It wasn't the warbling beeps of the alarm clock that woke me up or even Charlie as per usual. Instead it was the feeling of the cold nipping at my exposed toes. As my eyes timidly opened I noticed that something was different. Sure I was used to the cold, and the wet, and the general crap weather that plagued my bonny England, but the weather here in Forks was a different kind of wet, cold, and crap. I had gotten accustomed to the mist and fog that was usually created in the morning, when I finally decided to peel back my curtains. It was usually a fine layer over the greenery, a floating carpet of morning dew, making the place seemed a little eerie. Especially since I looked out over the forest, a girl could have nightmares if she were a squeamish type. Luckily I'm not. But this morning was different. As I opened the curtains and looked out I saw that the morning dew, mist, and fog weren't there anymore. In their place was a thick fluffy layer of snow, almost glowing in the mild sunlight.

Sunlight.

Crap!

When I usually woke up the sun was still battling to rise through the clouds. Sure there weren't many clouds today but the sun was way too clear to mean anything but the fact that I was late.

I cast an accusing glance at flashing red backlit numbers on the alarm. 8.40 am. Wonderful, that gave me a good ten minutes to make myself resemble a human being and figure out how to drive The Beast.

I rushed around as if were my first day, gathering the few things I knew I would need and unwillingly abandoning the unnecessary things I wanted to take. The little silver hip flask, the blade from the pencil sharpener, my iPod, that little white pill. Those things took time to organise and gather. Time I didn't have.

By the time I hurled myself, bleary eyed, into the driver's seat of the truck I realised I hadn't actually given a thought to driving a foreign car in the snow.

I didn't give myself time to think. Instead I slammed the thing into reverse and hit the gas. If I hit ice, well that would suck but at least I wouldn't have to go to school. At least Charlie couldn't blame me for the unfortunate event.

I was a pretty good driver, you had to be when you liked burning rubber at 100 mph, still driving The Beast was a challenge. Thanks to the thick layer of ice coating the road I never went any faster than 20 mph, but even then I had the problem of driving on the correct side and fiddling around with the gears.

I ended up bunny hopping my way along the road, lurching and jerking like a drunk, until finally I got the clutch balance right. I'd spent ages pumping my foot up and down trying to figure the damn thing out before I remembered Jacob's words. It seemed the boy actually knew his stuff about cars.

"Fuck!...Sorry," I called to an elderly woman that I'd only just managed not to hit. Of course I didn't shout the fuck at her, that was my own self-exclamation.

Shouldn't have even bothered with apology because I got the finger right after. I was flipped off by a senior citizen, surely there had to be something wrong with that.

I was so shocked and awed I nearly rear ended the car in front of me. I almost caused a few more accidents as I tried to navigate this near impossible scenario. I had never said 'I'm sorry' so many times in my life, not even for things when I probably should have. One thing was for sure, the quiet streets of Forks certainly weren't that peaceful as I roared along them.

I snuck another frustrated glance at the clock in the truck. I could have sworn it was five minutes fast because according to the ticking hands I had a grand total of two minutes until the bell rang.

I raced towards the entrance of the school parking lot, noticing Tyler's blue truck pulling out of a street behind me. At least I wasn't the only one who was late.

I manoeuvred the entrance pretty safely and drove like a pensioner towards the space in front of me. I decided reversing into it would be my better option, given the trucks general poor rear drive. I didn't look at the staring students, and I didn't bother scowling at their mocking expressions. Sure the car was a bit of a dump but it beat being carted around everywhere, relying on other people. Plus I was pretty sure the The Beast could crush any one of their Japanese shit boxes.

I was focussing on straightening up in the space when I heard an odd sound. It was a high-pitched screech, and it was fast becoming painfully loud. I looked up, startled.

I saw several things simultaneously. The joys of adrenaline. Nothing was moving in slow motion, like it does in movies. Instead the adrenaline rush seemed to make my brain work much faster, and I was able to absorb every detail of several things at once.

Fuckward was standing with his family as usual, all of them clustering around their expensive cars as if protecting them from any of the 'peasants' touching the glossy paint jobs. Still, frustratingly, his face stood out amongst the sea of others, all frozen in the same shocked mask. But of more immediate importance was Tyler's dark blue van hurtling towards me. It was going to crash right into my side. Exactly where I was sitting would be where his front end would collide.

I wrenched at my seat belt, and hurled myself to the side, landing awkwardly on the gear stick. It hurt like a bitch but it was the best I could do. Next came the sickening crunch of metal on metal, the screeching sound of the surfaces scraping across each other. I felt the repercussions, the force throwing me forward so my head hit the dashboard and my arm folded awkwardly beneath me.

