A/N: Hi everyone. Thanks for giving the story a try. I like the Jasper/Bella pairing and thought I would give it a try. Jasper won't show up for at least one more chapter. I have some back story I want to get into. This is the first thing I've written for Twilight, and the first thing in years. Hope you enjoy.

BPOV

Well this sure as hell wasn't how I expected my life to be playing out in front of me, sitting in this dimly lit living room on a couch that had no doubt been found at the side of the road. It featured a brown floral pattern that reminded me of every old person's basement I had ever been in. It reeked of smoke but I couldn't tell how much of that was old and how much the current owners had contributed. Yet somehow I was comfortable here in this messy room, and even in my messy life. Maybe it was because I had tried so hard to pretend that I was normal that I was even fooling myself.

I took the little pill that Trip handed me and put it under my tongue before sinking back down into the old sofa, laying my head into his lap.

How did I end up here anyway? I had come here from my dorm room, I knew that. I spent more of my time here than in that small box of a room I shared only with my thoughts. I only took it because Charlie and Renee paid my rent and would not be okay with me living with this group of guys. But how did I end up here in Rhode Island, in this situation? I never considered myself to be completely straitlaced or even judgmental of others' actions, but this just wasn't the type of situation that I saw in Washington.

I guess I was here, at least in Rhode Island through my parents' exile. I didn't really care if I went to college or not. Renee, Phil, Charlie, they all tried to push me into it. They thought it would be good for me to focus on something. There was a time when I was set on the University of Alaska, but I knew I wasn't going there anymore, too many reminders of what once was and what could have been. While in my zombie stage I had mindlessly applied to schools to make them happy, filling out whatever applications I had picked up in the guidance office.

I was living in Jacksonville when I started to get my acceptance letters in the spring. I picked the University of Rhode Island because it was the only East Coast school I had to applied to and that way I would far way from both Jacksonville and Forks.

Renee and Phil could no longer put up with me. They said they were going back on the road, but I knew they only did so because they could no longer tolerate me. To tell the truth I was ready to get as far away from everything that reminded me of my old life as possible. It also didn't hurt that Trip was going to school at the Rhode Island School of Design.

I thought the fact that I had a friend would have made Renee and Phil happy. When I showed up at their door, the shell of my former self they were beside themselves. When I started going out, doing normal teenage things, they even seemed happy at first. But when they started to feel I had moved from an anti-social zombie, to a drug induced one, Renee didn't know how to take charge because she never had before. So that was it. I was sent away, for the second time in my recent past.

Charlie had done the same thing with me only months before. He couldn't take the return of zombie Bella. I had spent months going through the motions and Charlie was so happy when he thought I had been making progress with Jake. I was starting to feel like I would actually heal after all. The whole in my chest closed a little when I was with him. But then he stopped taking my calls and seeing me. Of course I found out that it was because he was a wolf.

I didn't care, I knew his secret and we were free to be together (whatever that meant to each of us). But then Sam ordered him not to see me anymore. He didn't have a choice, he had to follow orders. That was in March, when my life fell apart again.

I guess Charlie couldn't go there again. He arranged for me to finish my year in Jacksonville. The school year was almost done, and so long as I passed my exams in Florida I would graduate. I had somehow did well enough even in my zombie state to warrant this. Maybe my teachers had felt sorry for me.

So that's how I found myself on a Jacksonville beach on a late April day sitting by myself. Renee and Phil were always trying to get me out of the house and I liked it here. I could be alone and there were few reminders of things I didn't want to think of.

That particular day I was sitting in a shady spot under some boats. I sat there each afternoon as it was the only shade for miles. This day the beach was empty apart from two girls sun tanning. By the way they were talking I would have guessed they were straight from the valley.

A group of guys made their way onto the sand and surrounded the girls, making various attempts to get their attention. One of them stayed behind and I wondered why he was not joining in his the contest for the girls' affection. He was wearing jeans and a t-shirt, not quite the khakis and polos that his friends were wearing. His shaggy brown hair fell just beneath his eyes as he shook his head at their amusement.

I looked back to the group and didn't realize he was making his way over to me. He was already sitting next to me when I noticed. I didn't acknowledge his arrival, I wasn't about to start making friends now.

That didn't stop him from breaking my silence. "What are you doing all alone in the one shaded place in all of Jacksonville? It makes you look anti-social. Besides, it looks like you could use the sun anyway." Really, was this guy serious? I didn't even know him and he joked like were old friends.

