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The misty walk to school the next morning passed without much incident. The blonde boy, Mike Newton, ran up to Aubrey as she passed by his car in the school's lot. He began talking about planning a trip to the beach. Apparently he intended to invite the lunch crowd from the day before plus Bella, Aubrey, and a few others. Aubrey declined his invitation as kindly as she could and excused herself away with Trig. She walked away quickly, but not too quickly, as she didn't want to hurt Mike's feelings. It wasn't that the social gathering or Newton himself would be bad in her opinion. Beaches just weren't her thing. Least of all cold, rainy Washington beaches.
Trig seemed to flit by in no time, soon followed by Biology and Government. In the latter class, however, Aubrey caught Mike Newton sending hurt glances her way and she felt a twinge of guilt at her previous behavior. After the bell rang she approached him.
"Hey Mike," she said with an endearing smile. Mike nodded shortly. "Listen, I'm sorry for being rude earlier. It's nothing against you I swear. Me and beaches just don't mix." Mike's eyes didn't look away, but his expression seemed to soften a bit. "Sorry if I gave a bad impression."
"It's alright," replied Mike after a moment.
"Besides, I'm still new and I just don't feel right going around so soon." This wasn't really true, but she didn't want to be antagonized on her second day.
"Maybe you'll change your mind. I'm not planning this to be soon, and it would be on a sunny day," said Mike. Aubrey shrugged with another smile.
"Maybe. Well...I'll see you in Gym."
"See you," Mike replied, managing a grin. Aubrey felt a swell of relief wash her guilt away as she waved and walked out of the building. English with Mr. Mason was all the way across the freshly mowed, wet lawn, and by the time Aubrey reached the door, her feet were entirely covered in loose grass clippings, much to her discomfort. She shook out her bare feet over the ground as best she could before walking inside.
The day before in Mason's class, Aubrey had found that the class was paired up already for a group project that would lead to an eventual essay. The other pairs in the room were boy-girl, but Aubrey had been paired with a girl named Sarah Barnes, a blonde with no academic skill whatsoever. Sarah's partner had been absent and Aubrey had been forced to listen to her pointless prattle about her brother in California, who had sent her some, as she put it, "totally cute" bracelets. Aubrey had vented her frustration by decorating the back of a worksheet with millions of curly pen doodles.
But luck seemed to be with Aubrey upon her second attendance of Mason's class. Sarah's partner had come back to school, and she would be in her own group. However her delight was somewhat numbed when Sarah's partner walked in through the door. Aubrey had retrieved a blank piece of notepaper and had uncapped a pen to doodle once again when he strode, or rather glided, to the chair in front of her three minutes before the bell was to ring. Aubrey couldn't help but stare in a daze.
Sarah's partner was unmistakably a Cullen, one of the missing two from the day before. He had stringy, dark, wavy hair that extended to the nape of his neck and curled around his ears, flipping out slightly at the ends. Like the other Cullens, his skin was a flawless, translucent marble, but his eyes were darker than the others', with dark circles beneath them as if he had been up all night. This Cullen was nowhere near as muscular as Emmett or as tall as Jasper, but his form was lithe and strong, with long legs and arms. All in all, he was gorgeous. Far too gorgeous for a small town like Forks in Aubrey's opinion. She was transfixed by him, in a dreamlike daze, with her head propped up on an arm.
The Cullen's godlike face turned slightly to look to the other side of the room and his lovely profile was exposed to Aubrey. She let out a quiet sigh of bliss. Never, in all the guyspotting she'd done over the years of raging hormones, had she ever gazed upon such a heavenly face. Suddenly, the dark eyes flicked to the side, locking on hers. Aubrey turned away, her ears reddening. As the Cullen's face turned away, her eyes flicked back in time to catch sight of a smirk upon his perfect lips.
Before anything more embarrassing could happen, the bell rang and class began. Of course through the entire lesson Aubrey didn't catch a single word Mr. Mason uttered. She was too focused on the back of the Cullen's head. Whether it was Marek or Edward she was staring at, she didn't know or care. This guy was an angel. She could not tear her eyes away...
"Miss Neils?" Aubrey felt the rush of adrenaline as Mr. Mason called her name. She hadn't heard the question and she felt her ears begin to redden as the eyes of the rest of the class turned to look at her. She looked up to meet Mr. Mason's expectant gaze, her eyes wide.
"I'm sorry, what was the question?" she asked innocently.
"Stay with the lesson, Miss Neils. The back of Mr. Rhodes's head may be fascinating in and of itself but in this class we're focused on literature." Aubrey felt her face beginning to redden now as she nodded silently. The Cullen...or rather, Marek Rhodes, turned his face around to look at her, but she trained her eyes on the words printed on the yellow worksheet she'd doodled extensively on, trying to ignore him. Her heart pounded in her ears as the embarrassment took its toll. She saw Marek Rhodes turn back around to face the front in time to answer another one of the teacher's damned questions.
Class ended and Aubrey busied herself with packing her books back into her backpack, prolonging the action until she was sure Marek Rhodes had left the room. She stood and slung the bag over her shoulder, ignoring the glances and giggles of the other students as she walked out of the door. Her eyes stayed shamefully glued to the ground all the way to the cafeteria.
