The Diary

Chapter Two: Monster

Monster—by Skillet

Those of you familiar with my writing, I like to use songs to kick off a chapter and to give my readers a little taste of what the main character feels like while she's going through her ordeals. This time, I've chosen the above song to accessorize the chapter. It's an option if you want to listen to it or not.

So, in the last chapter, we learned that Renesmee would not be attending school for a few more months. As this chapter starts, note that she has not started training for normal life. That's important.

Also, I wanna give a shout out to my most loyal reviewer, who I always look forward to hearing from. Fiction101, thank you again for reviewing on every single story of mine, and practically every single chapter. I always look forward to hearing your thoughts.

And now, Chapter 2.

OOO

"God, I'm bored."

I was a typical Saturday evening: my family had gone hunting, reluctantly leaving me alone with Jake for the fifth time in my life. Surprisingly, it had been my mother, not Alice, who had convinced my overprotective father to allow me to be alone with my boyfriend.

"We have movies," I reminded Jacob sweetly, patting his knee.

He groaned. "I looked at all of them."

I highly doubted that, but I said nothing except, "We have more in the attic." Some attic, I added silently. It was as big as two bedrooms combined. "I'll go look."

His arms flew to my waist. "No!" he protested madly. "Don't go!"

I effectively removed his hands. "So what are we supposed to go if you don't allow me away from you?"

"I can think of a few things," he suggested, waggling his eyebrows.

"No."

"Why not?" He looked so heartbroken, it was almost comical. Almost.

"You know exactly why not." I reached my hand over to his face to show him my thoughts: My father striding through the door, looking livid to find me in a heated, shirtless embrace with Jacob.

His eyes went mockingly wide. "Are you really wearing that bra?"

"I am not answering that," I told him harshly, removing my hand. He made a move to grasp it, but I danced out of his way and headed for the stairs.

"That's a yes!" he called after me, struggling to get up.

"You're worse than Emmett!" I shot back, darting up the steps. "I'm leaving now. Going to the attic. By myself." He stared after me dejectedly, hurt in his eyes. "I know you were just kidding. I'll be back down with a movie in a few minutes."

I ascended the stairs as quickly as possible, my feet dancing across the wood without sound. While dancing and playing the piano were ways of expressing myself, and two things I felt confident in, playing the guitar was my real passion. Jake had taken the practice up for me, and we would have a "battle of the sexes" every Monday afternoon in Rosalie's garage. I always won, and not because he let me.

Lost in my thoughts, I wasn't aware I'd reached the attic door until it happened to smack me in the face. "Ow," I muttered, glaring at it.

"You okay?" called Jake, not sounding at all concerned. This happened often when I forgot how to use my grace.

"Yeah." Some dancing, I added to myself.

Carefully this time, I opened the door, rubbing the rapidly healing bruise on my forehead. The attic looked like just every other room in the house—spotless, tidy, huge—except for the fact it reminded me of a department store. On the floor stood racks of clothing from my family's past lives: clothes that had long since gone out of style had been promptly tucked away by Alice, hanging neatly on the metal rods, bookshelves lined the walls, movie and music racks were way in the back. There was at least on of each of these things for every family member, including Jake.

And these things weren't easy to lug around. After we'd moved to New Hampshire a few years ago, Alice had rented about five moving trucks (all to arrive on different days in the favor of remaining inconspicuous) to take all of this with her. "You never know when certain clothes might come back into style," she'd explained slyly with a wink in Bella's direction. I'd decided not to pry.

Smiling, I walked over to Jake's rack. The sweatpants he had been in favor of were nowhere to be found, although he'd tucked them into his suitcase. My guess was that Alice had decided to throw them away without consulting him. I didn't blame her—the things were ratty and beyond repair.

On my way to the movie section, I passed my father's set of bookshelves, which was almost as expansive as Carlisle's. However, out of the many colorful paperbacks and hard-covers, one bland, leather-bound notebook caught my eye. I felt compelled to touch it, to stroke its binding and cradle it to my chest.

I had never not been encouraged to read my father's account of his many lives, I reasoned with myself. There was no rule that banned me from doing so. And yet, as I stared at the book, I found myself feeling guilty as well as immensely curious. It was a breach of secrecy, I told myself. Maybe I should ask first before assuming I'm aloud to just open any book.

But for every time I told myself I shouldn't be prying, my curiosity reciprocated with a well thought out excuse. My hand reached for the book, and as my fingers touched the binding, just barely, a shiver coursed through my veins.

Was it fear that I felt, now? Or merely anticipation? I pulled my hand the slightest centimeter away, contemplating, and then, against my better judgment, my hand shot forward to close around the cover. I pulled it towards me with a fierceness I cannot describe, and it fell, heavy, into my waiting hand.

