Chapter 3: A Ride

I was a young woman sitting on the back of a motorcycle with a complete stranger, both my arms wrapped around his narrow waist as I held on for dear life. This scenario smacked somewhat of a lame horror film. I could provide the monster part, but I would rather stay human for now. So long as Phil behaved himself I would not show him my game face.

At least you know his name now, Phil. It seemed wrong to call him that, I would not have picked him to be a Phil. For some reason when I thought of a Phil I pictured a middle aged heavily sweating plumber with a big beer belly and a receding hairline.

We stopped at a red light, I didn't recognize the cross streets, this prompted me to try to find out our destination. "Where are we going?" I asked. He did not respond so I tapped him on the shoulder to get his attention. "Where are we going?" I practically shouted when he turned his head to look back at me.

"Now you ask me?" I heard the muffled answer, but he did not tell me our destination. The light turned green and off we went, he really liked accelerating.

A normal human would have been freaking out, but I was not normal. So instead of worrying about where we would eventually end up I decided to enjoy the ride. Wrapping my arms more securely around his waist I took a deep breath and left all my worries behind - at least for the moment. Even if he dropped me off in the middle of nowhere the worst that would happen is that I would have to run back home in wolf form after disposing of his body of course. I surprised myself by smiling at my own joke.

I had never ridden on a motorcycle before, it was a lot different from a car. I could appreciate the engine and the speed in a way that was not possible when driving a car. There was a huge difference between going eighty miles and hour safely inside the steel cage of the car versus on a bike with the pavement less than a foot away from your skin. Not that my mother's honda could get up to the speeds Phil was doing, he seemed to enjoy pushing his motorcycle to its limits. Jake had a motorcycle, I had never been on it, even as a novice I could tell the difference between Jake's and this man's bike.

It was somewhat disconcerting being plastered to a complete stranger's back, I tried not to think about that too much, instead I thought about the sense of freedom. It was almost as good as running as a wolf, not even close to being as fast. One major benefit to the bike over the wolf for was that Jake or Seth could not interrupt my solitude - unlike in wolf form where all they had to do was shift anywhere within several hundred miles and they would be inside my head. Would Jake let me borrow his bike? Maybe it would be best to learn how to ride one first.

I sighed in contentment until I peered over his shoulder and saw the speedometer. Holy crap I knew that we had been going fast but I had not realized it was that fast. Even I would be seriously hurt if anything happened at this speed, he sure was in a hurry to get somewhere. Maybe back to his place where he can chop you up into itty bitty pieces. Well he could try to do that but he would not succeed, I smiled slowly as I thought of his surprised look if he tried something along those lines.

Phil turned off the highway, I could feel the bike slowing down - the fact that the pavement was not rushing past us in a blur of grey was another clue. I did not recognize this turn, but then I had not been paying too much attention to where we were going. Getting used to riding on the bike at the high speed required most of my concentration, that and I had been daydreaming about doing this all by myself.

Come on Leah pay attention to what he is doing, I told myself. I looked at the road signs, it was one of the public beaches. I could not remember this exact beach, we usually frequented the ones closer to the Reservation, I was more familiar with those ones.

Phil ignored the nicely marked parking lot and rode the bike all the way onto the beach. Past the obvious no motorized vehicles beyond this point sign, he must have failed the road signs test in driving school.

This beach was typical for the region, more rocks than sand. The "sandy" looking portion was actually made up of small rocks and seashells strewn about. There were also some large rocks jutting out of the land, the ocean had not worn away those portions yet. Only a small area of the waterline was free of trees, on both sides of the beach the forest touched the water. The older trees were dipping their branches into the water, a great many of the leaves had already fallen off and were landing in the water.

There was one lonely lifeguard station for the entire beach. It was abandoned at this time of the year, as were the five or so picnic tables dotting the area. Both needed to be repainted, the matching red and white paint was peeling off in large chunks. Paint did not last long around these parts, both the rain and salt wearing away at it very swiftly. I remember my father complaining about the frequency with which he had to repaint everything.

I hopped off the bike, trying to hold onto the elation of going against Sam's orders. The motorcycle ride had helped maintain my glee, but now I needed more. I looked around for a something to take my mind off my miserable life.

Phil was searching around as well, a confused look on his face. I kept expecting him to pick up a rock and start hunting for whatever elusive thing he expected.

"What are you looking for?" I asked not really caring about what his answer might be, I was impressed with the fact that I actually managed to say that without growling. I really needed to hold onto my good mood, I was almost acting like a human being again.