Aubrey got her lunch and sat down at the table from the day before without a word. She didn't meet anyone's eyes as she began shoveling a small pile of macaroni into her mouth. Her ears barely picked up the conversation occurring between Mike, Jessica, and a blonde girl named Lauren. Then Jessica said her name and she looked up.
"Yeah?"
"Another one of the Cullens is here today. That's Marek Rhodes. Edward's still gone." She pointed over Aubrey's shoulder at the Cullen table, but Aubrey didn't look. She lowered her gaze instead back down to her food.
"Uh...yeah I know...he's in my English class..."
"Mason caught her staring at him," sniggered Lauren. Aubrey then remembered that she had been in her class. She continued to focus on her food. "He announced it to the entire class."
"Really?" Jessica sounded like she was about to laugh. Aubrey made a mental note to never confide in either of them, Lauren or Jessica. No doubt she would be the talk of the school by the end of the day.
"How long has Edward Cullen been gone?" she asked, changing the subject. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Bella squirm slightly.
"About two days," said Jessica.
"Why do you think?"
"Maybe he's sick," piped up Angela. The conversation moved to various possible illnesses and then on to other things. The subject of the English incident didn't resurface much to Aubrey's relief.
Lunch ended and Aubrey made her way to French. On her way, she turned her thoughts back to the lurking exhilarated feeling she'd had while staring at Marek Rhodes. It seemed impossible that anyone could be as good-looking as the Cullens. Just impossible. The only people Aubrey could attribute to coming close to that kind of beauty were celebrities in magazine pictures, but those had been touched up by photo editors. But nobody could touch up realtime reality...
French presented a difficult set of quizzes that Aubrey managed to scrape through, handicapped as she was with her distracted mind. Twelve misconjugated verbs and eight missed questions later, the bell sang its liberation song and Aubrey set off for Gym class, her mind unwaveringly glued on the same thing it had been since English. Marek Rhodes. She changed slowly into her uniform in a kind of dreamy state. Bella had the kindness to inform her that she was trying to pull her shorts over her head in her distraction and she rectified the problem in a hurry. The girls walked out of their locker room, mixing with the boys that stood against the wall, already changed. Coach Clapp appeared then, his clipboard in hand. There was something foreboding about his posture.
"Today you'll be playing extreme dodgeball," he said in his gruff bark of a voice. Bella's face fell in disappointment next to Aubrey. Clapp went on, "Newton over versus the rest of you." His hand split a line between Mike and Bella and swept over Mike and those on his left. Clapp ordered the indicated group to move to the far end of the basketball court.
One person from each team moved into the opposite team's freethrow zone, ready to strike from behind. Those struck out moved to the sidelines along the territory of the other team, ready to grab stray balls and strike out from both sides. The teams were surrounded from all sides and, according to Coach Clapp, this is what made extreme dodgeball, extreme dodgeball. Coach Clapp blew the whistle and threw six balls into play. Bella caught one, but immediately handed it to Aubrey.
"For the safety of the rest of the team," she explained. Aubrey took it without question.
Two balls flew past her head and she ducked to avoid them. Then she ran to the front line and threw the rubber ball with all her might, immediately getting Mike out on the other team. Behind her, Bella tripped over Angela as she stepped back to avoid being hit by a boy from the sidelines. The two of them toppled over onto a fellow teammate and all three were spiked by the other team.
Aubrey caught another ball and searched the opposite team for a possible victim. Her eyes widened as she spotted him. She froze, awed. How she hadn't seen him before was a mystery. There he was in all his perfection, bending to pick up a ball on the floor. He straightened and his dark eyes connected with hers. Aubrey's jaw went slack. She stood loosely, in a daze.
Consequentially she didn't have time to react as a red rubber ball went flying towards her face at full speed. It hit her on the cheek with surprising force. Several other balls followed it and rendered her inarguably out. She walked over to the sidelines by the other team to join Angela and Bella, but all the while she felt her ears turning red.
"You've got a big red mark on your face," Bella told her as they changed after the game. Their team had lost. Go figure. "Are you sure you're okay?"
"Yeah, I'm fine," said Aubrey, rotating her jaw testily. The ball had hit her harder than she thought. It still stung. They left the gym and walked around the building, heading for the student lot.
"Need a ride home?" asked Bella. "You live close, right?"
"Yeah, thanks. I'm right around that corner and down for a bit," said Aubrey. She paused. "It's not out of your way, is it?"
"No, I'm going that way anyway," said Bella with a wave of her hand. Aubrey followed Bella through the lot to her bulbous red truck. She opened the door and climbed up to the passenger's seat. "If you ever need a ride, you can just ask me, you know," said Bella.
"Are you sure?"
"Yes, it's fine," said Bella with a smile. Aubrey returned it gratefully.
Bella backed the truck out of the space and started towards the main road. As she passed the Cullens' red convertible, however, Aubrey craned her neck in time to catch a glimpse of Marek climbing, not into the red BMW, but into a blue-green Trans Am next to it. He had so discreetly added flame decals to his car, she noticed. Bella brought the truck to a sudden brake as the two, sleek vehicles sped out of their places and rocketed past her, racing off at well over the speed limit.
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