"Does Forks have a theater program?" Sarah asked Mike as he walked with her to government the next day. Apparently the two shared more classes than Sarah had realized at first. Eric seemed slightly put out by the fact, but she'd made sure to smile at him. No sense in alienating people if she could help it, right? Mike just glanced at her curiously as though wondering where the question had come from.
"Nah. I heard when the old theater teacher here retired a few years back there was never a replacement," Mike replied, only knowing the story through what he'd heard since that was before he'd moved to Forks. It had never been enough of a story for people to really talk about though.
"Why not?" Sarah asked, genuine curiosity shining through her expression. The idea of there not being any kind of theater program was unthinkable, at least for her. Even in all her worried of what Forks would be like, Sarah had never once considered that as a possibility. She thought everywhere had a theater program.
"Not much interest, I guess?" came the response, and Sarah could tell that Mike himself wasn't terribly interested. In fact, she could almost see him formulating other topics to shift the conversation to, despite Sarah not being done with her line of questioning. "The program had been failing for years. There is still the old auditorium behind building five, though. Some kids go there to skip class. It's not a bad place to hang out…."
"There is?" Sarah's excitement was more than she'd shone in a while, making Mike actually stop in place for a moment. In her mind she was formulating plans to make a pitstop there later and check the building out, missing the implications from Mike that the two of them could go there to hang out. Sensing he had her full attention, Mike was quickly trying to figure out a time when he could offer to show her, but Sarah was too fixated on the idea currently floating around her mind to notice him. "In that case, why hasn't anyone made a theater club? If there haven't been any plays for a while, I bet the whole town could get behind it. We might even be able to get sponsors." Clearly Sarah had already jumped from questioning why no one else had done it to making plans to start one herself.
"You'd have to get people to join." Though not one to be particularly shy or have stage fright, it was clear that Mike had his share of misgivings about the idea and a complete lack of enthusiasm. Sarah didn't let that stop her.
"You wouldn't join a theater club?" she asked him with a sideways glance. Aware that she might be pushing her luck, Sarah knew that any possibility of getting back up on stage would be worth it. Mike's expression looked torn.
"I might…." he consented as they reached the classroom. Sarah smiled at him.
"It's worth a try," she said. "Besides, who doesn't want a chance to be someone else? To experience what their lives and adventures would be like, if only for a few hours." Mike glanced over at her. It was probably too early for him to be saying the line that popped into his head just then, but he found that he was already speaking before he could stop himself.
"Be someone else?" he asked her, raising an eyebrow. "Why would you want to? To me it seems like Bella Swan is already pretty amazing." Unaware of the irony of it, Mike wasn't sure why his comment seemed to amuse his companion so much. But—once she'd finished laughing—she smiled and thanked him. Mike wasn't sure exactly what that meant as far as progress.
Sarah hadn't really expected her simple idea to catch on so quickly. Though Mike had agreed readily enough—if, she suspected, more out of interest in pleasing her than in theater—Sarah had expected the rest of her new friends to take more convincing. In the class period before lunch, Sarah took the time to write up a quick speech to try and get the support she needed to turn her idea into a reality, but it was unnecessary. They all seemed excited by the prospect, especially when Sarah mentioned the people who didn't want to act would still have important roles backstage. With the questions she was getting asked, Sarah found herself wondering if people were, in fact, more interested in the transfer student and her wacky new idea than in theater itself, but at this point she'd take what she could get.
Between getting the school approval, recruiting new members and finding a staff supervisor, Sarah barely had a chance to notice that Edward Cullen was not in school. It only did occur to her that he was gone when she reached her biology class and was left with a table to herself every class. Sarah figured Edward must have gotten his transfer after all, so she took the opportunity to spread her things out across the table, taking up both her space and the free one next to her. Beyond that she was determined not to think about her former tablemate or his violent dislike of her. Admittedly though, it would have been nice to have a seatmate to discuss her answers with. Science had never been her strongest subject. Sarah's creative mind took to literature with ease and her writing was near flawless—or so she'd like to think—making even history fairly simple. One might have thought that math would trouble her, but after her journey through the Labyrinth, Sarah had developed an interest in logic which translated well to math. It was just science that she struggled with. How was it possible to really understand the fundamental laws of the universe when she'd seen them broken time and time again? Then again, perhaps not having Edward there to be a distraction worked out in her favor.
