Disclaimer:- I don't own any of the Twilight characters, I'm sorry to say - all belong to Stephany Meyer and I am merely borrowing them for this story.

NOTES - As with my other Twilight stories, I'm rating this M for language, violence and sex of the SLASH variety. Don't read if it's not your thing :o)

CHAPTER ONE

I had spent virtually my whole life in La Push so far; the whole of my fifteen years. I even went to school on the reservation and only escaped into Forks on rare occasions when Dad drove over there to visit Charlie Swan, the chief of police and one of his closest friends. I would go along to help him in and out of the truck with his wheelchair and for a change of scene. It had been just Dad and me since I was nine when Mom died in a car accident and since then I'd had to grow up fast and help take care of him when his diabetes landed him in a wheelchair for the rest of his life. Sue Clearwater would come over a lot to help out and make sure we weren't living on microwave dinners and take out, but mostly it was just the two of us and that had a lot to do with me never going anywhere. Dad was always telling me he was fine and I should get out and do things with my friends, but I always felt guilty when I did go off for any length of time.

My two best friends were more or less in the same boat in that their world was La Push and not much outside of it. Quil, my cousin, lived with his Mom and Gramps after his Dad died in a storm when he was a little kid. His Mom had always been over-protective so he spent as much time as he could over at my place to escape her constant nagging at him. She wouldn't even let him have a bicycle in case he fell off of it and scraped a knee or something.

Embry, the other member of our trio, was something of an outsider. He was born in La Push, but he was Makah, not Quileute like the rest of us. His Mom had left her tribe and whoever Embry's Dad was before he was born and turned up on the reservation looking for a job and a home. They were accepted, although a little grudgingly. A lot of the kids picked on Embry for not being 'one of us' so Quil and I had sort of taken him under our wing from the first day when we all set foot in school at the age of five. The three of us had been as thick as thieves for ten years after that; usually if you wanted to find one of us, he wouldn't be far from the other two. Then somehow during the summer break of 2005 something changed.

I was out in the old shed behind the house working on a broken down old Volkswagen Rabbit Dad had given me. I had loved fixing anything mechanical from an early age and one day this old car had arrived on the back of a trailer from a scrap yard - a project for me, Dad said. He never had much money and he wouldn't have been able to buy me a decent car, so he picked out a junked one instead. If I could get it running by the time I turned sixteen and got my permit, I would have my own wheels, was his idea. Quil and Embry had laughed their asses off when I showed them my new car, but I loved the rusty old heap with its burnt out wiring, blown engine and flat tyres. I figured I had seven months to fix it up and I knew I could do it.

That Saturday I was out there as usual from eight in the morning, oily, greasy and sweaty, my hair tied out of my face in a tail, when Quil turned up to hang out with me. He was on his own.

"Hey," I said, glancing up. "Where's Embry?"

"My company not good enough?" he grinned. "He's busy."

"Doing what?"

"I don't know," Quil said, looking down at the ground. "He...uh...he just said he's got stuff to do."

I shrugged and bent back over the car. This was the third time in the last week Embry had been 'busy'. I looked up at Quil again and found him staring at me with a slight frown on his face.

"What?"

"Nothing."

I straightened up. "Come on, what's going on? The pair of you are being weird. Embry is never 'busy'. You know something, don't you? Since when did any of us keep stuff from each other?"

"I promised not to say anything," Quil blurted out and then reddened. Now I knew something was up.

"Quil..."

"Embry'll kill me," he muttered.

"Fine. Don't tell me. I got better things to do than worry about some stupid secret of Embry's," I grumbled.

"Jake, it's not stupid. He's just worried you'll not like it. Think less of him, maybe." Quil shoved his hands into his pockets and shuffled his feet.

"Oh, for crying out loud, are you going to tell me or not?" I demanded. "What could he possibly do that would make me think less of him? And if it's that bad, how come you know about it?"

"He's gay," Quil said quickly and turned even redder.

"Oh!" I could feel my eyebrows creeping towards my hairline and my mouth hanging open. I snapped it shut quickly. "This is kind of sudden."

"Not really, he said he started to realise last year, he just tried to pretend it wasn't true."

"Well, it makes no difference," I said. "He's still our friend, right? What's he think I'm going to do? Tell him to drop dead or something? Or to stay away from us?"

Quil sighed heavily and avoided my eyes.

"There's more, isn't there?" I said. "Come on, you might as well just spit it out. You know you're going to eventually. Surely it's better I know, then Embry can stop worrying about nothing."

"He likes you," Quil almost whispered.

