Part Two

Artemis

I had never really thought much about wolves before. Actually, that was a lie. Really wolves tended to scare me.

But, for some reason, I wasn't frightened this time. He stood there, tall, elegant. And I wasn't scared. I went to him-the wolf I mean, not that there was anyone else there-and reached out for him...

Only to be pulled back roughly, by what felt like the pit of my stomach.

I swear my eyes snapped open-and it took me a few minutes to remember where I was. Forks, Washington. The rainiest place on God's green earth. I looked around my empty bedroom (my dad and uncle were driving the truck up and wouldn't get here until tomorrow-or maybe it was today...My clock was still on its way here.

It was spacious, big enough for three people, with its own bathroom. Also the only room on the second floor. And, lucky for me, it had a window seat by the one window that practiacally took over the whole northfacing wall. That's where I was now, it was practially a bed-well, almost, maybe half the width of a twin bed, but it covered the entire wall and curved out a bit to make more seating and an extrodinarily comfy place to sit-or in my case sleep. Think the window seat from Elanor's library in the movie Inkheart.

Sitting up a bit, I closed the book that still layed on my lap and turned off the dying flashlight. Laying them both on the floor, I twisted to look out the window.

It took a few minutes for my eyes to adjust, but (even with my glasses on) it was hard to see through the pouring rain.

A man ran across the street-from our house to the Swans' (mom had meet the owner of the house earlier today, yesterday?) and swiftly scaled the wall and climbed into the window on the second floor.

Anouther male shape appeared under the window, gazing up at the window the other had dissapeared into, before looking up at my second story window.

We stared at each other-I felt so sure he could see me, before a wolf howled and he slowly jogged off to the woods behind the Swan's home. I swear I could see him looking over his shoulder as he ran. When he was out of sight I released a breath that I had no clue I was holding.

I blinked, and tossed my glasses onto the floor next to my book and the flashlight. Now I was hallucinating. Perfect.

I closed my eyes, waiting for sleep. But my mind decided to wander.

It went to my sister, Halley. How she had gone missing. How she had just left everything, us (her family), her friends, her career...

Her career was the worst-she had left it to me. Just left it to me as if I could just do aomething with it. It had been the one thing we had fought over-the one thing I would have made her give up. The one thing I was glad she had lost.

Despite my sister being a year younger, she had been a singer. Well, not just any singer. She had been Crystalized (seriously, that was the name she had picked for herself) and had a whole Hannah/Miley thing going for her, only she was Crystalized/Halley.

Of course, on stage she had dressed as wild (and inapropriate) as Lady Gaga. That, and some of her song lyrics, were what we had argued over. (How ofen does she have to swear in the songs? Seriously?)

They told the press that Crystalized had retired, that she was giving up the spot light to relax and write new songs, something that she was too busy for before.

I grabbed my headphones off the floor and turned on Halley's albums (all four of them). Despite them being inappropriate, I had always listened to them. Even though I told her that I never did and never would because of her word choices. But now...

It was as close to my sister as I would ever get now.

Good news: it wasn't raining. Bad news: forecast was leaning toward rain from now until Friday.

And it was only Sunday.

I could only find cheerios in the pantry, but there was no milk in the fridge, so I didn't bother with a spoon and just took the box with me to Caelon's room.

Caelon was about a year older than me, despite the fact we were both in the same grade-seniors. He had brown hair that was as curly, frizzy, and unruly as mine; only with brown eyes to match, unlike my flat metallic silver color.

"Hey," I leaned against the doorway to his room (I was the only one with an upstairs room, both my brothers had rooms tucked behind the kitchen) munching on some cheerios.

That was the neat thing about brothers-or at least mine-they never judged if you talked while chewing. Actually, most of the time they just took up unused space.

"Dad should be here soon," he said without looking at me, texting away madly.

"And how do you know that?"

"Rivera just texted me," he said simply.

Rivera (pronounced River-ah) was our cousin-practically my twin in age and looks. We both had the same thick, crazy fizzy/curly hair-though she had bleached hers to be light blonde while I had dyed mine midnight black-the same silvery eys that looked way better on her. Her face was still round from 'baby fat', while mine had lost baby fat ages ago. She was taller by a good five inches compared to my 5'3 and had less 'curves' than me. We were only days apart. She had been born two days after my birthday-and my birthday also happened to be known as the Hallmark holliday, Valentine's Day. Truthfully, we were more alike than Halley and I would ever have been.

"And she would know because-" I prompted, before I could dwell to much more on Halley.

"Because she and Uncle Scott are on thier way with dad," he said simply.

To clear up confusion-dad was driving the truck with all our stuff up. Mom and us kids had driven up early to clean up the place a bit. We had gotten here late Friday-but everything was cleaned by yesterday afternoon, and all the walls (excepting bathrooms and bedrooms) had been painted by bedtime last night.

"Huh," I let the news sink in before leaving the cheerios by his sleeping bag-his bed until his actual bed got here with dad-and wandering off to find mom.

I found her in the last place I looked-the front yard's garden bed. Or what appeared to be a garden bed. Really, it was weeds and dirt.

"Anything else need to be done?" I asked as I looked up at the sky, grey clouds shwoing no sign of breaking and unleashing the sun.

"Not at the moment," she pulled up more weeds that I knew would only grow back because of the rain. "I could think of something though."

She brushed her forehead with the back of her hand as she looked up at me.

"I just wanted to walk around the block for a while, you know, before it rains," I pointed to the sky to make my point clearer.

"Go right ahead," she smiled, showing dimples only Halley had inherited. "Just make sure you take your phone."

"Got it," I tapped my pocket as I walked down the gravelly drive and onto the smooth paved road. I waited until mom was out of sight before I started to run.

Cherry:Again, some slight changing that will affect later... And I only own the OC's, the rest belongs to Kelly Armstrong and Stephenie Meyer.