A/N: Hi again all, I'll try to keep this short! This story came to me in a dream. It started out as a one shot, but with AJTOTHEEDS encouragement it has become a multi-chapter story! I have it about half-written, but barely BETA'd. (By the wonderful AJTOTHEEDS of course!) IF I can keep up, I am aiming for weekly or bi-monthly updates. Reviews may keep me motivated to finish up faster. ;) Please give it a chance. It's an Embry based story, and All-Human, but most if not all the pack will make an appearance. Okay, time to end this author note and let you read the first chapter. :)

Listening to the teacher trying to teach a room full of antsy students is very entertaining, but all Carrie wanted was to get out of the classroom and be at home relaxing. Of course, that's all any student wants on a Friday afternoon.

As the clock ticked down the final minute to three o'clock, the teacher gave up and wrote something on the board. As he sat down at his desk his last words were, "The assignment's on the board, due Monday." Carrie scrambled to write it down before the bell rang.

The loud, shrill sound of the bell sounded in the hallway; releasing a tidal wave of students out of classroom door as they headed for their lockers. Carrie worked her way through the crowd to her locker and pushed a couple that stood sucking face away from the front of hers so she could open the combination lock and get at her things. "Move it you parasites," she growled as they ignored her.

She grabbed her jacket and pack, shoving the books she needed into it as fast as she could. Her pack couldn't quite hold all her books for the weekend, so Carrie scooped up the last two, zipped up her pack, and wove her way through the other students.

"Hey watch it!" Carrie flinched as one of the Senior boys snapped at her after slamming into her side, causing her to drop her books.

"Sorry," she cried, crouching down to pick up the now stepped on textbooks. "Shit," she swore, noticing the ripped pages and a large footprint in the middle of her open math book, but she would have to wait until she was home to fix it. She carefully closed the book and sighed.

"Are you okay?" A voice behind her startled her into movement, causing her to drop the book she held, again. "Shit, let me help you with that." Carrie avoided looking behind her, but a pair of hands appeared in her vision and reached for her books. Quickly, she scooped them up again and nearly fell backwards in the process.

She blushed as he stopped reaching for her books and caught her before she fell. "I... I'm fine, really. I've got it." Now truly mortified at her clumsiness, she stood up and shrugged his hands off her arms. "I've gotta go," she whispered, "...bus."

Embry sighed and stepped back, letting her move away from him. He called out to try and catch her attention again, but she took off with out giving him a second glance. Do I smell or something? He wondered. Behind him, his friends yelled his name and a few uncreative insults to get his attention. Something about his mama and how fat she was. Trying to be subtle, Embry sniffed to see if playing ball in the gym during free-period had given him a nasty stench, but he didn't notice one. Shrugging, he turned and walked with the guys out to the student parking lot.

Racing outside, Carrie watched in horror as her bus pulled away from the curb and drove off without her, again. Looking around, she spotted her sister talking to friends in the school's student parking lot. Her sister looked right at her, then at the rapidly disappearing bus, and grinned. Before she could catch them to get a ride, the group of girls stepped into the car and drove off as well. Around her, the school grounds cleared quickly, leaving her with few options. At the far end of the parking lot, a group of Senior boys lounged against some large dirty trucks. One of them was her next door neighbor, Embry Call.

"No way," she mumbled. He wouldn't give her a second glance, and she knew it. She'd caught him giving her strange looks often enough, like he thought she was from another planet. Like last week, when she took out the trash, he'd watched her from his yard, leaning on the hedge and staring while pretending to trim the top. But, it was either ask him, or walk the several miles home on the side of the highway where she would get doused with water from all the passing cars. Clutching her books and pack tight, Carrie ducked her head and walked determinedly towards the boys.

Embry watched Carrie approach out of the corner of his eye while pretending to be focused on the sick joke Jared was in the middle of telling. She looked... scared he noticed, her body seems to shiver despite the determined frown on her face. He was sure she was going to yell at them for ruining her book and being so rude earlier, but then he noticed the quiet of the yard. The buses were gone and here she was, with no ride home yet again.

All conversation stopped as she stepped into their circle. Panicking visibly, she started to turn and walk away while berating herself for being so stupid. Looks like it was time to put some wear and tear in these shoes, she told herself.

"Hello?" One of the boys called out. Carrie recognized the voice as the one that had yelled at her in the hall. Risking being laughed at, Carrie looked back to see if he was talking to her. One of the tallest boys was looking directly at her, Carrie realized then who it was... Jacob Black.

"Hi... um... I... excuse me, I wanted to talk to Embry." Mortified, Carrie could feel her cheeks turning bright red even as she spoke.

"Yeah?" Embry replied as he stepped away from the others and stopped in front of her. Embarrassed, Carrie turned away and flinched as several of the guys started laughing at something. Behind her, Embry's hand hovered inches from her shoulder. The guys were laughing at the look on his face as he debated on whether or not to touch her. His hand dropped back to his side before she turned back partway to look at him.

