I'm sorry I suck so much, I know it's been forever but I...have a lot of stuff going on that you don't really care about.

Chapter 11:
Just A Day

Alyssa was tired.

There was no other way to put it, she was tired mentally, physically and emotionally from everything that had happened in the last few weeks. All she really wanted to do was go to the small island that Jacob had taken her to a few years ago and be left completely alone for a few days. The knowledge of vampires, shape shifters and whatever else there might be in the world was starting to weigh on her. As was the fact that Charlie was busier at work than she could ever remember him being with the murders he was helping the county sheriffs with were making her a nervous wreck.

There was also the fact that a vampire was on the loose that hadn't been seen or smelled since it had broken into her room and it was stressing everyone else out just as much as it was her. The pack seemed to pop up out of nowhere, no matter where she was or what time of the day it was and it was starting to annoy her. She understood that they were only looking out for her but if one of the oversized boys snuck up on her in the middle of the woman's health care aisle she was going to scream and more than likely break her hand trying to hit them.

"Have you finished your paper yet?" Bella asked, bringing the other girl from her thoughts.

"Ugh. I forgot about it with everything going on." She sighed, the paper in question was due in just two days and was worth about ten percent of her grade.

"I usually wouldn't offer but…I actually had to do pretty much the same thing and got a decent grade. Do you maybe want to…use it as a reference?"

The question threw Alyssa and all she could do was give a small smile and nod of her head surprised by the older girls question, making her wonder what was going on since the two weren't exactly the best of friends. In fact, she had a feeling that they were going to end up clashing soon and not just because their boyfriends were mortal enemies and hated each other. It was going to be over just about everything from Charlie to Bella's sickening and clearly controlling relationship and it wouldn't be pretty. But if they were going to be civil and sisterly like for the time being, she would take as much of it as she could since she actually liked the girl when Edward wasn't around and Bella showed that she was capable of thinking for herself.

"I really appreciate it. I'm going to run to the grocery store. Is there anything you need?" She asked as she stood up and grabbed the list with various hand writing on it, some of it that was obviously Jacob's.

"Actually, do you mind if I ride with you? I want to get out of the house and I need to pick up a few things."

"Sure, I just need to change and grab my bag and then we'll go." She smiled.

As she walked up the stairs she couldn't help but be slightly worried about how their trip to Wal-Mart would go seeing as they had never really spent any alone time together unless it was under a five minute period. She could admit that it was possible that she was judging Bella simply because of who her boyfriend was and how she treated Charlie but she highly doubted it. She had a good intuition and if she didn't necessarily like someone it was for a good reason that would show itself with time it just hadn't happened with family before.

Thirty minutes later and they were climbing out of the car and Alyssa could feel eyes on her once again which she was actually growing quite use too. Scanning the parking lot she wasn't surprised to find that she couldn't see anyone staring at her and wondered if being invisible when you needed to was simply something that came with being a supernatural being. After one more look around, paying more attention to her surroundings she was surprised to find a large Jeep pulling in, the driver's long wavy blonde hair flying behind her.

"Rosalie's here." She commented to Bella who glanced around with a frown.

"Awesome." Bella sighed with a small eye roll and Alyssa couldn't help but wonder why out of all the Cullen's it was the blonde that she didn't seem to like.

In Alyssa's opinion the model like vampire seemed to have the most humanity out of them all which worried the teenager about how her sister would turn out if she was to become a vampire. Rosalie had told Alyssa her story, she was the only one so far, and the human was surprised that in all of her years she hadn't killed a single human by means of 'The Thirst'. In fact, for her to not go completely insane and kill the entire town after what happened Alyssa had to give her major props because there was no way she wouldn't have gone on a rampage.

"Hello." The vampire smiled, looping arms with each of them.

"What are you doing here?" Alyssa asked, genuinely wondering what a vampire could possibly need for the department store.

"I need some shampoo. It's not easy being as gorgeous as I am." She said it jokingly but her voice was slightly off.

Alyssa stopped and waited for the blonde to turn around so that she could look into her eyes. When they did lock eyes Rosalie tried to slip her mask on but Alyssa caught her eyes flick toward the left end of the parking lot. Even though she didn't turn around Alyssa suddenly realized that was where the staring was coming from and as much as everything in her body told her not to turn around as well as the suddenly cold hands on her shoulders. It was the slight tug of her hair that made her turn but not to where Rosalie had looked but towards Bella who was raising one eyebrow at her and made her realize that she couldn't acknowledge that he was there.

