She loved this, being surrounded by quietness and solitude in a library. Books always made her feel better but those were the most important things in her life.
There was no room for noise or anxiety in this space. Here, she could be herself without the stress, the constraints and all the other negative aspects in her life.
Also, she could read as much as she wanted without people interrupting her constantly. Her life didn't feel so monotonous anymore when she could immerse herself in other people's fictional life, more often than not with a happy ending which was part of the reason why she loved to read so much.
It'd never felt like she'd get her happy ending with a loving husband, the two children and the house in the suburbs with a white picket fence. Or more like, she wanted someone to love her and a stable life. When she was a small child, barely able to grasp the concept of why her parents lived together and that there were children who weren't as fortunate, she'd wished that for herself one day.
As she got older and saw all the other girls having boyfriends, she didn't think about it much; just sometimes that she wanted what they had.
At the same time, she knew she was too young for that with barely 12 years.
Nobody had told her that those weren't serious boyfriends who wouldn't last long.
When she was 15, it got even worse. Everyone else would talk about their relationships while she was the girl who was weird and with whom nobody wanted to talk to more than was necessary.
They probably saw her with a book in her hands and her somewhat "arrogant" attitude and thought she didn't want any friends and definitely a boyfriend while also being repulsed by her strangeness.
By then she thought it impossible to make her wish come true. She felt like nobody wanted her, especially with all of her issues.
Now she was 16 and working part-time at a library.
Someone abruptly brought her out of her thoughts by asking her something, she suddenly noticed.
"Excuse me, could you please tell me where I can find the classics?"
Apparently, he was new here she observed while looking at the painting to the left of his head.
"You'll find it to your right, the first row."
"Thanks."
She stared at his back while he walked over to the classics section. He was good-looking, she spotted.
Then she asked herself where she'd seen that backside before but couldn't come up with anything. It was probably nothing anyway.
After that, her afternoon was pretty boring. She sorted through old books and positioned the ones people gave back on the shelves.
Once or twice she caught herself thinking about the boy asking for directions and where she'd seen him before but still couldn't come up with anything.
Objects, she could always remember without any difficulty but people were another story altogether. It probably didn't help that she couldn't even look her own parents in the eye.
When it was nearly time to close, she made her round through the building which actually was only an excuse to look at more books and to decide which ones she'd
borrow next.
She didn't look where she was going and suddenly felt a heavy object bumping into her. At first she thought it was a bookshelf but it didn't feel solid enough to be one.
Once she had the nerves to look up at least for a split second, she realized she'd run right into the boy she'd given directions a few hours prior.
Why he was still here was a mystery to her, she knew no one who'd stay this long around books by choice, at least not at the age he appeared to be.
"I'm so sorry, I didn't see you", she apologized to him while trying to will the ground to open up.
He had the nerve to start laughing. It made her angry, especially since she didn't know what was so funny.
"Actually it was my fault. If you'd look at me, you would see me holding a book in my hands which I was reading until I bumped into you. So, I'm sorry. I shouldn't probably try that again, how anyone can walk like that is a mystery to me", the last part sounded like he was talking to himself.
"It isn't that difficult. You just have to look out for any shadows in your field of vision."
"Thanks for the advice. Maybe I'll try it sometime but then without the chance of making you feel awkward."
"Thanks."
Walking at a brisk pace, she tried to get away from him as fast as she could. The proximity of his body made her uncomfortable.
"You know, you could've at least told me your name."
Not wanting to be called arrogant again, she did so while still walking faster than normal.
"I'm Bella."
"Nice to meet you Bella, I'm Edward by the way."
The way he said her name sounded beautiful.
"Well, I won't hold you up much longer but I hope we'll see each other again. Bye Bella."
"Bye Edward", she mumbled in the direction of his retreating body.
She noticed he'd left the book at the counter without checking it out.
After that encounter, she just stared into space for a few minutes while trying not to think about him anymore.
That evening when she got home, there was no one there. Her parents were out on a date, seeing as they appeared to be as in love as they always were.
Once they realized she could manage a few hours without supervision, they started to go out more than once a week but never went too far.
So the house was eerily quiet and it was twilight outside. She knew that twilight meant her parents would be home soon.
While she was already 16 years old, she was still afraid of the dark.
She used the time until they'd get back to do her homework and read like she always did. Only this time she couldn't concentrate. The encounter still flitted through her head. It'd been just too strange to be true. Nobody ever talked to her like that and especially wouldn't care about her name.
