I didn't understand why my parents were moving back to Forks. Sure, I missed our family, my aunts and uncles, as well as my grandparents, but only seeing them a couple of times a year when they'd come to visit in Maine didn't leave me with a strong bond to any of them. We'd left Forks when I was just months old so that I could have as much of a normal life as possible, which was never really going to happen when you considered that I was only half human, and yet now we were headed back. I guess you could say I was being a moody teenager that just didn't want to leave the place I grew up, but I was homeschooled and had been secluded from humans for so long that it wasn't like I was actually leaving anything behind.

Realistically, I was more concerned about being introduced to human life. When you age supernaturally fast and look like a teenager by the time you're seven, it raises a lot of questions, no matter where you live. However, now that seventeen years had passed, I could finally go to Forks, woooo!

"It still doesn't make sense," I said from the backseat, "You should be like….forty now, and you still look my age."

My mom sighed from the front seat and I watched my dad grip the steering wheel a little tighter. If he wasn't careful, he'd snap another one. "We had you seventeen years ago. Fresh out of high school," he said through slightly gritted teeth. "Seventeen plus seventeen is thirty-four, that's still not close to forty."

"Regardless, you look like teenagers, not adults entering their mid-life crisis."

"People age really well nowadays," my mom said, "Tons of women in their thirties look really young."

"Yeah, celebrities who can afford botox and personal trainers, and meal plans."

"We can afford that too," my dad reminded me.

"Yeah, but it's just weird for Forks, Washington to have mega rich thirty-somethings that look like teenagers. I don't see why our family couldn't ever just join us in Maine. Besides, mom, aren't you worried about your weird friend?"

That time I'm pretty sure I did hear the steering wheel start to crack, and my dad growled my name in a voice that was barely audible. I sighed and leaned back into my seat, arms crossed over my chest and watched the trees pass by as we approached the Washington state line. "We should've just flown," I mumbled.

Seventeen years ago my mom was caught up in a weird love triangle with my dad and her best friend. Seventeen years ago I was born, and my mom's best friend decided that I was the one he was meant to be with instead of her. Yeah, I guess we owe him and his pack our lives since they helped us when a bunch of big bads came to kill my mom and me, but it doesn't change the fact that I was about to finish growing up with this guy looming over me as if he had some kind of claim over me. My dad didn't like him to begin with, so off to Maine we went.

Before the car had even come to a stop in the driveway, my Aunt Rosalie came rushing out of the house. She was by the car as I was stepping out and immediately wrapped her arms around me in a tight hug. "I've missed you too Auntie," I told her, grinning as I hugged her back. The rest of the family came out to offer hugs and help with our suitcases. Most of our stuff had been shipped to Forks weeks ago, but all of our necessities were packed up and driven across the country with us. "How was the drive?" Grandpa Carlisle asked my dad as they headed inside.

I ignored their conversation as I turned my attention back to Aunt Rosalie. At this point Aunt Alice and my mom were headed inside chattering about how exciting it was to be back in Forks after so long. "I'm glad you're in Forks," Aunt Rosalie told me as we started to go inside.

Uncle Emmett had grabbed my suitcase out of the trunk and walked alongside us, "Are you ready to start school?" he asked with a big grin.

"Not even slightly," I admitted.

"Its not that bad," Aunt Rosalie reassured me, "You'll fit in and be used to it in no time."

I shrugged, "I don't know, I barely know anything about humans beyond what mom and dad have told me, and I definitely don't know how to be human."

"Well, you're half human, so that's a good start, you're already halfway there," Uncle Emmett gave me another goofy grin and I couldn't help but laugh. Maybe I was just psyching myself out. At least my favorite aunt and uncle had my back. If they could repeat high school over and over, I could handle it once, right?

Monday morning came way too fast, and I was up earlier than I'd ever needed to be so that I could get dressed. Uncle Emmett had offered to drive me so that I wouldn't be seen on the first day of school in "my dad's lame Volvo," his words, not mine. However, my mom declined the offer without consulting me because she wanted to send me off on my first day of school ever.