"The beach, did I read the sign wrong?" he replied with confusion in his voice. He walked over to one of the picnic tables and hoped up to sit on the table portion. His legs were long enough that they reached the ground. I watched him pick up some paint chips and throw them towards the water. He had a pretty good throw, he kept hitting the same spot on the rock formation a few yards out over the water.

"This is the beach," I could not help but laugh. It felt good to laugh, he did not seem bothered by the fact that I was laughing at him. He looked up at me and without interrupting his target practice he gave me a small smile. I knew a lot of tourists came expecting the sunny palm tree beaches and instead get the rocky shores.

I took my flip flops off so that I could climb one of the larger rocks. It helped that I had the extra benefit of the werewolf balance and I had gotten used to walking around barefoot. I would not have been able to make this climb otherwise. Phil stood up and brushed the paints bits off the back of his jeans as he followed me to the bottom of the rock; he did not climb up with me, he looked up to meet my my gaze for a moment before moving back to observing the water. I could feel myself falling into the depression again, the high of causing Sam pain wearing off. Phil's expression was neutral again, he was not going to be entertaining, so I looked away from him.

I don't know how long I sat there staring out at the water before he interrupted my thoughts, that was a good thing, I had been starting to think about bad things again.

"That is an awesome right hook you got there Princess. Remind me not to piss you off," there was a great deal of admiration in his voice. It might have been vain, but I liked having a man look at me like that. It had been far too long, I know what the boys of the pack all thought about me. I used to think she was kind of pretty but not anymore, and it is all her fault, if she were only nicer.

I tried to hide my smile, "A little piece of advice then, don't call me Princess." There was no need to encourage him, he might think I was a pushover or something.

"What would you like me to call you then?" He asked looking away, this man's serenity was amazing. I could almost feel the waves of calm coming off of him.

"How about my name?" I pointed out the obvious answer to his question.

"Sorry, I have a hard time with names." I don't know how he did it but a look of pure innocence blanketed his expression. I did not believe it for a moment, who did he think he was trying to fool?

"But you can remember Princess? How is that?" It was kind of fun this back and forth banter.

"Well, for one thing you throw a tantrum like a princess." Was that small smile on his lips a way to soften his insult or was he laughing at me?

Jumping down from my rock, I landed less than a yard from him, "I do not throw tantrums." I was in his face now, my temper flaring, it annoyed me to no end that I had look up at him. He is tall enough that you would never have to worry about wearing too high heels on a date and hurting his manly ego. All right, where did that thought come from, it was irrelevant at this point. I was trying to win an argument.

He waved his hand in my direction, as if I had just proved his point. I paused for a minute, his impassive demeanor leaching some much needed calm into my brain. Oh crud, did I just jump all the way off the rock? Had Phil noticed this awesome move on my part? I had forgotten about how high that rock was, as a human I should not have been able to make the perfect gymnast landing - both feet at the same time no wobbling. I tried to think of a good reason I had been able to do that, a good reason that did not involve me explaining about being a werewolf.

"And the other reason to call you Princess, is you seem to require a lot of rescuing." He continued calmly like I had not just broken a world record in jumps.

"Ok just once, but don't let it go to your head." I would give him this point, maybe then he would forget about what I had just done.

"For some reason I get the impression you would swiftly deflate any ego." He might have been right about that one, I was not exactly a major ego boost to have around.

"You may not call me Princess!" I may have possibly shouted that at him.

That is when he did it, hit me with his full smile. Of course he would have the perfect smile with the rows of pearly white teeth but that is not what did me in. He had freaking dimples, and not the tiny things you needed a magnifying glass to find. I am talking moon crater sized dimples, ones that should only be found on fat little babies so that you will love them on sight. I don't think I had ever seen a face less likely to have dimples but there they were, there was no denying their existence.

"All right... Princess," he rumbled with that deep voice of his. Whoever had handed out these attributes should have been a little more careful. Those dimples were dangerous and should not be put on full grown men, especially not in combination with that deep voice. For a moment I was utterly beguiled.

I sighed, he was going to call me Princess, it seemed my overreaction had cemented the deal. But what was a little more perplexing is that I was going to let him. It was the dimples, they had saved him from destruction, at least for now.

"So this is a beach huh?" he said continuing our earlier conversation. He might have thought our conversation regarding what he would call me was over, he was probably right.

I looked out towards the water, there was a slight breeze coming in with the tide, it brought with it many different smells. My improved sense of smell was great for finding vampires, but sometimes it could be overwhelming. I could pick apart the entire scent into its individual pieces, currently the most dominant was the water, I could almost taste the salt.

