July
The summer before her senior year was when Principal Beeter officially signed off on Grace Alo's expulsion from Westmoore Highschool.
Probably for the best if she's being honest.
"Maybe I'll just get her GED and bounce off to the west coast and find something cool...there," Grace told her friend Margot between demolishing her second cherry slurpie.
"Right, because that totally works out for everyone," she mumbled back. "Gracemean, you didn't even do anything really. So what, one tiny trailer–"
"Can we not?" Grace interjected.
"Yeah, sorry." Margot cleared her throat and her eyes rolled up toward the sky.
"her mom's gonna kill me." her eyes ran over the length of the highway. From below, Grace could just see the cars skirting the top of the overpass. She wished she was in one of those cars headed far from here.
Grace took one big deep breath and shook the nervous pain from her hands before grasping the door handle and pushing open the front door.
Mom was in the front hall, phone to her ear and back turned to me. This ought to be good. She could only make out the last bit of what she was saying:
"No, yeah, I really appreciate it. Thanks again, Charlie." Grace's mother hung up and held a hand to her eyes.
"Everything okay?"
She jumped and spun around to face her daughter, one hand still resting up on her forehead. At first, Grace thought she wasn't actually mad at her, but her body posture quickly tensed up, hackles raised, hands coming to rest firmly on her hips. Here it came.
"Grace, I have..no words," her anger was palpable. Grace had always been a little sensitive to those things, but this was new-her anger was rolling off of her in waves and making its way down the hall to crash over her.
"Mom, honestly, truly, I am so so sorry. I never thought-"
"No. You didn't. You never think." Harsh. Was she shaking or was that just a trick of the light?
"Mom, please. What can I do?" Grace was trembling now and a ringing sound was growing in her head. She could feel her fight or flight kicking in but had nowhere to run to. This was home.
She'd been in trouble before, but never like this. Sure, she'd never been kicked out of school before, but she was familiar with not having a plan. Not like this.
"Who was that on the phone?" she asked suddenly. Grace hadn't moved from her position from the door. The light backlit her mother's frame, the gold light washed over her, illuminating her auburn hair and pale skin. Her green eyes flashed up at me every so often with a look of determination and fatigue fazing through them. Her eyes were the only thing Grace inherited from her mother that she could place. her warm complexion, broad face, and silky black hair was reminiscent of her father. Everytime her mom looked at her, she could see it and Grace would feel pain sweep through her all over again, even if it had lessened over time.
"That was your Uncle Charlie. You're moving to Forks." Her eyes were stern, but her lip quivered and she looked at Grace like it was the last time. They both knew it wasn't but her mom felt things harder than any person she'd known other than her dad. But, Grace could tell by the look on her face that she meant it.
"Wait, what?"
Charlie slammed the trunk shut as Grace settled into the front seat of his police cruiser. Sea-Tac was a bustling airport, but where she was headed was nowhere near this level of hopping. Even Oklahoma City blew Forks, Washington out of the water when it came to city centers.
Charlie settled into the driver seat and gave her a quick grin, which she tried to reciprocate quickly but it may have turned into a grimace. Grace turned her attention out the window as Charlie accelerated onto the road connecting to the highway.
"Bells is excited to see you." Charlie suddenly quipped. "And I got your registration at Forks High all squared away."
"Great, thanks." Grace kept her eyes on the deepening green protruding from the sidewalks, around bends, and over railings. They drove in uninterrupted silence for which she was thankful. Charlie was good that way-not too overbearing,didn't really hover, or force conversation. It was nice and she enjoyed the peace.
"Billy was asking about you." And just like that, the silence was gone. Grace cringed. "Billy Black. You remember him right?" A lump caught in her throat as she tried to keep her breathing even. Charlie waited a minute before continuing. "You know, he stopped by the house the day after I talked to your mom. Brought his son Jake with him, too. He's real excited that you're back in town."
Grace could feel him glance her way, mostly by the sound that his police blazer made as he looked over his extended right arm, but she didn't meet his gaze.
Billy Black.
She hadn't been back to the Quileute reservation in La Push in years. Even before dad died, Grace hadn't seen the familiar beach or sat in the quiet, dated homes, or sat around the communal fire at council meetings for awhile. But after her dad died, it became harder to go back. And once they moved to Oklahoma for his new job, her old life seemed to fade away. The reservation was always the same in her mind, like an old friend, waiting for her inevitable return. But it made her sad more than anything at this point. The comfort she once found there evaporated with her father's spirit. Going back now felt too hard.
