Floss

“Go on, stop being such a grump and take you brother out.”

“I’m not being a grump – I’m trying to pass my A-levels and catch up on four years of high school.” Her brow lifts, the dark curve sarcastic and I sigh, shoving myself off my bed and slamming my laptop shut. “It’s fine Carrie, when I end up unemployed at thirty I guess I’ll have to share a room with the baby.”

“Won’t be a baby when you’re thirty will it though genius?” I glared hard at the other body that forced its way into my already cramped room. “Please, it’s just a lift.” The lower lip bulges a little, and his eyes do the same. “You want me to have friends, don’t you Floss?”

They’re both staring at me now, Teddy gangly and pouting, Carrie with her arms crossed over her bump. “For fuck sake, okay.”

“Language Florence.” She scolds, waddling from my room. I can hear her careful, heavy steps on the staircase.

“For goodness sake.” I retract, “Let me get dressed then you pain in the arse.”

“Thank you sister dearest.” He vanishes quickly, no doubt rushing to the phone to tell Seth he was indeed coming to visit. I wasn’t even sure how much they had spoken over the last few days but they were already thick as thieves. “I need to disconnect the playstation and stuff, meet you downstairs in ten?”

“Sure, sure.” I waved him off, smothering a yawn with my hand. It wasn’t really a bad thing that I was getting out of the house, not at all. I’d met my tutor for the second time today and the deadlines for my coursework had been brought forward to allow time for the paper copy to reach England as well. I hadn’t thought of that bit and now had two less weeks so I’d buried myself in my bedding and finished my second draft. I needed a break, desperately. I wanted to finish an email to a friend from home though, but that could wait until tomorrow morning. Regardless of her fancy satellite phone we had consistently missed each other and decided emailing was the way forward.

I didn’t bother to look out of the window, I could hear the gentle tapping of rain as it was and promise myself I will remember a heavy coat. “Ready?” Teddy knocked for a change, before sticking his head around, “Come on – we’re going to be late.”

“We’re?”

“Well… Emily was coming over to Seth's' and wanted to see you quickly?”

“Could you not have told me that before I put on the worlds scruffiest outfit?” He lets his eyes scan over me and his grin widens. “You look fine, come on.”

“I am coming.” I bark, jamming my foot more angrily in my boots and dragging my top off over my head. I replace it for a less horrific jumper, purposefully baggy. I don't feel great after dinner and fiddle desperately with my hair. I can hear Teddy grumbling to himself as he tries to unhook his precious playstation and know I don't have long. I wave him away as his footsteps near my door.

“Give me a minute!”

“No-one cares how you look.”

“I care!”

My Dad shouts up, we've finally had some good news and he was offered the position he had interviewed for the other day. He was starting next Monday, so was finding out as much relevant information before the weekend as possible. He had been as glued to his laptop this evening as I had. But he's trying to concentrate and we're annoying him. I allow myself some rude mutters under my breath and stomp down the stairs. “He's in your car.”

“Course he is. See you later.”

“Not too late, you've got school tomorrow.” Carrie sticks her head over the back of the sofa, “And then that's the first week down.” She beams, although she looks exhausted. She's nearing seven months now and the pregnancy is literally weighing her down. “Won't be long,” I promise although I realise as I'm grabbing a coat I need to find out if I'm expected to bring Teddy back.

He's fiddling with my limited CD collection again, “Am I supposed to be picking you up as well?” He shrugs at me, clearly he hasn't thought that far. “And it's only Thursday so you can't be there all night.”

“Well,” He checks behind for me as I reserve onto the road, “If Emily is there, why don't you just stay?”

I took my last thought back, clearly, this was his idea all along. “And does Emily, or Seth's Mum for that matter know I'm coming? I don't just want to invite myself in.”

“They know. Seth said to invite you.” This makes me laugh, and we take the turning for the road leading to La Push. “I feel way more tricked than invited.” He has the grace to look embarrassed for a few seconds but I'm not annoyed at him any more. I like Emily, I know Teddy likes Seth and I'd already told myself I needed a break. The drive is easy enough after that, Teddy fidgets as he does and we reach La Push in just under twenty minutes. I'd let him coax me into driving a little too fast a few times. “Right, where does Seth live then?”

His face drops. “Oh, erm...”

My irritation is nipping at me instantly, “Are you kidding? You don't even know where his house is?”

“He told me but I forgot.”

