Closed Minds

'Open Book'

"Now every day I see you in some other face… They crack a smile, talk a while … Try to take your place," George Michael, 1990.

24 January 2005

The girl is watching the snowfall.

Whilst her peers are gallivanting around the small layer of snow before class at his family's arrival, Isabella Swan is sitting on the roof of her car, quietly, watching it fall. Her music, strange and still much too loud, is playing and she watches with wide eyes. Face flushed a soft red on her still fading tan(her clear, dusty complexion fading into a creamy thing that highlights how rosy she turns, how flushed her round checks could be). She has a blanket across her legs, and some sort of thermos with a drink in one hand, something she is carefully sipping with gloved hands bringing them to her small lips. She ignores the other humans even when they asked for her to play with them, but she simply lifts her thermos in a 'cheers' gesture and atop of her ghastly truck and watches. Peaceful, grey eyes distant as she watches the small crystallin snow fall upon everything.

"It's my first snowfall," she had said, quietly, and the popular children leave her to her quiet activity, and from a distance, Edward tries desperately to understand, "Or at least the first time I've seen it fall in front of me..."

It is in the nature of the children to fall back to play at the slight change of weather, when the sun is out they roll across wet grass despite the lower temperature of the Pacific Northwest, and at the first snowfall of the year, they always toss it to each other in careless abandon and competition. But the girl is simply sitting and watching, seemingly content, her boots softly thumping across her windshield as she swings her legs in a slightly agitated gesture. It is the only thing that indicates unease and ruins the general impression of stillness the girl was giving. But it was also an absent-minded one...

"Feels like I've been living in a dream… But never make it to the end… My eyes open when they feel the light… It's always right before I'm about to scream," sang out an average, but passionate voice. Edward could not place the singer, even with his knowledge of music, vast as it was, "...Younger now..."

The girl seemed completive at the moment, and the song fit well enough. Her music was ever changing, unstatic in choice. No rhyme nor reason to her choice of listening. Edward had yet to determine her favorite genre of music, even with the frequency of her listening to music(driving, between classes, in the classes that allowed it). It jumped too often, though it seemed the girl gravitated with vocal niceties with instrumental prowess or beat being a secondary standard. Lyrics were varied, male and female voices in chorus, in different languages, Spanish mostly, ranging from rhythmic reggaeton to soft power ballads, but Japanese aplenty and to his surprise, what he faintly recognized as Hebrew, some sort of hymn with a giant chorus.

Emmett and Rosalie, growing ever bolder, ever more in love with the concept of a simple friendship outside of the family, as the most isolationist of them, are already heading her way bouncing with anticipation. They had driven today, in Emmett's jeep, which delights many of the young boys about the school. Emmett is eager to ask the girl's opinion on some video game that had come out recently, something about a rescue mission for a president daughter or something of the like. Ghoulish images of digital monsters flicker in his mind, clawing things and Edward frowns at Emmett's obvious eagerness to scare the girl with something of horror. He does not expect the girl to know of it, or to even play video games as it was a childish pastime, so he doesn't know why Emmett bothers. The girl though mullish and against authority as typical to children* of that age is far more mature than a typical girl of seventeen and would surely dismiss his brother's eagerness for something so juvenile.

Rosalie herself is of another mind- she has her designs in her backpack, eager to show off her thoughts of colors for the Beast that the girl drives. Another point of confusion for Edward, as he does not think that the girl is very eager to be driving what she does, as she did not buy it for herself nor seemed attracted to such things as his sister. The work that Rosalie is planning would increase its value of course, but such a girl like Isabella Swan will surely sell it the second she has the means to, perhaps to a junk heap for all its 'classic' value as Rosalie had fumed to him the other day for discouraging her to paint such a lackluster car.

The girl likes pretty things, after all, if her need to dress in clothing with a slightly vintage edge, moving away from crop tops and miniskirts that the other girls of her age and in this decade seemed to adore. It reminds him of the 50s, all a-line skirts and high waisted shorts, darker and muted colors, yes, but with a love of many flower prints. Pretty things, feminine things. Of course, Rosalie was such an exception with her love of vehicles, but that is more for what they do for her and what they used to represent than an aesthetic value.

The girl could not be as complex or contradictory or see much value on something that is so standard in this modern age. The truck will not have been her first choice of vehicle, he is sure. He can see her in a small, diminutive thing… Perhaps one of the smaller Porsche if she would ever get such income. Blood red, he thinks, amused at the very thought of such an image. She likes red. Most of her objects, save her clothing, are red. She most likely loathes the large thing that her father could provide on a civil servant's salary.

"Izzy!" that is Rosalie, and the girl jumps slightly atop her lonely perch. She slips away her headphones, tucking into an inside pocket of her jacket, her calm, wondering face fading into a friendly smile.

Part of him finds himself irritated at the loss of her innocent expression, for reasons he cannot fathom. Even if her next expression is a smile, something tenses in her small, round face, perhaps the way her eyes cloud, or the nervous way she licks at her lips...

