Hey, guys! I'm sick, so I decided to update earlier than usual (currently 7:30). I know that usually when you're sick you are able to write a bunch, but I ache all over. My hair hurts. It's quite depressing. MySuperAwesomePenName has also been quite sick, so we've slowly dragged ourselves down the road to recovery. I have exactly three words done on Chapter 6. I'll do my best in getting it finished by next Friday, but no promises. Also! Happy February!
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Crash
Chapter 5
As the weeks passed by quickly, Tala found herself getting into the rhythm of things. Go to school Monday and Tuesday, stay home the rest of the week, and take a bus from Port Angeles into Seattle for her Junior College veterinary class on Friday. Pig out on Emily's delicious food on Saturday, cram on finishing homework Sunday night. And repeat. Again and again and again. The only thing that happened, almost habitually, every day was that the wolf visited her every night around ten, and left when she left for school.
On this particular day, however, Tala woke up alone. The wolf was not lying on her bed, or on the rug by it. He had been arriving later and leaving earlier every day now for the past three weeks. Feeling strangely uncomfortable being alone in her room without him, she slid out of bed, walking with both of her feet for the second time since the accident six weeks ago. Her left foot was finally healed, yet it was still pretty tender. She shuffled to her door, cracking it open and peering out with her startlingly green right eye.
It was a Friday, and the rain was pouring down as usual, the clouds attacking the house with such fervor it seemed almost impossible that the house was still standing. Quietly, she opened her door all the way and made her way to the kitchen, where she found a sack lunch next to a water bottle with a pink Post-It on it.
Tala peeled the Post-It off the bottle and quickly scanned the four nearly indecipherable rows of Sam's messy handwriting.
Congrats on getting your cast off, Brooks.
Have a great day at vet school.
Sam
P.S. Happy Six-Months Early Birthday. Keys are in the lunch bag.
Tala's eyebrows nearly disappeared into her hairline. "Keys?" She glanced out the large windows on the door and caught a glimpse of her black Jeep, fully-restored, sitting in the now misty outside.
"Oh my gosh." Tala was blown away. She smiled, and felt a wave of happiness and love towards Sam wash over her.
She floated out of the house like she was in a dream, the keys in hand. Her hand subconsciously rubbed against a worn-down dog tag as she hit the unlock button, as if to check that the car was really hers.
The Jeep's headlights blinked twice with a small "weep-weep" that echoed throughout the woods. Tala let out a disbelieving laugh and squeezed her keys in excitement, hitting the alarm key.
The alarm screeched out, and somebody let out a really loud F-bomb. Somebody who was not Tala.
She yelped in surprise, quickly shutting the alarm off and tilting her head to see who had yelled. She spotted a pair of faded jean cut-offs that, upon further inspection, led to a pair of dark brown legs and two bare feet that were sticking out from under her car.
"Oh my gosh. I'm so so so sorry, Sam! I didn't know you were under there!" Tala cried as she bit at her thumb anxiously.
The legs rolled out from under the car and instead of seeing Sam's older face, one that had small crinkles around the eyes, she came face to face with Embry Call.
"Hey, Tala." He smiled at her, a rosy hue on his cheeks and an emotion in his eyes Tala couldn't quite make out.
"Oh, it's you." Tala's voice visibly decreased in emotion, leaving it deadpan.
Embry's smile faded a tiny bit, his eyebrows knitting together, and he fumbled with the greasy, bright yellow rag he had in his hands almost anxiously. He swallowed, this time obviously nervous, and his Adam's apple bobbed.
Tala quickly averted her eyes from his neck, her nose and cheeks a soft shade of pink, embarrassed that she had been staring at him.
"Err…" His eyes flickered over her small body, then to the car, and back to her. "Is your car looking better? Because, if it isn't, I can always fix it and-"
"You fixed my car?" Tala interrupted, visibly surprised. "Why?"
He shrugged. "It obviously meant a lot to you, and I want to mean a lot to-" he stopped, but not before Tala knew what he had been going to say next.
Her cheeks turned a dark red, along with a stripe of the same color running from her hairline down her nose and chin to pool in a three-shades-lighter pink on her chest. "Oh, well, um-"
"Will you go on a date with me? Please?"
Tala was stunned into silence. Never had she met somebody so interestingly blunt - but maybe that was how all boys were; it wasn't as if she would know. Stupidly, she replied with the best question she could think of:
"Do I have to?"
Embry's hopeful and anxious face fell quickly into a depressed-looking one.
Too late, Tala realized what she had said, and the effect it had on the man standing before her.
"Oh, gosh. Embry, I didn't mean it like that, I-" She began, tripping over her words.
But it was too late; Embry had already disappeared from sight, and the closest way he could have left was through the woods.
"Oh, f-" Tala began, but then resolved that she couldn't let him go in the woods alone with no protection.
