DAKOTA LAHOTE - e.c

3. jacob black

during first period on monday, dakota was minding her business doing her math homework when embry and quil got her attention.

"psst." quil whispered. "dakota."

"what?" she murmured back without taking her eyes off her paper.

"what'd you get for number five?"

"negative twenty-two."

quil turned to embry, who shrugged with a confused look on his face. "i got seven-hundred thirty-three."

quil picked up his pencil and wrote down -22.

"guess what day it is today, dakota." embry blurted.

"what day is it, embry?" she asks with the least bit of interest.

"chinese food in the lunchroom!" he exclaimed, causing quil to make a fist with excitement.

"wow, what a great day it is then!" she says sarcastically.

the boys roll their eyes at her sarcasm before going back to their work. embry suddenly gets bored after five minutes and starts talking again.

"so, dakota, what'd you do this weekend?"

"not much really." she responds. "finished a 300 page book, worked on a biology project, went to sam uley's house for dinner."

this causes her to get both their attention. "woah woah woah, you went to his house for dinner? what?!"

"yeah, paul was leaving for his house and i had no plans, so i went with him. it wasn't bad. the lasagna was amazing."

"what was it like?"

"did he leave any drugs out?

"was jared there?

"did it look like anything suspicious?"

she rolls her eyes. "guys, seriously. the most dangerous thing about his house is the fact that he's growing eggplants the size of his arms. he's harmless."

"what? sam uley is not harmless. i know you did not just say that." quil snaps.

"guys, please just end this. i'm sick of you always talking about him." she snaps back.

"okay, fine." embry nods. "but are you going back to his house anytime soon?"

"well, his fiance said i'm welcome anytime. but probably not, since i'm gonna be so busy with the spring exams coming up."

quil drops his jaw, about to say something, but embry beats him to it. "exams? i thought those weren't for a couple of months!"

she gives them a concerned look. "try three weeks."

they look relieved. "three weeks is plenty of time. why are you already studying for them?"

"i just want to get the best score i possibly can." dakota says. "i don't know, i just want a fresh start here, you know?"

embry looks puzzled. "no, we don't know. why do you want to be different? you seem normal."

she pauses for a second. "yeah, i know. nevermind, forget i said anything."

they look even more confused but they don't push an answer out of her. that's what she liked about them. sometimes they knew when to shut up.

the teacher asked for the homework right before the bell rang. dakota gladly handed hers over and said bye to the boys before heading off to her next class.

lunch was the same as usual.

dakota walked with embry to lunch then was quickly abandoned so he could go get sesame chicken with an egg roll. she sat herself with quil and jacob, who were already helping themselves to the chinese food.