Disclaimer: As much as I'd love to own these characters, they are the works of Stephenie Meyer, except Alexander, he's mine.
Chapter Two: One Glance
I awoke early Monday morning from my slumber to the sound of my alarm clock. I looked over at the buzzing clock to see it read 6:00. I didn't have a car, so I was either walking to school, which was a two mile walk, or ride the bus, which I did not want to do.
I arose from my bed to go to the bathroom and brush my teeth. I walked back in my bedroom and stood in my full length mirror, taking in my appearance.
I was pretty plain looking, if you asked me. With my long, straight brown hair, my large brown eyes, my slender looking figure. I stood 5'4", with pale as a sheet skin. Like I said, plain.
Boys never really noticed me before. Unlike Alexander, I didn't get many date invites. So I never really had to worry about the pressures of dating, much to my relief.
I went to my closet and looked around at all my clothing, which was not much. I would have to go shopping. There sat my box of dance dresses and shoes. Alexander had brought them before I initially moved here. On my hangers were my other clothing, such as, my cream tunic, my midnight blue long-sleeved blouse, and various other long-sleeved shirts and sweaters. In my drawers were my very few pairs of jeans. I grabbed a pair of jeans and a red t-shirt.I pulled out my cream, lace flats, and then sat on my bed.
I looked around my room. It had not changed in the 17 years it existed. My walls were still the midnight blue my mom insisted made my room look more like the sky, not that you could see it much. My curtains were a cream color, much like the moon. In the corner was a rocking chair. My small mahagony dresser was next to it. At the far end of my room was my closet. My bed sat opposite of my dresser. There was a small table next to my bed. Underneath my table sat my laptop, which I did not use much, except for finding new music to dance to. Next to my table stood my small window, which probably wouldn't open due to underuse. Next to my closet was my bookshelf, which held many books as well as some of my music. It all got up here thanks to Alexander.
I stumbled downstairs to see Charlie smiling widely at me.
"What is it dad?" I asked warily.
"Come outside with me." Was all he said.
I grabbed my bag and a granola bar and was outside. Just as I was about to put the bar in my mouth, I stopped dead in my tracks to see a very old, but very nice looking Volkswagon Beetle.
"Your homecoming preasent. The Blacks down at La Push rebuilt it and decided to give it to you," he stated.
I was in a mixture of shock and awe. It was an old car, but much to my surprise, I adored it.
"Holy crow! Thanks dad! This is perfect. What year is it?" I asked.
"It's a '58 Volkswagon Beetle. This black is the original color too," he told me.
"And it works?" I questioned.
"Of course. Why would I give you a broken car?" He told me as if it were obvious.
"And I can drive it to school?" I asked with a smile.
"Yes, of course." My dad smiled at me with a look of relief on his face. Possibly from the fact that he didn't have to drive me in his cruiser.
"Oh, okay. Well, I am going to go pick up Alexander and then go to school." I told my dad.
"Okay, Bella. Have a good first day of school," he said as he pulled out in his police cruiser.
I turned on the ignition and found that I jumped because it was so loud. I would have to get used to this.
I pulled out of the driveway and took off towards Alexander's apartment, which was not too far away. I took in the scenery around me. Everything was green. And when I say everything, I mean everything. The green covered the ground, the trees, the rocks. The sight was blinding, kind of.
Once I sighted his apartment I started to slow down. As soon as I came to a stop, he came outside and walked to my car. He was wearing his usual black slacks, black shoes, and his orange t-shirt. He slid in my car and we were off to school.
"What, is it Halloween already?" I asked jokingly.
"I like to celebrate early." He laughed at my question.
"Did you know about this car?" I asked.
"Sure did!" He said excitedly.
"How come you never told me?" I challenged.
"Your dad wanted it to be a surprise." He said nonchalantly.
I nodded and for the rest of the ride we chattered on about dancing and school and who we might meet or become friends with, and what-not. He also started talking about that if there was a talent show, we should sign up and show the village people what we were made of.
We arrived at the school sooner than I expected. It was all one story, with several buildings. The parking lot was average-sized, so it was easy to find a parking spot. All the cars there were either beat up or older. The nicest car there was a Volvo S60 R.
"You ready?" Alexander asked happily.
"As ready as I'll ever be," I muttered sullenly.
We took our schedules to the main office. The lady at the front desk, Ms. Cope, looked up from her glasses. She had red hair and a light purple shirt on. We walked up to the desk and Alexander asked for our names.
