DISCLAIMER: I own nothing. I'm renting this corporeal form from a guy named Tony, who also happens to be my dealer. If you've read this far, may I just ask you how? Also, thank you, and an extra special thanks to anyone who has commented/bookmarked/favorited/reviewed/drawn little hearts on this. I'm a slut for feedback, even if it's negative. Actually, especially if it's negative. Punish me, Daddy ;)

ANYWAY. This is where we venture even farther away from canon. As usual, it takes me ten—eleven, twelve? I've entirely lost count—fucking chapters to get to the actual story. Typical. But we're finally gonna get to it! The real deal! The pièce de résistance; Plot. My arch enemy, my dearest love. We were bound to cross this bridge eventually, I guess. After this one, the chapters become a bit chunkier, like twelve or so pages a piece (not 38 pgs, like Rachel's story—sorry again about that). This is why this part's format is a little different from the rest. I only mention it so it's clear; we're switching POVs, folks. Goin' back and forth. For those of you who still have not tapped into your mindreading abilities, I have added a lil (parentheses) to denote the switch. Not everyone has the mental fortitude—myself included—to read a fan fic told from the POV of an OC. It reminds me of My Immortal too much. But since I'm writing Twilight fanfiction, I might as well lean into it.

Chapter 7: A Bovine Parasite/First Sight

Bella,

I hope you're feeling all right. Mom says she used to chew on ginger before getting out of bed to deal with the morning sickness while she was pregnant. And if you're looking for someone to chop Jake's balls off, I'm ready, willing, and definitely able.

Sorry I went MIA at Emily's wedding. I know you probably had to clean up all by yourself. I'm sure Jake would've pitched in if he wasn't so useless. Tell Jake I don't miss him in my head.

It feels different here than when I used to run around La Push, and I have a better grip on the earth here. I was always muddy at home when I returned, but now there's only dry dirt and twigs, and it's a nice change.

I promise I'll tell you everything once we're together again—whenever that is. For now, though, I'll give you the highlights.

¾ Robbed a hot dog stand. Then I stole from a couple that went for a skinny dip. Oh, and I took a truck, too, and didn't even have to hotwire it.

¾ Met a lovely couple in a backwater farm town. I'm living with them above the Bar they own. It's just called the Bar. There aren't any others around here to mix it up with.

¾ Gone to church a few times. Don't ask how or why, please.

¾ Imprinted on the nephew of the man who owns the largest working ranch in town.

One day, when we're gray and old, I hope we can laugh about this time in our lives when we were fighting our own battles out in the big, wide world. Right now, though, I'm trying awfully hard not to cry, and it would be a pity to smudge up the ink.

I don't know what to do, Bells.

On the one hand, I'm overjoyed.

Do you remember what it felt like when your leech left? I know the kind of pain; I've known it every day, all the time, constantly. But it's gone now. Can you imagine? After all this time, after everything that's happened, it took the same wolfy magic to clean up the mess it created in the first place! In a way, I'm relieved beyond belief.

On the other hand, I'm truly, madly, and deeply overwhelmed.

Happiness wasn't built for people like me. I'm a strong-weather girl—a hunker-down-and-survive-in-the-cellar type of person. For months, I lived in the woods on raw animal meat and polluted river water. I wasn't made to love someone and bask in the sun like a fat cat. Who could expect me to settle down, especially here, in the middle of buttfuck nowhere?

But I want to. I want whathe wantsnow. I want to grow old here and spend my last days sitting in a rocking chair on a porch and watching my grandchildren grow up on the lawn. I want to tell him everything—the tribe, the pack, my brother, my father, my mother—but I can't.

Because I'm not made for happiness. I'm too dangerous to be so close to these humans, and I shouldn't be risking their lives like this. I mean, what if I shift on the couch and give his grandmother a heart attack?

I've done it before. I could do it again.

I found a family who took me in, no questions asked. I know the pack is all about 'family' and 'tribe pride,' but I'm not one of them. I never was. Ask Jake—he'll tell you the truth. He'll always tell you the truth, no matter what. He has to.

