By the way I probably should tell you all that I only read Twilight. I'm planning to read the other three but that will not happen for another couple of weeks.
I still don't own anything that has to do with the book, or movie, series and make no profit from this.
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Chief Swan's Mysterious Daughter.
It was the talk around town. Bigger than Mrs. Baileys approaching triplets that may or may not be Mr. Bailey's triplets (but maybe the mail man's). It was a scandal seventeen years late and about their very respectable (but not untouchable as far as gossip went) Chief Swan. He had a daughter no one, not even himself, knew about.
It started two weeks earlier when the Chief of Police went to Forks High to meet the Principal to enroll this mysterious daughter. The Principal assistant had shamelessly eavesdropped, like she always did, not knowing she would get the scoop of a lifetime. After the Chief left she had thrown herself on the phone and gleefully told her gossip ladies all about it. It was needless to say that a few hours later everyone in Forks knew.
Two weeks later they still talked about it. The Chief hadn't said much about it besides the fact that her name was Isabella, apparently named after his sister (who disappeared eighteen years ago, another scandal coming back to life) and the general agreement was that she was Renee's daughter. Why Renee never said anything about her was heavily speculated. Another thing agreed upon was that Renee must have been pregnant with this girl when the divorce was finalized.
Opinion differed about the matter of why she was coming to live with the Chief now when she was a year away from being eighteen. Suggestions such as abuse, and Renee was going to jail for it, to a new man in Renee's life who didn't want a grown child by another man to take care of and that she was a runaway who refused to go back to her mother was just a few of the more popular opinions. But most people agreed that for whatever reason she came for she probably wanted to stay to get to now her father.
Those really sentimental, primarily older ladies with a soft spot for the lonely Chief, thought how happy he must have been finding out he had a daughter and how his life would now change for the better.
If they only knew the real truth about her and Charlie.
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1975
The kid had locked in on her and would try it soon, she was sure. The market place was crowded and people couldn't help but bump in to each other, an easy situation to control for a young pickpocket. One of his young friends had already tried, as she projected the image of a young happy woman with money to spend. But she hadn't lived this long without picking up some tricks on her own and had easily sidetracked the child without making him aware he had been caught. He had just assumed it was a fluke and stepped back to let some of his other fellow thieves try.
And now this one, he couldn't be older then seven or eight, had been tailing her for a few minutes never letting her out of his sight. Smiling to herself she moved her wallet from the pocket he thought it was in to the one on her other side, without him noticing it, but left some money in it for him to take. She would consider this her daily good deed. She stopped by one stand, pretending to be interested in the merchandise, but made sure she stood in a way so that her pocket was easy to access. In the corner of her eye she saw him approach and slowing down the closer he got to her. Finally he was behind her, stopped and then running past her like he saw a friend he wanted to meet.
She was impressed. She hardly felt his hand reach into her pocket. This boy was good at what he did. Still smiling she continued through the market putting the young thief and his friends out of her mind as they didn't approach her again. But she would see them every now and then trailing other oblivious victims.
At the end of the day, when the stalls began packing up and the visitors were leaving, she decided it was time to leave too. But she had not gotten far from the market place when she heard a commotion further away. A little curious she decided to investigate (something her teacher always said she would lose her head for if she didn't stop).
Between two houses she saw a grown man holding a child tightly by the arm, shaking him roughly. She recognized the child, it was her little thief.
"You useless little bastard! This is all you got?"
In his other hand she saw money, a larger amount then what she had let him take from her so she guessed it were his total earnings for the day. The child seemed terrified and could only nod. The man growled, pocketed the money and raised his hand to hit the boy. She couldn't let that happen, she didn't agree with child abuse of any kind.
"Hey!" she called out. "What do you think you're doing?"
Both man and boy turned towards her, surprise looks on their faces. The man seemed to hesitate as he watched her but soon turned back to the child and said quietly, "This isn't over. I see you later." He tossed the child to the ground and ran off.
She walked towards the child as he stood up. "Are you alright?" she wondered concerned.
"What's it to you?" he asked with a defiant expression. She raised an eyebrow at this but didn't say anything. The child sighed and said softly, "I'm fine."
"What's your name?" she asked.
"Charlie," the boy said.
"I'm Isabella," she said with a smile, already knowing she wouldn't leave the child here alone. "Why don't you come with me and we see if we can clean you up and maybe give you something to eat too?"
