Chapter two
Part two
Josh's POV
Three weeks earlier
Marcus and I arrived in Washington three weeks ahead of the rest of our family; it was our job to scope out our new surroundings and find a place for our family to live. It's a good thing that vampires don't need sleep otherwise we wouldn't have found a house big enough for our family. There are twelve members in our family which is considered highly unusual in the vampire world but that is not the case for my family as we are blood related, this is due to our mother who we call Amanda now after many strange look from people and her extraordinary gift who is leader of our coven. Her gift is that she can bear children, so even though she is a vampire her body is still alive. I guess you could say that it's everyone women's nightmare when they are changed from a human to a vampire and find out they can no longer have children. Amanda on the other hand is the complete opposite; while she may have the hard as rock skin like all vampires and any other trait of a vampire she still has a monthly menstrual cycle which allows her to have children like any normal human being.
Since she first found out that she had this gift she has not been able to pass on the gene as she has no daughters and over the last five centuries she has given birth to seven sons in counting, as she calls herself the breeder and refuses to settle down with a mate, saying it is her job to expand on the vampire world because of her rare gift. Four of my brothers have found mates which joined our family's coven. I am in the middle of seven and have not found a mate but I'm not worried, the most important people to me are my family and that will never change. Marcus is the oldest even though he looks no older then twenty. After giving birth to her first son Marcus Amanda hand time to work out that we would eventually reach maturity approximately eight and a half years after our birth drinking only blood, being bottle feed until we were old enough to hunt.
It was human blood until our mother gave birth to our youngest brother so far, Jesse(who she babies a little being the youngest in a family full of vampires) who turned out to be human which was a shock as his father is a vampire and has been for two hundred and fifty years in counting.
Since then most of our family switched from the life of living off human blood to living off animal blood. Marcus is the only one who continues to feed off the blood of humans and only occasionally drinks the blood of animals.
That he said would change once we moved to Washington as we'd be living in such close proximity to humans.
We had three weeks before we would be going to Washington High where Marcus, Jesse and I would be attending High school as freshman.
Jesse could easily pull it off being a sixteen year old human Marcus and I on the other hand would be getting a little help from one of our brothers Adam who has a gift which changes the way you look, making you look older or younger. His gift came in handy when we didn't want to move around a lot which is a necessity because people found out we were never aging. Jesse being human is the only one in our family without a gift not being a vampire and is very interested in whether he will get a gift when he is eventually changed. It was decided after much debate that Jesse would be changed shortly after his eighteenth birthday.
Two days before we were to attend Washington high, Amanda and the rest of our brothers Adam, Brad, Chris and James arrived at the new house. Amanda rang the school and enrolled us into the school; all we had to do is pick up our schedules from the front office on Monday morning. Chris and James were attending as seniors, Adam and Brad as sophomores and Marcus, Jesse and I as freshmen with the help of Adam and his gift.
Monday morning came with a blur and in the early hours of the morning, while Jesse was still asleep the family had just started to discuss what was to happen. It was decided that Marcus would do most of the talking when we arrived at the front office later today to pick up our schedules.
Four hours later we could all hear the distinct change in Jesses breathing and his heart rate increase and exactly ten minutes later Jesse came downstairs in jeans and a button down shirt, looking very good for the only human in a family full of vampires.
After taking a seat at the dining room table where Brad had seat out a small stack of toast with an assortment of spreads we started to explain to Jesse the routine of today and as Jesse was no stranger to moving it would just be a simple run down of what was to happen so that the humans wouldn't catch on to what we were and Jesse being the human and the most comfortable for humans to be around was to keep an eye out if anyone got suspicious.
"Hey Jesse, you know the drill?" said James. "Yeah, the routine hasn't changed. I know what to say and do James, will you chill?" Jesse said sarcastically. Jesse was right James needed to chill; he's always the weariest of humans catching on to what we are. He's a vampire for heavens sake nothing can touch him and its not like he has a human for a mate, Amy's a vampire and has been ever since her change in 1901. She's more then capable to look after herself even if she lets James look after her.
"So you ready for school bro? Should be fun huh?" I teased. "Yea sure Josh, it's a good thing I'm smarter then the average human, maybe I did get a portion of the vampire gene after all otherwise I'd be failing with all the classes I've missed with us moving around" Jesse retorted looking sour. "Only two more years, then mum can change you into a vampire, it's not really that long bro" I said sympathetically. "Not long for a vampire you mean" he grumbled. "Don't worry love, it'll come" mum said lovingly. "Now finish your breakfast, you don't want to be late on the first day" she said before wondering into the kitchen. "I'm done" he said a minute later and grabbed his bag as we headed for the door. "Bye mum" he called before heading out the door after us. "Bye" the rest of us breathed, it was no higher then a whisper but we heard clear "Bye boys" from mum, she must have used a louder then usual voice for Jesses benefit.
"Shot gun front seat" said Marcus. "What you always get front seat, can't I have it this time" complained Jesse. "Marcus, just let him have the front seat" I sighed. "Why" Marcus quipped. "Cause I said so and this is my car so what I say goes, got it?" I practically shouted at him. "I was just having a laugh man, chill" Marcus replied looking sombre while jumping into the back seat with Adam, Brad, Chris, James making room for Jesse to squeeze past him and jump into the front seat of my monster ten seater black SUV.