And now I'm sympathizing with Jacob Black, of all people. Gag.

This was absolutely NOT part of the plan, Bella. I just wanted to run away and be alone in my own head again. I know I went about it wrong, and I'm sorry if I hurt you by not saying goodbye.

You've got plenty of time to forgive me, in any case. I'm stuck here until I can figure out what keeps killing the livestock on the farm. I got a job there, actually. I'm a guard dog. (Haha.)

They're paying me in room and board, which means I'll be sleeping under the same roof as him. Pray for me, will you? I'll need it. Oh, and keep this letter away from Jake in the meantime. You know what a big mouth he has.

Yours,

Leah

I ripped out the loose leaf from my journal with a swift tearing sound. Jack's snores—audible even to human ears through the open window on the fire escape—stuttered to a halt momentarily, then restarted with vigor.

I tucked the letter into an envelope, addressed it, and slapped a stamp on it before throwing it in the mail bin at the end of the street. Once I was out there, the glow from the window of the Bar didn't seem so inviting anymore. I glanced back at the quiet night, alive with the light from the stars and the full moon overhead.

After checking to ensure there were no creeps peeking out their windows, I stripped down to my bare feet and tied the oversized overalls to the wire on my ankle.

You can regret this later, I promised myself.

I just needed a few hours to blow off some steam. Being human had its restrictions. It felt nice to stretch my legs and push myself faster until the wind ran through my fur. It was cathartic to burn off some of the extra anger in my system.

Seth was in my head when I shifted, and he knew automatically what'd happened.

Disgusting! He yelped as if he'd been bitten. Yuck, why did you have to do that?

I couldn't really stop it, dingus.

So, finally joined the club, eh? Paul greeted.

It's not the mile-high club, Jared replied.

Eat shit, dumbass, I sneered.

Maybe it's not so rare after all, Embry commented. I mean, if Leah can do it—

Don't compare yourself to me, ugly, I snarled. We're not even in the same ballpark.

But wait, how could Leah imprint? Quil asked the group. I thought you didn't get your—you-know-what—anymore?

Stay out of my business, birdbrain, I snapped before he could finish.

The man has a good point, Paul insisted.

I'm regretting this now.

You guys are gonna make her leave! Seth whined.

Should I tell Bella to look for a letter, then? I could feel Jake's wolfy grin like it was on my own face.

Nah, let it be a surprise.

But if she asks —

Obviously, if she asks, you lie, I retorted, though I knew it was impossible.

I didn't have to be telepathic to hear his eye-roll. Save it, will you? I was in a good mood today.

Jakey! And to think, everyone's coming outta the woodwork now! Quil exclaimed. When will you two bring your imprints home and have a big pack orgy?

At least it's just the idiots who know, I thought to myself as the group rebuked Quil. At least Sam isn't here.

Are you not over that yet? Jared groaned.

Emily still has scars, right? I growled in response.

Below the belt, Quil muttered.

Kiss my ass, I whispered back.

Why is it always hostile with you, Leah? Seth wondered. Mom says, 'Hi,' by the way. She said some other things, too, but I told her I wouldn't tell you.

Did she call bull on you?

No. I think she knew, though.

I knew every word my mother had said about me to Seth. She must've known I could hear them in his thoughts. Maybe she hoped they'd put her voice in my head, too.

You can tell her I already have voices in my head, but thanks.

I'll just say you miss her, too. That's fine, he replied, letting me know it was not fine. I'll just keep passing messages along between you two. It's not like I'm the only one trying to keep this family together or anything...

That's not fair, I argued.

You know what's not fair? You never coming back, he barked.

I couldn't stay anymore, I added weakly, crushed by the force of his grief and anger.

You can't just up and leave! Seth growled, his intensity growing. I could see in his head images of our mother with the same cold, blank face she'd had after our father died, but now she was wearing it while staring out the window with it for hours at a time, watching the trees and waiting for her prodigal wolf to come back. Seth could see her solemn, disappointed eyes scanning him from behind the glass whenever he came home, searching for a different form.

