Chapter 13: Bella

Homework is so Much Better Than All of This

Friday could not come fast enough. I couldn't wait to get my ass back to school, where I didn't have to deal with imprinting, biting and treaties. I was looking forward to starting my new semester and the busyness that it would bring me. Honestly, anything would be better than the bullshit I had been dealing with at home.

I knew Charlie was still worried about me but he never mentioned anything about that night again. He was good like that; he didn't like having to discuss matters of the heart and all that mushy stuff, so it saved me the trouble of having to explain myself. That was the advantage of living with him versus Renee.

Charlie helped me load up my truck (that Steven had driven back to my house—thank God) with my stuff and said his goodbyes. He wasn't a very sentimental person, but I knew he loved me and worried about me getting myself into trouble—trouble had a special way of finding me. "Be careful at school. Study hard."

I smiled at him, it always made him completely uncomfortable to be parental (well, unless he was yelling at me about something that is). "No problem, I always study hard." I gave him a quick hug and he returned it. "I'll see you soon."

He ruffled my hair, "see you, kid."

"Bye dad."

I hopped into my truck and peeled out of my driveway, on my way back to normalcy. At least I hoped it was going to be closer to something normal that the crap that always seemed to find me when I was at home.

When I arrived on campus, there was some kind of ruckus going on out front of my building. The cops were pulled up in front of the building, and a young girl, who I noticed looked a lot like me, was standing next to a cop, talking frantically, as he made notes on his notepad. I rolled my eyes, if it wasn't one thing it was another.

I stepped out of my truck and went over to the cop. "Officer is it safe to go inside? Is something wrong?"

He looked up at me and frowned, "we haven't determined if there is any risk in going inside. Some of the rooms have been ransacked, but there doesn't appear to be any perpetrators on the premises. Just be careful."

I nodded and went back to my truck to get my belongings. As I walked past him again he called out to me. "Oh, miss! Please report anything usual to us so that we can get a complete report."

I nodded at him and made my way into the building. I looked around, aside from papers being strewn about the floor and some of the garbage lying outside of the garbage can things seemed to be alright in the main lobby.

My past experiences with traumatic events made me wary of what could have happened to the building that I lived in. Had other buildings been vandalized, or was it just mine? Was there some kind of connection here?

I cleared my mind of all thoughts of this nature, not wanting to bring my home troubles to school with me. I needed a clear mind to focus on my studies and get away from the drama that going home always brought me.

I got into the elevator and pushed 6 for my floor. I looked around and noticed something sticky and red on the wall, but I tried not to think the worst about that. When the elevator arrived at my floor, I jumped out, hating the confided space. I quickly went to my room; 624, and slid the key into the lock. It was then that I noticed that my door was not locked. That was funny….I was absolutely positive that I had locked that.

When I walked into my room, my heart practically jumped out of my chest. My stuff was everywhere. Every paper had been read and thrown on the floor, my bed had been left un-made and turned over. My diary had been read and left open on my desk.

I held myself, I really didn't like the creepy feeling I was getting. There was nothing like an invasion of privacy to make a person feel completely uncomfortable. I didn't know what to think. Why would a random person break into my room and go through my papers? If someone broke into the building and wanted to ransack the place, they would try to find things of value…wouldn't they? How could my diary be of any value to anyone? I had a sinking suspicion that I knew who had been in my room, going through my things and the hairs on my arm stood up, as panic ran through my veins.

It was then that I noticed that my pocket was vibrating. What the hell was that anyway? Oh…it was my phone. I pulled it out of my pocket and brought it up to my ear, "hello?"

"Bella!" Alice cried, frantically, "You aren't safe at the school. The Volturi has been there!"

The phone fell from my hands, as my biggest fear had been realized. Well, I guess technically it wasn't my biggest fear, because that was about Jake and Edward being hurt, but it was more like the biggest fear I ever had concerning myself.

I knew what the Volturi wanted from me; they wanted me to be turned. If I wasn't turned then they wanted me dead. I didn't like my options on this one, though at the time I had gladly chosen to be turned. I had wanted it anyway, and when the Volturi insisted then it was just extra motivation for Edward to turn me. That had seemed like a positive to me at the time. Oh, how stupid and immature I really had been.

Now the idea of being turned was far less romantic, however it still beat the heck out of dying for real. I was fairly certain that most people would agree with me on that one. I picked up my phone and desperately asked Alice "what do I do?"

