Only by Moonlight

Chapter 8

            So basically, I had no experience with boys in high school.

            Obviously, I had looked forward to being able to meet guys in college once I left Forks behind, and Charlie was no longer present to scare them to death, but the two years of my mom’s illness followed by her death meant that I felt little inclination to bother with dating in college—mostly because college guys demonstrated little to no improvement in maturity over high school boys. They were interested in two activities: partying and having sex with “hot” girls.

            Intelligence in a girl was obviously a major drawback, as was having hair any color but blonde.

            And my experience Mike had only emphasized how alike high school and college guys were. In fact, I wasn’t sure if college guys weren’t actually worse.

            The only exceptions seemed to be my new roommates; Jasper and Emmett were in committed relationships with amazing women and possessed more sense than to try to kill off every existing brain cell with extensive drinking and drug use in the name of “partying.”

            Ugh.

            Despite my disgust with boys in general and college boys in particular, I finally fell asleep.  

            My alarm the next morning was an unwelcome intrusion, and I reluctantly dragged myself from bed and to the shower. Returning to my room dressed for class in jeans, a dark blue sweater, and ankle boots, I threw on a brown leather jacket and started gathering my things.

            Then I saw it.

            Sitting in the middle of my dresser was a small black velvet jewelry box. And I knew exactly what would be inside when I opened it.

            The golden locket caught the morning sunshine perfectly, glinting and glimmering in its box.

            But how had it got here?

            I was positive that Alice and I had replaced it in the wooden chest last night before we shoved the heavy container against the attic wall.

            The open jewelry box still in my hand, I raced up the attic stairs, pulled on the chain to illuminate the room, and moved to the chest which remained exactly where Alice and I had left it last night.

            I laid the box I had just discovered in my room on the side table beside my armchair so that it would stay within my line of vision. Then kneeling in front of the wooden chest, I opened the lid. As I gently moved the quilt aside in order to view the contents beneath it, I argued with myself. Even though I logically knew that the locket couldn’t possibly be inside the chest, something compelled me to look anyway.

            While I had half-expected to find the locket among the precious contents of the chest, I was still a little surprised when it wasn’t there. Everything Alice and I had examined last night was exactly how we had left it…except for absence of the black velvet box containing the locket, the same box that I had set on the side table within easy reach just a moment ago.

            Yes, I knew that racing up here to try to find the locket in the chest was a ridiculous idea, but given how much ridiculous stuff I had already dealt with in the past week, I wasn’t sure what to expect anymore. Logic seemed to have been set aside in favor of mystery as soon as I moved into this house.

            But I tried to regain my hold on the real world for a moment….

            Perhaps I had dropped the box somewhere and Rosalie or Jasper had found it and put it on my dresser?