Their Silver Moon

Alice Forrest

I carefully placed the straw between my lips, the cool metal warm on my skin as I drank, careful not to smudge the makeup, no- artwork that had been painted onto my face. To my distaste, my skin felt heavy from the foundation, my eyelashes felt ten times longer and my lips sticky with gloss. But I trusted those around me, my dearest friends and now, bridesmaids.

“And you’re sure that I can’t have rum in this?” I asked Steph, who had handed me the glass.

She turned and threw me a dirty look, “No, I don’t think your mate would appreciate it if you were drunk walking down the aisle,” she said, rolling her eyes and turning back to the bouquets. Patricia had been spot on helping choose a colour, no a shade of green that flattered all three of them – the rich emerald green colours floated around me for weeks now. With curtains, table clothes, and ribbons filling the town as those around us blissfully hummed to the music in their heads.

Few Alpha’s of the Moon Pack had married their mates, and those who had often only had quick ceremonies at city hall or council buildings. To them it was nothing more than another way to be bound to their mate, a contract sighed for humans, so that their paring transcended the werewolf realm. But my own mate, had pulled out his black bankcard to every service we hired, to the florist, the caterers, the decorations, everything had been paid in full, with no expense spared.

For the last week, it had been as if someone was washing the street with roses, for the last few days random pack members greeted me and shook my hand, blessing me and Nate, wishing well on our union. These last few days, patrol guards found themselves occupied with restraining paparazzi photographers and reports from scaling the walls of the town and climbing trees, sending them off the private property that the city sat on.

All morning, butterflies ate away at the knots in my stomach, butterflies that I had hoped to drown with a stronger, stiffer drink.

A soft knock on the door snapped me from my mind, making me look down at the empty cup I had consumed. The knocker was my father and for the first time in years I saw him. Given – it was through the reflection of the mirror, but I finally felt the last of the air rip from my lungs as I struggled to overcome the growing lump in my throat.

There had been a time, when I was young when I resented him. I resented every aspect of his being, I resented how much I had struggled and how I couldn’t rely on him, I was jealous of my friends and their families. For I just wanted a father. But now, mated through destiny or choice – I could not have imagined the who hearted pain he must have gone through when my mother was killed. When she was killed, because I was alive.

My pain had turned into sympathy, and my sympathy into love.

And my wedding day would not be complete without my father. After all, I needed one parent there to walk me down the aisle.

For the first time in my life, I could see my father’s chin, his jawline and the sweet dimples that donned his cheeks. He looked almost unrecognizable, his hair well groomed, his skin glowing and the wrinkles on his skin seemed less harsh than what I had last remembered. The black suit fit him well, in fact, it fit him to well – it had been custom made – the fine black suit fitted his body like a glove and showed off the Beta blood that flowed through him – his natural physic and height. For the first time in my whole life, my father looked like the man in his wedding photos.

“Don’t you dare cry,” he choaked out himself, making me realise that my eyes had welled with tears. “Don’t you dare cry because if you start, I will start and that will ruin your makeup.”

And I laughed, it fell out of my mouth forcing a to grin split across my face, and I looked to the ceiling - blinking back the tears that I didn’t know I had in me. “Thank you for coming,” I said softly as he pulled me into a hug, taking the most care not to crinkle my dress or disrupt my makeup.

“Thank you for inviting me, thank you for asking me to walk you down the aisle,” he said, the evident sadness lingering in his voice as my bridesmaid left the room, giving us some momentary privacy.

His hand caressed down the loose waves in my hair and stopped on my shoulder, his eyes dancing over the silver mark on my next, “I had worried, when Angel told me you two were having issues,” he said, lost in his thoughts, his eyes unfocused but still fixed on the silver mark. “I had worried, that you had the same fate as your mother, it was like jumping into a frozen lake. I realised I didn’t even know my daughter, I never did. I was too busy reliving a moment that I could have done nothing about and missed all of the moments I could have done something about.”

“You don’t need to apologies,” I started.

A sharp gaze shocked me into silence, “but I do. I don’t deserve such a perfect daughter as you, I should have been twice the parent instead of barely a parent. I wonder how incredible you would have been had I supported you, loved you and helped you to thrive.” Taking in a deep breath he stepped back, his hands running down my arms and holding my own hands, looking at the white lace dress that hugged my body and looking me up and down.

“I always saw your mother in you,” he continued. “Despite everyone saying that you looked like me – of course, it was the wolf in you I see now. But now you look nothing like her, you look like who you were meant to be - Dr. Alice Black. You looked beautiful, smart and strong; you look like some has finally given you the love that I was not able to.”

His words cut into me, and a weight I didn’t know I carried lifted from my shoulders, without realising it, he had freed me from something I had lived with my whole life.

“Your mother would be so proud of you, and she loved you more than life itself.” And the tears ruined my makeup.