“Well remember then.”

“I'm trying.” He snaps, and I back off. His brow is creased, and his fingers keep moving as if to make a fist. He finds it hard enough to make things stick in his mind and I chew my lip. “Did he text it to you or anything?”

“No, no. I said I'd remember.” He grins but it's flustered. I feel myself pout, and bring the car to a stop, indicator flashing. An idea springs into my head easily, “Actually, wait, I've got Emily's number on my american phone.” I shift in my seat and yank it from my pocket. “Here, call her if she's with Seth.”

“Brilliant.” He flicks through my very short list of contacts and hits the button too hard, the click loud as I turn down the music. Emily obviously picks up and there's a few seconds where Teddy plays off his embarrassment fairly well and he's given an address. Teddy's ready to hang up when Emily clearly realises a street name is no help to us and asks for him to describe where we are now.

I don't know how she manages to realise, but she does quickly and Teddy keeps the phone glued to his ear, barking me a direction at the end of each street and a couple of minutes later we're closer to the beach and I see a familiar figure in the weakening light. “Yeah, we see you! Bye, bye.”

Seth's house looks bigger than the outside, but it's far more uniform. The shape and wood panelling all but identical to the buildings either side. He is closer to the beach though, and I can smell the salt in the air. La Push may even be more picturesque than Forks, the high green woodland coats one side whilst the sea meets the other.

I realise I'm daydreaming and climb from the car, watching Teddy struggle to heave out his heavy bag. “Hey guys.” Emily greets, hair flat from the drizzle in the air. I can hear the noise from the house before we're even on the front garden and feel that knot form again in my stomach. “Is everyone here?” If my voice betrays me she doesn't let it show.

“Almost,” Teddy has already gone in, absent of the nervous energy bubbling. I force soothing remarks through my mind. I had met them all before, I'd spent three days at a school where I had started off knowing nobody and that was going okay. Alice was a big part of that, admittedly we had that one lesson together a day but she'd sweet talked the teacher into letting us sit together and seemed to be a wealth of knowledge in the subject.

I sat beside Edward in English which was fine. We didn't speak much, and he always seemed to be overly polite with that now familiar smile lightly curving his lips. I liked them both though, and I was managing to get over the staring point with Edward. He very clearly wasn't my type, and if Bella was his then there was no chance there.

Not that there was anything wrong with Bella; she was nice enough but she seemed so clingy, so utterly dependant on him it was a little pathetic. My opinion in that respect hadn't improved where I had heard the gossip of how comatose she had been when Edward and his family had moved away for a few months.

I liked her friends better, Angela was quiet and quick-witted, although she was as sweet as anything. Jessica and Mike were alright, although he had been extremely over friendly so Jessica had been quite cold. Angela had hissed under her breath not to take it seriously, he had been the same when Bella had moved here but Jessica was usually very nice.

It wasn't hard to ignore Mike's affinity for new shiny things and he knew a lot about the local area and the woods, which was interesting. There was still a hint of tension in amongst it though, not including Angela and her boyfriend Ben who was so reminiscent of a boy I knew from home that I had to second guess and correct myself whenever I went to use the wrong name. Mike and Jessica were uneasy with Edward and Alice. Jessica likely because however much she pushed up her cleavage he didn't so much as glance at her and Alice well, I couldn't work out how someone couldn't like Alice. She was so nice, the only possible criticism was that she was too nice, maybe that was off-putting to some people.

Today was the first day I hadn't sat with them at lunch, and Alice's face had made me feel like a monster. I don't think I'd imagined her being a little less friendly than usual during last lesson.

People were people, and although there was still a mass of people I hadn't spoken too, I was already feeling a lot more comfortable at Forks high-school. As if on cue my phone buzzed, and I quickly glanced at it as we headed towards the house. It was from Jenny who I sat next to in biology. She was probably who I was closest to already, my own version of Seth. I was in the midst of tapping back when Emily caught the back of my jumper quickly, “Oh, careful.” I apologised instantly, having nearly walked straight into Jacob helping an older man in a wheelchair onto the driveway.

“No harm done.” The man assured me, smiling widely. It was so similar to that of the boy pushing him I knew instantly they were related. Jacob confirmed that, introducing me to his father Billy. They were just leaving, and Billy said something about the council. I nodded, the only thing I knew about the council was that they had been very iffy about us considering moving to La Push. Emily leant over to hug Billy, and then upon her tiptoes for Jacob and they left.