"Good morning," calls the girl softly, as she slowly makes her way to slip off the top of the cab, directly perhaps into the bed before she climbs down from the seven or so feet.

To his horror, Emmett goes to her hands extended in invitation. The girl blinks but easily reaches back out, Rosalie taking her thermos and blanket. Emmett is grabbing at her waist to aide her down, hands so large they completely circle her thin hips. His brother than holds her in an easy embrace, something that startled the girl, but it is still easily returned.

The girl gives the giant man a quick squeeze around the neck and a softer, wider smile when he puts her on the ground, her face relaxing more. The smell through Emmett's mind does not pull Edward to near madness, but the way that Emmett quietly delights on how warm the diminutive girl does nearly does. It is not a sexual delight, of course, Emmett would never dare think of anyone but his wife, but a startled one in which his brother vividly realizes how they used to feel as humans.

But there is a horror in his thoughts as well, at how easily breakable his new friend is, on how much he could so easily hurt her if he grabbed her waist a little harder if he put her down much too quickly or with too much force.

Edward does not realize he is grinding his teeth until Jasper nudges him in the shoulder, and raises a single brow.

Ye'll startle the humans, says Jasper's voice in his head, deliberate, the usual chatter of his head slowing to a halt at the projected message. It, unlike his speaking voice, still has the drawl of a Texan, careful and like honey.

The strength of their teeth evidently made such an action louder then he would have thought and Edward forces his jaw to relax.

"Pardon. You know how reckless Emmett can be," he muttered.

Jasper simply relaxes his brow and gives him a slow blink in response. His mind is full of constant strains of thought, jumping rapidly, trying to sort through the projected strain of over four-hundred sentient creatures in his range*. Those emotions flow through him, pulling him into them, at moments he is consumed with an eagerness of the snow, a playful smile flickering upon his face, the other he is wincing at the force of some poor girl's cramps, forcing himself not to hunch over at the phantom twist of pain. His thoughts are the most chaotic of any creature he has ever met, so rarely does Jasper's voice filter through in his head with coherency, or at least concerning an action thought or muses to himself. Until he had met Isabella Swan, Edward had thought that Jasper to be the most difficult creature to read.

They're puttin' us at a tactical disadvantage. If this gets any riskier I'ma request an absquatulate* with Carlisle, I don' want Alice in no elephant*. It's not as if they want to change the girl.

Alice, foot tapping, is also looking in the direction of the girl, a deep frown on her waifish face. She is practically vibrating in her place, hands twisted in little impatient claws at her sides.

"Why on earth can't I meet her?" she said, bouncing on the balls of her feet, "They've been so mean."

If I can meet her, surely I would be able to see?

Emmett and Rosalie have been possessive of the girl, blocking Alice and warning both Edward and Jasper to keep their distance. It was a prudent choice- but Edward wished that his 'older' siblings would follow their own stipulations. The girl was dangerous… With how she smelled… With her evident blockage of all of their gifts.

"I still can't feel her," said Jasper, quietly, instead of responding to his wife's comment, his mind seemingly in the same place as Edward's.

He reaches out, to Emmett's eagerness and warmth, to Rosalie's mixture of affection and wariness, and when he tries for the girl he gets… Nothing. As if she wasn't there at all. Alice frowns again, but annoyance laces her thoughts.

"And I can't see her in my visions," she mutters, fussing with her designer, velvet skirt. It is her way of distracting herself, from the way she had realized that any time the girl was a factor, she received no visions about the girl, no matter how much she concentrated on her.

It was as if she made no decisions, even when it was evident she did and no visions regarding her interaction with people ever came to Alice, leaving her with an enormous blind spot. It was one of the reasons Jasper was so cagey over her increasing proximity to Alice, even by proxy- he saw a tactical disadvantage over the lost of Alice's visions.

"She is a void," said Edward, watching her, as she flipped through Rosalie's color choices, "She just… Isn't real. As if she drags everything in."

Her small face flushed, her round cheeks creased in her beaming smile. The girl, where she to have a happy life, would grow laugh lines. She had dimples, he noticed in her chin, two, at the right corner of her mouth, small and hardly noticeable.

"I thought Elzear said she could be a shield? A very powerful one?"

Edward gave a shrug, blinking at the fact that he had said that aloud.

"Seems to be. Her father is difficult to read for me. Almost like inefficient sound-proofing."

He had thought the man mentally slow, wondering that it had never occurred to him that it was Edward own ineffectiveness as a telepath. Alice tapped her foot.

"I've never tried to see Charlie Swan. Perhaps-"

"He's her father. I got limited emotions from him, surface, the more powerful ones, perhaps," interrupted Jasper, voice clipped, it was not as a slight towards Alice, but because Mike Newton, who was passing in front of them, was severally annoyed as he too was looking in the girl's direction, "For you, cher belle, he would automatically be blocked if he lives with her. Unless you focus on him now, when he's away from her."

