Y'all just to clarify - I'm aging up the wolf pack by a couple of years and having them phase by the beginning of the first book because this is fanfiction, dammit, and I can do what I want.
Chapter One - Break
We were driving along a winding, sharply twisting road through the gorgeous Idaho mountains. A river spotted with white rapids roared down below us to the right. Endless trees all around us, reaching upward toward the steely gray sky. Windows down, hair blowing, music blaring. Destination: our lake. I had one hand on the wheel, the other jazz-handing around as I wriggled in my seat along with the beat, driving a bit too fast and much too confidently as we teenagers tend to do. Barely remembering our friends following along much more safely behind us. Rebecca beside me, DJing and singing at the top of her lungs, hand out the window, floating through the air.
"Ooooh I'm just a girl living in captivity," Her hideously off-key singing muffled now, as she bent down to retrieve the snacks she'd stashed on the floor. It slowly trailed into a mumble as she fumbled with the wrapper on ultra-sour gummy worms.
"Oooooh, I'm just a girl, lucky me," I continued singing, glancing over and holding out my hand for the bag, now steering with one hand and only half a mind. She dropped the bag in my hand and then turned her attention to her phone to pick our next musical masterpiece as our song wound to an end. I pulled open the gummy worms, upturned the bag into my mouth.
"Hey! Keep your tongue off my food!" She laughed as she pulled them away, leaving a shower of sour pixie dust to cover my shirt and gummies hanging out of my mouth.
"Wrood," I garbled around the mouthful of gelatin, taking both hands off the wheel and brushing the dust off with one while simultaneously pulling the excess candy from my mouth. Rebecca laughed at me again as she sticks her tongue out. She stretches her arms to the sky and lets out a yell.
"We're invincible!" She cried, candy clenched in her fist, red hair glowing despite the overcast sky.
And in that moment, for the first time and the last time, it was true.
She turned on 'Break' by Three Days Grace, cranking up the volume even more. I speed up and don't even realize it.
"Oh my God, I forgot to tell you Hot James in my chemistry class -" she began but what she was going to say about Hot James I'll never know because that moment we rounded a blind, hairpin turn and he was there. In the middle of the lane, like he had been waiting for us. For me. I had no time to swerve, to stop, so I sped up, maybe I could kill him? Oh God, please let me kill him. Rebecca screamed as Adam Gontier sang 'At night I feel like a vampire".
"What are you doing? You're going to hit him!" She screeched, grabbing hold of the steering wheel and pulling hard to the right, toward the edge. As we missed him and veered toward the drop-off I turned and watched in slow-motion. One wheel dipped off the road. He had that wicked, evil smile on his face. The second wheel left the pavement. His bright red eyes glowed with the same malice that shone when we first met. The third wheel abandoned safety. He raised his hand to wave and mouthed something. Soon. Then we were headed down, down, down. Brakes, brakes. Nothing. Too steep, too slippery. We hit a fallen log and went spinning. And everything went black.
When I woke everything was fuzzy. The airbag in front of me, collapsed all around my lap, a white blur. The numbers on the dashboard nothing - just a blur. I tried to gasp in air but it hurt, hurt, hurt. Steam, blurry and opaque rose beyond the shattered windshield. Front end of the car wrapped around a tree. Mighty, unbreakable, pine. I tried to turn to see Rebecca, but everything hurt. My window splintered and he was there, reaching for me. All red eyes and evil menace. Red? Rebecca's hair was red. Rebecca… He was reaching for me but stopped. He looked over to the passenger seat and then his eyes were black.
A growl and he was gone but then he was there again, next to Rebecca. She was gasping, gurgling around the blood bubbling from her mouth. Red against her pale skin. Bright red blood was gushing from her arm and then she was gone. Pulled out the window by a red eyed monster and away. The windshield broke. Outward? How? He must've punched it from the inside when he took her. Then I was alone. Alone, alone, until I heard them screaming for me as everything faded to black again. The radio was still playing.
Break! Away from everybody.
Break! Away from everything.
I stared at my mom in disbelief. "You can't make me do this!"'
She returned my gaze, eyes oddly blank. I've seen that look before. On others. "I'm sorry, Lydia. This is the way it has to be. Your father and I are moving to Thailand and it's really no place for you. You'll finish out your schooling with your aunt and uncle. When you graduate you can come join us."
Blindsided, heart racing, mind reeling, I turned toward my dad. "Dad! You can't be serious! I'm your daughter, you can't just abandon me!"
"It's better for all of us, this way." He said, eyes an unmarked canvas. Like he wasn't really there. "A change of scenery will be just what we all need. And not even you can get into trouble in Forks, Washington. Go start packing, the moving truck will be here by Wednesday."
"But why can't you take me with you?" I whispered, heart breaking into a million little pieces, each stinging with the pain, rejection, betrayal.
"Lydia, we just need to be away from you." Mom shakes her head sadly, knowingly, as if this makes sense but it doesn't.
I turn away so they don't see my tears. If they don't need me, then I don't need them. My mind was trying to dominate the rejection, the pain, to keep me strong. But the million quivering pieces of my heart were all I could feel. I'm up the stairs, in my room, sitting at my desk, opening my journal.
September 12, 2004.
My parents don't want me anymore.
September 17, 2004. 3:32 PM. The plane touches down in Seattle with a gentle thump. I might've felt relief, if I could feel anything other than the pain of watching my parents walk away without looking back after dumping me at the Boise Airport. What did I do? I'd racked my brain for days and nights and nothing, nothing could explain why my parents were abandoning their only daughter like this. Out of the blue, random, unexpected. Everything had been normal, fine, dandy and then that.
Numbly, I sit until the plane is mostly cleared out then I raise. Then I'm walking. Looking out the windows of the terminal at the overcast sky. Then I'm standing outside baggage claim, and staring at the revolving belts.
"Lydia." A statement. I send a glance toward my aunt and uncle. Concern, confusion, worry etched into the lines of their faces.
"I don't know why I'm here," I said, to pre-empt their questioning. Aunt Julie, resident of Forks, Washington, population 3,000, nods but she doesn't understand. I looked back toward the belt and reach for my suitcase.
But now Forks, Washington is population 3,001.
We're in the car. Passing out of the city, into trees, trees, trees. Winding roads, overcast skies. I'm waiting for him at every turn but he's not there. And neither is Rebecca. But she wouldn't be. They found her body 10 feet from the car, thrown through the windshield because she hadn't been wearing her seatbelt. Or so they believed. And I let them believe.
The hours pass quickly. We're at a small house, framed by a neat yard and gardens set against the forest on the outskirts of town. Or what they call a town. I sit and stare at my new home, wondering where on Earth I was going to go from here.
