Chapter 11: If I Looked A Little Closer

Emergency Author's Note: WWWWWAAAAAIIIIIIIIIITTTTTT! Before you completely skip over this Author's Note, I have a new title for the story. The new story title is The Nessie Ventures, Book 1: The Witch Apprentice so remember!


"Renesmee," Aunt Christa said trying to wake me up, "Time to wake up!"

I pouted and pulled the blanket over my head to try to ignore Christa's shoves to wake me up.

"You can't under there forever," Christa said and nudged me further and I grumbled.

"Did I mention I made eggs?" I peeked out under the covers to look at Christa and well enough I could smell the eggs she cooked on her.

"Are they scrambled or sunny-side-up?"

"Sunny-side-up."

"Okay fine you win," I said then pushed myself eagerly off the couch and skipped towards the kitchen. When I got into the kitchen, there and behold, were the eggs Christa had promised though she had made a ton of them. I counted twelve eggs on two large plates.

"Why'd you make so many eggs," I asked Christa as she came into the kitchen.

"The eggs aren't just for you. In case you haven't noticed we still have guests," Christa said and then pointed to the door that led to her bedroom where I'm guessing Christa and Sage had decided to sleep.

"There's also toast and bacon over on the other counter," Christa said. I ignored the toast but took a slice of bacon and then took a large plate of six eggs (which deserved an eye roll from Christa) and started to chow down. Somewhere while I was eating, Sage literally bounced into the kitchen.

"Gooooood Mourniiiinnnng!" Sage said in a loud singsong tone, someone was happy.

"Um…hello Sage. Are you always this hyper in the morning?" Christa asked.

"Well no," Sage said and then looked embarrassed and blushed, "I mean I'm like this some days but not all days because I'm usually tired in the morning and, um, I'm usually still sleeping right now but I couldn't get any sleep last night because I was thinking really hard about something. Not anything that you need to worry about it was just about someone that I'll probably never meet again unless fate wants to bring us together but you know this probably happens a lot to a lot of people and I should really stop thinking about this guy…" I got lost in Sage's rambling and just decided to continue to eat my eggs while Sage just kept talking.

"Sounds like someone has a crush," Christa said and I snapped my head to back at Sage.

"No, no, that's silly. Anyway we should be focusing on Victor right now," Sage said but was still blushing heavily. I ate while Christa and Sage continued to have a conversation

"What about him?"

"Well we could start by tracking Victor to where he fled."

"Sounds like a good idea, we could also see if any of his minions left anything important behind."

"Alright lets-" Sage was cut off by the sound of the doorbell chiming

"I'll get it," Christa said at the same time I said, "Who in the world could that be?"

I heard Christa open the front door with a sound of shock and the greetings of two familiar voices.

"Nessie," Christa said, "Your aunts are here." I skipped to the front door and well and behold were Aunt Alice with her charming smile and notable shortness and Aunt Rosie with her head held high giving me a small smile.

"Hello, you two are early," I noted.

"We know, it's just that were going somewhere and we need to go early and we thought we would bring you along," Alice said cryptically. I looked at the wall clock on Christa's living room wall and noticed it said nine 'o seven.

"Oh okay let me get my stuff then-"

"It's okay, I packed your stuff while you were sleeping," Christa said.

"Sorry if we are waking you up so early, Christa," Aunt Rosie said.

"It's no problem. Thank you for letting her stay over," Christa said politely.

"Thank you for taking care of her," Aunt Rosie said and actual gave a genuine smile. "Well come on now, Nessie, let's go!"

I said goodbye to Christa and walked out the door with Aunt Alice and Aunt Rosie to Aunt Rosie's red BMW. One we were in the car I started firing questions at them.

"So where are we going?" I asked

"Where else? To the mall!" Alice said gleefully.

"Why?"

"Because you need new clothing. My goodness, I think that's the fourth time I've seen you wear that shirt!" Alice pointed to my wavy red blouse.

"Your clothing is also looking a bit small on you," Aunt Rosie noted.

"I guess they have…" I said when I realized that my red blouse used to go way below my waist but now just revealed a bit of my stomach. I guess I am growing up really fast; I should really treasure my childhood more often. I may just look fourteen soon enough.

I talked with Aunt Alice and Rosie a bit more, mostly about my sleepover. I got confused though when Aunt Rosie pulled up into the driveway of our home.