But then again, neither was she. Running a bit lopsidedly into the house, she went straight to Sam's bedroom, flinging the door open with a loud bang. She went straight to his sock drawer, tossing the contents through the air as she searched for the one item she was looking for.
Dirty sock… clean sock… a pair of socks… boxers… cond- EW… Cosmo magazine- don't even want to know…
When she picked up a bright green sock with blue squiggles, something heavy thudded against her wrist, and she smiled in triumph, bolting out of the room. She quickly threw on a pair of Emily's hard-core hiking boots and grabbed the first hat and jacket out of the closet, just as the light mist that had been gathering outside crackled with sudden electricity and the rain began its attack on the little world once again.
Grabbing another, heavier jacket for Embry, a rain jacket for her, and a large, heavy-duty flashlight, she raced out of the house and straight into the woods, flicking the flashlight on as she ran.
Hurt… Pain… She can't stand me. She asked if she had to.
The wolf kept running, as far away from that place as he could get. He couldn't be there anymore. He wouldn't be able to control himself, and his girl would have been hurt. He kept running until he couldn't anymore, then collapsed onto the forest floor, exhausted.
"Embry! C-c-come on, Embry! Where are you? It's f-freezing out here!" Her only answer was the crackling of thunder, the only thing she saw was the small circle of light in front of her feet and the jagged lightning that seemed to be coming closer and closer to joining with the thunder.
The lightning flashed again, and Tala stopped to count the seconds. One, two, three, fo- The thunder rolled over her in a loud, roaring wave, making the hairs on her neck stand on edge. "Barely a mile away. I need to keep moving."
And so she did. Faster, and faster she ran, tripping over roots and gnarled branches, always calling out for Embry.
Warmth, the woman thought, her lips smiling. She turned to her companion, who mirrored her expression.
"Wait until it's closer. You never know what it may actually be. A pet, or something." The man said, his impossibly dark hair shining in a flash of lightning, his cheekbones more severe-looking than ever. His thin lips curled into a sneer.
The woman looked away again, searching through the trees for something. Suddenly she let out a soft laugh that was like music. Her rich, red-brown hair that curled almost impossibly perfectly whipped around her face, dancing with the wind. "You and I both know it isn't. She's just been with those mutts of a family for six weeks."
The man snickered at the jab, observing her face.
She looked back at him, smiling lovingly, her bright red eyes shining in the lightning-filled night. "Don't worry. After tonight, we can all be-" The man didn't let her finish the sentence, and forcefully pulled her towards him. He kissed her.
Embry woke up under the tree he passed out by. He was naked, and the rain was cold. Shivering, he sat up and grabbed a pair of soaked cut-off jeans that weren't torn to shreds and put them on. Shaking his body like a dog to get rid of excess water, he stood up and began jogging back to his house, unaware that he had missed being found by Tala by three minutes as she stumbled over the exact place he had been lying before.
She was so cold. The extra jacket she had brought for Embry was wrapped around her under, the rain jacket over it. She could no longer feel her nose, and her lips and fingers were tinged blue with cold.
"Embry!" she screamed, her voice cracking. "Embry! I'm sorry!" Her shout was drowned out with the roar of a thunderclap. She rested for a minute, then continued searching, unaware that Embry had just woken up moments ago under the very tree she was now under.
The woman pulled away, her red eyes shining with two different kinds of lust, her teeth pooling with venom. "It's time."
Embry arrived back at Sam's house thirty minutes later. All the lights were on and a police car was in front of it. His felt his stomach instantly drop to his feet.
"No," he choked out, bolting inside.
The second he saw him, Sam grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him so hard it was a surprise his head didn't roll right off his shoulders.
"Where is Tala, Embry?" He roared, his eyes manic.
"I don't know! I left the house earlier and that was the last time I saw her today!" he said, shoving Sam off of him.
"When was that, huh? Five hours ago? Ten? Twelve?"
Emily reached out for Sam's arm to try and calm him down, but he couldn't be stopped.
"I don't know, okay, Sam? I wasn't paying attention! She blew me off and I left!"
"You lef… you left?" Sam felt like murdering Embry. "You left, and she's nowhere to be found! The contents of my sock drawer are all over the floor of my room, and Emily's boots and three jackets are gone! She went to go find you - oh god, she's dead. She's dead."
Emily wrapped her arms around Sam comfortingly, her beautiful eyes shining with worried tears. "Sam, calm down; it's fine. Just get the pack out there and we can find her. She can't have gone that far."
Sam shook his head, trying to clear it. "Okay, okay. Call them. I want them to find her. If they don't, you'll have hell to pay, Embry." He grabbed his phone and hit a speed dial.
Fumbling for the phone in the jacket he had left on the couch, Embry called up Seth, who was the closest to Tala besides Emily and Sam.
