Unable are the loved to die, for love is immortality
-Emily Dickinson
Preface
I'd never given much thought to how I would die — though I'd had reason enough in the last few months — but even if I had, I would not have imagined it like this.
I stared without breathing across the long room, into the dark eyes of the hunter, and he looked pleasantly back at me.
Surely it was a good way to die, in the place of someone else, someone I loved. Noble, even. That ought to count for something.
I knew that if I'd never gone to Forks, I wouldn't be facing death now. But, terrified as I was, I couldn't bring myself to regret the decision. When life offers you a dream so far beyond any of your expectations, it's not reasonable to grieve when it comes to an end.
The hunter smiled in a friendly way as he sauntered forward to kill me.
1. First Sight
My mother drove me to the airport with the windows rolled down. Though it was January everywhere else, it was seventy-five degrees in Phoenix and the sky was a perfect, cloudless blue. I was wearing my favorite tank top; I was wearing it as a farewell gesture. I wouldn't be needing tank tops anymore.
In the Olympic Peninsula of northwest Washington State, a small town named Forks exists under a near-constant cover of clouds. It rains on this insignificant town more than any other place in the United States of America. It was from this town and its depressing gloom that my mom escaped with me when I was only a few months old. It was in this town that I'd been forced to spend a month every summer until I was fourteen. That was the year I finally put my foot down; these past three summers, my dad, Charlie, vacationed with me in California for two weeks instead.
Yet, somehow, I now found myself exiled back to Forks for the rest of my high school education. A year and a half. Eighteen months.
Of course, this was my choice. It was a self-imposed exile, but that didn't make it any easier.
I loved Phoenix. I loved the sun and the dry heat and the big, sprawling city.
"Beau," my mom said to me—the last of a thousand times—before I boarded the plane. "You don't have to do this."
My mother and I look so much alike; the same shaped face, the same nose, the same pale gray eyes. No one would doubt we're mother and son. I felt an empty feeling in the pit of my stomach as I stared at her wide, childlike eyes that were so like mine. How could I leave my loving, erratic, harebrained mother to fend for herself? Was leaving my mom the right thing to do? It seemed like it was, during the months I'd struggled toward this decision. But now, in this moment, it felt all kinds of wrong.
Of course she had Phil now, so the bills would probably get paid, there would be food in the refrigerator, gas in her car, and someone to call when she got lost, but still…
"I want to go," I lied. I'd always been a bad liar, but I'd been saying this lie so frequently lately that it sounded almost convincing now.
"Tell Charlie I said hi."
"I will."
"I'll see you soon," she insisted. "You can come home whenever you want—I'll come right back as soon as you need me."
But I could see the sacrifice in her eyes behind the promise.
"Don't worry about me," I urged. "It'll be great. I love you, Mom."
She hugged me tightly for a minute, and then I walked through the gate, got on the plane, and she was gone.
It's a three-hour flight from Phoenix to Seattle, another hour in a smaller plane up to Port Angeles, and then an hour drive back down to Forks. Flying doesn't bother me; the hour in the car with Charlie, though, I was a little worried about.
Charlie had really been pretty decent about the whole thing. He seemed genuinely pleased that I was coming to live with him for the first time with any degree of permanence. He'd already gotten me registered for high school and was going to help me get a car.
But it would be awkward. Neither of us was what anyone would call outgoing, and I didn't know what there was to say regardless. I knew he was more than a little confused by my decision— like my mother before me, I hadn't made a secret of my disdain for Forks.
When I landed in Port Angeles, it was raining. I didn't see it as an omen, just an inevitability. I'd already said my goodbyes to the sun.
Charlie was waiting for me with the cruiser. This I was also expecting. Charlie is Police Chief Swan to the good people of Forks. My primary motivation behind buying a car, despite the scarcity of funds, was that I refused to be driven around town in a car with red and blue lights on the top. Nothing slows down traffic like a cop.
I stumbled off the plane into Charlie's awkward, one-armed hug.
"It's good to see you, Beau," he said, smiling as he automatically caught and steadied me. "You haven't changed much. How's Renée?
"Mom's great. It's good to see you, too, Dad." I wasn't supposed to call him Charlie to his face.
