A/N: So, somewhat unexpected plot twist. I dunno. I can't really tell where it came from, but it works anyway. In a dramatic sense, like. Can't have too little conflict. I didn't realize the feud would just end in one chapter, for example. Meep. I am so not ready for novels…

But Maya is that awesome. XD

Disclaimer: I don't own anything I can make money off of. Yet.

Chapter Seven: Firelit

It had been a while since anyone had seen Maya happy. School helped, of course, because everyone from the security guards around the doors to the principal spoke her name with joy, but that was still worthless in the face of the one person who wouldn't even let her touch him: Jacob's second cousin. He received her in the large crowd at the longhouse but left if she tried to approach him; meanwhile, she had a sneaking suspicion that he was sometimes watching her, hidden, as she went through the neighborhood.

She only told all this to Jacob, but Bella and Edward didn't need words. Bella concerned herself with trying to cheer her up, if only temporarily, while Edward had his own plans. The popularity Maya had so promptly won from everyone around her proved handy now; her social life had never been better, and every day was a brand-new distraction from her own internal problem. However, she eventually stopped putting on a brave front, and didn't talk with anyone but her best friends and Jacob; as time wore on, only the latter remained her confidante.

"Why?" he would ask, sometimes quietly, sometimes irritatedly. He rarely ever got an answer, but he kept asking nonetheless. He had never seen Maya like this before, or imagined that she could be this way. As much as he had wondered at her vivacity before did he now watch her uncomprehendingly, waiting for some semblance of a return to normality. But he loved her: love gave him hope, and hope told him to wait.

After nearly a month of waiting, Jacob got his answer one late evening in the longhouse. His second cousin had been in the forest all day, not even coming to greet her, but by now Maya seemed numb to the disappointment. She ate dinner quietly with the family, afterwards retiring to a shaded corner with Jacob, in his arms, seated with backs to the wall, curling her fingers around a lock of his hair.

She was warm: but it was a sensation he felt on her skin, not in her voice. "You know something?" A light murmur, directed more to his chest than his face.

"No. What?"

"I…don't really know why—" A mutual sigh, slightly irritated on his side. She was lying. Commencing to cover her finger entirely with black strands, she started again. "You'll probably think it's just silly. Worrying. All this." She let go of the strands, smoothing them down. "But you don't understand."

"I want to understand." He pulled her hand away, tilted her chin up to face him. "Tell me. What went wrong?"

"It was a guy." His left hand half-clenched in the darkness. "The year before last, at school. He—well, he had problems. He couldn't really handle his anger, and he wasn't the best in the class, so…But he was nice. And he liked me." She snuggled closer to Jacob. "And I didn't like him. I hung out with him, I was practically the only one in the school who even tried to be his friend, but I didn't like him in that way. It hurt, and I couldn't do anything about it, but what could I do? Then one day, he just—"

She stopped, pensively chewing on her tongue. He nudged her, knowing what the gesture meant, but couldn't bring himself to make her keep talking. After about a minute of staring into the glowing fire far into the middle of the longhouse, she continued.

"…He didn't come to class one day. It was only a month to graduation, so it was really weird. I tried to contact him, but he wouldn't respond, and when I called, his mom answered the phone." She held onto Jacob's hand. "She was polite and all—we'd met before—but she said that he'd gone off to live with his father for a while. It seemed he'd had an…episode, that last day I turned him down. He'd said he couldn't go to 'that school' any more, so he moved to Georgia. And that was the last I heard of him."

"…Oh." Maya nodded and cuddled closer. He held her, trying to take it all in. For a few minutes, they sat there, no effort at speech, both in their own thoughts. Jacob could understand now, at least why she made friends with everybody: she was trying to make up for the one person who'd rejected her, after all she'd done for him. Now two people, he realized ruefully.

"Well, nobody ever liked me after that," she began abruptly, and he looked at her. He'd thought that was the end of the story. "Really. The main reason I hung out with that boy was because nobody else would go near me. And after he left, it got worse."

"—That's impossible."

She shook her head, and hung on his arm. "That's why I liked Bella, as soon as I saw her. Everybody else looked like the type that would push away from me if I tried to make friends, but she had some look in her eyes: not judging, you know?" Jacob nodded; she was right, he'd noticed it himself. "And Edward: he just didn't mind."

"And I…?" They smiled. "You were you. And that was more than I could ask for." He nodded, and held her close. "Now I look back on it, it is silly."

"No, it's not. I get you. It's just—Is it worth it to worry about the one person who won't make friends with you, if everyone else loves you?"

"For me, it is. I like being friends with people; if I don't know them, I can't tell what they think of me. If we're not friends, if they don't want to be friends with me, I have to ask myself why."

He rolled his eyes. "Isn't it enough to know that they're missing out?"

She pulled away, gently. "How do you know that I'm not missing out?"

He sighed. "That's what all this has been about? You, wondering if you've missed out on having two more friends?" She glanced up at him, innocently, a bit frightened. She nodded.

"I can't help you there, Maya. Look, I'm here for you for everything else, but no matter how hard you try, you won't be able to befriend the world. And believe me,"—he playfully tweaked her nose—"if someone doesn't want to be with you, it's their own problem."

She looked at him for a few minutes, and then threw her arms around him. He reciprocated, chin on her shoulder to pull her closer, until a few minutes later, he felt that there was no more distance, and he finally understood her.

"Just don't tell anyone, ok?" she murmured. "Not even Bella or Edward. I don't want anybody to feel sorry for me."

He nodded. "I think it'll be enough that they've just got you back."

A/N: Sorry it's so short. I'm saving the juicier part for next chapter. I have an idea for it this time. =3 Press the green button if you liked it!