So surprising that a Cullen has the urge to grace someone with their presence, came Mike's voice, his hands fisted around a snowball he was readying to aim at his brother's head. Edward blinked in astonishment at the line of thought as the boy threw the snowball with the grace of a somewhat practiced pitcher, he was after all, in that position on the school baseball team. The snowball arced, and though Emmett tensed in anticipation, sensing or perhaps hearing the arc of the packed snow, he did not move to dodge it. It smashed against his head in an explosion of powder, spraying both Rosalie and the surprised Isabella. The girl jumped back, eyes wide and her hand rubbing at the quickly melting powder.

"Dude what the heck!" was her scream, "This means war, Michael Newton!"

The boy flushed, he could see, through Rosalie's irate eyes at the snow sticking in her hair as ice crystals. They hardly emanate heat, as humans did and it would not melt quickly.

"Um-"

Emmett's grin, through Mike's eyes, was vicious.

"Come on Squirt," said Emmett, cracking his knuckles, "Let's show these kids what's what."

OOOOOOOOO

Lauren was both startled, and incredibly grateful how easy it was to become Isabella Swan. The best thing about it was that most people she interacted with had never known Isabella, making it much easier for her. No one batted an eyelash at her different personality, at her hobbies, nor thought her out of place in comparison to a girl they had never known. Even Renee, her own mother, was so far away with infrequent, expensive calls and scare emails that Lauren could fake it reasonably well, using simple non-committal wording and phrases.

"Izzy, you know you can come home at any time, right sweetheart?" asked Renee, softly voice far away.

Lauren was both unsure if Renee's voice was distant if it was because she was semi-distracted about the fact that she was calling from a pay-phone with limited change(now that was strange to think of real payphones in such a plenty, she had physically starred in mild surprise when she had noticed one in the parking lot of the Grocery store), or because the older woman was trying to convince herself that her offer was genuine. Lauren was not convinced either way. Renee called very frequently, at least every week and sent an email every day if she could manage it, but she also sounded happy to be separated from her daughter with her new husband. At least she spoke so happily of her time touring the country with the minor league team and her new husband.

Had she been Isabella Swan, Lauren would have been terribly crushed at the woman's reaction- even if she had left Phoenix with the purpose of allowing her mother to have time with her new husband. As she wasn't, Lauren felt a faint feeling of pity, even despite the obvious effort the supposedly flakey and forgetful Renee was trying to stay in contact with her daughter in a day and age were cellphones were not yet the norm. Renee's happiness was not terrible in itself, but being excluded from it would hurt anyone no matter how happy you were for them. Especially how close Bella had stated she was to her mother.

Lauren also a faint one of unease, as, according to a couple interviews Meyer had originally intended for Phill to have been making advances on the seventeen-year-old Bella as another reason for leaving to live with her father. That seemed not to be the case as far as she could guess from the little interaction she had had with Phil, but it was one of the many reasons that Lauren had axed any thought of getting as far away from the Cullens as she could. Other than, of course, the unknown factor of Southern Vampires more brutal feeding habits and her extra nice scent. She knew the basics of the Northern Vampires in more detail on top of it and felt more confident about staying alive.

"I know," she said, faintly, an automatic response. Renee asked the question in every call, and as a postscript in all of her emails.

"How's school, honey?"

Lauren tried not to sigh at the small talk, or the awkwardness she felt. Instead, she describes her very typical experience and how nice everyone was.

Charlie was more then a little estranged from his daughter for the same reason and seemed to have taken the switch as if he was just coming to understand her better.

It was just a couple things really, beyond that, as she hardly tempered her real personality, it was more of a couple behaviors that she no longer could do in front of other people. She had to hold her tongue, after nearly three years of being encouraged to speak out and being respected for what she said, it felt… Odd to temper her cursing, to raise her hand to speak freely, to check her references and not say something completely out of place to those of the year 2005. She failed sometimes, not perfect, unsure of normality twelve years before her actual time with only faint memories and observation as her dubious guide. Hell, she had to ask to leave for the restroom, and she had never would have thought how annoying it was with the mindset that she usually just left the room without any Professor bating a fucking eyelash. It was the little things, really, that she missed the most, that irritated and grated on her. Not more so than her family or her friends(God, not more than then them), but more frequently.

But the lacking of agency was more than a bitch and half.

Take, for instance, the torture that was math class. The last math class she had taken was over a year ago in her mind(if she took into account the few months she lost between her transportation into Twi-World), and she had never taken Trigonometry as its own subject. It had only ever been a subset of her pre-Calculus class and originally introduced in her advanced Algebra class. So she was not really used to this high focus class, even if she knew the material more or less.

It really didn't help that Lauren hated math. It wasn't just that she was bad at it- even if she did acknowledge that math, in general, was a hit to her pride as a usually straight A student- but the main reason she detested math was the fact that it was too damn linear. Uninteresting, unchallenging to her. Unlike science or literature or art, math was more or less set in stone. There was no freedom unless you were highly into the theoretical and advance subsets of math that was far beyond the high school education. Anything below that was A+B=C. X=Y, etc. It was… boring. Not up for debate. It was just not her jam, and Trigonometry was no exception.

