Heya Peeps!

Thanks for all the feedback; it's awesome to be so well received (and it definitely motivates me to update)! So here's another chunk of goodness...hope you like it!

--JW :)

Sunset

Chapter 2

By JewWitch

Spencer had just taken a seat for her first class of the afternoon—Spanish—when a soft, musical, wind-chime voice spoke very close to her ear.

"Hey, it's Spencer, right?" Not having noticed that anyone had taken the seat beside her, Spencer jumped a little in alarm at the close proximity of the voice, turning to see the other Davies girl—Kyla—giving her a stunning smile from the next desk. She was heartbreakingly beautiful, too, though her proximity didn't have quite the same paralyzing effect on Spencer that Ashley's did…though that may have been due to the simple fact that Kyla wasn't giving her the kiss-of-death stare. Her hair was light brown, but as sleek and bone-straight as the black hair Spencer was used to seeing on the Asian kids back home. Combined with her just barely slanted eyes, and a slightly broad nose, Spencer was pretty sure she was at least part Asian, despite her startlingly pale skin. Like Ashley's, it almost seemed to glow; Spencer wondered fleetingly what would happen if she shined a blacklight on one of the Davies in a dark room. Suddenly, she realized she'd been sitting there silently staring at the girl a little longer than was strictly polite.

"Oh…yeah. Sorry. You're Kyla Davies, right?"

"My reputation precedes me," Kyla grinned, cocking her head to the side and rolling her eyes playfully. Spencer instantly liked the girl. "Are they giving you any room to breathe so far? You've been the buzz of the school for over a week already."

"Yeah, I'm kind of picking up on that," Spencer sighed, rolling her eyes, too. "It's…different. I'm not used to getting this much attention."

"That's hard to believe," Kyla said bluntly, putting her chin in her hand and focusing her shockingly dark eyes on Spencer's face. "You look like the homecoming queen type, hon. You weren't at the top of the cheerleader pyramid back home?" Spencer snorted in disbelief.

"Um, not quite. My old school didn't even have cheerleaders…or football players…or homecoming queens. But if we did, it definitely wouldn't have been me. I was more the blending into the scenery type."

"I don't think that's gonna work for you here," Kyla whispered conspiratorially, with a little smirk of amusement.

"Nope, doesn't seem like it. But everyone here has been super-nice to me…mostly." Her thoughts flickered automatically back to the furious expression on Ashley's perfect face, and her stomach flip-flopped like a Slinky going down stairs.

"Yeah…sorry about my sister. She's usually not such a tool. I think she's feeling sick today or something, not that that's an excuse. But honestly, she's cool."

"Oh…" Spencer felt the heat rushing to her cheeks at the mere mention of Ashley's name. She wondered how Kyla knew about that; then figured that Ashley must have told her, though, again, she wasn't sure how Ashley even knew her name. Probably the same way everyone here seemed to. But still… "That's okay. I mean, I plowed into her with an enormous pile of books—not exactly the introduction Miss Manners would recommend."

"You're funny," Kyla beamed, and Spencer couldn't help smiling back.

"I am?" She asked hesitantly.

"Of course," Kyla laughed, shaking her head. "Funny and cute—you'll have half the guys in this school vying for your attention before the weekend rolls around." The way she said it, Spencer could tell that Kyla was trying to be nice, not freak her out. Still, it wasn't thrilling to hear she was about to be beating off boys with a stick. She wanted to come out on her own terms, not as a defense strategy against the entire male population of Forks High ogling her.

"Peachy," she groaned, putting her head in her hands.

"What? You have a boyfriend back home?"

"No," Spencer mumbled.

"Girlfriend?" That got Spencer's attention. She immediately picked her head up and stared at Kyla warily.

"No…there's no one back home."

"Well all right then. You're young and free in America! Cheer up. And I'll tell you what—if you really don't want to go on any dates this weekend, just tell everyone who asks you out that I'm taking you shopping all weekend. Okay?"

"'Kay," Spencer nodded, grinning shyly. She tried not to think about whether being friends with Kyla would increase her chances of seeing Ashley again. Then, belatedly, something else occurred to her. "Wait—what's wrong with my clothes?!" Kyla giggled again, putting her hand over her mouth as the teacher walked in and began the lesson.

