1. Fortifying (EDITED/REVISED
The night passed by quickly. It was spent with me prepping dinner for my dad and I, consisting of fish lasagna. My things were already situated in my room, and I even had time to make one of the two bathrooms that I claimed for myself more homely, feeling lucky that dad and I didn't have to share a bathroom.
Dad and I decided last night that I would go to school today, and later we would invite Billy—a friend of his who he had saved from an untimely death resulting in them becoming fast friends about 12 years ago, though he didn't tell mom or her sisters about it—and his son over for a fish-fry dinner, seeing as dad and Billy had caught so many fish the day before and we would still have plenty left even after I cook most of it. There's just so many…
As I finally fully woke up, I looked over toward my closet, getting out of bed. I had to fight the strong urge to orb my clothes to me, though, and I sighed as I disappointedly walked toward my closet, yanking out a pair of comfortable ripped skinny jeans and a long-sleeved royal-blue shirt, grabbing my toiletries on the way to my bathroom.
Once I was showered, I ran down the stairs to where I expected to find my keys hanging on the key holder. I already knew that Charlie wasn't going to be there, he told me last night that he has to be in at work early today, so I wasn't upset when I saw that he wasn't there to hand me the keys. Taking the keys, I eyed them, noticing that he added another key—the duplicate to his house key—and I smiled, feeling at home already.
Dad was right, the school was only a turn and a short drive away from most of the residents of Forks. Though with this town, it wasn't much of a surprise since the population numbers are seriously low. This is the town that dad chose to hide away in, and he blended in pretty well, with it being such a boring and bland town and all.
I pulled into the school's nearly completely vacant parking lot, pulling my Impala to a park, and tried to calm the nerves that I've been hiding. I should have dealt with this fear earlier. But seriously, what if I get so nervous, that I blow up a clock or something? Not that I can. Or what if I accidentally astro-project myself?—I can't do that either, but it's a possibility. Or what if I get a vision that I haven't actually been known to have?
Getting a slow grip as I held tight to reality, my thoughts gathered. I need to calm down. Our powers, witches powers, are tied to our emotions. And it really isn't that big of a deal. In reality, I've only known myself so far to be able to orb myself and objects, freeze small things, and I'm supposed to be able to get premonitions… Even then, my powers aren't strong enough to activate themselves on their own from my little emotions alone, and even if they could, I barely can control my powers enough to call them forth without too much effort, so how would my emotions be able to do it? If anything would have happened, I would need to call aunt Prue—the old fashioned way, even if it was just to tattle on myself. Letting realization settle in, I finally got out of my car to see that there were two other cars in the parking lot now.
...And there was also one boy standing not four feet away from the rear of my Impala, almost scaring me into orbing out, or worse, freezing my heart.
"Hey, you must be the new girl, Isabella Swan?" he asked with a friendly-sounding voice. As I heard his voice, I let myself calm down as I looked him over, mentally taking note of him. Blonde hair, candy-blue eyes, baby-faced pretty boy, easily.
"Bella," I corrected with a small smile.
After he saw my smile, his own grew a little more. Knowing that my smile must have given him some kind of confidence, at the sight of his smile widening, my own diminished slowly at the eagerness he showed. Too eager. I had to keep myself from frowning, though.
"Do you need help… or need me to show you where to go…?"
"The office?" I asked, making my small request even smaller to make him realize that I'm not interested in anything that he might be, and he seemed to get it as he pointed me to a small building that seemed to sit forefront and center of all the rest. "Thank you," I murmured as I made my way toward the building.
The office lady's name was Ms. Cope. She's a dyed red-headed middle-aged lady with a few extra curves than some other people with a small challenge with height. She had a friendly, though gloom-induced soft attitude toward whoever seemed to greet her; easily fitting into this town way more than I did, even with my pale skin.
She easily went through an orientation for me, pointing out on a map where all my classes were after she gave me my schedule, telling me to come back to her after I received a signature from all of my teachers at the end of the day.
By lunch time, I had five signatures, and I only needed two more. A girl that was in all of my classes—Jasmine, I think?—insisted on escorting me to lunch, and me, not knowing anyone at this place besides her and Mike, decided 'well, why not?', and she all but dragged me to the cafeteria, introducing me to her friends the second we reached their table where I soon was re-informed that her name was in fact not Jesminica, but Jessica. Jessica Stanley, she lives down the street from me, apparently.
"So guys, this is Bella Swan, the new girl," Jessica introduced with a big wide, showy smile on her face, one that was more fitting for a child that just received a shiny toy and wants to show off to their friends.
I smiled a small smile and waved a small wave, sticking to the only girl that I know's side, allowing for Jessica to continue with the intros.
"Bella, this is Angela, Ben, Eric, Lauren, and Tyler," in order they sat and it was easy to tell who was who, so I nodded my greeting to them, seeing that only four out of the five seemed remotely friendly, and that Lauren just seemed disinterested from the moment I walked in. Her attitude suits her just fine, I thought uncontrollably.
And just when I thought Jessica was going to dismiss me being the topic of discussion for something more interesting, she started speaking again once the introductions were through.
