AN: Chapter Five! Enjoy! (Still don't own anything By The Way.)

Backpack? Check.

Pencils, Pens, Notebooks, Folders? Check, check, check, check.

Wallet for lunch money? Check.

Gigantic fake school transcript? Check.

Gun in the glove box? Check.

Knife in right boot? Check.

Bottle of Holy Water? Check.

Sense of Foreboding? Holy Mother fuckingcheck.

Go Gettem' Attitude and Positive spirit? Well, can't have everything, now can we?

My hands, which in the scariest of circumstances were steady and sure, shook as I double and triple checked over everything I needed.

I sat in my car, facing the weirdest looking admissions building I had ever seen. Granted I hadn't seen a whole lot of admissions buildings in my lifetime. The school in front of me looked less like a school and more like a cluster of squat, ugly, single story brick bunkers, perhaps built as above ground nuclear fallout shelters? I had no idea what an actual high school was supposed to look like, I had never really paid attention when we passed them driving though towns, but I was almost sure that this was not what academia looked like. Oh well. Either way I needed to get this done. Step one of moving on after a supernatural bad guy offs your boyfriend, for me at least, was going to school.

I slung my backpack over my shoulder and stepped out of the car, locking it behind me and pocketing the keys. It was just a few short steps from my car to a set of double glass doors, and through them was a large secretarial station. A lumpy looking lady with the strangest color orange hair I had ever seen was settled behind the desk, fiddling around on the computer and chewing on a spoon. She did not look up when I stopped in front of her.

"Umm excuse me." I gave and awkward wave, jolting the woman out of her reverie. "I'm Isabella Swan? My father Charlie Swan should've enrolled me yesterday?" I tried to smile winningly, though I know that it turned into more of a grimace.

The secretary's eyes widened as I said my name. For a moment she just sat there, spoon still in mouth, hand still idly moving the computer mouse about. Then she snapped right to business, as if realizing what valuable solitaire time she'd been wasting. "You're the Chief's daughter!" She exclaimed, her voice breathy, "oh yes dear! You've made our lives quite a bit busier the last couple days!" She let out a girlish giggle before continuing, "Now, we didn't have the files from your old school, so we couldn't make you a schedule, but your father said you'd bring those with you. You got them? Good!" She didn't even wait for me to get a word in edgewise, she just kept talking. I hated this place already. "So just go on down that hall way to the councilor's office, and I'm sure that he'll be happy to make you up a schedule to fit your needs. Okay? Bye-bye now!" And without being able to say another word I was sent on my way down a narrow hall to a small closet like space that looked like it might have, at one point in time, served as a mechanical closet.

I knocked on the open door and a balding man with a slight pudge of a belly waved me in. "You're Isabella?" I nodded, wondering just who else I might have been. "Ahh good. Have a seat and I'll look over your files."

I sat in the chair next to his desk, cringing slightly at a strange looking stain on the blue woven cloth. From my backpack I produced the file folder with my school history, and he took it eagerly with a small toothed grin.

I tried not to fidget too much as he leafed through the papers, mumbling to himself and frowning ever so slightly. He came to the forms filled out over the supposed suspension and he sucked in a big breath, making him look like some sort of fish. Finally when he was done reading all about my made up sordid past he scooted himself over to the computer and began to type furiously, faster than I could've believed possible for a man with such sausage fingers. He clicked his mouse once, twice, three times, and the printer began to whirr, slowly regurgitating my class schedule. Then he turned to me, his face a mask of seriousness.

"Isabella." He started, "I don't think I need to tell you this but I will anyway. Solving matters with your fists might have worked out alright for you at your old school, but here it simply will not fly. I'm sure you already know this though, right?" He raised his eyebrows at me waiting to hear my heartfelt confession.

"I've been informed that socking people is highly frowned upon in polite society." Was all I could think to say.

The guidance counselor blinked at me for a minute or so, not quite sure what to make of that statement before sighing and continuing. "Yes, well… You've also got collage to think about now, which is why I'd like to see an improvement in your grades. You seem to be a fairly bright individual—" Buddy you just met me, I thought sourly, You have no idea who I am. "—but your grades simply don't reflect this. I would like to see that change. I believe in you Isabella. But do you?" He watched me steadily. It unnerved me. I was also sure that most of his speech was straight out of the guidance counselor's handbook.

Unfortunatly I knew what I'd have to do to get him to quit watching me. "I know I can do better. And I'm learning to believe in myself. I have a good feeling about this place, and about this school. I'm so excited to start my classes. What's my schedule like?" I could see that just with those words I had silenced him. There was simply nothing else to do but hand me my schedule and a slip that I had to get signed by all of my teachers. Inside my head I did a fist pump. On the outside I was a teenager who had lost her way for a while and was now trying to find her way back.

