AN: sorry about how long this took. I went to Disneyland then almost immediately after I got back my family went camping. Plus I needed to find a job which I lost before I even started due to a communication error. So I've been stressed. Enough about my life on to the story you all have been waiting patiently for.
Disclaimer: No shit Sherlock I don't own Twilight.
Charlie was about to pass the book off to Harry when he noticed a note tucked into the book on the page that he stopped at. "Guys looks like we have another note," Charlie announced and started to read it aloud.
Now no fibbing children this is what's known as a truth circle. You can be as vague as you want, but no out right lying! It would be pointless anyway see as the books will reveal all.
Love, the Squirt and her Giant 3.
"Well that was interesting should I start reading now?" Harry questioned.
First Sight
My mother drove me to the airport with the windows rolled down. It was seventy-five degrees in Phoenix, the sky a perfect, cloudless blue. I was wearing my favorite shirt - sleeveless, white eyelet lace; I was wearing it as a farewell gesture. My carry-on item was a parka.
In the Olympic Peninsula of northwest Washington State, a small town named Forks exists under a near-constant cover of clouds. It rains on this inconsequential town more than any other place in the United States of America. It was from this town and its gloomy, omnipresent shade that my mother escaped with me when I was only a few months old. It was in this town that I'd been compelled to spend a month every summer until I was fourteen. That was the year I finally put my foot down; these past three summers, my dad, Charlie, vacationed with me in California for two weeks instead.
It was Forks that I now exiled myself - an action that I took with great horror. I detested Forks.
"Why is she coming here, then?" Edward asked with curiosity.
"I'm not sure. She just called up and asked one day," Charlie answered, "Maybe we'll find out why."
I loved Phoenix. I loved the sun and the blistering heat. I loved the vigorous, sprawling city.
"Bella," my mom said to me - the last of a thousand times - before I got on the plane. "You don't have to do this."
My mom looks like me, except with short hair and laugh lines. I felt a spasm of panic as I stared at her wide, childlike eyes. How could I leave my loving, erratic, hare-brained mother to fend for herself? Of course she had Phil now, so the bills would probably get paid, there would be food in the refrigerator, gas in her car, and someone to call when she got lost, but still…
"Are you sure that Renee's not the one coming here to live with you Charlie?" Billy teased.
"Naw much too observant and responsible to be Renee," Charlie joked back.
"I want to go," I lied. I'd always been a bad liar, but I'd been saying this lie so frequently lately that it sounded almost convincing now.
"Tell Charlie I said hi."
"I will."
"I'll see you soon," she insisted. "You can come home whenever you want - I'll come right back as soon as you need me."
But I could see the sacrifice in her eyes behind the promise.
"Don't worry about me," I urged. "It'll be great. I love you, Mom."
She hugged me tightly for a minute, and then I got on the plane, and she was gone.
It's a four-hour flight from Phoenix to Seattle, another hour in a small plane up to Port Angeles, and then an hour drive back down to Forks. Flying doesn't bother me; the hour in the car with Charlie, though, I was a little worried about.
"What's wrong with spending time with your father? My son use to love to have one on one time with me," Old Quil asked.
"It's not that we don't like to spend time together it's more that we haven't seen much of each other so it gets awkward." Charlie responded.
Charlie had really been fairly nice about the whole thing. He seemed genuinely pleased that I was coming to live with him…
"Of course he's happy that she's coming. I know that Esme and I are always at our happiest when the whole family is at home together," Carlisle commented.
Edward started snickering, "Are you sure about that? Because that's not what you said the last time Emmett tried to get a pet pig or when Alice threw out your favorite loafers."
All Carlisle did was give Edward a look that clearly meant that he needed to stop picking on his sibling.
Meanwhile the Elders were shocked at how homey and close the Cullens seemed.
… for the first time with any degree of permanence. He'd already gotten me registered for high school and was going to help me get a car.
But it was sure to be awkward with Charlie. Neither of us was that anyone would call verbose, and I didn't know what there was to say regardless. I knew he was more than a little confused by my decision - like my mother before me, I hadn't made a secret of my distaste for Forks.
When I landed in Port Angeles, it was raining. I didn't see it as an omen - just unavoidable. I'd already said my goodbyes to the sun.
Charlie was waiting for me with the cruiser. This I was expecting, too. Charlie is Police Chief Swan to the good people of Forks. My primary motivation behind buying a car, despite the scarcity of my funds, was that I refused to be driven around town in a car with red and blue lights on top. Nothing slows down traffic like a cop.
"True," the Cullens said in unison.
The rest of the men looked shocked that Carlisle as a father agreed with something illegal.
Charlie gave me an awkward, one-armed hug when I stumbled my way off the plane.
"It's good to see you, Bells," he said, smiling as he automatically caught and steadied me. "You haven't changed much. How's Renée?"
"Mom's fine. It's good to see you, too, Dad." I wasn't allowed to call him Charlie to his face.
"She forgot to say hi for Renee." Harry mumbled to himself.
I had only a few bags. Most of my Arizona clothes were too permeable for Washington. My mom and I had pooled our resources to supplement my winter wardrobe, but it was still scanty. It all fit easily into the trunk of the cruiser.
"I found a good car for you, really cheap," he announced when we were strapped in.
"What kind of car?" I was suspicious of the way he said "good car for you" as opposed to just "good car."
