chapter seven

Charlie waits a couple of days for me to become accustomed to being in Forks, never pressuring me to talk about anything he wants to talk about. He doesn't force me to talk about Jacob and what my thoughts are when it comes to my godbrother, and if I will secretly confess, I am jealous how he had gotten a girlfriend before I could have the chance. I almost snorted some at that image of me, pathetically throwing myself in a heap on my bed and demanding to know if what my dad says is true. I'm better than that, and I know if I did like Jacob, I would either learn how to get over it or wait for Lizzie to screw up so I could step up to the plate.

It's on one of his days he took off that Charlie comes bounding down the stairs in his casual wear. The plaid button up shirt, his police academy sweatshirt underneath, random pair of worn-out jeans, and some of his hiking boots. He comes over and sits down next to me, there is a hopefulness in those brown eyes of his, he wants me to accept what he is about to say or do.

"Earlier in the week you said we could hang out with Billy and Jacob. Well, they invited me over and I was wondering if you wanted to come with me," Charlie offers, his voice is soft. His fingers tap against his jean clad legs, and eventually I nod my head.

"Sure. Can you help me up the stairs? I need to go and get changed," I responded, allowing Charlie to pick me up even if I could go up the stairs on my own. I'm not in the mood to deal with the stairs, and before long I'm in my bedroom again.

Pulling out a black camisole and some khaki-colored sweatpants I slip them on and put on the matching-colored hoodie to the sweatpants. Scooping my hair up in a sloppy bun I leave my bedroom and go down the stairs, where Charlie is already standing by the front door with that same eagerness as before. He's acting as if he is the kid who asked his mom if he could go to the zoo and now, I've gotten my things so we can go to the zoo.

The drive to the reservation is spent with me sitting in the police cruiser, my eyes taking in the scenery around me. Another reminder how I'm far away from the city, and how I'm in this small town just to spend my last summer with the one parent of mine who actually cares about me. I don't have any interest in seeing either Renee or Phil before I'm turned into a vampire, and of course never see them again after I become one too.

The Black Residence is a simple long trailer with a ramp instead of stairs. There are three bedrooms, one which belongs to Billy, another which was shared between the Black twins, and the last one of course being for Jacob. A hall bathroom for all three siblings while there was a master bathroom for both Billy and his late wife Sarah. The house on the inside is decorated with the Native American Indian culture, while there are other cultures decorated here and there (Sarah adored collecting things from different cultures, she was one of the most open-minded people). The furniture is antique, having been passed down throughout the decades.

Sitting outside on a railing at the top of the ramp is Jacob, and he's texting someone with interest. He brings his attention away from his phone, his warm eyes brightening up when he sees the familiar police cruiser coming up. He lets his eyes flicker away from where Charlie is to where I am, and I give him an awkward wave to tell him I've acknowledged him. He bounds off of the railing of the porch and rushes down the ramp with a spring in his step.

He's wearing another one of his motorcycle shirts he has, denim jeans that have gasoline stains here and there, along with some leather flip flops. His long, beautiful hair is pulled back in a low ponytail, and his figure is even more masculine than I remember. He doesn't look anything like the upcoming sophomore at the high school on the reservation. There is even a tattoo that is on his left bicep, a wolf howling up and so detailed it almost looks as if it will come out of his skin and appear in front of you to protect him.

Charlie has barely parked in the gravel driveway when Jacob reaches us.

He opens the side door for me, and I unbuckle my seatbelt before getting out.

Then I go to the backseats of the car and pull out the generic medical crutches I had been given at the clinic.

The cool metallic feeling of the ring keeps me stable, and I glare hotly down at the brace upon my knee. I didn't say anything other than giving an odd look at Jacob, as he kept glancing down at his phone, as if he was waiting for someone to call him. I had hoped he hadn't broken up with Lizzie because if Charlie had an opening, he would make sure he would use it.

As if he realizes I've noticed him messing with his phone, Jacob pockets the phone into his pocket.

He gives me an awkward smile, before saying, "sorry about that. Lizzie has been kind of busy helping her dad with the mechanic shop. He watches her phone like a hawk so the only time she can talk to me is during her lunch break."

"Oh yeah, that's good."

I roll my eyes in exasperation as behind me Charlie says this with obvious disappointment. I glance over my shoulder at him. He chuckles and rubs the nape of his neck, as if asking me to forgive him. He looks off to the side, gives us a wave of dismissal when he goes up to the ramp of the trailer towards the front door. I watch him with Jacob next to me, waiting for the moment he goes through the front door and shuts the door behind him.

"We can go to the shed in the back where I've been working on some cars for practice," Jacob offers, earning a nod from me before we slowly but surely head to the back of the yard. The wind comes and wisps around us, pulling at some of my hair. Jacob's hair sways side to side from his walking, the strength emitting from him is apparent.

