Contest entry for the Thirst Vampfic Contest
Title: Imprint of Yore
Summary: I always used to find Romeo and Juliet to be bullshit, but apparently the gods knew what I thought and decided to get a laugh at my damn expense. Too bad for them... I still want to kill him
Disclaimer: The author does not own any publicly recognizable characters herein. No copyright infringement is intended.
Imprint of Yore
I hadn't lived in Washington since I'd been four years old, and my considerably finite memory of that time left me with a mixed bag of emotions about my return as I waited to get off the plane so I could find my godfather.
I remembered more about my godfather's daughter than I remembered the man himself... And even those shadowy memories of making mud-pies with her and shoving her into the tidal pools were limited at best. The truth was, aside from the things my father had once told me about Charlie Swan, I knew next to nothing about him.
So why hadn't I moved in with one of my two older sisters after my father had died? Taken his own life, actually.
My sisters blamed the screw -up baby brother who'd been so busy skipping classes and failing school that he apparently couldn't even see what his dad was going through. The thing was – and I wasn't sure if it made it worse... or better – I had seen. I'd also heard and smelled. So I knew, unlike my sisters, that dad was sick, as in dying.
So I hadn't tried to stop him when he'd decided to choose his own exodus rather than waiting for the illness to kill him.
I'd never bothered to explain my decision to Rebecca and Rachel, though... And I had no intention to ever do so.
Of course, if they'd really cared that much about their father, they wouldn't have abandoned him and moved out the instant they'd graduated high school.
Some people would claim I was angry...
I was always angry.
Ever since I'd turned into a werewolf almost a year and a half prior, anger had been my constant companion. How Rachel and Rebecca had both escaped becoming wolves was beyond me, but they had, and barring a major upset, they would never become wolves.
Yet another reason I was moving to Forks.
In theory, there were supposed to be more like me in Washington, albeit not specifically in Forks.
Instead, they'd be in La Push, the home of the Quileutes.
Finally, after too long of a wait, the flight attendant advised we could exit the plane in an orderly fashion.
…
"Thanks for letting me stay with you," I mumbled to Charlie as he pulled into the drive of a house overrun with vines and cracked paint. Some part of me vaguely recognized it as being his home.
"It's what your dad would have wanted," Charlie said as he got out of the car, continuing after he shut the door in a mutter I wasn't supposed to hear. "Well, what Billy really would have wanted would have been for one of his daughters to take care of him, but obviously, they both have their heads up their asses."
I resisted grinning even as I contemplated explaining how it wasn't my sisters' faults. Of course, I couldn't really risk him figuring out I was a freak. The last thing I needed was to end up completely homeless.
Sighing, I opened the cruiser door and got out, shutting it behind me.
"I didn't really have much time to prepare for your arrival, Jake, so the room you'll be staying in was Bella's. The only thing I bought before you got here was a new sheet set, so you'll just have to deal with the feminine color scheme and touch until there's time to go get paint."
"It's no big deal," I said.
But the big deals would come. I couldn't help but wonder how long it would be before Charlie started insisting on me being home at certain times. How long would it be before my grades started slipping the way they had in Hawaii?
My dad had known what I was, and even he had frowned at me more than once.
How would I ever be able to make someone who wasn't allowed to know my true nature understand? Was such a thing even possible?
After pulling my luggage – a single bag – out of the trunk, I followed Charlie into the house.
Much like Washington itself, the house was built in a much more oppressive style than what I was used to. Despite the fact that most of the walls were painted white, the cabinets I could see in the kitchen were yellow, and there were several windows of varying sizes, it still felt depressing.
I was too used to the sun and open air of Hawaii.
"Your room is upstairs. First door on the left."
"Thanks."
I glanced into the living room, noticing the five pictures lined up over the small fireplace. Not one of them was recent. The newest had to be the one farthest right, which was a picture of Charlie – appearing to be in his mid-twenties – with a young woman who I suspected was his ex and a baby. Bella.
"How is Bella doing?"
The silence lasted long enough that I glanced at him. Charlie didn't say anything for several seconds longer, his face giving nothing away.
Finally, he shrugged. "She's her mother's daughter. I haven't really seen her in the last two years, not since Renee got remarried to Phil, and they all moved to Florida. Last I heard, Bella was dating some hotshot baseball player that's about a year older than her. Fred something is his name. Renee's pretty sure Bella and he will eventually tie the knot... She's completely giddy over the idea."
I frowned. "Why not ask her to move up here? Slow things down a little." I mentally kicked myself for even suggesting it. If he did get her to move up here, then where would that leave me? But I couldn't help but respond to the feeling – the need – behind what he wasn't saying. I couldn't help but know how much he missed her.