"Well, it's a truck actually, a Chevy."
"Where did you find it?"
"Do you remember Billy Black down at La Push?" La Push is the tiny Indian reservation on the coast.
"No."
"Well I'm hurt," Billy stated hamming it up more than necessary.
"He used to go fishing with us during the summer," Charlie prompted.
That would explain why I didn't remember him. I do a good job of blocking painful, unnecessary things form my memory.
"He's in a wheelchair now," Charlie continued when I didn't respond, "so he can't drive anymore, and he offered to sell me his truck cheap."
"What year is it?" I could see from his change of expression that this was the question he was hoping I wouldn't ask.
"Well Billy's done a lot of work on the engine - it's only a few years old, really."
"Actually it was Jake that fixed it…I'm crap with cars I can barely change the windshield wipers by myself," Billy admitted sheepishly…well the note said to tell the truth.
I hoped he didn't think so little of me as to believe I would give up that easily. "When did he buy it?"
"He bought it in 1984, I think."
"Did he buy it new?"
"Well, no. I think it was new in the early sixties - or late fifties at the earliest," he admitted sheepishly.
"Ugh…If Rosalie hears about this truck she is going to run in the opposite direction," Edward commented.
"Why is she too good for an old car?" Old Quil commented he was after all a young man in the fifties.
"No, Rosalie just likes to fix and build cars, and the fifties and sixties weren't exactly what we would want to call her favorite." Carlisle explained.
Billy and Charlie raised their eyebrows at this having been the only two to actually know what Rosalie Cullen looks like.
"Don't let Rosalie's looks fool you," Edward simply put out there.
"Ch - Dad, I don't really know anything about cars. I wouldn't be able to fix it if anything went wrong, and I couldn't afford a mechanic…."
"Really, Bella, the thing runs great. They don't build them like that anymore."
The thing, I thought to myself… it had possibilities - as a nickname, at the very least.
"How cheap is cheap?" After all, that was the part I couldn't compromise on.
"Well, honey, I kind of already bought it for you. As a homecoming gift." Charlie peeked sideways at me with a hopeful expression.
Wow. Free.
"Well yeah. Jake was practically begging me to take The Thing."
"You didn't need to do that, Dad. I was going to buy myself a car."
"I don't mind. I want you to be happy here." He was looking ahead at the road when he said this. Charlie wasn't comfortable with expressing his emotions out loud. I inherited that from him. So I was looking straight ahead as I responded.
"Two peas in a pod," Billy snickered to himself.
"That's really nice, Dad. Thanks. I really appreciate it." No need to add that my being happy in Forks is an impossibility.
"Come on all you have to do is look for the silver lining," Harry encouraged momentarily forgetting that he was talking to a book.
He didn't need to suffer along with me. And I never looked a free truck in the mouth - or engine.
"Well, now, you're welcome," he mumbled, embarrassed by my thanks.
We exchanged a few more comments on the weather, which was wet, and that was pretty much it for conversation. We stared out the windows in silence.
It was beautiful, of course; I couldn't deny that. Everything was green: the trees, their trunks covered with moss, their branches hanging with a canopy of it, the ground covered with ferns. Even the air filtered down greenly through the leaves.
It was too green - an alien planet.
"I guess that would be a little jarring. Imagine going from one environment where there was little to no greenery to an environment where there was practically nothing but greenery," Edward commented insightfully.
Eventually we made it to Charlie's. He still lived in the small, two-bedroom house that he'd bought with my mother in the early days of their marriage. Those were the only kind of days their marriage had - the early ones.
Carlisle and Edward frowned at this; both having been raised when marriage was considered a forever thing.
There, parked on the street in front of the house that never changed, was my new - well, new to me - truck. It was a faded red color, with big, rounded fenders and a bulbous cab.
A horrified shuttered went through Edward at the description of The Thing.
To my intense surprise, I loved it.
"How?" Edward asked in disbelief.
Everyone gave him a look that said how-the-heck-are-we-supposed-to-know.
I didn't know if it would run, but I could see myself in it. Plus, it was one of those solid iron affairs that never gets damaged - the kind you see at the scene of an accident, paint unscratched, surrounded by the pieces of the foreign car it had destroyed.
"The Apocalypse couldn't take The Thing out," Billy muttered to himself.
"Wow, Dad, I love it! Thanks!" Now my horrific day tomorrow would be just that much less dreadful. I wouldn't be faced with the choice of either walking two miles in the rain to school or accepting a ride in the Chief's cruiser.
"Walk," Edward mumbled under his breath.
"I'm glad you like it," Charlie said gruffly, embarrassed again.
It took only one trip to get all of my stuff upstairs. I got the west bedroom that faced out over the front yard. The room was familiar; it had been belonged to me since I born. The wooden floor, the lightblue walls, the peaked ceiling, the yellowed lace curtains around the window - these were all a part of my childhood. The only changes Charlie had ever made were switching the crib for a bed and adding a desk as I grew. The desk now held a secondhand computer, with the phone line for the modern stapled along with the floor nearest phone jack. This was a stipulation from my mother, so that we could stay in touch easily.
"Why couldn't she have just used the house phone?" Old Quil asked, "Sounds like a waste of money to put in another phone when she could just as easily go down stairs."
