Chapter 3: Good Day Miss…
In just 3 days, all of our items were packed up and loaded into a U-Haul truck headed to Forks, Washington. Mr. Saw seemed disappointed to see me go and he wished me luck in my new town. Cassandra and I had spent the entire day together yesterday, walking past Donny Mack's Book and Tourist Shop and the coffee shop with the plushy seats of velvet.
"So," whispered Cassandra mournfully, "This is it, I guess." I nodded grimly as I shoved my hands in my pockets and let the silence stretch.
"I know you didn't want to hear another thing about you and Bella Swan," Cassandra began slowly, "But for me, could I list off the similarities I see?" I sighed grudgingly and permitted her to begin. Besides, this was probably going to be the last time I'd hear her babbling about this nonsense for a very long time. She brightened a little as she ticked the facts off on her fingers.
"Well," she mused, "You both have dark hair. You both hate dances. Both of you act a bit distant at times, almost in another world. You're moving to Forks like she is. You don't go by your real names. There." I stared back at her and almost said something then I bit my tongue and held my criticism in.
"Except all she did was kick the first 3 letters of Isabella off to make Bella," I remarked, "I rather omitted letters and added them. Claire doesn't easily make Lara on omissions alone." Cassandra smiled a little and looked fondly onwards. I felt that Claire was the most unsuitable name you could have given me since I look nothing like a Claire. Once I turned 7, I started calling myself 'Lara' since it sounded more casual and fitting for me.
Cassandra stopped a few feet short of the ice cream shop and turned to face me. "Promise me that you'll e-mail me at least every other day and IM on Facebook every week?"
I smiled and we shook hands on it. "It's a deal," I told her as we went in.
Yesterday seemed like a blur as we touched ground in Olympie. June woke up and Bobby quit making funny faces at her sleeping form. He winked as she rubbed her eyes and I suppressed a giggle. Bobby was a grown-up kid at heart-he played jokes on June and swapped ridiculous jokes and riddles with friends and family. He was a better father figure to me than my pathetic excuse of a father in England.
The process of collecting my suitcase, obtaining the rental car, and arriving at our hotel hadn't registered in my mind at all. June called down to the desk for a spa treatment since travel wears her out and Bobby went to go call the boss of the Forks branch he would be working for. With my laptop, wallet, and jacket armed in hand, I walked across the street to the nearby plaza which had a coffee place within it.
A bell on the door tinkled as I entered and I realized that it wasn't very crowded at all. A young couple sat in the corner chatting away and an elderly man read the New York Times.
The young clerk perked up as I placed my order. As he was handing me my change, he leaned on his elbows and asked, "So, are you from La Push? I know I haven't seen anyone like you around here before." I blinked at him and raised my eyebrows.
"Hollister, California is more like it," I replied slowly, "I'm not Native American, I'm Asian." As soon as I said that, the boy flustered and promptly apologized. Was it because of my tan skin that he thought that I was a La Push resident? Yeesh!
The hot chocolate burned my throat as I logged onto my Internet provider and clicked on my Facebook home page. Cassandra had updated her status to: Cassandra is depressed because her BFF moved to Forks. Underneath it, 20 people had responded to her status. Much of the comments were, "Forks! I wanna be there!" or "Seriously? The Forks?" or something else related to the matter. Not one single comment was aimed at me since people didn't care who it was but the fact that the person moved to the infamous Forks, Washington. Go figure.
I sighed heavily as I shut down my laptop and stuffed into my bag. Taking the remnants of my hot chocolate, I left the coffee shop. Before I turned the corner to exit the plaza I walked straight into someone. My hot chocolate splashed upwards and landed on the person I collided into. Whoops.
"I'm very sorry about that," I moaned as I fished some napkins out of my bag, "I wasn't paying attention to where I was going." A pale hand took the napkins from my hand and dabbed the hot chocolate off his hands and pants. My eyes traveled up the hand's arm to a pale face with blonde hair and green eyes.
"It's alright ma'am," he replied with a slight Southern twang, "I'm guilty too of not looking where I'm going. So I guess that makes two of us." He took the soggy napkins and tossed them into a nearby trash can. "You look like you're new," he began lightly. He stuck his hand out and smiled a little, "My name's Jasper. Jasper Cullen."