I only had a few bags. Most of my Arizona clothes were too permeable for Washington. My mom and I had pooled our resources to supplement my winter wardrobe, but it still wasn't much. It all fit easily into the trunk of the cruiser.
"I found a good car for you, really cheap." he announced when we were strapped into the cruiser and on our way.
"What kind of car?" I asked, suspicious of the way he said "good car for you" as opposed to just "good car."
"Well, it's a truck actually, a Chevy."
"Where did you find it?"
"Do you remember Billy Black down at La Push?" La Push is the small Native American reservation on the nearby coastline.
"Not really, sorry."
"He used to go fishing with us during the summer," Charlie prompted.
That would explain why I didn't remember him. I do a good job of blocking painful things from my memory.
"He's in a wheelchair now," Charlie continued when I didn't respond, "so he can't drive anymore, and he offered to sell me the truck cheap."
"What year is it?" I could see from the change in his expression that this was the question he was hoping I wouldn't ask.
"Well, Billy's son has done a lot of work on the engine— it's only a few years old, really."
Did he really think I would give up that easily?
"When did he buy it?"
"He bought it in 1984, I think."
"Did he buy it new?"
"Well, no. I think it was new in the early sixties— or late fifties at the earliest," He admitted sheepishly.
"Ch— Dad, I don't really know anything about cars. I wouldn't be able to fix it if anything went wrong, and I couldn't afford a mechanic..."
"Really, Beau, the thing runs great. They don't build them like that anymore."
The thing, I thought to myself…it had possibilities—as a nickname, at the very least.
"How cheap is cheap?" After all, that was the part I couldn't compromise on.
"Well, son, I kind of already bought it for you. As a homecoming gift." Charlie glanced sideways at me with a hopeful expression.
Wow. Free.
"You didn't need to do that, Dad. I was going to buy myself a car."
"I don't mind. I want you to be happy here." He was looking ahead at the road when he said this. Charlie had never been comfortable with expressing his emotions out loud. I inherited that from him. So I was looking straight ahead as I responded.
"That's amazing, Dad. Thanks. I really appreciate it." No need to add that my being happy in Forks is an impossibility. He didn't need to suffer along with me. And I never looked a free truck in the mouth—or engine.
"Well, now, you're welcome," he mumbled, embarrassed by my thanks.
We exchanged a few more comments on the weather, which was wet, and that was pretty much it for conversation. We stared out the windows.
It was beautiful, of course; I couldn't deny that. Everything was green: the trees, their trunks covered with moss, their branches hanging with a canopy of it, the ground covered with ferns. Even the air filtered down greenly through the leaves.
It was too green—an alien planet.
Eventually, we made it to Charlie's. He still lived in the small, two-bedroom house that he'd bought with my mother in the early days of their marriage. Those were the only kind of days their marriage had—the early ones. There, parked on the street in front of the house that never changed, was my new—well, new to me—truck. It was a faded red color, with big, rounded fenders and a bulbous cab.
And I loved it. I wasn't really a car guy, so I was kind of surprised by my own reaction. I mean, I didn't even know if it would run, but I could see myself in it. Plus, it was one of those solid iron monsters that never gets damaged—the kind you see at the scene of an accident, paint unscratched, surrounded by the pieces of the foreign car it had destroyed.
"Wow, Dad, I love it! Thanks!" I was genuinely enthused about the truck. Not only was it perfect, now I wouldn't be faced with the choice of either walking two miles in the rain to school or accepting a ride in the Chief's cruiser.
"I'm glad you like it," Charlie said gruffly, embarrassed again.
It took only one trip to get all my stuff upstairs. I got the west bedroom that faced out over the front yard. The room was familiar; it had belonged to me since I was born. The wooden floor, the light blue walls, the peaked ceiling, the faded blue-and-white checkered curtains around the window—these were all a part of my childhood. The only changes Charlie had ever made were switching the crib for a bed and adding a desk as I grew. The desk now held a secondhand computer, with the phone line for the modem stapled along the floor to the nearest phone jack. This was a stipulation from my mother, so that we could stay in touch easily. The rocking chair from my baby days was still in the corner.
