Puppy Love

Chapter One

I returned home from college for Christmas vacation in my freshman year. Well, I guess you could say "home" could be either Forks or Phoenix, but I had called the former "home" for the previous forty-seven months, Besides, Renee was too busy that Christmas, helping some of the kindergarteners she taught put on a Chocolate Paradise show. Do not ask me what Chocolate Paradise is; I consider the knowledge so mundane that talking about it isn't pleasant.

On my first day back, Charlie just spent all day watching television. I was reading a book on deforestation, which made me cry. Trees are important to me. I'm not exactly a tree-hugger, but it pains me to think that humans kill them merely because they need space or hamburgers. If you don't understand how cutting trees down is necessary for a steady burger supply, allow me to explain it to you. Cattle need grass to eat. Humans want cattle for burgers. In order to meet the increasing population, you have to increase the number of cattle. But there's not enough room in some places for the cattle meat demanded. So, in order to meet the supply, trees are burned down so that there is a larger area for cattle to graze.

Those trees could be put to better purpose! Like paper for books. But no. They're burned! It makes me squeamish just thinking about it.

Anyhow, as I was reading the book on deforestation, the doorbell rang. A moment later I heard Charlie call up the stairs, "Bella, Mike's here!"

I ran downstairs, grabbed my jacket from the closet, and went into the kitchen, where Mike was.

"Hello," I said, smiling. Mike was my ex-boyfriend, but we still enjoyed each other's company.

"Care to join me for a ride to La Push?"

"You want to go to the beach?" I asked him, incredulously. "In the advent of winter?"

"Pretty much, yeah," said Mike. "Except that I don't know what 'advent' means."

"I'll explain in the car. See ya, Charlie!" I called. I'm not sure he heard me from the living room; he was so intent on the game.

We both got in Mike's truck, and we shared our college experiences. Mike went to Washington State University, while I attended Dartmouth. It was a good thing we weren't dating anymore, since it would tear me to pieces to have a boyfriend so far away for several months. In fact, that's why I broke up with my third boyfriend, Tyler Allen, just before I went away to college. I hoped he wouldn't get jealous of me being with Mike. Not that I expected him to be at La Push, anyway.

Mike parked the truck and we climbed out. He pulled a towel from the trunk.

"Are you crazy?" I asked him. "A towel on a cold day like this?"

"This is a magic towel," Mike said, brandishing it. "It'll make us invisible."

"You're joking, right?"

Mike just laughed.

"You know very well, Mr. Newman, that I don't believe in magic."

"Touche," Mike said.

"What's touché?"

"You calling me 'Mr. Newman'?"

"Well, I don't see what's so funny about you claiming an ordinary towel can do the extraordinary!"

"You know what's extraordinary?"

I shook my head.

"You are," Mike said. He leaned forward and gave me a kiss, full on the lips.

"Mike!" I exclaimed.

"What?"

"We broke up!"

"Doesn't mean we can't get back together again."

"But…a kiss…from out of nowhere, and you with that towel…"

"Bella, a guy can't help it when he's in love."

"You can't really love me, Mike. This is lust! It's revolting!"

"I prefer to call it puppy love."

"Well, go get a crush on a real puppy, then," I said, caustically. "Take me home, Mike."

Mike didn't say anything for a moment. But then he seemed to relent. "Okay, Bella, I'll take you home."

We climbed back in his vehicle. He started driving across the beach, toward the road. Then something caught my eye. It looked like a bunch of kids, but they seemed hairier than most people. Maybe it was just a trick of the sun.

"Mike, stop the car."

He didn't stop.

"I said stop!"

The vehicle kept on moving.

"If you don't stop the car now, I'll…"

"You'll what, Bella? There's nothing you can do. Heck, I could take you to Seattle and leave you stranded there."

Was this the sweet Mike I knew, or some phantom in his body? But I didn't believe in phantoms. Perhaps the kind Mike was all a façade. Then a disgusting thought came to me. He was planning to make me to a motel! I would be raped! No, I couldn't let that happen. I pulled my seat belt off, thrust the car door open, and flung myself out.

For a moment or two, Mike's truck did nothing, But then it turned around, coming back toward me. I was afraid of being forced back in there.

Three of the kids I had noticed on the beach appeared. They were hairier than most people. And they looked bigger, too. They stood in front of me. I was still sprawled on the ground.

Mike's truck stopped. One of the hairy boys went over to the truck and pulled off the side mirror next to the driver's door. It wasn't until later that I realized no human I had ever heard of, except maybe Samson, had the strength to do that.

Mike rolled down the window and shouted at him. While this was going on, one of the other boys went around to the opposite side and did something to the bottom of the car—I didn't catch what; I only saw him bend down. He went further back and did something else.

The boy Mike was shouting at smiled. "Well, thanks for the yelling," the boy said. "I don't get enough of that."

The other boy who had snuck around to the other side of Mike's truck returned, without Mike's noticing.

"I'll sue you!" Mike shouted at the boy who had pulled off his side mirror. Then he apparently decided that running over the boys wouldn't harm his conscience. He revved up his engine and intended to go forward, but nothing happened.

"Hey, doofus!" one of the boys said. "I think you're suffering from a puncture!"

All three boys guffawed at that. Mike got out of his truck. "Come on, Bella. Let's leave these goons," he said.

"I'm not going anywhere with you," I said.

"Bella, I'm sorry. I was a jerk. Now will you come with me?"

"If I fell for that, I'd be brainless, Mike. I think the fact that I attend Dartmouth should tell you that I'm smarter than that."

"Madam," said one of the hairy boys, bowing. "If you'll please to allow us to take you away from this creep, we will be sure you arrive home safely."

'Bella, don't listen to him! He just tore off my window, and one of them punctured my tires…they're fiends, Bella!"

"Take me away," I said to the boy.

"Okay. You'll have to climb on my back, though."

I was happy to oblige. If an alligator had come and told me that the only way to escape Mike was to jump in its mouth, I would have done so. As the boy turned around, I grabbed my arms around his shoulders, and put my legs against his sides. Then he started running, faster than I had ever known anyone to run before. But not, I knew, faster than a vehicle could go.

"What if he has a spare tire?" I asked the boy.

"Oh, don't worry about that. Embry punctured two of that bastard's tires, and he only had one spare. He won't be driving anytime soon."

That comforted me. But now I was with three boys, the nature of whom I did not know. Besides, Mike had always seemed so nice, and look what a creep he turned out to be. Who's to say I didn't just escape Charybdis, only to fall into Scylla's claws?