You all know the drill… Twilight belongs to Stephenie Meyer. I'm just grateful that she lets us put her Edward and Bella through every manner of angst imaginable.

Playlist for Chapter Four – "I Wish the Best for You" by Emerson Hart/ "Draining" by Silversun Pickups/ "Postcards from Far Away" by Coldplay

Chapter Four – I Wish the Best for You

May 1994

~Edward~

"You have to leave Forks NOW, Edward! If you stay, the Volturi will kill both you and Bella. You can't stay, and you can't go back and visit her. Now is not the time. Please, please hurry and leave Forks as soon as you can," Alice screamed into the phone.

"Why Alice? WHAT IS GOING ON?" I roared. "Explain to me why I have to leave Forks right now!"

"Edward, the Volturi will be scouting the area for some rogue vampires in the very near future –vampires who are turning children. The Volturi will detect you and discover Bella. Your involvement with a human child will draw their suspicion, and they will draw the wrong conclusion. They will kill her just for knowing about us and you for your association with her. You know the law regarding immortal children. To create an immortal child is an atrocity. The offense is punishable by death, carried out immediately and sometimes extending to the offending vampire's entire coven, regardless of their involvement. Edward, get this through your head – THEY WILL KILL BELLA AND YOU FOR CERTAIN and possibly they will kill us all," Alice clarified in a single breath.

"Is Bella in danger of being turned by the other vampires?" I asked, horrified. I couldn't bring myself to even imagine her as an unstoppable, uncontrollable, bloodthirsty monster.

"No, from what I can see, the vampires responsible are aware that the Volturi have found out about the immortal children in Seattle. They won't risk turning any more children at this point."

"Can't I come back after the Volturi leave? I have to be there to protect her." I was even more terrified of the thought of any vampires harming my precious Bella.

"No Edward, I see the rogue vampires eluding them, so the Volturi will be making several trips through the area for the next few years…"

"YEARS?" I interrupted, a feeling of panic starting to settle in.

"Yes, Edward, YEARS!" Alice emphasized. "If the Volturi find you there, they will automatically assume that you are the guilty party. It's not the type of crime they hold a trial for. They will destroy first, ask questions later. Look, Edward, I know that you have grown extremely close to Bella, but trust me when I say this, now is not the time. To keep her safe, to keep yourself safe, you have to stay away from her. You have to be far away from Forks. You will see her again Edward, I promise, but you have to wait. You have to be patient, for her sake."

"Can't I at least tell her goodbye before I go? Please, Alice, I can't leave her like this. I can't abandon her and run away like her mother did – I'm afraid it will break her if I just disappear," I said, anguish building in my chest. If I were able to, I would have been crying. I had to see her. I couldn't leave her to wonder what happened to me, thinking that I had abandoned her.

"You have one day to say goodbye. You must NOT stay any longer, or BELLA WILL DIE and YOU WILL DIE. I wish I could tell you otherwise, but unfortunately that is not the case. Goodbye Edward and good luck. We'll see you in Syracuse." With that, Alice hung up.

I let the phone fall to the floor. I was trembling and pain ripped through my body. I didn't know what to do. I couldn't risk Bella's life – she was the whole world to me, but I couldn't just leave her. It would be like ripping myself in half and leaving the best part behind.

I waited at the edge of the tree line for Bella to meet me during her recess. I heard the patter of her little feet as she ran toward where I stood.

"Edward!" she laughed happily as I scooped her up in my arms and swung her around.

"Hello, my Bella," I told her, trying to keep the sadness from taking me under. "How is your day going?"

"It's perfect now that you're here!" she squealed.

My heart sunk a little bit lower and I hugged her tighter. I tried to maintain a happy façade, but she saw through me and immediately recognized that I was sad. She was so perceptive, far more than her years. Even in my sorrow, I managed to be immensely proud of her.

"Take me to our treehouse, please?" she asked solemnly.

"Anything for you, my Bella," I replied. I cradled her gently in my arms and ran with her to the treehouse. We sat silently for several minutes, cross-legged in front of the fire, and I took her tiny hand in mine.

"Bella, I have to leave tomorrow to go meet up with my family. I can't stay here any longer."

Tears filled her eyes, threatening to spill over at any moment. "Will you come back to visit me?" Her bottom lip trembled.

My heart started to fracture into little shards, and I told her, "I will come back as soon as I can, but it might not be for a long time."

Her tears flowed freely down her cheeks, her beautiful brown eyes wide and filled with pain. I felt like I was dying all over again when she asked, "Can't I come with you?"

"No, Bella, I wish you could come with me, but it wouldn't be right for you to leave your Daddy. He needs you now. I will think of you all the time, I promise. You'll never know how important you are to me – you really are my world, my beautiful Bella. I wish nothing but the best for you."

"I'll miss you, and I'll think of you all the time, too," she said fervently.

She wrapped her arms around me and clung to me tightly. All I could do was rub her back and bury my face in her hair. I took deep breaths, ignoring my burning throat, so I could memorize her scent of freesias and lavender. It would have to hold me over until I could come back to her.

I returned her to the forest edge in time for her to make it to the school before recess had ended. I sat her down and held her while her tears streamed down her face, murmuring, "I will see you again, Bella. I promise the day will come that I will be back. You have my heart – keep it safe for me. Now go – you need to get back to school."

"I love you, Edward," she sighed, planting a kiss on my cheek, then she turned and ran across the field.

