AN~I'm soooo butthurt about the fun-killing the Twilight tumblr inflicted on my world this morning. "We have a HUGE announcement tomorrow guyz! . . . a boxed set of the movies. Ta da!" My fault for hoping for another book, I guess.

3

Renesmee's POV

She dropped me in the yard. I think she may have let me down a little rougher than necessary and I rolled my eyes behind her back. She jumped up into a tree and said, "I'll wait here for you."

"Sound good, boss. I'll let you know if I need help with a vicious lamp or something."

She scowled. Sometimes, a lot of the time, I felt older than my mom. The fact that we looked around the same age now, and I would probably end up looking a little older, didn't help. My relationship with her was similar to how she had described her relationship with her own mother. Like she was the mother. I had thought many times about trying to talk her into going to see my grandmother who I had never met but I knew it would have been too hard to explain about me. She didn't even know I existed. No one did, really. I was a phantom to nearly everyone from my mother's mortal life.

Except my grandpa. I didn't know how he would react to me since I wasn't the little girl he knew anymore but I hoped that since he understood the vampire world now that it would be easier.

There was a small series of notches on the railing at the edge of the porch from where he had started marking my height as soon as I could stand. There were far more of them then there should have been for the short time in which we'd been together. He'd known there was something.

I knocked and there was a ten second pause before the door opened revealing my mother's reason for not wanting to enter the house again. I had only seen him once before and he didn't really look all that much like the person in my memory. He had gold eyes like Mom and Dad and he wasn't wearing that scary military outfit. He looked . . . small.

And stunned. His eyes traveled over me quickly and then he whispered my name. He'd recognized me easily, would my grandfather?

"Charlie!"

He turned to yell back into the house and then turned back at me. He stared at me like that until another figure appeared in the doorway. It only took him a second and he was on the porch hugging me. He knew me right away. I was relieved and it made me realize how worried I had been that he'd forgotten me. We were so close before.

He pulled away to look at my face and then embraced me again. I was surprised that he didn't try to hide the fact that he was crying. Most men would have. I thought that the man I remembered would have but it was obvious that he had changed as well, the evidence there in the very anxious-looking vampire standing awkwardly in the doorway, watching us.

He pulled me into the house with him and Aro shut the door behind us. Aro looked like he was going to edge out of the room but Grandpa caught him and told him to stay even though Aro was shaking his head and looking like he wanted to go outside and jump into a tree like Mom.

"This is your house, too."

"I can't, Charlie. Please . . ."

Grandpa let go of him but Aro stayed, anchored with a look.

"I won't have separate lives. It's your choice to go but I want you to stay."

He turned back to me then.

"Hey, someone I can feed! Are you hungry?"

"Nah, I'll be good with just a glass of whiskey."

It took a few seconds for him to figure out I was joking and his face during that time was priceless.

"We ate with Jake's dad in La Push so I'm fine. Unless you have tea."

"We do, actually. Aro's old lady friends are crazy for tea."

"I'll make it," Aro said quickly, obviously relieved to have an excuse to abandon this uncomfortable scene. "What kind do you like?"

"Um . . . Earl Grey?"

He disappeared into the kitchen and Grandpa tugged me into the living room with him, making me sit on the couch. I looked around at the room which was very different than I remembered. It was beautiful. Mom must have hated it.

"I wasn't sure if she'd let you come . . ."

"Let me? Pfft. Once I'd found out she had seen you, she wasn't going to stop me from seeing you."

"Where is she?"

"Outside. Sulking in a conifer."

He smiled and then said to be nice because he knew she'd be able to hear us.

"I'm glad you're here. I wish you could stay."

"Jacob and I were planning on staying for awhile actually."

"You and Jacob. Are you, uh—?"

This question made me feel awkward but not because I thought he was prying. It was because I knew Jacob's feelings for me were not the same as my feelings for him. Jacob loved me, but he wasn't in love with me. I guessed I didn't actually know enough about love to say I was in love with him either but I felt something more than just the pull of his imprinting when we were together.

"Not like that. Um, how much do you know about the wolves?"

"Only what Aro has told me, which is as much as the Cullen's knew."

"So you know about imprinting?"

"A little bit."

"Well, that's what it's like with me and Jacob. He's driven to protect me, to take care of me at all cost."

Against his will. Where would he be if it wasn't for being compelled to watch over me? Prisoner to an ancient magic he'd never agreed to be a part of . . .

"Oh. Well a giant wolf is a pretty good body guard, I guess."

"He's the best."

"I'm glad you came here even if it was difficult."

