Portland

Emma:

I couldn't help smiling as I stepped out of the airplane and took a deep breath. The flight had taken almost all night and much of the day as well. But after leaving my little hometown in Norway, and changing planes four times, I was finally here, in Portland, Oregon. And I had an entire of five weeks to spend with my aunt and uncle and my two cousins, Sharon and Carol. I hadn't seen them since they came to Norway two years ago, the twins had only been five back then. That's when my aunt Melanie had suggested that I came to stay with them for the summer. I thought it was a great idea, but my parents wouldn't let me go so far away from home alone at the age of 15. I can understand that I guess. I had just tuned 17 now, and finally I had convinced them to let me go. Aunt Mel and I seemed to be a great team when it came to calming hysterical, overprotective mothers.

They were waiting for me, and as soon as I came in to the terminal I was all but attacked by two little red-haired girls. "Emma! We've missed you so much! I haven't slept for weeks, not since dad told us you were coming. We got a puppy, can you believe it?! Well, he's kind of old now though, or older at least. He's name is Toby and he's so cute…" They kept talking on top of each other, and it was impossible to catch half of what they said. I smiled. They hadn't changed much in that way at least. "Hey, hey, slow down!" I laughed. "Save some of the talking, I'm staying for over a month." Uncle Jonas came over to greet me then. "Hei jenta mi" he smiled. "Hvordan har du det? Gikk turen greit?" It felt good to hear my own language. Jonas was my mother's brother, but he moved over to America after meeting Melanie. "Jo da, alt gikk fint. Jeg sov mesteparten av tiden så…" Mel walked over and hugged me. "No, no, no you two! Part of the reason Emma is here is to improve her English, so no talking Norwegian." She pulled away to look at me. "The girls are right; we're all very exited to have you here for the summer." I had almost forgotten exactly how much I liked Melanie. I had only met her three or four times after she married my uncle, but we really got along great. She was 32 years old, but didn't look her age at all. She was very athletic, with thin, blonde hair and blue eyes.

"Thanks Mel, I'm really looking forwards to this." I turned to Sharon and Carol. "I've had trouble sleeping to." I winked at them, and they giggled. Jonas took my largest suitcase, Mel took my gray bag, and so we headed for the car. The twins skipped around us all the way, completely ignoring Mel when she told them to be careful.

It took almost two hours to reach their house, mostly because of the traffic. The house was located north of Portland, almost on the Washington boarder, in a cosy little street that kind of reminded me of the one in "Desperate Housewives." The house was bright white, just painted it seemed, and the doors and the window frames were a soft off-white, cream colour. It was a big lawn in front, and it seemed to stretch all the way around the house. There were a few apple trees here and there, and a grey brick path leading up to the house. The lawn was surrounded by a low, white fence. It was really cute, and very… Melanie. "Wow, Mel, this is great!" I enthused as they helped me get my luggage inside. The interior was all in bright colours as well, and very modern. "Glad you like it! You'll have the guestroom while you're here; it's the first door on the left." Melanie led the way into a room about the same size as the one I had at home. The walls were white, the floor had a light wooden colour. There was a bed on the left side, on the right there was a desk and a wardrobe, all in the same wooden colour. There was one window, with yellow, see-through curtains. I walked across the room, leaving my luggage on the bed as I passed, to check out the view. From the window I could see what I assumed was the backyard. The green lawn stretched out about six meters behind the house as well, and on the other side of the little fence there were another street. "You like it?" Melanie came to stand behind me. "Yes, of course I do, it's great!" While I spoke, a little Yorkshire terrier came running into the room, barking at the top of his little lungs, and started jumping up on me. "No, Toby, no!" uncle Jonas said in a stern voice. Toby didn't even sense his presence.

