Bella's Little Sister

Chapter 1

A/N: In this story, Bella is eighteen years old and completing her senior year of high school. Jess is seventeen, and in her junior year, going on her senior year. Also, they were both born in September, just for the sake of the timeline.

As I stood in the blistering, sweltering heat of Phoenix, Arizona, I wondered why I had agreed to pack up nearly everything I owned and move to the state of Washington with my older sister, Bella. Being a year older than I was-she was eighteen-Bella was finishing up her senior year of high school. With her slim figure and brown hair with eyes to match, she was no doubt beautiful. Bella certainly got her looks from our father.

I, on the other hand, looked a bit more like our mother. My hair was blonde, though many of the strands were an auburn color. I had hazel eyes and, like my sister, a slim figure.

We would settle in a small town named Forks where our father currently resided. The heat of the sun, despite its constant power to drain me of energy every time I stood in its light, almost made me regret going... almost.

The reason for this was because I did not enjoy the cold in any way, shape, or form. Phoenix was warm and sunny; Forks, on the other hand, was almost always shrouded in rain. Which wouldn't be a problem for me if it weren't for one small detail-the chill of the air the weather always brought with it.

But of course, I knew my sister and I were doing this for a reason. Our mother, Renée-erratic, hare-brained, and constantly forgetful about paying the bills and making her appointments on time-had gotten remarried to a guy named Phil Dwyer. Phil was a minor-league baseball player, and he traveled around the country more often than he was home. And while I had never actually spoken to Phil before, I felt he was an all-around nice guy.

So, clutching the small potted cactus I had dug up from the garden in the front yard-I wanted to at least have some part of home with me-I took a deep breath and reluctantly made my way across the yard to where my sister and mother were standing, saying their goodbyes.

Bella met my gaze as I neared them, giving me a grateful and yet apologetic smile for what I was about to do. My mother pulled me in for a quick embrace; she would not be going to the airport with Bella and I. Phil, instead, would be driving us.

Stepping back from my mother, I turned my eyes to where Phil stood at the rear of the car, loading our suitcases into the trunk. He wore a baseball cap and khaki shorts, with a green t-shirt and tennis shoes. Phil moved away from the vehicle and held up his hands in an almost impatient gesture.

"Guys, come on. I love you all, but we got a plane to catch."

Bella and Phil made conversation as we made our way to the airport. I, however, remained silent throughout the entirety of the drive. I was not one for conversation, and had not been for a long time. It had been years-almost six to be exact-since I had last spoken a word to anyone. So with my favorite playlist blaring through my headphones, and the windows down to allow a cool breeze to fill the car, I watched the desert scenery pass us by, knowing it wouldn't be long until a new change of scenery became my constant view.

Grey and green. That's all I saw from my position in the backseat of my father's police cruiser-he was chief of police to the 1,320 people of Forks-as we drove through town. Bella was in the passenger seat, talking with dad about unimportant things, such as what we had been up to in the past couple of years, and how the weather in Phoenix had been.

Dad would occasionally ask me a question, but Bella always answered for me. It wasn't like I would have heard him well anyway, for my music was yet again coming through my headphones at almost too high a volume. Bella tried to keep her voice quiet in an effort to keep me from hearing what she said, though it didn't do much good. Despite the volume of my music, I still heard her telling dad about how I hadn't spoken to anyone in almost six years.