There was the rotting seaweed, the slight smell of gasoline? Had a boat passed by here when I was not looking. I could distinguish several different types of fish smells; call it a side effect of being the daughter of a man that took his fishing seriously. If I squinted my eyes and looked sideways I could pretend to see the fish swimming in the water. Wait there was one, I could see its shinny scales glinting as it came really close to the surface. The air was heavy with humidity, it was going to rain again soon.

As I child I used to sit by the ocean and let the water lap around my toes, I would imagined the water touching the toes of others. My father would tell me if I listened hard enough I would be able to hear the voices. When you made a wish over a wave it would take it up and carry it away until one day the wish reached the right ears. I remember trying to listen for those wishes, maybe the waves would carry someone's wish to me so that I could fulfill it. I tried to listen to the waves now.

I could hear Phil's steady heart beat, it had a funny little skip, maybe he had a heart defect or something. His steady breathing was deep and slow, calm like the rest of him. Beyond Phil I could hear the birds overhead and the little animals scurrying about in the forest. Then there was my favorite sound. I never could find an official word for it so I just called it my tree wave. As a gust of wind moves through the canopy of the forest you can hear the individual leaves rustling, even with my human hearing I could follow the movement of the wind through the trees. If you listen to the rustling you can hear the wind coming at you long before you can feel the breeze on your face. Sometimes I sit on a rock and just listen to the waves of wind as they swelled and crested over the forest disturbing the small leaves. I loved that sound, whatever it might be called.

"Do you know what time it is?" I asked, finally looking back at Phil. He too seemed to be lost in his own thoughts. It was nice that he did not feel disturbed by silence and need to fill it with incessant chatter.

"The time? I don't know. Hold on a sec?" He quickly walked over to his bike, I could hear some sea shells breaking under his large boots.

I would have to go back home soon, especially if I wanted my mother not to find out about this little incident with Sam. Unfortunately for me I knew whose side my mother would take in the scenario and I would come out the loser. Again.

Phil put his key in his bike to check the time.

"It is past time for me to go home. Though if you continue to ride at break neck speed we should be fine." I really did not want this to end, reality was waiting for me at home. I had enjoyed this escape far too much.

"What is the hurry Princess?" he made sure to put extra emphasis on my 'name', it was best to ignore him.

"We are trying to beat my mother home." If I was lucky she stayed to chat with Charlie, he had nothing better to do on a Saturday afternoon and since tourist season was winding down my mother could let Jon mind the store.

"Ah say no more," I watched as he pushed his bike back onto the pavement. He kicked some sand off the tires. "Your chariot awaits Princess."

"You know that princess stuff is going to get old real quick," I did not add any venom to my voice, any protests on my part were interpreted by him as encouragement.

"Only for you...only for you; by the way, where am I taking you?" he seemed to enjoy his own joke. He even chuckled a little to himself.

"To the Rez," I told him, but then I remembered he was not from round here. It was disturbing how little I actually knew about this man, but what was even more surprising was how easily I could forget myself with him and not realize he was still a stranger.

I gave him some quick instruction promising to give more details when we got closer to my house. He nodded and after making sure my helmet was on, off we went.

I really should not have mentioned that we had to beat my mother home. He construed my words as a personal challenge and he was not going to let me besmirch his skills. If I thought we had gone fast before it was nothing compared to how fast we went now - I kept my eyes away from the speedometer.

I kept flinching whenever we swerved, especially on some of the turns. I went through scenarios in my head as to how quickly I could disentangle myself from the bike and Phil if anything went wrong. It took me a while to notice that he knew what he was doing. He compensated almost before the motorcycle actually veered off course, I guess this might come from experience.

My mother's car was not in the driveway when we stopped, but Sam's truck was.

Emily was nowhere to be seen, this was a good thing, I did not need to be tortured anymore. Sam was pacing the front porch, he did not avail himself of the two benches, he paced around them instead. My father had built those benches, and my mother had sewn the floral patterned cushions that covered them. The chairs were both comfy and sturdy, Sam should know that, we had spent many nights sitting on them together.

The house was nothing fancy, single story with three bedrooms. My father had been very meticulous in its upkeep, so even thought it was simple it was well maintained. More importantly, it was a home.

I hopped off the bike and handed my helmet back to Phil. I was kind of hoping he would leave now, so that I could really have a good "discussion" with Sam. Phil might be waiting to see if I needed rescuing again, it would be so nice if I could actually explain to him why he should not get in between Sam and me if we got into a fight.

I crossed the yard, some leaves from the quickly denuding trees crunched underneath my flip flops. I guess it was time to rake up the leaves again, I could try and talk Seth into helping me.

"Where have you been?" Sam yelled at me.

"Nowhere, you can go home now. Or are you waiting to tattle to my mother," I shouted right back at him.