There was only one small bathroom at the top of the stairs, which I would have to share with Charlie, but I'd had to share with my mom before, and she had a lot more stuff. This would be fine.
One of the best things about Charlie is he doesn't hover. He left me alone to unpack and get settled, which would have been altogether impossible for my mom. It was nice to be alone, not to have to smile and look comfortable; a relief to stare dejectedly out the window at the sheeting rain and let just a few tears escape. I wasn't in the mood to go on a real crying jag. I would save that for bedtime, when I would have to come to terms with how quickly everything had just changed, and when I would have to think about the coming morning.
Forks High School had just three hundred and fifty-seven—now fifty eight—students; there were more than seven hundred people in my junior class alone back home. All of the kids there had grown up together—their grandparents had been toddlers together. I would be the new kid from the big city, something to stare at and whisper about.
Maybe if I had been one of the cool kids—had a little more confidence in myself—I could work this to my advantage. But I certainly wasn't that guy. I was always different from the other guys in my school. I wasn't the football star, not the class president, not the bad boy on the motorcycle. I was the kid who got shoved into lockers until his sophomore year. The kid who was too quiet, and too pale, who didn't know anything about sports or cars or anything I was supposed to be into.
Despite the constant sunshine of Phoenix, I was still ivory-skinned and I had always been on the leaner side, obviously not an athlete; I didn't have the necessary hand-eye coordination to play sports without humiliating myself—and harming both myself and anyone else who stood too close.
When I finished putting my clothes in the old pine dresser, I took my bag of bathroom necessities and went to clean myself up after the day of travel. I looked at my face in the bathroom mirror as I ran my hands through my damp, dark hair. Maybe it was the light, but already I looked paler, if that was possible.
Facing my glum reflection in the mirror, I was forced to admit that I was lying to myself. It wasn't just physically that I'd never fit in. And if I couldn't find a niche in a school with three thousand people, what were my chances here?
I didn't relate well to people my age. Maybe the truth was that I didn't relate well to people, period. Even my mother, who I was closer to than anyone else on the planet, was never in harmony with me, never on exactly the same page. Sometimes I wondered if I was seeing the same things through my eyes that the rest of the world was seeing through theirs. Maybe there was a glitch in my brain.
But the cause didn't matter. All that mattered was the effect. And tomorrow would be just the beginning.
I didn't sleep well that night, even after I had managed to calm myself down. The constant whooshing of the rain and the wind across the roof wouldn't fade in the background. I pulled the faded old quilt over my head, and later added the pillow, too. But I couldn't fall asleep until after midnight, when the rain finally settled into a quieter drizzle.
Thick fog was all I could see out my window in the morning, and I could feel the claustrophobia creeping up on me. You could never see the sky here; it was like a cage.
Breakfast with Charlie was a quiet. He wished me good luck at school. I thanked him, knowing his hope was wasted. Good luck tended to avoid me. Charlie left first, off to the police station that was his wife and family. After he left, I sat at the old square oak table in one of the three un-matching chairs and examined the small kitchen, with its dark paneled walls, bright yellow cabinets, and white linoleum floor. Nothing was changed. My mother had painted the cabinets eighteen years ago in an attempt to bring some sunshine into the house. Over the small fireplace in the adjoining modestly sized family room was a row of pictures. First a wedding picture of Charlie and my mom in Las Vegas, then one of the three of us in the hospital after I was born, taken by a helpful nurse, followed by the procession of my school pictures up to last year's. Those were embarrassing to look at—the bad haircuts, the acne that had finally cleared up. Maybe I could get Charlie to put them somewhere else, at least while I was living here.
It was impossible, being in this house, not to realize that Charlie had never gotten over my mom. It made me uncomfortable and a little sad.
I didn't want to be too early to school, but I couldn't stay in the house anymore. I donned my jacket—thick, non-breathing plastic, like a biohazard suit—and headed out into the rain.
It was just drizzling still, not enough to soak me through immediately as I reached for the house key that was always hidden under the eaves by the door, and locked up. The sloshing of my new waterproof boots was unnerving. I missed the normal crunch of gravel as I walked. I couldn't pause and admire my truck again as I wanted; I was in a hurry to get out of the misty wet that swirled around in the air.
