Since the great and honorable Stephenie Meyer promised us a wedding in B.D., I'm going to give us another one -- the story (and eventually wedding) of Esme and Carlisle.

"Carlisle, Martha, anybody, grab a stretcher," one of the nurses called from triage.

"One minute," I called, my voice calm as ever. It was a busy day and I was starting to get stressed. "Martha," I called to one of the young interns; one of the silly little girls that couldn't look at me without breaking into a fit of silent giggles, or worse yet, swooning, "give me a hand, please. Amelia," this was directed toward an older woman wearing angel-print scrubs, "please help Mr. Anderson, room 10."

"Yes, Doctor Cullen," Amelia said, bustling away. It took another minute for Martha, who was busy staring in the mirror at the nurses station, primping her badly-dyed black bob, to come help me.

"Grab the other end of this," I told her, wondering, yet again, how on earth she had been hired. I lifted the head-end of a stretcher, little more than a piece of double-thick plywood with some padding on it. We walked carefully toward the front of the hospital; I spent the whole time wondering why the duce I didn't just do it myself. This girl was obviously busy daydreaming about the speakeasy that she would, undeniably, be visiting as soon as her shift ended. I didn't need to be Edward to know her type -- I could smell the bootleg liquor in her blood.

Kids these days, I swear.

In the triage area, a bear stood in front of me. 6'6" or 6'7", with brown hair that flowed over his shoulders in tight curls. He holding a crumpled woman in his arms. A white kitchen towel with a blood-soaked fleur-de-lis was held tight against her head.

"Put her on the gurney," I told the man, and he complied, placing her carefully on the gurney. He arranged her body carefully, and as he did so, I looked down at her face. The woman looked vaguely familiar -- and I knew her smell.

I forced myself to be rational. I couldn't be thinking about smell… or blood.

A willow branch of a woman, apparently the man's wife, was standing next to him. "Dr. Cullen? Is that you?" Her face registered surprise.

I looked at her carefully. I couldn't put a name to her face. Thin, tall, brunette, with long and plain hair. Like the woman on the stretcher, I knew her scent -- even though it seemed plain, compared to the other woman's -- "I'm…. sorry?" I said. Occupational hazard. When you work in a business where you come in contact with hundreds of people over the course of a year, it's hard to remember names.

And it was just ever-so worse for me.

"Stella Platt?" she said, with a hint of indignation in her voice. "Well, Stella Saint-Michaels now," She added with a glance toward her husband. "From Columbus, don't you remember? We lived down the block from you, on Arbor Road. All of my sisters and I had the worst crushes on you. You… probably don't recognize her, but that's Esme." She pointed at the woman on the gurney.

"Ah, Miss Platt. I remember you lot." I remembered Esme, all right. That girl had broken her leg at sixteen, and had tried to kiss me while I was casting her leg, and well, her smell -- as Aro would say, my tua cantante-- I almost kissed her back. Holding the board steady with my right hand, I picked up her arm.

"Carlisle," Martha told me, "I don't think she's breathing. We should take her down to the morgue."

Stella and her husband looked dumbstruck. I could have slapped that girl across the face.

"Martha," my voice was even. "People can survive with the most extraordinary wounds. Let me take her pulse." I rested two fingers gently over her wrist. There was a beat there, but it was slight., just a faint little beat. None of the humans would have detected it. But it was just a flicker. She was holding on to this existence by a thread that was perilously close to breaking. She had, to all intents and purposes, killed herself.

But there was time. The choice stood before me. I had taught myself to be detached. But I could give in. I could do the right thing. Or I could do the crazy thing. I needed to think.

--

"Were you able to see what happened, perchance?" I asked, trying to keep my voice cool. I was genuinely interested in how she'd ended up, but I also needed something to buy me time to think.

"There's a fun story," the man grunted.

"She jumped off a cliff," Stella said, being blessedly succinct. "Well, you see, Doctor Cullen, Esme had a baby boy less than a week ago, and he died, this morning. She was feeling really out of it." Well, that explained her rounded figure. I remembered as a medium-height, but slender, very slender young woman. I had to admit, she didn't look like she'd just had a child; she was beautiful; a collage of the best features of every young actress, stage and film, blended into one body -- not that I place much merit on physical appearance, of course.