"Renee insisted, and I was just so happy that Bella was coming that I didn't push it," responded Charlie.
The rocking chair from my baby days was still in the corner.
There was only one small bathroom at the top of the stairs, which I would have to share with Charlie. I was trying not to dwell too much on that fact.
"Me too now I get to look at feminine products every time I go in to use the john." Charlie grumbled.
One of the best things about Charlie is he doesn't hover. He left me alone to unpack and get settled, a feat that would have been altogether impossible for my mother. It was nice to be alone, not to have to smile and looked pleased; a relief to stare dejectedly out the window at the sheeting rain and let just a few tears escape. I wasn't in the mood to go on a real crying jag. I would save that for bedtime, when I would have to think about the coming morning.
Charlie frowned at this wish that he could find a way for his little girl to be happy in her new home.
Forks High School had a frightening total of only three hundred and fifty-seven - now fifty-eight - students; there were more than seven hundred people in my junior class alone back home. All of the kids here had grown up together - their grandparents had been toddlers together. I would be the new girl form the big city, a curiosity, a freak.
"Sorry, but you can't be the freak here my family already has the patent on that title," Carlisle said jokingly trying to lighten the mood.
Edward gave him a look that said he was spending too much time with Emmett.
Maybe, if I looked like a girl from Phoenix should, I could work this to my advantage. But physically, I'd never fir in anywhere. I should be tan, sporty, blond - a volleyball player, or a cheerleader, perhaps - all the things that go with living in the valley of the sun.
"Well that's ridiculous. They can't all be that way in Phoenix. For one there aren't enough positions on the squads or teams and secondly the world would be an awfully boring place if everyone was the same. It needs individuals to liven it up," Harry stated insightfully.
Instead, I was ivory-skinned, without much even the excuse of blue eyes or red hair, despite the constant sunshine. I had always been slender, but soft somehow, obviously not an athlete; I didn't have the necessary hand-eye coordination to play sports without humiliating myself - and harming both myself and anyone else who stood too close.
"For her sake I hope she doesn't have Emmett in her P.E. class," Edward said.
"Why?" Charlie asked not knowing the older Cullen boy well enough.
"Emmett enjoys a laugh anywhere he can get it…he's the clown in our family," Edward replied.
"Don't worry Charlie, Emmett's never malicious with his sense of humor. He knows when it goes beyond funny and turns into cruel," Carlisle informed Charlie.
When I finished putting my clothes in the old pine dresser, I took my bag of bathroom necessities and went to the communal bathroom to clean myself up after the day of travel. I looked at my face in the mirror as I brushed through my tangled, damp hair. Maybe it was the light, but already I looked sallower, unhealthy. My skin could be pretty - it was very clear, almost translucent-looking - but it all depended on color. I had no color here.
Facing my pallid reflection in the mirror, I was forced to admit that I was lying to myself. It wasn't just physically that I'd never fit in. And if I couldn't find a niche in a school with three thousand people, what were my chances here?
Carlisle ever the doctor couldn't stop himself from wondering what in Bella's past had caused her to have such low self confidence.
"Maybe she was teased by the other students," Edward supplied at a volume too low for the humans in the room.
Carlisle nodded thinking that this was the most likely cause.
I didn't relate well to people my age. Maybe the truth was that I didn't relate will to people, period. Even my mother, who I was closer to than anyone else on the planet, was never in harmony with me, never on exactly the same page. Sometimes I wondered if I was seeing the same things through my eyes the rest of the world was seeing through theirs. Maybe there was a glitch in my brain.
But the cause didn't matter. All that mattered was the effect. And tomorrow would be just the beginning.
"She needs to relax," Edward commented, "She will fit in just fine."
I didn't sleep well that night, even after I was done crying. The constant whooshing of the rain and wind across the roof wouldn't fade into the background. I pulled the faded old quilt over my head, and later added the pillow, too. But I couldn't fall asleep until after midnight, when the rain finally settled into a quieter drizzle.
Thick fog was all I could see out my window in the morning, and I could feel the claustrophobia creeping up on me. You could never see the sky here; it was like a cage.
Breakfast with Charlie was a quiet event. He wished me good luck at school. I thanked him, knowing his hope was wasted. Good luck tended to avoid me. Charlie left first, off to the police station that was his wife and family. After he left, I sat at the old square oak table in one of the three unmatching chairs –
"Why don't your chairs match?" Harry asked, "Typically when you by a kitchen set the chairs match."
"I had a couple of them break over the years so I replaced them with whatever I could find," Charlie responded.
- and examined his small kitchen, with its dark paneled walls, bright yellow cabinets, and white linoleum floor. Nothing was changed. My mother had painted the cabinets eighteen years ago in an attempt to bring some sunshine into the house. Over the small fireplace in the adjoining handkerchief-sized family room was a row of pictures. First a wedding picture of Charlie and my mom in Las Vegas, then one of the three of us in the hospital after I was born, taken by a helpful nurse, followed by the procession of my school pictures up to last year's. Those were embarrassing to look at - I would have to see what I could do to get Charlie to put them somewhere else, at least while I was living here.
It was impossible, being in this house, not to realize that Charlie had never gotten over my mom.
Charlie turned tomato red at this. Out of respect to Charlie's privacy nobody commented.
It made me uncomfortable.
