Chapter Text
The road stripe flashed by as the car veered onto the exit ramp. Yellow morning sunshine filled the car and was warm on her bare arms.
Hard to believe that in a matter of hours she’d be under cold rainy skies and bundled up in a jacket and scarf.
Bella blinked and forced her eyes to focus, turning away from the skyline of Phoenix as they descended from the freeway and down into the airport. She would probably be sorry that she had worn short sleeves by this evening, but it was with a wry nod to melodrama that she’d put on her favorite light blouse today in a sort of poetic farewell to the warmth and sun of Arizona—“poetic” in only the broadest sense of the term. This bit of angst could be likened a haiku at best. One that didn’t have the right number of syllables, no less.
Renée had been uncharacteristically quiet this morning. She typically seemed to regard Bella’s usual silence as an empty hole in the air that needed to be filled with as many words as possible. But today, after her usual (excessively) cheerful morning greeting, she’d fallen quiet, not saying much beyond checking to make sure that Bella had remembered to pack everything. That was a funny bit of a role reversal for the woman who had to be reminded to bring her toothbrush on every trip she’d ever taken as far back as Bella could remember.
She needn’t have worried; Bella had been packed for nearly a week. The bulk of her clothes were neatly folded and compressed into the ancient luggage that she’d rescued from Goodwill while she’d lived in the week’s worth of clothes that she’d packed away this morning. The few larger things she’d wanted to keep—mostly books and whatnot—had been shipped ahead and were waiting for her up in Forks. Everything else was staying. Her room would be waiting for her when she came to visit Arizona in the summers from her home in Washington, rather than the other way around.
The wrench she’d felt upon leaving all of her childhood knickknacks had been surprisingly small. Probably because there hadn’t been very many, and most of them were more to Renée’s tastes than her own.
The bright light of morning faded to cool shade as they coasted into the parking garage, Bella looking at the different license plates’ states as they scanned for an open space. They didn’t find one until the fourth level, but it was near the elevator at least.
At last Renée couldn’t stand it anymore; as they got out and started unloading Bella’s luggage, she started talking. “Now, are you sure you have everything, sweetie?” she asked, tugging pointlessly at the zipper pulls and straps and tags on the outside of the bags. “I’m so afraid that you’ve forgotten something and I’ll be out of town when you realize you need it.”
Bella quirked a smile at her. “If I haven’t remembered it by now, it must not be too important, so I wouldn’t worry.” She set her luggage down on its squeaky wheels and pulled out the handle, hefting her duffel bag in her other hand and schooling her face into what she hoped was a sufficiently enthusiastic expression.
Renée smiled back at her; apparently, she’d succeeded. “Oh, don’t mind me—just motherly anxiety, I guess. I know I shouldn’t—you’ve never had any trouble taking care of yourself before.” She turned and headed towards the elevator, listing a little under the weight of the duffel she carried, and Bella trailed along behind her.
“So it turns out that Phil will be in Texas for the next few weeks—which is a bit of a relief, really. I wasn’t looking forward to spending the winter in Nebraska. Can you imagine how cold and wet and awful it would have been that far north?”
Oh, yes. She could. And by this evening she wouldn’t have to imagine—she’d be living it. Bella made the appropriate noise of agreement.
“And it’s that much closer to home, too! If he stays there permanently, then it would be so much easier for me to spend more time in Phoenix, and you could come down more often. Really, I wouldn’t mind just settling there. I can’t abide the cold, and San Antonio is such a lovely town—you’d love it, Bella.”
She had no doubt that she would—but somehow she didn’t think that she’d be going there for any sort of permanent arrangement. It was a strange sensation, being a third wheel to her mother’s romance, but there it was. It was certainly no less disconcerting than the idea of her 36-year-old mother having a 26-year-old husband—which was definitely disconcerting. But it was still well within the bounds of imagination, Bella supposed. Renée had never looked her age. Her naturally golden hair, bright blue eyes, and sun-kissed skin would have been at home on any California beach beauty, and her endless rounds of health food and fitness manias had kept her fit and trim—she could easily pass for thirty, if not younger.
Bella wished she had such a graceful aging to look forward to—but if her father was anything to go by, it wasn’t likely. She was his spit and image: brown-eyed, brown-haired, and pasty-white, with chubby cheeks, round shoulders, and a short waist (only in her case, it was quite literally rounded out by wide hips and far more than her fair share of boobs). She’d probably start going gray early, too—quite fitting for the girl who was actually carded the wrong way when she was ten, accused of being too old when she tried to get into the pool on the kids-under-eleven admission.
