Author's Note: Here it is!! I give you chapter 7.

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer rocks, it's all hers, all that stuff that says Twilight isn't mine!

Chapter 7

"Denali"


Mini re-cap:

"Bringing the car to a stop, Edward said,

'Here we go.' And gave me a smile. Yep, here we go. I thought nervously."


We got out of the car and I leaned outside the Volvo's door, not sure what I was waiting for. I watched the others as they made their way to the house. It was a nice house, it kind of reminded me of the Cullen's because of how big it was. I glanced again toward the others. They weren't very far ahead of me, but they were at the bottom of the porch steps. They were talking quietly (I guessed we were going to surprise them) and Carlisle turned to look at where I was standing. When he saw me, he smiled and gestured for me to join the group. I smiled sheepishly and caught up to them. I think that Carlisle was just making sure that that we were all there and accounted for (which, we were) but as I got to the Cullens, the door to the other "vegetarian" vampires' house opened. And then they came out greeting us.

"Carlisle!" A pretty, strawberry-blond haired vampire called. From what I was told on the way up here, this must be Tanya, the leader of this "coven" or whatever it was called. She was pale -- they all were -- like the rest of us. After her came (who I guessed) her "sisters", Kate and Irina. Then came Carmen and Eleazar.

Everyone was talking excitedly now. I was expecting perhaps a few handshakes, an exchange of how things have been since they've last seen each other, something like that. Instead, I found myself in the middle of a big reunion. It was kind of loud, they were all talking at once, addressing each other and saying things about "how long it's been". It reminded me of a family reunion with people that haven't seen each other for a longer time than usual. I guess that they had been away from these guys for longer than I thought.

It was touching, how warm they were. I guess that what I was really expecting was a casual exchange of hello's and then to wait for them to notice me and then… be discussed or judged, something like that! I really wasn't sure at all what to expect! Maybe this won't be as bad as you've been expecting, Courtney. I thought to myself.

Then, I'm pretty sure it was Carmen, broke away from a hug that she had given Esme, and her gaze fell immediately on me. She came over to me and offered me her hand.

"Hello, my name is Carmen." She said politely. Esme had followed her over and as I smiled and shook Carmen's hand, Esme said,

"Carmen, this is Courtney. When we met her, we discovered that she had been following our way of life and we offered to have her stay with us for a while." Carmen gave me a welcoming smile and said, "Welcome, Courtney. It's a pleasure to meet you." I already liked Carmen.

I smiled back and said, "Thank you. It's a pleasure to meet you, too." When I said that, Eleazar came and introduced himself to me. After him Kate, Irina, and Tanya also came over. When they had all said a quick hello to me, Carlisle said, "Everyone, this is Courtney. As Esme mentioned to Carmen, she has been hunting animals, and we offered to have her stay with us." He looked at the other group of vampires. Tanya spoke up.

"You're very welcome here, Courtney." She said lightly, with a smile.

Then we were all lead inside the house. Some started to talk to each other again, but it was quieter. Kate came up to me and asked me things about where I've been and how long I've been on my own for. She mentioned that she and her "sisters" have been together for many centuries - about 1,000 years. Carmen and Eleazar are roughly about 400 years old now, which is a little older than Carlisle (he's about 360 years old now).

From outside, this house reminded me of the Cullens'. You could see that it was big and open, much like theirs, except for the fact that they probably didn't have huge window for a back wall. We went through a small foyer that opened up into a nice, big living room. It was a light tan with dark wood trim. Where one of the corners of the room should have been, there was a huge fireplace. Mounted over it, there was yet another gigantic plasma screen TV, and I could see speakers for surround-sound here and there. There was nice leather furniture and a coffee table in front of the largest couch, which was in front of the fireplace and TV. There were also decorations throughout the room, for example, a painting of a landscape on one of the walls, or a nice clock on the mantle. As far as I could see, in the wall across the room behind the furniture there was an arch that opened up to the kitchen. Along that wall next to the arch, a nice, wide staircase led to an upper floor. There were fancy-looking pillars on either side of the staircase, one halfway into the wall. A little past that, there was a door in the wall that was opened to another staircase leading to a lower floor. Next to the fireplace, there was a small wooden cabinet about three feet tall. It probably held a few movies, perhaps maybe some game systems. Overall, it had a nice, homey feel to it.

I guessed that we were going to have anther sort of meeting -- we seemed to have a lot of those -- and I sat with Kate on the largest couch. This time, Tanya spoke.