And thus, Sarah's first week in Forks flew by. Not since Jareth had unfairly stolen those two hours from her had she known time to slip away so fast. It was even better that it was fun and friends—not magic—which caused the time to move so quickly. It had been too long since Sarah had people she could call friends and even when she was younger people had always considered her a bit odd. Maybe the people in Forks were so sheltered that a bit of eccentricity was something to be coveted rather than avoided. Or, perhaps, they were all a bit odd themselves. Either way, Sarah started to believe she really fit in here. She could make this into a home.
There had not been a single sign of Jareth since arriving in Forks either, something Sarah was thankful for though it hadn't completely eliminated her paranoid. Her first impression of him had cemented him as unearthly capable, and the fact that she'd been able to outwit him seemed more implausible than she was comfortable with. While this may not have been the first time she'd beaten him, it seemed much more unlikely. Was he searching for her? Sarah didn't know which answer she would have been happier with. If he was looking it meant that this freedom of hers would eventually come to an end. If he wasn't… well didn't that just mean he didn't care? As complicated as her feelings were towards Jareth, she didn't want him not to care.
On the night that it first began snowing, Sarah just sat on the front steps watching it all come down. Snow had always seemed a bit magical to her, the way the white blanket slowly covered everything and the way that even sounds themselves seem to hold themselves in quiet reverence of the sight. That didn't mean she didn't know how dangerous it could be, leaving her sitting outside waiting for Charlie to come home safely. He did.
"Hey Charlie," Sarah asked him that night as they were finishing up their burgers, "you have snow chains, right?" He glanced up at her and then out the window, almost seeming surprised at the rate of the falling snow. "It's supposed to freeze tonight." Charlie nodded.
"Sure thing, Bells," he replied, getting up from the table to go look for them. Sarah grinned at the name. It had taken him some time, but now Charlie never seemed to think twice when calling her Bella. Even if it wasn't her real name, Sarah loved when he called her that. Somehow it had a way of making her feel at home, like she really did belong here. Charlie felt more like a father to her in the past week and a half than her own father had in over seventeen years. As Sarah was finishing clearing the table, Charlie returned, snow chains in hand.
"Thank you so much," she said, already feeling relieved that she wouldn't have to spend tomorrow stressing and worrying about driving through ice without any kind of support. Between the unfamiliar streets, cold temperature and her own strange bouts of clumsiness, Sarah wasn't about to take any chances.
"Need help?" Charlie offered in his usual manner, never putting in more words than he needed to. Sarah shook her head.
"It's alright, I've done it before," she assured him. Charlie didn't seem convinced until he and Sarah went outside and he watched her put it on. Perhaps she did an imperfect job, but in the end she managed. Though he wouldn't say it, Sarah knew he was impressed.
Though supposedly from Arizona and not meant to be used to the increasingly cold weather that settled over the down, Sarah continued to thrive. If anyone had been paying close enough attention, it would have been clear that Sarah was better equipped for snow than someone of her background ought to have been, but no one was. The people in Forks were quick to accept her and still seemed to think of her as an oddity, but they didn't have any questions about the inconsistencies in her story. Perhaps that lack of questioning made her a bit too lax in her actions, but Sarah had always been brash. When some boys called out and asked if she was interested in a snowball fight, her answer had been to lob a snowball at them expertly with a laugh before taking shelter behind her truck. They were all ten minutes late to class, dripping wet and with the warning that next time they'd end up with detention, but it had been worth it. Even the bruises from the number of falls Sarah had taken were something to be proud of rather than ashamed in her mind.
"So," Sarah said as she sat down and took a quick bite of her pizza at lunch that day. "We need to decide on a play." There was a hum of agreement from those collected around her and Sarah was thrilled to see that interest in the theater club had mostly held strong. Some people had drifted away after the original novelty wore off, but many people still listened attentively as Sarah began pulling books out of her bag. Seeing how limited her classmates knowledge of plays was, Sarah had taken the liberty of raiding her own bookshelves for some of her favorites and splayed them out across the lunch table for her friends to explore. She herself easily snagged up a couple and for each one she gave her very best sales pitch. For the first time in a long time, Sarah felt like she was in her element. Holding a copy of Hamlet as she discussed the play with her neighbor, she was certain that nothing could bring her down. At least, not until a voice from a bit further down the table chirped up.