I stopped breathing for a few seconds. What was he telling me? Embry had the hots for me or something? How did that happen? My guts clenched and I wasn't sure how to respond. I could suddenly understand why Embry was avoiding me. I thought about the previous day when he and Quil had both been hanging around. I don't think Embry had looked at me once and a few days before that, the temperature in the shed had been stifling. I peeled my shirt off while I was working and Embry had given me this really weird look...almost like he had seen something he wanted to eat.

"Oh, bullshit," I spluttered. "Where'd you get an idea like that?"

"He admitted it. I told him you wouldn't care if he's gay and he kind of blurted it out."

I could feel heat flooding my face and I turned away from him and poked at the car again for a minute. How the hell was I ever going to face Embry again knowing he liked me...like that?

"I shouldn't have told you, should I?" Quil said. "He made me promise not to."

"I suppose I'll get used to it...or ignore it or something," I grunted. My ears were turning red; I could feel them burning. "Look, Quil, I'm pretty busy too. Maybe you should go hang out with Embry today instead."

"Yeah, ok. I'm sorry," Quil said.

"Don't be. I'll see you tomorrow."

I didn't turn around and I heard him walk out a few seconds later. I stood up again and clenched my fists. How the hell had things changed so fast? Two weeks ago, the three of us had been hanging out like we always had and nothing had seemed weird. Suddenly Embry was...eyeing me up...and avoiding me because he didn't want me to know and now I did know. What was I supposed to do with a revelation like that? Ignore it like I told Quil? Pretend nothing had changed? Talk to Embry about it? Hell, no!

I sighed heavily. Maybe I should just bite the bullet and talk to him. He must be feeling pretty uncomfortable if he was making excuses to stay away from me. We had been best friends for ten years. But what in hell would I say? I didn't even know how I felt about it; not really. I'd been so obsessed with cars and bikes for as long as I could remember that I hadn't put much thought into girls - or boys for that matter. Now knowing someone liked me, I had to admit that I wouldn't have felt much less uncomfortable if it had been a girl; I still wouldn't know what to do about it. It was only that it was Embry of all people. Someone I practically grew up with.

"Fuck!" I shouted at the shed and flung the wrench I was holding at the wall. I should stop thinking about it, I told myself. Maybe it would just go away.

I spent the rest of the day working on the car alone, blasting out my CD player with rock music as loud as it would go so that my head vibrated with the noise and I had to concentrate hard on what I was doing. It left no space in my mind for thinking. When I finally returned to the house I ate dinner with Dad and then sat watching a couple of lame television shows with him, much to his surprise.

"Where are Quil and Embry today?" he asked. "You three are usually joined at the hip."

"They had other stuff to do," I grunted. I quietly hoped they would have stuff to do tomorrow too. Suddenly I didn't think I would even know what to say to Quil if he were to appear at that moment.

"I take it you didn't make plans for tomorrow?" Dad said.

"No."

"Good. Charlie invited us over to watch a ball game. You know his daughter, Bella, moved back here? I'm sure she'd be glad to see you too."

"Oh, great!" I said, probably a touch too enthusiastically. Another day where I could put off the potential embarrassment of seeing Embry. I knew I needed to just grow up and stop making such a big deal out of it, but if I could delay it by another day so much the better.

Dad grinned. "Getting bored with the Rabbit yet?"

"Never, but it'd be good to go into town again, see someone different."

I went to my room later and called Quil.

"I'm not going to be around tomorrow, I'm going into Forks with Dad," I said.

"Are you sure you're not just avoiding running into Embry?" asked Quil. "I knew I shouldn't have said anything, but you can damned well get blood out of a stone."

"It's not that, really," I told him. "Charlie Swan invited Dad over to watch a ball game, he just told me. Why don't you come over Monday? Embry too."

"Sure, ok."

We chatted a little longer and then I decided to get an early night. I didn't really think I would sleep, but I was dead to the world within minutes and barely moved all night, waking up in the same position I had laid down in. Right after breakfast we were heading off to Forks in the truck and I looked forward to spending the day with Bella. I hadn't seen her for years when she used to visit from Phoenix in the summer and now she was back for good apparently.

Dad and Charlie spent most of the day chatting, fooling around and then watching the ball game. Bella and I went and wandered around Forks for a while, then sat in her room listening to music and talking some more. She was about two and a half years older than me and had been enrolled in Forks High School already. I found myself staring as we talked, taking in every little detail about her. She was pale - astoundingly pale for someone who had been living in the desert - with long glossy dark hair and brown eyes. She had a nice figure, I noticed; very slim, but well-formed, shapely legs squeezed into skin-tight jeans, a strappy top clinging to her small breasts. I guessed I would say she was pretty. Did I fancy her? Maybe a little bit. I wondered if there was something wrong with me for being more interested in getting my hands on an engine than a girl.