My eyes shut with the force of being thrown forward. The sensation was immense, as if I had been catapulted completely out of the car. When my body revolted against the force and flung back from the whiplash, I felt as if I were falling. My body landed somewhere that felt wrong. Given the situation.

I opened my eyes hazily and sure enough I wasn't in Forks anymore, there was no truck, no gawping students, just me in my apartment gasping for breath on my cheap sofa.

My brain swilled with nausea as I looked around me. I'd surrendered. I'd chosen to accept Forks, I thought that was what was meant to happen. I hadn't experienced anything like this since. I'd been settled. Was it all a hallucination, was this room real, or was it Forks and that world which was the fabrication of my mind. Where had my life begun this routine of insanity? Was it when I met Mr R? When I went off the rails? When I first went to Forks? What in my memory was real and what was a trick of the brain?

I pressed my eyes closed and rammed my palms to my temples. If I thought hard enough it would all become clear.

I opened my eyes again and it wasn't clear. If anything it was worse.

I noticed what I hadn't before, that being that my little flat was frozen. Not with ice and snow but instead in time. It had a certain stillness which made it seem like not even air existed to move. As if it were a stale environment where I couldn't catch a breath.

I rose shakily from the sofa, looking at how the dust moats seemed caught in the air, as if held like one of those bugs they show you in the museums. Completely static, just like the clock, just like the TV that showed some freeze frame of a soap opera.

Time was stood still.

I moved with caution as I walked across the pitted floor to the bathroom. My palms touched on the doorframe as I spied a water droplet suspended in mid air.

I stepped forward, reaching with my finger to touch it, to see if it would break on my skin.

As my fingertip reached for it I felt my mind whirling once again, but all the time I kept my blurring eyes on the water drop. When I finally felt its wetness son my skin it felt like the water caught up in double time. There was rush of the moments as they stacked up on each other, making up the time they'd lost when they were frozen. The water droplet broke on my skin and in that instant I was thrown back, my body hitting a cushioned surface that—no matter how softened—felt like it knocked the wind out of me, taking my consciousness with it. It all got a little fuzzy for a while. However long a while was. It could have been mere seconds, minutes. No idea.

For the love of Satan!

I shifted my head from what felt like a stirring wheel and winced against the pain that throbbed in my forehead. It hurt like a bitch but it was my wrist that was screaming bloody murder.

I growled as I inhaled a deep breath.

"Ilsa, Ilsa. Are you OK? Can you hear me?" Damn his velvet voice. Even that fucking kills my head.

Go away. My mind grumbled as I groaned. Edward seemed to find this funny. Sadistic fucker.

"I'm fine," I grumbled as I heard him opened the door, the glass tinkling to the ground. My senses started to return to me and the surrounding screams and teenage babbling wasn't helping. It just irritated.

And then they found us, a crowd of people with tears streaming down their faces, shouting at each other, shouting at us. You'd think it was them who had just been rammed in the side. Some people could be so hysterical.

I felt Edward's hands moving over my body—checking for injuries was my guess—before he effortlessly helped me out the car.

Just wants to cop a feel, dirty perv, I thought with humour.

"I told you, I'm fine. So stop being all touchy feely." I tried to shove him away despite the way my wrist screamed. He just sighed and released me. Maybe it was reluctant, maybe he just wanted me close to indulge his little monster, maybe he wanted to suck me dry. Little vampire.

"Don't move," someone instructed, so I moved just to spite them. I wasn't going to sit there. I was mad, really mad.

"Get Tyler out of the van!" someone else shouted. There was a flurry of activity around me, but I cut through the crowd to where they were getting Tyler out.

I thundered around the car to where Tyler was standing, Lauren fussing over the cut on his forehead. Sure enough he looked shittier than me but that didn't numb my anger

"Tyler! What the fuck! I just got this piece of crap today. What am I going to tell Charlie?" I shouted at him, battling through the way my head protested. I cradled my wrist in my hand as I stormed towards him.

"I'm so sorry, Ilsa. It was the ice. I hit it wrong and I couldn't control it," Tyler explained, whimpering pitifully as Lauren dabbed the blood from the side of his face. The guy was all cock and no balls.

"Bull shit. You were driving too fast, you wanker. It took me weeks to get Charlie to trust me to drive. Now I'm going to be right back to square fucking one!"I screeched as I pointed to the truck behind me. Sure it wasn't that bad but the windscreen and the side window was shattered and there were a couple of scratches on the surface. It could have been worse, and there was part of me that was actually grateful the thing was built like a tank.