Billy had called the house a bunch after we moved away. He was her dad's best friend. And then after her dad died, the cracks in his voice were too much to handle. So, she stopped picking up or taking the phone from her mom when he called and just let things dissipate-distance again, quiet.
The rain slicked roads sounded like a hushed whisper as we whizzed over the bridge and broke into the town of Forks. The small town was familiar too, but not home.
Charlie hadn't said much else on the drive in and once they pulled into the driveway of the Swan house, she breathed a sigh of relief and pushed the passenger door open, gulping in damp, warm air. The air was so much different here. It didn't feel like freedom, but possibility hung in the air more than in the dust of Oklahoma.
Grace hitched her backpack over her shoulder and trudged up the front steps—Charlie was close behind lugging her two heavy suitcases. She tried to reach for one but he shrugged her off with a chuckle and ushered her into the house.
When the door creaked open, Bella peeked her head around the corner in the kitchen, a warm smile breaking across her face.
"Grace!" she beamed and walked briskly across the small landing, lightly tripping over the threshold from the kitchen with a soft 'oh'. She wrapped her in a hug and Grace breathed a sigh of relief. This felt a little more like home. She smelled like soft lavender and some kind of sweet spice.
Bella and Grace grew close when she would visit the reservation and Charlie's during her two-week summers with him. When they weren't together, they wrote letters sporadically which evolved into weekly phone calls. Bella and Grace's mothers were still pretty close—they even road tripped through Oklahoma a few years ago and took them to the Phillbrooke Museum of Art. Grace hasn't laughed that much since then.
Grace had heard through her mom that Bella was moving to Forks so Renee could take off with Phil but Grace hadn't heard much aside from the occasional email here and there. Bella told her that she had met a guy and that things were "intense" but good. Grace had raised her eyebrows at that and vaguely remembered sending back something short in response. She did that a lot lately.
When they pulled back from the hug, Bella held onto the bottoms of Grace's elbows and smiled. Grace's thick plait had loosened on the flight and she felt scrubby.
"Come on, come upstairs." She clasped her hand in hers. Grace couldn't help but give a small smile as Bella tugged her up the narrow staircase and across the short hallway to her bedroom. Well, their shared bedroom now.
The size of the room wasn't bad. She had pushed her full bed up closer to the far window to make space and pushed her low dresser across from the foot of her bed. The small desk was shoved on the short wall directly to the right and Grace's bed sat under the large bay window that looked over the side yard and into the woods.
Her bed was covered in a soft, plush light green duvet with two fluffy pillows. her eyes rested on the black and white patterned blanket at the foot of the bed and her mouth drew into a hard line. Grace couldn't speak for a moment. "Is that…?"
"Yeah, Billy had Jake drop it off the last time he was here. A welcome home present, I guess. Hey, are you okay?" Bella pulled her hands from her back pockets and rested one on Grace's arm which prompted her to pull her face up and give a reassuring smile.
"Yeah, of course! This is great Bells, thanks." Charlie had been leaning against the doorframe, chaperoning her suitcases as Bella gave the tour.
She pulled open a little side closet that rested next to her bed. It held a small white chest of drawers that had little purple flowers painted on it.
"You can put your clothes in there." Bella gestured. Grace shot a look at Charlie.
"You painted those purple flowers yourself Charlie?" she teased. He held his hands up in surrender.
"Guilty." Bella and Grace laughed. She sat on the edge of her bed, fingers curling around the loose threads at the end of the blanket. Warmth rushed over her as she traced her fingers along the familiar pattern from her childhood.
This can work. She thought.
The next few days, Grace spent her time settling in, drawing, reading, and unpacking. Bella and Grace actually settled well into a routine together, sharing bathroom space, one showering while the other brushed their teeth, maximizing the bathroom space efficiently. Bella was a quiet sleeper, but Grace couldn't find it in her to sleep just yet, so she would stare up and above her head out the window trying to catch a side of the moon just waning out of sight.
Her third afternoon in Forks, Bella called from the bottom of the stairs.