It was also not helpful, at all, that Mr. Varner was, as true to her first assessment to him, a complete and utter asshat that used his position of power to belittle and bully his students- as an ego trip through and through. Lauren was no stranger to people like him, customer service jobs aplenty had made her learn how there were many people that enjoyed having complete power over another person, how they relished the power of being able to have negative consequences for a complete stranger. The man was just a bully. No way around it, no pretty words for him, he was an unrelenting bully. He got off of the fact that he had twenty or so adolescents beneath him on the power hierarchy at any given time. He delighted in catching people off guard and belittling them for not knowing the material. Even though it was his job to teach it.

She very readily disliked the man, simply and utterly and felt indignant on the behalf of the real teenagers around her. She also knew readily that Varner understood and sensed her dislike and seemed to hate her in return. He called on her with alarming frequency, often with difficult questions in an effort to trip her up. Since she more or less could skirt by in the material with half-remembered formulas, Varner was hard pressed to catch her out without a wrong answer. Sure, she would get some wrong, it was math, after all, but the majority of it she didn't. So she was inattentive and mostly uncaring of the result of the class. It wasn't her life she was screwing up and was scraping by with a low A beside that.

She thinks that had lit a fire underneath his ass.

"Miss Swan," he all but drawled, looking viciously pleased, "Solve for number one, Mr. Crowley, number two, on the board."

She sighed, getting up, giving Mike a faint smile as he gave her a sympathetic look. Pointedly, she grabbed her calculator, a full graphing one that she wondered what the hell Bella had thought to buy as it was a hundred bucks a pop back in her time, who knows how much they cost in this one. She went up to the whiteboard, noting with amusement that it looked brand new, fondly thinking of the transition she had grown up in, not blackboard to white, but whiteboard to digital. She misses the digital kind, but is not unused to the white, pursing her lips as she inputs the formula. She notes with slight pity, that Tyler is sweating it out, calculator and marker in hand. He didn't know what to do, she noted, even though they were doing an algebraic formula of solving for X.

"Parentheses, exponents, multiply, divide, subtraction and addition," she sang out softly, startling Tyler, his brown eyes slide to her, blinking. She gave him a smile, nodding to the formula again, and repeated, in a soft, out of tune singing voice, "Parentheses, exponents, multiply, divide, subtraction and addition. What you do to one side you do to the other."

"Miss. Swan-"

"Just singing the Solving Song, Mr. Varner," she said, looking over her shoulder, his eyes were narrowed, his teeth slightly bared underneath his ridiculous porn stash, "It helps me remember the order I'm suppose solve for X. And that if you multiply or divide to one side, you have to do the same to other with the thought that they are equal."

"Be that as it may Miss. Swan, you are supposed to solve for X silently-"

"You never specified," she interrupted, cool as a cucumber, turning back to him, raising a brow, her voice sweet and innocent as could be, "Wouldn't it be better if I explained how I got to the answer? If my process is wrong, you could correct me, Mr. Varner?"

He was turning an interesting shade of red, she noticed, suppressing the urge to laugh. She breathed deeply through her nose, and instead turns back to the question, carefully and methodically working out the formula, and each step, showing her work down to the last line before she stepped back. Tyler, next to her, mouthed out the order, making his way through the question. His eyes kept flickering to her example, his expression relieved. He didn't get it wrong, and when she turned to Varner, he was visibly annoyed, red-faced and with a sour turn to his mouth. She smiled at him, sweet as candy, all but telling him to tell her off.

"To your seat, Miss Swan. Mr. Crowley."

21 to Lauren, 6 to Varner, she thinks, all but skipping to her seat.

Mike looks at her, shaking his head. He slips her a note which she takes easily, having another nostalgic feeling as the last time she had passed notes had been in middle school before everyone had a cellphone and they had learned to text in their pockets or without looking down at their laps. The note, written in a hasty, but neatish scrawl:

Keep it up and he's going to snap and stab you with a ruler. By the way, am I forgiven for hitting you with some snow this morning?

She just stopped herself from giggling like a five-year-old, writing out:

Mike, avenge me when he does. And yes, Emmett and I kicked your ass.

She passed back the note, getting a suffering sigh from her right. She took back the note by dropping her pencil, snatching it from the side of Mike's shoe:

You have a deathwish. And just you wait for after school, I want a rematch Swan, without the bodybuilder as your backup.

She snorts. Feeling vaguely like Captain America when she writes back:

I just don't like bullies. And please, Newton, I'll smoke you either way.

She shakes her head when he makes a motion to write back, flickering her eyes towards the front of the class were Varner was eying them with a narrowed gaze. She gives him an innocent smile as he went on his lecture, even as she moved her gaze past his face and towards the clock behind him. Quickly, she zoned out, absently jiggling her pencil in her fingertips, in the same motion as if was tapping the desk, but not actually hitting the plywood. The bell rang off, and she hurriedly pushed all of her things together.

She is halfway out the door debating to herself whether or not she can bully one of the lunch ladies, Mrs. Campbell to use the microwave in the kitchen when she is startled when an arm swings around her shoulder. She looks to the side, to see a Tyler, beaming at her.

