Chapter 01
It was no secret that dreary old Forks had secrets of the supernatural kind, but nobody took those rumors for facts. Just rumors and legends. Bella never liked it in Forks; while the forests were thick and green, the climate was terrible; she did better in warmer climates.
At this point, she had wished she had stayed with her mother and her new boyfriend Phil, even if it meant moving every few years because of Phil’s job, but Bella had wanted stability. Unfortunately, Forks had been anything but stable for her.
Ever since coming to Forks she’d been manipulated – groomed – by the Cullens, and Edward in particular. It had been subtle, and Bella hadn’t realized it at first and she didn’t want to listen to Jacob because of her own stubbornness and, perhaps, teenage hormones, but Bella wanted to live. Not to be treated like she couldn’t take care of herself.
Bella was surprised how easily the human brain was able to get traumatized by just a few months of trauma, but she was grateful of Jacob and his friends on the reservation, and her friendship with Emily Young, basically the rez’ caretaker. Cold Ones withdrawal was a bitch.
Dreaming of Edward a lot of times? Waking up in cold sweat?
She didn’t wish that upon anyone.
Her acceptance into the University of Alaska was still a reminder that she once wanted to become part of the supernatural community. The invitation letter was still pinned to her board in her room, but the only reason she had applied to that University was so she could remain close to the Cullens.
The only reason Bella had kept with Alaska was that it was a good school and Edward was nowhere near and wouldn’t be; after she told the Cullens to “go to hell” after her 18th birthday party that she didn’t want, he resigned and joined the Volturi army. He wanted to give Bella the space that she wanted and he needed penance; after all, Bella got hurt several times because of him. Hell, she even spent a while in the hospital because of him.
When she told Jacob of her newly found freedom at the time, he had to laugh and told her that he didn’t know she had it in her to come to her senses as abruptly as she had, but was glad she did. The Cullens were nothing but trouble and Bella deserved better, even if she couldn’t return the romantic feelings he had for her. Best friends for life. Forever in the friendzone.
Bella couldn’t wait to get out of Forks. She was going to graduate and leave. Not for Alaska, but somewhere else, work for a year and find another college. She wanted a lot of miles between herself and those marble slabs.
After her 18th birthday and nearly getting killed by a Cold One, again, she told them to go fuck themselves and live her own life. Edward disappeared quickly; the remaining Cullens took some time to leave, but Bella’s last year of high school was pretty good after they had gone.
Bella worked hard in ‘Newton’s Olympic Outfitters’ to ensure she could pay for her travels in her gap year, and when she wasn’t working, she was studying with the wolves on the reservation, enjoying bonfires and cooking with Emily. It wasn’t easy, but it became easier eventually and she started to feel a bit easier in larger groups of people.
Then again, life on the reservation was usually busy with a bunch of rowdy teenage wolves.
More and more, Bella saw her high school friends hook up with each other and be happy, hanging out with each other and Bella felt less guilty for spending less and less time with them as she was absorbing a lot of knowledge on the reservation. Learning about the Quileute history, their history with the Cold Ones – any Cold Ones – and their traditions and customs.
Jacob, Seth, Leah and Bella often went out on mini road trips during the weekends and camp in the wild in tents, driving up and down some parts of the Oregon trail, and multiple spots in Washington that were as far away from Forks as possible.
The good thing about keeping busy and her nose buried in books otherwise was that Bella was never bored. Even her daydreams were never boring. She was envisioning her gap year after graduation; she had enough money saved up to survive a few weeks on her trip. Jacob and Paul had completely fixed up her car, made it reliable and efficient, and she was going to use her car to get her to places.
Bella was going to drive around America until she found a place where she could stay and work for a bit, before moving on to the next place after she learned all she could about the history of the town and their legends and what not.
It was a great idea, but Charlie didn’t like the idea of his little girl traveling by herself and insisted on teaching her some self-defense. Bella, not known for her athleticism, struggled, much to her father’s frustration. Bella stuck with it though, determined to spend time with Charlie before she’d leave. Despite everything, she loved him.
And lo and behold; she actually became slightly better and coordinated as the months passed! She had taken up running as a hobby, usually running at the reservation or over the beach, not wanting to run into other people in Forks.
But the feeling lingered; Forks was an uninspired little town and Bella couldn’t wait to get out of it, no matter the people that she was going to leave behind. She could always return – briefly, but she needed more. Bella needed to grow.
A day before her graduation, she was sitting at the dining room table nursing her coffee when Charlie placed down a large envelope in front of her. “What’s that?”
“I dunno,” he shrugged as he sat down with his own coffee. “Looks official.”
Bella looked at the manila envelope, a sense of curiosity overtaking her. Charlie was always nonchalant, but it was evident that he hadn’t opened the envelope yet. The exterior of the envelope had no indication of its origin or purpose, other than the stamp on the envelope seemingly coming from somewhere in Louisiana.