But, despite the opinion of Bella and anyone else who looked at her, Renée had clearly been finding signs of her age over the past few years—and she hadn’t taken it well. As such, it really wasn’t too big of a surprise that she’d found a younger man to help her recapture what she saw to be her fading youth. Bella just hoped that she stuck with this craze longer than her typical mania—her short first marriage to Bella’s father included.
Like with any of her new fads, Renée now centered her life around Phil with a single-minded devotion that would do a Trekkie proud. And as usual, it was Bella who stood to the side and did her best to accommodate her as she immersed herself in her latest obsession.
Even if that meant moving across the country.
Phil Dwyer, Renée’s new husband of eight months, was a minor-league baseball player trying to get himself a contract with a team.; He hadn’t managed yet, and as a result was shuttling all over the country playing games and hoping to catch they eye of a talent scout or something (Bella was a bit fuzzy on the details about how baseball leagues worked). That meant that he and Renée really hadn’t spent too much time together since their whirlwind romance and wedding and honeymoon in Baja, and Bella could tell that she was unhappy about it. And so when Phil said that things looked good for him settling in San Antonio—at least for a good three months, if not permanently—and had wanted Renée (and Bella, of course, he’d added graciously) to join him, Bella had seen her mother’s obvious conflict and had made an executive decision.
Renée wanted to travel with Phil. Phil wanted his wife with him. So Bella offered to go live with her dad up in Washington so Renée wouldn’t be tied to Phoenix and could go where she pleased.
Renée wouldn’t hear of it at first. At least she put up a good front of pretending not to approve of the arrangement. But it didn’t take long for her to start mentioning the idea now and again, pondering out loud that it wouldn’t be permanent, that it would just be until she and Phil got settled somewhere new, and then Bella could join them—it would be like a big extended vacation, really—and you know how happy your father would be to have you, honey—
Bella suggested the idea in early September. It was official at the end of October.
Renée had been in a tizzy. She was clearly excited over the prospect of traveling cross-country with Phil but guilty over sending Bella up to Forks. Renée hated Forks, and so sending anyone there was tantamount to a prison sentence as far as she was concerned. But Bella had patiently insisted that she wanted to go (she didn’t), and that Forks really wasn’t so bad (it was), and that she wanted Renée and Phil to be happy (that one, at least, she meant).
Bella had approached the change with a more pragmatic outlook. She had focused instead on the myriad of details that needed to be sorted before she left: She’d had to see to withdrawing from her high school in Phoenix and getting herself enrolled in Forks High, had to beef up her winter wardrobe (Renée had dipped into the petty cash to help her out, and so she had a nice warm coat and plenty of sweatshirts), and had to arrange to have the water and electricity and the cable turned off when Renée left Phoenix for San Antonio, because Renée would forget as sure as shooting. She just hoped Phil would help her keep track of her credit card bills and remember to get them paid. She’d managed everything with plenty of time to spare, and so, after lingering in Phoenix to spend Christmas with her mom and ringing in 2005, now she was off.
They crossed the street and the shuttle and valet parking lanes to enter the airport, meandering down to the Southwest Airlines desk (odd, really, when she was flying northwest).
“Oh, good—the line isn’t too long, so you shouldn’t have any trouble getting your boarding pass,” Renée said.
“I already have it, Mom,” Bella answered, rummaging in her purse for a moment before coming up with a sheet of paper and brandishing it at her mother. “I printed it out last night.”
“Oh, okay, good—”
“But I’ll still need to check my luggage. You can wait here—I’ll just be a minute.”
Bella heaved the duffel out of her mother’s grasp and manhandled her luggage over to the desk to check it, her stiff fingers very happy to see the last of it for a while. It didn’t take long; she got her claim ticket and made her way back over to her mother and led her in the direction of security. Craning her neck, she could see that the line there was short, too, which was good. If it was long, it would just stretch out the goodbyes. She would miss her mother, yes, but she didn’t want to make a scene—better it was just quick.
She stopped a few yards away from the entrance to the little maze of barriers and turned to her mother. “Well,” she said unnecessarily, “here I am.”
Even though she’d braced herself for it, she was still dismayed when Renée burst into tears. Bella obligingly put her arms around her mother, and dammit, she felt her eyes getting a bit misty too.
“Oh, baby—I’m going to miss you!” Renée warbled in her ear.
“I’ll miss you too, Mom—but you’ll see me soon, don’t worry.”
