"He's at the funeral." the boy finally answered.
I shut the phone again. Staring at the screen, I could feel my body going rigid and the phone cracking in my hand, but I didn't pay much attention. The little screen kept flashing: Call ended -00:48. Numbness was trickling throughout my body, starting with my legs and ending in my brain. The numbness froze all of my thoughts so that for a couple minutes, at least, I was safe from myself.
Rosalie was lying, of course. She just wanted me back home. She had to be lying, it wasn't true. It couldn't be true…
All of my emotions came rushing back with full force.
Despair, anger, remorse, contrition, rage, self-loathing, hate…all these and so many more were pressing down on me, invading my mind and rendering me helpless. I threw the phone across the room, and it went through the outside wall, making a neat little hole. Through the flurry of emotions that raged in my skull, a memory came flooding back to me. It was the first time we had proclaimed our love; our afternoon in the meadow.
"The thought of you, still, white, cold…to never see you blush scarlet again, to never see that flash of intuition in your eyes when you see through my pretenses…it would be unendurable." And I never would see her cheeks flush bright red again. Her lovely eyes would never see through any more of my cryptic pretenses…
"You are the most important thing to me now. The most important thing to me ever." My heart, though it has been long since it stopped beating, was gone. It died with the most important thing in the world. It died with my Bella.
I curled again into the fetal position, my forehead banging against my knees and my arms clamped around my legs. Were I upright, I would be rocking back and forth. Instead, I clenched my teeth and tried not to think.
My Bella is gone.
No…no…she can't be…
"She's dead, Edward."
Shut up…please, shut up…
"Bella threw herself off a cliff two days ago."
No, no, no, no, no, no….
"NO!" I roared, slamming my fist against the soft wood of the floor. The wooden beams of the house shook, and a dent was left where my hand made contact with the floor. Cries of alarm came from the floors below me, but I ignored them. The numbness was spreading again, and nothing else existed. The world became colorless; all of my senses were dulled, and I focused simply on breathing. I wanted to die, and for the first time in 90-odd years, I cursed Carlisle for making me what I am. My vision narrowed to focused on a single crack in the plaster of the walls surrounding me. Through the mindless fog, a single word made itself known in my mind.
Volturri.
The fog almost immediately cleared, and all of the negative emotions I'd been harboring for a year disappeared. In their place, insane relief made itself known. I slowly sat up, staring at the door. A slow grin spread over my face, and I almost laughed out loud. The Volturri. How could I forget? I stood up, ducking to avoid the low ceiling. I crossed the room in a few long strides. I opened the door. Wait for me, Bella, I thought. We'll be together again. Wait for me.
I closed the door on my little room of despair, and started my journey towards Italy. My journey towards death. My journey towards love.