Here's a new chapter for you all, I skipped off homework for this! That shows you how much I love you all... or how much I hate homework.. Please Enjoy. I Need A Familiar Face Bella PoV
Rose said once that it would get less confusing and a lot easier for me. I think she has miscalculated that. Okay let's review;
1) Edward hates me.
2) Edward.. What do I feel for him? I like him yet I hate him, I want to touch him then I want to throttle him. Memories of him holding my frozen form to the ice floor in the school parking lot as soon as Tyler's van failed to hit me, lips nearly touching, I could still taste his breathe on my tongue..
3) Edward won't speak to me unless he wants to make me more bemused.
4) Edward, Edward, Edward, Edward, Edward.
As you can clearly tell, the only thing I can think about right now is that him. And it is annoying me to no end; before my impromptu episode with Tyler's vehicle, Edward and my totally platonic relationship was going well and then I just kind of.. verbally attacked him when he saved my secret. No, our secret. I realized after the hit-and-miss accident that he didn't do it for me but did it for himself and his family.
I stared blankly at the ceiling as I thought this, it nearly made me want to cry. I had nothing to do, no one to talk to. Everyone was busy, doing things people who can't sleep do at night.. Except him.. Of course, he isn't. Neither am I. It was going to be light soon, I could hear the early morning birds begin to chirp the incessantly happy song.. I wonder could I scare them away with my misery. Jasper is probably dry-sobbing in his room right now, my depression could get the best of people down and being an empath probably didn't help him when it came to my emotions. My head kept spinning with bewilderment. What did Edward mean when he said that it was better this way? Was it better if he didn't speak to me? Why was he always being so freakin' unfathomable?
My train of thought stopped once I realized what he must have meant. He wasn't speaking to me because he knew how captivated I was by his very presence. He knew that I was absorbed by everything he did. He was talking to me because he didn't like me back; he wasn't interested in Carlisle's baby sister. But then again, where is the surprise there? I mean, come on, he is Edward Cullen- he wasn't interested because I wasn't interesting! I was boring and I wasn't exactly as pretty as Rose, but then again, I was no gargoyle. But, Edward...He was interesting, and smart and beautiful and kind and good. I was his creator's sister and his adopter brother's friend. That's all that joins us together. Well, it's fine then. Edward will get what he wants. I'll live him to his own devices. I won't give him any unwanted attention; I won't look at him with admiration in my eyes anymore. Just indifference. I was going to turn into a human, or at least act as one of them- their lives don't hold any excitement.
I sighed as I threw myself from my bed. Why did I have one? It's not like I'll be doing anything in it, it must have been just for show. I went into the adjoining bathroom and got ready for the most likely dreadful day of boredom. I walked slowly down the stairs, making no noise as I left my harem, careful not the bump into any of my family. And sat in the living room while I waited for Alice or Rose to come down from their.. Boudoirs.
Carlisle was the first one down stairs, as soon as he saw me, his face lit up like.. Well a Christmas tree. "Isabella, why are you up so early?" He smirked at me, frightful man. He was making fun of my non-sexual doings in my room; I wish the guy would make up his mind! Only a few weeks ago was he insisting that my erm.. V-card stays unmarked. Back and forward all the time, jeez..
"It's early? I never would have guessed with all that racket going on around the house, you'd think it was time to get up." I simpered back at my brother. It wasn't like any of his family was quiet about what they were doing; I was getting sick of my immense hearing abilities because it is truly a heart ache sometimes...
Carl narrowed his glance at me then plopped himself beside me on the sofa. "Are you okay?" I saw that we were being serious now.
"I'm fine, why wouldn't I be?" I avoided the double meaning behind his question. I knew what he was implying he was talking about his son.
"Bella, you know what I mean." He looked at me with his knowing look that seemed to be his signature look when it came to me.
