TAMING THE NEW-BORN

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Yeah, so here I am. I'm sure you would think this a smut, cause of the title, but it's not. Because I don't do smuts. Esme is a new-born here, and Edward is in charge of her until Carlisle finishes up some experiments in the kitchen (his make-shift early twentieth century lab). My Carlisle loves to now more about the creature he has become, or any other creature for that matter… as is evident when he tells Jacob he checked his chromosome number.

Esme and Carlisle are destined to be mates, but haven't become that yet.

EDWARD'S POV

My throat burns… why wouldn't they just let me go? Why do I have to sit here, endure this, when I can go outside and feed?I know you can hear me! I NEED TO DRINK!

I looked up from my copy of 'Romeo and Juliet', and growled low in my throat. Couldn't she stop that inner monologue for a minute and let me read? It was bad enough to deal with my own neglected thirst, and hers was just driving me positively mad.

"Shut up and sit back down on that chair, slowly. Don't break it."

"I WANT TO HUNT!"

"Shh…" Carlisle murmured from the kitchen.

I lowered my voice to a level humans wouldn't hear. "We will hunt. Soon, I promise. Let the trails close so that there is no human near you, okay?"

"NOW!"

Does she know she looks exactly like a cranky baby right now? "Go talk to Carlisle."

She sprinted past me, unnaturally fast. Ever since Carlisle had brought her bleeding, broken body home seven months ago, she hadn't walked. She had sprinted.

Typical new-born. I must admit, seeing her embarrassed me as I thought about all I did when I was a new-born.

"I want to hunt," I heard her growl, a nanosecond before as I entered the kitchen to see her leaning over the counter, dangerously close to Carlisle.

Carlisle, who was engrossed in recording the contours of a slide of vampire flesh he had scraped with his nails, just nodded into his simple microscope. "We will. Let the trails clear."

"I don't want to hunt FILTHY animals; I want to hunt a human!"

Carlisle looked up at that. His eyes darkened a bit at Esme's closeness. Beautiful…

"OH COME ON!"

Carlisle gave a wry smile as I glared at him. Sorry, still getting used to your mind-reading. "Esme, in a rare moment of sanity you asked me to stop you from hunting humans. You told you did not want to steal someone else's son, like yours was stolen from you. Do you remember?"

"My throat's BURNING!"

With that, the new-born pushed Carlisle off the counter. He banged into the cabinets across the kitchen, and a part of my mind started calculating the cost of having the kitchen remodeled.

That was before I saw the fire.

Carlisle must have been holding a match in his hand, because somehow his arm was aflame. The monstrous, dangerous wave of it ate his arm at unnatural speed, egged on by the treacherous venom that made us what we were.

My mind froze for a precious half of a nanosecond, and then I was spurned to action by Carlisle's surprised yell. Grabbing the nearest pan off the counter, I filled it up with water from the tap, which felt unbearably slow, while the new-born repeated tried to bat at the fire with a kitchen-towel. It took nine entire seconds to put the fire out.

Carlisle was still gazing at his arm when we were done, his thoughts erratic, terrified, and—typically—curious.

The newborn was gone.

I didn't mean to. I just…lost it for a second. I'm such a horrible creature. He gave me back the life I threw away, and I…

When I returned to the dining hall, Esme was sitting in the chair, her hands neatly folded in her lap.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Purlease don't ask me what made me write (I think somebody spiked my soda). But honestly, I think that since Edward is older to Esme, she wouldn't be a mother figure immediately. Edward is too used to being the centre of Carlisle's attention, and Esme's entry on the horizon would be unwelcome to him—as is the case with a son getting a new stepmom. Did you notice how he kept calling her a newborn except in the end? That's his final acceptance of her.

Penny for your thoughts?