- 3. Homecoming Queen -
In the morning I didn't even feel hung over. I had dreamed of Edward, of course, but the dreams were rather cloudy and distant. I had remembered to set my alarm clock, and the morning shower felt like rebirth. The warm water unclenched all of my muscles and softened my skin somehow. I decided on a rather short, plain dress with black tights and boots and a long, comfy wool jacket. Comfortable, not overdoing it. My legs looked pretty gorgeous this way but I still gave the impression of just-got-out-of-bed. I realized that I now suddenly paid attention to what I was wearing. That was a first.
While I went downstairs to grab a bowl of cereal I remembered my trail of thoughts from two days ago. I really had been a goody-goody. I never smoked a single cigarette since I'd left Phoenix- and back then, it was only because most of my friends smoked that I occasionally shared one. I hadn't touched alcohol since ever I came to Forks, and back in Phoenix my experience with that was limited, too; I'd only been drunk once and that was at my grandfather's 75th birthday when an older cousin of mine stole Champagne for us younger teenagers. Pathetic. I had never had sex, either, due to the perfect level of self-restraint of my former boyfriend, Edward Cullen- which might have had something to do with the fact that he never really liked me to begin with, at least not the way I liked him. The way I loved him.
While listening to the sound of the cereal crashing between my teeth to avert further thoughts of him, I saw Angela pulling up the driveway in her normal car. She smiled when I walked towards her, and we drove to school in comfortable silence. She noticed nothing different about me, apparently, so I guess it wasn't possible to detect that someone had been tripping that easy.
It was insane to have to go to school a week after you graduated anyhow, but we were both still enrolled in AP classes than ran until mid July. I almost envied Tyler and those people with no ambitions, who didn't even care about college. Or well, those kids whose parents were wealthy enough to pay for any kind of college anyhow, so it didn't matter if they did well or not. Basically we would be hanging around here with all the juniors, already trying to take our places and form the new in-crowd, with all the sophomores and freshmen ready to go to camp and a seriously diminished selection of the senior class trying to get in a few more AP credits before reality hit hard in fall.
After Angela and I had parted, agreeing to meet for lunch, I decided to stay outside the building for just another minute, because the sun was shining so beautifully, and then suddenly I realized I was going to be late if I didn't rush now. But I didn't feel like rushing. I watched the big clock above the front entrance, almost smiling to myself, until I was absolutely sure that I'd be late, then I shifted my back away from my truck and slowly walked into the building. Nobody had even noticed me hanging out here.
I was late, of course I was. Empty corridors. I pushed open the door to my Trig class deliberately slow and walked in without a word. Everyone was staring. I hated the attention at some level, but if I wanted to bring myself back into this, people better noticed sooner than later that I wasn't the grieving mute anymore. At least, not on the outside.
"Miss Swan?" Mr Varner obviously expected something for me.
"I'm sorry I'm late", I said, but it didn't feel right, apologizing for something I had done on purpose. So I added: "I left late" and smirked at him.
While my admittedly slightly pompous entrance had silenced everyone, this remark got at least half of the class giggling. From the corner of my eye I noticed Mike Newton looking me up and down in approval. It was just like Edward had said. People at this school did notice me, in a way no one had before I came to Forks. Good.
I did a half turn from going back to my empty table in the back of the class, where I usually sat alone since Edward, who had obviously been my class neighbour in almost anything, had left. I went to sit next to Mike Newton and right in front of Jessica Stanley. I was slightly surprised they were part of the small "excellence cluster" staying on for AP grades, but hell, if anybody needed more credit, it was Jessica.
Mr. Varner, who had obviously waited for me to sit down, come to my senses and reply something rueful, slightly snapped at this turn of events.
"Miss Swan, this isn't your seat, is it."
"No, it isn't", some kind of devil was pushing me further, "but from here I can see you much better."
Someone laughed out, and then it went dead silent.
Mr. Varner was amazingly calm.
"Get out of my class and into the principal's office right now, Miss Swan. Tell them to arrange detention this afternoon for you."
I sighed dramatically and got up. I considered making another snappy remark, but I knew I'd gone as far as I dared. For a first day, this was good.
The lady behind the office desk was extremely surprised as I very friendly told her to schedule me for detention. I was probably one of the last persons she'd have expected to end up there. Well what can I say? I walked outside and just sat down on the side of the boardwalk, enjoying the sun. This was so much better than Trig!
