21|Small Talk

16.2K 581 66
                                    

There was a steady flow of people entering the venue for Bella and Edward's wedding, which happened to be the ridiculously large open space in front of the Cullen household

Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.

There was a steady flow of people entering the venue for Bella and Edward's wedding, which happened to be the ridiculously large open space in front of the Cullen household. It was up to the males of the family to welcome guests because Alice decided they would cause more harm than good inside the house, which was where last minute preparations were taking place. To be fair, Alice was probably right, but that didn't mean Aurélien enjoyed the task.

All the guests whom he directed to their seating areas seemed set on starting up conversations with him. Normally Aurélien would indulge them, after all his family were always an endless source of fascination for the locals wherever they went, but Seth had yet to arrive and the boy's absence was souring his mood. It was a tad juvenile and a little clingy, but Aurélien couldn't help it. He itched for the presence of his mate — his boyfriend — he craved it.

"Aurélien!" Recognising the voices of Jessica Stanley and Lauren Mallory, he tried to hold back a grown. It wasn't that he disliked them, in fact he was quite impressed with Jessica's intelligence and drive (that girl had the makings of a good lawyer and that's what she planned to be), he just didn't really want to answer their endless stream of questions.

Sure enough, when he turned around Aurélien was met with Lauren and Jessica, accompanied by Angela Weber, Eric Yorkie and...Mason? Matt? For the life of him, Aurélien couldn't remember the name of the blond boy who'd followed Bella around like a lost puppy. Though in his defence, the boy was a bit bland. Jessica was bubbly, Lauren was something of a Regina George wannabe, Angela was genuine and sweet and Eric was a clumsy nerd. All of Bella's human friends had something that caused them to stick out in Aurélien's mind, but the other boy was about as memorable as oat meal. Oat meal that always seemed to be appearing at inconvenient times and getting underfoot, but still oatmeal.

"Hello," Aurélien greeted with a cheerfulness that he did not feel. "Long time no see." God, how he hated small talk.

"I know right!" Jessica exclaimed excitedly. "We haven't seen you since you suddenly appeared at the graduation party. Which took place here too, isn't that weird?"

"Not really. My family planned both events, so it actually makes sense." Aurélien could hear his much of an arse he sounded in that moment, but his mouth had a habit of expressing his opinions even if he didn't want it to. And this opinion made the atmosphere of the conversation a tad awkward.

"Anyway," Lauren interrupted the silence. "What are your plans post-graduation, Aurélien?" Unusually, Aurélien could actually answer this question with complete honesty. Normally he had to bend the truth to make his answers more realistic, more normal.

"I'm going to Harvard to study medicine. But I'm taking a gap year first; I want to relax and maybe travel before I dive into the stress of Med school." Murmured congratulations came from everyone in the group, Mallory cooing over how intelligent Aurélien was and Jessica expressing how genuinely impressed she was.

Belle Âme ~ Seth ClearwaterWhere stories live. Discover now