Inside the truck, it was nice and dry. Either Billy or Charlie had obviously cleaned it up, but the tan upholstered seats still smelled faintly of tobacco, gasoline, and peppermint. The engine started quickly, to my relief, but loudly, roaring to life and then idling at top volume. Well, a truck this old was bound to have a flaw. The antique radio worked, a bonus that I hadn't expected.
Finding the school wasn't difficult; like most other things, it was just off the highway. It wasn't totally obvious that it was a school; only the sign, which declared it to be Forks High School, clued me in. It looked like a collection of matching houses, built with maroon-colored bricks. There were so many trees and shrubs I couldn't see its size at first. Where was the feel of the institution? I wondered sarcastically. Where were the chain-link fences, the metal detectors?
I parked in front of the first building, which had a small sign over the door reading FRONT OFFICE. No one else was parked there, so I was sure it was off limits, but I decided I would get directions inside instead of circling around in the rain like an idiot. I stepped unwillingly out of the toasty truck cab and walked down a little stone path lined with dark hedges. I took a deep breath before opening the door.
Inside, it was brightly lit, and warmer than I'd hoped. The office was small; a little waiting area with padded folding chairs, orange-flecked commercial carpet, notices and awards cluttering the walls, a big clock ticking loudly. Plants grew everywhere in large plastic pots, as if there wasn't enough greenery outside. The room was cut in half by a long counter, cluttered with wire baskets full of papers and brightly colored flyers taped to its front. There were three desks behind the counter, one of which was manned by a large, red-haired woman wearing glasses. She was wearing a t-shirt, which immediately made me feel overdressed for the weather.
The red-haired woman looked up."Can I help you?"
"I'm Beau Swan," I informed her, and saw the immediate awareness light her eyes. I was expected, already the subject of gossip. Son of the Chief's flighty ex-wife, come home at last.
"Of course," she said. She dug through a precariously stacked pile of papers on her desk till she found the ones she was looking for. "I have your schedule right here, Beauregard, and a map of the school." She brought several sheets to the counter to show me.
"Um, it's Beau, please."
"Oh, sure, Beau."
She went through my classes for me, highlighting the best route to each on the map, and gave me a slip to have each teacher sign, which I was to bring back at the end of the day. She smiled at me and hoped, like Charlie, that I would like it here in Forks. I smiled back as convincingly as I could.
When I went back out to my truck, other students were starting to arrive. I drove around the school, following the line of traffic. I was glad to see that most of the cars were older like mine, nothing flashy. At home I'd lived in one of the few lower-income neighborhoods that were included in the Paradise Valley District. It was a common thing to see a new Mercedes or Porsche in the student lot. The nicest car here was a shiny Volvo, and it stood out. Still, I cut the engine as soon as I was in a spot, so that the thunderous volume wouldn't draw attention to me.
I looked at the map in the truck, trying to memorize it now; hopefully I wouldn't have to walk around with it stuck in front of my nose all day. I stuffed everything in my bag, slung the strap over my shoulder, and sucked in a huge breath. It won't be that bad, I lied to myself. This wasn't life or death—just high school. It's not like anyone was going to bite me.
I finally exhaled and stepped out of the truck.I pulled my hood down over my face as I walked to the sidewalk, crowded with other students. My plain black jacket didn't stand out, I noticed with relief.
Once I got around the cafeteria, building three was easy to spot. A large black "3" was painted on a white square on the east corner. I felt a knot begin to form in my stomach as I approached the door. I took a deep breath as I followed two unisex raincoats through the door.
The classroom was small. The people in front of me stopped just inside the door to hang up their coats on a long row of hooks. I copied them. They were two girls, one a porcelain-colored blonde, the other also pale, with light brown hair. At least my skin wouldn't be a standout here.
I took the slip up to the teacher, a tall, balding man whose desk had a nameplate identifying him as Mr. Mason. He gawked at me when he saw my name—not an encouraging response—and of course I flushed tomato red. But at least he sent me to an empty desk at the back without introducing me to the class. It was harder for my new classmates to stare at me in the back, but somehow, they managed.
