The format got a little weird on me here for some reason. Sorry :)


"The ghosts the we knew will flicker from view and we'll live a long life." - Mumford & Sons

Chapter 3

The burning was outrageous. It was controlling and manipulative. Carlisle knew what he should to do, but the burning pulled him in the opposite direction. It led him to the top of a tree that overlooked his former home.

The burning, however, was not in his throat, but in his chest. It was the love he had for his father that burned inside of him and lead him strait to where he knew he could never truly go again.

A man struggled to chop a piece of firewood. His hands were tired and old, matching his body and the hair he so messily let go in all directions. Only a small pile of wood sat to the left of the chopping station.

Carlisle looked at his father. He knew he could chop him an entire forest of wood in a matter of minutes, or less. He wanted to help him. He wanted to spring from his hidden position and present himself; let his father know that he was alright and that he had beat the monster.

It pained him dearly to watch the old man, looking frail as ever and more tired than how he had remembered. His physical struggles could end if Carlisle could just reveal himself.

Purgatory, Carlisle thought, this had to be some form of purgatory.

His father was so close, yet so far. There was nothing he could do to help him. Revealing himself would potentially cause his father more pain than believing he had died in the streets. He knew there was no way an active pastor, with all of his beliefs, could accept him as the immortal he'd become.

The axe swung and connected over and over. Wood split into pieces and was added to pile that grew little by little over the course of fifteen to twenty minutes.

Each time the axe seemed to get heavier. Carlisle watched his father's arms shake and almost lost his will power to remain hidden. He felt it was his duty to help his aging father perform such a task.

Thankfully, he stopped and rested on the handle of the tool, letting the blade rest on the ground. He breathed heavily and sighed before setting the axe onto a remaining stump.

He removed a handkerchief from his pocket and slowly wiped his forehead before taking a few logs under his arm and heading inside.

Carlisle closed in on the house and peered in through the window. Night was creeping in and he concluded that his father would most likely be in for the night, if his past was any indication of his present routines.

He made his way over toward his old bedroom and quickly realized that everything had remained exactly like he'd left it. Not a thing had been altered or changed in any way, aside from a single, small cross that sat directly in the middle of his bed.

Carlisle bowed his head and sunk away from the window, sliding his back down the side of his house before sitting on the ground with his back against it.

He let his head rest against the siding and he put his hands over his face. Inside, he heard his father mumbling to himself before shuffling around the living room slowly.

Yes, he decided, this had to be purgatory.

Carlisle wanted to stay there forever. He wanted to protect his father from the real danger that was out there. He wanted to provide for him and be the unstoppable work horse so he would never have to swing another axe in his weakened condition.

Most of all, he wanted to show him that he was alive and that he had overcome the demons and the monsters. He had won the battle. He was not evil. He was not a killer.

He closed his eyes and put his hands over his face, secretly hoping that his father would walk around the corner and catch him sitting there. It would take the responsibility off of him and keep him from having to make the most difficult decision of his life.

Slowly, he removed his hands from his face, and for a moment he thought he saw him standing there out of the corner of his eye, though the mirage was quickly dismissed and all that lingered around him were trees and emptiness.

A very distinct, yet unfamiliar sound caught his attention. He let his previous thoughts exit his mind as quickly as they'd arrived. He turned around partway and listened.

Never in his life had Carlisle seen his father cry, though he swore he heard a quiet sobbing sound from inside the house.

He rose to his feet slowly and made his way so he could see into the darkened room where his father sat in an old rocking chair.

Carlisle raised his eyes just above the ledge of the window, standing directly at his father's back.

He was wrapped in a wool blanket and his shoulders heaved up and down. A bottle of liquor sat at his feet and the fireplace sat cold and dormant.

Sobs echoed off the walls of the bare room that reeked of loneliness and heartache.

Carlisle felt his chest tighten. His stomach twisted, stinging him with discomfort. The sight of his father's lament was too much for him to bear, and so he fled; fled the yard, fled the town, fled his old life.