Now I have to pick up all the pieces. Plus Charlie. I felt Seth's eyeroll as if it were my own. He's ALWAYS here making missing-person posters for you, and I think he's gonna get your face put on a bunch of milk cartons.

That's actually kind of sweet, I commented. Tell him thanks for me, will you?

Sure, sure... Seth shook his head in disbelief. Are you really never coming back?

I can't leave him, I answered too quickly. And there's no place for me in La Push.

You have a place with us, Seth argued, bowing his head. I know I don't always act like it, but I love you, big sis.

I nearly turned on my heels and ran back home. I missed my baby brother, who'd slept in the bunk below me all his life, whom I'd dragged into the world of legends and monsters, and who'd fought against bloodsuckers to protect his family.

I remembered with stunning clarity the day I'd first held him in the hospital, and my dad handed me the little bundle of blankets.

"Gently," he whispered. "Gently, now. Support the head."

I looked at the mashed-up little face, then back up at my father.

"So he's my brother?" I asked.

"Yes," he replied. "And you're his big sister."

"What does that mean?"

"It means you protect him with your life," he replied. "He's always going to be there for you—you'll need to be there for him."

And then a pair of big, brown eyes made me stop, so suddenly, my paws got buried in the dirt.

I can't leave him, I repeated, this time with disappointment.

Seth hung his head again. I know. I wish you'd come back sooner.

Hate to interrupt this family moment, Jacob interjected, but Bella's center of gravity is off, and she's not exactly graceful in the first place—

Take care of Bella, I interrupted.

I bet she and Emily got a lot to talk about, Jared thought.

Shh! Paul hissed, bumping into Jared's shoulder. Leah's not supposed to know about that.

No, I replied, surprise coloring my mind. I'm actually curious. How far along is she? Is she doing all right?

I had long ago forgiven Emily for loving Sam. Now, though, I realized I was happy for her. She'd found joy in a bad situation. She'd grown sunshine in a bottomless pit.

She's all right. A little cranky, Paul replied. Keeps asking about you. Driving Rachel crazy.

My lips curled up to show my teeth. Good.

Hey, be careful, Paul thought defensively. You're still on thin ice. And it's not her fault you're a wolf.

It's not mine, either! I howled.

No one said that!

Can we have one minute where we're not at each other's throats? Embry wondered. Or am I doomed to listen to you two bicker for the rest of my life?

You won't have to for much longer tonight, anyway, I assured him, coming up on the woods bordering the Ashwood's property.

I shifted back into a human.

After pulling up the soft, worn denim over my shoulders, I found one of the little footpaths from the ranch. I realized I'd been running the perimeter without thinking about it. Shaking my head to clear it, I started walking towards the house. About halfway there, I ran into a familiar scent that shook me in even-more-familiar convulsions.

I kept my overalls intact but moved with inhuman speed toward the barn, where the scent led me. There was another smell, like another wolf, but wild, almost too cloaked in woodsy musk to make out.

Had the leech eaten a wolf?

By the recumbent light of evening, in the full moon's glow, the barn was worthy of an impressionist master, more like an oil painting than real life. It embraced the hill in a hug of meadow grasses and blooms in silent sentry duty. It starkly contrasted with the night and its sickly sweet smell.

I came to an abrupt halt when I walked into the warm glow of the barn. There, surrounded by stacks of golden hay, was a cow—pale, lifeless, and drained of blood. Diana sat to the side, nursing a calf from a bottle. Buck was examining the cow. They both looked up when I came stomping in.

Diana dropped the bottle, startled. "Oh, dear, did you see it?" She asked, jumping up from beside the calf on the barn floor.

"See what?" I spat.

"The animal, of course," Diana replied, baffled, shaking her head momentarily before stepping away from me.

I was still shivering against the edge of shifting. My form was fluid in anger and outrage. I closed my eyes and forced my ribs to expand, trying to cool the lava down before I erupted, Mount Vesuvius style.

