I ran faster than I could ever recall running. Not for prey, not for fear or protection of another, not in desperation had I run this fast. But I was not feeling free and light. The air whistling past my skin, curling around me in my wake, would not liberate me from the tremendous, heavy burden. I wanted to turn around. My mind raced through conflicting thoughts, waging a battle that a significant part of me was willing to lose. Then, another feeling, so completely enveloping me that I was certain I would suffocate had I required air. Though I ran even faster, every part of me was physically heavier, weighed down, the rise and fall of each appendage becoming increasingly painful. It was as if the stone of my legs would cease movement all together. I ran without course or direction other than away. Far away. The branches and grasses sharply stinging my face and hands and in some places cutting to the bone, healing and tearing, healing and tearing again. Not punishment enough. Beams of sunlight escaping the canopy of the trees and penetrating down to the forest floor illuminated my path like daggers striking ineffectually as I thundered along.
"Edward. Don't. Don't do this." I could still hear her voice, each word striking a blow to my resolve. But there could be no returning. I knew this. It was my careful consideration, weighing each possible outcome that had led me here. My will, however ill placed and flawed, would forge me through this defining moment until an insurmountable distance was laid between myself and that of the horrid events that lay behind. Not that I imagined even in the minutest segments of time that I would ever escape what I had done. No amount of geography could separate me from the blasphemy that I had committed. On the contrary, I would live for at least as long as would be defined by her mortality, all the while with images of her stricken eyes, pleading with my own. I thought at first I was not to be successful. But with a wickedness only a monster such as my kind could possess I rolled the lies off my tongue that would seal our fate. How easy it would have been to crumble before her, kneel and quickly take back every last syllable. But this would not satisfy my greater fear, the fear that delivered me to this forsaken reality. The fear only I knew to be true and founded, that in some way, perhaps not directly by my hand, but because of my very existence in her world, she would face her death prematurely.
Farther and farther, my speed propelled me through the mountain range as if it were an inconsequential grouping of speed bumps. I could feel nothing and at the same time everything. Grief, overlapping grief. Hatred, boiling on top of hatred. Disgust, emptiness, misery, there was no end to it; there would be no end to it. The world, my life, my existence, unravelling in an explosive torrent of inconceivable pain. I will suffer. I must suffer. There will be no forgiveness, no excuse, I have met my fate.
I came crashing through the trees which suddenly opened brightly and I knew from the rich salt stinging my barren airway that I had reached the ocean. I halted with such force that my momentum dug my feet deeply into the mossy ground until a large ridge of mangled roots and underbrush lay before me. Small pieces of the forest were hurled over the edge of the cliffs just steps in front of me. I walked to the edge, blankly staring at the view. I noticed then that the voices, all of them, had stopped. Every sense I had was overpowered by the rumbling of enormous waves crashing mercilessly at the rocks below. It was impossibly loud and unrelenting, and it was then that I realized I was screaming. My cries pouring out all anger and frustration, all despair, all hatred, all that which I could no longer contain, spewed out of my core.
I fell to my knees allowing the numbness to overtake me. It would have been easy to welcome death at this moment, to erase the unbearable emptiness by erasing life itself. If I had possessed the power to will it, it would have happened. This, however, was not the arrangement with which I had agreed in deliberations with myself. I knew that beyond all suffering and certain pain, there lay a sound reason for this sacrilege. I would remain a loyal and dedicated protector for the rest of her days. She would not know of my existence, but it would be my sole purpose for remaining here, alive. This was the reasoning in which I had accepted the inevitable abandonment. She would believe that I had moved on so that she could do the same. And why wouldn't she? I could see no reason for her to linger on memories of me any longer than it would take for any other human being to survive a broken heart. I did not deserve her and she would see this in short time. My transformation, which occurred almost the first day I met her, being more a permanent one, would have to be lived out, until I was freed only by her natural passing. An assignment I was more than prepared to accept.
As if slapping me from my thoughts, the spray from the oceans torrent spattered across my face. I crawled along the cold cliff edge meeting a fissure in the rock face which allowed just enough space for my body to slip itself into, like a tomb. The cold, hard rock walls, indifferent to my skin, pressing against me, secured my position and afforded me the crutch I needed to support my lifeless limbs. I would stay here, I decided. I could not face my family and I had no immediate plans to methodically play out and use as an escape or distraction from the misery. Even if I had tried, no part of this aftermath could have been premeditated for nothing would have prepared me for the agony I was feeling now. My rational mind had anticipated this, yet there were no thoughts I could summon that could alleviate my living through the next hour. The only thing I knew for certain was that she may be feeling this too and that we were somehow still connected in this most desolate and empty state.
This was a time when the ability to sleep may have granted me some small amount of pity, relieving me, all be it, temporarily from this hell. But even if this was possible, the dreams would have come, the same dreams, or rather, nightmares, I had witnessed her suffer so many nights while sitting at her bedside. I wondered if those dreams would cease now. With her subconscious mind settled that the monster was no longer there, could she rest peacefully? I found myself imagining her life ahead, wondering where she might go, whom with, and for what reasons would she make her decisions. I imagined her father delighted with the turn of events and over time, my name being all but forgotten. It wasn't difficult to conjure the image of her soft features and smiling face gazing into the eyes of another, a human, who could deliver all the love and so much more that she deserved. Everything which I could not.
