Each Moment Lost to the Past
Chapter 3
Bella's POV
Billy Black looks exactly how I imagined him to be, down to his smile. Though, to be fair, he looks very similar to his son whose picture I've been staring at for the past two weeks. The only thing that I didn't get right in my imagination, is his age. He looks a good ten years older than what I had invented in my dream.
Jacob, on the other hand, looks exactly as he appeared on Before Bella's wall of faces. If I haven't visited in a few years, I wonder how Before Bella got a recent picture of him. Clearly, she still kept track of her childhood friend.
I shift uncomfortably under the young boy's curious notice as I try to pay attention to the adults' childish greetings. Billy smiles widely at me from his chair once he's done trying to roll over Charlie's toes.
"It's good to see you, Bella," he says, and I offer a polite smile.
Jacob slides up to my side as the adults once again get distracted as Charlie seems to sniff out what dinner is.
"Pst," he whispers, though they probably wouldn't have paid us any mind if he spoke at normal volume. I awkwardly turn my attention to the teen. "Did you really lose your memories? Or is this one of your elaborate pranks?"
I relax slightly with his open curiosity. There is no malice or accusation in his inquiry. It's childish in its innocence.
"Would I have told you if it was?" I tease, like a lost reflex jumping to my tongue.
A bright smile lights his face. "Probably not." He sticks out his hand and, even being younger than me, it dwarfs mine. "I'm Jake. We used to play together until, like, three years ago."
My smile is genuine as he leads me in the direction of the kitchen. It's a small one-story house. Everything is close together and feels lived in. Charlie's house was nice, but I can imagine spending hours here, sprawled out of the floor or running in and out, tracking mud across the floor as our parents tried to scold us.
"So, what's it like losing all your memories?" Jake asks, and as Charlie's eyes widen, a surprised laugh bursts out of me. There is no tiptoeing around the subject with this boy. His bluntness is definitely a breath of fresh air. My amusement seems to calm my father down, though Billy does shoot me an apologetic smile for his candid son.
"Not sure. I wouldn't have anything to really compare it to, would I?" I snark, taking the only open seat at the table across from Before Bella's old friend. He grins.
After eating the best meal I've ever had, or at least remember ever having, the adults retire to the living room to watch a baseball game. Jacob hovers at my side.
"You want to see the garage?" he asks, excitement expressing itself in a little bounce. "I just started building a car from scratch. An old Rabbit."
"Sure." I stand, following him out of the house and down a rocky path to the tree line where a leaning building stands. It looks to only be made of thin metal walls and leans like at any moment a strong wind might knock it down. It's amazing that it's survived the elements this long. "So, how old are you, Jacob?"
"I just turned fourteen," he grins at me. "It's where I got enough money to start buying new parts for the car." I follow him into the rickety building, and he flicks on a well working light. It's surprisingly dry inside, and there's more space on the inside than I was imagining. Two more cars could probably fit in the space if you played Tetris with them. In the center is just the bare bones, a shell really, of an old looking car. It doesn't even have tires.
"I'm going to take a trip to the junk yard soon to try and scavenge some parts. You can come if you want."
The invitation doesn't entirely surprise me. I might not know him, but he's known me for years. He was obviously Before Bella's best friend. My chest warms at his open friendliness and genuine extension of friendship.
"Yeah," I mumble, perching myself onto one of the cluttered work tables. "Sounds fun."
We spend almost three hours out in the garage, not even really messing with the car, but just talking about Forks, the Reservation, and his other friends. I recognize most of the names from Charlie pointing them out on the wall of faces.
By the time Charlie calls to us from the porch, I'm looking forward to the next time I hang out with Jake. He's friendly and fun and doesn't treat me like there's something wrong with me. When he mentions something I should have known, and he sees my blank expression, he gets excited about explaining it which delves us into three other connecting stories. We used to get into a lot of mischief, apparently.
Charlie grins at me as we climb back up the rocky path, and slaps a hand down of Billy's shoulder.
"Good news, Bells. Billy agreed that you can come down here a few times a week to get in some driving time in his truck while I'm at work. You could probably get your license the day you turn sixteen."
"That's great!" my grin stretches wider. Every minute I spend here in Forks, I'm more and more grateful that I left Arizona. I don't know why Before Bella would have hated Forks.
….
The cold wind bites through my thin shirt and whistles through the trees, sending clouds of white crystals into my stinging eyes. I'm dreaming, I know I am, but I feel the snow under my bare feet, making my toes numb, as if it were real. But if I shift my feet through the white coating, no footprints are left behind.
