No Way to Say Goodbye.

It wasn’t that Paul liked Hannah, or that Hannah liked Paul. Well, that he could assume anyway. It was just more of a competition to Paul. Jacob had lost his imprint, so he wasn’t going to be imprinting again. As for Paul, he was never going to get one because well, he just didn’t want to. He loved being able to have the freedom to touch a girl and know that it is not committed or that he even has to be. But he definitely got sparked when he thought of Hannah and Jacob together. Maybe he was jealous then; that Jacob had Bethany, and now he was more than likely going to end up with Hannah.

Even thinking of Hannah in a sexual way though, gave Paul a bad feeling. She seemed too innocent to be on his level, or what she allowed to be seen was innocent. He had to admit that if Jacob didn’t call dibs or insistently have his mind one hundred perfect on Hannah that he would try something; Paul swore thinking that if Jacob ever imprinted again. Now that, wasn’t fair Paul thought as he let the continuing fresh rain pelt on his warm skin.

“I can hear the sizzling,” Hannah called out to him.

“Huh?” Paul said, honestly unaware of what she meant.

Looking at the ground to compose herself to explain her flirtatious side, she said, “You’re so hot that when the rain—“

“—oh. Nice one,” He smiled.

Smiling at his appreciatively handsome smile, Hannah gave him a light punch before asking, hood atop her head, eyes squinted, and looking positively appealing to Paul right at this moment in time; “why’d you come outside?”

Shaking his head, he wasn’t going to give in that easily. With all girls, Paul learned that they were always up to no good. Especially if he couldn’t tell when they were flirting or not, because right now it was peculiarly hard to read Hannah’s intentions. He’d known her what: three months? Even though he was content on teasing her, ruffling up her hair, or being an ass sometimes he wasn’t quite comfortable spilling out himself to her—not the way that Jacob had anyway. He still couldn’t believe Hannah knew about Bethany, although, she never spoke a word of her even when she was mentioned which was on a highly marked rare occasion.

“I like the rain,” he confirmed which was the truth, but not the one they both wanted.

“Mhmm,” Hannah gave a wide smug look and twisted her body side to side, waiting for his cracking point.

Reminding himself to not let his anger, his infamous temper unplug on her Paul rolled his eyes and turned away from her. Why she wanted to know, or why she was trying this hard was beyond Paul. After he waved his arm in her direction, telling her to give up; to drop it, he walked into the darkening forest.

Jacob, who’d been outside for the past two minutes made his appearance known by stomping down the stairs. His arms were high on his chest, he looked mad. When he came close to Hannah’s side, he told her that she better just go home. She agreed, seeing as she knew she shouldn’t have pestered Paul so badly to tell her anything. Handing Jacob Seth’s and his jacket, he told her to keep it for now, when he handed her the soaking wet cardigan.

“Sor—“

“Shh,” he placed a warm finger to her cold lips.

Since he didn’t want her to be upset on the drive back home, Jacob put on a façade; he twitched his lips into a convincing smile, and he looked down at her. Wrapping Hannah in his bear hug, she rubbed the side of her face along his dark blue shirt. He smelled like the outdoors mixed with his own smell that she wasn’t able to distinguish quite yet. But she liked it.

Jacob also got the hint when and before Hannah left, she turned her cheek when Jacob tried to kiss her. Dumbfounded as to what had happened between them, he rubbed the back of his head and turned to his friends whom stood watching the rejection on the front porch. He shrugged his shoulder and held his arms up as if saying, ‘I don’t know guys.’

That week at school went by pretty quickly, yet this Friday afternoon was lagging. Here Hannah sat in her statistics class doodling on the chart which was supposed to be for homework as the teacher basically gave the students the answer. The class only had twelve students in it, so Mrs. Larson seemed pretty lenient on the homework curriculum. “Finish the charts!” She yelled when the bell rang meaning that it was two fifteen and school was over.

As Hannah, with books cradled into her chest, walked to her grandparents’ truck she heard a faint noise calling her name. Spinning in the direction, of the voice she definitely didn’t want it to be Hannah shifted her foot to one side and waited while Edward finished asking her what she’d be doing this weekend.

“Why do you care?” Hannah said rather icily before throwing her belongings inside the back seat.

He took a moment to pause, but Hannah wouldn’t have noticed for he was captivating her by his intense stare. Breaking the contact Edward looked down at the uplifting gravel, “oh nothing.”

Shaking her head, unaware if he was really playing this game Hannah hooked to his wrist, and immediately let it fall at how cold he was. It was unhealthy for someone to be that cold and look as though they are fine. “No, what did you want?” Curiosity getting the better of her, that was until a familiar red car pulled in front of her and Edward’s little moment.

“Hannah,” Jake called from the window.

Much to her surprise Paul, Quil and Seth were with him. All of them smiling, until they laid eyes on Edward and narrowed them, like the snap of someone’s fingers they were all on edge; Jacob urging Hannah to come with him.

“Hannah is quite fine with me,” Edward leaned down beside her to look into the car in which four bulky guys actually sat comfortably. “Nice rig,” Edward eyed the car. Obviously being a smart ass.

“Nice face,” he spat. “But not for long,” he mumbled.

Leaning up and pulling Edward with her Hannah and out of eye view she said that they would hang another time, which made Jacob’s fist turn red with anger against his steering wheel.

Pleading Hannah to spend just one night with him, Jacob growled when Edwards hands cupped around Hannah’s. He had no fucking right to touch her. But why was he getting so protective? Hannah wasn’t his, even if it was clearly there that they liked one another.

“Here,” Hannah scribbled down a number onto a piece of paper, “call me tomorrow or something.”

