Disclaimer - I don't own any of the characters from Twilight, just borrowing them from Stephanie Meyer - I added a few of my own too.

My second Twilight story - written from Paul's point of view. Rated for language, violence and sex - and if you didn't read the summary, it's SLASH so if you don't like that, turn back now :o)

Can anybody guess who the boy on the beach is? ;o)

CHAPTER ONE

I grew up in Tacoma, Washington. My parents divorced when I was eight; Mom moved out of state with a new guy she met and I stayed with Dad. He would never have let her take me away anyway, that much was certain. Since he couldn't control her any more, he intended to at least control me.

He transferred the application of his fists from her to me the minute she moved out and I guess I got used to it. I just did the best I could not to annoy him too much. He only hit me when he was drunk and that was usually the weekend after he got paid and a couple of days after, so I learned to keep out of his way for those few days. He took it out on the furniture or something instead when he couldn't find me, but at least I suffered fewer bruises and bloody noses.

The rest of the time things were ok - he would talk to me about when he was a kid growing up in La Push on the west coast. We were Quileute and everyone in La Push was of the same tribe, most of them distantly related in some way or another, which sounded kind of incestuous to me. Dad took me there to visit two or three times over the summer holidays and I loved the beach, but other than that there wasn't much life in the place. I liked that though; I enjoyed my own company.

We didn't go there for a few years and then one summer when I was fourteen we went back and stayed around a month. Dad was considering moving there again, but hadn't quite made up his mind. He had taken some overdue leave to see how he felt staying there for a few weeks and he seemed happier, not drinking so much. For that reason I hoped he would decide we were going to make the move.

I spent the summer hanging out at the beach and trying to pick up girls. There weren't that many to be had in La Push, not single ones who wanted to hang around with the likes of me anyway. I did manage to spend a couple of afternoons with some distant cousin ten times removed, named Kerri-Ann, but I wasn't all that keen. She was the same age as me, real silly and giggly, but there were advantages - for fourteen she was pretty well developed up top and didn't mind me kissing her, although my hands received a few slaps when they wandered.

Her parents weren't too impressed with her association with me and put a stop to it, so I went in search of someone new and found... a boy. It didn't bother me - I figured as long as I was getting some fun it didn't matter where it came from. In 2004 no one cared if you were gay - well, most people didn't - and a lot of the Quileute guys on the reservation looked like girls anyway, with hair growing down to their asses.

His name was Richie and he was a year older than me. We spent a couple of weekends fooling around on the beach, talking about sex and eventually jacking each other off a few times. He was of the same mind as me, in that he would rather be with a girl, but in the absence of any easy enough to let you do more than kiss, he was quite happy having a guy's hands on him.

It came to an end when my Dad found out and thrashed me within an inch of my life. He had come looking for me with the intention of taking me into Forks for the afternoon and found me on the beach with Richie, his hand in my pants. I was mortified and furious with both Richie and myself. Dad dragged me home and beat me unconscious. He was as sober as a judge and his fists hurt like hell until I blacked out. I didn't leave the rented house for a week afterwards until the visible bruises faded, but my chest and back were still covered in them.

I avoided Richie like the plague after that and he didn't come looking for me. That was the end to my fun for the rest of the vacation - except for one more little episode at a beach party the night before Dad took me back to Tacoma. He went out himself and didn't seem to care much what I did, so I helped myself to a bottle of his whiskey and took off to the beach.

There were probably forty or fifty kids there, ranging from my age to older ones in their twenties. A bonfire built from driftwood burned high and someone's truck was parked on the sand with its stereo pumping out dance music. Kids danced and drank and fooled about and I sat by myself drinking my whiskey and wondering if I could have one last play around before I had to go home.

I set my eye on two pretty blondes from Forks - I didn't know them, but they sure weren't from La Push. I picked myself up off the sand and went to talk to them, but they made it pretty clear they weren't interested in being seen in the company of a Native and stalked off with their noses in the air. I went back to my bottle, wondering if I would turn out like my Dad, waiting for payday so I could stock up on liquor again.

I didn't move again until I was about halfway down the bottle and more than a little tipsy. Then I hauled myself up again and walked - or rather, weaved - my way down to the water's edge and then followed the tide line. Away from the glow of the fire it was pretty dark and I stumbled along, partially from the soft sand which sank beneath my feet, but more from the drink, until I came upon another lonely soul sitting by himself in the dark.

I didn't know it was a guy at first - I could only make out a silhouette and long hair blowing in the breeze. The figure was sitting on a rock, knees drawn up and arms wrapped around them.

"Hey," I said, doing my best not to slur. "Want a drink?"

"No, thanks." It was a young male voice, but not Richie's, thank the good Lord.

"Not joining in the party?" I said.

"No. I came with a couple of friends, but I prefer my own company mostly," he said.

