SM owns. I just dabble.

Chapter 2

The beat up cowbell clanged against the glass door as Ms. Clearwater entered the gas station.

She greeted me boisterously as she walked to the coolers and asked me when I was going to be coming back over for dinner. She promised to make me Velvetta Shells and Cheese with bacon on top. I sort of laughed awkwardly and put down the textbook I had been thumbing through. I shoved my notebook under the counter.

"What are you studying for Edward?" She set down a few Coke bottles and a pack of beef jerky.

I just waived my hand dismissively and punched prices into the cash register.

"You know Leah could help you with," Sue tilted her head and read the cover of my textbook, "Anatomy if you needed it. You kids sure spend enough time together. Maybe you should consider asking her for a study session. She is really bright."

I tried to ignore the overtly sexual thoughts that were careening through my head. Sue didn't need to think of me as an asshole and a pervert.

"It's really no big deal, Ms. Clearwater. I've just got a little extra homework. Nothing I can't handle. Did you want the gas and snacks all on the same receipt?"

"Yeah, and throw a pack of Pall Malls in there too," she smiled sheepishly.

I reached behind me and tugged down a soft pack. I shoved everything into a paper bag and ran her credit card. We waited as the ancient technology processed the transaction. I stared at the machine to avoid having to talk to her about Leah. I didn't want to talk about her.

Seth bounced through the door to interrupt the silence.

"Ma, my God, you think you'd come in here to do your taxes. What the hell is taking so long? Oh hey Edward."

I lifted my chin to greet him as the paper receipt inched out of the machine.

"Shut up and go sit in the car Seth. I'm on my way out." She signed with a flourish of her pen and grabbed her purchases. "Now Edward, if I don't see you this week at my dinner table, I'm going to take it personally."

I cringed internally. She was making this whole thing difficult.

I gave her a tight smile and nodded. "We wouldn't want that."

She smiled back and headed back outside, yelling at Seth as soon as her feet hit the blacktop.

It wasn't an hour later that Leah walked in.

Her black hair was down and shining at me. Her black eyes were friendly as she waltzed over to the register. She leaned over the counter, her elbows bent and her head resting in her hands. Her long legs spread wide and suggestively. She chewed on her bottom lip.

"Hey Edward," she purred, "I've missed you."

"I saw you last night. How can you miss me after 19 hours?"

I busied myself with wiping down the countertop and rearranging the lottery slips.

"Edward, I could never get enough of you." Her voice was husky and making me damn guilty.

I moved my attention to the cigarette case behind me. I grabbed a carton and started refilling the empty slides.

Leah reached over the counter and grabbed me by my belt loop. I didn't turn to her and she huffed.

"Edward, when do you get off?" I could hear her bracelets knock together as she whipped her hair around.

"Not for a while."

"Can you call Jasper? Maybe he could take over your shift?"

"He has to work at the other store today."

She huffed again.

"Do you think he could pick me up a handle of Mr. Boston? I want to get it before everyone bombards him tomorrow. There is supposed to be a party down at La Push," she paused and tapped her fingernails against the acrylic counter protector, "Do you want to come with me?"

"I don't know Leah, you'll have to ask him. I don't dabble in supplying alcohol to the underaged."

"Oh Edward, you're such a straight edge," she laughed.

She'd been watching Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist again.

"But for real, you want to join me? I can promise you some hot, drunken sex by the end of the night."

"Look Leah, I've got a lot of work to do here. Can I just meet up with you this evening?"

Her eyes got all excited and I felt even more guilty.

"I'll be at Quil's until ten. After that, you'll have to ride out to the Rez."

"Alright. I'll see you sometime before ten then."

She looped her fingers through my belt loop again and pulled me towards her. I turned around and she was staring up at me with those crazy dark eyes.

"Give me a kiss for the road," she sighed.

I leaned down and dropped a kiss on her forehead. She caught me by the neck before I could lift my head completely and pressed her lips hard against mine.

She tasted like over ripened watermelon. Sticky and too sweet.

"I'll see you Edward," She traipsed back out of the store, her stupid schoolgirl uniform flouncing around the russet colored skin of her legs.

-----

I could hear Jasper's gravel laugh through the wall. Too many cigarettes and too many late nights left his voice that way. It made him sound wise, but I knew he was just an idiot who stayed out late drinking and smoking.

It was just before seven and more people were starting to filter in and out of the liquor store. I could hear the heavy door swing open and closed. It scratched a loose arch into the concrete floor. There was a jingle bell on the door and it sounded better than the jarring clatter of the cowbell.

I really needed to talk to him.

I needed him to explain how this was going to go down. He always knew exactly how things were going to happen. The way a girl would respond or whether the guy would throw a left or right hook. He just knew it and I needed to know.

