Rated T for some mild language here and there.

1. Fire Eyes

"It's f-freeezing! W-why is it s-s-so freezing?"

I rolled my eyes. "Gee Kev, maybe the fact that it's eight o' clock on a January night has something to do with it."

"Your sarcasm stings, Kelly," Kevin said, giving me a dirty look. Lex, my best friend and Kevin's twin sister, smacked her brother's arm and told him not to be so sensitive. This caused him to elbow her in the ribs, so she retaliated by squeezing the back of his neck—a spot where he was extremely ticklish.

"I love watching the dynamics of their relationship, don't you?" My other best friend, Cammie whispered. I laughed in response.

The four of us – Cammie, Lex, Kevin and I– trudged on, on the snow covered paths of Central Park. We were on our way to the senior ice-skating party.

"I'm so excited!" Cammie squealed, while tucking all of her wavy, blonde hair into her hat to keep it safe from the ferocious wind. "I've practically spent my entire high school life waiting for this thing. Magical things can happen on ice…"

Kevin, Lex and I groaned in unison. Cammie could be such a romantic at times.

"What?" She said defensively.

"You watch way too many chick-flicks," Kevin teased.

Cammie and Kevin were throwing comebacks at each other, so I sort of slipped out of the conversation and gazed at the snow in wonder. Living in Manhattan, you don't get this much clean, fresh snow, so when it does come, I'm ecstatic. I've always loved snow. And wind. And ice. The cold in general. The polar opposite of nearly everyone else who goes to my school, with the exception of Lex.

Out of nowhere, a snowball came flying right into my face.

"KEVIN!" I screamed, knowing exactly who the culprit was. When I cleared the white powder off my face enough so that I could see, Kevin was running around wildly, laughing and throwing snowballs at all of us.

"Lex," I complained, "your brother's an ass."

"Try living with it," she grumbled.

I'm sure Lex didn't mean to show off, but…well, we were jealous nonetheless. She'd been ice-skating since the age of seven, so now there she was, leaping and spinning on the ice all graceful and in her own world.

"Wanna take a break?" Cammie asked me, after falling for the millionth time.

"Sure. My feet are killing me!"

Cammie and I wobbled on our skates up the ramp to the rental/food building. All the students were given a coupon to exchange for a free hot chocolate.

"Oh my god, look at that line," I said once we were inside. The little snack 'shack' was to the left of the rental counter and the lockers and benches to the right. "We should sit while the lines thin out."

Cammie shook her head. "It's not going to thin out. People are coming in all the time – Ahh!"

I jumped. Cammie gripped my arm and turned beet red. "It's Michael, hide me!"

"God, woman," I chuckled, "how do you expect him to ask you out if you won't even show yourself to him?"

Prying her fingers off of me, I went in line behind Michael. Cammie just stared at first, but finally got the message and followed me.

"Maybe we should sit after all," Cammie tried tugging on my coat sleeve in the direction of the lockers.

I sighed. "Cameron Olivia Smith. You have liked this boy since sophomore year, and you haven't done a thing about it. I won't let you chicken out of merely talking to him, because by doing so, you are setting yourself up for huge regret later, while robbing him of the chance to talk to a beautiful girl at the same time."

Cammie rolled her eyes. She thought I was just saying these things because that's what friends were supposed to say, but I was dead serious. Cammie was adorable, with her blonde shoulder length hair, light blue eyes and petite frame. She and Lex – full name Alexandra – both had that in common. They were short and cute whereas I was tall and, well, not.

I turned my attention back to Michael. He was talking to his buddies, not paying any attention to us at all. I planned to change that.

"Cammie, I can't even count the number of times you fell on the ice. You need skating lessons." I announced loudly. Cammie scowled at me just as our history teacher, who is a total creeper, piped up from behind us.

"I could always teach you, Cammie." Insert gross, goofy grin here.

Michael nudged Cammie's arm and whispered, "Looks like Mr. McLowry wants to get to know you a little better."

Cammie's face burned up in embarrassment. She might've even gagged a little.

I turned my head so that Cammie wouldn't see me laugh. My head happened to turn toward the door though, and in walked the most gorgeous subject of the male species I had ever laid eyes on.

My heart started beating extra fast, like it was trying to get out and give the guy a smooch or something. Which was gross, if you thought about it.

He looked about twenty, twenty-one at most. His skin was pale, as if the moon outside had bleached his face of colour. He had straight, honey blonde hair that swept to the side and hung over his eyes. Oh, god, his eyes. They were a startling shade; a strange mix of harsh red and light orange. Like the color of a campfire. They were narrowed and darting from one side of the room to the other, until finally they settled on a spot.

Me.

We locked eyes for exactly three seconds, and in those three seconds I was scared.

Those eyes – his eyes – narrowed to slits and his fists clenched together so tightly his knuckles turned even whiter than they already were. I didn't know how that was possible. The stranger's perfect, ruby lips were set in a grim, straight line. His nostrils flared.

I was confused. Was this guy mad at me? Did I know him? No.

Surely I would've remembered his face. His eyes.

He started to advance on me, back hunched a little bit and lips slightly curled back. His strides were quick and graceful. He was only about two arms' lengths away when he stopped abruptly, straightened up and I saw those strangely mesmerizing eyes of his widen, looking frightened. In spite of myself, I wanted to go over there and give him a hug. Tell him not to be afraid. But some part of me wouldn't allow it. The stranger shook his head, as if clearing it, and focused his eyes back on me. His lips started moving. Too quickly. I think he realized I couldn't understand because he slowed them down. Squinting my eyes, I could see the words he was forming.

