Chapter 25:

Thanks to everyone who reviews and such!

So the overall score is… Sam 27 games, me 27 games. Whoo, stalemate! We play until 9:30am, the games getting dirtier and dirtier and us arguing about the other playing dirty until Michael steps in.

"You've been playing for over 4 hours now – take a break and get over yourselves!" he tells us and Sam and I exchange looks before turning the console off.

"Thanks Sam, that was really great!" I enthuse and he nods.

"It was – so tomorrow at 3am? And also, Michael, we're having a party meeting at 6pm tomorrow night so be at the lab by then or you're out!" he says and I nod at the time he suggests – if I go to bed at 11pm, I'll be up at 2:30ish and then a quick shower before going downstairs.

Sam leaves the house through the portal and Michael wanders through to the kitchen, clutching the paper off the table that Sam brought in earlier. I hear him turning the coffee pot on and I rush through for a mug before he finishes it all, which is what he does most days.

"So what are your plans for today?" I ask him.

"Going to work at 10am until 8pm tonight as it's a full day I need to work, to make up the hours I haven't been doing for the last week or so," he explains and I feel a pang of guilt because it's my fault he hasn't been working. I sip on my coffee before Michael gets two blood bottles out of the fridge and warms them both up in the microwave before handing one over to me. I hesitate because I don't think I really need it at the minute but I accept it when Michael says:

"Go on, isn't it better to have that extra precaution in there rather than turning into whatever later on?"

I drink it rather slowly, savouring the sweet flavour. The only thing I don't like is the way my vision turns red when I'm drinking – it's both annoying and also makes me feel slightly queasy. I would shut my eyes, but when I'm drinking blood I just can't seem to shut them whatsoever. Weird!

I look at the clock – it's almost 10am so I ought to be off to meet Oliver.

"See you later Michael – hadn't you be off now to work?" I say and he curses at the time, zooming ahead of me through the door. I slow down as to not get caught by the sun before heading through the portal to get to Common Grounds. Oliver is waiting for me in the study and as I enter, looks up and smiles (yes, he smiles!) before saying:

"Shut the door Claire, if you will, that living room is mighty tidy and is making me feel inadequate about the state of this room."

I comply before sitting down and wondering what we're going to talk about, given what we did yesterday. Oliver simply smiles and says:

"Well today we are going to simply discuss your plans for today because I feel that that may help you ascertain where you may feel a little down."

I nod and say:

"Well after this meeting, I'm off to be a slave to Amelie and help her prepare for her wedding. Honestly, Maid of Honour to her isn't a blessing, it's an officially titled skivy!" I moan and he laughs, "Then, depending on how long that takes because last time it took over two hours to decide what colour plates she wanted, I might go home before the council meeting at 6pm. Then after that, I'm not sure…" I finish and he nods.

"And where do you feel that you have the most likelihood of falling below normal?" he asks, rather confusingly because to me the question doesn't exactly make sense.

"Erm, well the times that I am not actively doing something like being here or with Amelie or at the meeting," I explain and he nods.

"And by now you must be experiencing the lack of ability to sleep through the night?" he probes and I nod.

"Yep – it started last night. Sam has already said that he'll come over and teach me analytical points about a book and we'll go through it in great detail. That'll continue until university starts up again and I'll go to the night classes in physics so I get my degree," I explain and he looks thoughtful.

"That sounds very nice of Sam to offer to help you with that. That has you covered for during the night so that's good. today I can guarantee Amelie will be keeping you until the council meeting because I saw her this morning and she was already fretting: she has a huge calendar on the wall counting down until the wedding – did you know that it is only 3 months 4 days and 10 hours away?" he says and I groan. Great, Amelie's stress heady again: normal people would make their decisions faster with such a tight (well for her, anyway, I think that that is a long way away!) deadline, but not Amelie. She spends even more time making sure that the decision is right – honestly, I may soon be using my rights as Maid of Honour and telling her to chill and that I'll sort the rest of the wedding. Which reminds me – I still have the centrepieces to do! I may just go for… oh, I'll work it out later!

We end up talking about small things such as the weather and Founders Square on an evening and just how busy it actually is, which is rather nice actually.

"So what do you want to do now?" I ask Oliver and he stands up. I look at the clock and somehow it's already 11:25am!

"Well there's not long left until the white queen would like to see you, so I propose you come and have a mocha and catch up with Eve?" he suggests and I enthuse that that sounds a great idea, following him through to the shop. Just before we enter, he turns to me and says very quietly:

"People don't seem to be as bothered about you being a vampire as we first thought, but still be careful and sit away from people you don't know or like."

