19 - The Island
The light was too bright behind my eyelids, not being ready to wake up yet I rolled over and tried to burrow myself further under the covers. I kept moving away from that sunshine, which should have been my first clue that everything was not normal - there is never any sunshine to greet me in the morning at home. But it took me rolling several feet away from the light to realize that had I been home I would have fallen off the bed by now.
The events of the previous day came crashing back. Phil not being human, going to another planet. It was not as devastating as it had been last night, but it was still overwhelming. I sat up in the bed and looked around, things in the room looked pretty much the same as they had last night. The walls were a plain cream color with nothing on them. My robe and towel were gone from the floor where I had dropped them before putting on my pajamas, looks like the magic cleaning fairy had gone through my room last night.
My stomach made a loud grumbling sound, seriously it needed to calm down. The past month had not consisted of regular meals but now that my belly had gotten another taste of Phil's cooking it was going to be demanding food more frequently.
I pushed my feet off of the bed, letting my legs dangle over the edge. I went to the bathroom to take care of business and was kind of annoyed to find that Phil had gotten to this room as well, the clothes that I had worn here were gone leaving me with nothing to wear.
I debated between searching for clothes and food, in the end I decided it would be best to get my explanation from Phil while fully dressed. So I headed back to the bedroom, maybe that dresser had some clothes I could use - there was also a smaller door that looked like it could lead to a closet. I hit the jackpot when opening the dresser, the top drawer had neatly folded underwear and socks. Next I found short and long sleeve tshirts, followed by what looked liked a pair of jeans but made of material much softer than denim.
Surprisingly everything fit, at one point I was going to have to ask Phil how he knew my underwear size but there were much more important questions to ask. Like what the heck he was and what he wanted with me. I headed downstairs after brushing my teeth, it was best not to interrogate a guy with morning breath. I went past several doors on the second floor but none of them were open, and at this point I was not going to go snooping around - that would wait till later.
I located Phil on the bottom floor, he was in the kitchen of course. He was wearing jeans and a long sleeve shirt like I was, though his shirt was a dark green as opposed to the fuchsia that I was wearing. His shoulder length hair was loose around his face, softening the edges of his hard jaw. He was busy reading something on the counter, the mixer next to him was turned on. Furiously stirring together something fabulous I was sure. I did not think that he actually saw me standing there across the room. It gave me the opportunity to finally observe him with his guard down.
How had I ever thought this man was normal? Everything about him screamed power, from the wide set of his shoulders to the way he just stood there. Even when he was not moving you could feel the power rolling off of him. I would be lying if I told you that I did not find all that tightly leashed power attractive. What would it take to make him lose control? More importantly what rewards would there be for the girl who got him to give it all in the bedroom? He lifted one of those hands that I had spent such a long time fantasizing about and ran it through his hair. It was then that he looked up to notice me standing there in the middle of the room.
"Wow I thought the cabin kitchen was amazing but this puts that place to shame." I was slightly embarrassed at having been caught staring. I looked around me in order to avoid making eye contact with him, hopefully he would not notice the blush going across my cheeks.
"Good morning Princess, what can I say I like to cook and I also like to eat." He told me with a smile while looking around his kitchen.
The kitchen looked big enough to cook for a small army. The living room and dining room were right next to the kitchen, just like in the cabin. Here the walls were a dark blue color with thick baseboards of dark wood, it matched the paneling that lined the stairwell. There were dark leather couches that looked like you could sink into and never want to come out. The seating area circle a fireplace big enough to roast a pig in, currently the wood was stacked in preparation of a fire but it remained unlit. Jewel toned pillows and blankets strewn across the couches gave the room a much more vibrant color scheme. Pictures and various pieces of art decorated the interior walls, most of the people in the pictures were strangers to me but I could recognize Phil, and his brother in some of them. It kind of irked me that Phila was in many of the pictures, but if they were good friends Phil would be expected to have pictures of her.
The exterior walls were not painted or adorned they alternated with being made of that dull metal material and clear windows giving a view of the pristine winter wonderland outside. It was interesting to note that my bedroom's exterior wall was the same way. Several shelves were pushed up against the dull grey wall, they were filled with various bits and pieces. "So this is your home." It was not a question, this place looked lived in. It looked like he had recently cleaned, but there was too much stuff hanging from the walls for it to be anything but someone's home.
"This is the place I consider to be my home, I have houses everywhere but this is the only place where I can be normal without fear," he looked around the place with a proud smile. "Now what would you like to eat?"
