The Twilight Twenty-Five: Goodnight, Noises Everywhere

Prompt: Worry

Pen name: Feisty Y. Beden

Pairing: E/B

Rating: M

Disclaimer: I own nothing.


Chapter 12: Worry

The throbbing in my arm woke me before the sunlight. I lay in the big, empty bed while I waited for the sun to rise. I counted my heartbeats as the darkness outside slowly crept away, nudged away by the light. The world was still revolving, turning its face toward the sun. When there was light enough in Charlie's room, I unwrapped the Ace bandage to check on the swelling. My wrist had turned many shades of purple and pale green, and I would have thought it quite pretty if it hadn't been my own skin. The swelling wasn't so bad. My body was probably so used to being injured that it healed extra quickly. I went to the bathroom to examine yesterday's damage in the tiny mirror on the medicine cabinet. I pulled the first aid kit from under the sink, finding an alcohol wipe. I dabbed at my chin and pulled my shirt collar away from my neck, exposing first one shoulder, then the other. The puncture wounds from Edward's fingers had already scabbed over, and I brushed my hands lightly over them, almost enjoying the soreness. The pain was proof I hadn't imagined it all. He had been here. But what little joy I received at the confirmation of his existence was negated by the crushing realization that he was gone.

I tried to go back to my pre-Edward routine, downstairs for breakfast, reading the last paper, but I felt like an echo of myself, a trapped image forever going through the same motions. I looked at the mess we'd left in the living room, the overturned furniture, the shredded remnants of the donation bag. I sat heavily on the sofa, thinking that just a day ago, he had been lying here.

Realizing sitting there doing nothing was not going to change the situation, I forced myself up and back to the kitchen. I cleaned up the baked beans from the night before, dampened a cloth and wiped my spoon clean, and took another few mouthfuls of rainwater. The sky seemed to be churning, clouds swirling and quarreling in the heavens. Maybe we would get rain today.

The possibility of rain at least gave me something new to do to avoid thinking about my loneliness. I went outside and circled the house, checking on all my rain-collection receptacles. After everything seemed to be in order, I lay on my back on the grass in the front lawn, my arms stretched wide as if to hug the sky, and watched the clouds billow and darken.

I played with the grass with my fingers, and the sensation triggered memories that seeped into my head, unbidden, of sleeping next to him on the sofa as he breathed shallowly. I'd drift off, and when I'd wake from a nightmare, my fingers would be twisted in his hair, which felt surprisingly delicate despite the cold hardness of the rest of him. His hair felt remarkably like … hair. If he'd been human and this starved, his hair probably would have fallen out in clumps, but the strands clung stubbornly to his scalp, soft and inviting, if not exactly warm.

I smelled green, a reminder of late spring at Forks High, when we'd have the windows open, and the sound of the lawn mowers mixed with the smell of cut grass and the potent gasoline vapors would interrupt the teacher's droning, and we'd know summer was near. I realized I'd been tearing out grass by the handful, my fingers now stained with chlorophyll.

The ubiquitous presence of grass frustrated me. It was the only thing that grew readily, the only thing that could survive the scarcity of rain and the dullness of the sunshine. All edible plants had shriveled and disappeared. I could barely remember what fresh produce tasted like. Once, desperate to eat something green and from the ground, I'd tried to chew on a few tough blades, but I'd choked and gagged and hadn't tried it again. The trees somehow still lived, but they produced no fruit. There were no bees left to help pollinate, or maybe the trees had just lost the will to try to bring new life into the world. Maybe there were nutrients enough in the soil and air to survive, but not to thrive, not to truly live.

Every day on my walks, I would touch tree trunks as I passed, like a strange, passive version of Duck-Duck-Goose. Sometimes the bark would crumble away in my fingers, and I'd know that tree would soon be gone too. The trees didn't die as rapidly as the people had—I thought of the redwood trees in Muir Woods Charlie and I had visited once on a summer vacation, my amazement that some of these trees had been alive when the Declaration of Independence had been signed. I wondered if those trees still lived, or if they'd decided they had seen enough of this world.

Maybe one tree a month died, but I mourned each one as if it had been a friend. Some of the more unusually shaped ones I'd named, wishing that dryads existed. "Won't you come to life for me?" I'd ask.

If the wind blew, shaking the dry leaves, I'd pretend it had answered me. "Not yet," I'd imagine it had said, gently bowing its head to me.

