Noir
"Hey, Thomas. What rhymes with 'loser'?" My Uncle Emmett stands in the doorway of the kitchen, where I am trying to do my homework.
"Writing my biography?" I ask, wincing at him.
He laughs. "No, I'm writing your mom a poem for her birthday," he says, frowning down at the piece of paper in his hand. Then he looks up at me with a look of horror. "Not that I'm saying your mom's a loser, Champ. I'm talking about Eddie's loser-dom."
I nod. "I figured as much." I lean back in my chair. "Let's see…'boozer,' 'bruiser,' 'PT Cruiser.'"
"I hate those cars," Emmett says. "So ugly."
"Yeah, they look like little hearses, huh?" I say. "How about 'chooser'? Actually, I don't even know if that's a real word. Why don't you use the rhyming dictionary Aunt Rose got you?"
Emmett shook his head vigorously. "That would be admitting defeat, my friend."
"But asking me is winning?" I don't get relationships sometimes.
"Just wait until you're married. You'll see. You have to maintain your pride. Using that thing would be like eating pizza with a fork. It's just not right." Emmett rubbed the back of his neck for a moment. "Not that I eat pizza. Or use eating utensils for that matter. I guess it'd be like eating a wild boar with a fork. Does that work?"
I snort at him. "Well, the whole relationship thing's not likely to happen to me anytime soon," I moaned. "I think I'm actually breaking unpopularity records at my new school. Like 'most time spent without talking to a girl'. I expect Guinness to call me any day about the World record."
"Yeah, you'd be up against some stiff competition from your dad, I'm afraid," Uncle Emmett says.
"Yeah, but chicks talk to him like all the time! He just ignores them. They can't even see me!" I'm serious. It's like the girls in this town are all taking crazy puberty boosters or something. They are all like a foot taller than me. Plus I have developed, over the summer, the worst acne known to man. I had a nightmare a couple nights ago that Aro decided to change me at my current age. I was frozen at fourteen and five feet tall with skin like a leper and a toothpick for a neck.
I guess I really shouldn't complain. Up until now I've had a pretty easy life. I've got a great family, plenty of money and have always had plenty of friends.
"Had" being the operative word here, unfortunately. This year, my freshman year of high school, I started at a new school all the way across the country from all my old friends. It's not the best time to do this, but we had to move on so that no one notices that my parents don't age.
And because they try to start out as young as possible in a new place, I get to go to high school with my parents. Yay me.
It's not enough that I am at that awkward, shorter than all the girls phase. It's not even the fact that my family is freakish-vampire pretty, even Uncle Emmett.
The worst part about this whole thing is how into each other my parents are. I am constantly walking into the cafeteria, where I have to eat for Christ's sake, to see my dad all over my mom like white on a vampire. Gross.
That's not even mentioning the vile things I've seen at home. I regularly start yelling "I'm walking into this room right now and don't want to have to gouge my own eyes out!" before I walk into rooms. I mean, in the abstract, it's great that they love each other. But in the concrete, "I have to live with this shit" sense? Eew. Just eew.
My family is pretty sympathetic but there's not much that they can do. Carlisle brings home industrial strength acne medicine from work. Aunt Rose has promised me her kick-ass Corvette when I am old enough to drive. Not that it's doing me any good now.
I continue to mope in the kitchen, doing algebra, until my parents get home from wherever-the-fuck they were. Probably making out somewhere.
"Thomas, put your homework away and come talk with me," my mom says, smiling. My pretty, happy, sparkly mom. I shrug and ignore her.
"Thomas Charles Swan Cullen, I'm talking to you." My mom busts out the full name. She means business. I glare at her.
"What, mom?" I load on the attitude. She folds her arms across her chest and purses her lips at me. My dad is starting to look anxious.
"I know you're not happy about the move but it doesn't give you the right to ignore me when I talk to you,"
"What are you going to do? Ground me? I don't have a social life. I'm an adolescent freak. It's not like it'll make a difference."
"Bella, why don't you go relax," my dad intercedes, putting his hands on her arms and moving her gently towards the door. "Thomas and I will bring in the groceries."
"He better, since they're all for him," my mom mumbles, and she walks out of the room.