After Spanish, Spencer was in a better mood; mostly due to Kyla, whose infectious charm made the blonde girl more optimistic that she might actually get to have a life in Forks. She made it through Trig, History and study hall without really paying attention, mostly because all her classes here were a little too easy. There was no honors track in a school this small, and Spencer realized that she was likely to be bored a lot of the time. Oh, well. Maybe if she talked to some of her teachers privately, they'd give her some extra projects to work on…she wanted to be challenged, but she didn't want to blab about it to the whole world. Hey, I'm so much smarter than the rest of you, I'm actually asking for more homework!

Her last class of the day was Biology, where all the seats were arranged in small tables of two, just like in her old school. She saw a balding, kindly looking man at the front of the room in a white lab coat, and went to introduce herself.

"Excuse me, Mr. Banner? I'm Spencer Carlin."

"Ah, yes, Chief Carlin's daughter," he smiled warmly. "Welcome, welcome. We're in the middle of a lab right now, but you can see me after class if you need help catching up. Will that be all right?"

"Sure," Spencer nodded absently, more concerned about the possibility that he would ask her to stand at the front of the class and say something about herself, as some of the other teachers had.

"All right, then. You can take the empty seat next to"—he was already pointing to an empty table on the left side of the room when his eyes fixed on the two empty seats, and he frowned. "Oh, it looks like Ms. Davies is running late. Well, I'll help you get started in the meantime." Spencer's stomach did another round of calisthenics.

"Um, are you talking about Kyla?" She asked nervously.

"Ahh, no, Kyla Davies isn't in this class. You'll be lab partners with her sister, Ashley." Spencer wondered if it was possible to feel this excited, and this terrified, at the same time; or if she was merely having a psychotic breakdown.

"Okay," she said hollowly, stumbling blindly over to her seat without really seeing anything around her. All her energy was consumed with what she would say when Ashley arrived. Her thoughts were racing so hard, she didn't realize until the period was half over that the other girl still hadn't arrived. Why wasn't she in class? Spencer wondered angrily. Maybe she really was sick, as Kyla had said; maybe she had felt so sick that she'd gone home early. Maybe that was why she was so bitchy this morning.

It couldn't possibly be about her. The idea that the girl would actually skip class to avoid her, after having spoken exactly one word in her presence, was insane. Spencer reassured herself of this, and it took the edge off her disappointment to know that she'd have plenty more chances to talk to the other girl, now that they'd be seated next to each other for an hour every day.

When the final bell rang, Spencer had to stop back into the office to hand in her enrollment form, which each of her teachers had signed throughout the day. When she arrived in the little room, she immediately recognized the long, shiny dark curls of the girl bent across the desk, speaking in low, agitated tones to the elderly school secretary.

"There must be another class you can move me into," Ashley was saying; her hauntingly beautiful voice was trembling with urgency. "I'll take anything, okay? Even gym." She sounded so desperate.

"Sorry, hon. No schedule changes after the start of the semester, you know that. You'll just have to manage."

"I can't manage," Ashley growled, and Spencer saw her hands shaking on the desk. "I know you can change the schedule; you did it for the new girl."

"Yes, well, that was a special circumstance, wasn't it? What special circumstance do you have, Miss Davies?" Spencer stood silently behind Ashley's back, her head reeling with shock, as she waited to hear Ashley's answer. Why, exactly, did she suddenly need her schedule changed? The pale girl stood stiff and silent for a long moment.

"Just forget it, okay?" She finally snarled, her voice venomous with barely controlled fury. "Thanks for nothing." Then she whirled on her heel, and her pitch-black eyes slammed straight into Spencer's. For the fraction of a moment that they shared eye contact, Spencer felt a wave of something hot and sparkling rush through her body. She stood dumbfounded, unable to understand the depth of emotion radiating from Ashley's pained expression. Was this really about her? How could it be?

"What?" Spencer finally demanded. Ashley just scowled, shook her head, and stomped out, her shoulder barely brushing against Spencer's as she passed. Despite how confused and indignant she felt, the blonde girl couldn't help swooning when the heady scent of something too fragrant to describe filled her nostrils. She couldn't quite put her finger on it—part floral, past musk, part citrus and cinnamon—but it made her tingle all the way through her body, and for a moment she stood there stupidly, unable to make her feet move. Then the door swung shut behind Ashley's retreating form, and Spencer came to her senses. She slammed her form down on the desk without even looking at it, and ran out the door.

