AN: I originally posted this on LiveJournal but I decided to post over here for the enjoyment of those who do not have an account. I'm not much of a talker so if you look forward lengthy notes at the beginning, I'm sorry but you won't find them here. I'll probably just post the original chapter description directly from LJ since I've already posted 4 chapters over there. Don't feel obligated to review, just enjoy the story. If however you'd like to leave a review or correct me on something, all kindly worded comments are greatly appreciated.
Chapter 1 Summary: Edward had anticipated that his first day at Forks high would be more of bother than usual given that he had the menial task of hunting down Isabella Swan (no pun intended) to find out what she knows. Needless to say the task proves to be more of a challenge than he could have every guessed.
"Isabella," the familiar voice was faint but didn't pull me from my thoughts. It must not have been very important anyway. "Earth to Isabella! Geez she's always zoning out like this! What a freak. Isabella!"
This time I came to my eyes automatically seeking out the source of the rather rude comments finding though it was unnecessary, as I already knew who it would be. I was met with the sneer of one Lauren Mallory who was glaring at me as she leaned against the countertop.
"Order up, don't want it to go cold now do we?" she tilted her head slightly toward the food that Mike Newton had set on the sill of the small kitchens window. I shuffled over to the window keeping my eyes down hoping I didn't show how irritated I really was by her attitude. I lifted my eyes again only when I was standing before the window. Mike met my gaze with a fleeting smile before turning his attention back to Lauren. Typical. I grabbed the tray and turned toward the dining area. As I paused Lauren she muttered "Freak" almost inaudibly before picking up some idle chatter about some recent school scandal with Mike.
This was my life. Everyday I woke up in the second story apartment over my mom's little diner and aided with the opening procedures before heading off to school, which was okay for the most part. I didn't feel like I really fit in anywhere specific but I wasn't exactly forced to eat lunch in a toilet stall in the girl's bathroom. People talked to me in class, I had a few friends who I would occasionally meet up with outside of school. Every afternoon after school I worked until closing at the diner and did all my homework before going to bed. The next day I started the process all over again.
I had good grades and my teachers were pretty indifferent toward me. I had a pretty good relationship with my parents and I never really went through the whole "rebellious teenager" thing, unless you counted dying my hair a lighter color without my parents permission then dying it back the next day because it looked terrible. All in all I was completely average. Mom, or Renee as everyone else knew her, preferred to call it normal. No matter how you dress it up though it wouldn't change what I was; utterly plain. Although she did have a point, I could never really be called abnormal unless abnormally normal wasn't considered to be an oxymoron.
I didn't feel plain, normal or average on the inside, though. I had always felt like the small town environment of Forks was just too simple for me, almost to the point of being suffocating. My dad, Charlie - or as the town folk knew him, Police Chief Swan - said I felt that way because I was a dreamer which in his book mean I spent too much of my "spare time" buried in a book, which was laughable since I didn't really have spare time. The difference was though that my dad thought being a dreamer meant I'd get away from the town I'd never left in my sixteen years, I didn't. Everyone knew that no matter how big of a dreamer someone was, they never got away from Forks for very long.
Once when I was a baby my mom took me and ran off to Phoenix for some reason. She was back by the end of the week begging my dad to take her back. To this day people would start the occasional rumor that she was taking off again. I knew she wouldn't, mainly because of the diner. My dad knew she was restless here after she had left and he wanted to give her something to make her feel like there was something to stick around for. So he bought out a little restaurant space and surprised my mom on their anniversary. She named it Chez Beaujolais because it felt exotic even if the exotic menu had to be changed within the first month to something more familiar to the small town patrons.
She loved the diner but I wouldn't lie. My mom never had a head for the knitty gritty of running a business. Sure she could do the upper management stuff and essentially run the place from her office but she had no idea how to make it run efficiently. That all changed when I was old enough to help out. I had grown up watching the small problems that would sprout and I got my mom's trust by suggesting ideas to amend them. When I started waitressing to save up tips, my mom basically dumped the managerial duties into my lap. I made schedules and duty charts, I took complaints from both customer and employee alike, I unlocked the doors as I went to school and locked them before going to bed. I ran the place from opening to close in almost every sense of the word.
