Author's Note: Anyone still out there? I really hope so! My terribly hectic schooling is my excuse... but I will try my best to update more frequently!

We lay in the cradle of a hammock that Emily had strung up under the eaves on one side of the house. A gentle breeze swayed us side to side as Emily held my right foot in her hand and painted my nails an obnoxious coral pink that went with neither my skin colour nor my clothing tastes. But I knew it would soothe her, so I let her. Her feet were tucked into my shoulder, their nails painted the same colour, overlaid with tiny hand-drawn flowers, what looked like pansies in whites, purples, blues and yellows. I would draw the line at letting her do that to me.

"Do you still paint?" I asked her, the first time I'd spoken since Sam had left us alone in the house. She'd coaxed me back to my brownie, let me finish it, and then led me by the hand to this hammock, toppling me into it with her own body weight when I'd protested. The nail polish had been tucked into her pocket already, and once she'd discovered it, there was no escaping my fate.

"Yeah, but not as much as I used to," she said. "It seems like I'm in the kitchen half the time." She squinted at my toes, surveying her work. I liked that her attention was directed elsewhere: it meant I could look at her without having to actually make eye contact.

"I never saw you as a den mother type," I admitted.

Emily let out a small laugh. "You and me both, sister," she agreed. "I thought I'd be in Europe by now, being romanced by some French guy named Jacques."

I couldn't help but smile a little. "I forgot that was your big dream- Europe. You never could wait to get out of Washington."

She shrugged. "It wasn't that. I just wanted to have adventures. I never got how you wanted to just stay here and have some babies and settle down. I mean, sure, you were going to go away for college, but you were always going to come back. I wanted to visit every country on Earth." She smiled a little at my toes. "You and I were always pretty different that way, though, weren't we? I mean, how many boyfriends have I had?"

"Not to mention girlfriends," I teased.

"That was one time! God, will you ever let me live that down?" she said, scrunching up her nose playfully at me.

"Probably not," I answered lightly, but I could already feel my own apprehension at where this conversation was headed. The last thing I wanted to talk about was Sam, so I changed the subject to avoid it. "So are you sad that you're never going to get to do those things now?"

"It might not be never," she said hesitantly, but I could tell she really didn't believe that. She returned the cap to the nail polish and set it down on the ground beside us, then carefully moved my foot, picking up the other one. But instead of starting to paint, she just cradled my foot in her hand and played absently with my toes. It almost tickled, but not quite. "It's just weird," she said finally.

"What is?"

She looked at me with a mixture of pain and pity, and I knew this conversation was going exactly where I hadn't wanted it to go. Emily said, "I figured I would get married one day- you know, when I was like thirty or something… but I'm twenty years old, Leah."

"You could have said no," I answered defensively. "When he proposed, you could have turned him down. It's not like he would have worshipped you any less." I could hear the bitterness in my own voice.

"I know," she said softly. "It's just… what's the point? We all know it's going to happen, so I guess, when he asked, the only answer I could really see was yes."

"But you could have said no," I insisted. "You could have told him you wanted to take a break for a couple of years, that you wanted to go to Europe or ride through the Australian outback on a kangaroo, or hook up with people on every continent, and he would have been here that whole time, waiting for you." I resented her freedom, her assurance, and her guaranteed destiny.

I was surprised to find tears in my cousin's eyes when I looked at her. She was shaking her head. "But I couldn't really, Leah," she said. "I couldn't do any of those things knowing that he was waiting."

Shrugging, I rolled my eyes a little, making it clear I had no sympathy for her whining. "Whatever, Em," I said. "If you're looking for a shoulder to cry on about how horrible it is to have Sam Uley's unconditional love, I am really the wrong shoulder."

"I know," she said quietly, glancing away from me. I could tell she still wanted to talk about it, though. Finally she said, "I love him. I do. I don't want you to think I don't. But… it's all so predictable. That's never who I was. I miss the thrill- the unexpected. The uncertainty of meeting someone who you feel that spark with, but who you also worry might not reciprocate. I miss obsessing about what I might wear or say, or what I might do, and what he might say or do and what that might mean. With Sam… it doesn't matter what I look like, what I say or don't say, what I do or don't do- he'll still love me. In the end, it's all the same to him. I'm just… perfect."

"Yeah, it sounds awful," I said sarcastically, but in spite of myself I was sort of understanding where she was coming from. Emily had always been a free spirit: she had thrilled in the adventure of life. Sam's love was a beautiful prison, steady and unbreakable. I could see how someone with her character might find that overwhelming, and because my cousin was also a sweet person, she couldn't take advantage of it, either. So she was stuck between wanting more out of life and feeling guilty for that desire.

I really looked at her. The scars were the most obvious thing that had changed her since she'd come to La Push such a relatively short time ago, but there were other changes, too. Her hair had gone a bit limp; she'd lost weight. Not a lot, but enough, and Emily loved food, so I knew that was a sign of something. Maybe the dreamy picture of happy perfection that Sam painted in his mind of their relationship wasn't true. I knew they didn't fight; I would have seen that. But maybe Emily was nurturing a secret heartache, what she was trying to explain to me now. And how could she possibly say that to Sam? How could she ask him for the one thing he could never give her? For the first time I saw how cruel it was that imprinting only worked one way.

