When Jules woke the next day at noon, she lay staring at her blank ceiling, wondering if the day before had been a fever dream. Every moment replayed in her memory, every trace of Rosalie Hale imprinting itself upon her mind. Nothing had really happened out of the ordinary, and yet, the mere idea of spending more time with the strange beauty had her heart fluttering. Her emotions only served to confuse her further.
By the time Jules had her coffee and made lunch for herself and her Uncle, she had decided she was not going to think about Rosalie or any of the Cullens until Monday. This, of course, meant they were all she could think about. It was as if she had begun by staring at a dark pool, her instincts warning her of the unknown swimming beneath the depths, warning her to steer clear…and yet somehow she was now drowning in those same very depths. There was an odd peace that came with what felt like a reluctant surrender. Despite her every attempt, the glimpses of memories tugged her down deeper at every chance, until she had surrounded herself with nothing more than the very idea of Rosalie Hale.
It was these same depths she found herself lost in as the sun ticked by on its slow journey behind the dismal, gloomstruck cloud bank that loomed over Forks. Charlie was busy with a case, which served well as the comfortable silence blanketed over their simple lunch. He came and he went, as he often did on weekends, and soon Jules was left to her own devices. She attempted at starting on the pile of schoolwork Rosalie had brought for her, but she ended up working on her door mural more, humming along to the same songs from the day before in a strange motion of retracing her steps, playing back and overthinking every second of their interaction. In the afternoon, Leah announced her forthcoming kidnapping attempt on her best friend with a simple text; pick you up in ten.
This was how she found herself sat on the passenger side of Sue Clearwater's chipped blue Chevy Sprint exactly ten minutes later. She could not hear Leah's voice, it sounded muffled and distant, her conscious mind still submerged in the waves of never-ending questions she had pushed down until the day before. Her eyes, distant, stared out at the wet, moss-coated pine trees that flew by her open windscreen, and her lungs filled with the thick, moisture-heavy cold air that breezed through her honey brown hair- yet, all Jules could see was a vision of a statuesque blonde, and all she could smell was the lingering memory of her sweet perfume.
"Are you even listening to me right now? Jesus Jules!" Leah smacking her arm jolted Jules out of her reverie, a scowl descending upon her features as she rubbed over her stolen flannel sleeve. "What's up with you today? I've literally never heard you being so quiet in my life."
"You've only known me a year Lee." Jules reminded her with a roll of her eyes at Leah's dramatic nature. "Besides, I was listening- you were talking about Sam, non?"
"You just guessed that." Leah glanced at her to squint, and Jules flushed, sheepish as she tugged the buttoned open flannel shirt up higher over her vintage t-shirt, hugging around herself to stay warm. She didn't even remember getting dressed to go out. "I'm literally going through a crisis here, come on. I need you."
"Yeah, yeah I'm here. I'm here." Jules sighed, slapping her own cheeks lightly as if to wake herself up and out of her Cullen-fogged brain. She turned in her seat, the seatbelt moving with her as she faced Leah better, her back against the locked door. It was only now that Jules could see that Leah looked genuinely upset, her eyebrows furrowing as her face falls, her heart sinking to her stomach."What did he do?"
"He asked my Dad for his blessing." Leah huffed, knuckles turning white over the steering wheel, glaring eyes fixated on the road ahead. "Like what the fuck was he expecting? Obviously Dad was gonna lose his shit. He looked like he was ready to pop when I got home from the store, like literally, it was a whole thing. He had Billy there and he'd brought my mom home from work and they made Seth go outside to play. It was like a full-on intervention."
Jules knew Leah was mad, but she couldn't help the relief flooding her system. "So you're not getting married?"
"Oh no, no we're still getting married." Leah frowned, tone coming down a notch as she glanced at her best friend. "It took a lot of yelling and I had to pull the 'I'll run away with him' card as a threat, but Dad insists we wait until we graduate from high school first."
"I mean that's not so bad, right?" Jules tried to placate her, but Leah only scowled. "Think about it this way, that gives you enough time to save up for a proper wedding, you'd have your whole family there in full support. You're already a junior so it's not like it's that far off. And you guys can start saving up for after the wedding too, fix up Sam's cabin better, make the foundations for a proper future together. You know what I mean?"
"I didn't pick you up so you could be the logical one. You're supposed to be on my side, Rowe." Leah grumbled, and Jules put her hands up in mock surrender with an amused dimpled grin. "It just sucks, you know? Like why would Sam go behind my back and do that? He should've talked to me about it first. Like I knew my parents would flip their shit when they found out, which was why we agreed we were going to tell them after."
"Sam was just trying to do the right thing by you, non? You can't fault him for that." Jules reached out to playfully poke Leah in the cheek, only making the grumpy girl sulk even more. "Come on, ease up on the poor boy, hmm? He just wanted you to have your family there, he knows how much they mean to you even when you pretend to hate them."
"I don't pretend-"
Jules cut her off with a look, Leah's mouth clamping shut. She sighed. "Lee, Sam doesn't really have any family left to go back to, to have there with him on a day as important as this. He doesn't want you to have to give that up too when you have a choice. Don't take it out on him, everything he does he does because of how much he's absolutely enamoured with you."
