Chapter Text
Jacob
The drive was long, but it provided something to keep at the foreground of my thoughts so I wouldn’t spiral like I normally do when I have nothing else better to do. Billy slept most of the way, so I just listened to my 80s music and zoned out. When he was awake, we had some small talk, but I was grateful that he didn’t try to bring up why I had been acting up. The views were nice, I always enjoyed the long drive over, the scenery didn’t change all that much but driving away from La Push always put me at ease, like I could breathe without the responsibility that held me there weighing down on me. The drive there goes from remote, narrow roads that are enclosed by what practically is a rainforest, the tall trees with handing moss, but as you get closer to Astoria, you start weaving down the road, seeing the Pacific again, the clouds that blanket the sky getting less thick, I’ve always liked seeing the small fishing towns and their gray marinas. When we stop for gas in Aberdeen and whatever old gas station I decide on, it’s like a breath of fresh air compared to Forks, so many more people, people who could care less who you are, people who don’t know your name. I like counting the numerous neon motel signs as we pass them to keep my mind preoccupied, my fingers tapping to the synth melodies of whatever song is playing, sometimes a lone bald eagle will fly along with the car which is cool, I count those too.
By the time you drive close to passing Cape Disappointment, you start seeing Washington melt into Oregon, massive river views underneath giant bridges, old maritime buildings, Victorian houses on slopes, and the sea mist. It’s my favorite part of driving up to the town through the Astoria-Megler Bridge with its long steel spans disappearing into the fog and gulls circling overhead. Driving through town you see the odd coffee shop in the various old buildings, antique stores with sea-weathered wood, but to get to Nikolai’s house you have to drive twenty minutes east, through the ‘down town’ area if you can even call it that and into the more wooded area of Astoria. It’s nice and quiet here, like La Push.
When we had arrived and driven up to Nikolai’s house, his truck was in his garage, meaning that girl is here. I close my door and round the car to help Billy out and into his wheel chair. I got his wheelchair out of the truck, unfold it and wheel it over to him. As I started to help him into his chair, we heard footsteps, but not wanting to drop him, I didn’t look up and kept on. I heard Nikolai before I saw the both of them.
“Billy! Velcome!” He shouted in his thick accent, happy to see us.
“Nik! It’s been so long! Still working on the Makah cabinetry?” Billy replied, rolling towards him, who had open arms, I moved out of the way so he wouldn’t have to get around me. They keep talking and catching up over some commissions that Nikolai has received and Billy mentions the food, he then turns to someone behind Nikolai.
“Ah, so you must be the granddaughter!” He says cheerfully. The girl, tall and lanky, with a red top and blue jeans that have seen some years, with a faded black zip up that seems to be someone else's shifted away, as if to make herself smaller behind her grandpa. She doesn’t look him in the eyes, her choppy, black hair falling over her face, it’s wet at some of the ends, but curls in waves , making the tips stick out in some places.
“We heard you were coming to stay! Have you settled in?” Billy asks
“Da. This is my Lesya.” He says, with a proud look on his face and pats her on her shoulder.
The mention of her name seems to make her want to cry, what has she been through? Jesus, it’s like watching a feral barn cat. Realizing she’s supposed to say something after a short awkward silence, she speaks up.
“H-hello, I’m Lesya. Yes, I just finished moving my stuff.” She says quietly, I smile a bit at her taking what he said literally rather than him asking how she was liking Oregon, I’ve been there.
“Well hello, Lesya! You must be the same age as my son, Jacob! Go on and say hello while your grandpa and I talk business before we get to eating the food we brought!” I freeze at my name. Fuck, dad, why do to do this to me now? I stare daggers at his back as he rolls away, talking to Nikolai. I don’t move, and she doesn’t move. Damn, this is awkward, I should say something, I open my mouth but she starts walking slowly over to me with her head still down, she walks oddly, like a fawn learning to walk, doing a weird flexing motion with her wrists, tugging at her sleeves. By the time she stops, too close for comfort for a stranger I just met, I consider taking a step back, but she lifts her hand for what I think is a handshake, her sleeves that she was pulling at lifting up her arm, revealing a skinny, white wrist.