When we reach the shed, Jacob opens the hanger door and I'm welcomed with a few antique cars spread throughout the shed. It wouldn't surprise me if some of the older men on the reservation have given their cars to Jacob to work on. I find one of the two benches that are in the room and sit down on one, while Jacob sits on the hood of one of the cars. He pulls his phone out of his pocket and sits it on a shelf off to the side, where he has some of his tools. He gives one last glance at the phone as if he's waiting for Lizzie to call him right before he can talk to me.

Jacob surprises me when he calls an order for some pizza, which in return makes me perk up some even in the predicament I am in. I almost want to ask him if he knows anything more about the Cullens, since I've obviously met them…well at least Dr. Carlisle Cullen and had seen Alice Cullen when I was leaving the clinic with Charlie. I know there's no point, partly because I'm not interested in meeting any of the other family members.

"You know, I can't believe that you go to that preppy boarding school," Jacob says in between bites of his pizza. There's pineapple on the slice he's eating. While there is just plain and proper pepperoni for me. He's always been about wanting to travel to the tropical islands but until he can save enough money or be lucky enough, he's content with eating pineapple on pizza even if the majority of the world believes it's blasphemous (including me).

Before long there's voices in the distance and the crunching of soles from shoes on the grass allows both me and Jacob to know we are about to be welcomed with Charlie.

It doesn't take any longer for Charlie to pop his head around the corner, his eyes studying us closely.

It's obvious he wants to see us rip away from each other, blushing hotly at how we've been caught making out or almost kissing. I want to roll my eyes at him but manage to control myself at the last minute.

"I see you ordered some pizza. Got any left for me and Billy?" Charlie probes, earning a nod from me and Jacob. Jacob hands over the pizza box and Charlie gives us a brilliant smile before he wanders away, most likely back to the house so he can munch on the pizza with his best friend. It's not the healthiest thing the two of them should eat due to their health but neither Jacob nor I care. It's not like they gauge themselves on the food all the time.

It starts getting dark when Charlie decides it's time for us to head back to the house.

I hug both Jacob and Billy before we leave. Billy hugs me tightly, and I'm certain he's going to try and persuade me to stay here next year for my senior year. He wants me to spend time here so that he can have me hang out with Jacob more. He wants to have a chance to be a real godfather to me since my past with the town. I don't have too much sadness towards him, at how he clings to Charlie in an unhealthy manner, and how in return he wants to cling to me too.

The house is freezing when we get back, enough that I shiver. Charlie likes to keep the thermostat at a ridiculous temperature. He's warm blooded, and while I'm quite the opposite. I've had to wear multiple layers in this house since I can remember and go to sleep with a lot of blankets draped over me. Charlie sleeps with half of his sheets off of him and one of his legs sticking out while he snores and drools on his pillows. It's one of the things I never inherited from him, and even Renee is a lot warmer blooded than me but she's not too warm blooded.

Eventually it's time for me to head back to the clinic in order to have my leg checked out. I should be able to have my crutches taken away and be able to walk around without having that stupid brace on. I don't have to be clunking around whenever I move around the house and go to the grocery store in order to get some meals for me and Charlie. I still have to deal with the glances from the townspeople but that's to be expected, even if I didn't trip down the stairs and hurt my leg.

My mind travels towards Carlisle and his daughter, Alice, as Charlie drives us towards the clinic. I think of their butterscotch eyes and their odd behavior (obviously this is something that all vampires have) and how they can stay in this town with Carlisle being a doctor. Charlie had said that he's in his early thirties but since I've been around Alec before it's obvious the man is a lot younger than he is. He looks as if he's in his early twenties instead, a whole decade younger.

Charlie is tapping his fingers against the leather cover of the steering wheel while there is rain cascading down from the cloudy skyline. I think of how Principal Dwyer had given me that clear canopy umbrella when I had gone to see him in his office. He was so friendly to me and didn't seem as if he had any problems with doing that to begin with. I know he most likely will have me visit his office in the first week of my senior year to ask me how my time with my dad was.

Renee and Phil have already moved down to Jacksonville, Florida and she's sent me multiple pictures of the picturesque house and scenery around her. She sent pictures of her and Phil visiting the local lighthouse, St. Johns River Lighthouse. It's not open to the public but the skinny and worn-out red paint reminds everyone how the lighthouse has been around since the Civil War.

Charlie had a complicated look on his face when he came across the pictures when I had left them on the coffee table to go to the bathroom. He's never been much of a traveler and it's another slap in his face how he had hurried to marry Renee when they hadn't known each other except for a couple of months. They had completed high school, and it was the summer before he would head off to military school, while Renee would end up going to college a little after I was born so she could provide for me and be a proper single mom (yeah right, like that's something she had ever achieved).