I tried to ignore him and went back to looking at the guys making fools of themselves over the girls. I should have brought a book or some music. I still didn't like either much these days, they reminded me of someone or something I wanted to forget. But I could at least pretend to be occupied with them.

"Friends of yours?" He asked and it looked like he wasn't going to quit.

I decided to play along, hoping that it would bring an end to the conversation. "Sure, Candy and Kiki over there and I are like the best of friends." I rolled my eyes and looked away. Maybe he would get the point I didn't want to chat.

"Oh, well then I guess that must make you Cookie." I stifled a small laugh. I hadn't done that in so long that I had almost forgotten what it felt like.

I didn't have any intentions of continuing the conversation, but I was caught off guard by my desire to smile and before I knew it I was speaking with him. "And why have you ventured over here into the shadows? Shouldn't you be with your friends over there."

"Well you see I'm the tortured artist type. I'm much more comfortable in the shadows." He said with a smirk. "That's my brother there in the yellow shirt. I'm home for the summer from school and he dragged me out with his friends. I much prefer to watch people from afar." It was easy talking to him, and that scared me more. He was leaving again in a few months. I couldn't handle anyone else leaving me, so there was no way I wanted to make friends.

I wondered why he had come to talk to me if he preferred to be on the outskirts and watch people. As if he knew what I was thinking he broke into my thoughts saying, "You know, I could just tell we are kindred spirits you and I."

Lucky for me the two girls were leaving and the guys were following closely afterwards. "You're friends are leaving, you wouldn't want to miss them."

"Well, I'm Trip. I guess I'll see you around Cookie." I shook my head with a smirk as he walked away.

To my surprise he was right. He started hanging out at the beach more often and we actually became friends. I don't know how it happened, but it did and it was like I was powerless to stop it. I found that I didn't mind though. We just clicked and it was easy, like it had been with Jake.

He was sarcastic and found most people to be intolerable. Maybe he was right that we were kindred spirits. He had been an outcast most of his life and never considered himself to be "normal". We often found ourselves people watching, providing social commentary on what other people were doing.

It was easy, but things were still hard for me. I did my best to forget that hole in my chest, but it still ached. Trip and I grew closer, and after we had been hanging out for about a month we went to a beach party with his brother and his friends. When he handed me a cliched red cup I looked at it for a minute. "Take it Cookie, It's not poison I promise." As I took a sip, I saw his golden features. It had been so long since I had seen them. They had started to fade a little and that made me sad. After Jake left, I didn't have the heart to continue my dangerous streak that I had been on trying to find his face.

"Don't start this, Bella." I didn't know what he meant and so I continued drinking. He didn't fight me or re-appear. He didn't care anymore and my subconscious knew it so I guess it let it go.

I actually had a good summer. Sure I was still upset, but I was making it through, hanging out with Trip and some of his friends. We spent a lot of time at parties or the beach. I was supposed to be having a normal teenage experience, that's what he had said wasn't it. That first night that someone passed me a joint I didn't even see his face. He was truly gone.

My parents thought my teenage rebellion was getting out of hand and that brings us back to here. I moved to Rhode Island to go to school. Trip and I hung out all the time. He had some friends that we spent time with too and we spent most of our time in the house he shared with them, or out at some party or another. All the while I was searching for something. To remember or to forget? I wasn't sure which I wanted. With each substance I put into my body a part of me hoped to see his face again. Maybe if I took it up one level I would.

But most of me did it to forget. At some point while I was out pretending to live a normal life I actually started to do so, at least to some extent. I made friends with these other outsiders and when I drank a beer I didn't think about the past, only where I was.

And that's why I was here, after the long year that started after he left me in the woods. The woods... that's right. He doesn't love me, he never did. He's leaving. I watched as his figure retreated away from me again just like before, and suddenly I was alone.

"No, don't leave me!"

Suddenly I was being shaken by the shoulders. "Cookie, snap out of it. You must be having a bad trip, you're screaming something about being left in the woods."

Oh that's right, back to reality. I shook my head, trying to erase the memory.. "Sorry, Trip" I said as I sat up. I had gotten so good at forgetting, why had it broken through now. "Let's get out of here, what do you say?"

"Whatever you say Cookie, let's go listen to some terrible music, watch some terrible dancing, and drink some terrible beer. Let's go be normal."

A/N: Just wanted to say I'm not from the States, so if I at any point mess up anything relating to exact details with schools or states I apologize in advance. Please Review!