I stared in the mirror for far too long making sure that my long dark curls were styled fine, and that there weren't any wrinkles in the outfit Aunt Alice helped me pick out. I wanted to keep it simple, and not stand out too much, but still be stylish and not look as if I got dressed in the lost and found. So I recruited the most stylish person I knew. I smoothed out the imaginary wrinkles in the red velvet blouse and tugged on the legs of my dark denim jeans to make sure they weren't hung up on any of the accents of my black ankle boots.

I checked the time and headed downstairs, ready to immerse myself in a whole new world. My family oohed and ahhed over the fact that I was about to attend my first day of school ever; I blocked a lot of it out as I mentally ran over a checklist to confirm I had everything I needed in my backpack before we walked out the door.

My mom and I drove to the school in near silence. She attempted to give me a pep talk about how I would do great, and I'd make friends super easy. As awkward as she was, she still made friends when she first moved here, and I would too. I ignored a lot of it. My mom of course had the advantage of having lived a normal human life for the first half of her life. I had been secluded for the last seventeen years and was only taught about the human world rather than experiencing it.

When we pulled up to the front of the school, I didn't want her to feel bad so I hugged her and gave her a small smile, "I'm sure I'll be fine mom. I've watched plenty of movies, how different can real high school be?"

She smiled back, "I'm sure you'll have a good day. You'll do great. I'll see you this afternoon."

I got out of the car, and slung my backpack over my shoulder by one strap and headed into the seemingly massive building. Fortunately the office wasn't difficult to find, and I went inside to collect my new student packet.

"You must be Renesmee Cullen," the cheery receptionist said with a smile as she started shuffling through envelopes on her desk."

"Carlie, please," I corrected as I took the envelope she offered.

"Carlie," she confirmed. "Your schedule is in there. We also assigned you a Peer Buddy to show you around and help you get acclimated to the school. Normally we try to match schedules, but some of the classes are full, however, y'all share homeroom, so you'll meet them there. And your buddy is…." She trailed off as she stared hard at her computer screen. "Julienne Nova."

"Thank you." I left the office and stopped just outside the door as I looked through the large envelope for the schedule and a map. I should've asked where 'homeroom' was. Amongst all the new student paperwork that needed to be returned, student code of conduct, and other random papers, I managed to find both and scanned it quickly.

Homeroom ended up not being too difficult to find and I was relieved to be the first student in the classroom. I wasn't necessarily afraid to walk into a room full of students, but it was nice to not have everyone stare as soon as I walk in. I could meet the teacher and get seated without being watched.

I approached the desk where a middle-aged man with short-cropped brown hair sat behind a small plaque with the name 'Matthews' engraved on it. He looked up as I approached, and smiled. "You must be my new student." His voice was warm and friendly, and I couldn't help but smile back.

"Yes," I told him. "Um, I go by my middle name though, Carlie, if that's okay."

"Of course," he chuckled, "That's not a problem. Go ahead and take a seat anywhere you like. There's no assigned seats in here."

"Thank you." I nodded my head slightly before looking across the room. The desks were bunched together in groups of four, and the groups were scattered around the room with seemingly no rhyme or reason. I picked one relatively close to the door and took a seat.

I pulled a book out of my bag so that I could focus on something else while students filtered into the room. I didn't look up from my reading until I heard the scrape of the metal chair leg across the cheap tile floor and noticed someone sit at the desk across from mine.

I looked up and for a moment forgot everything I had been practicing about being normal. The girl across from me was stunning. Her short, blonde hair fell in loose curls to frame her angular face. Her eyes were such a light brown that they almost looked gold, and I had to look again to make sure they weren't. Her red lips curled up in a friendly and welcoming smile. "Hi, you're new here right? I'm Julie Nova."

"Um…Carlie." It took me a second to find my voice. "Nova? Are you related to Julien? That's supposed to be my peer buddy or whatever?"

She laughed and it sounded musical. I wasn't entirely sure why she was laughing, but I didn't think she was laughing to be rude. "That's me," she clarified. "My mom's weird and was obsessed with the name, she was going to use it whether I was a girl or a boy. She thought adding an N and an E on the end would make it more feminine. So I just go by Julie."

"I can relate." I told her, my own grin spreading across my face. "My mom combined the names of my grandmas for my first name, and my grandpas for my middle name."

"So you go by your middle?" Her tone implied she was asking a question, but being that she was my peer buddy, I was certain she already knew my name before she'd even sat down.

