Chapter Four

It was lightly snowing, the white flakes drifting down from the gray, blue skyline above me as I walked out of the house and shut the door behind me. I locked the front door and slipped my house keys into my cross body satchel, before I went down the steps of the front porch.

I had to be more careful here since I knew the sleet ground and the wet, frozen wooden porch steps could literally make me break my leg, something I had done up here in Forks since I could remember. I would be moving too fast and end up in the clinic getting a cast put on my leg or arm.

Reaching my truck, I hopped in and shivered some from the freezing temperature that surrounded me in the truck. I was once again cursing the fact that Charlie had given me the old dirt truck as a homecoming present.

I needed a car that didn't make so much noise!

I needed something that could help me when I would eventually murder Lauren Mallory, or else it would be easy for them to connect me with the truck. I'd probably have to go on foot. Which was probably good, since I didn't exercise as much as I should but still. It would have been nice if I could have driven to Lauren's house instead of having to walk to it in the end.

Driving to the high school I dismissed the radio, finding there was no reason why I felt as though I should be playing anything. I tapped my fingers against the leather steering wheel cover, wanting nothing more than to try and see if I could find any dirt on Lauren online.

The girl had a social media account on all types of social media websites. All the big and important ones. I had made sure to make fake ones so that I could befriend her and see what her latest things were happening for her without needing to listen closely at school.

She'd tell everyone what she thought about the girls at school, as though this was Mean Girls, and she was doing an online version of a Burn Book. I even saw some of my opinions from her, but I merely scoffed at what she had written. She obviously still thought that she was in sixth grade and didn't realize she was a year away from graduating high school so she should act more like an adult than a preteen having a tantrum.

Arriving at the high school I didn't hesitate to shoot the middle finger before pulling into my usual parking spot. I was not in the mood to be here. I didn't want to be here, nor did I feel as though I should even have to come here if I didn't want to. I didn't skip school all the time, but if it were possible for me to do so without Charlie knowing it, I would be skipping school here more in Forks than I ever did in Phoenix.

Parking in my usual spot I could only pray for the people that were around me because if they so much as said something wrong to me today I would make sure to kill them by the time I would graduate here. I already dealt with enough bullshit when I was back in Phoenix, I was not going to put up with any of it when I was here.

Getting out of the truck, I went to go around the bed of the truck only for me to hear the screeching of brakes locking on dry ice. I snapped my head in the direction of where Tyler Cowley's van was skidding across the icy parking lot and went to move out of the way only for Edward Cullen to appear in front of me out of fucking nowhere and pushing me back behind him order to protect me from Tyler's van. I hit the back bumper of the truck and shot an angered glare at Edward.

Edward turned to look at me, but by then I had masked the anger that came from me. Instead, I made sure I had enough shock still apparent on my face. Tyler's van was a few inches away from Edward, he had managed to shield us away from the van by putting one side of him against the van. I pressed my lips together in a tight manner. It was obvious that Edward was slipping on his human facade. I could have easily been able to escape from the doom of Tyler's van.

"Are you okay, Bella?"

"I…I think so. Are you okay?"

Edward's golden irises widened in shock. It was almost as though he hadn't expected for me to ask him if he was the one who was okay. He opened his mouth to say something only for us to hear the teachers and students to start calling out our names. They were finally moving after standing there in stupor at two students almost being killed by Tyler's van.

I went to call out my name only for Edward to do so and I swore if he kept talking to me, I would strangle him right then and there in that parking lot. Witnesses be damned, him not obviously being human damned! I would murder the asshole if he didn't let me do what the fuck I wanted, which was to just say I was okay!

Soon I found myself put onto an ambulance table with a neck brace put onto me before I was put into the ambulance. Edward, the bastard, managed to talk himself out of having to be in the ambulance. I was certain it was because of the fact that he didn't end up harmed from it. I would have narrowed my eyes at him, but he was already gone by the time I would turn and look at him.

When we arrived at the clinic, I was pushed into the emergency room and placed onto one of the hospital cots. I sat there with irritation still leaking from me and the nurses that came to check on me were weary. They could tell I was more than pissed at the fact that I was even here. I hadn't even been hurt from the car wreck, nor would I have been since I would have moved out of the way before Edward had to come and rescue me.