"Hi, Embry! What's up?" Seth's cheerful voice thrust through the numbness he was feeling.
"We can't find Tala; she's out somewhere in the woods. Call everybody up. We have to find her." He hung up and sprinted out of the house, phasing as he passed the tree line.
Minutes later, four other wolves joined up with him. The tension was high, and not just because Tala was gone.
I can't believe you imprinted on my sister, Paul.
Well, it's not my fault!
Is too.
Is not.
Is too.
Is n-
SHUT UP. We'll talk about this later, we need to find Tala.
The wolves split up in different directions. The rain had erased all smell of Tala. Embry felt empty. He didn't know where she was, and he couldn't even locate her scent. He couldn't find her.
She couldn't find him.
She was exhausted, but she could have sworn she had already passed that tree three times. Looking around for something she could leave as a way to know she'd been there, she grabbed three rocks, stacked them on top of each other, and placed a bright red leaf on top of them, holding it down with a smaller pebble organized into an almost-perfect circle. She got up from the ground and kept walking. The rain had already penetrated her jacket, and the two others did nothing to keep her warm; everything was completely soaked except for the very bottoms of her feet.
She walked for a while, and as she climbed up an uncannily familiar, small hill, she almost missed a very familiar set of three stones. She saw them out of the corner of her eye, and she approached them, almost scared. Instead of the leaf with a circle of pebbles, there was a piece of paper. The pebbles were in a heart formation.
Shaking, she lifted up the note, noticing that its letters were already starting to fade in the rain. But she could make out exactly what it said.
Hello, sweetie.
Fear drenched her quicker than anything ever had before. Somebody was playing with her. These were the exact same three rocks, and the exact same pebbles. And look, the leaf that she had placed right there was strewn on the floor not two feet away. Her breath quickened and her heart pounded. Unbeknownst to her, the people watching her could hear her heartbeat, and it made them even the hungrier for her.
Throwing the note down, she pulled out the bright green sock she had stolen from Sam's drawer and pulled out a small, black box. It crackled with electricity when she flicked it on, and Tala smiled grimly. If somebody was trying to do something to her, she'd take them down first.
Embry ran. He ran so fast, he was almost afraid of not being able to stop in time. Through the rain, he had caught a whiff of the most putrid scent in the world. He knew what that scent was, and he knew that needed to find Tala before they did. He had to; his life depended on it.
Tala couldn't keep her eyes open. She kept tripping and falling half asleep. The last time she checked her watch, she'd found that it had stopped working at five PM. She supposed that that had been three hours ago. She passed the rock pile again, and shivered. She had to keep walking or she might die of hypothermia. Keep going, keep going. That was the only coherent thought going through her mind.
Her head was down, so she didn't notice the log she'd stepped down onto until it was too late. As she watched, her foot vanished through the log and she tumbled down a cliff, her scream piercing through the air and the illusion disappearing.
The man and woman untangled themselves from their embrace and took off flying towards the girl that was falling through the air.
They had found her.
Embry didn't stop running, even as he felt his emotions go haywire. It was now a battle. A battle for Tala.
Embry, don't just rush into things! Think about it first! Sam said.
Tell me that when she's safe, Uley! He yelled, blocking out his voice and racing down the mountainside to his imprint.
Tala closed her eyes, knowing that she was going to die. But at the last second, something grabbed her and snatched her away from the cliff and back into the forest.
The man slammed Tala against a tree, and she coughed as his hand wrapped around her neck, choking her painfully. Lightning flashed through the stormy sky, and Tala could just make out another figure with red-brown hair and impossibly red eyes standing behind him. The lightning struck again, hitting a tree not twenty feet away from them, its entirety bursting into flames as if by special effects in a movie, though Tala knew it wasn't.
The third time lightning struck, it had already passed them by safely, but the thunder was deafening. Through the swift flicker of light, she finally saw the man's face. His black hair, high cheekbones… bright red eyes and pale lips curled into a sneer, with a tooth peeking out from his closed mouth that glistened with something Tala could not guess.
She knew this man, had known him her entire life. But he was supposed to be dead. Uncertainly and with difficulty, she spoke around her nearly crushed esophagus.
"Dad?"
His lips smiled even more cruelly. "Hello, sweetie."
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Sooo, how was that? Favorite chapter of all time. Super proud of it. Thank you to the three reviewers I got for last chapter! You guys seriously made my day week. Reviews make me heal faster. :D
And, just stating again, if you didn't read my above authors note: It's very very unlikely that Chapter Six will be up next Friday. I still have to write 3,000 words and have MySuperAwesomePenName read it through. Sorry! :(
Pichi's Weekly Story Suggestion:
Boyfriend by Molly Raesly. It's a Harry Potter fanfic, and it's the best thing in the world, almost as amazing as Nutella. Molly also has two sequels out for Boyfriend.