"Yep! They called me Nessie for awhile, and I guess that was okay when I was little, but Carlie just sounds way better."

"Well, Carlie it is." Her smile grew wider to show off her perfect teeth and she reached across the two desks. "Let me see your schedule, I want to know how many classes we share."

I slid the paper towards her, and our fingertips nearly touched as she pulled it onto her own desk. I watched her as she studied the schedule. "Looks like we have first together, then you have art and math without me. I'm not sure which lunch Wheeler has, so I don't know if I'll see you in the cafeteria. If he has third, I'll be there, if not, then I'll meet you outside his class when third is over, and we'll have the rest of the day together." I hung to every one of her words as she spoke, committing everything to my memory. "On our way to chemistry I'll point out the art room and Wheeler's class for you so that you'll know where to go."

"Okay." I felt so dumb for not being able to think of anything better to say. "Thank you."

Julie grinned again, "You're welcome."

First period was chemistry, and the teacher, Ms. Arnold, sat me with Julie. Throughout the class Julie would fill me in on little things that had already been covered so that I could catch up to where we were in the lesson. Fortunately my mom and dad had done a pretty good job homeschooling me the last few years, and I already knew quite a bit about the topic.

Even though I didn't get to spend art with Julie, it was one of the highlights of the day. With or without her, it was nice to get to spend an hour sketching. Miss Ross, a short, pixie-like woman in her early thirties, had told me when I first walked into the classroom that the students were going to be spending the day finishing their sculptures from last week, and I'd be excused from having to turn one in. Instead, I could spend the day sketching whatever I wanted.

"Wheeler's class" ended up being pre-calculus, and I was sat in the middle of the room. It wasn't hard to catch up to the class, even without Julie whispering in my ear. I also had the luck of getting the "third lunch" that Julie had mentioned, which meant the longest class of the whole day, wasn't really that long. An hour and a half on the schedule turned out to be an hour of class time with thirty minutes in the cafeteria. Mr. Wheeler, a tall, stocky man in his sixties, had clarified for me before I left the classroom that I wouldn't be expected to return after lunch, and so I could take my things with me.

Julie wasn't hard to find in the cafeteria, and she grinned when she saw me approaching her table with my lunch. "Carlie! You have third!" The excitement in her voice and the grin on her face made me feel as if she was genuinely happy to see me. "Sit down," she said, scooting over on the bench seat. "These are my friends, Megan, Chloe, and Oliver."

Even sitting, you could tell that Megan was tall and lean. Her long, black hair was pulled back into a ponytail, and her dark brown eyes were almost hidden under her bangs. Chloe looked to be about the same size as Julie and had stick straight, strawberry blonde hair hanging down to her collarbones. Oliver's black hair was slicked back, and he looked to be considerably tall, even sitting next to Megan. In fact, seeing them beside each other, they looked quite a bit alike.

As if reading my mind, Julie confirmed, "Megan and Oliver are twins."

"Paternal," Oliver clarified, "I got all the good looks."

Megan playfully hit his shoulder, "We look exactly alike."

"That's what you think," Oliver grinned.

"I'm Carlie," I smiled. I would've never guessed making friends would be this easy.

"It's nice to meet you," Chloe said, "Julie's already told us about you."

A faint blush seemed to touch Julie's cheeks and she picked up a fry to put in her mouth.

"It's nice to meet you all too."

"So where you from?" Oliver asked, propping his elbows up on the table and leaning towards me.

"Don't be rude," Megan nudged him and he pulled back slightly.

"It's fine," I told her. "I'm actually from here. I was born here, but my family moved to Maine a few months later, so that's where I grew up."

"Well, welcome home," Chloe grinned.

"Hey, usually after school we all go to this coffee shop on Main," Julie told me. "We just kind of hang out and do homework together. Do you want to go with us?"

"Sure! I just have to let my parents know that I'm not going to be home right away."

I quickly texted my parents in a group chat, letting them know I'd made some friends and would be going with them after school.

My dad responded very quickly:

What about your homework?

I responded:

It won't be a problem. Julie said they go there and do homework together.

My mom replied before my dad had a chance to say no:

Ok, be safe, have fun, and let me know if you need us to come get you.

I pocketed my phone and finished my lunch while listening to my new friends chat about how their mornings had gone.