"I was wondering... if it's not too much trouble... see my bus left without me and... well we're neighbors and... could I get a ride home?" Unable to look him in the eyes for long, Carrie kicked the dirt and turned away from him again.

Behind him, Jacob and Paul snickered and made kissy faces at each other to annoy him, but he ignored it and focused on the quiet girl in front of him. He knew her, even if she didn't notice him. Every morning she raced to catch the bus on time, and he tried many times to offer her a ride in his truck but she always blew him off, asking her mother to drive her instead. Every day after school was the same story. Her locker was on the opposite side of the school from her class, and opposite the main road where the buses picked up the kids, so she often missed it. She had finally come out of her shell for a moment and asked him for help, and he was determined to go for it.

Trying not to appear too eager, Embry smiled and reached for her arm. "Oh... sure. Come on." Embry lightly gripped her elbow to get her to turn around before taking her books from her arms and pointing to his truck. Carrie gasped in shock, that was way too easy, she thought.

"Hey Call! What about the cliffs?" Carrie glanced back to see the crowd of boys watching them as Carrie followed Embry to his truck.

Embry shook his head and continued walking, stopping to unlock the passenger side door and help Carrie inside. "Next time, you guys go ahead."

As Carrie set her pack on the floor and accepted her books back from Embry, she risked a glance over her shoulder at the group of Seniors. They stood looking like they were in shock, as Embry ran around the front of the truck and climbed into the driver's side. He backed the truck up, driving past his friends who still had dumb slack-jawed looks, and smiled.

The short ride home consisted of listening to a local rock station, punctuated by light chuckles from Embry as he glanced down at his phone that vibrated on the seat next to them. The first time it began its dance, he picked it up to check the number before dropping it down again. It stopped, but started again moments later. The next time he picked it up, rolled his eyes, and chuckled again. By the third time he left it on the seat and just smiled and laughed.

Carrie watched curiously as it danced across the seat until it almost fell off and Embry caught it, only to toss it back against the seat and let it begin its dance again. As they reached Embry's driveway, Carrie was too curious to stay quiet.

"What's so funny?" She inquired.

Embry shrugged and laughed again. "It's the guys, they haven't stopped calling since we left. Probably trying to figure out why I drove you home."

"Oh..." Carrie blushed and ducked her head, wondering that same thing as well. Next door, she could see her sister and her friends all hanging out and leaning against a car while obviously trying to not stare at Embry's truck as it sat idling. Carrie knew her sister had a crush on him, and she would not leave Carrie alone until she knew what was going on right now in the confines of the cab.

"So..." Embry coughed and turned to her. "You miss your bus a lot?"

Carrie's tongue started to tie in knots, but she managed to blurt out, "Yeah, but the bus driver... he hates waiting for us!"

"I remember that," Embry admitted as he turned off the engine. "Meet me at my truck after school, I'll wait for you." The lack of the rumbling engine felt deafening in Carrie's ears. He wants to give me a ride again, really? Embry smiled, and started to lean over towards her, but then stopped. Carrie could see it out of the corner of her eye. Turning away again and frowning, Embry got out of the cab and walked around to her side. She sat looking out the window and wondering what had just happened.

"O...o...okay," Carrie managed to stutter as Embry caught up her hand to help her out of the cab and walked her past the group of girls to her front door. The feel of his fingers entwined with her own was... comfortable, she grew more nervous realizing that she liked it, a lot. But after only a moment, he let go of her hand again. "I'll see you tomorrow."

Out of the corner of her eye, Carrie could see Embry watching her. Stupid girl, he's just waiting for you to haul ass inside so he can go home, her inner voice snapped at her, he's probably already regretting driving you home. Why is he being so nice? Before she could make more of a fool of herself, she turned and opened the door, barely remembering to say goodbye before running up the stairs and into her room.

It was only when she lay sprawled across her bed that she realized what she had said. "I'll see you tomorrow." What the hell was she thinking? Obviously her brain had stopped working. He must think her a real idiot now.

Walking back to truck for his bag, Embry wondered once again what he had done wrong. She had bolted inside the house so quickly it made his head spin. It looked as if she hadn't even noticed when he almost kissed her cheek in the truck, or when he had held her hand for a moment. Stupid, his inner voice snapped. But, he smiled as he hauled his bag inside to start his homework. She did say 'see you tomorrow,' and he planned on doing just that.

Before the girls standing around next door could call out to him wanting his attention, he jogged up the porch steps and headed inside.

"Em?" Embry stopped as his foot landed on the bottom stair on his way to his room.

"Yeah mom?" When she didn't answer right away, he turned and walked into the kitchen.

His mom stood kneading bread dough and watching the television on mute. "Could you be a dear and take out the garbage and recycling, please?"

