Asteria was forever thankful for Charlie's quiet, gruff nature. After taking Liam to the airport they had spent the next three days developing a routine before the fall semester started. Charlie would go to work, or fishing with his friend Billy, and Asteria would lounge around the house. Occasionally she would do actual chores like vacuuming or picking up the living room, but for the most part her days consisted of reading, watching tv, or messing around on the internet. She went on a few walks and found her favorite spot on the trail in the daylight, but mostly she saved outdoor time for sneaking out at two a.m.

One thing she was adamant about was that they get groceries, if for no other reason than Asteria spent most of her time at the house and was fairly certain she'd starve to death if she didn't speak up. She told Charlie she would take care of the shopping herself, but he was dead set on going with her the first time at least. Asteria thought it was because he wanted to know exactly what she was capable of cooking.

They took the police cruiser, which was equal parts embarrassing and amusing: embarrassing because nothing made people pay more attention than seeing a cop car, and amusing because she always figured any time she'd be in a police cruiser…it would be in the back seat.

Forks was a fairly small town. Of course, her hometown also had a little over a thousand people so she was used to it. The grocery store was pretty slim aside from the essentials, not that she was ever crafty in the kitchen anyway. Asteria was just focused on getting in and out; it seemed like anytime she ventured into town with the chief, he had twenty different locals coming over to greet him and ask about her. She supposed she was big news for a small town, but it was obnoxious nevertheless.

The most interesting interaction had to come as Asteria was trying to pick out a ripe watermelon. A couple walked over, looking like they just stepped off a movie set. The man, a handsome blonde in his early thirties and his wife, an equally beautiful woman with caramel colored hair and honey colored eyes, strolled over with all the grace of professional dancers. Asteria inwardly rolled her eyes even as she admitted she was being judgmental and unfair.

"Chief Swan, I don't think I've ever seen you at the grocery store before," the woman teased with a smile.

"Mrs. Cullen, Dr. Cullen, nice to see you," Charlie greeted.

"Oh please, call us Carlisle and Esme," the blonde man responded cordially.

"Then you'll have to start calling me Charlie," he replied.

"And who did you bring with you today," the woman, Esme, asked.

"Oh, this is my niece, Asteria. She'll be finishing out her senior year here at Forks High. Asteria, this is Dr. and Mrs. Cullen," Charlie responded.

"Nice to meet you," Asteria responded as pleasantly as she could. There was that odd, tickling pressure at the back of her mind that meant her tuition was kicking in. She stomped down the feeling as best as she could.

"Asteria is such a pretty name, and it's very uncommon," the woman replied.

"My parents were pretty uncommon as well," Asteria said with a shrug and a smile. It was more of an inside joke for herself than anything else.

"You're a senior this year? You'll be the same grade as several of our children then," the man responded.

Asteria fought hard to keep her eyebrows from rising at that, and thankfully won. They twitched before she tamped the reaction down. Somehow, the Cullens seemed to notice it anyway.

Esme let out a graceful little laugh. "Our adopted children, of course. Alice, Edward, and Emmett are Carlisle's niece and nephews, while Jasper and Rosalie are my own niece and nephew."

Asteria nodded in understanding, beginning to feel more suspicious about the whole thing. Wasn't it just such a coincidence? If Asteria had more than an empty gum wrapper in her pocket, she'd bet they were well aware of their situation before they walked over. Then again, most people seemed to know before they asked around here.

"Rosalie and Emmett are seniors this year as well. The other three are starting out their junior year," Carlisle continued.

"Cool," Asteria nodded along. She was fairly positive soon there was going to be one of those disgusting emotionally charged invitations to 'talk things out' if she ever wanted to talk to someone who 'understood what she was going through' and she'd rather drink bleach.

"If you ever need anything," Esme started. Ah, there it was. "I'm sure any of our children would be willing to show you around the school or give you a hand. They've all been the new student before, I'm sure they would all be more than willing to help."

"Thank you, I'll keep that in mind," Asteria said with a purposefully unconvincing smile. She was definitely into that hands-off approach. Thankfully the conversation fizzled out and they were able to get the rest of the groceries without incident. Charlie seemed oblivious to her attitude about the whole conversation, which was better in the long run.