"I'll pay for the damage. I swear. I'm sorry, really. But I couldn't avoid you," Tyler said apologetically. His words really weren't helping my rage.

"You couldn't avoid me? Are you saying it's my fault? Well, Tyler? Is it my fucking fault you can't drive for shit?!" My arms twitched as I stormed towards him, sending a shot of pain up my nervous system.

"Ilsa." I felt Edward's hands catching me around the waist, stopping me from going forward but avoiding my injured wrist. His voice was so damn polite and cautionary, it was frustrating. It was like I was some out of control toddler.

"I told you to get the fuck off me."

"Calm down, Ilsa. You've hurt your wrist, and I think you might have whiplash along with the knock to your head." I rolled my eyes against his false concern. As if he actually cared. I could run off a cliff and he wouldn't give a damn. He'd probably be relieved, no one left to annoy him in biology.

I spun to glare at him but the pain and speed of my movement made my head spin and a whimper leave my mouth. I decided to just be still and wait for the ambulance. It was completely my decision, absolutely nothing to do with what Fuckward said.

It took four EMTs to get us checked over and moved into the ambulance. Tyler took his stretcher with no arguments, I wasn't so easy. I spent a good ten minutes showing them that I was walking and talking just fine before Edward stepped in and practically forced me down on the stretcher, claiming he was coming with us. I think it was just so he could be in the back of ambulance, holding me down. He took a little bit too much pleasure telling them I seemed to have whiplash and that a neck brace would possibly be best. So I lay there with a sodding neck brace making me feel like an invalid, silently panicking about how I was going to hide the track marks on my upper inner arms. The rules of a self-harmer: embrace the pain, injure yourself to release the emotions, but never do it enough to go to hospital. Hospitals meant doctors and doctors meant examinations, and examinations always revealed the ugly truth. I always had the opinion that if a self harmer ends up in hospital it's because they want help, they want to be found out. I didn't. I managed myself just fine. Sometimes I'd just hold ice cubes, because they didn't leave a mark, but sometimes only a cut would do the trick. It was my release, like smokers need a cigarette when they're stressed.

To make matter worse, Charlie turned up at the hospital, meeting the ambulance as I was being carted off for god knows what. It was sweet really, that he'd turned up, but it just made my agitation worse. I liked Charlie, truly I did, but that geniality was based on the fact that he thought I was behaving myself and so didn't ask too many questions. He gave me freedom but still offered me the safety of a home and someone to talk to in the evening, if I wanted. If he found out about the cutting, then I couldn't be sure that the freedom would stay put. I'd be watched constantly, and that meant no more cutting, no more drinking, no more ways to escape. That idea was far too claustrophobic right now.

They put me in the emergency room, a long room with pastel green curtains separating off the different patients. I made sure mine was pulled all the way round, even though I was told to sit very still and wait for the nurse. Next adjustment was removing the ridiculous neck brace and chucking it under the bed somewhere.

When the nurse came, I reluctantly rolled up my sleeve, revealing the webbed pattern of scars over scars. I watched her study the arm before wrapping the pressure cuff around and taking my blood pressure. She offered me a smile, popped a thermometer in my grim mouth, took down some notes and swept off. I knew she'd seen it and right now she was probably prancing off to tell Doctor Do Good to tell me how naughty I'm being and how I should care more about myself.

There was another flurry of hospital personnel, the noises passing through the curtain. I heard the moans and groans of Tyler as they no doubt arranged him on the bed. I huffed and scowled at my feet, trying to ignore the pounding pain in my wrist.

Another minion came and wheeled me away for an x-ray of my wrist and head. I let them do their thing while I just sat there, a belligerent stare on my face. They were just fluffing around, wasting time until they could turn me over to whoever my doctor was and let them deal with my 'low self-esteem' and 'masochistic tendencies.' I don't 'tend' to do something; it's not a fanciful action. I do it because it makes me feel better, even for just a few minutes.

Eventually I'm carted back to my bed and I lie there with a hazy mind, eyes closed, trying to make the time go faster. I think about home, not the house I live in with Charlie, but home. Or the place that offered me that kind of comfort. The ratty little apartment on the bottom floor, with a wilderness growing in place of the garden, and a door that gets jammed in winter. I think about my family, the mother and father that let me go, cut me off like a tumour. I think about my little sister, the little ballerina who was quite the sweetheart. Of course she was too young to really realise when I was around and when I wasn't. I think about Mr R, our tumultuous year together, the good times when he'd bring chocolate to detention or take me on secret cinema dates. I stop before I think about the bad times, the times that I'd buried. That's what happens when you end a relationship. At first you know your reasons and you know that the bad times were more often than the good, but after time the bad memories fade or get buried and you're left with more and more good ones. You remember how he held your hand and kissed you tenderly, not the bruises he gave you because he held too tightly, or the cut lips because he bit your lip too hard. You remember them as being wonderful, and caring, and therefore you think that all along you were just unworthy. That even now, a year after it ended, you're just a worse person than you were when you were with them. Worthless, unwanted, a waste.

