Chapter 2
It obviously rained when Bella arrived in Seattle. Heavy dark rain. The sky was dark too. In the waiting area Charlie waited, his hands in his pockets. He looked out for Bella nervously. He hadn’t seen his daughter in years - especially not as a teenager. He wasn’t sure if it had been the right thing to agree with Renée to take her to Forks. He knew how much Renée hated Forks - at least it was the reason she told him she broke up with him. What if Bella was just like Renée? What if she also hated Forks? What if she would also leave him, just like Renée? Charlie told himself that he wouldn’t mind, but at his true core he felt excitement to have his daughter living with him. Over the years he missed having a family around. He wouldn’t dare to label himself as lonely but that was what every other person would probably describe him as.
When Bella recognized her dad she sped up a bit. He looked older than in her memories. Gray hairs accompanied the dark browns in his mustache and his messy hair. Charlie slightly raised his hand as if he was going to wave at Bella but decided not to at the last second.
Their first encounter after all those years was awkward. They didn’t know the agenda of a dad/teenage daughter relationship. So they just stared at each other, nodding, saying “hi.” Without knowing how to continue, how to keep up a conversation or even start one.
On the ride out to Forks Bella stared out of the window. The music coming from the radio was different from what her mother listened to. Charlie’s taste in music was more rock, more sad. It fitted the landscape in a way. The tall trees, a luscious green that would never be visible in Arizona, probably not even if it rained for weeks straight. Rocky formations and one lane roads. The world here seemed to be tinier, everything closer together. And at the same time everything was more apart from each other. Sometimes five miles passed by without a sign of life.
For a second Bella regretted her choice. She was going to be lonely. Just like her dad. - Wasn’t she? What had she done? She could have stayed with her mom in a city where she was surrounded by life instead of trees. Bella’s favorite color was green but now she wasn’t so sure about that anymore. It was almost like Forks was too green. And definitely too wet.
Forks was familiar and new for Bella at the same time. When Charlie parked the car in front of the house it felt like she had never been away but at the same time there was a certain weirdness that Bella couldn’t ignore.
Charlie took her suitcase out of the trunk. As he was chief of the local department he had a nice car with a great trunk. - At least he said that to Bella while they were making their way out of the airport. After that little conversation they mostly sat in silence. It didn’t really bother either of them but also did not make them feel very comfortable. They were family - weren’t they supposed to have something in common, something to talk about? With her mother there was never silence, not a minute, but to be fair, it was always Renée talking. Bella was a listener. Usually she was fine with that too but now she did wish she was more talkative. She had so many questions but she didn’t know what she was asking, what she wanted to know. There was so much to say, but Bella nor Charlie found words to speak.
The interior of Charlie's house was the same it had ever been. Not a picture on the wall was moved even a millimeter.
“Should I show you your room?” Charlie was still nervous. He didn’t know how to act. He had even asked one of his female friends for help when he decorated the room for Bella. He didn’t understand teenage girls or women at all - at least that’s what he always told himself.
Bella nodded.
Charlie put down Bellas suitcase on the floor next to the bed.
“Do you like the sheets?” Those he had gotten with Sue's help. She had told him that purple was what girls liked these days. And Sue had a teenage daughter - so Charlie trusted her.
“They’re really nice. Thank you dad.” Bella smiled and touched the soft bedding.
They stood there in the room for a while. Charlie cleared his throat. “Do you want to get supper now or later?”
“I can cook for us," Bella offered. She enjoyed cooking; she cooked for herself and her mom most days.
“No need for that. I reserved a table at the diner.” Charlie put his hands into his pockets. It was like he needed that otherwise he felt like his hands were weirdly in the way - which they weren’t but to him it felt like they were. “It’s your first evening here, remember?”
Bella smiled. Now that her dad mentioned it, she remembered. Every summer she came up here the first night they would go to the diner. It was their tradition - their only one.
“What time?” Bella longed for a few minutes just herself on the bed in silence.
“Doesn’t matter. This is Forks, don’t you remember?”
“How could I forget? Why did you reserve a table then, though?”
Charlie laughed and shrugged. For a moment he saw his little girl in the almost grown woman again.
“I’ll give you half an hour?”
Bella nodded thankfully. Charlie turned away and closed the door behind him. As he went down the stairs he had to pinch himself. This was real. Bella was up in her room. He wasn’t alone anymore.
The diner was unusually crowded for a Thursday night. Unusually crowded meant in Forks that there were more than three tables occupied. When Charlie and Bella entered the patio of the diner everyone turned around in their seats.
They all knew that Bella was going to live here now. It’s the only news they have had in the last few months here. Nothing happened in Forks, never in a million years. And never in a million years would anyone have thought that the daughter of Renée Dwyer would move to Forks on her own free will. - But here Bella was, in Forks again after all those years.
Everyone knew Bella, of course they did. In Forks there were nothing like strangers. Everyone knew everyone. Especially the daughter of the chief.
“Remember me?” An old man held up his beer to Bella and grinned into his cheeks. His chubby face wasn’t familiar to Bella at all. She just smiled at him, because that’s what people do, right? Nice and polite…
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” A lady stepped from behind the bar and pulled Bella into a tight hug. “Look at you. So beautiful! Bella!” Bella also didn’t remember her. But the way the lady with the long brown hair acted it seemed like they had been close - or at least closer - in the past. Her smell reminded Bella of something but she couldn’t say what it was.
Bella looked out for Charlie in need from a rescue from all the strangers to whom she wasn’t one. But he once again just stood there, his hands in his pockets. Did Charlie have any other position to rest in? Maybe this was his dad's stance; he had years out of touch with reality to practice.
Charlie ordered for both of them because when Bella looked at the menu she was overwhelmed with what to get. It all seemed to be sort of disgusting. Nothing like the food she ate back home. But well, Forks was going to be her new home and she would try (at least once.) And in the end, she had eaten here many times before and maybe it was just a trick in her or her dad’s memories but she used to love it here. She would just need some time to fall back in love with good old Forks.