TODAY'S QUOTE:
Don't judge me. I was born to be awesome, not perfect.
Chapter Nine
Driving to the Cullen's house was, in a word, lengthy. I wanted to drive myself, so Rosalie and Emmett came by mine so I could follow them because they didn't think I could find their house on my own. They were right. I carefully followed Emmett's jeep down the winding driveway, and even with my bike's speed I kept losing them.
When I finally arrived, I had to keep my amazement in check. Of course had already seen the house (cough, mansion, cough) on that fateful Port Angeles trip, but whatever. I was kinda out of it then, and Carlisle ran me home.
There were gardens upon gardens, and the house was simply stunning. The house was timeless, graceful, and probably a hundred years old. It was painted a soft, faded white, three stories tall, rectangular and well proportioned. The windows and doors were either part of the original structure or a perfect restoration. And it was all glass. I loved it.
I parked my bike next to the jeep, and the second I did the other Cullens raced (and by raced, I mean went as fast as they actually could) to come meet me.
"Good afternoon," I laughed.
"What do you think?" Esme asked. "About the house."
"It's gorgeous, Mrs Cullen."
"Esme," she reminded me.
""It's gorgeous, Esme."
She beamed at me, before shooting a glare at Jasper. "I told you she'd like it."
"I thought she'd be too freaked out by the vampire thing," he defended.
I coughed. "She, is right here."
"Good point," Alice said. "Why are you still outside? We only have a few hours to fix… that."
She made a circling motion at my head and I frowned. "I look fine."
"You have helmet hair, and your makeup is black."
"Yes, I look like this everyday."
"Exactly. Now you're getting it," she chirped. Rosalie whacked her over the head, and I almost jumped at the booming sound that came along with it.
"C'mon, Shortcake," Emmett said, throwing me over his shoulder. I squeaked in surprise. "I'm under strict orders not to let you run."
"Great," I deadpanned. I threw a pout at Carlisle, the only one not in front of me, and silently begged him to save me. He just laughed.
Emmett sat me down on the bed in which I assumed was Rosalie's room, judging by the motorbike posters and magazines, and what I guessed was Emmett's video game console thing. Alice and Rosalie appeared through the window not much longer.
"Okay," Alice said, consulting a clipboard that had me rolling my eyes. "First up, showers and waxing, then-"
"Absolutely not."
Alice looked shocked, and Rosalie appeared to be holding back laughter.
"Why not?" she whined.
"Because I said no?"
"But you need waxing."
I raised an eyebrow. "I'll be fine. I really don't care if I have hair on my legs or not."
"But then what will we do?" she pouted.
"I don't know. Bake a cake?" I asked, shrugging my shoulders. "Whatever you want, but I'm not waxing."
"But-"
"No, Alice."
"Morgana," she whined.
"Alice, drop it," Rosalie said with a glare. "What's after?"
"Make up, then we let the human eat," Alice said, bouncing on her heels, suddenly over her little tantrum. "Then we get dressed, do photos, and head out."
"That sounds like… fun?"
"So much fun," Alice laughed, oblivious to my silent horror.
"Okay, off," Rosalie said. I got off the bed, confused when she kept flicking her fingers. "Clothes."
"Oh!"
I stripped down to my underwear, before pulling on the dressing gown she handed me.
"Where's your dress?" Alice asked, and I passed it to her from my bag.
She shrieked in horror.
"What happened?"
"You folded it," Rosalie answered, shaking with laughter.
"Yes. How else would I get it here? On a hanger?" I asked rhetorically.
"I just, I can't even, no." Alice rushed out of the room with my dress, rambling as she went.
"I think you broke her," Rosalie teased. "I haven't seen her like that since the 80s."
"Tell me you didn't," Rosalie said, glaring at Emmett.
"Didn't do what?" he asked innocently. The disco lights flashed across his face, and his skin glittered slightly with purple and blue diamonds. I tugged at my dress, trying to ignore the stiffness of it, and the pain on my head from the pins in my hair.
"Spike the punch," she said, gritting her teeth.
"I didn't do it," he defended, holding his hands out submissively. It was probably Morgana."
'It wasn't me, thank you very much. I left my fake IDs at Mothers."
"We all know it was you," Jasper drawled. "We can smell the alcohol, Emmett."
He scowled.
"On that note," I said cheerfully, "I'm going to grab more punch."
I made my way towards the bowls, carefully twirling in between different teachers and students. I did not need their bad attitudes to ruin my night.
I poured myself a glass, and downed it, barely noticing as the alcohol burned my throat when I drank. I poured two more, one for later and one to sip while I made my way back.
Rosalie wrinkled her nose when I came over. "Emmett how much exactly did you put in?"
"Enough."
She frowned, taking one cup from me and smelling it, a grimace on her face. "It's revolting."
"It smells fine," I defended. "And it tastes even better."
She just rolled her eyes.
Three drinks later, I was officially tipsy. Four more, and I was full on drunk.
"You should come home," Rosalie said.
"I wanna dance," I whined. "It's fine."
"You're not fine," she said, pulling me outside the hall. I leant heavily against her, allowing her to carry most of my weight.
"Yes I am," I slurred. "I'm always fine."
"Not right now," she muttered, but I still heard it.
"Yes right now. I'm always fine, Angel. When have I ever not been fine?"
"Port Angeles, for one."
"I was fine then," I said. "Carl-Carlisle shouldn't have helped me. I was okay."
She pursued her lips, and Emmett appeared beside me. I jumped, startled, and almost fell over.
"You were not okay, Shortcake."
"Totally was," I slurred. "I don't deserve saving. I don't want it."
"Yes, you do," Emmett said, shaking my shoulders. "Okay, Morgana? You're pretty damn important to us."