"She's a grown woman in her last semester of high school. Frankly, even if Renee wanted her to move up here, there's nothing either of us could say to force her. Bella hates Forks even more than Renee does. Now that she's legally an adult unless I go to visit her, I doubt I'll see her again."
The certainty with which he said it made me want to do something to fix it, though I had no idea how I'd manage it, much like I wasn't sure how to respond to his words.
Finally, I said, "I better go up and check out my room, I suppose."
He waved me off as I carried my bag up the stairs and went into the room he said was mine, immediately cringing as I entered.
As Charlie had stated, the room was obviously set up for a girl. They had painted the walls a pale lilac purple, and almost all the furniture was feminine in nature. It wasn't the floral engraved dresser or even the desk, which was obviously a vanity, that made me cringe, though. Instead, it was the bed – the small, twin-sized bed.
The last time someone had measured my height, I'd been only a couple inches shorter than six-feet tall, and that had been before the growth spurt which had come with becoming a werewolf. I knew I'd grown at least a good seven to eight inches with my transition. As such, there was no way I'd be able to sleep on a twin-sized bed.
However, the one good thing about the room, as long as I ignored the lace curtain, was the window.
It was an easy way for me to get in and out of the house without Charlie knowing – something I needed to do regularly.
Until my dad died, I'd shifted and ran usually once a day or more. But in the weeks since he'd passed, I'd barely managed to shift at all. There'd been too many eyes constantly on me for me to do such. Between my sisters; Rebecca's husband Solomon; and the social workers – all with questions and accusations – I'd had no chance to do the very thing I was meant to do.
Not that I was even a hundred percent certain of what that was.
Dad used to talk about legends of the werewolves being meant to protect the tribe from things like cold ones and hunters from distant lands. I wasn't sure what to make of the legends of vampires – I'd certainly never met one – but I was relatively sure that if I went around killing white men that it would end with me dead.
Besides, in spite of the tribal legends, biologically, it was merely some trait that appeared randomly in teenagers whose lineage began with the same ancestor, skipping every other generation as it did so.
The origin legend of how werewolves came to be the tribal protectors suggested Quileutes were once some sort of spirit warrior, and in order for an ancestor, one Taha Aki, to survive, he merged his soul with a wolf.
I was a skeptic, though. I assumed the ability to become a wolf started with something far more realistic. In fact, there was a one word term for it.
"Hey, Charlie, I'm tired and going to hit the hay," I shouted down to the living room before shutting my bedroom door.
The instant I heard his affirmative, I forced the window open, wincing as it made a painful squeak.
I waited a moment, but when Charlie didn't storm up the stairs to determine the source of the noise, I slid out of the window feet first, cursing under my breath at how small the window was.
Once outside, I stripped out of my clothes before closing my eyes and imagining the giant russet wolf I'd turn into.
The change took me, and I landed on the ground on all fours before taking off into the forest.
…
Charlie had offered to give me a ride to school in the morning, but the thought of arriving at school in a police cruiser had made me decide to walk. Not that it mattered in the long run because I was singled out the instant I got to school.
"May I help you, sir?" a loud voice thundered as I was walking through the parking lot.
I looked up, startled.
A man with thinning hair at his temples in a checkered shirt stood in front of me. "I'm Jacob Black, supposed to be starting school here, today."
"Wha...? How?!"
The spluttered demand from the man would almost be funny, except it wasn't my first time dealing with such consternation. "I'm sixteen." Barely, at that.
"Humph. The main office is that way." He pointed in the direction I'd been heading before he'd stopped me.
I took it as my hint I was free to leave and continued on, hearing his muttered comment after I passed.
"Sixteen going on thirty."
I slumped forward slightly, my shoulders curling in under the all too familiar rebuttals.
Most kids and young adults always talked about how they wanted to look older, to be older, but I didn't. In fact, I hated it – absolutely despised it. I purely wanted to be a normal kid, not some werewolf destined to protect people and mate with some perfect soul mate someday in the future so the gene could pass on.
I didn't even like women in that way – not that I'd ever admitted it to my dad. For even though most Native American nations were actually accepting of homosexuality... And I'd never had any reason to believe my dad would have had an issue with it; some part of me just knew he would have rebuffed me over it.
Suddenly the scent of dry ice burning my nostrils had me coming to a hard stop and swinging my head around to find the source. My eyes stopped on a flashy Volvo S60R halfway across the lot.
Without getting any closer, I instantly knew the source of the scent was from the vehicle, or more specifically, whoever the hell owned it.
A shudder worked its way through me as my entire body tensed before I shut the urge to shift down hard.
Forcing myself to turn my back on the vehicle, even though I could clearly see no one was in it at the moment, was far harder than I wanted to admit. Still, I managed to do it and then continue on my way to the office.
