Disclaimer: Everything and everyone you recognise is Meyer's, I'm just giving them bloodsucker-free lives. No copyright infringement is intended, etc etc.

Warning: Wolves have filthy mouths, and dirty minds. I also don't have a beta, or a Leah to kick me up the arse and tell me to get a grip and finish other things before giving in to new ideas.

Credit: The following excerpt has been lifted from the epilogue of Eclipse ('Choice'). There's also a few lines of speech from Billy which have been used. Title and lyrics are from 'Slow and Steady' by Of Monsters and Men.

A/N: This is only going to be three, maybe four chapters of a budding friendship. I don't often write in this style, so please be gentle with me. It was for a contest but I didn't finish it in time. What can I say? I love runaway!Blackwater.

Passing By
(all the monsters in my head)

take me for a spin
two wolves in the dark, running in the wind
i'm letting go, but i've never felt better

slow and steady — of monsters and men

'If you're so upset about gender confusion, Leah… How do you think the rest of us like looking at Sam through your eyes? It's bad enough that Emily has to deal with your fixation. She doesn't need us guys panting after him, too.'

Pissed as I was, I still felt guilty when I watched the spasm of pain shoot across her face.

She scrambled to her feet — pausing only to spit in my direction — and ran for the trees, vibrating like a tuning fork.

Jacob Black (Eclipse, Epilogue: 'Choice')

i.

The guilt is still an uncomfortable weight in your chest as Leah disappears into the trees. There's a ripple over your skin as she phases, and her following snarl is just as bad as the look on her face had been.

Sam's going to give you absolute hell for it, and you swear to yourself that it's the only reason you get up. Life is so not going to be worth living once he finds out what you've said. Sam is… strange when it comes to Leah; he gives her a little more leeway than you and your brothers, and he comes down real hard when you piss her off.

Hard is running double patrols for a week straight and babysitting the new kids.

So not worth it.

You sigh loudly before getting up and giving chase. You follow the path of destruction Leah's left behind with her teeth and her claws. She's fast. But you're stronger — the strongest of all of the Pack, thanks to your stellar bloodlines — and it's easy to catch up with the grey wolf who has whipped back around and is now snarling and snapping at you. Daring you to phase, to fight, to feel exactly what she's feeling.

No, thanks. You've got enough feelings of your own. Enough of them that you almost wish Leah would rip into you like she really wants to, or that she had pushed you off the edge of the cliff instead of running away.

You aren't friends, you know that. She doesn't owe you anything. But Leah is always good for a rip-roaring fight, and these days she needs as many punching bags as she can get. So you often bite and hurt and snap at each other, because nobody else understands and because nobody really cares.

Nobody else understands being second.

Leah paws angrily at the dirt, like a bull getting ready to charge might. Phase, you coward, you can almost hear her shouting, or has the leech lover taken your fire, too?

"I'm sorry," you say, as heartfelt as you can manage. "That was out of line."

Leah growls. Liar.

She's not wrong, but you say, "Sorry," again because even though you're not, it really was out of line and you don't want to run double shifts. Sam's made you miss out on sleep for less. "Really."

The grey wolf snorts, but at least she stops gearing herself up to charge. She paces the forest floor instead, back and forth, back and forth, until she's calmed down just enough to stop growling and spitting behind her teeth.

And you wait until she's calmed down because… Well. You don't really know why you wait. It's all you've done recently, you suppose. Waiting for something that's not going to happen. Waiting for someone to tell you that the last few months have been a joke. Waiting for Bella.

But you're not going to wait any more. You've made your mind up already — had cemented your decision up on that cliff. You're not going to wait, but neither can you stick around.

You're leaving.

You have to. Bella is everywhere. She's in the garage — your only safe haven, once — and she's in your room and the bike you rebuilt and the tyre tracks around your house. She's in Charlie, who's as much as part of the furniture as your dad is. And she calls you. All. The. Time.

You can't do it. You thought you could. Let her go. Watch her get married. Take her bloodsucker down and burn him when her heart stops beating and her eyes turn red.

But you can't, so you're leaving. Taking the coward's way out and doing your best not to give a damn. You just don't want Sam to dish out any kind of punishment before you change your mind. Before any of your brothers hear your mind and try to change it for you.

Finally, Leah stops. She sits on her haunches in front of you with a huge, hot huff, and she cocks her head.

"What?" you snap, but there's no heat, no fire to your voice. Just defeat and exhaustion. You can't remember the last time you slept more than three hours straight.

Leah simply stares, her light brown eyes curious as she considers you. Like she's trying to figure you out.

She won't phase and talk, you know that. She's shredded her clothes, her shoes, and she quite happily sinks her canines into anyone who so much as looks at her bare butt, whether they can help it or not.

(You might have lost your fire recently, but Leah has enough to keep the whole Pack running for a hundred years. More.)

You won't phase, either. She'll definitely sink her canines into you when she finds out you're leaving — fine, when you're running away. All because of a broken heart.

Broken hearts are a sore subject with Leah. Imprint wins against leech in her book, so she won't let you off easy, and she's always thought of you as a little bit pathetic anyway — even before everything went to shit. You're just Rach and Beck's little brother, to her.

"So are we good?" you ask. There's no point in hanging around.

Leah rolls her eyes and snorts again. Whatever, kid, is what she'd say. I won't tell Sam, if that's what you mean.