While I remained tucked into the crevice the blazing sun slowly dropped into the ocean to allow a black emptiness to blanket the earth. My ears having grown accustomed to the thrashing sound of waves, noticed that the water had calmed and was replaced by an eerie stillness. Immediately in front of me a small spider worked busily repairing the damage to its webbed lair most likely caused by my intrusion upon it. It worked swiftly and methodically never wasting a step, every movement designed to achieve its goal until, satisfied, it retreated where I could no longer see its form. I envied both the spider for its oblivious nature and the potential victim for its mortality. I had studied it for what seemed to be only moments, which turned out to have been hours, as a hint of purple hue began to caress the sky.
By the full morning light it was gently raining and the ocean remained calm. There was no sound, no voices entering my head. Feeling no urgency to change my position, I continued on a more indulgent train of thought. She was laughing in my memory this time. The chocolate curls of her hair cascading around her face. She was surrounded by friends, all of whom seemed much happier, looking at her as though she had a secret power which was holding their gaze. She never saw this in herself, not while she was with me. I knew in my absence she would finally see the things that I could see all along. How so many people around her wanted to possess her confidence, her maturity and her independence. Of course I had the advantage of hearing their thoughts, but even without that ability, one could easily pick up on the signs. Then there were those that wanted much more of her, which in another time the very thought would have forced venom to my mouth. I had to accept the fact that the Mike Newton's of the world might now very well stand a chance and of this I had no control.
My thoughts trailed in and out of this realm for a good portion of the day until the darkness once again fell upon the space around me. I still had not moved from the rock and I was becoming more and more distant from any motivation that might suggest I do so. It was pleasant staying here like this. Regular movement after all was something we, as vampires had acquired only to avoid being viewed as odd or suspicious while living in the midst of people. It was well known amongst ourselves, we could remain still for an undetermined period of time whilst contemplating or drafting our next ambition. I knew too long would risk insanity, but as yet I could not find purpose in a change of scenery which would only be void of her. What if I was to remain here and just cease to exist? I could simply stop functioning and allow the rot to take me. Perhaps I would fuse into the rock never to move again unless the core of the planet unearthed me in some catastrophic event, in which I would disintegrate and in pieces, fall to the ocean floor.
Carrying on with these thoughts I was abruptly shaken from my reverie when I heard what couldn't be. It was pitch black, although to my eyes this was irrelevant, and I knew what I thought I was hearing must be a mistake, an illusion born from my pathetic condition. She could never have come this far, nor could she have known how to find me, especially in this darkness. But then I heard it again. "Edward. Edward." Was I hearing it, or was someone thinking it? I cringed and shrunk deeper into my hole. My face grimaced as I relived her cries. Suddenly there was a hand on my shoulder. I leapt from the haven of the rock and reeled around grasping hold of an outstretched arm.
"Edward it's me!" Alice shrieked.
" Oh...I..." I could not formulate words.
"We have been looking for you! What has gotten into you! Look at yourself, I have never seen anything like it."
I glanced down at myself. My clothes were ragged, shredded in places with various degrees of filth staining numerous areas. I was dazed. I did not look up.
"Edward...what is happening?" Alice asked the question in a tone in which a psychologist might approach. I must have stood stone still for an exceptionally long period of time, as Alice stepped forward and peered up into my face.
"I'm Ok Alice," I lied, "I just wanted to be alone," I finished blankly.
"Edward, there are many ways one can achieve solitude, and covering yourself in dirt, while clinging to the face of a cliff doesn't top the list. Can I take you home now?"
I thought about it for a moment. My home. Could there ever be a place besides, with her, which I could call home?
"Edward?" Alice looked up at me with obvious concern.
"I will go with you Alice, but I am not speaking of anything."
Alice linkedher arm under my own and led me away from the cliff. We walked carefully, almost as slow as a human pace and Alice did not say another word. I heard her thoughts. It was impossible not to. She was literally screaming that she'd found me, 'Thank God I found him, thank God he's Ok'. I knew that God had nothing to do with it. It was her keen senses as a vampire that led her to me, nothing more than that. And I wasn't exactly careful not to leave a trail. The forest remained massacred in my wake and my scent was everywhere and on everything I had hurtled myself against. But I was surprised none the less that she had actually come upon me, until I realized how far I had travelled. It appeared that, in one afternoon I was standing on the edge of the forest outside her home in Forks and then I was nearly in the State of Alaska before the sun fell, not too far from one of our residences. I had lost count of the days since. It was all very much a blur. A horrific, astoundingly painful, blur.
Without announcing her intentions, after some time had passed, Alice picked up the pace and journeyed swiftly along, all the while keeping a firm hold on my arm.