Author Note::

I'd like to thank

redbull93

'I love your story! You do a great job staying true to the original characters while also adding in your plotline and unique characters! Good job!'

I enjoyed the first review of the story! And for fav'ing it.

Also aclamon95 for adding an alert to it. :]

I was back in school the next morning. My mind was always going back to Jake, and how worried I was about him being sick. That and if Embry was still alive.

I saw Alex at lunch, greeting him with a hug and a kiss on the cheek. A quick sweep of the table told me that Bella wasn't there. And another quick sweep of the lunchroom told me that she was sitting with the Cullen's, right next to Edward, and sitting very...very...very, close to him.

Anger filled me, about how she wouldn't even try to work anything out with Jake and just jump to that creep like that. I pushed my feelings aside, and sat down next to Alex and started to eat my lunch. They must have noticed my dislike of Bella at the moment, because Crystal sneered right along with me. "No offense," she scowled, "I know she's your friend and all, but that's a bitch move. I mean, she was like dating your like best friend right? Then is all over Edward like all the time, and now like, she can't even sit with us?"

I stabbed a piece of radish in my salad; "Exactly what I'm thinking. Doesn't matter though, because she broke up with Jake Friday, for Edward. I don't know the details yet, but the kid cried himself to sleep that night and got sick. I took care of him all Saturday."

Then there was the Embry kiss on Sunday morning. I didn't tell Alex about that one either. Man I was being really unfair to this guy. I turned to him, to find that he was starring at me with the most happiest smile on his face. Smiling back I gave him a chaste kiss. His lips were cool and no where near as hot as Embry's or Jake's had been. No, I can't start comparing my boyfriend's kisses with other guy's kisses. Not to mention that one is my best friend, and the other is his best friend, and kind of my other best friend.

What in the hell is wrong with me?

Later after heading home and dropping my things off, I headed off to La Push to check in on Jake. When I knocked at the door, Embry answered, bruised eyes and blood on his chest with numerous cuts and more bruises. Did Jake really try and kill him?

"Oh God Embry! Are you okay," I exclaimed placing a hand on his shoulder.

He laughed, wincing slightly. "It's nothing."

"How's Jake," I got straight to the point.

He looked around outside, then back into the house as if he was making sure no one was listening. "He's still pretty sick. You can't see him. He's got Mono or something. We're waiting for the doctor to come by later to make sure," he smiled, "so we can't have you getting sick now can we? How about coming back later."

I didn't even get to tell him my response before he slammed the door in my face.

Just great...

Later I found myself at Alex's house, Coke and Pepsi mix in hand worrying my face off about Jake. When I left him the other day, he was feeling better yes, but he wasn't all up to standard. Alex kept telling me not to worry about it, that Embry was taking care of him and Billy would be there soon. All in all it was all true, but I still didn't want to go unknowing if he was worse than meets the eye.

"Laurel, really," Alex prodded me with his finger in the shoulder, "Jake's going to be fine. I promise alright? I bet he'll be better in a week, him and Bella will get back together; and everything will go back to normal."

Nodding my head, I rested it on his shoulder.

God, if only I knew how wrong Alex had been at the time...

Days turned into weeks, and weeks turned into a damned month.

Every time I called Jake's house, Billy answered and told me that he was too sick to talk on the phone, and every time I went over to at least see him, Billy would tell me that they couldn't risk letting me get sick.

I was slowly dying on the inside, missing Jake and Alex's empty words ringing in my ears. Everything wasn't alright and normal. Bella was still hanging out with creep-o-zoid, and I still wasn't having my daily filling of Jake. How could someone be sick for an entire month?

Not only was I dying on the inside, I was going insane.

Every-once-in-a-while I'd crack a joke that Jake would know, or something stupid that only he'd laugh at, and Alex would just look at me weird.

Being with Alex helped some, because when I started to be at home alone, I'd just cry and bawl my eyes out. The world felt like it was closing in on me, and I couldn't breath, see, or feel anymore.

I needed to see him, now.

I didn't bother to ride Molly over, or even ask Terry for a ride, I just walked. I didn't even regret my decision when it started to snow the first snow of winter.

