Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight.
Author's note: My first attempt at a Leah centric story. This is more of a prologue than really a chapter but please tell me what you think. This is just the start, but although it will focus on Leah, it will also involve the rest of the pack and people in Twilight. It's post BD and will attempt to kind of look more critically at the Imprint and what it means. It will also be canon.
A Route To Escape
Chapter I
"The only way to maintain a moderate sum of happiness in this life, is not to worry about the future or regret the past too much." – Mel Gibson
She was walking back to her house with weary steps, the day having taken a lot out of her. For some reason, they were still patrolling the Cullen's house, although it had been months since the half-leech freak had been born, in a manner of speaking, and saved from another stupid group of leeches. She still couldn't understand how Jacob could imprint on such a thing – surely it was contradictory to the whole purpose of their existence? And she smelt bad, on top of being weirder than the usual supernatural type existences that came across Forks.
It was dark, well past midnight, but she saw the figure that stood a little distance from her house. She hated herself passionately, again, in this moment because she knew who it was, even though she couldn't yet smell him or see his figure clearly, let alone his face. Sam.
"Leah," his soft voice drifted to her ears. She hated herself all the more for how her heartbeat sped up at the well-known caress in his voice that he seemed to save only for her. She'd never even heard him call Emily in quite this tone, though his voice held that special warmth when he talked to her anyway. It was the Leah-tone, her own very special tone that spoke of love and regret and all that crap.
"Sam," her response was just as soft. She was too tired to pretend to hate him today. They both knew the truth behind all the fighting and acting and facades anyway and they knew that it changed nothing. Sam and Emily were Sam and Emily, no matter how little either one of them had wanted it to begin with.
"There's something I...wanted to talk to you about."
Words that she knew would herald something new utterly crap and disastrous into her life, she had no doubt. She could see his face now and it worried her a little. It didn't dampen her dry humour. "And you couldn't wait inside my house? Are you really that scared of my mom?"
His smile was perfunctory at best. "I wanted some privacy. Walk with me?"
She complied, despite her exhaustion and deep desire to sleep. She could never refuse him when he looked quite like that – the wistful look that he showed her in private and she desperately hated because otherwise, it would be too much. "What did you want to discuss?"
"Jacob's imprinted on that half-leech weird thing." Old news, Leah thought, even if it was crazy enough to still be talked about. Leah had to admit that she full-heartedly agreed with Sam's description of the Creepy Thing. Jacob and Seth might think she's cute but she just thought that it was weird, creepy and completely wrong.
"Old news, Sam."
"Haven't you thought about what it means?"
This brought a puzzled furrow to Leah's forehead. What did it mean? Aside from Jacob being one of those disgusting, nauseating Imprinters that she despised so much, albeit weirder and worse than the others. "What does it mean, Sam? Stop being so damn cryptic and tell me what you want to say."
"Jacob's imprinted on something that'll live forever. He'll live forever...unless he's killed in battle or something." Things started to click in Leah's head as Sam talked, although she couldn't see the picture yet. He paused, before speaking slowly and more softly that before. "If he lives forever, it might mean the Cullens living here...for a long time. In the least, they'll be here in the foreseeable future. That'll mean us werewolves will be around, for a long time."
"Which'll mean that I'll be stuck here for a long time," she whispered what he'd been trying to tell her all along. Her life will be stuck on hold in this nightmare she found herself in. And what else was he trying to say without saying it? "What are you trying to say?" Her tone was impatient and annoyed because fucked if she'll show how appalled she felt at the thought of having to live through this forever.
"You need to get out, Lee. Get out while you still can," his voice sounded oddly strangled, as if he was being forced to say such things. "Get out before it drives you mad."
"Mad," she repeated after him, still stunned from the realisation that the end wasn't near, not even slightly. But this was such a stupid thing for him to say; surely he knew sanity had always been just outside her grasp when these events had first started?
"I've been watching you. We've been watching you," he continued, ignoring her uttered word and stricken expression. "We've seen you change. I know everyone thinks you're so much happier...but you're not, are you?" The soft question was rhetorical. "You're still miserable and you still hide it with anger and sarcasm. And the pain's killing you inside. We've seen it, Lee. We've seen it and...it's killing us too."
And that was the truth of it, at the end of the day. No matter what she did, her pain hurt others and it had gotten so that she didn't really know what happiness was – happiness untainted by pain and regret and guilt and the thousands of things that she tried to hide from.
"You need to get out, Lee."
She knew this; she'd known this for a long time. Leaving Sam's pack and leaving his thoughts had been a start, a blessed release and it had been enough at the time. But Sam wasn't the only pain in her life and it was still poisoning her and all those around her, everything she touched, everyone she was with. She took a shuddering breath in, uncertain of what she was going to say. "What about Jacob?" What about Jacob? What did he have to do with all this? Surely with Sam's pack and his remaining pack, he'll be able to control everything and protect everyone? If he had the balls to leave the stupid half-leech for a few minutes...
"Jacob will be fine with this. He'll understand; he ran away himself, remember?"
He didn't understand. It wasn't about Jacob at all. "That's not what I bloody meant!"
"Leah, you have to do this! For yourself, for us..." She should have been prepared for what he said next. "Emily and I are going to get married and...it's going to kill all of us if this carries on."
This what? What 'this' was he talking about? What was she doing intentionally that screwed them up more than screwed her up? He was such a self-centred, egocentric bastard, sometimes. "Fine, I'll do it." What other choice did she really have? Stay here, unaging, surrounded by misery and nauseating Imprinters and leeches that reminded her day after day that her life had been destroyed because of their existences? She hated them so damn much. She might not hate them individually or want them to die, but she could never forgive or stop resenting their existences. Getting the hell out was definitely the best option she had. It sort of was the only option she had, really.
"Leah..." Sam sounded uncertain, as he looked at anywhere but her. "I..." He sucked in a breath that sounded painful. "You know I still love you, right?"
WHAT-THE-FUCK? What-the-fuck-what-the-fuck-what-the-fuck... "Sam-"
"I've got to go. Just...thanks..." He walked away, leaving behind a broken silence.