The sun filters through the light and grinning clouds, unhindered in its pursuit to find land, to warm the damp, starving grass. It's nice weather outside for almost a week, dipping into the weekend until the telling dark clouds hover on the edge of town. Alice has taken to light colored tank tops, shorts that push the school dress code, sandals that show off the little ankle tattoo she has.
Isabella, unlike the sun, is nowhere to be found.
Alice had hoped to catch her after the game, skin alight with adrenaline and all of her inhibitions tossed out the window. She wanted to smile at her more, see the startled expression on her face, the slight dip of her stained lips.
"Did you like the game?" She would have asked after Isabella had gotten done talking to Jacob. She would have turned around, surprised, but her expression kind.
"I did." Alice imagines that her mouth would have tilted into a smile, something small that she was comfortable with. She's never smiled with her teeth. Not ever. But that was okay, Alice was determined to see it one day. She would be the cause, she was sure.
Alice would have taken the time to look her over, and she would have looked good. Tight dark jeans, black long sleeved shirt, a bracelet on one hand and a small watch on the other. Comfortable, never stepping out of bounds, never near to pushing her own bubble. This, too, Alice would be looking to amend.
"And… did you have fun?" Alice's voice would have been slow, low, and entirely too sensual. Isabella would have blushed, she's sure. That would have been the triumph of the night.
"Yes. You performed very well." Isabella would have said, polite as always. Esme would be impressed with her. "Did you have fun?"
"Oh," Alice would have grinned. "I had a lot of fun."
Of course, that conversation didn't happen. Maybe it's better that it didn't, Alice reasons. She's not sure the girl would have been able to make eye contact with her for weeks, and at worst, a month.
When Isabella was absent, Jacob tended to sit with some of the basketball guys, and they were as loud as Emmett wanted to be, but his desire to sit with his family won out on most days. Today, he does sit with them, his laughter shaking the whole cafeteria.
For lunch, it's just the two blondes and her. "I don't know." Alice shrugs. "She misses a lot of school, do you think her grades are going to be alright? I can't even imagine how my grades would look if I had missed a week of school and then some."
Rosalie sighs quietly through chewing her sandwich, having to hear about Isabella this entire week was finally taking a toll on the blonde. "Alice. I'm pretty sure she's in the top three percent of our class." A pause to take a sip of some water. "I'm sure she's fine."
"Top three?" Jasper glances up from his phone, munching away on some dried jerky. "Will she be speaking at graduation?"
Rosalie shrugs. "Probably not. When's the last time you saw that girl participate in anything other than brooding and sneering at the majority of the student population?"
"That's not nice, Rosalie." Alice frowns, pushing her food back and crossing her arms over her chest.
Indignant, Rosalie digs at her cheeks with her tongue, too upset to continue eating, apparently. "Why do you care, Alice?" She pauses for theatrical effect, Alice knows. "It's not like she's particularly nice, either."
"You know she doesn't mean to be mean."
"She doesn't mean not to, either."
Alice sits, fuming, refusing to make eye contact with her sister. Logically, she knows Rosalie is right. She usually is. Isabella is mean, she's known for it. It's nothing for the girl to glare at people like Mike Newton or even snipe at Jessica Stanley when she approaches the girl to ask an innocent question. Isabella is mean and she doesn't get along well with others — she is beautiful and mean and spiteful but...
But, in the same breath, Isabella has never looked at Alice unkindly. The words that stammer out of her mouth are endearing, shy. Her eyes are even soft and gold, not the flint black she sees when she's been forced to communicate to other students. It has to mean something, still. Alice opens her mouth to say so, but is cut short when Rosalie decides to speak again.
"It doesn't matter as much to you because she's pretty and she's broken and you're a sucker for brunettes." Rosalie picks her sandwich back up, a roll to her eyes. "I know, babe, I know."