She picked it up and noticed that her name and address was beautifully written. The envelope also felt quite heavy for a simple envelope. She could feel a book in there. Biting her lip, she slid her finger under the flap and opened it.
A bunch of papers were inside the envelope, including what Bella expected; a book. The book didn’t really have a cover, or at least not at first glance. However, she was going to focus on the papers first. There was a flyer for Loyola University in New Orleans. “Look at this flyer,” Bella said as she passed it along to Charlie.
“Hm,” he hummed as he flipped the paper around. “For a long time we had a rumor in our family that we had relatives in New Orleans, did you know that?”
“No, why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I heard that as a child from my grandmother. I don’t know exactly how far removed those relatives were because it was a long time ago and apparently our side of the family stopped talking to them because that side of the family was ‘weird’.”
Bella let out a snort and shook her head in disbelief. “Families are such a delicate ecosystem.”
Charlie shrugged and motioned towards the rest of the papers. “What do they say?”
Bella started reading the letter and discovered that it was quite an extensive letter from an attorney in New Orleans. “It’s uhh… an invitation to come to New Orleans, plane ticket is attached, dated a few days from now…” she eventually said as she kept reading. “Apparently our long lost family member died and left me some stuff as the last member of our family.”
“For now,” Charlie let out a snort. “I hope you’re going to make me a grandfather one day.”
“One day!” Bella laughed. “There’s still a lot of time!” She took a sip of her hot coffee. “There’s also an acceptance letter for Loyola University, I can study whatever I want. Fully paid scholarship.”
“Bells,” Charlie said with a low voice. “What’s the attorney’s name?” He said as he grabbed his phone.
“Uhm… Antoine Dupont, why?”
“One moment,” Charlie said as he started to make a phone call to ensure that the guy was legit, and that the letter was legit. He eventually was able to get the guy’s phone number and left the table while Bella continued to read the papers, not believing that this landed on her table.
New Orleans would be perfect, a University in a warm climate and in a huge city. But this was too good to be true, wasn’t it? Bella had read a few books where something similar to her current situation would happen and it never ended well. Or it ended in the heroine developing feelings for their benefactor and having sex with them… Well, Bella was sure that wouldn’t happen because her benefactor was dead.
According to the papers in front of her anyway.
Bella had been reading up on vampires and their lore too much to know that some people just don’t die. They disappear a lot of times during their lifetime, being forced to start over because people might get suspicious of their eternal youthful looks or, in some cases, some vampire couldn’t handle their blood very well and snacked their way through an entire town.
It was funny how during her library times she often found newspaper articles about people going missing without a trace, or murder victims with punctures in their neck. Or there were reports and sent-in-letters that would describe pale, enigmatic figures lurking in shadows, disappearing mysteriously, or exhibiting otherworldly characteristics.
There were newspaper articles from Virginia, for example, about animal attacks, people supposedly rising from the dead or people disappearing without a trace spanning decades.
Bella had found it interesting that, according to her research, there were two kinds of vampires.
The distinction between the two kinds of vampires intrigued Bella. The Cold Ones, with their marble-like skin and venom, stood in stark contrast to the more human-looking vampires that the papers and various internet sites seemed to believe were real.
The Quileute wolves she had encountered in Forks challenged the very notion of normalcy, and she found it amusing that in a world where creatures defied conventional understanding, the idea of a vampire blending seamlessly with humanity seemed almost far-fetched.
But this was one of the reasons why she wanted to study myths and legends. Folklore. Hearing or reading stories from locals that have been passed down from generation to generation and seeing how things evolved. And, maybe, find out where those stories started in the first place.
An example would be the ‘Chupacabra’, a mythical creature in Latin American folklore. To be honest, the Chupacabra had a lot in common with the Cullens, the vegetarian Cold Ones, where the creature was a blood-sucking creature preying on livestock, mostly goats, and leaving behind drained carcasses.
The myth could be traced back to the 1990s, where reports of mysterious livestock deaths circulated in parts of Latin America. The animals were found with puncture wounds and their blood seemingly drained. So, naturally, there was speculation, panic and fear, and it turned into the legend of the Chupacabra.
In reality, the livestock deaths were likely due to natural predators, diseases or even humans. But the myth spread through media coverage, local folklore and word of mouth, taking a life of its own as a creature with supernatural powers.
Bella scratched her head for a moment. But maybe that was a cover up, and the Chupacabra were “vegetarian vampires”.
Crap.
She’s going to run into this a lot, wasn’t she? Letting out a deep sigh, Bella finished her coffee as Charlie walked back in and sat back down. “And?”
“I confirmed that the attorney is real, even spoke to him. It’s real,” he replied, finishing his now cold coffee. “You should take the offer.”
Bella barked out a laugh. “You just want me safe in one place.”
“Is that too much to ask for my daughter until she turns 21 when she’s allowed to legally carry and drink?” Charlie smiled at her. “At least go to New Orleans and find out the full extent of this thing, make your decision after, what do you have to lose?”