"Wednesday, you are a fucking life savior," He said, happily, "Varner is such a hardass."

Next, to him, her fellow Lauren has a slightly furrowed brow, almost absently tugging her boyfriend's opposite arm to hook her's through it. Tyler allows it, hand wiggling across that arm and Lauren M.'s thin waist.

"Babe, I told you to study."

Tyler, still with his arms around both of them, shrugs.

"I did. But I blanked. And then Isabella saved my stupid ass."

"You're not stupid, Tyler," she said automatically because she honestly believed he wasn't.

He was just a bit forgetful and nervous for all of his showboating. Beneath that cocky asshole was a just a teenage boy that put too much pressure on himself, he wasn't a straight-A student, but a straight B one, but he was in several sports, in all seasons as far as Lauren had found out. He was in constant strain to keep his grades up to stay on those teams and it wasn't rare for him to stay after school for tutoring. Tyler blinks, eyes, brown and warm, staring at her. A strangely shy smile lit his usually cocky face.

"Really?"

"Really," she confirms, wiggling away from his arm casually, bumping hips with him to push him farther away, "Math is hard."

Mike, on her opposite side, snorts. She tries not to flinch at how much the boys seem to box her in. It was something they had started to do more and more, and she wonders if it's her glowing personality, or more realistically, the factor of getting comfortable with her. The girls did it too- but something about Mike and Tyler doing it always set her slightly on edge. Maybe it was because she honestly expected them to fall over themselves like in canon…

But they didn't.

At first, she had assumed they would, she wasn't sure why, beyond the fact that only one thing really lined up as far as Canon went. Because of that, she had expected them to fall into the same pattern as they had with Bella. especially after the fact that Edward had reacted the same way to her scent. Despite her not being like Bella and a completely different person on top of it. Heck, she was a different blood type, different ethnicity...

But it wasn't so and she thanked all that was good and holy that Lauren's arrogance was very off the mark.

Lauren Mallory, surprisingly, had taken a shine to her and Jessica had not, which was the opposite of what was true in the books. Lauren M. seemed to have determined her as A, a none-threat or B, just more pleasant than the original Isabella Swan. Vaguely, she remembered reading from the illustrated guide that Lauren M. had originally hated Bella because she knew she was more attractive then Bella and Bella still got more attention from guys. She tried to push thoughts like that away because she could already tell that her knowledge of the books was making her prejudice, too sure of what made these people up.

But the Twilight Saga had only scratched the surface, and people were much more complex than one note character traits, no matter what age. The illustrated guide had hardly given much insight either.

But regardless, the younger girl was a little snide, a little bitchy, but smart and more or less was a filter between Lauren and the rest of high school, a small protection against what could have been a bullying situation. Lauren was not immune to what she was: disconnected and distant to most people, even from the majority of people in her normal life(she often sought no one's approval but those who mattered to her, and while she was outgoing friendly she made no friendships, for the most part, she was the epitome of an acquaintance, not a friend).

She was overly polite and courteous in a way that contrasted greatly with the teenager attitude, she was not 'cool' because of it. She was slightly overweight, sharp-tongued to those who made her feel extra threatened and sly, quirky to the extreme. In short, Lauren was not the type of girl to win any popularity contests, even if she had run with the popular crowd in her original high school experience, but that had been more of a chance of fate, of being smart and friendly enough to help people who needed it and have them ask her to tag-a-long out of courtesy. She wasn't unkind, nor extremely unattractive.

But she did not fit the mold and that was the most damning thing now, did not fit into what was more than a decade behind. She was not what a typical teenager in 2005 should be and it marked her a little more then she would have thought. Lauren had not been a stranger to bullies in middle school, and while she had a much thicker skin then she had at eleven to fourteen and would have not really cared what a bunch of teenagers had thought of her, she appreciated what she knew was a protectiveness in the other girl.

She seen them, people in the edge of the 'popular' kids, looking at her with frowns, with dislike, and she remembers vividly a girl who was being snidely catty next to her about her weight, had shut up when Lauren M. had come along and threaded her arm with Lauren's.

It was the gesture that mattered to her, that what most thought to be a shallow, pretty girl in a cheerleading outfit thought to keep anyone who was less than kind away from her.

Angela Weber was more or less the same, nice, polite, but with a small bit of fire and firmness that came from being a journalist and a little insecure because her taller than average height for a girl. Lauren appreciated the fact that she was a little more mature than the rest of the teenagers, a side-effect of caring for her younger brothers, of strong morals that Lauren vaguely understood from her Catholic upbringing. She was semi-typical to what came from being the Minister's daughter, but she wasn't preachy or a complete pushover about her beliefs, something Lauren respected. She was more of a go with the flow type of person, that would occasionally stand firm in what she thought was incorrect behavior. It had also helped that Angela loved reading as much as Lauren did a comradeship had settled over both of them because of it.

"You have two brothers?" Lauren asked, surprised.

Angela smiles, a small shy one that spoke a million words, sisterly affection, pleasure at the question. She has pictures and the layout of the next week's newspaper on her lap, and she looks down at it, her strong shyness coming out in that gesture.