A wicked blush curls its way up Alice's neck, but she doesn't try to deny any of it — she would be lying. Isabella is pretty. Isabella is broken. And Alice does, indeed, love brunettes.
"Has she ever been mean to you?"
Rosalie shakes her head. "No, I haven't really talked to her." She eyes Alice carefully. "But maybe I should."
"Has she ever been mean to you, Jaz?" Alice turns towards him, tries not to fidget under their scrutinizing gazes.
"No, I don't have a class with her." A sly smile picks up at his face before it disappears. In that instant, she knows he's watching her. Watching how her hands twitch nervously when she talks. He's cataloging her, figuring her out from the inside, what makes her tick. He's always been good at that, figuring people out, picking them apart at the stiches.
Rosalie is similar that way, though she's more malicious and less forgiving about the information she finds. She's usually a pretty good judge of character.
Even when Alice doesn't like to hear about it.
They're watching her, now. Patient, cold, calculating. Ugh, blondes. But she knows she has to say something to justify her questions. What could she say, what could she say? She's broken, broken, shattered. Her leg is stuck in a bear trap, bullet holes are in her shoulder. Am I supposed to leave an injured animal alone in the forest to die? What would you do?
"She just looks like she needs a friend."
It's not good enough, the faint smiles deepen and they know. What do they know, what do they know?
Alice was thirteen when she realized people have grinning devils behind the calm of their faces, was thirteen when she learned to be cautious. She remembers why; there's no hiding from these two.
As the bell rings, Alice whispers that she has to use the restroom, and the knowing look in Rosalie's eyes has her unnerved. In a house full of traumatized people, nobody really has their own secrets.
Rosalie isn't wrong though, in whatever she was assuming.
Alice is quick to find Jacob, his chest still shaking with laughter from before, the corners of his mouth stained with ketchup.
Jacob, too, is alone. He does a good job fooling everybody — he participates in school sports, he's Rosalie's Vice President in student government, he smiles a lot and is far too loud for anybody to think that this man doesn't love himself. For Alice, though, it's easy for her to calculate the same downward slope of his shoulders and compare it to Isabella's. They're identical. The rise over run equalling loneliness and heartache. Under their long lashes, she sees the evidence of sleeplessness, of troubled, turbulent nights. Her heart aches for him just like hers does for Isabella. She knows what it means to be a foster kid - but they don't have the unyielding support of Carlisle and Esme. As far as she knows — or at least from what the newly circulating rumors say — both of them got out of the foster care system at sixteen years old. Jacob got a lot of help from the tribe in La Push, the one his grandfather was apart of, and they pay a lot of Isabella and Jacob's living expenses. Granted, though, that he goes over there a few times a year for a week or sometimes longer. Isabella has old money from her family that she was given access to when she turned eighteen.
Of course, Alice has no way of knowing if any of this was the truth. If she had to go with her gut feeling, she'd call bullshit. The sharply clenched jaw of Isabella and the need to find somewhere to belong that Jacob has lets her know that, realistically, neither of them have known love, have known family.
Alice has cried for them, a little. A lot.
It's just that Carlisle and Esme have given everything to her, their love, their compassion, their time and patience. It helped a lot, especially coming from a not-so-great living situation that she endured before they found her. She owes her entire life to those two.
Isabella and Jacob don't have that.
So when she chirps happily at Jacob, despite hardly knowing him, she does mean it.
"Alice." Jacob says, surprised. His long, confident stride turns to an awkward, lanky one. He palms the back of his neck, obviously a little confused. He does have every right to be confused. On one hand can Alice count how many times she's communicated with him.
"You got a little something here." Alice points to the side of her mouth and grins when he goes to wipe it off, a deep blush flushing over his cheeks.
Is that how Isabella would have blushed?
"How are you, Jake?"
"Good," he sighs, a little embarrassed, a little disgruntled.
"That's great news!" Nodding, Alice continues. "You played very well last weekend."
"Oh, thank you."
