The other night with Jasper had scared me. I never thought that he would ever try to kill me. I hadn't seen any of Alice's family since the incident and I was starting to worry that they had secretly moved away. School was strange without them, although it did give me more time to spend with my other friends. It had been a whole week without Alice at school and I was definitely missing her. I had spoken to her on the phone but she had always avoided the conversation topic of where she was. I was happy to see that, after driving home from a bad day at school, Alice was stood by my house waiting for me to come home. I got out of the car and smiled to myself. She was beautiful. How could I have even lived one day without seeing her face? I walked up to her and hugged her.
"Walk with me." She said, and held my hand as she pulled me into the forest.
I followed a little behind her, making sure I had a firm grip on her hand. We walked in silence for about five minutes. I knew that she had something planned so I just let her carry on. She eventually stopped and faced me.
"Bella." She whispered.
I looked her in the eye, her golden eyes glowing in the light.
"It's hard for me to do this."
Oh no. Not the break up talk.
"You know how much I love you."
I nodded. "And you know how much I love you." I said.
She sighed. "What happened with Jasper the other day..."
"Was nothing!" I interrupted. She looked at me blankly. "It was nothing Alice."
"You're right, it was nothing. But it's nothing compared to what it could have been."
I took a second to process this. She was right. It really could have been so much worse.
"That's what I'm scared of Bella."
She gripped my hands a little harder and closed her eyes.
"Just the thought of losing you is unbearable." She sighed again. "Which is why I'm not going to leave you." She opened her eyes and looked at me.
A sigh of relief left my mouth and I breathed out breath I didn't know I was holding in.
"It would be very stupid of me to do that to you. I know it would break your heart and mine. And not only break your heart, but leave you vulnerable to other vampires in this world."
A huge smile broke out over my lips; I was so sure that she was leaving me.
"So are you going to tell me why you haven't been in school recently?"
"That's why I brought you all the way out here." She said, "For some peace and quiet. I can hear no human or vampire here. Apart from you of course."
I smiled at her and sat on a nearby tree trunk which had fallen over. She sat down next to me.
"We haven't been in school because we've been busy. Arranging."
"Arranging what?"
"Family issues. Jasper decided that he still needs to work on his, attachment, to human blood. He and Maria are moving away."
"What?"
Moving away? They can't move away just because of me. Oh no this couldn't happen; I didn't want it to happen. This was all because of me.
"It's not your fault Bella. Before you blame yourself, it is in no way your fault. Jasper has been thinking about it for a while."
It was too late to try to convince me this wasn't my fault.
"Where are they moving to? It's not too far away is it?"
Alice shook her head. "No. Not too far away for us, but a couple of hours drive for you."
"When are they going?" I asked.
Alice looked at the floor. "They've already left."
"What?" I was starting to get slightly angry. "And none of you thought to tell me?"
"Bella we didn't want you knowing because we knew you'd try to stop them."
"Well of course I would! And if they really wanted to go I would have let them obviously... But I didn't even get to say goodbye." The last part was mainly to me.
I was really going to miss Maria. I had gotten so close to her over the past few months, she was like a sister to me now. I still felt bad for what happened to Jasper. If I was him I probably would have done the same thing; if I was a vampire that is. The thought hadn't really ever seriously crossed my mind, but now it did. Would I want to be a vampire? Alice interrupted my thoughts by suggesting we go back to my house as Charlie would wonder where I was.
"Can you hear people's thoughts as well?" I asked her, not really sure if I wanted to know the answer or not.
She shook her head. "Unfortunately not. Although it is something I'd love to be able to do." She said happily.
I laughed.
"Why did you ask anyway? Thinking about something you shouldn't?" She winked at me.
"No of course not, just a thought that popped into my mind."
She smiled and held my hand all the way back to my house. I let her lead me as I had no idea which direction we were going in anyway.
"How do you know where you're going?"
Alice shrugged. "I just know. It's a vampire thing." She said with a grin.
When we arrived back at my house I invited her in for a while as Charlie was still out. I looked at the phone as I went in and saw a message on the answer phone. I listened to it in its entirety then put the phone back down. It was Charlie saying he wasn't going to be home until past eleven.
"It gives us more time." I said to Alice, snuggling up to her on the sofa.
She "Hmm'd" in agreement.
I looked over at her and she met my gaze.
"It gives us more time." I whispered in her ear.
She laughed at the realisation of what I meant.
"No." She shook her head. "Not here anyway."
"Why not?" I asked, getting ready for any excuse she was about to throw at me.
"What would Charlie say if he got home and found your bed in pieces?"
"True." I said and lay my head back down on her.
After the mess she made of her own bed by breaking it I wasn't really about to let her do that to mine as well. I laughed at the memory of waking up to what looked like a bomb site with Alice lay in the middle. An angel lay in a war zone. I sighed. My stomach rumbled.
"I need food." I said and got up off the sofa.
"Wow, record timing Bella, you've never moved so fast!" She joked.
I pulled a face at her and made some tea for myself. It still felt strange not offering Alice anything, and I was tempted to even though I knew what the answer would be.
She stayed with me until Charlie got home. He didn't mind Alice being here, he said she was allowed round anytime that she wanted. I was pleased that he liked her; it was one less barrier to deal with. This reminded me that I needed to see Jake.