Other than that, it was life in Forks was rather dull. Asteria wasn't one for close friends. She had lost touch with most of her childhood friends after moving in with her uncle Liam, and didn't bother getting too close with anyone in Greenfield although she occasionally texted a few people from there. They were fun friendships while she was there, but Asteria wasn't very good at long distance things.

Relationships were another thing entirely, and she vehemently opposed the idea of finding any sort of love interest. She had always had trouble in the love department, much like any teenager, except for her last relationship that came straight from the pits of hell. She promised herself to never think about that particular boyfriend for too long and drowned any emotions or thoughts on the matter with alcohol as soon as they cropped up.

With school starting the next morning, the idea of finding a new group of degenerates to sneak out with seemed mildly daunting. After all, it was a small town which meant slim pickings. She had gotten considerably lucky in Wisconsin. She supposed being the creepy loner kid wouldn't be so bad; at least she'd dress well enough that people wouldn't mock her behind her back too much. The awkward conversation with Charlie was just cringe-inducing enough to keep her from getting too worried about anything else though.

"So, school starts tomorrow," he started out over dinner. Asteria nodded along, hoping it would fizzle out like most conversations. No such luck. "I just wanted to say I hope this year isn't going to be like your last. Your Uncle Liam was telling me you had a bit of a wild year. I expect you to try for good grades this year at least. And I know every single one of those kids and their parents, so there's not going to be any wild parties."

God, you start a fire in the neighbor's backyard once and no one lets you forget it, Asteria thought. "I know, Charlie, and I'm really looking forward to wrapping up high school on a good note. College is coming up soon."

She prayed in her head that Charlie would accept that, and thankfully he seemed to nod and let the matter drop. The rest of dinner was spent in companionable silence as they watched the evening news.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Asteria didn't care what high school it was, waking up before dawn sucked. Hard. It probably didn't help that she kept up with her nightly adventures into the woods, but she wasn't willing to assign blame anywhere. The shower did help her wake up, and as she got ready she could vaguely hear Charlie getting ready for the day downstairs.

She decided to dress up a bit and hopefully make a good impression. Or hell, at least some sort of impression. Anything that kept the other students from calling her 'new girl' the whole year. Her makeup was perhaps toeing the line of appropriate for school, but she wasn't showing up without her winged eyeliner and cherry red lips. That kind of confidence boost couldn't be passed up. She threw on her dark wash skinny jeans, a maroon long sleeve shirt, and her favorite tartan shawl. Paired up with some heeled ankle booties and she felt invincible.

Of course on a dare she snuck up the stairs with her coffee thermos and topped it off with a bit of whiskey, but hey, she felt invincible. No one had ever exactly called her a role model.

The drive to school in her old Camaro was actually fairly short, and she was very happy to note most of the cars in the lot looked older. None of them were as well-kept as the Camaro though. She dropped by the front office of possibly the weirdest high school campus she had ever seen. Seriously, who builds a high school with separate buildings, particularly in a climate that's always raining?

She was still grumbling to herself as she climbed back in the Camaro and drove it around to the student parking lot. It looked like most of the parking lot was full of rusting vehicles, except for a Volvo parked in the corner. Given the track record for teen drivers, she decided to park off to the side near the Volvo, far out of the path of destruction.

Her phone was still connected to the Bluetooth speaker, and was currently cranking out "Shutter Island" by Jessie Reyez perhaps a little too loudly. Hey, everyone had their own methods to wake up in the morning. It wasn't until she had opened her car door that she felt eyes on her. Looking over, she saw a small group of five people crowded around the Volvo, and at least three were looking at her.

She made an instant connection between the teenagers and the Cullen couple from the store. If by nothing else but their ungodly beauty. She noticed a tall blonde girl, the one closest to her, staring at her with a delicate eyebrow raised.

"The song's Shutter Island by Jessie Reyez," Asteria told her while sipping on her coffee.

"I didn't ask," the blonde said with an edge of harshness.

"Then I guess I didn't answer," Asteria said while arching an eyebrow of her own. She took another sip, regrettably realizing she shouldn't take it inside with her.

"Nice Camaro," the blonde said. Asteria squinted slightly, but it seemed the blonde was being begrudgingly genuine. She leaned down and pulled the handle to pop the hood. That definitely got the blonde's interest.

