Thank you for the reviews last chapter. I appreciate them. Enjoy this next part… surprise ending, too!
Leah's POV
Chapter 12
It had been nearly a week.
To put it in reality, six days, two hours, thirty four minutes and thirteen point six seconds since I last saw Vinnie.
Okay, maybe the seconds part was made up, but the rest seemed to be spot on. I had kept track. I missed him that much.
Not to say that I haven't heard from him. He had called me just yesterday.
"I think they'll let me out soon," he had told me. "I'm feeling better than before."
"I miss you," I admitted quietly. It was the truth.
"I can't begin to tell you how much I feel the same way. I miss you, too."
I had not seen Embry in nearly a week, either, but Vinnie explained that, saying, "He's stuck stuffing my pillows and carrying my food up to me. He hates it pretty bad."
Even with this excuse, I found it pretty weird that he never came to patrol anymore. Jacob didn't seem to really know what was up, either.
"Maybe their mom is making him do it," he had said. "You know how worried Alyssa can get."
It was starting to get painfully obvious to other people how miserable and worried I was, too, especially to Seth, who had to live with it at home and on patrol.
As he was doing right now.
"Leah," he begged. "Please just try not to think about him for five seconds. We are supposed to be, you know, patrolling. Making sure the Cullens and the people on the rez are alright. I know how guilty you'd be if a vampire got out on our land because you were too busy thinking about-"
"Look, I'm sorry, alright?!" I nearly screamed in my head, growling at him. "It's just hard not seeing him. You don't understand."
"No, I don't." He seemed like he was waiting for some kind of explanation from me.
I did not know what to say. "You can see my thoughts. You see what I feel."
"But I don't understand why. That's the question."
"He… When I'm with him... It's like… He…"
"You're not usually so good with words," Seth commented.
"Shut up! This is kind of difficult for me to put into words."
"I'm sorry." He seemed genuinely apologetic. "I won't ask again."
We continued on the patrol without another word about him.
I woke up at around eleven o'clock, but instead of my mom's cooking serving as the alarm clock, it was my doorbell ringing.
It went off again.
"Could someone get the door?" I screamed, annoyed.
No answer. Of course.
I sighed and threw the blankets off my bed. "Fine," I mumbled angrily. "I'll get the damn door."
I ran –well, more like stomped –downstairs to the door.
It was a delivery guy, but instead of the brown UPS outfit, this guy was adorned in a blue and green coat and hat.
"1-800-Flowers" was what it said.
My God, I said, how corny is Charlie going to get with Sue? I mean I get that she has "sleepovers" over in Forks to make sure he's "alright" by himself at his house –what with that demon not living there anymore –since he's just so incompetent. But why can't they just come out and say that they're seeing each other?
"Delivery for-" the man looked down at his paper "-Leah Clearwater?"
Wow. That was unexpected. "Leah?" I asked. I had to make sure.
"That's what it says." He looked confused. "Is this the wrong-"
"No, it's me."
"Oh." He handed me the digital clipboard. "Sign here."
I scratched a few lines and handed it back quickly.
"Here you go," he said, handing me the package. "Enjoy your flowers."
I closed the door immediately and clawed open the box quickly. When it opened, I guess I should not have been so surprised at what I saw.
Little purple flowers.
My heart was pounding louder than normal when I saw a little white card attached to it. My hands began to tremble when I reached for it.
"Don't forget me" was all it read.
A minute after I read this, my phone went off. It didn't take a genius to figure out who it was, even without looking at the called I.D.
"What, are you some kind of stalker now?" I asked him.
I could hear him chuckling on the other line. "That's the beauty of the internet. You can see when your packages are delivered."
"How handy."
"Very."
A moment later, when I was able to get serious, I told him softly, "How can I forget you, Vinnie? I didn't four years ago, and I'm not gonna start now. It's only been a week."
"It feels like… well, longer," he laughed.
"Yeah, I know."
"I have some good news, though."
"Hmm?"
"I'll be out the house in three days."
My smile probably took up my entire face. "Really?"
"Yeah."
"This is the most serious case of a cold that I have ever heard of," I teased. "Ten day recovery time."
"Well, it turned out to be the flu. I never got my vaccination this season."
"Oh." I felt bad. I remembered getting the flu once when I was younger. It was terrible.
"I'm fine right now, but the… doctor told me to take it easy so I could recover one hundred percent."
"So, only three more days."
"Seventy two hours."
"That's not making it better, Vinnie."
"I'm sorry. What if I promise you a surprise when we get together?"
I chuckled dryly. "Vinnie, the last time you surprised me, you ended up with the stupid flu."
He laughed. "Well, let's just say I built a stronger immune system."
I didn't know what to make of that comment, so I ignored it. "I never really thanked you for the flowers."
"It's no problem. I kind of wish I could Fed-Ex myself the four blocks it takes to get to your house, but I'm sure my mom would get pretty pissed."
"Probably. She worries about Embry enough."