By time I got to Jake's house, there was a thin coat of snow on the ground. My mind was reeling on what I was going to do or say if Billy said he was still sick. Just the thought sent me into a fit of rage.

I stomped up to the front door, ready to bang harshly on it, when movement caught my attention out of the corner of my eye. Someone was walking out of the woods. A man was. He was shirtless and barefoot. This defiantly was interesting. Giving my full attention to the unbeknownst stranger, I shivered at the thought of walking barefoot in the snow.

Once he was halfway in Jake's yard, was when I realized that it was Jake.

He was walking, in the snow, barefoot and bare chested.

If this wasn't 'not-sick' I don't know what is.

"Jake!" I full out started to run towards him. The second his name fled my lips, something felt different. At the sound of his name, he immediately snapped his head down and froze on the spot.

My body collided with his, enloping him in a hug. His skin was still on fire, and it burnt away the cold that was nipping at me. I put my hand to his forehead, which was hotter than the rest. "Jake," I said excitingly, "you're still burning up. And out here with no shoes on? You'll get worse. Come on. I'll make you some—"

"Leave."

My words died in my throat. I starred breathless at his eyes, but he wouldn't look at me. He looked at the ground and refused to spare me a glace. "What," I whispered. We haven't seen each other in a month, because he's been sick, and he tells me to leave?

"Go, away. Go home. No one wants you here," he muttered. Then he stepped to the side, walking past me towards the house. I quickly grabbed his arm, pulling him to face me again.

"What's wrong Jake?"

Finally he looked up, but past me and back into the woods. I turned my own head to see what he was looking at. There on the edge of the woods was nine Indians. One was a girl, the rest men... No, boys. Quil, Paul, and Embry were familiar to me. Jared, Leah, and her little brother Seth were sort of familiar. Seth looked like he went through several growth spurts though. The other remaining three didn't look familiar at all.

This...was this Sam's Gang of Goons?

'No one want's you here.' Jake's words echoed through my head.

I turned back on him. My eyes immediately looking for that mark on his shoulder.

Low and behold the tattoo was there.

God no...not Jake too...

Spinning on the spot, I started sprinting towards the group. Nothing was processing through my mind at the moment really, but I still knew what I was about to do was considerably bad.

And before I or anyone else knew it, my fist collided with the front person's face. He didn't look like anyone I knew, but I only hoped to God he was Sam.

He fell backwards, and I was laying in one punch after another.

I had gotten in a good seven before two pairs of arms started pulling me back and off. This wasn't right. No one should be pushed into a stupid group of people, and taken away from their friends. This wasn't right, and it would never be right. The guy in front of me had slowly gotten to his feet, wiping blood away from his lip.

"Laurel," Embry's voice was in my ear, "you have to leave."

I turned, slapping him across the face in the process.

Rounding back on who I thought Sam was, I started screaming.

"Who the hell do you think you are damn it! Turning people against their friends and making them into something they aren't, thinking you're hot shit?"

All the while he was smirking at me, mocking and laughing me.

It then hit me that they were the ones that didn't want me here. Jake didn't want me here either... Fine.

I turned back towards Jake's house, ready to go home.

Jake stood in the same spot, jaw set, nose flared; like he was ready to beat me up. Once I reached him after my long walk of shame, I didn't even bother to say anything to him. He finally looked me in the eye. His large brown orbs were now engulfed with a black ring, and his eyes were red and worn, bags that would put even someone with insomnia to shame.

Warmth went through my spine, and I got the 'I can't see, breath, or feel anything' feeling again. Tears actually filled my eyes, blurring the image of Jake in front of me. It felt like at that moment there wasn't air, snow, the earth under my feet, or even a reason to live without him. "Laurel," he choked out, voice thick with something, something that I've never heard before, "we can't be friends anymore."

It was like a slap across the face. I defiantly couldn't breath now. Not be friends? We've been friends since I was six. The both of us. Ten years. This couldn't be coming from his lips.

So I did the same.

This slap was louder than the one I issued to Embry. I felt the burn on my hand from it, and it stung to the point where a few more tears fell down my face. But I refused to scrunch it up and bawl. The same hand that slapped him came up again, and he didn't flinch. It cupped his hotter throbbing cheek. My thumb rubbed the cheek bone, then over the lips I can't stop thinking about for some reason. "I'm disappointed in you Jacob."