"Do you have any granola?" I had missed the stuff in the past couple of weeks.
Phil laughed, humor just rolling off of him in waves, it was hard not to smile at him a little bit. I was such a sucker for good cooking, I would probably forgive anything Phil did so long as he fed me.
He did not stand around laughing for long, instead he headed to a humongous pantry that had a refrigerator like feel to it and pulled out a metal tin filled with my crack. He pulled some yogurt out of the proper fridge, instead of waiting to be served I started looking in the drawers for a bowl and spoon. I encountered a lot of cooking utensils and gadgets.
Phil let me dig through his stuff without comment, I finally located what I was looking for and took them to the table next to the kitchen. The vase at the center of the large table was made of wood and had been ornately carved. A forest scene with animals, flowers and even a small stream ran across the surface. It was so authentic looking I kept expecting one of the bunnies to jump out onto the table. The vase was filled with evergreen branches and some holly, if the red berries were any indication.
I sat down and put a generous helping of granola into my bowl then I doused it in yogurt. Damn this stuff tasted really good, I was so going to make him teach me the recipe. Having received my granola fix I was ready to get down to business.
"Now what?" I asked Phil, I do not know how much I liked him being in charge of my destiny.
"What do you mean?" He asked making me a plate of breakfast items, the granola must have been an appetizer. My plate included eggs, fried ham, tomatoes and a generous slices of thick brown toast. Phil place the hot sauce and butter next to me along with utensils.
"What can't you just read my mind?" I grumbled at him as he put the large glass of juice next to my plate. "Why am I the only one eating?"
"I am not like Edward, he gets all thoughts, unless I am really concentrating hard I only hear your really loud thoughts." Phil shrugged. "Most of my family can read thoughts in some form or another, so over the years we have learned that it is best to mind our own business and stay out of other people's minds. As for why I am not eating with you. I finished my breakfast a while ago, you slept late and I did not want to wake you up."
It was good to hear that Phil did not constantly dwell into my thoughts, I sure as heck did not need him poking around in my brain. "I mean what happens now? Do we go through some sort of training to become a guardian?"
"Oh you mean the whole you just helped take down the Volturi a few notches?" He finally understood my question.
My mouth was full of eggs so I merely nodded.
"Well let me see, in a few weeks time you will head off to Seattle and start school. It would be best for you to find a job and a place to stay. I am headed off to California to move my practice to Seattle, Carlisle is considering moving his family there as well. I will be closer at hand to help out in case the Volturi have decided they want to try something stupid. Phila already lives there so she does not have to do anything." He ticked all this off on his fingers.
"But that is normal." I said after quickly swallowing the food in my mouth.
"I thought you wanted normal, was I wrong?" Phil asked me, while he put some food on a plate for himself. I guess he had decided to join me and eat again.
"Well yeah but then what the heck was yesterday about?" I was getting confused.
"Yesterday was about several things. First we needed to remind the Volturi about their duty. Second we needed the vampire world to see what the Cullen family is actually capable of. And third we wanted the Volturi to know that we have the Cullen's back, in the past year the Volturi have really become envious of the power they see that Carlisle has. They crave that and this little attack was just the first of many. By taking Carlisle's side we made them hesitate for a moment, they will be a little more cautious before attacking Carlisle in the future." It was comforting to know that we had allies when it came to facing the Volturi, my question was what was the price for this protection.
"But they will attack?" I asked suddenly worried, would they pull out the dead things again if they did. "And will those corpses come out again?"
"Probably not for a couple of years if not decades. Immortals count time differently." Phil said around a bite of his toast. "As for the dead things that the Volturi think make up the power behind the guardians, well that is kind of a stunt. I assure they are completely normal."
"What do you mean they are completely normal?" There was no way those freakish mummy things could ever be seen as normal, not to mention the old women.
"As in you would walk past them in the street without really noticing them, most of them tend to be either my cousins or aunts and uncles. I even played that role a couple of centuries ago."
"Seriously, but why do they look so dead."
"All you have to do is wrap yourself in layers of cloth, the worst part is that you cover your eyes and can't really see. But it is not that hard to navigate without the ability to see. We also use a noise canceling device to muffle our heartbeats and use a chemical to make us rank as death. Maybe that part is the worst, smelling of bloated whale carcass that has been out in the sun for a couple of weeks." He told me with a smile.
"Yeah it definitely stinks to high heaven," I agreed with him. His mentioning centuries reminded me of something he told me last night. "What do you mean you are a grandfather?"
