Bella's forehead leaned against the cool glass of her mother's car window. It was a reprieve from the hot temperature of Phoenix, cooking them from within the vehicle. It was all too easy to close her eyes, seeing the raging flames and remembering why her mother was dropping her off at the airport and kicking her out. Inside the car was a type of heat that was withstandable, a warmth that hugged her close and made her sweat only a little. The blistering roar of a fire that circulated the biology lab at Bella's now old school was on a whole other level. She could still feel the scorching heat circulating around her skin. Being the only person in the classroom while the room erupted into a blinding orange and smoke-filled space meant goodbye Phoenix and hello Forks.

Not that she claimed any fault to the fire in the biology lab, but maybe if it had happened in Forks, it could've been put out sooner with the promise of a constant state of drizzling rain. If more fires decided to light up at random and happened to be in close proximity to her, maybe Forks was the best place to be. Besides, Forks wasn't so bad with grey, dark clouds and the forever threat of rain. Surely it meant that the people were more comfortable with staying inside and more than fine with isolation. Being cooped up indoors with nothing but books to keep her company sounded like a pretty good place to haul up. Paradise saddled with puddles. While in Forks, Renée, her mother, couldn't encourage Bella to go on morning hikes and walks or anything that could be done under the sun. Renée never did understand introvertism and boy did the sun dwindle Bella's energy as if it were a social event twenty-four-seven.

Besides, spending time with Charlie, a man that may have not reared her but had a similar soul essence and a similar outlook on life, a person suited to the weather and climate of Forks, didn't exactly scream punishment for nearly burning down her school. It probably seemed that way to her mother, but then again they were polar opposites at heart. Where she escaped Forks, Bella was embracing it.

"You seem to be taking this well, Bella," Renée commented quietly.

Renée ruffled a hand through her red hair as her eyes bore straight ahead. She was young and normally her skin was fresh and near damn imperfect but there was a gloomy crinkling of her forehead and the laughing lines near her eyes were deeper and not lighthearted. It was Renée's idea but she was taking it much harder than Bella.

"You see it all the time," Bella said casually, pushing herself away from the window. "Kid with problems gets mysteriously sent away and never seen again. It's kind of a cliché."

"We'll see each other again. Don't be so dramatic, Bella."

"I know."

"You'll thrive in Forks," she said. "You'll thrive. It's smaller, and maybe when the world isn't so big and scary, you'll pop your head out a bit more to say 'hey'. You're a good kid, Bella—a good person with a big heart. More people deserve to see it, even if those people are in Forks."

"I didn't do it, you know," Bella said, watching her mother closely. "You never asked, but I didn't set that classroom on fire."

Instead of answering, Renée pulled the car over, alerting Bella to the fact that we were at the airport already. Once the luggage was on the ground by their feet, Renée gripped both Bella's hands and squeezed them tight.

"I did drastic and wild things to get out of Forks, Bella," Renée told her with a look in her eye that said she understood why igniting the school on fire made sense. The fact remained. Bella. Didn't. Do. It. "I know you think we're different, Bella, but we're not, not really."

Was there really a point defending her innocence when she was about onboard a flight that she'd wanted to board for years?

Renée was wrong about most things when it came to Bella and her inner workings and motivations for being the way that she was. According to her mother, Bella wore converse shoes to let people know that she was a hardcore lesbian. Apparently liking the style of the shoe wasn't a solid reason. Nope. It had to be a signal to everyone that she was a member of the gaygirl squad. Hating the feel of foundation on her skin was a grudge against straight women who wore makeup. Apparently all lesbians hated makeup because they saw it as a way for men to see them as attractive. Bella's likes, her dislikes, always had some hidden agenda when in actuality, sometimes a shoe was just a shoe and discomfort was just discomfort. Renée like to think it was much deeper than it was.

Besides, it couldn't have been Bella that set the fire because she was sat at her desk when it happened and spinning a pen around her fingers. She had been waiting for the biology teacher to come in and give out the stacks of graded papers that were sitting on the edge of the teacher's desk. There was probably a sound and logical reason why the stacks of paper erupted into fire abruptly. It must've been the sun beaming through the glass of the classroom window or some secret remainder of cigarette buds hazardously sprinkled across the desk. There needed to be a cause, something obvious, but nothing was found. All she knew was, one second she was contemplating checking her possibly bad grade before anyone came in and the next, the room went up in smoke. She hadn't moved from her desk, not until the fire had already started.

So no, Bella didn't resort to drastic measures to get herself kicked out of her school or to get sent out of Phoenix to join her father. She wasn't like her mother, willing to destroy relationships to escape a place that she didn't like. Just because she didn't accept the accusation of being an arsonist didn't mean she put up that much of a fight when Renée suggested going to Forks for the rest of Junior and Senior year. It was a pretty convenient excuse. Maybe this time, she'd let her mother assume the worst without an argument. She had said she was innocent once, there was no point pushing that point home. It was on the record.

Charlie, on the other hand, a man of local law enforcement kept schtum about the fire when Bella hopped into the police cruiser and drove her home from the airport.

He smelt like coffee, as did the interior of the car. His hair remained jet black. There wasn't a single grey hair to be found. Not yet at least. That was a major milestone that she at least hadn't missed. The only thing that changed since the last time she'd seen him was that he decided to shave the little goat beard he had going on—which was a good call. He looked better this way—a chief of police that you could take seriously.

He nodded to the cupholder in-between the driver and passenger seat to one of the two steaming cups.

"I didn't know if you drank coffee . . . so I got you hot chocolate," Charlie said, scratching the side of his jaw. "Hope that's okay."

