Defective - Jacob Black {1}

Chapter 9: Transformations

Three months later...

Three months had passed in a blur of sun and uneasy silences.

Only two weeks remained until summer ended—just fourteen days until the comfort of routine returned. School. Homework. Something to anchor me. And yet, this had been the most surreal summer of my life. Forks was flooded, constantly drenched in record-breaking rainfall. But La Push... La Push had basked under an unusual run of golden skies. The sea sparkled, salt-sweet and serene. Mornings glowed pale amber, and even the gulls seemed to cry out with more joy than usual.

But beneath that calm, something was off. Unsettling.

Tori had just left to spend the end of summer with her best friend's family in Port Townsend. And Mom? Her "quick two-month Miami project" had exploded into a full-blown career-defining success. Six months later, she was still there, freshly promoted, thrilled—and completely unaware that her eldest son had practically become a stranger.

So here I was. Alone in a house that didn't feel like home. Trapped between a father who lied too easily and a brother who no longer spoke to me. It didn't help that Jake had also left me for a week to go on a fishing trip with his dad... the lack of signal wherever he was felt like torture. 

Jesse and I... we existed in parallel. We crossed paths in shared spaces—on the beach, at bonfires—but we never collided. We didn't even make eye contact anymore. His moods had become volatile, explosive. Just a few weeks ago, he kicked the living room door clean off its hinges. I could still picture the jagged splinters and the stunned silence that followed.

Paul was worse. Always short-fused, but lately it was like walking past a lit match. He nearly assaulted a tourist just for looking at him sideways. Jared had gone quiet, withdrawn. He slipped from our group one day without a word. I asked about him once—Jesse didn't even blink. Just changed the subject.

There was an unspoken truth building between all of us. One that no one wanted to name.

And then Jesse disappeared.

Three full days. Not a word. Not a call. Not a trace.

Dad told me he was camping with Paul and Jared. Said it with a shrug, like it was nothing. But it was everything. They'd all been missing, not just Jesse. I could see the lie glinting behind his eyes every time I pressed him. His jaw would clench, his fingers would twitch. He barely touched his food. And at night, I heard him pacing, talking on the phone in a hushed voice. No one replied—just Dad, murmuring frantic words into a silence that felt heavier than anything I could understand.

I gave him two days.

The morning of the third, I exploded.

"You haven't even done anything!" I shouted, heart hammering in my chest as I blocked the doorway. "He's been gone for three days. You act like that's normal?"

Dad's voice snapped like a whip. "And what have you done, Aria? Besides throw tantrums?"

"I'll tell Uncle Charlie. He'll actually give a damn."

That got him. He stepped between me and the front door, a flicker of panic flashing across his face.

"I said I'll handle it."

I didn't believe him. I didn't trust that calm voice. Not when his eyes looked like they were screaming.

The silence that followed was suffocating.

I drifted around the house that morning like a ghost, barefoot on the cool floorboards, unable to sit still. The quiet had weight to it—like the air itself was holding its breath.