“Hi,” She says impossibly quietly, “I’m—Lesya.” She stutters, still looking down. What a weird girl, maybe she’s socially inept, I dunno.
I look at her thin hand for a second and then lift my hand to shake hers. Seeing as how shy she seems, a firm handshake wouldn’t do her any good, so I lift it up slowly and concentrate on shaking it gently. The moment my fingers graze hers, I feel it. Cold, weird and unnatural cold. I can feel my heart stop, oh fuck, not another one. But I take another second and breathe in, wait…there’s no sickly sweet smell of roses covering up death. It was more of a combination of rain-damp fabric, faint soap, cedar, old paper with a stress-scent cutting through it all, it was comforting, like the woods. Bella smells like—no. I’m not doing that, focus on the girl, focus on the girl, focus on her hand, the top of her head, something, anything but her. We shake hands, and while I’m wondering what she looks like, since she hasn’t looked up yet, I try to think of something to say after while we wait for Billy and Nikolai.
Maybe I’ll ask her if she likes the rain, or the forests, or— She suddenly looks up at me, locking eyes with mine. I blink. Something's off, I can’t tell what exactly, but something is. Her dark grey eyes seem to stare straight into me, I stare back, underneath her thick, curling lashes, she has flecks of brown around her pupils, there’s an understanding in them that bothers me. I break eye contact for a second to examine her face, she has sparse freckles right below the corners of her eyes and deep eyebags, as if she’s never slept in her entire short life. She’s…she’s just as tired as me, maybe in another way but still… I don’t know what to think, I don’t know what to say, she’s got me trapped in her eyes. My shoulders drop slightly and my hand loosens, to which she lets go, breaking eye contact. I look down at my hand and can almost see the supernatural heat rushing back into it— oh, she noticed. Fuck.
“I-I’m sorry I forgot to introduce myself-” Realizing that I hadn’t done what she had and somehow forgot and was apologizing for I corrected it.
“You actually didn’t.” I try to smile, but realize that it came across as rude since she drops her arm and looks down, tapping her arm against her leg.
“R-right, sorry.” She stammered. Oh no, she probably thinks I’m a piece of shit.
“What are you apologizing so much for? It’s fine. I’m Jacob by the way. You took my line, Lesya, I’m the one who forgot to introduce myself…I am saying your name right, right?” I laugh a bit as I reply, trying to show her I’m not rude. Her name feels weird to say, I don’t know why, it’s not that hard to get. She blinks at me.
“Y-yeah… yeah, you are.” She says as she nods her head, I breathe a sigh of relief in my head.
I try to think of something else to say to make her more comfortable. “You, uh…” My voice falters, knowing that once I say this, my body heat will be brought up, but I need to try and make it seem natural. “Always that cold?” I ask, eyeing her wet hair as I do, then looking away in disbelief with myself. Why do I care about a stranger so much?
“Yeah… guess you’re the opposite, huh?” She counters, nervously laughing, I try not to show that it makes me nervous that she knows and straightens up a bit.
“Yeah. Yeah I guess I do.” I say, exhaling a short breath out of my nose.
Silence starts creeping in and awkwardness soon follows, she seems like she wants to leave, but dad’ll kill me if I don’t at least try small talk.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to stare— before I mean.” My voice cracks. For the first time in months my voice betrayed me. Damn it all. “It must’ve been uncomfortable, so I apologize.” I clear my throat a bit, and see the corner of her mouth twitch. Great, now I’ve embarrassed myself in front of her.
“It’s fine. Only natural I guess. You know, new girl and everything.” She rolls her eyes as she says this. Wait, how have I never noticed her accent before this moment? It’s not anything crazy thick and unintelligible, but rather her drawl appeared in flashes: a stretched vowel here, a softened ending there, gentle as breath. A faint Appalachian cadence threaded through her voice, easy and unhurried like creek water over a stone. Her voice is low and gravelly for a girl, quiet, but maybe that’s due to being shy around a new person. Bella's is quiet too, but more soft, and equally hesitant. I wonder if Bella’s voice had an— damn it, why do I keep doing this? I look at her again to try and forget the thoughts about Bella. It’s not fair to Lesya for me to compare her to a girl she’s never met and will probably never meet. I should give her a chance to show me her personality before chalking her up to being a budget Bella Swan.
