Prologue
The preview provided below is from Isabella M. Swan's gallery called "That Girl". It's part of the Seattle Art Gallery's Summer Guest Photo Series. Please note that this display contains mature themes and is recommended for guests who are 16 years old and above.
Miss Isabella Swan (of I.S. Photography) is an award-winning photographer and best-selling author, known for her book Is It What It Is, who resides in the sunny state of Florida. Autographed copies of the book based on Miss Swan's viral online gallery about self-acceptance will be available in the gift shop for the duration of the exhibit.
Annual Pass holders are granted free admittance to the Summer Guest Photo Series while general ticket buyers will need to purchase an additional ticket.
All guest exhibits will run from July 1st until September 1st.
Dear you,
I want you to know that something terrible will happen to you.
Someone will take something from you that is not theirs to take.
You will examine every word and action leading up to the incident, wondering how you could've changed your fate. You will examine every word and action following it.
You will choose to blame yourself for many things.
There will be many losses.
There will be many regrets.
But I want you to know that I'm here. And I'm going to get you through this.
But first, I want to say I'm sorry.
I'm sorry because I let this happen.
I let this happen because I never wanted to be that girl.
These notes are to help you cope and to show you that being that girl isn't so bad.
Chapter 1
"Which one?" I asked, holding up two swatches of color for my assistant. There were more shades of green laid about on tables than I could count, two of the top contenders found their way into my grip. Charlotte narrowed her eyes, raising her hand to rest under her chin. She studied them, irises flipping between the two until a sigh escaped from her mouth.
"They're the same color."
"They are not," I said.
"They're green."
"They are not just green. This one is called moss," I argued, holding up the swatch in my left hand. "And this one is called … seaweed." I turned over the right swatch, staring at the nametag.
Every cell in my body leaned left.
Moss. It was innocent, inviting. Moss covered the trees in this god-forsaken state I was shipped to just before junior high started from the red, mars-like deserts of Phoenix where my mother lived. Eventually, moss became home.
Seaweed was … intrusive; it was everywhere, littering the damn beaches as if it was made of plastic. It was slimy. It was gross, revolting, nauseating.
Seaweed made my skin crawl.
But nowadays so did moss.
"I like them both," Charlotte said, noting the differences.
"I actually think we'll go with something else," I said dismissively.
"What—"
I didn't stay to listen to the end of her sentence, forcefully pitching the swatches into the trash bin as I headed for the door. I could feel my blood running cold, heat emitting from my forehead as I shoved open the doors, racing the curves of the museum until I found the brisk breeze of the city hitting my face. My throat had its own blaring pulse as I leaned against the cold brick wall, wishing desperately for a cigarette between my fingers, a glass in my hand, something. The slight mist of rain felt good on my forehead, and I counted the heartbeats in my head until they vanished as quickly as they came.
One to ten, we said—that was a healthy place to start; though in the very beginning, I had trouble getting to three.
The droplets were big, splashing in bursts, no doubt smearing my mascara. I sighed, taking a few deep breaths before turning back toward the large red door. I stopped when my phone rang, cutting into the silence of the alleyway. The caller ID made me frown, but I welcomed the distraction.
"If you're calling about the phone cord, you put it in the junk drawer after your yoga class ended," I said, rolling my eyes.
"You really think that's the only thing I'm calling about?" my mother said, gasping in false astonishment. "I'll have you know… my phone battery has never been higher. Phil's got a spare, but thank you for reminding me."
"Anytime," I said dryly, a smile cracking on my lips, and a full breath finally escaping me. I missed her. "How are you functioning without me?"
"I couldn't tell you, sweet girl. I really couldn't." My mother laughed. "You've only been gone a few weeks. We aren't going to fare well here, are we?"
"I don't think so," I agreed.
"It's only a few months, Bells," She chided. "We can get through it."
"I know. It doesn't make it …" Any easier, I answered myself, biting my lip. "Anyway, I sincerely doubt, and hope, your phone missing the phone cord is the reason you called."
"You're a genius. I'm calling to remind you that my flight lands tomorrow at 6:45PM."
"Your flight?"
"My flight. To Seattle? DL16, connecting from Atlanta? The one you booked?" she said, the astonishment real this time. "The dedication ceremony is this weekend. On Saturday?"