Damn, that meant he'd have to go back outside, where Ramona and her group stood giggling and gossiping. It's not that they were... bad, but he just didn't see why other guys thought they were so great. Knowing his mom would assume he was complaining about the chore if he grumped now, Embry waited until he was outside to sigh and growl. But he got lucky, the girls must have scattered up and down the little lane that held about a dozen houses. Next door, the front door clicked shut as he walked down the driveway to the curb.

x~x~x

"What were you doing, getting a ride home from Embry freakin' Call?" Ramona screeched as she flung open Carrie's bedroom door.

"I...I... well I had to get a ride home somehow!" Carrie shot back, wishing once again that she had a lock on her door. "You and your little group of twits didn't wait for me, and you knew the bus was already gone!"

"Well, I figured you would just call mom. I wasn't planning on going home right away anyway," Ramona huffed as she leaned against the wall. "But that's not why I came in here, he... he... he kissed you! What the hell was that? You're only a Sophomore, he's a Senior!"

"And you're a Junior. Now that we have that established, what does that have to do with anything? Besides, he didn't kiss me, just almost did." Carrie snapped as she set aside her newly repaired math textbook.

"It has to do with the fact that Seniors don't date Sophomores, or even speak to them that often."

Rolling her eyes, Carrie picked up her battered copy of Othello. She needed to read a scene for English, and she wasn't looking forward to it. "So... it was only almost on the cheek, he was being nice and chivalrous. That's all."

Looking even more annoyed, Ramona moved to drop onto the end of Carrie's bed. "I saw him kiss you in the truck... so did the rest of the girls. Even if it wasn't a kiss, as you claim, it looked like one. You know this is going to be all around the school by Monday morning. They can't resist good gossip, ever. The little rep you had... is now shot."

Carrie snorted and shrugged, her so-called 'rep,' didn't matter to her. This was high school, if you sneezed wrong you were tossed to the bottom of the social totem pole in seconds. "I don't care." In the following silence, Ramona's cell phone buzzed and danced in her pocket. "You'd better get that, it's probably the gossip girls you call friends looking for the latest news."

Ramona surprised her sister by pulling out her phone only to turn it off and toss it onto the bed between them. "So what. They can hound me on Monday." Her demeanor changed from harpy-gossip-bitch to big sister in moments, catching Carrie off guard. "So... whatcha reading?"

"Othello. I have to write an 'observation' on Act II, Scene III."

With a fake gag, Ramona flopped on to the bed. "I remember that play... lots of people die."

Carrie giggled, "Isn't that the case with most of ol' Willie's plays?"

"You're right. Ugh, how depressing." Sitting back up, Ramona studied her sister's face. "Hey, do you mind if I bring my homework in here? We haven't studied together in a long time."

"Sure, I have a lot to do and company would be nice." Standing up, Carrie wandered over to her dresser and turned on her iPod dock. "Music?"

"Anything upbeat, please!" Ramona called as she skipped out of the room and down the hall to get her backpack. Carrie fussed with her playlists until she found one that qualified for her sister's request and started up the music.

x~x~x

Embry sat on his bedroom floor, leaning back into the side of his bed. Through his window he could see the faint light that attested to Carrie being in her room. Resisting the urge to sit by his window and stare at the stars rather than study, Embry reached up to close the curtains before turning back to his book.

Carrie's window must have been open slightly, because as he tried to focus on his studies the sounds of two girls giggling and music playing interrupted his thoughts. Damn it, he growled to himself. How was he supposed to concentrate with her laughter teasing him, tempting him to go over there or toss something at her window to get her attention? He'd been tempted to do just that many times over the last few weeks, and it was driving him insane. Rather than losing the nice breeze in his window, Embry grabbed his headphones, jammed them over his ears, and played the loudest music he had. If he was going to attempt to see Carrie tomorrow, he had to focus on homework tonight or his mom would take away his truck keys for the weekend. Just as he opened his first textbook, his phone lit up with a text from Jake.

*Seacliffs, Saturday, Noon*

"Fuck!" Even through his headphones Embry heard his mother yell at him from down the hall, using his full name. "Sorry mom!" Groaning, he picked up the phone and hit 'Reply.' *Sorry, can't, got plans, don't ask.* To avoid further bitching from Jake, he turned off his phone and tossed it into the corner.

Over the music in his ears, Embry heard the squealing giggles of the sisters next door. It was enough to make him stand up and walk over to his window and pull aside the curtain. He could just barely see inside her window, and only a stretch of wall covered with posters and snapshots, but her blinds stood open, revealing the sight of two dancing shadows on the wall. He gave up and watched those shadows for just another moment, feeling like a creepy Peeping Tom, before sitting back down to his studies.

Thanks for giving this story a chance, I hope you like it! ~Lady Grey Doom

P.S. Nope, don't own Twilight, and don't claim to. I do however own Carrie, Ramona, and their parents.