But when Melanie cleared hear throat, the little dog sat down at once, staring at her with adoring eyes and a wagging tail. That made me laugh. "Yeah, right, listen to her" Jonas muttered. "Well, now you met. Toby, Emma. Emma, Toby." He gestured between us. "Good thing you aren't afraid of dogs, Em, because that guy is all over the place, 24/7" I leaned down to pat the little bounce ball. Not afraid of dogs was fairly an understatement, I guess. I adored all kinds of animals. My family had two rabbits, three cats and three horses back home, and they took all my free time. Plus I worked at the local rescue centre for homeless pets. Yeah, pretty much love animals.

The rest of the day I spent unpacking, eating dinner and then just sitting and watching some TV-show I had never heard of. It was pretty good though… Jonas and Mel would ask me about my parents and the rest of my family, school, and how my riding competitions were going. The twins were exhausted, so they went to bed quite early. I was really more than a bit tired myself, so after a while I said: "You know, I think I will be heading for bed now. The time difference is kind of taking it's tall on me." Both Mel and Jonas hugged me, and so I went to my room. I changed into a huge t-shirt, the best thing to sleep in if you ask me. I really wanted to call my parents, but they were probably still asleep. I could tell that this time difference thing was going to annoy me. I settled for sending them a text message, letting them know that I had finally made it, and that everything was fine. I pressed "send", and then turned my cell phone of. I really was very tired. The bed was comfortable, and I had no problem falling asleep.

Seth:

Paws hitting the ground and steady breathing were all I could hear as I ran around the boarders of our land. I'd been running a long time now, and I knew someone would cut inn soon. It was very quiet, as usual. Except for the Cullens, no vampire had set its foot anywhere close in about half a year. We always ran alone now, not bothering to team or pair up, it was just not necessary. Nothing had really happened since that time with the Volturi. Although I didn't want a repetition of that last Christmas, which was the most terrifying thing I have been a part of in my life, it wouldn't hurt if something happened. Every day was pretty much the same. Running patrol, eating at Emily's, spending time at the Cullen's, stopping by mom and Charlie. From time to time I went to school to, but it had sort of lost its importance after what happened. Of course, now it was summer, and no school to go to, regardless. Not that I minded, it kept the others of my back with all the talk of my education for a while.

Suddenly I was not alone in my thoughts. "Hey, Seth. I'm taking over, you're free to go."

It was Quil. "Thanks man, I'll se you around."

I decided to go over to the Cullens house. I'd bet my last pair of shoes on finding Jake there. As soon as I came to the river, I phased and pulled on the navy sweats I had tied around my leg. Just as I'd thought, as soon as I came through the door, I could see Jake sitting on the white couch, with Nessie's head in his lap. She was sleeping, which made me wonder what time it was. Careful not to wake her, I merely waved at Jake, before heading for the kitchen. I don't think he saw me, he was looking at Nessie.

"Hey, Seth! Just the man we needed!" Emmet shouted as soon as I came around the corner. He was leaning over the kitchen counter, Bella leaning over it on the other side to face him. Arm wrestling again. Their hands was standing upright, not moving an inch, though they both pushed all they could. "Its a tie, right?" Bella hissed through her teeth. "No way, I've got at least two centimetres on her!" Emmet growled. I leaned down close to their hands, narrowing my eyes and making a show of studying their hands, walking around them and checking out every angle. Esme stood by the wall biting her lip, looking very worried.

I had a feeling she was seeing a dark future for her kitchen interior. "Admit it Bella" I finally said, "you're loosing it". I grinned at her as Emmet howled with laughter and threw his arms up in the air. Bella stood up slowly, but smiled as well. "Well, it's almost been a year" she sighed and went to stand next to Edward. Esme relaxed and walked towards the fridge. "Good morning Seth. Are you hungry, honey?" I was pretty much always hungry. "Yes, thanks" I smiled at her. I still had a hard time understanding how some of the pack members didn't like the Cullen family. "Was Renesmee still sleeping when you got here?" Bella asked. I sat on one of the chairs by the huge dining table. "Yeah. What time is it by the way?"

