Hi everyone! I know that I just put up a new chapter the other day, but I'm just so excited about where we're getting that I couldn't stop! Sooo, happy early Halloween with another new chapter!

Thank you, as always, for all of your feedback!


Saying that the following chain of events was dismal would've been an understatement.

The group had stopped moving, Jacob frozen in place as he seemingly stared into Aria's soul. She felt chills run down her spine and could foggily hear Quil mumbling her name in question, but staring into the chocolate pools she had had a crush on since she was six years old was deemed far more important in her mind.

"Jacob," Jared yanked his arm back, pulling his eyes from Aria and onto himself. He began whispering to him, the others listening closely in.

All at once, Arto had Jacob by the shoulders and pinned against a row of lockers just a few down from Aria's.

She heard herself gasp and began to take a step forward, Quil's arm immediately reaching out and grabbing her, holding her in place.

"Are you kidding me?" Arto screamed, his face mere centimeters from Jacob's, "My sister?"

Aria felt the blood draining from her face as she stared in shock. What could she possibly have to do with this?

Quil kept a firm grasp on her, and the entire hallway had frozen, everyone stopping to see what fight was going on.

"Arto, not here, man," Embry stepped forward, his eyes flittering to Aria for only a second before back to their shaking forms.

Jacob pushed Arto backwards, breathing deeply through his nose and staring daggers at him, "You think I wanted that to happen?" He challenged, shaking his head, "Everything is ruined now," he spat, storming down the hallway and out the double-doors.

Aria's eyes went to her brother, somehow meeting his just in time. He sighed as they stared at each other, a look of sadness crossing his face and leaving just as quickly as it came.

"I'm sorry, Ari," he mumbled, taking off down the hallway and out the doors Jacob had just gone through.

She raised an eyebrow, her eyes following him as he left before coming to Embry. He grinned half-heartedly at her before pursing his lips and leaving for his homeroom.

"Ari…" Quil's voice brought her back down to earth as the hallway grew alive once more, and she turned to face him, eyebrows scrunched together.

Without a word, she felt herself launching her body against his for a hug, breathing in his safe and familiar scent and feeling his arms come around to hold her together. She couldn't even describe the feeling that had settled in her stomach, daring to make her sick and crush her ribs or suffocate her lungs, or maybe even all of that. Everything that had happened over the last couple of months seemed to come crashing down on her in that moment, and Quil was seemingly the only steady thing in her life anymore. He was grounding her to earth.

Her family was falling apart, Arto now rarely ever seen unless it was to grab a spare shirt- one that April hadn't snuck into her own drawer. April wandered around the house, once a loud a boisterous, dramatic, bossy creature, now a mere shell of herself covered in her estranged twin's clothes that he couldn't fit in anymore. It seemed like her parents were always busy with the council, so she or April ended up making dinner most nights. And whoever didn't have to make dinner had to get Ava ready for bed. Arto was gone, Embry was gone, Jacob was gone, and now there was something else wrong that somehow had to do with her?

The warning bell rang, and she held onto Quil for just a moment more, sucking in the softness of his sweater and the firmness in his hold before she pulled away, embarrassingly wiping away the tears that had managed to sneak out.

"Thanks," she mumbled, pulling her bookbag closer to her body and spinning on her heels to head towards homeroom.


The day seemed never-ending, and by the time she and April got home, she nearly cried out of gratitude for the day being over.

"Leah just had to bring Seth and his friends home, but she'll be here in a minute," April told her, tossing her bookbag at the foot of the steps.

For the first time in her life, Aria felt like she was a part of Leah and April's friendship. It felt foreign to her to be considered one of them, but with everything being all out of whack, she couldn't complain about the solace she was finding in them.

Participating in actual "girl-talk" was even more foreign and frightening than actually hanging out with the older girls.

"And I remember one time, Sam and I thought we were home alone, we're in bed, and all of a sudden, mom and Seth bust through the door with a bag of chips or some dumb shit," Leah laughed, throwing her head back and clapping her hands together, "I was grounded for two weeks or something, I don't even remember." April laughed along with her, Aria sitting beside them yet feeling as if she was in another world.

"Remember when I dated Kyle Conweller?"

Leah nodded in response to April.

"Yeah, literally almost the exact same thing, only it was my dad, and Ava."

Leah nearly fell off the bed with laughter, but Aria couldn't help the tilting of her head, "When did that happen?"

April jokingly rolled her eyes, "You were probably with the boys or something."

"Speaking of Aria's boys," Leah interjected, eyes flickering to Aria, "what happened this morning with Jacob Black and Arto?" She looked back and forth between the sisters, Aria sucking her bottom lip and April raising her eyebrows quickly before also turning her attention to Aria.

"I don't know, Lee," Aria shrugged, somehow feeling self-conscious under her eyes.

"What happened?" April asked, scooting closer.

"Arto lost his shit on Jacob Black, I guess, knocked him into a locker, screaming something about 'my sister,' I don't even know. And then they both left."

Aria hadn't even noticed Leah was around to see what happened.

"That's so weird! Weird for them, even." Leah nodded in agreement with April, and the two flung themselves into another conversation.

