May 12

Dear Diary,

You'd have thought that I'd have gotten over all of this by now. It's slowly sinking in but I don't know if I've completely came to terms with it.

Although I have came to the conclusion that if I have to have met my soul mate when I'm still an awkward, dorky teenager then I'm glad that my soul mate is Jared. I wasn't ever really interested in getting to know him befpre he imprinted (I was fine with just staring at him from afar when I was sad) but now I couldn't imagine it any other way. I've grown so accustomed to his soft touches, intense gazes, and teasing that I truly think I'd be lost without them – I'm not used to them, but I love them. I still act like an idiot and blush whenever he does any of those three things, but I do like them very much.

And it's just not the physical things either – I never realised just how funny he was. Or considerate and just plain kind. I think being kind is really underrated nowadays. Girls are too concerned with finding the 'bad boy' or the guy with the six-pack or the guy with the swishy hair. When people ask you to describe your ideal man or woman I think people don't reply with 'kind' enough. Why would you even want to be with someone who isn't nice to you all the time? The girls in my year are constantly moaning about how all guys are dicks, but that's not true. Not in the slightest. Jared is a good guy. He cares about people. He doesn't care about everyone, but he really cares about those closest to him. And I think that's a trait that you don't necessarily see in everyone all the time. And I really like it.

Jared took me to see Emily the other day. And you can tell that he really cares about her too. She told me that it was probably just because she made them food. I told her she was probably right.

Emily shooed the boys away after about ten minutes of us meeting. Even though Sam is supposedly the 'Alpha', she pretty much wears the pants in that relationship. They moaned and grumbled but eventually left. She told them to get out of hearing distance because we were going to talk about them, which caused Jared to grin happily so I don't think they minded too much.

I'd been looking forward to talking to her for ages, so I wasn't scared when she did send Jared away. I hadn't met her before but there were things I wanted to discuss that I didn't necessarily want him hearing. She's the only other imprint, so it would be nice to know how someone else copes with this. According to Jared imprinting was supposed to be 'rare', but now the two wolves who phased first have both imprinted so they're starting to think that maybe it's not this time round. They're just waiting for Paul to imprint, apparently. He didn't seem to find it funny. I didn't see why they found it funny either.

Emily and I talked for literally hours. It appears when you have something in common as significant as this, you find quite a lot to talk about. We both found it weird to think that we could be the only 'imprintees' in the world. Because how many werewolves out there are there? And how many of them find their soul mates?

Although maybe there are quite a few out there. You just don't know. And we will probably never ever find out.

It's so bizarre and utterly mind-boggling. Emily told me that she still hadn't quite gotten used to it, so I don't know whether to be happy because it's not just me, or to despair because if she still hasn't gotten used to it, and she was imprinted on before me and she seems more level-headed than me, then I've got no hope. I suppose if Jared has gotten used to turning into an animal then I'll get used to it too. Eventually.

We didn't touch on the Leah situation or the scars, even if I did want to know what happened that made him lose it and do that to her. Not that it had anything to do with me, I didn't have any right to know it, I was just curious. For the small time that I saw Sam with her, he seemed to worship the ground she walked on. You couldn't imagine him hurting a fly when he was around her, let alone actually scarring her – which is much, much different to when he came out of those woods when Jared and I were on a walk and he nearly made me shit myself because he was so scary. I dunno. It's just weird. I feel like I should worry about hanging around with the guys because if he cared about her so much and yet he could still hurt her like that then... But I'm not worried at all. They're all so sweet and kind and I can't even imagine them turning into these supernatural beings. God, if my mom knew about all this she'd go ape shit on me for choosing to hang around with a pack of werewolves, but I can't believe that any of them could hurt me, even unintentionally. Even Paul.

Emily is so genuinely lovely. And she's really easy to talk to. It was just so nice to finally talk to someone about it. You're great and everything to get my thoughts out, Diary, but you can't really beat actual human contact and conversations. Sorry. It's just nice to know I'm not alone in this.

Oh sweet Jesus. I can't believe I'm speaking to a notebook.

I've so lost it.

Jared and Sam came back about three hours later. Jared put his hand on his hip.

"Are you going to come with me or stay here for the rest of your life with your new BFF?" he asked.

I just looked at Emily, who smiled and rolled her eyes. I thanked her and then left, letting Jared tug me out towards his car.

"I can't believe you ditched me for Emily," he muttered. "I can't believe I was chucked out."

"Like a dog."

He glared at me.

"Jeez, I'm sorry. It's not my fault I found better company."

