British Bella
A/N: Story takes place in 2001. Bella is 18, it's everyone's senior year.
They were staring at her – all of them – with undisguised curiosity. The girls, Lauren and Jessica, ran critical eyes over her long, braided chestnut hair (and its many split ends). They regarded her bitten nails with disdain, noting the dark red color of the chipped polish. They found her hand-me-down 'The Clash' t-shirt, red jeans, and black Chucks to be the opposite of whatever passed for cool in B.F.E.
The boys, Mike and Tyler, were simpler. They checked out her legs and her tits with varying degrees of inconspicuousness.
None of them were impressed until they heard her speak.
"Like, oh my God!"
"Are you from England?"
Bella nodded.
"That is so cool!" Jessica and Lauren squealed simultaneously.
"Do you know the Spice Girls?"
"Do you hate America?"
Lauren rolled her eyes at Jessica. "Jessica, you can't just go around asking people if they hate America. That's, like, against the Constitution."
Bella barely restrained her eye roll.
"As a matter of fact, it's a bit rubbish," Bella said, turning into their classroom and wishing she had time for a cigarette. These damn Muggles were giving her a stress headache with their helpfulness and their judgment.
Instead of inspiring a spirited political debate, or an in-depth discussion of the ongoing political ramifications of the Cold War, all of Bella's newfound friends simply insisted she hadn't yet seen the right parts of America.
"I thought Massachusetts was, like, the cradle of America," Bella said, wondering if they realized she was mocking their speech patterns. She heard someone snicker as the Fatheaded Foursome herded her to a seat in the middle of the room. Maybe someone around here was intelligent, Merlin save her.
"Yeah, but they're all commies out there," Mike said a little too fervently.
"Really, Mike," another girl said from in front of them. "I think you've watched a little too much Fox News down at the store."
Mike sneered at the girl, marring his otherwise boyish good looks.
"At least I don't do everything my jackass boyfriend says, Angela."
Angela Weber was vaguely ethnic (Asian and white, possibly?) and the first person who didn't jump at the chance to be friends with the new girl. She simply smiled shyly at Bella before turning around as their teacher walked into the room to start the lesson.
Lauren and Jessica whispered poisonous gossip in Bella's ears during the class, about how Angela used to be their friend before she started dating Edward Cullen, who was, like, totally hot. Way too hot for someone as mousy and studious as Angela.
"She must be putting out."
"She does whatever he says."
"They broke up for a while and he skipped town, and she went a little crazy, and now they're like back together and just so disgusting. It's like PDA 24/7."
Lauren and Jessica weren't exactly the most discreet people, and their whispers must have carried to Angela's ears. But Angela kept her attention toward the front even as her back stiffened. There was really little to pay attention to – the teacher was only going over the syllabus.
Her attentiveness and resolve reminded Bella, suddenly and forcefully, of Hermione.
"Hello," Bella said after English. "I'm Bella Gr-, er, Swan. You're Angela Weber, right?"
Angela glanced around uneasily, avoiding eye contact. Her shy smile was long gone, replaced by wariness.
"Yeah," she said. "Gonna ask me if I'm a slut like they said?"
Bella's eyebrows shot up her forehead.
"Um, no. Wasn't planning on it... unless you have tips you want to share." Angela's eyes met hers, clearly surprised at Bella's response. "Actually, I was wondering if you would be willing to tutor me for the week? I'm a bit behind on Mu- on world lit, you see. I went to a, um, specialized school where literature wasn't exactly top priority-"
"No offense, Bella, but you don't look like someone who cares about their schooling." Angela eyed her outfit, which was admittedly a little too punk rock for Forks.
"And you don't look like a slut, but..." she trailed off, hoping Angela would consider her request.
"I can't," Angela said. "My boyfriend wouldn't like it."
Bella rolled her eyes. She thought Lauren and Jessica's gossip was just that, but apparently she was wrong.
"Then your boyfriend is a dick. See you later, I guess." She walked away, ignoring Angela's indignant huffing and the high-pitched voice asking her what was wrong.
She was going to have that cigarette, even if it made her late for the next class. Not like her grades in this place mattered anyway.
Bella made her way to the locker room entrance at the back of the gym, where a convenient overhang shielded her from the ever-present rain. As she lit up, she reviewed her game plan for the week: ward the house, write to Hermione and the Order, talk to the Quileutes about soul magic, cry herself to sleep missing her mother, cook for dad and try to keep it together in the light of day.
She sighed and snapped her fingers, causing a flame to appear on the end of her thumb – a flame which she used to light her cigarette. On the inhale, she focused on making her breath conform to the standards of meditation. Losing her temper was a bad idea today, or any day, no matter how stupid and sheltered the people around her were.