I felt completely empty – drained. My life, my light, and my heart had gone with her. The dark days had begun.

"I love you, Bella," I whispered, as I watched the distance increasing between us.

Alice was bouncing with excitement on the front porch when I pulled into the driveway of the family home in Syracuse. Everything will be alright Edward, you'll see, she assured me with her thoughts. I didn't feel her enthusiasm at the moment, and all I wanted was to find my room and be left alone with my thoughts. I hadn't seen any of my surroundings on the drive here, and there wasn't anything I was interested in seeing here, either. The only thing I wanted to see was nearly three-thousand miles away. I barely acknowledged Alice and reached for the door.

Esme nearly flew through the door and squeezed me in a tight embrace. "Edward, I'm so glad you're here. We've missed you so much," she exclaimed. "I wish everyone were here to welcome you home, but Carlisle is at the hospital, and Jasper, Emmett, and Rosalie are still in class. We'll have to celebrate when they get back."

"I've missed you too, Mom," I answered softly. I hung my head, and continued. "But I'm not in the mood to celebrate right now. I miss Bella so much that it hurts. I'm sure you've heard all about her from Alice."

"Yes, dear. Alice has told us and she sounds like an incredible, adorable little girl. I wish we could meet her, but Alice said it would endanger Bella's life. We'll just have to wait until the time is right."

Alice was bouncing again. "Show her the picture, Edward – the one Bella drew for you," she said.

I pulled the folded piece of paper from my wallet and handed it to Esme. It had been opened and folded so many times the paper had worn through at the creases, which were held together with tape.

The picture was of two figures, one tall, with very messy brownish-red hair and gold eyes, holding the hand of a much smaller figure, with long brown hair and brown eyes. They were standing in front of a huge treehouse in the background, surrounded by flowers. My heart was immediately pulled back to Bella. I remembered the sound of her laughter, ringing through the forest as she ran. I thought of all the times we spent at the treehouse – playing, singing, swinging – all the things I had forgotten from my own childhood I was able to see through Bella's wide brown eyes. She had added so much color and beauty and light to the world. Now my world was cold and gray.

Esme gasped when she unfolded the picture and then looked at me intently. "This is a lovely picture – amazing work for a five year old. Edward, please don't be sad. Keep all the wonderful times you've shared together in your memory, and know that you will see her again. Alice promises that you will see her again, and that we will all get to meet her."

"I'm so afraid I'm going to miss something – some important milestone in her life, some time when she desperately needs me. She's growing older every day, and I just want to be there for her. I worry that if I'm gone too long, she'll forget me. It's tearing me apart to be away, even though I know that her life depends on it. I wish there were a way I could be with her," I answered, anguish overtaking me.

Two pairs of arms wrapped around me as Esme and Alice tried to comfort me. But their cool marble arms weren't the right ones to make me feel any better. I needed little, warm, soft arms to take away this pain.

Time dragged by. I had inhabited the planet for over a century, before I met Bella. Time had little impact on me when it stretched out over decades, but now it seemed as if each minute was a year. How much longer would it be until I could return to Forks?

My family was occupied with work and courses at the university. I declined to enroll at Syracuse knowing full well that there was no way my heart would be in it if I did. All I could think of was getting back to Bella. She would be bigger now. I wondered what she would look like.

Recently, Alice had been trying to keep her visions from me. I would catch a brief glimpse of young woman with long brown hair, and then Alice would immediately begin mentally flipping through the pages of a fashion magazine or translating the works of Edgar Alan Poe into some long-dead language like Sanskrit or Latin.

I occupied my time playing my piano, composing for Bella. My feelings flowed through my fingers to the keys, a bittersweet and haunting melody that reminded me of her shining chocolate-brown eyes, her dazzling smile, the bubbling sound of her laughter, the feel of her little warm hand in my cold stone one, and the way her flowing ponytail would bob behind her tiny figure as we ran through the woods playing hide and seek.

God, I missed her so much that the pain was palpable.

She had given me so much in the time we spent together. I couldn't go back to the emptiness of my bleak existence before Bella. I had to hold on to some hope that we would be together again. So I saved every thought I wanted to share with her but couldn't in a journal. Each time I wrote an entry, I would tuck the picture she had drawn of the two of us between the pages to mark my stopping point. It was my way of keeping her close to me, always.

A/N: I would normally say Happy Thursday to everyone, but this chapter is not so happy… If you've read the story description, you knew this was coming. I had a frown on my face the entire time I typed it.

Mucho love and thanks to Christine (A Little Distracted, author of "Naughty Secrets" which is smokin' hot, by the way) for her endless encouragement and lunchtime discussions of new stories we've discovered and old favorites updated, as well as our own plot developments and new story ideas.

FangMom, if you need the names of any restaurants for your Bella (and Edward incognito) to try on the west side of Houston – we've got ya covered… FangMom's story, "Hide in Plain Sight" is a delicious treat – I highly recommend it!

Our next big event is the Twilight Convention in Houston at the Houston Galleria Westin Hotel – April 9 through 11! I plan to add Peter Facinelli's autograph to the inside cover of my Sony digital reader, right there with Kellan Lutz's autograph from last year's TwiCon in Dallas… Double drool…

Anyhoo, happy April Fool's Day (although this chapter is the real deal - not an AF's Day joke), and to all who celebrate Easter or Passover - have a wonderful, safe holiday!

The playlist for the story is on playlist(dot)com(slash)playlist(slash) 19366254859

There is also a link to the playlist on my profile.