Tyler was wheeled in and placed onto the hospital cot next to me. He was freaking out, as was expected, and when he turned and noticed me, he was basically groveling on his feet. I found it quite aggravating, not embarrassing or anything. Thankfully he must have sensed the irritation that came from me because he soon went quiet, the deadly silent look I often gave to people I didn't like always gave me results such as that. He learned quickly.

Footsteps came heading towards me, and I turned away from looking at the black teenager next to me to the sight of a doctor with a clipboard in his hands and a doctorate coat slung over his medical blue scrubs. He reminded me of Apollo.

With his golden hair framed perfectly on his head, his pale features were borderline feminine for a boy. He, just like the rest of his foster children, had that old aristocratic face structure. Sharp at the perfect angles, lips just the right amount of plump, and those golden irises were quite dangerous. His medical scrubs and coat clung to him in a sinful manner though he had this boyish charm to him as he reached me, those golden irises mocking me with their inhuman color.

"Hello, I'm Dr. Carlisle Cullen, but you may call me Carlisle if you wish. I've been informed that there was an almost car collision in the school parking lot due to dry ice and non-working brakes. I see that your birth name is Isabella but if you prefer to go by the nickname, you can tell me and I can put it down on your records," Carlisle explained, that saintly patience that came from him was something that you'd never get from me.

I gave him a warm smile though as he came closer to me.

"I like to be called Bella. Yeah, you can thank Edward for saving me from Tyler's van. He shielded me from the van," I remarked, making sure that all the innocence that I didn't have appeared within me for the short time period I would host said innocence to Carlisle.

Carlisle's eyes widened a little bit. He let his eyes flicker behind him, where I had noted that Edward had come through and was in the corner of one of the emergency room spots. He was conversing with one of the nurses, though he let his eyes flicker towards his foster dad and gave him a meaningful look. He knew that he would have to talk to Edward about using whatever inhuman abilities they harbored out in public.

I was calling his son out. I wanted him to give me an answer that would make sense.

He wouldn't have had to deal with this if it weren't for the fact that he didn't give me the chance to move out of the way. Yet he did and I wanted him to feel as uncomfortable about it as possible, because it was the least of what he deserved.

"I'll make sure to talk to him about it later. Let me do a quick check up on you and if everything turns out to be fine you can head home. I'm sure you'd not mind missing school for the rest of the day," Carlisle commented, as though he was hoping that I wouldn't speak about the whole Edward saving me from Tyler's van aloud once more.

I opened my mouth, where I was certain whatever, I would say wouldn't be examined in my mind before I said it, only for me to see the emergency room doors that led into the corridor that was connected to the lobby of the clinic slammed open. Charlie came rushing into the emergency room, his eyes flickering over all the different people and cots that were in the room before they landed on me sitting awkwardly on a hospital cot with Carlisle Cullen in front of me.

Charlie reached us before I could even have time to think of what to say to him and wrapped his arms around me as though he was hoping he could shield me away from everything else in the world. I sighed tiredly in my mind, allowing him to hug me as long as he wanted to. Even when I wanted to shove him away from me and tell him not to touch me for at least two days, I allowed him to hug me because that was what proper daughters allowed their fathers to do when they almost lost their daughters in near death experiences.

Pulling away from me, Charlie soon turned his attention over to Carlisle. I sat there and let my eyes flicker towards Edward. The stupid bastard was still standing off to the side with his hands stuffed into the pockets of his jeans.

He was fine with standing in the corner of the room as though he was actually a doctor or nurse that was back here instead of the foster son of one the doctors. He arched one of his eyebrows up at me and without hesitation I went to bring my hand up to shoot him the bird only for a clearing of the throat to gain my attention.

"Isabella Marie Swan, you will not do what I just saw you attempt to do to Edward Cullen. The boy saved your life!"

Charlie hissed this at me, the kind of fatherly voice that would make any normal child of his tremble from the alpha tone. I on the other hand did not feel that kind of fear from him, the need to lay down on my stomach and submit.

I might not feel it but that didn't mean I wasn't able to show it either. I apologized with emotion in my voice, the red that came across my cheekbones were not in embarrassment at having been caught having almost shot the bird at my savior. The red that was on my pale face was instead there because of the fact I was angry. I was seventeen, so yes, I still had to listen to him and Renee since they legally had power over me.

"I want to go and thank him properly," I mumbled before I got out of the hospital bed and went after Edward, since he was in the corridor now. Carlisle let attention turn and focus on Tyler and his family now, since there wasn't anything concerning me that needed to be done.

