Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters, except for the ones I do. Stephenie Meyer is the creator of the Twilight Saga and anything you may recognize in here belongs to her.

Now that that's out of the way you should probably know that this is my first fan fiction, and my first time letting people read what I write. Please be gentle with me in your reviews, but I am very welcoming of any constructive criticism you may have to share. The first chapter is a little Bella-centric but later it will be focusing mostly on Jake and Nessie. Also, my computer hates me and it didn't save a bit of what I had written in this chapter, so some parts are a little thin. Enjoy, and don't forget to review.

Chapter 1

Jake walked by, wearing an all too thin t-shirt for the cool day, and snuck a wink at Nessie. "Ridiculous," Bella whispered, "can't he throw on a coat and try to blend in?" The crowd of vampires didn't have to look around to know that every other person in the school yard was wearing jeans and a sweatshirt.

Nessie rolled her eyes, "He gets hot Mom, give him a break. He is trying."

"You need to relax Bella," Jasper cautioned.

She was on edge. It was her first day of high school as a blood thirsty, killing machine. She had completed six years of Dartmouth, with Edward at her side, to get her masters degree in English so it wasn't her first time packed in a room with warm blooded, delicious smelling, soft, OFF LIMITS, humans; however, it was the first time in too long. Alice had made a point of taking her shopping three days before they started up at school to prepare her-or at least that was how she had convinced her to go-but now faced with so many delicate humans, it didn't seem like enough.

"What are you thinking?" Edward whispered in her ear.

"I'm thinking that this wasn't a good idea," she whispered back.

"We'll be late if we don't go now," Rosalie was annoyed as per usual, "I hate being late."

"Stop worrying Bella," Alice chimed, "we won't let you hurt anyone. We've been doing this for a very long time."

Bella sucked in her last breath for the day, it was a precaution she had briefly discussed with Edward, and they all put on a smiling face as they walked into the school. Nessie was the only one at ease, she breathed deeply, enjoying the smell of the surrounding humans. It wasn't painful for her as it was to the other Cullen's, she didn't crave the sweet taste of human blood, she simply admired the bouquet, as Edward would have put it. The others' throats ached and burned, their eyes darted from side to side as an automatic response to the uncomfortable burn, and they desired to taste the scent that caused the reaction.

"I'm going to go find Jake," Nessie informed her parents with a smile, "see you at lunch?"

"Okay, just remember..."

"I know, I know, don't worry, I'll be fine." She rolled her eyes again as she walked away.

"...to keep the family safe." Her father finished, and then sighed. "She wasn't like this in Massachusetts."

"She was worse," Alice laughed. "She's just being a teenager Edward, think of it as being in character."

The bell rang for the first class, and the group dispersed.

Bella's first class was English, and despite majoring in the subject for six years, she was excited to revisit her old favorites. The English classroom was small and cluttered. The air was clouded with dust that sparkled like a rainbow under the florescent lights. Shelves and cabinets were stuffed with books and theater props. Bella, curious, risked a small breath. The fire hit her like a wall. The room was saturated with years of human smells, preserved in the musty room. As a precaution she froze. If she didn't move a muscle she could remember who she was. Edward stood by her patiently, waiting for her to be ready to move again.

"Oh," a girl squeaked from behind Bella, "hello." Bella automatically made breathing motions and shifted her feet. Very slowly, with Edward's arm curled around her waist in an iron grip, she turned to greet the girl.

"Hello," Edward's velvet voice was effortless.

"You're new. I mean, I haven't seen you around before. My name is Brittany."

"Yes, we just moved outside of town. I am Edward, and this is Bella."

"Oh, you're the ones who moved into the old Cullen Mansion." Edward nodded and gave a friendly smile-no teeth. The girl blushed; red, sweet, mouthwatering, OFF LIMITS blood colored her face as venom filled Bella's mouth. She had to wonder, not for the first time, how Edward had ever resisted her when normal blood was so enticing. "Um, well, it was-I mean I-I'm," there was no hope of a coherent conversation now, Brittany had been dazzled.

"It was nice meeting you. Bella, shall we find a seat?" Edward led her to the back corner of the room, somewhere where curious eyes would find it hard to see them.

The room quickly became crowded with students, and the class began. To Bella and Edward it dragged on. She had let him into her head so that he could stop her from harming anyone, and the two of them sat carefully monitoring those thoughts until the bell rang.

