The days turned into weeks, and the weeks into months. Jules was proud to say she spent each one doing exactly as she liked, a million little mini-adventures melting off into a montage of memories she would not trade for the entire world.

Juliette Rowe had never been one for routines. In a town as mundane as Forks, Jules found she could nurture her impulsive nature to its greatest potential. She would stick to herself during her mandatory school hours, the ones she grew to loathe with a burning passion. She would aim to finish off her homework during her lunch periods, sitting on her own at a table the other students soon learnt to evade, her self-claimed territory. The only person she ever really spoke to was Ella Hammond, who she shared most of her classes with and chose to partner up with in any classes that required as such. Ella had joined the volleyball team though, and so the two never ventured past the 'school friends' boundary.

Most days, Leah Clearwater and Sam Uley would pick her up from school in Sam's beat up Chevy Blazer, already prepped and ready for some grand adventure. They would spend their days hiking a trail through the Olympic forest, picnicking on cliffs, gathered around a campfire on First Beach with Rachel and Rebecca and all their friends. On the weekends the group of them would make trips to Port Angeles to go see a movie, or as far as Seattle for as harebrained a scheme as buying Chinese ingredients so Jules could cook more food for everyone.

Charlie Swan's house transformed from a lonely two-story bachelor pad to a bustling home often filled with teenagers and adults alike, coming and going as they pleased. Jules and Charlie grew into a close knit pair, the two coexisting in a rather informal relationship. Jules brought Charlie out of his shell as much as Charlie Swan possibly could, but she never pushed him to be more than he was-a boundary the Chief of Police appreciated. Instead, whenever Charlie worked a particularly draining case or seemed frustrated about his strained relationship with his daughter, Jules would be there for him with a fancy home cooked meal he could hardly pronounce and a beer and a coke, eating on the couch together watching a game. It was nice to have the companionship they both so desperately craved.

For Jules, it was the summer after her freshman year that things began to fall apart.

Her cousin Bella had stopped coming to Forks for the summer two years after Jules herself cut her visits, something Jules suspected to be a consequence of her own decision. This meant that she had to sit through Charlie squirming for a whole day over whether or not to bring up the issue before she finally had enough and forced him to tell her what was on his mind. Charlie had spent two weeks out of the last summer in California with Bella, a trip he intended to repeat. He extended an invitation to his niece- as did Bella through him as a proxy from their weekly phone calls. Jules suspected why- she had spent much of her youth serving as a buffer between the two awkward humans alongside her grandmother. She did not intend to keep up this tradition.

Jules had the perfect excuse. Leah and Sam had been taking her to driving lessons offered by Forks High, and she had her final test right in the middle of the proposed trip. Jules had also begun to work on restoring the truck her grandfather Geoff had left her in his will, a beloved '86 F150 short-bed that had deteriorated in the garage at the same pace his body had with his raging arthritis. Jules remembered sitting in the front seat on Charlie's lap trying to peer over the steering wheel at the stock shelves in the garage, pretending she was racing off as a child. She loved the truck, and she was determined to see it back to its glory days by the time she reached her senior year.

And so Charlie reluctantly agreed to let her crash at the Clearwater house on an air mattress in Leah's bedroom for the two weeks he would be away, and Jules felt good about her decision knowing Bella and her Uncle needed proper father-daughter bonding time without interference.

Which led to now, sitting in the back of Sam's Blazer, groaning as she dropped her head back against the glass while her best friend giggled in the passenger seat in front of her. "Could you guys be any more lovey dovey? It's disgusting. No no- it's excruciating. That's the word. Yes. Excruciating."

"You won't complain when you fall in love, just you wait." Sam laughed, still letting Leah drum her fingers along his forearm while Jules scrunched up her nose in distaste from where she was stretched out across the entire backseat, braiding a thin lock of her hair.

"What happened to that guy?" Leah glanced over her shoulder, the goofy little smile never leaving her lips. Sam was driving them to Port Angeles to watch Prizoner of Azkaban, the latest Harry Potter movie which both Leah and her had nagged him to take them for weeks. "What was his name? Trevor? Trent?"

"Troy." Jules rolled her eyes. I wonder if they would notice if a unicorn crossed the street right now, ugh. Dégoûtant. "He texts using shorthand, this is simply not acceptable. If it is so difficult to text me then call me- if I wanted to crack a code I would join Mission Impossible."

"You're too picky." Sam chuckled, reaching over to fiddle with the radio, making Jules dive forward to smack his hand sharply. Leah bubbled with laughter, used to Jules' golden car rule that she was in charge of the radio. "You're never gonna meet a guy if you don't even give them a chance."

"I do not have to give them a chance." Jules snorted, leaning back again as she shrugged. "For a chance they must first know what to do, non? I will not bother with little boys who do not know where to put their hands or how to speak. If I can woo you better than you can woo me, it is a problem, non?"

"I can't believe you just said 'woo'." Leah snorted, turning to Sam to mouth 'woo' slowly while he snickered.

Jules rolled her eyes. "L'enfant."

"At least I act like I'm seventeen, sometimes you remind me of a thirty year old. Like I picture you smoking a cigarette every time you speak waving around a wineglass with your other hand." Leah snarked.

"I think that's borderline racist." Jules squinted her eyes at Leah. "What is romance if not to be romanced? It is the chase, the thrill, the dance before you entrance. You Americains take all the magic out of it."

"Yeah. This is why you're dying alone Jules." Sam shot back at her dryly.

