The remainder of the party was boring at best. The few other random faces that I tried to interrogate were much too drunk to carry on intelligible conversations with so I found myself skipping out early. If 2am could be considered early. When I returned to the apartment I was fortunate to not have another run in with Jones. Sunday was pretty laid back as I spent it beginning my notes on the life of Isabella Swan. Jones had spent his day in town, trying to get more scoop from the older crowd but based on his disappointed face, I gathered he hadn't found anything besides the three bags of groceries. So that brought me to Monday. I was early so I preferred staying in my vehicle. I wanted to get out and start talking to more students but I had to admit that I was a little apprehensive about how news might have spread from the events of Saturday. I may be playing a teenage girl but I need to stop acting like one. As soon as I stepped out the car and grabbed my bag I watched a bus pull into the parking lot. It pulled up close to the building. I decided to stay put and watch as about 40 teens stepped out of the bus. I realized they were the kids from the Reservation. I walked closer.

"Hey Bernadette." I looked up and found Kim calling my name. She had just stepped out of the bus. I found it no surprise that she was followed immediately by Jared. Her acknowledgement of my presence also caused a large amount of attention to be drawn to me.

"Hey Kim." I said back. I went to step closer to her and it was then that I noticed that nearly all the Rez kids were staring me down. I'm an infiltrating outsider…bring it on. "How was your weekend?" Jared was still staring me down from behind Kim. Her previous confidence at calling me over diminished though, when a group of muscle guys came off the bus already sizing me up. Man! Up close they are even hot-bad Natalie!

"It was good." Kim glanced around nervously. "How was yours?" Two of the bigger guys took a step towards us.

"It was…interesting." I felt like I was being closed in when a few more guys started to form a circle around us. Before the circle was closed though I felt an arm slip through mine.

"Hey Bernie," I looked to my right and was greeted with the sight of Tyler. "I think we should head into school now." His forced smile indicated to me that he was not simply requesting that we go inside. I turned back to Kim just as he started pulling on my arm.

"I'll talk to you in algebra Kim-"

"Calc." She corrected.

"Right." I waved awkwardly and then faced forward as we were rapidly approaching the school building. By the time we reached the first hallway of lockers I remembered that I wasn't a helpless child that could be dragged along for no reason. I yanked my arm out of Tyler's grasp. "What was that about?" Tyler stared at me like I was insane.

"Are you crazy? You can't get that close to those Quileute guys."

"I can do what I want." I didn't really mean to snap that harshly back.

"Did you not see how they were caging you in?" I had noticed but I didn't want to look intimidated. "Mike spotted them first. He sent me over to make sure you got away."

"Why didn't he just come over himself?" I asked taking a step closer.

"Well he kinda sorta thinks we're an item now…" And that statement earned him two more steps closer.

"What?" And I didn't really need to clench my teeth together to ask that.

"He didn't forget about seeing us in his room and he thinks we have something going on, so he kept telling people that went to the party and I'm sure it's all over school by now. But don't worry, we can just break up at some point today and it'll be cool." He added a shrug as if this was no big deal. So high school relationships weren't big deals to me. It was underage high schoolers being in relationships with women that had 7 years on them. I hope my superiors don't hear about this.

"Fine. We're breaking up first period."

"I'm not in your first period class." Of course…

"Okay what class do we have together then?" If my eyes weren't mistaken, I think he actually looked hurt that I didn't know his schedule.

"Lunch." This is just peachy. I was a little miffed that the breakup for a relationship that I didn't know existed for two days was going to become public spectacle in front of a third of the school.

"Fine." What I do for a paycheck.


Unfortunately for me, I had an obstacle to get over before I could make it to lunch. It's called Health class assembly. Everyone taking Health this semester was shuffled out of class the period before lunch and separated by gender on either side of the auditorium. Then of course we were seated in alphabetical order.

"Cates, Felicia. Coplin, Bernadette. Cullen, Alice. Okay next row." My ears perked up at the last name. I took my seat following a slow moving Felicia into the row. The short girl, Alice Cullen seemed to bounce into her seat happily and energetic. She was already talking before I was completely settled into my seat.

"Hello. I'm Alice. You're Bernadette correct?" She held out her delicate hand and firmly shook mine.

"Yeah."

"My brother, Edward, told me about you."

"Oh uh…" Real eloquent Natalie.

"Don't worry he says you're very witty and observant. Then when he described your appearance it reminded me of a friend of mine so I really wanted to meet you." She flashed a lot of teeth with that smile. I only managed a half one in return as I was still processing her quick speech. "Have you ever had your palm read?" Okay by this point I was shaking my head, trying to figure out who this mysterious friend of hers was and wondering how she could jump to another subject so quickly.

"No, I haven't." She clapped and bounced as if she were truly excited. Before I could utter a groan of annoyance at her bubbly personality she had already latched onto my hand and was inspecting my palm. The assembly was about to start. When someone carried a sign on stage that had ABSTINENCE on it in big letters, I wanted to groan again. I have sat through more than enough of these talks in my lifetime.

"Oh…" She had this wide eyed look of fascination. So dramatic. I decided to play along.

"What's it say?"

"You have the potential to live a long fulfilling life but an unnatural cause will result in your early and untimely death." The fact that she was smiling as she said this, freaked me out more than just a little. "But the good news is that the love of your life is someone that you least suspect yet trust completely." She looked up at me, that smile still plastered on her face. I held her stare for a few moments trying to read her expression for any sign of mental disorder.

"Can you actually get all that from a palm reading?" I was doubtful.

"Yes. I'm very good at what I do." And with that she released my hand and sat back in her seat just as the lights in the auditorium dimmed and the speaker came on stage.


