Story Notes: Twilighted Beta: Admittedly Obsessed Author's Chapter Notes: Disclaimer: Twilight and associated stuff is Stephenie Meyer's.
"Forks, ma'am?"
"Yes, Forks. It's about an hour away."
"Never heard of it, but anything that far will cost you."
I sighed in frustration. The taxi driver was playing with me. Back in Phoenix, taxi drivers knew where everything was, including some places that were best left hidden. It must have been 'mess with the tourist' day or something, but I wasn't a tourist.
"Just follow 101 west for a while."
"Okay..."
The taxi finally began moving as the driver shifted into gear. It would indeed cost me to use a taxi from Port Angeles, but it had the closest commercial airport to Forks. I was lucky. Port Angeles was a small city. It might not have had that airport at all.
I watched the concrete and asphalt fade away into the trees. Everything was so... green. Everything was so different from Arizona. The sun was hidden away in the clouds, and the air had a tangible moisture. It was unpleasant. The cool shade might mean less sunburns, but I lived for the burning rays of light and heat that scorched away the gloom.
It was all for a good cause, I berated myself. Renee needed some alone time with Phil. A lot of alone time. It would do them no good to have a seventeen-year-old daughter hanging around, reminding Phil that he wasn't Renee's first. However, Renee, Charlie, and even Phil were all against the idea.
Surprisingly, Charlie, usually a person of few words, argued the hardest against me. He loved me, as a father must, but he had a deathly fear of my relocation to Forks. I was certain there wasn't a person in his life like Phil was for Renee; Charlie wasn't dishonest about things like that. He said Forks was a terrible place for a child. The schools were terrible and crime rates were embarrassing. I hadn't been a child for a long time, and I had just one more year of high school ahead of me. As for crime rates, being a police chief's daughter would have its benefits, I'm sure. Besides, how bad could a small town in the middle of nowhere get?
Actually, I had never even been to Forks. Whenever I visited Charlie, we would spend a week in Seattle, or we would meet somewhere else, like Los Angeles. He would never speak about Forks. All my questions were turned away or otherwise never answered. It was never said out loud, but Forks was a taboo subject for Charlie.
Strangely enough, I couldn't find out about Forks for myself. It was a blank spot in the vast repository of the world wide web. Heck, the taxi driver didn't know about the place, and it was right in his region. It was as if it didn't exist.
In the end, Charlie 'put his foot down,' but that didn't matter. By then, I was already on the plane. He was going to deal with having a daughter in Forks for a year, whether he liked it or not. It was his legal responsibility as a father, and that was one title he refused to tarnish.
Even then, he was still stubborn about it. He had actually booked me a flight straight back to Phoenix for tomorrow, but he didn't have time to show up to make sure that I would be taking it. Being a police chief was a busy occupation. He'd just have to refund the ticket tonight.
"What the --" said the driver in disbelief.
I looked out the window, and sure enough, I saw a sign as we passed by: "Welcome to Forks, WA. Population 764."
765 now.
I gave the driver directions to Charlie's. It didn't take long to find the house with a cruiser parked in the driveway.
"This is it?"
"Yeah." The driver parked the taxi at the curb.
I got myself out of the taxi and the luggage out of the trunk. The taxi driver read me the rather large sum for the trip to Forks. I pulled out a wad of cash from my purse and paid him in full through the window. He immediately zipped away, eager to get somewhere away from the middle of nowhere.
I turned around and looked at Charlie's sad little house. It was definitely big enough for two people, and there was no evidence of anyone other than Charlie living there. I sighed and dragged my luggage across the grass over to the front door. I'd have to get this over with as fast as I could. Charlie wasn't going to react well to my appearance on his doorstep.
I rang the doorbell. Nothing happened, no sound other than a simple two tone jingle from within the house.
I rang again.
"I'm coming!" came Charlie's voice, muffled by the door. Stomping footsteps approached and stopped. The door opened.
"Hello, Charlie," I said, smiling with as much cheer as possible. Maybe I could rub some of it off on him. As his face became more and more pale at the sight of me, I realized it wasn't working.
He stood there in grim shock, staring at me. I began to feel nervous. What if I was wrong the whole time? What if Charlie didn't want me living with him as his daughter? I felt the back of my eyes throb lightly. I blinked convulsively.
He was breathing heavily and shaking slightly. He reached out for the doorframe and leaned to steady himself. After a particularly deep breath, he blurted, "Isabella, you have got to get out of here. I told you I booked you a flight back to Phoenix for tomorrow!"
"Charlie, I can't to go back to Phoenix," I said softly. I was becoming less and less certain. He never called me Isabella unless things were serious.
"You don't understand, it's not that I don't love you, but you can't live here with me. It's because I love you that I have to get you back to Phoenix."
"Renee and Phil don't need me getting in between them, and here you need someone to cook edible food." Renee often joked about Charlie's infamous culinary skills and the various toxic 'foods' he invented.
"Alright, I need to get you to Port Angeles," he said, ignoring me. He steadied himself on his feet and slowed his breathing. He paused a bit and muttered something too soft for me to hear, as if he was gathering his courage.
"Alright," he repeated. "We need to get you out of Forks before it's too late."
He pushed past me and grabbed my luggage. I stood there, disbelievingly, as he dragged it over to his cruiser. We were going to have a fight.
Charlie and I were going to have a fight.
"Charlie," I said pleadingly as I ran over and blocked the trunk from him.
"Please, Bella, I don't want to agrue over this," he begged, voice breaking, but eyes determined.
The two of us stood there, watching each other. The silence grew longer, and then suddenly the determination just vanished from his face.
A mellow voice rang from behind me. "Hello, Charlie. You never told me about your daughter."
I whipped myself around dangerously fast, and there he stood. Bronze hair and skin as pale as marble. He was tall and lanky and probably old enough to be a college student, though why such a beautiful college student was in Forks escaped me. His facial features were angular and as perfect as the rest of his proportions, inhumanly perfect, but it was his eyes that drew my attention. They were a deep rusty color, almost brown, but not quite.
"Hello, Edward," replied Charlie, resigned.
Chapter End Notes: Have a nice day. |
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