"What are we doing here?"

"Well your Aunt Rosalie forgot to bring our $100 T. J. Maxx gift card with us!" Aunt Alice said then narrowed her eyes at Aunt Rosie.

"I didn't forget it, you were supposed to bring it!" Aunt Rosie said right back at Alice and Alice stuck out her tongue.

"You also need to change your clothes. I can tell you slept in them last night," Aunt Rosie said and frowned at my blouse (that I now realized was wrinkled from sleeping in it) and my skirt that still had a bit of dust around the hem from the battle yesterday.

"I was just really tired yesterday."

"You seem to be really tired lately. What do you do at Christa's house that makes you so exhausted?"

"Nothing, I guess the sleepiness is just a side effect of growing up." Aunt Rosie speculated me for a second but then shrugged and mumbled in agreement. Aunt Rosie and Alice fled out of the car and into the house at abnormal speed before I could say, "Wait for me!" I got out of the car and trudged after them but stopped when I heard arguing in the woods.

I moved close to the arguing voices while also being as quiet as possible so not to disturb them. I peeked around the corner of the house and saw Leah and Jacob in a heated altercation.

"He did what?" Jacob yelled.

"Don't act like you didn't hear me," Leah said back snidely.

"But how?"

"I don't know I was just patrolling through the woods when I picked up on his thoughts and heard him talk ridiculously about a girl. He hasn't shut up about her since."

"Do you know who she is?"

"No," Leah said then scowled, "But I think I remember him saying that he saw this girl at Chri-" Leah paused when she saw me peeking at them from around the corner of the house.

"What?" Jacob said then turned to where I was standing and went bug-eyed when he saw me.

"Hi," I said then gave an awkward wave at the two of them.

"Nessie, how long have you been standing there?" Jacob said nervously.

"Since a couple sentences ago," I said then turned towards the front door of the house, "I'll leave you two to finish your conversation." I skidded to the front door then.

Once I was inside I ran upstairs to my bedroom and locked the door (My family had created a second bedroom for me in the main house in case I wanted to stay here for a bit). I opened me drawer and shuffled though some clothing; both trying to find an outfit to wear that still fit me and to get Leah's and Jacob's conversation out of my head. I tried not to think about what they were saying because it was rude to get into other people's business but I couldn't help but wonder who this person was and why it would bother them if he was (by the sound of it) in love.

I found a floral pink shirt and blue jeans to wear that would appease my aunts and left my room. I headed downstairs hoping to find my aunts waiting for me…only to find Jacob.

"Hey Nessie," Jake said trying to be casual.

"Hey Jake," I said, "I'm sorry if you and Leah were having a private conversation when I was eavesdropping."

"It's fine," Jake said then gave his signature smile, "So how was the sleepover?"

"It was good, we had fun."

"I noticed you and Christa had some company."

"You were there?"

"I came by to drop off your stuff, so are they friends of Christa's?"

I stumbled to come up with a story for Sage and Ellie so I just blabbed the first thing that came to my head, "The blond haired girl is Ellie and she's Christa's old friend and the other girl with the long braid is Sage and she's…Ellie's…cousin. She's her cousin but she's also a good friend." I smiled but on the inside I felt like an idiot for seeming like such a bad liar.

"Cool," Jacob said and I relaxed when he seemed to believe me, "So what are they like?"

"Well Ellie is really sweet, polite, and smart and Sage is really hyper and happy."

"Hyper and happy, huh?" Jacob said as if he only cared about the last part of my sentence.

"And maybe a bit sarcastic and funny though all around she's like a human proton," I added.

"Hmm, she seems nice. Does she live nearby?"

"No, not really but her and Ellie go to Christa's house everyday afterschool and on the weekends. Anyway, why do you care so much about Christa?"

"Oh no reason, I was just curious because she seemed like an interesting person." I speculated Jacob a minute to see if I could find some sort of blush under Jacob's dark features but found none. I was about to question him more until Aunt Alice and Aunt Rosie cam sauntering into the room.

"Are you ready to go Nessie?" asked Aunt Alice.

"Um yes just let me get my money-" I was interrupted by Aunt Rosie scoffing and Aunt Alice giggling.

"You don't have to be so nice Renesmee," Aunt Rosie said, "We'll handle it besides you probably don't have that much money anyway."

I sighed grimly at Aunt Rosie's words but continued to smile; "Well I guess we'll be on our way then."

