I read Twilight so you don't have to // CHAPTER 12: BALANCING
"His brow puckered for a brief moment."
A Summary: Bella lies to everyone about her weekend plans so she can secretly spend Saturday with Edward. He takes Bella hiking deep into the forest where he dramatically steps into the sunlight…
*Also, we are HALFWAY through the book! I think we all deserve to celebrate. I’m getting a donut.
Outfits:
Stephanie takes multiple tangents to describe how Bella and Edward (unintentionally) show up to their Saturday forest date in matching outfits: beige sweaters and sleeveless white button-downs. I thought she was kidding at first, but she makes a point of describing Edward taking off his sweater to reveal that sleeveless number. And it’s unbuttoned. It was baffling to read.
My Thoughts:
Papa Charlie invites his BFF Billy and his son Jacob to the house for Sports Time and Grilled Cheese (prepared by Bella, of course. Did you think we were done with gender roles? Get outta here.) Billy, who is playing our sterotypical mystical Native-American, gives Bella the thousand-yard stare and tells her to be careful around the Cullens. Jacob brushes this off and follows Bella to the kitchen so she can be a Good Eldest Daughter and take care of the boys.
Edward drives Bella to school again the next day and he continues to act like an alien creature who’s never encountered humans before.
He also expresses surprise to learn something we’ve heard a few times already in the book: Bella’s never had a boyfriend, and everyone in Forks is positively SHOCKED to hear it.
Edward grimly explains that he’s going hunting that day so he can stand being alone with Bella and not eat her. Every time he talks about this, which is most of the time, he makes it sound like Bella’s making him do this, like he has no choice, that she’s so stupid for wanting to hang out with him when…he’s the one who could potentially hurt her? Gaslighty Eddie~*
We also meet one of Ed’s “sisters”, Alice, who seems to be the only one in the family who approves of Edward hanging out with a human. She’s described as being pixie-like, and floats and skips around school with the haircut I would have killed for in high school.
Eddie leaves a note on her car, because Loca needs reminding not to trip on her own laces:
On Saturday morning, like we said, Bella and Edward end up wearing the same outfit, including jeans and tennis shoes, and Edward tells Beller that he’s driving her out to the middle of the woods to go on a 5 mile hike. In jeans. And sleeveless button-downs. I can’t tell you how royally pissed I would be if I had to shlump through the underbrush in my stiff jeans and dress shirt.
They hike, Edward broods because Bella was stupid enough to isolate herself in the woods with a vampire, or at the very least a guy who hasn’t been shy about telling her how dangerous he is. Also, Bella didn’t tell anyone where she was going, not even Charlie.
Stupid.
At last, they step through a beautiful meadow (which, fun fact, was Stephanie Meyer’s dream that sparked the whole book series btw), Bella beckons Edward out into the light, he takes a deep breath, and…
To be continued!