Beautiful Things Can Come From the Dark

Cami excused herself from the dinner table thanking her hosts and nodding to Josephine with a thank you and a distracted smile for the invitation to the bakery and took her dishes to the sink where she washed them off and set them on the counter.

“I’m going to explore for a bit?” Cami asked Emily as she came into the kitchen with the rest of the dishes.

“Of Course dear, just don’t stay out too late, it’s suppose to storm again sometime tonight.” Emily smiled when she saw Cami’s clean dishes by the sink. “And thank you for your help.”

Cami made a noise of acknowledgement and slipped out the back door before Sam could find her and ask her more questions that she didn’t want to answer. She was thankful to Josephine on that matter.

‘I wonder if she knew I didn’t want to talk about it.’ Cami thought, not that it made a difference, but she was glad for it none the less.

Soon Cami found her way to the beach and sat on a log that wasn’t covered in snow and crossed her arms across her chest to keep the heat in.

And then it hit her; the impact of her decision.

She left her family behind.

She ran away, started over.

This was the first day of the rest of her life.

She was petrified.

Tears gathered at the corners of her eyes as she drew a ragged breath – how was she going to live?

Where would anyone let her get an apartment knowing she wasn’t yet 18?

When would her family find her?

What would they do when they found her?

At this point tears were streaming down Cami’s face and she was lost in her own hysteria. She thought she was running away from all her problems, her past. But they had just followed along with her and would continue to haunt her until she had a plan.

‘Or,’ her mind quipped. ‘Until they find you and punish you for abandoning them.’

When that thought sunk in, Cami doubled over holding herself tightly as she cried violently.

After some time, she felt a blanket being draped over her shaking shoulders and she jolted up in surprise, fearing the worst. Through her tear filled eyes she saw the outline of Jake and quickly started wiping at her face.

“I thought you might be cold, you’ve been out here awhile; I went to Sam’s to see if you wanted to hang and Emily told me you’d gone out.” Jake explained, giving Cami a chance to get some sort of control over her breathing. “I’m not stalking you I swear.” He joked, fidgeting awkwardly before deciding to sit next to Cami.

Cami forced a small smile to her lips at Jakes attempt at a joke, the smile soon turned to a small frown when he sat down beside her, why would he do that?

The two sat in companionable silence for awhile, every so often Jake would peek at Cami to see if she would start the heart wrenching sobs again, but she was just sitting there, a blank look on her face while a tear or two would leak out occasionally.

“Are you alright?” Jake finally broke down and asked.

A humorless laugh escaped Cami’s lips and Jake flinched.

“Sorry,” Cami apologized, sobering up. “I’m pretty sure I’m not alright, but I’m alive, that’s got to count for something though, right?”

“Well, yeah, I guess.” Jake answered. “But what’s wrong? And don’t say nothing, you can’t cry that hard over nothing.” Jake hurried to finish his sentence when he saw Cami open her mouth.

She shut her mouth and closed her eyes, pausing before opening them again and looked at Jake.

“My whole life has changed recently and the weight of it all just caught me by surprise.” Cami was internally proud of herself for being honest, yet vague; the last thing she needed was pity from him. Jake seemed like a genuinely nice guy, but they didn’t know each other from two strangers walking the same route to work everyday; a familiar face, but nothing more.

Jake frowned and shot Cami a look but decided to change the subject. “So how long are you staying in La Push?”

“Oh, until my car is fixed; I couldn’t possibly impose on Sam or Emily any longer then that. I feel bad enough as it is that they have to put up with me for so long.”

A snort followed that sentence and Cami tilted her head slightly put out and asked “What?”

“Come on,” Jake started. “I’m sure Emily and Sam both have said it wasn’t a big deal, ‘cuz its not. We’re all happy to help out however we can.”

“I sure hope you don’t think you’re fixing my car.” Cami retorted when she noticed he included himself in wanting to help.

“If not me, then who?” He shot back, a small grin at the corners of his mouth.

