Turning Page - A Jasper Hale story

Chapter Two

That summer in Forks passed by in a flash. Jude spent the majority of the vacation time with her friends, or working at the diner. She enjoyed the almost carefree attitude that the summer allowed and so used every minute to her advantage.

They had done all sorts with their summer, explored so many places in their own hometown and, yet, had never come across the supposed new arrivals from the first night of summer. The group had taken to tease Eric and Angela over it, suggesting that they were hallucinating - it had become an on going joke between the five friends, and the small group from La Push often joined in too.

As the first day of school rolled back around, the sky above the town of Forks felt that a spot of pathetic fallacy was apt - and so it was raining. Heavily. The heavy, grey clouds had brought non-stop rain to the town and Jude was not happy about it. She loved the rain, don't get me wrong, but the trip from the front door to the door of her car had her soaked through. And nobody likes the feeling of wet clothes.

As she pulled into a space in the car park of Forks High, her Volkswagen Beetle rumbled, as if foreshadowing the school day ahead. The car shuddered to a stop and Jude braced herself to exit into the cold and rain.

She was shocked by the doors of the car being yanked open and her friends piling inside - she let out a shriek before realising who it was. Her eyebrows furrowed in confusion, looking over each of her friends, hoping for an explanation. Needless to say, this was an unusual occurrence.

"To what do I owe the pleasure?" Jude asked sarcastically, after minutes of watching her friends gawp out of the windows. She assumed they were gawping at the weather, although, she was unsure why - rain like this was not unusual.

"Look," Angela whispered from the back seat, turning Jude's shoulders back towards the front of the car, subtly pointing into the carpark and through the deluge. Five strangers stood beside the bonnet of a large, shiny Volvo. They did not talk amongst themselves, nor did they interact with any of the other students.

Jude gasped. They were beautiful, nobody could deny that. They were all stunning.

"Who are they?" she asked, eyes scanning their features individually, eyes hovering for longer on the male furthest to the right. He looked incredibly uncomfortable, almost... in pain, she thought. But he was still undeniably beautiful. He had curly, golden hair with unusual golden eyes to match. They all wore, mostly, white - apart from the boy with bronze hair who stood a few steps further away from the others. 

"Apparently," Jess answered, her hobby as a gossip serving her well today, "there's a new doctor in town. Just moved this summer with his wife. They're their kids - all adopted." Jess raised her eyebrows at the last sentence. "He must be selective with who he adopts though," she laughed, "they're all gorgeous."

The others laughed, nodding along to Jess's observation, before climbing from the car again - gossip session complete. Jude emerged with them, pulling her bag from the trunk and opening an umbrella. She took the opportunity to glance over her shoulder at the newcomers, curiosity and excitement swelling in her stomach.

She found the blonde boy staring back at her, small smirk on his lips. Her face flushed as she looked away quickly, mortified that she had been caught admiring him. 

'Oh god,' she thought, 'he probably thinks I'm gawking at him because he's new but he's just really... really pretty.'

She looked back over again, and this time found all of them staring. The boy with bronze hair was chortling lightly, smiling at her in a way she couldn't quite decipher. 

'Was it condescension or politeness?'

She couldn't quite tell.

The smallest girl, who had short, black hair, smiled at her brightly. Jude felt slightly unsettled by the attention, but smiled back politely.