The Shape of a Heart That You Cut Out of Stone

The wedding was over. As much as I had been dreading being the blushing bride at the center of Alice's elaborate preparations, my friends and family had somehow managed to make the day not just bearable, but actually fun. It was strange to think that I might already have seen some of them for the last time. After... the change, I wouldn't be able to let the humans who had known me see what I had become. Angela, Eric, Mike, Jessica... their new lives were waiting for them at Berkeley, at Reed, at Boulder, at Forks Community College. I snickered at that last one. My future was right here, right next to me, driving the car to the airport for our honeymoon. Edward.

"Bella...?" said Edward, casting a sidelong golden glance at me. "You know I've been rather secretive about the destination for our honeymoon and...it seems...well, why spoil the surprise now?"

"What, Edward, are you going to blindfold me until we get all the way to wherever it is you're taking me?" I laughed, looking fondly across at my new husband.

"Actually, that was what I had in mind."

"You've got to be kidding!" I exclaimed.

"Nope. Would you mind? I know it'll spoil the in-flight movie, but I figured we'd be talking to each other all the way anyway."

"Won't it be a lot of hassle? What if, after all your efforts, I hear an announcement on the plane or at the airport when we arrive telling me exactly where we are?"

"I can take care of that," Edward said. "Money, in the sorts of sums possessed by my family, talks. I can take care of everything. I will carry you to and from the plane myself. So what do you say?"

"Oh, Edward, how could I say no?"

At the next lay-by, Edward pulled over and pulled a bright Hermes scarf from the glove compartment. He knotted it gently but securely across my eyes.

"Does that feel all right?"

"Yes," I giggled. "This is so romantic, Edward."

When we got to the airport he was as good as his word, gently lifting me out of the car and carrying me in. I had thought that there might be some problem going through airport security, but when the staff spoke to Edward, their tone was always deferential, indulgent. It was great being a Cullen, I thought, as Edward guided me through the metal detector. It seemed everyone knew that we were going on our honeymoon, as people were constantly coming up to me to offer their congratulations. I supposed even at an airport it didn't happen often, a bride going on her honeymoon and not knowing even the continent of her destination.

I was heartily sick of people fawning over Edward by the time we got to the first-class passenger lounge. We waited there a short while before being allowed onto the plane. When at last the airline employee told us, in honeyed tones that I knew were meant for Edward alone, that she was pleased to announce that the first-class cabin was ready, he scooped me up and carried me on board. He settled me into the soft, expansive seat, and held my hand as we waited for take-off.

I could feel the aeroplane turning slowly as it taxied up to the runway. Suddenly the engines began to roar in readiness. We shot forward and began to lift slowly upwards.

"Holy crow, here we go!" I sang.

I settled my blindfolded head onto Edward's stone chest for the duration of the flight. It only seemed that we had been in the air a few hours when the plane began to make its descent.

"Not long now..." Edward murmured.

Landing, with the blindfold on, proved to be scarier than take-off, but clutching Edward's stony hand gave me the strength to hide my fear. It was silly really; of course my being able to see wouldn't have made the plane safer, but it would have made me less edgy about all the strange noises and jolts. With one last bump, I knew we had arrived. After what seemed an unnecessarily long time between landing and being told we could finally exit the aircraft, Edward picked me up again and carried me off. After all the well-wishers at the airport back in Washington, the place seemed strangely quiet.

"Do we have a layover here?" I asked.

"No, this is it. I must ask for your patience, Bella, while I arrange the car and collect the luggage. Are you hungry at all? Can I get you anything to eat?"

"Did I smell donuts a while back? Something with cinnamon would be nice."

"Of course," said Edward, turning around and marching back the other way, with me still in his arms. Then, donut purchased, luggage collected, he loaded me into the passenger seat of a car and got in next to me.

"This is so exciting!" I exclaimed as we drove off.

"I know," he said, softly squeezing my hand with his cold marble fingers.

Wherever we were, it was night-time. The air was cool and even through the blindfold I could sense the darkness. I had lost all sense of time. We might have been driving for fifteen minutes or over an hour when we turned in somewhere and stopped. Edward set me carefully down on my feet. I heard a heavy door clang shut. Then, he slowly removed the Hermes scarf from my eyes.

