Rolling onto my stomach for the umpteenth time since laying down, I let out a large sigh. I kicked my legs viciously back and forth to free them from the tangle of blankets. I hugged the pillow close to my chest.
"I'm never going to fall asleep at this rate," I whispered to myself.
Ever since that strange meeting between Billy and Jake, ending with Jake leaving the house, my brain was a hurricane of random thoughts and worries. Although I tried, I just couldn't get my eyes to stay closed without picturing Jake wondering through the woods to meet Bella to keep her warm. A strange feeling wormed its way into the pit of my stomach.
Why does Bella always have to get all of the good guys! No, Brooke stop this. Bella is involved with some kind of fight tomorrow and all you're worrying about is her stealing Jake from you?
"Ugh!" I muffled a scream into my pillow.
I quickly realized that sitting here was going to get me nowhere, and I was eventually going to become delusional. Swiftly, I rolled myself off of the bed.
"Screw waiting for tomorrow night, I'm getting my answers now," I muttered to myself.
I padded my way to the door. I prayed that this door was not like my old bedroom door- it was near to impossible to sneak out with the constant squeaking of the hinges. Deciding that I could always just say I was going to the bathroom, I opened the door and did a quiet victory dance when it was silent. Walking on my toes I put my head against Billy's bedroom door. A soft snore could be heard through the door so I decided that I was safe when it came to Billy. If he was anything like Charlie, then he wouldn't wake up even if I did make a lot of noise.
My only light was the glow of the oven light from the kitchen at the end of the hall. I'd navigated through worse so I neatly dodged the table that I had conveniently forgotten about at the moment. If I remembered correctly, which I was positive that I did, there was a chest in the living room beside the couch. I was sure that there would be something useful in it since when I was looking through the house earlier and went to approach the chest, Jake dragged me away telling me some lame excuse about wanting to show me the beach. I refrained from sarcastically asking him if he meant the same beach we'd been to earlier that day and decided I could always investigate later- it was now later.
The chest seemed to call to me as I entered the living room silently. Turning my head in all directions, I noted my surroundings. Moonlight barely shone through the small window because of the blizzard outside, but it was enough I concurred. The living room smelt like the rest of the house, and Billy and Jake themselves, pine with a hint of salt although the latter could of just been my own hair from the beach trip. Carpet situated itself between my toes, the rich blue hiding all of the dirt that I knew was nestled in their somewhere. I highly doubted Jake was a vacuum kind of person, although the image of him in an apron while he did vacuum was very entertaining.
Creeping over to the couch I decided that I was safe, and rolled myself right over the back of the couch, landing with a quiet 'oomph' on the soft cushions. I held myself back from laughing, although I really wanted to laugh at my own boredom mixed with stupidity. Really, who just rolls over the top of couches? I smacked my palm into my forehead, and pushed myself to focus at the task on hand.
I pushed myself up using my elbows and crawled army style over to the arm of the couch. Here goes nothing, this better be worth it. I thought to myself.
The chest itself was obviously Quiluete property. It was made from wood, and looked like an ordinary treasure chest. The only thing that made it stand out was the intricately carved designs. Wolves of different shapes and sizes were etched into the wood at the top, I only noticed this though once I removed the blanket that had been hiding it. Why would somebody want wolves carved into a chest? I mean, I've heard of flowers but wolves? They're not very decorative or festive if you ask me.
A silent drum roll went off in my head. I could feel the back of my neck get cold, something that always happened when I got nervous. I'm quite positive that their wouldn't be any decapitated heads or dead bodies shoved in their, but the scenarios still played in my head thanks to an unhealthy obsession with Criminal Minds. My hand shakily reached for the top of the chest. At this point, I was now sitting on the floor in front of it. Apparently my body had moved me closer to the chest without me even realizing it.
I took a deep, soothing breath and opened the chest. Wow, it's a bunch of books.
Great job, Brooke. You made such a big deal over a bookshelf. Go figure.