I sighed before speaking quicker than I normally spoke, rushing through my speech, "Like I said to Alice, I'm confused. More than confused, he doesn't like me, Carlisle." I whimpered, "Your son doesn't like me at all, how are we supposed to make you happy if we can't get along?" I complained to my brother rhetorically, I mean, how was he suppose to answer that sort of question?
"Isabella, you know that isn't the case! He is confused too about things concerning you, but don't you think that he dislikes you, little sister, you are impossible to hate." He wrapped his arm around my rigid form and kissed my head. That is what I missed all those years, the tender moments Carl and I shared; they were the majority of my memory of him.
I rolled my eyes at him, "When did you get all corny, Carl? It seems you matured over the years."
He chuckled, "That's what having children does to you." Children..I smiled back at him, I doubted it reached my eyes; of all the things in my possession and all the things I own, kids are the one thing I can't possibly have. Of all the things in the world- God took my purpose away from me; a woman's purpose to a have children.
Carlisle realized what he had said, "Oh Bella.. I didn't mean.." He knew that I never really thought about reproduction before it was taken from me but he also he knew what Esme and Rosalie thought on the subject.
"I know, Carlisle, I know." I whispered, it wasn't as if I ever truly wanted children, they were just expected from me, and I had no desire for them or had I no desire to not have them. If I was blessed with a child; I would have loved it greatly.. But that blessing won't ever be a reality now.
I smiled more fully, "We are becoming so morbid in our old age, we must loosen up." I giggled, "But I'm sure Esme helped with that last night, right?" I bit my bottom lip to stop the laughter flowing out especially when I saw the look on Carlisle's face.
He looked shook at me, "You, my dear sister, have spend too much time with Emmett!" He chuckled with me though.
"Merely getting you back for that little comment earlier, just because I spend my night-time staring at the ceiling.." I drifted off.
He chuckled, "Maybe you should take up an instrument or start singing again. You should get a hobby and not always waste your night away." Says him; the vampire-doctor.
"Ah... no." I shook my head, "The last time I sang a song was before the Battle of Gettysburg." He laughed at me.
"Bella, you strange child!" He ruffled my hair.
"Hey you are only six months or so older than me, in vampire-terms.. You slightly-older-than-me-child!" I mocked his calm, smooth deep voice as I ruffled his blonde waves.
We both laughed at each other. I heard movement upstairs. Esme soared down the stairs with her usually flare; she was truly the perfect woman, other half, for my brother. She came into the living space, held a hand out to me and helped me up before embracing me and kissing my cheek. "Good morning, Bella." Her sweet voice caressed.
"Good morning to you too, Esme." I kissed her cheek back. It was nice of her to still greet people the way she was taught, I could tell she was raised well and was a good-natured child before I saw any of her fuzzy childhood memories.
"How was your night?" She asked me politely, but she seemed like she truly wanted to know.
I smiled warmly at her, "Very similar to last night." She chuckled, she had started the habit of asking me how my night was and that was my usual reply, unless I was in a truly rotten mood.
Alice flounced rapidly, hands held with Jasper, downstairs. She had a great grin on her face. Jasper looked emotionless. I smiled at him receiving a wryer smirk back, like he was in on a secret. Actually they all had that same smirk on their faces whenever I saw the now. It was disconcerting. Edward was always stuck in his room until Alice and Emmett hauled him from it and made him drive them to school. I suspected today was no different; he probably had a quarter of an hour left or so until the attack. "Hi Bella." Alice said to me happily.
"Hello Alice, Jasper." I nodded to him. For goodness sake! I was getting so formal with the two of my best friends! How pathetic.
"Hey, B'." He still had that god-cursing smirk..
Alice ran and gave me a squeeze. "Guess what, Bella." She playfully smiled at me. Oh no.
"What, Alice?" I joked along with her. Even though I knew it was going to be something bad to do with my future.
She giggled and shook her head, "You are suppose to guess, Silly Bella." There's the nickname again..
