Midnight Sun (The Twilight Saga #5) - Stephenie Meyer Page 0,73

He had not simply given up and slunk away to nurse his wounds—he was going to try again.

Bella got to school quite early and, seeming intent on enjoying the sun while it lasted, sat at one of the seldom-used picnic benches while she waited for the first bell to ring. Her hair caught the sun in unexpected ways, giving off a reddish shine that I had not anticipated.

Mike found her there, doodling again, and was thrilled at his good luck.

It was agonizing only to be able to watch, powerless, bound to the forest’s shadows by the bright sunlight.

She greeted him with enough enthusiasm to make him ecstatic, and me the opposite.

See, she likes me. She wouldn’t smile like that if she didn’t. I bet she wanted to go to the dance with me. Wonder what’s so important in Seattle.…

He perceived the change in her hair. “I never noticed before—your hair has red in it.”

I accidentally uprooted the young spruce tree my hand was resting on when he pinched a strand of her hair between his fingers.

“Only in the sun,” she said. To my deep satisfaction, she cringed away from him slightly when he tucked the strand behind her ear.

It took Mike a minute to build up his courage, wasting some time on small talk.

She reminded him of the essay we all had due on Wednesday. From the faintly smug expression on her face, hers was already done. He’d forgotten altogether, and that severely diminished his free time.

Finally he got to the point—my teeth were clenched so hard they could have pulverized granite—and even then, he couldn’t make himself ask the question outright.

“I was going to ask if you wanted to go out.”

“Oh,” she said.

There was a brief silence.

“Oh”? What does that mean? Is she going to say yes? Wait—I guess I didn’t really ask.

He swallowed hard.

“Well, we could go to dinner or something… and I could work on it later.”

Stupid—that wasn’t a question either.

“Mike…”

The agony and fury of my jealousy was every whit as powerful as it had been last week. I wanted so badly to race across the campus, too fast for human eyes, and snatch her up—to steal her away from the boy I hated so much in this moment I could have killed him for no reason but to enjoy it.

Would she say yes to him?

“I don’t think that would be the best idea.”

I breathed again. My rigid body relaxed.

Seattle was just an excuse, after all. Shouldn’t have asked. What was I thinking? Bet it’s that freak, Cullen.

“Why?” he asked sullenly.

“I think…” She hesitated. “And if you ever repeat what I’m saying right now, I will cheerfully beat you to death—”

I laughed out loud at the sound of a death threat coming through her lips. A jay shrieked, startled, and launched itself away from me.

“But I think that would hurt Jessica’s feelings.”

“Jessica?” What? But… oh. Okay. I guess… huh.

His thoughts were no longer coherent.

“Really, Mike, are you blind?”

I echoed her sentiment. She shouldn’t expect everyone to be as perceptive as she was, but really this instance was beyond obvious. With as much trouble as Mike had had working himself up to ask Bella out, did he imagine it wasn’t just as difficult for Jessica? It must be selfishness that made him blind to others. And Bella was so unselfish, she saw everything.

Jessica. Huh. Wow. Huh. “Oh,” he managed to say.

Bella used his confusion to make her exit.

“It’s time for class, and I can’t be late again.”

Mike became an unreliable viewpoint from then on. He found, as he turned the idea of Jessica around in his head, that he rather liked the thought of her finding him attractive. It was second place, not as good as if Bella had felt that way.

She’s cute, though, I guess. Decent body—bigger boobs than Bella’s. A bird in the hand…

He was off then, on to new fantasies that were just as vulgar as the ones about Bella, but now they only irritated rather than infuriated. How little he deserved either girl; they were almost interchangeable to him. I stayed clear of his head after that.

When Bella was out of sight, I curled up against the cool trunk of an enormous madrone tree and danced from mind to mind, keeping her in view, always glad when Angela Weber was available to look through. I wished there were some way to thank the Weber girl for simply being a nice person. It made me feel better to think that Bella had one friend worth