"Stop it," she said suddenly.

"Stop what?"

"You're staring." She blushed and looked down at her hands.

"Sorry. I was just thinking you look a lot different from the last time I saw you."

"I should hope I do, I was about six then."

I laughed. "You look really pretty."

"Thanks." She raised her head again and smiled. "Don't go getting ideas, though, I just want to be friends."

"Oh, I wasn't, friends is cool," I said at once.

"I'd be surprised if you haven't got a girlfriend already, or several," Bella grinned suddenly. "You didn't turn out so bad yourself."

I snorted a touch self-consciously. "I'm just ordinary."

"I don't know, I think you're sort of beautiful."

"Bull," I scoffed. "The sun must have fried your brain, all those years in the desert." But suddenly I couldn't help wondering if that was what Embry saw when he looked at me. Did he think I was sort of beautiful? I shivered. I had to do something about that; talk to him. It wasn't awkward talking to Bella about such things, so why should he be any different? Probably because she wasn't the one who liked me.

The rest of the afternoon flew by and all too soon Dad and I were leaving Forks and heading back to the reservation. Bella had promised to come over some time and hang out with me and we swapped phone numbers. I knew I would enjoy spending more time with her in the future.

The following morning I was in the shed early again as always, beginning to strip down the Rabbit's engine when Embry turned up - alone. He looked pale, eyes ringed with shadows as if he hadn't been sleeping too well.

"Hey, Embry." I swallowed, my throat suddenly dry and told myself to behave normally, whatever that was.

"Hey." He shoved his hands into his jeans pockets and looked down at me.

"Where's Quil?" I asked.

"In bed. His Mom got some dodgy take-out last night; they're all sick as dogs."

"You don't look so hot yourself," I said and then frowned. Hot? That wasn't the best choice of adjective.

"I'm just tired." He sat down on the ground cross-legged on the opposite side of the engine which was positioned on blocks in front of me. "You want any help?"

"Sure." I passed him a socket wrench. "There's a bunch of bolts over that side that need to come out." I reached over and indicated.

"You know you're probably going to still be working on this in ten years," Embry said.

"No, I won't. I'll have it going by Christmas." I turned my attention back to the bolts on my side. I was suddenly tense and my heart was skipping unevenly. I wished I could think of something to say which would get the awkward secret between us, which wasn't a secret any more, out in the open. Much to my surprise, Embry spoke himself after maybe ten minutes. I guessed he must have been even more nervous than I was.

"Did Quil say anything to you the other day?"

"About what?"

"Me."

"He said you were busy."

"Nothing else?"

"No. Should he have?" I glanced at him over the top of the engine. His head was down, his long hair falling forward over his shoulders, partly hiding his face.

"Well, I told him something, but he's got a big mouth, I thought he mightn't have kept it to himself."

"What did you tell him?" I stared fiercely at the socket wrench in my hand, suddenly not sure which way to turn it to loosen the bolt.

"I'm...uh...I wasn't going to tell you. I don't know, I suppose I thought you wouldn't want me to hang around any more if you knew. But I don't feel like I can be myself any more." He took a deep breath and let it out in a rush. "I'm gay."

I peered over the top of the engine again. He was staring back at me with wide eyes, looking like a terrified animal caught in the headlights of a speeding vehicle.

"That's no big deal, Embry, you're hardly the only one," I said as casually as I could manage. What else was he going to say?

"Really? You don't care?"

"No, of course I don't care. How long have we been friends? Do you really think you...um...batting for the other team makes any difference?"

"I guess I'm being stupid." Embry grinned suddenly. "It's not something that's easy to tell your friends."

"What did Quil say?" I asked.

"The same as you, more or less. Except I kept worrying afterwards that he'd go and blab to everyone. My Mom would probably kick me out if she knew."

Little did he know that Quil had indeed blabbed. I had no intention of telling Embry that, although I still worried about what he was going to come out with next. Would he indicate he liked me at all? And what the hell would I say if he did?

We spent the rest of the day together and after only a short while it became clear Embry had no intention of saying anything else. He seemed to be back to his usual self, teasing me about my heap of a car, laughing about nothing. For a time everything he said and did had me over-analysing it, wondering if there was some hint in it that he did actually feel something for me, but there was nothing at all and I couldn't help wondering if Quil had made that up, or exaggerated it. But why we would he even do that? I resolved to stop dwelling on it. The most important thing was that Embry had cheered up and was relaxed in my company again and with the subject out in the open, so was I.