I propped open the door and tucked the portable phone into my back pocket. I threw a glance down the 101 and walked into the store next door. I swung the door open and stood in the doorway so that I had a clear view of the store register.

Jasper was hunched over a box restocking the shelves near the coolers.

"Hey, I need to talk to you." I could hear the rumble of an approaching car. It passed without slowing.

"Talk to me then," he said groaning as he picked up the heavy box.

"It's about Leah."

"Is she pregnant?" His head didn't lift from what he was doing. Bottles rattled together as he twisted the labels to face out.

"No," I replied curtly, "I am going to break up with her." I ran a nervous hand through my hair and looked back down the street.

"And you want my permission or my forgiveness?"

"I want your advice." My voice came out strained. He was really going to make me beg for this.

"Ok, I advise you to be straight, to the point, and don't try to be too nice about it."

"I've never broken up with anyone. What is too nice?"

He looked up at me with his lazy blue eyes and tucked some of his long hair behind his ears. He always looked like a girl when he did that.

"Sometimes I forget you're still a boy," he sighed.

"What the hell does that mean?"

"You've got so many firsts ahead of you." He brushed past me with the empty cardboard box and grabbed a box cutter from behind the counter. He ran it through the shiny seam of tape and broke the box down flat.

"Whatever Grandpa, get to the part where you tell me how this is going to go down. Skip the sentimental shit."

He grabbed a new lighter off of the counter and nodded his head towards to door. I followed him outside. He sat down on the curb and lit a cigarette. I ran my hand over the beginnings of a hole at the knee of my jeans.

"Why are you breaking up with her?"

"Because we are too different."

"Opposites attract." He puffed his cigarette, holding it between his thumb and middle finger.

"We don't. She is annoying and hyper sexualized. She wants to talk about the dumbest shit and she is all of the time drinking and being stupid."

"She is acting like a seventeen year old. You should consider trying it."

"I'm eighteen."

"Going on 108. And for fucks sake, what does hyper sexualized even fucking mean?"

"Just because I'm not a social deviant doesn't mean I'm… forget it. This conversation isn't worth having." I stood up and Jasper grabbed me by my wrist. The cherry of his cigarette was dangerously close to my skin.

"Sit down. Stop being such an asshole."

I sat down. "I hardly consider myself the asshole in this situation."

He snorted. "You never do."

We sat in silence as he finished his cigarette.

"You can't go into the conversation half-assed. You have to stand firm. Let her know that there is no changing your mind. There is no changing your mind, right?"

I shook my head. There was definitely no changing my mind.

"Well, in my professional opinion, I'd say to send her a text," he waggled his eyebrows at me, "But in my personal opinion, just tell her that the relationship isn't going anywhere. That you've really thought it through and you want to end it now. I mean, you've only been dating for a few months right? So just don't take it too far. Don't over explain. Don't sugarcoat. Don't let her think you can change your mind. And don't, not matter what you do, say it's not you, it's me."

I started to formulate a plan, write a script. I let the words rattle around in my head. I honestly didn't want to hurt her, but shit I couldn't handle it anymore.

Jasper's cell phone started to ring inside.

I ain't asking you to turn off the sunshine, no
And I ain't asking you to turn water into wine, no
I'm not asking you to, to fly
I'm just asking you to, save me

He moved slowly, getting up and walking back inside. "Good luck little brother."

I just gave a tight nod and sat stone still.

I heard him in there talking to Alice. I knew it was her without hearing her voice. The way he talked to Alice was unlike anything else. I tried not to look into it too much. You always did best not to read into Jasper too much. You'd just wind up confused as hell and broke.

Jasper is five years older than me. He was born in June. He is like my father. All legs and eyes and comforting words. After Mama died, he'd let me sleep on a palate in his room. He didn't let me sleep in the bed because he said he didn't want me to be a pussy. That he didn't want me to be above roughing it. I was eight and didn't even know what a pussy was, but I slept on that floor with my Transformers blanket and pillowcase. I cried sometimes and his hand would fall down and stroke the top of my head, making me feel infinitesimally better. But sometimes that's all you need. Just a little bit more than what you've got.

Jasper and I aren't anything alike. He is smooth and calculating. He is the life of the party and people like him. He made terrible grades in school, opting to have fun rather than claw his way out of Forks.

That is part of the reason why he works at a liquor store. The other part is that he makes good money selling product under the table to minors. That was probably more of the reason why everyone liked him. Outside of the occasional bouts of wisdom, he was a manipulative asshole.

How many times had I been conned into picking him up or dropping him off or giving him money or my lunch or my clothes?