"We're glad that you all made it one piece." She smiled at all of us. "Well, you know where the other rooms are, you can pick different ones to put your belongings in or stay with the ones that you liked." The way she talked about this made me think that the Cullens have previously stayed here, or at least they had stayed with the Cullens, kind of like what we were doing now. I wondered how long we were going to stay this time.

"Courtney," she looked at me now. "This house is quite big, so you have a choice of which room you would like to stay in." Then she addressed the group again. "You may choose to be here for a while, you might end up being here for only a small amount of time, but for however long you stay for, you're all welcome here." She smiled warmly at all of us, and I was grateful to see that she even smiled at me, too. Her smile made me relax. I felt welcome here. Well, hopefully they truly accept me. I thought. Though the thought might have been sort of sarcastic or ridiculous, it made me relax into my seat a little more. I think that the Cullens are beginning to accept me as a part of their family… as small a part as I may be, I continued. Then I glanced at Edward, suddenly wondering if he could hear me. As I tried to conspicuously glance at him, I saw that he had a small smile on his face. His eyes met mine and he gave a nod so tiny that I almost couldn't tell if he really had nodded.

That made me smile. At least Edward accepted me, a little bit, anyways.

"Well, go ahead and make yourselves at home. And if you need anything, feel free to ask or simply help yourself." She smiled at us and we all got up to retrieve our things from the cars. Jasper and Emmett ran off at vampire speed. Seeing them just take off like that made me want to run too. I ran, and the rest of the living room, the front hall, and the door flew past me. I was standing next to the Volvo now, and Jasper had the trunk open with bags on the ground next to him. Alice appeared next to me and started to grab some of her bags. She turned to me and said,

"Come on, Courtney, I'll show you where your room is." I picked up my rather large suitcase and began to follow her. She turned and smiled at me. "You'll like it - it's next to mine, and it's so cute!"

I laughed and followed her back into the house. We went through the small foyer and entered the living room. I followed Alice up the big staircase and down a hall. We passed a lot of doors and turned down another hall until she slowed down in front of one.

She turned to me and said, "Just so you know, this one is mine." Then she walked to the door next to it and said, "And this one is yours." Then she set a few of her bags down and opened the door.

I walked inside and looked around. There was a large bed that came up to my waist with a nightstand next to it. Across the room from the bed, there was a bay window with tan colored pillows. There was a computer in the corner and on the left of the door, there was a walk-in closet and an armoire next to that. Next to the armoire was a very nice TV with a DVD player. The color scheme of the room was pretty cute; it was a light blue and a soft green. The carpet was a neutral tan, the walls a soft white, but there was a light blue rug at the foot of my bed. The comforter on the bed was green with blue around the edges, and the curtains were blue with a green print on them. There were just a few things like that around my room; not too crazy, with a lot of color everywhere, but it was nice. My room really fit me, I though of it as a sanctuary. I put my bag on the bed and leaned against it. I looked around the room and then back at Alice, standing by the door still holding one of her bags. Her face was expressionless as she watched me, but her eyes were bright, expectant, still waiting to see what my reaction was. I gave her a big grin. She gave a little giggle in response.

"I really like it!" I said. She laughed a little more then said,

"I knew you would!" I remembered that she had probably already 'seen' that I would like it, maybe she even saw my reaction. Heck, she had probably already seen a lot of things that were going to happen so far! I smiled at her and walked over to her to help her carry her bags to her room. I left my suitcase on the bed; I would come back and unpack it later. We were going to be here for a while, right?

The room Alice was in was kind of like mine; it had a big closet, another TV, and she also had a DVD player. The only differences were that the bed was a little bigger (I think I had a queen-sized mattress. Alice and Jasper's room probably had a king-sized one) and the color scheme was different. The walls were just kind of a simple white, much like mine, but the bed spread was black and had a few random bunches of pink on it. The curtains on her window looked like they matched her bed spread. There were other random decorations and things like that placed about the room, and it made me think that Alice probably had a big part in decorating it. It made me smile.

Alice put two of her bags on the bed and I began to help her hang some of her clothes in her closet. As we unpacked, she started telling me of the things we could do here. It was a pretty small town, not too much to do - the hunting here was ok. One thing she said that I was hopeful about was that you could see the northern lights at night, if you were lucky. She mentioned that she was also thinking of planning a shopping trip out of town, perhaps even out of the state of Alaska. I laughed a little when she said to herself that Paris had excellent shopping, but something told me that I probably laughed too soon; she was probably serious about it. Then Esme came in.