A few tears streaked down his cheek before I turned away and started my own journey home.

Finally, it had gotten to the point where I stopped going to school. I had finally cried myself into being ill. I was coughing, sneezing, crying, and throwing up every once in a while. Terry was the one that first offered keeping me home from school. I gladly accepted and lay on my bed all day.

This went on for the first week of December.

On Friday Alex came over, bringing me school work. He made me dinner and helped me down stairs to eat. Then helped me back upstairs and held the bucket while I started to throw up the dinner I just ate. I hadn't told him about what happened between me and Jake just a week ago.

I was so worked up I haven't talked to even Terry since it had happened. I haven't spoken anything since that farewell of a sentence.

"Babe, what's eating you up," Alex asked sitting next to me on my bed, "I know it's something more than being sick. You haven't been talking, and usually you want to talk about things."

Alex. So caring and trying to help, and all I could do was sit here, throw up, and cry. I placed a hand on his and squeezed it. More tears spilling from my eyes.

He squeezed back, clearing his throat, "Have you heard from Jake yet?"

I gripped his hand tighter, feeling the tightening of my chest; nodding.

"Did he tell you Bella and him were back together?"

Another piece of my heart just fell and shattered in my ribcage. That's why he didn't want to be friends anymore. Bella probably told him that if he wanted to get back together with her that we couldn't be friends. I sniffed, rolling on my side away from Alex. I didn't want him to see me cry over Jake anymore.

"Bella also told me," he sounded frustrated now, "that you and Jake kissed on your birthday."

I cringed away from him. It was only an accident, and I know I should have told him, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it. And now look at what shit I have gotten myself into.

"I'm glad you two aren't friends anymore," he muttered letting go of my hand.

The straw that broke the camel's back.

"Leave," my voice rasped out. Sounding cracked and dry like I needed water. Which I probably did. "Get out, don't come back."

"What?"

"I don't like you anymore. You're a jerk and inconsiderate. Just leave. Consider us broken up."

My bedroom door slammed, the house door slammed, and then; silence.

The digital clock read eleven.

Life sucks.

My throat was raw, and I woke up screaming. Then flip over to retch in the bucket on my floor. That dream... Oh God...

Every night I've had that dream of what Jake said to me. How every syllable was emphasized to the point where he was talking down to me like I was a child; and I couldn't take it.

Then-tonight-it took the turn for the worse unlike any other time; he punched me in my stomach—sending me flying into Sam where he tackled me to the ground.

His face contorted into an animal. The nose turned into a long snout with a wet black nose. I watched fur grow over his face; teeth growing into sharper longer ones. He growled, no snarled in my face.

In the end, he had the head of a giant wolf—and his teeth were barred, ready to bite me. And the next thing I knew, he was tearing into my chest and trying to take my heart. That's when the screaming started. It felt so real, the blood looked real, and it felt warm; and I felt the snap of my ribs when he ripped those out too.

Finally when he got to my heart, he growled again betting into it and jerking my body back and forth.

This is when I woke up.

I think I'm going to be sick again.

Grabbing the bucket I started for that bathroom in a hurry. The bucket was pretty disgusting and full anyways. I emptied another round of my guts into the bucket before turning the hot water on in the shower and dumping it in. I made sure to rinse it out a few times.

At the sink I started to run cold water. Since the bathroom was right across the hall, the mirror was positioned to where as I could see my room through it. I starred at it a while, trying to find my digital clock in it. 2:34.

Looking back to the mirror, I almost didn't recognize myself. I was paler than normal, giant dark bags under my eyes, hair greased to high hell, and my eyes were red from all the crying. I also had red marks from me scratching at my own chest in my sleep.

After splashing my face with some water, I grabbed the hand towel, starting to dry it off. Looking back into the mirror—like girls normally do—I saw giant light blue eyes instead of my dark green ones, with an oval pupil and a black ring engulfing them.

So I screamed.

Slamming my eyes shut I blinked them back open. They were dark green again, thank the lord. I'm going delusional.