“So Didyc says you know motorcycles?” Her wary voice snaps me out of my thoughts, I meet her eyes again. Wow, they’re really grey, they’re almost— I blink, right, she asked me a question.
“Didyc? Ooooh, you mean Nikolai. Yeah I do, I know cars too. I work in a body shop back on the Res.” I say, excited to talk about something I’m good at for a change, something I won’t embarrass myself trying to talk about. I try to restrain my willingness to do so in order not to scare her, since she still seems like she could run at any moment.
“Well…I’ve been wanting to build my own motorcycle and I was wondering if you could help me get started, since, you know, I don’t know anyone else ‘round these parts.” I freeze. The mention of the motorcycle build stings, like salt getting rubbed into a fresh wound. Flashes of memories of Bella and I building the two pieces of shit bikes that she salvaged to rebuild. The memories still hurt with the knowledge of her using me to get over the blood sucker, her making me think I had a chance, only to leave me for him once he decided he wanted her back. I really don’t want to go through another build again, I’ve even been avoiding motorcycle requests back at the shop.
“I could help, but seeing as I live four hours away I don’t know if I could be that much of a help..” I say, trying to politely decline, running my hand through my hair to try and soothe myself, and hide my trembling hand.
“Four hours? Damn. Well I guess it was worth a try, thanks anyway. I guess I’ll figure it out eventually.” She smiles, but it’s more polite than genuine, she seems to have been let down at my response, which makes guilt stab at me. But something about her reaction interests me, she doesn’t push to know why I don’t want to. Even the guys back at the garage do, to which I always have to make up an obvious bullshit excuse, and after they push more, I try another one to back up my initial excuse. But she gave up immediately, no begging or putting, even though it seems like she really wanted it to work out. Against my better judgement I get curious. Why does she want to build a motorcycle of all things? I want to know, but I can see her shutting down.
“Well, it’s okay though I guess I’ll—” Fuck. Fuck it all.
“I mean—it’s not impossible.” Jacob Black, you fucking idiot.
“What?” She snaps her head up to look at me in surprise at the rescinding of my rejection, her eyes wide.
“The build, I mean. What kind are you thinking of building?”
“Uh…I dunno. Something old maybe?” She says, looking off to the side, clearly embarrassed at not having the specs. I smile at her reaction, I must admit from what I’ve seen, she can be quite endearing. I decided to make her feel better.
“Old like vintage old or old like Craigslist deathtrap old?” I’m grinning now, this is fun. And then, out of the blue, a smile splits across her face, and she laughs. For the first time throughout our short conversation, I managed to make her laugh. And it’s a pretty one at that, her laugh reveals two deep dimples on either side of her cheeks, and a third on her upper right cheek, her freckles raised and more noticeable, pink tinging the apples of her cheek, matching her nose.
“Yeah, definitely Craigslist deathtrap old.” She says sarcastically, still laughing. I laugh at her response. “I just want something that’s mine for the first time, y’know? I never had anything like that, plus if I build it, I’ll know it, and it’ll know me too.” I stare at her. So this is why, it makes sense, I’m the same way about my Rabbit.
“Stupid, ain’t it?” She quietly asks, making me frown. Why would she say that?
“I don’t think it’s stupid.” I say, seriously now. It bothers that she puts herself down like that, since I feel the same way about the Rabbit, I wouldn’t agree with her question.
“Huh?” She looks shocked at my answer, searching my face for some sort of lie, finding none.
“I get it, trust me.” I say softly, continuing. “I couldn’t come everyday, but I could come every three days or at least once a week.”
She looks at me oddly, the question of why clear across her face.
“Sooo…what’s the catch?” She asks cautiously, which slightly offends me. What kind of person does she take me for?
“Catch? There’s no catch. I just want to help.” I reply
“Oh. Well then, thank you. I appreciate your help.” She smiles again.
I smile in reply and want to ask her why she thought there’d be a catch, but before I can, we hear Billy and Nikolai approaching the house, guess it’s our cue.
“Looks like they’re done, want to go inside?” She turns to me and asks me, before walking around the Rabbit and towards the garage.