Unfortunately Renee still held the power to hire and fire and that is how people like Lauren end up working at the diner. It wasn't really a matter of me hating Lauren because she didn't like me. Rather it was the fact that she never stuck to routine and slacked on her duties consistently. She didn't consider me her boss and she knew how to put on a good face for my mom. She was more of a hindrance than a help as an employee. Mike was tolerable, though he had pursued me relentlessly for a few years but now that Jessica Stanley was showing interest in him his affections toward me were dwindling. Not that I minded though, I didn't really have the time for some drama filled high school relationship at the moment. Well there was that and the fact that I was still nursing the broken heart Jacob had left me with just a few short weeks ago.
There were a few other employees who worked during the day while we were at school. The only true saving grace in the place was Angela. She worked to the best of her ability and on the days when she worked she always stayed with me through closing, sometimes staying over to study with me. She never failed to give her all in whatever she was doing, which I found to be an admirable quality.
I looked across the dining room to where she stood with her order book at the ready trying to keep her calm as the two men at her table tried to rudely urge her to go away. I reached table 5, to which the orders on my tray belonged.
"One Chicken Club sandwich and one order of hotwings with extra ranch," I said placing the first order in front of the middle aged woman and the second in front of what I assumed was her husband before carefully placing a bright smile on my face. "Is there anything else I can get you folks?"
"No thank you I think we'll be okay," the woman said shooting a glare at her husband as he dove into his food and ignored her.
"Alright, just let me know if you need anything at all!" I headed toward the order window passing Angela on the way catching a bit of what she said.
"Sir, I apologize but if you don't order anything I'll have to ask you to –"
"Fine! Just bring us some coffee for now!" One of the men said. I took in his appearance, he was large wearing a flannel jacket and dirty jeans. He had thinning sandy blonde hair that he kept running his hands through. The other was wearing a stained gray t-shirt and a tangle of long dark hair that seemed to blend into his unkempt beard. I turned my attention to Angela who nodded mutely to the men and started toward the order window a few steps behind me.
"Need help with them Angie?" I muttered warily as we stepped behind the counter.
"No, no, it's alright, they're just arguing with each other." She shook her head and grasped a pot of coffee pouring it into two mugs. I noticed a slight tremor in her hand as she poured. It was hardly noticeable but I caught it, and it was rather unsettling that calm and collected Angela was upset enough to be physically shaking at all.
"I'm taking a break," Lauren informed me haughtily as she sauntered past me toward the front of the diner. Apparently the whole hour she'd been on the job was too much for her. Angela smirked and rolled her eyes grabbing the two mugs and stepping from behind the counter into the dining area again. I grabbed a rag and started wiping up a bit of spilled sugar from the counter top and aligning some of the containers that were stored on the shelves.
"Bella!" Mike called from the order window. I looked up and saw him leaning against the order window. I didn't respond verbally just raised my eyebrows to indicate I was listening as I pulled out a package of Styrofoam coffee cups and started stacking them in their proper dispenser. "I need Friday night off. I'm taking Jessica to the movies."
"Finally asked her out?" I said smirking a bit hoping I was faking enough interest, despite my obvious lack of it. I noted the way his smile broadened slightly. Apparently his affections toward me hadn't dwindled as much as I hoped as he obviously thought I was jealous. I forced what I hoped came across as a genuine smile, continuing before he could continue with that train of thought. "We'll I'm glad. You two make a great match. I have Friday night off so I guess I could cover the kitchen for you but you will owe me."
His face fell as he gave me a half-hearted smile and mumbled an almost inaudible thank you before turning into the kitchen again. I shoved back the chuckle building in my chest and finished stocking the cups. I heard the door open as Dean Martin's That's Amore started played overhead and I winced at the typical cheesy music that usually played in the diner.
I froze in a complete daze as I spotted three figures entering the diner. There was a hulking male with dark curly hair and bulging muscles taking in the room with a look of amusement on his face. An impossibly small girl with cropped dark hair almost standing on end appraising the diner in it's entirety. Behind the two strikingly contrasting figures was a tall boy with the oddest shade of messy bronze hair. A look of irritation played across his face his gaze focused intently on the floor. All their eyes were the most stunning shade of almost golden brown. Then I realized why the boy looked so irritated as I saw Lauren stood a few feet away behind the front counter batting her eyelashes at a sickeningly rapid pace rattling off the standard welcome as she played with the ends of her hair idly, her eyes locked on the poor boy as if he were some kind of trophy. He started to speak to her so quietly I couldn't make out his words.