"Give the girl a minute to get her lid on," Buck warned his wife, watching me cautiously. "Did you see anything, Leah?"

I took another breath, feeling it in the bottom of my belly. Only then did the terror seep in.

When I opened my eyes, they must have been less unnerving. Buck's shoulders relaxed visibly. I eyed him suspiciously, crossing my arms and leaning against the door to the barn as if passing by on a casual visit. I didn't fool them. I was too stiff, like a four-by-four propped on the wall.

"I didn't see anything," I finally whispered.

"You looked like you were spooked by something," Buck argued.

I shrugged. "I get spooked sometimes."

"That's instinct," Diana interjected, putting her hands on my shoulders. "So, did you talk to Mel Peter and Jack about taking the job here for the harvest?"

I nodded, my nose filled with the putrid stench of a leech. "What happened to the cow?" I asked, pointing at the carcass with my chin.

"Same thing that's been happening," Buck sighed, leaning beside it. "A coyote or something. We found another one yesterday, out in the fields."

"No coyote did this," I choked out, feeling the burn of parasite stench crawl down my throat with every breath.

The two of them looked back at me with wide, fearful eyes.

"What did, then?" Buck asked.

For a fleeting second, I almost told them the truth.

"Where's Noah?" I asked instead.

"He's..." Buck hesitated. "He's busy tonight."

I raised an eyebrow, the rest of my face carved in stone.

"So?" Diana urged when I didn't respond. "Are you taking the job?"

I glared at the cow carcass.

Suck it, bloodsucker.

(Noah's POV)

I woke up in the dirt.

This was not uncommon. It was also not normal. It was more of a "how-did-I-end-up-here-again" situation.

Something happened that night. Something important, probably. I couldn't remember it, of course. But no one really knows when something big is happening to them. Usually, they only notice it after the moment is gone.

I was walking home. I didn't remember getting up. Or how I got naked. It wasn't unusual for me not to realize things had happened to me until long after the fact.

I had my own memory issues. At least now I was reliving a happy one.

Out in the fields, the girl looked more like a lump of dirt from my passenger window. Rusty was the one who hopped out of the moving cab and ran up to her. I only realized that was fate after the fact.

Instead of focusing on my feet as I stumbled through the forest surrounding the ranch, I remembered walking to the car with her. She let me wrap her in my arms and whisk her off to safety like a knight in shining armor. Or, at least, it felt like that after the fact. When I was in the moment, she was relatively small and weightless. It felt like picking up a bird with a wounded wing.

The day greeted me with the dark, quiet stillness of the early morning. In my life, I'd learned there were times in the day when the peaceful silence was just a cover-up—an illusion. Animals understand. In the sky's transition, when the stars are all but gone, the sun is still nestled beneath the horizon, and the day takes its first large breath, and animals begin to stir.

And so did I.

I took care of the animals. Buck called that my "defacto" job on the farm. I kept forgetting to look that word up. But being with the animals wasn't hard for me. I liked it. On most mornings, I rolled out of bed without thinking about it. I didn't even realize I was awake until I found myself sipping coffee in the kitchen. I didn't even notice I was milking the cow until she knocked over the bucket with a carefully aimed kick I suspected wasn't accidental.

As the early morning darkened into the color of earl grey tea, I saw the girl from the field—Leah—perched in the top window, head hanging out in the air, letting the breeze blow her chin-length hair back and forth across her face. I thought she looked like a part of nature, a wild animal yearning for the freedom of an open field.

I didn't realize she was on my porch until I was halfway through the front door.

I got the story about the sow and Leah later—she'd stopped by too late for Buck and Diana to let her return to the Peters on her own, so they offered her the gable room crammed into the very top of the house.

That one wouldn't have been my first choice. I was curious to know if it was as wide as she was tall. I almost laughed when I tried to picture her standing up straight against the angled rafters. Last I'd seen it, they'd fit in a short twin bed, an antique—and unrepaired—dresser full of clothes to be handed down, and an eastward-facing window on the only vertical wall. It groaned and squealed if you could manage to yank it open.