I didn't want to be too early to school, but I couldn't stay in the house anymore. I donned my jacket - which had the feel of a biohazard suit - and headed out into the rain.
It was just drizzling still, not enough to soak me through immediately as I reached for the house key that was always hidden under the eaves by the door, and locked up. The sloshing of my new waterproof boots was unnerving. I missed the normal crunch of gravel as I walked. I couldn't pause and admire my truck again as I wanted; I was in a hurry to get out of the misty wet that swirled around my head and clung to my hair under my hood.
Inside the truck, it was nice and dry. Either Billy or Charlie had obviously cleaned it up, but the tan upholstered seats still smelled faintly of tobacco, gasoline, and peppermint. The engine started quickly, to my relief, but loudly, roaring to life and then idling at top volume. Well, a truck this old was bound to have a flaw. The antique radio worked, a plus that I hadn't expected.
"That's because things were actually made to last when the Thing was born," Edward commented.
This caused Charlie to look at him oddly, "That sounds like something an old man would say." Charlie thought to himself.
Finding the school wasn't difficult, though I'd never been there before. The school was, like most other things, just off the highway. It was not obvious that it was a school; only the sign, which declared it to be the Forks High School, made me stop. It looked like a collection of matching houses, built with maroon-colored bricks. There were so many trees and shrubs I couldn't see its size at first. Where was the feel of the institution? I wondered nostalgically. Where were the chain-link fences, the metal detectors?
"Why would anyone want to go to a school where they had someone looking through all of their things every day?" asked Billy.
"I think it is more of what she is use to and less of actually wanting it there," Edward commented have thing felt the same thing as the years progressed especially where media and fashion were concerned.
I parked in front of the first building, which had a small sign over the door reading FRONT OFFICE. No one else was parked there, so I was sure it was off limits, but I decided I would get directions inside instead of circling around in the rain like an idiot. I stepped unwillingly out of the toasty truck cab and walked down a little stone path lined with dark hedges. I took a deep breath before opening the door.
Inside, it was brightly lit, and warmer than I'd hoped. The office was small; a little waiting area with padded folding chairs, orange-flecked commercial carpet, notices and awards cluttering the walls, a big clock ticking loudly. Plants grew everywhere in large plastic pots, as if there wasn't enough greenery outside. The room was cut in half by a long counter, cluttered with wire baskets full of papers and brightly colored flyers taped to its front. There were three desks behind the counter, one of which was manned by a large, red-haired woman wearing glasses. She was wearing a purple t-shirt, which immediately made me feel overdressed.
A shiver of revolution went through Edward's spine at the mention of Mrs. Cope.
"What?" Old Quil asked having actually noticed the vampire's movement.
"It's nothing, Mrs. Cope just thinks that Edward's handsome," Carlisle stated trying to tone down the very obvious and very disturbing crush that she actually had on his son.
The red-haired woman looked up. "Can I help you?"
"I'm Isabella Swan," I informed her, and saw the immediate awareness light her eyes. I was expected, a topic of gossip no doubt. Daughter of the Chief's flighty ex-wife, come home at last.
One of Edward's eyebrows shot up at this for it in fact had been what people had been saying nonstop sense Charlie had let it slip that his daughter would be moving in.
"Of course," she said. She dug through a precariously stacked pile of documents on her desk till she found the ones she was looking for. "I have your schedule right here, and a map of the school."
All the men snorted in almost unison at the thought of actually needing a map to find your way through any part of Forks that wasn't the forest.
She brought several sheets to the counter to show me.
She went through my classes for me, highlighting the best route to each on the map, and gave me a slip to have each teacher sign, which I was to bring back to the end of the day. She smiled at me and hoped, like Charlie, that I would like it here in Forks. I smiled back as convincingly as I could.
When I went back out to my truck, other students were starting to arrive. I drove around the school, following the line of traffic. I was glad to see that most of the cars were older like mine, nothing to flashy. At home I'd lived in one of the few lower-income neighborhoods that were included in the Paradise Valley District. It was a common thing to see a new Mercedes or Porsche in the student lot. The nicest car here was a shiny Volvo, and it stood out.
Edward's face broke out into a smile at the mention of his Volvo. It wasn't his favorite, but it still was one of his guilty pleasures.
Still, I cut the engine as soon as I was in a spot, so that the thunderous volume wouldn't draw attention to me.
I looked at the map in the truck, trying to memorize it now; hopefully I wouldn't have to walk around with it stuck in front of my nose all day. I stuffed everything in my bag, slung the strap over my shoulder, and sucked in a huge breath. I can so this, I lied to myself feebly. No one was going to bite me.
At this the Cullen's could hold back a couple of stifled chuckles. Earning them an astonished look from the Elders and a small smile from Charlie.
I finally exhaled and stepped out of the truck.
I kept my face pulled back into my hood as I walked to the sidewalk, crowded with teenagers. My plain black jacket didn't stand out, I noticed with relief.
Once I got around the cafeteria, building three was easy to spot. A large black "3" was painted on a white square on the east corner. I felt my breathing gradually creeping toward hyperventilation as I approached the door. I tried holding my breath as I followed two unisex raincoats through the door.
The classroom was small. The people in front of me stopped just inside the door to hang up their coats on a long row of hooks. I copied them. They were two girls, one porcelain-colored blonde, the other also pale, with light brown hair. At least my skin wouldn't be a standout here.
