Chapter Three: Mazarin Blue

That night, I'd arranged to meet Mike outside The Shed music venue. As I approached it I smirked. This guy wasn't in his natural territory and looked distinctly uncomfortable. It wasn't that he was any older than the people around him; he was just dressed too smartly and already looked like someone's Dad. I'd driven past the venue enough times to know that even clean jeans were too smart for this place. I didn't have a great many casual clothes, but I did have a faded pair of jeans which were perfect.

Mike was also trying too hard with his hair. It was differently arranged from work and if he was aiming for casual messiness, then he'd missed the mark and ended up with just a mess. He was blonde like Daniel but not a glorious blond; but a muted, almost mousey blond. However, I wasn't here to compare him to an angel; I was here to have a rare night out.

Mike was a nice guy, but I'd already had to push him away once before. He'd almost hurled himself at me at Forks' Sixtieth Anniversary celebrations back in August. I'd kept him firmly at bay on that first resolute day of my 'no men' rule. With Daniel I was on quicksand with that rule now; but Mike was a work colleague, so as long as we stuck to those parameters, it was fine.

He looked relieved to see me and we joined the line of people waiting to be searched before they went in. "How did the viewings go?" He asked.

"Good thanks. One looked promising, but I'll keep looking. I'm not being too specific right now; I'm just getting an idea of what's around."

"Have you thought of looking in Forks?"

"That's a bit too close to school. I don't know if I'd be happy living and working in the same place. Doesn't it cramp your style meeting students in the grocery store on a Saturday?" I joked.

"Not really, Forks is a nice place. Quiet, nothing much ever happens. I don't really care for Port Angeles."

I shrugged. "I like it." I said cheerily. I liked it even more knowing that Daniel lived here.

We got through security and into the venue. There really wasn't much to say about The Shed; other than it was painted entirely black and had what seemed to be optional lighting. There was a stage at one end and its one concession to Halloween were strands of black bats hanging from the ceiling.

It wasn't long before we discovered other people that we knew. Bex and her guy Todd were here and she got completely the wrong idea about Mike and I.

"Oh my God you two?" She whispered at me, while Mike and Todd went off to get beers.

"No. He invited me to come see the band."

"But…?"

"But what?"

"Oh come on Stephanie, he's a nice guy and there aren't too many of those in the world."

"I'm off men for the year."

"So you keep telling me, but I'm saying that good men are hard to find and he's a good man; so grab him while you can."

"Why don't you grab him?"

Bex looked lasciviously over to Todd. "I like them tall, dark and handsome."

I couldn't resist. "So what are you doing with him?" She laughed. Todd was a Police Officer in Forks and Bex had met him when he caught her speeding last year. He let her go and out of it came a relationship that had blossomed.

The guys returned with beers and as I drank, I cast an eye over the crowd, looking for Daniel. Would this be his kind of thing? Probably not, since he drove a Jaguar. This didn't feel like somewhere he'd hang out in. Why was I thinking about him when he made me feel so uncomfortable? That was obvious; he was gorgeous and I was attracted to him, end of story. I was also more than a little intrigued by why I was being warned off him. I searched the crowd, but he wasn't here. This wasn't the kind of place that angels hung out in anyway. Maybe I'd be better off trying a church?

Todd wasn't the only Forks Police Officer here this evening. I recognised the Police Chief, Charlie Swan. He and his girlfriend came over.

"I can't go anywhere without the Chief being on my tail!" Todd joked.

"Just making sure you're here," replied Charlie. "Thanks for coming to support Ness and her friends. It means a lot to me." Charlie lifted his beer in acknowledgement.

"It's a pleasure, she's a great kid." Todd continued.

"And Mike, nice to see you and… Stephanie isn't it?" I nodded; glad he'd gotten my name right. I wasn't a Steph, I was most definitely a Stephanie. Charlie smiled. "It's almost a Forks High School staff night out."

"It's certainly a student one," said Bex. "Have you seen how many there are at the front?" Bex pointed towards the stage.

"Yes, out in force. It's what I like to see." Charlie turned to me. "Do you come here often?"

Heather, his girlfriend, good-naturedly poked Charlie in the ribs. "Excuse me! Are you hitting on another woman right in front of me?"

Charlie realised what he'd said and laughed. He pulled Heather closer, "I was only making conversation; it just didn't come out the right way." He grinned and kissed her hair.

"To answer your question Charlie," I said. "No I don't. This is the first time I've been here."

"I hadn't been until Ness joined the band, but I like it now. What do you think?" He enquired of Heather.

"Well, it's not somewhere I'd usually come, but that's what I'm about -not being found where you'd expect me to be. Well, apart from Sunday mornings."