"Hello, Alice, Courtney", she said.

I smiled at her and Alice said, "Hi Esme."

"Carlisle was discussing with Tanya about how long we were going to stay this time," she looked at me and added, "when we come, we are usually here for a year - a few years at the most." Then she continued talking to both of us, "And we are probably going to stay here for the rest of this year, perhaps a little into next year, and toward the end of summer we're going to go back to Forks." I looked at Alice. She tapped her chin as she tilted her head up, thinking. She said,

"Ok, so that gives us what… a few months?" I looked back at Esme and she said,

"Yes. It was pretty quiet, easy to stay in. And I think that we all rather liked Forks the last time we stayed there, which was a few years ago -- about a decade, give or take a year or two -- and Carlisle thought that it was a good idea if we went back again. For just a little bit at least." I looked back at a smiling Alice and she nodded her head.

"Ok. Thanks, Esme." She said. Then Esme looked at me and said,

"Is that alright, Courtney? Did you want to stay here longer? Was there something else you might want to do?" I was touched by how concerned she was about what I'd do. She seemed almost worried; I could tell that she was probably about to go on, maybe talk about whether or not I would leave, but I really wasn't planning on leaving them anytime too soon. Before she could say any more, I said,

"No, Esme, that's just fine. I don't really have any other plans, so this is just fine." I saw a little bit of relief on her face and added meaningfully, "Thanks again for letting me stay with you. I really appreciate this." I gave her a grateful smile and she warmly smiled back. Then she turned and walked out of the room. I turned to Alice and saw that we were basically done with her unpacking. She began putting her suitcases in a stack. She smiled at me and asked,

"You want me to help you with your clothes?"

"Sure." I replied. I had a few questions about where we were going when we would leave Denali. Alice headed toward her door and then followed me as I left her room and entered mine. I had forgotten some of the things that Alice and Rosalie had packed for me, so I opened the suitcase and sifted through the clothes a bit. They were really cute! I caught a glimpse of one of the tags and recalled that they were all my size. I remembered Alice's closet was pretty big -- and also that some of these clothes were from Rosalie -- and even though Alice would basically always be the same size, she could probably fit a bunch of spares sizes in there (for times like these, maybe). Rosalie too, though I was closer to her size than little Alice's.

I opened the doors to the armoire then turned to get some clothes from the suitcase. I thought of which question to ask as Alice walked into my closet with a handful of clothes and I turned and grabbed some to put into the armoire.

"So, is Forks the town we left when we came here?" I asked her.

"Yes," I heard her say from the closet. "Our house is on the outskirts of Forks." I just nodded my head and kept putting clothes away. I remembered that Alice said that we had a matter of months until we left to go back.

"What is today's date?" I asked, a little stunned as I realized more time might have passed than I have been keeping track of.

"It's December 21." Alice smiled as she came back out of the closet for more clothes. My jaw fell open then I shut it quickly. I was surprised; I knew it was around December, but I was about a week off from what I thought it really was. Christmas was in four days! I thought we had at least another week!

I wondered briefly how my family has been getting along. It made me kind of sad to wonder, so I thought of more questions to distract myself.

"How many rooms are in your house in Forks?" I asked her. I was sure that I would stay with the Cullens for a while; I was trying to get used to telling myself that I would, though I still kind of felt like I was in some way intruding on them. They honestly seemed like they wanted me to stay with them. And after all, if I was going to stay, I hoped that they might have a spare bedroom for me there like the coven living here did. Alice seemed to sense my thoughts. She simply smiled and said,

"Don't worry, Courtney, we've got plenty of room." Then she walked back in the closet with a few more things in her hands. I walked back over to the suitcase and looked in.

For just one suitcase, I was a bit surprised at the amount of clothes she and Rosalie had been able to fit in there. Now, though, we were getting toward the end. I saw that all I really had left was underwear and just a few other things, and was grateful for that.

Like most, I was always a bit uncomfortable with other people seeing my underwear, and even though Alice had helped me pack it, it was sure to be a little awkward -- for me at least -- if she were to unpack it for me. I quickly picked up the rest of the clothing and put it away. Alice walked out of the closet and zipped up the empty suitcase.

