Snowball Fights
Disclaimer: sigh the genius does not belong to me.
A loud and sudden smack reverberated throughout my room as I sat at my desk. I quickly looked to my window, the source of the sound, in time to see the remnants of a snowball sliding down the icy glass.
"Cllllaaaaaaiiiirre," I heard an unmistakable voice calling up to me. I sighed as I walked over to my window and threw it open. I looked down into the grinning face of my best friend, who also happened to be a werewolf, Quil. "What do you want Quil?" I asked, "I'm kinda busy up here."
I had been working on an English paper before he had interrupted me. Sure, it might be winter break, but those damn teachers still felt the need to make us suffer. My English literature teacher had us doing a 10 page paper on our current novel, To Kill A Mockingbird.
"Claire, come down here and take a break. Me and the guys wanted to have a snowball fight and I wanted you on my team. With that killer arm, we'll definitely win!" he exclaimed.
It was true, I was amazing in snowball fights, but last time I played with all of them, them being a pack of werewolves, Paul had made us lose when he came up with a 'brilliant strategy' that ended with our team being covered in snow and the other team, well, not. Jake hadn't let me forget it yet, since he was on the opposing team.
"C'mon you remember what happened last time," I said, exasperated, "Plus I really need to get this essay done. You might not have anything better to do but I do." "Please?" he asked looking at me with his puppy dog face. Crap, he knew I couldn't resist the face.
"Ugh, Quil," I whined, already resigned, "Fine I'll do it but you have to promise to help with my essay after," I grumbled. "Yes!" he said, grinning in triumph, "It's done!" he agreed.
"I'll meet you down there in five minutes." "I'll be right here," he said smiling innocently. I shut the window, rolling my eyes, and set about making all the necessary preparations for a day in the snow.
As I got ready I couldn't help but think that this might not be too bad. I really did enjoy snowball fights and it would probably be a nice rest for my mind. I had done an outline and gotten all the information for my essay, the only thing left was to actually write it, which might be easier to do after a little break.
In truth, I probably didn't even need Quil's help with it but I liked him to be with me regardless. He was my best friend and when he was with me, it was nice.
My musings were interrupted with Quil impatiently calling, "Claire, what's taking you so long?" I opened my window and called back, "Chill out Quil, I'm almost done." With that I shut my window, wrapped a scarf around my neck, pulled a hat on, raced down the stairs yelling a hurried explanation to my mom, stuck my boots on, and went out the front door at a slower pace, meeting Quil in my front yard. He was wearing only a pair of jeans and a light t-shirt.
"Hey Claire," he greeted me. His smile made his features look even better than usual. Wait, what? Did I just say Quil looked good? And why was I grinning goofily back at him? And why did my heart just flutter?
"Hey Quil," I said back as naturally as was possible with the tumult my thoughts were in. The confusion must have been evident on my face however, because Quil said, "Are you ok?" I inwardly groaned. Why did he have to be so damned observant? Stupid werewolf senses.
"Oh yeah, I'm just peachy." Just peachy?! Why the hell did I say that? I have never said 'just peachy' in my life! Quil gave me an odd look but let it slide. Ok, I got out of that one, now I just have to be more careful. What the hell is my problem today? I'd chalk it up to the essay.
We walked in silence then I said, "Did Uncle Sam let you all off the hook? No vampires threatening us today?" "Yeah, Sam thought it was a nice day to do something and we haven't had any leeches in the area in a while so he gave us the day off." "Oh," I replied, "So where are we going?"
"The same place as last time," he informed me. "Who's going to be on our team?" I asked. "We haven't figured the teams out yet but we do know that Jake and I are captains and I'm picking first."
With that said, we arrived at the site of the infamous snowball defeat where Paul got us killed. The place looked the same as last time except there were now some really impressive snow forts at each end of the open clearing. The clearing was roughly the size of a football field and lined up in the middle were all the La Push werewolves, minus Leah and Sam. I guess she didn't want to mess around with the guys and Sam was probably with Emily. They were all wearing about the same thing as Quil. Life was so unfair. Why did I have to be the only one with a normal body temperature?