I kept my eyes down on the reading list the teacher had given me. It was fairly basic: Brontë, Shakespeare, Chaucer, Faulkner. I'd already read everything. That was comforting… and boring. I wondered if my mom would send me my folder of old essays, or if she would think that was cheating. I went through different arguments with her in my head while the teacher droned on.
When the bell rang, a nasal buzzing sound, a pale, skinny girl with skin problems and hair black as an oil slick leaned across the aisle to talk to me.
"You're Beauregard Swan, aren't you?" She gave off the vibe of the overly helpful, chess club type.
"Beau," I corrected. Everyone within a three-seat radius turned to look at me.
"Where's your next class?" she asked.
I had to check in my bag. "Um, Government, with Jefferson, in building six."
There was nowhere to look without meeting curious eyes.
"I'm headed toward building four, I could show you the way..." Definitely over-helpful. "I'm Erica," she added.
I managed a smile. "Thanks."
We got our jackets and headed out into the rain, which had picked up. I could have sworn several people behind us were walking close enough to eavesdrop. I hoped I wasn't getting paranoid.
"So, this is a lot different than Phoenix, huh?" she asked.
"Very."
"It doesn't rain much there, does it?"
"Three or four times a year."
"Wow, what must that be like?" she wondered.
"Sunny," I told her.
"You don't look very tan."
"My mother is part albino."
She studied my face apprehensively, and I sighed. It looked like clouds and a sense of humor didn't mix. A few months of this and I'd forget how to use sarcasm.
We walked back around the cafeteria, to the south buildings by the gym. Erica followed me right to the door, though it was clearly marked.
"Well, good luck," she said as I touched the handle. "Maybe we'll have some other classes together." She sounded hopeful.
I smiled at her vaguely and went inside.
The rest of the morning passed in about the same fashion. My Trigonometry teacher, Mr. Varner, who I would have disliked anyway just because of the subject he taught, was the only one who made me stand in front of the class and introduce myself. I stammered, blushed, and tripped over my own boots on the way to my seat.
After two classes, I started to recognize several of the faces in each room. There was always someone braver than the others who would introduce themselves and ask me questions about how I was liking Forks. I tried to be diplomatic, but mostly I just lied a lot. At least I never needed the map.
In every class, the teacher started out calling me Beauregard, and though I corrected them immediately, it was frustrating. It had taken me years to live down Beauregard—my mom thought it sounded regal. I comforted myself with the knowledge that she chose Beauregard over Beaufort, her second choice. No one at home even remembered that Beau was just a nickname anymore. Now I had to start all over again.
One girl sat next to me in both Trig and Spanish, and she walked with me to the cafeteria for lunch. She was short, several inches shorter than my five feet seven inches, with long, straight, light-brown hair. Her bubbling, energetic personality almost seemed to make up the difference between our heights. I couldn't remember her name, so I smiled and nodded as she rattled about teachers and classes. I didn't try to keep up.
We sat at the end of a full table with several of her friends, who she introduced to me—couldn't complain about the manners here. Overwhelmed by the rush of new information, I forgot all their names as soon as she said them. They seemed impressed by her bravery in speaking to me. The girl from English, Erica, waved at me from across the room.
It was there, sitting in the lunchroom, trying to make conversation with seven curious strangers, that I first saw them.
They were sitting in the corner of the cafeteria, as far away from where I sat as possible in the long room. There were five of them. They weren't talking, and they weren't eating, though they each had a tray of untouched food in front of them. They weren't gawking at me, unlike most of the other students, so it was safe to stare at them without fear of meeting an excessively interested pair of eyes. But it was none of these things that caught, and held, my attention.
They didn't look anything alike.
There were four boys; one was big— muscled like a serious weight lifter, at least six-five or taller, with dark, curly hair. The one sitting next to him was only slightly shorter, but still well-muscled—clearly the school's star-athlete. And the prom king. His long gold hair was wound into a bun on the back of his head. The third one was almost as tall as the first, leaner, but still muscular, with honey colored hair. There was something intense about him, edgy. The last was lanky, less bulky, with untidy, bronze-colored hair. He was more boyish than the others, who looked like they could be in college, or even teachers here rather than students.
