passion. So we went into a jewelry shop. I wasn’t very picky. So within a few minutes we entered, I chose a pendant that showed the letter ‘A’ with a few stones embedded in it’s left stem and two wings on either side. It was cute.
Later, we both went into a clothing store. I bought myself some underwear while Nora bought something for herself and threatened to scream banshee when I tried to look at what it was. Okay.
And after that, it was Nora’s time to sign. She took the reins of the shopping wagon and dragged me one shop to another, in search of that ‘it’ dress.
At this point, I probably had tried more dresses than I could actually wear in a year. I was looking for a chair, to rest my legs, around the boutique when she came back with a black dress in her hands.
“Nora. What are you doing? It looks expensive. I don’t have the money.”
“oh it’s affordable, I checked it”, she said, stuffing the dress in my hands, ” now go try it”, she pushed towards the changing room. I closed the curtains and removed my pullover, my arms tired from doing the same action many times.
But I took back all the eye rolls and whines, once I saw myself in that dress. It was a flare black sleeveless dress with lace yoke that reached just above my knees. I didn’t expect it to fit perfectly.
“You done?”, Nora yelled from the other side of the curtain. I peeked out and gestured to her to come in.
Her mouth fell open as she saw me, which morphed into a smile once she completed her look over.
“How is it?”, I did a little twirl for her, and laughed waiting for her answer.
“You look stunning”, she said admiring the dress, “You should totally get this”, she said coming to stand behind me, looking at me in the trial room mirror. From her reaction, I knew that she liked it.
She went out to wait while I changed back into my clothes and carefully folded the dress and walked out.
“Now this.” She pushed a pair of black stilettos at my face.
“No way I’m wearing that. I can’t even walk in that”.
But we all knew who won that argument.
After convincing me that I would have enough time to practice-walk in that shoe before the party, we paid the bill for both and left.
After a few more hours of shopping, my feet felt like they had been run on.
“Nora. It’s enough. I am tired.”
“No. We have only a bit more” she trailed off as I zoned out.
“Please. I need food. I am starving”, she stopped and looked at me, finally considering that eating was a primary need to survive, besides shopping.
We found a table in the food court and ordered our dinner. Food never tasted that good before.
After a few ‘this is the last one’ shops, we finally headed home.
I went up to my room and placed the dress in the cupboard. Tired to point I could barely stand, I completed the bedtime rituals as fast as I could and fell asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow.