The Beginning: Target Confirmed

…Memories are useless. They are the diamonds of life, only meant to create a sickly illusion of happiness. In the end, they are truly worth nothing. They do not bring pleasure. Happiness is only a deception of the human brain. Humans are useless. They leech onto others for life force. They are unable to find happiness and belonging from within themselves. Instead, they cling onto one another like lost little puppies. Yes, humans are worthless beings. That was what I felt until I met the girl of my dreams. Of course, she had to be human. God loved irony, now, didn't he…

Very nice. That entry would keep them thinking to themselves for a few days. Then, they would be begging for more. Sigh My life was just a repetitive cycle of writing and thinking. I mean, I wasn't complaining. Truly. I was probably better off than a lot of people. See, I can come up with a whole list of things that I am lucky to have:

Food

Clothing

Shelter

A friend

Education

See what I mean? I was pretty well off. Anyways, I'm actually the anonymous writer Stephanie Mayor. You know, who wrote the new internet novel Twin Light? While everyone's running around, falling in love with a bunch of cold-blooded vampires, I'm in the back silently congratulating myself. It's pretty pathetic. Nobody really knows about my little secret, though. Well, except for one person…Jacob. He's actually my cousin, although we aren't blood-related. Basically, my parents got divorced, and my mom remarried. My stepfather, Phil has a sister Diane, and Jacob is Diane's son. Even with this weird thing going on, it's not complicated at all for us.

Nevertheless, I can't help wondering if Jacob is bored with me. I mean, I'm an outcast in this school, and he's my only friend. Of course, if he left me for the crowd, I'd be hurt but only a little. He's a really great person with his bright, cheerful smile and all. Sometimes, the smile is so bright that it hurts my eyes. Then, he asks if something is wrong, and it takes about ten minutes to reassure him that I'm seriously fine. See what I mean? It's all a big cycle. Anyways, he's sort of like fresh fruit pie on the windowsill. All the flies come to him, buzzing. Except, imagine the flies as people. Wait, I guess fruit pies attract people, too. Yeah, as I was saying, Jacob was really popular. It's kind of weird though; every time someone tries to get close to him, though, he just brushes them away with a fly swatter or something. Later, I started suspecting that he was doing it for me.

It was like that today, too.

"Hey, Bella."

"Hello, Jacob."

"Mike is so annoying. He asked me for the third time today if I wanted to sit by him at lunch."

"What'd you say?"

"No, of course. Hello? I'm sitting next to you right now."

I smiled but couldn't help feeling a little guilty.

"You know, Jake," I said, "it's okay if you have other friends besides me, you know."

"Yeah. What's your point?"

And just like that, he avoided the topic, once again.

When I got home, I plopped onto my bed and rubbed my temples. I was experiencing another painful migraine. I slid my phone open, deciding to check for any new comments. A few of them caught my eye.

Kellie: OMG! Her new chapter was like totally osm!

Jane: I know, rite? But y' know, I thought the love parts were kinda weird. I mean, it was pretty good, like a lot better than what I could write, but it was kinda cheesy, not that im complaining or anything.

Kellie: I TOTALLY understand wut you mean. Like I thought, it was kinda weird. It was like she didn't get enough REAL feelings in.

Hm. Realy feelings? What did that mean? Oh well, I was too tired to care about some whiny readers. Whatever. I scrolled down the page and found some more comments.

Yolanda: That was the first love scene that she wrote! I hope she keeps it up. It was REALLY great, although I felt that it was a little cheesy. There wasn't enough heart-racing moments. It's like she has no experience in love. lol. That sounds so weird.

I couldn't help but feel a tiny prick of pain in my chest. It was true; I really didn't have any experience in love. I've never actually thought about it, either. This was really weird. I'd written lots of chapters about friendship and understanding, but this was my first chapter on love. I've never gotten any negative comments on my first seven chapters. But then again, I'd had experience in the friendship category. Perhaps…it was time for me to experience love.

**********

The next day, school was quite interesting. Now that the idea was firmly rooted in my brain, I started looking for suspects. I glanced around the room. Oh, Jessica was wearing a new sweater. She probably bought it on sale. Her glance kept flitting to Mike. Interesting, she was trying to impress him. I quickly scribbled a note down.

Signs of love:

Secretly looking at the guy

Buying new clothes

"What are you doing?" a voice asked.

Suddenly, my paper was snatched away. I recognized him right away. After all, he was the main character in my story, Edward Cullen. Personally, I thought that he was a shallow-minded, narcissistic fool, but everyone flocked around him, and he was what you could call "popular". What was he doing, bothering me after about…let's say, an ENTIRE SCHOOL YEAR of ignoring me?

Anyways, before I could regain my property, he began reading it aloud.

"Signs of love."

"Hey, give it back!" I said, getting a little frantic and reached out to retrieve the paper.

"Secretly looking at a guy."

I stood up and took another swipe at the paper. Unfortunately, he was quite a bit taller than me. By now, we had the entire class's attention.

"Ooooooooooh! Is little Bella in love?" he taunted.

I felt a ghastly blush begin to creep onto my face.

"Who's the guy?" the annoying bronze-haired jerk asked.

I couldn't stand it any longer. I rushed out of the room, my face hot with embarrassment.

Obviously, I was angry. In the hallway, I passed our teacher, Mr. Banner, as the late bell rang. Out of the corner of my eyes, I saw him raise his eyebrows in confusion or anger, but I raced past him without a word. Normally, I would have stared at the expression and imprinted it into my mind, but today, my mind was obviously distracted.

I ran into the bathroom, tripping on the way in. I slammed into the disgusting gray-green walls before helping myself back up. Edward Cullen needed a punishment. Here at school, I was powerless, a little dwarf in the world of giants, but I did have my power. Even though it was against the rules, I whipped out my cell phone, logged onto my account, and began typing frantically.

By the end of my rabid typing, I had managed to transform my beautiful, gentlemanly, loving, kind, etc. vampire into an evil, disgusting, mean, selfish, etc. player. Before I clicked the "okay" button, I hesitated. Should I really do this? What if it ruined my story? Suppressing my doubts, I confidently (with shaking hands) clicked "okay". Five minutes later, my blog was bombarded with comments. Seriously, did these people wait around all day for me to update?

Joanne: I can't believe it!!!!!!!!!! Edwin sucks!!!!!!!!!! I totally thought he was the best. That was so terrible. I hate him. Jake is way better!

Rodney: I know!!!!!!!!!! I can't believe he had such an evil side. Why'd he dump Belle for Laura? Even so, that chapter was AWESOME! I was hanging on the edge of my seat, reading it. lol. That sounds so cliché, right? But seriously, I did that!

Joanne: I know, the thoughts and feelings of Belle were so REAL!!!!!!!!!! Stephanie Mayor's writing skills are getting SOOOOOOOOO awesome!

Rodney: Yeah, but don't you ever wonder who Stephanie Mayor is?

Joanne: Yeah, she's so mysterious. When they figure out who she is, it's gonna be world-wide news. lol.

The last part made me a little nervous when I read it. Who would think that THE Stephanie Mayor was actually an outcast in school? Oh well, at least I got the "feelings" across, whatever that meant. I guess this chapter was pretty successful. Thank you, oh-great-and-terrible-Edward-Cullen-of-Oz. I was feeling pretty great about myself when the PA system came on.

"Miss Bella Swan and Mister Edward Cullen, will you two kindly report to the principal's office?"

After the announcement, I was kind of in shock. I had always been "the shy girl in the corner" or "the weird girl who never talks", and now I was being called to the principal's office. Today was such a great day. I could either stay in the bathroom and get into even more trouble or go to the office and wait while Mr. Baldy the Principal chewed me out. I really didn't want my mom hearing about this, so I decided that the latter would be a wiser choice.

Unfortunately, my wise decision was immediately put to fault when I stepped out of the bathroom and spotted oh-great-and-terrible-Edward-Cullen-of-Oz a.k.a. the greatest plague of all time. I skillfully ignored him by maintaining a consistent two yards of space between us at all times.

We were merely two strangers walking down the hall. We had never met each other before. After all, I was just the weird, quiet girl that nobody knew. My daydreams ended when we reached the principal's office. My unacquainted companion knocked on the door.

"Come in," a voice called.

We walked into a dull, poorly lit office. The shades were drawn, so the only source of light came from a flickering lamp on his desk. His shiny bald head that I had glimpsed at a few times at assemblies now depicted irregular shapes that danced every time his head moved. This was an interesting setting. Perhaps, I could use it in my next update. I inconspicuously glanced around the room a few times before taking a seat in one of the cherry wood chairs placed strategically in the room.

The principal clasped his hands together and leaned forward.

"I heard that there was an interesting…occurrence in Mr. Banner's class, today."

We remained silent. This trivial act of unity between me and Cullen got on my nerves, for some weird reason, so I decided to speak up.

"I accidentally dropped my paper on the floor, and Mr. Cullen…"

I gestured at him.

"…was so kind as to pick it up for me."

The principal peered at me through his spectacles.

"Why did you run out of the room?"

"I didn't run out of the room. I merely walked with an urgent pace to the bathroom."

"Was it necessary to remain in the bathroom for a period of fifty-one minutes?" the principal, whom I was beginning to suspect was evil, asked.

"I was experiencing problems with my stomach," I replied calmly. Two could play this game.

Unfortunately, our pleasant conversation was rudely interrupted by Edward Cullen's snickering. Maybe it was the weird lighting of the room, but I believed the principal's face grew a little redder. My suspicion was confirmed when his tone grew louder as he spoke.

"Mr. Cullen, do you find this conversation humorous? Well, perhaps an afternoon of detention would further humor you."

The snickering stopped.

"Miss Swan and Mr. Cullen, it would be wise for both of you to never come here again. I will forget about this little meeting for now, but if this happens again, I will not be so condoning. Do we understand?"

Silence.

"I will take that as a "yes". Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some paperwork to attend to. Good day."

Taking one last cursory of the room, I rose from my seat and exited the room. Cullen rushed ahead of me just as the warning bell rang. Mr. Popularity would never want to be seen with someone like me. Misunderstandings like that would probably cause fatal wounds on his social status. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed something on the floor. Instinctively, I picked it up. It looked innocent enough at first - a dark blue book with the scripted word "Notes" in white ink on the cover. I flipped through the pages, searching for the name of the owner. As I slowly began to comprehend what it was, a smile began to form on my face. Interesting.

Mission one accomplished. My target had been confirmed.

A/N: How was it? Review, please. Since school's almost out for Winter Break, I will be updating quite recently. Let's aim for say…10 reviews? 20? Any ideas or guesses on what will happen next? PLEASE REVIEW!!!!!!!!!!