Hello my faithful readers. Here's my next story and this one is all about Esme and Edward's struggles. No worries Bella will come in later so don't fret. Just stay with me until she does. On with the story!

Esme's POV

"Where have the years gone?" I asked myself as I looked into the gilded mirror. Although vampires didn't exactly change -at all- my expression had. My eyes held much more wisdom than any normal 27-year-olds should have. Never changing, never growing but always moving forward. I looked squarely into the eyes that were reflected back at me. Not only did the wise eyes in the mirror hold wisdom anymore but pain, hurt, and an overall heavy burden that no one should have to carry, it was then that I thought back.

I thought back, back to a time that was much simpler than today and one that was much easier to understand. Unfortunately, it wasn't any easier to handle than this one, and my memory had the sharpness of a vampire- you couldn't un-think one thought, they were never forgotten. Old thoughts were the same thoughts and, even though they were buried behind more previous ones, they were still there, and they caused a burning, heart wrenching pain inside of me. I could imagine the deep color that her eyes would be. The way her hair would curl slightly when she left it alone, and the way she would smile.

I would have seen a lot of Charles in her, more than me but I would have seen myself in there as well. Maybe some honey in her hair, or the paleness of her skin with freckles, like I'd had. Maybe her smile would even look like mi- NO! I had to stop daydreaming about her. She wasn't even existent anymore! That's what had caused all of this. If I could have cried I would have, but I am a vampire and we can't. Should-a, would-a, could-a's were all that existed for me now.

My beautiful baby, I had even told Charles and some of the nurses what I would name her when she came to me, but now I couldn't bear to even think the name now. If I did I would end up dry-sobbing my heart out until Carlisle came home and found me. Or worse- the kids might. They all knew what I had gone through. We didn't keep any secrets in the house, but Edward- my closest son- knew me best and he would pity it.

I wished that I didn't need the pity. I wished everything had gone alright during the birth, but life never seemed to work our precisely the way I planned it to. Sometimes that was a good thing- it had lead me to Carlisle and I didn't regret the fact that he had saved my life. I never would, because I was happy with my family now, and I had him. I could live through anything now if I had him. There was only one thing that I wouldn't be able to put up with was losing and that was another one of my children.

I wouldn't be able to handle that, no matter what anyone else said I would find some way to save every single one of them if they got into the slightest bit of trouble. I wasn't going to lose them the way I lost my bouncing baby girl.

I walked stiffly away from the mirror so that I wouldn't have to look at my own pain-filled eyes. I walked downstairs to the living room where Emmett and Jasper had made a mess while playing Guitar Hero. I knew I couldn't blame Edward because he hardly every stooped to the other boys' foolish games. He had an old-soul. It fit him, oddly enough and he was so special to me that I wouldn't push him. Although the others had all found their special mates, Edward remained alone, and that worried the hell out of me.

I couldn't understand how Edward, wonderful, talented Edward, continued to be mate less, wifeless, and lonely. Although Tanya, a dear friend of ours, had clearly offered to try out a relationship (in a not-so-subtle way, might I add) he still refused, saying that she "just wasn't exactly what he was looking for". Even though he had done this in a gentlemanly fashion I could tell that he wanted so much to say yes. Not out of desire or because he thought he was lonely, on the contrary he believed that he didn't need a mate, that he was complete within himself. But he knew my every thought and he knew that I worried about him.

He also wanted to say yes, not just to please me, but Tanya as well. He was upset that by refusing her offer she might be angry with him and would think of himself badly- he never went against the rules of a gentleman. Unfortunately for him, by refusing Tanya he only made her more resolved to get the guy that she wanted which, in this case, was Edward. She threw herself at him again and again to no avail. It wasn't that horrible, but I did feel bad for him.

Anyways, back to the living room, it was one huge mess! I was going to have to sit the boys down and have a long talk with them about respecting the rules of the house. Then the next time we moved and they destroyed yet another living room they would use some poor excuse like; "You said that about the last house not this house." What was I going to do with them? Boys will be boys, I suppose, and I'll love them no matter what.

I quickly cleaned up the room with my enhanced speed, picking up ripped pillows, some balloon skins, a bag of human chips that Emmett had tried to make Jasper eat, and some pieces of… MY FAVORITE VASE!!! THEY WERE SO GOING TO GET IT AS SOON AS THEY GOT HOME!

It was then that I heard the familiar purr of a Volvo hitting the pavement about 10 miles away. I glanced at the clock. "Perfect timing," I thought grinning to myself. I put the broken pieces of my vase into a plastic bag and, though it hurt me to do it, I stomped on it some more, making the five large broken pieces become on splinters of what it had been. I then took the bag back over to the now clean living room, set it on the coffee table and calmly awaited the arrival of my five adopted, vampire children.

