a/n-Why averages are important: It took me 3 years to write the first 48 chapters of this story and another 3 years to write Chapter 49. Please enjoy this chapter (huge shout out to 2017 Me for the outline I found today!) while I go finish re-reading the rest of this story so I actually know what's going on again!

Chapter Forty-Nine

"I have a proposal for you."

Kim didn't look up from the stack of notebooks she was attempting to stuff into her backpack with the rest of the belongings she'd accumulated in her locker throughout the school year, simply answering, "We're far too young to get married."

Jared made a choking sound before sputtering out, "I-you-wha-married?!"

"You're proposing something to me," Kim replied, keeping her head ducked down so he wouldn't see the laughter she was trying to hold back. "Marriage is the first thing that comes to mind."

"Yeah, a proposal that we make going to the diner on the last day of school a tradition," Jared protested. "Not marriage."

"Hmm…" Kim hummed noncommittally, "You should really be more clear about these sorts of things upfront. I hope when you do eventually propose to me you make your intentions clear so that I don't get the wrong idea that you're talking about food or something.

"Kimberly," Jared began, "You are the love of my life and my soul mate but I'm also a teenage boy and you are definitely not allowed to talk about marriage to me…yet."

"In your immediate post-imprint panic, you once contemplated proposing to Kim so that she would never leave you and that was before you even remembered her name. But now 'marriage' is a dirty word?"

Jared visibly jumped and turned to see Paul leaning casually against the locker two down from Kim's. She'd seen him arrive not long after Jared made his appearance at her locker, but clearly Jared hadn't noticed his pack mate.

"First, what the hell dude! Don't sneak up on me like that! Two, what the hell dude? What are you even doing here? And three, what the hell dude! You can't use the pack mind against me like that!"

Paul smirked. "One, so much for wolf instincts. Two, it's the last day of school; I'm obviously here for our traditional last day of school trip to the diner. Three, I will use any and all embarrassing information against you whenever possible…dude."

"I always forget what a cute couple you two make," Kim interjected, slamming her locker door shut for the last time for the next several months. "Now let's go. There's an ice cream sundae bigger than my head calling my name and apparently that's a tradition now."

With summer vacation finally here, there was now plenty of free time for Kim to spend with Jared.

Or rather, it would if the pack wasn't constantly patrolling—on high alert for another reappearance of the redheaded leech.

And so, more often than not, Kim's free time was actually spent with Emily. It should also be noted that free time for Kim didn't quite mean 'totally free to do whatever she wanted with her time' anyway. Rather, it was more along the lines of 'thankfully not in school, but not yet free of Kylie.'

(For the record, no matter what it might sound like, the only thing that Kim was truly bitter about was that she was currently limited in the amount of time she got to spend with her boyfriend.)

Luckily, though, the pack was not completely without free time. No school certainly meant more time to patrol, but it also allowed for a more consistent rotation of the patrol schedule. And of course, like always, when not on patrol, the teenaged wolves could be found spending a majority of their time at Emily's house. Because food.

And that certainly made things easier for Kim. She wanted to see Jared as much as possible when he wasn't busy protecting the tribe and she wanted to spend time with Emily, whom she had become fast friends with. Kim also spending her time at Emily's was the obvious route to take. Especially because today…

"I'm so glad Tiffany and I finally get to have our play date," Kylie told Kim, skipping alongside her sister as the pair walked hand-in-hand on their nearly-daily trek to Sam and Emily's house. "Emily promised we could have a play date forever ago."

"Tiffany and Claire don't get to come visit very often, and Emily deserves some playtime with them, too," Kim reminded her sister, not that she needed to—Kylie was very capable of carrying on a one-sided conversation all on her own.

Emily, as it turned out, was more than happy to turn her niece over to Kylie's attention as soon as they stepped through the front door.

"This child has too much energy for me," Emily told Kim as she poured herself a cup of coffee. "Sam kicked all the boys out since the girls were coming and so I could spend some time with my sister. But Aunt Sue is busy all weekend, so dropped the girls off and went to go visit with her and we'll do something on Sunday when she picks the girls up instead. Only, they've barely been here an hour and I am already exhausted. And of course, this is just after spending time with one of them since Claire's been sleeping the whole time…I should really start taking cues from her, I think; nap time sounds amazing right now. But hey, at least Tiffany has Kylie to play with for now, which gives me time to caffeinate. You know, now that I think about it, this explains why my sister laughed for so long when I offered to take them for the whole weekend. But hey, I think I'm at least still making a solid case for being the fun aunt."