“Me.” She stated simply, and grimaced internally at this disbelief.

Jake shook his head, not wanting to argue and ruin Cami’s slightly elevated demeanor.

“Uh-huh, well then I’ll act as supervisor. Wanna go to the pick and pull in Forks tomorrow and get what we need?”

Cami found herself nodding; surprised she was that eager to spend more time with her new acquaintance. And then she remembered. “Oh, Josephine invited us to her shop tomorrow, if you want to stop by; I think I heard something about it being in Forks.”

“Ahhh! That sounds amazing!” Jake grinned and absentmindedly rubbed his stomach. “She makes THE best muffins!”

Cami smiled a true smile and replied, “That’s what Josephine said!”

“Alright, sounds like a plan then. After breakfast I’ll come pick you up, we’ll get out parts and head to the bakery. But we should be getting back, looks like the storms about here.”

Jake laughed when a snowflake landed on Cami’s nose.

Cami scrunched her nose with annoyance but stood, stretching her legs and back, wrapping the blanket closer around her small frame. She looked around and paused, turning up to look at Jacob.

He laughed. “Here, let me walk you to Sam’s, wouldn’t want you freezing to death.”

Emily was waiting anxiously on the porch, blanket around her shoulders as well.

“Thanks for walking her home Jake, Sam was just about to head out himself, the storm will break any minute. You hurry home!” She said while ushering Cami inseid to the living room where two steaming mugs of hot cocoa sat.

When Cami looked questioningly to Emily, Emily laughed and said, “Sam thought we might enjoy a girl’s night, go pick a movie and I’ll make some popcorn.”

Emily returned minutes later to discover Cami had picked out Underworld and chuckled at the irony.

“This is one of my favorite movies.”

“Mine too,” Cami said with a genuine smile. “I’ve always been fascinated with Vampires and Werewolves, I wish they were real.” You could tell that Vampires and Werewolves were capitalized by the reverence she said them in. “But you probably think I’m just being a silly kid.” She quickly amended.

Emily smiled a coy smile and answered. “You never know, maybe they do exist.”

Cami shook her head at Emily, thinking Emily was just messing with her; but she sat down on the couch and started watching the movie.

After the movie ended, Cami helped pick up the living room with Emily and headed up the stairs, she didn’t expect to see clothes lying on the bed with a note.

Cami,

You don’t have to worry, all these are hand-me-downs,
but I thought you’d appreciate a change of clothes while
you’re here and getting yourself settled into whatever
it is you want.

-Emily

Cami was touched, there was two pairs of worn jeans, several tanks/shirts, another hoodie, and a pair of pajamas. She put the clothes on the desk carefully and changed into the pajamas swearing no matter what she’d find a way to pay back these kind hearted people for everything they had done for her and probably still would continue to do.

A light knock woke Cami the next morning and Emily’s voice saying, “Jake called, he said he’d be here in about an hour and a half.”

Cami yawned and stretched, thankful for her dreamless night and answered “Thank you Emily.”

“The shower is the door to your left if you want to get ready before breakfast.”

After a quick shower Cami put on a pair of dark was jeans, a light green tank, and a black zipped hoodie. Starring at her reflection Cami sighed frustratingly, she looked so much like the people she wanted to forget. She’d found a pick and untangled her unnaturally blonde hair and pulled it into a low pony tail, her bangs were swept to the side.

“Good as its going to get Cami, deal with it. Cheer your ass up and go downstairs.”

By the time she reached the kitchen it was a little after 11. Sam and Emily were both at the table eating, neither looked perturbed at eating breakfast at such a late hour.

“Morning Cami” and “Morning Cambria.” Were the kind words spoken by the loving couple that took her in.

“Morning.” She greeted and sat down, nodding special thanks to Emily for the clothes.

She grabbed a slice of toast and some bacon and poured herself a glass of juice trying not to stare at the mass amounts of food on the table, surely Emily hadn’t made it all for her?