"Alexander Gold and Bella Swan?" He inquired politely.
"Oh, yes, of course. The new students, correct?" Alexander nodded. "Alright then, just let me add you to our roster," she stated while eyeing Alexander.
She handed us our passes and another copy of our schedules. And with that, we walked out and sat on a bench and waited for the warning bell to ring.
"Let me see your schedule," I said to him.
He handed it to me and it seemed that we only had a few classes together. 5th period Lunch, 7th period Study Hall, which would be spent in the music room, and 8th period Gym.
I glanced down at my schedule and took notice that I had English first period, and Alexander had Trigonometry.
The warning bell rang and Alexander and I stood and hugged eachother and wished eachother luck with eachother's classes.
I walked off towards the English building getting stares as I was walking. They were all very irritating.
"...Police Chief's daughter."
"..I heard that she is from Phoenix..."
"....she arrived with some hot guy.."
"..pretty girl.."
I grimaced at the last whisper. I was not pretty, not to myself, at least.
I walked into the English room, and much to my relief, no one really was in there. I took the pass to the teacher, who was a old, bald guy. He directed me to my seat near the back of the room. I took it without complaint, not wanting very much attention.
Every once and while, I would receive glances from the students sitting ahead of me. Many of the faces looked curious and questioning. The occasional one or two would give me a nasty glare. Likely out of jealousy or just pure rage. Not knowing what I did, I looked away from such unkind looks.
As soon as the bell rang, a boy about as tall as Alexander walked up to me and introduced himself.
"Hello, you must be Isabella Swan. I'm Eric. Eric Yorkie." He stuttered as he said this.
"Hello to you to Eric, and it's Bella." I smiled encouragingly.
He walked me to my next class, Government, since he had it too. I could tell by his personality that he was not a ladies man. He also seemed like that chess club type of guy, but he was nice and had a lot of guts to come up and talk to me, rather than ogle me like the majority of the school.
During Government, a girl came up to me as Eric was telling me about school and other random things.
"Hello! My name is Jessica! You must be Isabella Swan. It's so nice to meet you, the town has been waiting for you to arrive." She rambled on. She seemed like one of those people that auction off things, since she talked so fast.
Jessica had Spanish with me the next period and Trig with me 4th. She walked me to both classes and chattered on about people around the school, her friends, et cetera.
"So what about you?" She asked.
"Huh?" I mumbled pathetically.
"What do you like to do?" She asked with a laugh.
"Oh, I dance, with my partner Alexander." I told her.
"You.. DANCE?" She asked incredulously.
"Yeah, is there something wrong?" I challenged.
"No nothing, it's just that I know no one who dances with a partner. It's just different." She had a tone when she said this.
I didn't respond. Not only because what she said was kind of rude, but also because Alexander was walking towards me.
"Hey Bella!" He yelled to me. He ran over and stood beside me and looked at Jessica.
"Hey Jess, this is Alexander, my dance partner." I introduced her to him.
Jessica looked like she was going to faint. Her eyes were glazed over as she stared at my dance partner. This was not the first time he got this reaction out of girls. So, Alexander held out his hand to shake hers.
"Hello, Jessica, it's nice to meet you." Always the gentleman.
"Er.. hi." She said in a dazed voice as she shook his hand.
We all walked to lunch and sat down at a table that had a lot of people sitting there already. I recognized Eric sitting there, as well as some people I recognized from a few of my classes.
Alexander had a way of talking to people, because he was already laughing and joking with most of the people who were at the table and some who were passing by. I was just looking around while he conversed with everyone, when my eyes stopped on five students sitting at the far end of the cafeteria.
They were all sitting there, not eating, not talking. They were all chalky white and had golden-yellow eyes. But, the most dominant trait in all of them was the fact that they were all disgustingly, inhumanly beautiful.
"Who are they?" I asked Jessica and a girl next to her who I think was named Angela.
"The Cullens." Angela stated while Jessica sighed.
"They are um, Dr. Cullen's adopted children. They just moved down here about 2 years ago," said Jessica.
I examined each one of the Cullens. There were three boys and two girls. The girls looked like supermodels, while the boys looked like Gods. The blonde haired girl was so beautiful, that it would a sin just to stare at her. The other girl, who was a pixie like girl with short, black, spiky hair. She was very small. The boys looked old enough to be in college. The biggest one had thick muscles and brown shaggy hair. The blonde one was as tall as the brown haired one, but was more lanky in his figure. The last one was the smallest of the boys, who had copper or bronze colored hair, in a messy style. He was the youngest one of the group, and maybe the most beautiful.