"What are you doing here then, if you prefer being on your own? There's about fifty people right over there," I grinned, waving my arm in the direction of the fire although I knew he wouldn't see it.

"I always come down here to the beach."

"Mind if I sit down?" I said. "Or would you rather I leave you alone?"

I hoped he would suggest I sit down as I felt I might fall down otherwise. I wished I hadn't drunk so much.

"I don't mind; sit down if you want," he said.

I dropped onto the large flat rock beside him with relief and then stupidly took another swig from the bottle. I didn't think I would be getting home any time soon. I glanced at him, wishing it wasn't quite so dark. I couldn't see his features or work out his age or anything. He seemed to be a similar size to me.

"You live here?" I asked.

"Yeah."

"I'm on vacation. Going home tomorrow," I said and absently gulped more whiskey. I asked him about life in La Push and sat listening to his voice, wondering what my chances would be in persuading him to get me off.

"I was hoping to have one last night of fun, but the damned girls here aren't very friendly," I said after a while. "Have you got a girlfriend?"

"No," he said.

"Ever had one?"

"No. What about you?"

"Not exactly. I spent a couple of days fooling about with this girl when I first got here - her parents weren't too keen though and she was kind of annoying." I hesitated a moment. I was itching for some kind of contact and now was as good a time as any to test the water. "Then I met this guy and we had some fun for a while."

"You like guys?" he said.

"I like anything," I grinned. "I prefer girls, I guess, but really who the hell cares? You?"

"I don't really know. I guess I haven't thought about it that much."

"How old are you?" I asked suddenly. The last thing I wanted to do was try and get it on with a twelve year old.

"Fourteen."

"Me too."

I decided to take a chance. What was the worst he could do? Punch me, act all outraged and storm off. I lifted my hand and brushed his hair back where it was blowing over the side of his face, then held it out of the way as I leaned closer and kissed his ear. I felt him shiver, but he didn't pull away. I lifted my other hand and turned him towards me so that our lips met.

I maintained I didn't care who I fooled about with, but I didn't make a habit of actually kissing guys. I hadn't kissed Richie and didn't really plan to kiss this boy either, but I found myself doing it none the less. His lips were warm and soft and after a moment they parted and caressed mine in return. I explored a little with my tongue and found his mouth hot and eager to respond.

I hadn't expected this and I was suddenly filled with excitement. My jeans began to feel tight and I was dying for him to touch me. I slid my arms around him and pulled him closer, stroking one hand up and down his back and running my fingers through his long hair. I dropped my other hand to his thigh, feeling the loose fabric and random zippers and buttons of cargo pants. I squeezed the firm flesh beneath and let my hand creep higher, edging my fingers between his legs until I was about an inch from his groin.

He gasped into my mouth and then broke the kiss. For a moment I thought he would pull away, but he didn't; he just sat there letting me touch him, his head drooping forward against my shoulder. My head was spinning from the whiskey, but I was still with it enough to know what I was doing. I was just about to feel for his dick, see if he was as hard as I was, when a couple of voices yelled out of the darkness and he jumped away from me.

"Sorry. I'm sorry. I gotta go." He scrambled to his feet.

"Hey, wait," I slurred, disappointed.

He was already walking away and he didn't stop. I stayed where I was, frustrated and suddenly lonely.

"Damn," I muttered to myself. "I don't even know your name."

Why hadn't I asked him his name? Wasn't that usually one of the first things to ask when you talk to someone new? I groaned and took another gulp of whiskey.

I stayed there on the beach for a while longer and then made my way back to the house. It took me half the night because I couldn't remember where it was and wandered around in circles trying to find something I recognised.

I couldn't stop thinking about that kid. He had a nice voice, beautiful hair and his lips... so soft. The guys who called to him on the beach shouted out a name, but I couldn't remember for the life of me what it was. If only I'd been sober, I would have remembered.

Finally I reached the house. Dad wasn't home and I fell into my bed, relieved that I wasn't going to have to face the third degree or his fists. I fell asleep still thinking about kissing the boy on the beach. That was all it could be; just a kiss and a memory. I was going back to Tacoma tomorrow and even if I stayed, I would never find him. I hadn't even seen his face properly.

I woke just a few short hours later with a fearsome hangover. I'd never drunk like that in my life; in fact I'd never drunk whiskey at all and promised myself I wouldn't again. I drank a pint of water and followed it up with some milk. I was just washing the glass when Dad came in, looking about as bad as I felt.

"Alright, son?" he grunted.

"Fine, Dad." I tried a smile, hoping he wasn't still drunk enough to land one on me.

"Good. That's good. Make me some coffee, would you? Better leave it a while before we hit the road."