They sit in silence a little, the air laden with awkwardness entirely caused by her own presence. Jacob is just too polite to do anything about it, really. Alice knows that they aren't actually siblings, but they share a lot of similarities. Isabella, too, would be too polite — to her, at least — to tell her to go away, to ask what she wanted.
She debates with herself just a moment longer. Would it be weird if I asked him about his sister? She decides that, yes, it would probably be weird. But, how else is she supposed to figure out what she wants to know? Sometimes, you have to do things you don't like, and that's just how it is.
"So…" Alice trails off, internally winces. Not the best start to this question but, well what can you do? "I haven't seen Isabella around lately."
"Oh, no." Jacob's hand starts to knead the back of his neck a little too harshly. "She's been sick."
"Sick." Alice's eyes narrow, that's the same answer Isabella gave to her last week when Jacob ended up leaving. "Must have caught something really bad."
"Oh, yeah, yeah." Jacob nods. "For sure. I think she touched a door knob and stuck her hand in her mouth or something." At her silence, he continues, nervously. "You know how gross the people of Forks are."
Alice nods, slowly. People get sick, she's knows this. Obviously she does. It's just so interesting that both of the siblings seem to be sick every other week, presented with some of the worst immune systems alive. But, both walk through the hallways unaffected during flu season or any bout of cold.
She relents, she's just being ridiculous now. People get sick. She knows this. She knows this. "Poor girl." She tsks. "Make sure she's drinking a lot of water. Isabella seems like the worst patient."
Jacob's relief is palpable. "I will." He says, laughing. "She's such a grouch when she's sick."
"Will you tell her I said hi? I hope she gets better soon." Alice rocks back and forth on her feet. "And, that I saw her at the game, I hope she had fun."
His smile is wide and bright, full of teeth. Sharp. "Will do." The warning bell rings. "Okay, Alice." Jacob points over his shoulder. "Gotta get to class, I'll see you around."
She waves goodbye and heads to her fourth period, which isn't a class, but she's the nurse's assistant during fourth.
Mrs. Heminger is sweet and gentle and a little bit easy to trick.
"Alice!" She whispers, scandalized. "You understand that you're asking me to violate HIPAA, right? I can't just give you that information."
"Well, don't give it to me. Just tell me." Alice's smile is blinding and she knows it. While Rosalie and Jasper are entirely too nosy, her power is getting her way. "Besides, who am I going to tell? I just want to check up on my fellow classmate."
Mrs. Heminger stares at her hard for a very long time, before she goes over to her filing cabinet, unlocks it, and starts to shuffle through it.
"Okay, who are you interested in?"
Alice goes over to sit in her chair, spins around in it, once, twice. Thinks about the phrasing of her question. Thinks about oddly golden eyes and the slope of her neck. "Isabella Swan."
A few more moments of shuffling, opening and closing another cabinet door before Mrs. Heminger emerges victorious. "Okay, so it looks like…" The old nurse takes a few minutes to flip through the layers of papers behind the cover of a manilla envelope. "So it looks like Isabella has a rare blood type that brings on really bad symptoms of anemia."
"She's anemic?" It has to be a joke. Nobody is gone for more than a week because of anemia.
The nurse nods. "Yes. She also has history of multiple seizures, poor circulation, and a profound sensitivity to a lot of allergens."
Alice is a really, pretty reasonable person. She's good at math, excellent at english, proficient in science, so there's no way that she's having such a hard time trying to fit this equation together. She already knew, she supposes, about the poor circulation. Definitely couldn't have known about the seizures. Maybe Isabella is just skipping school. Maybe Jacob does, too. Maybe they're tired of seeing people smile and laugh with their friends, family. Maybe they're tired of hurting. But why would Jacob lie?
She would be, if she had to see people smile everyday, then in return have nothing to smile about. She's been there, she knows how it is. The ache, the loneliness, and then the empty. A void that swallows and takes and takes and takes.
"Interesting."
