An invisible looming dark cloud settled between us after that confession. Mike turned on his full student mode. I wanted to laugh at the juxtaposition since I was now the one maintaining unrequited eye contact. He sniffed at some point, effectively breaking me out of my gaze. I guess I should be subtle in my interest of the girl as to not raise suspicion but I couldn't help the rush that came with finding my first living link to the dead Swan girl.
"Do you mind if we work with you?" I looked forward, and was met with a red sweater and poorly painted fingernails. My gaze drifted up slightly and I came to face with the owner of the timid voice. Her fingers twitched as if she were contemplating whether or not to offer her hand. I took the liberty to do so myself.
"Bernadette." She relaxed a little and smiled, reaching forward to shake my hand.
"Angela Webber." It was at this point that I noticed most of the students were shuffling around the classroom in an attempt to form groups. "And this is my boyfriend Ben."She added happily. Standing in front of Mike on the other side of the table was this said Ben. Introductions aside, our group decided to studiously begin working. And by working I mean, getting as much pertinent information out of each other as possible.
"Do you have lunch with us?" Angela asked hopefully. I was about to question who 'us' entailed but she cleared it up by pointing to herself and our two male group mates. I pulled out my schedule. Mike at this point must have decided there was no longer a dark cloud over us because he leaned in towards me to read the already crinkled paper.
"Yeah, she does." Mike stated before returning to a doodle he was making inside his notebook.
"Oh, good you'll be able to meet everyone then." She said with an uncertain excitement, as if she were waiting for me at any point to reject her and her unidentified friends.
"I can't wait." I replied, hoping to pull off the excited yet nervous new student vibe. "As long as none of them are part of the 'fams'." I added. The three shared a silent glance as that dark cloud joined us again. I think I saw Mike actually shift away from me. Angela let out a quick nervous laugh.
"Don't worry, we're not a clique or anything." She said with a wave of her hand. I found it amusing that she would think such a statement would convince anyone of anything. I decided to break the silence before the grin crept up on my face.
"Oh I know, Mike here was just filling me in on some of theā¦basics." I finished not wanting to give away too much interest in any particular subject. He looked up then and smiled slightly.
"Yeah, I get to show her around later." He added, his cheerfulness coming back to life. Angela and Ben smiled encouragingly. Mike, true to his word, showed me to all of my morning classes. It wouldn't be until lunch that I would meet up with my somewhat helpful group mates again.
"Bernadette, over here!" Mike yelled as he waved me over to a table that looked pretty full already. He seemed excited to see me again, I guess I shouldn't deprive him the same sentiment.
"Hey!" I said and nodded as I made my way through the lunch crowd. Angela cleared a seat for me next to her. On her other side, sat Ben and across from me sat Mike. I was quickly introduced to Tyler, Eric, and
"Jessica Stanley." The girl said suddenly as she sat in the seat at Mike's right side. I reached my hand out to shake hers but she apparently had better things to do since she ignored it. I pulled my dejected hand back, a little miffed that a 17 year old just blew me off.
"Bernadette." I said to answer her unasked question. She looked me over then.
"So Bernie, I see you've met my boyfriend Mike." Jessica said as she casually tapped said boyfriend's shoulder. Mike found more interest in his carrots than the conversation at hand.
"We have English together." I answered her. She flicked her hair over her shoulder and flashed a phony smile.
"Jess," Angela started, "how has your day been so far?" Apparently she was the mediator of the group. Jessica droned on about every minute of her day so far. Around the time that she mentioned her burnt chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast, I zoned out. I studied the lunch room and realized that it was pretty much how I expected it to be. I easily picked out the jocks, the cheerleaders, the geeks, and the loners. I realized that I'd fallen into the group of average joes. I knew these were the kids that would go to college, get normal 9 to 5s, and become your everyday upstanding middle class citizens. And they would be perfectly content. I decided to take a swig of my strawberry milk. It was then that I felt the staring.
"Ang, do you mind telling me who is trying to burn a whole in the back of my head?" I said without turning around to eye the perpetrator. I saw Angela fail at sneakily glancing over her shoulder. She opened her mouth to tell me but Jessica beat her to it.
"That's Edward Cullen." She said without looking up, and once again that dark looming cloud seemed to swallow the table. All side chatting ceased, the guys finding more interest in their mediocre food. I took a bite out of my hamburger, not bothering to profile the kid. I'd just let the girls do the talking and I'd form a picture in my own mind. "And his sister Alice. They have three older siblings as well but they graduated already." I saw Jessica glance back over my shoulder. "They're all adopted. Don't get involved with them though." She ended suddenly as she played with a strand of Mike's hair absent mindedly. My curious thirst wasn't quenched with that little bit of information so I spoke.
"Why not?" I asked her. Jessica looked at me as if I were stupid to ask such a thing.
"Just don't." She said, I could pick up the irritation in her voice. Mike looked up from his plate.
"They're trouble." I wanted to laugh at how serious everyone became with Mike's statement. I decided to spare them the discomfort of continuing the conversation and moved on to more people watching. I took another sip of my milk and nearly spit it out when I came across another interesting group of tables on the far end of the cafeteria. The tables were exceptionally crowded with similarly tan people. A center table held a lot of guys that looked alike: muscular, tall, and attractive. I really needed to lay off the caffeine if I was scoping out high school kids.
"What's with the teenage playboy mansion over there?" I asked, it caused Angela to stifle a giggle. Mike caught my eye and I could tell he found what I'd said, humorous.
"They're the kids from the Rez in LaPush." He said nodding his head in some vague direction. "Their school burned down sometime last winter, so they get bussed up here. They pretty much associate amongst themselves. A few of them are cool, but the table with the guys that look like body builders," he stated, I nodded my head in comprehension, "you'll want to steer clear. My advice, don't fall in with them either." Mike added trying to put some finality in his tone. It didn't discourage me.
"Why's that?" I asked casually then taking another bite out of my hamburger. Mike looked a little frustrated at my questioning so Jessica took over.
"Let's just say, the Cullens, and the Quileutes," She shot a thumb in their direction over her shoulder," are two families that don't see eye to eye." She explained.
"And you don't want to get caught in the crossfire." Mike added without looking up. A lightbulb lit up in understanding when I realized that these must be the two 'fams' Mike spoke of before.
"Is that what happened to Bella Swan?" I asked curiously. Forget about that dark cloud. A black hole just opened up and sucked the life out of everyone within a 3 table radius of us.
"A lot of things happened to Bella Swan." Angela said before Mike got up quickly and left the table. No one said anything to stop him, and I apparently ceased to exist at the table for the duration of the lunch period.
A/N: I meant to post this last night but I kept gettin this msg about the document manager being down. I love REVIEWS! :D
