The way they were staring at me, unblinking and still only the way a vampire can manage, you'd think I'd asked to join a brothel. "It's a really good school," I said.

"I don't doubt it," my father replied.

"They have a music program."

"I didn't know you wanted to study music," my mother said.

"I'm not really sure what I want to study but that's what's so great about this school." I shoved a brochure into her hands. My father looked over her shoulder at it as she opened it. "You can focus on different majors in addition to the standard classes until you find the one that you want to pursue."

"That is an interesting concept," my father said. His eyes were moving rapidly over the glossy pages of Evergreen Academy. There were dozens of pictures of happy teenaged students dressed in adorable plaid uniforms with knee high socks on the girls and blazers and checkered pants on the boys. They were holding books while chatting animatedly and walking over the cobblestoned pathways of a charming campus surrounded by great elm trees.

"Its in Connecticut," my mother said, a distinct sour note in her voice.

"That's true."

Her eyes met mine and my heart broke a bit at the look of betrayal I saw there.

"Could you have found a school any farther away from Forks?"

"Well, there was one in Hawaii that I was considering but I thought all the sunshine would make it difficult for you to visit."

My father graced me with a wane smile. "How kind of you to consider our feelings."

"Oh, come on! I'm asking to go to an elite boarding school. Most parents would be thrilled if their kids wanted to pursue a better education." I sighed and they exchanged a look that clearly stated I was an unbearable teenager. I sat down and put on my best puppy dog eyes. They didn't seem impressed. "This is the opportunity of a lifetime. They don't just accept anyone that sends in an application."

"You've already applied?" my father asked.

"Did I not open my pitch with that?"

"Nessie, how could you do that without coming to us first?"

"Maybe because I could just guess as to how receptive you'd be to the idea."

"Well, how could we be receptive to it?" My mother jumped up from the couch, the pamphlet crumpling in her hand. "It's all the way across the country! You belong home, with us. You're only sixteen!"

My father and I both snorted at that one. He put a hand on her shoulder and she slowly sat down on the couch again. "Bella, she might have been on this planet for sixteen years but Carlisle said just the other day that she has progressed well beyond the mental capacities of a twenty two year old."

"That doesn't mean that she's ready to move away from her family and home." I'm sure if my mom were able to cry, she would have been.

"Mom," I whispered. I reached out and grabbed her hand. "You might be completely right but I'm ready to try. I'm sorry if that hurts your feelings but I'm so ready to do something new and try something harder. I can't sit through ordinary tenth grade classes anymore. I'm going to become suicidal if I have to write another paper on 'How to Kill a Mockingbird.'" She finally smiled at me and I held my breath. If she got on board, my dad would cave in a second.

"You have to come home every weekend."

"Mom, that's insane."

"We can afford it."

"That's not the point."

My dad leaned forward. "How about one weekend every month?"

My mother remained silent for several tense seconds. "I can agree to that."

"What about every two months?" She looked like she was about to argue but I spoke again before she could. "It might be a dream come true to have your only child out of the house. You could have some alone time, second honeymoon type deal. You should think about that but don't tell me anything."

My mother bestowed upon me her most exhausted expression. "Let's see how the first month goes."

I jumped into her arms and hugged her. "I love you so much, you have no idea!"

"We have some idea," my father said with a chuckle. Their arms encircled me and held me close.

The rest of the summer was spent ordering textbooks and uniforms, submitting my housing forms and packing. There was also an immense amount of time devoted to creating my new identity. The Volturri hadn't threatened us in years but if there did happen to be a spy in the Connecticut area, it would be better if I didn't bear the name Renesmee Cullen. My new name was Vanessa Collins. Not terribly creative but I could still go by Nessie, which I preferred, and say that it was a nickname for Vanessa.

My Aunt Alice insisted I bring everything I owned and my mother assured me that she would hide what I didn't want to bring so that she wouldn't know. Carlisle and Esme bought me a new computer, which was too amazing that I couldn't even pretend to refuse such an expensive gift. Emmett and Rosalie tried to convince me to take one of the cars with me but I didn't want to. I wanted to immerse myself in campus life and walk everywhere like all of the other students. My parents gave me a beautiful box that could only be opened with a special key that I now wore around my neck at all times. The box was stuffed with bags of blood: a secret stash in case I could find time to hunt. Carlise still worked at the hospital and would send me more when I needed it.

We had to take three cars to the airport. Everyone wanted to say goodbye at the gate. They all hugged me at least twice. Carlisle, Esme, Alice, Jasper, Emmett, Rosalie, and Charlie. Rosalie held onto me the longest. She kept stroking my hair and whispering in my ear about not forgetting about her. Charlie cried but tried to pretend like he didn't. My parents hugged me together, the way they did everything else, with one arm around each other.

I waved bye to them at the gate, carrying just my purse. My luggage had been too large to carry-on. There would be a car waiting for me when I landed. I was ready. I drank in the sight of my family. No matter how much I wanted a taste of freedom, I could already feel the twinge of missing them in my gut.

My dorm room at Evergreen Academy is smaller than my closet at home. The cafeteria menu contains almost no red meat, my main diet staple. My class schedule could be called overwhelmingly stressful at best. Why did I want to attend this school so badly? Anyone? Yeah…I can't remember either.

The saving grace is my roommate, Caitlin. I've never had a lot of girlfriends, or male friends for that matter, but she makes me feel like we've known each other for lifetimes rather than a few hours. Her arm is linked with mine as she gives me a brief tour of the campus. "That's the boy's hall." She points to yet another old, brick building across the courtyard. "We're not allowed there after seven. Actually, we're not allowed anywhere after seven."

"Why not?"