"And all that crap with her husband, on top of it," the man added, breaking me out of my little reverie.

If looks could kill, Stella would have killed that man. I had a feeling that she wasn't going to tell me that part of the story. "Charles Evenson," she said, reluctantly, at my inquisitive glance. "Esme was afraid to tell mom and dad about the things he did to her; she didn't love him, but they kept insisting that she marry him -- not directly, of course, but they dropped little hints here and there. She couldn't hide the scars from me. The bruises, too. She came north after she found out she was pregnant, to get away from the scumbag, to give the kid a chance." Her voice broke up, and tears started to form in her eyes.

So her life had been utter shit, in the most technical terms.

Well, now I knew that I was going to do. I was going to make Esme Platt a vampire. I was going to give her the 'life' that she'd never had. I knew that I was being self-centered and selfish, but frankly, I didn't care.

Now, I needed a plan.

--

My fingers were still hovering over her wrist, while I was thinking. After about twenty seconds, I had my plan: improvise. I gently let her hand fall to her side. I pulled a silver watch out of my pocket, and spent a moment glancing at the hands. "Time of death, 9:21 hours." My voice was brisk and detached. "Cause of death, Suicide via major head trauma. Martha and Lois, please take her down to the morgue. I will be down there shortly." Clean and professional.

Another nurse appeared out of the ether, and took my end of the board. They maneuvered the board slowly toward the back of the hospital.

"I am so sorry," I said to Stella, who had broken into tears. "I understand that this must be difficult for you, especially after everything that you described her having gone through. But she'll have peace now."

That seemed to offer her a little comfort; she was still at a loss for words."

Her husband stepped in, "What about services… and things like that?" his gruff voice was hesitant -- he didn't want to upset his wife further.

"I will have somebody talk to you presently," I promised. "I need to go… take care of things," I said, praying that they didn't want me to be more specific.

--

I walked toward the back of the hospital, into the morgue area, where Esme lay on a table. She was still comatose and unmoving, but I knew that she was alive. Looking at her, looking beyond the streaks of dried blood that matted her beautiful caramel hair and, and the black and blue patches that marred her pale skin, I felt passion well up inside of me. Somehow, I knew that this was the best decision I had made since I was born.

I closed my eyes and soundlessly screamed Edward's name. When I was confident that I had his attention -- completely unsure, but confident -- I told him what was happening. We would have to leave Wisconsin, as soon as I changed her, because, unfortunately, people have the nasty habit of noticing when the bodies of their loved ones mysteriously disappear.

I took a bit of sponge and wiped the blood away from Esme's forehead, looking at some of the lacerations that covered her body.

It was miraculous. Other than a few bumps, cuts, and bruises, Esme was relatively unharmed, physically. It seemed as though sheer will protected her while she fell, slowed her heartbeat and held her in a comatose state -- she had died inside before she threw herself off the cliff. The more and more I thought about it, the more improbable it seemed. More likely than not, she had knocked her head hard and was actually in a coma.

This was in Providence's hands now.

My body was calm and controlled, practicing a routine I'd performed many times; cleaning wounds; my mind was still screaming, despite my rational mind's attempt to calm down. Was I doing the right thing? Many of the cuts were shallow, but there one cut that ran from her temple to her jawbone. She had tried to kill herself, after all. The cut was deep and oozing warm blood that smelled like a symphony. Would this plan even work? It would have to be stitched. Would she hate me for giving her unending life?

This was in Providence's hands now.

I didn't bother to numb the area around the cut -- she wouldn't feel any pain. I worked quickly, suturing the cut. I wasn't sure if it would hold very long -- I hoped it would hold long enough for her to change. If I was very careful…

I carefully picked Esme up, and left through the back door, running like it was the second coming of Christ.

I hope you enjoy. Please, feel free to be constructive in any criticism. Point out any mistakes.