"Come meet Edward!" she yelled. Grace skipped out of bed and shuffled down the steps, running a hand through her dark hair to try and tame it away from her face.
Bella had told her about Edward on her first night there. They'd stayed up too late, cross-legged on Bella's bed as she picked at pilling on her pajama pants and spoke in a hurried but elated voice about the Edward.
She had been right though, it sounded intense. While she winded her way through the last eight months, Grace couldn't help but feel bad that she hadn't been more engaged in her emails with her. Grace must have sounded pretty switched off to Bella. Faraway. She had picked up on none of this information about Edward in their email exchanges.
"He's really great. Unlike anyone I've ever met, honestly." she laughed a little at this and Grace tilted her head curiously.
"Oh yeah?" her eyes flitted onto her bed and back up toward Grace a couple times. She opened and closed her mouth as if to say something and landed on an exasperated sigh before smiling.
"Yeah, you're just going to have to meet him for yourself."
Color me interested, Bells. Grace thought.
When she landed on the bottom step, Grace looked to Bella who was standing next to a tall, pale, but generally handsome guy. Her brain hesitated over the word 'guy'. He seemed—felt—otherworldly somehow.
"Hey." she gave a tight lipped, but friendly smile. "I'm Grace, I've heard so much about you."
His eyes seemed incredibly kind and their golden hue was captivating but she still found herself tilting her head, as if she was trying to see around his eyes, golden orbs that wouldn't quite turn and reveal a hidden side. His eyes stayed focused on intently on Grace, undisturbed.
He dipped his head in response to her head tilt and smiled warmly (a hint of menace?) and held out a leather gloved hand.
"Nice to meet you, I'm Edward as Bella said. She's been very excited to have you here, so I've been really excited to meet you." Grace extended her hand to meet his.
As his hand closed around hers—light, but firm—Grace heard a low rumble, like thunder, building behind her left ear. The sound grew rapidly and felt like a building rush from a broken river coming up behind her to sweep her away. She was frozen in place thought and felt that rumble crowd into her head and start to vibrate violently.
From the top of her head, the rumble gained in speed and sound, pounding and pulling at her chest in a downward wave, crashing through her feet and rippling out around her. As the thunder left out of the bottom of her feet, the ripple manifested in a rolling wave under the floorboards, silent but moving away.
Grace audibly gasped but didn't pull her hand back, her eyes quickly scanning the floor for that outward ripple. The feeling had lasted less than 2 seconds.
"Did you see that?" her eyes shot up from the floor and landed on Edward. Grace thought she saw his lip curl ever so slightly. Bella looked unperturbed but her eyes widened in surprise.
"See what?" she looked around her. Grace took a beat and felt her heart settle as the aftershock of the ripple left her body, small vibrations smoothing into nothing.
"Nothing." she said shaking her head and letting her hand fall from Edwards. He looked nonplussed and raised his eyebrows comically at Bella.
"Well, Edward was gonna take me on a hike. Did you want to come?" Bella asked. Edward's face looked measured but somewhat surprised.
Something in Grace told her not to go.
"Nah, I'm going to check in with her mom and get some reading done." she replied, tucking some stray strands of hair behind her ear.
"Another bookworm. The likeness is growing." Edward said smoothly, a small smile peeling his mouth open and a glittering chuckle rolled out. Grace shrugged and wished them well and headed back upstairs to her room.
When she was safely behind the closed bedroom door, she let go of a full breath that caused her heart rate to spike. Her breathing became ragged and she felt an icy tingle snake slowly up her back. It felt like panic, but she wasn't sure why. Could it be what she felt when she shook Edward's hand? That was pretty weird, but it hadn't been followed by a sense of rising panic.
She put a hand over her chest and one on her stomach trying to take slow, smooth breaths like the counselor had told her. The one she'd seen when her dad died.
Focus on something still, calm your breath, calm your mind. In and out. In and out.
But every exhale came out as shuddering, then gasping breaths. Grace could feel her pulse quicken, beating against the skin of her wrist as if the blood was trying to burst through.
She collapsed onto her bed and her vision started to blur and go dark. It was over, this life, it had to be. This was it. But as the ceiling blurred in and out of focus, Grace wasn't upset or scared. As her vision faded, a warm coppery hand shimmered and reached out to her.
So she let go and reached back, relieved.