I took the slip up to the teacher, a tall balding man whose desk had a nameplate identifying him as Mr. Mason. He gawked at me -
"You would think the adults would at least have the decorum to treat her like another student," Carlisle commented.
- when he saw my name - not an encouraging response - and of course I flushed tomato red. But at least he sent me to an empty desk at the back without introducing me to the class. It was harder for my new classmates to stare at me in the back, but somehow, they managed. I kept my eyes down on the reading list the teacher had given me. It was fairly basic: Brontё, Shakespeare, Chaucer, Faulkner.
Both Edward and Carlisle were shocked to find such a well read teenager; most girls that age typically read the incredibly inaccurate vampire romance novels the Cullens enjoyed making fun of.
I'd already read everything. That was comforting … and boring. I wondered if my mom would send me my folder of old essays, or if she would think that was cheating. I went through different arguments with her in my head while the teacher droned on.
When the bell rang, a nasal buzzing sound, a gangly boy with a skin problems and as an oil slick leaned across the aisle to talk to me.
"Eric Yorkie, he's okay tends to think a lot of himself, but he's helpful to almost anybody," Edward supplied to those in the room who were unfamiliar to the teens of Forks.
"You're Isabella Swan, aren't you?" He looked like the overly helpful, chess club type.
"Bella," I corrected. Everyone within a three-seat radius turned to look at me.
"Where's your next class?" he asked.
I had to check in my bag. "Um, Government, with Jefferson, in building six."
There was nowhere to look without meeting curious eyes.
"I'm headed toward building four, I could show you the way…" Definitely over-helpful. "I'm Eric," he added.
I smiled tentatively. "Thanks."
We got out jackets and headed out into the rain, which had picked up. I could have sworn several people behind us were walking close enough to eavesdrop. I hoped I wasn't getting paranoid.
"So, this is a lot different than Phoenix, huh?" he asked.
"Very."
"It doesn't rain much there, does it?"
"Three or four times a year."
"Wow, what must that be like?" he wondered.
"Sunny," I told him.
"You don't look very tan."
Carlisle was shaking his head wondering when teenagers stopped learning tact.
"My mother is part albino."
He studied my face apprehensively, and I sighed. It looked like clouds and a sense of humor didn't mix. A few months of this and I'd forget how to use sarcasm.
We walked back around the cafeteria, to the south buildings by the gym. Eric walked me right to the door, though it was clearly marked.
"Well, good luck," he said as I touched the handle. "Maybe we'll have some other classes together." He sounded hopeful.
I smiled at him vaguely and went inside.
The rest of the morning passed in about the same fashion. My trigonometry teacher, Mr. Varner, who I would have hated anyway just because of the subject he taught, was the only one who made me stand in front of the class and introduce myself. I stammered, blushed, and tripped over my own boots on the way to my seat.
After two classes, I started to recognize several of the faces in each class. There was always someone braver than the others who would introduce themselves and ask me questions about how I was liking Forks. I tried to be diplomatic, but mostly I just lied a lot.
"And they believed her?" Charlie said in disbelief, "Bella's the worst liar on the planet."
A least I never needed the map.
One girl sat next to me in both Trig and Spanish, and she walked with me to the cafeteria for lunch. She was tiny, several inches shorter than my five feet four inches, but her wildly curly dark hair made up a lot of the difference between out heights. I couldn't remember her name, -
"Jessica Stanley," Edward said in revulsion.
"Uh… I take it you don't like her," Harry questioned.
"No, she's infatuated with me. It took almost two years for me to make her comprehend that I have absolutely no feelings for her."
- so I smiled and nodded as she prattled about teachers and classes. I didn't try to keep up.
We sat at the end of a full table with several of her friends, who she introduced to me. I forgot all their names as soon as she spoke them.
"That's not the right way to make friends," Billy said sarcastically.
They seemed impressed by her bravery in speaking to me.
This earned an eye-roll from Edward.
The boy from English, Eric, waved at me from across the room.
It was there, sitting in the lunchroom, trying to make conversation with seven curious strangers, that I first saw them.
They were sitting in the corner of the cafeteria, as far away from where I sat as possible in the long room. There were five of them. They weren't talking, and they weren't eating, though they each had a tray of untouched food in front of them. They weren't gawking at me, unlike most of the other students, so it was safe to stare at them without fear of meeting an excessively interested pair of eyes. But it was none of these things that caught, and held my attention.
"How can she notice this much its inhuman?" Carlisle questioned in his mind.
They didn't look anything alike. Of the three boys, one was big - muscled like a serious weight lifter, with dark, curly hair.
"Emmett," Edward identified.
Another was taller, leaner, but still muscular, and honey blond.
"Jasper"
The last was lanky, less bulky, with untidy bronze-colored hair. He was more boyish than the others, who looked like they could be in college, or even teachers here rather than students.
The girls were opposites. The tall one was statuesque. She had a beautiful figure, the kind that you saw on the cover of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue, the kind that made every girl around her take a hit on her self-esteem just by being in the same room. Her hair was golden, gently waving to the middle of her back.
"Rosalie," Edward snorted conveying that he didn't agree with the description.
The short girl was pixielike, thin in the extreme, with small features. Her hair was a deep black, cropped short and pointing in every direction.
"Alice."