"Yes. Joshua and Isaac. They're twins, only seven-years-old."

Lauren smiles.

"How sweet. I always wanted younger siblings," she said, and she blinks when Angela flinches.

She looks up through her lashes and gave an awkward smile.

"No, you don't. I love my brothers, but they are such a handful sometimes. Sometimes I wish they were older than me."

Lauren laughs.

"Being the youngest isn't a walk in the park either- Or so I heard," she said, quietly, only just remembering that in this world, people saw her as an only child.

Angela shrugs.

"Everyone always wants something different. Sometimes I wish I was an only child, but frequently I hear how lonely that can be. No one can ever be satisfied. Or thankful."

The girl looks at her hands then, twining them together in quiet contemplation.

Jessica Stanley was more or less the epitome of displeased to her critical eye. She was determined to be Queen Bee, despite the fact that she did not have the same looks or charisma that Lauren Mallory oozed. She was friendly, but frustrated and had a tendency to resent when attention seemed to drift from her. She liked Mike Newton but did nothing to actively talk to him beyond a hello or a casual question about his day. She wanted him to make the step, to come for her, and he seemed unaware of her infatuation or disinterested in it.

"Hi Mike!" said Jessica, shanking Lauren in the ribs with a pointy elbow.

She flinches, but forces herself to look very interested in the announcement for the Valentine's day carnation sale, coming in a few weeks and for funding of the cheerleader's competition over in Port Angeles. Angela and Lauren M. huddle around her. Her fellow Lauren is rolling her eyes, while Angela gives a small sigh.

"Hi, Jess… Oh, Izzy, did you finish the chapter from Bio? I completely forgot about it-"

Reluctantly, and ignoring Jessica's heated glare, Lauren gives the boy a rundown of the chapter he had forgotten to read.

Jessica wanted to be on the varsity volleyball team to be the next prom queen, but she was more focused on her grades, the stress of it all making her social life and her extracurriculars, suffer. She was a teenager that wanted but could not get and to her, Lauren seemed to have what she wanted. Maybe it was because Lauren was so at ease with the person she was outwardly, that Jessica disliked her. Or maybe she was better at being observant then Bella and Jessica's green eye stood out so visibly to her as a result, or Jessica just disliked her more, she was not sure.

Tyler, Mi, e and Eric were not idiotically infatuated with her. They were just nice, as much as most teenagers could be, regardless of who she was. She was not sure if it was because she wasn't Bella and not as pretty, or because of the different timing in her arrival, or simply because Bella had been reading signals incorrectly in the first book. They were just three high school boys that had been curious about the new girl and she did not think it naive on her part from how normal they had reacted to her. Tyler Crowley was an overconfident athlete, Mike was very kind and funny, perhaps on the flirty side but he was like that with most girls even Jessica, as oblivious he was to her feelings, and Eric a slightly shy geek. Normal seventeen boys that had she had come to call tentative friends.

"You have an A in the class, Iz," said Mike, pointedly, wagging his finger at her.

She shrugs, wondering at the shorter nickname that Mike had gotten into the habit of calling her. Her paranoia over things was settling, easing off of her expectations of the books, but Lauren was always one to analyze to death anyone and everyone who talked to her.

"I think that was very brave, to stand up to him," and that's Angela, quiet, a small smile on her lips.

Lauren shrugs again, because she doesn't think she's brave. It's just a matter of perspective. She was already in a habit of defending and standing her ground against others- it a reality the art world and society in general… It wasn't odd to have people judging you illy or harshly. However justly, a key to being an adult and mature about it was learning to both listen to critiques and to push against them when it was warranted. Lauren felt it was more and warranted to push against a man that abused his power against teenagers that had no thought to push back because of the conditioning of society to knuckle under authority. Authority deserved respect, of course, but only if the authority respected you first. Authority was there for you, as something meant to protect, teach or care for duties society deemed for them. Not to simply command you.

Mrs. Campbell did not let her use the microwave, and Lauren made a silent vow to charm the woman enough to use it eventually. She mullishy turned to go sit with everyone and started when a heavy arm came around her shoulders.

Is my shortness just the perfect height for people to do this?

"Squirt!" called out Emmett and she swore that half the cafeteria turned in interest.

"Hi Teddy-Emmy," she replied, easily, smiling up at the much older being.

He was beaming at her, with that venom filled mouth that made her stomach cold, as he gathering her tight against his side. She appreciated that what she knew to ban e abnormal strength, even for vampires, was tempered to the point that it was only mildly uncomfortable. She made a note, as she pushed gently and he let her go without issue, about personal space was becoming a thing of past with Emmett Cullen. The hug this morning seemed to be just a tipping point as he was already grabbing her hand in a careful hold.

"Sit with me and Rosey-Posey!"

"Only if you stop calling me Squirt," she said easily, absently scanning the cafeteria.

Her regular table was gaping at her, and she could only wave absently in their direction as she spotted Rosalie.

"No dice. But sit with us anyway."

