Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns Twilight and all its characters. No copyright infringement is intended.
Author's Note: A while ago, I wrote a short dark piece never intending to use it, but it had ideas of its own and was laying in wait to ambush me when I least expected it. Now that it's finished, I'd like to share it with you.
The story is told mainly from Bella's point of view, but for some reason Edward seems to think it's okay if he interjects in the middle of each chapter, therefore each has alternating points of view—Bella/Edward/Bella.
Warnings: The prologue is a quite dark, but things lighten up from there on (for the most part) and any humour is either irreverent or tongue-in-cheek. I wrote this story to please Mortissues. That should probably tell you something...
1. Prologue
I can't breathe, I can't sleep, and anything I eat just comes straight back up. The only thing I can think of is that you left me.
You. Left. Me.
You don't want me because I'm not good for you. Well, since you cast me aside, I haven't been good enough for anyone. Who would want a skinny shell of a girl with sallow skin and sunken eyes and brittle hair?
You have it so easy. You still have your family—my family, or at least I thought they were mine. I was such a fool to allow myself to believe that I could be a part of that. They called me daughter, sister, best friend, but then they left me, just like you did.
Have you found another distraction to fill your time? Is she human too? Everything with me was just an act, wasn't it? I believed you when you said you loved me, and I believed you when you said no one had aroused that side of you in over ninety years.
None of that was true though, was it? I didn't arouse you, not really. Your body didn't respond to mine as mine did to yours. The whole thing was just a game to you, to see if you could draw me in and capture my heart and then break it.
Why didn't you just finish the job and drain me properly? How could you have been so cruel and heartless as to leave me behind? Without you, I am nothing.
The waves are crashing against the rocks below. The sea is turbulent, white with froth and foam, and the spray keeps reaching me all the way up here at the very top of the cliff.
My clothes are cold and damp and clinging to my body. It's getting harder to hold myself together. I know I should, for Charlie and for Mom, but I'm so sick of fighting. I don't even know what I'm fighting for.
You won't be coming back, and I don't want to be here without you. I, too, am tired of pretending.
At first it seems like such a rush, plummeting feet first into the freezing cold water. It makes me feel alive for the first time in months, but then my body turns numb and I feel nothing.
My heart is frozen, just like yours, but it's not the same.
I don't want to be here anymore.
...
Rosalie called. She told me that you killed yourself. You jumped from the highest cliff in La Push into the stormy waters of the Pacific Ocean. There was no chance of survival.
You are dead and I have killed you, just as surely as if I'd drained you of your blood myself. But I did drain you, didn't I? I drained you of your life when I left you, and I drained you of your soul when you jumped. Your life and your soul are the very things I left to protect.
How did I come to believe that by leaving, you would forget me and live a long and happy human life? I was so very wrong. Perhaps I should have done it sooner, should have left well alone from the start, but it was too late for you, for both of us, the moment our paths crossed.
Leaving you has solved nothing. Leaving you has only proven what I already knew: I am the very worst kind of monster, and I have all but killed us both.
You were far too young to die; you had barely begun to live. And I? I have lived long enough.
I don't want to be here anymore.
...
When did I go from being so cold to being so hot? There is a fire raging through my body and the heat is stifling, burning me up from the inside. There are flames licking at my heart, and it hurts almost as much as it did when he left me.
I don't know where I am, and I can't open my eyes to see, for they had been welded shut. Am I in hell? Shouldn't the flames be on the outside?
I remember jumping from the highest point of the cliff. The water was so cold, it was soothing. It took away the pain until the fire took hold. Did I kill myself? Was it suicide? No. I was dead before I jumped. He killed me.
But I don't feel dead anymore. My skin feels damp. Sweat is coming out of every pore while my insides are burning to a crisp, but I think I am more myself than I can remember being in a long while.
What do I remember? Who am I?
Extra Note: You never know what you'll enjoy until you read it. These wonderful stories might take you out of your comfort zone or simply expand it:
Three's A Crowd? by RobzBeanie
Experiment Me This by Mortissues
Both stories and authors can be found in my favourites.