Disclaimer : Not mine.
It had been a sunny day when I died. Knowing how rare true sunlight is in Forks, I'd been thankful for the chance to catch a glimpse of it as I lay on my back in the forest, Edward skin's glittering as he drank my life away. I don't think I'd ever seen such a beautiful sight.
But I'm getting ahead of myself.
The sequence of events that brought me to my present state, that of Vampire, started earlier that day.
It was my first day in Forks, and, sitting forlornly on my brand new purple bed-cover, I was already questioning my decision to move here.
The decision to move in with Charlie had been an easy one back in Phoenix, my mother's involuntary smile when she realized she could have her long awaited honeymoon with Phil had been the only sign I needed to confirm my choice. She had fought long and hard against it of course, but ultimately relented when she saw I wasn't about to change my mind. She recognized the Swan brand of stubbornness when she saw it.
The sun had been up on our drive over here, which I think Charlie took as a good omen, as he told me to enjoy it while it lasted while wearing a rare smile. The two-hour drive from the airport to the house had held a different connotation for me altogether. The deeper we went into the mountains and wilderness, and the longer the awkward silence between me and Charlie lasted, the more I felt like a prisoner being led to his execution. I pictured all that I was leaving behind, the sun, the closeness my mom and I shared, the comfort of my room, of the known; and, as I looked out the window to the sad and greying town of Forks, enclosed within an unassailable barrier of trees ands rocks, I started feeling cold dread seep into my limbs.
Shaking my head to clear out the depressing thoughts, I looked out the window of my room, and felt instantly better when my eyes fell on a big red truck, my truck. A gift from Charlie, it was a godsend, gracing me with at least a level of independence, not to mention it was my first car.
I was suddenly hit with the need to go driving.
My sour mood forgotten, I leapt up from my bed with the grace of a drunken rhinoceros, and went down the stairs. Of course, me being me, I missed the last step and went sprawling at the bottom.
The loud crash alerted Charlie, who came instantly rushing in from the living room.
"Holy Crows Bells! Are you okay?" he shouted, as he went to help me.
Embarrassed, but unharmed, I waved him off, and stood while brushing myself off.
"I'm fine Dad, you know me, if there is something to trip over in a five mile radius, you can be sure I'll be there to trip over it" I answered him, hiding my embarrassment behind self-deprecation with long acquired ease.
Reassured, Charlie smiled.
"That, I do remember. I still have nightmare about that ice-skating rink incident when you were seven you know" he said while chuckling.
I remembered the ice-skating incident with extreme clarity, as one the most excruciatingly embarrassing moment of my young life (and that was saying something, given how prone to tripping, falling, and fumbling I was).
Now beet red, I smiled back.
"Well at least, there was no need for firemen this time"
"Ha! And thank god for that… you're sure you're okay though? Because we can be at the hospital in…"
I hastily cut him off "Really, Ch… Dad, I'm fine, and I really don't want to go to the hospital on my first day" I said seriously.
Seeing my face, he hastily backtracked.
"Okay, okay Bells, no hospital, it's just… I'm glad you're here, I've missed you kiddo" he said finally, in a soft voice.
Touched by this uncharacteristic display of emotions from Charlie, I took a few steps and gave him a hug, which he returned, holding me tightly.
"I've missed you too Dad" I said, my face pressed against his heart.
After a few moments, we both let go, feeling better yet decidedly awkward, neither of us being used to big displays.
Charlie recovered first, "So where you off to? You need a ride?"
"Actually, I thought I'd go and test out my new truck, maybe go to the reservation to thank Billy" I answered, pushing a little more excitement than I felt in my voice.
"That's a great idea Bells, I'm glad you like your truck. And if you're going on the reservation, be sure to thank Jacob too, according to Billy, he redid most of the engine himself, you remember Jacob don't you?"
"Sure I do, and I'll be sure to thank him" Truthfully, I remembered very little of my time in Forks, but I wasn't about to tell Charlie.
"Okay then, be sure to be back by seven"
"Sure" I answered as I opened the front door.
Then, just as I was about to leave, standing on the threshold I was hit with a wave of nostalgia and longing, that I was unable to explain.
Possessed by a strange instinct, I turned around, and called to my father's retreating back "I love you Dad", after that I quickly closed the door, embarrassed by the strange outburst, and having no idea of its provenance.
Half an hour later, I was heading North on the I-95 and completely lost.
After a grand tour of Forks which took all of fifteen minutes and was eminently depressing, I'd decided to make good on my word and head to the Quileute reservation to thank Billy Black and his son. The truck itself ran like a dream, a big, slow and rusting dream, but I was still very happy with it.
Of course, it was only later that I realized that I had no idea of which way to go, and that I was pretty sure I'd missed an exit somewhere.
Bringing me to my current position of being lost.
Suddenly, and out of nowhere, a deer bolted right in front of my truck. I screamed and instinctively swerved to avoid him, the tires screeched and I suddenly felt myself being thrown against the cabin amid a deafening metallic roar.
After a few moments to compose myself, I took stock of my body, and apart from some pain in my arms and back, I was reassured that I was unscathed.
Still slightly dazed, I got out of my truck and saw that its side was pressed against the emergency barrier, which had saved me from plowing right into the forest that surrounded me. I also noticed that the engine was starting to cough out a worrying black smoke, and that there was no sign of the deer.
I looked to the side and saw that the thin metal barrier had indeed saved my life, for there was a downward hill full of roots, mud and trees directly beside me, on which I would have surely broken my neck.
