6:09:04

As soon as the bell rang, Emery sprang out of her seat, hearing a calming and soft laugh behind her as she made her way towards the door. Emery blushed wildly and shook her head, allowing her hair to cover the apple of her cheeks as she treaded her way through the hallway and near the stairway door, where her sister stood waiting for her.

There Bella stood with a tight jaw, a rosiness to her cheeks that was only ever present when she was truly upset.

Emery immediately squinted her eyes and paced her way over, her eyes glancing over her sister. Without seeing the need to physically speak, she simply raised an eyebrow and waited for her sister to speak.

"Edward Cullen is a jerk." Bella said with finality, her brown hair rustling wildly as she walked down the stairs, a grit to her teeth.

"Edward who?" Her older sister asked as she followed her carefully, holding onto the railing as students flew by with excitement, due to the day almost being over.

Bella huffed and looked back at her older sister with annoyance, which caused her to playfully place her hands up and almost lose her balance.

"Be careful would you," Bella said with a sharp tone, her eyes softening as she saw the wounded look on Emery's face. "I'm sorry, okay? It isn't you, I promise. I was sitting by one of the Cullen's in my Biology class, and he was really rude to me." Bella said after releasing a deep breath, sighing as they finally hit the first floor of the building.

"Well, what did he do?" Emery asked, walking next to her sister as Bella directed them to the guidance office. Bella said something under her breath that she couldn't hear and asked her to say it again.

"He didn't give me any attention and acted as if I smelled really bad, okay?" Bella announced defensively, blistering underneath the look her sister gave her.

"Is that all? Broody didn't give you enough attention and it hurt your feelings?" Emery asked in an incredulous tone, stopping near the office's door and looked an her sister, unamused.

Bella pursed her lips and went to respond, but her attention was caught by a tall figure standing inside of said office with an annoyed look on his face. "That's him." Bella insisted, quickly wrapping an arm around her older sister's arm and tugging her inside before she had any chance to reply.

Emery stood behind her sister and watched as the boy took in a deep breath and tensed so strong, his body winding up in a pose that looked almost predatory. "You know what, just forget it. It'll just have to be something that I will have to endure." He said sharply, leaving the guidance counselor to sit there with wide eyes and an open mouth as he began to turn around, his eyes darkening as he looked at the two that stood in front of him with distaste.

Edward quickly looked away from the hurt look on Bella's face and winced as he met eye contact with the older. Emery held him in place with uncharacteristically dark and black eyes, and Edward could only stare back, his head feeling as if it were truly on fire.

Emery's eyes flickered and she quickly blinked, looking away from the Cullen with confusion, slightly jumping as the boy grunted and stumbled out of the office, firmly closing the door behind him in an almost slam. Emery winced as she felt a deep pulse go throughout her entire figure and her nose began to turn, her eyesight becoming almost tunnel vision.

Blinking rapidly, she took a moment to close her eyes and when she opened them, she took the opportunity to clear up the awkward environment the Cullen left after he vanished.

Clearing her throat while leaning against the counter almost taller than her, she simply said in a dismissive tone,

"First days really do go by fast, huh?"

The look of amusement that was aimed towards Emery from the guidance counselor, and the huff of a laugh she got from her sister Bella, made it worth the embarrassed flush that crawled up her cheeks from her own antics.

▹

Emery smiled to herself and sat up in her seat as the final bell rang, carefully shuffling all of her belongings into her already heavy backpack.

"What do you have in that thing anyway?" A voice asked in an amused tone, voice cancelling out the sound of the loud footsteps as everyone practically run to get off of the schoolgrounds.

Said girl turned around and made eye contact with the an insanely buff guy with soft eyes, and the girl she sent the smile to earlier.

Emery simply sent them a raised eyebrow as her hand wrapped around the extra bottles of pills and her enhaler, before zipping her bag and carefully standing up.

"Nice to meet you too, I'm Emery." She replied back sarcastically, an amused look painting her face as the blonde behind him pursed her lips and stared at her intently, while the male continued to have an easy smile on his face.

"Just curious, that's a pretty big bag for such a small girl." The boy replied casually, watching her as she slowly put on her backpack with a wince. "I can carry that for you. What happened to your shoulder?" He asked with a worried tone in his voice. Rosalie narrowed her eyes as she saw a bruise slip out from underneath her jacket.

"Did somebody hurt you?" She demanded, stepping towards the girl, but didn't make it far as Emmett held her back, remaining eye contact with the now frightened girl.

Emery quickly backed away from the duo and stepped to turn around, beginning to flee the classroom.

"Wait," Emmett began, watching the girl struggle to make her way out of the classroom as quickly as she could with her backpack weighing her down.