Somehow, by the time she reached the parking lot, Ashley was already gone. It didn't seem possible that she could have reached her car already, let alone driven away; but Spencer's threshold for surprise and confusion seem to have been tapped, at least for today. Her capacity for frustration, however, was clearly unlimited, as she stomped to her truck, threw her backpack violently across the seat, and slammed the heavy door. Far too agitated to go home, she drove around Forks aimlessly, finally finding herself at the beach. But this beach was nothing like the warm, sunny escape she was used to back in LA; it was winter here, and the wind whipped her hair wildly around her face, chilling her straight down to the bone. She walked along the sandy shore anyway, hoping the cold would calm her boiling blood, her wriggling stomach. What an utterly bizarre first day. If it weren't for Kyla, the whole experience would have been a complete bust.

Thinking of her one real new friend brought a small degree of calm back to her; Kyla would surely be able to explain, make Ashley's insane behavior all make sense somehow. Maybe there was a reason, a perfectly reasonable reason, and Spencer was jumping to all the wrong conclusions, after all. Maybe I'm just a complete narcissist, thinking everything's about me, Spencer thought wryly, a small grin tugging at the corner of her mouth. The movement made her realize that her face was numb with cold. Turning stiffly into the wind, hurried back to her truck, shivering madly all the way home.

By the time Arthur came home, she was considerably calmer. Her homework was spread over the kitchen table, already mostly done. She'd managed to distract herself from any further thoughts of Ashley by throwing herself into her schoolwork; but at this rate, that strategy clearly wasn't going to hold out. She definitely needed more academic stimulation.

"Hey, sweetheart. How was your first day?" Arthur asked, ruffling her hair as he crossed to the fridge to get himself a beer.

"It was fine," Spencer shrugged, pleased with the casual tone of her voice. "Everybody was really nice to me. I made some friends…I think I even have a shopping date for this weekend."

"That's my girl," Arthur nodded approvingly. "I knew you'd get along fine here. This is a good town, with good people. Who's your new shopping friend? I probably know their parents."

"Kyla Davies," Spencer said, trying and failing to hold onto her breezy tone as she bumped up against the edge of what she wasn't letting herself think about.

"Ah…well that's the one family around here I don't really know. They just moved here a couple of years ago, from Alaska I think…but they've never caused any trouble on my watch, I can tell you that. Dr. Davies took over as chief of the ER when old Dr. Gerandy finally retired, and we're lucky to have such a gifted surgeon in a small town like Forks. He could be making a heck of a lot more money in a big city hospital somewhere…but he said he wants to give his kids a nice, quiet, small town life. Not many people put their families before their careers these days...those are some lucky kids, I think." Arthur nodded approvingly.

"Well, Kyla's really nice. She sits next to me in Spanish. But she seems to have this crazy idea that all the boys in town are, like…interested in me, or something."

"Well that's not so hard to believe," Arthur shrugged, nudging her gently with his elbow. Spencer sighed. "But just because they ask, doesn't mean you have to say yes…you know that, right?"

"Yes, Dad." Spencer rolled her eyes.

"And you should also know that when you find someone you want to say yes to…no matter who they are…it's all right with me. Do you know that, honey?"

"I…yeah, Dad. I mean, thank you." They grinned at each other, and Arthur patted Spencer's hand.

"You're a good kid, Spence. Now let's get dinner started. Want to be my sous-chef?"

……………………………

Spencer slept badly that night, unable to distract herself from thoughts of Ashley once the lights were out, and the stillness of the night took over. She tried to imagine what she'd say when they were side by side in Biology, mapping out several different conversations in her head. In one scenario, she started out on the offensive, demanding to know what the other girl's problem was; but she couldn't see that one ending particularly well. Next she imagined a gentler approach, where she was compassionate and open to listening to whatever the other girl had to say about what was that was bothering her, that had made her act so strangely the day before. That was assuming that Ashley was willing to open up to the complete stranger who just happened to take up residence in the empty seat beside hers. Finally, Spencer imagined simply pretending that yesterday hadn't happened, and starting over with a clean slate. Hello, my name is Spencer Carlin, it's very nice to meet you. Do you mind if I just sit here and smell your hair for an hour?

