Disclaimer: Twilight and all affiliated characters are the property of Stephanie Meyer and Atom Publishing House. All events and characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to actual people or events, other than those clearly in the public domain, is purely coincidental.

This is not a darkfic but it may contain dark themes.

SCREAMING SILENTLY

Chapter 1

Bella POV

Bella thinks she is unconditionally and irrevocably in love with her boyfriend…until he stabs her and throws her off a cliff.

The tiny town hadn't changed much in all those years I had been away at college. My shiny little car zoomed through Seattle and Port Angeles then onto Forks. It was probably the last time James and I came back before we had to come back for Father's funeral. He wasn't dead yet, but all those years of smoking when he was younger were starting to take a toll: he was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer.

James and I were in the same course at college and we had overlapping social circles and friends. We were formally introduced at the 21st birthday of a mutual friend: suffice to say, we left together and haven't parted since. He was ruggedly handsome with dirty blonde hair and dark eyes that were hypnotically deep. His muscular body was toned and firm and I didn't mind saying that the sex was absolutely fantastic.

The only thing that we disagreed on was the future. He didn't wasn't any kids or to settle down in one particular place. He wanted to travel around making business deals for his company. I, on the other hand, wanted two children and to live in a place that was close to the city but quiet and tranquil. Sure, I wanted a healthy career, but my mother was told that she wasn't able to naturally conceive children and that I was her little miracle. Granted, I was an only child but something was better than nothing, right?

"Do we have to do this?" whined James once again. "Small towns are so boring. I want to live right in the city, right in the thick of it."

I sighed inwardly and replayed my mantra over and over in my head. He loves you and would do anything for you: he won't begrudge you a few small lifestyle changes. Problem was, every time I repeated myself in my head, it became a little less believable: he wasn't a piece of rubber that I could mould to my will, he was more like a weed that, no matter how many times you cut it back, would always grow again, thicker and lusher than last time. The problem is that the weeds were becoming prettier now and it was harder to pull them out.

"We only see him three times a year, babe," I cooed. "Its not like he will live much longer anyway, so then we can stop coming."

Even as the words were coming out of my mouth, they hurt. Personally, I couldn't bear never coming back to the tiny town. My mother and father divorced when I was young and my mother and I moved to Phoenix. I was in my junior year when I came home one day to find the house burning down. It turned out that my mother had left the stove on then gone upstairs for a nap: she died, presumably when the ceiling collapsed in on her. I moved in with my father and completed the rest of high school in Forks, then went to college in Seattle where I met James. We took a business management and finance course together, but never really noticed each other until we were formally introduced.

We pulled up in front of the quaint weatherboard house that Charlie lived in. He greeted us warmly when we walked in and I gave him a small kiss on the forehead.

The usual prattle and obvious questions followed. I made sure that my father was keeping himself well and was received with the expected, noncommittal grunts: I had already seen the takeout containers in the trash. I cooked dinner for the three of us then James and I went for a little drive to first beach, down on the nearby reservation. We parked the car to take a walk along the beach as the sun was setting.

There was a twisted tree on the border to the dense forest. That was where I had received my first kiss, from an extremely sexy, albeit juvenile, boy name Jacob Black. Our fathers were old friends and they pushed us together. It ended when I found him in bed with a girl named Leah Clearwater. Suffice to say, I felt pretty betrayed and it took a while for me to get over it.

James and I walked aimlessly until we reached the end of the path that took us to the top of the nearby cliffs.

"Isabella," he said, turning to me. Oh my god, was this it? Was he going to get down on one knee and propose to me? He came close to me then led me over toward the edge of the cliff.

I could nearly hear his soft, deep voice whispering the magic words then sweeping me into his arms. His warm lips whispering…

"I've met someone else."

What.

What!

WHAT?

No no no no, this couldn't be happening, not to me.

"Why?" I whimpered.

He smiled and malice twisted his face. He backed me up further. His hands slid around my waist as he brought me close to him.

"You were an interesting diversion for a while," he said, gazing at me lazily. I caught the evil glint in his eye.

"Let me go," I said forcefully, trying to push away from him. His cologne seemed stale under my nose and I gagged. "Let go of me!"

"Ah, but then I wouldn't get your lovely life insurance," he sneered. "You left it to me, remember?"

"You'll never get it!" I spat at him. "They'll never believe you are innocent under suspicious conditions!"

"But the cliffs collapsed when you went too close to the edge," he said. "They couldn't put out a search at night and only your broken body was discovered next morning."

I stared as he withdrew a knife from inside his jacket. "Goodbye Izz," he said, motioning to plunge the knife into me. I stumbled back at the last moment but he was on me in a second. He plunged the knife into my side.

I screamed, a bloodcurdling noise that seemed to ricochet off the cliff. He pushed me backwards until I felt nothingness open up beneath me. I clutched my hands to my side, feeling the blood seep across my side.

The water rushed up to meet me and I screamed when I impacted with bone breaking force. The waves bashed me around and my head snapped back and forth, wrenching my neck and pulling my muscles. I clawed for a stable something or even air as my head kept dunking beneath the water. The water was so dark but was clouded with my own blood.

Finally, everything seemed to give out. I stopped trying. I was loosing consciousness and before I went out, I took one last excruciatingly painful breath…with my head still underwater. I blacked out as the water rushed into my lungs.

A/N: Thanks for reading the first chapter. Like...Dislike? Review so i know what you want!