“Are you sure you want to do this, honey? You don’t have to go—it’ll be all right if you want to stay—”
“No, no, Mom—I want to go, and I know you want to go with Phil,” Bella soothed, doing her best to keep her voice level and to blink back the tear that was trying to escape the corner of her right eye.
“But I just feel like I’m just tossing you aside—”
“I know you’re not, and you know you’re not, so it’s okay.” She reached around and pawed blindly in the purse hanging on her arm and managed to find the wad of tissues she’d stuffed in there this morning for just this eventuality. She pulled away, extricating herself from the embrace to give them to Renée, who took them gratefully and mopped at her soggy face.
It gave Bella time to compose herself, and so it was a bright and dry smile that she flashed her mother, who mustered a watery one of her own. And then she was hugging her tightly again, and Bella hugged her back. “I’ll miss you, baby,” Renée sniffed. “Call me first thing when you get in—and I love you.”
“I love you too, Mom.”
Bella let her hold her and snuffle on her for a moment more, but then she pulled away—if she didn’t go now, then Renée would never let her leave. She gave her one last, big smile, and then gathered up the jacket that she’d dropped on the ground, set her shoulders, and made her way to the line to enter the concourse.
Renée didn’t leave immediately, but stood tearfully to the side and waited for Bella to pass out of sight. Bella watched her and kept smiling all the way to the gate, and with one last wave she passed through the doorway and towards security.
Whew. Well, one hurdle down, she thought to herself as she entered security. She made her way into the line and she waited patiently behind the suited man who was next through the scanner; she really did hope she didn’t set the stupid thing off this time.
The security guy on the other side waved her through and she stepped forward—
BEEP.
Damn. Most metal implants didn’t set the thing off, her doctor had told her, but she had decided since then that he’d lied—she could only remember two times of the last eight that she hadn’t been pulled to the side at airport security since she’d had her accident.
The guard was already gesturing her to go back through, his expression annoyed. Bella gave what she hoped was an unsuspicious but apologetic smile and proffered the card given to her by the doctor, which stated that she had orthopedic implants—a metal plate screwed into her skull near her right temple and a rod in her right forearm.
The guard glanced at it and then waved her on to the glass-walled area on the side. Bella sighed but went along gamely enough as she was obliged to hold her arms out and let them run the wand over her. She made an effort to be accommodating and told them what and where her implants were, and the wand helpfully went off in her ear when they passed it over her head (but not her arm, because of course it was always the one in her head that did it), and so all in all it only took an extra few minutes before she was hustled out to go collect her shoes and her carry-ons.
Two hurdles. Now she just had to find her gate, and then she should be set until she landed in Seattle.
The thought was not entirely a comforting one, because even now she could theoretically make her escape; could run out and find her mom and stay here. But once she was in the air, she was stuck—and would be stuck in Forks for at least the next year and a half.
Joy.
She plodded through the terminal; she hadn’t had breakfast, so she treated herself to a bagel from the coffee shop she passed but opted out of any caffeine. She was hoping to sleep through most of the three-and-a-half hour flight.
Bella meandered her way through the crowd, keeping her chin up and her eyes front and looking like she had a purpose, until she found her gate. It was fairly busy, but she managed to wedge herself in an out-of-the-way seat tucked in a corner next to a harried-looking woman who was jabbering into her cell phone while tapping away at her laptop keyboard with only the occasional pause for breath and a slug of her coffee—which was clearly needed to keep up her frantic pace. Bella thought it might help if she dialed her pacemaker down a few notches from the hummingbird setting.
She slumped down in her seat, and ignored the occasional elbow to her side, tuning out the noise around her as she gnawed on her bagel and looked glumly out the wide windows. It was beautiful out—mocking her, no doubt. The winter had been exceptionally pretty this year. Between seventy and eighty degrees and sunny almost every day—her kind of weather. The sky was the wide, faded desert blue that it always was, with only a few white puffs of cloud skating across it.
Forks averaged over a hundred inches of rain a year—she’d done her research. It was cold and wet and rainy, and it was like that all the time. And here she was, already fishbelly pale even living in Arizona—her eyes would probably start to evolve away after an extended stay in Forks.
From the Valley of the Sun to the Peninsula of the Rain. Somehow the latter just didn’t have the same ring to it.
Bella was jolted from her self-pitying thoughts and her contemplation of the planes on the tarmac by the boarding call for her flight. She took a deep breath and stood, wiping away any crumbs on her lap and balling up the wax paper from her breakfast and tossing it in a nearby can. She took a deep breath, and then insinuated herself in the line that was forming.