And yet, they were all exactly alike. Every one of them was chalky pale, the palest of all the students living in this sunless town. Paler than me, the albino. They all had very dark eyes despite the range in hair tones. They also had dark shadows under those eyes - purplish, bruise-like shadows. As if they were all suffering from sleepless night, or almost done recovering from a broken nose. Though their noses, all their features, were straight, perfect, angular.
Charlie was now looking at Carlisle and Edward. He too noticed so of the same things; though the bruise-like shadows were considerably lighter than what Bella had described.
But all this is not why I couldn't look away.
I stared because their faces, so different, so similar, were all devastatingly, inhumanly beautiful. They were faces you never expected to see perhaps on the airbrushed pages of a fashion magazine. Or painted by an old master as the face of an angel. It was hard to decide who was the most beautiful - maybe the perfect blond, or the bronze-haired boy.
Edward pulled a face at being compared to Rosalie in anyway.
"Edward," Carlisle said in soft chastisement.
They were all looking away - away from each other, away from the other students, way from anything in particular as far as I could tell. As I watched, the small girl rose with her tray - unopened soda, unbitten apple - and walked away with a quick, graceful lope that belonged on a runway. I watched, amazed her lithe dancer's steps, till she dumped her tray -
"Well that was wasteful," Old Quil who was born at the end of the Great Depression which caused his parents to waste nothing.
- and glided through the back door, faster than I would have thought possible. My eyes darted back to the others, who sat unchanging.
"Who are they?" I asked the girl from my Spanish class, whose name I'd forgotten.
"Not Jessica you'll get the most bias answer I've ever heard," Edward moaned.
As she looked up to see who I meant - though already knowing, probably from my tone - suddenly he looked at her, the thinner on, the boyish one, the youngest, perhaps. He looked at my neighbor for just a fraction of a second, and then his dark eyes flickered to mine.
He looked away quickly, more quickly than I could, though in a flush of embarrassment I dropped my eyes at once. In that brief flash of a glance, his face held nothing of interest - it was as if she had called his name, and he'd looked up in involuntary response, already having decided not to answer.
Edward's eyebrows shot up at the accurate description of his book-self's reaction.
My neighbor giggled in embarrassment, looking at the table like I did.
"That's Edward and Emmett Cullen, and Rosalie and Jasper Hale. The one that just left was Alice Cullen; they all live together with Dr. Cullen and his wife." She said this under her breath.
I glanced sideways at the beautiful boy, who was looking at his tray now, picking a bagel to pieces with long, pale fingers. His mouth was moving very quickly, his perfect lips barely opening. The other three still looked away, and yet I felt he was speaking quietly to them.
"She's going to notice everything isn't she?" Edward asked Carlisle under his breathe.
Carlisle's thoughts where somewhere between a shrug and a nod.
Strange, unpopular names, I thought. The kinds of names grandparents had. But maybe that was in vogue here - small town names? I finally remembered that my neighbor was called Jessica, a perfectly common name. There were two girls named Jessica in my History class back home.
"They are … very nice-looking." I struggled with the conspicuous understatement.
"Yes!" Jessica agreed with another giggle. "They're all together though - Emmett and Rosalie, and Jasper and Alice, I mean. And they live together."
"It's not like they're related," Charlie commented.
Her voice held all the shock and condemnation of the small town, I thought critically. But, if I was being honest, I had to admit that even in Phoenix, it would cause gossip.
"Which ones are the Cullens?" I asked. "They don't look related…."
"Oh, they're not. Dr. Cullen is really young, in his twenties or early thirties. They're all adopted. The Hales are brother and sister, twins - the blondes - and they're foster children."
"They look a little old for foster children."
Edward couldn't hold back a snicker. Causing Charlie to look at him oddly.
"They are now, Jasper and Rosalie are both eighteen, but they've been with Mrs. Cullen since they were eight. She's their aunt or something like that."
"That's really kind of nice - for them to take care of all those kids like that, when they're so young and everything."
"Your daughter is very kind Charlie," Carlisle commented.
"I guess so," Jessica admitted reluctantly, and I got the impression that she didn't like the doctor and his wife for some reason.
"Jealousy," Edward stated bluntly.
With the glances she was throwing at their adopted children, I would presume the reason was jealousy. "I think Mrs. Cullen can't have kids,
Which Carlisle frowned at; knowing that if he could he would give his wife as many children as she desired.
- though," she added, as if that lessened their kindness.
Throughout all this conversation, my eyes flickered again and again to the table where the strange family sat. They continued to look at the walls and not eat.
"Have they always lived in Forks?" I asked. Surely I would have noticed them on one of my summers here.
"No," she said in a voice that implied it should be obvious, even to a new arrival like me. "They just moved down two years ago from somewhere in Alaska."
I felt a surge or pity, and relief.
"Jasper's going to be so confused," Edward mumbled to Carlisle.
Pity because, as beautiful as they were, they were outsiders, clearly not accepted. Relief that I wasn't the only newcomer here, and certainly not the most interesting by any standard.
As I examined them, the youngest, one of the Cullens, looked up and met my gaze, this time with evident curiosity in his expression. As I looked swiftly away, it seemed to me that his glance held some kind of unmet expectation.
"Which one is the boy with the reddish brown hair?" I asked. I peeked at him from the corner of my eye, and he was still staring at me, but not gawking like the other students had today - he had a slightly frustrated expression. I looked down again.