He turned on me and pinned me against his car. "What did you say?"

I giggled like a fool, and that was before he started to tickle me. Eventually I was able to push him off and I jumped into his car.

"You're so mean to me," he sighed as he got in the car at the driver's side. "I don't know why I even put up with you."

I smiled up at him because he's so funny when he's upset like this. It's like when he bickers with his brother or with Paul.

"I wanted to spend the day with you," he grumbled.

I tried not to laugh as I stroked his hand while it rested on the gear stick between us.

"You're such a child sometimes, Jared."

He pouted and the laugh finally escaped my lips.

"Sorry."

"You should be," he continued to feel sorry for himself, frowning ahead at the road.

"How ever will I be able to make it up to you?" I asked.

He smirked and turned to me.

"Remember when your step-dad invited me round for dinner?" he said. I held in the groan.

"Err…"

"The day you were ill. I told you."

"Oh yeah."

I was trying desperately to try and forget that.

"It would be rude if I just didn't ever turn up, wouldn't it?" He looked at me out of the corner of his eye.

He wasn't even trying to be subtle.

"I'm sure he'll understand," I said, scratching my neck and looking out of the window.

His eyes flickered to me before returning to the road. "Are you embarrassed of me?" he asked.

"Jared!" I spluttered. "Why the hell would I be embarrassed of you?"

He shrugged and kept his eyes on the road. I turned to him and rubbed his arm. "No, Jared. That's not it in the slightest. You're too far out of my league, not the other way around!"

That didn't seem the right thing to say because Jared let out an angry breath but I spoke again before he could interrupt.

"I'm just embarrassed of my parents. That's all."

"Everyone's embarrassed of their parents."

"You're not," I noted as we pulled up at my house.

"My mom wouldn't stop hugging you for about half an hour, that is embarrassing for me," he said, smiling, turning to me once he shut off the car.

"Your mom is lovely."

He nodded. He's so sweet with how he's so close to his mom.

"My mom… she's a little different," I cringed as I searched for words to describe it. "She's not as… openly welcoming."

"Basically," he replied, "you don't think she'd like me."

I tugged at his big muscley arm, which I couldn't even get both hands around.

"No! Anyone would be crazy not to like you!"

He didn't respond and from the look on his face you could tell he was upset. I groaned and felt like banging my head against the dashboard.

"Seriously, Jared. I was just trying to protect you from them. Mom is naturally quite… I dunno. I'd say protective but that's not really the word for it."

He continued to stare ahead. I couldn't take the silent treatment.

"Okay, Jared! You can meet my freaking mom! But if she inadvertently insults you, don't come crying to me!"

A wide grin broke out on his face and he leant over and kissed my head.

Why am I so weak-willed? Now I have to endure another awkward mother meeting. I'd take on scary Momma Thail any day.

Oh god. This is awful.

You know how some people are really conscience of what they say, and worry about offending the person they're talking to? My mom isn't like that. She somehow seems to think that if you get offended by what she says, that's your fault, not hers. She's not gonna make the effort to pretend to be nice. And it's honestly not that I don't think she'll like Jared because of who he is, she just won't like him because she believes all teenage guys are after one thing and one thing only. And she won't see past that to see how truly wonderful he is. She's not a horrible person, not in the slightest, but she just... has a narrow-minded view on things sometimes.

If she's rude to Jared and he never speaks to me again I'll die.

'Doomed' doesn't even cover it.

Anyway, I had my first 'tutoring' session with Paul yesterday at his house. I was scared shitless. I know he's Jared's friend and all but I still find him as intimidating as hell, even if I spend rather a lot of time with him now. It wasn't too bad, I suppose… Okay I take that back. It was awful.

His little sister bit my ankle. That was weird and slightly scary. She also made me call her Alyssa even though her name is Lilian – Alyssa isn't even her middle name. She told me she just liked it better but when she thought I was out of hearing distance she told Paul she didn't want a 'nerd' to know her real name in case I wanted to try and steal her brain cells… Yeah. Not 'too bad'.

Paul just laughed and ruffled her hair before telling her to scoot. Apart from that the actual tutoring wasn't too bad. Jared said we should just swap but Mr. Meakin wants to see evidence and he said he'd know if we did. And Paul's not exactly a bad person. He just gets angry easily. He doesn't get angry with me, though. He's actually being quite nice with me lately. I think he's trying to put the effort in for Jared's sake. But he's still teasing me dreadfully. It's not as endearing as when Jared does it.

I hope next week isn't so bad.

On a much, much, much, much better note, I'm pretty sure Jared nearly kissed me a couple days ago.