"The blonde haired girl is Rosalie Hale, and her twin brother with the blonde hair is Jasper Hale. They are foster children, and they're seniors." Jessica said.
The short black haired girl is Alice Cullen, and the big dark haired guy is Emmett Cullen," continued Jessica.
"The last one is Edward Cullen. He is the only single one. The others are already paired off with eachother. But, I wouldn't waste your time, he doesn't go out on dates," Jessica sniffed.
I stared at Edward. He was looking around, but then he glanced at me, and my dance partner, who was also listening in on the conversation. Edward looked between troubled and frustrated, like something was taunting him, in some way.
I looked down from the beautiful boy who was staring at me, or Alexander, and started up another conversation with Alexander for the remainder of the lunch period.
"Bella, don't forget, we have a gig this weekend as well as a recital practice after school everyday this week." He reminded me.
"Okay, see you 7th period, partner." I smiled and walked off to my 6th period Biology class.
Angela was nice enough to walk me to my class. She was a really easy person to talk to. She was quiet and shy, like me.
When I walked in, the first thing I noticed was that Edward Cullen was sitting in the back all alone. He had the only table with an empty seat next to it. When I took the pass to the teacher, he gave me the seat next to Edward. I was a little more excited than I should be, which was really stupid.
As I was walking down the aisle to my seat, I noticed Edward Cullen was sitting very stiffly, and facing away from me. I also took in that he wasn't breathing. I took one look in his eyes and noticed they were black. So black, that when you looked in them, they just screamed death.
I sat down awkwardly, while remained still as a statue, unmoving. He had a death grip on the table, as if he was restraining himself from something. I never knew anyone could be so still. But, he seemed to be something else. Something terrible.
A chill ran through me as I thought this. I hid my face in a curtain of my hair as the red colored my cheeks. That was one thing I was extremely embarassed of- my blush.
I decided to take one more peek at him before I stopped looking at him. So I peeked out of the corner of my eye, and he was glaring right down at me. If looks could kill, I would be killed ten times over.
He sat throughout the class in his stiff position, hands clenching and unclenching, leaving indents in the table with his hands. I looked at the indents and tried to figure out how a human could be so strong as to leave marks in a wooden table.
I tried to ignore him by taking notes, and then glancing at my music, organizing it so it went in the order I wanted it to go. But, Edward was hard to ignore when his piercing black gaze was burning a hole in the left side of my head.
After one hour of the nervewracking class, the bell rang. Edward jumped up right before the bell rang and ran out the classroom very quickly for a human. Was it something I did? I don't even know the guy and already he is looking at me as if I was Satan.
I stood stiffly, and just as I was about to walk out, a boy a little bit taller than me came to my side and started talking to me. He had blonde hair that were arranged into orderly spikes. He had sky blue eyes and a round baby face, like he hadn't lost all of his baby fat yet.
"Hey, you must be Isabella Swan. I am Mike Newton." He stated confidently.
"It's Bella, and it is nice to meet you Mike." I smiled. He was the nicest person I met today.
He went on about random things before he asked me what my schedule was for the remainder of the day.
"Um, I have Study Hall next period, and Gym last period." I told him.
"Oh, me too! Well, Gym at least." He replied. "Can I walk you to your next class?"
"Sure." I mumbled.
"So, what happened with Edward Cullen? He looked like he wanted to kill something." Mike said.
"The one next to me in Biology?" I asked as if I didn't know who he was talking about.
"Yeah, I have never seen him like that before. Usually he looks all bored and sad." Mike replied.
Hmm, interesting. So, Edward never usually acted like this. And I had a scary feeling it was because of me. I couldn't imagine that I could resurrect that reaction out of anyone.
Mike dropped me off at Study Hall, and Alexander was already there. He was talking to the Study Hall aide about us going down to the music room so we can practice our dancing. She reluctantly agreed. Alexander and I walked down to my locker to get my bag of dancing attire. We then walked to the room next to the music room. He brought a small boom box and put an older CD in it. It was Elvis Presley.
I changed into my leotard and my long flowing skirt. I pulled on some silver heels as well. I looked up at Alexander and he was changed into a black wife beater and he kept his black slacks on. He smiled at me and pulled me into his arms and we started to waltz to "Heartbreak Hotel."