The lone girl was the complete opposite. She was short and pixie-like, thin in the extreme, with small features. Her hair was a deep black, cropped short and styled like she had fallen right out of the twenties.
Totally different, and yet, they were all exactly alike. Every one of them was chalky pale, the palest of all the students living in this sunless town. Paler than me, the albino. They all had very dark eyes—from here they looked black—despite the range in hair tones. There were deep shadows under their eyes— purple shadows, like bruises. Maybe they were all suffering from a sleepless night, or almost done recovering from broken noses. Except that their noses, all their features, were straight, perfect, angular.
But all this is not why I couldn't look away.
I stared because their faces, so different, so similar, were all devastatingly, inhumanly beautiful. They were faces you never expected to see except perhaps on the airbrushed pages of a fashion magazine. Or painted by an old master as the face of an angel. It was hard to decide who was the most beautiful— maybe the blond prom king, or the bronze-haired boy. I mean, all of them were gorgeous, but the boy with the bronze hair was something more than just beautiful. He was absolutely perfect. It was an upsetting, disturbing kind of perfection. It made my stomach uneasy.
They were all looking away; away from each other, away from the other students, away from anything in particular as far as I could tell. It reminded me of models posed artistically for an add—aesthetic ennui.
As I watched, the pixie girl rose with her tray— unopened soda, untouched apple— and walked away with a quick, graceful lope that belonged on a runway. I watched, amazed at her lithe dancer's step, till she dumped her tray and glided through the back door, faster than I would have thought possible. My eyes darted back to the boys, who sat unchanging.
"Who are they?" I asked the girl from my Spanish class, whose name I still couldn't remember.
As she looked up to see who I meant—though she could probably guess from my tone—suddenly he looked at her, the thinner, boyish one, the youngest, perhaps. He looked at my neighbor for just a fraction of a second, and then his dark eyes flickered to mine.
He looked away quickly, more quickly than I could, though in a flush of embarrassment I dropped my eyes at once. In that brief flash of a glance, his face wasn't interested at all—it was as if she had called his name, and he'd looked up in an involuntary response, already having decided not to answer.
My neighbor giggled in embarrassment, looking at the table like I did.
"That's Edward and Emmett Cullen, and Royal and Jasper Hale. The one who left was Alice Cullen; they all live together with Dr. Cullen and his wife." She said this under her breath.
I glanced sideways at the beautiful boy, who was looking at his tray now, picking a bagel to pieces with long, pale fingers. His mouth was moving very quickly, his perfect lips barely opening. The other three still looked away, and yet I felt he was speaking quietly to them.
Strange, unpopular names, I thought. The kinds of names grandparents had. But maybe that was in vogue here—small-town names? I finally remembered that my neighbor was called Jessica, a totally normal name. There were two girls named Jessica in my History class back home.
"They all are… very nice-looking." I struggled with the conspicuous understatement.
"Yes!" Jessica agreed with another giggle. "They're all together though—Jasper and Alice, I mean. There's even a rumor that Emmet and Royal are like, a thing. And they live together." Her voice held all the shock and condemnation of the small town, I thought critically. But, if I was being honest, I had to admit that even in Phoenix, it would cause gossip.
"Which ones are the Cullens?" I asked. "They don't look related… well, I mean, sort of…"
"Oh, they're not. Dr. Cullen is really young, in his twenties or early thirties. They're all adopted. The Hales—the blondes—are brothers, fraternal twins, I think, and they're foster children."
"They look a little old for foster children."
"They are now, Jasper and Royal are both eighteen, but they've been with Mrs. Cullen since they were eight. She's their aunt or something like that."
"That's really kind of nice— for them to take care of all those kids like that, when they're so young and everything."
"I guess so," Jessica admitted reluctantly, and I got the impression that she didn't like the doctor and his wife for some reason. With the glances she was throwing at their adopted children, I would presume the reason was jealousy. "I think that Mrs. Cullen can't have any kids, though," she added, as if that lessened their kindness.
Throughout all this conversation, my eyes flickered again and again to the table where the strange family sat. They continued to look at the walls and not eat.
"Have they always lived in Forks?" I asked. Surely I would have noticed them on one of my summers here.
"No. They just moved down two years ago from somewhere in Alaska."
