Life as I Know It

Chapter 2

Previously...

I sighed and just spat it out. "He treats you like shit and you keep going back to him. Even though I've told you, everyone else has told you to move on. You can't stand to be alone but yet you choose an asshole like him? I could go out, I could have a life of my own, but what's going to happen to you? Who's going to save you when he breaks your heart again?"

SLAP!!

My hand automatically went to my burning cheek, tears clouding my sight. My breath caught in my stomach, along with my shattered heart. "I hate you."

~oOo~

You ever feel like no matter how hard you try, no matter how many good things you do, no matter how many good grades or compliments you get, you still can't get out of this rut in the pit of your stomach?

Like you just can't get enough of doing the same thing over and over, but you're comfortable that way, so you just follow along anyway, just to see if something different happens?

Well. If you haven't, good for you. If you have, welcome to the club.

I, Bella Swan, am what people call a homebody. I'm shy, sensitive, a wallflower, basic, short girl with glasses and dreams of being a writer. But with an overbearing mother, my dad Charlie who lives in Texas whom I hardly see, and a controlling older sister, it's a wonder that I have a say in anything at all.

My life isn't bad or abusive, it's just not as well thought out as I thought it would be. After high school, I went to a private university for my freshman year, with aspirations of becoming somebody worthwhile. But that all changed when I couldn't afford to go there anymore and transferred to a community college. It was alright; I graduated with an AA in English Lit, made a few friends there. But with all of the workload I was given, I got exhausted too easily and took a break for six months after I graduated, got a lowly mall job (two, in fact, I'm on my second one now) and I feel like my whole family resents me for it. They don't say it to my face, but I can feel it, and it kills me. It kills me that we all feel this way.

Luckily, I have my two closest friends from high school, Alice and Angela, who keep me sane. And I have an amazing next-door neighbor whom I've been crushing on hard since eighth grade: Edward Cullen.

He's tall, dark, handsome, and the sweetest big brother on the planet. His older brother Emmett went to join the military, so Edward had to basically raise his deaf younger brother Jasper while their parents worked in the science labs across town. We met when I was a freshman in high school, and he was a junior. I'd thought he'd be a punk-ass like Emmett, but he actually wasn't, which I'd thought was refreshing. I'd loved the way his deep, green eyes sparked up when he'd talk about Jasper, which made me fall for him even more.

I wish I was brave like him. Hell, I wish I was brave like half the people I look up to. I wish I was different than myself.