"Come on, kiddo," Dad says. "Let's go bring in the groceries."
We bring the bags in from the car. I feel a little guilty because my mom has totally gotten all my favorite foods. I sit back down and stare at my math book while he puts stuff away and starts dinner.
"Are you going to make me apologize?" I finally ask him. He looks at me for a minute, frowning slightly and then shakes his head.
"Naw. She's not really mad. She just feels guilty. You know, about the move and all. She sees how unhappy you are and she feels bad." My dad is washing some chicken in the sink.
"It's not her fault," I mumble. Even though it totally is.
"Well, it's all of our faults," my dad says, throwing the chicken into a pan and wincing at the smell. "If you had a more normal family, you wouldn't have to move every ten years and lie to your friends." He pauses. "Or go to school with your parents." He smiles at me apologetically.
"I don't want a normal family. My family is way cooler than everyone else's. It's just hard being so alone at a new school." I blush as soon as this comes out of my mouth. I mean, my dad was alone for decades before my mom came along. He must have been miserable - and I'm complaining about having to sit by myself in class for a couple days?
"Well, for what it's worth, your Aunt Alice says it's temporary. And your Mom says she was kind of a late bloomer, so that's probably where you get it."
"Dad, she was pregnant at seventeen. How late could she have bloomed?" I feel a hand on my shoulder as I say this, and I look up into my Mom's amber eyes. Oops.
"You benefited nicely from it," she says, smiling dryly at me. "Besides, I was eighteen."
"Just barely," my Dad says. She shoots him a glare and sits down next to me.
"Honey, I'm sorry that this is so hard. If you want to go back to Forks, you could always stay with Grandpa Charlie. We would just have to be careful about visiting you."
I can tell that my Mom doesn't want this, and I know my Dad doesn't because he gets this horrified look on his face.
"I want to stay with you, Mom," I say, putting my hand on her cold one. "I just don't want to be a friendless loser." I can see my Dad slump down in relief and go back to washing vegetables.
"I was thinking about that," she says. "I was thinking that we could join a club or something." She looks at me with such sincerity I feel bad about being a jerk about this. But I do it anyway. Because, you know, I'm fourteen and stuff. That's what we do.
"Yeah, joining the Chess Club with my 'big sister'..." I accentuate the air quotes. "...is gonna make me look totally cool." My mom frowns.
"How about Yearbook?" My dad suggests. "I'll do it with you."
My mom looks at Dad in shock. "You're going to join a club? With teenagers?"
"It's more of a class, I think, Mom," I intercede. I'm thinking that, with dad, it won't be as embarrassing. I mean, at least he's a guy. It'll look moderately better to join something with my "big sister's boyfriend" than with my "big sister". Plus, I'll be like his wingman. You know, when the chicks hit on him and he turns them down I'll be there to help them pick up the pieces. Perfect plan.
"I've joined stuff before," my dad tells Mom.
"Like what?" she asks, smirking.
"Well, Alice and I joined the French club one time," he says, shrugging his shoulders.
My mom looks unconvinced.
"And Emmett and I did 4H one year," he adds, hopefully. "Of course, Emmett ate our sheep before the county fair came, so that was kind of embarrassing."
"Less making out at school would be nice, too." I add. "It's kind of gross."
"That's not what Mr. Terrence thinks," my dad says, wiggling his eyebrows at my mom. "He thinks we should make a…"
"STOP IT! LA LA LA!" I yell, putting my fingers in my ears. I totally did not need to think about my principal thinking about my parents that way.
"Sorry, Thomas," my dad says, sheepishly.
Things just may not improve on that front, but at least while dad and I are in Yearbook, he can't be swapping venom with my mom, right?
a/n: Don't get all "Awww, poor Thomas," ok? The kid has a charmed life.
The lovely and talented Betham betas this, without her it would all be darkness and chaos. The outtakes are coming in no particular order, just as the mood strikes, so my apologies for any disorientation, loss of sensation in the extremities and/or drowsiness they may cause. Also, don't operate a motor vehicle while reading "The Red Eye." Thanks for reading (while stationary) and, uh, yeah. Xoxo JuJu