Shit. The dedication ceremony had completely left my mind. Or I violently shoved it out and locked the door behind it. I shook my head, then rested my head against the brick again. I wasn't ready for it. Would I ever be ready for it? I doubted that.
"Yeah …" I exhaled. "I forgot about it."
"You forgot about it?" she said.
"Slipped my mind."
"Sure." She accepted that, but I could hear the turning of the gears in her head from the other side of the country. "We talked about this, Bella—"
"I know, Mom," I said. "I know we did, I just—"
"We have to go. We've gotta deal with the damn house. We— He … he would want us there. He would want you there. We can't keep doing this, kiddo. We missed one year; we missed five. We can't miss ten."
Ten years ago, my life became a nightmare, and sometimes, I still don't think I'm awake. As if on cue, phantom tingles in my neck fluttered atop my marred skin and down my arm. It was healed, no long-lasting damage; we'd been lucky. But it was a reminder nonetheless.
"Not sure how he can want for anything. He's dead."
"Isabella!"
I swallowed. "I'm sorry."
"We're going. I won't take no for an answer. They want to honor him. It's important that we be there. They know about the gallery, so they know you're close. It's been years. I'm sure things aren't …" She trailed off.
Aren't as bad?
The bile rose in my throat. It wasn't an argument to be had. She could try to understand, try to comprehend, but she would never be able to do it. She'd never been on the other end of the looks, the glares. The heated stares when we showed our faces at my father's memorial service a few weeks after the fire told me the hate ran bone deep. I stood tucked into my mother's side like a babe, a dark black raincoat zipped to my throat, a hood covering my head, and a black umbrella not used for the trickling rain but for the prying, angry eyes of my neighbors, my friends. The town of Forks, Washington might as well have been a ghost town, a distant memory of the streets I knew like the back of my hand, but if they had their way, I'd never step foot on them again.
"All right," I said, cutting her off in the middle of a rant I paid no attention to. "For the weekend. That's it."
-TG-
"You sure you're ready for this?" Renee asked as she struggled to get her large suitcase into the trunk of the small rental car. "Nearly all the tickets are sold out for the gallery, and they couldn't splurge for a bigger vehicle? Damn Washington weather; I forgot that this place can experience all four seasons in the span of an hour."
I adjusted the seat in the back, moving my own tiny duffel away to make room. "Unlike Florida. Where you can stay. Where you do absolutely not have to leave. Ever."
"Where were you when I was young and dumb and making spontaneous trips to Africa?"
I rolled my eyes and stood up, frowning at her. "Really, Mom. It's going to be okay. I can handle it." A night of thinking on it helped me a little. This was happening whether I liked it or not. There was no excuse for it not to. I spent the night making myself poke and prod at any reason I could come up with not to go, dissecting it until there was nothing left. It was only a weekend. I came to the jarring conclusion that for the first time in forever, bravery didn't look like running away.
At least that's what I was telling myself.
"I know you can. I just … I don't want to see you get hurt. It's been years since you've been there, but the last time we were there was … very hard on all of us."
"What happened to the pep talk you were giving me yesterday?" I asked, finally getting the trunk to close.
"It's one thing to talk when I'm over 3000 miles away. Now it's just …" She faltered.
I felt the same way when I arrived in the area a few weeks ago. There was something eerie in the air here, knowing something that was so far away in the past was so close. We were separated now only by a few hours of road.
-TG-
Almost four hours later, I found myself staring at the popcorn ceiling of the nicest inn in town. I'd long abandoned my phone, doom scrolling through the comments on my latest Instagram post did little to ease my anxiety. It was a photo taken this morning displaying all the various shades of green, preparing for the gallery opening.
Karen53: Can't wait for the gallery!
ArtLuvr4: It's going to be beautiful!
Missy1: I already got my tickets!
Shauna119: I absolutely need you to shoot my wedding!
ISH8r: Killer.
There were a dozen responses to it, some agreeing with it, it was going to be a killer event. The work was killer.
But I knew what they meant.
It was the same thing they wrote on everything.
Killer.
It wasn't going to be a killer event; it was going to be an event hosted by a killer.