Lunch didn't come fast enough. I grabbed my packed lunch and headed towards the normal table but was grabbed before I made it.

"Ok Bernie, here's what we're going to do. To make it painless for both of us, just come over to the table, yell at me or insult me, whatever, then go sit at another table. Got it?" Tyler was whispering like it was some big mission or something. I nodded enthusiastically just to humor him. He went and sat down at the table. I waited a few moments before resuming my trek. When I reached my destination yet didn't sit down, everyone looked up expectantly. I pointed at Tyler who had this fake look of innocence on his face.

"You Tyler Crowley are an idiot. G'day." I turned around, swinging my hair in the process. I figured it was a dramatic enough exit. I headed to an empty table expecting to spend the rest of the period observing people. What I didn't expect was for two other people to join me at my table.

"Ang, Jess, what are you doing?" Angela smiled shyly while Jessica just looked annoyed.

"We came to see if you needed anything or just some company." Angela said softly. Jessica scoffed.

"It's what we do. You broke up with Tyler so it's our job to come and join you in your anti-guy period." I felt kind of bad. I wish I could just tell them it was all fake. Angela kept stealing glances at Ben and Jessica was looking expectantly at Mike who had yet to return her gaze. The guys seemed more comfortable just having the table to themselves. I decided that I should at least make an effort to not make the girls miserable.

"So, how are your relationships going?" I had to admit, my lack of interaction with teenagers in a while made me a little rusty in the conversation department.

"Great." Angela was beaming.

"Fine." Jessica replied although it came out as more of a sigh. I felt myself start to pity her a little after hearing her story. I needed to find a way to keep the conversation going but was coming up short. I was saved by an approaching figure.

"Hello. Mind if I join you?" I looked up, well more like straight ahead to see Alice Cullen standing near our table with a lunch tray in hand. The expressions of both girls changed instantly into one of panic but I couldn't bring myself to just leave the other girl hanging.

"Sure, why not." I gestured to the seat across from me and next to Angela. Jessica was already glaring at Alice before the girl was even seated. Angela looked uncomfortable and I saw her shoot a look to the guys table. I didn't even want to know how badly Mike was probably fuming right now. "So why aren't you sitting with your brother?"

"He left early. I didn't want to sit by myself." She replied quickly as she prepared her salad on her tray. She glanced up as if she remembered something. "I'm sorry I never introduced myself. I'm Alice." She held out her hand to Angela. Angela hesitated before taking it lightly. Alice turned to Jessica next. Jessica was still glaring, she looked at Alice's hand in disgust.

"Looks like you have enough people for your pity party Bernie. I'm going to sit with Lauren." Jessica stood up and left to go to a table across the room. Alice pulled her hand back, apparently unaffected by the rude exit. She added the dressing to her salad.

"So how did you two meet?" Angela asked timidly. Alice glanced up in surprise then smiled.

"We had an assembly today for the health classes. We sat next to each other. I read her palm." Alice explained happily.

"Oh? What did it say?" Angela asked, slightly interested in the palm reading. I decided to answer before Alice could.

"Just that I'm going to have an early unnatural death." I explained with a fake happy tone. Angela's face twisted into one of horror. Her mouth was open. I knew she didn't know how to respond to that. Alice's gaze had returned southward to her salad. Angela was glancing between us. Before I could assure her I didn't believe in mystics, another person walked to our table.

"I didn't get a chance to talk to you in math class. Can I join?" It was Kim. She seemed nervous yet determined. I motioned to the seat Jessica had vacated next to me. Everything after that turned extremely strange. Alice's smile faded and soon she was just straight faced and silent. Kim sat, smiled at me then her face turned into one of slight disgust. Angela was even more wide eyed, now glancing between the two late arrivals to our table. The tension was so thick that I probably would fail if I tried to cut it with a knife. Maybe a saw would work. "So Bernadette, I saw the confrontation at your other table. What happened?" I turned to Kim, yet keeping an eye on Alice.

"I broke up with my boyfriend of two days. Tyler Crowley." I explained robotically. It was then that I noticed our table had drawn a lot of eyes from the lunch room. The normally rowdy LaPush tables were staring us down in virtual silence.

"He seems like such a nice boy though. I guess you can't judge a book-"

"You know, if you feel sad about it, we could have a real pity party complete with ice cream, chocolate, and movies at my house." Alice cut in. I didn't quite know how to respond to the sudden invitation. Kim looked completely put off by the interruption.

"Bernadette, I've been meaning to tell you. We're having a bonfire this weekend on the Rez, you know since I invited you to come last week." I caught the tail end of a glare that Alice sent to Kim although she ignored it. The power struggle going on right now I would have found amusing but considering how seriously everyone at this table was taking it I decided I should probably say something. I turned to Alice.

"I did intend on going to LaPush sometime soon." Alice's face fell. "But maybe we could hang out some other time?" I asked. Her eyes lit up again, though not as brightly as they had before. She nodded. I found it best to appease both sides. I remembered then that Angela was still at the table. "Could Angela come along as well?" Angela's head popped as both girls agreed enthusiastically. I knew I was putting her on the spot but part of me was selfishly looking for witnesses. There had to be some reason as to why these groups were so exclusive and so feared. They had to be hiding something. I could tell Angela was itching to shake her head to decline my offer but with all of us looking at her expectantly she didn't have enough gall to pull off a Jessica.

"Great…" she mumbled. The conversation at the table wasn't nearly as interesting for the rest of the period. I turned to my food finally. Crap I forgot to buy strawberry milk.


A/N: I changed character to Bella because well...like everyone's in the story except for her though she's like the main subject. I love REVIEWS! :)