Disclaimer: All characters that are not my own, as well as The Twilight Series, belongs to Stephenie Meyer.
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This was horrible. I walked down the stairs, my arms around me; who thought that Illinois would have horrible weather waiting for us? My thoughts were bitter. From the constant drench of the rain in Forks, where my relatives were, to a cold front back here….
I blinked a few times to the bright lights in the kitchen, trying to get the effects of sleep out of my eyes. I found a potential conversation there.
"Hey, Ben." I tried to make my voice as friendly as possible, despite the horrible mood I was in. I didn't get a reply- my stepfather's head was on the kitchen table- a mug of coffee in his hands. "Hello?"
"Hey."
Such a talkative man. "Something wrong?"
"The temperature dropped last night."
"Yes, it did."
"A lot."
A little annoyance came from my end. "Yes, I know."
"I have to get in the car in ten minutes. And it's so damn cold."
Ahh. "I agree."
I smiled now, genuinely. Last night's events came into my mind- after we off the plane, Ben had insisted we rent a movie… and I, naturally, chose to skip the fine tale of cheesy heroic lines and gunfights.
"I only got an hour or two of sleep." He finally raised his head, and chose to just stare at his coffee instead. No wonder he was cursing the chilly weather.
A slap made us both jump. "That's your fault."
My mother made her way across the kitchen, a rolled up newspaper in her hands. She was already dressed for work- nothing could distract my mother, with her quiet but distinct determination. I would sometimes stare in awe at her attitude- she was one of the two people that I never questioned, never doubted. The other person, respectively, was Mrs. Masen.
Ben looked her over once, and returned to staring at his cup of coffee. "I don't understand you, Ang."
She laughed. "Of course you don't."
.
The drive to school was uneventful- a few hundred feet, stoplight. Gas station. Stoplight. The list continued on. Once in the school parking lot, I didn't hesitate to get into a building- I'd have to do it sometime. I sighed dramatically as I got out of my car.
A surprise awaited me as I walked through the parking lot- someone had chosen to sneak up behind me and shake me by the shoulders. I shrieked in surprise.
"What the hell was that for?"
The boy roared in laughter.
Tall and olive skinned, the face of Orion Nestor looked down on me as if I were an animal doing an amusing trick. What a kind friend he was.
"Orion."
He scowled. "Melanie."
He hated to be called by his real name, and I didn't like him laughing at me- a fair trade.
He slung an arm around my shoulders, and we made our way out of the parking lot.
A wide smile spread across his lips as we walked. "I think Aimee has something to tell you." And there I saw her, running towards us, excitement evident on her face.
And there was the three of us, best friends for five years. Aimee Stein- the funny, charismatic, good-doer of the junior girls at the school; Orion Nestor, the quiet goalie for the school's soccer team- reserved around everyone but his friends. And then me, Melanie Raymond. Nondescript- the literature freak who willingly saw one of the school's counselors three times a week, as a result of having a horrible father- which shouldn't mean much, as she now had an incredible stepfather... But still, the memories were there.
We made up an odd trio, us three- each of us were so different that we just fit together. It was indescribable.
Aimee looked slightly disheveled as she came towards us. "Did you see Mrs. Masen today?" she asked.
"It's seven fifteen in the morning." I was surprised by her question- my best friends were never happy that I saw Mrs. Masen so much, and yet Aimee apparently wanted me to see her now.
Orion's mouth was twisted into a smirk as he began to speak. "How easily excited you are, pet." Aimee scowled at his choice of words. He continued speaking, as if he didn't see anything. "There's a new guy in school. He was talking to Masen."
My eyebrows raised. "There's 3,000 people in the school, Aimee."
She shook her head impatiently, and tried to explain the importance of this particular student to us.
"His name is Edward Cullen- I found that out while I was talking to Barbra this morning. From up north, or something like that- student teacher for AP Biology..."
Orion interjected. "Call her Ms. Smith, Aimee. She's too old to be called Barbra by students." His voice was teasing.
"She's only twenty-six, 'Ryan!"
He sighed. "You spend too much time with that woman. Maybe you'll come to school as a blond tomorrow, like her." He laughed, and Aimee hit him playfully on the shoulder. "I'm only joking…."
Mrs. Masen was younger than the office clerk, Mrs. Smith… that much I was sure of. No matter how much she knew me, I still knew next to nothing about her. She grew up west of Illinois, and her husband was going to become a doctor… that was pretty much all I knew about her. It wasn't comforting to know that she was a blank page to me.
Aimee continued her conversation. "He's actually as pale as Mrs. Masen, Mel- imagine that. With reddish hair, tall, muscular… and he's beautiful." This was apparently what she'd been trying to get across- she did it rather bluntly.
Orion was feigning interest. "But what about Daniel?"
She frowned. "I'm not sure. They'll give each other a run for their money. Maybe Edward already has a girlfriend- of course, he's in his twenties…."
Mrs. Masen and Daniel Adams were known to be the talk of the school- although both weren't very social. Despite that, boys had asked Mrs. Masen to prom on more than one occasion, and Daniel had the heart of nearly every girl in the school. They were undeniably beautiful- and perhaps by coincidence, they seemed to look alike in some ways. Both were sickly pale, both had extremely bizarre eyes. But both seemed to be perfect. It sounded like this new staff member was like them.