It's Forks, but it's not. Afterall, it's supposed to be summer. There shouldn't be snow blanketing the ground or weighing down evergreen branches, and the sky is clearer than I thought this rainy state could get. The sun breaks through the forest cover in patches and short bursts.
A flock of birds suddenly erupt into the air behind me, shrieks of alarm suddenly startling the silence.
I whip around in the direction of the commotion, and suddenly I'm gliding over the earth from a cord wrapped around the organ in my chest. A man is there, blond hair a neat halo around his head as he gently lowers a dead dear to the ground.
He looks up as I draw to a stop, startling golden eyes looking through me, and I recognize the man, vaguely. I've dreamed about him before, or at least some people who had the same ichor color eyes as his.
At first, I think he might see me, but then the forest behind me comes alive. Wolves, three of them bigger than horses, silently seem to melt out of the trees themselves around me and the man, and I scramble backward out of the middle of the clearing in a bit of panic. Neither the man nor wolves pay me any mind.
When I look to the man in fear, I notice another person that I must have missed when I was distracted by the man, and when I blink, I see the other people as well. They all look familiar, but different. There are five of them. They all wear strange clothes, but even stranger, a bit of sun breaks through the leaves overhead, sending a scattering like diamonds across their skin.
"Peace," the man says wearily as the monstrous snarling wolves circle. For some reason, they seem just as weary as the humans. They hesitate to attack.
My heart pounds when the giant black wolf suddenly stands up and shrinks until the wolf is a naked man. He makes no move to cover himself.
"We know what you are," the wolf-man snarls, and the other wolves circle to stand at their leader's shoulder. He actually looks very familiar. He reminds me of the man whose house I've been spending time at these past few days. He looks like what Billy Black might have looked like thirty years younger and in his prime, but even that doesn't quite sit right.
"We don't want any trouble. We only eat animals," the blond man says calmly, gesturing to the dear at his feet he must have been hunting, but I can't see any weapon that could have brought it down with.
The werewolf looks at the five wearily and with suspicion. He hesitates. "Your eyes," he eventually says slowly.
"A byproduct of our diet," the golden-eyed man assures. "My family and I have just moved to town. We didn't know that there was a pack already living here. Perhaps we can form a treaty of sorts?"
The wolf man hesitates another moment, contemplating, before giving a short decisive nod. "As long as you and your family remain to your diet and stay off of our land, my pack will leave you be. The river will act as a boundary."
Another wolf suddenly melts into a man letting out a protesting snarl, "Ephraim, we can't-"
"Silence," Ephraim snaps forcefully, and the protesting wolf's mouth immediately snaps shut and both other werewolf's heads bow low in submission. The leader waits a moment before his deep voice takes a lecturing tone. "We are protectors of our people; that is it. And these cold ones are no threat to our people as long as they keep to the treaty."
I feel a familiar tug, and I have less than a moment to brace before I'm waking up in my bed, shivering as if I'd been standing barefoot in the snow.
I just lay there for a moment, breathing heavily, before I shakily turn on the lamp by my bed and reach for my backpack that I hadn't touched since first setting it down my first day here. I pull out the shoe box that contains the journals and pick out the new one resting right on top. Only the first three pages are filled so far, soon to be four as I set my pen to the next one.
By the time I'm finished writing, the sky is a soft gray, and I kick the blankets off to start the day. The journal goes back into the shoebox, and the shoe box under my bed, to be forgotten about until my next dream.
For once, I'm up before Charlie, so I go about getting breakfast ready. Cereal or eggs seem to be the single man's chosen food, so I decide to make some French toast as a small thank you for letting me stay.
Charlie comes down the stairs only twenty minutes later, smiling in surprise.
"You're up early," he comments, immediately going about setting two placements at the table and pouring me some juice and coffee for himself. The coffee was the first thing I had prepared, having seen him drink it almost religiously every morning. "You excited to go shopping?"
"Weird dreams, actually," I say, flipping the last piece of bread onto the plate before flipping off the stove and placing the plate on the center table. Rene wouldn't let me touch the stove.
"About what?" he asks, not hesitating to stack his plate.
"Werewolves, I think," I shrug, and he laughs.
After eating, Charlie nudges me in the direction of the stairs before I can try to start on dishes. "You go ahead and change and then we can head out. Port Angeles isn't too far; we might even get done by lunch since we're leaving so early."
The morning is actually really nice. We move through the stores quickly, focusing on jeans and long sleeve shirts. The last thing to do is get a warm jacket, which I now find myself flipping through the clothes racks for. At my own suggestion, we are at the thrift store first on the off chance of finding a nice one for cheap.