When Quil and I reached everyone, I took my place in line and Quil took his place next to Jacob, facing all of us. Jake started speaking, "Ok, we all know the rules and we all know that Quil's picking first, so let's begin," he said in a tone of authority. I rolled my eyes. These guys took a snowball fight so seriously. It was like an actual war to them.
Quil started off. He, of course, picked me first. Then Jacob picked Embry. Then Quil picked Jared. In the end, Jake's team was him, Embry, Seth, and Collin. Quil's was him, me, Jared, Brady, and unfortunately, Paul.
Quil and Jacob shook hands then each team retreated to their own forts. When we got to ours, Quil turned around and looked at us all, pacing up and down in front of us. Finally he stopped and turned to face us. "Gentleman," he began, before catching my eye, "and lady," he added, "I come before you today with one simple objective. To attack mercilessly and beat Jacob's team. Now I know last time we were crushed," here he paused as every eye turned to Paul who grinned sheepishly before Quil continued, "but this time we will defeat the opponent because I have a game plan."
Every eye was on him because when Quil had ideas, they were usually good ones. "Here's the plan," he stated, "Paul will stay back to protect the fort. I will phase and Claire will come with me since she has the best arm. We'll go through the forest so that the enemy doesn't see us and then once we are around to their side, I'll phase back and she and I will rush their fort from behind, hopefully catching them off guard because Jared and Brady will serve as the distraction," he now directed them, "About ten seconds after we leave, you two will run out the front of our fort and start attacking the others from the front, which then should allow Claire and I to penetrate their defenses without being seen," he finished.
A stunned silence met this and then I said, "Quil that is brilliant." "Thanks," he said grinning. "Yeah I like it," said Jared. "Me too," said Brady. "Sounds ok to me," Paul said looking annoyed, "But why do I have to stay behind?" he asked. "You do remember what happened last time don't you?" I asked him.
He looked at the ground before looking back up at me. "Oh yeah, that," he said. We all turned back to Quil, waiting for his direction, "Ok I'll be right back," he said looking at me. Then he was running into the woods and we were standing there waiting.
Quil came back out, only this time as a massive chocolate brown wolf. He came over to me and licked my face. "Eww, Quil don't!" I giggled. All the guys rolled their eyes. As I climbed on Quil's back I reminded them all what they were to do, "Remember Paul, stay back. Jared, Brady, ten seconds after we leave ok?" They all saluted me and then Quil was running in a wide arc around the clearing, through the woods.
I crouched low on his back and held onto his neck with all my might to avoid falling off. Werewolves run really fast. Soon Quil came to a stop and I hopped off his back to observe my surroundings.
I could just make out the back of Jacob's fort. I was watching so intently, I didn't notice Quil leaving to phase back so what he said next when he returned really surprised me, "Jared and Brady should be about ready to go." He said it really quietly but it still startled me and I let out a loud gasp.
The next thing I knew my back was pressed against the ground and Quil was on top of me, pinning me down, with his hand over my mouth. I looked up at him, startled and he gazed back trying to calm me down. The butterflies started in the pit of my stomach again as I looked into his eyes.
After a second or two of this he whispered, a little breathlessly, "Sorry Claire, it's just that when you gasped earlier, Jake heard it and he looked around so I had to get us on the ground or he would have seen us which would have been bad. Then I also had to make sure you didn't say anything or he would have heard," he explained.
He then removed his hand from my mouth so I could respond, "Th-that's ok," I said quietly, a little breathless myself, "It was stupid of me. I shouldn't have been so surprised by you." I was conscious of the fact that he was still on top of me so that I could feel the angles of his body but he held himself off of me enough that his weight wasn't entirely on me. There was a pause as he continued looking in my eyes.
Then all of a sudden a sound from the clearing made both our heads turn. "Jared and Brady must be attacking," he said quietly. "C'mon, it's time to go." He pulled himself off me and reached down to give me a hand up. Then we started edging through the trees towards the other fort.
All I could think about was what had just happened. I couldn't help but think about how easy it would have been to reach up and kiss him. I noticed that I was starting to get goose bumps but it wasn't from being cold. I really had to stop thinking like that. I mean, this was Quil, my best friend and only my best friend. I stole a quick glance at him and saw he had been turning to look at me. We both turned away and I felt my face heat up a little.