I just looked at her. She sighed and rolled her eyes, "I'll help you out.. Guess where you, I and Rose are going on Thursday night?" I thought briefly. Oh no! Please no!
The look of horror on my face must have told her I guessed, "Not Port Angeles? Please no, I beg of you... Let me be for one night!" I pleaded of her.
She flipped me off, "Bella, what were you doing last night? Sitting alone in your room starting at the ceiling?.. I thought so." She knew me too well.
"Fine, just don't go over-board, I actually have a conscience, I don't want something to be stolen or anything like that." I warned her.
"I don't steal. I have too much money to!" She said with pride.
"Really? Then how did you pay for that little yellow Coupe you took from the dealership, the last time you dragged me to hell, when the parking lot was 'too far away'? Cash or by card?" I smirked at her. She looked away sheepishly.
"Why would the parking lot be too far away? You could have run." Jasper asked.
"Well, maybe because I had a new leather suite with I and I didn't want to look stupid." She defended, she just made it up in her head.
"Correct me if I'm wrong, the suite didn't fit in the car so you gave it to some second-hand store, isn't that what happened?"
"Maybe." She winked at me, I chuckled at her. Silly Bella? Freaky Alice, more like it.
"Carlisle, Your daughter's a thief!" I called to Carlisle who was in his study packing his briefcase for work.
"Oh, no. Whatever shall I do, Bella?" He chuckled at me. He seemed more laid back than he had been in previous days- it was good to see.
"Hey, that's unfair, Carlisle, because your sister is probably wanted in twenty-seven countries!" Alice yelled at Carlisle. I shrugged- it was probably true.
"I suppose you are right, Alice. What should I do about her?" He called out. We ignored him and started a battle of finding their faults and I was going to win...I was very stubborn and didn't like losing. She was 'going down' as they say now-a-days.
"Your eldest son is a war criminal..." I protested. Jasper. He didn't mind.
"Your other daughter is a murder." Alice took up my challenge. Rosalie. I heard a brief 'hey!' upstairs it was then muffled by a moan.. Yeesh.
"You strongest, and youngest, son likes to kill endangered animals..." Emmett.
Nothing wrong with that, Babe.. Emmett thought from inside Rose and his bedroom. They were both chuckling.
"Your wife is emotional unstable.."Alice stuck her tongue out at me, Esme just chuckled at our bickering, she accepted the fact that she was emotion unstable when she tried to take her own life.. She wouldn't be unstable if she didn't..
Alice's eyes were full of delight, knowing I wouldn't find a fault in Edward.. He was too perfect.
I smirked at her; I took the test, "You first son hears voices in his head." Edward. Everyone chuckled at that.
"SO DO YOU!" Alice exclaimed and pointed at me; she takes things a little too seriously at times..
"Did I deny it?" I countered.
"Hmph." She pouted. She had lost the challenged.
"I am, once again, victorious." I bowed to Alice.
"You are such a sore winner." She folded her arms.
"Is that possible?" I tilted my head to the side.
She thought for a moment. "No, I don't think so.." She mused.
I chuckled at her craziness, and then spoke seriously, "So, maybe after school I thought that I could look around town.. Alone. Perhaps?" I squeaked out. She looked wary, so did Jasper. He had joined Alice as soon as I said it, Rose and Emmett walked down the stairs suspiciously looking at me too. Esme just smiled at her children's over-protectiveness, "What?" I asked them, tilting my head to the side.
"Where will you be going?" Alice asked.
"Who will you be with?" Jasper questioned.
"Why are you going?" Rosalie inquired.
"When will you be home?" Emmett probed.
"Out. No one. No reason. Don't know." I answered all at once.
Esme chuckled and said, "Bella, you can go wherever you wish. You are a grown woman, forgive them, they only wish to keep you safe."
"I know, I find it funny, they all have the same expression- Distrust." I chuckled.
"It isn't that they don't trust you, it's just they are worried about you." Carlisle said, " Okay. Well I have to go now." He hurried over to his wife and gave a chaste kiss on the mouth. "Bye, Dear." Esme replied to his kiss.