I was standing inside a concrete box.

I looked up at Edward expectantly. Of course, with his family's wealth we could have stayed at the most expensive suite of most opulent hotel in Paris, or at the grandest mansion in the whole Caribbean. So what were we doing here?"

"What is this place?" I asked.

"A self-storage facility."

I didn't really get what was going on. "Are we picking something up here, or...?"

"No," said Edward, smirking. "No. We're staying here. Well, you are."

"What?" I said, giggling expectantly.

Before I was fully aware of what was happening, like lightning Edward had gently but irresistibly seized my wrists and shackled them together.

"What's going on?" I cried.

Edward said nothing. He was testing me, I was sure of it.

"Edward, tell me! What is this place? What are we doing here?"

Again, he didn't respond. For the first time, a creeping sensation of doubt came upon me. Was this really Edward?

"Edward? What's happening? Where are we?"

Finally, Edward seemed to burst with mirth. "Now you start to wonder who I am," he cackled. "A bit late for that, my dear!"

"Late? Why? What? What's happening?"

"What's happening? What's happening is that you are learning, very slowly and entirely too late, that it's best not to be too trusting. Especially when you know I'm a vampire."

It felt as though my world had fallen away, leaving only a blank numbness. This couldn't be real, couldn't be happening. We had lived out an impossible love, lion and lamb.

"What a stupid lamb," I repeated to myself, a hollow feeling in my gut.

"Indeed," Edward smirked. "You made everything as difficult as you could for me." He screwed up his face and his voice went up into a mean, mocking falsetto. "Kiss me, Edward. Lick my neck. I don't care how close you are to ripping me into tiny scraps of sinew and skin, you're still the hottest guy in school and Jessica's going to be so mad when she hears that we made out. God, you're pathetic."

"I never..."

"One of my main attractions was that I was the guy you thought everyone wanted. Unattainable, to anyone but you. You liked it when I compared Jessica unfavourably to you."

This was true, if unflattering. I had liked it, very much indeed.

"That's why I did it. It flattered your vanity to believe the worst of this poor girl who was only trying to help a standoffish new student settle in."

Poor girl? But Jessica had always been so dull, so petty, so jealous.

Edward snorted. "Dull? Petty? Jealous? Isn't that a better description of you?"

"That's not..." And then the bottom dropped out of my stomach. "But... but... you can't read my thoughts!" I exclaimed.

Edward rolled his eyes. "You really believed that? I thought it would make you feel special, thinking you had this ability no-one else did. And it worked. You were so ready to believe anything that fell from the perfectly-moulded, angelic lips of Edward Cullen. The only hard part was concealing my knowledge of whatever little banalities crossed your mind that you neglected to communicate to me directly. Well, those and my utter contempt for you," he added, as a mock-afterthought.

"So when you said my blood was special..." I said, my voice breaking.

"Oh no," he laughed. "Your blood really is special for me. Don't you remember what Aro said? That your blood sings for me? That's the reason for all this." He gestured around the barren room. He snorted derisively. "I certainly wouldn't have bothered otherwise."

"H-h-have bothered?"

"Yes. You see, the prom, the wedding, everything, I just went through that because I knew it would be the easiest way to get you here."

"Why here?" I sobbed. "What's happening?"

"I wanted somewhere private and cheap to store you, so that I could build up a stock of your blood. So here we are."

"Store me?" I repeated, trying not to snivel.

"Store you." His golden gaze met mine. He seemed to be enjoying himself.

I tried to sound authoritative. "You won't get away with this!"

"Won't I? Your friends and family aren't expecting you back... for a while. You were preparing them for your permanent departure yourself, remember? You were so ready to give up your life, your family, everything, throw it all away for a handsome, glittering stranger. Rosalie warned you. Maybe you should have listened."

"Rosalie won't let this happen to me!"

