DISCLAIMER: Do you honestly think I'm Stephenie Meyer? Really? (But I secretly own everyone you don't recognize!)
I knocked lightly on the door. I looked back at Afton, still in the car; he smiled encouragingly at me. I wasn't sure about what I was doing, but at the very least, Carlisle had to know. He wouldn't be judgmental about the decision as I knew the others would be. I had no idea if he was even home. The lights weren't on.
Aro had been too much to handle after the disaster that came of Irina's false accusation. And if Aro had been unbearable, Caius made him look like Marcus. Caius was taking his anger out on the castle walls and doors. I've never seen Felix and Demetri running around doing so many repairs as they had been in the past few months.
Still, I had been thinking about it ever since Afton had first proposed the idea two hundred years back. Aro knew I had been chewing it over, even more so lately. The witnessing just gave me, and then Afton after he got over his initial excitement, the push to leave.
I still remember a lot about my human life, especially after Aro's visit when he told my family that he'd be taking Antonio, my older brother, and I back to Volterra with him. Oh how I would miss Antonio.
I saw the flurry of motion in the windows die down when Edward growled Afton's and my name. It had taken maybe half a second for the whole thought process and commotion dying down to happen. Being changed by Aro made you super fast at everything as he would always be a skilled vampire at a lengthy three thousand years.
A short girl with black hair - Alice, if I remembered correctly from the photos and meeting last January - opened the door timidly. Immeadiately, my hand went up to the light scar on my cheek (the only scar on my face) where Aro had struck me after he found out about my new split dietary habits. Half humans, half animals. It was a small price to pay, but I knew Carlisle would see that I took his advice to heart. I sighed on the inside when I thought of Afton having a tougher time splitting his diet. He was also younger.
"You must be Chelsea," Alice said, looking scared out of her mind. She suddenly looked a lot calmer, and I saw Jasper step up right behind her. Jasper. He was the one Southern who got away from Maria. He could control emotional atmospheres. I was amazed at how my brain was still wired to spit out facts about every vampire in the world.
I smiled softly, and held my hands up about shoulder-high. I looked straight at Carlisle, hoping the centuries hadn't been too long for him to forget how to correctly read my face. Hoping that he did, I drew the smile down into a slight frown.
"As you know, Carlisle, I took your words and advice to heart; you can see that in my eyes. After you left, Afton suggested leaving. That was over two hundred years ago, and I am just now taking offer up. Again, you can see that in my eyes," I said, still staring at Carlisle, hoping all those hours in the courtyard and library hadn't been wasted.
I had hoped correctly. Carlisle disentangled himself from Esme's arms and took me into his own. I smelled his scent in again, relishing in the familiarity. Holding on tight for dear life, I wondered whether or not he would take me up on my offer.
"I'm so sorry," Carlisle said. I felt Afton come up behind me in the doorway. "For the both of you." I buried my face in his neck, the last connection I had to my human past.
While leaving the Volturi is optional, if you were powerful and "collected" by Aro, he didn't take it easily. I know he had Caius beat Afton one night for giving me the idea - after all, I was the one who kept everyone loyal. Aro had slapped me for my dietary change, and yelled at me for hours upon hours, but never got physical. That was the sexist male in Aro. Always going easy on the women.
"I'm just sorry we waited so long," I muttered, and calmed down a little when Afton hooked one of his fingers through a belt loop in my jeans.
"That must've been awful," I heard Bella - newborn, mental shield, had Edward infatuated as a human, left Volterra alive - say. Remembering that Edward could read minds, I assumed Edward had mentioned it to Bella, being his mate and all. Carlisle let go of me, and I almost stumbled into Afton. He set his chin on the top of my head, almost eager to be able to be open about our relationship for the first time. Back in Volterra - I never referred to it as "home" for home would always be Venice for me, in the house I grew up in - because of the ban against mates in the Guard, we had to be extremely discreet about our relationship.
Carlisle smiled sadly at Afton and me and then introduced everyone. It was hard not to make comparisons to those in the Guard (Rosalie, Heidi; Jasper, a bit like Marcus; Bella, Renata), but I managed to make them quickly and then push them out of my mind.
As most do when guests are over, we all moved into the living room, Afton never letting go of the belt loop.
"Amazing," I heard Jasper mutter at some point, when Afton and I were throwing back a slightly heated argument about dinner tonight in rapid Italian.
"What?" Alice said, equally as quiet. I was suddenly glad for my excellent hearing skills.
"They're closer than Bella and Edward. It's like watching a future version of them," Jasper whispered. I heard Jasper say this as Afton said a very old, inside joke about feeding on humans and I slapped him on the arm.
"Actually, they're closer than Edward and Bella will ever be," Carlisle said, dropping his voice down to their level. "You know how Edward and Bella sort of orbit around each other?" I saw them nod in my peripherals, and Carlisle continued on. "They don't orbit; they shadow. Although they had to keep their relationship quiet, one was the other's shadow; so close a shadow that sometimes they looked like one person. It's absolute hell if one has to leave to go on a trip and the other is left by themselves in Volterra. They become worse than Marcus. Even Marcus can't draw Chelsea out of her shell if that happens, and the two of them are pretty much best friends."
"Wow," Rosalie breathed.
"Yes," Carlisle murmured. "If I know Chelsea, and I know her extremely well, she's just being introverted right now and into nothing but herself and Afton, it's because she's working up the courage to tell her story. As you'll hear later, one of the conditions I made in the offer I gave her to seek a home with me if she were to ever leave was that, because I never heard it, as soon as she walked in the door, she had to tell her story to me. You all, by chance, will get to hear it as well. From what I've heard in my days with the Volturi, it's quite a story. Makes ours look dull, boring, and short," Carlisle added. Damn. He did know me very well.
He was right - I was still working up the courage. The last time I told my story, it was to Afton, and I hadn't told him everything....
We played catch up, talking about what both sides had done over the years. I heard the quick, abbreviated versions of everyone's story except for Carlisle's, Renesmee's, and Bella's, since it had been my job to know Bella's inside out.
"Are you two married?" Renesmee asked me a little while later, leaning against Bella in her lap. She had to be what now, seven physically? A year in a few months?
I felt Afton smile small against the back of my head. I looked at her and Bella enviously, although I didn't allow the envy to appear on my face. Oh how I hated Aro for taking away a daughter from my future. Sure, I had hated my first husband, but a daughter would have kept me in the horrid marriage. I shifted my attention to just her as I absent-mindedly traced random curves on the back of Afton's hand. I was on his lap in one of the armchairs decorating the room, and his arms were around me, almost a little protectively. I felt comfortable and safe, two things I only felt every so often.
I nodded at her. "Yes, yes we are." I took a mental deep breath. "Would you like to hear the story of how? It's a rather long story, but a story nonetheless."
Renesmee's eyes lit up. "Yeah!"
And then I took the high, deep dive into the water that I had probably should have taken a long time ago. And as I soared down for the water, I knew the only way I was going to be able to surface was to finish the story.
"Well, it starts on a late summer's day in August, around, oh, fifteen ninety-eight and Aro had come to visit my father...."