Her - Malia Tate

13. her

HER

"You're what?" Isaac almost didn't believe what I was telling him.

"Adopted. I'm adopted." I repeated what I had said before whilst tucking my hair behind my ear and lifting up the adoption documents to show him proof.

"What? How?" He stammered, coming further into my room and closing the door behind him.

"I don't know. But it's obviously possible." I told him, being reasonable.

He stared at me, gobsmacked, lost for words after finding out that I wasn't his real sister. "No." He ran a hand through his hair and pressed his lips together. "You can't be. We grew up together. You are my real sister. You can't be adopted."

"I'm sorry." I said, putting the documents back into the box and standing up from my somehow suddenly uncomfortable place on my bed beside Kira. "Look, I've only just found out. I-It's not like I've been hiding this from you our whole lives."

"What's going on?" Scott asked us as he stamped into my crowded bedroom. Well, it was crowded for me, I wasn't used to this.

"Bella's adopted." Isaac stated, rapidly turning his head around to face Scott as he said so.

"What? How?" Scott repeated exactly what Isaac had said about a minute beforehand.

"That's exactly what I said." Isaac muttered after hearing Scott.

"Look, I don't know where I came from. I don't know if my real parents are still alive. I don't know if I have any actual blood-related siblings. I don't know anything. Okay?" I tried to stay calm whilst talking to the three of them, their faces covered with confusion and shock.

"It's alright, it's alright." Scott attempted to calm me down, sitting me on the edge of my unmade bed and kneeling in front of me, comfort in his eyes. "You'll figure it out."

༊*·˚

"Are you sure you're okay? You're going through so much right now and I want to be here for you, I don't want to leave you." My 'brother' told me as he gathered the last few boxes and piled them up in Chris' car. Him and Chris were leaving to go to France. Chris needed to get out of Beacon Hills for the time being. He longed for a break. But Isaac had too much of a heart to let him go alone. So, he's decided to go along with him. I'm okay with it, I guess. I don't want to leave Beacon Hills anyways. I'm okay with it.

"Yes. I'm completely fine." I lied to Isaac as I put a box in the back of the car, "Go."

"Okay." He agreed before adding on, "There are a couple of boxes of Allison's belongings upstairs. I think you should have them. She would've wanted that. Trust me."

"Alright, I'll go have a look." I told him, followed by me heading back into the Argent's apartment one last time before we were to say our final goodbyes. I stepped into the empty hallway. The silence was calming. All that was heard were the creaking of the floorboards every step I took towards Allison's old bedroom. I approached her door and took a moment before turning the handle and walked inside. The comforting smell of the room reminded me of all of our memories in here, although we didn't have a lot, but I still treasured them. There were 2 boxes placed in the opposite corner of the room, where her wooden dressing table had previously stood in front of her window. The boxes weren't too heavy, well at least they weren't heavy enough for me to not be able to carry them. I made my way downstairs with the boxes and neared the car once more just as Isaac was about to open the passenger door.

"You're sure you're gonna be alright?" Isaac repeated his concern for me once more.

"I'm gonna be just fine." I reassured him whilst placing the boxes on the floor and opening the car door; gesturing for him to get in.

I closed the door behind him before he rolled down the window to say his final goodbye. "Bye."

"I love you." I told him, once again picking up the two boxes containing my dead best friends' belongings and tightening my grip on them.

"I love you too." He said. I moved my glance towards Chris who then gave me a small smile and a nod, me doing the same back to him before I watched his car drive off into the distance. My brother was gone. And I was doing moderately okay, I guess. Of course my life wasn't perfect. Who's is? But I hadn't lost everybody. And there was still a glimmer of hope left for me. And that hope for me was a girl. A girl called Malia.

༊*·˚

I walked at a normal pace through the school hallways towards my locker to get my book for next period. I know I hadn't been at school that much recently. But, it was still a drag. I approached my locker and put in my combination, 2 8 1 1, and quickly opened my locker. It was then when I heard an extremely familiar heartbeat coming closer towards me. "And here this is your locker." Coach explained as he stopped next to me. I grabbed my biology book and slammed my locker to see who Coach had been showing around and who was going to have their locker next to mine for the rest of high school. I turned to look at the person. And as soon as I did, I swear my heart skipped a beat. I am seriously not kidding. I'm 99.9% sure that that did happen when I saw the person standing beside me. It was Malia. I smiled at her and she smiled back softly. "Do you two know each other?"

"We're friends." We both said in sync as we looked at one another, real smiles placed upon both of our faces as we did so.

"Well I'm glad to see you won't have to struggle making friends here." Coach added on before taking Malia off to show he around more.

I watched as they both walked away. There was something about her.

Her. She was the hope.