Writer in the Dark - J. HALE

71 - ʙᴇɴɴʏ

THE WEEKS, the few weeks, passed in such a blur of worry and meeting tonnes of new people that the various different teams were sending back to the house. Rosalie and Emmett had gone somewhere, Carlisle and Esme had gone to London and various other places and each of them sent back vampires - some of which had red eyes. Athena was in the house while everyone else was outside, recording some books on the living room shelf that had bugged her for days on end. She paused her focused reorganizing when a gust of wind blew through the window and caught her attention. The leaves that were caught in the gust of wind swirled like in a tornado, yet the outside wasn't even windy. She looked at the leaf now on the floor with confusion furrowing her brow.

"Holy-" she gasped upon realising what was going on. She slipped the final book in place then ran out of the room, heading straight to the nearest door to the back garden. She stopped in the door, staring at the person who stood next to Renesmee. "Lucifer," she muttered and the person turned towards her, only knowing one person who said that instead of the usual cursing.

"Atti?" he laughed, almost not believing his own eyes as she ran towards him, leaping down the steps.

"I thought I told you to stop calling me that Benny," she laughed as the both of them launched into a tight hug, so forceful that they stumbled and nearly lost their footing. "You finally escaped the shadow of Amun! Congratulations!"

"Oh, really?" Amun groaned, scowling jokingly at Athena. "Not you again."

"Missed you too, Amun," she laughed as she and Benjamin finally broke the hug, still half hugging as he had his arm draped over her shoulder. .

"I can't believe you're here!" he grinned, "Are you here for the child too?"

"No, I actually live here," she replied, watching as he pieced together everything.

He raised a brow, "Ah, is this the place that you used to talk so fondly of? With the wolves?"

"The very same," she nodded with a huge smile, happy to finally run into him again after such a long time. "The forest is beautiful," she continued, watching as his intrigue grew immensely. Benjamin shared the same fascination for nature that she did, though he tended to lean towards natural water sources.

"You'll have to take me on a tour through it."

"Oh definitely," she agreed with an excited grin, looking forward to showing her work to someone who she knew would definitely appreciate them. "How is Tia?"

He chuckled and looked over her shoulder,  "As gorgeous as always." She smiled softly, glad to know that the most perfect pairing she had ever seen were still together. Then her smile fell when she noticed the frown begging to form on his face. "Someone's already scowling at me," he whispered to her, hoping that no vampire around them - who was busy with Renesmee - had heard.

She turned to see who she was looking at and chuckled, "Oh," she paused, looking away from Jasper's piercing gaze. "That's just how he is."

He raised a brow, "Grouchy?"

"Protective," she corrected with a soft smile that had him sure of what their relationship was.

"Boyfriend?" he asked quietly as he started to walk over to the two of them. She nodded discreetly, smiling at Jasper despite the frown pressed on his face. "Ah, that makes sense."

"This is Jasper," she introduced with a smile, stepping out from Bejamin's arm and going over to Jazz. "I met Benjamin here on a random trip to Egypt."

"It's nice to meet you," Benjamin replied with a polite smile, thought she could tell that there was some sort of discomfort coming from his end. She just assumed it was because of the look on Jasper's face, he did not look like the happiest person at that moment in time.

Jasper wrapped his arm around her waist as he replied vacantly, "You too, Benjamin."

Athena rolled her eyes.

-

Later, after managing to escape Jasper's relatively disapproving gaze, she came back from a wandering in the forest with Benjamin. They spent the better part of two hours in the forest, just walking around and talking so they could catch up on the goings-on in their existence alone. "So not fair, whatsoever," grumbled, walking ahead of Benjamin as he laughed.

"Come on, you surely didn't expect me not to?"

"It's just plain rude! I don't use my gift on you," she scoffed, wringing the remaining water from her jumper. 

He laughed even more as the water dripped from her clothes, "You were stood right there, in your little admiration world and the river was just-"

"I'll get you back Benny, don't you worry."

"I'd like to see you try Atti," he joked, nudging her with his elbow as he gave her a side-eye glare.

She turned, stopping the scrunching of her hair and exclaimed, "Stop it!" Benjamin just laughed as they walked up the back steps to the house.

"Woah, what happened to you?" Jasper, who 'happened' to appear in the door as they were about to walk into it, asked looking to Athena in concern.

"Benjamin getting back at me for an ancient bet that we had," she laughed, scowling at him jokingly."Long story short, I need a new phone."

"I said I'd buy you a replacement," he added as she walked through the door.

"You better," she replied after she turned around to look at him, still scowling before she disappeared into the house with Jasper following behind.

-

Feeling drowned in river water and all the microbes within it, Athena quite literally ran into a hot shower and lavished the feeling of the warm water over her body. Due to stupidly not keeping any clothes at the Cullens' house, she had to borrow a jumper from Jasper and a pair of baggy jeans from Luna's very limited 'winter' wardrobe. She walked into his bedroom and started to put her jewellery back on, pulling her wet hair away from her face for her earrings. "So how do you know Benjamin again?" Jasper asked, from the corner of the room as he looked up from his book - smiling discreetly at the sight of her in one of his sweaters/

She sighed softly, knowing that this conversation had been boiling within him for a while. "I told you, meeting in Egypt on a random holiday I took. I was there for about two months and spent the entire time with him, sometimes with Amun too. He took me around everywhere, showing me everything about the place in great detail, it was one of the best holidays I ever had," she explained then turned around, brow raised. "Is something wrong?"

"Nope. Not at all..."

"I'm sensing some levels of jealousy here Whitlock," she replied softly, walking across the room to him.

"You just seem so connected to him, like different to the connection you have with anyone else," he blurted with a sigh, looking up at her as he closed the book on his lap. "And he seems too flirty with you. He's very touchy-feely."

"That's just how Benajmin is," she smiled reassuringly. "I promise you, you have nothing to worry about. Why would I love anyone else but you anyway?"

"I wasn't worried," he half muttered, meeting her gaze so she knew he was telling the truth. She leant down and gently kissed his lips, increasing the intensity as she moved to sit on his lap - legs outstretched onto the sofa.

"Though jealously is kinda hot on you," she chuckled softly as she pulled away from the kiss, moving her wet hair from her face again. He raised a brow, smirking as she burst into laughter and nestled her head on his shoulder still laughing quietly.