On my way out of the office the secretary, who I learned was Mrs. Cope, waved and wished me a fantastic day. I nearly laughed, but instead just thanked her for her help.

My watch told me that I had already missed my fist period class, some type of English elective called Psych Lit. or something. It was my understanding that we would be reading about crazy people. Oh joy.

I headed off to my second period in building five room seven: Government. As soon as I entered the room heads shot up; it was like I was a massive dosage of caffeine to these exhausted high schoolers. The teacher, Mrs. Applebee, seemed kind of annoyed that I had interrupted her lecture on electoral voting and how and when and why that came about. The students all looked thrilled that I had interrupted. She signed the slip the pudgy guidance counselor had given me in a huff and directed me to the back of the classroom to an empty desk behind a meaty looking football player and between a stoner passed out on his desk and a blond girl who was texting. It truly was exactly like the movies.

It was also possibly the most boring thing I had ever been forced to sit through in my entire life. Ever. By the end of the class I was almost in tears and I understood why the dropout rate was so high.

I was making my way to the door when I heard my name being called.

"Isabella! Hey, Isabella!" A lanky looking guy with acne enough for the entire high school population and black, slicked back hair came jogging up to me, puffing slightly with the exertion of running across a class room.

"Um hello?" It was a question because I had absolutely no idea who the hell this kid was or why he was talking to me. Well, I did have an inkling of why, but I'd rather not know for sure. Maybe he had turrets. Maybe he needed to tell me I looked exactly like some moody actress from Hollywood or something. Or that I had toilet paper stuck to my shoe. Or that I had a blood stain on my pants. No. Don't Go there. Just don't. Because we would like to get through one entire day without some sort of emotional meltdown. So just think about rainbows and unicorns and butterflies and killing shit. Just not the blood.

Geekerton didn't seem deterred by my obvious standoffishness or by my momentary lapse in sanity. Instead he just laughed. "I'm Eric, the eyes and ears of this place. Anything you find yourself needing, wanting? I'm your guy!" He through what I could only guess was an attempt at a sly smile my way. I felt like my eyebrows were about to disappear into my hairline. This could not be happening. I started to move towards the door again, hoping that if I backed away slowly maybe he would just leave me alone. Instead he followed after me. And slung his arm over my shoulder. Immediately alarm bells started clanging in my head.

Danger Will Robinson! Big Fucking Danger! Invasion of Personal Space! Set phasers to Kill! Like prontonomo!

I was almost sure that I was going to end up killing the kid whose name was Eric and whose arm was currently slung around my shoulder. There was a knife in my boot, but I didn't even need to use it. With the right move I could crack this kid's head like an egg against the concrete. He wouldn't stand a chance. Poor sucker. At the moment I wasn't thinking rationally. This was pure animalistic instinct taking over my brain, telling me to neutralize the threat and then get the fuck out of Dodge. I was about to do it to. But suddenly something happened. The oddest feeling came over me, a feeling of inner peace, calmness. I was no longer freaking out about Eric the Geek's arm being slung around my shoulders. I still didn't like the feeling, I still wanted that arm off of me, but now the immediate survival instinct was gone, and I was left knowing that I would've killed that kid had that strange calm fog not intervened. That terrified me, but I would deal with it later. Right now I had to get the arm off of me.

"Thanks for the offer Eric, but I've really got to get to class, I don't want to be late twice in one day," I smiled at him and shrugged out from under his arm, immediately feeling relief. The calm fog slowly retreated from my body as though assessing if I was really alright or not before completely leaving me. I checked my schedule: Spanish, Building three room one, before giving him a slight wave and hurrying off, leaving him on the sidewalk alone, mouth slightly ajar, completely speechless.

+++++HELTER SKELTER+++++

Surprisingly Spanish wasn't all that bad. Having lived in Arizona for all of my childhood, with the exception of being born in Forks, I was pretty fluent in conversational Spanish. I spoke faster than all of the other kids in my class, and with a slight Mexican accent as opposed to in the formal Spanish dialect they taught in schools, but nonetheless Senora Herder seemed impressed.

She stood at the front of the class, lecturing about questions and phrasing, but my mind was stuck in the past. Sam had taken freshman Spanish as one of his prelaw requirements at Stanford, but I think the only reason he passed the class at all was because he met Jessica half way through the first semester and she was a fluent speaker. Once he had tried to question a maid at some no-tell motel in El Paso, Texas about some werewolf killings. The poor boy hadn't gotten five words out of his mouth before the maid was rolling her eyes and asking the saints why white men were built so stupid. That's when I had stepped in to reply, in my charming Spanish, that it wasn't white men that were the problem, just men in general. We learned everything we needed to know.