During lunch I wasn't alone. I entered the hall a bit late, and I was aware of people watching me. I didn't know if they'd always done that and I had just not noticed it, or is this was a new thing because word had spread that I'd acted up in Trig this morning. I got a bowl of mixed Salad since I wasn't feeling particularly hungry and then I saw Angela waiving at me and went towards the small table in the middle of the room where she sat by herself. Almost all eyes were watching me. Had it always been like this, or was this really all because of this morning?
"Your hair, your tights... you look beautiful you know", remarked Angela as I set down opposite from her.
"Thanks", I mumbled.
"Everybody is staring at you."
"Yeah", I answered, but then I realized I never wanted to be snappy with Angela and quickly added to my arrogant comment: "That's because knowing this school everyone knows by now that I'll spend a good part of my day in detention tonight."
Her look told me that she already knew. "Want to talk about it?"
"Have you not heard an exact and detailed description of every word I said this morning by now? It seems I underestimated Forks High."
"Nah, I have." She grinned. "I don't get it, but I'm cool with it. This place is really boring, when you think about it."
"Don't you dare get yourself into detention, too", I whispered half joking, half menacingly, suddenly scared I could make this lovable, sweet girl just as miserable as me.
She shook her head though, and probably started out to say something, but that was before little Ben Cheney walked up to our table and fixed his eyes on her after having shot a short, probing glance in my direction.
Angela stared at him, obviously uncomfortable, obviously wishing for him to go away. Had some of Edwards unnatural talents rubbed off at me, or had it always been that easy for me to read people? Well, maybe not people, maybe just her.
But now, Edward's name was in my head. I took my time rearranging my hair around my face with my fingers. Started eating. Seeing nothing but his radiant smile. The one I wouldn't see again. Then I realized Ben was still there, not speaking.
I jerked my head up and gave him an annoyed look.
He cleared his throat and murmured: "I just wanted to check on you."
Angela couldn't find a voice to speak, and shot a pleading look at me. It was so clear. Make him go away, Bella.
"She's fine", I said softly. He seemed to miss the warning in my voice.
"Look, I just wanted to see if you were doing okay." He twitched.
"And why wouldn't she be?" I looked at him plainly, with a smile on my lips almost as sweet as fake. He apparently had no answer for that. Angela relaxed a little. This was going well, I knew it. Ben still seemed reluctant to go away.
"I tried calling you on the weekend, Angela. You were never home."
"She was with me", I jumped in again when Angela didn't open her mouth. He finally turned to me. "All weekend?" He seemed more surprised than questioning, and I remembered somewhere in the back of my head that up until last Friday I'd been a wreck, a mute little ghost basically oblivious to all the people around me.
"Yes, we drove up to hang out with my friend Al..fie in Seattle." I'd almost said Alice. But lying came easier now. "I was his birthday and lots of friends came around, he has a few cute cousins and we both thought it was time we had fun at a party, seeing how both of us were trapped in relationships so long." I had hurt him with the word trapped, I knew it. Ben Cheney was one of the good guys here, and I knew it. Why hurt him? I didn't know that. But I knew in that moment I had wanted to hurt him.
"You felt trapped by your relationship, Bella?" he followed up. But he knew full well I had meant not just me, and he was looking at Angela.
To my great surprise and satisfaction, Angela managed to swallow that bite of food sealing up her throat for the past few minutes and quipped nonchalantly: "Don't we all?"
Ben looked as if he had been kicked in the balls right then and I decided to finish him off, see you far the newer, meaner version of me could go.
"You said it, dear, don't we all? She's right, Ben. I of all people was a fool to think I had a broken heart. It was funny, being the broken hearted actress for a while. But our hearts are way too young to be broken yet. It takes some time, you know, but after a while you realize you are only young once and you shouldn't waste all you free high school years on just on bloke, even if he's kind of nice."
He smiled not very convincingly and left our table. Angela didn't say anything during the rest of our very healthy lunch (she'd gotten a salad too and it just then occurred to me that I'd never seen her eating pizza or a cheeseburger), but she mouthed "thanks" to me when we both pushed our plates away, and I knew that she had relied on me and I had just proved worthy of that. And it had been easy, too. Way to go, Bella.
That was when the crowd decided to join us for the rest of sitting around after the actual eating part was over. Mike Newton, Jessica, who'd been the most frustrated with me and probably still was, Eric, Lauren and a couple of others. My table was suddenly the table for the in-crowd. The popular kids. And I knew why it came that easy to me. Because I didn't care about it at all. About none of them, save Angela, a little.
