Chapter 2: Goodbye
I examined myself in the full length mirror. Okay, this wasn't too bad. Alice had dressed me up in a pair of Guess jeans and a black halter neck designer top. The jeans were fine – straight cut and sat on my hips. But I wasn't too sure about the top. It was really pretty with all the sequenced patterns and the cut was great. But I felt it was a bit too revealing, especially of the back and arms.
I rushed to my closet and pulled out a black jacket which I thought would match. Yanking off the label, I threw it on me, checking the result. Much better.
I went back to my bed to put the rest of the clothes in my closet. Alice never let any of us wear the same clothes twice and had thrown a fit when she saw some of my favourite pieces I'd managed to salvage from her last raid. I laughed at the memory as I left the room with my three bags – yes, three. Alice needed three for all the clothes she'd packed for me. Before I headed down the stairs, I caught site of myself in the passage mirror. I wandered… would Jake perhaps notice me if I were to reveal more flesh? I started to remove my jacket when dad's voice said sharply, "Ness, you look fine."
Ugh. He'd seen my outfit through my thoughts, and worse still my reason was to impress Jake. That's what happens when your dad is a mind reader. A very over protective mind reader.
"Protective for a good reason, honey," dad replied to my thoughts. I could hear the smile in his voice. "Come down, we'll be leaving soon."
With one last look in the mirror, I rolled my bags down the staircase. Jake said he'd be about ten minutes with the pack. I wandered if he was back.
"No, he isn't," said dad.
Argh, I hated these kinds of conversations! I couldn't keep anything private. When I reached the bottom of the stairs, I gave my dad the most annoyed, teenage look I could come up with. The others laughed at my expression, though I could tell they had no idea what we were talking about or why I looked at dad this way.
"I'm just trying to be a good dad," he smiled. "You know I only – hey. What the… oh, Bella." He sighed.
Mum winked at me, "Well Edward, you've got to give a teenage girl some privacy." She had blocked my thoughts. "You remember about seven years back…"
"Like it was yesterday," dad whispered as he wrapped his arms around Mum. The way I wished Jacob would hold me, more than just my best friend. I blushed at the thought.
"So when IS Jake getting back?" I asked.
"Well our future vanishes approximately on and a half minutes," answered Alice, "so it'll be soon."
And sure enough a while later I caught scent of Jake's woodsy smell. And just to spite my dad, I ran out the door to meet Jake. Hah, take that over protective dad!
Not one, but two werewolves came into sight. My russet-brown wolf and a sandy brown one, Seth.
They yelped in greeting when they saw me and turned back to the trees to phase.
"Jake," I smiled, walking over to greet him.
"Hey Ness," he replied with a bear hug. I inhaled my favourite woodsy scent deeply.
"Hey Seth. I haven't seen you in a while," I said as I turned to hug him.
"Yeah, you haven't been down to La Push lately," he grinned, "and what with me running patrols while Jake slacks off, there's no time to come here – hey, just kidding!"
Seth dodged one of Jake's thwacks.
"Have I been you away from your patrols, Jake?" I asked worried, "I'm really sorry. I didn't mean to –"
"No you haven't," replied Jake, trying to smoothen the worried creases on my forehead with his hand. Little flames licked my skin, the shivers of pleasure came back. "My patrols are fine."
"Yeah, I was just kidding Ness," soothed Seth. "So you ready for school?"
"Uh… um… no. Not really. I'm actually a tad bit… worried."
"About what? I hope it's not about the homework, Ness, because with your brains, you'll be top of the class by the first term."
I blushed at his compliment, the way everyone says my mother once did as a human.
"Seth," greeted dad, joining us outside, "Good to see you."
"Yes, it has been a while, Hasn't it?
"Indeed," replied mum, walking out the door.
Dad got along so well with Seth – sometimes even better than he did with Jake. It often made me feel that he would want me to end up with Seth instead of Jake. Something we all knew wasn't a possibility.
Dad gave me a look. "Argh, teenagers need privacy, remember?" I screamed in my head.
"Mum, a little assistance, please?"
"Edward," she sighed.
"Uh, what am I missing?" Jake asked.
Using my gift, I sent him and Seth images of what happened earlier, though I carefully left out the parts about wanting Jake to notice me. I wouldn't want to see his reaction then.
They both laughed. Of course dad couldn't comment what with me being "mentally mute" as he once put it.
"Come on people," Alice barged out the door, followed by Jasper, Rosalie and Emmet, who all had bags. My grandparents were the last to leave. "We don't want to be late."
"Just came over to say goodbye," said Seth, "hope you have a safe trip."
"Thank you Seth," replied Carlisle smiling. "We'll see you soon."
"Yeah, a whole month away from the whining pack," joked Jacob, "Boy am I gonna enjoy this vacation."
Seth raised his eyebrow, "Oh sure. You'll miss us so much, you'll wish the month will come and go quickly."
I didn't know about Jake, but Seth was right – I know I would miss him and the rest of the pack… A lot.
"We'll be back before you know it, sweetheart," soothed dad, "And you'll enjoy the trip."
"People, seriously now, we're going to be late if we don't leave now," said Alice, "I can see it!"
"Bye Seth," I said, hugging him again.
"Bye Ness," he replied. He then turned and ran back to the forest, heading back to La Push.
"We'd run to the airport, but seeing that Alice decided one bag per person wasn't enough, we're going to have to take the cars," teased Jasper.
Thanks to my dad's vampire driving, we reached the airport in fifteen minutes. I'd never been out in the public much, so I was a tad bit scared of how the humans would react towards me. And flying on top of that was waking up that horrible feeling of fear in my tummy again.
"Relax, Renesmee," whispered dad, "it's going to be fine."
I took a deep breath and walked through the airport doors, ready for their reactions…