We went back to his house and we were just sitting on his sofa watching shitty television when it happened. He had his arm around my shoulders as if it were so natural and I couldn't help but notice how freaking toned his chest is. This wasn't out of the ordinary.

Jared said something funny and I replied with something dorky as usual and he laughed, cupping my cheek in one hand. He tilted my head to the side so that I was looking up at him through my eyelashes. He had that look in his eyes again and I froze, my heart thumping against my chest. He stilled for a moment before his face started to get closer. His nose brushed against mine and my heart leapt to my throat, my lips tingling with anticipation. I didn't dare move in case it would cause him to stop so I tried not to breathe either. His thumb stroked my cheekbone softly and he leant in even further, his breath tickling my lips. I wanted to close the distance between us as fast as possible but I didn't have the guts.

To my great dismay, his mom walked in the room and he quickly pulled away; sitting up straight, removing his arm from my shoulders. I licked my lips a couple times and cleared my throat. The moment was gone as soon as it came.

Joan seemed to have realised something was going on as her eyes widened. She apologised and left the room, giggling. She seemed to find it exceedingly entertaining.

It wasn't.

It was mortifying. We sat in an awkward silence for a while, the both of us sitting up straight. All you could hear was the TV and our breathing.

For the rest of the night we spoke minimally and drove home in silence, although the tension was deafening.

As usual, he walked me to my door. I turned around and opened my mouth but didn't know what to say. He was leant in under the porch again because the rain was hammering down around us. My hair was completely soaked just from the short walk from his car to my house.

He pushed the wet hair off my face and brushed his hand through it.

"I'll see you tomorrow, then," he said and I nodded.

I don't think the whole 'friends' thing is going to work. I wanted something more too much.

He leant down and kissed my cheek, but his lips lingered there a moment longer. I forced a smile before whispering goodbye and running inside the house before I had the chance to jump on him and kiss him within an inch of his life. There's just something about someone being covered in rain that adds a certain amount of sexy to a situation, which is really not helpful when he's already ten times too sexy for my brain to handle.

When I said I just wanted to be friends I didn't realise quite how difficult it would be. I don't really have any other friends who are sexy. I don't have any other friends who are my soul mate either, so I suppose that makes it a little bit harder as well.

It's hard not to want something more when that person acts like Jared does as well. He seems to care about me so much and I think, really, that's all anyone ever wants. And when he acts so kind and sweet and he touches me softly it's so hard not to profess my undying love for him. My heart aches with want whenever I'm around him. But oh no, I 'just want to be friends'. God, why am I such an imbecile? Why would you say something like that to someone like Jared? You should try and snatch him up as quickly as possible or else someone else will. And boy, do the girls at my school try. It's difficult not to go mental and start hitting them when they flirt with him, and they flirt a lot. I have to just keep telling myself that it's no big deal. But I think if Jared got with one of the girls that periodically throw themselves at him then it would break my heart. Which is extraordinarily selfish of me, I realise. I can't ask Jared to not get with another girl when I told him I wasn't gonna get with him.

This is so confusing.

At least Jared doesn't flirt back. Well, at least not when I'm around.

Unlike Jared, Paul openly welcomes girls' advances. He welcomes every single one of them. He's such a sleazebag.

He has a new girl hanging around him every week. That makes it difficult for me because even if I'm not really friends with them they think that we've got this great thing in common because we're both with guys who are best friends. Not that me and Jared are together, we're just around each other a lot and I think everyone thinks we're secretly together. I wish.

Anyway, they think we have this bond and I have to smile and talk and be buddy-buddy, knowing that she's gonna be thrown away the same as the last one in a couple weeks time. I want to try and warn them but I can't.

I didn't realise there even were this many girls in La Push. And I certainly don't get how the hell he gets so many of them to sleep with him. I don't see why they fall for him when they're obviously not gonna be any different. They all think that they can 'change him', which is a stupid thing to think because Paul doesn't want to be changed. Why would he? He gets free fucks all the time without any emotional baggage. It's a win-win situation, apparently. I think it sounds dreadful.

Whenever I'm starting to think Paul's actually alright he always seems to find a way to prove me differently.

Kim Conweller

Okay, so this was originally two seperate chapters but they were rather short on their own so I thought I might as well just put them together, but I think you might be able to notice. I only got two reviews on the last chapter so if there are reasons as to why you're going off this, I'd really love to hear them, don't be afraid to be too truthful as I'm always looking at new ways to improve :) After all, what's the point of writing this if noones enjoying it?

Thanks again for reading!