I thank him for his concern and then go sit at the empty table in the corner (darkest) as I watch him tell Eve to take a break. She removes her apron and runs over here: I stand up to give her a hug.

"CB, I've missed you! How's the counselling going with Mr Moody Pants over there?" she asks.

"I've missed you as well!" I reply, "And to be honest, it's going a lot better than I had expected!"

Just then Oliver brings over a mocha for me (Eve brought her own drink over) and he smiles as he sets it down before walking back over to the coffee bar, Mr Nice Guy mantra (although it may actually be him, really) in place to sell coffee to the university students. Loads of them are still here, no matter the university being shut, because some are Morganville natives and some don't want to go home for some very strange reason. Imagine how bad your home life must be to want to stay in Morganville!

"So, any plans for today?" Eve asks me and I nod and check my watch – 11:30am.

"At 12pm I've gotta go to Amelie's and carry on being titled skivy and help her make her decision about every single detail of the wedding because her and Sam narrowed it down to 5 variations of each item but he doesn't care which one of each it is, so he can just sit there in the living room and play games whereas I'm putting up with Miss Dragon Lady who took 2 and a half hours to decide on a plate!" I vent to Eve who laughs and pats my arm.

"You can keep that job CB, but just remember, Amelie needs you to be there, or there would be nooo decisions made whatsoever, I'm betting," Eve says and I feel slightly comforted by that.

We talk for another 20 minutes or so about how we're both doing (fine comes out, with a little elaboration about how I'm getting better) and what she's been up to recently (apparently I'm not to tell Michael, but she has a date tomorrow night with Neil Freir, a human) and so on before she has to return to work and I have to go to Amelie's.

"Oliver, 6pm tomorrow at the lab for the party planning. Be there or be gone from the proceedings," I say to Oliver as I pass and he nods in gratitude for my telling him. I walk through to the back and through the portal to the (normally tidy) study which looks as if a bomb has hit it. Literally. There are piles of magazines and brochures everywhere, charts with numbers and random squiggles on every wall, piles of revised seating plans and that's just the beginning. One wall has a huge digital calendar counting down to the wedding and at the desk is a very stressed looking Amelie who looks up and attempts to smile at my arrival. All she manages is a grimace, which I feel sums up all her current feelings. Great – how long is it going to take per decision now?

"Hello Claire, as you can probably tell, I'm a little stressed with everything now and I realise I've been too picky these past few weeks, therefore we want to be getting through a minimum of 5 decisions today. If I take more than 30 minutes, bring Sam through and he'll decide. That's what we agreed on last night," she says, letting down all her guards and showing her vulnerability.

"Now we are going to get through those," I say kindly, sitting down next to her. "So what are we starting with"?

"Plate sizes – we want a bread plate, a soup bowl, a main meal plate and a dessert one," Amelie explains and I grab the nearest blank piece of paper – and there aren't many left, with the amount of scrunched up paper on the floor – and a pencil complete with ruler and compass, ready to draw.

"5cm radius for the bread plate," I suggest, drawing it for her and she looks a little so-so with the size.

"Maybe 6cm?" she suggests and I draw that for her – she nods.

"That's perfect Claire, now what do you suggest for the soup bowl? Also should it be a shallower bowl with a wider rim or steeper with no rim?" she asks, pulling at her hair slightly.

"I say a shallower bowl with wider rim is more 'weddingy' than a normal bowl," I reply and she nods slowly, taking this into account. As I wait for a reply, I look around the disgustingly messy room and feel I can't face sitting in such an untidy room anymore. And I know Amelie must be feeling the same, under all the stress, because normally she's little miss impeccably clean – note the cream suits she normally wears.

At the moment she's wearing jeans(!) a plain white t-shirt and pumps which is extremely casual for Amelie. She notices my looking at her clothes and she smiles slightly before saying:

"Well Sam sort of locked away all of my suits and formal clothes, saying that unless there is an event to wear them, I may as well dress casual and now I do have to admit there is an air of niceness about wearing these clothes. And about the soup bowl, I agree entirely, and was thinking perhaps an 11cm radius for it with a rim of 2 cm?"

She changes the subject deftly from her clothing (which I assume she will be changing for the council meeting this evening, given it is a formal event – if not, I'm going to go and speak to Sam myself) to the matter at hand, and I draw the circle for her – she nods.

