Toxic Rose
Chapter One: The New Girl
A/N: Editing the series for grammar and consistency as of summer 2018. The main content will remain unaltered, just doing some sprucing up. Additionally, now more aware of how FFnet works, I am including warnings for violence, self harm, dub-con, and adult content.
"H-Hello, my name is Bella Swan."
A young, pale skinned girl of seventeen introduced herself in front of her peers in the new school she would be attending. She had brown eyes complimented by brown hair which she had tucked under a too big hoodie with some little known college name on it.
"Ah, Isabella Swan, the chief's daughter, right?" the balding English teacher of the first period class asked the girl in question, who shifted her feet uncomfortably.
"Yea, but I prefer the name Bella." The girl blushed awkwardly and ducked her head down.
"Well then Bella, why don't you take a seat so that we can get this class started." The teacher gestured towards an empty seat next to a blonde haired boy. Bella made her way carefully over to the desk and sat down. "I'm Mike," the blonde introduced himself, a wide grin on his face. "Where are you from, Bella?" he asked as the teacher started his lesson and began to drone on.
"I'm from Phoenix"
"You don't look very tan," Mike joked.
"Yea, I didn't spend too much time in the sun," Bella stammered and pulled out her notebook to take notes. Why was this boy already talking to her? She was too overwhelmed with first day jitters to try to come up with a conversation. She had just moved in and settled here two weeks ago. Being reunited with her father had felt weird but what was she to do? Her mother was getting remarried and starting a new family, it was best to stay out of the way.
Bella tried to angle her body away from Mike so that he would see she was busy with something but he was not easily deterred. "If you have any questions about this school just ask me. Or if you need help finding your classes or want a tour, I'll be here."
Bella just nodded her head and scribbled down something the teacher was saying. Mike smiled and took out his notebook. "Man, I wish I was such a good note taker..."
This continued all period long until the bell rang. "Let me take you to your next class. What do you even have?" Mike grabbed the schedule out of Bella's hands before she could even register what was happening. "Follow me, I have the same class. Let's sit together too, I can tell you a bunch of cool things about the professor." Bella let out an inward groan at spending another class period with this talkative and annoying boy.
She just wanted to be left alone. She hated attention. But the students of Forks only high school were not keen on letting Bella out of their sight. She was the new girl in school, as well as the chief of police's daughter and her name found its way onto everyone's tongues by the end of the day. They were curious to meet her and by the time lunch had arrived, Bella's brain had been turned to mush by Mike's incessant chatter, she'd been hit on by a guy named Eric, and a girl named Jessica had attached herself to her side, insisting she had to sit with them for lunch. Bella was on the fence about sitting with someone for lunch. She was too tired out by first day nerves to talk to anyone and she just wanted to curl up in bed and watch Netflix but she agreed to Jessica's demands in hopes that Mike would leave her alone and that she could somehow answer any questions the student body had about her under Jessica's interrogation. For that was the whole purpose of the lunch. She could tell Jessica was a rumor mill and whatever she told her would come full circle.
"So tell us about yourself," Jessica prompted as she slid into a white cafeteria table occupied by Eric, a dark skinned girl, a blonde girl, and ugh, Mike.
"I'm from a big high school in Phoenix. Nothing small like this town," Bella mumbled, not sure what she could provide to satisfy Jessica.
Jessica twirled her hair around her finger. "Okay, what's something cool about you?"
Bella shrugged haplessly as she bit into her apple. "I don't know."
"Like, do you play any instruments or juggle? Like, I can do my makeup in a moving car." Jessica twirled the hair harder, a crease growing between her eyes.
Bella shrugged again. "I'm just not talented, I can't do anything cool."
The crease deepened. "Are you sure?"
Bella nodded.
"What about- I don't know, just say one interesting thing about yourself." Jessica was trying hard but Bella simply was not an interesting person or had done anything remotely interesting.
She did know one thing that would peak the girl's interest but this was something she would never ever tell anyone again for fear of what had happened last time.
"Jessica lay off her. The poor girl's probably overwhelmed by the first day of school and she doesn't need you grilling her." The dark skinned girl finally spoke up, looking away from an article she had been reading on her phone.
"Yea, and besides when were you going to introduce all of us?" Eric smiled and winked at Bella. "I'm sure she'd like to get to know us too." Bella held in an inward shiver.
"I'm sure you didn't forget my name, we've spent the whole day together." Mike looked at Bella, propping his head up on his elbow and smiling at her. Yea, there's no way I could forget someone as annoying as you, although I wish, Bella frowned.
"You're Mike and you're Eric," Bella pointed to each individual. "Jessica, and I'm sorry, I don't know the last two."
"I'm Lauren," the blonde girl announced. "But you'd know if Jessica wasn't such an attention hog." Bella noticed the barb wasn't hidden and so did Jessica, who just glared at the girl.
"And I'm Angela," the dark skinned girl responded. She smiled warmly at Bella and Bella felt like perhaps she would be the only one she could genuinely ever like.
