Voodoo Child
A/N: This is just a one shot, if I come up with any other stories that are related to this, I'll put it up here. In this story I tried a different type of narration, so tell me how I did! I'd like to thank GreenEyeStudio for her Beta job.
Thank you so much!
Please review!
Disclaimer: Bella, Jacob, and all the other Forks/La Push citizens belong to Stephenie Meyer. I do not own any of them.
The unusually gentle waves off of the La Push beach quietly crashed against a small wooden boat floating out on the water. Billy Black was calmly watching the shore become smaller and smaller in the distance. He swayed back and forth with the rhythm of the water as his good friend Charlie Swan rowed the boat. Billy opened the tackle box, checking, again, to make sure everything was inside.
"The kids'll be okay, right?" Charlie suddenly blurted out in a gruff voice.
Billy thought back to the kids waiting in the house. Charlie's daughter Bella was visiting for the summer. She was back at his house with his two daughters, Rachel and Rebecca, and his son Jacob.
"Yeah, she'll be fine, Charlie. Don't Worry." But Billy wasn't as sure as he sounded. Rachel and Rebecca were known to be quite irresponsible, and yet he had told them to watch out for Bella. Well, at least he had made an attempt. Bella was old enough to take care of herself anyway.
"They'll be fine," he said again, hoping to convince himself as much as Charlie.
Billy and Charlie sat in a tense silence. Both of them thinking about the children back at the house, worrying if they would be okay, but trying to enjoy the fishing.
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Bella sat on her end of the little red couch, watching the clouds through the small window. She missed the sun back at home, and tried to imagine that glorious golden light here, but the thoughts just made her sadder.
A loud burst of laughter could be heard from the room down the hall. Bella could only assume that Rachel and Rebecca were playing some game together. Some game that she was not invited to play. Bella crossed her arms tighter over her chest, glancing around the room for something to do.
Some baseball equipment was lying in the corner, but she couldn't play with that. She was known to break things quite easily. Charlie had tried to teach her baseball one summer, but all it resulted in was a sprained ankle and a broken window.
There was a TV, but Jacob was using it at the moment, and Bella didn't want to disturb him. She tended to be quite shy, and Jacob was scaring her with his cold behavior. So Bella looked back out of the window, trying to find something to look at besides the clouds.
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Jacob was sitting in the living room of his house, watching a cartoon on the TV, but he was constantly distracted. There was this girl sitting on the other end of the couch. She was constantly looking out the window, and sighing. Jacob just couldn't concentrate with this girl making so much noise.
Jacob was seven years old, and like most boys his age Jacob felt that girls were a complete waste of space. They couldn't play sports, they cried, and they played with dolls. And seriously, what kind of normal person played with dolls.
He glanced back at the TV, but Bella's loud sigh made him forget what was going on. In response, Jacob picked up the big bulky remote that barely fit in his hand, and shoved the volume button down, causing the green bar on the screen to move all the way to the right.
Bella was surprised by the sudden amount of sound released from the TV. In her surprise, a small scream escaped from her lips. But even her yell wasn't loud enough to pierce the carpet of sound that had filled the room. Jacob sat smugly and happily watching his TV, and thinking that nothing, not even that "annoying girl" could ruin his show. A small thought ran through his head, but he quickly pushed it away, not wanting to think negatively. So the small hopefully went ignored as he continued to watch the TV.
/-\-/-\-/-\-/-\-/-\-/-\-/-\-/-\-/-\
Even as Bella sat, her heart pounding loudly in her ears and her eyes opened wide, she couldn't help but feel the sting that Jacob's actions had on her. This is just some silly boy! She thought exasperatedly. I don't care about him.
But she did care. Bella couldn't ignore the deep feelings of exclusion and loneliness fluttering in her gut. Even though Bella didn't wish to acknowledge this fact, she desperately wanted Jacob, and even Rachel and Rebecca, to accept her as a friend. Not even a friend, just some person in their house. But she felt out of place, being older than Jacob and younger than both Rachel and Rebecca. She always felt out of the loop when the two girls would speak. She felt younger then she should at ten years old when she compared herself to the twins who were only eleven.
She viciously pushed the thoughts to the back of her mind, looking around for some other way to distract herself.
There was a bookshelf on the wall. Bella thought that there had to be something there to interest her, so she decided to take a look.
Bella stood on her tiptoes under the shelf, but it was just too high. She reached and reached, stretching her back and arm and fingers as far as they would go, feeling the strain all through her body, but she still couldn't reach.
Bella dropped her arm, disappointed and upset. She desperately wanted something to do, but she couldn't reach her something.
A loud sigh escaped her chest as she crossed her arms and surveyed the room again, hoping in vain that something entertaining would pop up from the corner.
Nothing happened to pop up, but she did see something else, something that caught her attention. Through a doorway in a small dark kitchen Bella saw a couple of mismatched chairs sitting around an empty table. Bella was suddenly struck with inspiration. She could move the chair right below the shelf and climb on it to reach the books. This is perfect! She thought jubilantly.