There was nothing that could have pained him more. He wished he had never gone to see him, at least not on that evening. For twenty-three years he had lived without seeing the man shed a tear. It was far more impacting than seeing the glowing, red eyes of the beast for the first time.

Carlisle continued to run. He didn't care where he ended up, as long as it wasn't his home town.

His legs never got tired. He needed no air in his lungs. He could just run freely, and that's exactly what he did.

It felt like days before he stopped, though he knew that was impossible. The sun had yet to rise and he remained shackled by the endless night.

Never again, he thought, never again.

Carlisle switched roles and let his brain regain control of his feet. He commanded them to stop, and as they skidded along the untraveled path, he glanced around him.

There was a town close by, he was certain of that, for the scent of human blood was within a breath's reach, though it was not overwhelming.

He gathered his thoughts and wanted desperately to feel rational and in control again. The sight of his father had sent him into a frenzy that even he was surprised by. Nothing could have prepared him for that sight.

Now, like in his recent past, he had to concentrate on moving forward. Carlisle needed to get closure, in regards to his father, in his own way. In the days to follow, he would figure out a way to do that. Luckily, time was on his side.

Carlisle made peace with the idea that he would never again come in contact with his father. He kept a close eye on him over the course of several weeks, though he knew it was in both of their best interests if he made no attempts at interaction.

His father, too, needed to come to terms with the fact that his son was gone. Allowing him the knowledge that he had taken the form of a vampire would only break his heart more, regardless of Carlisle's lifestyle decisions.

In the middle of the his final night watching over his only living family member, Carlisle made his way to the pile of wood that consisted of only a few split logs.

He picked up the axe from where his father had placed it earlier in the afternoon and chopped as much wood as he could over the course of five or six solid hours.

His father's snores were his guide. When they stopped, he stopped. When they picked back up, he continued.

The wood pile grew and grew as dawn crept in on the town. Carlisle never tired. He provided as much wood for his father as he could manage through the night until he heard his father's snores stop a final time just as the sun began to rise.

He glanced at his work. Split logs all laid in neat piles, each towering far higher than the roof of the house. It would have taken even the strongest human man months to come up with lumber Carlisle had provided his father with.

He hoped it would help him with his hardships, at least for the time being, and quickly scampered away from the property for the last time, looking over his shoulder and backpedaling until the house was out of sight.

Carlisle's father stirred as early morning light spilled into his room through the open window across from the bed. It provided him a light breeze as he slept, which helped him stay in a deep slumber through the night.

He raised his hands high above his head with a stretch and a yawn, preparing for another day. Each one had become more of a challenge since Carlisle had been taken from him.

He swung his legs over the edge of the bed before letting his feet graze across the dusty, wooden floorboards.

A streak of sunlight hit his eyes directly and he squinted, raising a hand to block its intensity. As he did, a clear view of the back yard was within eyeshot.

He nearly stumbled as he climbed all the way out of bed, racing toward the window to see if his eyes were playing tricks on him.

The back yard was full of wood. Not just any wood, wood that needed no splitting; wood that was ready for his fireplace.

He stared with a great bewilderment, wondering if he'd drunk enough of the whiskey to have blacked out and chopped the wood on his own.

The thought left his mind as quickly as it had entered. He looked upward at the clear blue skies above him.

"How in the world did this happen?" he asked the heavens.

Carlisle's name popped into his head, even before the name of God, Himself. He looked out at the woodpiles again before exiting the house to see how high they actually went.

He looked around the vacant yard for some sign of life and swore he felt his son's presence. Then, his eyes fixed on something that nearly made him drop to his knees.

Whenever Carlisle chopped wood in the yard, he always left the axe positioned neatly across the chopping block, with the blade nearest the house. That was exactly the position it was currently in.

To anyone else, the small detail would have meant nothing, but he knew that the night before he had left the tool as he always did, standing strait up and down with the blade in the grass and the handle leaning on the stump.

He approached the bench and traced his hand along the axe, ending with the blade, before retreating to the house to say his prayers.