The wind had picked up since they had arrived at school that morning; the still green leaves were ripped from the trees with the colored ones. Even Emmett could feel the bite in the wind. Jake's hair stood on end, the frost was coming, it always made him edgy. The human's had to feel it too, but it only made them more eager for that day's gym class; like they wanted to make the most of outdoor football while they could. No one complained about the wind or the cold, the humans jumped up and down frequently-Emmett and Jake only slightly less frequently to keep up an image-waiting for the game to start, but no one complained.

The teams were picked, red and blue pinnies handed out, and the whistle was blown to start the game.

Jake picked the ball easily out of the air and loped towards the orange cone that represented the end-zone. He didn't need to run for the humans to have a hard time catching up, his legs were too long. Emmett was standing in the middle of the field, trying to keep his mind out of the game, but when he saw Jake with the ball and the humans struggling to catch up, he couldn't help himself. He bolted, though not as fast as he would like, still fast enough to catch Jake, and planted his hands on Jake's back and pushed a little too hard. Jake fell to the ground and glared up at the grinning Emmett.

On the next play, Emmett intercepted a pass by jumping a little too high. If Jake could push the limits, so could he. The hunter's instinct kicked in, and it was hard for Jake to ignore it; hunting vampires wasn't about food for him, it was about survival. He ran at Emmett with full speed, and tackled him around his middle. Jake's shoulder shattered on impact, but Emmett was caught off guard by the surprise attack, and he fell to the ground. Emmett shoved the grimacing Jake off of him, and Jake shoved back. The scuffle quickly turned into an all out fist fight. The sounds of Jake's bones breaking as he landed and received blows from the rock who was his opponent didn't go unnoticed by their on-looking peers, but they were quickly ignored as neither opponent seemed to notice them.

A whistle blew, one sharp tweet, and the fight was over. Both fighters realized what they had done and separated themselves as the coach ran towards them. Emmett didn't show a scratch, but Jacob was bruised and broken. If he was lucky, he'd be suspended so no one noticed his quick recovery.

"All right boys, get up. You'll be coming with me." The coach was a big man, but not big enough, or imposing enough, to stop the two from fighting if they wanted to.

Emmett glowered at Jake as they both stood. He was going to be in more trouble than Jake was and in his mind it was all the shape-shifter's fault. Why couldn't he have just thrown the game like Emmett had so many times before? Jake glowered right on back, but he just hated Emmett for existing.

The coach made the two boys sit and wait for the principal while he went back to supervise the class. Jake was already mending. His cuts were closed and he was going to have no way of explaining all of the blood. The only solution to that was going to be letting Emmett hit him again, and that wasn't going to happen. So he left it all, hoping no one would notice. Emmett's clothes were just as ripped as Jakes, and his hair was just as messy, but either than that it didn't look like he had even been in a fight. Together they made an odd sight. The seconds dragged on. Jake tried to re-break and set some of his bones, but it made the secretary jump every time so he soon gave up. Carlisle would do it better anyways.

Out of nowhere, Emmett sighed and put his head on his hands, "Rose isn't going to talk to me for a month."

With that confession, the tension broke. Jake busted out laughing, and Emmett chuckled along side him. When the principal came out to talk to them, they were laughing with each other and mock fighting, shoving a little bit and punching one another's arm. They only received a warning and a 'boys-will-be-boys' shrug. On the way out of the office, Jake caught the time, "Shoot, I'm going to be late for lunch." He loped towards the gym locker room leaving Emmett chuckling behind him.

Bella's second class was with Alice. After wards Alice went to find Jasper, but Bella caught sight of Renesme when she passed the cafeteria on the hunt for Edward. Nessie was sitting with the chair tipped backwards, the way Jake always did with only two chair legs on the ground. No matter how many times Bella had told her 'four on the floor', she still insisted on sitting like that. Well, she decided, walking into the cafeteria, what are mothers for if not embarrassing their children.

"Nessie!" Nessie fell back off of her chair, caught off guard, "Sit up straight."

"Thanks Bella, c'mon, help me up." She held her arm extended towards her mother, who took it, naively. Nessie pulled her down on top of her to avoid Bella breaking the floor tiles. She could have stopped her fall easily, but not without making the onlookers suspicious. Bella ended up rolling onto the tile floor as Renesme laughed. Without thinking Bella sucked in a breath as she began to laugh too. The fire in her throat started almost before the scent reached her tongue. She didn't know anybody here and no matter how hard she tried her mind would not allow her to understand that these people had parents, friends, people that loved them; all she could think of was the kill, and the taste of blood. It wasn't a taste that she had experienced since becoming a vampire, and even then, the only fresh blood she had ever tasted was her own, this smell was nothing like either of those experiences. It wasn't like what Edward experienced with her and Bella was embarrassed by the thought but it didn't stop her from tasting the air again. It was a drug, and she wanted it so badly. Usually Alice was able to warn the coven if blood was going to be spilled but with Nessie and Jake in the same room, things got past her. It was a struggle to stop breathing, to stop taking in the drug.