Then I saw a person in my room across the hall.

So I screamed, again.

No. Hell to the freaking no! The only thing I found close to a weapon was the plunger.

By hell, I'll take what I can get.

I came running out of the bathroom like a maniac swinging the damned plunger like a sword, and hitting the figure that was prodding my bed with their hands. "Get! The! Hell! Out! Creep," I yelled each word with each swing. "Laurel! Stop it's me, Jake!"

What?

I turned to my nightstand and flipped the light on. And low and behold was Jake in nothing but shorts. "What do you want," I asked shocked. Why was he here? I don't have anything of his or anything, not that I know of. Did he want Molly back?

"To see if you were okay," he offered a smile. "Alex called yesterday saying you were doing pretty bad."

"How'd you get in here?" I didn't care what he had to say at the moment. A dream where his cult leader tried to eat me, and he was the one that pushed me into such cult leader; yeah, not in the mood for light talk.

He pointed to the window as if it supplied such an answer.

We're on the second floor.

I shook my head, letting a sarcastic laugh slip, "Yeah right. And I can run faster than a cheetah. Was the front door unlocked?"

"No Laurel, I really came in through the window," he sighed flopping on my bed.

Silence. How it was so deafening, I'll never know. But I did know that it was slightly awkward.

"I didn't mean it," Jake finally spoke starting to get up. I flopped down in my computer chair, starring at my picture of us at the beach. He was over to me in seconds, hovering over my shoulder starring at the same thing I was. "Not entirely anyway. I just—I can't tell you Laurel. There's something bigger at stake than you could ever know," he mumbled wrapping his arms around my shoulders and chest.

Resting my head on his arm, I sighed. "So it costs us our friendship? Jake...you're my best friend...there's no one else. No one could ever take that spot; I don't want anyone to take that spot." He grunted, letting go and stalking towards the center of the room with his head in his hands.

"I feel the same Laurel, but—God I'm not even supposed to be here!"

"What, did Sam tell you you can't be here?"

I'd be dead by now if looks could kill. "Not just him, everyone. It's too dangerous for you."

To dangerous for me? Suddenly I didn't feel so pissed off or anything. But curious to what as he was talking about. Maybe he wasn't lying when he said he didn't mean it. I got up and met him in the middle of my room.

"Am I going to catch what you have," I asked slightly even more curious.

He smiled a half Jake smile, and it became contagious until it was a full out Jake smile.

A laugh came out when he spoke; "If you did, my life would be perfect."

"Just tell me what's going on Jake, maybe I can help. And I'd be more cooperative."

He grunted, pacing the room again in anger. If whatever happened has something to do with me being in danger, and Jake being sick and odd to the point where he wanted to end our friendship, then I could help. "I can't tell you," he mumbled, "I just can't."

"Well who the hell can? What the hell do I have to do so you can see me everyday like we used to. What the bloody hell do I have to do in order to make everything normal like it used to be?"

"It's Sam. All Sam. And Sceeter, nothing's going to be normal again. We can't go back to the way we used to... it's just to hard. It's just," he growled, "you already know! You know and you're just not piecing it together!" His hands grasped my shoulders and started to shake me. "Just remember Laurel. On Halloween, at the beach. Just think."

Halloween, beach. Right... we set up tents, told stories, ate, Bella and Jake broke up, and I got into a fight with Jared.

"I remember a lot of things Jake, I just don't know what you're looking for," I sighed, trying to piece something together. "I'll do anything, just tell me."

He pulled me into a hug, rubbing my back and shoving his face in my neck. So much better than that stupid old dream.

Wolf head Sam. The Quileute Legend. Everything clicked into place.

"Jacob Black," I whispered pushing him off of me. Bending his knees slightly he crouched to see my face. My breath was quickly coming and going, fingers and whole body shaking.

There's no such thing though...and Jake? My best friend that I've known for our whole lives? How couldn't I know?

My eyes searched his slightly new ones. The only new thing was the giant black circle around his light brown iris'. How couldn't I make the connection sooner?

"Jacob Black, are you trying to tell me the Quiluete Legend is true?"

Smirking, he looked to the window, then back to me smiling wider. "I knew you could figure it out."