It was only a matter of time and I'd be free from his constant neediness.

I heard the crunch of tires on pavement as Ms. Newton's car pulled in to the station. I stood up and started to walk back inside.

"I'm getting twenty bucks worth Edward," she called out and stepped out of her rusty red Buick.

"Ok, I'll get it going." I punched the keypad behind the counter and authorized the pump. I snapped the portable phone back into its cradle and sat down on the stool.

The wall calendar behind my head fluttered as a cool evening breeze blew through the open door. I cast my eyes on the Midwestern landscape featured for the month of October. Dad's birthday was coming up quickly. A big red balloon was drawn over the 13th. He was going to be 41 years old.

Carlisle Cullen is a good man. He is a hard working man. He is a good father and an even better friend. Always willing to lend advice, he always has a kind word to give. Unless he'd been drinking. Then he might pick a fight. I'd only seen him get into it once. Someone made a comment about my mother at a Fourth of July BBQ and he reacted instinctively. He pinned the dude to the ground and shoved his elbow against his windpipe. My mother huffed and pulled and finally managed to get him off of the guy and into the car.

Nowadays, Dad runs the gas station. He keeps me on staff to work after school lets out and he pays me a dollar over minimum wage. In turn, it is my responsibility to keep an eye on Jasper and his bootlegging as to ensure he doesn't get arrested on site. The police around here have tried to find a reason to handcuff Jasper since he was 13 and went on a graffiti spree. He managed to spray paint four of the five cop cars without getting caught. They've been out to get him since.

My father was a good man, but I didn't want to be anything like him. He was stuck here taking care of a decrepit gas station and reckless son. He had the potential to be anything he wanted. He was extremely intelligent, good looking, good natured… he was the whole package.

But he was too good.

My mother got pregnant with Jasper when she was 18. Rather than leave her holding the proverbial bag, he stuck by her. Married her. Slaved at a timber company so that they could afford food and rent and electricity. He let a full ride scholarship to the University of Washington slip through his fingers just so that he could say he did the right thing.

I'd never be able to do that.

I was too selfish.

Too controlled.

Too desperate to get out of here.

Where I lacked the social graces that my father and Jasper shared, I made up for in intelligence and drive. Where my father was content with living in poverty and in want, I was committed to break out of this vicious cycle. I was going to get out of here, if it was the last thing I did.

And Leah was complicating things.

She wanted more from me than I was willing to give.

She wanted more of me than I was capable of.

She wanted me to be happy and carefree and promiscuous and wild.

She wanted me to not try so hard in school so that she could spend more time with me.

She wanted me to work less, but that meant less money in my savings account.

She wanted me to hold her hand and tell her that our futures were intertwined, that we had forever.

But we didn't.

Forever fucked things up. The future fucked things up.

If we only had right now, I may have considered her. But my future couldn't be interrupted. It couldn't be disrupted. Because if I had to stay in Forks forever…

I can't even consider what that would mean.

So I studied. I went to school everyday. I came to work every night. I prepared for life after graduation. I prepared for college and challenges and what I could have when I wasn't the unfortunate, motherless son of a gas station clerk who could have been something way back when he was worth something.

Ms. Newton sashayed in and plunked a twenty dollar bill down on the counter. I rang her out and handed her a receipt.

"So Edward, you celebrated your 18th birthday recently didn't you?" she hummed.

"It's been a few months ago, but yeah. I'm old enough to buy cigarettes and scratch offs."I replied thumbing towards the rack behind me, not really sure where she was going with this.

It didn't take me long to realize.

She leaned over the counter, her large round breasts practically spilled out of her small shirt. Her red nail beckoned me closer. I tilted my head closer, but did not move from my perch on the stool.

"I think as a man, there are a few things I could teach you," she purred.

My stomach turned. This was Michael Fucking Newton's mom. The same woman who served me ice cream cake at every single birthday party he had between the ages of 4 and 13. The same woman who served on the PTA and patched up the mascot's uniform when it was destroyed during a school brawl.

"Ms. Newton, I'm …" I choked out, unsure how to proceed. "Ms. Newton, I think I need to learn a few things on my own. You know, with my peers."

Her face didn't register rejection, only smugness. "Edward, when you realize that those peers of yours are just as clueless as you are, you know where to find me."

And with that she walked back out to her busted ass Buick.

I shook my head and considered banging it against the counter.

Mike Newton's mom is a cougar.

------

I was so damn nervous. Jasper's land yacht rode smoothly, but my overly sensitive stomach was tied up and nauseated. I took a wide turn and could barely make out the small brick house at the end of the street. It was all lit up and there were several cars parked in the yard.

I hated it when people parked their car in our yard.

It was just rude.