"Six in the morning" a peeling voice said. Alice walked in the backdoor, holding hands with Jasper. They had been hunting it seemed, judging from the very light colour of their eyes. A delighted laughter sounded from below, and we all turned towards the stairs at the sound of it. "And also wakie-wakie time for Miss Nessie, it would seem." Esme smiled. Bella ran downstairs, just as Esme sat a plate with huge amounts of eggs and bacon in front of me. "Here you go, you must be very tired." She gave me her motherly smile. She had pretty much taken the role of "pack-mom", along with Emily; as Jakes pack spend a lot of time here. "Thanks Esme, it smells great." As I dug in, Alice came to sit at the table to. "Don't forget the weather today people!" she announced loudly. "What about it?" I said through a mouthful of bacon. It didn't seem to bother her, maybe they were getting used to our lack of manners. "It's going to be quite sunny today" she smiled. "So we are all staying inside."

"Ah, the sparkling thing." I realised. Spending time with our local vamps had caused me to learn a lot more about vampires that I didn't know before, we all had.

I went downstairs when I was done eating. Nessie was sitting on Bella's lap, reading out loud from some book, while Jacob stared at her with a huge grin on his face. She had reached about the size of a seven-year-old now, but mentally she was clearly a lot older than that.

She stopped reading after a while, and stared out of the window. "What, Nessie?" Jake asked. Nessie touched her mothers face without looking away from the window. Jacob shifted his eyes to Bella. She sighed. "She's tired of staying inside the house and just leaving for hunting."

"Well, I could take her somewhere." Jake said. "We could take a drive somewhere, would you like that Nessie?" he asked her. She beamed. "Yes, yes! Long drive, let's go somewhere new." Bella looked sceptical. "Aw, come on, Bells! Don't you trust me after all this time? You know I would not let anything happen to her." Bella tightened her hold on Nessie, I don't think she noticed. "Yes, but I also know how terribly good she is at talking you into having her way. If you go anywhere, I want someone to go with you, as a representative for rational judgment" she added sarcastically. Jacob looked around, and his eyes fell on me. "Well, Seth can come, can't you?" Well, I had nothing better to do… "I guess" I shrugged. "But won't she be a little, er… conspicuous, in the sunlight I mean?" Bella shook her head. "No, Renesmee doesn't sparkle. She has a faint glow, but nothing conspicuous." She smiled. "I actually would feel better if you went with them, Seth. It's incredible what she can get his promotion to do."

Jake looked sheepish enough for me to believe her.

So a couple of hours later we were in Bella's Ferrari, heading for Portland. It had been Edwards's suggestion, and Nessie would like to see a big city. Jacob was exited like a little kid in Disneyland over getting to drive the blood red Ferrari, and I had to admit, I was a little awed myself. Nessie was in the backseat, humming a song to herself and staring out the window. "So, have you been thinking about doing something for your birthday?" Jake asked me after a while. I snorted. "Naw, it's nothing special."

"Sure it is, eighteen's pretty big. Legal adult and everything." Jacob turned to smirk at me. I was pretty tired of being the youngster, even with Brandy and Collin around, but I guess that wouldn't change no matter how legal my adulthood was. "You just want an excuse for having Emily's cakes" I accused with a laugh. "Besides, it's still three months away, so you'll have to find another reason for Emily to bake." Jacob laughed. "Can you blame me though? Emily's cakes are heavenly!"

When we got into the city, people were staring a lot. The car was a real attention magnet. Nessie looked slightly fascinated as we drove through the center of Portland city. It was probably the biggest city she had ever seen. "So, Nessie, what do you want to do?" Jacob twisted around to look at her while we waited for a traffic light to turn green. "Go look in shops maybe, or we could see if we found a park…" Her face was thoughtful for a second. "Park, I think." The cars in front of us finally moved, and Jake drove on. "Then a park it is."