“Yeah- Oh shit, the food let me get that real quick, and I’ll be right there.” I say as I quickly open the back door to the Rabbit and get the three paper bags with the fish fry and the fry bread. Surprisingly, she stands there, waiting for me to finish getting the food. Once I get it all, I slightly run so as to not keep her waiting. We start walking through the hallway towards the front door. Right before we approach the large red door, she stops.
“Do you need any help with the bags?” She asks, eyeing one of the paper bags.
“Nah, I’ve got it. I’m much stranger than I look.” I joke, she giggles and opens the door for me.
As we enter the foyer, she quickly takes off her shoes and promptly grabs the bags from my hands and sets them on the kitchen counter, allowing me to take my shoes off, which I quietly appreciate. She’s very considerate, I’ve noticed. I walk over to where she is and help her unpack it all, and I turn on the oven to preheat to the correct temperature and place the seasonal root vegetables that I thought to grab last minute before we left in the fridge. Lesya wasn’t familiar where the appliances’ were so I pointed them out for her for her future use to which she thanked me, which felt nice, it’s nice to feel useful for something wolf-unrelated for once. Billy and Nikolai were talking in the living room, Nikolai in his usual recliner, they were watching some baseball game that was on TV.
“Um…Jacob?” I turned towards her, it was the first time she used my name. It caused a weird feeling in my stomach that I didn’t have a name for. Cool. Awesome. I always love therandom unamed feelings. Maybe it was because of how her Appalachian accent curled around my name as she said it, but it made my stomach flip a bit when I met her grey eyes again, they were dark and turbulent.
“Y-yeah?” I replied, can’t help but stutter.
“When are… the woman and the boy coming? I haven’t seen them all day.” She asks quietly.
“Woman and boy? Who—” Oh shit. She’s talking about Mariya and Nicky. How the hell? Does she not know? How do I tell her? Do I even have a right? But if she asks Nikolai it could be bad…damn it. I gently take her by the arm, damn even her arm is cool to the touch, and pull her towards the fridge, farthest in the kitchen from the living room and turn towards the counter, leaning closer to her. Greeted by her scent again.
“Mariya and Nicky…. they passed away eight years ago,” Her eyes widened at the news. “There was a really bad accident, only Nikolai survived.” I whisper.
“Then why— Oh God, the rooms. The dust makes so much sense now.” She says quieter than me, covering her mouth at the realization, I look at her, knowing the pained look I have on my face is clear.
“It’s best if you don’t mention them, alright?” I whisper. She only nodes in response, hand still over her mouth.
The oven beeps and I walk over to place the fry bread and fish fry inside. I turn to Lesya to ask her to get the Cattails and Fool’s Onion out of the fridge, only to see her still standing there, still shocked. Shit, I’ve gotta fix this before the others notice. Gently placing my hand on her shoulder which makes her freeze, but with a pleading look in my eyes, I lead her towards the foyer.
“I think I might’ve forgotten something in the Rabbit, Lesya, do you mind coming with me to check?” I say loud enough for Billy and Nikolai to hear, then nudge her to do the same.
“S-sure thing.” She says louder than I’ve heard her all day, still rattled with the new information.
I led the way out of the front door, not wanting to make her feel cornered. It’s silent as we walk to the garage. I stop at the truck and turn around, seeing her standing there, arms tightly crossed over her chest, almost hugging herself. Her breathing is shallow, I lean against the truck cab and tap the side of it gently, to tell her to do the same. She shuffles over to it and leans against it, then sides down and sits with her knees to her chest. I let the silence sit for a while, hearing her breathing even out, I squatted down to her eye level.
“Hey.” I quietly say.
She peeks at me through her black hair, swallowing hard as if she was trying not to cry.
“Hi.” She whispers so quietly that if I didn’t have my heightened hearing, I would barely catch it.
“It’s not your fault, you know. You didn’t know.” I say gently.
Silence stretches as her breath hitches. I let her have the moment to collect herself.
“There were so many signs I— How could I not know? The calendars, the rooms covered in dust, how could I not—” Her voice catches.