"I have a son who has a son, that makes me a grandfather." Phil told me with a twinkle in his eye. He was doing that again, telling me the truth without actually telling me what I wanted to know.
"I really hate it when you do that. Why don't you just get it out and say it." I told him getting frustrated.
He looked up at me confused. "What would you like to know?"
"How can you be old enough to be a grandfather? That would be a good place to start."
Phil heaved a large sigh before he explained. "Part of what I am makes it so that I do not age."
"So what you are saying is that you are older than you look?" I asked him, obviously he was since he had encountered the Volturi centuries ago. His mouth was full of food so he simply nodded. "And how much older would that actually make you?"
He made a funny face, yeah he did not really want to answer this question. "I don't know exactly, you kind of lose track of the years after a while. But roughly somewhere around two millennia."
"What you are two thousand years old. You are old enough to be a grandpa. So can I call you that...grandpa." This explained a great deal about his attitude and knowledge base. No wonder he could talk circles around me, he had had two thousand years of practice.
"You may not call me grandpa." Phil said narrowing his eyes at me.
"Grandpa it is," I said with a laugh. "Payback is a bitch." I was reminded of our first conversation, when he decided he wanted to call me Princess. I should not be having this much fun harassing a man that could probably annihilate me instantly.
But for some reason looking into his eyes I knew that I was perfectly safe. Like Phila had said, there had been ample opportunity in the past to harm me - and over and over again they did nothing but protect me.
My head finally stopped spinning to the point where I could ask some important questions. I was expecting that Phil would finally stop being vague and start answering with a little more detail than he had in the past. The secrets were out, I knew that he was not human and he knew that I was not human. I soon found out how wrong I was, he continued to be as ambiguous as when I first met him.
"Hey, answer the question fully." I demanded, punching him on the arm.
Phil cringed, I guess I had used my full strength. "Watch it, some of us do not have your healing abilities."
"So what abilities do you have? And what are you?" I started to get a little more insistent for answers. I may have hit him a little too hard, he got up and started walking around the room. I smiled at the thought that he was getting out of hitting range; that was a good plan while he remained hazy on the details. "Speaking of which what is with the huge house?"
After breakfast he had given me a tour of his home. There were four floors total, which seemed a little excessive for a single guy. He lived here alone, his brother and parents had a house somewhere else on the island. Phila had her own house as well, it was nice to know that they did not live together, but from the sounds of it this place was his ultimate sanctuary - nothing came to this island but family and they too valued their privacy. Apparently even if someone figured out the coordinates to jump to this place those ribbons would tear them to shreds if they tried to go past them.
From what Phil was saying that eventually if he got married his wife would come here and his kids would be raised in this house.
"You have never been married?" I asked him in surprise, I mean if you live for two thousand years you would think he would have done that.
"What can I say, I am somewhat picky when it come to the woman I want to spent the rest of eternity with. Plus this house is not so big if you add another person with their hobbies and a couple of kids." He gave me a dimpled smile, it made sense to build your house a little bigger when you lived for a long time. Especially since it did not sound like they moved, it would be nice to have some room to grow. I noticed that the bottom floor was lived in looking as was his bedroom and study; those two were located a few doors down from my bedroom. The rest of the rooms looked mainly like the one I had spent the night in, with no color on the walls and bare minimum of furniture.
The tour had ended in his sun room, on the top floor of his house. Not that you could see the sun anymore, the sun had disappeared since this morning - large fluffy clouds had moved across the sky blocking out the sunshine. Phil had commented that we would get more snow out of it; this place did not need any more snow. His sun room was like the living room downstairs and filled with all sorts of memento's and such, I had started to notice that he only lived in a few rooms of his house, and the rest were just there for potential use. This room was very well lived in, I am guessing he spent a great deal of time here. It was a very large area, taking up about half of the entire top floor. The room was filled with big deep leather couches that Phil seemed to like, low bookshelves and tables that were covered in things I could not identify. I had pointed out that bookshelves were for books, he explained that most of his books were digital so he did not bother with the paper version.
The floor seemed to be some sort of slate or stone, not that I got to see much of it since it was mostly covered with thick area rugs. I could not see any sort of pattern in the style or colors in the rugs, it was a hodge podge of patterns scattered around the room. It did match the art on the walls, which were just as varied as the rugs. He had what looked to be a large table with all sorts of tools, as well as a half finished vase. I was starting to suspect that the creator of that intricate vase downstairs was in the room with me. I should not have been surprised, he had always been good with his hands. Those long dextrous fingers were more than capable of carving out such awesome creations.