I ignored it and focused back on the intricate patterns.
My legs, covered by a long skirt, splayed out before me, and my white blouse was untucked. My hair laid around me in long, loosening curls while my mother scrolled through her own phone.
"What's the plan for dinner?"
"Should have stopped on the way. Unless you want to drive out to Port Angeles, our pickings in this town are slim at this hour."
"Can't we just order something?"
"Mother, this is Forks. Not Jacksonville. The only place I'm betting is open at this hour is the Lodge," I said, looking at the watch strapped to my wrist. Just after midnight. The thought of that old diner made my stomach crawl to the back of my throat—it didn't matter what hour of the day it was, the Lodge always had customers sipping coffees, reading daily newspapers.
Whispering at you.
Staring.
"You know what? I'm not hungry," I said quickly, swallowing the growling of my stomach, hoping the noises didn't give me away. It had been a busy day full of back-to-back meetings for the gallery before picking Renee up at the airport. I skipped breakfast and lunch in my haste to put off decision making because all I could think about was the impending doom of the weekend.
"Hush," my mother said, ignoring me as she pried into the drawers of the large desk at the opposite end of the hotel room. "Ah ha! Here's a menu for the diner. It's only a few blocks from here." She started reading over the diverse yet somehow limited selection that the nicest spot in Forks had to offer. "They've still got the berry cobbler."
I didn't reply, trying to lose myself in the stupid ceiling.
"Berry cobbler." Renee lightly shook her head and sat on the bed next to me. The anxiety must have been rolling off me in waves, and she waded in it along with me. "I don't know what sort of crack they put in that dessert, but your father would insist on getting a slice of it every week. Every—"
"Every Thursday," I finished for her.
The Lodge's berry cobbler was almost as much a part of Charlie Swan as this town was. It was his comfort, his silly little evening indulgence after a long day on the job in a tiny corner booth known as the Chief's seat. It was the ghost laughs of my barely legal mother across the table with him when she told him the news. I bet his entire face paled at the words, no bushy mustache to hide the redness of his cheeks when the bone-chilling thought of becoming a father hit when he was just barely over the drinking age. It was the celebratory piece he insisted on us getting when I was fresh off the plane from Phoenix.
I had no friends, nothing to look forward to aside from the anxiety of walking the halls of a new school halfway through the school year. But I had him, and he looked at me in a way that it didn't matter right then and there. I had my father, and he was going to do his damnedest to make sure I knew it.
"I'm not going in there," I said affirmatively. "I don't care what time it is. I'm … not making myself go through that today. I need a night to just … brace myself for the impact that this weekend is going to bring. The ceremony is going to be enough drama as it is."
Renee didn't argue.
"It is Thursday," she said, eying the menu.
"Technically, it's Friday," I deflected. "Fine … just get me a …" I glanced over at the aged paper, tossing out the first thing that caught my eye. "Turkey burger, no tomato."
She smiled at me, stood up off the bed, and swung her purse over her shoulder.
"And a slice of berry cobbler," I added.
-TG-
My mother had only been gone a few minutes before the walls seemed to be closing in on the two queen beds in the room. Before I could stop them, my feet took me on the familiar route outside, a path I hadn't taken in decades, but the cool air felt crisp through my hair as I walked. Renee was extremely familiar with the Olympic Outpost Inn. It was the nicest hotel in town, she could afford it because her new husband was a baseball player, and she wouldn't let anyone forget it when she came to visit me. It was also only a few blocks away from the amenities the town had to offer: the diner, the school, and of course, the small but comfortable house of the Forks Police Chief.
Even in the dark, I could see the uneven stone pathway that led to the rickety porch and the bright red door. A decade prior and the porch would have held a cooler filled to the brim with the day's catch and thin fishing rods leaning up against the old patio furniture. My nose twitched as I ascended the stairs, picturing the odor so vividly it tickled. I could hear my father's gruff roll of the eyes, echoing in my head like a ball down a lane, as junior high me protested that I was a vegetarian now and couldn't eat anything with a heartbeat.
The automatic light came on as I bent down to lift the aged rocking chair to the right of the doorway. It creaked, banging against the siding. I reached my arm out, nails combing across the dirty floor in search of the spare key I made Jake keep underneath it. One of Charlie's old habits in case I made the mistake of forgetting my keys in high school.