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Emmett walked through the door first followed by Rose, Jasper, Alice, and Edward. I set my face so that no emotion showed. Not that it helped much, Jasper could read ever emotion that was passing through me, including my still near-hysterical thoughts of my daughter and, although I was also furious, my feelings for my lost daughter were still stronger than the fury. I tried to bury them but, of course, he could sense that too. I had to remember that Edward had probably heard what I was thinking as he got into close range of our house so he knew why I had a bag of splintered glass on the table. He had a smirk on his face as he looked towards Jasper and Emmett.

As the two boys entered the room I could see that they were surprised that everything was clean. Then they gaze fell on the smashed bag-o-vase. They locked eyes with me, and I could tell that mine showed more of the anger instead of the hysterics this time. They could tell that they were gonna get it. I motioned for them to sit down, and I waved the other three on, but they decided to stay in the room to see what would happen, although Edward just stayed to watch the plan -he had seen in my head- play out.

The other two boys sat down on the reassembled couch obediently. They were staring at the bag and had a WTF-is-going-on look planted on their faces. I cleared my throat.

"Does anyone want to explain to me what happened to my vase?" I asked in one of those deadly-calm voices. They could sense the change in my tone and they scrambled to explain.

"See. Uh, well. We…were gonna fix everything… and uh," Emmett gulped down air to try and explain.

"It wasn't that, um…broken when w-we left. There were only a couple of pieces and were gonna crazy glue 'em back together, but, we, u-uh couldn't and we had to leave so the… um, stupid h-humans wouldn't suspect anything." Jasper stuttered out. They knew that if I got mad then they were going to regret it. Even though mothers were always loving, they could go evil if they wanted to.

"Does it look like you could crazy glue it back together now?" I asked them.

"N-no." They answered at the same time.

"Well then I guess you going to have to try really hard then, aren't you?" I asked them in a pleasant tone. The looks of confusion on their faces told me that they had no idea what I meant. Rose, Alice, and Edward on the other hand, knew exactly what I was up to.

"Well get going already." I said. Again, they had on the WTF looks. "Clean it up." They still didn't respond. "Use the crazy glue and fix your mess." I left them to it. It would either take hours to fix it or they would have to find an exact replica of the vase. Vampire or no vampire, you couldn't force the pieces of a splinter back together…well, you could but you might just break it. My other three children left the room with excuses like; "Sorry, Jasper, homework." or "Emmett, I already told you on the way here that I had to paint my nails". Emmett and Jasper went to their last resort.

"Come on Edward, PLEASSSSSEEEEEE" Emmett begged him.

"Edward you HAVE to help us." Jasper whined. I could tell that Edward thought this was hilarious.

"No way guys, you got yourselves into this mess, now you have to get yourselves out." He was snickering on his way to the kitchen. I heard the rattling of glass shards as the other two boys set off to work, most likely going to the dining room table. Edward entered the kitchen.

At first he was quiet, just sitting on the stool by the island. I was staring at the blue prints to one of the new buildings that the humans were building in Seattle. Sometimes the humans started building things well and they got so full of themselves from doing a good job that they just expected the rest of it to be perfect. Take this building for example. They had started out well but they got cocky and now they were putting support rods in the wrong locations! They were going to end up knocking the building down if they couldn't correct it soon enough or, if the didn't spot it, the building could collapse if too much pressure was but on a certain floor.

Luckily my stay-at-home job was looking over the designs and telling the contractors what I thought of their ideas. I would call them up as soon as I was sure that Jasper and Emmett weren't making prank calls. I heard Edward laugh, he must have heard that. At least he didn't hear me earlier when I was thinking about HER… oh great, damn it all! I just did it again. Edward's laughter was gone and as I looked he had a saddened expression on his face. I knew this would happen eventually- that he would catch me thinking about HER. The only thing that I didn't know was that I would be the one to LET him catch me.

He sighed. A sure sign that he was either going to do something to show how he pitied me for all that I've gone through or he's going to tell Carlisle about it. Most of the time it turned out to be option 2.

"Please, Edward?" I asked in a small voice, though I had meant for it to come out strong and sure and not as a question at all really but a command that he wouldn't tell his father figure. He looked at me with pain in his own eyes. It hurt him for me to be hurt. That was just the kind of person that Edward was, it came naturally to him to care about others.

"Esme… you know that Carlisle worries about you. You had reason enough to kill yourself while you were human, it's no different as a vampire." His words were true. Nothing had changed now that I had lost my daughter, and the Volturi hadn't seemed like a bad idea at first… NO! I had Carlisle now and I loved him- he was my soul mate! I would never leave him no matter how much it hurt.

"Edward, I won't leave my family." My voice rang with finality. He smiled at me."I know you won't Esme, we won't let you. We love you too much." He said. He may believe that we've lost our souls, but he knew that love still existed for everyone.

"Have you heard about the new family moving into town?" Edward moved on to a lighter subject.