Heminger nods. "Yeah. We have files on students the date back to the first time they were introduced into this school system."
"How far does Isabella's go back?"
A few shuffles of paper. "Junior year."
"Kids." Esme calls, caramel hair swaying back and forth, catching the light. "Will you go set the table?"
From the couch, Emmett and Jasper frantically flick their gazes back and forth between the TV and their mother. "Um." Emmett responds, face torn. "I mean, I can." It's the last ten minutes of a basketball game, the championships, from the way it sounds. Alice watches, amused.
"Don't worry, mom. I can do it."
Esme smiles gratefully, wiping her hands off on the towel hanging from the oven. "Thank you, dear." She continues, smiling kindly. Alice is filled with love. "How was school today?"
From where Esme couldn't see, she rolled her eyes. How could she say "awful" without making Esme worried? "It was fine…"
"Just fine?" There's the worry. Deep and under the question.
Alice doesn't know how to tell her it's because Isabella hadn't been showing up to school. How it's because she looks forward to talking to her, seeing the glimmer in her eyes when she's amused, the haze that covers them when she's thinking about something. Would it be hard for Esme and Carlisle to adopt the two siblings? Would they even want to be adopted? Isabella should know, has to know that there's a better life waiting for her. She just can't see it.
Alice can though. She sees it. She sees Esme's arm wrapped around Isabella's shoulder, and for once, for the first time, Isabella's smile is big and full of teeth. Alice's chest melts at the thought. She would give anything, anything to see her smile like that.
"Well, I've just enjoyed the sun so much recently, and now that the clouds are coming back — it kind of sucks."
Alice turns around to see the critical gaze that Esme has, clearly trying to decipher whether or not Alice is telling the truth. Alice stills, makes sure that she's smiling but that it isn't too stuck, isn't too forced. "Really, mom."
Esme relents. "I've definitely thought about taking you guys out of school the text time it gets sunny to go, I don't know, hiking or something." The oven beeps, she continues to talk when she goes over to it, pulls out a pan with aluminum covering it. Alice knows immediately that it's a casserole recipe she's wanted to try for a few weeks now. Maybe a mashed potato casserole, that, or the green bean one.
It's slight at first. Something she thinks is just a figment of her imagination. Something on the periphery, a ghost not wanting to be caught, not wanting to disturb. Then, it's a train, full speed, unstoppable. In the back of her mind, she knows she's talking to Esme. But reality is blurry, fuzzy around the edges — like a video you're trying to watch but it doesn't have a good connection to the wifi.
"Esme." Alice says, voice a million years away, a hundred, present but far in the future and so close in the past. "Is something burning, do you think?"
"Burning?" Esme asks and Alice can't see her face. Watching from above, she knows she's just dropped the dinner plates, knows the glass is at her feet. "Alice? What's going on?" Silence. Silence. "Alice!"
Her vision grows black. Then she's in a field of simmering embers, black dirt is under her fingernails. Screams. She tries to find the source and she looks to her left, her right.
It's a massacre. A boneyard. Half arms lay next to her knee. Alice yelps, scrambles back, but she can't hear herself. She only hears the screams of an animal, the roaring of an animal dying, maybe.
Her hands are dripping, dripping with blood.
Scared, she scrambles to her feet, calls out for Esme, for Carlisle, for Rosalie, for Edward, for Jasper. Anyone, anyone.
The air is still burning, the earth on fire.
Looks to her left, to her right. Stops.
There's a man on the ground, body half burned away, the other half on fire. He's screaming and clawing at the ground, the whispers of prayers on his lips. He pushes against something and pleads. It's only then does Alice realize that there's a girl in white kneeling over him, face in the crook of his neck.
The man spits up blood, gurgles out of his mouth, and Alice watches as his eyes roll into the back of his head. The girl pulls away.
All Alice sees are ruby red eyes and bloody fangs that extend past her bottom lip, the blur of charcoal across her face, before her vision goes black again.