"I've been wanting to come back for years, it wasn't difficult for me."

"I meant because of Aro . . ."

"Right. I don't actually know how to feel about that. I mean, I only met him once for just a second and I didn't really understand what was happening at the time. He was sweet to me but I'm sure there are reasons Mom hates him. I really don't know what happened back here after Jacob and I ran . . ."

Aro came back then with a tray that he set on a little table next to the couch. Then he went to a chair across from us and sat, looking slouchier than I had ever seen a vampire look. It was quiet for a few beats and then he exhaled a sigh as heavy as his posture and spoke.

"I assumed someone would surface someday. I didn't wish for anyone in particular, that felt greedy but I knew that almost anyone showing up here could end my life as it is . . ."

"Aro, everything's fine."

"It's not fine, Charlie. It's time for me to pay for my crimes. I just wish you weren't also paying."

"I"m not here to hurt anyone . . ." I said.

"Maybe you should be. I don't know exactly what your mother told you about us or why you left or why your family did not follow you but I will tell you that the reason is me. I destroyed your life, Renesmee Cullen. I apologize, Charlie. I really cannot do this . . ."

Then he was gone with vampiric speed before Grandpa could stop him.

"Everything was so normal this morning . . ." he said tiredly.

"How should I feel about this, Grandpa?"

"I can't tell you how to feel, Ness."

"Then what am I supposed to do? Mom hates him and, I assume, you love him so how am I supposed to have both of you in my life?"

"I don't know. I would say I could tell you the whole story but I don't know it either. I think Aro's the only one who knows the whole story."

"Then tell me what you do know."

"Okay. Um, so there used to be this coven in Italy called the Volturi, do you know about that?"

"Sort of. They were like royalty Mom said."

He snorted.

"Royalty. Yeah, that explains why he's so imperious I guess."

"They came here and we all met up in this big field way out in the middle of the woods."

"Oh God, a field. That's where he goes. He took me there once but he didn't tell me what it was. He just said he goes there 'to think' sometimes. So do you know why they came here?"

"Nobody said it to me directly but I knew it must have been about me."

"Yeah. Aro said they were told by someone that you were an 'immortal child.' Like a kid that had been turned into, you know . . ."

"A baby vampire! I would have been adorable!"

"You were adorable. Anyway, making vampire children was against the law, I guess. They were too hard to control."

"So they came here . . ."

"To kill you."

"But then they met me and saw I wasn't . . ."

"That's what Aro said."

"Then what?"

"I don't know."

"Then they attacked us anyway and killed everyone we love."

Mom was standing in the archway leading into the living room. She still looked pissed but also defeated.

"That doesn't make sense. Why would they attack us when they knew I wasn't immortal?"

"Because that was just an excuse to come here. They were actually after your aunt Alice because of her future sight. Aro wanted to force her to go back to Italy with them."

"So you were fighting over Alice?"

"I guess when it comes down to it, yeah."

"But how did it happen? I mean, who started it?"

"Aro did . . . or your grandpa Cullen and he did, I guess. Carlisle tried to stop them from taking her. It was impulsive. Not like him to react like that. He was always so calm. And he didn't even have any powers, he just ran at them with no defense at all and without saying anything to any of us. It was insane. He and Aro fought and Carlisle lost. It was over after that. All of us sort of charged in when he died and it just . . . got out of hand."

She said these last words like they were a confusing revelation, like she was repeating the answer to a complicated math problem that she'd heard before but hadn't understood then because she didn't understand the equation yet.

"So everyone is dead then, Mom?"

She looked at me for a second and then came and sat on the floor at my feet. She put her hand on my leg.

"Baby, did you think your dad might be here alive still?"

"No, I think I knew. Hearing it is different though . . ."

"Well we left before the fighting ended so I guess I don't actually know for sure. But Aro said he was alone at the end."

"So he killed everyone?"

"I fought for my life like everyone else did. If you need an account of who killed who, I can't tell you that. I can't even tell you who I killed. I watched my coven die. My brothers, my wife and all in the wake of murdering one of my closest friends. I should have subdued him but discipline, not diplomacy was our modus operandi at the time, unfortunately for everyone there that day. Many people ran when it became clear that that fight would likely end in their deaths. I don't remember a moment when I knew it was over. There were ten vampires around, all fighting and then there were five and then none and I was alone. I saw figures disappearing into the trees, but I couldn't tell you their identities. I can only tell you who I found afterwards when I went about doing what I have always done: concealing the evidence of vampires from humans by clearing away the evidence of the massacre. I can give you a list if you want it."

