"Arrive upon the mountain just to see what we've done..."
Coal War; Joshua James
Somehow I'd gotten wedged between Paul and Sadie, and, honestly, I'd rather not be sitting alongside either of them at this moment. When we had all squeezed into a booth, I'd first claimed to sit by Kim because I'd thought that meant that Paul would have to sit on the other side. It wasn't until after Jared had plopped himself down by his girlfriend's side and flashed me a wide grin that I'd realized my place wasn't going to be there. And so I was stuck by Sadie, who'd chosen to sit on the inside, which left only one place for Paul to sit.
I was trying to ignore him, or at least put some distance between us because he was making me feel a little crazy (and not in the good way). One minute I was swimming in his irises, remembering the horrible line he'd used right before we'd all chosen a spot to eat, and then the next I'm drowning because he's become too much.
"What're you going to get, Blair?" asks Sadie.
I know she could see what was going on, but she hadn't commented on a single thing. She'd only been giving me a look that told me she'd demand answers once the two of us were alone. But I didn't know what I'd tell her; I didn't know what was happening myself, only that Paul Lahote was everywhere now and sometimes (most of the time) I liked it.
A deep sigh rattles out of my chest as I sink down into the warn leather of the wide booth we'd chosen to fit our large group in. I start to flip through the menu, but can't focus on much because Paul's elbow keeps grazing the skin of my forearm and it's so distracting.
From the little bit I can feel, he is warm (but I knew he would be) and toned. One thing I would have suspected was for him to feel so soft, but he does. He skin feels like it has never had to save him from any of the fights I'd witnessed him getting into when he was younger, or the harsh wind when he decides to dress half naked.
"Are you ready to order?"
My head pops up so fast that I guess Paul doesn't have time to move. I careen the top of my skull into the bottom of his chin and, for a time, see white.
"Oh my God," I moan, hiding my face in my hands as pain vibrates down my spine.
"Shit," I hear Paul hiss.
And then I feel warm hands. Fingers spread apart on my back and a big hand moves up and down as cool breath fans across the side of my face. Words slur together so that I can't make out what Paul is saying, but he has nuzzled himself closer and sunk lower so that he can peer underneath where I have my head hidden.
There is pain and it pulses through my temples. I try to squint my eyes open, but the light hurts and the rays from the overhead fixture cause me to moan again. But the heat from his big hands are soothing as he moves them up to push pieces of my thick hair from my face. A different sound emits from my mouth at feelings this: a rather embarrassing sigh.
"Shit, dude. Why d'ya always gotta knock her for one?"
That's Jared, I know. Things were ever-so slowly becoming more clear, but my head was still pounding and my eyes still hurt when I opened them.
"I'm... I'm okay," I say.
"Let me see, Blair," says Sadie. "Is there a mark yet? Maybe we should ask for some ice."
But Sadie isn't the one who gently grips my chin and peers into my half-open eyes. It's him, Paul, and the look masking his handsome face is riddled with as much pain as I was feeling. That's when I remember that I'd hit his chin with my head. Instantly, I feel horrible, an apology already pouring out before I can help it.
"I'm so sorry," I start. "I guess I wasn't paying attention and I- are you alright? I hit your chin. I'm so sorry."
"I'm fine, Blair," he says, worry evident in his tone and clouded, honey eyes. "It's going to bruise, probably-the mark on your forehead, I mean. I shouldn't have been so close."
Paul spends another minute inspecting what I feel to be a big goose egg on my forehead, then switches his attention to Jared when his friend says that they need to head back. Sadie murmurs something under her breath at this, but I don't catch it.
Soon, Paul is helping me out of the booth, softly apologizing again as he leads me out into the cool Port Angeles night air. I try to tell him that I hadn't been the only one involved and go to check on him, but he just shakes me off, explaining that he was 'made of tougher stuff'.
When I make it onto the street, I learn that Jared was going to ride back with Paul, and that Sadie and I are going to go in Kim's car. No one says why the trip back is different, but nobody asks either. In the back of my mind, as I load into the back seat of Kim's car, I know why. It was Sam and it was probably Jacob too.
Sadie is surprised when a tall, well-built boy is trudging through school on Monday morning and Quil is so angry that he is shaking, but I'd known all along, even if it was a reality that I hadn't wanted to face, that Jacob had slipped over to Sam.