"You're the only person who could ever understand," she whispered. I saw a single tear escape her left eye and roll down her cheek. "There is literally no one else I could ever talk to about this, Leah. I know it's not a fair place to put you in."

My gut reaction was to retort something angrily, but I forced the urge down. "I just had no idea," I admitted. "I only see Sam's side."

When she smiled, it looked strange because her eyes were so full of tears. "I don't want you to think I don't love him," she repeated her earlier words to me. "I just wish I hadn't found him so young."

I couldn't agree. Suddenly, I imagined myself at thirty years old, married to Sam, one child at my side and another on the way, and Emily coming to visit. I saw him imprinting then, when that one moment could destroy an entire family and not just me. For the first time, I was grateful that it had happened when and how it did. Emily was related to me: it would have been inevitable that he would have met her eventually. I realized now that imprinting was like a ticking time bomb under someone's skin.

I wondered, not for the first time, if there was a person out there somewhere who would elicit a similar reaction in me. Who would I be then? Sam had changed so profoundly because of it that it terrified me to imagine a similar reprioritization in my own life. I just hoped that if there was someone out there for me to imprint on, they stayed out of my way for a few years, until Seth was grown up and could more easily endure my abandonment.

"I told my mother about me and Seth," I said. "Last night. So you can talk to her about it." I knew Emily and my mother were not nearly as close as she and I, and my mother wasn't exactly an impartial shoulder to cry on, either, but she was more than me. I couldn't be there for Emily like that: not now. Maybe not ever. She had to understand that. But I didn't want her to be alone in this, either.

She nodded, and picked up the bottle of nail polish again, starting on my left foot this time. A comfortable silence settled over us once more, and we sat there for a long time not speaking a word to one another. As kids, we used to spend whole afternoons like that: those moments were some of our closest. A truly comfortable silence was a gift that few could give, but it had always come easily to us.

After a long time, Emily said quietly, mostly to my toes it seemed, "I got a birth control implant. I still have power over some things."

I have to admit that I felt incredibly relieved when she said that. I knew that kind of birth control lasted for years, and even though she could remove it anytime she changed her mind, it was obvious that a baby was the last thing Emily wanted right now. It would simply be one more thing to tie her down, and I could see that my cousin wanted to maintain at least the idea of potential freedom, that she could walk away at any time, if she had to. But I knew she never would and so did she.

"You know, the legends say it's possible to learn control," I said. "It's possible to figure out how to stop shifting."

"And then what happens?" she asked, looking up in interest.

"Everything starts up again. Aging… everything."

"I wish it was like in the movies," Emily joked. "I wish Sam could just bite me and I could run around with all of you."

"No you don't," I said flatly.

"So is that what you want?" she asked. "To stop?"

I nodded. "That's the plan, yeah. I want a normal life… children… old age. Death."

"What about Seth?"

I hesitated. "Right now in his life I think he thinks this is pretty much the coolest thing to happen since sliced bread."

Emily laughed. "Well, that's Seth. What isn't he enthusiastic about?"

"I know," I answered. "It just scares me. I worry about him all alone, when Mom and me are gone."

"He'll be much older then," she pointed out.

"Yeah, but he'll look twenty forever, max," I countered. "And Seth at twenty will probably still look fifteen."

"You don't know that for sure. I've been looking a lot into the legends and asking people lots of questions about what they know- the answer is basically next to nothing, Leah. I don't think even the council ever thought this would happen again."

I shrugged. "Well, it did."

"Thanks for that revelation," she teased me. More gently she said, "You can't look after him forever."

I nodded. "Yeah, I know that. At a certain point, I'll have to just cross my fingers and hope for the best."

"When's that going to be?" she asked curiously.

I gave her a half-smirk. "I'll tell you when I see it."

She finished my foot and set it aside carefully. "Fair enough," she said.

It was getting dark, and I wanted more than anything to avoid another confrontation with Sam. "Well," I said. "Now that my toes are appropriately hideous, I'd better get out of here before you start on my fingers, too."

"I wonder if it'll pop off when you shift," she mused. "Or if it'll still be there when you change back."

I hadn't thought of that; it actually intrigued me, too. "I don't know," I admitted. I tried to think about it for a moment: no one in the pack had dyed hair, and of course none wore makeup because they were all boys and I hadn't worn makeup to speak of in over a year. So I had no idea. Our tattoos came back every time, but that's because they were scars. It wasn't the same.

Emily tumbled out of the hammock with me, the two of us finding our feet at the last second. "Change," she said. At my incredulous look, she begged, "Oh please, let me see? I want to see if you have painted claws!"

"If I do, you have to get some nail polish remover and take it off immediately," I groaned. I found myself shy under her gaze, so I made her turn around as I removed my clothing, piling it into her blindly outstretched hands. Finally nude, I wasted no time and shifted into my wolf form. It was always a strange feeling, that split-second where I was sure my body would come apart, but it didn't.