But the night of stomach-churning anxiety did Spencer no good at all, because Ashley wasn't in school the next day; or the day after that. Kyla said she was home with the flu, and Spencer tried very hard to believe that, which was difficult if she thought about it for any length of time; so she tried not to do that, either. By the third day, she was running dangerously low on distractions. Looking for something, anything, to occupy her mind once school let out, the blonde girl decided to make dinner as a surprise for her dad. She and Glen had mostly lived on frozen dinners and pizza at home, with Paula always working late; but Spencer did have a few specialties up her sleeve. She drove to the grocery store from school to get ingredients, satisfied that she'd stay busy until her dad got home to keep her company. It was a bleak, wet day, and she had to watch her step in the icy parking lot, especially when she was coming out of the store with her arms full of groceries.

Suddenly, several things happened at once. The awful sound of squealing tires made Spencer look up, to see a grey minivan spinning out of control across the ice-slicked asphalt. The back end was arcing around to the front, and in the second it took her to look up, Spencer could see that it was heading straight for her. Even if she'd had the sort of athletic reflexes necessary to jump out of the way in the split second she had available, there was nowhere to go; she was standing right at her truck's back bumper, with cards parked on either side. Her heart seemed to freeze in shock.

I'm going to die, she thought calmly, like it was a dream. I'm going to die right now, and I never kissed Ashley. I never even really talked to her. Without any conscious thought, her eyes squeezed shut, her body automatically protecting her from having to witness her own gruesome demise.

Then something hard slammed into her; but it wasn't the minivan. It was much too small…and a familiar smell, too delicious to confuse with anything else, filled her nostrils. Then her head smacked the pavement, and a horrible, metallic crunching sound filled her ears, as shattered glass rained down over her head. With a gasp, Spencer's eyes flew open.

Ashley was crouching protectively over her, with her back against the truck, and one hand braced against the minivan's back wheel, inches from Spencer's face. She stared down anxiously at the blonde girl, looking terrified; and all the disquiet Spencer had felt for the last three days dissolved like sugar in hot water.

"Are you okay?" Ashley asked urgently, unmoving. Her voice was low and smoky. Spencer just blinked up at her, dazed, staring into her blazing amber eyes.

"Your eyes changed color," she said dazedly. Then she tried to sit up; but Ashley put a surprisingly strong hand on her shoulder, forcing her back down.

"Don't move, okay? You hit your head."

"But it's cold," Spencer complained, becoming aware of the fact that she was lying flat on her back on a sheet of ice.

"Shh," Ashley whispered, taking off her coat and laying it over Spencer's shivering body. "You're okay…just lie still for a minute. We'll get you to the hospital."

"I don't need to go to the hospital," Spencer grumbled, noticing dimly that a noisy crowd was gathering around them. "My dad will freak out…"

"And I guess he wouldn't mind if you just got up and walked away with a concussion?" Ashley quipped sarcastically. There was a tiny smirk playing at the corner of her mouth. In her dazed state, Spencer almost reached out to touch it, but then she thought better of it. Instead, she asked the obvious question.

"Where…where did you come from? How did you do that?"

"What, knock you out of the way? Adrenalin, I guess. Did I hurt you? I'm so sorry, Spencer." It was the first time the dark-haired girl had said her name…the effect it had on the woozy blonde was so powerful, she almost forgot about her questions. Almost.

"No, you…didn't knock me out of the way…you got between me and the van. You stopped it with your bare hand."

"Um…I think you hit your head harder than I thought," Ashley frowned, and she looked so genuinely disconcerted, that for a second Spencer believed her. But she knew what she'd seen.

"No," she insisted stubbornly. "I saw you…" But the piercing wail of an ambulance siren cut her off, and suddenly they were surrounded by shouting paramedics. "Ashley," she whimpered, terrified when the dark-haired girl left her field of vision.

"I'm right here," Ashley assured her, and suddenly Spencer realized they had loaded her into the ambulance without her noticing; the dark-haired girl was sitting beside her in the narrow space, smiling gently now. "Don't worry, Spencer…you'll be okay. My dad will fix you up, good as new."

"I know…what you are," Spencer mumbled, blackness starting to invade the edges of her vision.

"Oh yeah?" Ashley murmured, and her heart-breaking smirk returned. "What am I, then?"

"You're an angel," Spencer whispered. Then she drifted into the blackness.