Chapter 7

Embry POV

Today was little different to yesterday and the day before that, and the thousand before that. That is until I heard her, the woman that would change my world, by becoming my world. I was just looking up from the sand at my feet to throw my ten cents on Quil's Leach story when I saw her, heard her, wondered how I had been surviving so long without her.

I stopped walking, stopped listening to Jake and Quil, stopped caring about my own needs. All that mattered was her, forest green eyes framed by dark curls, and tanned skin that glows in the setting sunlight. My brain took a few more moments to catch up with the moving gravity around me. This beautiful, amazing, spectacular, woman in front of me that could do no wrong was…

"Ava." My hart does a somersault at hearing her name, so simple, with three letters, yet so different, so perfect for her. For my Ava... my imprint.

My brain doesn't even comprehend that this couldn't be possible, that the woman in front of me has been labelled dead for years. My inner wolf whimpers at the thought of not knowing Ava, or losing her. No, never... I feel a hand slap me on the shoulder, bringing noise back to my ears and I hear Jake say, "Congrats man, you imprinted on a dead girl."

If he sees her, and I see her… That means she's real, here, living, breathing, mine. How she is here I don't care, because she is… here and never leaving again. "She's an angel," I chuckle, and walk towards her… my angel.

Ava POV

"Ava." A slight shiver runs through me at the male voice saying my name. I look away from Leah to see…

Embry POV

"Embry." My heart skips a few beats at the sound of her soft, silvery voice saying my name. I have to remind myself to breathe… blink… See beyond her captivating features, to Sue and Leah who sit beside her, giving me strange looks.

Ava POV

He's much taller and muscular then I remember, but his eyes are still the same unforgettable dark brown that if you look close enough you can see flicks of grey. Embry and I were once great friends, from Year One to Year Eight of school. That was good… and bad, kind of the reason we stopped being friends, I guess. Embry could only see me as one of the guys, to him I was no more than Jake or Quil. But Embry was always so much more to me...

The break between Year Seven and Eight was when I made the call, and changed everything about me. My look went from sweatpants, boy's shirts and joggers to fitted jeans, girly shirts, and high heels. So Embry was going to accept me for who I wanted to be, a real girly girl like my sister had always been. Or turn me away. The teenage girl piece of me thought he would fall in love with me and we would become high school sweethearts.

But he didn't. I walked by him multiple times before our first class together and he didn't even recognize me! By the time him and the other guys realised the girl they thought was new was their tomboy done up, it was too late. I had found new friends, one of them being hot shot boy of our year, John Uley.

A guy had never looked twice at me or given me any type of attention before then. It felt amazing when he said "I sure hope you know CPR; cos you're taking my breath away." That was John's type of humour, so stupid it would always make me laugh and giggle like an idiot.

After school that day Embry and I got in a huge fight. He was yelling at me for turning into a slut, resulting in me yelling at him for being a jackass bastard. Then all chance of saying sorry and forgiving each other was thrown out the window when John stepped in and gave Embry a black eye. After that… we stopped talking, could hardly make eye contact in the school hallways. Seven years of friendship gone in the blink of a black eye.

Sitting here now, I wonder how my life would have changed if I never caused that fight. For one I would never have gotten tangled up with John, so no Chaska, no running away, no legacy to my name. I would have graduated high school, might have gone off to college, might have become a maths or arts teacher like I had wanted to when I was a little girl.

Or is the future always set in stone? If I didn't tear us apart, would something else have come along? But there's no going back in life, what has happened has happened and the only way left is forward. But if I had the option of going back… changing the past. I don't think I could do it, give up ever knowing my amazing Chaska, never getting to feel all the things John could do to my heart. And in the long run of friendship, Embry and I wouldn't have worked out. I would have been stuck in the background watching him date whichever girl was lucky enough to get his attention.

But he looks happy to see me, well really he looks to me like a blind man seeing for the first time, but that's still good, right? I think I'm looking to him the same way though; I want to look away from him but I just- I just can't, I feel like he's holding me to the earth instead of gravity. A piece of me wants to run up to him, hold him close, feel safe in his arms… But another piece of me is terrified, if I move closer to him will he run away from me? Will he yell at me; could he ever forgive me?

I'm shaken from my worried thoughts by two more familiar faces appearing at Embry's sides. The same as Seth and Embry have done, these two have also gotten taller and muscular – is everyone on steroids – but their faces, covered with cheeky smirks, make me sure they're the same Jake and Quil.

"Long time no see," Jake laughs, whilst slapping Embry on the back of the head.

"Yeah…" I smile.

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