-Gunner-
Apparently, colleges get out for the summer before high schools do. Which I found to be annoying, especially when Maisie dramatically burst through the front door with her luggage. I forgot Dad had gone to get her from the airport.
"Ava!" I heard her yell. I rolled my eyes and turned back to study guide. Before I could read the next question to Derrick, he leaned forward to whisper to me.
"Dude, your sister's gotten hotter. How's that possible?" Now I rolled my eyes at him. And hit him with my pencil, for good measure.
"Shut the hell up. She's still obsessed with Jasper. You don't have a chance." Still, Derrick watched Maisie put Ava to work helping her get her luggage up to her old bedroom.
"You gonna tell me what this stick up your ass is about?" Derrick was still whispering to me, probably because Mom was flitting in and out of the kitchen, checking on the lasagna in the oven.
I dropped my pen and rand my hands over my face instead. No, D, I'm not. Because half of my problems revolve around my girlfriend's stupid wolf pack.
"I have to get a good grade on this bio final," I said instead. "My parents are gonna kill me if I get a D and have to take a summer class to make it up after graduation."
That was a legitimate concern. I had sucked at biology II all year. If I didn't make a B or higher on this final, then I would have a D at the end of the school year. I would have to beg to walk at graduation and take a remedial course during the summer to make up the difference between my final grade and a C to get my diploma in my hand.
"Alright," Derrick conceded. I guess it showed on my face how stressed out I was by all this. "We'll study. Like, really study. Give me the guide and I'll ask you questions for a while."
There was still a week until our bio final. We had time to study. I just hoped that the information stuck in my brain, and I was able to remember it on test day. It was just so hard to concentrate when my mind kept wandering back to every guy I'd like to punch in the face if I could.
Surprisingly, this was something in my life that had nothing to do with Maisie. She was still human, so the pack had no further complaints they could make. About Maisie, anyway.
Complaining about me was another story. Well, not me, specifically. I guess it probably would have been same for any guy Leah imprinted on, if it hadn't been me. Because no matter who it was that fate brought to Leah, he would have been just as weak compared to Leah as I was.
To be fair, it wasn't most of the pack. Sam and his second- and third-in-commands, Jared and Paul, were cool with me. They had too much respect for the whole idea of imprinting not to be. And Seth had always been friendly with me, even before I started dating Leah and he and his friends would join us at La Push Beach when we made trips over there.
The younger boys—all of which Seth had taken under his wing—weren't that bad, either. Their comments, at least, were said in true jest.
Who was I kidding? It was mostly Jacob, Quil, and Embry.
Does Leah let you wear the pants?
Hey, man, who tops? Like, seriously.
Eventually we're gonna end up seeing you naked from all the times you go through Leah's head when we're all wolfed out.
"They're just jealous because none of them have imprinted," Leah would tell me. Her words weren't as soothing as she intended them to be, though. I doubted it had much to do with imprinting, and a lot more to do with all three of them just being assholes.
And I was hung up on all of this because of a tradition for the younger wolves. The pack newbies hadn't heard Billy Black's retelling of the Cold Ones legend. I hadn't heard it either and I had only heard the legend in joking tones before I knew it was real.
"What this thing you're going to with Leah tonight?" Mom asked me over dinner. It was Maisie's first night home, and I knew Mom was annoyed I had plans. She was watching Maisie pick the green chile out of her casserole. With Maisie's head dipped over her plate, she missed how Mom shook her head affectionately at her.
"Uh, it's just a bonfire thing," I told her. "It's tradition for the elders to tell the tribe legends around a bonfire, I guess. Keeps the heritage alive, you know?"
That caught Maisie's attention. Her head shot up, and so did one of her eyebrows, disappearing under the edge of her bangs. I knew she knew, there was no way she didn't, so I nodded at her unasked question. Maisie nodded back and returned to digging through her food.