Lauren had long come to the age that unflattering nicknames no longer really bothered her. So she let the name slide with an over dramatic sigh of fabricated annoyance.

"Fine. But I want your little ice-cream," she said, simply, eying his strawberry little cup. It wasn't as if he was actually going to eat it.

"Deal."

Rosalie was, thankfully, not seated with Jasper, Alice and Edward, but rather alone and at the other side of the cafeteria. Mindful, no doubt, of keeping her and her scent as far away from her two brothers as possible. A knot she hadn't known was there unwound in her stomach and she breezed towards Rosalie with a smile on her face.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

The girl, once again, is in the classroom before he arrives, sitting by the window. He sighs, breathes deep, before he makes his way towards her. Relishing the last of the untainted air before he would be forced to interact with her and take her in. They start their first lab of the semester together in relative silence, not speaking before Banner's brief explanation and the chorus of groans through his announcement of 'no textbooks', the girl quickly and easily setting up the microscope and slide, before she peered through the eyepiece. She hummed tunelessly for a few moments, focusing.

"Prophase," she muttered, quietly, squinting down through the eyepiece.

Wordlessly, the girl pushed it over to him, lifting an expectant eyebrow.

"Did I get it wrong?"

Edward gave it a glance, and then slide the paper over to himself, and carefully wrote out both their names on his sheet, and than the answer. The girl hummed, looking down at their sheet. A small smile, seemingly unbidden, came to her face.

"You have beautiful penmanship," she said, softly, just as before.

He looks at her, sees a slight appreciation in her eyes, and he nearly rolls his eyes. In his day, fine penmanship was forced on you, made perfect by sharp whacks of a rod or ruler if you displeased your instructor with a wobbly line. She licked her lips, before carefully removing the slide labeled number two out of the microscope and into a small box it came in and replacing the slide.

"Your turn."

Edward checked it, before he carefully wrote 'Anaphase' on the sheet. The girl raised a brow.

"That's an arrogant assumption."

His hand stilled, and he looked up, blinking. The girl was frowning, arms crossed.

"I beg your pardon?"

"I slide the microscope to you to check my findings, yet you do not return the gesture. Arrogance, Mr. Cullen, is not flattering. You could be wrong."

A snort escapes him. Impudent girl. How on earth could she think he is wrong? He was no simp*.

"I very much doubt that, Miss. Swan."

The girl rolls her expressive grey eyes.

"Whatever. Give me back the microscope."

They finish the sheet, in relative silence, he checking her answers, she rolling her eyes each time he did so. She didn't get an incorrect answer, making him realize, once again, that the girl was relatively intelligent, for a human. When they finish, the girl tapping her fingers impatiently across the black lab countertops, other hand raised to signal Mr. Banner that they have finished.

"Have I done something to offend you?" the question escapes him before he can even think to sensor himself.

Fingertips still. Grey eyes slide his way. Her heart, speeds up, and she lifts her brows. Her mind, ever to his frustration, is still silent.

"What would make you think that?" she seems curious, furrowing her brows delicately.

Edward shifts, unconsciously leaning closer.

"You… You do not seem to speak to me very much."

The girl blinks.

"You don't speak to me either."

He had observed, that the girl rarely spoke unless she was spoken too, but it still bothered him that she would not speak to him unprompted. He could not fathom the reason, but it irked him.

"Yes… I suppose I do not. I apologize. But, I repeat the question, as you did not answer me, have I done something to offend you?"

The girl's heartbeat, having just slowed ever slightly down, speeds up again. Her hands, relaxed, twitch, as if she wishes to curl them. But her face is remarkably friendly, if tense in a way that most humans would miss. He does not. He can only assume that she is uncomfortable… But that is all he can do with her, assume. Nothing was concrete, an absolute with her.

"No," her words are careful, deliberate as she gives a polite smile, "Not anything you can help, Cullen."

He frowns. Her tone is pleasant. Her smile polite. But it does not reach her eyes and her words could be rude if she had spoken in a different tone.

"Please, I ask you to call me Edward."

Lips are licked, and his eyes follow the swipe of the pink flesh, something in the pit of his stomach quivering at the motion.

"Sure, Edward," that polite smile is still in place.

Banner comes up to them, thinking that they are 'slacking off' since they are just conversing, even with the girl's raised hand. When he glances at their sheet, he is annoyed at his perfect script, at the fact that the girl, didn't do anything. Typical smartass kid, helping everyone else skate by. Vaguely, he feels insulted on the girl's behalf- she was not a goldbrick* glittering about next to him. She had done most of the work, but Banner is too assured of his own intelligence in comparison to her's.

"So Edward," started the small minded man, eyes slightly narrowed, "You didn't think Isabella should get a chance with the microscope."

"Actually, Mr. Banner," the girl smiles, easy and polite, "I identified three of the five. Edward simply hogged the sheet. I feel better for it, his handwriting is much nicer."

The man turns to her, indgigant, so sure that none of his pupil's save him would have any clue what to do. He had purposefully taken this from an advanced course- his way of emphasising his cleverness and to get the children to be in awe of him as he taught the material anew in a more bombastic way.