I felt a surge of pity, and relief. Pity because, as beautiful as they were, they were outsiders, clearly not accepted. Relief that I wasn't the only newcomer here, and certainly not the most interesting by any standard.
As I examined them, the youngest, one of the Cullen boys, looked up and met my gaze, this time with evident curiosity in his expression. As I looked swiftly away, it seemed to me that his glance held some kind of unmet expectation.
"Which one is the boy with the reddish-brown hair?" I asked. I glanced at him from the corner of my eye, and he was still staring at me, but not gawking like the other students had today—he had a slightly frustrated expression. I looked down again.
"That's Edward. He's gorgeous, of course, but a complete waste of time. He doesn't date. Apparently none of the girls here are good-looking enough for him." She sniffed, a clear case of sour grapes. I wondered when he'd turned her down.
I bit my lip to hide my smile. Then I glanced at him again. His face was turned away, but I thought from the shape of his cheek that he might be smiling, too.
After a few more minutes, the four of them left the table together. They all were noticeably graceful— even the big, brawny one and the golden prom king. It was unsettling to watch. The one named Edward didn't look at me again.
I sat at the table with Jessica and her friends longer than I would have if I'd been sitting alone. I was anxious not to be late for class on my first day. One of my new acquaintances, who considerately reminded me that her name was Angela, had Biology II with me the next hour. We walked to class together in silence. She was shy like me.
When we entered the classroom, Angela went to sit at a black-topped lab table exactly like the ones I was used to. She already had a neighbor. In fact, all the tables were filled but one. Next to the center aisle, I recognized Edward Cullen by his unusual hair, sitting next to that single open seat.
My heart started pounding a little faster than usual.
As I walked down the aisle to introduce myself to the teacher and get my slip signed, I was watching him surreptitiously. Just as I passed, he suddenly went rigid in his seat. He stared at me again, meeting my eyes with the strangest expression on his face— it was more than angry, it was furious, hostile. I looked away quickly, shocked, going red again. I stumbled over a book in the walkway and had to catch myself on the edge of a table. The girl sitting there giggled.
I had been right about his eyes. They were black— coal black.
Mrs. Banner signed my slip and handed me a book with no nonsense about introductions. I could tell we were going to get along. Of course, she had no choice but to send me to the one open seat in the middle of the room. I kept my eyes down as I went to sit by him, bewildered by the antagonistic stare he'd given me.
I didn't look up as I set my book on the table and took my seat, but I saw his posture change from the corner of my eye. He was leaning away from me, sitting on the extreme edge of his chair and averting his face like he smelled something bad. Inconspicuously, I tugged at my shirt at gave it a sniff. It smelled like laundry detergent. How could that be offensive? I scooted my chair to the right, giving him as much space as I could, and nervously ran my fingers through my hair.
I leaned forward, resting my head in my hand, using it to block my face from him. I angled myself away, too, for good measure. I tried to pay attention to the teacher.
Unfortunately the lecture was on cellular anatomy, something I'd already studied. I took notes carefully anyway, always looking down.
I couldn't stop myself from glancing occasionally at the strange boy next to me. During the whole class, he never relaxed his stiff position on the edge of his chair, sitting as far from me as possible. I could see his hand on his left leg was clenched into a fist, tendons standing out under his pale skin. This, too, he never relaxed. He had the sleeves of his white Henley pushed up to his elbows, and his forearm was surprisingly hard and muscular beneath his pale skin. He wasn't nearly as slight as he'd looked next to his burly brothers.
The class seemed to drag on longer than the rest. Was it because the day was finally coming to a close, or because I was waiting for his tight fist to loosen? It never did; he continued to sit so still it looked like he wasn't breathing. What was wrong with him? Was this his normal behavior? I questioned my quick judgment on Jessica's bitterness at lunch today. Maybe she was not as resentful as I'd thought.
It couldn't have anything to do with me. He didn't know me from Adam.
I peeked up at him one more time and regretted it. He was glaring down at me again, his black eyes full of revulsion. As I flinched away from him, shrinking against my chair, the phrase if looks could kill suddenly ran through my mind.
