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▬▬ ❪ 2008 // 2012 ❫. the twilight saga ꩜ .ᐟ
❛ 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗽𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝗼𝗻𝗲, the town of forks ❜ ▬▬
˙ . ꒷ 🦌 . 𖦹˙— . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁˖ . ݁

    ﹒⌗﹒🪻﹒౨ৎ˚₊‧                 𝓣𝐇𝐄 𝐑𝐀𝐈𝐍 𝐈𝐍 𝐅𝐎𝐑𝐊𝐒 wasn't loud like in the movies. It wasn't the hammering, cinematic kind, drumming down in silver sheets. No, Forks rain was quieter, gentler somehow, more like a constant whisper settling into the bones, into the trees, into the hollows of Quinn Hollow herself. 

     The sky was always a muted canvas, painted in tones of ash and pewter, the clouds pressing low like they were holding in a breath they never meant to release. It was the kind of place that felt old, even when the buildings were new, the kind of town where secrets didn't need to shout because everyone knew how to listen for the hush beneath the words. 

     Quinn had grown up in Oregon, in a city that pulsed with strip malls and soccer games, where even the storms felt orderly and expected. She used to spend her weekends wandering the riverfront, sneakers skimming across cracked sidewalks as the wind tangled through her hair, her earbuds drowning out the chaos in her parents' house.

     She missed that river most of all—the way the water shimmered like liquid metal under the skyline, reflecting a life that felt endless, boundless. Camping trips to the coast were her favorite, sleeping under stars so bright they hurt to look at, mud-caked boots and the smell of woodsmoke stuck in her hair for days.

     She was seventeen now. The girl with sunlight hair had dulled it down over the years—straightened it, tucked it behind her ears, stopped wearing the yellows and pale pinks she used to love. Here, color stuck out too much, and Quinn had learned that when you stuck out, you got asked questions you couldn't answer.

     There was always that subtle, sticky feeling in Forks that people didn't just stare because they were curious. They stared because they were watching for something. Quinn had no name for it yet, but it made her stomach twist sometimes, made her fingers brush over the nape of her neck as if someone was always just a step behind.

     The high school parking lot reflected the sky like an oil spill, slick and gray and fractured in places. Quinn stood with her backpack slung off one shoulder, watching the little circles the raindrops made in the puddles, the way they rippled out endlessly, colliding into each other, disappearing only to start again.

     She didn't hurry to the doors. She never did. She liked these moments before the bell, before the narrow hallways pressed in around her, suffocating with chatter about classes, football games, and the inevitable weather complaints.

     Angela Webber was already at their usual spot near the steps, clutching her camera close to her chest like it was a shield. Quinn liked Angela—quiet, observant, the kind of girl who saw the world in pieces and put them together in photographs. There was comfort in Angela's silences, in the way she never forced Quinn to talk if she didn't want to.

     "You're late," Angela said softly, though there was no real scolding in it, just a kind of lazy observation, like the clouds noticing the rain.

     Quinn smiled faintly, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. "Not really. I just... took the long way." Which was a lie. There was no long way in Forks, only looping roads that led you back to the same place, but it was the kind of lie Angela understood.

     Eric Yorkie bounded over next, ever the self-appointed ringmaster of their misfit circus, waving his latest sci-fi comic like it was the Holy Grail.

     "Dude, Quinn, you have to read this one," he said, already talking over himself. "It's about these people who think they're human but they're actually synthetic clones—like, entire lives, memories, fake. It's wild." He laughed, a little too loud, a little too eager, like he was trying to fill a space that didn't want to be filled.

     Quinn took the comic because it was easier than saying no, flipping through the glossy pages without really seeing them. Her fingers stalled on an image of a girl standing at the edge of some apocalyptic wasteland, looking back at a city on fire. Something about the image clung to her, but she didn't know why.

     Mike Newton showed up then, ever the golden retriever in human form, dripping confidence and a hint of Axe body spray that didn't quite mask the dampness clinging to his hoodie. He grinned at Quinn like they were sharing a private joke she wasn't sure she was in on.

     "You look like you saw a ghost," he teased, bumping her shoulder. "Or maybe just another Forks morning." Jessica Stanley giggled behind him, linking her arm through Quinn's like they were best friends, though Quinn always felt like Jessica was more of a whirlwind that swept you up whether you wanted it or not.

     "I heard Mr. Molina's making us dissect frogs today," Jessica whispered conspiratorially, like it was some forbidden knowledge. "Gross, right? You think I can fake being sick?"

     Quinn shrugged, her lips curving into something that wasn't quite a smile but wasn't a frown either. "If anyone could, it'd be you, Jess."

     It was always like this. The chatter, the easy banter, the rehearsed patterns of teenage life in a town that never changed. And yet, Quinn never fully fit into the spaces they carved out for her. She was there, part of the group, but never at the center of it.

     She liked it that way. She liked the edges, the soft places where no one looked too closely. But sometimes, like now, standing in the soft hush of Forks' perpetual drizzle, she wondered if there was something wrong with her. If maybe she'd left something behind in Oregon she couldn't get back.

     There were stories about the woods, of course. There always were. Old tales whispered on school trips to the reservation, stories of things with teeth and claws, of monsters and wolves. Quinn never laughed along like the others did. She listened. She always listened. And sometimes, in the space between heartbeats, she thought she heard the stories breathing.

     She turned her gaze to the woods now, to the dense line of trees framing the edge of the parking lot, their shadows long and unfriendly, their silence heavier than the rain. There was a feeling she got when she stared too long at those trees, a tug in her chest like a thread caught on something ancient, something she shouldn't want to pull. But she always did.

     "You're zoning out again," Angela murmured beside her, bumping her shoulder gently. "You okay?"

     Quinn blinked, as if surfacing from underwater, and forced herself to nod. "Yeah. Just tired."

     But it was a lie. She wasn't tired. She was restless. Like there was something in her blood that didn't belong, something pacing back and forth, waiting for the world to crack open.

     Tomorrow would be just another day in Forks. Just rain, just the same faces, just the same roads. She told herself that over and over, as if saying it enough would make it true.

     She didn't know yet that some stories find you no matter how deep you bury them.