We were now pretty close to the fort, crouched down behind a tree so we weren't spotted. We could easily hear sounds of the battle going on, and when we looked out around the tree, we saw that Collin was the only on that was protecting their fort.
From the sounds in the clearing it sounded like it was a close battle but Jared and Brady were outnumbered. They needed reinforcements. Quil chuckled, "This will be too easy," he said, "On the count of three we're going to rush out and attack Collin, then we'll go out there and help Jared and Brady, ok?" he asked. I nodded my assent.
"One," he said grabbing my hand, making the butterflies start yet again, "Two," he said, the two of us stepping out from behind the tree, "Three!" we ran as fast as we could towards Collin.
The poor kid had no chance as we quickly overwhelmed him with snowballs. He was struggling to put together one as we each threw snow, having to let go of each others hands in the process. As soon as we were sure that Collin wasn't going to be a problem, Quil picked up my hand again and we raced around to the front of the fort to join in the battle now raging before our eyes.
Jacob, Embry and Seth were holding up against Jared and Brady's onslaught of snow and were managing to get quite a few snowballs thrown towards Jared and Brady as well. It was clear they needed our help.
Quil and I sprinted over towards Jared and Brady, using our enemies stunned expressions and lack of movement to our advantage. We hurled snowball after snowball at them and they quickly got over their surprise. But we were soon pushing them back towards their own fort, their hesitation costing them.
"COLLIN!" Jake yelled, "Get out here! We need reinforcements!" Collin staggered out but the beating he had taken wasn't exactly helping him. Quil then decided that we could use Paul's help if they were drawing on their reinforcements. "PAUL! GET OUT HERE AND HELP US!" he yelled. Paul came sprinting out of our fort and added to the deluge of snow already crushing Jacob's team.
We soon had gotten all of them back in their own fort and were mercilessly pounding them with snow. Every so often a snowball would come at us, but they were becoming fewer and fewer.
I, on the other hand, was getting more vicious as time went on. Snow was flying from my hands faster and faster. We pressed forward and pounded them with snow until all you could see was the white stuff. Soon we heard a cry of "We surrender!" and Quil yelled out, "Cease fire!"
We all stopped and allowed the cloud of snow to settle. The sight that met our eyes made all of us crack up. Jake, Embry, Collin, and Seth were all buried up to their necks in snow that was actually starting to melt from their heat.
I looked over at Quil just as he was turning towards me and we both started laughing even harder when our eyes met. Jared, Paul and Collin were all rolling on the ground they were so hysterical.
"Damnit!" yelled Jake, "Ok that's enough from you,' he said to us. The snow had finally melted enough that they could all step out of the pile. Quil walked over to me, still chuckling, and I was laughing a little still as well. He wrapped me up in a huge hug, lifting me off the ground and squeezing me so hard I was having trouble drawing oxygen.
"Quil, can't breathe!" I managed to gasp. He instantly let me down and this time kept his arms around me but my feet on the ground. I sighed, content, as I let my head rest on his chest. I pulled back and looked at him. None of the guys seemed to have noticed us, too wrapped up in what had just happened,
He let go of me and stepped back a little smiling at me and me smiling at him. "Want to get out of here?" he asked softly. "Sure," I managed to reply weakly. "Hey guys we're leaving, alright?" he said. They all nodded not really paying attention, still going over the details of the fight. He picked up my hand and we started walking at a hurried pace.
He led me towards his house and we went inside. He shared his place with Embry too but seeing as how they were all at the clearing, we didn't have to worry about him being there. I went into the living room and started taking my wet jacket and things off so I was left in my jeans and a sweatshirt, my cheeks still flushed from the cold.
Quil moved to the kitchen and began making hot chocolate as I sat on the couch, going over what just happened in my mind. Our faces had been so close again. Why was the world torturing me like this? I knew we were just friends but I couldn't deny it anymore. I liked him; no it was more than that. I loved him. I was surprised how relieved I felt after admitting this to myself. Just then the subject of my thoughts entered the room, placing the hot chocolate he had made in front of me and sitting beside me on the couch with his own steaming cup.
We sat there drinking for a little while when finally he spoke, "Claire, I have to tell you something," he said earnestly setting his cup down and turning to face me. He was so cute when he looked at me like that. "What is it?" I asked. "There's something I haven't told you yet, about werewolves," he replied.
