A/N: Canon? I think so. Instead of deviating from the plot, this sheds some light on certain subjects that were oh-so-conveniently glossed over in the book. Because no matter what Stephenie says, a gift like this has to be stressful. She really should have given up on the "we are perfection" idea. Beware of profanity (twice, I believe), insanity, and an all-around confusingly written oneshot.
Disclaimer: I disclaim.
Edward Cullen is going insane.
Others see it as a gift, a talent. Rosalie resents him in part because of it, because she feels normal, not special enough, since she can't move objects with her mind or shoot lasers out of her eyes or whatever the hell (hell, not fuck, because he can't curse, he's still following the rules of a society long dead) she needs to feel important. Emmett laughs at him, tells him to turn it off, teases him with horrible images no boy wants to see of his sister and brother, adopted or not. Nobody realizes exactly what it does to him. Not even close.
Alice understands in part. She, too, struggles with a gift she never wanted. Visions of the future flood her sight, upset her until Jasper runs in and holds her, reassures her, because everything'll be all right, you just have to calm down, darling, and when she can't his fake emotion does the work for her. Of course, Edward is saddled with the visions as well, and his brother's empathetic skills, but the mindreading is by far the worst, and he has nobody to turn to.
There's Bella, the girls he loves. And he does. He adores her beyond reason, beyond passion, beyond everything, and that's the problem, because he loves her too much to see her flaws, to ask her to change or ever risk hurting her. So he takes the pain instead, he feels the hurt and wonders why but then locks it tightly away. He ignores it because he sees no other options and because he's a masochist and because what is his pain, compared to hers?
He ignores it when the jealousy eats at him, the jealousy that not once has Isabella bothered to alleviate, when he's stuck at home wondering if she'll be coming back or if the mutt has stolen her heart away from him, the heart that beats for them both.
He ignores it when her casual disregard for his feelings makes him doubt yet again what she really loves: him, or the promise of immortality.
He ignores it when her unreasonable demands force his hand so that he loses his morals. He risks her life, all to please her and her fleeting desires, her selfish whims, pushing him further over the brink.
He ignores the fact that he's going insane.
And it's easy, far too easy, to ignore the misery. He's stuck in this strange alternate world, one without silence, without peace, without anything that could possibly rise above the millions of voices clamoring in his head, begging for his attention, and getting it because it's simply not possible to ignore thoughts when they shout straight into your own.
He's tested, before, on a good day, a happy day. His lowest range is just above two miles. That's way over ten thousand feet. Ten thousand, five hundred square feet filled with people, every single one crowding his head with their petty and banal thoughts until his own are just gone.
Other days it's worse. Sometimes his mind is freer, more sensitive, and he catches thoughts from over ten miles away. Ten square miles. That's a lot of voices.
Too many for his mind to handle, strong as it is, and it's starting to crack.
There isn't enough room as it is, so his thoughts are the first to go. He just doesn't think, doesn't feel, doesn't sense anymore, because what's the point when he can't discern his own thoughts from those of everyone around him? After all, he has plenty of people to choose from. He's plunged into mind after mind, uncomfortably, randomly, unwillingly, seeing the world through their eyes and feeling what they feel, like Alice and Jasper and Edward all combined. But it's just him, it's always him.
The person moves or switches their train of thought and suddenly he's gone, flying out of control, tossed into another mind, his consciousness thrown like an unwieldy hot potato that nobody wants to claim for too long. His poor mind, battered and bruised, is snatched and grabbed and forced into different minds one after another, each perspective opposite from the one before it, until every part of him is screaming in pain and confusion. And he changes his view and his opinions all the time, so when he's finally watching the world through his own agonized golden eyes (like a demon in disguise) he's forgotten what it's like to think for himself, to feel an emotion that is his own, to react to a situation the way he feels like reacting, because he, his self, doesn't exist anymore.
He fakes it, though, because he doesn't want help and he doesn't want sympathy and he most certainly doesn't want anybody's pity. He's fine.