The other portion of the top floor of his house was taken up by an enormous greenhouse. A room filled with raised beds of herbs and vegetables, the humidity in there was almost overwhelming. The ripe tomato I had picked attested to the fact that the plants liked it that way so who was I to complain.
Looking up I could not see anything that I would identify as a roof, it was just large squares of glass between blocks of the silver metal that seemed to make up most of the exterior walls. We were high enough now that I could see above the thick canopy. The house was built into the hillside, the gradient was much more steep than I had realized when we came here last night. There was nothing but ancient trees and hills as far as I could see. I could not tell if there were other houses in the vicinity. Some would be bothered by the fact that there was no sign of "civilization" as far as the eye could see, on my part I was enjoying the solitude.
When he first showed me this room I spent some time poking around trying to see everything, I had finally given up realizing it would take a lot more time than I had. Instead I had sat down on one of the couches propped my feet up on a big ottoman and started questioning Phil.
"So what is this about you being not exactly an alien. The question has a yes or no answer." I told him, the time had come for him to answer all my question.
Phil looked away from the window and came to throw himself down on one of the other couches, it was funny to note that he was out of range. Maybe I should stop abusing him. His pale green eyes had a look of worry in them, was he afraid I would think he was a freak? hello wolf girl here? how much stranger could he get?
"I am an alien in that I was not born on Earth, in fact I was born on this island. Just like every child from my generation." He was looking at my face, trying to gage my reaction to his statement. I just shrugged trying to indicate for him to move on. "My grandmother was born on Earth, she was a fully human."
He stopped for a second and I could not help but prod him to continue, "how do you go from 'fully human' grandmother to being born on another planet?"
He rubbed the back of his neck nervously before making a face. He so did not want to explain this to me. "That is kind of a very long story."
I rolled my eyes at him. "Really? And here I though you could explain in five words or less. Well guess what Marvin, I am currently immortal and you are immortal so I have all the time in the world to listen to your long story."
He gave me a little laugh, maybe he liked my Marvin the Martian reference. Or maybe he liked my snarky commentary about keeping it short, whatever the reason he seemed more relaxed.
"You can't say I did not warn you," he told me before continuing on with his story.
"A long time ago there were some beings that visited our planet, you might call them aliens. But to the people of that time they were gods, as you can imagine the technology of that time consisted of very rudimentary tools - it being the stone age and all that. When you compare that to faster than light travel capabilities it is not a surprise that they were deemed deities.
These aliens ran the gauntlet of personalities, some were good others were bad. Most were somewhere in between the two extremes. They did not see humans as the advanced species we now consider ourselves to be, instead humans were considered a primitive species. Some of them observed the humans, others chose to become more involved in their evolution.
Humans could do nothing as they became the white lab rat of some of these aliens. The full extent of these experiments is unknown to my family, after several thousand years we are still finding evidence of some experiments we had not yet heard of.
There once was a girl who was born completely human on this planet. When she was young she was kidnapped and taken to one of the alien's colonies. Technically her father sacrificed her to the gods. In reality this girl was taken by a couple of scientists. They were a strange collaboration, a geneticist and what you would call a neuroscientist. They were trying to see if they could genetically manipulate humans to make them more intelligent.
Most of their experiments failed, but for some reason they could not figure out they seemed to have succeeded with this girl. The only thing they failed to note was how well they had modified her. She had not only become more intelligent she had acquired some extra skills. Using her talents, she and several other test subjects escaped the facility. The only problem was they were not on Earth, instead they were on a planet that had been terraformed by the aliens.
Many managed to survive for a couple of years without being detected. They may have gone on living their lives out dodging being caught by the police but politics got in the way. The alien council, one that oversees all the colonies had sent an armada after learning of the cruel treatment of test subjects on this planet. There were other labs around that were doing some truly cruel experiments.
The girl and her companions were finally found by a member of the military. Let us just say their first meeting did not go well. He assumed they were weak little humans that needed saving, and the girl assumed he was one of the aliens trying to take her back to the labs. He got his ass handed to him by a tiny human girl, luckily for everyone involved he saw her as a potential ally rather than as an enemy.