The doors to the cafeteria swung wide open and a group of five students walked in, gait confident and relaxed. Bella felt her attention zero in on them immediately and she gulped hard. They were like nothing she had seen before. The first to walk in was a big guy, his muscles straining the tight designer clothes he wore. He had a silly smirk on his face and was talking animatedly with a smaller blonde haired boy who looked solemn and not to be enjoying the conversation at all. His frame was smaller and he wore looser clothing, but it was still immaculate like the giant's outfit.
The third boy was shorter than the other two and his bronze hair was twisted into a messy style. He had a brooding look on his face that said he was in pain, but what could he possibly be tortured about when he looked so handsome? And lastly, two girls entered the cafeteria. One of them was short and pixie like, her height barely above five feet. Her dark spiky hair stood out in all directions and she walked with delicate footsteps. All of them looked so beautiful, so otherworldly, and Bella knew they had to be the popular kids in the school. Their clothes and posture reeked of money and attitude. They knew they were the prettiest, coolest and most sought after. But all of their beauty was nothing compared to the last girl's appearance. She had ruby red lips, pale blonde hair, and an enchanting figure that anyone would kill to possess. Bella felt her mouth drop open as the five paraded past her and sat down in the cafeteria table in the middle. She tried to crane her neck not so subtly to continue looking at them as they sat down and started eating their lunch casually as if they hadn't just blown her away.
"Ah, so you've fallen under the spell of the Cullen's, have you?" Eric's teasing voice had a full blown smirk behind it, and it brought Bella out of her thoughts but not out of her staring. She watched every movement they made, from the big rash hand gestures of the big one to the small delicate ones of the pixie's.
"The Cullen's?" Bella asked, her voice a whisper as she finally realized Eric had said actual words.
"Yea, they're the popular group here, although I think you could already tell from their clothes. The big one over there is called Emmett Cullen, the brooding one is Edward Masen, the pixie is Mary Alice Brandon and the last two are siblings, Jasper and Rosalie Hale."
Rosalie... The name rolled off the tongue so easily. It was such a beautiful but old fashioned name. Fit for a queen like her. In fact, all of their names were a bit old fashioned-like names for royalty, which fit in perfectly with their character.
"Why do you call them the Cullen's?" Bella asked, her gaze still focused on their table. They moved with such a grace it was hard to believe people were capable of it. She was so clumsy herself that she was surprised she hadn't tripped yet today.
"They all live under the care of a guy named Carlisle Cullen. They're kind of like siblings but not. It's weird." Lauren's voice was the one that answered.
"Don't waste your time with them though, especially Edward. Apparently no one is good enough to date them or hang out with them." Jessica replied this time, her voice filled with a bitterness.
"That's only cause you got rejected," Lauren pointed out and the two started to bicker about something that had happened in the past.
Bella tuned this out as she continued staring. All of a sudden she noticed that Rosalie was staring back at her. Bella froze, blood rushing to her face as the blonde's gaze narrowed. Bella quickly turned around and busied herself with her lunch, trying to resist the urge to look back for the rest of the lunch period.
After lunch she found she didn't have any classes with Mike, thank goodness, but he still insisted on walking her to her class. As Bella entered the class, waving goodbye to him, she immediately saw that none other than Rosalie Hale was sitting in the second row. Shit, is she going to say anything about the staring? Bella felt awkward as she remembered how she had unabashedly stared at the gorgeous individuals at lunch.
Luckily Rosalie was preoccupied with something in her bag so Bella decided she could quickly sneak past her. As she was about to pass Rosalie's desk she felt something hard against her leg and she tripped, letting out a small squeak before a vice like grip grabbed her by the arm and held her up and close, perfect ear level to Rosalie's mouth. "If I ever catch you staring at me again, bitch, I will pluck out those ugly eyes of yours." Bella felt a cold chill run down her back at Rosalie's hissed threat. Then, she was letting go and pulling Bella up to her full height. "Be careful." She purred, a complete one eighty of what had just happened seconds ago. Bella gulped loudly and hurried back to her seat her mind racing.
What the fuck had just happened? It had occurred so quickly. She pulled out her notebooks and tried to push the incident out of her mind. Surely this was expected. She was the popular girl, they were usually bitchy and Bella had stared at her for a long time in what was seen as a creepy manner. So the threat hadn't been unwarranted. Bella would keep in mind not to stare at Rosalie ever again.
But this was harder said than done. Her gaze kept unintentionally drifting towards her during class to admire the color of her hair or the straightness of her back. Even the way she took things out of her bag and placed them back in was mesmerizing to Bella. Shortly, class was over before Bella knew it and she had barely taken any notes instead having doodled pictures of long wavy blonde hair. She quickly packed her things up and tried to leave the room to her next class when she caught Rosalie's eye. The blonde was squinting at her.
"I warned you," she mouthed and Bella felt her heart rate spike. Had she noticed Bella staring? Bella stood rooted, for what seemed to be forever, to the floor as she waited for the blonde to finally leave the room before making her own departure. She had more important things on her mind than being late to her next class. Like how she had made enemies with the most popular girl in school and was now going to lose her eyes.
Oh boy, what a year it was going to be.