"What's wrong Edward not what you expected?" Harry joked. All Edward did in reply was shrug not knowing what was wrong with his future-self.
"That's Edward. He's gorgeous, of course, but don't waste your time. He doesn't date. Apparently none of the girls here are good enough for him."
"No I just want a woman with a brain between her ears, and who cares more about her partner than about how that partner makes her look," Edward replied snidely.
She sniffed, a clear case of sour grapes. I wondered when he'd turned her down.
"Which time the first of the seventh?" Edward asked sarcastically.
I bit my lip to hide my smile. Then I glanced at him again. His face was turned away, but I thought his cheek appeared lifted, as if he were smiling, too.
After a few more minutes, the four of them left the table together. They all were noticeably graceful - even the big, brawny one. It was unsettling to watch. The one named Edward didn't look at me again.
I sat at the table with Jessica and her friends longer than I would have if I'd been sitting alone. I was anxious not to be late for class on my first day. Once of my new acquaintances, who considerately reminded me that her name was Angela, -
"Nice, shy, and open-minded; becomes best friends with her instead of Jessica, she's a much better person," Edward suggested forgetting momentarily that they were reading a book and that Bella could not hear him.
- had Biology II with me the next hour. We walked to class together in silence. She was shy, too.
When we entered the classroom, Angela went to sit at a black-topped lab table exactly like the ones I was used to. She already had a neighbor. In fact, all the tables were filled but one. Next to the center aisle, I recognized Edward Cullen by his unusual hair, sitting next to that single open seat.
As I walked down the aisle to introduce myself to the teacher and get my slip signed, I was watching him surreptitiously. Just as I passed, he suddenly went rigid in his seat. He stared at me again, meeting my eyes with the strangest expression on his face - it was hostile, furious. I looked away quickly, shocked, going red again. I stumbled over a book in the walkway and had to catch myself on the edge of a table. The girl sitting there giggled.
I'd noticed that his eyes were black - coal black.
"Shit," Edward cursed; Carlisle giving him a look that conveyed that he believed in him and that all would be fine. The Elders immediately stiffened recognizing the signs of a hungry vampire. And poor Charlie was left confused.
Mr. Banner signed my slip and handed me a book with no nonsense about introductions. I could tell we were going to get along. Of course, he had no choice but to send me to the one open seat in the middle of the room. I kept my eyes down as I went to sit by him, bewildered by the antagonistic stare he'd given me.
"What the hell is wrong with you?" Charlie finally snapped.
"I'm hungry," Edward responded truthfully. This just led to Charlie being even more confused than before.
I didn't look up as I set my book on the table and took my seat, but I saw his posture change from the corner of my eye. He was leaning away from me, sitting on the extreme edge of his chair and averting his face like he smelled something bad. Inconspicuously, I sniffed my hair. It smelled like strawberries, the scent of my favorite shampoo. It seemed an innocent enough odor. I let my hair fall over my right shoulder, making a dark curtain –
At this Edward simply groaned leaned on this seat resting his elbows on his knees and planted his face into his hands. Carlisle trying to comfort his son sat rubbing his back think that everything would be alright.
- between us, and tried to pay attention to the teacher.
Unfortunately the lecture was on cellular anatomy, something I'd already studied. I took notes carefully anyway, always looking down.
I couldn't stop myself from peeking occasionally through the screen of my hair at the strange boy next to me. During the whole class, he never relaxed his stiff position on the edge of his chair, sitting as far from me as possible. I could see his hand on his left leg was clenched into a fist, tendons standing out under his pale skin. This, too, he never relaxed. He had the long sleeves of his white shirt pushed up to his elbows, and his forearm was surprisingly hard and muscular beneath his light skin. He wasn't nearly as slight as he'd looked next to his burly brother.
"That's because Emmett's a bear," Edward mumbled through his hands.
"Don't let Emmett hear you say that," Carlisle warned.
The class seemed to drag on longer than the others. Was it because the day was finally coming to a close, or because I was waiting for his tight fist to loosen? It never did; he continued to sit so still it looked like he wasn't breathing.
"I'm most likely not," Edward whispered at a volume he didn't expect the humans to here, but by Charlie's startled expression Edward could tell that he had heard him.
What was wrong with him? Was this his normal behavior? I questioned my judgment on Jessica's bitterness at lunch today. Maybe she was not as resentful as I'd thought.
Great I just earned Jessica a second chance, Edward thought to himself.
It couldn't have anything to do with me. He didn't know me from Eve.
I peeked up at him one more time, and regretted it. He was glaring down at me again, his black eyes full of revulsion.
"What is wrong with you?" Charlie asked angrily.
"I'm very hungry," Edward mumbled dejectedly.
"What does that have to do with you glaring at my daughter?" Charlie questioned.
"I'm guessing that the book will explain," Carlisle responded trying to defuse the tension.
As I flinched away from him, shrinking against my chair, the phrase if looks could kill suddenly ran through my mind.
At that moment, the bell rang loudly, making me jump, and Edward Cullen was out of his seat. Fluidly he rose - he was much taller than I'd thought - his back to me, and he was out of the door before anyone else was out of their seat.