Heather Scott was the Pastor of Forks Baptist church. She didn't look at all like a Pastor, she looked… well; normal. She'd moved to Forks over the summer and had come to the school in early September to introduce herself. She was already well liked, mainly because she always pitched up on her visits with an enormous box of cookies for the staff. A very short time after her arrival, the gossip went around that she was dating Forks' Police Chief. Eyebrows were raised but then lowered, as the Police Chief and the Pastor proceeded to conduct themselves in a manner befitting their roles.

It was ironic that he and Heather were dating. I'd heard that Charlie's previous relationship had broken down, because his ex-girlfriend had fallen in love with the former church minister. The gossip about that had been downright ugly. That was the downside of living in a small town; you couldn't keep secrets from anyone.

Heather seemed to be having an impact on Charlie Swan. Last year, the few times I'd met him, in his capacity as Ness Masen's guardian, he'd seemed like a guy with the weight of the world on his shoulders. But now, there was a happiness that radiated out of him.

Ness was an intriguing girl. The Ness that had started at Forks High the same day as me, was completely different to the girl she was now. In those first few weeks understandably, given that she'd just lost her parents, she was incredibly shy, unsure of herself and watched everyone like a hawk; as if she was waiting for something bad to happen. Partly a combination of finding her feet and her friendship with the supremely confident Jess, Ness was blossoming into a truly delightful young woman.

Unlike other girls who applied their make-up with a palette knife, Ness never wore make up and was naturally beautiful. Everything about her was lovely; she was graceful, elegant, articulate, funny and incredibly intelligent. Once she'd settled and gotten through a very rocky first semester, she started to produce some good papers and had pulled herself up from a low B grade to garnering straight A's time after time.

In any other school, she would've been despised for being so 'perfect'. But not here, and perhaps Mike was right to claim that Forks really was a nice place to live; because everybody liked Ness. She had a natural charm that drew you in, nobody had a bad word to say about her and everyone was expecting at least a Dartmouth acceptance in the next few months. Bill Greene had high hopes for her. She was brilliant, beautiful and I knew from their looks, that she was adored by virtually every male student in the school. But she'd resisted the attentions of all of them, apart from Ricky Scott last year. Since they'd split there'd been no one else. The only likely candidate was Dan, her friend Jess's twin brother. Dan and Ness were clearly good friends and touched and hugged constantly; but that was all. It had never tipped over into them being boyfriend and girlfriend.

The Taylor twins and Ness were in a band with two previous Forks High students; Ricky Scott – no relation to Heather – and Zak Foster. It was their band we were here to see tonight, although there was a support band to get through first, and a case of getting through it turned out to be. They weren't easy to listen to, not my kind of music at all.

Todd bought us more beer while the stage was re-set. I was stood by a pillar and became aware that my right shoulder was being stroked. Mike was leaning on the pillar and I glanced to the side to see his thumb running along the top of my shoulder. Despite my rebuff in the summer, he wasn't giving up. I was a little annoyed. This wasn't a date; the word 'date' hadn't been mentioned. He'd asked me to go with him to see a band that I'd already been invited to go see. If this was a lazy way of asking me out on a date, then I wasn't impressed. I decided to make sure that he was aware of where the boundaries were and took a step forward, away from the pillar.

Finally, the band came on stage to loud cheers from their friends. Ricky was on drums, Zak on bass, Dan played guitar, Jess was on keyboards and Ness was singing. Ness had told me that their name, Mazarin Blue, had been picked at random out of a dictionary in the school library one lunchtime. They'd had to come up with something quick and it'd stuck, when none of them could think of anything else.

Surprisingly, for a band from Forks they were good. Actually, no, they were very good. I laughed when to the side of me I caught sight of Charlie bobbing his head in time to the music. They played a mix of covers and things they'd written themselves, but what really stunned me was Ness; I couldn't take my eyes off her! Gone was the shy girl of a year ago and in her place was someone who owned the stage. She had the crowd eating out of her palm and every move she made whipped them up into a frenzy. I couldn't get over that this was the same girl who sat quietly and unassumingly in my classes each week. She was a different animal!

They closed their set to wild applause, Charlie was whooping and whistling with the best of them, as was a guy behind me; whose whistle seemed to go right through to my bone marrow. I turned and was stunned to see that it was Will Randall from my Astronomy group. He was right at the back of the room, almost buried in the shadows. He didn't look my way; his eyes were fixed firmly on the stage like every other guy's. Ness sure knew how to get everyone's attention.

A little while later, Ness, Dan and Jess made their way over to Charlie. He was enthusiastic in his praise to Ness and her face lit up. Jess made me laugh, by sticking her fingers in her mouth to indicate that she wanted to be sick.

"Yeah, yeah Chief, we know." Jess batted away his compliments, her face lighting up as she saw someone approach from behind me. I turned and saw that it was Will. Jess's eyes narrowed and she put her hands on her hips. "You'd better write nice things about us." She said.