My fingers only found old leaves, crunched as the seasons passed. I could add the sweeping and power washing the porch to the endless list of things needing to be done to this old place. That was another reason for coming back here, much to my dismay. This house had sat for years; a few people from the reservation, old, loyal friends of Charlie, kept it together. But truthfully, it was a money pit and quite frankly too painful to hold on to. He left it to me, along with everything inside of it, and it, like many things in this town, were left to rot when we left.
Aside from more recent updates—a fresh coat of paint for the door, getting the carpet professionally ripped up, and a new security system since the latest generation of Forks hoodlums liked to use old buildings as their designated hang out spots—it was a decade of dust and memories.
"Seriously, Jake?" I growled, searching, pushing the furniture out of the way in case I missed the golden key.
I stared in confusion at the empty porch.
Suddenly, a door slammed, coming from inside the house. My shoulders tensed, and I instinctively reached for the holster pressed tightly to my thigh under my skirt as I rose. I fingered the small handgun strapped to my body and stared at the door, studying it. Another bang came from inside the house, and I quickly drew the pistol, turning the knob. My heart sank when it opened, but another thunk caused me to move forward, slowly, aiming as I went. I stepped into the foyer, and I had to push down the bile that rose in my throat at the sight of the unchanged rowboat-shaped key dish in the center of the hallway table.
"Shit!" a voice said, followed by a piercing screech of what could only be Jake's "state of the art" alarm system.
"Fuck!" it said again.
And the teen ran through the kitchen, stopping dead when he saw me. His bright green eyes went wide. There was something familiar about those eyes. Something—
I froze, pointing my gun.
He panicked, throwing his hands up in response.
The alarm system still screeched.
"God, what the hell are you doing here?" I shouted, lowering my gun and cursing myself for agreeing with the idea of the security system. I shook my head, brushing past him and ripping open the small closet at the edge of the foyer. I stared at the small egg-shaped screen, counting to ten in my head as swiftly as I could as the alarm continued to blare. I wasn't in the market for any more trouble than my being back was already going to cause, so I was hoping the kid had more brains in this moment than he did thirty seconds ago and would take the opportunity to skedaddle.
What the fuck was the code? I stepped back and took a deep breath, trying to thumb through old text messages in my head. I frowned looking at the table, attempting to ease my mind.
Unplugged cameras sat next to the blaring alarm on the table. What an investment.
Code. Code. Something I wouldn't forget, something that being here would make me remember. I've never even seen this damn thing aside from a lengthy text message Jake sent me weeks ago when it was installed.
"It's easy. I know you aren't good with passwords so it's something you'll remember."
"11251964" I stepped forward and pressed, praying for it, praying Jake had a lick of sense.
The blaring stopped, and I sucked in a sigh of relief.
"Damn it, Alec. I told you to be careful," another voice said. It was annoyed, scolding the boy as if he'd stolen a cookie before dinner instead of breaking and entering the home of a dead police chief.
"When the hell did they put an alarm in?" he rambled.
I stiffened. That voice. I knew it. No amount of years would take that away. There was a time when that voice was the reason I woke up in the morning, a voice that sent fire through my veins and let loose a flock of butterflies in my belly.
"How'd you stop the alarm?" it asked again, but I couldn't hear whatever came out of the kid's mouth. I bent to holster my gun, swishing my long, black, pleated skirt.
Edward Masen was someone I could never fully be rid of.
No matter how hard I tried. I accepted that a long time ago.
He had a fraction of my stone heart, a permanent piece of me, even after I left his rotting in the dirt.
"I didn't," the kid said, finally getting a word in, properly confused as to why they weren't running the hell away.
"He didn't. I did," I said, stepping out of the shadows.
AN: Thank you so much to my pre-readers (Steph, Mandy, Ausha, Heather) for reading this and to my beta, Alice's White Rabbit, for cleaning up my words. To readers, hope you enjoy this one. I am on FB as Sarah H PuzzlingSarah where I am going to share some graphics (such as the instagram post, etc.) throughout this story. Hope to see you there and catch you in the next one!