"Leah invited you along for something like that? Huh, sounds pretty special." The only teasing I could stand was from Dad, who dramatically waggled his eyebrows to make Ava giggle over her plate.
"It's not a big deal," I tried to downplay, but I could feel my face getting hot. Obviously, I wasn't part of the Quileute tribe so… It kind of was a big deal.
"Don't worry, I have a sneaking suspicion that asshats one through three will be on their best behavior tonight with the oldies around."
That was how Leah greeted me at her front door, in a whisper so Charlie Swan wouldn't hear over the baseball game he was watching in the Clearwater living room, before she slipped her hand into mine and led me back down the driveway. Seth came tumbling out of the house after us, jumping from the front porch to make up the distance we had gained on him.
"Hey, wait for me. I don't wanna walk in the dark alone."
"We're walking there?" I asked, making Leah roll her eyes.
"You two, I swear. It will not kill either of you to walk to the cliff. It's not even far."
"Yeah, but they did make these great inventions a while back," Seth started, throwing a wink my way. "I don't know if you've heard of them. See, they've got wheels and make it easier and faster to get places. People have been calling them 'cars'. Gunner's even got one."
I had to admit, I was impressed with the punch that Leah threw her brother's way with her left arm. But I had to be equally impressed with how quickly Seth ducked away from the punch, laughing all the while.
"Nobody asked you, Booboo."
On we walked until we were on top of the cliff Leah had mentioned earlier. It was an outcropping of rock that overlooked the beach. I could smell the sea air wafting up to us on the cold night breeze. Never mind that it was late spring; that meant nothing, temperature wise, in Forks at night in May. There was already a fire going when we got there, illuminating Sam and the others as they passed around typical bonfire foods.
Somehow Leah already had s'mores supplies in her hands, skewering marshmallows and passing them to me and Seth.
"You wanna eat now, before old Billy Black starts talking," Seth advised me. "Once he starts, it's hard to pay attention to anything else. You'll end up holding a gross, cold s'more in your hand before you know it."
"You've heard the stories then?" I asked, knowing Seth would know what I meant. Of course, any kid in the Quileute tribe would have heard the legends growing up. Only pack members—and imprintees—heard the legends as facts around these bonfires.
"Oh, yeah. They threw one for me and Leah when we phased. I think we had earned it."
Yeah, Seth, I guess phasing in front of your dad and them him dying of a heart attack earns you a bonfire.
Leah pulled her marshmallow from the fire, bringing it closer to my face so I could blow out the flames for her. Surprisingly, there wasn't even a comment from Jacob or one of his buddies about me being Leah's bitch or anything. I guess they were on their best behavior for Billy, and the other older men around the fire.
We ate our s'mores in silence, trying not to drip molten chocolate all over us. Seth ended up with a smear across his cheek; Leah licked her thumb and wiped it away, leaning across me to reach him. I caught Leah as she started to pull away, wrapping my arm around her as she rested her head on my shoulder.
She kissed the space just below my ear before whispering, "It's about to start."
A quiet had fallen around the circle, muffling and then silencing the laughter and chatter around the fire. And then Billy Black started to tell a story that I had only heard in between laughs and eyerolls.
"Chief Taha Aki had a long reign, and our people prospered under his careful watch. He defeated Utlapa, saving the Quileute people and becoming the Great Wolf. For over two hundred years, he protected the tribe, and paved the way for his descendants to take the wolf form even today."
I had heard Billy speak a few times, but now his gravelly voice carried such a solemnity to it that I felt enraptured by it. Leah, who had already heard this story time and again, had slid her hand up my hoodie to rest against my chest. Even the burn of her skin on mine did not draw my attention away like it usually did.
"It was during his reign that the Cold Ones first appeared," Billy continued, "and they, ultimately, were the reason his reign ended."
His voice carried on, mixing with the smoke from the fire. He told us how the Cold Man and Woman, the first vampires the Quileute had ever encountered, terrorized the Makah people and nearly started a war between the tribes. The revelations of what the Cold Ones were—their 'sickly-sweet' smell, cold bodies, near indestructibility.