It's about as good as you're gonna get. You stammer something that sounds like thanks, maybe, and you get gone before she figures out what you're doing.

About a quarter of a mile later, you realise she's following you.

In a few weeks, you'll wonder whether that's how it started.

Billy's acting weird. He follows you around the house, his wheelchair squeaking as he rambles about something and nothing.

Leah's still outside, hovering around the treeline. You can hear her quiet breathing.

You ignore them both as you pack your bag. Try to, anyway — your dad is obviously building up to something, and you sort of want to know what it is before you go.

"Spit it out, Dad," you eventually tell him after you pick up your toothbrush.

He reaches for an ivory envelope which he's kept hidden between his leg and the side of his chair.

"There's a note inside that's addressed to you," he says carefully, as if it might convince you to take it from him. "I didn't read it." And then, after a palpable silence, "You probably don't need to read it. Doesn't matter what it says."

Stupid reverse psychology. Nice try. "I don't want it."

"Jake…"

"I'm serious." You can smell that… stench clinging to the envelope from here. You know what it is, and who it's from, and you don't want it. "Anyway️, you're right. It doesn't matter what it says."

You bury who-knows how many pants into your duffel bag and zip it up a little bit too forcefully.

"I gotta go." You feel bad for leaving him, but Old Quil will be round this afternoon and Sue's been over every morning for the past week. She's trying to perfect Harry's fish fry, and Billy is a more than willing test subject. He'll be fine. "Sorry."

Your dad is a little bit pissed and a whole lot of sad as you walk out of the door, bag over your shoulder and the keys to the Rabbit digging into your palm.

You've left the sling and the crutches behind. No need to keep up the whole 'motorcycle accident' lie anymore.

There's only one road that leads in and out of La Push. Drive all the way down the one-ten for a while and you'll reach your first crossroads. Right will take you towards Forks, left will take you towards Port Angeles.

You pull over before you get there.

You have no idea where you're going.

After a while of not going anywhere, the passenger door is flung open.

"What the—" You may as well have screamed like a girl. "Oh, for the love of…" Great. Just great. "Leah! Be more careful, would you!"

Leah scoffs and shakes her head as she falls into the seat. "Boys and their toys."

"The Rabbit is not a toy," you protest indignantly, heart still in your mouth. You've spent months building this car, months working for every single part (not counting the one instance of blackmail from your dad when he'd given you twenty bucks and a promise to get you the master cylinder you needed, provided you went to Bella's prom).

Leah snickers. "Not this Rabbit."

"Know much about that, do you?" you snap.

Her skin flushes underneath the dome light which quickly dies after she shuts the door. Not with embarrassment, but with irritation. Serves her right.

"So," she says conversationally after half a minute of her looking at you like that again — like she's studying you, "where ya' going?"

You turn your eyes back onto the road and scowl. "Nowhere."

"Yeah? Sounds fun." She opens the door again and reaches down, and when she turns back, to your absolute horror, she's brandishing a frayed backpack. "Let's go then."

What? Is she actually—

"No," you say immediately. "Nuh-uh. No. Way."

Not happening.

"Oh, okay," she says with that same tone, "I suppose I'll just go call Sam then and—"

"No!"

Leah grins and throws her bag on the back seat. It lands right next to yours. Meanwhile, your outrage is still written all over your face.

"Why do you want to come with me?"

She shrugs and settles into the seat. "S'not like I've got anything better to do. Anywhere to be."

You stare until she caves.

"Okay, okay. As soon as I heard you say goodbye to your old man I went and packed my own bag. I figured that if you can just walk away, then so can I. Besides, you're only, like, twelve—"

"Sixteen," you correct.

"—and you can't even drive—"

"I can."

"—and if you're swanning off to have a breakdown then I kind of want front seats. It'll be more fun than being centre stage of my own—"

You cut her off with a growl and start the engine.

What You Waiting For? plays on the radio. It's the kind of music Embry likes — new wave crap — and Leah hums it under her breath all the way to Port Angeles.

You reach the bank just before closing and both write checks to yourselves, pooling together her college fund and your pitiful savings from working on engines around the Rez.

Nine-thousand and twenty-six dollars in total. Less than eight hundred of that is yours.

"I don't care," she says when she sees how uncomfortable you are. You've never been one for handouts; your dad would fall out of his chair if he knew what Leah's done, what she's giving away. Nevermind Sue — that woman would twist both your necks.

"What about college?" you ask. You hadn't thought she had that much saved up…

"Not my style." She shrugs. "I was only going to U-Dub because of…" She takes a breath, steadies herself. "Well, I'm not anymore. And I don't want to, alright? I never really wanted to do all of that. That was always his dream. Rachel's too, I guess. But not mine, so don't worry."

(Rach and Beck always had a plan. Granted they might not have stuck with it for long before moving onto the next greatest idea, but each and every scheme revolved around getting out of La Push. A beauty salon in Port Angeles, college in New York, a fashion set-up in Seattle… Whatever they planned, it always ended up with them being far, far far away — even before your mom died.

It seems that Leah's plan is much the same.)

"Consider it a charitable donation," she continues, "to the newly founded Runaway Foundation. No, that's shit. What about The Society for… the Protection and Rehabilitation of Captive Wolves? Or is that a bit of a mouthful?"

She carries on prattling off names for your new 'club' until you hit the interstate.