Disclaimer: S.M owns all.
What would you do if you were told you only had one year left to live? Would you go sky diving? Or bungee-jumping? Maybe you'd swim across the English Channel or run the Boston Marathon.
I received the news nine months ago. They found I had an inoperable brain tumor. They told me I only had a year to live. I considered all the possibilities of how to spend my last year on earth. But what I actually did changed my life more than jumping out of a plane ever could have. I fell in love.
I took a pause from my writing. I only had three months left to live. I had never told anyone the news. I had no family to tell and if the few friends I had knew that I was dying they would treat me differently. They already treated me differently because of my condition.
I had refused chemotherapy. I figured it wouldn't do enough to help me and it would make my hair fall out, ruining my cover. I slowly began to pull away from everyone. Why let them suffer when I died? If they didn't remember me they wouldn't hurt. Edward had ruined that.
As I tried to pull away, he had only gotten closer. As hard as I tried, I couldn't help but fall in love with him. He was beautiful inside and out. He was smart and funny. He had the most beautiful smile I had ever seen. He was subtly muscular, and would probably be awesome at sports, but he didn't play any. He watched football on the weekends and wrestled with his brothers, but he listened to classical music and played the piano. He was so different from anyone I had ever met.
When I first began to fall for him, I found myself wishing he had never moved to Forks. I only had one real friend there. Her name was Angela. There were a bunch of phony pretenders that I hung out with, but it wasn't that hard to pull away from them. It must have killed her, but I was sure it hurt me more to see the hurt on her face. After that, I sat by myself at lunch. The Cullen's moved here about a month after I was diagnosed.
It was my senior year. I turned eighteen on September 13, 2004. It was a pretty quite event, although usually it was. It was just me, my dad, and a cake. My mother had died when I was five years old in a car accident. A drunk driver had hit the car and the impact killed her. It was then my dad decided he was going to become a police officer. It was his form of revenge against the drunk driver. He really didn't have much to do most of the time, since Forks was a pretty small town, but he did put away a few people. I was pretty excited. I was 18, and now I was officially an adult. I was sure this was going to be the best year of my life. Oh, how wrong I was.
I went to school the next day. I returned to find a police car in my driveway. It was pretty common, obviously, since my dad was a police officer to see the car in my driveway but it was strange for it to be there when I got home from school. Usually, he worked late. I went inside and found my dad wasn't there. I figured he must have gone for a walk, so I started to make dinner so he could have something when he got back.
About 10 minutes later there was a knock on the door. I opened it to find Paul. My father was the police chief of the town and Paul was his right hand man I greeted him and invited him inside, informing him that Charlie was out but should be home soon. Paul looked somber.
What's wrong, I signed to him. Over the years he had learned sign language so he could understand me. You see, I'm a glossophobe. Glossophobia is a fear of public speaking; except for me it is much more extreme than that. I'm afraid of speaking at all. You may think it is an irrational fear, as most people do. It is hard for them to understand the fears I have toward speaking.
I have never considered it a disadvantage though. Most people would see it as one. My own father did. He tried constantly for years on end trying to get me to speak, but whenever I came close to speaking my first word, fear would overtake me and I would hyperventilate. He gave up trying eventually and learned sign language more closely. I could still communicate with people through sign language, so that was never a problem. It also made me a better listener. You hear so much more when you're silent.
Paul looked up from the floor. He had tears in his eyes. I knew something was very, very wrong. Paul was the strongest and toughest man I knew. He sucked in a deep breath and exhaled slowly.
"You're father…" There were tears in my eyes now. "He…he was killed…on the job today." I didn't stay to hear the rest. I ran out of the house, down the street, and the down the trail in the woods. I ran, veering from the trail. I collapsed and cried for hours. I really don't know how long I sat there or how long it took for Paul and his search party to find me. I was taken to the hospital for fear I had pneumonia or was hurt worse from my fall. I was kept in the hospital for a week. It was then that they discovered it.
An x-ray on my head revealed something strange. Six tests later I was diagnosed with the brain tumor. They gave me all of my options but I decided I didn't want treatment. I wanted to live out the rest of my life as normally as possible. I began to pull away from everyone. As I said, the only one I had difficulty pulling away from was Angela, but she did move on. She spent more time with her boyfriend and her friend's from the barn where she rode horses, and eventually she was ok.
I wondered how God could be so cruel. He had taken away my mother, my father, and now he was taking my life too. I turned cold towards the world, no interactions with it. I didn't watch TV or read or have any contact with anything that reminded me that other people were happy. I blocked out all the kids at school and when I returned home, I did my homework and sat there for hours on end thinking of nothing at all until I went to bed. I'll admit it was a pitiful existence.
Two weeks after, two weeks of sitting alone at lunch, and doing nothing but sitting in my empty house, the Cullen's moved to town. There were seven of them total. Carlisle and Esme were the parents. They had adopted five children; all of them were in their teens. Rosalie, Emmett, Jasper, Alice, and Edward were all strangely beautiful. They mostly kept to themselves and I noticed that they quickly became the object of everyone's affections.