Getting out my phone to call Charlie, and walking back to my truck, I tripped over an errant rock, and as I stumbled forward, I felt my phone slip from my grasp, fall over the barrier and roll all the way down the muddy slope.
"Raah!" I cried out in frustration, but the adrenalin from my most recent brush with death was still pumping, so I hastily crossed the barrier, and went after my phone. And of course, for the third time that day, and despite being careful, I slipped on some moss, fell flat on my back, and began rolling down the hill, not dissimilarly to my cell phone.
Slowly, I opened my eyes and got on my knees. I felt like my entire body was bruised, and a sharp biting pain was making itself known on my right wrist, I saw a gash, which was dribbling a steady flow of blood down my hand to the mud beneath.
It was the sight of blood, and the unpleasant sensation it had always brought me that finally broke my composure, and I felt it all come crashing down on me.
The loss of my home, of my mother, even of my truck, the one thing I liked about this place, surged up in my throat, only to be joined by the fear, frustration and loneliness that I'd always felt as long as I can remember. It was too much. My eyes began to sting, and I felt hot tears on my cheeks.
I raised my hands palm up, and whispered a prayer to the wind "Please…" take me away.
I looked up and that's the first time I saw Edward Cullen. Glittering in a ray of sunlight that I honestly thought had been sent down from heaven just for him, I thought him an angel. I was wrong.
EPOV
Of all the gifts I received when I was turned into a Vampire, there was only one that I could say I enjoyed without reservation, and that was my ability to run fast, faster than anyone. For, all the others were as much gifts, as they were curses; my mind-reading exposes me to an unending flow of thoughts, my unnatural beauty leads to the constant soulful looks and impure thoughts, my superior senses assault me constantly with the scent, sight, sound, feel and taste of blood. Running was pure though and I always let myself go a little when I run.
We were in the forest about three miles from our home when I heard the crash. I had been out hunting with Emmett and Rosalie, but had lost track of them about half a mile back, as I usually did, being faster and more prone to solitude than the rest of my family. I had also needed to distance myself because their thoughts had turned lustful and I was very aware of what Emmett and Rosalie liked to do after they hunted, often right in the middle of the woods.
It was just the three of us this time, Carlisle was hard at work at the local hospital, and Esme was off donating the weekly load of food we were forced to buy to keep up appearances to various soup kitchens. As for Alice, she had been out of sorts all week, claiming ominously that "someone was coming", while being unable to give any details. While the rest of us had been worried at first, after a week of being unable to see who this particular someone was, or indeed what they looked like, we relaxed and decided it must not be happening any time soon. All, except Jasper, who steadfastly remained by his wife's side, sending out wave after wave of calm and hope while she searched the future.
My superior hearing caught the faint sound of screeching tires and metal bending. Guessing that there had been a car accident of some kind, I debated what to do for half a second, knowing that if there was a lot of blood spilled I might be more of a threat than a help, compounded with the fact that if there was an investigation of some kind, I would be hard pressed to explain what I'd been doing running in the middle of the woods, miles from town.
In the next second however, I was assaulted with Carlisle's disappointed eyes, and knew that my conscience would not allow me to ignore a possibly dying human when I could help it. I took off running in the direction of the accident and was nearing what I believed to be the scene of the crash, all the while scanning for thoughts and finding none (had someone died during my momentary pause?), when my phone started ringing. The caller id said Alice, and I was about to answer it when I caught her scent for the first time.
I froze, my ringing phone forgotten. I had never smelled anything like this before, I couldn't distinguish or categorize any one scent in particular, and I didn't even try. This was ambrosia, the nectar of the Gods, not to be understood, only to be reveled in. I took a long deep breath and basked in the scent of what I knew to be the most delicious blood I would ever taste.
Everything was then forgotten. The love I felt for my family, the weariness of my existence, the incessant whisperings of my conscience, all of it was washed away. Here, in this sylvan atmosphere, everything that I had clung to for over ninety years, everything human disappeared. Leaving only the hunter, the beast, the predator. I took off running, leaving my ringing phone on the ground, Alice flashing on the screen.
The scent of my prey was getting closer and closer, and my mind was focused like it had never been before, I had a singular focus, in a way that vampires only ever experience in the middle of the most powerful bloodlust. And then, after what felt like hours but was probably mere seconds, I came to a small valley, and for the second time froze dead in my tracks.
I was at the height of a small valley right near the I-95, right underneath a beam of sunlight the first time I saw Isabella Swan. She was kneeling at the bottom of the valley, her bleeding palms held up towards me as if in supplication, her body and clothes were stained with grass and mud, all except for her face, heart shaped and pale as moonlight, warm brown eyes giving way to twin trails of tears rolling down her cheeks. I had never seen such a beautiful sight.
I wish I could say that my pause had been my struggling conscience trying to force my limbs to turn back, faced with the purest, most beautiful being I'd ever encountered, but it wasn't. I had accepted that this was to be my damnation, none could defile a being so clearly touched from God without burning in Hell. It was a hell I welcomed but for one taste of her blood. No my pause was simple admiration of everything I was about to ruin, her scent, her innocence, her mind, her life,
The beast I had transformed into drew its teeth, and coiled its limb in anticipation of a sign that would break this ethereal vision, and grant me the blood that I could feel singing inside me.
It came in a whisper carried by the breeze, a plea from the sweetest, most delicate voice I'd ever heard "Please".
That's it for chapter 1.
I've change the layout so now chapter 2 is actually chapter 2.
As usual, if you like it review it otherwise you're unlikely to see more of it.