Eventually they came to an understanding, Al'dor, the alien, would help them get back to Earth if they would do some jobs for him. It turns out that some other experiments had escaped and some of them were not so nice and were killing the normal humans. On Earth it had gotten to the point where there was less than ten thousand 'pure' humans left. Al'dor wanted the girl to hunt these guys down and put them down. It was not a a very organized operation at first and many mistakes were made costing a great deal of lives from among the girl's group. But they quickly adapted and asked Al'dor for military training as well as some of the alien technology."
"That is a very nice cute story about the girl, but why are you telling me this? Were you recruited by the girl's rebels?" I could not seem to connect the dots.
"I am telling you this because I am one of the descendants a member of the original group. My main job is to keep the alien experiments in check so that they will not wreak havoc with the human population." Phil explained in a patient tone.
"So you are part of some interplanetary police force?" I asked half jokingly.
"Something like that, but we try to be a little more subtle in our dealings. I usually do not go around killing the experiments. Most of them don't even know what I am, blending in with the population is something I have been trained from birth." He gave me a shrug, I had seen him in action. He had managed to avoid detection until he wanted to reveal what he was. Even when we were surprised by those three vampires that I now assumed he had killed, he still managed to keep his secret. I listened as he continued his story, he looked much more relaxed now and had even leaned back in his chair to look up at the clouds passing by above us.
"We have been keeping track of Carlisle for centuries now, we first encountered him when he went to stay at the Volturi court, his steady refusal to drink human blood sparked our interest. We followed him from there as he made his way back across Europe and then to the Americas. We considered approaching him then but were fearful of what would happen if Aro read his mind. It is not like with Edward where you can hide some old thoughts, that old vampire sees everything and all it takes is one touch."
"What made the difference now? Can he not do that still?" I could not help but interrupt.
"Yes he can but now they have Bella, I don't know if you were told this but her ability to shield her mind has expanded to the point where she can shield a group. So it would be easy enough for Carlisle and the rest of the Cullen family to block their thoughts if they encounter the Volturi again. Part of the reason we did not interfere earlier was because we wanted Bella to have a reason to push herself and develop this power."
"Why don't you just get rid of the Volturi once and for all?" That would solve most problems.
"The vacuum in power would be devastating, it would come down to the vampire wars again. That was really a crappy time." He shook his head as if trying to get some unpleasant thoughts out.
"What are the vampire wars?" I asked him confused.
"Ask Jasper about it, he lived through one version of them." Phil gave me a shrug, this was not his story to tell. Let me just say that there are heavy casualties when that happens.
We were made aware of your family the first time he came to Forks. Over the centuries we have been watching over your kind as well, but that gets a little more sporadic. You are harder to spot especially when your genes are not activated. And some of you step out on your relationships. Naughty, naughty." He turned to look at me, humor back in his face as he talked about the infidelities of my ancestors. "It happens more than you would think, our best guess is that one of you meets his true mate but since the genes are not activated it is not a full mating. So they are unbelievably attracted to some other woman while still married to their wives. The full mating would cause the marriage to break up, but with this half version it only leads to them stepping out."
"Why do you keep track of the wolves and vamps?" I was kind of bothered by knowing I had a stalker.
""The original vampires were one of these experiments. We keep up with all experiments and only really intervene if things really get out of hand."
Wow, that was kind of freaky, knowing that vamps were from an alien experiment. A moment later something in his words clicked, "so you keep up with the leeches because they are experiments, but why do you follow us wolves?"
He looked at me without saying anything, in his mind the answer was obvious.
"You are lying, we have our own legend to explain how we came about." I told him in a furious tone. I did not want to know that my ancestors came out of an alien test tube.
"I am sorry to have to tell you this Princess but that really cute story was actually written by one of my family members. It was the easiest way to explain what you were created to do and how you were supposed to do it." Phil told me in a quiet voice. "Everyone here is descendent from those experiments, it does not really change anything. We all carry genes modified by aliens."
It was a little hard to take it all in, and Phil understood my dilemma. It took me a few minutes but I was finally able to formulate my next question. "So what exactly are you? What are you capable of?"
"It really depends on the experiment that we were a part of. The girl I told you about, the one that escaped and started working for Al'dor. That was my mother's mother. You have actually met her, she was the smaller of the decrepit old women, Berenike." Phil explained in a quiet voice.
I was lucky that he was looking away from me, I could not control my facial expressions. That was his grandmother, umm wow.
"She really does not look like that, it was just a glamour. An illusion we project into the minds of those around us." Phil clarified, he must have heard the strange noise that I could not prevent from escaping. "I told you already, we do not age. Bee actually looks about my twenty-five or so."