At that moment, the bell rang loudly, making me jump, and Edward Cullen was out of his seat. Fluidly he rose— he was much taller than I'd thought— his back to me, and he was out the door before anyone else was out of their seat.
I sat frozen in my seat, staring blankly after him. He was so unnecessarily rude. I began gathering up my things slowly, trying to block the confusion and anger that filled me. I felt tight knots in my stomach. I hadn't done anything wrong. How could I have? I hadn't actually even met him.
"Aren't you Beauregard Swan?" a male voice asked. I looked up to see a cute, baby-faced boy, his pale blond hair carefully flat-ironed, smiling at me in a friendly way. He obviously didn't think I smelled bad.
"Beau," I corrected him, with a smile.
"I'm Mike."
"Hi, Mike."
"Do you need any help finding your next class?"
"I'm headed to the gym, actually. I think I can find it."
"That's my next class, too." He seemed thrilled, though it wasn't that big of a coincidence in a school this small.
We walked to class together; he was a chatterer— he supplied most of the conversation, which made it easy for me. He'd lived in California till he was ten, so he knew how I felt about the sun. It turned out he was in my English class also. He was the nicest person I'd met today.
But as we were entering the gym, he asked, "So, did you stab Edward Cullen with a pencil or what? I've never seen him act like that."
I cringed. So I wasn'tthe only one who had noticed. And, apparently, that wasn't Edward Cullen's usual behavior. I decided to play dumb.
"Was that the boy I sat next to in Biology?"
"Yeah," he said. "He looked like he was in pain or something."
"I don't know," I responded. "I never spoke to him."
"He's a weird guy." Mike lingered by me instead of heading straight into the locker room. "If I were sitting by you, I would have talked to you." He started blushing, "You seem cool!" He added quickly.
I smiled at him and he quickly walked through the locker room door, I followed slightly bemused. He was friendly and possibly liked me. But it wasn't enough to make me forget the last hour.
The Gym teacher, Coach Clapp, found me a uniform but didn't make me dress down for today's class. At home, only two years of P.E. were required. Here, P.E. was mandatory all four years. Forks was literally my personal hell on Earth.
I watched four volleyball games running simultaneously. Remembering how many injuries I had sustained— and inflicted— playing volleyball, I felt faintly nauseated.
The final bell rang at last. I walked slowly to the office to return my paperwork. The rain had drifted away, but the wind was strong, and colder. I zipped my jacket up and shoved my free hand into a pocket.
When I walked into the warm office, I almost turned around and walked back out.
Edward Cullen stood at the desk in front of me. I recognized again that tousled bronze hair. He didn't appear to notice the sound of my entrance. I stood pressed against the back wall, waiting for the receptionist to be free.
He was arguing with her in a low, attractive voice. I quickly picked up the gist of the argument. He was trying to trade from sixth-hour Biology to another time— any other time.
This could not be about me. It had to be something else, something that happened before I entered the Biology room. The look on his face must have been about another aggravation entirely. It was impossible that this stranger could take such a sudden, intense dislike to me.
The door opened again, and the cold wind suddenly gusted through the room, rustling the papers on the desk, waving through my hair. The girl who came in merely stepped to the desk, placed a note in the wire basket, and walked out again. But Edward Cullen's back stiffened, and he turned slowly to glare at me—his face was absurdly handsome—with piercing, hate-filled eyes. For an instant, I felt a thrill of genuine fear, raising the hair on my arms. The look only lasted a second, but it chilled me more than the freezing wind. He turned back to the receptionist.
"Never mind, then," he said hastily in a voice like velvet. "I can see that it's impossible. Thank you so much for your help." And he turned on his heel without another look at me and disappeared out the door.
I went meekly to the desk, my face white for once instead of red, and handed her the signed slip.
"How did your first day go, dear?" the receptionist asked maternally.
"Fine," I lied, my voice cracking. I could see I hadn't convinced her.
When I got to the truck, it was almost the last car in the lot. It seemed like a haven, already the closest thing to home I had in this wet, green hell. I sat inside for a while, just staring out the windshield blankly. But soon I was cold enough to need the heater, so I turned the key and the engine roared to life. I headed back to Charlie's house, grappling with the knots in my stomach till I was fighting tears.