Edward chuckled. "Rosalie, your protector? That's a world away from some of the nasty thoughts you've had about her. When all she ever tried to do was protect you from yourself. What were you thinking when she told you about what you were giving up? That you were throwing away the chance she'd never had? Stupid girl. Unfortunately for you, Rosalie knows nothing about this. I told my family that we would be wanting space and privacy over an extended period, and they're very good at respecting that. Especially when they have no idea where I took you..."

I desperately ran through all the possibilities in my mind, before alighting on what should have been obvious: Alice!

Edward shook his beautiful head ruefully. "Yes, you're right that I couldn't keep this arrangement hidden from Alice, but what you don't realise is, she doesn't care."

This I couldn't believe. Alice treated me as a sister.

"A sister, or a doll?" said Edward. It was difficult to get used to the fact that he could hear my thoughts.

"Just because she likes to see me in nice clothes, and plan parties for me, doesn't mean she can't care about me!" I shouted, not caring that he had already heard me think it.

"No, but it doesn't mean she does care, does it?" he sneered. "And if you think back, when has she ever chosen your interests over mine?"

"She-"

"Furthermore," Edward cut across me, "Her loyalty is easily bought. We have wealth beyond the imagination of human minds, and yet when I wanted her to keep you away from the mutt, all I had to do was wave that Porsche in front of her like a shiny toy before a child."

"I... I thought we were friends," I croaked, my voice sounding pitiful even in my own ears.

"Really? You think she cares about anything other than cars and clothes and shopping? If Jasper died she'd probably just buy another pair of Louboutins and get over it. But you don't even register to her. She's just glad I found a way to get you here without people thinking you've been killed or kidnapped. Moving is always such a hassle."

He stopped for a few moments to enjoy the effect of those words and their studiedly casual cruelty. Then he continued.

"Alice wished me well, but said she wasn't going to mention this arrangement to Jasper. Might hurt his efforts to keep off human blood."

"What? What arrangement?"

"Well," said Edward. "Seeing as your blood is exactly my kind of heroin, it's a very valuable commodity. As soon as you die, be it through natural causes, being eaten or, God forbid, you becoming a vampire, the source dries up. So I asked myself, what is the best way to, ahem, exploit, this resource. And I came up with a plan that I believe will help me extract the maximum amount of quality blood over the course of your lifetime. You're only mortal and after all, I'm going to be wanting it for a long time to come. Blood freezes OK, even if it's better fresh. "

"So that's all I am to you? A source of blood? Like some kind of...sick dairy cow!"

Edward smiled sadistically. "Finally, she catches on."

"But," I whispered, "I thought you were going to change me... make me one of you..."

"An eternity of your thoughts prating away in my mind with none of your blood to make up for it? No thank you."

I whimpered.

"But Carlisle... he'd hate what you're doing to me...he'd be so hurt..."

"Well, then, it's good he'll never know, isn't it? Even if having him on board would be useful, with his medical expertise..." As Edward spoke, he opened one of the cases he had brought and drew from it a tangle of plastic tubes and an empty blood bag. After gagging my mouth, "Just to be safe," he rolled up my dark blue sleeve and put the pressure cuff around my arm. I watched him insert the thick needle, swiftly, professionally, into my bulging veins, but the gag stopped me from crying out. I felt the warmth of my blood flowing down the tube and into the bag.

That was the first time.

I have lost count of the number of times Edward has taken my blood since then. He doesn't do it too often. That would affect the quality of the blood, he says. I'm not sure how long he waits, though, as I can't really keep track of time. My movement is so restricted that I can't even score the walls like prisoners do in films, and everything's a muddle in my mind. Edward comes back usually once each day to change my diaper and bring me food. Sometimes he doesn't come for several days. I think. It's hard to tell; the nights and days blur into one. I think Edward expected to have to force feed me in the beginning, but I always eat willingly, gladly even. Seeing him this way, even only for a few minutes, is enough. I would rather endure this exquisite pain than be without him. I don't know which of my memories are real, and which are just wishful mistaken visions of what might have been. I don't know who or what I have married. I don't even know where I am. But even though the events after my wedding have changed everything, I am still sure of one thing.

I love Edward Cullen.

A/N: Review please? If you're into the whole playlisting thing, this fic takes its title and inspiration from Brand New's awesome "Me vs. Maradona vs. Elvis".