Aria stood up from her seat on the living room floor, wandering into the bathroom in search of motrin or Tylenol, or anything really to settle her stomach. She inwardly scolded herself for having pretended to be sick the previous week, now feeling like her stomach was winding itself into one big knot.


Jacob didn't return to school for the rest of the week. Consequently, that same knot that had lodged itself in the center of Aria's being managed to stick around while he was gone. When she had mentioned it to her mother, she had merely sighed and pursed her lips, shrugging and saying she'd make her soup for dinner and tea to go with her breakfast.

Aria knew she was delirious for even thinking that that might help, but she also knew that Naomi knew that just as well as she did.

Having a somewhat consistent "group" so-to-say definitely made it a little easier to get through the days. Seth, Leah, and Quil came over to be with her and April nearly every day after school, and all three of them spent the weekend there, too.

"Bullshitttt," Quil drew out the word, shaking his head while laughter poured out, "there's no way you guys have never gotten trashed at First Beach. Everyone has."

"I don't know who 'everyone' is, Quil," Leah snorted, "but we haven't."

"Have you?" April challenged, her eyes turning playfully menacing.

It was moments like these that Aria could see remnants of the old April and Leah, the ones before Arto and Sam had gone off the deep-end.

"Uh, yeah! I have." Quil smirked, tossing an arm around Aria's shoulders, "with Aria and the guys."

Leah and April's mouths dropped into perfect circles, looking to one another briefly before turning back to the others.

"No way! Aria, when did you become so bad?" April teased, wiggling her eyebrows and lightly shoving at the younger girl.

Aria giggled and shook her head, pushing herself away from Quil and mock-glaring at him, "You can't go telling my sister all these secrets about me!" she squealed, Quil's face lighting up with delight.

She turned back to her sister and Leah, "and it was only one time!"

"Yeah," Quil snorted, "only because her and Embry are lightweights and ruin all the fun." He rolled his eyes. The older girls and Seth erupted in laughter.

The slamming of the front door drew them out of their world, all of their eyes coming to land on Arto's looming figure in the doorway. While everyone's eyes seemed to be glued to him, it was only Aria who received his full attention. His eyes bore holes into her face, and she felt uncomfortable beneath his stare.

"Stay away from Black."

He pointed an accusatory finger at her and spoke from deep within his chest. Had she not been so shocked by his words, she might've even laughed at the poor imitation of bravado he had no-doubt picked up from one of the other guys.

"He doesn't speak to me anymore, so, no worries there." She shrugged, pulling her eyes from him and onto the floor. She pulled her knees up to her chest to rest her chin upon. She still couldn't believe those words were coming from her mouth.

"Good. Keep it that way."

"Arto," Michael clicked his tongue at his son, shaking his head and plopping a hand on the teenager's shoulder as he came from behind him, "you know that's not how it works."

Arto stared at him with a fury no one had ever seen before. Even after this life-altering change he had underwent, he still seemed to love and respect his father. In that moment, though, it seemed as if every ounce of that was out the window.

"It's bullshit." Arto grumbled, shoving past his father and out the front door.

"And they're planning on hunting them, how barbaric is that? I mean, they're just…" Naomi's voice fell away as she was met with everyone's stares.

"… kids." Sue finished for her.

She nodded grimly.


Just when Aria thought she was falling into a comfortable, new way of life, Jacob Black growled in the cafeteria.

It had started off relatively normal- as "normal" as Aria could say her life was. She and Quil sat at their lonely lunch table, Aria babbling about all the things that had to get done before spring break and before their camping trip.

"And we told Seth that he can't just bring one change of clothes, but he's in that weird, gross guy phase right now, just like when we were younger and you guys suddenly forgot what a shower or a bar of soap was, but that's whatever," she giggled, "and…" her lips shut, her head tilting.

"Hey…" she watched him carefully, his elbows propping up his hands which held up his face. He wasn't even looking at her.

"Quil," she grabbed his hand, taking it into her own and nearly jumping back at the heat radiating off of him, "do you feel alright?"

He stared back at her with glossy eyes, his eyebrows scrunched together in concern as the sweat pooled above them. He slowly shook his head. He felt awful.

She released his hand and brought the back of her own to rest on his forehead, grimacing, before bringing it down to cup his cheek.

"You need to go to the nurse and go home, Quil, I-"

And then a growl rippled through the cafeteria so loud it nearly made the tables rattle.

The room fell silent.

Aria and Quil turned to the source of it.

And there, across the cafeteria, stood Jacob Black, eyes ablaze, every muscle in his body flexed as he stared at them.

The knot in Aria's stomach tightened.

"Woah, woah, woah," Jared called, himself and Embry leaping from their seats and surrounding Jacob, pushing back at his chest, whispering to him.

By the time they had shoved him out the doors, Quil had dropped his head back into his hands. With a moment more of convincing from Aria, and the promise that she'd be over to see him after school, Quil went to the nurse and his parents were called to come pick him up.

But when Aria chipperly knocked on his front door after school, his father told her that he was too sick for any visitors.