"Sir I'm going to have to ask you –" Angela's voice came from across the dining room shaking me from my stunned state. Her voice was a bit louder than her usual controlled tone, but that wasn't what caught my attention. It was the way her voice shook in fear. I stepped out from behind the counter and started toward the table. I don't care if Angela thought she could handle it, I wasn't going to let her be bullied by the customers like this.
"Dammit Jack if you don't follow through with this I won't have a choice!" A shout came from the wildly bearded man as he slammed his fist down onto the table rattling the coffee mugs sitting there. My attention shifted instantly to Angela who looked gripped with terror. I was starting to get angry and it seemed the diner had instantly become quiet to watch as I stormed across the length of the dining room.
Then a few things happened before I could connect their meaning. There were a few shrieks and clamoring sounds but my eyes were locked on Angela who's own eyes widened instantly and she stumbled backwards. There were words being mumbled from one of them men. I caught a cold gleam as something glimmered under the florescent lights of the diner before the wind was knocked from my chest as something hit me with incredible force. White hot light flashed behind my eyes as I was propelled backward and slammed into what felt like a wall or a shelf with a crash that didn't quite mask an explosion somewhere in front of me.
I felt a sharp slicing pain glanced across my arm tearing through my skin and leaving behind a searing pain. Glass rained down from the shelves above me nicking my skin in a few places along my body, but I barely felt it as my focus was on the burning on my arm. It felt like an eternity but in reality I hadn't even had the time to breathe in the time that had passed. My eyes snapped open as my breath came in suddenly shallow gasps.
A gun in the hand of the man with thinning hair and the man with the beard gripping his arms if he had been wrestling with him. Both were frozen for a fraction of a second and looked at me with wide eyes before turning to flee. I realized I was still being pinned with great force by something and look around to see the halo of dark hair belonging to the small girl who'd entered the building moments before. She pushed away from me and looked as if she weren't breathing herself as she stared at my arm. I looked down taking in the stream of blood flowing down my arm from a deep gash. Next to it in the shelf was a circular hole pressed deeply into the wall.
I took in a deep breath as everything sunk in. The bullet had missed my heart by less than a foot. The scent of my own blood hit me in a nauseating wave and I swayed slightly on my feet. This was just too much, thank God it was over. The commotion unexpectedly started again.
"Emmett!" The girl beside me shrieked before rushing at impossible pace across the room to the place she had been when I had first took notice of her. How on earth had she gotten across the room in a split second like that? Had she been closer to me than I thought? I didn't get to complete the thought as the bronze haired boy was being noisily slammed into a table sending debris in every direction. There was more shrieking and I watched as the boy shoved up from the ground amidst the remains of the destroyed table, not even phased and took a menacing step in my direction. I took in his eyes feeling a thrill of terror run through me as I took in the black depthless pits of his eyes, hadn't his eyes been a glorious shade of topaz before or had that been some trick of the light? A predatory look of rage was etched across his beautiful face as and I froze in shock, the hair on the back of my neck standing completely on edge.
He didn't get more than a few steps closer before the other male grabbed him by the back of his neck and dragged him backward toward the door, struggling the whole way as the boy flailed and thrashed wildly. The girl followed but paused at the door looking back at me. Her eyes met mine and they were full of what looked like pleading fear as she raised her finger to her lips in a gesture meaning silence. Silence about what? I had no idea what I had just witnessed. She bit her lip and rushed through the doors without another glance backward.
"Bella!" Mike came running through the kitchen door and leaping over the counter. I realized I hadn't been breathing much as I watched the scene that had just played out. The lack of oxygen made my head feel too light so I took a shaking breath in but realized too late that I was still bleeding. The rusted salty smell of my own blood hit me again this time like an overpowering wave and I couldn't fight the way the world tilted around me. I was reeling and most assuredly going to hit the floor but someone caught me and lowered me carefully to the floor. "Bella! Are you okay? Did you get hit? Bella please! Say something, anything!"
"I-I wasn't…" was all I could manage. I looked up at Mike's frantic face as he looked me over unsure of where I could have been hit. I let my eyes skim the room barely taking in anything around me. Luckily the diner hadn't been to full at this time in the afternoon and the few patrons who had been unfortunate enough to be here, seemed to be huddled in fear under their tables. That incident was definitely not good for business.