I sat frozen in my seat, staring blankly after him. He was so mean. It wasn't fair. I began gathering up my things slowly, trying to block the anger that filled me, for fear my eyes would tear up. For some reason, my temper was hardwired to my tear ducts. I usually cried when I was angry, a humiliating tendency.
"Aren't you Isabella Swan?" a male voice asked.
I looked up to see a cute, baby-faced boy, his pale blond hair carefully gelled into orderly spikes, smiling at me in a friendly way.
"Mike Newton, pervert, annoying, clueless," Edward answered before adding, "Male version of Jessica."
He obviously didn't think I smelled bad.
"Bella," I corrected him, with a smile.
"I'm Mike."
"Hi, Mike."
"Do you need any help finding your next class?"
"I'm headed to the gym, actually. I think I can find it."
"That's my next class, too." He seemed thrilled, though it wasn't that big of a coincidence in a school this small.
"Especially considering there are only two gym periods per grade level," Edward said critically.
We walked to class together; he was a chatterer - he supplied most of the conversation, which made it easy for me. He'd lived in California till he was ten, so he knew how I felt about the sun. It turned out he was in my English class also. He was the nicest person I'd met today.
But as we were entering the gym, he asked, "So, did you stab Edward Cullen with a pencil or what? I've never seen him act like that."
I cringed. So I wasn't the only one who had noticed. And apparently, that wasn't Edward Cullen's usual behavior. I decided to play dumb.
"Was that the boy I sat next to in Biology?" I asked artlessly.
"Yes," he said. "He looked like he was in pain or something."
"I don't know," I responded. "I never spoke to him."
"He's a weird guy." Mike lingered by me instead of heading to the dressing room. "If I were lucky enough to sit by you, I would have talked to you."
"I don't like him," Charlie commented forming plans to get Bella into an all-girl college.
"Charlie take it from me they have to date sometime," Billy comforted, "Better now where you can keep an eye on her first boyfriend; rather than 1000 miles away where she lives in her own apartment."
"She could always become a nun," Charlie muttered causing Carlisle to laugh.
I smiled at him before walking through the girls' locker room door. He was friendly and clearly admiring. But it wasn't enough to ease my irritation.
The Gym teacher, Coach Clapp, found me a uniform but didn't make me dress down for today's class. At home, only two years of P.E. were required. Here, P.E. was mandatory all four years. Forks was literally my personal hell on Earth.
"Hey if Charlie survived then you'll be fine," Harry joked at which caused Charlie to blush tomato red.
I watched four volleyball games running simultaneously. Remembering how many injuries I had sustained - and inflicted - playing volleyball, I felt faintly nauseated.
"Well she definitely gets that from you Charlie; the only sport you can manage is fishing and that's because you stay still for most of it," Billy teased.
The final bell rang at last. I walked slowly to the office to return my paperwork. The rain had drifted away, but the wind was strong, and colder. I wrapped my arms around myself.
When I walked into the warm office, I almost turned around and walked back out.
Edward Cullen stood at the desk in front of me.
"This is God's backlash for the thirties isn't it?" Edward moaned once again planting his face into his hands.
"Everyone makes mistakes Edward. God is not punishing you," Carlisle reassured.
These comments both worried and confused the Elders. Worried because they wondered what exactly happened in the thirties, and confused because they didn't expect vampires to care about what God thought, let alone believe in Him.
I recognized that tousled bronze hair. He didn't appear to notice the sound of my entrance. I stood press against the back wall, waiting for the receptionist to be free.
He was arguing with her in a low, attractive voice.
"Mrs. Cope's going to unbearable after this," Edward groaned. The rest of the men in the room chuckled at the teenager's dismay.
I quickly picked up the gist of the argument. He was trying to trade from sixth-hour Biology to another time - any other time.
I just couldn't believe that this was about me. It had to be something else, something that happened before I entered the Biology room. The look on his face must have been about another aggravation entirely. It was impossible that this stranger could take such a sudden, intense dislike to me.
The door opened again, and the cold wind suddenly gusted through the room, -
Edward didn't say anything he simply groaned and sat back with his head hanging off the back of the couch.
- rustling the papers on the desk, swirling my hair around my face. The girl who came in merely stepped to the desk, placed a note in the wire basket, and walked out again. But Edward Cullen's back stiffened, and he turned slowly to glare at me - his face was absurdly handsome - with piercing, hate-filled eyes. For an instant, I felt a thrill of genuine fear, raising the hair on my arms. The look only lasted a second, but it chilled me more than the freezing wind. He turned back to the receptionist.
"Never mind, then," he said hastily in a voice like velvet. "I can see that it's impossible. Thank you so much for your help." And he turned on his heel without another look at me, and disappeared out the door.
I went to the desk, my face white for once instead of red, and handed her the signed slip.
"How did your first day go, dear?" the receptionist asked maternally.
"Fine," I lied, my voice weak. She didn't look convinced.
When I got to the truck, it was almost the last car in the lot. It seemed like a haven, already the closest thing to home. I had in this damp green hole. I sat inside for a while, just staring out the windshield blankly. But soon I was cold enough to need the heater, so I turned the key and the engine roared to life. I headed back to Charlie's house, fighting tears the whole way there.
"Don't worry she cries when she's mad," Charlie informed the room as Harry passed the book to Old Quil.
P.S.: Thanks to my awesome beta and do me a favor review; it takes you a couple of seconds, but it makes me happy for hours.