Author's Note: Inspired by the movie Wristcutters: A Love Story, the greatest movie ever made.

Summary: Bella leaps of the cliff and dies in the rapids below. Now she's alone on Suicide Boulevard in an alternative afterlife, Death. Until she comes across a certain pale-skinned resident.

Tales of Macabre

"A Love Story"

Love is all we want

it's all that we really need

-----"Want," Adam Lambert

I leaned back against the bar, swishing the watered-down bear in it's bottle. I lost count at how many times I had been here, surrounded by people but so alone. The bartender (Charlie was his name, much to my disdain) with fat red slits at his wrist wiped at another cracked glass. He was baby-faced, probably only eighteen or nineteen when he died. He was skinny under his Bee Gees t-shirt.

"The Bee Gees?" I asked mildly, turning around and sliding the bottle from one hand to the other on the bar top.

Charlie grimaced, taking my bottle though I didn't ask for another. "You really expect me to find a decent shirt in this place?"

I looked down and dropped the subject. I didn't, to be honest. Everything in this place--from here, Suicide Boulevard, to Sinners Lane down the street, was always worse. Not to the point of insanity, not obvious, just...worse. Every color dull, every food bland, every soda flat, every cloth faded. It was a place where people just existed. Not like Saint Row, where every one of your smallest wishes were granted before you even thought of them, or Good Samaritans Lane, where they had banquets every night and doves floated in the sky, painting it the most beautiful of colors. Not even Other Street, where neither the good or the bad dwelled, had it worse then Suicide Boulevard.

The point, as far as I knew, was to prove to anyone who'd off'ed themselves that, no matter how bad life had been, it could have always been worse. Not that it did anyone any good.

I don't know how long I've been here---time is nothing more then a myth, a tale only asked on by the recently deceased and then thoroughly dropped moments later.

At first, I had tried keeping a home-made calender in my run down apartment, but it was no use. There were no days, there were no nights. People slept when they felt like it, ate even though they were never hungry, drank even though they were never thirsty. The only purpose for any of this was to keep up a sense of normalcy, to keep the sane sane and the depressed calm. Of course, it was probably better in the other streets of Death.

Then again, probably not.

It's not like I was allowed to check.

A girl without a scratch on her passed by me, slapping her hand on the bar. "Gimme something strong."

Not like she needed it; the pill poppers were always a bit drunk anyway. For the rest of eternity, as it was.

"Sure thing," Charlie mumbled. The girl spun drunkenly towards me on her stool. "You seen a little dick named Kyle 'round here?"

I avoided her eyes. "Um, no."

The girl snorted, taking the glass of yellowish liquid from Charlie's hand before he even laid it on the counter. "Stupid fuck. Should've known. He tells me, 'Oh, baby, I love you. I need you. I just can't be with you. There's no way out, except...' Well, you know." She takes a long gulp, downing half the glass. "And then I take a look at my funeral. There the bastard is, with his fucking wife, right behind my parents." She takes another gulp, taking the rest of the drink with her. "Men."

I look at Charlie pleadingly. He shrugs and goes to another customer flagging him down on the other side of the bar. As the girl goes on about how much of a dick That Rat Bastard is, I browse the bar. Bad music plays---again, nothing good makes it down here--and posters of losing sports teams litter the walls.

The bell rings. Everyone is quiet.

After a moment, the noise starts up again and all is at it was.

Meanwhile, everyone sits a little straighter, watching the bar entrance and waiting for the new recruit to walk in. Will it be someone we know? Will it be someone famous? Will it be him? Her? Them?

Turns out, it's some girl with stick-straight hair and a My Chemical Romance shirt. She quickly joins the others in the corner beside the jukebox.

The girl, still going on, turns to me. "Hey, you think that writer guy's here--what's his name? Hunter. Hunter something...You know, Johnny Depp played him in that movie..."

"Hunter S. Thompson," I say. "And, yeah. He's passed out in the back room."

The girl sniffs and nods, looking out glassy eyed towards the door. She takes a sip from her glass--her third--and rubs her head. "Man, I need a fix. You know a guy?"

"Yeah." I smile, the first time in a while. "He's passed out in the back room."

