Okay, I should be writing the fourth chapter of Uncontrolled right now, but I started to write this and I couldn't leave it until it was finished. It's not the most beautifully descriptive piece, it was all completed rather quickly, but I still like it, so I thought I'd share. Let me know what you make of it. A slightly angsty piece of pure fluff ahead.

Title: Who You Were
Chapter: One shot
Timeframe: Pre or during Twilight.
Rating: PG
Pairing: Alice/Jasper
Summary: The whole world fades into black and white, while we blaze with colour.

Who You Were

Inhumanely still, you stand with your back to me, seemingly transfixed by the swirling storm just beyond the window. You do not acknowledge my presence, but nevertheless I gravitate towards you and pull your diminutive hand into mine. I rub slow circles across your soft skin and let my inner calm seep into you.

"I wish I could cry," you say quietly, and I understand what you mean. You turn to look at me and your eyes remain as dry as ever. Behind them, I can see that you are falling apart with perfect composition. You hold your breath so long it makes your lungs ache, but it feels too weird to breathe normally without crying in a moment like this. Your never glistening eyes move from mine to the swirling night sky. You do not look back for a long time.

Unmoving, we remain in an unbroken silence until the next low rumble of thunder shakes the building. The sudden noise doesn't cause you to startle, human movements like that have been long lost to us, but it does seem to return your senses to you and with your familiar fluid movements you withdraw to the shadowy corner of the room. It doesn't stop the steady flashes of lightning and engulf the room in sudden bursts of clarity.

Your eyes are haunted, they seem to cry out in pain and have turned so dark in color that they are almost black. I watch them swirling like the storm outside, and you remain unaware of my close focus on you. You lose yourself in memories that never come.

I have always thought of you like a light in the dark. You came to me in my darkest hour and brought me hope. You seem to be able to see everything, except yourself. Everyone assumes that you're all knowing, but I know better. You feel less knowing than any of them.

"I don't know who I am," you say weakly. I can hear every tiny shake of your voice. It doesn't sound like your voice. It sounds pained, as you writhe silently in a never-ending lifetime of torture. "Who am I, Jasper?"

I feel the irrepressible need to embrace you, thus I join you in the shadows and wrap my arm protectively around your shoulders. I wish with every fiber of my dead heart I can protect you from the internal torment, but even my gift cannot remove something that was never there.

"You are my Alice," I respond finally. I know even as I say it that it is a weak answer.

You tilt your head and look at me with an expression akin to bemusement. Even in your darkest hour you are breathtakingly beautiful. You don't need to speak. I know what you will say, and you know what I will reply and so we linger in perpetual silence. Our gazes remain fixed on each other and after the passing of time your soft hand raises to affectionately cup my cheek.

"You should not wish your past away," you say in a firm but gentle voice.

A dash of guilt seizes me, but I do not break eye contact.

"My past is worse than you could ever imagine. It would be a blessing to let it slip away."

I can feel your emotions, an intoxicating deep and complex mixture. There is a slight flare of anger at my callous words, there is the ever existing sadness and confusion that plagues you, but there is also something deeper and more intense that makes the rest of your emotions look feeble in comparison: it is love. It is moments like this when I yearn for you to share my gift. If you could read emotions, like me, then you would actually understand the words that I repeat over and over for eternity. The past is of no significance, it is everything we have now that matters. I truly believe that.

If you could see our love it would be like the whole world had fades into black and white, while we blaze with color. It always feels that way for me.

You speak, your voice overflowing with desolation and I can detect a faint trace of insecurity between your carefully chosen words. "The past determines the person that you become, the good, the bad: it all matters. But, me, I don't have a good or a bad past; I have nothing. I am no-one."

I feel waves of anguish radiating off you, and I drop my mouth to your exposed shoulder, gently caressing the soft skin with my lips. You tilt your head to give me better access to your neck, and I oblige, running my lips up the back of your neck, while stroking my hand, soothingly, up your arm. I feel you unwind beneath my tender caresses. Finally you start to breathe normally as you relax back into my chest. I kiss the top of your hair and wrap my arms around you.

"The past does not define you," I whisper into your hair, resting my head against your shoulder and closing my eyes.

"I know," you whisper back. "But without a past I have no idea who I am."

"You are Alice Cullen," I breathe, breaking our embrace to move to face you. I crouch down in front of you and take your hands into mine while staring meaningfully into your eyes. "You are the kindest, most thoughtful and wonderfully unique woman that had ever graced this world. So screw the past: the only memories that matter to me are ones we will make together."

Your eyes swirl with colour.

"I truly believe that I was never really alive until you found me. It is like everything else that has ever occurred in my life was like a distant nightmare you pulled me out of. This right here, right now. This is my past, my present and my future…" I stop to kiss you, and for the first time, since the storm started, you kiss me back. I pull back an inch to continue speaking.

"You want to know who you were, I understand that. But this, right now, this is who we are."

I finish speaking and your eyes glaze over as your thoughts absorb you. You nod once, and I know you understand. Slowly, you start to smile, that familiar curving of your lips that makes my head spin and my chest leap with something akin to a heartbeat, and then you lean in to kiss me. I know this is my heaven, my own paradise in the afterlife. Your lips move urgently at first, it is as though you are figuring something out and then you slow down into a deep and passionate kiss that makes every inch of my skin tingle as though it is claimed by fire. Eventually, you break away and rest your forehead against mine. I hear you sigh in contentment.

"And this is all I ever want to be," you murmur against my lips.