Taking a deep breath Alyssa nodded and looped her arm back through the freezing one that was offered to her and plastered a fake smile on her face as they made their way through the sliding doors. As usual the store was busy but she had expected that on a Tuesday night since there wasn't really much to do besides walk around Wal-Mart, go mudding or get into trouble. That was unless you were close to someone on the Rez like she was and could get into the many things that they had going on from the almost nightly bonfires to the secret spots that you could be shown which were absolutely beautiful.

The bathing suits caught her attention almost immediately and she directed her companions to the racks that they were set up on and began searching for anything in her size, surprised to find a blue turquoise one peace that had the back cut out and was only connected by the front. The color just happened to be her favorite and the fact that it was strapless made her fall in love with almost instantly. After telling her friends that she was going to try it on and wanted their opinions they made their way to the changing room and she started stripping almost as soon as she closed the door.

"Oh my god." She smiled as she looked at herself in the mirror, she thought it was perfect, "Well, what do you think?"

"Don't wear it around Emmett." Rosalie laughed, "He'd start drooling immediately. You look hot."

"You really do. I'm pretty sure if you weren't with Jacob, everyone in the pack that's single would be all over you." Bella nodded, making a twirling motion with her hand as she spoke.

With a large smile the young blonde went back into the dressing room and changed quickly hoping that at some point during the weekend she would get to wear the bathing suit just to see the reactions that she got. After she changed back into her shorts and tank top she returned to her friends and they went to get a cart before heading to the body care section. The sudden feeling of relaxation poured over Alyssa like a bucket of water and she instinctively knew that one of the members of the pack was close. It wasn't Jacob, she knew that much because she didn't get the overwhelming feeling of his emotions but to know that someone was around was enough to make her relax.

"Dogs." Rosalie muttered, making both girls laugh as they stood in front of the various shampoos.

"I need to go to the mall. I miss my Amber Romance." Alyssa sighed.

"No you don't. I have like 10 bottles of everything it comes in, I'm tired of the smell you can have them." The vampire offered with a shrug of her shoulders.

With a smile and thanks Alyssa grabbed the brands that she liked the best and put them in the cart before moving onto the next section.

Putting various kinds of meat in the small deep freezer in the corner of the kitchen Alyssa couldn't wipe the grin from her face as she was having a much better day than she thought she would when she woke up. Bella had been very pleasant and a little more open since her beloved wasn't around and she had gotten to know Rosalie more and found that she was one of the coolest people she'd met, even if she was a vampire. Alyssa wanted to continue to think of Rosalie as a Cullen but after finding out that she had been strongly against moving back to Forks since she was there for the original signing of the treaty, the blonde couldn't help but like her.

"Why do you hate the Cullen's?" Bella's voice asked from behind her and the smile was immediately wiped from her face as she turned to the older girl with a raised eyebrow and flat lips, "Well besides your new bestie."

"Hm, maybe it's because they ruined the lives of my best friends. Or maybe because I lost my best friends for about a year because of them. They knew that it was a possibility that the boys might shift when they returned but didn't care that they were ruining their lives. Let's not forget the fact that because Jacob changed he completely shut me out and couldn't look at me in the eyes for almost a year because he thought I wouldn't be his imprint." As she spoke she realized that she was entirely to calm which meant her eyes were probably grey and that one wrong word and she would completely go off.

"Also, because you can't spend more than five minutes without Edward and you spend all your time over there, you are breaking my dad's heart. All he wants is to spend some family time together or even just have dinner just the three of us." She said shaking her head, "You know, I after today I thought you were going to be pretty cool and that maybe you were starting to think for yourself…guess I was wrong."

Taking a deep breath as she stopped herself Alyssa watched as a wide eyed Bella left the kitchen and rolled her eyes, not surprised that the older girl didn't have a comeback. She felt lighter however having gotten everything she'd been holding in off her chest. She hoped that maybe some of the things she had said had gotten through to Bella and she would actually listen, at least about Charlie. She knew that for at least two dinners Bella would eat with them before Edward started dazzling her again and she was never at the house.

Even with no help she had the groceries and her personal things put up faster than she ever had before and knew it was because she was angry. A quick look in the bathroom mirror let her know that her eyes were still a steely grey that her friends and family meant to stay away. Instead of her usual ritual of cleaning up to calm herself she let out a breath and headed up the stairs knowing that she had to get her paper written so that she could have a free rest of the week.

As she entered her room she headed straight for her desk which was the most organized spot in her room, she saw that Bella had put the paper on her desk with a sticky note attached that simply said sorry in her sisters chicken scratch. Sighing she realized that she probably should have been more rational and let the other girl get a word in but that didn't mean she was sorry, she had said what she needed to. She would still apologize to Bella, that was just the type of person that she was, but she had a feeling that her words had just changed the way the two interacted and wasn't sure if that was a good or bad thing.