He looked insulted at my last comment, that might be a good sign. There was a small chance that my mother would not find out about my joyriding with a stranger. Nope probably no chance at all. I was at best delaying the inevitable lecture.

"Just go home Sam," I told him quietly. He looked down at me, and I saw a shadow of my Sam. He understood the pain he was causing me; he might have seen how tired I was: tired of the fighting and the pain, and of going down the path of what might have been. He was a constant reminder to me of the way things were now, and of all the things that would never be.

"I was worried about your daddy with a shotgun, I must say this scenario never crossed my mind," Phil made the quiet observation, interrupting Sam and me. Thankfully he also reminded me we had an audience, with his words Phil saved me from taking yet another trip down memory lane. Maybe Phil was right, I may have needed constant rescuing, mostly from my own dark thoughts.

"Fortunately for you my daddy was a fisherman, and not that much into hunting. But that does not matter, my father died a few months ago. So the risk of you being shot by my daddy is pretty low." I don't think I had ever had to tell anyone that, everyone just seemed to know about my father, this was a very small community. It seemed strange saying it out loud. Despite the fact that I had almost made a joke of it, telling this stranger that my father was dead seemed to make it more real. It was somewhat cathartic to joke about it.

An emotion had crossed Phil's face when I had mentioned my father's death. It came and went too quickly for me to interpret. I watched as a neutral expression settled on his face, I was impressed, I had not seen many people that could clear their expression so swiftly - and most of them were leeches.

Surprisingly I liked being around him. He did not ask too many questions, and more importantly he drove really fast, almost fast enough that I could escape my problems. I could get addicted to that speed, and to the man who gave me my fix.

"What about your family?" I tried to turn the tables on him, I still did not know anything about this man.

"My family?" he looked confused for a second. "Yeah they would shoot you if I brought you home. Nothing personal, my mother does not like people. She would not use a shotgun, she would probably use a sniper rifle, just to make sure you were dead." He used such matter of fact tone that almost made me think he was serious.

"Is your father still alive?" I was diligently ignoring Sam pacing on the porch. He was probably impatiently waiting for Phil to leave so he could continue the lecture. I turned more fully back to Phil, trying to intently listen to every word. I tried to appear as interested in him as I possibly could. Maybe I was not completely faking my interest. I might care a little, plus there was that gorgeous voice of his.

"My father? Oh yeah he is still alive. He has tried several novel ways of committing suicide but fortunately for him they never seem to work. He calls it part of being an adrenaline junkie. Luckily we tend to be a long lived bunch - good genes and all that jazz - we rarely get sick. Well we had a few die young but usually they were from "unnatural" causes, if you know what I mean. For example, my grandfather died very heroically saving a young girls life." Something amused him about that story.

"That is nice, well kind of. Your family must be proud." I did not know quite how to respond to the humor in his voice.

"Not really, my grandmother was furious with him for dying on her. Sometimes I think he died just to get away from her." He stated this with a little laugh.

"Huh?" Maybe he his family did take the prize for being strange. Nope mine can shape shift into wolves, mine still wins the prize for weirdest, hooray for me. Is there some sort of reward for winning?

"Grandma has a few quirks, but who doesn't when you get as old as she is?" He shrugged his shoulders.

"Maybe you should go visit her, she might be missing you?" Sam interrupted, he was not exactly subtle in his hints.

"I just visited her a few days ago, she was doing great, still as sharp as ever. She did commend me for taking some time off work to relax. Life is short and all that." Phil laughed a little as he said this. It looked like Sam's rudeness was not going to ruin his happy mood.

"Well maybe you should go enjoy your vacation." I guess Sam was not going to let this go. I looked over at him, he had stopped pacing to glare at Phil.

"Maybe I will, have a good afternoon Princess. " He nodded at me as he reached back for his helmet.

"Bye Phil, thanks for the ride. It was fun, we might have to do that again." The manners I had been taught finally kicked in and I behaved almost like the young lady I supposedly was. Sam looked over at me like I had sprouted fangs all of a sudden. What? I could be polite.

"Anytime, see you later." Phil said as he adjusted his helmet. I got the impression from the tone of his voice that his words were more than just a polite goodbye. Maybe I would see him later, I could almost look forward to that.

Reluctantly I turned back to the porch, time to deal with Sam.


A/N: Someone made the helpful suggestion that I interrupt with too many memories. Hopefully this flowed a bit better.

PS: Twilighter, I tackled Seth and Sassy's yesterday afternoon for a little bit. Seth bet that he could pick more apples than Sassy. Should he win and if he does what should he ask for? Heehee.