I was officially giving up on finding anything useful in this house when a title caught my eye.
Quiluete Legends was written in plain black ink across the cover of what seemed to be an ordinary book. What intrigued me was that it looked ancient, like an artifact. Both the front and back cover were leather, and bound only by strings of leather... at least I assumed it was leather. I contemplated just leaving it there and trying to get back to sleep anyways, but then I figured maybe some boring old legends would lull me to sleep.
I snatched up the book, closed the chest, and lightly jogged back to my room. Just to make sure, before I went into my room, I opened Jake's bedroom door and peeked in. Sure enough, the bed was empty.
"Stupid know-it-all secret keepers," I grumbled under my breath, and closed the door.
I entered my own room and set the book down on the desk. I straightened out the blankets, fluffed up my pillows and grabbed the book before laying down on the bed. Once I was situated, I set the book on my lap and began to read.
What I had assumed to be boring old legends turned out to be one of the greatest reads of my life, and I read a lot. The legends talked of male descendants turning into wolves, shape shifters. Not only that, but at the end of the book it started to name specific people. Uley, Black and Ateara were notable names that I recognized. As I read on I discovered that these 'wolves' had made a treaty with the cold ones- vampires, and Carlisle Cullen was the man who initiated the treaty that- whoa WHAT?
Ephraim Black was approached by Carlisle Cullen, who stated that they were different. The colour of their eyes- a cool yellow- was proof that they stuck to a diet of animals opposed to that of humans. I treaty was drawn up between the Cullen family: they are prohibited to be on the La Push reservation at all times, they may not kill or BITE another human. They are never to tell the secret of the shape shifters. If any of these conditions are broken, the treaty is void.
Holy hell muffins. Cullen was the last name of Bella's boyfriend, the one with the yellow eyes (I thought of them more as an amber myself). It had to be the same Cullen family, they matched the description of the cold ones written in this book, plus I'm positive that Bella told me his father's name was Carlisle. Wolves, honest to god men that could turn into wolves. Jake's great-grandfather was one of them, one look at his family tree told me that. Perhaps that would explain why all of those boys, and Leah, were extremely hot -in both senses- and why they were so secretive. Why they hated the Cullen's, they were mortal enemies, why they ate so much, why they started shaking when provoked, and why they were so confident that they could help the Cullen's defeat whatever thing they were fighting against tomorrow. The pieces were all clicking into place now.
What the heck kind of place is Forks? Vampires and werewolves? Better yet, what the hell was Bella doing dating a vampire? It did say that they were vegetarian though... I was positive that Bella already knew everything that I had stumbled upon tonight. It was why she was always so damn secretive and fidgety. I would be too if my boyfriend could possible suck my blood at any given moment. What had Bella gotten herself into?
Was it possibly more vampires that were coming tomorrow? Why would they be coming for Bella though? It was true that most of my questions were answered that night, but there were still many more that begged to be answered too.
I read the book from front to back to make sure that I didn't miss anything. By the time I was done, there was only a few more hours until I had to be up to get ready to go to Sam and Emily's. Thankfully I was still coherent, and ran into the living room, placed the book back in the chest, and ran back to my bed once again. Even if Billy woke up now, he wouldn't know I had the book. He had to know about the legends, that must have been why Jake left last night, wolf stuff. I smiled brightly to myself, glad that I was 'in the know' now.
I rolled onto my side as I glanced out the window. Sleep was now inevitable and I gladly gave into the urge to close my eyes. My dreams were filled with what I once that were mythical beings.
If only I could have known that it would be my last peaceful dream for quite a while. Sometimes, God will give you a 'heads up' when something bad is coming your way, or when you're about to go through a drastic change. Something as simple as a bad feeling in the pit of your stomach, or a dreary torrential downpour with ominous dark clouds. Unfortunately, this was not one of those times.
Nope, what happened the next day was the last thing I had ever expected. Somewhere up there, somebody's getting a damn good laugh.