"Could you stop pacing?" Embry asked with a glare.

"And worrying. You're making me worry and I have no idea why I am. It's annoying." Paul added from his spot sprawled out on the couch. "Stop."

"Shut up." Jacob said simply before sitting down and taking a deep breath.

Paul was right though, he was worried and angry at the same time and he wasn't quite sure why unless it was his imprint projecting her feelings through the bond. He knew she didn't mean to and that she probably had no idea that she could, he hadn't known it was possible either since Sam never mentioned it when giving the spark notes version of what imprinting was like. Jacob knew that he should talk to the Elders about it and that they could probably explain it in a lot more detail but he wasn't up to facing them just yet as he knew they would bring up the Alpha thing.

He had made an agreement with both the Council and Sam that when he turned eighteen, could fully control his shifting and understood as much as he could about shifting as he could that he would take over. He hadn't thought he was going to imprint at the time so it was as much as a big deal then as it was now and he still had to talk to Alyssa about it. It would completely change her role in not just the pack but in the tribe as well and he wanted to explain all of that to her before he accepted anything to make sure she understood what would have to happen by their tribes ancient laws.

First he wanted to take care of James and band of disgusting blood sucking leaches.. He's hands literally twitched every time he thought about the leech that had broken into the most important person in his life's room. He knew that she considered her room a sanctuary and the fact that someone had violated that, scared her enough that he could still vaguely feel her fear from it. That made him all the more eager to want the creatures throat between his wolf's teeth and to hear the blissfully awful sound that was the sound of vampires being dismembered.

"Seriously, stop with all of the emotions dude, just come watch Family Guy with us. Before I lose my mind." Paul said turning in his spot, which looked rather uncomfortable.

"Honey! I'm home!" Quill's voice sounded from the front yard, why he yelled when they would have heard him perfectly if he whispered was a mystery to Jacob who simply rolled his eyes as he took up his usual spot in the plush arm chair.

"Anything?"

"No, lover boy. No scent, no trail, nothing just like it's been since the night it happened."

It was the answer that Jacob had expected but he couldn't help but let out a sigh as he wondered how it was that the scent had just disappeared. He wasn't sure if it was the vampires 'talent' the way Edward could read minds, if it had found a way to cover it or if they just hadn't looked in the right place. The latter couldn't be true though because they had made sure to search every inch of the area that they could and they still found nothing. There weren't even foot prints in the mud and it was winding them all up that they kept coming up empty handed.

They had upped their patrols so that they had a wolf on patrol twenty four seven and had expanded their boundaries to include Alyssa's house, something the Cullen's had easily agreed to. They had also came to the agreement that someone would follow the blonde girl at all times since they all knew that the vampire was obviously going to comeback. He was aware that his girlfriend knew and that it was annoying her but just the thought of one of his brothers keeping their eyes on her, which meant that he could too, put his mind at ease.

They also had no idea why it was that the blood sucker had gone into Alyssa's room and not Bella's, even the Cullen's were stumped since apparently Bella's scent was something that was setting all the 'veggie' vamps crazy. Sam had mentioned that the smell of Jacob may have gotten its attention considering that that no one really knew how many shape shifters there were or that it was possible that Alyssa's blood smelled better than Bella's. The why didn't really matter, other than the fact that it would give them some type of answer and maybe a piece of mind, what did matter was making sure that the Swan family stayed safe and that their hearts kept beating.

The fact of the matter was that they were still doing the same things that they had since the beginning, running themselves around for what appeared to be no reason. Of course there was no way that they would stop or ease up on patrols for the simple fact that the bloodsucker was out there somewhere. They had no idea if it was coming back, where it would turn up or if it would turn up with friends to outnumber them and that was really what was the most nerve-wracking thing about the situation. They had all kinds of possibilities but no answers and even Coppertone's mind reading and the pixie's visions were completely useless which he could tell was also frustrating the leech family.

"So, what's the plan for tonight?" Embry asked around a mouthful of blueberry muffin.

"Up to you guys. I'm spending the night with Alyssa." Jacob answered glancing at the television in time to catch an ad for the wrestling program that his girlfriend loved.

The boys immediately began discussing possibilities of what they could do that night and Jacob tuned them out as he began thinking about just how much she and Charlie enjoyed watching their three hour long program. She watched it every chance that she could and on the off chance that she was going to miss it she made sure to record it and would clear her schedule, if she could, to watch it. She was always talking about going to one of the live shows when she had the money and as soon as she could figure out next time there would be one in Seattle.

Telling his pack brothers he would see them later, he headed home with a small smile on his face, he had a surprise to plan for his family.

Not my best, I'm rusty and didn't proof read like a good author would.