We continued our dance session for awhile. We danced throughout Elvis's CD. Alexander put another one in. I knew the songs, although I did not know the band. I think it was a mixed CD of his.
When our time came up, we changed back into our school clothes, and walked out to see the whole music class staring at us. They must've seen us throught the clear glass doors. Anyone would be impressed with our moves. I noticed one of the Cullens, Alice, looking at us, well, more me, with a smug and impressed smile. Now, why couldn't her brother be like that? She smiled even more when I caught her eye, and I smiled back. She then looked away with the smugness still present.
Soon the bell rang, and I advanced to my next class with Alexander. Gym class, to be exact. Although I am a great dancer, I am basically terrible at everything else. It's like all of my balance reserves were put into dancing, and everything else is left in the mud.
Today, we didn't have to dress up, considering it is our first day. I was so relieved for this fact, however, Alexander was not. Apparantly he didn't throw all his balance reserves into dancing. They were more spread out than anything else.
As soon as the class was over, we filed back to my beetle. Just as I was about to leave, I saw Edward Cullen staring at me. Staring at me with the most hateful eyes anyone could think possible. He was leaning against the building next to the main office. His brother, Emmett, was holding on to his arm, somehow restraining him from something. I couldn't help but think that the "something" was me. Restraining him from trying to hurt me. I shivered at the thought.
Alexander called a few places on his cell phone. He told me that he had to cancel our practice today. So what he did was plan a double practice on Friday. So then, I dropped Alexander off at his apartment. I decided to go into town to check out the shops. Maybe I could find some new tights. I needed some more anyway.
I drove into town and parked on the street next to a shop called "Auntie Antiques." I got out of my beetle and started to walk past the shops. I got lucky and found a shop that looked promising for tights. I walked in when they sales clerk shouted in an enthusiastic voice, as if she hadn't had a customer in ages. I walked down one aisle to find a bunch of cheap tights. Well, beggers can't be choosers. So I picked up five pairs of beige and white tights, purchased them, and got out of the store.
I continued my venturing through town, and found a book shop. It was called "Nooks Books." How typical. I sauntered around and found a book that looked ineresting, but I haven't read it yet. I purchased the book, and left the shop.
As I was walking back to my car, I had an eerie feeling that I was being followed, indirectly. I looked around, but saw nothing. I jumped in my car, and drove home. I could swear I heard a deadly chuckle in the shadows.
Awhile after the event, I got home and started to make Charlie dinner. He decided that now was the perfect time to start a conversation with me.
"So, how was your first day of school, Bella?"
"Fine, I suppose." I muttered.
"Did you meet anyone new, interesting?" he probed.
Yes, I thought.
"Well, I wouldn't call them interesting.." I trailed off laughing.
My father laughed along with me at my dry joke, probably trying to keep the conversation going. I really didn't want to keep going. I wanted to go read my book and think for a little while.
After dinner, I did the dishes and went upstairs to take a shower, brush my teeth, and put my pajamas on. As soon as I was finished, I went downstairs to show Charlie I was going to sleep.
"Goodnight, Dad."
"Goodnight, Bells." He muttered, entirely too focused on whatever game was on the television.
I walked back upstairs and into my room. I pulled out my book, Harry Potter, and started to read. But, by the time I was finished with the first page, my mind drifted back to Edward.
Why did he hate me so much already? What did I do? If he had such a strong reaction to me, and no one else, then there was something.. wrong with him. Was there something wrong with him? Did he have a genetic disorder. No, he couldn't have one, he was too beautiful. But, the way he reacted to me taunted me in frightening ways. I tried to figure out which was stronger, his beauty or his fearful nature. As of right now, his beauty was winning.
The thing I found funny was the fact that he pulled such a strong feeling out of me. Of course, his looks had pulled me in. But, his mystery is what really captured me. I wanted to know more about him, to learn about him. I mentally chuckled. None of that could be accomplished if he had a strong aversion towards me. I sighed.
I set my book down, barely read, and set my alarm clock. I slipped under my comforter and drifted off to sleep. I dreamt of walking in a dark alley, no lights, no pedestrians, nothing. I was running after something, it looked like a light. But, as I kept running towards it, the light got farther away. It was then, finally, that I got sucked into a dark abyss, with nothing to pull me out.
AN: The deadly chuckle was Edward. The control for Edward is slightly harder for him in this one. Review! :D