He moved towards me and pecked me on the cheek, "Bye Carl." I winked at him.
"Bye Dad." His children all said together, not quiet in unison but nearly.
I shook my head, walked out the door; mumbling, "It's like living with the Clone Troopers.."
School went by in a flash, nothing really happened, a lot of unbearable silences and awkward chit-chat between family members during the short amounts of time were I was with them. I still sat with Jess and her band of idiots.
I still thought about Edward during these times. During class I would try and reason with myself as to find out what really was going on in his head. Every meeting I had with him now confused me more. All this drama was making me sick and tired, I was getting more down and down every second just thinking about it, I needed to get away from the Cullen's for a bit, I need to think without Edward intercepting my thoughts every other minute, I need.. I need a familiar face. I knew someone who knows me..The real me. I need Charlie; I need my great-grand nephew.
One time, not in the distant past, I was searching for any remaining relatives of mine. I knew that any relative I once knew as a human would have died long ago but I needed a link to the past. Someone I could call family. I was desperate. It had been years since I left Jasper, thinking that he had been killed, and centuries since I was left by Carlisle, I had no one. No companion, no friends, no nothing. Just me walking the lonesome road. So I searched and I searched until I found a distant descendant of my mother, God rest her soul. A young man called Charles Swan, informally known as Charlie. I was so happy, maybe I could just met him! That's what I thought for months, but I knew I was deluding myself with a dream that could never be –A family, something I would never have the courage to succeed at; my brother had made one but I just had taken one too many lives to make someone into a monster, I didn't have that kind of will. After a couple of years of searching, I finally had deceived myself into going to the small town called Forks, in the state of Washington. I had informed the man I was meeting before I came, I didn't want to come unannounced, Charlie didn't mind. He was just a fun loving kid.
We got on so well, he started to become like a brother to me, yet I knew it couldn't continue for long. He aged, I did not. His chocolate browns eyes, so like mine and my mother before me, had started to crinkle, his face started to drop. He started finding the tell-tale signs of age, grey hair. I on the other hand, still had my youthful complexion of a sixteen year old. He started to suspect.
"Bella, you are.. Normal. Right?" He asked on night as he made dinner for himself, I had 'eaten earlier'.
I simply shook my head, knowing I could never lie to Charlie, "I thought so." His heart beat started to increase drastically. "What are you then? A monster? An alien?" He asked was I an Alien!
I chuckled, "Oh Charlie, how I wish I were something so exciting." I sighed. "Do you really want to know?" I asked him sombrely.
He thought briefly, "No, probably not."
"Thought so." I smiled, "Don't you think it's weird how you've never seen me eat or drink anything? Or how I haven't been getting any older and my strange ice-cold, bone white skin? Or how about me never going on vacation to see Rennie with you?" Rennie was Charlie's partner; she hated Forks since the first time she went there to visit us, but she loved Charlie more than life itself. Charlie was attached to Forks and wouldn't leave it for some reason so they started doing to long distance thing that never seemed to work out, but for the police chief and the 'self-employed' woman; it seemed to be good.
"Charlie I'm a-"
The man before me cut of my confession, "What is the thing you always say to me, Bells?"
I chuckled, "With you, less is always more."
I loved Charlie like that, even though he knew I wasn't human, he still accepted me as a person. Wow, what an oxymoron. Charlie brought me everywhere with him, he started calling me his daughter and niece every chances he got, though I really was hundreds of years older than him. Once he brought me to a small town that was fifteen miles away from Forks, the cold beaches where so beautiful. I met his friends, I fished with him, I lived and laughed with him. But I saw what time was doing to him, he started getting stray grey hairs and a receding hairline. I couldn't watch him die so I finally put my foot down and told him to leave Forks to be with the woman he loved. I left soon after that not wanting to see him grow frail and decrepit; what pull did Forks have if my family wasn't there?