My memories were interrupted by a sharp "Psst!" from the girl who sat at the table next to mine. I looked over to find her staring right at me, eyes huge and mouth slightly open. When she saw me looking she waved enthusiastically. "Hi!" she whispered, though I could hardly call it quiet, "I'm Jessica. You're Bella right?" The English sounded strange to me after nearly an hour of listening to and speaking nothing but Spanish.

"Yeah, that's me," I smiled back, wondering if I was about to make my first ever high school friend.

"OhmyGod you like HAVE to sit with me and my friends at lunch! What class do you have next?" She squealed, apparently taking the fact that I had responded to her at all as proof that we were meant to be great friends.

"Trig. With Mr.—"

"Mr. Varner! Me too! OhmyGod! I can't believe this! It's like instant sisterhood!" She grinned crazily at me and bounced up and down in her seat in excitement. Then her expression suddenly turned serious, "Mr. Varner is like, an absolute a-hole, but if you keep your head down and know math pretty well you should be fine. If you don't though you're like totally screwed, and I am sooo sorry. That man is like Satan's older brother or something, I swear." She looked deadly serious for about five seconds before returning to her peppy chatter. I was still on edge over the Satan's older brother comment though.

Jessica provided easy conversation through the end of Spanish and all the way to building four room one where Satan's older brother apparently taught Trigonometry. She wasn't completely stupid as far as I could tell, and a couple of times she even made me laugh with her description of Forks and its tiny population. But as soon as we reached the door to Mr. Varner's room she shut up, turning towards me quickly to mouth I'll pray for you, before hurrying on to her seat. Not a good sign.

I stepped into the room and up to the teacher's desk, where a man with thinning dark curls and glasses as thick as the bottoms of glass coke bottles greeted me, signed my slip, and then forced me to stand in front of the entire class and introduce myself.

"Hello my name is Isabella Swan and I'm new," I muttered as quickly as possible before attempting to dart into an empty seat next to Jessica in the third row. But a hand grabbed the sleeve of my shirt holding me hostage at the front of the classroom.

Don't kill him, Don't kill him, Don't kill him, Don't kill him. "Come now, Miss Swan, I'm sure you can do better than that!" Don't kill him, Don't kill him, Don't kill him.

I smiled at the class and tugged my sleeve out of Varner's grasp. "My name is Bella. My favorite color is orange, my favorite subject is naptime, and I prefer college football to NFL" With that I headed towards the seat next to Jessica.

Surprisingly enough, Jess didn't chatter incessantly throughout the lesson, but sat up straight and paid attention to what Varner was teaching. It was weird, though I couldn't really judge seeing as I had only met the girl last period. So instead of being distracted by idle talk I had to actually try to pay attention to what was going on in class.

None of it made any sense at all. Varner stood at the bored drawing things out and scrawling out notes for everything he did, clarifying things over and over again for the idiots in the class. I wrote down everything he did, and some things he didn't, but by the end of the hour my brain was tied in knots and I had several pages of a notebook filled up with what looked like nonsense. I guess I missed a lot in those three years' worth of math classes I didn't attend.

At the end of the hour Jess and I walked towards the cafeteria, her providing most of the conversation an me adding in a sarcastic or witty comment wherever I felt the need.

"So, sorry about Varner. You seemed to hold up pretty well though, considering…" Jess at least had the decency to look apologetic about not warning me that Varner would want me to introduce myself. I just laughed though.

"Oh, so it could've been worse then? What, did he have a kid who peed himself up there or something?" Jess giggled. "Seriously though Jess! You go on and on about him being Satan's brother and I expect some guy with horns and fangs and instead I get that? He looks like… I dunno a Jewish accountant!" We both laughed as we made the last turn to the cafeteria building. "And then, I walk into the room expecting to spend another fun filled hour relaxing and learning more about this fair and bustling metropolis from you, only to find out that you're Varner's star pupil!" She really laughed then and we paused right before the cafeteria doors.

"I dunno Bella, math is just my thing! English, eh, who needs it you know? I already know my grammar and spelling. And Spanish? Although I admit it would be cool to speak another language, I just don't have the skills to master it! Science grosses me out beyond belief… Math though, math I understand. Everything has a rule and all the numbers will always be the way they are. It's like a giant puzzle. And there's always more to learn. But the Mr. Varner thing? Just because I'm his favorite doesn't mean I don't recognize that the guy's devil spawn!" She giggled.

"Well I'm glad you understand everything he just taught, because all of it went right over my head. I can help you with Spanish though. I'm pretty fluent." I added in the last part, hoping that she'd say something about helping me out with math. She did, and we made tentative plans to meet up on Thursday night for studying.