Several minutes, and a few arguments later, the three of us walked into the school in silence. I was completely lost in my own thoughts. Aimee looked slightly hypnotized- by supposedly seeing the new guy. And Orion was trying to stay away from Aimee.
It was by the school's courtyard that I first saw the boy Aimee was currently obsessing over. He stood in the partial shade of a pillar, eyes scanning the variety of students. Many people stared back at him. His lips were pulled into an expression that could only be translated as boredom. I heard Aimee sigh softly from my left.
He was very handsome, I decided- there wasn't anything to decide against. Strange colored hair that partly fell into his perfect, large eyes, a perfect straight nose, perfect full lips. Perfect, perfect, perfect. A very prominent bone structure to his face. Sturdy shoulders. Lean body.
I suddenly thought of the boy I sat next to in English class. The school's heartthrob, Daniel. His features were very different, compared to Edward's- raven-black hair, a narrow nose, more of a boyish frame. His eyes were strange, too- aware of everything, Daniel was.
I looked at Aimee hopelessly, and made my way to class.
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Five hours and a few 'welcome back' speeches later, I was sitting in the back of my favorite class- completely bored out of my mind. Our teacher, Mr. Brown, was about to assign us reports. On the first day back from school.
Oh, the compassion he has.
"Folklore," he continued his earlier speech, "is something that just about every country on our green Earth has. The variation is what's different- it's why you prefer Greek stories over Russian ones. You and your seat partner will get a culture, and a genre of their storytelling…" Everyone had stopped listening there.
Most of the girls in my class had glared at me in the twenty seconds that they knew I was Daniel's partner. They had been mad at me before, just because I happened to be seated where I was. However, those stares were nothing compared to these. Like I had personally insulted them, or something.
Meanwhile, Daniel's eyes were kept carefully to the windowsill to the left of us. "So, partner," he said in a quiet, but slightly amused voice, "what does our paper say?"
I looked at the paper, scanning the information we were to write about.
"Slavic legends."
He turned to me, his eyebrows raised. "Really?" I nodded. He seemed to think our topic funny- he tried to suppress his obvious desire to laugh. He eventually succeeded- his face smoothed out, trying to be serious. There was, however, a mischievous glint in his eyes.
"You know, Slavic stories are really rich- they loved mythical creatures, undead souls…. Goblins, ghouls, whatever you'd like to think." He smiled. "Like Halloween- all the spooky things."
I didn't know that. "Well, specifically- what creatures could we touch on?" I wasn't even sure if this was going to be interesting. I frowned at the thought.
Daniel saw that, and smiled even wider. "Well," he began, his voice dropping slightly, "there's the cyclops, a being that symbolizes misfortune- demons of bad weather, souls of undead children with deformed bodies…." he spoke faster, as my eyebrows raised higher and higher. "There are also more familiar demons- mermaids, dwarfs, shape-shifters, spirits that inhabit your homes… witches, vampires…." He smiled again as he said the last words.
I ignored his bizarre behavior. "How do you know all this?"
"I've been around, read a few books." His voice was light, easy going. He laughed quietly.
His behavior was infectious- I smiled, too. "So, tell me- what would you do if you encountered a mermaid?"
He laughed. "I don't know. We're not near any huge bodies of water… so I don't think you need to worry."
I pretended to scowl. "Okay, then. What about one of the demons of bad weather?"
The corners of his lips twitched at my tone. "I like the rain."
I glared at him, and he looked back at me, eyes innocent. "Fine. Vampire?"
He laughed again, louder than ever. People turned around to stare at us for a second time.
"Maybe I'd wear some garlic around my neck, and have a blade ready to decapitate him. Showing him my faith wouldn't hurt, either." His smile remained as he showed me the gold cross around his neck, under his shirt. "Do you think that would kill it?"
"You pretty much hit everything. I think you'd slay this mythical creature without much effort."
The bell rang, and Daniel immediately stood up. He leaned down, and his mouth was suddenly at my ear. His cool breath tickled me as he spoke. "But, you know, those are only ways to kill mythical creatures." With that, he walked away, still smiling. My eyebrows furrowed.
I had forgotten all about his little joke within the next hour.
.
"Mel! They're looking this way."
I had been staring at the cafeteria's walls until Aimee had forced me to come back into the real world. I looked in the direction she was- and sure enough, both Edward and Daniel were in the doorway of the large building, eyes on our little group.
"My, they're looking at you, pet." Orion hadn't looked up from doodling on his napkin.
My response wasn't as encouraging, and my voice was low. "Don't overreact."
I looked to the two of them again, and I saw Daniel talking, but with his eyes focused on me. As I saw his lips move- very fast, it seemed- his fingers touched at his collarbone. I understood that he was referring to our conversation earlier. Just as Daniel had done in class, Edward also laughed at the story. Our little chat in English wasn't even that funny.
I wondered what their problems were. Edward's attention had also focused to me, and he laughed at what must have been my expression.
With that, they walked away.
I frowned before I took another bite out of my sandwich. For the first time in my life, I knew the new semester would prove to be interesting- mainly because there were many things I didn't understand.
Remember... tell me what you think.
