"Well?" Embry asked again. His hopeful smile was slipping.
Ali nervously looked from Olivia's face to mine, giving us a plea for help.
"This is really…shocking," was what Olivia came up with. "Why don't you give her some time to get used to the idea. You all understand, don't you?" There was a big chain of nods from all the boys. It looked a bunch of bobble-heads were set off all at once.
"Thanks," Ali said to the ground. I wasn't sure whether she was thanking Olivia for the nice save or for the pack for allowing her some time to think about it.
Emily yawned. "Well, I better take these girls back home. It's getting late and they just got here. They should catch up on their sleep!"
This time, Sam stood up with her. "You guys should go home too," he ordered the rest of the pack. He probably didn't trust them there alone or something, because he had a slightly stern look on his face.
It was an awkward silence back to Emily's. I didn't know what to say. Sam and Emily were just staring straight ahead. Ali and Olivia had places to look absentmindedly – out the window. But I was stuck in the middle. Sam and Emily could easily turn around and look me in the eye. I fixed my gaze on my black flip-flops.
My friends and I rushed into the tiny guestroom when we got to the house.
"What was that all about, why aren't you just accepting him already?" I blurted out to Ali when we were all safely inside the room where no one could hear us.
"I – nothing." Ali flopped onto her bed.
"There is something. Nicole and I know you're hiding something," Olivia claimed.
Ali took a pair of pajamas and a toothbrush. "I'm going to take a shower," she said flatly. She marched out of the room without a single glance back at us.
"She'll have to tell us sometime." I sighed. "Anyways, did you bring any of the Twilight books? I need to refresh my memory. I have to find out which book we're in. It's killing me."
Olivia nodded. "I brought all four! I was so excited since we were going to La Push and all! I finished New Moon on the plane ride here! That's like, the shortest one! Well except for Twilight. But New Moon was so easy – "
I cut her off. "Alright. Here, gimme Twilight." She handed me her hardbound book with the familiar picture of a pair of pale hands holding a red apple.
I skimmed through the pages, looking for something, anything that might be useful. I should've realized that it mostly just said stuff about the vampires and all that crap. It didn't say practically anything at all about the wolves, so I realized Twilight was obviously not the one.
"How about New Moon?" I asked, tossing Twilight so it landed on Olivia's bed. Olivia handed me New Moon.
I began flipping through the pages. I was lost in the story. It was my absolute favorite out of the whole entire saga.
Suddenly, I came to one part that was a total clue:
"Then this week, out of nowhere, Embry's hanging out with Sam and the rest of them. He was out on the cliffs today." His voice was low and tense.
He finally looked at me. "Bella, they bugged him even more than they bothered me. He didn't want anything to do with them. And now Embry's following Sam around like he's joined a cult."
"We're in New Moon," I realized.
Olivia's blue eyes bulged. "How do you know?"
"Here. Look at this." I pointed out the passage I had just read. "Think about it. Embry's joined the pack now – we know that – but Jacob hasn't. He wasn't at the bonfire today, so he must not have turned into a werewolf yet. So it's only possible that we're in New Moon," I concluded.
I expected her to say "nice job" or give me a high-five, but then Ali opened the door. "What are you doing?" Ali asked curiously, eyeing the book I was holding.
"We just found out that we're in New Moon!" Olivia showed Ali the page.
Ali read the two paragraphs then flipped through more pages. Suddenly her eyes widened to the size of golf balls. Ali dropped the book and screamed. It hit the ground with a thud.
Sam came rushing in. "Is everyone alright?" he asked frantically, looking around the room for any signs of harm. I spotted Twilight and New Moon lying open on Olivia's bed. Oh no, I thought. If Sam sees that, we're in huge trouble! I raced over and threw them back in Olivia's bag. I exhaled the air I'd been holding in.
Sam eyed me suspiciously. "What's going on here?"
"Nothing, I thought I saw a spider. Goodnight, Sam!" Ali swiveled his body around and shoved him out the door.
"What is wrong with you?" I asked Ali, exasperated. "Why the hell did you scream?"