“Hey, hey. It’s okay.” I softly say scooting an inch closer. She doesn’t scoot away, so that’s a good sign. “You keep getting this look like someone’s going to yell at you Lesya, no one is mad at you, it’s okay.”
“But…I was so close. I was so close to asking if they’d come for dinner.” Her voice wavers and cracks. “If you hadn’t—” She stops again, not wanting to keep going.
“But you didn’t, did you?” I ask. She shakes her head slowly. “Right. So you’re fine. Now you know, and he won’t get hurt. It’s all good, Lesya.” I reassure her gently. “We can sit here for a bit until you feel up to going back inside, okay?”
She nods, lip quivering. I sigh in relief and turn back to look at the garage wall and its counter full of tools and random sticky notes, my head against the truck.
After a while, I hear her breathing relax so I get up from my squat and reach out a hand to help her up, she looks at it, and then up at me.
“All that sitting on the cold ground isn’t good for you, we don’t want you to get sick or else it’ll be my head on the line.” I say, smiling, trying to make her feel better. I can see the faintest smile tug at her lips so I take it as a good sign. She takes my hand and I pull her up, making sure I don’t pull too hard. She dusts her pants off and takes the sign, starts walking down the hallway, she follows after and closes the garage door behind her. Right before I turn the front door handle, I hear her voice.
“Jacob?” My stomach flips again. I turn around to see her next to me.
“Yeah?” I say, unintentionally quiet.
“Thank you.” She says, louder than my own reply, I smile, glad that I could help her.
“Well that’s certainly better to hear than ‘Sorry’.”
“I’m being serious.” She says, wait— is she…pouting? I can’t help but grin now.
“No problem. I don’t mind at all.” I open the door and wait for her to enter first, before closing the door after me and taking my shoes off. It feels good to help someone through it. If only I could give myself the same grace.
“Son?” Billy calls out from the living room. “Did you find what you were looking for?”
Oh right, that. I almost forgot about my excuse.
“No, Lesya and I looked all over the car and couldn’t find it, I think I left it at the house.” I reply, going into the kitchen, finding Lesya taking out the fish fry and fry bread out of the oven. I go to the fridge and get the Cattails and Fool’s onion out, chop them into the size of asparagus and fry them up really quick, showing Lesya where the oil and other spices are. With the food finished, I place it in serving dishes while Lesya sets the table with four places. Good thing I told her before she set six. We all sat down and were ready to eat. I had moved a chair to the mini bar on the side of the kitchen counter for my dad to sit at the table. We passed around the serving dishes and filled our plates. We started to eat except Lesya, who before she started, bowed her head and quickly made a silent prayer. I stopped eating out of respect, but it seemed as if Billy and Nikolai hadn’t noticed.
After the whole garage thing, Lesya seemed to have warmed up to me and in turn, to Billy, so there was light-hearted conversation. I kept steering the conversation to lighter, superficial topics, unsure of what would bother her. She looked at me only once, and mouthed a thank you. I smiled. I like that I’m useful to her. Two hours before sundown, Billy decided it was time to go, to which I was grateful, since I don’t like driving in the dark for too long. Lesya and Nikolai follow us out to the Rabbit and wave as we pull out. As we cross into the Astoria township, Billy breaks the silence that only quiet 80s rock was filling.
“So are you going to help the girl with the motorcycle build?” He says, staring out the windshield. I look at him, surprised he knows about that.
“Yeah, Nikolai doesn’t know much about motorcycles, so I thought I could help.” I say, staring out at the road.
“Nik told me about it.” Billy chuckles “He said it was the first thing Lesya asked him unprompted. The girl knows what she wants.”
I smile at the thought. Yeah. She does. I drum my fingers against the steering wheel and hum along to the song that’s playing, already mentally sorting through parts I could salvage for the bike build, what tools she’d need, she probably doesn’t have money, so I’m going to try and make this easy for her. The thoughts come so naturally, I don’t even notice that they’ve overtaken my spiralling ones about Bella. Billy gives me a sidelong look, like he’s noticed something.
“What?” I have a question.
He only laughs in response, and looks toward the road before I can ask anything else. Fair. He didn’t ask me any ‘what’s wrong with you’ questions on the way here, so I’ll let him have this.
I wonder if she likes 80s music.