I snort as I come across a brown vest like I imagine would be in a western.
"Oh, that's perfect," a bell voice says behind me, and I go ridged as a delicate-looking, pale, hand reaches out. I stare, wide eyed as the pixie-like girl plucks the vest off the rack. "Do you mind?"
I try to swallow, but my mouth is too dry for my throat to work right as golden eyes turn to me, smiling behind a spiky halo of ink black hair. "What do you think?" she shrugs the vest on. It hangs off her shoulders in an unflattering way, but she still manages to look unbelievably pretty. But all I can think about is how familiar she is. Her eyes, her voice, her delicate features. She appeared in my dream weeks ago. That dream is the first memory I remember ever having.
She pauses when she meets my eyes, a curious light entering them.
"You're why I had to be here today, aren't you?" she asks, tilting her head as a beautiful smile lights her face.
"I'm…er… Do you…" I stutter, my dry tongue frustratingly uncooperative. "Do you know me?"
"Not until you introduce yourself," she says cheekily, completely at ease with the situation, modeling a ridiculously oversized vest in front of a stranger. Based on the clothes she has on under the ugly vest, I can't even imagine a reason she would come into a thrift store. He clothes look immaculate and designer.
"Er, Bella," I introduce awkwardly, an overwhelming shyness flushing my cheeks as I offer my hand. Her hand is surprisingly cold as it shakes mine.
"Alice Cullen."
"So, um, why am I the reason you're here today?" I ask, finally able to get my vocals in decently working order.
Alice's countenance suddenly becomes a bit insecure as she shifts from one foot to the next. "Oh… Sometimes… I get feelings to do things, without knowing why until it happens. I think I was supposed to meet you here today." She searches my face, expression open but cautious.
"Like fate?" I laugh awkwardly.
"Kind of," she shrugs with a wry smile. Her movement draws her attention back to the vest, and she carefully pulls it off before draping it over her arm. "Anyway, I'm going to go pay for this." She says, surprising me as she takes a hesitant step backward as if she doesn't quite want to leave me yet. Her eyes linger on my face, and for some reason, that embarrasses me.
"Wait," I say, nodding to the vest. "I thought you were joking about that."
A grin lights her face so large that I feel like I have to blink away stars from how brilliant it is. "Oh, not at all; I was looking for something like this."
"It doesn't look like something you would wear," I comment, glancing over her perfectly tailored clothes.
"Actually, I design and make my own clothes. I like to buy and repurpose things from thrift stores, too. This would be perfect for this new design I'm working on."
"Oh," I blink in surprise. "That's actually really neat."
"Thanks!" She gives a brief wave over her shoulder. "I'll see you around, Bella!"
I stare after the friendly girl, feeling as if this is just a dream. Well, no, my dreams feel more real than this. I can believe werewolves more than I can believe in pretty girls, one who is literally the girl of my dream, walking up to chat with me. Despite the odd occurrence, I look forward to the day that I might run into Alice again, and only hope that she is right about it being fate that we met.
I finally turn away from the direction she disappeared and end up running straight into Charlie's chest.
"Oh," I say breathlessly, taking a step back so I can look up at the man. He is empty handed of any coat but is looking down at me contemplatively before looking in the direction Alice disappeared.
"Don't think we'll find a decent one here, Bells. Who was your friend, there?"
"Alice Cullen," I immediately respond, and Charlie raises his eyebrows in interest and looks after the girl again. She is long gone by now.
"Cullen?"
"Yeah, you know her?" I ask.
He shrugs before guiding me out the doors. "I know a Dr. Cullen. He just moved here at the start of summer. Works at the hospital. He's a good man- could have gotten a job anywhere but his wife wanted to live in a small town, so they moved here. I think he has kids around your age staring school with you in August. She could be one of them."
I bite my lip to stop the immediate smile at the news. Not only will I not be the only new kid, but I might have already made a friend (if she's not just that naturally friendly with every stranger she meets). Fate indeed.
He glances at me again from the side of his eye. "She seemed nice."
I bob my head in agreement, thinking about her strange eyes that only make her more ethereal than just her delicate beauty.
"Pretty, too" he continues.
"Charlie!" I gasp, startled, and my cheeks suddenly burn as I turn wide eyes on him. He only smiles in amusement.
"Fine, fine," he waves off before I can say anything or offer any protests (even though I had thought just that many times during our brief conversation, and then several times after). He places a placating hand on my shoulder. "Let's go find you a coat."
A/N: And Alice appears in a swirl of fashion and mystery. Please review!
~Silver~