For a minute, I just stare, watching as Jacob combs through his locker. He looks almost identical to Embry, with short, cropped hair and thick muscle banding all over his much taller frame. All that beautiful, long hair had been ripped away and his average body replaced with a look that seemed to be factory made when it came to Uley's 'boys'. Every one of them could be mistakenly called as the other (except for Paul, I realize).
My mind is blank. Even though I had secretly predicted this, it was still hard to be confronted with the reality of it all finally.
"I can't believe this," whispers Sadie.
Quil goes to say something rage induced and that is when I turn on my heel and begin to head away from it all. I didn't want to stay around so to be able to hear Quil scream obscenities at Jacob. I didn't want to see any of it anymore- I was tired of dealing with it all.
Why is this happening?
I'm halfway to class when someone says my name and I stop to peer over my shoulder. It's Paul and he's frowning.
I didn't want to see him either. Despite having a rather good time that night in Port Angeles, I had come to the conclusion that Paul was making me crazy. One minute I'd feel so much that I could swear I'd burst with it all, but then, in another minute, the distrust and anger at what was happening to my friends when they decided to join him and Sam would bubble up. It was all so chaotic and I was drained.
So I keep walking because Jacob wasn't my friend anymore and Paul Lahote was just a troublemaker who was trying to get me to fall all over him that like the other girls in school did.
I end up in the nurses station, complaining about the large bruise on my head and claiming that I felt sick. At first I don't think she'll buy the act, but when I'm asked if I was okay enough to drive myself home, I know I'm in the clear. I get a recommendation for some medicine to take for my headache and then slip out to my car.
My mom texts me before I can make it out of the school parking lot, so I know the nurse must've called her, but she's bought the story too. She tells me that I'll be home alone but that my dad will call to check on me a little later.
I head for First Beach because I needed the space and the lonesomeness to think. It's a short drive and when I get there, it's empty. Finding a spot on one of the cliffs that, if you went lower down, people liked to jump from, I sigh and peer over the dark, rolling waves.
The sound of the ocean as it careens together is calming and I shut my eyes while trying to rid myself of all the chaotic thoughts rolling around in my brain. There's so many, all of them rolling around like the angry ocean below. For a minute, I attempt to sort through them, thinking that I could make sense of what in the hell was actually happening lately, but it's a lost cause and so I resort to just attempt to calm my raging emotions.
Right as I was about to put up the hood of my jacket and lounge out on the damp rock I'd picked to sit on, I hear my name. When I turn, a surprising sight is waiting for me.
Bella Swan.
Of course I knew who she was. Jacob hadn't shut up talking about her since she'd moved back. We'd all spent many a night with him, listening as he prattled on about Bella and Edward, her apparent boyfriend. Sometimes he'd ask us for advice and we'd manage to scrounge up something, but he'd just sigh before saying that it wouldn't work. This girl had him wrapped around her finer so tightly that I doubted anything would pry him away.
"Blair, right?" she asks.
At first I don't know what to say because what was she doing here? She went to school in Forks, so shouldn't she be there? I knew she was older, but I didn't think she was out of high school quite yet.
"Uhm," I start, but she cuts me off.
Her eyes look wild, like she's gone a little bit off the deep end or something, and she won't stop fidgeting. That's when I think her reason for being down here wasn't a positive one. I stand then, wiping my dirty palms on my jeans, and frown worriedly at her.
"Look, I didn't know anyone would be here- it's the middle of a school day, so... You're gonna think I'm crazy but I have to do this. It's the only way I can see him."
"See who Bel-" I begin to stay.
And then Bella swan runs past me and throws herself over the side of the cliff.
A scream instantly rips up out of my throat and ripples into the cool air. I hear the splash as she crashes into the waves and lunge myself to the edge to see if I can make out her form, but the water is too dark.
Holy shit... I just watched her kill herself.
And I scream again and again, tears rippling down my cheeks as I manage out Bella's name through my hysteric fit. I start to jog down to the shore of the beach, falling and scraping my cheek and chin as I go. The thought to go in after her is pulsing in my brain, but I careen to a stop at remembering that I'd brought my cell with me. I hurriedly dig through my pockets before finding the thing. I'm about to dial the last number and hit send when someone screams my name.
"Blair!"
When I whip around, I have to wipe something from my left eye so to be able to see clearly through it, and when I do, I see Paul and Jacob. The first is ahead of the second and moving so fast that I think it inhumanely possible. But Bella is dead and I hadn't called the police yet and she was still in the water. We had to get her body.