Emery paced down the nearly empty hallway and sighed as the cold air hit her heated skin as she made her way outside. Making her way towards Rusty Red where her sister stood, Emery looked around and made eye contact with the Cullen's that stood outside and sat inside of their vehicles.

Emery blinked in confusion as Emmett and Rosalie sat in the front of the convertible, watching her with focused eyes. She couldn't understand how they made in to their car before she did. She never even saw them leave the classroom after her. Her eyes widened at the realization, and quickly looked away before she could see Rosalie watch her with panicked eyes, cursing quietly to herself.

With a shaky inhalation of breath, she continued her way over to the truck and made eye contact with her now worried younger sister.

"Hey, what took you so long?" She asked her now panting sister, resting an arm under hers to keep her steady.

Emery shook her head unsteadily and got into the truck as soon as Bella unlocked the doors. Placing on her seatbelt and lowering her bag onto her lap, she shot Bella a look. "Maybe we should just stay away from them." She said out loud into the small area of the car, her eyes unfocused and her hands trembling.

"Stay away from who?" Asked Bella, who looked at her unnaturally pale sister with an concerned look on her face.

"The Cullen's." Shaking her head, Emery merely put on a fake grin and leaned back into her seat, exhausted. Before Bella could stop her and ask her even more questions, she brought up the fact that she had a doctor's appointment soon and that they'd have to meet up with their dad soon for dinner.

Bella quickly placed the stick shift into drive and hightailed out of the parking lot after looking at the dust covered clock in the truck, completely forgetting about the family that sat in their cars behind them, watching them carefully. 

▹

"What are we supposed to do now?" Rosalie demanded, her voice raising. She met eyes with Jasper and sent him a glare as he tried to control her emotions. Alice sent her a sharp look, and Rosalie looked away, her jaw clenching. 

"She's catching onto us, they both are." Edward said with finality, all of them becoming uncomfortable with the silence that surrounded them, before Rosalie turned on her convertible and sped out of the high school's vicinity.

Edward got into his car and followed behind her closely, panic and worry rising inside of him for the first time in decades. 

He had to speak with Carlisle.

▹

After awkwardly smiling for two minutes while a guy who called himself over to their table in the Diner, Charlie looked over to his eldest daughter, noting the way she barely ate any of her food.

"Not hungry?" He asked gently, smiling as his daughter looked up at him with tired eyes and put down her fork with a sigh.

"The new medicine they put me on to substitute the chemo just makes me less hungry, dad." Emery responded, frowning as she saw her sister stop chewing and her dad look down at the table with saddened eyes.

Emery knew that it was hard on her family that she was terminal, but she had already accepted the fact that she was going to die. She way ready for it, as terrifying as it might be.

As she glanced up, she made eye contact with a teary eyed Bella and felt guilt chew her up inside. During the last few years of her being a cancer patient in their hometown's hospital, her and her younger sister became strangers. There were misplaced anger and resentment coming from her younger sibling, but she never blamed her. Sometimes Emery got mad at herself too.

Charlie cleared his throat and took a small bite of his pie, and tried to smile at his daughters, but it quickly fell.

The way that Emery carried herself didn't allow for people to see the severity of her illness. Nobody saw the sobs she let out as she cried in pain from her liver being enlarged and the abdominal pains that came with it. The dialysis she had to constantly go through at the hospital she mostly grew up in, the chemotherapy she gave up on because no matter what, she was in stage three, and her cancer was still growing. She gave up on the bone marrow transplant, as she was the thousandth person on the list, and she knew her time would run out before she'd ever get the opportunity to be operated on.

She was dying, and she knew it. But it pained her to know that it hurt her family, so she hid it well.

Choosing to pick up her fork, even though the nausea was making her stomach lurch, she bit down a mouthful of the pie that was placed in front of her, and smiled back at her father and sister who smiled at her for trying.

That's all she could do at this point, try.

▹

As Emery sat with her sister and dad in the cold waiting room, she twisted her hands together and stared at the wall in front of her.

The sterilization smell that used to give her the feeling of comfort like being at home, soon made her stomach fill up with knots. Emery knew that she was going to get an estimated time on how much longer she'd be able to make it with the medicine she was on now, instead of the chemotherapy sessions that made her feel so much worse.

Emery tried to relax next to her father, who thrummed his shoe against the tile nervously, biting his bottom lip raw in worry.

Placing a hand on his shoulder in comfort, she began to open her mouth. But before she could speak, she heard a door open.

Her head raised sharply as she met eyes with the nurse, who smiled at the Swan gently. Emery sent the nurse a small smile, although she just wanted to curl into herself.

"Doctor Cullen will be with you shortly." The nurse said before she went back into the office she came out of, missing the look the two sisters shared, and the way the eldest slumped down into her chair, her eyebrows furrowed.

'Of course.' she thought, 'just my luck.'