"What if you stop using your powers, will you age then?" I asked wondering if they were like the werewolves, once we stopped phasing we were supposed to start aging again. According to rumors Sam was supposedly trying to stop phasing so he could age with Emily. That was so sweet, not.
"Using my powers is like breathing for me, I grew up with the full knowledge of who and what I am. I don't think I could stop being myself." He seemed to be giving it some consideration. "I cannot be certain of what would happen if I stopped."
It must have been nice knowing full well what you were and what your capabilities would be. I was still a little angry at the tribal elders of keeping all of it secret until they had no choice but to tell us. I don't know if it would have made much difference had they told us but Bella had been a lot more prepared for what to expect. That probably made her transition into a vampire a lot easier.
"Why not? According to legends I can start to age as soon as I stop phasing." I continued my questioning of Phil.
"Yes because that is what you were designed to do. Vampires in the vicinity turn on your altered genes, and the phasing is kind of a like a positive feedback loop. When there are no vampires and you stop phasing that signal is lost and the genes get turned off."
"So we were really from some alien experiment?" I asked with a sigh, somehow it did not seem that cool. The legends of my people were far preferable to us being born in a lab.
"You were actually made by the same group as the vampires. I don't know the specifics, there are members of my family who are geneticists that specialize in that sort of stuff. They could explain it better." He told me with a shrug. "But I do know that you have the same genetic markers as the vampires." He turned back around and gave me a big smile. "So you guys are sort of related. Like cousins."
"You know what they say. Ignorance is bliss." I said grumbling. Then I realized he had completely distracted me from my line of questioning. "You still have not told me about yourself."
"Let me see, I am sort of an improved human. A little stronger, faster, and more durable. I am nothing in that department compared to you guys or the vampires. Most of my powers are tied to my mind." He told me with a smile, he was being deliberately vague. I wonder if he knew how much it bothered me and was trying to get a rise out of me.
"That does not sound very cool, how could you kill those vampires?" He was downplaying his skills I was certain of that fact.
"Lots of practice, and years of training. Speaking of practice, you are going to make dinner for us. So let us get started." I take it the explanations were over for the day, not that I minded.
After we started the soup, Phil talked me into going outside with him for a while. We got into a small argument as to how many layers I needed to be wearing in order to go outside. Phil ended up winning only because he threatened me with bodily harm.
"So you are going to hurt me if I don't dress warm enough, and you are doing this because you are trying to protect me from the cold?" I was trying to point out his stupid logic.
"Pretty much, it is your choice Princess." He have me a narrow eyed glare, and I gave up trying to argue. I had learned to pick my battles with Phil.
We ended up climbing several trees around the house, some of the branches had been weakened since the last snowfall and needed to be cut before they came crashing down on his fence.
Phil was surprisingly agile when climbing trees, but it was his descent that freaked the hell out of me. He just stepped of and landed softly at the bottom of the tree, as easily as if he had just stepped of a curb.
"Remind me never to take you cliff diving, you would be a total spoilsport." I yelled at him from the top of the tree before I descended in a more conventional way.
We were just about done when my pack stopped by the house, Phila had led them to the right place but she immediately left again, muttering something about it being Phil's turn to babysit.
We ended up back in the house, with Phil making us hot chocolate and starting the fire. He was a very brave man to let the boys roast marshmallows in his fireplace. I would not have trusted a group of obnoxious teenage boys with flaming balls of goo in my house. We served them the soup I had made for dinner, now I understood why Phil had insisted we make such a large batch of ham and pea soup. The boys did not stay long after eating, Phil and I ended up sitting on the couch reading. He had loaned me one of his silver tablet things and I started reading some mystery he recommended. It was almost like we were back in the cabin, except this time it was better - I no longer had to hide a part of myself from him. Unfortunately for Phil this equated to him being punched a lot more when he annoyed me, but he took it like a man.
It was when I was going to bed that I realized my mother would be searching frantically for me. I was about to go ask for a phone when I realized Phil had probably covered for me, he was always good about telling my mother what we were doing. But I would be sure to ask the next day.
A/N: All right girls I hope this chapter helped clarify a lot of things. There is of course more but like Leah you will probably getting it in smaller packets later on.
ABarbieStory: Glad you like it, hopefully this chapter answered most of your questions.
Twilighter: Yeah about jailbait, I need to get back to him, he has been neglected. But Leah has been taking up most of my time.
Connect2tjb: Is this making more sense than last time?
Keither Serenity: Interesting name, glad you like the story. :D