With all that out of the way we entered the feeding grounds.

Like everything else in high school, the cafeteria was loud, messy, and surpassed every one of my wildest daydreams. Teenagers perched themselves on every flat surface available: chairs, tables, window sills, railings, some were on the platform like stage that ran along one wall. A football whizzed across the room, nearly decking a kid in a beanie before beaning another guy in the nads. In the corner of the giant room a small table of adults huddled fearfully. In their classrooms they might rule with an iron fist, but in the cafeteria they were fair game for whoever got to them first, and they themselves understood this better than anyone.

And then amongst the chaos I saw them, sitting up straight in their chairs, food untouched in front of them, eyes all angled towards their own table, and air of polite disinterest about them. There were five, three boys and two girls, each undeniably beautiful, each perfectly pampered. They were rich, there was no doubt about that, and stuck up too probably. It was like the entire surrounding cafeteria was a giant episode of Food Fight and they were in their own private Gossip Girl bubble.

I followed Jess to a crowded table by the stage, obviously where the popular kids sat to eat, but kept my eyes on the table full of Barbie dolls. As soon as we reached our destination seats were kicked out for us and room was made. All of the sudden I was being introduced to people, giving awkward nods and waves and trying desperately to remember names for later. There was Mike, Tyler, Eric the Geek from earlier, Sarah, Lauren, Angela, Danny, Preston… the names went on and on until everyone became one giant blur. I was still trying to match names to faces when Jess poked me.

"Hey, what do you want to eat?" I stared at her for a moment before finally comprehending.

"oh it's okay, I can go up and get it myself—"

"No, no, Mike's going up for like fourths anyways, just tell him what you want and he'll pick it up for you! He's already grabbing like half the table stuff, he might as well get you as well!" She smiled and gestured to a sweet looking blond boy who reminded me of a dog, golden retriever maybe.

"I'll just take an apple and a can of coke, Mike!" With that he ran off towards the food line, a place that, now that I looked closer, I never ever wanted to go near.

Within moments our food was back and I was chomping down on a green apple while Jessica tried to explain the different groups in the cafeteria. "So there are the Jocks, all they do is athletics all day every day. Then over in that corner are the stoners. They come to school wasted, even out midway through the day, take a hit during lunch and then they're wasted for the rest of the day…" She went through pretty much everybody in the Caf, stereotypig them until I could easily remember who it would be okay to be caught alone in a dark alley at night with and who I would want the police on speed dial for. Then her gaze stopped at them, and I found myself staring too. "Those," She breathed, "Are the Cullens. Uber rich, uber stuck up, and all of them together, like together together." Her tone held all the markers of small town scorn, but I sensed that there was more to this story.

"So they're all a family?" It was creepy, to say the least, though whether it was the sibling banging sibling creepiness I was picking up on or something entirely more sinister was hard to say. For now I remained on alert.

"Oh yeah, adopted siblings, but still. Legally they've all got the same two last names and they all live in one giant house on the edge of town somewhere with Dr. Cullen and his wife. Emmet, Rosalie, Jasper, Alice, and Edward." She sighed, as though she were wishing she were part of that exclusive family.

"So who's banging who?"

"Probably the whole family," she said meanly, but then she amended her statement. "But officially Emmet, the big one, and Rosalie, the blond are together. Then Jasper, the one who looks like he's about to go Full Metal Jacket on the entire student body, is with Alice, the tiny girl. Edward's on his own, but good luck barking up that tree. Apparently nobody here is good enough for him." She sounded bitter by the end of her speech, so I decided to lighten the mood.

"Am I detecting some sour grapes there Jess?" I wiggled my eyebrows around playfully and she giggled, albeit reluctantly.

"Oh yeah, just about as sour as they come, though it'll be kind of tough to find a girl at this school who hasn't at least lusted over Edward Cullen. Most of us here have been rejected in one form or fashion." She laughed bitterly, so I decided to up the ante.

"And besides, how do you know that I was lusting after Edward? I could've totally been checking out his sister, you know, the blonde bombshell built like a brick shit house!" This time Jessica's eyes went wide as dinner plates and her mouth dropped open in shock. Then she laughed out loud, long and hard.

"Bella," She managed to get out between gasps, "We are going to get along fabulously!"

AN: So there it is. It's really long, but we got the first half of the first day of school out of the way! Bella nearly killed a couple people (what's life without a few emotional breakdowns?) and even made a couple new friends! (I was just so tired of those Everybody Hates Jessica fanfics. I mean come on! Grow up!)

So tell me what you think! I might not respond, but I will read! Love~ Rosie