"Ilsa?" a sad musical voice asked. My eyes flew open. Edward was standing at the foot of my bed, a faint smirk on his lips but that expression didn't hide the pity in his eyes. Did I really look that repugnant? Was I such a pitiful sight that every time he looked at me he just felt sorry for me? Was it because I wasn't a good person, because I liked to do things he clearly found immoral? I glared at him, battling the dull ache behind my eyes.

"Watching me sleep? Another dazzling display of social retardation, Dave," I said in a bitter voice. Liking how Edward flinched. "What do you want?" I asked.

"I wanted to see how you were." I noticed how his eyes flit to the rumpled, unrolled sleeve on my arm. How could he know about the scars?

"Well now you've seen, so you can leave. I don't like being stared at like some freak show."

"You're still your charming self so you must be fine." Edward smirked and I rolled my eyes.

Just then a doctor pulled back my curtain and stepped through. I think my mouth fell open. He was young, blond, and he could give any movie star a run for their money. I may have had a dislike for doctors but he could give me a physical any day.

Edward cleared his throat and said, "Ilsa, this is my father."

"Dr Carlisle Cullen. It's nice to meet you Miss Crowe." I nodded and tore my eyes away from him. So he was a vampire as well, explains the good looks. Still it meant I didn't feel happy ogling him anymore. That and there was a grumbling in my mind that made him seem familiar. Like I knew him from somewhere, somehow.

"How are you feeling, Miss Crowe?" his voice was far too appealing but I kept my eyes down.

"Ilsa. Miss Crowe makes me feel old. And I'm fine, except for a few aches." Carlisle walked to the light board and turned it on, examining my x-rays.

"You've got a fracture in your wrist, but other than that you seem to be just fine. Edward said you took quite a lot of the force and hit your head. How is that feeling?"

"Fine. Just drug me up and send me on my way." Carlisle's cool fingers probed lightly on my wrist, the cold temperature of his skin soothing the pain. "Tylenol should do just fine."

I winced when he prodded the joint.

"Tender?" he asked

"A bit, I've had worse."

"Yes, well. Ilsa, one of the nurses mentioned you have some abrasions on your upper arm."

"Yeah, and..." I said with a flippant tone, I was on the defensive.

"Would you mind showing them to me?" the doctor asked.

"Yes."

"Ilsa," Edward sighed in exasperation, exasperation that his 'father' wasn't showing.

"Butt out, Dave." I scowled at him before turning my defiant gaze back to Carlisle.

"Now, Ilsa, I realise this is a sensitive topic, but I just want to have a look." I moved my arm away from him, but he just went for the arm with my injured wrist, the one I couldn't just tear away.

I sat with gritted teeth, glaring at the pattern on the linoleum floor while Carlisle looked at my arm. It felt like I may as well have been sitting naked. I hated feeling so vulnerable.

"This has been happening for a long time, hasn't it, Ilsa?" I continued to glare at the floor, refusing to respond to his question.

"I'd like you to talk to someone. We won't involve Charlie, it's your choice." My eyes snapped back to his golden ones.

"Pff. You want me to see a shrink? Thanks but no thanks, doc. You can make the appointment, sure, but I'm sure as hell not turning up. It's my life and I'll live it how I want." I growl and move my arm from his light touch, even though it hurts like a bitch. I know he's trying to help; some distant part of me can register that. And I know my sullen, spiteful behaviour is rude but I have no other tactic. I have two faces I show to the world, bitch, or super bitch. That was it, and it didn't take much for me to switch between them.

"Now I want to go, so get some Candy Stripe in here to do my cast. I'm done talking." I set my jaw and watched as Carlisle rose. I even noticed how he and Edward seemed to share a loaded glance, like they were passing something between them just through their eyes.

That's one seriously close father/son relationship.

"Why are you being so rude?" Edward spat but I just sneered at his question.

"My body, my life, my decision."

"He was just trying to help. Everyone around you is just trying to help, but you're just pushing them away."

"Yeah well so what. I don't care."

"How mature of you."

"You don't like it; you know where the curtain is." I smirked and lay back on the bed.

"Ilsa, will you just..." Edward was cut off by a nurse coming in carrying the various bandaging things. She gave him a sharp look and he left shortly after.

Fifteen minutes later and my wrist was secured in a cast that made my arm feel like a tonne weight.