I brought my fingers to my face and inhaled deeply. The smell of fresh-cut grass was potent, transporting me back to a simpler time, even after the virus had begun to spread, but before it had hit Washington State. We still laughed it off. It was easy to pretend it was just a scary movie on TV when we hadn't yet experienced it firsthand.

Charlie and Billy were having a serious talk, so they'd sent Jake and me outside. "Go out and play," Charlie said, as if we were still little children.

I sat on the stoop for a while, the damp cold of the concrete seeping into my jeans, and I poked at the ground with a stick. "What's all that about?" I asked Jake.

He shrugged. "Tribal shit, I guess. There have been a lot of meetings. People are getting scared. The stars are sending messages. I don't know, Bella. I'm kind of worried. I didn't think I'd be, but, god, I'm just a kid. What if this is it?"

I slipped my hand in his and gave it a little squeeze. "It's going to be okay," I said, even if I didn't really believe it. "They're the adults. They're supposed to fix things."

"Do you really believe that?" he asked, his eyes wide and frightened. I hadn't seen him this afraid ever. He was always the bold kid, not afraid of spiders or crawly things, of darkness, of things in the woods.

I swallowed hard. "Of course," I lied. I squeezed his hand again.

"I've never even been kissed," he said, looking at his feet. "It might all be over, and I'll die just a kid, a little kid."

I knew he was hoping that I'd lean in and kiss him, and I nearly did, but then I thought a pity kiss would be worse than no kiss at all. So instead I laughed and said, "Kissing doesn't make you an adult."

"I love you, Bella," he said, dead serious, so I punched him in the arm, hard.

"Stop that shit right now," I said, and watched as he massaged the place I'd hit him. "Why are you telling me this?"

"Ow." His ego seemed more bruised than his arm. "I just, you know, wanted to tell you … in case anything happens. I want you to know that."

"Well, nothing is going to happen, dork. And I love you too."

He ducked his head more and smiled. We leaned against each other and watched the grass ripple in the wind. It looked almost like rolling waves of the ocean. It was hypnotic, and I began to nod off on his shoulder.

I woke up as he tried to kiss my temple, and I jerked back. "You asshole," I said, my hand clenched in a fist, ready to pop him one.

"Sorry," he muttered, holding his hands up defensively. He lowered them slowly. "No, I guess you have every right to hit me." He tilted his head toward me and set his jaw. "I'm ready. Take a swing."

He looked so pathetic and scared that I didn't have the heart to slug him. "Well, that takes all the fun out of it," I joked, letting my hand unclench like a flower and drop back by my side, a harmless open palm.

His eyes lit up. "So you'll kiss me?"

"Oh my fucking fuck, you are relentless!" I stood up and stormed down the stairs, tripping over my untied shoelaces and falling onto the soft grass.

"Are you okay, Bells?" He scrambled after me, extending a hand to help me up. I waved him off.

"I will never kiss you, Jacob Black. Never. So stop with the bugging, okay?" I breathed in the good, earthy smell of the lawn. Spring was coming soon. "Life is going to go on. Nothing is going to happen. Nothing but dances and acne and heartache and term papers and graduations and growing up and college and … life."

"Okay," he said, flopping next to me on the grass.

The front door creaked open behind us, and Charlie and Billy cleared their throats in unison. They both wore the same expression: a falsely bright smile, with eyes clouded over with worry and doubt. "Well, we'd better head back home," said Billy, and Jacob hopped up. He tried to help me up again, but I stubbornly folded my arms. I was still annoyed with him.

"Well, bye," he said, shrugging, before getting back in the car. I rolled onto my back and waved to him without bothering to get up.

It was the last time I'd see him—alive, at least. The Quileutes soon closed down the reservation to visitors, hoping the self-imposed quarantine would protect them. But when the virus crept closer and closer to our little corner of Washington State, they hadn't thought that the animals would carry the disease, that the virus was transmitted easily from animal to human, from human to animal and to human again. And with their borders closed, medical aid couldn't get to them—not that it would have helped, once the birds and insects carried the virus to their lands. But the drugs and medical assistance could have at least slowed the disease's rapid takeover of the patient's immune system, or made the patient more comfortable, oblivious.

When Charlie got off the phone with Billy that one awful day, telling me that Jacob had fallen ill and died, I sank to the floor in the kitchen, studying the grungy linoleum tile as if it were a map that might tell me what to do, how to think, how to make it through this. I should have kissed him when he asked. It would have meant the world to him. And I couldn't—wouldn't—do it.