She could clearly sense my apprehension, “We're done with the council stuff. Billy was the last to go.” I follow her into the house, it's an open set plan and hot with the number of bodies.”Normally they like to meet on the beach, but Sue is taking on Harry's role a bit.” She continues, rolling her eyes as a couple of the guys' fight to plug in the play station. I let myself scan over the group, trying to reconnect faces to names.

I'm only about halfway through when I'm noticed and a loud barrage of greetings hit me. There are several questions about how our first week had been and I half answer them, losing attention as the games loads up and Seth and Teddy bag the first round. “Boys,” Emily complains.

“To be fair,” I allow, “It's a good game.”

“Which you suck at,” Teddy interjects loudly, although he swears with even more volume when he crashes his car on the circuit. “Cause you're way better.” I taunt, which gets a laugh.

“You want a drink?” Emily offers, waving off several pleas that overshadow my response. She shows me where the kitchen is and is looking for the juice when Leah enters. She looks far happier to see me than before and quickly grabs what we're looking for. “How's it been then?” Her voice is deeper than I expect, but her grin is impish. “Oh, erm, not as bad as I thought. School is school I guess.”

“Guess so. You went into senior year right?” I tell her I did, and she starts asking if I'm making friends and how that side is going. I feel a bit like I'm being interviewed, her questions are short, straight to the point. It's more an interrogation than a conversation and Emily frowns, both sides of her mouth now pointing down. “Yeah, that's been alright. Everyone's been really nice which I wasn't expecting. I mean I live a couple of doors down from one girl in my year Bella, and then her friends and...”

“Bella Swann?”

I scramble for her full name but nod, “Yes, do you know her?”

“You bet I do.” Her eyebrows lift now, “Unfortunately.” I feel my mouth make an o-shape.

“Leah.” Emily scolds, trying to take back the way this nice little talk is going. She twists, leaning on the counter to face me, “Bella and Jake used to be really close.”

“Until the leech came back and she chose him. Really hurt Jake. Only happened a couple of weeks ago.” I'm not sure why I'm being held responsible for this and I struggle for a comeback. There's a surprisingly dark look on Leah's strong features and part of me wants to shrug away. I don't need to, Sam appears, literally blocking out some of the light and with a simple shake of his head she leaves the room, although she's still sauntering. “Sorry about her.” Emily quickly murmurs, her look toward Sam is pointed.

“Leah can get a bit heated.” Sam explains, his tone condescending. I nod, if Leah was standing up for a friend then obviously she would dislike Bella's boyfriend. Leech was just an odd sense of words. There's some hissing in the living room, sharp tones tried to keep low enough not to reach us. That isn't working and Sam huffs, his shoulders tense. “Best stop Leah and Paul from murdering each other.”

“Or worse.” Emily trails and again my confused expression must betray me. She laughs now, melodically. The sound in the other room lessens, and Emily goes to lead me back through when someone else blocks the way. “Oh, Paul.” She sounds surprised, and quickly glances at me, “excuse me.” She squeezes past him, although he's nowhere near as wide as Sam and vanishes. Other than Teddy and Seth on their game the house is very quiet again.

“Oh, hi, erm...sorry. I didn't properly get to introduce myself the other day. I'm Paul.” There's a sense of trepidation in his words, so familiar that I smile a little. “Florence...hey.”

“Hey.” I suck on my lips, feeling hotter than ever. I'm embarrassed, feeling a bit attacked by Leah and far too anxious that the same may follow from Paul. It doesn't, “Sorry about Leah.” The only things I know about Paul are that he has an awful temperament and does not get on with Leah. The apology is unexpected but I thank him, still half-hoping Emily will come and save me from this awkward exchange. There's no sign of her though, and it's still too quiet in the living room like we're being listened too. I bite the bullet and look properly up at Paul, determined to make a good impression.

His eyes are so intense that mine drop again, resting on his collarbones which must be about level with my chin. I could feel my heart fluttering, uneasy, but at the same time... “Floss, come here and show me that cheat you saw!” Teddy breaks through my daze and I nod, before realizing he can't see me. “Give me a sec.” I call back, and my voice wavers. I glow with heat again, careful to avoid Paul's eyes as I ask him to excuse me and move past him.

My fingers brush against his bare arm.

If I'm hot that's nothing, he's the sun.