Ali seemed too frightened to speak. She was hyperventilating again, exactly like she had been at the bonfire. Ali shot a shaky finger at the book. "I swear…I saw…words…change…" she stammered, in shock.
I rolled my eyes. Wow. Ali was either A) crazy or B) trying to attract attention. I suspected B. I guess I was still kind of angry at Ali for not telling me the truth, but B was the kind of thing she would do. I would've suspected that even if I wasn't mad at her.
Ali saw the doubtful look on my face and became serious.
"Look for yourself!" She dug New Moon back out of Olivia's bag and thumbed to a specific page. "See, look?"
I squinted my eyes. It looked just normal to me – a bunch of black words on white paper, not moving or changing or anything. Then a small paragraph popped up out of nowhere:
"Embry imprinted on this girl named Ali," Jacob told me, a hint of sadness in his voice. "She's one of Emily's cousin's friends."
I blinked my eyes once. Then twice. Then three times. The words were still there. This couldn't be happening.
"Oh god. Not you too, Nicole?" Olivia complained.
I hurled the book to Olivia as if I were playing hot potato. She caught it neatly and opened up the page, reading it over and over again.
"Do you believe that's just a coincidence?" Ali asked. "It's all true! My name is in it! Embry imprinted on me! That wasn't in the book the last time I read it! Ugh! Someone get me out of this damn world!"
"Yeah, I would know! I read the whole New Moon on the plane ride here!" Olivia finally agreed.
"Wait a minute…" Olivia was staring at the book.
I ran up and looked over her shoulder. "What?"
But she didn't have to answer for me. There were more words popping up on the page:
"What's wrong?" I asked. I could sense his gloominess by his tone. Oh yeah – Ali had been the girl who had come in the garage the other day, disturbed our peace, and I had decided to leave until I could be alone with Jacob the next day.
"It's just that…" Jacob seemed to be determining how to put his feelings into words. I had trouble with that sometimes, too.
"I…I really like Ali. We kissed before, before I knew about werewolves. But Embry imprinted on her, and he got mad at me…" He sighed and pulled up his sleeve, revealing three pinkish-white lines, jagged against his dark skin.
"Embry did that to you?" I gulped.
Jacob nodded. "He thought it was my fault that Ali liked me better than him. But it wasn't. I didn't even know at the time about werewolves!"
Had Jacob and Ali really taken it that far after I left that day?
"You kissed Jacob?!" I yelled a little too loudly in Ali's direction. She shook her head over and over.
"Let me see the book." Her eyes scanned the new words that I had just read. Finally she looked up at Olivia and me. Her face look like a bully searching through their mind for an excuse so they wouldn't get in trouble with the teacher. "I don't know what you're talking about! That book is lying! I haven't even met Jacob ever since we've gotten here!" she claimed.
"So that was what you were up to when you 'went for a walk'," Olivia said, obviously not believing Ali's explanation.
"No! You have to believe me! I was just in shock…I didn't kiss Jacob Black…I've never even met him…I think you're right, Nicole. This is all a dream. It's impossible to go into a fictional story world."
I stared doubtfully at her. How ironic. Just a few hours ago she was trying to persuade me that this was all real.
Before I could object, though, I heard a horrible sound that sounded like nails on a chalkboard. I stared around the room. What could've made that sound? There was a big wooden drawer, and on the opposite side, three small white beds. There was practically nothing else except for one tall lamp that we were all supposed to share, apparently. But there was nothing that would've made that noise.
"Who's there?" Olivia said cautiously. She was staring out the window that looked out on the beach, its ripples a shiny black in the moonlight. The huge willow tree's branches, which the house was shadowed in, had made several white scratch marks across the grass.
"What was that?" I breathed.
"Probably just the wind," Ali suggested nervously.
But I pushed open the weathered-up window and stuck my head out. A tall figure was jogging away, out the backyard, down the sidewalk, and around the corner, out of sight.
"It wasn't the wind," I whispered. "It was a person. And I think they just heard every word we said."
7