"She just cares about him so much. He was all she had while I was away. I kind of feel like I abandoned her. I'm trying to get on better terms with her."
"Vinnie, I'm sure Alyssa doesn't mind that you went to college. I don't see it in her nature to hold a grudge because of something she made you do."
"Yeah, you're right."
"I usually am."
He laughed.
"So, what was college like for you, anyways?"
And from there, the conversation flowed without any effort. He launched on about the legendary parties, trying to be the designated driver for his roommate and making sure nothing too out of control happened. He had his fun, but he couldn't help but let a little of the gentleman he always was affect his morals.
By about three o'clock, I could hear a deep voice in the background scolding Vinnie.
"I'll get off in a second. Go preoccupy yourself with someone else," I heard Vinnie say angrily.
"Is everything okay?" I asked confused.
"Yeah, just my brother. Mom's been making him stick close and do everything for me. Now that I'm decent, he doesn't know what to do with himself."
"He can come do my chores if he really wants," I joked.
"Don't give me the idea. I might go through with it."
I laughed.
I heard the low voice again, but before Vinnie could kill Embry, I said, "You know, it's alright. I have to go figure out where the rest of my household went."
"Okay. I'll talk to you later."
"Yeah."
A pause. "I miss you," he whispered.
Even through the phone, his voice managed to give me goosebumps. "I miss you, too. Three days."
"Seventy two hours."
"Vinnie," I sighed. He was purposefully making it seem longer.
He laughed. "Goodbye, Leah."
"Bye."
Just three more days.
How in the hell was I going to manage that?
Originally, I was not scheduled for patrolling that night, but somehow, Seth wormed his way out. He had spent the day with Jacob and the Cullens, mostly eating the food that was prepared by the mother-like bloodsucker. Rumor had it that the doctor's wife was a great cook, but I was not going to be the one to find that out.
So now, it was Quil and me out at about eight in the evening. Already, we were getting on each other's nerves, what with me apparently dreading the next three days of my life, and Quil thinking of nothing but patty-cake with Claire and how adorable she looked in her pink dress today.
"You know how creepy that is? You thinking how cute a three year old looks in a dress?"
"What's creepy about it? She's cute. She's three. She's Claire."
He obviously was missing the point.
"And you're the creepy one," he continued, "thinking about surprises with Vince."
I growled, though he was a good mile away from me. "I wasn't thinking about it that way, and you know it."
He said nothing, but kept traveling the circuit.
"Leah?" he asked a moment or two later,
"What?"
"What's with you and Vince, anyways?"
"That's none of your business."
"I know that, but I still want to know."
I was confused. How was I ever a concern to Quil? "Why?"
"I don't know!" he said defensively."He just seems to be on your mind a lot lately."
"Yeah, and Claire's on yours."
"And Nessie is on Jacob's," he continued.
I must have been missing something, because I did not understand what he was getting at.
He knew this, since he continued, saying, "You didn't imprint on him, did you?"
That hit me like a ton of bricks. I had not even thought about myself imprinting since he came back. Before, I would do nothing but moan and nag about how I either hated or wished it would happen. Granted, I was better now with Jacob's pack, but the longing had not escaped me. But now…
"I didn't imprint on Vince, Quil."
"Oh." He was silent, and almost a little surprised. "So, you really do love him that much?"
I growled. "Who said I loved him?"
"No one. It was the wind. Look at the pretty birdies…" he trailed off, trying to pretend it was nothing.
I was not getting into that argument with myself –breaking down the "L word" and seeing if I really felt it for Vinnie –right when Quil was in my head. I would do it later, by myself.
Suddenly, I smelled something. In the back of my head, I thought it was familiar, but could not place it.
Running at my top speed, I was getting closer to the origin. It smelled… like a werewolf, but not one of Jacob's, or any of the older ones from Sam's pack. Something was off about the scent, like it was foreign and out of place compared to the rest of the surroundings.
With my good eyesight, I could see a glisten of something bright in the moonlight in front of me, just beyond the woodsy trees that were surrounding me.
Pulling out from the woods and into the grassy area where the wolf was, I saw a gold untamed coat I had never seen before. The wolf looked scared at first, and started to back away. I was having none of that, and approached it. Finally, it picked up its head from looking at the ground and instead stared at me. His eyes were… a color I had never in my life seen on a werewolf before.
They were green.
And there in lies the cliffhanger. I have already started the next chapter, and am nearly finished with it. What did you think of this one though? What do you think will happen next?
Oh, and I have a question that really has nothing to do with this. I have been trying to find a couple of old stories on the Fanfiction site, and can't. I have searched as hard as I could. Is there such thing as a forum out there for the Twilight fanfics that you can ask someone for help to find one? If there isn't, I for one think it would be a great idea. Sometimes, people's summaries are just so vague and the titles so generic that it's hard to find them in the Search Engine. It'd be cool if you tried to describe it, and someone on the forum could be like "Oh, yeah, that story is..."
Anyways...
I'm done complaining. Promise.
Cocoa
