The worst part about Friday was that, even thought I knew he wasn't going to be there, I still hoped. When I walked into the cafeteria with Jessica and Mike, I couldn't keep from looking at his table, which was deserted.
At my usual table, everyone was full of plans for the nexr day. Mike was animatedly boasting a forecast of sun tomorrow. I'd have to see it before I would believe it.
I intercepted a few unfriendly glances from Lauren during lunch, which I didn't understand until we were all walking out of the room together. Unknown to her, I was right on her heels.
"...don't know why Beall" - she sneered my name - "doesn't just sit with the Cullens from now on. I mean, all fags should stick together." I heard her hiss at Mike. I'd never noticed her totally homophobic attitude or nasally tone.
"He's my... friend." Mike replied. "He sits with us."
I paused to let them pass me. Mike didn't even defend the fag comment. Sure, I'd gotten worse at my old school, but I'd thought these people would at least accept me, if not be my friends.
I ignored the group for the rest of the day. I didn't want to hear any more of their crap.
That night at dinner, Charlie seemed enthusiastic about my trip to La Push in the morning. I think he was channeling his guilt over leaving me alone every weekend since I'd gotten there. I excused myself early.
After today, I had very little desire to go to La Push with everyone. Not only did I realize that they were just a bunch of stuck up snots, but that they must have only liked me in the first place because I was new. I went to bed angry.
I meant to sleep in, but an unusual brightness woke me up. I opened my eyes to see a clear yellow light streaming through the window. I couldn't believe it. Sun.
Even if I wasn't going to have any fun on the trip, I'd go just to enjoy the sunshine while it lasted.
The Newtons' Olympic Outfitters store was just North of town. As I pulled into the lot, I recognized the group huddled around Mike and Tyler's cars. Eric, ben, Conner, Jess, Angela, Lauren and three other girls. The guys welcomed me, but the girls just glared and tossed their hair. I gave them a snarky look in reply.
"You came!" Mike called, delighted. "See? I called it with the sun!"
"Dude, I told you that I'd be here." I reminded him.
"We're just waiting for Lee and Samantha, unless you invited someone?" Mike added.
"Nope." I lied lightly. Mike instantly looked satisfied.
"Will you ride in my car?" He asked. Good grief, he was flirting again.
"Sure." I might as well humor him.
"You can have shotgun." he promised. I hid my chagrin. Jessica already looked pissed. Luckily, we ended up needing extra space, so I wedged Jess in between Mike and I. I tried not to think of her as a well manicured cock block.
It was only fifteen miles to La Push from Forks, with gorgeous views on the drive that made me glad to have the window seat. I tried to absorb as much sunlight as possible.
I'd been to the beaches around La Push many times during my Forks summers with Charlie, so the mile-long crescent of First Beach was familiar to me.
The water was dark gray, even in the sunlight, white-capped and heaving to the gray, rocky shore. Islands rose out of the steel harbor waters with sheer cliffsides, reaching to uneven summits and crowned with austere, soaring firs.
The beach only had a thin border of actual sand at the water's edge, after which it grow into millions of large, smooth stones that looked uniformly gray from a distaance, but close up were multi-colored and really pretty.
There was a brisk wind coming off the waves, and birds wheeled around in it. We picked out way down to the beach and settled at a ring of driftood that looked like the main party spot. There was even a firepit already in place. Eric and Ben gathered wood, and soon we had a good setup ready to burn.
"Have you ever seen a driftwood fire?" Mike asked me. I was sitting awkwardly away from the groups of girls, unsure of what to do.
"No." I replied. Mike kneeled by the fire, putting a lighter to the base of one of the driest pieces of wood.
"You'll like this then, man. It's pretty colors." He used the lighter on another few sticks of wood, and the fire quickly crackled to life.
"It's blue." I said in surprise.
"The salt does it." He reaaranged some logs then came to sit next to me. Jessica instantly smelled trouble and came over to distract him.
After a half hour of chatter, the other boys wanted to hike to the nearby tide pools. It was a slight dilemma for me. I loved the tide pools, but I tended to fall in them a lot. That reminded me of Edward's request not to fall in the ocean.
Lauren made the decision for me. She was going to stay, so I decided to go. Screw what Edward Cullen said, I could go fall in tide pools if I wanted to.
We had to take a roundabout trail through the woods to get to the pools, but luckily it wasn't a long hike and we soon found ourselves back on the beach.
I hopped around with the other boys a little so they knew I wasn't chicken, but then I quickly settled myself down in front of a larger tide pool and sat down to watch the little mini ocean in front of me. Anemones, Eels, crabs and strfish all moved around the pool, easily keeping me entertained until the others wanted to go back and get some food.
When we got back to First Beach, the group we'd left behind had multiplied. As we got closer we could see the shining, straight black hair and copper skin of the new-comers, teenagers from the reservation come to socialize.
When we got back to the circle, I immediately noticed a younger boy sitting near the fire glance up at me with interest. I heard their group leader introduce him as Jacob. Food was passed around, and everyone began devouring.
During lunch, the clouds started to advance, slinking across the blue sky and casting clouds across the sun. People began to disperse; some to the nearest store, others to hike or walk on the beach. I stayed at the fire.
Jacob sauntered over to sit by me. He looked liike he was a couple years younger than me, with long glossy black hair pulled back into a ponytail and soft dark eyes and skin.
"You're Beall Swan, aren't you?"
Jesus, was there a person in the state of Washington that didn't know?
