This is Kayla's sister, Autumn.
Kayla has cancer. We found out over the summer. Early November, she fell into a coma, and she hasn't… yeah.
We held out, but… her brain activity isn't… God. She's on life support. No hope. They might pull the plug. I'm so angry, I can't process it, but she's still alive. She squeezed my hand a couple days ago, so…
Our parents asked me to go through her phone, to reply to all the support she's been getting, and I noticed a lot of emails from FanFiction. So I thought I'd… check her FanFiction folder. She had two chapters lined up, this one and the next one.
Here they are. Think of her, she's obsessed with these stories.
Stephenie Meyer rocks my socks, yo. Fo rizzle.
The Bravery, they are musical genius. They also own the chapter.
\/\/\/\/\/
4. Believe. ~ And I need something more / To keep on breathing for ~
Her poor hands.
They move so fast, without pause, and they're almost chafing together in her rush to expel this thrilling, heady feeling and capture it forever and ever and ever.
Her optimism is so, so rare.
Scratch that, nonexistent.
Bella's had no reason to be happy in a long time. She's not even sure if what she's feeling right now is happiness, either – if joy is the flame, then hers is a spark. To someone other, this feeling is nothing to be alarmed over, nothing to be ashamed of, and definitely not something out of arm's reach. For everybody else – the lucky ones, at least – they can feel like this every day.
She has to write, now, fast, ceaselessly, to cage this fleeting hope.
Hope?
Her pen moves faster.
And a large, cool, rust-dusted hand stills her jittery fingers.
Bella looks up from her notebook to stare at the hand that swallows hers whole, scowling slightly. No one usually sits in that seat – she doesn't have a biology partner. She works alone. But then her eyes are inching up the arm attached to the hand over hers, and in the wide, clear eyes that lock hers into place, she finds the one person she definitely does not need to have reading over her shoulder.
The words he inspired are exposed before him, and he's right there. She's glad she doesn't know his name, because if he had looked down to find it inked all over her paper, she might just die.
She closes the cover over her chicken scratch, anyway, shielding it with her forearm so the abused plastic doesn't fly back open. Just to be safe.
And she ignores the electric current that flows from his palm to her core.
"What are you doing?" she asks, and her voice is hushed, but it carries without breaking – a contradiction of the riot that's made a home under her heart.
He smiles crookedly, and her breath hitches.
It's so cliché.
"I'm saving you."
Bella's mouth has taken on a mind of its own. It's opening and closing, and little sounds are coming out, but they don't make sense because she can't decide whether she should thank him, tell him to fuck off, or ask him what he's talking about. She decides on the latter.
"From what?" she finally inquires. It comes out all breathy, and it's embarrassing.
He finally takes his hand away, and it's like Bella's come to the surface for a breath of fresh air because now she's no longer drowning.
"From combustion. Your hand was moving so fast it looked like it might start to hurt later – but I'm sorry. Now that I think about it, that was a little bit rude."
He's so thoughtful and kind, and his voice, it's like honey pouring from a spoon, sweet and slow, and she just wants to bask in it, to be serenaded, but right now, she has to think of something to say so she doesn't come across as a bitch.
"No, no, you're fine," Bella reassures him, and she's sort of proud that she hasn't said anything weird yet.
"Okay," he says. His lower lip protrudes a little bit as he runs his tongue along his bottom teeth. "I'm Edward."
"Edward," she sighs, too quickly. The situation is two seconds away from being awkward.
He nods, and the left corner of his mouth turns up into a lopsided smirk. He's waiting, and Bella jumps, mortified by her infatuation, which is making itself so evident in her behavior.
"I'm Bella," she breathes. Could she humiliate herself any further?
Why is he even bothering with her now? Is she all of a sudden, in the short five minutes between the end of lunch and now, worth his time?
Mr. Banner chooses that moment to walk over to their lab table to discuss the semester's syllabus with Edward, unknowingly interrupting what could have been the most embarrassing, or possibly the most wonderful, event of Isabella Swan's short seventeen years.