She hated boarding. She always felt like she had to be as quick as possible, so as not to hold everyone up behind her, and she always just knew she was going to trip because of it—and once she had, right down the incline of the gate in front of everybody, and it was horrible. At least this time she didn’t have any bulky carryon luggage. That way, she wouldn’t have to hang her big behind out in the aisle and block traffic while she tried to wrestle it into the overhead bins on the plane without breaking all her nails or dropping it on her own head (two things that had also happened to her, and were also horrible).
The ticket-taker was chirpily cheerful, and Bella did her best to return her smile as she handed over her boarding pass, but she had the feeling that it was rather more than a little wan. Squaring her shoulders, she marched down into the maw of the gate. She didn’t trip, either on the inclined floor or between the gate and the plane, and she found a seat quick enough—a window, thank heavens—and crammed herself in it.
And so here she was. She was on the plane. And she was going to Forks, for what at the moment felt like the rest of her natural life.
And here she’d always been under the impression that you needed happy thoughts to fly.
She concentrated on looking out the window at the passing planes and the baggage handlers, gnawing on a hangnail and ignoring the crick starting in her neck from craning at the awkward angle. The stewardess announced that flight was full, and so she was resignedly expecting to have to sit right next to someone. And she did; her company for almost four hours was to be a young couple who didn’t seem aware of much other than themselves as they slid into the seats next to her, trapping her in place.
Boarding dragged a bit.; It was a packed flight, probably because it was non-stop. She already had the feeling that it was going to be a very long flight as well, at least for her, because the couple next to her were so wrapped up in each other that they were practically sharing a seat. Bella just looked out the window, disgruntled, until the attendant’s voice suddenly announced that it was time for departure as the plane suddenly began to taxi towards the runway.
It was their job to give the safety spiel, and Bella somehow always felt obligated to at least pretend to pay attention as the attendants ran down the laundry list of things to do in an emergency. She really just wanted the plane to hurry up and take off—she always rather enjoyed it. Her mother hated it, as did most people, as she understood it, but she loved the acceleration.
Finally—she wasn’t sure how much more of the cloying talk from next door she could handle—the plane started to move. Faster and faster, until it was hurtling down the gray blur of the runway, the engines roaring, and she was pushed back into her seat as she watched the flaps on the wings shift—and then they were airborne.
The brief burst of rollercoaster-like elation fizzled out quickly as they began to level off, because now she was trapped in the air next to the cuddle-couple and well and truly on her way to Forks, Washington, USA. Her previously glum mood settled back down on her shoulders like a shroud, and it was with great relief that the pilot finally announced that the passengers could turn on their electronics. Bella reached into her jacket pocket and came back with her MP3 player, popping the headphones in her ears. She spared one last irritated glance for her seatmates, who didn’t notice (but they probably wouldn’t have noticed anything but their mutual petting), and then turned to look out the window, thumbing her music past the inappropriately cheerful Katrina and the Waves and A-ha, through a few depressingly angstful piano sonatas, and finally settling on the Firebird Suite. She always liked to listen to classical when in the air; it was the best to watch the clouds go by.
Okay. That’s that, I guess, she thought to herself. I’m going to Forks. She stared out at the receding desert vista below. It hadn’t felt real, somehow—even after all the planning leading up to it, it still felt like some sort of vaguely unpleasant dream that she hadn’t quite forgotten upon waking. That it wasn’t really going to happen.
But it had. It was happening, and right now. In less than four hours, she was going to be in Washington—and this time, it wasn’t just for a month of summer vacation.
Bella pressed her forehead against the edge of the window. She hated change—she wanted to maintain the status quo and just rock along. But maybe this was good for her in the long run, she reasoned—in a year and a half, she would be going to college. That was going to be a serious change, so she should just look at this as a trial run, a good-sized disruption to her schedule as a prelude to the really big one that was looming on the horizon.
She sighed again, her eyes sliding out of focus as the earth flew by beneath her. She must have been more tense over this trip than she’d thought, because with the steady rumble of the engines in the background and the strings of Stravinsky in her ears, it didn’t take long for her to drift off to sleep.
The trees flashed by, melting together in the falling darkness before her unfocused eyes into a leafy green blur. Bella concentrated on the trails of the raindrops on her window rather than the rumbling of her stomach.