Unfortunately for the school's population, Alice and Jasper, and Rosalie and Emmett, were dating. Most people found in strange that they were dating within their family. I didn't. They weren't really related, because they were all adopted, so I didn't see anything wrong with it. Edward was the only one in the family not dating. The girls of the school were thrilled when they discovered that.
Maybe it was fate. Maybe God just knows when two people need to be together, whether it is good for them or not. For me, the day the teacher told Edward to take his seat next to me in biology was the most important day of my life. It led to love and the best nine months of my life.
Mr. Banner introduced Edward as a new student, and had instructed him where to sit. Rather reluctantly, I might add, since it was better that I just did the work myself since I couldn't communicate ideas with other people in the class who didn't know sign language. When Edward asked me what I thought of the first slide under the microscope I signed him the answer.
He nodded, grinned, and then asked if he might check. I nodded in return. He put his eye up to the microscope lens.
"Yep, metaphase it is." The lab continued like this, we switched off answering the questions and checked each others answers. We finished in record time. The rest of the class was still working on the lab so we had some extra time. I was curious as to how he knew what I was saying to him. I signed him my question and he sighed.
"Before I was adopted, I had a little sister. Her name was Ally. She was the cutest little kid, but she was deaf. My whole family learned signed language to communicate with her." I looked at him confused and he understood my silent question without me even signing it to him.
"They died in a car crash a couple of years ago. All three of them. Carlisle and Esme adopted me shortly after that." I signed to him that my mother had also died in a car crash, and that I knew the pain he felt. It was his turn to ask a question now. He, of course, asked the most obvious one. Why I used sign language instead of talking, since it was obvious I could hear him and wasn't deaf. I explained my unique condition which he seemed fascinated by.
Maybe I should have never started talking to him. He seemed intrigued, and even though he was by far the most interesting (and handsome) person I had ever met, I knew I needed to stay away. But as hard as I tried, I couldn't. He talked to me in biology, showed up at my house, and even dragged me to his. It wasn't long before I was sitting with his family at the lunch table and falling madly in love with him. He was definitely the best thing that ever happened to me.
Unfortunately, as my year comes to an end, I feel as if I have done something wrong. I was supposed to be pulling away from people, making it less painful when I leave. Maybe I should have worked harder at staying away from Edward and his family. Or maybe this is just the way things were meant to be. It would be hard for them to move on, I suppose, but they would eventually.
"Time passes. Even when it seems impossible. When each tick on the second hand aches like the pulse of blood behind a bruise. It passes unevenly in strange lurches and dragging lulls, but pass it does." And pass it will for Edward. He will eventually move on. He may not forget me, and he may always hold a place for me in his heart, but someday his heart may be filled with the love for someone else, and the image of me will slowly fade into the back of his mind.
I sucked in a big breath. It's time to wrap it up. I needed to explain to him why I kept it a secret from him, from everybody. I needed to make it as least painful as possible while still letting him know how much I loved him.
I'm sorry for not telling you, Edward. I'm sorry for not telling anyone. I didn't want to be treated any different from how I have always been treated, and finish my life as normally as possible. I know there is no excuse for keeping a secret from my loved ones, but it was something I have to do. And I hope, as I begin to fade from your mind, that you will forgive me for keeping it from you.
And so Edward, I write this to you, with love. You made this year the best one of my life, and I pray that time will heal you, just as you have healed my heart and restored my faith. I can only wish that you won't forget me. I know that I will never forget you. I love you. Goodbye.
I saved the word document where I had typed my story. Then I printed out a single copy, placed it in a manila folder. I got in my old beat up truck and drove down to the small little building right next town hall. I walked in and told the receptionist that I was here to see Cynthia. She smiled and pointed to a door to her right; I thanked her and walked over toward the door, knocking and then entering when I heard the muffled "come in" from the other side.
"Oh, hello Bella! You are looking great!" I smiled.
"Thanks, Cynthia. You're not looking too bad yourself." Cynthia was the only one who knew of my condition. Before my father died, the two of them had been dating for about three years. I had grown close to her during that time and I even thought that they would be married someday. I told her, not because I wanted her to know, because I didn't want anyone to know, but because she could help me.
I held up the manila envelope. She raised an eyebrow.
"You're finished with it already?" She asked, surprised.
"Well, I don't know how long I have. The doctor's estimated a year but I wanted to have it finished just in case they were a little off." I handed her the envelope and she placed it in her desk drawer. "Now remember, this needs to be in the newspaper the day after my funeral. Can you get it in there?"
She laughed at my silly question. "Oh course I'm sure. I am the editor after all."
"Thank you so much, Cynthia. Goodbye." The goodbye had a double meaning and I was sure she caught onto it.
"Goodbye, Bella," she said. Her tone insinuating the double meaning as well. Then I left the office, never to return.
I wrote some of this story a while ago and as I was cleaning files off of my computer I found it and decided to finish it. I may do another chapter later from Edward's point of view. Maybe....please tell me what you think.
...Sapphire...
P.S. Anyone notice the quote was from twilight? It's one of my favorites.