Emily giggled at the expression that found its way onto Cami’s face and said, “ Don’t worry Cami, I know this amount of food could feed a small country for a week, but Sam has the most ridiculous appetite I’ve ever seen! There is definitely plenty there if you’d like to have more though.”

“I’m not much of a breakfast person, but thank you, again, for everything.”

“Cambria, don’t worry about it. I’m glad we could help.” Sam said in between bited, his reassurance made her feel better.

“Jake should be here soon, would you like to borrow my make up? Have me do it for you?” Emily asked in a hopeful tone.

“No thanks Emily. I’m not much for make up. Thank you for the offer though.” Cami smiled her appreciation for the time and energy spent at her expense.

*knock knock knock*

“Oh, Jake must be early. I think he likes you Cami.”

The girl in question blushed 10 shades of red and made some off-handed ‘yeah, right’ comment before bolting out the door, leaving a very confused Jake at the door. Both Sam and Emily chuckled at Cami’s antics and wished her and Jake a safe trip.

The drive to the pick and pull had been short, but filled with good natured teasing and laughter.

“Alright, here we are, let’s go find some parts.” Jake said while pulling out some bills from his wallet and before Cami could protest, added. “Remember? I said we’ll work something out, so chill okay?”

Cami reluctantly held her tongue through the whole process but started back up again as soon as they reached the bakery.

“Jake come on,” Cami complained a frown on her face. “You have to let me pay you back, I dunno how, but somehow I swear I will.”

“Cami, relax.” Jake chided. “Seriously, I’m not worried about it, so drop it, kay?” Jake turned from Cami to the cash register, noticing a key person was missing. "Hey Joey! We're here and want free food!"

“Geez Jake, that’s a lovely fucking way to greet someone!” joked Josephine, “Cami, I'm delighted that you came! Come on; let’s get you two seated so we can have some of my delicious creations.”

“Did you make the muffins I like?” asked Jake, his stomach growling when the word muffins escaped his lips.

“Sure did, made them about an hour ago since I knew you couldn’t resist free muffins.” Josephine pulled out Cambria’s chair so that the young woman could sit down. “Alright, I'm going to make a quick run to the oven where I put them so that they wouldn’t get cold and if you guys see anything you like, anything that seems tasty feel free to get it.”

Josephine grabbed a massive tray from her counter and loaded it up with the muffins that she’d baked along with a gallon of milk and glasses for them to drink of. She had been afraid that Cambria wouldn’t go over since she didn’t seem too fond of attention, but Josephine was very happy to see the two youths enter her business.

“Voila!” exclaimed Josephine when she set the muffins down in front of them. “I really hope you enjoy them half as much as Jake.”

“Why half?” Cambria found herself asking.

Josephine grinned, “Because Jake’s love for these muffins is a bit unnatural. Just look at that face! You’d think that he’d be getting some from underneath the table.”

Cambria couldn’t help but look in Jake’s direction to see his facial expression and sure enough, he looked as if someone was pleasuring him underneath the table. Curious to see whether or not they were all that good she took one from the batch and took a bite.

“These are so good,” Cambria looked over at Joey, “How do you make these?”

“I'm not all that great for explaining things but I could definitely show you if you wanted.” An idea suddenly struck Joey. “In fact you could be my apprentice for a little while and I can teach you the magic to baking!”

“Thank you for the offer but I'm only staying until the end of the week so I couldn’t really be all that great of an apprentice.”

“Nonsense, five day apprentices are the best kind! So what do you say? Apprentices here get a salary and I know you crazy kids are always wasting money on one thing or another.”

“When you put it that way, I could use all the extra money that I can get right now.” Cami admitted somewhat guilty shooting Jake a look. “When can I start?”

“Tomorrow at 6,” Cami’s eyes widened in horror causing Josephine to laugh. “I'm just playing get here at nine and we can start work.”

“Nine it is!” Cami smiled, things were finally starting to look up.