"That's perfect Claire. Now, before we start the main plate, I was wondering if you would mind helping me clean this place up?" she asks and I nod, zooming around and picking up every discarded piece of paper in seconds.

"Why, aren't you fast!" she jokes, helping me. "So, I'm guessing that you didn't need blood this morning but Michael made you have some to guarantee you'd be ok?" she guesses accurately – I nod. Just how did she guess?

"Why, how I remember the feeling. He's only done it to make sure you were ok because he chose to be a vampire, he didn't suffer it. The extreme blood thirst lasts until you stop sleeping through the night and as that occurred last night as I heard Sam leaving, so now you just need blood approximately every 36 hours but you may as well just have it every morning," she explains, looking wistful at the beginning.

"Ok – when does it go to about every couple of days?" I ask, whilst bagging up all the waste paper in the room for recycle.

"When you're about 40 – Sam's only been able to last two days for a decade before… you know, and now he's returned to that given he is at full strength once more," she says and I inwardly groan – blood daily – what responsibility!

After a few minutes the office is looking rather like it used to, except with the huge calendar. Still, it's much better and with a clearer desk, it makes concentrating on the task in hand much simpler. As well as seeing the massive task ahead – there are 14 more decisions to make. Great!

Within another 15 minutes we have the main plate and dessert plate measurements and then Amelie phones up the company to make her request for 200 of each size for the 11th November – Remembrance Day for her, given she is originally from England.

"Can I ask why the wedding is on Remembrance Day?" I ask her and she shrugs slightly, smiling also.

"I'm from England and whilst I was there I lived through many bad events, indeed, but there were also the brilliant memories with Myrnin and so on, so to have a way to recognise my old life before Sam and all of Morganville, even America, at my wedding is a brilliant thing," she says. That is so sweet – I had almost forgotten that Amelie is English – this will be a way to honour her old life, whilst also embracing her new one (just a couple of centuries late) at the same time.

"That sounds really nice Amelie," I say, as she moves the plate brochures and drawings over to one side – the 'Finished' pile, which, unfortunately, is rather empty.

"Speaking of nice, with a rather tenuous link, what are these suits like and also their colours?" she asks me with urgency. "Because Sam said something about turquoise and he knows how much I hate that colour, so please Claire, tell me what my fiancé will be wearing!" she hisses the last part but I shake my head – she's not getting this out of me – and she looks murderous for a moment.

"Nope, not a chance – it may be turquoise, it may not, so you'll just have to deal with it and if some colour you choose clashes with anything, I'll change the colour of whatever you want to have," I explain and she leans back in her chair, breathing heavily.

"Fine, if that's what you want. It's just so hard not to know what is going on with every part of this wedding – I just want it to be perfect," she sighs and I pat her arm gently – I understand the feeling.

My phone beeps and I read:

You have a text message from Myrnin:

Hi my darling, is Amelie driving you up the wall yet? I will see you at 6pm, do you want to come over tonight? M xx

I quickly reply to this:

Oh she's not too bad today, babe, and yes we will. Sure, but I have to be back at the Glass House for 3am because Sam is giving me some English Lit lessons because I can't sleep through the night anymore :( C xx

I quickly send this, and get back to Amelie, who is now fretting over the type of wine glasses there should be: crystal or not? See through or distilled? And so on…

Fun afternoon here!

At 5:30pm, we pack up – we only had to get Sam in once, and that was only to decide between two things that were almost the same, but Amelie couldn't decide upon – that was rather good I think!

"So, what are you going to wear?" I ask her and she pulls a face.

"One thing is for sure, I am not wearing jeans in front of Oliver – he'll take the mick and so on," she retorts so I motion to wait a second before running through to Sam (who's reading a book) to ask:

"Can I have the key to get something to wear for Amelie because, I'm sorry, she can't wear jeans to a meeting where she is in charge!"

He faux groans before digging the key out of his pocket and saying:

"They're in our room in the wardrobe – the only bit that's locked."

I nod and say thanks before rushing off to get a suit – I go for chocolate brown with a cream silk top with cream heels and take them to Amelie (after returning the key to Sam) who looks like a child in a sweet shop. I laugh before going through to sit with Sam whilst she changes – she comes through for me, kisses Sam goodbye (I look away, not wanting to see how far she'd go in public – just thinking about that with Amelie proves just how much more modern she is now!) before we go through the portal to the city hall.

"Ready for your first vampire council meeting?" she asks and I nod – this is going to be great!

Did you like this chapter? It's a lot longer, like I promised so please review - 4reviews = update!

Vicky xx