Charlie got down on the floor next to me and tried to wrap me in his arms, but I pushed him away. "Bells, we all hurt," he said.

I shook my head vigorously. "No, Dad, it's not like that. I had a chance to make his life happy, to give him the one thing he wanted, and I wouldn't, because I didn't want to give him the wrong idea. Because I thought I was better than he was, or something."

"What, exactly, was Jacob Black asking for?" Charlie spoke quietly, with hidden menace.

"Jeez, Dad, no. Just a kiss. He wanted me to kiss him, just so he would have known what it was like, to kiss a girl." I curled onto my side and sobbed. "And now he'll never …"

Charlie smoothed out my hair, waited a moment, and then got up to get me a paper towel. "You're too hard on yourself, Bells," he said, squatting again by me. "You might have kissed him, but it wouldn't have changed anything. And if you didn't mean it, well, it wasn't what he would have wanted anyway. He wanted you to feel something for him that you didn't, and you were being honest—with yourself and with him."

"Okay, Dad," I said, but guilt still tore at my insides like a rabid dog. A few days later the Quileutes had opened their borders again, in time for Jacob's funeral, and I'd kissed his powdery, unreal forehead during the wake. It was too late then for him anyway, but I felt I owed it to him, somehow.

My face was wet, lying on the same grass where Jacob and I had worried about the end of the world. I thought I was crying, but when I opened my eyes, I saw that it had just started to rain. It began as a few fat drops, and then the heavens ripped apart, pouring down water and soaking me to the bone. I stood up and spread my arms wide, spinning in a slow circle, catching raindrops in my mouth. I was parched, but now I could drink the remainder of the water in the jug inside the house. A rain this hard would give me enough water for weeks.

I stood in the rain and cried for Jacob, for Charlie, for Renee, for all my friends and family and just those people you saw every day but didn't know by name. My hot tears were washed away again and again by the rain, but I couldn't tell if it was forgiving or condemning me.

It's just rain, I thought. It's just wet and cold. Not everything has meaning. I corrected myself: Nothing has meaning.

With heavy steps, I trudged back into the house, shivering. Folded neatly and set on the banister was one of our large bath towels. I never put towels there, and there certainly hadn't been a towel on the banister before I'd gone outside. Edward? Had he been here? The towel was scratchy and dingy, since rainwater and line-drying didn't exactly recreate the softness of Downy plus a dryer sheet, but at least it was dry, a comfort as my teeth chattered. I wondered what color my lips were.

I dried myself off roughly, feeling just a little bit cleaner. My hair hadn't been soaked like that in several weeks, and I never remembered until I felt it again how much I missed the once-mundane, now precious sensation of damp hair on my neck and shoulders. It reminded me of being late for school, not having time to blow my hair dry. I could hear Charlie yell after me, "You'll catch your death!" as I ran for my truck with a bagel crammed in my mouth.

I'll catch my death.

If only it were that easy.

I untied my damp shoelaces and turned my shoes over, hoping they'd dry without getting mildewed. My feet had already started to wrinkle from the wet soles, so unaccustomed they were now to being wet. I wrapped the towel around me as if I were a kid at the beach just coming out of the ocean, looking for her family in the sea of blankets and bright sun umbrellas.

I wanted to call out for Edward, but I was too afraid of hearing nothing but the absence of his voice, so I wrapped the towel more tightly around myself as if it were his arms, aching to know where he was right this minute.

Heel-toe, heel-toe, slowly I walked into the living room. All evidence of the struggle from yesterday was now gone, the shreds of plastic swept away, the afghan carefully folded and placed over the arm of the sofa. The coffee table had been put back into place, the furniture righted and set back into the divots in the rug. It was as if he'd never been here. I touched the sore spots on my shoulders again, pushing against the barely scabbed over wounds, wincing and rejoicing in the pain. "He was real," I said to the room. "He was here. He did this to me." But the furniture just sat there like always, like it was any normal day except for the rainwater that cascaded down the windowpanes.

I sat on the couch, knees to my chest, hair still dripping at the very ends. I listened to the rain tap against the roof and the windows, glad for the sound, glad not to be sitting in silence.

I stared out the window, squinting to see through the windowpanes streaked with the unceasing rain. Was it the movement of the water down the glass, or did I see something—someone—outside? I ran to the big window, pressing my nose against the glass, and I could swear I saw a form hurrying away. "Edward?" I dared to whisper, and when I pulled back, all I could see was the smudge my nose had left on the glass.