Virago

1. Hesper Lowe

I glared at the female before me who was eating a parcel. A chicken parcel to be exact. Why would she eat something she knew I loved especially when I could not have the said food?

She chuckled at me. The audacity of her. "Stop glaring at me, Hes. I am not going to throw the parcel just because you can't eat it now."

I huffed and concentrated on fiddling with the mascara tube as I had before she came in here unannounced with the parcel. But the scent of the food was enough to drive me crazy. At times like this, I truly envied the humans who did not have a superior sense of smell as we did. Sure, they could have smelt it too, but they would have gotten used to it. Their sense of smell was inferior to ours.

"Is this fine?" the hairdresser my mother had arranged tonight asked me.

To be honest, I loved my curls, the way it had volume and how it actually made me, well, me. But my boyfriend, soon-to-be fiancé wanted me to straighten them. One conversation with his sister and I knew he hated my curls. Straightening them at our engagement banquet was the least I could do.

Now that its personality of them had been toned down, it looked weird. My own hair was completely creepy on me right now, but I hoped that Devon loved it. For who else was I doing it all?

"That's fine," I said half-heartedly. "Is this all?"

"It's temporary," she said, packing her things. "Your hair... it was actually beautiful, Miss Lowe. I hated to straighten it. But it will be back by the end of this week."

I gave her my best smile. "Thank you, Mel. I appreciate it."

Just the dress and I was done. Whoever said that getting ready for a banquet was easy? Especially when it was my banquet?

I was more of a sweatshirt and sneaker kind of girl. Iliara was the one who got excited over weddings and pretty dresses. No number of years being friends rubbed that trait in me.

After the hairdresser left, I walked around the gown Devon gave me to wear for the night. Honestly, my taste sucked and he did a better job at selecting dresses for me.

"Are you happy, love?" Iliara asked, finishing that damned parcel.

I choked for a second before I concentrated on the dress before me. It was a papery pink dress that had a long slit up to the left side of my hip. The V neck dipped right up to mid-cleavage and thin straps came on the shoulders with ribbons of transparent pink hanging off. I had worn it once and it hugged my body like a second skin.

It was not that I was not confident in my own body, but I hated showing too much skin. The fact that this dress was backless made me narrow my eyes at it. Paired with this was a pair of stilettos that Paige, my lovely sister-in-law gave me.

"Hes?" Iliara called again. "Are you happy?"

This was not the first time she asked me this question. Ever since I told her that Devon and I would be hosting an engagement banquet, she had been asking me this.

To her question, I was happy. Truly happy. I smiled more and my mother commented how I had more colour on my face. I was giddy at times.

But Iliara on the other hand claimed that I had lost the spark my eyes held.

Just when I was about to console her, she snapped, "Don't bullshit, Hes. You know how big a deal an engagement is. You are basically sealing your life with this wolf."

I sighed. Engagement was a big thing in the werewolf community. It stated to the pack that the two wolves had chosen each other as mates and the said couple would usually Mark each other on their engagement night. Rarely wolves held a wedding ceremony but that was often glossed over. A wedding was just a fancy way of telling others that the couple mated, but wolves tended to skip that ceremony and just mate.