Roxanne The girl in the red dress

Prologue

I knew straight away when she had come in. The room that just moments before been buzzing with discussion and dancing had suddenly been converted to absolute silence and stillness. It had spread like a ripple from the entrance of the hall to the front where every head turned in the direction of the whispers and gasps. The anticipation of her arrival had been undeniable although to say that her appearance was doubtful is an understatement. Everyone knew that she loved to make a dramatic entrance and I can say with absolute certainty that not one person was disappointed when they caught sight of her. Never before had I truly understood the true meaning of eyes popping out in bewilderment. In the eyes of every girl in the room, the same eyes that had looked at her in a strange combination pity and spite, I could see one powerful emotion; envy. In the eyes of the boys, there was nothing but pure desire. Both bad emotions, driven by the Id of human nature but also very powerful emotions that could drive people to things that would normally be out of the question. In other words, the translation of these natural responses was danger.

Danger. Her middle name. The warning you heard in your head the first time you met her telling you to walk away which you ignored and later regretted. The thing you could see in her eyes and in her lopsided smile but could never quite put your finger on. Occasionally, for a fraction of a second, you could glimpse the danger that surrounded her, and followed her like a moth to a flame. You could find a crack, a flaw in her angelic facade. But this red flag would vanish as quickly as it had appeared. And you would be under her spell once again. The same spell that we were all under after catching sight of her flowing red dress that rippled with every confident step she took down the staircase. Above the plunging neckline of her dress was an extravagant silver necklace that caught most of the light in the room and reflected it into our enchanted eyes which slowly travelled up to her scarlet lips with her signature lopsided smile. Anyone looking at her would be led to think that she oozed confidence and certainty. That is, anyone who didn't look into her eyes to see the rawness of pain and fear that didn't belong to such a young face and was too distracted by her daring dress to notice her shaking hands. One could easily forget the scandal that surrounded her and I'm sure that for a brief moment, most people did. But that moment quickly passed.