Edward was slowly walking down the corridor, the ceiling to floor windows that looked out to the forest in the distance, another reminder how different things were here than it was in Phoenix. I wouldn't be walking through the corridors of the local clinic. Instead, I would still be in the hospital bed in Phoenix, and they would be running all different tests so they could make sure to run up the medical bills by the end of my stay.

"Edward…"

Edward paused for a moment, enough for me to study him some more. He stayed still a moment longer than I expected and I stood there without saying anything. I knew it was completely rude for me to do that. Just something made me want to actually thank him for saving my life. I didn't fear death, I knew one day I would die but the good-looking bastard had kept the devil from claiming me another day. And claim me one day he would, but not today.

"Thank you."

Edward turned around so he looked at me, his golden irises showing so many different layers throughout them. I could not name all the different emotions that were through him. He was pushing and pulling at each layer within him to see if one of them was the appropriate choice. He seemed to decide what emotion he wanted in the end; he was respectful and would respond with a 'you're welcome' because that would be the proper thing to do.

The doors behind me opened and I turned my head, noting how Charlie was coming out of the back emergency room with his hands stuffed into the pockets of his police uniform pants. He reached his hand out for Edward to take. I noted how when they shook hands Edward was wearing leather gloves, when it was warm enough inside the clinic that he didn't need to wear them. Charlie didn't seem as though he was bothered with that little oddity of wearing leather gloves.

I couldn't help but smile some on the inside, at how Edward was dressed in the case of a serial killer even though he had decided to be a hero. He decided he would do the right thing in the end and let me live.

He could have stayed off to the side and smirked when I would have been slammed into Tyler's van. My bones would crack and my head would snap back into the metal. I would have either died immediately depending on how hard and the angle it was or I would have been in the hospital/clinic suffering with the pain until I would succumb to the pain.

The blood that would spread and stain the pavement of the parking lot would be the equivalent of the bloodied title spot in the Phoenix High School Staircase. I would end up being on the news for being a casualty, instead of being the one who would cause the casualty at the high school. I would have the appropriate amount of people that would come to my funeral, and I didn't know if the Cullens would even care about going to the funeral.

"Come on, Bells. I can drive you back to the school parking lot and you can drive the truck home. Or you can tell one of your friends in the lobby to bring it to our house," Charlie explained, making me let my mind wander from the time I had spent in Phoenix to the current situation that was currently on hand. I needed to stop daydreaming and being pulled away into other bloodier, more intriguing situations inside my mind than the real world.

"I think we can just head back to the high school, and I can drive it home," I quickly remarked, since I wasn't in the mood to converse with anyone.

I would rather be away in my bedroom, caught into my macabre state of thoughts for a while. I could start painting in my bedroom on one of the numerous canvases I had brought with me and hiding the paintings underneath the floorboards. I knew they would be disturbing and no one in their right mind would even want to look at the paintings that long, they weren't meant for the innocent. They weren't tamed and cute; they were dark and sometimes I would add some of my own blood into the paint to make sure there would be more of me in the paints than the chemicals.

I still had to face all the teenagers in the lobby as we went through them, while Edward had left to go talk to Carlisle most likely in his office. I couldn't care less what he was talking to him about, he was probably glad that I hadn't pointed out the inhuman speed and ability to stop Tyler's van. It wouldn't do anything other than make my blood pressure go up because he would deny it, so what was the point of asking him about the obvious inhumanity inside of him?

Entering the lobby, I kept my tongue clamped by my teeth inside my mouth and my face plain. Charlie chuckled before letting everyone know that I was okay, but I was tired. Jessica was more than upset at what had happened, while Mike had a healthy amount of interest. I was glad he had decided he would focus more of his concern over his best friend than he did about me. The last thing that was on my mind happened to be romance.

"Well, that's disappointing. She's alive! It's a fucking miracle! We can go now, Jess."

I turned my attention to Lauren entering the lobby with her hands stuffed into her designer, smug jeans. She had on a more expensive brand jacket over her blouse. Her hair was pulled up in a high bun and her makeup still didn't compliment her skin tone. She kept chewing on that stupid bubblegum, her perfect white teeth a mockery to me. She was a little miss pretty popular, and all I wanted to do right now was lunge forward and give her a good right hook to the face.

Everyone turned their attention towards Lauren, a few of them smirking because all they wanted to do was watch some dramas unfold in front of them. The majority of them were kind of surprised that Lauren would say something like this in front of Charlie. Charlie gave an unimpressed glare at Lauren at what she had just said, while Lauren had no apologetic looks upon her face.