Sorry. I'm sorry.

Was he saying sorry to me? What for? For being unbelievably hot? For looking at me like…like…

And that was when I realized.

He didn't just look angry with me. He looked murderous. As if he wanted to…to kill me.

But what the hell did I do?

"Kelly!"

I flinched as Cammie snapped her fingers in front of my face. "What?"

"Earth to Kel. What's wrong with you? You look scared to death!"

"I'm fine. Just a little dizzy is all," I started swaying as I said that, and I felt a pair of hands on either side of my shoulders.

I jumped and spun around, expecting to look into those fiery eyes, but a pair of dark brown ones were there instead.

"Hey, you okay?" Kevin asked. "Lex told me to tell you guys that our dad is here, so get your shoes on."

I tried thinking up a witty reply to that, since that's my natural instinct with Kevin, but the fog around my brain wouldn't let me. All I could do was nod distractedly.

When I looked around the room for the stranger, he was gone.

Five minutes and various shoe mix-ups later, we were on our way to meet Lex and Kevin's dad, who was going to be waiting at the subway station.

We were all walking in silence, until Kevin started another all out snowball fight. It was all fun and silly until one of his snowballs hit me in the eye. You wouldn't expect it to hurt that much, but that's where you're wrong. It stung a whole lot, and I couldn't open that eye for about three minutes. When I did, it stung even more. Lex, being the mother hen that she is, coaxed me to open it just a little bit so she could inspect it.

"Oh jeez, it's really red," she frowned.

"I'm sorry, Kelly, I'm really sorry. I'm soooo sorry," Kevin's apologies were a constant background music. Well, more like background noise.

"It's fine," I snapped. I knew it was just an accident but I was really annoyed.

Kevin shut up and looked down, which instantly made me feel super guilty for yelling at him. It really wasn't his fault. Cammie looked at her watch.

"Guys, it's eleven thirty and we were supposed to meet Lex's dad 5 minutes ago. Should we call him?"

After a few mumbled agreements, we were finally ready to move on but I slapped my hand to my forehead. "CRAP!"

Startled, everyone turned to look at me. "What is it?"

"I left my bus card in the locker room," I groaned. "I have to go back and get it."

Lex immediately dismissed the idea. "Kelly, it's okay. You can borrow mine."

I shook my head. "No, you don't understand, my mom lent it to me and it's got forty bucks in it. She'd kill me."

Lex sighed, "Fine. Kev, you go with Cammie and wait with dad. I'll go with Kelly."

"No, you go with them. I feel bad about this as it is. I can go by myself. There'll still be people at the rink."

"You've got to be kidding. You can barely see, and you want to travel through the darkest parts of Central Park, alone, at eleven thirty—" she broke off, glancing at her watch. "—five, where you could get freaking raped or kidnapped or BOTH?"

"Well you make it sound bad," I mumbled. "But yes, that's exactly what I'm going to do, and we're just wasting more time here arguing so I'm gonna go, and you should go to your dad and tell him I'll be back in ten minutes tops. Then we'll all go along our merry way. See you guys in ten."

I started walking in the other direction before anyone could protest, but tripped on an irregular pile of snow. Lex was right, I could only see through my good eye, since my other one was still swollen. I looked behind me to find that Lex was exactly where I had left her. Arms crossed and a frown on her face. I waved, but she just shook her head and caught up with Kevin and Cammie reluctantly. I had to smile at that. She was so motherly. Lex had been my best friend since third grade when I fell off one of the playground equipment and scraped my knee. She had insisted on bringing me to the bathroom first to clean the cut and by the time she was done, all the nurse had to do was give me a band aid. Since then, Lex and I have been inseparable and Kevin was like the brother I never had. Albeit the most annoying creature on the planet.

Thinking this, I dragged my feet through the snow, which was still falling so there was even more now than three hours ago. Snow was getting into my rain boots and making me stumble every so often.

Something in the air shifted. I don't know what it was, but I was getting paranoid. I kept glancing behind me in the shadow of the trees. Suddenly it dawned on me that I was being a complete idiot. I should have let Lex come with me. My mom was always telling to never go anywhere alone at night, why didn't I listen?

"I am so stupid!" I muttered and started to pick up the pace as various gruesome scenarios popped into my head.

I had one hand covering my swollen eye, the other hand tucked into my coat pocket and clutching my cell phone, when a flash of blonde hair caught my – functional – eye.

"Is anyone there?" My voice sounded small and pitiful. I cringed at myself.

Deciding it was nothing, I walk on, even faster than before. I could already see the lights and hear the music of the ice-skating rink. There was only one thought running through my head.

"Please don't rape me, please don't rape me."

A thought came to me then. Cammie had blonde hair.

I was so relieved that I actually laughed out loud. "Cammie, come out right now. You scared the crap out of me!" Obviously Lex had sent Cammie over here to scare me. Teach me a lesson. No wait, Lex wasn't like that. It was probably Kevin. He was the prankster.

"Cammie get out here," I laughed.

No one was emerging from the shadows so my relieved laughter was quickly turning into nervous laughter.

"Cammie?"

Finally someone did step out.

But it wasn't Cammie.

Thanks so much for taking the time to read this. Don't worry, the Cullens show up within the next few chapters. ;)

Won't you be so kind as to review?