"What about this one?" Looking up from her conversation, Sarah glanced at the book Lauren was holding up and the blood drained from her face immediately. She didn't remember putting that book into her bad when she'd been grabbing suggestions this morning. Honestly, Sarah didn't remember packing it to take with her to Forks at all. In fact, Sarah distinctly remembered tossing the book out on her return home from the Labyrinth… so why was it here? Mouth falling open as she tried to force some kind of objection out behind the rising dread she could feel, the rest of her tablemates didn't seem to notice.
"What's it about?" one asked, making Sarah's heart rate increase even more. No. this couldn't be happening. Of all the more than twenty plays she brought, they couldn't be choosing that one.
"Apparently it's to do with a princess whose brother gets kidnapped and she has to solve a maze in order to save him from the evil Goblin King." Seeing the interest peaking on the faces of her acquaintances, Sarah already knew it was too late. She couldn't fault them for being interested in the play, it had always been her favorite after all. And what was she supposed to tell them if she claimed they couldn't do it? Any mention of what she'd actually gone through and they'd think she was insane. Her hands shaking as she collected her plays back, Sarah couldn't think of what to do. She knew that if anything happened and anyone happened to call upon the goblins because of this, it would be her fault, but it was too late to turn back now. She could tell by the way they were all talking that nothing she could say would get them to change their minds on the play and even putting her foot down would mean the end of her theater club.
"This is so unfair," Sarah mumbled to herself, before realizing what she'd said and feeling even more dread. It was okay. She was going to be okay. After all, it was just a play, and it wasn't as though it even said the words that summoned Jareth anyway. If she had to, Sarah supposed she could edit the play a bit before giving out copies. Her mind was full of this and only this when she was jolted out of her thoughts by a voice at her ear.
"Edward Cullen is staring at you," Jessica whispered, almost as if she was purposely trying to add more anxiety to Sarah's day. Things were already complicated enough as it was with her fears about one pain in the neck, Sarah didn't need to be worrying about someone else's blind hatred of her. Even so, Sarah pulled her attention away from the black hole of her own panic-inspired thoughts to look up and over towards the Cullen table.
"What?" Sarah asked her with confusion, speaking before she'd even really processed what her eyes were telling her. "He's not even…." Before she could finish that statement, Sarah's eyes caught Edward's and she just let her voice trail off in confusion. "Damn, does that mean I have to shake the bio table again?" Sarah said that more to herself than to Jessica since she didn't think the girl would appreciate it. Jessica's unamused scoff proved her right. The comment hadn't been for Jessica's satisfaction anyway, but for her own. Moving her eyes back down to her lunch, Sarah tried to focus on calming her already erratic heartbeat. There are too many things going on at once, she couldn't handle it all, so she needed to minimize whatever parts of it she could in that moment. She simply didn't have the motivation to be concerned with Edward's hostility at the moment.
The walk to biology was short as always, and Sarah set her things down to chat with Angela for a moment before taking her seat. Pulling her completed homework out and setting it within easy reach, Sarah also took out the purple folder she'd been using for the theater documents and grabbed a blank piece of paper. She paused. Sarah knew she was supposed to be writing down a cast list and dates for auditions and so on, but her pen hovered above the paper uselessly. As far as a cast list, first she'd have to write down his name, right? No, nothing had been decided for sure. Slowly Sarah started writing down a list of alternatives to the play and trying to brainstorm objections she could use in order to push for a new selection. Her mind was almost entirely focused on this when there was a light scraping of the chair next to her. Sarah sighed quietly, but tried to ignore it.
"Hello," came a voice to her left. Sarah started and had to look up quickly since she almost didn't recognize it. Had she been wrong and someone else transferred into the class in Edward's place? She hadn't heard Edward's voice before, but somehow the idea itself was easy to dismiss even before she'd looked up to confirm it. The strangest thing was that the voice itself wasn't hostile and his expression was as open and friendly as could be, at least on the outside. Somehow that just made her more uneasy.
"Hi…," she replied hesitantly. Shyness was something Sarah had left far in the past, but there was something about his eyes that made her uncomfortable and kept her from being able to even hold eye contact for very long. That was how she noticed his posture. He had pulled away from her as far as their table would allow. So much for not being a jerk. "I don't have cooties, you know," Sarah commented with a roll of her eyes, no longer feeling overwhelmed by him in the face of her annoyance. Edward looked surprised.
"What?" he asked, his brow furrowing quizzically. Sarah gestured to the space between them, noticing he also tensed up a little more as her hand shifted towards him. Her eyebrow rose.