Everyone was silent after he spoke. Maybe it was better not to know. It wouldn't change anything here but . . .

"I want to know," Mom said. "If you don't want to know, Renesmee, we can talk somewhere else."

"I'm okay."

Aro sat in the same chair he'd vacated a few minutes before but he was more composed now.

"Many people fell into that pit as you know, Bella, and I can't say for certain everyone who did. I know I saw Kate and Eleazar fall. Also . . . um, Emmett and a few of my own guard. Among the dead I found one of the Romanians, Zafrina and her sister, the Irish coven except for Maggie, Esme, Jasper, Jane and Alec, Caius and his wife, my wife, Marcus, six of our witnesses, Felix and Chelsea, Demetri, the rest of the Denalis, some wolves but I couldn't possibly identify them and what looked like a human only wasn't . . ."

"There was a human out there?"

"No. Not a human. It had blood but it wasn't . . . I think that he may have been someone like you, Renesmee. A human vampire hybrid. I found another with a skin tone similar to his so I assume they were together but I saw no evidence of them in Edward's thoughts that day."

"I don't know who that was either . . . we went looking for more people like Renesmee but we never found any."

"Hmm. Well, that is a mystery."

"So with those people dead that leaves . . ."

"Revolutionary Garrett . . ."

" . . . Alice . . ."

" . . . the Egyptians . . ."

" . . . Rosalie . . . "

"And Renata. I don't like to think that she would have deserted me but I don't suppose she owned me anything . . ."

And Edward. My dad. It hung there unspoken. No one knew if he was alive.

The feeling in the room was funeral, somber. I had seen movies and documentaries about the Jewish holocaust and the listing of names felt like that to me. A roll call of unnecessary death. Of people who shared my heritage, now gone forever and remembered by name and face only to a few.

Mom was quiet, leaning against the couch between me and Grandpa. Aro was staring at his hands, pressing his fingertips together. I was glad Mom didn't have the ability to read minds because I felt sorry for him. Grandpa was watching him sadly as well.

Not much more was said that night, I asked to stay over and the request was accepted immediately. Grandpa said he'd take the next day off so we could spend time together. Mom looked sullen and fidgety as we all got up to go to bed.

"Come on." I pulled at her arm pointlessly but she rose from the floor anyway. "We'll have a slumber party."

She followed me upstairs looking grumpy. I heard a short exchange between Grandpa and Aro as we went.

"I don't want you to go out there anymore."

"Go out where?"

"Aro, don't. You know where. That field. If I had known what it was, I would have made you stop before."

"My family is there, Charlie . . ."

I knew if I had heard this, Mom had too. I turned to see her face and it was set in a blank expression. I didn't know how I felt about Aro but I could see that she was struggling with her feelings about the whole thing now. Placing blame probably felt good but it wasn't as clear cut as that. She hadn't refuted anything he'd said so I assumed the account was sound. I wanted to hug her but I knew it would upset her if she thought I was pitying her.

Grandpa joined us a minute later, leaning on the edge of the doorway to watch us as we surveyed the room. It looked exactly as it had before when I slept over back then. Same walls and books and bedspread.

"I told Aro him could do whatever he wanted with this room but he wouldn't touch it. He said it didn't belong to either of us and he was done taking things that didn't belong to him."

He glanced at Mom as he said this. I knew he was trying to make her see Aro differently. She stayed stony-faced though and my heart ached for him. I went back downstairs to retrieve my tea which was lukewarm now but still good. Aro was in the dining room, sitting at the table with a laptop computer. I sat next to him and stirred my cooling tea absentmindly.

"So. Are you evil then or what?"

He looked a little shocked at my bluntness but not angry.

"I don't know what 'evil' is. I think it means different things to everyone."

"Okay, well, do you intentionally hurt people?"

"The last time I came close to physically harming another person was in self-defense. Or Charlie-defense actually as they could not have harmed me. I've attempted to avoid psychological harm as well but just me being here has hurt Bella a great deal . . ."

"She needs an enemy. It makes it easier to deal with being nomadic. It's not in her nature to move around so much. It's not such a big deal for Jacob and me but Mom likes stability. She hasn't been very happy since we left here. I didn't see it clearly until I was older but I think that having the facts about that fight will maybe help her to move on from it."

"I hope that you are right. Bella hurting hurts Charlie and that's incredibly difficult for me. I would leave if I didn't think it would only hurt him more . . ."

He was tapping the pads of his fingers lightly against the keys, making a small clicking sound. He wasn't typing, it was a nervous action like biting your fingernails.