"Where do you want your suitcase to go? I could put it with mine." she suggested. I thought about my options, though they were limited. I could let Alice keep track of it for me or I could put it somewhere in my room. Or maybe they had some sort of closet somewhere where they put certain things for traveling like suitcases. I decided it was best for me to just keep it -- for all I knew, I might need it sooner than expected.

"That's ok, Alice, I'll keep it with me. Thanks." I smiled at her. She nodded her head and handed me the suitcase.

"Well, I'm going to go find Jasper and make sure that he's unpacked now. So if you need me or anyone else, just come get us." She smiled at me then turned to leave.

"Ok. Thanks Alice." I called after her. She stopped her graceful little walk (almost a skip) at the doorway for an instant and gave me a warm smile. She nodded her head then turned down the hall. I turned and looked around my room for a place to put the suitcase. I thought about putting it by the armoire, but wanted to look inside my closet for possible room there. I took the suitcase with me as I walked in. I looked around at the shelves and racks of clothes, almost in awe. I didn't have too many things -- I still had some room to fill -- but this was a pretty big closet! I had never had my own walk-in closet before. I turned and looked behind me at the door and decided that I'd just set my suitcase next to it. I set it down then walked back into my room, thinking of what to do next.

I felt happy and almost mischievous; like a little kid again, where you're on vacation or you're somewhere new, and you've been left alone in a big, new, exciting place and you've been unleashed to go explore the area!

Ha ha, mature way of putting it, Courtney I thought sarcastically. Smiling, I rolled my eyes at myself, went over to my bed and sat down on it. I crossed my legs and found myself thinking about all that had happened so far, much like I had at that beach.

The Cullens were very nice to me. I was surprised at their immediate kindness. Maybe this new life isn't going to be so bad after all. Alice was so nice - she was treating me like a sister! I realized that I kind of thought of her like that. Rosalie, too. Emmett, Edward, and Jasper seemed like brothers to me, now that I thought about it. And Esme was so nice and loving, like a mother, and Carlisle was kind of like a father. I smiled to myself. They really were like a family. My new family, I thought. Perhaps the coven here in Denali could be extended family or something like that…. I just smiled to myself and looked at my hands in my lap.

…What was that smell I was following when I stopped on the beach; before I took off again and found Edward? It was kind of unpleasant, but it was surprisingly strong, which made me follow it when I first smelled it. Now that I think on it, there was just something about it…. I don't know what it was; I don't think it was anything human, though. I was pretty sure that an animal didn't have anything to do with it either, at least I didn't think so. When I met the Cullens -- and the coven here, too -- I found that vampires had a peculiar scent to them; it sort of… sweet. There was something about that scent, though -- along with being unpleasant -- that I didn't like. It almost kind of made me territorial. I realized that I was tensing up a little bit now, just thinking about it. I relaxed and decided to think of something else.

How has my family been doing so far? I missed them a lot. Do they miss me as much as I missed them? Taylor's wedding was a few months ago. If things went as planned, she was going to marry a guy named Charlie Miller. Charlie was a pretty cool guy, I liked him; even though they had met in their freshman year of high school and had been friends ever since, Taylor was lucky that she was going to spend the rest of her life with a guy as great as Charlie. How has she and Logan been doing? I wondered briefly about my brother's status. He had met a nice girl in one of his computer classes, and I wondered if he had asked her out yet. When I asked him about that, he said that he'd been thinking about it. She must have been a nice girl; when some of my friends saw him, they would tell me about how they thought my brother was cute and all, and had wanted me to get him to notice them in some way. Of course, him being my brother and everything, this was kind of awkward to me. When I thought about it, though, I had to admit that even though he could really bug me at times, he was kinda cute -- I'd give him that. I wouldn't go so far as to say he was "hot", as some of my friends had so lovingly put it, but he was alright. Maybe I could find some way to check up on my family somehow, around Christmas. I wasn't sure about how I would do that, but I could figure that part out later.

I glanced at the pocket containing my iPod. Suddenly, I had a quick flashback: the sky was pretty cloudy, and me and Beth were sitting under a tree at a park. She had an ear bud in her ear and I had one in mine. We were laughing really hard and she fell over.

Then I came back to reality. I took my iPod out of my pocket and stared at it for a short moment. I put the headphones in my ears and went through the songs on it again. Oh, the memories. I thought, smiling. I selected the song "Can't Take It In" by Imogen Heap, from The Chronicles of Narnia soundtrack. It was definitely a different song, not one you would hear on the radio -- I suddenly wondered why I put it on my iPod in the first place -- but I let it play anyway. I went to the main menu of my iPod and once I saw 'photos', I remembered that I had in fact put some on here. Curious to what I had there and what possible memories might await me, I clicked on it. I set the slideshow timer for about two seconds per slide then let it play.