With a new bounce in her step, Bella strode over to the dingy kitchen, choosing what seemed to be the strongest of the feeble chairs, and started dragging it over to the wall on the far side of the next room.
It was a little tough for Bella, since the carpet slowed her pulling, but with work and great determination she was able to pull the chair to the right spot.
Jacob watched with little interest as Bella clambered onto the chair, shaking slightly but grabbing the back for support. From the corner of his eye he saw that Bella's hand was just able to reach over the edge of the shelf. His gaze drifted slightly, he was barely interested in what Bella was trying to accomplish. He watched as she grabbed a large book off the shelf, and saw a bright smile of pleasure spread across her face, celebrating her victory.
But Bella being prone to accidents, in even the smallest of situations, was bound to find something slightly tragic. So, inevitably, her foot started slipping off of the old worn wood, making its way towards the edge. Bella realized what was happening just a second too late, but she tried to right herself anyway. Her arms flung back, swinging wildly back and forth. Bella didn't even realize that she had lost her grasp on the book until a loud crash sounded behind her.
Then, no matter how much she swung her arms, and no matter how desperately she tried not to fall, her body started tipping forwards towards the wall. Bella reacted by doing the only thing she thought would help: she grabbed the curtains hanging from the window. She pulled too violently on the cloth, which caused the curtain rod to fly up out of the brackets. Bella fell to the ground, landing quite hard on her bottom, and pulled the curtains down with her.
As the rod came crashing down, it hit the shelf holding the books and pushed them right off the edge.
Bella scrambled away before any of them fell, but just barely. As she crawled away, one thick leather bound book hit the back of her calf, leaving what she thought would be quite a nasty bruise.
As the last book hit the floor, Bella looked around, surveying the damage she had done. A lamp was smashed, a pile of books was now on the floor, and the curtains had fallen in a huge heap.
Of course, she thought, this had to happen to me. Bella was thoroughly embarrassed and without a clue as how to react to this mess.
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Jacob sat in shock in his place on the couch. This girl had just managed to destroy his living room in the matter of one minute. He was impressed, and thoroughly amused. He saw Bella's bright red face and huge eyes which just pushed his amusement over the top. He started laughing a bright bark of a laugh that brought tears to his eyes and caused him to slump over clutching his stomach.
As soon as he managed to glance up from his slumped position, he saw Bella's feeble glare and the tears falling from her eyes. The small fact that she was crying caused a more ferocious glare to form on his face. He looked away, completely disgusted.
/-\-/-\-/-\-/-\-/-\-/-\-/-\-/-\-/-\
Jacob's nasty glare told Bella exactly what she was waiting to hear. She wasn't wanted and wasn't accepted in this house. All she could think of was escape, a way to get away from the glares.
Bella wiped her tears away with her sleeve and clambered to her feet. The thick leather bound book that had caused her leg to ache was right next to her. She quickly peeked at Jacob, making sure that he wasn't watching her, before she cradled the heavy book in her arms and rushed for the door.
The cool damp wind was a sudden yet welcome surprise. She shivered slightly, but this was toasty compared to her cold welcome.
Bella scoured the Black's small yard, hoping to find a small-secluded place for her to sit and read.
She walked around the whole house, clutching her arms tighter against her chest to keep out the cold, until she found a small path leading through a patch of trees. At the end she found a couple of old sheds that sat next to each other, each one seeming to melt into the next.
The door squeaked and screeched as she pulled it open, yet despite the frozen-ness of her hand, the peeling paint stuck to it.
Bella felt a tad nervous; she wasn't sure what she would find. She clutched the book tightly against her chest as she waited for her eyes to adjust to the oppressive darkness.
Eventually she could make out the large outline of what looked like a truck. She approached it cautiously; as she got closer she could see the faded red paint on the car and even the rust spots. The front of the truck had a huge rounded fender that was pushed right up against the wall.
Bella circled the truck once again, trying to find the light switch. She walked by the side of the truck when a long chain whacked her in the face. She grabbed the gritty chain and pulled lightly, rubbing her now greasy hands on her pants. As soon as the old lamp had buzzed on, she used its dim light to climb into the cab of the car.
The smell of tobacco and leather hit her in the face; it was strong, almost as if the car hadn't been opened in years. But the cab had a strange warmth that made Bella comfortable. She lay down on the bench, looking at the cover of her book for the first time.
In a simple calligraphy the words Magical Creatures: An Encyclopedia were imprinted on the front of the leather.
The wonderful musty smell of old paper greeted Bella as she opened the cover to the first slightly yellowed page. A quote, written in the same calligraphy as the cover, was the only thing on the page. It read:
'If the gods bring it about,
No marvel ever seems beyond belief to me'
-Pinder, 'Pythian Ode 10'
The next page had a large letter A in the middle, and nothing else. Bella flipped the next crinkly page, a little confused but extremely curious.
The bolded name, A Bao A Qu stood out at the top along with other strange names like Aatxe, Ababil, Abada, and Abia. But that was just the first page.