"Alright, well, maybe I will feel differently later on, but for now, Grandpa loving you is good enough for me."

My words didn't seem to sooth him though. He looked sadder, more guilty. I stood and picked up my cup.

"Welp, been a long day for me so I'll see you tomorrow, Gramps."

He smiled oddly at this title.

"Thank you, Renesmee. And I don't wish for you to take sides against your mother. She is well justified in her anger. The fault lies mainly with me and she would be in the right to continue to hate me for as long as she or I live."

"Sure. And you know, be careful on the internet there. Scammers love tricking the elderly out of their retirement funds."

He laughed self-consciously and I went back upstairs. Mom was standing at the window. She turned on me when I shut the door, looking confused and angry.

"I don't want you talking to him about me."

"Well I'm going to talk to him because he's married to Grandpa and I'm a guest in their house."

"You don't have to talk about me though."

"I like talking about you. You're my mommy."

I saw her soften against her will. I had stopped calling her "Mommy" as I got older and wanted to seem older but I shamelessly used it for manipulation purposes now. I went to the window and slipped my arm around her waist. The darkness outside had transformed the window into into a dark mirror which reflected us and our nearly twin-like appearance in its face.

"So did you sneak Dad up here when you were dating?"

She laughed shortly.

"He snuck himself up."

"Can't trust vampires."

"That's what he always said . . ."

"Do you remember when you met?"

"Why are you asking about this now?"

"Because we're having a slumber party and we're supposed to talk about boys. I saw it on Gilmore Girls."

She sat on the bed and picked at the fraying purple velvet flowers on the comforter.

"It's one of my clearest human memories. It was in the cafeteria at the high school—"

"Ooo, sexy."

"—I saw your aunts and uncles first, actually. First Emmett and Rosalie and then Alice and Jasper. Your dad came in last. I think I stared at him pretty stupidly but everyone did. He was too beautiful to be real."

"Aw. And then you seduced him with your feminine wiles . . ."

"No. I couldn't have seduced anyone. I was totally and clumsy and socially awkward."

"You're still clumsy and socially awkward."

"Thanks. I didn't know why he liked me honestly and I still don't. He was perfect and I was just some boring human. Later I found about 'la tua cantante' though."

"What's that?"

"Um, it's Italian. That's what Aro called it when I met him in Italy—"

"You went to Italy!? I want to go!"

"Well maybe your new 'grandpa' will take you," she said sarcastically.

"That sounds like fun," I said bouncing onto the bed behind her. "I wonder if Grandpa's gone? We should fake me up a birth certificate so I can get a passport."

"I was joking."

"I wasn't. So what's this 'singer' thing about now?"

"Who told you about that?"

I laughed at her. I didn't speak other languages around her and Jacob often because she only spoke English and he spoke English and Quileute so she always seemed to forget that I spoke more languages than she even knew the names of.

"You did, Dork. I speak Italian. That thing you said means—"

"I know what it means," she said grumpily.

"Okay. So what does it mean though?"

"It refers to when a vampire feels an almost irresistible draw to a human's blood. They call those humans 'singers.' I was Edward's singer."

"So he was destined to fall for you?"

"No, not like that. He just really wanted to kill me because I smelled extra delicious to him."

"Ah. But instead he decided to make out with you?"

"Something like that."

"That's romantic."

"Your definition of romantic makes me concerned about your potential love life."

"I don't have a potential love life."

I think I must have given something up in the way I said it because she made a face and said, "If this is about Jacob, you shouldn't feel like you need to protect him. If you found someone else, you shouldn't worry about that. He wants you to be happy . . ."

"I don't think I'll find anyone else."

"We haven't really stopped moving long enough for you to know that."

"I mean I don't want to."

"So you have feelings for Jake?"

"I think so. He doesn't though."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes. Would it bother you if he did?"

"I don't know. I've thought about it a lot and I can't decide. I guess it wouldn't really matter how I felt though if you liked each other . . ."

"How did you guys meet?"

"We met when we were kids actually but we didn't become friends until I moved back here after Grandma Renee got remarried."

"Did you ever like him? I mean like that?"

"Yes. There was an incident the fall after I met your dad met and he and his family left for a few months. Jacob and I spent a lot of time together while they were gone. We never dated but we were very close."

"Have you kissed?"

"Once."

Ew.

"Okay. Well that's gross but whatever."

"It wasn't really like that. It was just a weird moment. Edward was there actually. Just down the hill from us . . ."

