Disclaimer: SM owns Twilight.
A/N: I don't write much for Twilight anymore, but for some unknown reason, I suddenly got this inspiration to write. I've never liked Bella because of her rather annoying damsel-in-distress quality, but I decided to make an attempt at humanizing Bella. Please R&R.
Title: Only Human
Summary: She's just a girl who, like all the other teenaged girls, wanted a fairytale ending and to be swept off her feet. She is, despite the horrible, taunting irony of that fact, only human.
She's never said so, but she absolutely hates it when people give her awestruck glances, when they compliment her on her designer clothes, or stare with longing at her flawless face.
It's not because she's modest – she was never much for modesty. It's because they're fooling themselves, telling her she's something she's not. They say she's such a lovely person for downplaying her beauty, her kindness, her overall nice-ness. She nearly tears her hair out in frustration – she ISN'T downplaying anything! She's just telling the truth! But she hides her raging emotions, sends an apologetic glance at the wincing Jasper, and plasters a smile on her face, pretending she's flattered by their comments. She tries to change the subject, and, as always, it works. If they hear the urgency in her voice, the strained quality in her smile, they don't mention it.
Whenever Edward kisses her and tells her she's perfect, she smiles an insincere smile, cooks up some random excuse and exits the room, leaving a confused and slightly hurt vampire in her wake. She hates it when people lie to her. She's always been an honest person, and despises lying to others about her supposed sisterhood to Renesmee, her age, her relationship with Edward.
She knows she's being a hypocrite when she reprimands Edward for calling her perfect and says the same sentence to her daughter and husband every day. But then again, hypocrisy is probably just one of her many idiosyncrasies. She has so many; she can't believe anyone could call her anything but imperfect.
She's not sure if she likes this new lifestyle. In her opinion, the fact that she's giving false hope to everyone around her - that maybe, if they tried hard enough, they could be as good as her, as perfect as her, as intelligent as her – was just as bad as being a monstrous blood drinker. Why not? You lie to animals and coax them to come near you, only to rip their hearts out once they come close enough. You lie to humans and completely ruin their future, leaving them hoping that one day, maybe, they would have a fairytale ending, just like she apparently did. What's the difference?
It breaks her heart, really it does, that she has to ruin so many people's lives by just being. And she knows, despite the irony of the statement, despite the fact that she's contradicting herself – she's not perfect; she's only human, even if technically, she isn't.
Maybe that's the reason why she's striking a match now, and failing because her hands are shaking too hard. That her heart is filled with guilt, but she just can't take it anymore. That there's a note on the coffee table, addressed to her family, with the assurance that it's not that she doesn't love them – it's that she can't live a lie. Not anymore.
Maybe that's why she's moving the lighted match towards her horribly perfect body, looking at the mirror with self-disgust. Maybe, when they saw nothing but that note and a pile of ashes on the otherwise pristine floor, they would realise that she was just a girl who grew up too fast, just a girl who couldn't live with the guilt of lying, just a girl who would selfishly leave her problems behind for someone else to bear, despite the fact that she had a husband and daughter who needed her, just a girl whose death would reawaken her followers' painful reality, that life simply didn't have happy endings, just a girl who would leave a best friend, a mother, a father and a stepfather behind, wondering what they had done wrong.
Maybe, just maybe, they would understand that she isn't a vampire – she was never a flawless, perfect being. She's just Bella, an ordinary human who wanted, like any other teenaged girl, to be swept off her feet and have a fairytale ending.
She's only human, and it was absolutely essential that they understood that fact.