"So, Bella, where did you come from?" she settled herself by Mike, who she didn't bother introducing because she saw him introduce himself to me earlier, with a screwed up look on her face might I add…
"Phoenix, Arizona," I answered, trying my hardest to stay polite.
"Phoenix? Isn't that city… sunny…?" Lauren questioned with a raised dirty blonde eyebrow that didn't match her bleached-blonde hair.
"Yes, it is."
"Then, shouldn't you be tanned?" Jessica joined.
"My family has albino genes in my father's line," I shrugged. It was partially a joke. My father is a white lighter, his skin is lighter than others naturally. And me being half-white lighter, I gained that pale trait, just as aunt Paige inherited it from her father, Sam. "I guess I just inherited it."
"What a freak," Jessica laughed with a smile that seemed friendly, and she attempted to show me that she isn't trying to get rid of me, but simply implying a friendly joke. I didn't laugh.
But, out of interest of something that ticked a bit out of place, my eye was drawn immediately to the other side of the room. There I saw movement, flashes of skin even paler than my own, and I looked just quick enough to see that they made their way to a table, and were already sitting down. And out of the other corner of my eye I saw that Mike was conversing with the other guys at our table when he nodded my way and spoke a little snidely.
"Looks like she's caught sight of the Cullen's already," he jibed.
Jessica, looking a little smug for once looked toward where my eyes never left, out of curiosity, and she started to nail me with the gossip. "The ones you're staring at? They're antisocial. The Cullens'; the adopted children of Doctor Carlisle Cullen, and his wife, Esme Cullen, since Esme can't have children. I heard that the two icy-blue-eyed blondes? Rosalie and Jasper Hale are Esme's niece and nephew, but since their parents died, Esme took them in. The other two, Emmet and Alice McCarty were siblings, and the last, the gorgeous one with the red-bronze hair, and amazingly beautiful green eyes? That's Edward Mason."
She saw that I was fighting to catch up, so she hurriedly fixed everything up for me.
"Of course, they all go by Cullen, not their actual surnames," it was a small warning, I guess. But she was near nervously laughing by the end when she said, "and, if I were you, I wouldn't waste my time on any of them."
I tried to raise a brow in question and my guess is that my efforts weren't wasted completely since Lauren jumped in to save her friend from explaining something that she really couldn't.
"They're all together…" she frowned, leaving it at that.
"And Edward doesn't date," Jessica was finally finished laughing, settling to get a sulk in.
I wonder when he turned her down, I ducked my head, finally letting my eyes leave the Cullens.
Before she could get in another excuse for why I shouldn't 'waste my time with them' the bell rang, and the thought of even bothering with them completely left my mind. Seeing how sneaky and a bit shallow these girls are made me doubt any of these other kid's attitudes. What were they? Brought up in a bubble where nothing else actually happens for them to think before judging anyone else?
I got to my feet slower than everybody else, noticing that Angela Weber lagged a little behind the snobbies as well, probably deciding that now is a good time to try to converse with me without the other girls' interference.
"So you've met the two wicked Wiccas of the west," Angela chuckled at a small inside joke, her friendly eyes now meeting my panicking one at the Wicca reference that she used.
My heart started racing for a second before I realized that she was only joking, and I laughed it off. "So that's what you guys call them?"
"Yeah," Angela smiled warmly. "They may seem nice, but really, they'll start to eat you alive if you let them walk all over you. It's good to see that you didn't really have an effect after they tried you. Be ready for Lauren's claws though, it looks like you've caught her boyfriend's attention, Tyler; and Mike's interested as well—not good. Jessica likes him," she warned.
"And, I'll let you be assured that I'm not interested in either of them," I laughed beside her and she giggled as well.
"I suppose not, but I don't know if they'll understand that."
It wasn't until we stopped outside the door of the Biology room that I realized that Angela must be going to the same class as I am and my smile widened considerably, I liked her presence; it felt natural to me. But I couldn't, for the life of me, understand why. "Here's our stop," I took a guess.
"Yeah," she didn't stop smiling though, and it appeared that I was right when she pushed the door open and I allowed her to walk in first, choosing to stay by the door and look over my surroundings before I enter unarmed, and unsuspecting.
It turns out that Edward has this class as well, and he's one of the only people in the class when I walked in. He sat in the back, his green eyes straight ahead, on the front of the class, unseeingly it seemed like. The teacher was at his desk, looking over something that might be the roster, of some sort.
Seeing it as safe, I walked further in the class, keeping my eyes in front of me so that I don't trip. "Mr. Banner?"
He chanced a look up at me from his roster and looked me over as if trying to figure out of he's seen me before or not but realization started to dawn on his face as he decided that he's never seen me before. "Ah, new student, right? Isabella Swan?"
"Bella," I corrected automatically, and I nodded with a small smile, handing him my schedule and my sign slip, easily getting my sixth signature.
"Well, the only open seat we have is next to Edward, in the back…" he began. "You can't miss it…"
My eyes have already made themselves known to the amazingly beautiful green eyes that belonged to Edward Cullen though, and if it hadn't been for the slight scowl on his face, I would have worried that my heart would actually freeze from the way his beauty forced my being to take notice of the attraction.
In that moment, my sight left me before another view took its place, giving my spectators hardly any reason for the shocked gasp that escaped my lips.