"Then lets go before the mall gets mobbed; even vampires can't avoid a mall with crowds," Aunt Alice said with mocked irritation.

I was about to turn to say goodbye to Jacob but he had already left…


Aunt Rosie and Alice had dragged me to at least nineteen different stores. We started at Justice, then continued to Abercrombie, then continued to Macy's, then to Abercrombie and Fitch, then to Forever 21, then to a couple other stores, and finally ended at Alice's precious T. J. Maxx.

We had to keep making trips back and forth to the car because of how much clothing we got (I'm surprised we managed to fit so many bags into one car, much less one trunk). I had never gone on such a shopping spree in my life and I vowed never again would I allow my aunts to drag me around a mall. I could now see why my mom ran to the hills whenever one of my aunts said the words "new" and "clothing" in the same sentence.

Aunt Rosie and Alice finally decided after visiting so many stores to take a break at a Starbucks in the mall, much to my delight. I gave an exaggerated groan when we sat down at a small table.

"Nineteen stores and we only bought clothing for me," I said and gave another exaggerated groan.

"Well we do have to buy you an entire new wardrobe," Aunt Rosie said.

"We actually went to twenty stores if you were really counting," Aunt Alice said lightly and I gave her an even more incredulous look.

"So what do you want to eat?" Alice said.

"I'll have a hot chocolate and the largest food source they have."

"Perfect, and Rosalie and I will "have" black coffee each." Alice then skipped over to the massive line at the Starbuck's café not looking the least bit annoyed as some of the other people on line.

"Can I talk to you?" Aunt Rosie said to me.

"You can talk to me anytime." I gave Aunt Rosie a warm smile.

"Do you love me?" I was surprised when Aunt Rosie actually looked sincere when saying it.

"Of course, what would make you think different?"

"It's nothing, it's just that you've been spending much more time with your Aunt Christa then with me…or your Aunt Alice or Uncle Emmett or really anyone in this family. You've been neglecting us."

"Well," I racked my brain to find a reason that didn't have "witch apprentice" in it and finally found something good to say this time, "You see I'll have you guys forever and I'll have all the time in the world to spend with you guys, but my time with Aunt Christa is limited. Soon enough we'll have to move away and I won't ever be able to see her again ever so I'm cherishing my time with her." I was surprised by how genuine my words seemed to be.

"But won't it be hard when you finally have to let her go when you two have become so bonded?"

"It'll be harder if I distance myself from her and then wonder for the rest of my life of all the good memories we could have had."

"I see," Aunt Rosie said then leaned back in her chair as if to contemplate about something. I reached my hand over to put it on top of her colder, icier hand and smiled.

"I love you," I said. Aunt Rosie looked up and squeezed my hand with hers.

"I love you more," she said.

"And you say that your life is so horrible." Aunt Rosie giggled at my words.

"Maybe it's not all that bad," Aunt Rosie said with a small smile. There was a very small part of Aunt Rosie and that part was very kind and hospitable and motherly and wonderful in every way. Though like I said it was very small and you rarely ever see it and I think only Uncle Emmett and me have ever witnessed it.

Soon enough, Alice came back with food and drinks; two coffees for her and Aunt Rosie and a hot chocolate, a muffin, and two croissants for me. I ate happily with them until I began to ponder on my previous words about Christa.

What was going to happen when we had to leave? I had to stay with my family but I was also Christa's apprentice, for the time being, and I couldn't abandon her. And Christa was immortal and so were my family and so were Jacob and the wolves; forever is a long time to keep a secret and it was only a matter of time before Christa was discovered. Unless Christa went into hiding, but then again forever is a long time to hide. Should I just tell everyone now before fate reveals it in a crueler way? No, I couldn't betray Christa like that. But still I'm just prolonging the inevitable.

Halfway through my meal, I pushed my food away saying I wasn't hungry anymore and I wanted to go home which my aunts happily obliged to.


Author's Note: Yay I finally get to post this earlier! Sorry if it may seem that this chapter is boring, I didn't have this chapter that well-planned out. Sorry if you don't like it! And while I'm apologizing I'm sorry about my horrible grammar. I NEED A NEW BETA! Anyway…I'm reaching the climax of my story within the next couple chapters and don't worry I'm making a sequel! If you didn't catch the name of the new title for the story it's up top.

-J.J.