I got myself organised and threw open the curtains, storming or the exist before another doctor could pin me and ask me all sorts of personal questions. Unfortunately Fuckward had other ideas and caught up with me on the other side of the emergency room doors.

"Can I talk to you for a minute?" he asked in a low, persuasive voice.

"Don't want to hear it. Plus Charlie's waiting for me," I said through my teeth as I continued to march down the corridor, scanning the signs for the exits while nurses and pastel colours mingled around me.

"Ilsa." Edward pressed, with that same exasperated sigh. I must really get under his skin, I thought with a smile. I liked the idea of being an impossible itch below his perfect, Victorian skin. I continued to walk, faster and faster until I was almost breaking into a run, still he walked calmly beside me until I reached a corner and spun to face him.

"What do you want?" I asked in a rush, stopping in frustration.

"Why do you do it?"

"None of your business," I said with resentment.

"Does Charlie know?" his tone was cutting. My temper flared now, and I glared at him defiantly.

"What's it to you? I mean, what do you care if I cut too deep, drink too much? Why do you fucking care, Edward?" I was so mad I could feel the hairs on the back of my neck stick up like hackles on a wolf. I tried to keep my voice discreet and low by grinding my teeth together.

Edward was just staring at me incredulously, but his face was tense, defensive. "I don't."

I merely nodded once, jaw tight. "Exactly, so stay the fuck away from me," I said each word slowly, carefully controlling my anger. We scowled at each other in silence. I was the first to speak, trying to keep myself focused. I was in danger of being distracted by his livid, glorious face.

"I'll see you at school, Edward," I said frigidly and I turned, and I left. I was so angry my hand hit the door a little harder than I needed to, but I didn't wince at the way it clashed off the wall.

The waiting room was packed. It seemed like every face I'd glanced upon in Forks was there, staring at me and the noise I'd made. Charlie rushed to my side; I put my hands up

"I'm fine. I just want to go." I assured him sullenly. I was still aggravated and definitely not in the mood for chitchat, as if I ever was.

"What did the doctors say?"

"Nothing interesting. Dr Cullen saw me." I ground out as I weaved my way through the people who were converging on us. I didn't need to listen to all the 'get well soons' and the sympathy. Didn't need it, didn't want it.

I kept my eyes on the cruiser, trying not the clench my fists when I saw Edward sitting in the Volvo, looking at me through the window.

I snarled and threw myself into the passenger seat of the cruiser, willing Charlie to hurry up before Edward could come up with a reason to badger me again.

We drove in silence. I was so wrapped up in my thoughts that I barely knew Charlie was there. I didn't know why Edward was so bothered about how I ran my life. I was just another girl, there was nothing different about me compared to the others in Forks. Well at least nothing on the surface. How could he possibly know I wasn't from this world? That none of this was real. No one else did, and I hadn't given anything away. It didn't make sense, his words didn't make sense and neither did his actions. He was the first one at my car door and yet I knew for a fact he wasn't the closest. Why would he be bothered if I got hurt? I was just the annoying girl who sat next to him in biology and pissed him off more times than not.

When we got to the house, I finally spoke while Charlie fixed some coffee.

"I'm sorry about the truck," I mumbled. It was probably still sitting in the parking lot.

"It wasn't your fault. Tyler should have been more careful." He poured the boiled water and placed the two cups on the table. He plonked down onto the chair with a huff and dragged his hand over his face when he saw my cast.

"That's what I told him." I said with a smile and Charlie glanced up at me.

"I heard you shouted it more than told," he said in a grave voice, although his brown eyes showed his amusement.

"Maybe. It was just typical though. The first day I drive the thing and he careers into me."

"Just one of those things. Did you manage the snow alright?" I nodded through a sip of coffee, smiling as I remembered the awkward journey.

"I got flipped off by an OAP though." Charlie spluttered a bit before throwing me a smile. I let a small quiet laugh leave my mouth.

"Did the snow chains make driving easier? There was a lot of black ice."

"Uh, yeah. Thanks." I hadn't even known he'd put snow chains on but the revelation made me look at the man with a little more admiration. Maybe I was wrong to think no one cared, just maybe.

Charlie had watched me anxiously for a while as we watched TV but I didn't feel the same irritation as I might have done previously. I said goodnight and I went to bed early that night. I made sure to set my alarm this time. I stopped to raid the bathroom cupboard for the Tylenol and took three. They helped and although the dull ache in my wrist was still there the pain in my neck and head eased. As they did, I felt my body grow tired and I drifted to sleep.

Unfortunately, that was the first night I dreamed of Edward Cullen.