"Ah, you must be Jacob, the ward our chief took in," the red-headed lady behind the desk – Shelley Cope according to the nameplate – said.
I smiled, grateful at least one person didn't automatically jump to the conclusion that I was some adult creep. "Yes, that's me."
"Rumor says your family was originally from here, but I don't recognize you," she said as she handed me a stack of papers.
"I was born in La Push, but after my mom was in a bad car wreck about twelve years ago, her health was deteriorated in such a way that her doctor recommended moving to warmer weather. So we did." Not that it had done much good. A mere two years later, she died in her sleep – caused by long term damage from the car wreck. "Before we moved, my parents didn't come into Forks all that much. My family is a hundred percent Quileute, and we pretty much stayed to the res."
"Ah, I see. Well, your schedule is the top paper. All the different buildings are clearly labeled, so it should be easy for you to find your way around. But be sure to get all your teachers to sign the next page and bring it back here at the end of the day." She became brisk with her instructions as the first bell of the day rang. "You better hurry."
"Thanks." I turned and headed out, glancing at the paper just long enough to see my first class of the day was supposed to be math.
"Least favorite subject," I grumbled as I walked briskly to the mess of buildings for classes, finding the one with the matching number and entering it.
As I opened the door, I could hear chatting in the room, which stopped as soon as I stepped in. I refused to look too closely at my classmates; instead, I focused on the large desk I made my way to. "I'm supposed to get you to sign this, Mr. Varner." I handed him the second sheet.
As he looked at the paper I gave him and pulled out a pen to sign it, I couldn't help but overhear the muttered words by a couple of the students behind me.
"I thought the chief's godson was from Hawaii."
"He is, but he's from La Push originally."
"Yet another giant freak from them. What did they do, give their kids steroids in the womb?"
"Who knows, but at least he's a dude. That one Clearwater chick is damn close to seven-foot tall."
"Eh... tall girls are hot."
My ears were burning as I took the paper back from the teacher, and he instructed me to sit at one of the open desks. I turned, finally focusing on all the students in the class, immediately noting the two kids leaning close to each other – clearly the two that had been gossiping. The class as a whole was a fairly even split of guys and girls. But it was the overwhelming feeling of nervousness and even fear which encompassed most of the students that made me want to walk out and never come back.
Instead, I made the way between two aisles and took a seat toward the back of the room, slouching in the desk as best I could.
The next three classes each consisted of much the same, with overheard whispers and an overabundance of nervousness leading into fear.
"You know, if you smile a little, people will think you're a bit more friendly," a girl's voice to the left of me said as I stood to go to lunch.
"What?" I looked over, having to look down in the process.
If the girl was much over five-foot-tall, I'd be amazed. "You know. Smile. Seem a little approachable."
"Well, you approached me without me having some false expression on."
"We're probably going to see each other quite a bit as I live literally around the corner from you. I figured I'd better introduce myself, I'm Katie."
I couldn't help but grin slightly as I gripped the hand she held out to me. Her undeniable forced cheerfulness was more than a little amusing.
"Hi Katie, I'm pretty sure you know I'm Jake. Everyone knows I'm Jake." I rolled my eyes over the knowledge that everyone seemed to know about me.
"It's a small town. Once Chief Swan mentioned it to one of the waitresses at The Lodge, it became public knowledge."
"Is that how this place works?"
"Pretty much," she said as she grabbed her backpack from the ground. "Come on, let's walk and talk. I've got to get some of Wednesday's mystery meatloaf. It's to die for."
I laughed hard at the amount of sarcasm she managed to fit into those two sentences. "Is that what the food is like here?"
"Yes!" she stated adamantly before continuing, "Okay, this place isn't really that bad. We get pizza delivered from Port Angeles a couple times a month, and sometimes we get subs brought in. Of course, no using your free school lunch for those options. But they also have a snack bar and a deli section. But the actual official lunches... yeah, they're shit."
"I see. So, if everyone knows everything here, then what do you know about the kids in La Push?" When she didn't reply immediately, I explained why I wanted to know. "I overheard a couple of kids in my first period mentioning how I was a freak like them."
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Katie roll her eyes. "Had to be D.J. At least now I know why you're scowling so much today. Ignore him, he's an idiot. "
"But is there truth to it?"
"Umm... sort of. Some of the kids there about three years ago shot up like weeds, with the most noticeable being a girl who goes by Lee Lee. She seemed to jump a foot and a half in height overnight, though I'm sure it actually took months for her to get that tall. It's just we weren't paying attention, I guess. Anyway, there's about twelve of them in La Push that are like that. Some of the kids here call them a cult because they all hang out together, but it's just a bunch of bullshit. They're just kids that got lucky with their gene pool. And trust me, as a person who weighs a buck ten soaking wet, I know what I'm talking about."
