BPOV
"Got anyyyyyyy… twos?" I exclaimed.
"Yup," Emmett smirked smacking his cards down.
"I quit," I said standing. He was clearly cheating or something.
I pulled on the legs off my rolled up sweats the cuffs were sitting on my calves, which drove me crazy.
"Such a sore loser," he snickered.
"B is very competitive with her card games," Mom said from her spot on the couch.
She didn't look up, but kept her attention on her book. We had all been in the living room for the past half-hour. Emmett came over to hangout our original plan was to go to Port Angeles, but the news had storm and flood warnings. Mom didn't want us driving in it.
"A little competition never hurt anyone," Em quipped.
"I hate you," I said squinting my eyes. "Let's play Chutes and Ladders or Trivial Pursuit… something."
"Wow you have a wide range of game play."
"Do you want to he bored all after evening?" I asked raising an eyebrow.
"Chutes and Ladders it is," Emmett fist pumped.
I started up the stairs going two at a time. I heard Emmett following behind me.
"Leave the door open," Mom called from the couch.
"Your mom afraid you're going to take advantage of me, Swan?" he asked now in the hallway, putting me in a headlock.
I managed to push off his massive frame back handing his chest as I walked away.
"If you would have hurt my nose, I would've hurt you," I glared pointing at my recently healed nose.
He laughed throwing his head back giving me his signature dimpled smile. "You know I would never hurt you, Smalls."
"I know," I shrugged because he was Emmett and he had been nothing, but there for me.
We had been in Forks for almost a month and I really didn't know what I would have done without Emmett. His friends had even accepted me. Well maybe not Jessica. I think she had a keep your friends close and your enemies closer complex. She tried to hard to hang out with me, but I knew her intentions were not genuine.
The rumor mill at school was that I was Emmett's girlfriend. It was ridiculous to me that just because we hung out that automatically meant we were dating. I was pretty sure Emmett was seeing someone anyway. In the mornings when he picked me up, I would hear snippets of his conversations. I even saw a pair of lacy panties in the corner of his room the other day. He never talked about it though so I didn't want to be nosy about it.
"Prepare to lose, Smalls," Emmett said clapping his hand together as I set the Chutes and Ladders box on the bed.
"I always win," I grinned.
"Uh huh, we'll see," he said cocking his head in a nod.
As we started to set everything up, I felt as though I was being watched. I turned my head to the bay window and saw Edward, Rosalie and Alice sitting on his bed watching us.
The Triad, as they were known, were really not welcoming. Rosalie glared at me ninety percent of the time with her stoned out blue blood shot eyes. She always came to class smelling like pot and patchouli. I didn't know what either of those smelled like until Emmett told me that was her signature scent. Patchouli he would sigh. It was weird.
Alice was the only one that was indifferent towards me and I was fine with that. One day I accidentally dropped my Chemistry book in the hall and she picked it up. Here you go. Thank you. It was polite and short. I could deal with that.
Edward though was my problem. I would never be able to say I understood how frustrating it was for him to deal with anyone. He didn't like people very much that was fairly obvious. He was only nice to adults it seemed. I would go out to my swing in the mornings and find hoodies, cereal bars and thermo mugs of coffee. Don't even get me started of the sweet notes he left. All writing from different poets. These were the things that appeared, but at school he was edgy and mean. He didn't have to say anything his scowls and glares spoke volumes.
Emmett followed my line of sight and sighed. Once the three of them knew they had our attention Rose leaned over and captured Alice's lips in a frenzied kiss. Alice then started to unbutton Rose's flannel. Edward then pulled Rose in for a kiss and she started to go to town on his pants. Right as Rosalie's boob and Edward's dick were débuted in plain sight and all three were in the weirdest lip lock ever, Emmett's hand came over my eyes.
"Keep those closed," he grumbled at me and I did.
I felt his hand leave and heard him get off the bed before I heard the curtains being pulled shut.
"They're such assholes," he said.
I slowly opened one eye to see if it was safe. I saw Emmett sitting on the windowsill with a frown on his usually happy face.
"I…I…what…" I stammered still horrified at what we just witnessed.
I knew about sex and I'd heard about threesomes, but that shocked me. I still had my v-card proudly intact… I mean they were over there doing that while Em and me were playing Chutes and Ladders.
"I'm sorry Bella, you shouldn't have had to seen that," he sighed jabbing his thumb behind him.
"They were getting ready to…" I trailed off feeling my face heat up.
"They were getting ready to do nothing. Two of those fools are virgins," he snorted.
"That didn't look very virginal. I mean I don't do…" I cut myself off knowing I was going to be so embarrassed.
I mean Emmett was a boy. Was I seriously going to talk about sex with him? Me being sixteen and completely oblivious to all things sexual and the lacy panties in his room definitely told me he was far from innocent. He was older too and went to parties.
"This is um, awkward," I mumbled.
"No, Rose was trying to be a bitch. She's always such a goddamn bitch," he said more to himself.
"Are they all seeing each other?" I squeaked.
