Book Two: James
Monday – July 9, 2012
I woke with a start, my only memory from before of the image that I saw like I was floating outside my body in a pile of broken glass and a pool of my blood. I shook my head trying to clear it before I got my bearings. What I kept seeing had to have been a dream. All the blood, the broken glass, the smashed car lying in front of me on the side of the road, Tiffany, Kat and I singing together as if we knew our end were coming. It was a nightmare. Then I remembered more; the stranger's voice that was calm and yet somehow the most frightening thing I'd ever heard, not being able to open my eyes when I felt my body burning with such intensity I must have been on fire. Then there were the memories that at the time I must have thought were of me after I'd died, being carried at what seemed like incredible speed through the trees of the forest and finally being able to open my eyes to see the handsome face of a blonde, muscular god.
I shook my head again to try and clear these thoughts. I obviously wasn't dead so it must have all been a dream. Then I took in my surroundings. I wasn't anywhere I remembered. The white clean pressed sheets and duvet cover over me were not mine nor did they smell like mine. Everything in this room smelled oddly good though. Like fresh baked berry pie, not too sweet but with the natural sweetness of blackberries, raspberries and blueberries. I looked around the room and noticed clothes hanging on the wall with a note.
The accident was too bad, hope these fit.
It was a pair of jeans and a plain black t-shirt. I noticed then that the clothes hanging loosely on my body were shredded looking like glass had been blown through them. I changed quickly not sure what else to expect from this strange sort of experience and then decided I needed to look in a mirror and see if this so called accident that I seemed to remember so vividly had done anything harmful to the way I looked.
As I looked around for a mirror I found a bathroom and decided I must be in a hotel or motel room, though I had no recollection of entering one, even in my strange dream-like memories. But I entered knowing there would be a mirror there. But when I looked at my reflection I had to double-take. It didn't look like me staring back from the mirror. My face was more angular than I'd remembered it being and my skin was so sickly white that I knew I'd at least had a little pink in it before. But then there were my eyes staring back at me…there was no way to describe how horrified I was looking at this reflection. My eyes were red. A sort of sickly red like the pool of my blood I remembered being in and it only emphasized the brilliant red of my curly hair that fell in ringlets around my face.
I took a deep breath in that felt hollow and I realized it was the first breath I'd taken since I'd woken only moments ago. "This is a dream right?" I whispered to myself, testing my own voice. It sounded higher than I'd remembered it but maybe that was the effect of the solid windpipes that I could feel in my throat.
It was then I suddenly felt eyes on me. And somehow I managed to hear a voice when my newly heightened hearing heard no lips moving. Maybe I should have said something to her before turning her. The voice said and I realized now that it was in my head.
I spun around and saw the blonde man from my strange dream state. "Who are you?" I asked the first question that came to mind when I saw his blood-red eyes that matched mine, "What are you?"
"My name is James. I am a vampire, and so are you," he said in a voice that fell like silk over my ears. It was calming in the way that made my skin crawl with unease and fear.
The next thing that came to mind was that I'd felt as if I'd seen him before somewhere, "Where am I?" I asked ignoring the familiarity.
"In a cabin in the Cascade Mountains. You were driving on the peninsula when you hit an elk, can you remember that?" he pressed and suddenly his voice held no fear over me. He wanted me to remember but what exactly was hard for me to grasp.
I thought hard about the few memories I had. The blood and glass and my broken body stood out most to me. But if I thought a bit harder I could make out driving and feeling carefree with Kat and Tiffany in the car with me. I could remember the brilliant sun and how wonderfully warm it felt on my skin, which was when I realized that I was far colder to the touch than ice. "I can remember driving and my friends," then the new thought hit me: Kat and Tiffany screaming with me as if we were all set aflame, "Where are my friends?"
"Your friends are fine for the moment. I need you to remember what happened. Focus," James ordered.
I tried to focus on the memories; I shut my eyes and tried to play the events over in my head. I really did try…but all that kept entering my mind was death and blackness and that horrible sound of their screams. And then it was like the world had rushed into my head I saw all of my memories from the past day flowing together in a swift reel that was almost like a video clip in fast forward and then it slowed almost to a stop when I saw the elk in the road looking at the car, at me, eye to eye. It was like he'd stopped and waited for us knowing that when he died our deaths would be shortly after. He was not afraid; if anything he was doing this on purpose. And then it happened, my car hit him at full force bouncing off only long enough to hit a tree by the side of the road. The force was enough to throw all three of us from the car, even with our seat belts on. There was glass everywhere, blood everywhere and the saddest song playing between the three of us until the stranger had come and sung, You haven't had enough time. My eyes threw themselves open and I felt as if I needed air. I gasped and gasped for air feeling as if I couldn't pull enough air into my lungs. "You saved us?" the words didn't sound right on my lips.
"Yes," James replied, "You remember everything now?"
"Yes. You tried to take us to the hospital. The doctors wouldn't even let you in with the three of us bleeding so badly… Why would someone turn away three dying people? It was a hospital!" my emotions raged inside of me and I couldn't tell anymore how I had so many of them.
"You deserved to live longer, even if it's not quite life," James said.
"Was the game not fun enough for you since it was an elk that sealed our fate instead of you?" I asked seeing his thoughts flicker to a chase and a deadly game.