Will lifted his hands as if she'd accused him of something. "Have I ever given you a bad review?"

"No, but there's always a first time. If you want my opinion – and you're getting it – I think that was damn near perfect. What d'you think Dan?"

Dan's expression said he wasn't as convinced as Jess that their performance was perfect. "It was OK." He qualified.

"Pfft!" Jess blew a raspberry at her brother and then turned back to Will. "Anyway, how are you? What've you been up to since I last saw you? Still a freelance journo? Not thinking of getting a proper job, then?" Jess's very northern British way of speaking sometimes had me wishing she came with subtitles. She gave no quarter to anyone who wanted it 'in English'. It came out and you dealt with it.

"Journalism is a proper job!" Will laughed.

"Yeah but freelance? That's just one step up from freeloader."

Will laughed again. "I am not a freeloader and if you don't quit taking pot shots, you might find me writing that bad review."

"No you won't, you love me really." Jess grinned at him. "Besides, you need all the friends you can get with that tragic obsession with sci-fi you have."

"I have friends." Will asserted.

"Imaginary ones, no doubt. I mean, other than me, when did you last speak to another human being?"

Will guffawed.

"There's no point fighting it." Said Dan, you'll never win, you know it. Once she's got her claws in, she never lets go. I did warn you that you're not Jess-proof."

"So I'm finding out. Thursday; at my Astronomy group for your information."

"Astronomy?" Jess sounded appalled, which made me smile. "Which other sad fuckwits do Astronomy ?"

"I do." I said and Will looked behind him.

"Stephanie, Hi! I didn't see you there."

"Oops." Jess was instantly embarrassed and clapped her hand over her mouth.

"You called our history teacher a fuckwit, Jess? Oh well done." Ness giggled.

"I'm sorry Miss." Jess smacked Will on the arm, shaking her hand as if she'd hurt it. "Now see what you've made me do."

Will was incredulous. "I didn't make you call Stephanie names." Jess stuck out her tongue at him. "Oh, very attractive." Will replied.

"Bite me." Jess drawled, Dan and Ness sniggered.

Will leaned down to her. "One of these days girl, I will." He turned to me, thumbing at Jess. "Is she like this in your class?"

"You mean does she ever shut up? No." I smiled.

Jess gasped. "Miss! I've gone right off you, you were my favourite teacher."

"Does that mean I am?" said Mike. He'd been looking for a way to get into the banter, but with Jess that was never easy. Dan dropped his head onto Ness's shoulder; the pair of them were trying very hard not to laugh and failing miserably.

Jess looked her science teacher straight in the face. "I think you're about fourth. But she," she said, pointing at me and eyeing me with amusement. "Has gone right to the bottom."

I laughed.

Will stayed around to talk to Jess. More correctly he stayed around to be constantly insulted and never get a word in edgeways. He was laughing a lot whatever she was saying. For her part, I got the feeling that Jess was flirting. She was another one that like Ness, I couldn't understand why she didn't have a boyfriend.

Mike and I got chatting and Bex was right, he was nice. When he stopped trying to impress me and was simply himself, he was easy to be around and kept me laughing; especially with the catalogue of failed class experiments he was racking up.

It was getting late and I was tired. Bex and Todd said goodnight, as did Charlie and Heather. Charlie stunned me by hugging Ness. He'd previously given the impression that he held the entire world at arm's length. Perhaps he'd had a beer too many and had let the world in, or maybe Heather was having more of an influence on him than I thought. Whatever was going on, Ness didn't mind and was hugging him back.

Eventually, Mike and I left and there were a predictably awkward few minutes, where I weighed up whether or not to invite him back for coffee. But as we walked a block or so I was uncomfortable with that. I didn't want to go back on my promise to leave guys alone, I needed space. There was also someone else that I'd rather invite back for coffee. On an intersection Mike and I said goodnight. I thanked him for a great evening and turned in the direction of my apartment.

The streets of Port Angeles were quiet, but I loved the night and felt safe here, I knew where I was. I stood for a moment, looking up into the clear night sky. At first glance it was easy to think that every star was pure white; but once you looked at them in detail, you began to see that each one, depending on their temperature, was a distinct colour from red through to blue. I picked out the familiar sight of Orion the hunter; identifying the key stars of Betelgeuse, Rigel, Saiph and Bellatrix. I walked on, picking out other constellations and naming their principal stars.

With my head engaged in things above, I wasn't paying attention to what was going on here on Earth and stepped off the sidewalk right into the path of an oncoming car. It screeched to a halt beside me and the fender came to rest against my leg. Reality came crashing back in and the stupid thing I'd just done hit me like a rock.

I hoped I'd fainted, but I couldn't be sure of that. It was entirely possible that I'd died and gone to heaven; because gazing down at me where I lay on the road, was Daniel.