CHAPTER TWO: Antipathy


Her first day of school went smoothly, if dully, until sixth period Biology I.

Apparently, not everyone got the memo that Bella was the only one allowed to be the rude, angsty teen.

She wanted to snap at her biology partner, because um, hey, she had some serious issues to repress and take out on the general populace. How dare he steal her thunder with his dark looks and clenched fists.

He appeared murderous. Positively stunning, but aggressive. To be honest, it was a look she envied. Her features were simply not made for intimidation. Nonetheless, she would make a valiant attempt to mimic the look later in the day. Situations where leveling others with a downright scary glare were more numerous these days.

"Are you okay?" she asked under her breath, when her stupid science teacher turned his back. All science teachers were dumb, in her exalted opinion, but this one in particular looked like he drew the short stick in deciding who would teach high school level biology.

"Mm," was the forced out reply, resulting in an angry exhalation. Well, if he didn't want to do her the honor of a proper response, then she would ignore him. See how he liked that!

Either he didn't notice her blatant cutting of him, or he was so hurt from the experience he couldn't form the words for an apology. Yeah, she was certain it was the latter.

Then he said: "Could you move away from me," with such vehemence, Bella immediately complied and scooted as far as she could from the hostile being. If he intended for to actually leave Biology, well, that wasn't going to happen.

He clenched the corner of the desk, and she wondered what the hell his problem with her was. Why didn't he just leave if he was so distraught by her mere presence? His behavior was absolutely ridiculous, and while her stomach was filled with knots over it, she was used to that and coped by stewing.

He disliked her? Then she would dislike him. Easy enough. She had already heard the gossip concerning the Cullen family—how odd they were, snotty, rich, high and mighty, model-like gorgeous, and pseudo-incestuous (the last tidbit was dropped by a blonde named Lauren, who gleefully defamed each Cullen, but even had to concede that no, they weren't actually related).

She had observed that they had admittedly alluring looks, and had no further observations on the matter until Mr. Banner assigned one of the Cullen's as her biology partner.

His instantaneous bad conduct served only to reinforce most of what she heard at lunch. Not even his aesthetically pleasing face could unsour her low opinion now.

Biology continued on, dragging at an infinitely slow pace. When the bell finally rang, her bio partner raced out faster than a mouse chased by a cat.

Her being the cat, him the mouse. The chase being her existence.

While ineffective, she leveled a preliminary semi-homicidal glare after him.

She could say three things with unequivocal certainty:

She hated this town.

She hated this school.

She hated her biology partner.

Her last class was gym. The less said, the better.

When the bell rang that finally allowed freedom, she grabbed her backpack with her good arm and slung it on one shoulder. Upon leaving, another annoyance popped up beside her, chipper.

"What did you think of our first day? Sucks that you had to sit next to a Cullen in Bio," Mike Newton said, trying to clearly irritate her with his intolerable presence and by breaking her triplet of hate list to add a fourth. Perhaps she could add him to the category of school; but then wouldn't her bio partner also be in that category? No, he seemed to be a special snowflake all his own.

But Mike was the type of guy who was annoyingly persistent. Didn't her general appearance scream unsociability? That was the whole point!

"It was fine," she mumbled, wishing for the first time that her hair was its pre-cut length and she could hide her face behind it.

"He is such a freak," Mike went on, as they stopped at her locker and she began fumbling with the lock. "Let me hold your bag!" he offered quickly.

She hated being helped. Pragmatism won out, however, and she allowed it and even gave a small thanks. She wasn't a complete asshole.

"So, Bells—"

"Bella," she corrected sharply, closing her locker and snatching her bag back. Not complete, but partial asshole, yeah.

"—Bella, a group of us are getting together this weekend—"

"Fun!" she interrupted hurriedly, "have a good time! Bye!" and she used her well-developed ditching people technique to turn a corner and make a graceless sprint to her truck. She ignored his voice calling after her.

Some might see her conduct as ungrateful (for his overtures at friendship) or rude (for her outright dismissal of him and his jittery puppy attitude). But, well. She isn't interested in being his friend, isn't interested in having any friends. She wants to do her time, complete her punishment, and get the hell outta the town of Forks.

Bella all but collapsed in relief that she made it to her car without a) killing anyone, b) making anyone cry, and c) getting invitations to, eek, socialize.

Her truck made a rumbling sound of agreement as she sped as fast as it would go out of the parking lot and back to Charlie's house.