Bella flipped through the pages finding names just as strange and unfamiliar, cottus and seatco, along with mythical creatures she knew of, unicorns and goblins, and even every day animals that she never knew were magical, crabs and serpents. She kept looking through the strange encyclopedia until she fell upon a two-page entry simply entitled Vampire.
Bella read through the whole section. She read about the Camazotz, the vampiric bat-god, the Chupacabra who sucked the blood of goats, and the Incubi and Succubi, vampires who formed partnerships with their prey.
The entry mentioned shows such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and it spoke of the silent movie Nosferatu.
Bella flipped through the book, looking for more long entries such as the vampire one. She didn't have to go very far. Thirteen pages away there was another double-paged entry entitled Werewolf. This one spoke of the legend of Zeus and Lycaeon. It even explained a condition, lycanthropy, where a person believes that he/she is a wolf. This article also included movies from The Wolfman to Teen Wolf.
Bella sat in the cab of the car, reading through as much of the book as she could. By the time she had reached the K section, the sun had disappeared behind the horizon.
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Jacob had been very happy for the last couple of hours. The girl had left him, so he could do whatever he wanted without any interruptions. He couldn't have been any happier, that is, until she left for good.
But Jacob knew that she would have to come back eventually, and he wasn't happy when that happened.
Bella came stumbling through the front door, tightly clutching a huge leather book in her arms. Jacob gave an annoyed huff at her entrance, but ignored her like usual.
Bella simply sat on the couch and started to read, shivering every now and then, while a smile grew across her lips.
Jacob peeked over at her to see what was keeping her quiet and still. He saw the huge leather bound book in her lap. Realizing what it was, he jumped off of the couch and grabbed it, cradling the book in his arms and clutching it tightly.
Bella gazed at him strangely. Here was this seven-year-old boy who would only watch TV or eat, grabbing a book from her and holding it like his most prized possession. She just could not understand this boy!
Bella sighed, knowing somehow that she would never get the book back now.
"Geeze," she said, quite annoyed, "I was just reading about werewolves and-"
But she stopped; Jacob was looking at her now, not with his usual glare, but with a bit of interest glittering in his dark eyes.
"What?" Bella asked, a bit miffed by Jacob's change in expression.
"Did you say werewolves?" he asked her. His tone was coated in excitement.
"Yes," Bella responded, a bit wary. Bella had no idea what was going through his head. He had been cold the entire day, but now he was hanging on her every monosyllabic word.
"The werewolves are so cool!" he said, a bright smile forming on his face. Bella watched as his quick fingers flipped to the back of the book. It seemed like a familiar action for him. His eyes raked the page slowly, the huge grin seeming to grow even wider, if that was even possible.
If this sudden burst of friendliness surprised Bella, then his next actions would knock her off her feet.
Jacob sat on the couch next to her, putting the book down so that one side was resting on Bella's leg. He pointed happily to one of the paragraphs and blurted, "This is just so cool!"
Bella found herself smiling despite the confusion; Jacob's excitement was intoxicating.
It was so much so that Bella was discussing the mythical creatures with Jacob for quite some time.
After a while, Bella found it easy to be with Jacob. She could talk to him easily, well, as easily as a ten-year-old girl can talk to a seven-year-old boy.
"You know that movie the book talked about? Teen Wolf?" Jacob asked, staring intently at her.
"Yeah," Bella replied, "I saw that one with my mom. It was cool. My mom said it was only okay, but I really liked it."
"Well," Jacob said, sitting up taller "My dad said that that movie was silly, and that werewolves aren't like that at all." He drew out the all, trying to prove his point.
"He said that werewolves don't change according to the lu-lu, uh, lunar phases and stuff," Jacob blurted out in a rush, stumbling a bit at the end.
"He said that wolves can change whenever they want." Jacob smiled, seeming impressed by his own knowledge.
"How does your dad know this?" Bella asked. She wasn't sure if werewolves were real, but maybe Jacob's dad was.
"My dad knows everything!" Jacob said, obviously proud of his father's accomplishment. Bella looked at him skeptically, not really sure what to say. So she decided on, "Well, how does he know everything?"
Jacob rolled his eyes, thinking that girls were always prying into everything.
"My tribe, the Quileutes, have tons of legends about wolves and stuff. I know them all. My dad told me about them."
This made more sense to Bella, but before Jacob could elaborate she said, "Um, I have to use the bathroom. I'll be right back." She didn't want to get up, but she had to do what she had to do.
Jacob watched happily as Bella scooted off of the couch. He never knew that girls could actually like interesting stuff. He always thought it was just make-up and boys. At least that was the impression he had gotten from his sisters.
Well, Jacob thought happily, she's not so bad.
He turned to see Bella walking into the next room. But before she made it in, her foot caught against the baseball bat lying in the corner of the doorframe. She fell flat against the floor, her elbow taking most of the damage.
"Ow, ow, owww," Bella moaned, clutching her elbow tight against her chest. Her cheeks had turned a bright red, and her eyes started glimmering from the excess moisture.
Jacob looked at her disdainfully. Well, he thought, she was okay, but she's still an annoying girl.