"She fucking jumped! Bella jumped from way up on the first cliff, Jacob! She just ran right past me- she's dead! We have to call someone! Oh my God, she's dead."
Jacob goes past me, shedding his shirt and shoes as he does, and dives head first into the harsh waves. I glance back down to my phone and wipe blood off the screen (I must've hurt myself worse than I'd originally thought) before pressing the final number with shaking fingers. But before I can hit send, a large hand jerks the device out of my grasp and jerks my head up.
Paul's eyes are fast as he looks me over, pushing pieces of my hair out of the blood that I now know to be pooling down my face. He removes his shit in one fluid moment and does so so fast that I barely catch it. He's wiping me clean of the liquid after that, asking me questions too fast for me to catch.
Everything is too fast and I can't keep up.
"Look at me, Blair," he says. It takes me a minute to be able to focus my eyes on him, but I do and as soon as my dark brown meets his honey irises, I'm gone. "Bella is okay. Jacob's going to get her. A jump from this high wouldn't kill her, only injure her a little if she went into the water the wrong way. She isn't dead."
"No, I tried looking for her after she jumped," I sigh, a hysteric scream erupting up. "She's fucking dead and I saw her kill herself!"
He pulls me against his shoulder, pressing my face there so I can scream and no one but him can here. He keeps trying to reassure me that Bella was alive- that that was why Jacob had went in after her, but I know that to be a lie he was trying to feed me in order to calm me down. How would she have survived that fall? The water was littered with ice chunks this time of year and I just knew that she'd been sliced up as soon as she'd hit it. Not to mention the shock she would've sent her body into at the abrupt icy coolness.
"Look, Blair," he says a few minutes later, my screaming momentarily subsiding to listen to his words.
He turns me around and outstretches a long arm to point a little further down the beach. Jacob is there with Bella, but she isn't dead. She's hacking up a lot of water and looking a lot more pale than she did before she went in, but she was breathing.
Holy shit. She'd survived.
"But how did she..." I start.
"Whatta a fuckin' idiot," he hisses. "An alive idiot, though, Blair. It's okay now."
I slump against Paul, then, almost hysterical again because I hadn't actually watched somehow jump to their death. He catches me easily and shushes me gently, telling me over and over that everything is okay. I latch onto his words, attempting to use them to lull me back to something that related to sanity because nothing my brain could conjure up now was working. I needed him and the addicting serene feeling that he always made me feel.
"We need to get back. She needs dry clothes and we have to help Leah," comes Jacob's deep voice.
I hadn't heard him come up, but now I can make out Bella's chattering teeth and nonsense murmuring. I peek over my shoulder as Paul just holds me tighter and balk at her blue lips. When her brown eyes fall onto my face, I notice that she has nearly the same reaction, only weaker.
"Your face," she whispers.
"She did that while trying to help your dumbass," spits Paul. "Do you have any idea how fucking stupid that was? You both could've-"
"Lay off, dude," cuts in Jacob. "Now isn't the time. We have to get back."
"Poor Harry," shivers Bella, who begins to weep and hides her face in Jacob's neck.
I peer up at Paul after hearing those words leave her lips, confusion furrowing my brows. Now he appears sad rather than angry, like he'd sounded a second ago. That's when I know something worse than what had happened here had plagued the rez today.
"What's wrong with Harry?" I ask.
It takes a minute, but he answers me. "He died, Blair, this morning. Heart attack."
I don't manage to say much of anything, just a little 'oh', and then Paul is guiding me through the treeline and back towards somewhere that I'd never been. As we walk, I gravitate to his warmth and am glad when he slides his arm around my waist. He pulls me to his side and gives me a brief squeeze his big hand continuously tries to bring some warmth into my body.
It was comfort that, at that moment, I needed.
Harry Clearwater, a man who my family had been friends with for as long as I'd been alive, was dead and I'd just witnessed someone attempt suicide (at least, I think that was what Bella was doing). I'd come to the cliffs to think, to sort through everything that had been happening, and gotten the complete opposite. Now I was exhausted and on the verge of another crying fit. But Paul was comforting, with his large, burly body and all the warmth that radiated off of him.
I don't think about how crazy he made me feel; instead, I just relish in the feeling of him and hope he won't let go for a very long time.
Authors Note: We're getting into the nitty gritty of New Moon now. Harry has passed and most of the wolves had transformed, all except for Quil (and a few of the minor ones). But he will and boy... That's gonna be a rough chapter. You get quite a bit of Paul/Blair action in this one! I hope you enjoyed. (: