All things Twilight belong to Stephenie Meyer


Chapter 1


When I woke up in the hospital, he was gone.

There was a note from Alice, saying: "He insisted. Please forgive us. Love, Alice." I read it over and over again, until the nurse came back and told me it was time to sleep.


Back in Forks life was as dreary and grey as I had expected it to be before I met Edward. It felt empty; everything I did felt mechanical and meaningless. I just couldn't bring myself to feel sorry for myself; I hadn't deserved him, after all. I had stupidly gone off to sacrifice myself after he told me to take care of myself. He shouldn't have stayed as long as he did: my Mom had told me he had waited in the hospital while I was in a coma. He felt responsible for me, I reasoned, just not happy enough with me to stay long enough to say good-bye.

School was dull. My math homework was easier after Edward's tutoring, and English and History was more interesting with the different perspectives I had after spending time around the Cullens. Spanish was simple after spending my whole childhood near the Mexican border, being in the room reading while Renee watched Spanish-speaking soaps and whatnot. Why didn't we learn French instead, since we were closer to the Canadian border? Every day was the same: I went to school, drove home, did homework, made dinner, did more homework or housework or, when there was none, just read. I needed to keep my mind focused on something, to stave off the hollow feeling inside me. "Sleeping" was like falling into a pitch black bottomless hole; I woke up unrested and feeling like I hadn't slept at all. I couldn't remember dreaming.

Charlie let me work through it on my own, as he said. Mostly he either worked late or went fishing, and I didn't mind, though I suspected him of just not wanting to deal with sappy teen girl feelings. Not that I had any; I felt hollow all the way through, without room for grief.

With my unsatiable need to keep my mind focused, I started driving to Seattle on weekends to visit the library there. It was bigger than the one in Forks, and there were better bookstores than in Port Angeles. There were books in at least two dozen languages. I would read anything and everything; with intense mental focus it was easy to read three or four books in a day. It continued like this for three months, until I aced every one of my exams exept P.E., after having been too distracted for it to occur to me to be nervous.

But once the summer vacation came, it all fell apart.

I woke up the morning after my final exam and just laid there, staring at the celing. I felt disoriented and depressed. My inner vacuum was caving in. There was nothing more for me to focus on, nothing I could pretend was worth getting out of bed to do. Edward wasn't there. Alice had left with him, as well as their foster parents who had obviously thought it would be best for him. Esme had once said she wanted me to be with him, not because I was good enough for him, but because I was what he wanted. And he no longer wanted me. And it was my own fault for pulling that stunt trying to save my Mom, who if I'd stopped to think about it at all I would have realized had never been in any real danger at all. There was just no way she could get from Florida to Arizona in so short time. I wanted to hit myself, but I couldn't move. My arms lay frozen at my sides. I felt cold.

After some time, Charlie knocked on my bedroom door: "Bella, are you awake? I thought I'd let you sleep in, but it's two in the afternoon. Don't you think it's time to get up?" "Yes, Dad," I croaked, making no move to get anywhere. He left anyway, probably to go fishing, and after staring at the celing for awhile longer I managed to gather the resolve to swing my legs over the edge of the bed. The alarmclock on my nightstand now said four p.m.

It was sunny outside, as one might expect from a day in July, but I felt cold. When I reached for my clothes I saw why: my arm was extremely thin, the bones and sinews protruding. I looked down at my body: It looked emaciated. I guessed I hadn't had much of an appetite over the past few months. All I could think of now was that I had to find Edward.

By the time I remembered that I hadn't eaten at all that day, I was already on the road headed towards the Cullens' house. My stomach growled once as if to make it's opinion clear, then kept quiet.


The Cullen house looked deserted, even from the driveway. It looked well kept from the outside, but the whole place felt abandonned. I walked around the main house once, looked in through the glass wall, felt the emptiness grow when the sight confirmed my what I believed. The furniture was covered in white sheets; the piano still there, uncovered. Walking around to the front, the thought occured to me that if I triggered a burglar alarm, that would make the owners come back to press charges, or at least to get in touch. I looked for a rock to throw through a window, but after months of near-starvation I hadn't the strength to break a single glass panel. I hacked away at it anyway, but to no avail. There were cracks, but not enough to make the damn thing shatter. In the end I gave up and sat down on the porch, trying to think.

Alice. How could she have just left? I knew Rosalie hated my guts, and the others either found me amusing (like Emmett) or saw me as Edward's pet, or maybe both. But not Alice; she had been my friend. She had been the one to leave a note, as well as the one to make first contact. I remembered the day Tyler's van had crashed with my parked truck, when she had come over and led me away from the site maybe with maybe fifteen seconds' margin. I had shuddered to think what might have happened had I stood closer to the car - the whole thing made more sense once I learned of her talent - but now I would have welcomed that fate over this one, I finally admitted to myself. Death - not to exist at all - would have been better than walking the Earth like a hollow shell...

My fingers brushed something metal beside me. I picked it up and stared at it. A key? Who would leave a key to their house when they had no intention of returning in the immediate future? My starving brain slowly put the picture together. Alice... she must have seen that I would be the first one to come here, she must have seen me sit here wishing for death... No, that didn't make sense. If she had seen me wish for death she might have done more... what? What could she have done? She was Edward's sister; she couldn't go against her family. But still...

My eyes went to the door. Maybe? There was no guarantee, but I had to try it. After all, why else would they, or one of them, have left the key out here? I put the key in the door, turned it... and the door slid open. Apprehensively, I walked in, half expecting Emmett to have left the key after having rigged booby traps for the benefit of potential thieves.

Nothing happened. It smelled musty, and the sun shone through the glass wall revealing dust motes, but there was no sound. I walked slowly to the stairs, feeling sure that if it were Alice she would have left me something. A note, a clue, anything. In her and Jasper's room on the second floor, where there was only a bed and a stripped book case, I found it. It was just a piece of paper with one word on it: Alaska.