"It's a '71. Every part is either original or custom made to be an exact replica," Asteria said as the blonde walked gracefully over with a hulking brunette boy in her wake. The blonde had the hood propped up before Asteria even walked around to the front of the vehicle.

"Wow, everything seems in good condition," the blonde said, almost too quiet for Asteria to hear.

"I learned to do the basic upkeep and repairs myself. It belonged to my dad before me," Asteria said.

"You did a good job," the blonde replied. Asteria accepted the compliment gracefully; she had the feeling the other girl wasn't impressed easily.

"Why the separate speakers though," the brunette boy asked for the first time. "You could get a decent stereo built for it."

Asteria raised both eyebrows at the boy. "You don't go through the time and effort of custom replicating the original parts to bastardize it with some new stereo system. That's the original radio in there, in working condition."

The blonde girl smirked at that, which made the boy smile. A bell rang across the campus, which she was fairly certain meant something.

"Fuck," she whispered under her breath, carefully lowering the hood and scrambling to pull her backpack out of the passenger seat.

"If you need help finding your class-," one of them started. She was fairly certain it was the shorter brunette girl.

"Nah, thanks," Asteria responded. "If I don't find my classroom on time I don't have to go."

"I don't think that's how it works," the girl responded with furrowed eyebrows.

"I'm fairly certain that's exactly how it's going to work," Asteria laughed as she walked briskly across the lot. She glanced over her shoulder as she was walking away to realize none of the other kids were following. Guess they don't care about being on time either. The blonde girl was still talking with the brunette boy, but it was the other three that caught her attention.

She was already halfway across the lot, so maybe the distance was tricking her eyes, but Asteria could swear the blonde boy and the bronze haired boy were staring at her intently. It even looked like the bronze haired boy was glaring in her direction. Shrugging it off, she chalked it up to either a trick of the eyesight or a stick shoved somewhere it didn't belong and hurried off to class…as leisurely as possible.

Unfortunately for Asteria she arrived at homeroom with a minute to spare, which meant she would have a long morning of dull classes and, God forbid, learning. Seats were slim pickings at this point so she settled for the one next to the door. At least she had a fair shot at a quick exit. She threw her things down and sat idly picking at her nail polish.

"Hey," a deep voice said to her left. She recognized the brunette boy from the parking lot in the seat directly next to her, which might have seemed stalkerish if not for the lack of other seating options. "My name is Emmett Cullen, by the way."

"Asteria Swan," she responded, skipping straight to the point.

"Cool name," Emmett said, "not a lot of Asterias running around."

"There's not exactly an abundance of Emmetts either," she replied.

Emmett grinned at her, which somehow made him seem both boyish and feral at the same point. That same intuition reared its ugly head in the back of her mind and she had to beat it down like a piñata at a quinceañera.

"Nice car, by the way. Rose knows way more about them than me, but she was saying it was in near mint condition," he said. "Rosalie was the blonde you were talking to. We really should have introduced ourselves."

"You're good, no worries," Asteria responded with a wave of her hand. "I believe I met Dr. and Mrs. Cullen at the store the other day as well. They had mentioned something about adopting their nieces and nephews." She said it to test the waters, see how he felt about his own situation.

"Yeah, Carlisle and Esme are great, really. I didn't know you had met them already," he responded. It seemed heartfelt, except for the very last bit. Asteria's eyes squinted a little bit as her keen senses detected a lie. That was, after all, one of the few blessings of her own little curse; she could often separate the bullshit from the truth.

"Just in passing, they seem nice," Asteria replied, thankfully interrupted by the teacher walking in.

The hour passed by far too slowly, even for a history class. Actually, history was one of Asteria's favorite subjects, but that was a while ago when she still cared about school and things were normal. Instead she spent sixty minutes doodling things on her syllabus as the teacher droned on about what he expected from the class.

The bell couldn't ring fast enough as Asteria threw her things into her bag and slung it over her shoulder. One useless class down, six more to go. Asteria idly wondered how much trouble Charlie would give her for taking a nap out in the Camaro instead of going to her next couple of classes.

"What class do you have next," Emmett asked, keeping in line with her as she wove through the crowd of students.

"Chemistry," she responded without bothering to look at the papers the secretary had given to her earlier that morning. Nothing said 'new student' like having your head buried in a school map.

"Oh cool," Emmett responded. "Rose has that too. I bet you could pair up with her if you wanted to."