We left La Push at lunch time and made it home by early evening after a couple of stops. The journey was a hundred and sixty miles and I knew Dad wasn't fit to be driving, but there was no way I would have said so. I sat in the passenger seat in silence, ignoring the country and western radio station he insisted on playing and trying not to think about the kid on the beach. What the hell was the point? I was never going to see him again and the last thing I wanted was to be hooked on a guy anyway. It was alright fooling about a little, but that was all.

Two days later I did forget about him. I went back to school, saw my friends again and met a girl who had just moved to Tacoma with her parents and started at the high school. She was in most of my classes and as luck would have it, in some of them I had a desk to myself which she ended up having to share as there were no other empty seats.

She was a redhead; that luscious deep red that most people can only get out of a bottle. It was down to her waist and she wore it in a fat braid with little strands escaping around her neck. She had the deepest blue eyes I'd ever seen and a little scattering of freckles over her nose. She had the figure of a sixteen-year-old already and wore tight waistbands and push-up bras to emphasise the fact. Her name was Caitlin and her family was Irish. I'd almost laughed when I heard that - she looked like a typical Irish redhead and it turned out she had a temper to go with it so at least we had that in common.

For some reason I could never quite fathom, Caitlin seemed to like me as much as I liked her. She'd apparently read a lot about Native tribes and was fascinated by the old legend of the Quileute shape-shifters. I didn't know much about it myself and couldn't really say I was interested either, but I asked Dad a tonne of questions one weekend when he was sober so I could talk to Caitlin about it. Much to my surprise, he was only too happy to talk to me at length on the subject and also delighted when I took Caitlin home for supper the first time. To be honest I could have probably taken home the ugliest creature in Tacoma as long as it was female and he'd have been happy.

Over the next few months I fell head over heels for Caitlin. She was beautiful, funny and after a while she didn't seem to mind where I put my hands either, although she wouldn't let me do anything else. She would get me off too, but only with her hand outside my pants and it began to drive me crazy after a while. I was fifteen and filled with raging hormones, but I behaved myself because I was besotted. Until the end of the summer semester when it all got too much and I messed everything up.

Caitlin was determined she wasn't going to have sex before she was eighteen and figured that if I loved her - which I'd said I did - I would wait. I did the best I could, jerking myself off every night and groping with her on the weekends, but two and a half years was a hell of a long time.

One weekend her parents took her away to visit family out of town and I hung around the harbour at a loose end, wondering what to do with myself until she came back. It was there that I stumbled upon Eugene Bentley.

Eugene was as queer as a nine dollar bill - hell, even his name was gay and he got picked on a tonne at school for it. But there he was, parked on a bench reading some girls' magazine and no one else was around. As I sauntered by he looked up and gave me a small wary smile.

I don't really know how it happened; we didn't have all that much of a conversation, but within an hour we were in the wooded area nearby and he was getting me off. Boy, did he do a hell of a job too. I was leaning against a tree, holding onto a branch above my head to stop my legs giving way while he kneeled in front of me, sucking my dick. I thought I'd gone to heaven for those few minutes and apparently so did he, even though he didn't get anything out of it.

I opened my eyes and shoved myself back into my pants as he stood up and when I glanced past him I saw a couple walking towards us down the path, both their faces showing sufficient horror for me to realise they'd seen quite enough. Josh and Samantha. Superb. Sammie was Caitlin's best friend. The four of us often went out together. Eugene took off as if the devil himself was after him and having no clue what to do with myself, I just shoved my hands into my pockets, shrugged as if I hadn't a care in the world and walked away in the opposite direction.

"Fuck!" I muttered to myself. "What the hell did you do that for, you jerk?"

I knew it was all over even before Caitlin's mother called Dad on Sunday night to tell him to keep his disgusting perverted son away from her little girl. I spent two days in hospital after a 'gang' attacked and beat me. At least that was the story. Dad broke my arm and my nose, blacked both my eyes and covered my upper body - front and back - with a rainbow of bruises. I suppose I was lucky he didn't kill me.

There was only a week to go before school ended for the summer break and Dad told them I'd been in an accident and wouldn't be fit to go back. Then he applied for a job in Forks, put the house up for rent and packed all our things into a trailer to go back to La Push. It happened so fast I barely had time to tell my friends, although when I spoke to one of them on the phone, it was clear he'd heard all about my fun in the woods with Eugene and was quite relieved I wouldn't be spending the summer hanging out with him. I didn't bother calling anyone else. There was no point. Let them think what they liked; I wouldn't be there to worry about it. The only thing I did worry about was Caitlin, who I actually had really cared for. I didn't quite know how I was going to stop thinking about her and kicked myself repeatedly for screwing up so badly.

"Paul! Get in the truck," Dad said, interrupting my thoughts. Everything was packed, the house was locked and he had just handed the keys over to the agent arranging the rental.

I did as I was told and sat in silence as Dad started the engine and drove slowly out of Tacoma. I stared out of the window, watching the scenery go by and simply waiting for us to reach La Push and our new life.