The ride to school was quiet and we arrived at school with fifteen minutes to spare thanks to my brilliant driving skills. "The front office is this way guys" I said motioning to a big cream building to the left of us. Upon entering the small office the smell hit me like the force of a wrecking ball and looking around me I noticed that I wasn't the only one of my family who had noticed the distinct smell of vampires. They were all on guard; Jesse had noticed our complete stillness but knew better then to ask. Our plans of having Marcus as the only person to speak to create less suspicion had been abandoned and Jesse seeing that we were all preoccupied approached the front desk where a middle aged women gave us a welcoming smile and said "You must be the Ryan boys, yes?" she asked. "Yes, that's us" replied Jesse. "Well then, welcome to Washington High and here are your schedules" she continued. Jesse accepted the schedules and started passing them around. While we all briefly glanced over our schedules Jesse could see that we all needed to talk and quickly thanked the receptionist as we headed out the door. As soon as we were out of the confines of the office everyone started speaking at once before Jesse called us all to a stop. "HEY!!! Will someone tell me what the hell is going on???" he said getting more frustrated when no one was answering him. "Did you guys hear me; I said what's going on?" We all look at each other for a brief moment before "You tell him" said Adam suddenly. I looked around at my brothers and they all had the same look on their faces, which read that they didn't want to be the one who informed Jesse that there were other vampires in this area and by the smell of their scent there are quite a few and also maybe a werewolf with them as there was a lingering scent of it in the office back there. I thought about how I was going to handle this when I had a sudden thought that made me smile. "Fine" I said smirking at Adam "but you have to call mum and let her know" I continued and was pleased when the smile was wiped clean off his face. After explaining to Jesse about there being vampires in the area he was at first shocked and scared as his scent was particularly pleasing if you are a blood drinker and it's lucky that we have Chris with his gift to mask the scent of human blood and who has kept his gift attuned to Jesse and now doesn't even have to try for his scent to be completely undetectable to the vampire race. It is this reason exactly that stopped Amanda from coming down to the school and running Jesse all the way home to make sure he was safe. It was decided that we would stay at school and see what happened, if they turned up then we would just returned home and pack ready to move on, if not then we would stay. The bell for the first class of the day rang and we all headed off in our different directions, Jesse, Marcus and I had chemistry first lesson then Marcus and I had history while Jesse would have gym. The only problem we had with that was that no one had gym with him so Chris would have to make sure that even if there is a vampire in his gym class it won't be able to smell him.
Chemistry passed in a blur, it is so boring when you've repeated school at least eight times. Jesse was the lucky one only has to go through high school once that is until his eighteenth birthday in two years when he'll go through high school over and over lucky for us we have Adam so we can choose which year we want to do so we're not always stuck doing the same thing. Once for a laugh Adam had made Brad look like a Ten year old and wouldn't change him back so Brad spent the whole of 1946 looking like a ten year old. We left chemistry and said bye to Jesse as we headed for history. The history class was almost there were only two seats left in the class, one next to a tall gangly boy and one next to a pretty girl. No pretty was an understatement, she was beautiful. Long Blondie-brown hair in gorgeous curls, medium height and slender. She is so beautiful I would swear she was a vampire but then that doesn't make sense her skin isn't pale like it should be, it's a beautiful red russet and there's a hint of blush in her cheeks. She definitely isn't a vampire but she can't be human, no female human is that beautiful no male human is that beautiful not even Jesse who has a vampire for a mother is that beautiful and he's very handsome compared to other human males.
That's when I new, I simply had to know what this beautiful girl was and if that meant I had to tell her I was a vampire then that's what I would do.
I started to make my way over to her and as I did Marcus made his way over to the last spare seat next in the room next to the boy. As Marcus started to I noticed that she gave him a weary look and then glanced at the boy. This is interesting maybe she already knows what we are maybe that's why she looks so frightened. Either way I wouldn't hurt and neither would my brothers, she's mine.
I noticed that she'd had put her head back down and this gave me the opportunity to glide over to the empty chair next to her. I decided that I would give her some former warning that I was there just in case I was wrong and she was just an exceptionally beautiful human, which I highly doubted, but still. So I slowly dragged the chair out from under the table and seated myself in it ready for the lesson to begin.
A minute later when the teacher, Ms Paige was her name had started the lesson and I noticed that the strange girl next to me was leaning in towards me slightly which made me smile as a remembered a girl who told me that I smelled liked fresh honey-milk chocolate covered strawberries and apparently was a very appealing aroma for young women though I never really noticed then neither human nor vampire but this girl had a strange hold over me as I found myself daydreaming about her until I finally couldn't take it anymore and I had to introduce myself saying "Hello, my name is Josh" she seemed to hesitate for a moment before answering "Hi, I'm Renesmee but you can call me Nessie if you like" she said looking a little unhappy with what she had said. Renesmee what an unusual name but it fits her well; I wonder where she gets Nessie from. "Nessie, I like" I said smiling. I guess there's no beating around the bush, so here goes. "Do you know what I am Nessie" I said wiping the smile from my face to let her know that I wasn't joking. "Yes" she said simply nodding all the while to make sure that I knew she understood. Making sure the no one was listening in on our conversation she leaned and said "you're a vampire" pausing before adding "and so is he" she said glancing at Marcus who was obviously listening before returning her gaze back to me. This is where I could take my chance to find out what she was so I answered "Yes that is correct, so you know what we are, would you care to explain what you are" I said patiently. She seemed a little confused by this saying "excuse me" and cocking a perfectly arched eyebrow. I sighed "well your not human even if you do have a heartbeat, your way to beautiful to be a human" I said, which made her blush a cherry red and sent a smile to my lips. "But you do indeed have a heartbeat however much faster it is then the average human being and I'm sure that your skin is just as impenetrable as mine is, though I am not willing to try" I said smiling which she answered with her own smile which was just as beautiful as she is. "So would you like to enlighten me with the secret of what you are" I asked leaning in towards her letting just a little of my scent near but not to much as to overwhelm her. She paused thinking and you could almost see her arguing with herself over whether to tell me or not, I just hope that she trusts me enough to tell me and that one day she'll love me just like I love her now and will for the rest of my existence.