"Excuse me, what's your name?"

I sighed internally and just wanted to leave. I knew there was no point in asking Charlie not to say anything because he would. He always was the kind of dad that would fight for his daughter's honor and reputation even though I didn't really have one to begin with in this school. The only thing that they knew was that I had moved here from Phoenix to lie with my dad again because I didn't want to be a bother to my mom and new stepdad.

"Lauren Mallory."

Charlie let his eyes flicker towards me, before he seemed to remember how I had mentioned her when I had been having dinner with the Blacks and him the other night. He could understand why I was thinking about her, though now he didn't seem as though he would have liked her if we were interested in each other either. Not that there was anything wrong with me having a girlfriend, but Charlie was quite protective of me.

"Miss Mallory, you're standing in the way of us leaving. If you would so kindly move out of the way, I'd like to take my daughter to go pick up her truck from the school parking lot. I know that's disappointing to you, I'm sure that you would rather be leaving to go back to the site where my daughter had been crushed to death instead of just getting her truck," Charlie commented with a blandness in his voice.

Calm and straight to the point, enough for everyone to kind of shift their soles of their shoes at the thought of actually finding what Lauren had said funny anymore.

It was one thing to agree with her because they had no actual independent thoughts of their own on the majority of things. It was another thing to share the same idea that it was disappointing that the new girl hadn't died, especially when the said 'new girl's' dad ended up being the chief-of-police.

Lauren moved out of the way, and I walked out, rolling my brown eyes at her as I went out into the chilly northern air. I shivered some but it only reminded me I was alive. I wasn't in the nice, heated medical clinic anymore. I would barely get warmed up again before I would end up switching to my truck, where the heater/air conditioner was broken and desperately needed to be fixed. It was another downside of the fucking truck, I hated it.

Arriving at the high school it was a good thing that Charlie was in law enforcement. He was able to get us through the yellow tape that had been put around the truck to keep others from getting into it. Principal Greene was standing on the curb with his hands folded against his chest and studying Charlie and I as we pulled into one of the parking spots that weren't too far from my truck.

I had barely gotten out of the police cruiser when Principal Greene began to make his way towards me. I didn't have time to school my features before he could notice the absolute anger and annoyance that was in my features. He paused nervously, as though he was wondering if I would randomly decide to kill him right then and there in the school parking lot. If only he was that important, no he would be fine and left to take care of the teenagers of Forks long after I would graduate here.

Reaching the truck, I unlocked the front driver's door before hopping into the truck. I shivered uncontrollably for a moment, hating how cold the truck would get. I rubbed my arms against my arms and before I could shut the door behind me to start the truck Charlie popped up next to me and felt how cold my hands were. Guilt came over him at the knowledge he was making me feel this kind of coldness inside a truck that he had given me as a homecoming present.

"I'm sorry about the fact we didn't have time to fix the heater/air in the truck before you came here. I promise I'll take it to one of the mechanics on the reservation this weekend," Charlie informed me, enough for me to almost shrug my shoulders but instead I gave him a small smile.

Was I an ungrateful daughter to nitpick every little thing that Charlie did for me? I made sure to pick and prod at every little thing that Charlie did, things that I should just take for granted. I shouldn't look at the things he did for me and think that they were stupid, or he shouldn't have even given me them. Chances where I was a complete and utter bitch to Charlie, and he was better off with having a daughter that wasn't me.

Charlie pulled away from leaning into the truck to feel the temperature before he went over to where Principal Greene was. He must have been deciding he would reassure him he wouldn't sue the school or Tyler for the almost death of mine. Edward had come and saved the day, which I was grateful for, because that meant I would actually be able to kill Lauren soon.

By the time I arrived back at Charlie's house and pulled into the gravel driveway, it was starting to snow and sleet again. I grabbed my things and got out of the truck, making sure I wouldn't trip and break my ankle. I had more important things that needed to be done. Such as making sure to set a date in stone for the day I would kill Lauren Mallory. I was certain the town would be better off without him.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: for those who are wondering, I am doing a 3 in 1 update schedule. Each time I update this fanfiction I will be updating the two stand-alone novels in this trilogy, 'As I breathe', and 'through hell or highwater', also. So that is why it will take a while for me to update this fanfiction along with the other two.

-as always: Twilight doesn't belong to me

Emmy