"Have you done this lab before?" he asks, comforted by the thought.

The girl shakes her head.

"No, sir."

Dammit, not another one.

John Banner was not a man of great intellect, but he believed he was. He felt uncomfortable by anyone's greater intelligence, even a seventeen-year-old girl and Edward pitied him for it.

"Well," says the man, easily, hiding his annoyance well. He walks away, muttering, "It's a good thing you're partners...So the other kids can actually learn something."

The last part, Edward doubted the girl heard. If she had, he would have called Banner out on the carpet*- his insecurities and ego had no place in the classroom before adolescents. What a wisenheimer*. Humans were so delicate at this age, after all. She goes on to ignore him again, hands slipping into her backpack and bringing out a sketchbook. It is a mess thing, full of stuffed papers of loose drawings and he finds himself irritated that she seems so set on ignoring him- perhaps he must be more persistent, like the boy, Mike, to keep her attention from wandering. He is now out of air, he noted, and he clenches his fists before he slowly, through his mouth, brings more airs into his lungs…

It nearly knocks him over, the hard crash of her scent. He could taste her on the back of his tongue, coating his lungs like mustard gas. Potent, fast and devastating. Everything of his body tightens, tenses at the smell. He grits teeth, minutely, before he turns to the girl with a faint, perfect, but entirely forced smile.

"It's ratty* about the snow, isn't it?"

The girl stops taking out her pencils and things, looking over with a highly raised brow.

"Um, come again?"

Edward blinks, before he realized that the word 'ratty' is not a word used in this decade, he swallows irritation.

"It's too bad it melted."

The girl stares at him, before she nods. Her hands, so small, so delicate, curl into a fist.

"Yes. It's too bad. It was so pretty."

"You seemed to enjoy it a lot," he mentions, proud of the normal way of the conversation. She hums.

"It was my first snowfall," she whispers quietly, "I just wish the snow would last."

"You like the cold, I take?"

A smile, secret, not for him, comes to her lips.

"Just call me Sailor Popsicle."

He blinks at the odd prompt, but just by the way it is not for him, he can guess it has to do with something of an inside joke. Her attention wavers away from him and he wonders if she has some sort of attention deficit disorder, gone undiagnosed, as she returns to flip through her sketchbook and find an empty page, ignoring him once again.

"So," he tries again, "What brings you to Forks?"

And what can I do to make you leave, and go so far far away from me,

Something flashes across her face, something dark, angry and terribly fleeting. It is replaced by sadness. Almost immediately. It is as if she cannot bring herself to feel that initial anger, just… Defeated. Edward felt strangely helpless.

"I… don't know," honesty colors her tone, and she is looking forward, eyes distant, "It would not my first choice, but I'm here."

"But why?"

She looks toward him. Grey eyes, vivid, stark and he is surprised at how easily he had dismissed those eyes just a few weeks ago. He had noted their pretty color, perhaps, but never done much beyond that. They are large and... He has never paid so much attention to how many different colors the human eye can have, blues, greys, greens, yellows, and spots of red. Vampires eyes turn flat in a way, depending on their maker, nearly solid eye color with little to no variation. Her eyes are... beautiful. He feels drawn into them, they so different and attention-grabbing… Brimming with her secrets.

"I don't think that's any of your business. It's personal, Edward."

She's smiling, but its a dismissal. Her secrets are her own. She is a very private person, or conversely, she is unwilling to share with him. Something about that upsets him. He frowns. The girl, immediately returns to her sketchbook, dismissive… They do not speak again, and when the bell rings, he has to flee as quickly as he can, his mind still on her, wondering.


1*: I was always weirded out by the fact that Edward called teenagers children. I kept it, but it always bothered me that an Edwardian contemporary would look down upon people, that in his age, would have been adults. It never really fit for me, but I guess you can attribute that to his mental age of a hundred and seven and perhaps looking down on contemporary(in 2005) teenagers not being as 'mature' as those of the ones of his era.

2*: I just think that Jasper should not struggle solely for his bloodlust. The projected of FOUR HUNDRED OR SO emotions of sentient creatures would fuck anyone up, no matter the brain power. Its a lot to process and even if he's more or less controlled that's just not feasible. So I say, he has mood swings like nobodies business!

3*:Absquatulate: Get the fuck out- think Civil War absence from the battlefield.

4*: Elephant: Battlefield/shitty situation.

5*: Simp: An idiot or a simple-minded person.

6*: Golden Brick: Useless.

7*: Called Him Out on the Carpet: Told him off and called him on his shit.

8*: Wisenheimer: A person who behaves in an irritatingly smug or arrogant fashion, typically by making clever remarks and displaying their knowledge.

9*: Ratty: Sucks or is too bad.

Good grief I've been trying to finish this chapter since the fifth of July but I am in the process of an out of town internship(for a solid month and a half) that requires my attention so much. So sorry my lovely readers, I would have had this published a few days ago but real life sort of got in the way. I hope you enjoy the chapter and happy reading!

~Moon Witch '96