The fights that ensued between Taha Aki's sons and these strange beings.
"So vengeful was the Cold Woman, for her mate's death, she was determined to destroy the Quileute tribe, and try she did. All of Taha Aki's older sons perished, leaving only their father to battle the Cold Woman. But Taha Aki was over two centuries old, and though he was a valiant warrior still, he wasn't as strong as he once was. The Cold Woman very well may have succeeded, had the Third Wife not plunged a knife into her heart to save her people."
The Third Wife's sacrifice. Taha Aki's retreat from the tribe, still in his wolf form, never to be seen again.
Despite being flanked on each side by Leah and Seth—both of who radiated nearly as much heat as the fire—I got colder and colder the more Billy spoke. My insides felt like ice as he described the barbaric ways of the ancient vampires.
My mind was racing, but I couldn't reconcile the image of these brutal hunters snapping the necks of the Makah girls and draining their blood with the polite and genteel Cullens.
When Maisie's face swam up in my thoughts, I pushed it down immediately. Never mind that no one here could read my mind like Edward could; I would have died on the spot if anyone knew I had compared my very much alive, very much not a killer sister to those cold beasts.
"To this day, we battle Cold Ones." Was it a trick of the firelight, or was Billy really looking right at me even as I tried to avoid his eye? "Though now they try to deny their nature and hide behind a human face, the Cold Ones remain our enemies. But one day, those masks may slip, and we must make ourselves ready for the day we may be at war with the Cold Ones again."
There was such a finality to his words, they sent a shiver through my body that not even Leah wrapped around me could ward it off.
"Hey, Gun."
When we were little, Maisie used to wake up before me all the time. She would come into my room and lean over my bed, so that her long hair tickled my nose. Just like it did the morning after the bonfire.
"Mmmm." I rolled away from her, but, of course, that didn't dissuade Maisie in the slightest. She climbed onto my bed, occupying the space I had made, my mattress dipping under her weight.
"Let's get tattoos."
I rolled again, stretching my legs, trying to cling to the sleep my sister's voice was pulling me out of. "What?"
"Tattoos. There's this expo thing in Port Angeles tonight. C'mon, it would be fun. And you're eighteen, I'm nineteen, Mom and Dad can't tell us no."
Giving up at sleep, I pushed myself up, so I was sitting beside her.
"When did you get this idea?" I asked, eyeing her through my fingers as I rubbed at my face. Her cheeks were flushed, meaning Jasper must have given her a dose of blood last night. I had learned to track these subtle changes in her during my time in Alaska.
"Last night, while I was reading to Ava. She's on a space kick. We read about moon phases."
I smirked, already knowing where this was going. "You think I should get a full moon because Leah's a werewolf, huh?"
"It's fitting," she admitted, running her fingers through the ends of her hair. "But we were both born under full moons, did you know that? Yours could be gray scale, traditional. I would get mine in red ink."
Maisie smiled at me then, waiting for me to get her joke. When it clicked, I groaned at her, falling back into my pillows and blankets.
"You know making it a blood moon would be funny."
"Hilarious," I told her, stretching out and trying to kick her off my bed. "Get outta my room, unless you come back with breakfast."
A/N: Do you ever just randomly remember that the actor who played Seth was named Booboo Stewart? And then you go on a deep dive about him on Google and read all about his acting career? And then use the actor's name as Leah's nickname for Seth in your fic?
Same.
Anyway, I know I said I wouldn't put this out until Saturday, but I'll be travelling tomorrow so I decided to go ahead and post it tonight.
Now that it's summer, (in the story) a lot of fun will be happening. Mostly: The Cullen family on Isle Esme, which I have been SO EXCITED to write. There's a ton of ideas in my head, a lot involving scenes between one of my favorite dynamics-Maisie and Emmett.