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2004
It had been three weeks since her phone call with Charlie and a few hours since she arrived in Forks. Isabella, or Bella as she would now start calling herself, was done familiarizing herself with her room in Charlie's house. It was smaller then she was use to but perfect for the personality she had just began building for herself.
That it had taken three weeks was because first she needed to lose her shadow, that was done easily enough as she had done it several times before, and second she wanted to make sure there was no connection that could lead anyone from Isadora Byrd to Charlie and Bella Swan. Lastly all the paperwork in need of forging (the one thing Charlie really didn't approve but knew was necessary) took some time, even with the connections Bella had.
But here she was now; Bella Swan, a seventeen year old soon to be a Junior high school student.
The story she and Charlie had agreed to was this; Renee had been pregnant when the divorce was done and never told Charlie about his daughter. Bella had never contacted him because Renee didn't want to. Renee had been killed in an accident leaving Bella to live with Charlie. It was easy for them to say this about Renee as she no longer was alive to contradict them, she had been killed in a fire a few years back, and no one in Forks knew about it as she had not had any family left there.
As for her personality Isabella had decided to base a lot of it of Charlie from when he was younger. For starters she would be extremely clumsy, as Charlie had been. She had always gotten a laugh from the fact that he had been the best when it came to pick pocketing but could trip over air, especially in his teens before he grew out of it. She would also be quiet and shy not wanting to be the center of attention, this was her own wish as her survival often depended on it. But she would try to be friendly with anyone who wanted as that was the way to pass on by without any fuss.
As for her appearance they wouldn't deny that she looked extraordinary like 'Isabel Swan' Charlie's sister to those that might still remember Isabella's last identity in Forks. They could always blame it on good genes. It might be stupid to be back so soon but hopefully it would work out.
Bella left her room, thoroughly bored with it, to find Charlie. Noise from downstairs she easily identified as a game on the TV, so Bella headed for the living room. She stopped by the entrance and leaned against the frame, watching Charlie watching the game. She smiled seeing him with his guard down but it turned sad as she realized just how much he had changed in the last eighteen years. He was still very handsome, he always had been, and time had not yet caught up with him. But his personality change had chocked her the most.
He had always been happy, once she got him of the street and the abuse he had been subjected to, and optimistic about life. He wouldn't hesitate to help people and threw himself into things with all of his heart. That was probably why he had gotten along with Renee so much, she had been the same.
But now he was quiet and a workaholic without a life outside the job. Before he could, and would, befriend anyone and no one had been able to resist his charm but now he hardly had any friends to spend time with and the few that were there had to stick to him like glue or be forgotten.
She suspected the divorce was the trigger for the personality change. After all, he had thrown everything of himself into the relationship with Renee like he had with everything else. It hadn't worked out and deep down she suspected that part of the divorce was because of her; she didn't know what or why and didn't dare to ask, she just knew.
"Isabella!" Charlie's surprised call startled her out of her thoughts. He looked ill at ease having been watched without knowing about it and she could relate. "Um, how's the room?" he wondered trying to get his composure back. He turned the volume down on the TV, not off because God forbid he would miss anything of the game.
Bella smiled and walked around the room, looking at pictures on the walls. Some were old of him and Renee, others were a little newer, one man, a dark skinned black haired man, was in a lot of them and in every one he and Charlie were fishing.
"The room is fine Charlie," she said stopping at one picture. "It's very teenage-y," she teased. Charlie seemed to be at loss for words and Bella decided to let him of the hook. "The room probably should look like that if a teenage girl would live in it," she smiled and turned back to the photograph.
"Good, that's… good," he cleared his throat. "I probably should take that down, right?" he said about the picture. It was of him, eighteen year old Charlie, with Renee on their wedding day standing side by side with Charlie's 'sister' in front of a Las Vegas wedding chapel.
"You probably should," Bella said. Best not to take chances. Just because it had been eighteen years and peoples memories would be a little fuzzy about how 'Isabel' used to look didn't mean they wouldn't connect the dots if they saw a picture of an exact replica of his daughter.
"So… you ready for school?" Charlie wondered.
Bella rolled her eyes. She was stuck in an age that, with the help of make-up, she could look between 16 and 23 before people became suspicious, most of the times when she moved and started anew she would have to go to school. She had done High School several times now. She was more than ready.
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To Be Continued in : Could that really be… Edward?
