Edward's voice was irritated as he spoke, "I couldn't read her - it's not like Bella, her mind's completely shielded. But it's as if Elle's thoughts are muffled, I can hear her thinking but the words are just beyond my reach. It's infuriating."
The Cullen's stood infamously in the corner of the car park as they discussed the curious new girl, watching her and Bella retreat into her truck.
"I can't see her future either, I didn't even see her coming." Alice's voice was similarly disturbed but softer, laced with curiosity.
"Well there's definitely something going on with this chick," Emmett chimed in.
"Thanks for the insight." Rosalie's sarcastic tone matched her eye roll.
"I'm just saying it's weird, but she's seems pretty cosy with Bella so I'm sure we'll figure it out." Emmett's positive outlook didn't much lift the family's spirits.
"Jasper could you feel her?" Edward asked, not trusting Bella being with someone none of them could grasp.
He contemplated.
From the moment Elle entered the cafeteria he could tell there was something peculiar about her, something he's never experienced before. As she sat opposite him he felt waves of apathy roll onto him, so powerful the trivial high school emotions he was constantly surrounded by paled in comparison.
Elle felt nothing. It was refreshing.
The numbness was so potent it overshadowed the burning thirst in his throat. As she sat across from him, all he could feel was her blank mind despite the smile she plastered on her face for appearances.
Whilst he was enjoying the distraction from his unquenchable thirst, he could see the dullness of her eyes, almost unseeing as they roamed the table. So he pushed his own feeling of content over the table, and for a moment her eyes seemed alive again.
"I could feel her but, she's different."
"How so?" Alice's curiosity was growing.
"All I could feel was numbness. She's devoid of emotions."
The Cullen's felt blinded. Without Alice's sight and Edward's insight, they were in the dark. No understanding of her intentions or how she might affect them.
They had never been in this position before.
Jasper found himself just in the shadow of the woods bordering the Swan's house that night. Even from this distance he could feel the chilling numbness that followed Elle.
He watched her face, resting on her palm with a cigarette dangling from her lips, as she looked up at the overcast sky from her window. It was raining, heavily, but it didn't seem to affect her - she looked almost enamoured with it. Her hand stuck out from her window as if she were trying to catch it in her palm.
Elle only wore a small black tank top, her arms bare and exposed to the harsh weather as she took another drag from her cigarette - it reminded Jasper of his home town in Texas. Back then it was pipes that they smoked, or simply chewed the tobacco. He hadn't thought of it in a while.
Something about her drew him in. Maybe the simple fact that she spared him from the agony of thirst. Or perhaps she resembled himself in an odd sort of way - cold and often detached from the emotions he understood so well.
She looked up at the sky, stars peeked out from behind the thick clouds, and he could see the longing in her face. A silent wish to feel awe as she looked up to the sky.
Instead she flicked her cigarette from her window and receded from view.
He promised himself to stay away. Yet he often broke his own promises.