"It's more than okay. I love hot chocolate," Bella admitted, offering a thankful smile.

"Do you?" he asked. "For uh, future reference, do you like coffee?"

"No," Bella said simply, prodding his cup with her finger. "What's your go-to?"

"Black."

"Americano," Bella drawled. "Simple. I like it."

"What's your go-to, Bells?"

"Water, usually. But I've been meaning to change that. So, you got it in one go. For future references."

"Huh." He seemed pretty pleased with himself, biting back a smile, making his moustache flicker. "You used to guzzle it back before bedtime. It'd knock you out, every time with a smile on your face."

"Then mom went vegan," Bella recalled.

"Almond milk just didn't hit the spot, did it?"

"No, it really didn't."

"You're not vegan now, are you?"

"She gave up on that phase years ago." Renée had gone from being vegetarian to cutting out dairy to an all-liquid diet and finally settled on eating whatever her boyfriend Phil wanted. Of course, whatever phase Renée had, Bella also was forced to go through. Phil, as much as he had been always around, came with some benefits. She was no longer the person Renée wanted to impress. "She never did let me get that hot chocolate mix again. Something about me having wild dreams because of the milk. I thought it was some weird myth she believed in but turns out it's true. Who knew?"

Charlie glanced at Bella briefly with an awkward smile. "I'm sure you can handle it now."

She grabbed the cup and clanked it against his cup still in the cupholder before taking a sip. It really had been years since she felt the swirl of marshmallows and cream with hot chocolate. The sweet aroma sent her back in time to when Charlie would heat up the milk in the pan a few minutes before bedtime, letting her sit on the countertop beside him in silence.

It was the simple moments like that she'd missed about him.

Maybe he didn't ask the all-important questions like why she caused the fire in her old school or if she even did it in the first place. Maybe he didn't probe about her emotional well-being or her state of mind. What he did was better. Learning little details like her drink order was a start. They could build from there. There was no point pretending that they had the conventional father-daughter relationship when he was a familiar stranger who was around when she was younger and sporadically on vacation times. Starting from fresh sounded like a great idea. There were no expectations or preconceived notions—except from the occasional gossip from Renée. Bella could work with this.

They drove an hour from Port Angeles to Forks in mostly silence. As soon as they passed the sign that welcomed them to Forks, grey clouds formulated and rain unforgivably lashed against the car. That was the best 'welcome to forks' moment she could've wished for. This was the quality weather she dreamt of.

"I bet you'll miss the sun," Charlie joked, flicking on the window-wipers with a flick of his thumb.

The sun was still there, albeit hidden. But there was something . . . warm about huddling into the car seat, watching the rain race against the glass.

"No," Bella said after a long stretch of silence. "I don't think I will."

Bella couldn't help it. She stayed in the car when Charlie pulled up near the green garage door outside his house. She took her time, taking in the changes of her old home. She craned her head around and took in the abnormally placed tree at the front of the house. It was taller than the two-story building. Seriously, who decided that that was a good idea? It sat in front adjacent to her bedroom, the leaves and branches blocking the view outside of the bedroom window. Not caring that it was still raining, she finally got out of the car and grazed her fingers down the bark of the tree, revelling in the damp and mossy feeling. It had grown. It had grown a lot. Damn, she really had missed out of years and years with Charlie.

The sudden pang in her chest had nothing to do with the luggage she had yet to help Charlie drag up to her room. The rain washed away her pain. It wouldn't be a sparse visit for a week or two. Like Charlie, the rain would be a constant companion.

When Charlie came out of the garage, Bella spotted fresh cans of paint before he managed to shut the door. That made more sense. The vibrant green that was more glossy than the crackling orange leaves of the tree. The red door of the front house and the blinding white of the exterior of the house stood out. It had all been done recently.

He led her inside and up the stairs. Her bedroom was much the same, freshly painted in white, except the colour of her walls were temporary.

"I meant to ask before you got here," Charlie said, unloading a suitcase onto the bed. "But I guess we could . . . I got a bunch of paints in the garage. We can mix and match this weekend if you want? For the walls? Or if we need to, we can get new sets of paint. I don't mind."

"That sounds like a great idea, thanks, Dad." Bella finally hugged him, although she had wrapped her arms around his waist so her cheek pressed against his back. It was less awkward this way. Maybe.

"If we get that done, we can pick out other things for your room, if you want. Anything you want. New lamps. Maybe a bookcase. Things like that."

"Are you sure?"

"Bells," he said, unwrapping her hands from his stomach and shuffling to face her. "This was your room when you were a baby. It might be time to update it a little, don't you think?"

"I mean . . ."

"I . . ." Charlie ducked his head down. "I want this to be your home, Bella. Not someplace you crash at night."

"Are you sure, though? Anything I want?" she teased. "I might have expensive taste."

"I'm a single man living by myself. Luckily not anymore. Trust me, I can afford it." He hung by the bedroom door, pausing to ram his knuckles against the wall. "Speaking of I may have gotten you a truck too."

"Dad—"

"It was free! If that helps," he said quickly. "I'm getting it in the morning for you before school. I'll leave you to settle in."

The first thing that she did when he ducked out of the room was to open her window. She fidgeted with the green curtains as she sat by the window, counting the branches of the tree right outside. Smelling the rain, the fresh air, and feeling the occasional drop of water brush against her cheek? She found her nesting spot quite quickly. All she needed was a good and a cup of hot chocolate and maybe a blanket and she was all set.

Renée was right.

Here, she would thrive.