Asteria just raised an eyebrow at him. For one, she didn't like his overly helpful attitude, seeing as she wasn't a charity case. And two, Rose didn't seem to match his overly helpful type. "I'll keep that in mind," she responded, and was surprised to find a lack of sarcasm in her tone.

The blonde in question joined them right then, and Asteria used that moment to surge ahead of them out of whatever awkward conversation would undoubtedly be forced to follow. She knew the two were adopted siblings, but something about their interactions with each other felt more...intimate, like she was hanging around a married couple. Not that it was deeply unsettling, but she did detest love in all of its finest forms.

Sending up a silent prayer, Asteria was pleased to find the classroom still half empty and quickly snagged a seat in the back of the class. The chemistry lab was set up as tables with two stools at each, and she managed to grab the only table in the back row still unoccupied. Rosalie, she noticed, entered a few moments after her and grabbed a seat at the empty table in front of her instead of opting for the seat next to her, which suited her fine.

A boy ran into the class seconds before the bell and tried to sit beside Rosalie, but seemed to think better of it when he saw her there. His next attempt was beside Asteria, but her own reproachful look sent him to the front of the classroom instead. Asteria laughed inwardly, glad it seemed she would be partnerless for the year.

The chemistry teacher followed soon after, prattling on about the usual start of the year nonsense. She seemed unusually bitter and strict, which meant this class was going to be lots of fun for Asteria. She resolved to cut down on her usual tardiness to school, if only to pacify the bitter harpy and save her from boring lectures.

Neither Cullen was in her English Lit class, which gave her the chance to people watch for the next hour and see which kid was the least obnoxious on the offhand she had to partner up with someone. Not that she expected to partner up with the Cullens, but given Emmett's over enthusiasm she assumed it likely.

Asteria's luck didn't hold out however, and as she entered her Spanish class she saw the tiny brunette Cullen girl practically bouncing around in her seat with excitably energy. She quickly went to sit in the front of the class, but caught the other girl's eye.

"Hey, come sit by me," the brunette said. Asteria blinked several times before realizing she didn't have a socially acceptable excuse to refuse and found her feet automatically carrying her to the seat next to the tiny brunette.

"I'm Alice by the way, and you must be Asteria. My siblings mentioned your name, of course it was also easy to put two and two together. After all it's a small town, people had been talking about the new girl and you're the only new face. Weird to see you in this class though, considering you're a senior. Shouldn't you be in the next level," Alice rambled.

"I took three years of German in my old school, but all they have here is Spanish, so here I am," Asteria replied.

"If you already have three years of foreign language you shouldn't need this class to graduate then," Alice said.

"It was either this or woodshop," Asteria said. "And I really don't want a birdhouse."

"Actually, I think they make napkin holders," Alice grinned.

"Oh, well that changes everything, sign me up," Asteria replied sarcastically. Alice flashed her another grin, and she couldn't help but remember Emmett's grin before. Equal parts innocent and feral that set the warning bells off in the back of her mind.

Class passed much the same as the others, with a dry reading of the syllabus and school rules. However, the teacher emphasized the amount of work that would be done in class with partners, to which Alice expectantly looked at her. God, am I a special project for this family, Asteria thought to herself.

The bell rang once again, thankfully signaling for lunch. Alice easily kept pace with her as Asteria collected her things and moved towards the door.

"So where did you move here from," Alice asked happily.

"A small town in Wisconsin," Asteria replied. She wasn't big on the whole 'get-to-know-you' thing, especially when it felt forced.

"Oh, Wisconsin is lovely, we've visited there before," Alice responded. "If you'd like, you can sit with my siblings and I at lun-"

"Thanks," Asteria cut her off, "but I already have somewhere to sit." It was a flat out lie, but she didn't think the other girl was capable of calling her out on it.

"Oh," Alice said, brows furrowing before they smoothed out and she smiled. "That's fine, the offer's always open if you change your mind though."

"Thanks, see you later," Asteria said while veering off course from the cafeteria building. She moved towards her locker, not out of necessity but more as a way to get free of the conversation. She moved a few books around in her locker and eventually grabbed the textbooks she needed for her last two classes before shutting the door and going to lunch.

