Chapter one~

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I look out of the windows of my small car into to the pouring rain.

The signpost on the side of the motorway is just visible through the dreary mist, declaring that we are two miles away from a place called Forks. Well, not that I'm with anyone except my trusty car, a second hand Mini Cooper that I love and have pooled my savings into for my stay in the US. I'm English, I don't drive fast on the highway or sit on couches, I'd prefer to be in my small house in a town in West England, reading in my single cosy armchair with a cup of hot tea. Oh and that's another thing, it's not like all the English drink tea, both of my friends hate it, yet my country is classified as main drinker of tea anyway.

My phone rings and I put it on speaker, it's not as if we're moving anyway; the rain must be causing all this traffic.

"Hello?" I ask.

"Victoria? Is that you." A clear female voice asks.

I smile, it's my friend Kelsey. She's intelligent, very much so, but still fun. However, she's often busy with her job in London in a university laboratory, so we don't hang out that much. She also calls me Victoria, the only other person except for my parents. It's not like I dislike my name, I just find it too regal, as if it doesn't suit me. Everybody else that I know calls me Ria, which I like a lot more. I'm training to be a doctor, I used to work in marketing, but then returned to what I studied at university. I feel like this job will suit me better than my previous one, and I've loved all of my training courses so far.

"Hi, Kels." I reply. "What're you up to?"

"Oh, I'm just in the lab, but I wanted to call to ask how you are? Have you reached Port Angeles yet?"

"No." I sigh. "But I think it looks nicer in pictures than in real life. It's pouring with rain."

It's true, the pictures I'd seen online were of a small sunny town right next to the sea. It had looked really nice. I'd always liked settlements near the ocean.

"Yes, the coastal arrangement around there is interesting, with the global currents hitting the coastline and the prevailing winds from the ocean, it's an arrangement that causes not only frontal rainfall but-"

"Sorry Kelsey, but I need to focus on what I'm going to do when I get there, not how clouds are formed." I say, only slightly apologetic. I hate geography.

She sounds slightly disappointed. "Okay. So what are you going to say to the roommate you've never even met when you first meet her?"

I sigh. "I don't even know, we've literally had one conversation over email, I have no idea what she even looks like." I've been worrying about this for a while, my 6 month stay with an unknown girl in Washington, on the Olympic Peninsula, in a country I'm not familiar with.

"You'll be okay, you're not a massive extrovert, but even if you don't get on, you'll probably have lots of stuff to do at work." Kelsey laughs. She knows how much I've been waiting to start my training in action period at Port Angeles' emergency center.

"Yes!" I say excitedly. "Medicine is complicated, I know quite a bit, but there's always more. I don't think Port Angeles' center gets a lot patients coming in, but it's a good place to start."

"Yes," Kelsey says distractedly. "I've got to go. Sorry, we are testing blood with a few cancerous cells in with a variety of chemicals and the results are almost ready. Bye!"

"Bye!" I tell her and reach forward to turn the music on in my car. A piano piece drifts through the car, one of my favourites.

A car horn blares behind me and I glare into the wing mirror. They're disturbing my music. A car speeds past me, way too fast, and I'm annoyed. Somebody's going to end up hurt. I would love to test my doctors knowledge out but I really don't want anybody in pain. I guess that's a little hypocritical. Well it's not like I can do anything about this car now. It's gone. I didn't even memorise the plate.

A new song drifts throughout the car and I smile. The main thing I do in my spare time is dance, and this is another thing Kelsey and I have in common. However, I'm a lyrical and contemporary dancer, maybe with some acrobatics thrown in here and there, whilst Kelsey is strictly ballet.

When I dance I forget my troubles and I feel the emotions in the music instead of my own. I've always loved to move and dancing makes me happy, almost light. I meet up with a squad every Saturday and Wednesday evening, and we have a lot of fun, creating routines and sometimes entering shows or competitions. I have a solo that I've been working on lately and it's flowing but dark, one of the best dance routines I think I've ever created. It's to the song that's currently playing in my Mini, 'A Thousand Years' by Christina Perri. I feel like the solo reflects a part of me - a side I usually keep hidden, a side I'm afraid of. But when the past comes out in my dance, I'm no longer afraid. I let it all out and it wraps around me, in my own world where it can't hurt, just be channeled through me into the world.

As the song finishes I decide I'm going to have a break from driving and stop in the town of Forks. It's small, and there's only one main diner and a coffee shop, which I enter. It's nice to get out of the pouring rain and I love the warm aroma of different teas and coffee inside.

"You new in town?" The lady at the cash register asks me. Forks must be a very small town for her to pick up on that.

"I'm just passing by," I smile. "I'm headed to a place called Port Angeles, do you know it?"

"Oh yes." The woman says warmly. "It's not to far from here. You on holiday? We don't get many English round here, I love the accent!"

"Oh thank you! To me you're the one with an accent, but I like yours too. I'm actually staying in Port Angeles for half a year, practicing medicine." I reply.

"Well then, you should come by Forks some time. There's a hospital here too, probably bigger than the Port Angeles one now I think about it. Sorry, I got sidetracked. You hungry?"

"Oh, then I'll be sure to come by. I'm not that hungry, could I just have a tea?" I ask her.

"Of course. Guessing you want lots of milk in there?"

"Yes please." I smile. I can never say no to milky tea, it's my comfort.

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I'm back in the car again and the rain has finally decided to calm down. The woman in the coffee shop, Ellice, gave me advice about a dance studio in Forks. She said it doesn't even get used very much. I feel as if I might have to change that!

There's a queue to pull out of the junction back onto the motorway. Or should I say highway now I'm in America? I hear a horn blare far behind me and pull out. I'm moving forwards when a movement in the wing mirror catches my eye. I barely have time to widen my eyes before the pickup truck crashes into me. He was going so fast! I'm sure it's the same car I saw speeding before stopping in Forks, but why is he going down the same stretch of road again?

As the car hits my Mini I'm jerked forwards, the airbags exploding out. I'm flung to the side and my back hits the edge of the seat at a weird angle. There's a resounding crack and I scream. It was the sharpest pain I've ever felt in my life but now there's nothing. It was like a gunshot wound but now I'm numb. Something's very wrong. My head hits the roof and a sickening pain flares through my skull as we finally come to a standstill. I can't move. I can hear broken glass. The worlds black and then fuzzy and tears are coming out of my eyes. I can hear my heart drumming in my ears. It hurts. There's screaming. People are screaming. Or is it me? I don't know.

There's sirens, I'm being moved, pulled, and glass snags my clothes. I can't feel it.

The world's tilting.

Dance.

Where am I?

Blackness.

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