New Moon Chapter 08 – “I got in a fight with Thor?”

Previously: Jacob got totes pissy about not being part of Sam’s super cool gang. Also, Bella was there.
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Kirsti: After that fabulous curb hanger, Jake makes Bella prove that she knows how to use the motorbike by demanding to know where various controls are. After a FULL PAGE of that shit, he tells her that she’s ready to actually start moving. Obviously, she freaks the fuck out. He tells her to pretend the clutch is a live hand grenade so that she won’t let go of it????? This strategy would have me getting the fuck off the motorbike, but we all know that Bella’s nowhere near as smart as me.

Anyway, she’s too feeble to kick start it herself, so he does it for her. Bella revs the engine a little and oh my God, you guys, we’re onto our FOURTH CONSECUTIVE PAGE OF HOW TO START A MOTORBIKE AND I JUST DON’T CARE.

Catherine: What, you mean you don’t want to read a motorcycle manual with a few werewolves thrown in at the end? Wtf? 

Annie: Sure, Stephenie can take the time to research how to start a motorbike, but not the Spanish influenza, or how plants grow, or even how faces work. 

K: Like any of us are surprised by this.

Eventually, after another half page, she starts to let go of the clutch, and then freaks out because she hears a voice that doesn’t belong to Jacob. “‘This is reckless and childish and idiotic, Bella,‘ the velvet voice fumed.” Excuse me while I stop to cackle because all I can picture is a really angry talking theatre curtain. It’s possible that I’m sleep deprived, but I don’t give a shit.

Marines: In my head, the angry talking theater curtain is literally fuming and smoke is everywhere. Because I need sleep too and instead I’m reading New Moon.

K: Legit.

Bella’s reaction is to let go of the clutch. The bike falls on her. Jake rushes over to help her up, and Invisi-Edward gloats. Bella realises that the voice can’t possibly be deja vu because she’s never ridden a motorbike on a road in La Push before, and decides that it must be “some combination of adrenaline and danger, or maybe just stupidity.” My money’s on the latter, personally.

She gets back on the bike – literally – and manages to kick start it herself this time. Invisi-Edward asks if she wants to die, and orders her to go home to Charlie. “The sheer beauty of [the voice] amazed me. I couldn’t allow my memory to lose it, no matter the price.” BELLA. GIRL. SLOW YOUR ROLL.

Mari: Because SPOILER if you DIE you will probably lose the angry curtain voice in your head.

Catherine: That is just one of the many downsides to dying horribly. 

K: And yet, one of the upsides for the Snark Ladies if Bella were to die.

Invisi-Edward growls some more, and Bella manages to get the bike moving.

She feels like she’s flying, and decides to give it more gas. Invisi-Edward is unimpressed: “‘No, Bella!’, the angry, honey-sweet voice ordered in my ear.” She realises that the road is starting to curve and Jacob didn’t teach her how to turn yet. She slams on the brakes and obviously manages to flip the bike because she’s suuuuuuper clumsy. The bike lands on top of her, and she lies there being confused until Jacob rescues her.

He informs her that she’s bleeding all over the damned place and she’s all “OH SHIT, SORRY” because in her world, blood leads to badness. We’re also treated to this clunker: “I pushed hard against the gash, as if I could force the blood back inside my head.” (A: Ew.) Jacob’s all “Why the fuck are you apologising?” He pulls off his t-shirt – gratuitous abs shot! – and gives it to her to mop up the blood so she doesn’t faint, then rides the bikes back to the Wow. Free. Truck. Bella’s envious of how super cool he looks because she probably looked like a dweeb.

Mari: She should probably be more worried about how she looks with a gushing head wound.

K: You would think. But no.

Jacob drives the Wow. Free. Truck. back to her, and helps her in. Bella insists that she’s fine. Jake’s all, “dude. Bleeding everywhere.” She refuses to go straight to the hospital because Charlie will hear about it, and she promises not to bleed to death until after he’s taken her home. Because that’s a thing you can promise… Jake gets pissy – “his full mouth turned down into an uncharacteristic frown” – but drives her back to Forks.

Catherine: For the rest of this book I’m gonna pretend that Jacob is being played by John Simm. Just to make it easier. 

K: I accept this interpretation.

As they drive, Bella thinks back over how awesome breaking her promise not to be reckless was. “And then to discover the key to the hallucinations!” she gushes. That… is not a thing normal people would gush about. But Bell-End wants to test her theory ASAP.

At home, she’s all “Shit, I look like roadkill.” She cleans herself up, “pretending the blood was paint so it wouldn’t upset my stomach.” (C: I hate playing this card so often, but as someone who is squeamish about blood myself, no. No, Meyer. This is not how it works.) Then she heads back downstairs and tells Jake that their cover story is that she fell over in his garage and landed on a hammer. That… is a fucking terrible cover story. (M: “THAT HAMMER CAME OUT OF NOWHERE.”) (C: I landed on a hammer and it caused a huge cut and road rash? How dumb do they think Charlie is again?) (A: Charlie doesn’t deserve this level of fuckery.) They get half way to the hospital and she realises that Jacob is still shirtless. This means we’ve had like four pages of gratuitous ab shots. It’s like New Moon Happy Hour or something.