Kim could only laugh as Emily alternating rambling and taking long draws from her coffee cup.

"I'm just glad the timing worked out so perfectly, since Kylie leaves to stay with Gram in just a few days," Kim finally said.

"Oh, that's right," Emily commented, "She leaves next week, doesn't she? I'd almost be worried that Paul isn't more disappointed that he won't see her for a whole month while she's with your Grandma, if it wasn't for how excited he is that she's spending all of July with him and their dad."

"He's adorable," Kim stated, "Have you gotten regaled with the saga of picking out the paint color for her room? Paul didn't shy away from the big brother role before, but this is next level excitement and I am here for it. I wish all the besotted girls at school could see him now—wait, actually, no I don't. They'd probably be even more obsessed."

"Paul might just give Tiffany a run for her money for who can be more energized about a sleepover," Emily agreed. "But…speaking of people being obsessed, how has Jake been doing, do you think? Sam told me that Bella came to visit Jake last weekend, but it almost seems like he's been more upset since then than he was before."

Kim heaved a big sigh.

"Summer vacation is amazing because it gives me a break from all of the girls cornering me in the locker room to set them up with Paul—who, by the way, is a major player, and needs zero assistance from me—but it is also the worst because it gives Jake more time for his mopey pining about her being in love with a vampire and not him," Kim lamented. "Jared thinks he's going to try to win her over in some way, but I think it's a lost cause and he needs to move on."

Emily just shook her head. "We need to find Jake a girl," She mused. "A new girl. A not Bella girl."

It was clear as day to the whole pack, Kim knew, that Bella Swan was not going to give a romantic relationship with Jake a shot now that her vampire boyfriend was back in the picture. Jake seemed to think he still had a chance with her, but Kim personally couldn't see it happening.

The pair continued alternating chatting and gossiping and, once Emily began pulling out ingredients for a meal large enough to feed half the reservation (or just the wolf pack on a typical afternoon), they quickly fell into their familiar cooking routine as well. Kim loved these afternoons with Emily. Yes, it was nice getting time with Jared (oh alright, quite a bit more than just 'nice' if she was being completely honest), but this girl time with Emily was a solid second place.

Nearly an hour later, Kim was just pulling the third sheet of cookies out of the oven when the sounds of a crying child started echoing through the house. 'Crying' was perhaps a rather generous way to phrase it, though, Kim thought. A perfect impersonation of a banshee shrieking was probably more apt. Emily sighed.

"Well, there's Claire finally making her grand entrance," She said. "I had a feeling she wouldn't be happy about waking up in an unfamiliar place with mom nowhere to be seen."

"I think I've got things handled fine in here, if you want to go get her," Kim told her.

"That lasagna probably still needs a few minutes," Emily said as she started exiting the kitchen. "And don't forget to keep stirring the sauce. Oh! And the rolls need to be prepped for the oven; they can go in when the lasagna comes out. And I was just in the middle of tossing the—"

"I've got it," Kim laughed. "Go save everyone's eardrums—I mean, comfort the upset child."

Within five minutes, however, it became very clear to Kim that she did not 'got it.' The very opposite, in fact. She thought she and Emily had an equally balanced partnership whenever they cooked together; prior to right this moment she'd even go so far as to call them a well-oiled machine, in fact. But, as Kim balanced both a bowl of salad and a tray of buns ready for the oven just as she realized she'd need at least a third hand to pull the lasagna out and that the sauce on the stove had yet to be stirred, it was quite apparent now that Emily was the grease that was the only thing keeping that machine going. Keeping Kylie alive and fed had nothing on feeding a pack of wolves.

So, it was only fitting that just as Emily finally re-entered the kitchen with a sniffling Claire cuddled in her arms that the wolves quite literally descended, as the back door opened and the pack came pouring in.

Chaos. That's what this was. Absolute chaos.

Kim's eyes landed on Jared as soon as he entered the room with his brothers and a grin spread across her face. It might be chaos, but she loved everything about it.