I paused, my hand still poised on the doorknob, staring at her with furrowed eyebrows. Her skin was dark, shimmering copper, so beautiful even the rosy-fingered dawn reached out to touch it. Her hair was cropped unevenly against her shoulders like she'd chopped it off with kitchen shears. Her eyes were unsettling. I couldn't place my finger on it, but how her gaze darted to mine made me feel like I was staring down the barrel of a gun.

She looked surprised when she assessed me with an icy, feline stare, but it was gone so fast that I only saw it in my memories later.

In an instant, she was standing with her shoulders perpendicular to mine. She tore her eyes away from me, staring at the rolling, purple fields.

"Can I help you?" I asked, turning to face her.

She pointed. A pair of shorts flopped over the back of the porch swing like she'd known I'd need to cover up. Even brought underwear. No chafe for this guy.

"So," I started again, "can I help you?"

She didn't look my way as I pulled the shorts on. "No, I don't think so."

"Oh," I said, forming the word with my lips. I rubbed the back of my neck as I searched for something to say. "Well, do you want some coffee?"

Her neck almost snapped with how fast her head turned to look at me. Her feather-lined, dagger-sharp eyes narrowed in suspicion.

"I make it a little strong, I admit," I continued, unperturbed by her silence. "But if you're looking for a pick-me-up, there's nothing better." I grinned.

Her face softened. "Okay," she agreed.

I didn't realize an animal was in my kitchen until she sat across from me, her hands wrapped around a steaming mug of coffee. Rusty ignored his bowl of food and sat at her elbow.

"So," I began after an uncomfortably long silence. "Did you take the job?"

She grimaced at me through the steam. "I told you I was going to yesterday."

"You coulda changed your mind," I countered, taking a sip of coffee.

"Once my mind is made, there is no changing it," she replied.

I grinned. "Flexible, huh?"

She hid her dark cheeks by craning her neck to look into the coffee. She didn't look up. "What's in the coffee?"

"Uh," was my first reaction. My second was to lean back and grab the tin from the counter next to the sink. "I put ten scoops of this in," I explained as I handed it to her.

"It doesn't have a label."

"Got it in town," I said around more coffee.

She took the tin and opened the lid, inspecting the contents. Gingerly, she leaned forward and sniffed it. Her face was almost disappointed as she popped the top back on.

"You like some other kind?" I asked.

"No, this is good," she answered, bringing the mug to her lips.

"Sorry, there's no cream or sugar."

"That's okay."

"I've been meaning to go into town."

Her eyes darted to mine. "How far away is it?"

"No more than thirty minutes if you skip the traffic signs."

She raised an eyebrow.

"You wanna come with me?" I invited.

I didn't know I'd said it out loud until she was staring back at me with eyes like a deer caught in headlights.

"No," she replied, her voice strangled and careful, as she put her mug on the table and crossed her hands on her lap. "I don't think that's a good idea."

I watched her for a moment, taking her in more thoroughly than I had on the porch before coffee. At that moment, her skin looked like an overstretched bag, her bones poking at odd, unnatural angles. Her face was dirt-covered and looked like she hadn't slept in days. There was a leaf in her hair.

"S'pose not," I allowed, looking down at my drink.

"Thank you," she breathed, so quiet I wasn't sure I'd heard it.

We sat in silence for a while, sipping our coffee. I didn't ask any more questions. She picked at her overalls and avoided my gaze. I was remembering picking an injured bird out of a bramble bush and bringing it home.

A/N: Fun fact-Noah's POV came to me before this story was fully outlined. At the time, I'd written it for something else (would you judge me if I told you I'd convinced myself to write Anne of Green Gables fic? Whack), and it conveniently slid into place. Plus, it explains how he's so nonchalant about Leah's weirdness. Sort of. You have to keep reading the rest if you wanna know the secret ;)