"Okay, no. That's getting weird you can stop now. What was the incident?"

"The what?"

"You said there was an incident and Dad left."

"Oh. It was on my birthday. Alice had a little party because you could never stop her from doing those kinds of things and I injured myself at their house during it. Drew a little blood. It wasn't a big deal for most of them but Uncle Jasper was kind of new to the 'vegetarian' thing and he freaked out a little bit. Scared Edward off. He didn't want to turn me and he felt having them around made things too dangerous so he left."

I hadn't really ever thought about them before I knew them. I don't think anyone dwells much on the private lives of extended family members so I hadn't considered the fact that they all might not have been animal blood drinkers their whole lives.

"So Uncle Jasper used to drink human blood?"

She didn't hesitate before answering but she looked like she didn't want to answer.

"Me and Carlisle are the only vampires I know of who have never killed a human."

"So Dad . . ."

"Yes. But he used his mind-reading ability to track and kill evil men."

"Why didn't he just do that forever? Couldn't he have found people for all of you that way?"

"He didn't feel good about it. He really saw himself as a monster, as bad as the men he fed on."

"But he thought he was doing the right thing at the time?"

"Baby, you don't need to rationalize his actions. He was a good person, the rest of it is circumstantial."

"Do you think Aro thought he was doing the right thing?"

"No. I think he's selfish."

"So you don't think that his actions were 'circumstantial'?"

"No."

"That sounds . . ."

"Hypocritical?"

"I didn't want to say it."

"The difference is what we'd be overlooking, honey. Your dad didn't want to hurt anyone. Aro . . . he liked hurting people I think."

"I guess I don't see motive as being as vital as you do in this case. The life he's living here with Grandpa doesn't seem that different than Dad's family. And before they had that life, all of them fed on humans . . . and they didn't all have Dad's ability to make sure the people they killed were bad . . ."

"It's just different, Renesmee."

"If you say so."

I put my hand on her cheek and sent her a series of images. Me and her in happy moments. Us with Jacob. Us with Dad. And then, a risk, a thing I had never shown her: my first meeting with Aro from my point of view. He was taller but he still could have reached my hand without stooping at all and yet he leaned down to be at my level, to look into my face. I remembered feeling no fear of him. His face reflected my own in appearing very young.

I wasn't sure yet, but what my mom had seen as selfishness, I thought was more like him being a bit of a child in a man's body. Children don't have a finely developed sense of self-control or complexly formed morals. They just want what they want and they don't think about right and wrong. But that didn't mean they didn't feel things. They loved and they felt afraid and they felt sad when they hurt people they loved. And lost people they loved.

I didn't want to overlook something bad if it was there but I also knew I was feeling a strong inclination to know Aro for Grandpa's sake.

"He said today that it was Caius who wanted to stay and fight us," she said after I took my hand away.

"Do you believe him?"

"I don't know. He was trying to make himself look better to Grandpa at the time so . . ."

"He loves Grandpa."

"He seems to."

"Grandpa's really good at knowing when people are lying . . ."

"I wouldn't know that because I'm a bad liar. Everyone always saw through my fibs."

"That's true. You sure kept a lot from me for being a bad liar though."

"You never asked before."

"I'll probably ask more things later."

"Later sounds good. Go to sleep now, baby."

She lay down next to me on the bed and said it was so I would feel safe but I was pretty sure she was the one who needed the safety.

I didn't plan on ever telling her but I wondered if she would eventually figure out on her own that the reason she didn't like Aro was because they were too much alike. Both of them eternal children. And both of them bent on getting the thing they wanted at almost any cost without properly weighing the consequences.

I hoped she would recognize before it happened that the consequence of continuing to hate Aro would be us losing the only family we had left.

END NOTES: Oh God, Renesmee Cullen is such an awesome badass. She's everything her parents could have been if they weren't both so lame.

And today, because of this, I started a thing I've been secretly wanting to do for some time: write an Aro/Ness fic. It seems weird in concept but really no weirder than her being with Jacob which is actually weirder since Aro never held her as a baby at least. Ew. (It's from Aro's POV and he has a filthy little mind . . . or I do, I guess.)

Oh right, practical things. This chapter required a lot more research than I wanted to do but I did (most of) it anyway! I omitted many vampires from the battle according to book and a few from the movie that nobody cares about and only mentioned people I thought might be useful to me somewhere along the way.

And man, it was really weird having one Twilight character tell another one such basic Twi knowledge like A and R's convo at the end there. But how much do you know about your aunts and uncles, really? Or your parents story? Weird.