I stared at Bella. Bella stared at me. God, we were both idiots.
Then we were both laughing. She was clutching her sides in an attempt to keep breathing. I was holding on to the table for dear life, hoping that my grip was enough to save me from slipping off
My breath left me in a gasp as my ass made contact with the floor. I guess my grip wasn't good enough after all.
Everyone was staring at us now. I didn't really care, though I could tell Bella did from the scarlet stain on her cheeks.
"Sorry," I mumbled, dragging myself back up to my seat.
"It's okay," she said. "At least it wasn't me everyone was gawking at." Then she appeared to notice something. "Hey, who are they, in the corner?"
I looked over to where she was pointing discretely. "Topic number 32 that that Jess was rambling on about. 'They', my dear girl, are the Cullens." Like I said: I only remember the stupid things.
There were five of them at the table; three guys, two girls. One guy looked to be only about two inches shorter than by brother's six foot eight. He had short brown curly hair, and could have been a professional weight lifter. He reminded me of old Thunderbutt himself, Zeus.
The girl sitting next to him was a tall blonde, filled out in all the right places. Give her red hair, and more revealing clothing, and she would be another Artemis. Because one wasn't nearly enough…
The other blonde, a boy, or more of a man, really, I presumed to be the twin of the girl; I recalled Jess mentioning that two of them were twins. He was also tall and muscular, but not to the extreme the brunette was. Actually, he looked the spitting image of Apollo. I growled quietly at the thought.
Next to this boy was another girl. Ridiculously skinny and short, she looked like a pixie. She had short black hair that was spiked up, and appeared to be wearing Gabbana. There wasn't really a goddess she reminded me of. Probably for the best.
The last boy sat a little away from the others, and unlike them, didn't seem to be attached to anyone else. He was tall, but lanky compared to the other guys. He had reddish brown hair, almost a bronze colour. And he was gorgeous. Sans the hair, he appeared just like my favourite sculpture of Hermes. No one knew what he really looked like. He was always moving too fast; all you saw was a blur.
None of them really looked anything alike. And yet, they looked identical. They all had alabaster skin, even paler than my own. They all had purplish bruises under their eyes like they were all suffering from chronic insomnia. And their aforementioned eyes were a butterscotch shade in colour.
I saw that Bella also was taking stock, and decided to fill her in on the details.
"Jess actually filled me in on quite a bit about them. Apparently they're all adopted. The one who looks like a runaway from the circus sideshow is Emmett. His brother and sister, Edward and Alice are the bronze haired one and the short one. The other two are the Hale twins, Rosalie and Jasper. According to Jess, the local gossip girl, Emmett and Rosalie, and Alice and Jasper are together. She also said Rosalie could be a model, but… well, I've seen prettier."
At this point, Bella looked at me in disbelief.
"I asked her if Edward was with anybody, but she just glared at me and changed the subject, so I'm guessing she asked him out and he turned out to have had better taste than that."
"Not that that's very hard…" Bella said, smiling wickedly.
"No, it wouldn't be. I mean, come on. Did you see what she was wearing?"
The conversation continued on like this until the end of lunch, when we parted; she to chemistry, I to biology.
As I came in, I saw Edward was here, with the only available chair. I walked past him to get to the teacher so he could sign my slip. But as I drew level with him, he turned with a violent glare, filled with hate. I froze. All I could think of was I haven't even met him yet. What have I done? Did he hear us gossiping about them? Why does he hate me?
I felt my hand reach into my bag, towards the secret pocket where I kept my dagger. Realizing what I was doing, what I was about to do, I yanked my hand away and continued towards the teacher.
There were no other available seats. Now, for the rest of the year, I was stuck next to him. As I sat, he leaned away, presumably in revulsion, like he smelled something bad.
I lifted an eyebrow. "Bloody hell," I muttered under my breath, still staring at him as if he was certifiable. "Way to make a girl feel comfortable. I showered and everything."
I didn't intend for him to hear me, but he must've, because he turned to send me another glower. Fury and some hatred of my own coursed through me, and I sent him my own angry look, one I had spent centuries perfecting, one Ash liked to refer to as the 'Slitty-Eyed Death Glare'.
His eyes widened as he turned away from me again. I settled in my seat, pulling my long hair from its braid as I did so. If I was standing, my hair would have been at my knees. As it was, it nearly brushed the floor. I pulled it over one shoulder to keep it out of the way.
I steadily ignored Edward for the rest of the class, only daring to peek over every so often. Each time I did so, he was still facing the opposite direction; gaze carefully averted from my own.
About halfway through the class, I gave up on writing the notes in proper English and switched to ancient Greek: much more comfortable that way. Now all I had to worry about was someone trying to read over my shoulder. Yeah, that'd be real fun trying to explain.
When the bell rang, Edward was out of his chair and out the door before anyone else had stood. Really furious now, I threw my notebook back in my bag and stormed out not far after him.
Now it was time for gym. Yay. It turned out I wasn't expected to participate on my first day; a good thing, as I didn't really feel up to whacking a ball around a court for an hour. I pasted on a suitably 'ill' expression and asked the coach if I could go to the office, as I wasn't feeling well. He gave me the lesson off happily, as I knew I looked like I was about to throw up at any moment.
I grabbed my bag and stalked to a secluded area, pulling out my cell phone. I hit the speed dial for my brother. It only rang for a second before he answered.
"What's up?" he asked.
"Come pick me up. Now."
"What's wrong?"
"I'm feeling a little bit livid right now, and I would rather avoid killing someone if I could."
"Who did what?"
"This dick in Biology."
"I'm nearly there."
"God bless you, Ash."
"As if any of them would. They're all too afraid of me."
I laughed once and cut the connection, running to the front office as I did. I faked my sick look again, handed the receptionist my papers, and said my brother was nearly here, and thanks for all the help.
I ran out of the office again into the parking lot. And joy of joys, there was Edward again, sitting in his car. I smirked at him as he glared back, only breaking it off as my brother tore into the lot. He stopped right in front of me and shut off the engine, getting out at the same time.
I jumped for joy at seeing my car again. My baby, my Porsche Boxter. I had missed her so.
"You are my favouritest, favouritest brother ever!" I told him as I hugged him.
He shook with laughter. "I'm your only brother, sis."
"The only one I would ever admit to being related to, anyway," I said as I leaned over the door to plant a light kiss on the steering wheel.
"Of course." He sobered as he continued, switching to Greek as he did so, in case anyone was listening. "Now, who's the asshole who's making trouble for my sister?"
"See for yourself," I said, pointing to where Edward sat in his Volvo. Immediately Ash growled, and his eyes did what most people referred to as the 'Freaky Fire Dance'. The slowly swirling silver turned to a violently churning scarlet. I lay one hand on his arm as he started to stalk over to the Volvo.
"Don't. He's not worth it." I switched back to English. "Is that Godsmack I hear playing?"
"Yep," he answered, still not looking at me.
"Well, change it. I'm in an Evanescence mood. Heck, anything loud and depressing will do."
He grinned. "Loud and depressing? Good choice. We have lots."
The bell rang, shocking both of us out of our private world. Students started pouring into the parking lot and stopped as they saw my brother and I next to a ridiculously expensive car, and one of the Cullens glaring at us like there was no tomorrow.
The only thing to be heard was Evanescence's 'Bring Me to Life' playing loudly. I took advantage of the lull by stealing the keys out of Ash's hand and jumping over the door into the driver's seat.
"In," I commanded.
As soon as he did, I revved the engine, smiling lovingly as I did so. Then I accelerated, roaring out of the lot at eighty miles per hour, leaving the gawking students behind us.