He might open up to Bella, the only person he trusts everything with. He would tell her but he knows she wouldn't want him to, she likes her vision of him as perfect and infallible and unfeeling and existing solely for her happiness, and refuses to accept his flaws like he has hers. No responsibility rests on her shoulders, and she wants it to stay that way. It's the ultimate proof that she doesn't really love him, she worships her idea of him because she likes the way he makes her feel and she's selfish enough to use him like this. And God, their relationship is unhealthy, unbalanced, he knows this, but he loves her too much and she's the only thing keeping him anchored, keeping him from just floating away from the body that he no longer consciously controls. Detached and disconnected.
It's an excruciating process, really. The constant battle of the mind to separate reality from fiction, truth from fantasy, mental from physical, and he's losing. He's floundering in the blackness, alone, hidden in plain sight, where nobody can see him and nobody cares. He feels the confusion, but then he's forced to think, is it his? Or is he simply absorbing the confusion of another mind? Secondhand? Third hand through Jasper? Is he thinking this, is it possible, when he's forgotten the sound of his own thoughts?
And he doesn't know, he'll never know. He's exhausted and hurting and he wants it to end, he needs the pain and the numbness to stop, dammit, STOP!
He was hopeful, at first, when he heard of the wolves' mindreading. He thought that maybe, just maybe, he'd found somebody else who endures the hardship he endures, who understands, but that idea faded quickly.
The wolves are cruel and mean and mocking and hurt his already low, endlessly low, self esteem, and besides they don't understand because they only share a few minds, never more than twenty, and they can phase back whenever they want and he'd like to know if they could handle the several million he hears every day, all day, forever, and stay sane (not than he can, really). So he puts on his arrogant front and pretends the taunts don't sting, pretends to ignore the way they blame him for being a vampire, as if he could control it, as if he wanted this? He falsifies himself until he's scared because his own mind, the real him, is absolutely nowhere to be found, sucked into the black void that surrounds him, but it doesn't matter anyway because he's tired and he just wants to sleep and he can't and it makes him so angry…
On the outside he's perfect. The wolves see that perfection, and they hate it. Hate the beautiful face. Hate the speed and the strength. Hate the incredible mind and the musical voice and that hair, that ridiculous hair.
They hate it because beneath the perfection is imperfection. And they see it.
They hate the leeches, with their easy skills and brains and looks because behind the scenes, hidden from the humans, is a family of monsters. They suck blood and they murder and they're damned, they know that, and the wolves hate them because of that outdated prejudice they just can't shake.
The humans see Edward's perfection as well.
They don't hate it, they resent it, sure, but that's not the same as hating, and they know this. The anger and the lust and the jealousy build over those strange beautiful sort-of-siblings in the corner table of the lunchroom, and those children, the kids who know nothing, fume with discontent because the offense is too terrible, nobody can be that perfect, right? They aren't, of course, but humans think they are and so, delusional, the Cullens and beautiful Edward especially serve as the scapegoats, the targets of their resentment. But it doesn't matter, they don't care, and a flutter of their eyelashes, no matter the vampire's gender (yes, they really are that beautiful) sends the unsuspecting human's heart into a frenzy and for an entire day the kid forgets all about their misplaced, unshakeable jealousy directed towards the bronze-haired boy. The one who never will, never can, grow up. Forever seventeen.
On the outside, the surface, and reaching down deep enough to fool his family, Edward Cullen is fine. Not perfect maybe, but he's close enough. He's unstoppable and impermeable and controlled, always controlled.
But on the inside? He's not fucking (there, he said it) perfect. Because he's not even close, he's a mess, with the anger and the resentment and the jealousy and the want and the need and the doubt and the desire and the depression and the terrifyingly intense self-loathing, stronger than even Sam or Jasper or Rosalie could ever imagine, that eats away at the soul he thinks he lost and the love of a person he'll never see himself as deserving of and yet above all of this, overshadowing it, is the constant babble of the millions upon millions of voices that never shut up.
And slowly but surely, with absolute inevitability, Edward Cullen is going insane.