"You have to go somewhere they can't find you." She told me, her voice sounding rushed and nervous.

"Where exactly is that?"

"With the wolves. Their powers don't work on them, as far as we know anyway."

Great! I had been so excited to get back to school so that I didn't have to deal with Jake and the imprint, just to find out that I had to go running back to him. What the hell? Why did my life have to suck so much?

I hung up with Alice and looked around my room. Should I try to get my stuff? Would I be coming back here at some point to get my things? I didn't know what to do. After giving it some thought I realized that getting to somewhere safe was more important than gathering my things. I did grab my diary, because I couldn't bear the thought of anyone else reading it.

When I got back to my car I noticed that the cop was still down there talking to the girl. He barely noticed as I slipped by them and hopped back into my truck. I turned around and pulled back out of the campus drive.

Where was I going to go? Could I really stand the thought of going to Jake's? Obviously I would be safest there, but did I really want to put myself back in the middle of all that drama? Where else could I possibly go? When the answer hit me I knew it was right. Something just guided me to where I should go.

I pulled up in front of the Clearwater's house. I was nervous about how Leah would react to me, but I believed in my heart that if anyone would understand losing the man she loved to an imprint, it would be her. I knocked on the door, hoping that either Seth or their mother, Sue would be on the other end of it. Much to my dismay, Leah was the one who answered the door.

"Bella." She looked at me quizzically. "What are you doing here?"

I smiled at her, trying to be as friendly as I possibly could be. "Hey Leah, can I come in?"

Seth appeared in the doorway, right behind his sister. "Hey Bella! Of course you can come in." Seth was always very nice to me. In fact, Seth was really the only werewolf who felt completely at ease with the Cullens, and they seemed to like him in return. I smiled at Seth, very grateful for his presence.

"To what do we owe this honor?" He asked, ushering me in to their small living room.

"I need a huge favor."

Leah folded her arms; she clearly was not inclined to do me any favors. "What could we possibly do for you?"

"I need to hide out here for a while."

Seth smiled, "that could be fun! It would give me someone to hang out with besides miss moody pants over here."

Leah tugged on my arm, "do you think we could speak in private?"

I shrugged but followed her to her bedroom. Leah shut the door and turned to me, her expression questioning. "Why in the world would you want to stay here with us?"

"The Volturi is after me."

She raised an eyebrow at me, "Like the Italian head vamps?"

"Those would be the ones."

"What do they want with you?"

I shifted uncomfortably. "They want to make sure that I've been turned."

"What will they do to you if they find out that you're still human?"

"They will kill me."

She made a face, "if those creeps touch a human we will tear them limb from limb."

"And then they will put themselves back together again and kill you. They're extremely powerful. Trust me; you don't want to mess with them if you don't need to."

"So, why aren't you hiding out with your vampire boyfriend? Surely he could protect you from one of his own kind; especially with his thought reading abilities."

I shook my head, "they have powers that surpass the Cullen's. They will be able to find me if I am with them. The werewolves are much harder for them to seek out, so most likely they will not be able to find me, or at least not as easily anyway."

"Okay, million dollar question…..why didn't you go running to Jake like you like to do whenever you get your ass in trouble?"

I didn't like what she said to me, though I had to admit that there was a bit of truth in her words. I did have a habit of using Jake to my own advantage in the past. But, I had changed….and clearly, so had he. "You can read his thoughts, you tell me?"

"Is it because of that other girl?"

"Jamie." I said her name with such irritation that it reminded me of the way that Leah talked about me. Ironic I guess.

"He thinks about her a lot." She folded her arms and looked me in the eye, "but he thinks about you just as much, if not more."

"Well, Jake and I—"

She nodded, "okay, so you and Jake had a fight and you don't want to go to him for protection, so you decided to hide out here?"

I gave her a sheepish look, feeling like a twelve year old being scrutinized by an adult.

"Fine, but as soon as we run patrol with him he's going to know that you're here."

I made a face, "please try and keep it out of your mind. I really want to keep this from him as long as possible."

"That fight must have been epic." She shook her head at me, running her hands through her hair, "I can keep you out of my thoughts just fine, but we both know how Seth is."

I groaned; she really had a point. "I am going to have to talk to him."

"I'll threaten him."

I smiled at her, "you would do that for me?"

"No, but I would do it for Jake." With that she turned and left the room. I stood there wondering if there was more between Jacob and Leah than their petty arguing had always pointed to.