Dazed from the adrenaline rush, I let the pages fall open. Every account, every word, I realized, was from the year I was born. I knew for a fact that that particular year was crowded with events and emotions, and as I flipped through the crisp pages, I came across all of them: my parents' engagement, their graduation, the newborn fight, their wedding . . . . I skipped blindly over their honeymoon, not wishing to hear any specifics, and then I came across my mother's pregnancy.

I don't know what I had been expecting. I didn't remember much from my earliest days, so anything would come as a surprise.

I know that I didn't expect this surprise, however:

I am unsure of how to describe my feelings at the moment, but I cannot help but feel that everything, every happy moment, was wrong. If it all led up to this, I'm sorry to say nothing was worth it. Not even falling in love with Bella was worth it, because if we had never fallen in love, this never would have happened.

There is a murderer in my wife, sucking away every ounce of her life, her color, her beauty. And it is my entire fault. I should have known better than to agree with her. Was this worth her precious human experience? Was it worth her death? I feel that it was not. It never was.

I am sickened by the monster, by the absurd rate that it grows, by the life that it steals away for itself. I am helpless to do anything to help my Bella, for it is against her will for me to gladly kill the devil inside of her. And neither does it help that Rosalie is backing her. Does my "sister" even care about Bella's safety? Perhaps Jacob's anger-inspired assumptions were correct. Maybe Rosalie does just want the demon child for herself and Bella easily gone, out of the picture. God knows they've always had a questionable relationship. However, if this is the way it ends for us—and it won't—Rosalie can have the spawn, because the monster will be orphaned before it can even blink.

Horrified, I pulled away from the book. Demon child? Murderer? Monster? My heart had leapt into my chest at his harsh words. Terrible images flashed through my mind—my father glaring at my mother's turned back, wishing I had never come to exist. I pictured him conspiring with the rest of my family—Emmett, Alice, even Carlisle—with looks of pure loathing on every pristine face.

And Jacob! By the way my father made it sound, he'd been against me, too.

All my life, I'd been equally loved by everyone in my family. Alice always bought things for me, Rosalie had taught me dance. Emmett was always the one that played board games with me, and Jasper had taught me how to fight. Carlisle had taught me how to learn, and Esme had tutored me in cooking and gardening. My mother, father and Jacob's love went without saying.

The knowledge that I'd been hated made my face hot with shame. What could I have done? I had just grown fast, right? That was all, right?

I read on, unable to stop. I had to know what I'd done—what had made my father loathe my very being.

I cannot take this anymore—I feel as if I'm being burned from the inside out. Bella has been forced to resort to drinking blood—blood!—in order to stay alive. Jacob was repulsed by the action, almost as much as me, but for entirely different reasons. However, we soon became overjoyed by our success—finally, a way to outsmart the beast. Bella was able to come off the hospital bed and color returned to her wax like face. We were ecstatic.

Our ecstasy was short-lived, however. The monster grew stronger within hours. Jacob arrived in a wreck, more livid than his usual infuriated state. His thoughts match mine exactly. The stronger the fetus gets, we both realize, the more chance there is that Bella will succumb to it. Already, the thing has begun to break her bones . . .

I tore my watery eyes way. Blood. The thought made me tremble. As a human, my mother had drunken—I couldn't finish the thought. So no wonder my father had hated me. I'd been killing his wife, day by agonizing day.

Oh god, I thought. Oh, god. Oh, god.

And then, stupidly and without reason, I read ahead to the day of my birth, September Ninth.

As I sit here writing this, Bella lays motionless except for the shallow breaths that show her pain. Somehow, she's refrained from screaming, from writhing in place, from begging to die. I can't help but wonder if I've done something terribly wrong.

I recount the circumstances in order to find my mistake:

After hearing the baby's thoughts prior to her birth, I'd been feeling better. Bella had a chance of hope, now that we could safely and effectively remove the child. I'd been astonished to see that it was capable of love, and that it did love. That it was trying to stay within itself in order to protect its mother.

Jacob did not see it this way. He felt ruthlessly betrayed by my sudden excited state. He nearly had a mental breakdown before I launched my car keys at him and told him to get some air. He didn't realize what hearing the baby's thoughts provided us with. He didn't understand the hope. And yet, I'm afraid he never will. He will never forgive me about doing this to Bella, about putting her through the pain, even if we did have a happy ending.

Which we did, so far. The baby is a girl, Renesmee Carlie Cullen. She's beautiful with her warm brown eyes and auburn curls, but she's growing uncomfortably fast. I already love her more than myself, more than my family.

However, the circumstances surrounding her birth were anything but beautiful.

It was ironic how, in one more day, the baby was to be born. Its thoughts had told me everything I needed to know. But I underestimated the baby. As Rosalie and I went to take Bella to the bathroom, her cup of blood fell, and Bella being Bella, she lunged for it. This disturbed the child, who moved merely a centimeter, which set everything, every horrible action, into motion.