Her plane had arrived in Seattle a bit behind schedule, so she’d had to dash to catch the twelve o’clock shuttle to Port Angeles. Between tearing through the concourse and collecting her luggage, she hadn’t had time to nab anything for lunch. Her bagel was long gone, and so she’d had to endure the long, four-hour ride across Washington with her stomach angrily gnawing on her backbone. She’d been bored enough that she’d thankfully managed to fall asleep for part of the way, but now, on the last leg of her journey—one last hour of bus ride to Forks—she was starving. The Coke and bag of peanuts from the vending machine in Port Angeles weren’t helping. She’d have to get something once she got to Forks.
Forks. She was nearly there. Welcome to every day for the rest of your life.
Bella hated sitting around feeling sorry for herself, but stuck in the creaky, drafty bus as it jounced and jostled her closer and closer to the rainy little hole-in-the-road that was to be her home for the next year and a half, it was hard to do much else. She did not like Forks. There was nothing there, nothing to do, and it was cloudy and rainy three hundred and seventy days a year. She’d been uprooted from her boring but happily stable and familiar surroundings in the big city in sunny Arizona and was being shipped up to this wet, miserable little Podunk town so that her mom could go gallivanting across the country with a man closer to Bella’s age than her own.
That wasn’t very fair, but as she’d been more than a good sport about it, she allowed herself the luxury of at least a few minutes of bitterness.
Shaking herself, she leaned her head back against the seat rest and closed her eyes, sighing a little and at least trying to think of the positives of this situation. It was something new, and as much as she personally hated it, most of the world seemed to regard new experiences as good things. Surely she could at least try to see it that way. And even if it was wet, she didn’t necessarily think that she’d mind a little cool weather now and again, rather than the searing summertime heat of the desert. And she probably wouldn’t have to worry about getting sunburned.
She’d best keep all these positive thoughts in her head—a lighted sign had just flashed by her window.
Welcome to Forks.
Bella couldn’t help her sigh when she saw it, and she turned away to glower pointlessly at the loudly snoring man two seats away. Any and all of the dreamlike quality of her sudden relocation that had kept her from dwelling on it had long since evaporated, so now there wasn’t much else for her to do but accept it and make the best of it.
It wouldn’t do to greet Charlie with a face like the clouds above her. She drew herself up, calling on her “ray of sunshine” persona that she often used to deal with Renée. She knew Charlie didn’t usually need it turned up quite that high—he was as placid as herself in that regard and didn’t require a show of enthusiasm—but for her first night here, she figured that it couldn’t hurt.
Even as late as it was, she had no trouble making out the depressingly familiar (and familiarly depressing) landmarks of the town of her summers past. The same boring old restaurants, the same tired old stores, the same dreary old houses.
Well, I did say I hated change, after all, she thought wryly.
It was thoroughly dark by the time that they left the highway and wound through the streets to the Forks bus stop. However, despite the rain and the weak light of the only street lamp, she could still see the black and white cruiser with the bubble lights on top parked nearby.
When the bus squealed to a stop, she schooled her features into a happy expression, much like the one she’d used when bidding her mother farewell, and she gathered her luggage from the racks and hauled it out into the rain.
And there was Charlie, standing at the stop, craning his neck to look in the bus. He beamed when he saw her, and the answering smile that spread across her face was quite genuine.
“Bella!” he called, waving, jogging up to the door, oblivious to the downpour, hurrying to relieve her of most of her bags and hustle her back under the awning. He dropped her luggage, and she did the same, so that she could return his hug.
“How are you, Bella?” he asked, pulling back and holding her at arms length to get a look at her.
“Great, Dad,” she said—which was only half a lie, really.
“Did you get your hair cut?” he asked, squinting.
She smiled a little and shook her head. “No—not since I saw you last.” He had, though. It was shorter at the temples—and grayer.
“Oh.” Charlie stood still for a minute, seemingly casting around for something to say, and finally settled on, “Well, let’s get this stuff in the car—” he gestured to her bags, “—and get you home.”
Bella nodded and flipped up her hood; Charlie grabbed both her heavier bags before she could say anything about it and was already charging out into the rain. She grabbed her duffle and followed, almost landing on her kiester when she slipped in a puddle but managing to right herself at the last minute
Once her bag was tossed safely in the trunk, Bella was extremely grateful to get into the still-warm cab, the smell of old coffee and stale corn chips notwithstanding. Charlie slid in beside her and obligingly fired up the heater. “Have you eaten?” he asked.
“No—and I’m starving,” she answered emphatically.
He smiled, his mustache crinkling. “I thought you might be—how about a dinner date with your old dad?”
Bella felt herself smiling back. “That’d be great.”