"I suspect that's one of those things where the grass always seems greener from the opposite end of the spectrum. I mean, as cool as it may seem that I could go into a liquor store and buy alcohol without getting ID'd, the first time you have a teacher ask why you've been held back, it puts this whole growing up young shit into a real perspective."
She giggled ever so slightly. "I suppose you're right. There's positives and negatives to any picture. Well, this is the cafeteria. I'm going to go sit with my boyfriend and his group. If you want to join, you can." She walked away after we entered the cafeteria, heading to a large group of kids.
I turned to the cafeteria food line, and as she promised, mystery meatloaf. It even smelled like a mystery. After looking through the different options available, I settled on a bag of chips and a bottle of Gatorade.
There were a couple of empty tables available, but as I looked toward one, I couldn't help but notice Katie stiffening. Obviously, she was preparing to get me if I didn't join of my own accord. Shaking my head, I went over to the table.
"Yay, I'm glad you decided to join us. This is my boyfriend, Eric. He's a senior. Well, actually, a good number of these are seniors. That's Mike, Jessica, Tyler, Lauren, Ben, Angela, and Austin." Katie rattled off the names as she pointed at each one.
A few of them said hello, which I responded to appropriately as I took my seat.
"I couldn't help but notice when I got to school that there was about a forty thousand dollar Volvo in the lot. Who can afford something like that here?" I asked, taking advantage of being at a table with a bunch of students to figure out what exactly I'd smelled.
"That's the Cullens car. Most of them graduated last year, but the two youngest, Edward and Alice, graduate this year. They're over there, as ostentatious as their car."
I turned to look in the direction that the brunette pointed – I was pretty sure she was the one Katie had pointed out as being Jessica.
I stopped breathing the instant I spotted the two sitting at a table in the far corner. If it weren't for the pale skin that, even with the distance between us, I could tell looked closer to stone than flesh, I'd say they almost looked like teenagers. But they weren't.
They weren't even human.
I clenched my hands into fists, just as the male, Edward, glanced at me.
For a moment, absolutely everything stopped as I found myself staring into the most stunning honey-golden eyes I'd ever seen.
It was as if I was free-falling into an ocean with no way out.
Then he did a crooked half-smirk.
Everything snapped into place, and I jumped up, not even caring about the surprised exclamations from the people at my table. I stalked out of the cafeteria in a hurry, only mildly realizing my speed was probably more than human fast.
"No way. No fucking way," I ground out as I continued pacing away from the school, reaching the fence at the back of the school property in record time and climbing over it. "I'm not doing it. I won't."
I was supposed to imprint on some girl. Continue the line and all that shit.
Imprint on a blood-sucking fiend, though? Unheard of.
And not happening.
I wouldn't let it.
"Am I really worse than being bound to someone you'd literally have no sexual attraction to?" A shockingly smooth voice said from just to my left all of a sudden.
I spun, finding Edwa... I mentally shook myself... finding the vampire, my kind's enemy, about ten feet away.
"I don't know what the fuck you're talking about."
"Yes, you do. Also, if my kind is your enemy, then why did you imprint on me?"
"Mother nature apparently likes classic romances like Romeo and Juliet and decided to dick with me. Too bad, I hate them." A small part of me registered that he somehow knew I imprinted on him, but I ignored that. He wasn't going to live long enough for it to be an issue. I wouldn't let him.
"You can't kill me, even if you wanted to."
He was entirely too confident. "Why not?" I snarled.
"Firstly, it would destroy you if something happened to me. That's just part of how your kind's imprint bond works. I'm fairly sure you know that, at least on some level. Second, your grandfather signed a treaty with my family over sixty years ago. You aren't about to break your own ancestor's treaty."
At first, his words didn't make sense, but then a vague memory of a story I'd been told at a bonfire when I'd still lived in La Push came to my mind, though I couldn't really remember any of the details about it. "Fuck!" I swore viciously, stalking away from him.
"Yes, what you're trying to remember, that's the story of my family's first time here. And I know, parasites don't have families. But we do. It was how different my family is from other vampires that impressed your grandfather," he said, catching up with me.
I spun to attack him feeling my muscles tense as I pulled on the wolf in me.
He jumped backward so quickly I pulled up short.
"Just stay the fuck away from me!" I snarled.
"If that's what you really want." I didn't know him well enough to truly know, but I would swear there was mirth in his eyes.
I ignored it.
"It is!" I spun, shifting to wolf as I raced away.
I'd kill him before I'd agree to any classic love story bullshit... well, maybe.