"You're scooted over as far as possible. Either you think I stink," Sarah noticed a light twinkle in Edward's eyes as she said this, as though he were in on a private joke. She was not amused. "Or you think I have cooties." Looking over at him expectantly, Sarah noticed he seemed a bit lost for words. She supposed she didn't expect an explanation and instead she just sighed.
"Oh. I didn't realize." Sarah rolled her eyes again. She was doing that a lot lately. It would have been impossible for him not to have noticed, the position had to be uncomfortable at the very least and was obviously forced. She turned away again before having to glance up as he moved closer.
"You didn't have to do that." The fact that her words left Edward looking positively befuddled only made Sarah smirk lightly. "You also don't have to talk to me, you know. We may be sitting together, but you seem to have made up your mind to hate me, so you can keep doing that if you want." This was worse than what Sarah had expected for today. She'd expected the same as before, that same tense annoyance. At least with that she'd known what to think and how to react. But, between her panic before—and heartbeat that still fluttered a bit whenever she thought about it again—and her fear that Jareth would pop up if she so much as said the word 'Labyrinth', Sarah was not in the mood to deal with Edward's confusing shifts in persona.
"You are a very confusing person, Bella Swan," he remarked finally, not moving back away again and his lips twitching at the sides as though he was fighting a smile. "And a hard one to read."
"Maybe you're too easily confused, Edward Cullen," she retorted. Admittedly though, Sarah had thought she was fully prepared to be senselessly hated, she found herself fighting a smile of her own a small bit. No matter how much she thought she prepared herself, ultimately she didn't want to be hated by anyone. As frustrating as the change was, there was something nice about it, and that strange feeling of familiarity was still hovering around Edward, making her oddly more relaxed and more on guard around him.
The teacher choose that moment to begin the class and the chatter died down. Sarah made sure to pay attention, though her mind did drift between Edward and Jareth occasionally. One thought left her with a slightly pleasant sort of confusion, while the other was nothing but dread. Dread… and maybe anticipation. Still, at the moment both seemed equally problematic and worth her attention. Once Mr. Banner began passing out microscopes, Sarah glanced at Edward through the corner of her eye and noticed he was still staring at her.
"Nice contacts," Sarah whispered as the teacher moved away from them and to break the silence between them. It was much less weird if they were at least talking while he looked at her. Edward looked confused once again.
"I'm sorry?" he asked, his smile fading to a look of confusion. Sarah barely noticed, shifting her eyes down to find the pages in the book she was supposed to be looking for.
"Contacts. I knew a guy who changed his eye color all the time too. He went from green to blue to black and sometimes even red or purple. I never did figure out what his natural color was." Glancing back over to be polite, Sarah noticed that Edward seemed to be growing more distant the longer she talked, and had even looked away at last, as though to hide his eyes from her. What was there to be embarrassed about being caught wearing contacts, Sarah wondered to herself. It was just one more entry on the ever growing list of oddities around Edward Cullen. Ones that Sarah decided now was not the time for as she brushed it off and reached for the microscope.
After five minutes of struggling to get the slide into focus, Sarah had no idea what she was looking at. She knew that biology would never be her strongest subject and cells confused her even more. Science told people that goblins and magic didn't exist and that teleportation and shapeshifting were the things of myth. Having seen all of those and more in real life, Sarah had to say she didn't know how much she trusted science. Part of her felt that it was even silly to bother learning anything about it when she'd seen the so called laws of nature broken as many times as she had. Pulling her book towards her with a sigh, Sarah flipped through the pages in her desperate search for the answer.
"Prophase," Edward said suddenly. It wasn't until he spoke that Sarah noticed he'd turned back to her. He was smiling again which, while it didn't surprise her, still made her a bit uncomfortable. The boy was way too hot and cold. Sarah had moved across the country to escape one attractive and mysterious but utterly confusing man, she didn't need another in her life.
Sarah was about to check his answer with the picture in the book when he swiped the slide out and put in another one. He barely looked at it before writing down another answer. Too dumbfounded to stop him, Sarah watched him complete their assignment in all of three minutes while she knew the rest of the class would be struggling for the whole hour. And, remarkably, Sarah didn't even think he was cheating. She wasn't quite sure why, but she was fairly certain that all of his answers were correct. He had that sort of confidence to him, and Sarah wouldn't be surprised if he really was good at everything.