"If I must, I must." Jules sighed overly dramatically, returning to her earlier position as her bones cracked out, settling back against the glass. Her lips twitched up into a mischievous dimpled smirk. "But I intend to have many lovers before the end, mon ami."

The two laughed, and Jules felt her reservations fade. She had noticed in recent days, after the summer had begun and Jules had moved temporarily into the Clearwater home, that there had been a shift in their friend group dynamic. Rachel and Rebecca were going to enter their junior year of high school, which meant they would be spending less time socializing as they had forewarned so that they could focus on their studies and on taking care of Jacob and Billy- the latter's diabetes getting worse. This meant Jules had prepared herself for less time with the girls and more time with her best friend Leah, something the two had initially been excited about- until Sam inserted himself into all their grand plans for the summer. Jules hadn't minded at first, she was friends with Sam too after all and she understood that Leah and Sam were a package deal. But as the first days of the summer began, she noticed more and more how the couple often forgot her presence.

Jules hated feeling like a burden.

By the end of the movie, the feeling had returned. Jules didn't particularly care that Leah and Sam spent the first half of the movie making out in the seats next to her, she would never let anything distract her from a movie she enjoyed- and she spent the entire movie with her eyes glued to the screen so much that she forgot the bucket of caramel popcorn in her lap, snacking on it as they left the cinema instead. No, what really got under her skin was how Leah chose Sam's side in their post-movie argument.

"But it doesn't make any sense. Why would a werewolf stand on two legs?" Sam scoffed, arm over Leah's shoulder with their fingers intertwined while Jules hugged her popcorn bucket to her chest, snacking while she argued at his side.

"Because duh? That's how biology works? How would your bones shift and break to the point you turned into a real wolf? Like where does the fur come from? Where does the anatomy shift out from?" Jules frowned. "And you heard Hermione, the term werewolf came from the term 'man-wolf', ergo, part man part wolf. Not just full on wolf."

"That's not how it works." Sam rolled his eyes.

"Well excuse you, when did you become the sole expert in lycanthropy?" Jules snarked back defensively, incensed. Sam had a terrible habit of dismissing her, and Jules was not one to stand for being shut down as if it were not her place to have an opinion.

"It's in our tribe legends, it's a whole thing." Leah defended her boyfriend. "Trust me, he knows what he's talking about."

"Well why does your mythical tribe legend beasts have to match with the mythical majestical beast that is Remus R. Lupin?" Jules retorted, tossing another popcorn into my mouth. "Come on, the man's been through enough. It was merveilleux."

"Because it's stupid." Sam snorted. "Werewolves are badass, they're huge horse-sized wolves and they protected our tribe from evil. Super speed, super strength, super healing- those kids would've been dead in seconds."

Jules gasped, as if genuinely attacked. "You did not just call the golden trio kids. The sacrilège!"

"Jules-"

"Ferme ta geule! Tu as bête comme ses pieds, aller se faire cuire un œuf te plouc-"

"Jules!" Leah cut her off, so sharply and so loudly in fact that the man walking by them on the way to Sam's car jumped. "Shut up, Jesus."

Jules frowned. Leah had never looked embarrassed of her before, but she did now- and it made her feel funny inside. She didn't care what most people thought of her no matter what she did, but she did care what the people she loved thought of her. Sam was being unfairly critical of her favourite franchise, why do I have to be the one to shut up? I'm not the child they're babysitting and taking out to the movies. I'm not disrespecting Sam. He's my friend, I can tell him he's being stupid when he's being stupid, non?

"What's going on?" Jules confronted them in the privacy of Sam's car, sat in the backseat again but this time in the middle where she could see them both through the rearview mirror. The two shared a look. "No- something's been different from weeks, don't you dare tell me otherwise."

"You wanna tell her?" Sam smiled at his girlfriend, the two intertwining their hands in front of Jules. At once she wrinkled up her nose reflexively. They seemed giddy about something, as if they hadn't just shut her down for discussing a fictional creature mere minutes prior.

Jules, to her credit, merely blinked when Leah dug into her jean pocket and fished out a tiny diamond ring. At first, it didn't register in her brain what it was. Jules was fond of rings, she owned such a vast collection that she merely thought it was one she'd left behind in Leah's bedroom. Then it dawned on her that she only ever wore rings with gold bands, and this was clearly something else.

Then the confusion filled her.

"You just turned seventeen." She forced her tone to be gentle, sobered up from the jewellery she kept staring at in Leah's palm. "I know you're madly in love but-"

"We won't get married 'til Leah turns eighteen." Sam cuts her off, tone firm but the smile remaining on his lips as his tender eyes met with an oddly bashful Leah. "We haven't told our parents yet, we'll wait a while first. But when you know, you know. We want you to be a part of it."

"The wedding?" Jules' eyebrows went up. "Sure. Yeah. I'd be delighted."

Except her tone wasn't, and Jules knew she wasn't. The mere concept of signing your entire life away to one person after knowing them for only a year did not sit well with her. In fact, the entire situation did not sit well with her. If you have never been with anyone else, how do you know you've found the one? How do you know you have not just settled for the first one?

"You don't seem excited." Leah furrowed her eyebrows together, clearly looking for acceptance.

"Honestly? I think I'm in shock." Jules frowned back. "Give me a minute. Let me absorb and process, I promise I'll be throwing you a party come the morning."

"No you won't." Leah rolled her eyes with a snort, smiling fondly. "The only party you would throw before noon is a slumber party."

"I feel attacked- but also, yes."