Twenty bucks says it stays on, Quil's voice entered my mind, immediately reading my thoughts and figuring out what was going on.

No way it'll stay on, Embry's replied. I'll take that bet.

I looked down at my toes; long, sharp claws emerged from the end of each one, as smooth and mottled black as ever. I heard Quil's groan almost at the same time I heard Embry's glee, but I ignored them both. Instead, I nudged Emily's shoulder with my nose, and she turned towards me with a huge grin on her face. She glanced down at my toes and shrugged, then looked at me. "It's so cool," she said softly, "how your eyes are still exactly the same." Mostly to make her laugh, I rolled them for her, and she giggled. She reached out and touched my head, and I lowered it a little, letting her scratch me behind the ears and feel the soft thickness of my fur. "Do you like that?"

I shrugged my shoulders a little and butted my head into her hand, making her giggle again. Then I jerked my head in the direction of the woods, indicating that I was leaving. I offered her my leg, where she tied my clothes securely, and I pulled my lips back over my teeth just enough to give the sense of a smile. Emily threw her arms around my neck and held me close.

"I'm so glad you came," she said into the ruff of my neck. I tucked my chin around her in the semblance of a hug and then she let go. Giving her a wag of my tail as a goodbye, I bounded off into the forest.

It would have been so cool if it had stayed, Quil lamented now that my moment with Emily was over.

Yeah, well it didn't, and you owe me twenty bucks, Embry answered cheerfully. I could already see all the things he was planning to spend the money on.

No way, dude, we didn't shake on it, Quil protested.

Oh, come on! Embry protested. Shake on it? How exactly could we have done that when you're like ten miles from me? Leah! he whined.

Quil, I answered sternly. Pay up.

Again I got the distinct impressions of Quil's groans of protest and Embry's happy satisfaction.

Want to come running? Embry offered politely, but I could see that neither he nor Quil really wanted me to, and neither did I.

Just heading home, I answered, ignoring their obvious relief. In fact, I'm already there. The incredible speed I could run at was another perk of being a wolf: I was home in seconds when a drive would have taken much longer. Without even waiting for a response from either of them, I shifted back to human form on the outskirts of my family's property and dressed hurriedly before heading towards the house.

The immediate silence was like a switch being turned off inside my head. I was alone, but not just that… I was lonely. I could admit that because no one could hear me. It was obvious that no one was home, so I used my key and stood just inside the threshold for a long moment, breathing in the cedar scent of the walls that had framed my home since birth. When had it stopped feeling like home? Was it when Sam left me? When I first shifted? When my father died? The place was upsetting to me now, the bad memories it held threatening to drown out any safety I had ever felt cradled in the embrace of this wood and glass structure.

I sighed and stepped outside again. I set off away from my house, taking the long path through the woods that still wasn't particularly long. Not to the pair of muscular legs I now owned, anyway… besides, the monotony of my footsteps and the quiet rustle of birds and tree limbs allowed me to think of nothing, which was welcome. I let my mind drift to silence, so by the time I arrived at Paul's place I was surprised to find myself standing in front of the small green trailer he called home. I'd never been there before, but I knew the look and layout of it by heart from Paul's memories. It was nothing to speak of, a meager little place that gave him a reprieve from his parents' home. They weren't abusive, nothing you could put your finger on, but his father especially had an oppressive presence. It was hard to live with, hard for all of us.

I knocked on the door. He opened it, sleepy-eyed and clad only in boxers, and it was then that I remembered that he'd been out patrolling the night before. It only would have been a few hours since he'd gotten home.

"Sorry," I said by way of greeting.

"Leah?" he answered, rubbing sleep from his eyes as he registered my presence on his front stoop.

"I was just going for a walk," I tried. "Thought I'd say hey."

"Hey," he said, his lips curling up in just the hint of a little wry smile. He held the door open a bit more. "Do you want to come in?"

I eyed that door, open just wide enough to allow me to slip inside the dark room. I could smell that room even outside in the cool, clean air; it wasn't a bad smell, just the typical smell of a teenage boy that often overtook Seth's room until my mother threatened him good-naturedly and he cleaned up. Paul's room was a bit mustier, though, a bit different than Seth's, and I knew it was because I recognized his particular scent on some subconscious, instinctual level now, because of what had transpired between us.

We both knew what would happen if I went through that door. It was why Paul was looking at me with that small, knowing smile, why he was patiently waiting. We both knew this was my choice, and that he represented a doorway as clear as the one he stood in now. I could step through it and leave all my worries outside, or I could go home. Did I know what I was doing? I had promised Seth I would try to avoid this, and I had found it difficult to look in the mirror after what Paul and I had done in the woods. I tried to blame it on my hormones, which had become elevated in abnormal ways since my first shift, but I knew that was only a tiny factor. Paul was an escape, but more than that he was an escape that was uncomplicated. Safe.

I stood there for another moment, and then I walked through the door.