"Nessie," she managed to rasp low enough for the humans to not be able to hear, "help," she begged.

Nessie could smell the blood too and knew immediately what was wrong, only a fraction of a second had passed. She looked up panicked and Jake locked eyes with her, he was always there with one eye on her. He saw the panic, he saw the boy sucking the blood from his cut finger, and he saw Bella's coal black eyes. Jake loped over in long strides before any of the human's could compute that something was wrong.

"Hi Nessie," he said pleasantly as he approached, "is this your sister?" He leaned over the two of them. "Let's stand up Bella," he whispered and pulled her up and put his arm around her. "Just like old times hey?"

"You have her?" Nessie asked. Bella was wild eyed and on the verge of snarling, but Jake's atrocious scent was helping.

"Yup, I've got her. I'm going to take her out to get some air."

"Good idea, I'll be out in a bit." She turned back to her new, prospective friends as Jake pulled Bella out of the room. "Sorry, I have to go. It was nice meeting you all, I'll see you tomorrow."

"Is she okay?"

"What happened?"

"She'll be fine, she hit her head." She grabbed her purse and jogged after her boyfriend and her mother. They were already out of the school and down the street when Renesme caught up.

"Jake, wait up, let me talk to her." Both heads turned, her mother's eyes were still black, she would have to feed before going back. Jake held her in place as she fought instinctively to get back to the school, and satisfy her thirst.

"Stay away Ness," Jake cautioned, but Renesme wasn't about to listen.

"Mom," she approached them with her hand stretched towards Bella's face, slowly and carefully. She knew she smelled like food, Bella always said that she couldn't ever hurt her, but she knew this wasn't exactly her mother. Bella snarled viciously, but Nessie knew her ferocity was dwindling as she looked into her eyes. Her hand planted firmly on her mother's face, images flowed from her mind to her mother's through the simple touch. Nessie showed Bella images of who she was, how she looked at Edward, her laugh, her scowl when she was upset, the way she chewed her lower lip when she worried. The snarls ceased and her eyes took some color again as her breathing calmed. She was still thirsty but Jake didn't have to hold her back anymore.

"Neat," Nessie smiled.

"You're amazing," Jacob said with a big, goofy grin.

"Sure, sure," she replied, returning his grin.

"I'm going home." Bella looked like she wanted to vomit, and for once it wasn't because her ex-love was in love with her daughter.

"Do you want me to get Dad?"

"Just send him home, I'll be there."

"Bells, are you sure?" Jake asked, "I could take you home if you want, that way if you catch a whiff of something good..."

"I'm fine, Jake, go back to school. You need to be educated, I doubt you learned anything the first time around, and my daughter is not dating some high school drop out."

"Thanks for that, it was exactly what I needed Mrs. High-and-Mighty."

"Oh, I'm high and mighty? What does that make you, Black?"

"Wow, it is so obvious why you guys used to love each other," Nessie put in dryly.

"Don't bring that up," Bella snapped at her. "You know it disgusts me."

"You're not the only one," Nessie snapped back, "thinking that my mother used to make out with my boyfriend makes me want to vomit."

Jake threw his hands up in the air in defeat, "Edward," he yelled as he made his way back to the school. Edward was suddenly there between the two girls.

"What happened?" He demanded.

"Nothing," Bella hid her eyes from her husband, and shielded Jake and Nessie's thoughts, "I'm just a little tense. Nessie was trying to help and I snapped at her, I'm sorry Nessie."

"Don't worry about it. I'll see you at home." She took Jake's hand and walked back to the school.

"Bella, look at me, what's wrong?"

Reluctantly, she looked up into his eyes. "I lost it Edward. Jake had to drag me out."

"Bella," he caressed her cheek, "its okay. Nobody was hurt."

Her throat still burned with fire, and her legs twitched, wanting to pull her back to the school, "I couldn't stop myself."

"That will come with time, come one, you need to hunt."

Bella's stomach churned; the thought of animal blood made her want to vomit in comparison with the promise of human blood. "Not yet."

"I'm sure that Esme misses us already, let's go home."