I don't own twilight... all rights reserved to Stephenie Meyer...copyright stuff
"Maude! Come over here!!!"
Hearing my name, I whirled around to see my friend, Alayna. She grabbed my wrist and pulled me over to our lunch table.
"Whew, your hands are cold" she told me
I stifled a chuckle. Still after being her friend for three years, she didn't know much of anything about me. Like why hadn't my appearance changed? I still looked seventeen as I was 125 years ago. I was married at fifteen had my daughter at sixteen. The day before I turned eighteen, a man came to me while I was collecting herbs because my daughter had fallen ill. He very boldly came up to me and told me how nice I smelled and bit into my neck. I awoke and felt a fiery pain that wouldn't stop. My husband, long gone now, feared I was dying and took my daughter and left the village we lived in. I knew what I had become. I never fully understood why my God would let such a thing happen to me.
When my daughter gave birth to her son, she came to me and knew I was different but told me of him.
"I named him Edward, mother"
"A charming name."
"You still look as though you are seventeen, how?"
"it's a secret" That day was so hard for me. She had the most delicious smelling blood. I fought the urge. And today I am immune to it. I live only on animal blood.
fourteen years later, I still looked the same, She came to me again this time with Edward. He was beautiful. And looked so much like her. He had auburn hair and emerald green eyes. He greeted me like a true gentleman.
I sat in a rocking chair with a quilt I was knitting in my lap. I looked at him and sighed. I had pulled my hair back and my daughter painted coal dust on my cheeks to make me look older. There was no way he was going to find out what I truly was. We bonded over time and eventually my daughter made him think I was dead.
The year was 1918, She came to me again
"Ah, my dear. It's a shame I won't be allowed to see him again"
"Yes. Mother, he has the Spanish influenza. I fear his death."
I was startled by the announcement. Three days later she brought a portrait of him to me. It was the size of my hand and wonderfully painted. I let a tear roll down my face, it hit the right side of his face. I looked up at her.
"I love you." we both said at the same time
"See you soon mother" then she left.
The next week I received word from a doctor Carlisle Cullen that she had caught the flu from Edward and died.
And so here I am today. Young and a junior in high school.
"He did not!" Alayna was off telling some story to a girl about her date the night before.
Chloe looked at her and very bluntly asked
"You didn't sleep with him did you?"
Alayna laughed and said "No! Of course not. I'm still a virgin unlike Amanda"
"Shut up!" Amanda said to her. They started arguing about something then Alayna looked at me.
"Are you still a virgin?" she asked. I decided it would be best to tell her the truth.
"No"
"Who was it?!" she shrieked
"his name was George. I was married. Had a daughter and a grandson but they are all dead."
"How is that possible?...oh your just joking! You had me there for a minute"
"Yeah. I was just joking" too bad she didn't believe me.
When none of them were looking, I reached into my green bag and pulled out the portrait of Edward. The tear mark still distinctly there.
"What are you looking at Maude?" Chloe asked
"Oh nothing. Just an old picture" she snatched it out of my hands faster than I knew a human could move.
"Oh my goodness Maude! He is so cute...where did you meet him?"
I looked at her with a definite glare. I took it back and didn't say another word. I got up from the table and left to go to my class. I hear Amanda say "way to go Chloe" under her breath.
"Maude Langston? Would you like to illustrate for us on the board what you think a nineteenth century village would look like?" Mr. Jones, my history teacher asked me
"I would be glad to"
My vampire gift was being an extremely talented artist. I drew what my old village looked like. And a young woman holding a baby. I drew the woman to resemble my daughter holding a young Edward. I had to try very hard not to draw too quickly. It took me five minutes, I stepped back from my work and looked at the instructor.
"My oh my, what an artist you are"
"Thank you"
I graduated and twenty years passed. I decided to go and repeat high school once again. I enrolled in Forks, Washington. I picked it because of the almost constant cloud cover. I purchased a house there and got a new driver's license. On the first day of school, I walked in to find like most of the schools, most everyone staring at me. One I noticed in particular was a girl with short black spiky hair. She came up to me and introduced herself.
"Hi I'm Alice."
"Hi, I am Maude"
"Don't let me be too bold here, but I think I know what you are."
"I know. I can see it in you too. The skin and the eyes."
She smiled at me and said "Sit with us at lunch today"
"I'll be there"
I spent the first four periods of the day wandering about what Alice meant by 'us'. I went to the cafeteria. And since I didn't eat, I went in search of her.
"Maude" It was her.
"Alice" I said happily
"Come over here" She sat with four others. A blond girl, a dark haired man, a blond man and a boy that had a striking resemblance to my Edward. I went and took the last seat, it was between him and Alice. He slid a small cup across the table and whispered
"You look 'thirsty'" he was right my eyes were almost black right now. But I was so confused right now.
"Maude." Alice said excitedly "Tell us about yourself"
"I don't even know all of your names"
"Oh sorry" she pointed to each one. "Rosalie, Emmett, Jasper and Edward"
Edward and I stared at each other for a few moments and then I said
"Well, what year did you...become like this?" they each said the year they were changed and then Edward said
"1918. you?"
"1887"
Alice looked at me expectantly. "Well!, tell us everything" then added "Please"
"Well, I was born in 1870, married at fifteen. Had my daughter at sixteen. The day before my eighteenth birthday a man came to me and changed me. My husband took my daughter and ran because he feared me. Then fourteen years later, she came to me and told me that she had given birth to a baby boy who was now fourteen. We bonded then she feared he would guess I wasn't aging so she made him believe I was dead. Then he caught the Spanish influenza and she brought me his portrait that I still carry with me today. Later I found out from a doctor Cullen that she had also died. Now I am here, one hundred and forty five miserable years later."
They looked at me in disbelief then Edward asked
"i caught the Spanish influenza in 1918 and was dying. Carlisle found me and changed me to what I am now. My mother died"
My eyes burned. If our kind cried, I would have then. This in front of me was my Edward. He was changed into the same thing I was. It was a beautiful and terrible thing all at once.
"May I see this portrait?" he asked. His eyes red also.
I took the image from my bag and handed it to him. He looked at it in disbelief and then looked at me. The others were all staring at us confusedly.
"I can read minds, and I saw this picture in your head when you came over. All I saw was this and something that looked me at fourteen" He turned the picture around to show his family. They all gasped and I said.
"Everyone, this is my grandson, Edward"