Now I was interested. I thought he had told me everything about them but I guess not. "Ok go ahead," I said, setting down my own mug and turning to face him. "Well, you know how we have some weird side affects from being a werewolf, like the high temperature?" he asked. "Yeah…" I said, wondering where this could be going. "Well there's this one that I haven't told you about. It's called imprinting."
"And what exactly is imprinting?" I asked curiously. He started looking uncomfortable and fidgeting a bit. "It's sort of hard to explain, let me think," he said. "Well it's kind of like love at first sight, only stronger. When a werewolf sees her for the first time it's like the world moves. You know that you're supposed to be together and nothing can ever stop you from trying. You become what she needs you to be because you would do anything to be with her." "Wow," I said, "And has anyone imprinted?" I asked.
"Your Uncle Sam imprinted on your Aunt Emily," he said, "And Jared imprinted on Kim." "Oh," I said, "And have you imprinted on anyone?" I asked dreading the answer. "Yes," he replied in a whisper, looking down. My heart plummeted. Of course he had. Why wouldn't he?
"Who?" I managed to ask in a small voice. I heard him take a deep breath before I felt him lift my chin up with his finger to look in my eyes. He stared for an immeasurable moment at me and simply said, "You." I was stunned. I could feel that whatever expression had been on my face before was frozen there.
He dropped his finger but still was staring at me. "Say something, Claire, please," he said, pain coloring his voice. I attempted to move and found I was no longer frozen. "Me?" I asked breathlessly barely managing to get the word out, "You love me?" I asked in the same breathless tone. He merely nodded wordlessly.
That was when I decided to throw caution to the winds and go for it. I stared back into his eyes and slowly moved myself towards him. When I was about 3 inches away from him I stopped and whispered, "I love you too."
Apparently that was too much for him because he flung himself at me and pressed his mouth to mine with a gentle pressure. It was bliss, heaven, as he pressed me back on the couch and held himself over me, his hands in my hair. I reached up to put my arms around his neck and pulled him closer. About a minute later, he pulled back, both of us gasping for air and smiling crazily. He put his forehead on mine and whispered, "I love you." "I love you too," I said, reveling in the feel of the word.
He sat up, pulling me with him, then turned to me smiling, "You have no idea how long I've waited to hear you say that." I giggled, "I love you," I said yet again. He chuckled at me and pulled me in to kiss my forehead. "I can't believe this is happening," I sighed. "It does seem pretty crazy doesn't it?" he asked. "Big time," I replied.
"Now I have a question," I said snuggling into his side. "Shoot," he said pulling me closer. "When did you imprint on me?" I asked. He sighed and I looked up at his face to see a resigned expression. "Ok, now don't freak out or anything," he said. I continued gazing at him puzzled, "But," he said, "You were two." Again I felt myself freeze. He felt it too because he said, "I told you not to freak." I slowly recovered from the shock. "You've been in love with me since I was two?" I asked.
"Well sort of," he replied. "It's not like I had romantic feelings towards you at two, I just knew you were my soul mate. Sure, I loved you, but in a brotherly way at that point. Then as you've gotten older, it kind of changed to a different kind of love." He said, struggling to explain. "Well that makes sense," I said, "That's exactly how it's been for me. It just kind of scared me at first when I thought you were in love with a two year old because that would be kind of wrong," I babbled.
He laughed, "I'm glad you understand," he said happily. I looked up at him and saw he was looking at me with such love in his eyes I couldn't help but lose my train of thought. "So, um, what was I saying?" I asked confusedly. He laughed at me and kissed my nose, "I believe we were discussing the circumstances under which I imprinted on you," he said.
"Oh yeah," I said. "Were you wondering anything else?" he asked. "No not really," I replied. "Except…" I trailed off. "Yeah?" he asked. "Well I was wondering if you might want to kiss me again," I said. He chuckled lightheartedly, "Sure why not, I've got nothing better to do," he laughed, shrugging. "Good," I said, trying to look intimidating, "Then get over here right now," I told him completely failing to keep up the intimidating façade.
He laughed at me and I giggled, then he bent to press his lips to mine once more.
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