Suddenly, there was a knock at her door.
"Bella, we're back. I've just started dinner."
"Thanks mom. I'll be down in a few."
Bella heard her mom walk back downstairs to presumably start dinner.
After that, she finished reading the chapter with small difficulties and then went downstairs.
"Hi mom, hi dad."
"Hey, how was your day?"
"As always. Nothing unusual happened."
Bella didn't want to tell her parents about Edward. They would just start to ask too many questions at once and her mother would assume they were friends or even a couple.
She knew after asking them once that they only wanted her to be happy and understood that it wasn't easy for her but sometimes they tried a little too hard to make her feel like every other teenager.
Sometimes she even wondered if her parents wished themselves another daughter without all the issues and the strangeness.
It'd be easier for them to not have to look after her most of the time and have someone who could fend for themselves.
Her parents would never tell her so but she knew it was true. She felt it whenever she couldn't do something which everyone else could.
But then there were also the moments where she was better than everyone else.
"Bella stop daydreaming, your food's getting cold", her mother reprimanded her.
"Sorry."
Her mother just smiled at her.
The rest of the evening was uneventful. She just read even more and didn't even realize it was time for her to go to bed which was why this time her father knocked at her door to remind her.
Bella couldn't sleep. The "Edward situation" as she called it now, was still running through her head over and over again.
Her feelings were pure chaos and her breathing got a little shallower every time she realized that she'd probably see him again in the foreseeable future. After all, there was a reason why Forks was a small town.
She frantically searched for her earphones so that she could listen to music without alarming her parents.
Somehow she found them under her bed and when she pressed play on her phone, she started to calm down again.
Over time, she started to feel sleepy and her eyes dropped more and more. Somehow, she fell into a restless dream.
Waking up felt like the worst nightmare ever. Every morning she felt the same trepidation with no relief in sight. Most of the time she just wanted to stay in bed forever but she knew that she had about five minutes until her parents would destroy that dream as if pouring ice cold water over her head.
While she knew they were right, it didn't make the day ahead of her any easier. Nobody would speak to her and she'd just try to blend in and to not attract any attention.
Most of the time, it worked. But then there was the occasional new teacher who didn't know that she had to be left alone and made matters worse by trying to integrate her.
But now she had to get up before matters got worse which was exactly what she did. When she was finished getting dressed, she wore her most comfortable pair of jeans and her favorite dark blue hoodie.
Then she frantically tidied what was messy, which was her bed and some things strewn around the room and then had breakfast with her parents.
Nobody spoke but the silence wasn't uncomfortable like everyone would expect.
It was just that no one of them was a morning person and Bella also needed everything to be as quiet as possible before school so that there was no reason not to go.
This morning, her mother brought her to school. She didn't have a driver's license because she didn't want to. The risks were just too high for her and the traffic too much and too stressful.
Fortunately for her, the teacher was already there when she got to her first class which was English, her favorite and best subject. Throughout the period, she did nothing more than write.
Then, it was time for Math, her least favorite subject and also the hardest next to gym. She could never concentrate enough to do any tasks just because everyone around her thought it the perfect time to talk.
After that were history and German, both subjects she loved and was good at. Actually, she was even fluent in German. Both the teachers were pretty nice to her and always let her do whatever she wanted.
Unfortunately, German ended too soon and it was time for lunch.
Normally, she would've sat outside with a book but today it was raining and she knew she'd catch a cold if she did it.
Still, she was hesitant to go to the cafeteria and tried to delay it as much as she could which was actually only five minutes.
The cafeteria appeared too loud, too bright and too full. She just wanted to get it over with so she sat at the table farthest away from the others and miraculously nearest to the exit and got her homemade food out of her bag.
Today it appeared to be a tomato mozzarella sandwich, her favorite. She felt like music so she got her earphones and her phone out too.
The music made the whole experience a little less awful just because she couldn't hear as much.
Looking around the room, she noticed that everyone appeared to be here.
The people didn't hold her interest for long and she got her book out of her bag. It was "Pride and Prejudice", one of her favorites. She started to read and got so immersed in it that she didn't even notice the person who sat himself next to her.
Only when he pulled one of her earphones out did she notice him while also getting startled so much she nearly fell off the chair.
"I'm sorry. I didn't want to alarm you but you sat here all alone and I thought to keep you company."
She didn't know how she should reply so she just sat there, staring at him like he was the eighth world wonder.
It was him. Edward was here.