I had certain, funny icons about random things, and a picture of me and one of my old friends came up. I focused on the picture and remembered that it was taken on the last day of my eighth grade year. The friend I was with was going to move over the summer, it was the last time we'd see each other. I smiled sadly and let the slideshow go on. One icon said "Boys suck!" with the exclamation point dotted with a heart. I smiled and remembered once again that Beth had helped me get out of my relationship with my old boyfriend. I remembered that I was only a freshman at the time, but I really wish I could remember what I was thinking when he asked me out and I accepted. I had begun to see a side of him I had never before seen, and after the first week, I was sick of him. How did I make it a full month?! I asked myself, amazed.

You know how when a girl and guy start going out, the girl can sometimes get kind of clingy and call him a lot, maybe plan out the future a little, and stuff like that? Yeah, well, he and I were totally switched. (At least it should have been.) He called me at least three times a day after school, e-mailed me even more, and gave me the 411 on how the rest of our lives were going to be. This was only about one week after we had started going out, and he had begun to freak me out a little. For example, if things went according to his plans, I was going to be a stay-at-home mother with at least three kids, perhaps one on the way, while he was off in the navy. We were to live in a big city and he wanted to be a mechanic before he joined the navy.

That was okay -- I was fine with being a mother, and he could do what he wanted -- but, seriously, I had my own plans for my life.

I wanted to get a college degree, maybe follow in my sister's footsteps and eventually become a doctor, or do something with astrology - I had always liked to study the stars. But he was talking about doing this right when I graduated high school! He was older than me, so he would have time to get some college done, but what about what I wanted?! I sure wasn't ready to settle down and start a family when I was fresh out of high school, and I wasn't sure that it was him I wanted to marry in the first place; we were only going out at the time. He freaked me out even more when he began to tell me that he couldn't live without me and crap like that. I never told anyone that I loved them unless I meant it, but it told him that I loved him because he told me that he'd be suicidal if I were in some sort of life-threatening accident, or I died, and he genuinely scared me then. It was a little after that when he started to take my stuff to get me to wrestle with him, that I just couldn't take it anymore. I told Beth about some things that were going on and confided in her as to what I should do. She seemed worried when she told me that I should definitely end it, and I knew that I wasn't wrong when I thought he was being… I don't know, kind of abusive.

These thoughts on him only lasted the two seconds that the picture showed, and when the next picture came up, I cleared my head from thoughts of him and watched as the slide show went on. There were more icons, a couple pictures having to do with a movie here and there, and I knew that the slide show was coming to an end. Before the last few pictures, one of a puppy came up. I paused the slide show to see the picture a bit longer. For an instant I was totally puzzled by this picture; where did it come from?! And in the next millisecond I realized that it was my dog Benny. Benny had died only about a year and a half ago, due to old age, and this picture was one of the ones taken when he was younger. Looking at the picture, totally stunned, a small sob escaped my throat. My heart felt heavy at remembering him and my family. Oh, how I missed them! I was so homesick now.

I pressed down on the pause button, turning off my iPod. I put the little switch to 'hold' and wrapped the headphones around it. If I was going to make sure I wouldn't have an emotional break down right now, I should probably stop remembering. For now, anyway. I looked at the half-closed door. I was going to go downstairs and see what everyone was up to, but I needed to calm myself a little.

Instead, I walked over to the computer in my room and turned it on. Maybe I would get onto YouTube or some other website like that, and look up the new songs that had come out. This was a pretty fast computer which was good, and as the desktop loaded, I clicked on the Internet Explorer icon. I supposed that I might as well find new songs, discover all the ones that had come out since I had last listened to the radio or updated my iPod. I smiled as the page loaded.


AN: Hi, sorry this took forever! The only time I could really work on this was over weekends and stuff like that. In case you're wondering when I'm going to get to the good part of this whole story, just know that this is all just the beginning, and that I have plans…. Big plans!!! (No, I'm not crazy, just give the story a chance, it's just barely getting started! Plus, I've had a horrible case of writer's block, that's why it's not as great as I wish it could be.) Anyways, chapter 8 should be up in about and hour, maybe more.

Please Review!

-ELS

P.S. In case you're interested, there's a poll on my profile - go check it out!