"What are you thinking about, Bells?"

I came up with saying I was thinking about the clinic and Carlisle so he won't have to hear me say I was thinking about Renee and Phil. He sends me reassuring smiles and again reminds me how Carlisle is the best doctor in town and how he has been offered to go to better paying hospitals in cities instead of settling here with his wife and adopted children, all five of them. It reminds me how the 'family' is on the edge of being too obvious of not being human, and I wonder how they can get away with the charade since they've been here for two years already.

Eventually we arrive at the clinic, and I notice there's not too many people there. There are a couple of cars that are in the parking lot but most of them are most likely owned by the staff of the clinic.

The shiny black car that just got released to the public that sits in the parking spot in front of the front doors most likely belongs to Carlisle. Every other car is average, nothing special and lovingly worn. Nothing too flashy that demands attention and lets everyone know they are of the higher middle or even rich class.

Entering the lobby of the clinic I note how there are three patients who are waiting to be called back.

One of them is on her phone and her fingers are moving quite impressively against the keyboard of the phone. Her attention is solely based on whoever she's texting, and I'm almost concerned for the person on the other end, most likely it's either her boyfriend/husband or one of her friends. She doesn't even look up when she hears the front doors sliding open, no one has called her name, so she doesn't see the point of seeing who the latest patient is.

Another is flipping through the magazines that are provided for those who are waiting, their eyes not really paying too much attention to the pictures and the paragraphs in front of them. There are not a lot of magazines provided for the patients, and a few of them are months old. Forks isn't a place to provide a lot of luxuries so it's not surprising the magazines aren't from every newest edition.

The last patient glances up at us, sending us an intrigued glance towards me.

They let their eyes flicker towards Charlie, but it connects in their brain how I'm most likely the famed daughter of the chief of police. The one who goes to the fancy boarding school in Seattle, and the one who has decided she won't stay here for her senior year. There's no chance of any of them finding out more about me from their children at the high school.

Heading up the receptionist, who has a gentle smile on her face and a welcoming aura it doesn't take too long for me to check in. She assures me that Dr. Cullen will be coming to bring me back himself after he's finished with his meeting, which won't be too long from now. I wouldn't be surprised if he was talking to the dean of medicine from a hospital, probably one of those teaching hospitals for medical students who are almost licensed.

Plopping down on one of the uncomfortable and quite ugly folding chairs I let my eyes flicker up towards the ceiling tiles. There are a few water stains from the intense storms that travel throughout the town along with a few lights that need to be replaced. The room has a hint of cleaning supplies smells along with the typical rubbing alcohol and medical smells. I frown some, as a reminder how I've been accustomed to the smells in the past due to being accident prone.

I don't have to wait too long for Carlisle to come sweeping into the lobby/waiting room with his scrubs and doctorate cloak. His beautiful features and butterscotch eyes land on me almost immediately and he almost floats on air as he comes over. Charlie beams brightly at him, he reaches out and shakes hands with Carlisle before assuring him everything is fine both at work and at home when it comes to how my status is on my leg. Carlisle turns and looks at me, there is still that weariness that is there as if he's not forgotten how he had seen that Volturi ring nestled around my neck by the chain.

"You can stay here, Dad. This won't take long," I inform him before leaning over and kissing him on the cheekbone.

The warmth of his skin, it's something I can only take in for a few seconds, for the rest of my life most likely. I won't be able to touch Charlie any longer after I leave the town, I'm certain this will be the last amount of time I'll be able to do this and accept the warmth of his human skin. In the future it will be the opposite, it will make a torch be lit up inside of my throat, as all I would want to do would be to sink my teeth into his neck.

Leaving Charlie, I go into one of the patient rooms and plop down onto the examination table with my legs out. The scruff linoleum tiled floors and the flickering fluorescent lighting above me barely catches my attention. My attention is focused solely on Carlisle as he cracks the door a little bit so everyone can know he's not doing something he's not supposed to be doing. Not that it would be an issue, I'm sure the vampire doctor has a squeaky clean reputation when it comes to his code of conduct.

For the first part of my appointment everything is fine, nothing happens which would cause me to be alarmed nor even Charlie if he had still been with me. I answer any medical questions Carlisle has for me, and roll my leg around and bend the knee to let him know I don't have any problems that could become even worse for me. He writes down on the clipboard, his wrist moving in a swift manner and not showing any reason to stop because of sloppy handwriting.