She blanches for a moment, and I'm afraid she's going to vomit, until I realize she's laughing. Her lip ring sparkles in the light.

I look around some more; I have this game I play with myself, or whoever needs something to do. Guess how they offed themselves.

I see a man with a bleeding hole in his temple, dried blood crusted around it and matting his hair. Definitely gunshot wound.

Another man, his hair sticking out in all ends and his limbs blackened like he'd stuck them in a fire, is playing pool with a few wrist cutters. The easy answer would be electricution, probably a toaster in a bathtub, but you never know. I've seen many different methods since I'd been here, from suicide bombers to a guy who chopped his own head off. Most people want it to be quick and easy, but there are those who simply do it to make a statement. I can't imagine why; from watching my own funeral, the only statement made was the school principal using my death as an example of why one should be careful while hanging around cliff edges.

The bell rings again.

Even the girl, new as she obviously is, knows to halt her laughter.

I watch the door intently. Whenever someone dies--purposely or otherwise--they wind up at their streets' general meeting place. On Suicide Baulevard, it just happens to be the bar.

I remember when I showed up at the bar's doormate, still damp from the rapids of La Push, still shivering, with my hair stuck in clumps around my face. The bar was a blank stone storefront, reminding me of a gas chamber. No sign, no graffiti, just a grey wall with smoke coming from the windows and bumble-gum pop spilling out through the walls. It was frightening, to say the least.

The music switched to a Miley Cyrus song as the door slid open.

My breath caught.

Rusted brown hair and golden eyes, pale skin and a white, charred dress shirt, open at the chest. His head hung loosely on his neck, revealing the hint of a pure white trachea and a clear liquad spilling down his collar bone.

Edward.

"Edward," I breathed.

His eyes caught mine almost immediately. They wavered, hesitated, locked.

The silence, unlike usual, hung in the air. It was very, very rare that the latest arrivals knew the others. Something to be seen in an otherwise drab existance.

In a moment, I was out of my seat and he was across the room, his wonderfully cold hands around my waist. I gripped back, furiously digging my face into his chest. If anyone was able to cry, I would be. So hard.

I couldn't think about how he got here, why he did, who he did it for. All I could think about was how he was here he is here he's here!

His breath was cool against my neck. "Bella."

We didn't need further greetings.

I was dry sobbing, shaking my head and holding his face in my hands. I didn't take notice that the girl at the bar was glaring at me, or Charlie smirking gently, or that the rest of the bar was staring, whether at us or just Edward (undoubtedly the most beautiful thing to happen to Suicide Boulevard). He was here, and, God, he shouldn't be.

I shivered, because he smelled the same.

"No," I said. "No, you're not here. You shouldn't be."

His expression, one of undying affection and relief, didn't falter. "This isn't so bad," he said. "Hell. It's not as terrible as I imagined it would."

"Hey," Charlie barked from the bar. "Lovebirds, take it outside. Don't need you two taking away my customers."

I looked at him sharply. "There's only one bar on the entire street, Charlie," I said. "I think your okay."

A burly guy with crusted blood on his lip and a bullet hole bursting from the back of his head chuckled.

"Come on," I said, taking his hand and pulling him towards the back rooms.

Once the music had died down behind the thick concrete walls, I turned to him. He wrapped his arms around me once more, and for a moment I forgot about everything.

Here he was. Here he is.

His skin blackened and his head disjointed from his neck.

Still. Here he is.

"What happened?" I croaked, wishing I had tears to obscure my vision. "What'd you do, Edward?"

His breath shook. "I couldn't stand being without you, Bella," he whispered. "When I found out...I just..."

I knew the rest. Why else would he be here?

"I know," I said. "I know. It doesn't matter."

He pressed his lips against mine and, for the first time in too long, I was happy. So, so happy. Because no matter how bad this place was, all I needed was Edward. The Fates could make the afterlife as miserable as they wanted and it wouldn't matter. Nothing would.

"Hey," I heard. We both turned to see Kurt Cobain looking around anxiously, his guitar hanging from his hand with the strings broken. "You see Hunter anywhere?"

A/N First person who can tell me who Hunter S. Thompson is gets a character named after them AND gets to choose the twisted plot for the next story.

This is not nearly as surreal as I hoped.