Shaking his index finger like it were saying ‘no,’ Edward shook his head, “Tsk tsk, please write the correct number Miss Pierce.”

Changing the last two numbers to the correct ones, she crumpled it against his hard cold hand and asked if she was free to leave. Obligated to let her go with a bunch of dogs, Edward bowed and backwardly walked to his shiny car. Swiftly getting in, Hannah waited until he—quickly—drove away to go back to where Jacob impatiently sat.

Leaning her arms on the bottom of the opened window Hannah looked directly at Jacob before warily asking, “why are you guys here?”

“Because I told you we’d come get you Friday, don’t you remember?”

Mentally kicking herself, she licked her bottom lip and nodded her head; eyes closed, “yes. I’m sorry. Just a lot on my mind is all.”

“I’ll say,” Paul said leaning over. “That him?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, he’s handsome,” Paul made a kissing noise.

Shoving him against his seat Jacob barked, “stop it Paul,” then he turned to Hannah before adding, “meet us at my dad’s tonight around 7:30, there is something you need to know.”

All Hannah could think about was what they needed to tell her. Was it something bad? Was she going to want to leave in the middle of it? Why was she acting like she was PMSing right now? She rolled her eyes, before jumping onto the shower to clear her thoughts. Today was just a mess, Edward was more on her ass than the whole gang was altogether and it was starting to get annoying. Why he always had to be so close to her, she was desperate to know. But it shocked her to feel him, and she couldn’t stop thinking about that event today after school. He was like an arctic glacier.

It was now three forty five, and Hannah had two hours before dinner so she did the only homework she had to: Stats. Finishing fifteen minutes later, Hannah decided to put in a movie and watch that for a while. Yawning many times, she was shaken lightly by Maggie around six twenty when dinner was ready. It was chicken and potatoes. Simple but she loved her grandmothers cooking altogether.

“So got any plans tonight?” Maggie asked shifting around her food.

Hannah who’d barely taken three bites mumbled, “yes, with the boys.”

Finally catching what she said Maggie asked, “what are ya going to do?”

“Supposed to hear something, I’m leaving at seven to meet up with them.”

Nodding at her granddaughters tiredness, Maggie took her plate into the kitchen and walked outside where her husband, Addison, sat in a chair still skinning a piece of wood. This must have been a long piece of wood because Hannah remembered him skinning it weeks ago. Addison gave a short wave a soft smile to his granddaughter.

Nodding at her grandfathers orders Hannah reversed out of the gravel lot, and once she was out of ear-shot began to blast the radio. She was in the mood to hear some comforting music before being bombarded by the guys. After driving for ten minutes or so, Hannah found herself accidentally speeding. She knew damn well that she wasn’t in any hurry to get there, but there was also this gravitational pull that subconsciously made her drive faster. Maybe she just wanted to get this over with.

Finally making it to Billy’s, Hannah parked in her usual spot. There were two other trucks, so Hannah assumed this was the place and she was thankful because she didn’t feel the energy to walk through the dark forest right now. In the garage there were some clanking and loud metal hitting against metal noises. The light was dim, but it stood out among the darkening sky.

Peering into the somewhat huge space Hannah crossed her arms across her chest and rested her head on the frame of the garage. All of the guys were standing in a circle, obviously looking at something that had been laid out on the table. Except this group consisted of except Sam and Jared who must have had to stay at home, Hannah guessed.

Out of the group, Seth who’d been facing towards the entrance screamed, “Hannah!”

Running over to her, his arms squeezed around her neck. Hannah’s hands attempted to reach around his torso, but he had definitely grown since Monday. Seth wasn’t in the six feet range, but he still managed to tower over Hannah, who stood a mere five foot five.

“Hey Seth,” She said loudly with a laugh, “I’ve missed you!” She whispered honestly.

When Seth let go of Hannah, he linked her arm with his and pulled her over to the rest of the guys. Each of them giving her nice smiles except for Paul who wore nothing but a smirk, unless he was mad. But it even surprised Hannah when she looked at Paul right not to see he was indeed smiling back at her. Blushing to herself and hiding her hands in the sleeves of her hoodie Hannah stood in between Jacob and Paul.

“Mmm, is that you that smells so nice Hannah?” asked Quil sniffing the air.

Shaking his head at the obviousness, Embry slapped his friend, “of course. None of us could pull that off.”

Intimidated at the mini scene, Jacob cleared his throat and sneakily laid his hand on top of hers. Feeling the warmth of his hand on top of hers somehow sent a heat wave down each vein in her body and even though the cold wind blew inside the already freezing garage, Hannah was unable to tell because Jacob’s temperature. Plus, it helped standing in between Paul and Jake.

The others looked at him, clearly waiting for him to continue when there was a desperate howl from outside. The guys locked eyes with one another; Hannah being the only one to shoot erect and spin towards the wide open space. It was so dark at the entrance that she thought her mind was playing tricks on her when there was some sort of fast movement.

Grazing his lip nervously, Jacob deliberated about what to do. That call was most definitely Sam, and they needed to leave right away. But his father was over at Charlie’s—the sheriff of Forks. Delegating on the numerous options, Jacob told Hannah to go into his house and that Seth would stay with her.

Whining from missing out on the action once again, not because he had to stay with Hannah; although she didn’t know that Paul gave him some interaction. Paul came over and softly nudged his shoulder. “Just think, you have her all by yourself. No Jacob, nobody.” He was definitely torturing Seth.

“Why do you all have to leave?” Hannah grabbed onto Jacob’s hand, who was now standing by the garages’ doors.

“I’ll explain later,” He turned to face her and push his forehead carefully to hers.