"That chase was not for you. It was a memory of a time before you. I saw three girls in the prime of their lives dying because of a stupid animal and wanted to help is that so wrong?" James asked.
"Yes, because that's not who you are. You live for your games. What stopped you from letting us die? Or better yet, we were ripe for the picking and you didn't drain us dry, why did you do that?" I growled.
"I don't know. There was something about you three that just seemed right that seemed life-like. I just knew you needed to live," James said but his thoughts were saying, Wait till she asks, if she asks how she can repay your kindness then it's okay to use her and her friends.
"I will not ask how I can repay you for your kindness! There was no kindness just selfish gain!" I growled and suddenly he was slightly afraid. I was a newborn, he was thinking, and I was stronger than him, "Tell me what you were planning on asking us to do before I decide to rip your head off. And don't try bluffing that I can't because not only do your eyes give away you can but your thoughts to too."
"You can hear my thoughts?" James asked.
"Stop avoiding the question," I growled.
"If you can hear my thoughts why do you need to ask?" he was getting cocky again.
"Don't you want to know if I even want to help you with whatever it is you want? I mean I know it's not normal for people or vampires to be able to hear thoughts but that's beside the point," I loved holding this over him.
"I want Isabella Swan," James said and it suddenly dawned on me why I thought I'd seen him before. Cam Gigandet had done an excellent job at looking like his character in Twilight but the vampire that stood before me was more well-muscled and actually wore a t-shirt and sneakers.
"You're telling me that Twilight characters exist?" was all I could think to say.
"Where's your confidence now?" James asked.
He was starting to sound more and more like the character from the books I remembered so well. It frightened me honestly, but it also calmed and exhilarated me. This bad-ass wants the girl dead because it's a fun game thing that he had going was almost sexy in a way. "I'd also like a cheeseburger but I don't think that'd settle well," I mocked, suddenly this game was fun.
"Ya, I wouldn't try the cheeseburger thing, it won't even taste good anymore. Just go for the human jugular and I promise your hunger will be satisfied," James had caught on to my game too quickly but I figured it was because of his tracking abilities – he could probably read people more easily than I could now hear people's thoughts.
"What do I get if I help you?" I asked no more games. I wanted the score settled on who got what and where it left my friends and I.
"Whatever you want. I'm sure you can blend into society if you wanted. I mean the Cullens have done it so it can't be all that hard. Or you could live on the edge and pick off the weak and sickly like most of us do. I really don't give a damn what you and your friends do. I just want Bella and if I can have a fun little game from the beginning then that's all the better," James said sadistically.
"So you enlisted my friends and I to do what exactly? Go play high school and become BFF's with Bella and get her away from Edward long enough for you to drain her dry and then do what? Pull out some hidden cameras and go 'gotcha!'" I said.
"That's one way to do it. I really don't care how it happens I just want to have a bit of fun with a game and get my prize and continue on my way. The fiery death in the books is not what I have in mind for how this little game ends," James said.
"I want to see my friends first," I said.
James silently led me into another room where Tiffany was lying face down on a bed similar to the one I woke up in only hers was black. "I love what you've done with the place. It totally screams 'Tiffany.'" I said and she bolted upright.
"Oh great you're alive too!" It was honestly the happiest I'd seen Tiffany in a long time, "What about Kat?"
I looked at James who lead the two of us into a third room done up in purple rather than Tiffany's and my black and white. Kat was in the corner of the room, curled into a ball with her hair a total mess. But when we entered her red eyes light up and she instantly flitted over, graceful as if she wasn't walking but gliding, and wrapped her arms around us, "I thought we were all dead," she said and I could hear tears in her voice.
I noticed then that all three of us had tears in our eyes. Stephenie Meyer had said that vampires couldn't cry but hey our venom kept our eyes moving around in our heads so it only makes sense that we could cry it right? "I'll come back and talk to you three later," James said disappearing.
I sat with my two best friends on the end of the purple bed. I explained my whole conversation with James and let Kat and Tiffany comment where they did. Our lives were over and we needed to get on with these new lives. "Well I suppose we have experienced the end of our world," I said suddenly utterly depressed.
"Did he tell you if we were even pronounced dead?" Tiffany asked suddenly.
"I can remember the puddles of blood the three of us were in and I can remember the hospital staff turning us away. It wouldn't surprise me," I replied.
"Nothing will ever be the same," Kat suddenly said.
"I'd still like to know if we were just pronounced dead or missing. If we were pronounced missing at least we can go back and continue where we left off," Tiffany said determined to stay positive.
"But we're vampires! As much as I'd love to go back to my life we're still the walking dead! We'll need blood to survive and I'd rather not be staring at my family's necks holding myself back from sucking them dry!" Kat was not herself. I figured it had something to do with the fact that she was right – nothing would be the same, ever again.
"We can control cravings. I mean we all used to get a little violent when we wanted chocolate. This shouldn't be any different. Right?" Tiffany was looking to me. If I backed her up maybe Kat would let it go and we could go back to normal. But I knew she wasn't right and when James walked in with copies of our death certificates I knew that it was over. Normal would never be attainable and Tiffany just wanted it to be back to exactly that, normal.
A/N: Okay so a little morbid I know but it'll get better I promise. Please let me know if you like this one better than the last chapter of meeting James if you read the last version!