I was brought out of my reverie by the sound of the last school bell. Alice was silent all during Study hall; maybe she knew I was reminiscing. Maybe she herself was doing the same. "Bella, I know, you are going off by yourself now, for awhile, but please come home." Her large worried eyes and pleading tone caught me off guard. I soon realized that she thought I was going to leave them; she sighed and closed her eyes, "Take the Volvo to wherever you are going. Edward won't care." Of course he won't..
With that, she walked off in the direction of the red BMW that was parked at the very corner of the parking lot. Rose was waiting there, she smiled softly at me. "Will she leave us or not, Alice?" Rose voice was barely a whisper yet I could hear it clearly.
"I don't know, Rose, I just don't know." Alice's voice lacked any sense of happiness. "I can't see her. I can't see her!" Alice opened the passenger's door and abruptly got in; Rose did the same on the driver's side, I couldn't hear anymore. Alice can't see me? How is that possible? Alice can see everyone, she must be wrong.
I stalked over to the sliver Volvo and shrugged into the driver's seat. Trying to let that small titbit of information to sink in. Alice can't see me...
I tried to breathe calmly; I hadn't noticed before but I was oddly nervous. I was going to visit a friend. That was okay right? I looked around me in the car for a second. It was the first time I had been in his car by myself. I inhaled deeply; it smelled just like him, it was like almost-honey-lilac-and-sun. It that was possible. It was delightful; I felt as if I could sit there all day and just sniff. Stalker-ish? I know.
I looked up, something small and white caught my gaze; a note. I picked up the note and read it: Be Safe. The writing was beautiful, I knew who it belonged too; of course I would know! I sat beside him every day after lunch. I smiled as I bended my head and breathed in the odour that surrounded the page. It was almost-honey-lilac-and-sun. I sighed happily as I ignited the engine; maybe there was hope for me in the Edward department after all.. Nah- who was I trying to kid.
The Newton's Olympic Outfitters store not far out from Forks, just to the right, I had seen it a couple of times when Alice and Rose kidnapped me for a shopping spree but never dared go in there just in case Mike happened to be there. I searched the cars to see if one of my admirers were there. Damn it! Mike's Surburban and Tyler's Dad's Sentra were both parked out front. I called them both every name I could think of before parking beside Tyler's car. I walked into the store unwillingly. Mike was the first one to see me.
"Bella!" He yelled running over to me; ignoring his current costumer. At least he was happy.
"Oh hi Mike." I said pleasantly, "I never knew you worked here during the week." You said you only worked weekends, why did you lie?
"Mom was short staffed, so I thought I would give her a hand. I'm saving up for this killer surf-board.." Insert boredom here.
"Oh that's great!" I said.
"Bella!" Another voice called. Joy..
"Hi Tyler." I said, once again, pleasantly.
"What are you doing here?" He asked as he joined Mike who was grudgingly looking at his friend for stealing my attention.
"I was looking for direction to another town not far from here. I used to go there with Uncle Charlie during the summer before he moved to Jacksonville." They nodded.
"Which town?" Mike asked helpfully.
"I think it's called the Reservation, La Pull? The Put? Something like that. I wasn't very good at paying attention when I was younger." No lie! Mike went behind the counter and starting scribbling something down.
"Oh, La Push?" Tyler asked. "It's such a weird name for an Indian Res. I mean, French? What's with that?"
I nodded, "It's a strange world."
"Here I wrote down a set of directions for you, Bella." He stuck into my gloved hand with a bit too much gusto.
I smiled happily at him, "Why thank you gentlemen. See you at school." I left the store before they started bringing up other things. Not that they weren't kind or anything just. I looked down at the paper; beneath the directions to La Push was Mike Newton's cell phone number. I tried to resist crumbling the page and kept up a string of profanities as I drove on down the road.
Did you like it? I hope you did. Tell me what you thought of it.
~YMCM