My anxious fingers drummed against the steering wheel and I cruised to a stop. I carefully parked the car a house down so that I could be sure I got the hell out of there when the deed was done.

There was no room for error here.

I wasn't in the yard good before Leah was bounding down the porch steps. That ridiculous, preppy schoolgirl uniform fluttered around her as she ran towards me.

I braced myself for impact. She crashed into me and her hands and lips were all over my face.

"Leah… please stop… really."

"What is it now Edward?" She stopped kissing me, but didn't take her hands out of my hair. Her face was almost touching mine and I couldn't make good eye contact because she was too close and I couldn't focus.

"We need to talk."

She huffed and walked toward Jasper's car.

"No, we need don't. You're too serious." She yanked on the door handle and it was locked. She stood waiting by the door and I could see the orange streetlight reflecting against the onyx that was her hair.

That was one thing I could never get over. How shiny her hair was. Not just hers, but Jacob's, Quil's, Embry's. It was like black glass. Long and liquid.

"Yes we do."

"Well, can we do it from the backseat?" she grinned at me.

"No. We can't."

Her lip curled up and her black eyes rolled.

"Did Jasper send my stuff?" She leaned down and cupped her hands on either side of her face as she peered through the car window.

"He did. It's in the trunk. You'll have to get it though. I don't have anything to do with his transactions."

"Don't be such a prude Edward," she chided. She knocked her knuckles against the light green paint of the trunk. I walked to her and fished the key ring from my pocket. The bottle opener nicked my thumb.

Damn alcoholics.

I unlocked the trunk and she pulled out the paper box with a few bottles in it. She pushed a wad of cash towards me.

I held my hands up, palms out. "I'm not involved remember. Put it in the glove box."

She laughed at me like I was making a joke and took the keys out of the lock. She propped the box on pale cloth top of the car and slipped the cash into the glove box.

"So what did you want to talk to me about?"

I looked around at our dark surroundings and figured that this was as good a spot as any.

"Leah, I don't think we should see each other anymore."

Her black eyebrows knit together. Apparently she wasn't expecting this at all.

"Look, we want different things in life. I don't see our relationship going anywhere and I think it would be best for us both if we just ended it now, before we get anymore emotionally involved."

Keep it short. To the point. Don't over explain.

Her mouth just flapped opened and closed. Her eyes wide in disbelief. I felt like an asshole.

Who was I kidding. I was never going to get emotionally involved with her. I only ever went out with her so that Jasper would quit calling me gay. And because she was making herself look bad, constantly coming to the store for packs of Wrigley's gum and Red Bull. I mean come on, everyone knew why she went up there all of the time.

"What the FUCK Edward Cullen? Are you motherfucking breaking up with me?" She was screeching.

"Yes, and you don't have to scream at me." I sounded like a pussy.

"You motherfucking asshole. You slimy fucking piece of fucking shit. You fucking cunt-avoiding, limp dick fucking fucker."

Wow. Had to be some sort of record there.

I cringed. She was getting loud.

"Look Leah, it doesn't have to be all confrontational. We can still be friends, you're a great girl and all, but…"

"But what you douchebag? But fucking what?"

I saw Quil step out onto the porch, his freakishly tall frame caused a disruption in the orange glow of the porch light.

"Stop fucking yelling at me. I'm trying to be nice here."

"Hah!" She put a hand on each of my shoulders and I thought for a second she was going to headbutt me. "I will fucking yell until every damn one of these fucking neighbors come outside. I want them to fucking hear me when I fucking rip you a new asshole, you pole smoking motherfucker."

Now she was just getting ridiculous.

"I can see that this isn't going to get any better," I sighed and tried to remove her hands from my shoulders, "I'm sorry things couldn't work between us Leah."

And I was. But I wasn't sorry enough to stay with her and lead anyone on.

Her fingers wrenched down on my shoulder and I wanted to elbow her or something to get her off. One hand loosened and without warning, a hard fist connected with the flesh of my cheekbone.

"You bitch! You fucking hit me!" I screamed holding my cheek. I briefly considered giving her a slap to the tit or something equally juvenile.

"You motherfucking bet I did. You're lucky I didn't kick you in the balls you asshole bitch! I hope you enjoy your lonely fucking senior year you… you… fucked up loser."

And with that, she threw my keys into the dark. My only inclination as to their location when I heard a light jangling thump that resonated in the quiet night.

She grabbed her box of booze and laughed maniacally as she ran inside.

Shit. How the hell was I supposed to find three keys and a bottle opener in the dark?

I sulked and walked in the direction of the sound. I flipped my cell phone open and hoped to get lucky.

I don't know what I was thinking.

I never got lucky.

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