Summer. Three months just like any other, except that I was moving. Not Renee. Not Phil. Just me. I was moving to Charlie's house, in a dark, gloomy town called Forks. Oh, my bad, do you know everything, exactly everything that happened? Maybe you don't. So here's the whole story.
"Why? What's wrong with Phoenix?" my mother had asked in wonder. "Don't you like it here?" Ugh. Mom. She didn't know that I knew that she and some baseball player named Phil that she'd been dating were, well, betrothed.
I sighed as I answered her question. "Um, yeah. Sure. I do like it here. But, um, I just kind of wanted to spend time with Charlie." Renee sucked in her cheeks. I was never a good liar. "Are you sure, sweetie? I mean, come on Bells, are you sure about moving? With Charlie?"
"Yeah, mom. I'm sure. 100 percent," I forced a smile at her. "100 percent sure that I want to move to Forks." Forks. What, like there's some place in Arizona named Spoons, and another in California named Knives? I'd done research online about the place, and I found out that it's everything I hate: cold, rainy, pretty much deserted, and small. Barely anyone who lives even 10 miles near it has ever heard of the place.
"All right then, Bella, if it's really what you want." She sounded doubtful. Suddenly the phone rang. "I'll get it, sweetheart!" Renee ran over to the kitchen, which was across from my bedroom. I packed my favorite t-shirt into the suitcase. It was bright yellow, with a pink pig on the front. I zipped up the bulky, rectangular box.
Five days later I was on a plane. "I love you Bella. Have fun, and email me often!" Renee waved through the window. Phil was at her side, his arm around her waist. I closed my eyes. Renee had thought that telling me that they were getting married and that I should come to the wedding would have stopped me from going to Forks, but she should have tried harder. Didn't she get that Phil was the reason why I was leaving?
I mean, don't get me wrong; I have nothing against Phil, but I just don't want to go through the change. Renee was moving to Florida with Phil, and there were all these wedding plans, and everything. I didn't want to be in the middle of it. We agreed that I'd come visit for the wedding, but I could go back to Charlie if I didn't like it in Florida.
I fell asleep, dreaming about being in the middle of a freeway. Cars, everywhere. Motorcycles. Strange, because they went around me, instead of driving right through. I woke up, dazed. What the hell was that dream? I tried to figure it out, but then I just let it go. Ah, who cares. The bright orange seatbelt sign blinked. I sat back and listened to the clicks of everyone who had unbuckled theirs.
A half hour later, I was on a bench, looking around. I had my three suitcases by my side, and I was looking for a tall, middle aged man with brown wavy hair and a thick moustache. A guy who was looking for a slender, seventeen year old girl with straight brown hair and very pale skin. A teenage girl who had a heart shaped face, long arms and legs, and brown eyes. Then I spotted him.
He wasn't hard to recognize. I'd seen him last summer, a month that I barely remembered. I was good at things like that, not remembering. Not remembering anything I didn't want to. In fact, Renee was pushed far from my mind. "Bella?" the man asked. "Hi, Ch- I mean, dad." I wasn't allowed to call Charlie to his face. "Oh, Bella! I missed you so much!" He wrapped his muscular, slightly hairy arms around my body in a very awkward hug.
"Hey, dad, how've you been?" I asked Charlie in his police truck. Actually it wasn't really 'police-y', because all it was was a van with the words Forks Deputy painted on the side and some police lights on top. The van appeared clean and nice from a distance, but if you looked close it was rusty and seemed really old.
Charlie looked very hard at me, and then returned to his driving. "Business is going slow, as always." He chuckled. "Not a lot of bad guys in a small town like Forks." I knew what he was trying to do. He was trying to get me to tell Renee about Charlie as a good father that wants his daughter to live in a safe area. 'Business' wasn't as slow in Phoenix, or Florida.
We got to the house, and he sat down on the couch after bringing my bags inside. I picked them up and took them to my room. I'd been here enough times to know where it was. In some ways, I was glad that Charlie wasn't really exactly a 'responsible' parent and just left me alone. I had a lot of thinking to do.
I unpacked my bags, and got settled, then pulled out my laptop and sat on my bed. I started typing my email server. I typed in my information, and looked through my unread messages. I had eight. Six of them were from Renée, one was from some ad company, and the other one was from Anne, my old friend who went to my school in Phoenix. I replied to each one and closed my laptop. I sighed.
Looking around, I noticed that Charlie didn't do very much with my room. In fact, he didn't do anything. There was a whole pile of dust in each square foot of the room, and the carpet was grey. That part didn't really surprise me, as Charlie never vacuumed. I'd have to get started on that.
The two months of summer I had left of went by slowly. Nothing much happened. I ate, slept, watched some T.V., and went on the computer occasionally. Charlie had bought me an old rusty truck that seemed to fit me perfectly. I loved it, and I drove around often. Mostly to do things for the house, buy food, drinks, paper towels, and stuff like that. I also had to stock up on jackets, because Renée and I never were cold in Phoenix.
School crept up on my very slowly, and I knew it was in front of me. That's because nothing distracted me. I was alone, pretty much. Dad's close friend Billy had a son named Jake, who was two years younger than me but seemed to like me. It didn't bother me that he was two years younger than me, but it did bother me that he didn't care that I didn't feel the same way. He just kept chasing me.
So I was talking about school, junior year. A few days away. Then it hit me. It was the first day of school.