Asteria entered the cafeteria line and grabbed a quick salad, not particularly interested in whatever they were serving as the hot lunch of the day. She moved through the sea of tables at a steady pace before a blonde caught her eye and stopped her.

"Hey, I'm Madison," she introduced herself. The blonde girl looked like the typical, preppy popular person in any high school movie. "You're that new girl, Aster or something, right?"

"Asteria," she corrected in a flat voice.

"Whatever," Madison replied, "I saw you talking to Rosalie Hale before school, and I heard you were sitting with that Alice in class. Are you friends with the Cullens now?"

Asteria raised an eyebrow. "Why?"

Madison laughed and looked around her own table, like she was missing some obvious joke. "The Cullens are total weirdos. Everyone knows Rosalie is a stuck up bitch who couldn't care less about anyone else and Alice is the total opposite; she's this freaky little weirdo who's too friendly and talks too much."

Asteria chuckled and nodded to herself. "Oh, I see. Rosalie is a bitch because you feel like she owes you something, and Alice is weird because she tries to be nice. If I didn't know any better, I'd say you're a bitter, judgmental asswipe looking for socially acceptable ways to tear other women apart because you don't like feeling threatened."

"Excuse me," the blonde said in a raised tone. Asteria was blankly aware of the eyes of everyone nearby on her, but she honestly didn't care.

"I said you're a bitter, judgmental asswipe," Asteria repeated louder for the other girl's benefit since she was so hard of hearing. "I can run through the whole thing again in depth if you need more help understanding."

"You just made a big mistake," Madison said in what she no doubt thought was a very threatening tone.

Asteria just raised her eyebrow again. "Really? Bigger than pairing those shoes with that shirt," she asked while looking the other girl up and down for emphasis. She registered muffled laughter in the background. "Catch up with you later, Maddie."

With that, Asteria stalked off to a corner of the cafeteria. Before she got there a chair was pushed out in front of her. "Take a seat," a red headed girl told her with a shit eating grin on her face.

"My name's Natalie," the red head told her as Asteria took a seat. "And I absolutely hate Madison Fairbanks with a burning passion, so you just became one of my favorite people. This is Damien," she said with a nod to the brunette boy to her left, "and that's Rachael," she said while nodding to the brunette girl directly to Asteria's right. "Matt has yet to grace us with his presence, probably getting high in his truck as we speak."

Asteria gave a chuckle. "He does that a lot?"

"More than the rest of us, anyway," Rachael replied. "Is that a problem?"

"Not at all," Asteria replied, "although I prefer drinking to smoking. Shit's murder on your lungs." The table laughed.

Just like that, Asteria found a group of enablers to hang out with for the year. They weren't true burnouts, in fact Matt was the only one that really smoked. The rest smoked only occasionally, and for the most part dressed like they had goals after they left high school. Asteria figured that unless they had a record, she could bring pretty much any of them by Charlie's house and they wouldn't set off any warning bells for him.

The rest of the day went by in a rush, thank God. Asteria's fifth period statistics was wholly underwhelming, but at least Damien, Natalie and Rachael were in it so she had familiar faces to see. None of them were in her last period, geography, but she did happen to run into Emmett and Rosalie once again. She ducked back into the last row of seats and managed to avoid the both of them entirely.

That luck lasted until she was almost to the Camaro, when she was just beginning to see a light at the end of the tunnel. Asteria had the key in the door, in fact, when Alice Cullen walked over, the tall blonde boy that Natalie had explained over lunch as Jasper in tow.

"Hey, I heard about what happened at lunch," Alice started. "Thanks for calling out Madison, but really-,"

Asteria cut her off before it got into the realm of actual emotion. "No offense, but I wasn't trying to defend your family if it came out that way. I don't like bitchy girls like Madison, and truth be told…I like picking fights." At that, Asteria winked at the other girl.

"Still," Alice continued. "You didn't need to say anything."

"No, but I did," Asteria said. "So now I get to spend the year taking the resident bitch down a level. God, it's like Christmas." With that, Asteria climbed in and started up the engine. She wondered why Jasper bothered to tag along for their little interaction since he had nothing to say, but figured it was moral support. His presence didn't really bother her much anyway.

"See you tomorrow, Asteria," Alice said to her as Asteria shut the door and synced her phone to her speakers. The only thing Asteria was concerned about was drowning out a crappy first day at a crappy new school.