"No, I'm not," I said, my eyes fluttering as I fought to stay awake. "Not important to anyone."
"She reminds me of Edward," Rosalie sighed to Emmett. Then louder, t me, "We're taking you back to ours. You can sleep it off, and then we'll be talking."
I mumbled some sort of agreeance, before passing out.
When I came to, I was lying in a strange bed, and it was still night, according to the window.
"Morning," someone to my left said. I rolled over and squinted in the darkness.
"Carlisle," I said, not altogether surprised that he was here, and a little creeped out. "Where am I?" I asked, looking around to find that it wasn't just the bed that was unfamiliar to me.
"My room."
"Right," I said. Cause that wasn't at all creepy or alarming. That said, it wasn't like he actually slept, so he didn't share the bed with me. Then again, if he didn't sleep, then did he just spend the whole night watching me? "How long have you been here?"
"Just a few moments. Alice warned that you'd be waking up soon."
Good. Still creepy, but not as weird as I had thought it'd been. I decided to ignore the last few moments of thought. They were too confusing. "What time is it?"
"Just past three am."
"What happened last night?" I asked, sitting up against the headboard, and wincing when the movement made me dizzy.
"Here," he said, passing me advil and a cup of water, which I took eagerly. "Emmett decided to spike the punch bowl-"
"SORRY!" Emmett's voice yelled from downstairs. I felt it'd be better to just disregard that.
"-and you became intoxicated and passed out."
Hence, the hangover.
"Sorry," I said, blushing. "I'm terrible drunk."
"YES, YOU ARE!" Emmett yelled.
"Stupid vampires," I muttered.
"I'M SMARTER THAN YOU ARE!"
"Debatable."
"Would you like to go somewhere more private?" Carlisle asked. "I'd like to talk to you about something."
My heart fluttered, and I forced it to stop. "Sure," I said. "Just let me get dressed."
I had a quick shower, and pulled on a pair of jeans, boots and singlet that Alice left at the floor of the door. Carlisle held out his arms, and the second he had a good hold on me, he was off like a bullet, stopping when we reached the fairy-tale clearing I had found week ago.
"How did you know I liked this place?" I asked, sitting down on the grass when Carlisle did.
If Carlisle could blush, I'm sure he would. If anything, he looked flustered. "I, um… Your scent passed through here quite a few times, and I was curious."
I blinked.
"What did you want to talk about?" I asked, trying to find a safe conversation.
"Something Rosalie said you said last night."
I laughed awkwardly. "I wouldn't read into that too much, I get really weird when I'm drunk."
"This wasn't weird, more so concerning."
"Hmm?"
"You said you didn't deserve to be saved."
My heart fumbled for a second, and I felt my face pale. "Again, I'm really strange when drunk."
"It's not the first time you've come off this way," he said. He sounded pained. I tried to avoid looking at his face, instead watching the frogs that jumped over and into the stream. "Would you tell me why you think that?"
I frowned. "I'd rather not."
"Please, Sweetheart?" He reached over and pulled one of his hands into mine. "I worry about you."
"You know I didn't live with Mum and Bella for most of my life, right?" At his nod I continued. "When I was nearly seven, my 'gift' started developing. Mum sent me to an asylum when I blew up the house. I almost killed Bella. She doesn't remember, but she was playing in the garden. Mum wanted me to stay with her, and I wanted to visit dad. I had just run out onto the street when I got too angry."
"And your mother blamed you?" Carlisle asked.
"Yeah. This was a few months after several fires being set and me burning Bella's hair. She just assumed somehow it was me." I almost choked on the sentence. Carlisle started stroking my palm.
"It was a school, but not really. Fights would break out, and it wasn't very safe. They used to use Shock-treatments, some times."
Carlisle drew in a sharp breath. "I'm sorry, sweetheart."
"It's not like it's your fault," I laughed bitterly. "I ended up blowing up that school eventually, which got me kicked out. I kept cycling through asylums, generally getting kicked out for making things explode. I got kicked out of two for murdering three students."
"Morgana-"
"I've injured at least a hundred kids."
"Morgana-"
"My sister hates me, I hate my mother, and I only got to come meet Dad because of good behaviour for the past two years."
"Sweetheart-"
"I'm not exactly worth anyone's effort. People just end up hurt, or dead."
He didn't try to say anything this time, but instead just held me as I cried for the first time in years.
Please keep reviewing - I can only make it better if you tell me what's wrong.
Okay, so this is the shortest chapter I've written, barely making 2000 words...
I've been struggling with the timeline, as I keep making it too fast for what happens in the book, but I've finally decided that I'm just gonna go with it, and things are just going to progress a lot quicker than they should have. Hopefully no one finds that too annoying or hard to read.
WOW! 100 follows! That's actually really awesome. When I started writing this, I expected maybe 5-10, but 100? You guys are too nice. That said, please keep following, favouring and reviewing.
Yes, I am Aussie, so I apologise for the confusion with 'thong'. I'd go back and change it, but I enjoy reading your confused reviews too much. To any that don't understand it, a thong is a flip flop.
When I started writing Morgana, I wanted to base her a little off the Morgana from the TV series, 'Merlin', hence the name. I also kinda based her off Katniss, if Katniss was the slightest bit nicer. So a blend of the two. I wanted her to be as badass and yet calm and collected throughout the whole story, but she's kinda creating her own personality.
A few people have reviewed me about Bella and Morgana's relationship. I intend to have their friendship increase around Breaking Dawn, which yes, is a long time to wait, but I feel as though that's the best time to really solidify their bond. Is their lack of relationship annoying you guys? Do you think it's too cliche, or written unconvincingly? Please tell me, as I want to make this book as real and relatable as a fantasy story can get.