When she lost her temper, things broke.
Her mother always said-
No, not thinking about her. Not today.
The hole in her heart left by her mother's death ached uncomfortably, shortening her breath with the force it put on her lungs. Her mother had been walking back from the store around the corner from the Grangers' apartment in Boston when the Death Eaters caught her. There was no warning. The Confunded Muggles said it was a mugging gone wrong, unable to see the runes of warning carved into Emma Granger's dead flesh.
Death
Destruction
Unmaking
Bella and the local Aurors could read them even if her father and the Muggle ME couldn't, and they had put her in touch with the American Department of Magical Affairs (ADMA). On the advice of the stern-faced Director Allen, Bella and her father had been placed in protective custody, sent to the other end of the country, and given new last names. Her father had found work as an oral surgeon in Forks, serving the local population and the Reservation, when the old surgeon's practice suddenly went up for sale.
Bella shook her head, amazed at the way magicals manipulated the world to suit their needs.
Of course, she'd had some input when deciding on their location. When her sister and Harry Potter and all the rest had defeated Voldemort three years ago, it had been the start of a war instead of the end. Voldemort had been aware of the destruction of his Horcruxes, and had taken precautions should the Prophecy come to pass.
On that warm May day three years ago, Voldemort's snake-like visage had crumbled to ash as his soul sought out and possessed the body of his most closely bound servant: Lucius Malfoy. As the reincarnation of the Dark Lord, Malfoy had waged a bloody and costly war on the magicals of wizarding Britain. The Dark artifacts at his disposal boggled the mind – based on Hermione's notes, Bella shuddered to think what other instruments of torture were hidden in the attic of Malfoy Manor.
Which brought her here, to the woods of western Washington, where a group of Native American witches had successfully soul-bound their shape-shifting men to the land and the tribe.
Bella's mission was to study the magic used by the Quileutes for their "imprinting", tear it down to theory, and see if it would be helpful in the fight against Malfoymort.
It was a long shot, but they were running out of time. Many of the Order were dead or missing, and it seemed like the whole war would come down to the Granger girls, Harry and Ron.
Bella gasped in pain as her cigarette burned down to her fingers – she had been too lost in thought to notice it. With a wave of her hand she made the butt disappear and trudged back into teenage hell.
After two more classes, it was time for lunch. Bella's nose wrinkled at what passed for food in America's public schools. She thought longingly of the food that graced the tables of Hogwarts the two years she had been there – Hermione pulled her out after her second year, after the events at the Department of Mysteries and the upswing in the war. Fresh salads, warm rolls, crispy fried chicken – these were the things she could have been eating if Voldemort wasn't so hell-bent on world domination.
Lots of things would be different if that megalomaniac had died like he was supposed to back in 1981. Harry would have parents, so would Neville, and Bella would still-
She clamped down on that train of thought, selected a piece of rapidly cooling pizza and superfluous plasticware fork/knife set wrapped in a tissue-thin napkin, and followed Lauren and Jessica to the 'cool senior' table. Mike and Tyler took seats on either side of her, Tyler casually draping an arm over the back of her chair while Mike leaned forward over his splayed legs.
"So, Bella," Mike said in what he clearly thought was a seductive voice. "Is it true what they say about British chicks?"
"I don't know Mike," Bella said in a warning tone of voice. "What do they say about British chicks?"
He really was oblivious.
"That they give great-"
She picked up her plastic knife and positioned it right over his junk.
"You don't want to finish that sentence, boyo," she said. Mike's eyes widened while Tyler chuckled.
"You're feisty," Tyler said, inching his hand closer to her shoulder. "I like that."
Bella smiled coldly.
"Trust me, you probably don't." He gulped and removed his arm from the back of the chair. Mike turned to face the table, and both looked more than a little terrified of her.
Good, she didn't have time to deal with stupid boys.
"So," she asked Jessica and Lauren, who were seated across from her and watching with a kind of horrified hopefulness as she shot down the two hottest available guys in their class, "anyone else I should know?"
Jessica smiled like a happy Golden Retriever before leaning forward. "Don't look too quickly, but Alice and Edward Cullen are at the table behind you and to the right." Bella glanced over and saw a heavy-set kid with a bad case of acne sitting next to a skinny, greasy-haired girl. She raised an eyebrow.
"That's the guy that's controlling Angela?"
"Oh shit, no, sorry. My right, your left."
"Idiot," Lauren muttered under her breath and Bella looked over her left shoulder as casually as possible.
Oh.
Oh dear.
Angela Weber was dating a vampire.