Bella “frowned guiltily“(?!?!?!), but Jacob insists that he’s not cold because he’s a damned werewolf straight boys wear shorts in a blizzard so no one will think they’re gay. As they drive, she studies his muscles and tells us that “His skin was such a pretty colour, it made me jealous.” I make this face at the page:

Then she tells him he’s beautiful and Jacob’s all “Shit, you’ve got concussion”. But no.

At the hospital, she has to get seven stitches, but it totally doesn’t hurt. “Jacob held my hand while Dr. Snow was sewing, and I tried not to think about why that was ironic.” Um. Why… why is that ironic, Bella? I know that I’m sleep deprived, but I honestly can’t work out what the fuck that sentence is supposed to mean. WHAT’S IRONIC ABOUT THIS?????

Mari: I honestly made a note to make sure and check why this was ironic because I had no idea. I mean, she’s probably using ironic incorrectly, but what’s she even trying to get at? Her last boyfriend didn’t hold her hand while she got stitched up. He had to go outside and breathe through his mouth so he wouldn’t eat her.

Catherine: She does mean to reference the fact that Edward couldn’t hold her hand the last time she got sliced up from walking normally and existing (5 minutes ago or whatever) because he wanted her Bellashakes too much. But Jacob can. It’s not ironic it’s just, like, a thing that happened. 

Annie: Pretty sure Stephenie just has so fucking idea what the word ironic means. That’s okay, Stephenie. Don’t be embarrassed. I mean, Alanis Morrisette wrote a whole song about how she doesn’t know what irony is. You’re not alone.

K: *headdesk*

She drops Jacob home, then makes dinner. Charlie totally buys the story about his clumsy daughter being clumsy, (C: Neverfuckingmind I guess. I tried, Charlie.) and Bella sinks back into her post-Edward depression, because hearing Invisi-Edward’s voice tore open the hole in her chest again. Except not quite so badly because now she knows how to hear Invisi-Edward’s voice whenever she likes. She also has another nightmare, but this time she knows it’s a nightmare and she just sits there waiting for it to end?? Which doesn’t sound very nightmare-y to me.

The next week, she has to go to the ER again, but this time the doctor phones Charlie and is all “Hey, your daughter probably has concussion, so…yeah.” She claims to have tripped again. Charlie looks suspicious. Bella gets panicky that he’ll stop her from going to La Push, because “I’d had the most amazing hallucination today. My velvet-voiced delusion had yelled at me for almost five minutes before I’d hit the brake too abruptly and launched myself into the tree.” Christ on a cracker, Charlie. Send her to a psych ward. She clearly needs it.

Bella insists that it happened hiking, and Charlie’s still not convinced because LOL BELLA HIKING. Eventually, he relents and tells her to stay close to town because there are reports of a bear near La Push. She’s all “LOL, whatevs, lemme get back to hallucinating, yeah?”

Mari: As an aside, Jacob has this thing he does where he says, “sure, sure,” and it’s like a consistent little character thing. Bella just said it to Charlie. It would be cute if Bella were hanging out with Jacob because he was a nice guy and a good friend and not because she was obsessively spending all her time using him to satisfy her boy addiction and get some lessons in danger, or whatever.

K: Agreed.

She complains to Jacob a few days later, and he suggests that they maybe stop doing things that send her to the ER, at least for a little while. Bella sulks because that means “I was going to have to find some other avenue to the danger and the adrenaline, and that was going to take some serious thought and creativity.” Nah, girl. Just go play chicken on the highway.

But no. She decides to go to the meadow instead. Jake is on board with this plan, even though she has zero idea where it is, because “Jacob was always game for anything I wanted.” Because Jacob is a fucking doormat. So she buys hiking boots from work and they study some maps and joke about seeing bears before heading out. As someone who’s owned multiple pairs of hiking boots in her life, Bella’s going to have some killer blisters from not breaking those boots in first.

They reach the start of the trailhead, and Bella’s all “WE NEED TO GO INTO THE FOREST NOW”. Jake’s a little confused, but starts out on the search grid he worked out. As they walk, Bella asks how Embry’s doing. Jacob emoji-sadfaces that Embry’s still with Sam’s little gang. Everyone else is still looking at him expectantly and Billy’s being super unhelpful. Bella suggests that he stay on their sofa, but Jake jokes that Charlie would be reported for kidnapping and that would be awkward. Just like that line.

By this point, they’ve gone six miles and they’re still no closer to finding the meadow. They head back to the truck, and Jake says they’ll go hiking every Sunday until they find it. They resolve to go again the following day, and Jacob teases her about how her new boots must be murdering her feet. She admits that “It felt like I had more blisters than I had space to put them.” HA. Told you.

She jokes that they might get eaten the next time. Jacob jokes that bears don’t want to eat people because people don’t taste good, except he’s pretty sure Bella tastes good. Bella looks away because “He wasn’t the first person to tell me that“. Urgh. (C: Ew, Bella, this is why no one likes you.)  And with that delightful sentence, this insanely boring chapter is finally over.

Allow me to sum it up in one sentence: Bella hallucinates a lot and goes to the ER multiple times. The end.

Em dash count: 23
Ellipses count: 11

We got off light this time, friends. (M: Did we, though?) (K: Sort of)

 

Next time on New Moon: Bella goes on not-a-date with Mike and Jacob in Chapter 09.