People I am so sorry for leaving you hanging like this. I hate it when other people do that so I'm updating. Now.

Disclaimer: I don't own anyone. Meg can have Bella if she wants. But she doesn't so I get to keep her, deal?

Bella

"OH MY GAWD IT'S KELLY PRESCOTT AND DEBBIE ACKER-I SO MEANT MANCUSO!"I screamed down the hall. HEY! It's my first day of school. Ever. Ok with people under the age of 30 in it. We pirates are so not dumb. I'm not a Jack Sparrow. I'm WAY cooler and famous. Not.

"Bella shut up! Do you want to be caught by Sister E?" Suze yelled at me

"So THAT'S her name! I just called her nun lady the whole time. Ops. AUGH! RUN FOR YOUR LIFE! IT'S A GAYWAD PAUL! " Ok strike 2. But princesses get as many strikes as they want. And I feel like I'm going to get a lot.

"Who the hell are you? Some kind of midget? Wait are you David Ackerman? Suze I thought he was a guy!" Paul shrieked. No he actually shrieked. Not even kidding you.

"No I'm Bella de Silva and-HEY SISTER E! PRINCESS PAULINA SAID THE H-E-DOUBLE-HOCKEY-STICK-WORD!" Suze was laughing now. Wow and pirate, princess, and comedian. Bella, you have skills

"HELL NO! SHIT! I MEANT CRAP! DAMN YOU DE SILVA! YOU LITTLE BITCH!" Nice one Paul. Tell me how detention goes if manage you get out of it.

"Mr. Slater, come with me to Father Dominic's office. Miss de Silva, I assure you this imbecile will be punished reasonably. I hope your stay in Caramel and in the Mission will be happier." Sister E lectured My God, she sounded like that Barbie on Toy Story 2 where she's all goodbye only a couple MILLION times. I swear. How do people manage that? I mean, smile all the time.

"Hi…Bella right? Jesse's sister? I'm CeeCee Webb" CeeCee stated.

"Yep Bella, the one everyone got to hear yelling down the hall. I'm living with Jesse. I was kidnapped when I was 1 and they finally found me and madre and padre are dead so I went to Jesse. I'm 13 if you're wondering. My kidnapper believed in good education so he home-schooled me a lot." I chanted. I had prepared a speech so I would tell where I'm from so no questions came up. I kind of was kidnapped though.

I'm pretending to be a junior except for English. I failed that test. Ok Aye is so a word! 7th grade English. Fun! Fun!

"Come on Bella! Let's get to world history with Mr. Walden!" Suze said.

"I hope Aunt Pru isn't there again." CeeCee sighed. That must suck your aunt going out with your world history teacher and being an albino. I thought I had it bad.

Jesse

I couldn't focus today. I was too worried about Aqua. She's going to mess up. She'll be discovered. So will I. Slater will know and so will the rest of the world. I called Susannah and told her. She said Aqua is fine. After I hung up the vision came.

Suze

Bella's life is going good for her now. Even Kelly likes her. Bella still hates her though. Paul has OSS(out of school suspension) with supervision of course and Jesse called my new razor cell phone told me he got a raise. He also told me he's worried about Bella. Only he calls her Aqua. Like the Spanish word for water. I closed my phone and I saw the vision.

Bella

CRAP I CAUSED A VISION!

The Vision:

While Sleepy and Dopey rolled around-Dopey yelling," Get offa me, homo"-I picked up my bounty and went back upstairs. Heck it was my day off. I wasn't going to spend it indoors, despite my mother's orders. I decided to give CeeCee a call and see what she was up to. Maybe the two of us could hit the beach. I deserved, I thought, a little R and R.

When I got up to my room, I saw Jesse was already up. He doesn't usually pay morning visits. On the other hand, I don't usually sleep thirty-six hours straight, so I guess neither of us was really sticking to the schedule.

In any case, I hadn't expected to see him there, and so I jumped about a foot and a half and quickly hid the hand carrying his miniature behind my back.

I mean, come on. I don't want him to think I like him or anything.

"You're awake," he said from the window seat where he'd been sitting with a copy of Abbie Hoffman's Steal This Book that I happened to know he stole from my mother's bookshelf downstairs.

"Um," I said sliding over to my bed. Maybe, if I was quick enough, I could thrust his picture under my pillow before he noticed. "Yes, I am."

"How do you feel?" he asked me.

"Me?" I asked, like there was somebody else in the room he could possibly have been asking.

Jesse laid down his book and looked at me with another one of those expressions on his face. You know, the kind I can never read.

"Yes, you," he said. "How do you feel?

"Fine" I said. I made it to the bed. I sat down on it, and quick as a mongoose-I've never seen one in action, but I've heard they're pretty fast-I thrust the check, the letters, and the miniature under my pillow. Then I relaxed.

"I feel great," I said

"Good," he said. "We need to talk."

Suddenly, I didn't feel so relaxed anymore. In fact, I sprang to my feet. I don't know why, but my heart started beating very fast.

Talk? What does he want to talk about? My mind was going a hundred miles a second. I suppose we should talk about what happened. I mean, it was very scary and all of that, and I nearly died, and like Paul said I do have a lot of questions-

But what if that was what Jesse wanted to talk about? The part where I nearly died, I mean?

I didn't want to talk about that. Because the fact is, that whole part, that part where I nearly died, well, I nearly died trying to save him. Seriously. I was hoping he hadn't noticed, but I could tell by the look on his face he totally had. Noticed I mean.

And now he wanted to talk about it. But how could I talk about it? Without letting it slip? The L word, I mean

"You know what," I said, very fast. "I don't want to talk. Is that okay? I really, really don't want to talk. I am all talked out."

Jesse lifted Spike off his lap and put him on the floor. Then he stood up.

What was he doing? I wondered. What was he doing?

I took a deep breath, and kept talking about not talking.

"I'm just-Look," I said, as he took a step toward me. "I'm just going to give CeeCee a call and maybe we'll go to the beach or something, because I really...I just need a day off."

Another step toward me. Now he was right in front of me.

"Especially," I said significantly, looking up at him, "from talking. That's what I especially need a day off from. Talking."

"Fine," he said. He reached up and cupped my face in both his hands. "We don't have to talk."

And that's when he kissed me.

On the lips.

Above was an excerpt from the Darkest Hour by Meg Cabot

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Bella