"I hate when you're right." Leah sighed, and Jules grinned again in triumph. "Shut up."
"I said nothing you did not already believe." Jules chuckled. "Are you going to forgive him?"
"Later." Leah reached up to adjust the rearview mirror, shooting Jules a brief soft smile. "I feel like we never get to hang out just the two of us anymore, right? I mean I nearly lost my best friend this week, you could've died. The least I can do is treat you to shakes and fries at The Edge."
"It was just a cold, mon dieu you are such a dramatic little shit." Jules rolled her eyes with a huff as Leah pealed with laughter. Inwardly, Jules felt overjoyed that she could spend time with Leah without her fiancée attached to her hip. She tried desperately not to let it show, aiming her little smile out the open window and away from her best friend instead.
"Okay so what's going on with you?" Leah finally asked as they sat in a booth overlooking the Quileute Marina- the same booth Leah had sat in since she was a child. The River's Edge Restaurant, the most popular spot to grab a bite in all of La Push, was ironically nowhere near the Quillayute River and Jules had tried repeatedly in her past visits to ask why it bore the name that it did.
"Nothing." Jules shrugged, the guilt briefly spiking in her for her far too quick lie. Everything. "Same old, same old. I got so bored of being trapped home I started painting my-"
"Cut the crap." Leah cut her off with a level look, and Jules clamped her jaw shut, flushing. Her best friend squinted at her, cocking her head to the side as she seemed to search for something. Jules felt the hairs prickle along the back of her neck as she shuffled in discomfort, picking up another french fry to dip into her side plate of ketchup. "Oh my god- you have a new target."
"No I don't." Jules snorted softly.
"Yes, you totally do! Spill!" Leah's eyes lit up, sucking more chocolate milkshake through a red and blue striped bendy straw. "Come on, you literally listened to me rant about Sam the whole ride. I wanna hear the juice."
"There is no juice." Jules defended. "There's just new kids at school, you know, the Cullens?"
"Oh yeah." Leah frowned. "The Elders threw a whole tribe meeting on it, told us to steer clear. Something about ancestral bad blood, Sam and I didn't really pay attention. We were a little more preoccupied. Anyway, not the point- some people really buy into that stuff, you know? Like if Old Quil tells you to back off you know you should back off. Like, you know my cousin, Colby Fuller? He got into a motorbike accident being a dipshit with his friends and my mom went total apeshit because he should've gone to Forks Community but he insisted on showing up at our place instead, and she had to fix him up all on her own. Like I had to scrub blood off the dining table for ages, it was disgusting. Ugh."
"Yeah, Charlie and Billy are fighting about it. It's kinda stupid." Jules chuckled.
"It's the dumbest shit I've ever heard." Leah agreed with a snort. "So you like one of them? What does he look like? What's his name? Is he in your class? How'd you meet? Did he ask you out yet?"
"They're all exceptionally attractive." Jules hummed thoughtfully, being vague on purpose. Leah seemed ready to pounce on her if she didn't give any details soon, but Jules only shrugged. "It's not like that. I have already told you how I feel about dating people my own age, they don't know how to romance a girl, it is pointless. Absolutely pointless."
Jules waved it off dismissively, chewing on another french fry while Leah frowned in confusion at her. "Then what is it?"
"I do not know. Something is a bit…off? I cannot explain it, there is just something about them makes me feel strange. Like they are hiding something. I don't know, maybe I am just paranoid." Jules shrugged with a frown, pulling her full bottom lip in behind her teeth as she hesitated before speaking more on the topic. "Two of them are in my grade, and the girl, she came over to my house yesterday after offering to collect the work I missed at school. There's- she talks so differently."
"You're foreign." Leah waves off. "Everyone talks different to you."
"Non, it was not that. It was…it was like listening to Greta Garbo or…or Rita Hayworth. Like it was a completely different dialect." Jules frowned, ears ringing with Rosalie's voice once more.
"Who?"
Jules rolled her eyes. "How do I know more about American culture than you do?"
"'Coz you're a freak." Leah doesn't miss a beat, stuffing herself with more french fries. "So what? People talk different all the time. You don't sound too French, but you don't sound not-French either. That's a different dialect."
"That is true." Jules hummed, resting her chin on her fist as she fiddled with the straw in her vanilla milkshake, twirling it round and round her spindly finger. "Mmm. Je ne sais pas. There is just something odd about that family."
There's something odd about the way she makes me feel so much.
"Well you don't have to hang out with them." Leah pointed out. Jules ate another french fry, and Leah squinted at her. "You're hanging out with them."
"Mmm non, just Rosalie." Jules corrects her. "She's helping me fix the truck."
"Her name's Rosalie?" Leah chortles. Jules frowns at her. "Come on, that's a total grandma name. Poor chick. Wonder what her mom was thinking, giving her a name like that."
"I think it's a wonderful name." Jules shakes her head slightly. "It suits her well."
"Well tell her thanks once she fixes up that old wreck, maybe I can finally stop being your personal chauffeur." Leah fires back with a cheeky smirk.
Jules shot her a glowering look, fighting a smile despite herself. "You don't even have your own car."
"Why would I need my own car? That's the whole point of a fiancée, I get a personal chauffeur."