"Were you planning on letting me have a look?" Sarah asked him, slightly exasperated and indignant as she reached for the microscope. Edward reached out too and their hands met. Both jerked their hands away just as suddenly. "Cold," Sarah mumbled quietly to herself, though once again it wasn't the cold that had startled her. Edward's hands were very much like Carlisle's. It wasn't their frigid temperature that shocked her, but that same peculiar spark of magic.
"I…." Sarah had no doubt that Edward was about to rattle off the same comment about poor circulation so, she beat him to it.
"Poor circulation?" she asked, her most innocent she could manage, but even when Carlisle had used it the excuse had been almost laughably bad. Poor circulation was natural and even boring, it definitely didn't explain the unnatural and even exciting feeling that Sarah got from touching their hands. Edward eventually nodded, but was unable to offer anything more as their teacher interrupted them.
"Very nice, Edward, but were you planning on letting Isabella here learn this too?" He looked mildly annoyed as he said this and Sarah wondered if it was a common problem of Edward's. Maybe that's why he was given a seat to himself in the first place. Sarah wanted to speak up and agree with Mr. Banner and complain that it was what she'd been trying to do when they'd accidentally touched hands. She also wanted to argue with the teacher at his assumption that she hadn't helped out, but she supposed one look at her grades was probably proof enough.
"Bella answered three of five correctly," Edward lied smoothly. Mr. Banner looked abashed despite Sarah wondering why he was so easily convinced. Perhaps the awe for the Cullens felt by the student body was felt by the teachers as well?
"Did you do this lab back in Phoenix?" the teacher asked her, making Sarah have to stop gaping at Edward and turn back to Mr. Banner.
"Uh… sure," she said with a nod, not throwing Edward under the bus as much as she wished to, mostly due to the way the teacher was looking at her and how he mumbled about extra credit as he walked away. Every point counted, right? Sarah turned back to Edward and eyed him carefully. "What was that?" she demanded of him. Edward didn't seem to understand.
"He would have made you redo it," he defended himself. Sarah huffed.
"I didn't do it in the first place," she reminded him with a roll of her eyes. "Unlike you, I actually need to learn this stuff." Whether or not Sarah believed it would help her in life, a failing class grade was still a failing class grade and graduation wasn't as far away as it had once seemed. Edward seemed to understand then and carefully shifted both the microscope and his chair a little closer to her.
"You see how those are lined up like that? This is metaphase." Edward's explanations of the slides were detailed but clear and by the time he'd finished, Sarah was beaming. Regardless of what she thought about him personally, anyone who could break down topics like this so they made sense to her immediately was hard to dislike. As much as she was good at holding grudges, Edward seemed a little too good at improving his estimation in her eyes. While she still found the science explained shortsighted and probably false in some respect, it helped to at least know what she was meant to learn from this class.
"Well that makes much more sense now," she told him at last, slumping back into her seat as they'd finished going through them all. It had taken almost the entire class period, but in Sarah's mind it had definitely been worth it. Whether Edward thought the same after having to teach her, Sarah couldn't say. Instead she tilted her head as she examined him. "Thank you for that. You know, you're not a bad guy after all."
"After all? Was that in doubt?" he asked with a smile that Sarah thought was supposed to charm her. While it did make her think slightly better of him, she didn't think it worked to the level that he'd wanted it to.
"Yes," she told him seriously, nodding solemnly. Seeming to have gotten the hang of the way she operated a bit more, Edward looked more amused than surprised by this response. It was funny, but Jareth and the Labyrinth had not crossed her mind for over an hour now, despite how much they'd dominated her thoughts not long before. It probably would have stayed that way, too, if Edward hadn't noticed the slip of paper she'd been writing on before.
"Have you decided on a play?" he asked, gesturing slightly to the list she'd been making. Feeling like she'd been suddenly doused in ice water as she was forced back to remembering, Sarah finally just shook her head, forcing a smile.
"No," she said, her voice a bit weak. Clearing her throat, Sarah tried again. "No, no. We're still working on that." Edward looked as though he didn't quite buy what she was trying to sell him, and Sarah was thankful when the bell cut off any chance he had to counter her comment. She gathered up her things as quickly as possible in order to escape the conversation, but once again he'd beaten her to it. Before she could even fully process it, Edward was up and out the door. She really wished he'd just make up his mind whether he disliked her or not, because she had this strange feeling that if he did, they could actually be friends.