"Curfew." She begins a count off on her perfectly manicured fingers. "In dorm building by seven sharp, lights out at ten sharp, no booze or drugs ever." She laughs a bit manically. "That last one is pretty easily broken."

I have learned that Caitlin likes to speak in lists. "Can we ever leave campus?"

"Only in life or death situations." She didn't sound like she was kidding. We arrived at the on campus market and she held out her arms like she was showing me the Holy Grail. "This is the most sacred place on campus. This will be your saving grace for every all-night study session, your finals week oasis, and your get-over-that-stupid-boy haven."

I nodded respectfully. "It's beautiful."

"It's the Garden of Eden." She grabbed a basket and pulled me toward the nearest aisle. We perused for a while, picking up all the necessities that a teenager might require, including but not limited to Cheezits, Twizlers, Pringles, Tater Tots, Pizza Bites, Mozerella Sticks, and Fritos.

"How are we going to cook this stuff in the dorm room?"

"There's a toaster oven in the game room."

"We have a game room?"

She laughed and grabbed yet another case of diet coke. "Don't get overly excited. It is equipped with a ping pong table that is missing the net and an old two by four that's supposed to be used for limbo and a small assortment of puzzles." She picked up a pack of double stuff Oreos and shoved them in my face. "Have you ever tried Oreos with Nutella?"

"No and I'm sorry but I have to ask: why don't you weigh three hundred pounds?"

She laughed again and flipped her thick auburn hair over her shoulder. "Everyone eats everyone else's stuff. You can try to hide your goodies but there is no fail-safe hiding place. If there is food in the dorm, someone will find it and eat without asking questions."

"That doesn't seem right."

"You're so naive. I keep forgetting that you've been in public school your whole life." She gripped my arm and turned me so that we were staring dead into each other's eyes. "Private boarding school is basically a year-long sleepover. Have you ever been to sleep-away summer camp?"

"Uh…no."

She sighed, bemoaning me as a hopeless case. "I have so much to teach you."

We proceeded to the checkout line and started unloading the cart that was filled to the brim. "Our first shopping excursion is on me." She gave her meal plan card to the cashier.

"Thanks, that's sweet."

"Anything for my new charity case."

"I have another question."

"Shoot. I have no secrets."

"Why didn't you have a roommate this year?" For the first time since we were introduced, she got quiet. After a few seconds, the air was terribly awkward. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to pry. It's just that you're awesome. I thought lots of people would want to room with you."

"It's okay. Everyone else knows the story so I haven't had to say it out loud yet." The cashier bagged up the last of our items and handed the meal plan card and a receipt back to Caitlin. She started slinging the bags onto her arms. "I'll tell you on the way home."

We had walked halfway across campus before she started talking. "I was living off-campus with my boyfriend last year. He was going to the local community college. He was older. I'm very scandalous." She wiggled her eyebrows at me. "One night, he went to a party with some old friends from high school and got really wasted. They went out into the woods. Started climbing trees and doing back flips off of branches."

"Oh my God."

"Yeah. He landed wrong. Broke his neck. Died within minutes, I was told."

"I'm so sorry, Caitlin."

"I was supposed to go to the party but I had a test the next day and I decided to stay home, be a good girl." She wiped at her eyes. Mascara smeared across her cheek. "I should've been there."

I really didn't know what to say. "It wasn't your fault."

"That's what three out of my four therapists told me."

"No kidding."

"Yeah. The last one told me that I shouldn't have been in such a co-dependent relationship."

"I hope you didn't pay a lot for him."

"Trust me. I had one and only one session with him before I decided he needed therapy more than I did."

"What was his name?" I asked.

"The therapist?"

I laughed. "Not who I meant."

"Aaron." She pulled out her phone and showed me a picture of him. He looked like the hunky all-American type guys you found in Abercrombie and Fitch ads.

"Cute."

"Yeah." She stared at the phone until we reached the dorm. "He was the one."

"He was?"

"I'm certain of it. If he wasn't, no one is."

I just nodded, having no advice to offer her on the business of lost love.

I opened the door to our room and we both dropped our bags on the floor just inside. "Thank goodness we're on the first floor," she said.

We unpacked and stuffed our goodies under our beds and stacked the sodas into a teeny fridge that Caitlin's parents had bought for her. She popped a Diet Coke and plopped down on her bed. "Let me see your schedule." I retrieved it from the one small desk we would be sharing and handed it to her. She barely glanced at it before letting out a cheerful whoop.

"You're very excited about that heavy class load."

"You got Professor Black for Early American History."

"And that's a good thing?"

She reached under her bed and scrounged around for a few minutes before emerging with an old yearbook. She flipped the pages for a few minutes and then held it out to me. "Take a look at that and you tell me if it's a good thing."

I looked down at the page full of faculty photographs and found Professor Black in an instant. It might have been because of his huge smile and white glossy teeth or his tanned beautiful skin and his soulful dark brown eyes. Or it might have been because Caitlin had drawn a huge red circle around his picture and labeled it Professor Hot Stuff.

"Wow." It was all I could say.

"Seriously."

"He's-"

"Yes, he is."

I held the picture closer to my face. "He looks so young."

"He's only 30."

"And he teaches here?" Evergreen Academy was known for it's first-rate education and you couldn't teach here unless you had a Masters.

"He doubled up his class load while he was in college so he could graduate early."

"That's impressive."

"Everything about him is impressive. That little picture doesn't even do him justice." She took the book back from me and looked longingly at the page. "You'll see tomorrow."

"How do you know so much about him?"

She closed the book. "Aaron was his assistant."

She got up and started getting ready for bed before I could offer her another lame apology.