"Yeah." I replied.
"I'm Jacob Black." He held out his hand. "You bought my dad's truck."
"Oh." I said, shaking his hand. "You're Billy's son. I think I should remember you."
"Nah, you probably were stuck around my sisters more."
"Rachel and Rebecca?" I didn't know why I suddenly remembered their names.
"Yep. One's at college and the other got married."
"Wow." I said.
"So how do you like the truck?" he asked.
"I love it. Runs great."
"Yeah, but it's really slow." he laughed. "I was so relieved when Charlie bought it. My dad wouldn't let me work on building another car when we had a perfectly good vehicle right there."
"It's not that bad, man." I came to my truck's defense.
"Have you tried to go over sixty?"
"No." I admitted.
"Good. Don't." He grinned. I felt myself grinning back.
"It does great in a collision." I threw in.
"I don't think a tank could take out that old monster." He agreed with another laugh.
"So you build cars?" I asked, impressed.
"When I have time and parts." He replied, flashing a brilliant smile and looking at me appreciatively in a way I was learning to recognize. I wasn't the only person who noticed.
"You know Bella, Jacob?" Lauren asked insolently from across the fire.
"We've sort of known each other since I waas born." he replied smoothly.
"How nice." She didn't sound like she thought it was nice aat all, and her pale, fishy eyes narrowed.
"Beall," she called again, watching me like a hawk. "I was just saying to Tyler that it was too bad none of the Cullens could come out today. Didn't anyone think to invite them?" Her concerned expression was so fake, it could have been put on her face with plastic surgery.
"You mean Dr. Carlisle Cullen's family?" A tall, older native boy asked before I could respond, much to Lauren's iirritation.
"Yes, do you know them?" She asked condesendingly.
"The Cullens don't come here." he said in a tone that closed the subject, ignoring her question. I pondered on what that meant.
Jacob interrupted my meditation. "So, Forks driving you crazy yet?"
"Understatement." I replied with a grimace. I was still turning over the brief comment on the Cullens, and I had a sudden inspiration. It was a stupid plan, but I didn't have any better ideas. I hoped that Jacob was as of yet inexperienced with gay men.
"Do you want to walk down the beach with me?" I asked, flashing my classic half-grin half-smirk. Jacob jumped up willingly enough.
"So you're, what, sixteen?" I asked casually, stuffing my cold hands into the pockets of my jacket.
"Fifteen." He replied.
"Really. Thought you were older."
"My height." He laughed nervously.
"Do you come up to Forks much?" I asked. I hoped for a yes.
"Not too much." he admitted with a frown. "But when I get my liscense and the car finished, I'll be able to more often."
I nodded, and we walked in silence for a little while.
"So, what was your friend saying about the doctor's family?" I asked casually.
"The Cullens? Oh, they're not supposed to come onto the reservation." He looked away, out toward James Island.
"Why?"
He glanced back at me, obviously a little nervous.
"Hey, man... I'm not supposed to say anything."
"Promise I won't tell. Dude, I'm just curious." I flashed him another grin. He grinned back, and his voice became a little huskier.
"Do you like scary stories?" he asked ominously.
"Hells yeah." I enthused. Jacob waved me to follow him and led me over to a larger log of driftwood. We sat down, and I saw a little glint in Jacob's eye. He was going to make this good.
"Do you kow any of our old stories, about where we came from - the Quileutes, I mean?" he began.
"Nope." I admitted.
"Well, there are lots of legends, some of them claiming we survived the flooding of the world by tying our canoes to the tops of tall trees. Others say that we descended from wolves - that's why it's illegal for us to kill them. Then, there are the legends about the cold ones." His voice dropped lower.
"The cold ones?" I asked, intrigued.
"Yes. There are stories of the cold one as old as the wolf legends, and some much more recent. According to legend, my own great-grandfather knew some of them. He was the one who mde the treaty that kept them off our land." He rolled his eyes.
"Your great-grandfather?" I encouraged.
"He was a tribal elder, like my father. You see, the cold ones are the natural enemies of the wold - well, not the wolf, really, but the wolves that turn into men, like our ancestors. You would call them werewolves."
I almost didn't believe what I was hearing.
"Werewolves?" I asked.
"Yep. So the legends say. Anyhow, they only have one enemy."
"Only one?" I asked. What about silver bullets and Anthony Hopkins?
"Only one. So you see, the cold ones are traditionally our enemies. But this pack came to our territory during my great-grandfather's time was different. They didn't hunt the waay others of their kind did - they weren't dangerous to the tribe. So my great-grandfather made a truce with them. If they promised to stay off our land, we wouldn't expose them to the pale-face." He winked at me. Uh-oh. I paddled back to my quest for information.
"If they weren't dangerous, then why...?"
"There's always a risk for humans to be around the cold ones, even if they're civilized like this clan was. You never know when they might get too hungry to resist." He deliberately worked a tone of menace into his voice.
"What do you mean by civilized?" I asked curiously.
"They claimed they didn't hunt humans. They supposedly ate animals instead."
"So how does that fit with the Cullens?" I asked casually. "It kinda sounds like mumbo-jumbo to me."
"Those cold ones my grandfather met? They weren't just like the Cullens. They were the same ones." My jaw dropped, and Jacob looked pleased with himself.
"There are a couple new ones now, but the rest are the same."
"And what are they?" I asked. I had an idea already.
"Blood drinkers." he replied in a chilling voice. "Your people call them vampires."