Once he has finished he sits the clipboard down onto the side desk, enough for me to let out a sigh before reaching underneath my shirt to grab my necklace with the Volturi ring still attached. He scoots his rolling doctor chair towards me and I pull the necklace off before handing it over to him. He holds the necklace in his hands, his fingers running against the metal of the ring before he smiles some. He turns the ring around and studies it for a moment before chuckling. He hands it over to me, earning an arched eyebrow from me at how he chuckled at some engraving on the ring.

"Apologies, Isabella. I was merely fondly thinking of my time with the Volturi near the end of the sixteenth century, beginning of the seventeenth. I had been studying in Europe, when I had come across Italy and decided to stay with them for two decades. I became good friends with the kings, and in return became good friends with the guards. I know the guards usually give their rings to their mates, and from the type of ring there are only four guards who would have this ring: Demetri, Felix, Jane, and Alec. May I ask which of them it is?"

"Alec."

Carlisle nodded his head before he handed the necklace over to me.

I put the necklace around me again and allowed the ring to be hidden underneath my shirt again. I studied him this time, noting how there was this odd emotion on his face I couldn't put into words. He reached his hand out and went to put it on my shoulder, I merely nodded my head to let him know that it's okay for him to touch me. It's not the same feeling I have from Alec but it is still comforting and reassuring me, allowing me to know he won't judge me.

"Alec is a good kid. He and his sister Jane were very kind when I was there. They don't use their abilities unless it is necessary, or at least that was the way it was when I had lived there. Alec isn't used unless it's absolutely needed, he prefers to be there when he's needed. He's not keen on being there to see people executed," Carlisle informs me, which in return makes me think of what I should expect when I end up in Volterra with the rest of the Volturi.

I wonder what Jane is like, if she smiles freely or if she only smiles when she is around those who she is comfortable with. She probably looks exactly like Alec, only a female of course.

Dressed modest like her brother, this I can imagine at least.

She probably will be guarded when she first meets me, as would be expected when it comes to siblings when they bring their significant others to meet them for the first time. I might have to prove myself to her due to this but again I am understanding, because I know I would be just like that if I were in her spot. I'm an only child though, so that would be just a what if instead of a real possibility in the future (Charlie isn't over Renee and I'm certain both Renee and Phil couldn't care less about having children, they already have me after all).

"Would you like to meet my family before you head back to Seattle? You can get to know the other side of the diets for vampires."

Sending him an awkward smile, one which lets him know I'm not too keen on the idea, I'm quickly given a nod of the head to let me know he understands. I've already been claimed by those whose diet is focused solely on drinking humans, and I will end up having the same diet as them. There's also the fact that I'm the mate of one of them, I'm not being forced to join them. It's just natural of me to want to join them, since Alec will be there and not here.

"Very well, I understand. Alice will be disappointed in not getting to know you but she'll understand. You aren't the mate of any of us so there's no immediate need for you to get to know us. Just know once you are turned and have gotten accustomed to being a vampire I wouldn't mind if I come and visit you. It would be nice to see you adjusting into our world, and it would be nice for me to see the kings again," Carlisle remarks.

By the time I head back to Charlie's house I contemplate what it would be like if once I become a vampire I would want him to come and visit me. He's not forcing me to have him come and visit me once I am turned, giving me a due date. Carlisle is merely curious as to what it would be like to have someone known to help mentor when it comes to being a vampire, and most likely he's thinking of what it would be like to visit the Volturi again.

Arriving back at the house, I'm getting out of the car without needing the crutches or having some clunky cast or brace around my leg when Charlie goes over to where the mailbox is and pulls out the mail. He goes through the envelopes without any true interest but pauses when he reaches one of the envelopes and turns to look at me with confusion.

"Who is sending you a letter from Italy? I thought you said you hadn't really become friends with anyone at Northwest," Charlie inquires, making me blush at the thought of Alec sending me a letter from Volterra to check on me.

"I made a friend there. Her name is Alexandra. Her family is currently in Italy at the moment, she said she'd write to me but I had thought she'd write to me after she'd return from her holiday vacation," I come up, knowing the name Alexandra is close enough to a female version of Alec. Besides, I know if I said a boy's name, Charlie would rip open the envelope and read what Alec has to say, since he's been very protective of me since I can remember.

Once I'm in my room and curled up on my bed I hold the envelope close to me, perking up at the nice scent of cologne that was peppered against the envelope. I can't help but think of him spraying his cologne against the envelope to me, which would be the equivalent of me kissing an envelope while wearing lipstick for him.

Opening the letter I immerse myself in his beautiful calligraphy and him announcing how he'll come and visit me at our coffee shop during fall break. It won't come soon enough in my opinion.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: TWILIGHT DOESN'T BELONG TO ME

-IT'SEMMYNOTEMMA