The baby accidentally detached the placenta, causing Bella to shriek in anguish, vomit all the blood she'd drunk, and pass out. As the baby grew too big for the womb, it began to suffocate, and we rushed Bella's bloodied body upstairs and began our seemingly futile attempt to save her and the baby.

Bella awoke halfway through, screaming as Jacob stood motionless in the doorway. The blood vessels in her eyes popped, her mouth filled with blood. There was a debate between Rose and I about whether to let the morphine spread, but there was no time. As Rosalie pierced Bella's skin, something else happened. Something that complicated everything. She got thirsty.

Jacob leapt into action, knocking Rosalie out of the room so Alice could get rid of her. Before Jacob could practice CPR on Bella's unmoving body, the baby broke her spine, causing her to go unconscious once again. Jacob immediately began his task, thinking desperate thoughts, horrifying thoughts.

And then, as I removed Renesmee, Bella went limp, but she breathed. I stared at the tiny baby in my arms, the beautiful creature I'd once hated. I couldn't imagine now how I could possibly loathe her for anything, not even Bella's death.

Bella asked for her, so of course I gave it to her, thinking the baby would do nothing to hurt her. I was wrong. It had been searching for milk, I suppose, when it bit her breast. I snatched it away, shocked but not angry, and chided my daughter.

And then it happened. Bella's heart stopped.

Jacob continued the CPR in a blur of motion, and I stood there, for once unsure of how to proceed. "Take the baby," I demanded of him, to which he responded, "Throw it out the window." I wasted no time being upset with his comment, as Rosalie had appeared, now in control, able to take Renesmee off my needed hands.

I couldn't let myself feel the dreaded emotions that had plagued me for the past month. That would not help Bella now. So instead, I grasped the syringe I had prepared and plunged it into Bella's unmoving heart. I then proceeded to add my venom to her wrists, her ankles, her throat.

After a moment, Jacob's mind went into acceptance. He knew Bella was not coming back, and he couldn't bear it. He wanted to leave. I told him to go, shoving him away from my Bella, telling myself that she would live, she would be fine.

I still don't know if that's the case.

Moments later, as I worked over Bella, Jacob's thoughts filled with hatred. I could see him staring at my daughter, contemplating how to murder her. Could he kill Rosalie before Alice and Jasper came to her rescue? Could he kill them, as well? The abomination—as he classified Renesmee—needed to be taken care of.

As much as I hated his thoughts, I couldn't leave Bella alone, dead or dying. I desperately wanted to warn Rosalie, but I couldn't get the words to interrupt my mantra. "She's alive, alive, alive . . ." I kept muttering to myself, and nothing could stop it.

His thoughts raged on, analyzing his plan from every angle. He wouldn't kill me, he decided, because it was too fair to do so. Jacob wanted me to live with what I'd done.

And that was why I was so surprised when, odds of all odds, Jacob imprinted on my daughter.

And Bella's heart began to beat.

I wasn't breathing anymore.

The words lunged off the page at me, making me want to cry. Vomited blood . . . shriek . . . thirsty . . . dead . . . . I gasped in pain, in horror, throwing the book away from me with a vengeance.

It was all my fault . . . . Everything was my fault. I'd killed my mother.

And Jacob wanted to kill me. He was completely justified, of course. I didn't blame him. But now, now I was holding my power over him. He only loved me because he had to. He'd wanted me dead. He'd wanted me not to exist.

And how could my father love me, after all of that? Surely, like nothing else in this diary, that had been a lie. He couldn't. Not after all the destruction I'd caused.

My chest hurt from every revelation that had crossed my mind.

"Hey!" called Jacob from downstairs. "Did you find that movie?"

His words were innocent enough, but they sent my world spiraling. Every game we'd played, every conversation we'd had, every kiss that had graced my lips . . . Every interaction we'd ever had was a lie.

A sob escaped my chest as my hands flew to my face.

The sound made Jacob come running.

Quickly, I grabbed the book, placing it back in the bookshelf perfectly. I needed an excuse for the tears, for the crying, so I deliberately snagged my right hand on one of the bookshelves, smearing blood across the wood. I would tell them I'd tripped. They would believe that.

Jacob barged through the door just as I collapsed to the ground. "Nessie?" he asked, alarmed. "Are you okay?"

I nodded, trying my best to sound like I'd only cut myself, not like my entire world had been turned upside down. "Yeah, I just tripped," I lied, showing him my hand. "I tried to catch myself and it didn't work out very well."

"Why are you crying?" He was suspicious. I should've known.

As I stood, I said, "It hurts," as if it was obvious.

"All right. Forget the movie." He grabbed my healthy hand and led me out of the room. "We should probably clean that up."

I sighed, my heart breaking. I was red-handed in more ways than one. My world would never be clean again.

OOO

And there we go.

I lied about the presents. Next chapter—I promise. Um, so story's in motion. I'm liking it so far. What are you guys thinking?

Jamie.