We made it to Charlie's place, the small, two-bedroom house he'd bought with my mother in the early days of their marriage. Not that there had been anything other than early days to their marriage. The Thing was parked out front, a faded red giant sleeping peacefully by the sidewalk.
It looked like it had been carved out of solid iron. I suddenly imagined it at the scene of an accident, not a scratch on it, surrounded by the tiny pieces of the foreign car it had just torn into a hundred different spare parts.
This was a pretty appealing thought. I tried to thank Charlie again, but he gave me the same gruff embarrassed "You're welcome" and looked away bashfully.
It took one trip to get all my stuff upstairs. The room was much the same as it had always been- the same light blue walls, the same yellowing lace curtains at the window, same creaking rocking chair in the furthest corner. Swap the bed for a crib, and it would be impossible to tell what decade it was, apart from the secondhand computer clumsily installed on the desk. The phone line for the modem was stapled to the floor, creeping along the wall to the nearest phone jack in the outside hall. My mother had forced Charlie to do that, so that we could stay in touch easily. If we could have made him install a second bathroom, we would have done that, too.
Unlike my mother, Charlie never hovered. He left me alone to unpack and get settled, a feat that would have been impossible for her. It was nice to be alone, for once.
I finished putting my clothes in the old pine dresser and took my bag of necessities to the communal bathroom to clean myself up. My skin seemed sallow and pallid. Nothing had color, here. Not that I had ever had any color to speak of. Maybe I was just tired. I plodded into the bedroom and sank wearily into the sheets.
The constant sound of rain and wind across the roof takes some getting used to. It refuses to be a part of the background, no matter how many quilts and pillows you bury yourself under to muffle the noise. It wasn't until midnight that the weather finally settled into a calmer drizzle and I was able to slip into unconsciousness.
In the morning there was thick fog pressing against the windows. Claustrophobia set in. I wished I could see the sky.
Charlie and I ate breakfast together in silence. He left first. I sat at the the old square oak table in one of three unmatching chairs and examined the tiny kitchens dark paneled walls, bright yellow cabinets, and dirty linoleum floor. My mother had painted those cabinets eighteen years ago in an attempt to bring some sunshine into the house. Again, nothing had changed.
This was a pretty appealing thought. I tried to thank Charlie again, but he gave me the same gruff embarrassed "You're welcome" and looked away bashfully.
It took one trip to get all my stuff upstairs. The room was much the same as it had always been- the same light blue walls, the same yellowing lace curtains at the window, same creaking rocking chair in the furthest corner. Swap the bed for a crib, and it would be impossible to tell what decade it was, apart from the secondhand computer clumsily installed on the desk. The phone line for the modem was stapled to the floor, creeping along the wall to the nearest phone jack in the outside hall. My mother had forced Charlie to do that, so that we could stay in touch easily. If we could have made him install a second bathroom, we would have done that, too.
Unlike my mother, Charlie never hovered. He left me alone to unpack and get settled, a feat that would have been impossible for her. It was nice to be alone, for once.
I finished putting my clothes in the old pine dresser and took my bag of necessities to the communal bathroom to clean myself up. My skin seemed sallow and pallid. Nothing had color, here. Not that I had ever had any color to speak of. Maybe I was just tired. I plodded into the bedroom and sank wearily into the sheets.
The constant sound of rain and wind across the roof takes some getting used to. It refuses to be a part of the background, no matter how many quilts and pillows you bury yourself under to muffle the noise. It wasn't until midnight that the weather finally settled into a calmer drizzle and I was able to slip into unconsciousness.
In the morning there was thick fog pressing against the windows. Claustrophobia set in. I wished I could see the sky.
Charlie and I ate breakfast together in silence. He left first. I sat at the the old square oak table in one of three unmatching chairs and examined the tiny kitchens dark paneled walls, bright yellow cabinets, and dirty linoleum floor. My mother had painted those cabinets eighteen years ago in an attempt to bring some sunshine into the house. Again, nothing had changed.
Over the small fireplace in the cramped family room was a row of pictures - wedding photos of Charlie and my mom in Vegas, one small shot of the three of us in the hospital after I was born, and a procession of school pictures dated all the way to last year. Some of them I'd never even seen. My mother had stopped putting the school photos up after I refused to smile for them.
School. Charlie had registered me already. I didn't want to be too early, but I couldn't stay in the house anymore. I donned my new jacket and waterproof boots, briefly imagining them as a biohazard suit, and headed out into the rain.
This morning was a light drizzle, which is what constitutes normal weather in Forks. Misty wetness clung to my hair underneath my hood. The gravel crunched strangely against my boots as I reached for the house key that was always hidden under the eaves by the door and locked up the house.
The inside of the truck was nice and dry, smelling faintly of peppermint, tobacco and gasoline. The engine started quickly, and The Thing roared to life like a beast possessed, idling with a deep and throaty rumble that threatened to eat the neighbors. The antique radio even worked.
The school, like most other things, was just off the highway. Without the sign you would miss it - it looked more like a collection of matching maroon houses than anything, with so many trees and shrubs that I could scarcely tell its size. I was suddenly overrun with nostalgia for chain-link fences and metal detectors.
The first building was the front office, which must have been off limits for students to park in front of, as the lot was empty. It was a mistake I was perfectly willing to make on my first day. The Thing went where it willed. Let no man try and stop it.
I stepped unwillingly from the toasty truck cab and walked down a little stone path lined with dark hedges. Outside the door I drew in a deep breath and, despite the rain, hesitated for a moment. The dark patter of rain was lonely and unsettling. I opened the door.
The room inside was warm, and brightly lit: a small office divided in half by a long counter cluttered with wire baskets full of papers and adorned with dozens of brightly colored flyers. Notice and awards cluttered the walls, and a big clock ticked audibly away. Behind the counter were three desks, one of which was manned by a large, red-haired woman wearing glasses and a purple T-shirt. I suddenly felt overdressed.
The red-haired woman looked up. "Can I help you?"
"I'm Isabella Swan," I said, and watched her eyes light up in recognition. Swan? Not that Isabella Swan? Why, the daughter of the Chief's flighty ex-wife, come home to roost at last!
"Of course," she said. She dug through a precarious pile of documentation on the desk until she found the one file she was looking for. "I have your schedule right here - oh! And a map of the school."
She went through my classes for me, highlighting the best route to each on the map, and gave me a slip to have each teacher sign so that I could bring it back at the end of the day. I crumpled it and stuck it in my back pocket. She smiled at me with every pearly white tooth in her mouth and expressed her hope that, like Charlie, I would like it here in Forks. I smiled back as convincingly as I could.
There is an awful lot of whine with this cheese. It's weird, the setting and dialogue actually set the tone pretty well, since the tone is "you should feel sorry for me" and the unnecessary addendum is "because I'm an awful person". But Meyer refuses to let go, and continues to drown you in sorrow until, funnily enough, she achieves the opposite effect.
ReplyDeleteCutting out internal descriptions of feelings and cleaning up the language a little bit is serving pretty well for getting through this part. I might need to wind back around to the classroom woes as we approach an actual day at school, but I think we can all agree that not being tan in Washington is not going to ruin your social life.