"Bella, Alice and Edward have never had sex."
"How would you…"
"I hookup with Rose…a lot. She has a big fucking mouth when she's baked," he said flatly pinching the bridge of his nose.
"Oh," I said not sure what I could say. "So she's you're girlfriend?"
"God forbid if she was," he snorted humorously.
"Do you want to talk about it?"
"Do you want to hear about it?"
"I'm just really confused as to what all that was," I gestured behind him to my closed curtains.
"That was Rosalie Hale acting out because she doesn't know how to express real emotions. She comes off as this aloof stoner, she doesn't want others to know how brilliant she actually is… She also is such a cuddler, like when we sleep she buries herself in my side and tells me to never let her go. And you know what, I don't. We started hooking up last year neither one of us talked before that. We grew up together and it took one of Crowley's parties for us to get together," he said sadly.
"You love her," I said.
He looked down at his feet looking so defeated and my heart hurt for him. He was a great guy and deserved to be happy all the time.
"I used to think she had a thing with Edward and I was fine with that, but she said he and Alice were prudes," he said rolling his eyes.
"I still don't understand why all that happened then," I said a bit more frustrated.
"Because Rose is jealous of you, Edward has the biggest crush on you and Alice pretty much goes along for the ride."
My brows furrowed. Edward has a crush on me? The boy that has been nothing, but hot and cold to me likes me?
"How do you know that?"
"Rose said you're all he talks about especially when he's token up."
"And she's jealous of me?" I said incredulously.
Rosalie was super tall and skinny; her boobs were at least two-cup sizes bigger than mine were. I was petite and flat chested, boys never showed an interest.
"Thing about Miss Bitchy is she keeps us a secret in town. My dad's the only one that knows cause he kind of walked in on us one time," he chuckled closing his eyes. "She thinks I'm interested in you and since we're not exclusive or anything she thinks I'm a pig trying to make you my girlfriend while I fuck her."
"Uh," I bit my lip feeling slightly flustered by all of this. "You're just my friend, you know a good buddy."
"My wounded heart," he teased.
"You don't want to date me do you?" I asked slowly.
"You're cute as all hell, Bells, but I seriously feel like you're my sister. I don't know what it's like to have a sibling or anything, but I'd imagine it would be like how I feel about you," he said sincerely.
I felt the tears sliding down my face because he was really sweet. Since dad died, I felt like I lost my protector, Emmett though filled that role quite perfectly. I stood and kissed his cheek.
"Thanks, bro," I smiled as he gave me one of his Emmett bear hugs.
"That was wrong what they did, they shouldn't have made you uncomfortable," he said looking down at me.
"They've had to have done that before or something… I saw things, they were touching things," I whispered loudly.
"You don't want to know about all that do you?" he cocked and eyebrow at me.
"They just looked… familiar," I shrugged moving back to Chutes and Ladders.
"I really don't know what they do," he said sitting across from me.
"But you said…"
"All I know is Edward and Alice have never put the plug in the socket," he said and flicked the game wheel.
"Ew to that," I frowned.
"Bells, don't worry about it they're assholes."
Before I knew what I was saying my thoughts just poured out of my mouth. "But you said Edward has the biggest crush on me," I said lamely.
"Do you like Edward?" he smirked.
"No he's a jerk…and broke my nose."
"I think everyone from here to Seattle knows he broke your nose. I mean you let everyone know that," he laughed.
"Never mind, let's just play the stupid game," I grumbled.
We played our game and I was pretty sure Emmett let me win. I didn't want to play anymore the Triad pretty much put me in a sour mood. They made me feel innocent and uncomfortable, the thing that pissed me off most was Edward had a crush on me and treated me like complete crap.
When I hit the landing, me and Em noticed my mom wasn't the only person in the living room. Phil was sitting across from her chatting away.
"Hey, guys," he smiled.
Hey, Pops. Hey, Phil. Were our collective responses.
"Phil brought over some pizza," Mom said skeptically.
That was weird. Her body language was cautious and regarding. Weird. Phil though was smiling a lot, which wasn't out of the norm; he was a happy guy just like Em. He did stare a lot at my mom though and I could see a sparkle in his eye.
"How very gentlemanly of you, Pops," Emmett smirked.
"I ran into Marie at Newton's and she said she was working late, so I thought I could bring everyone some food," Phil explained.
"Thanks Phil," I smiled plopping down on the floor as I dug into the pizza.
Emmett soon followed my lead even Mom and Phil fell into easy conversation. As I watched everyone, it suddenly felt really real that my Dad was gone.
Too much was changing very fast. I wasn't sure if I liked it or wanted to be accepting of any of it.
A/N: How awkward and confusing of The Triad… I think next chapter might be Edward's full début. I love all of the reviews and try to answer each of them, but a lot of time I read them at work on my phone and can't respond. Another thing is this will update when I can update it as much as I love your enthusiasm I have a full time job so I'll update to my schedule… As always this was beta'd by Dolphin62598!