-.-
The End of a Bloodline
Chapter: 14. To slow down the time; veil thy fragile eyes
Rated: M
Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer created Twilight, not me.
I, on the other hand, created TEOAB – respect that
Beta: Gasaway Alley
A/N: Hope no one's getting confused… this picks up in chapter 12. Back to Isabella.
When you see this: **, you should listen to
http: / /www (dot) youtube (dot) com/watch?v=lzr23yDeSI4
and just read slowly, savoring the music.
Do it… just do it. Nike agrees with me.
-.-
On the bus back to Brooklyn, I look at the other patrons occupying the seats. Five people. A couple in the back, making out and smiling adoringly at each other in between kisses. The two of them sit in each other's arms, blonde and shining, lost in love Then there's an old man in the front, staring out the window. I see his reflection in the glass, and his old and wrinkled face reminds me of my grandfather, who passed away when I was six. Though I can't distinguish the emotion in his eyes, I imagine he's feeling lost. For some reason, it seems fitting. Across from me sits a black man, resting his head against the glass, seemingly sleeping.
Block after block, they stay while strangers board on and off, performing as temporary understudies on the stage that is this bus.
All in a hurry.
Why?
It's Christmas Eve.
It's dark now, and I wonder if Edward will come for me tonight. It's obvious he's the one who opened my window and I still wonder why he left me be. I have no hope left, but I don't need it - I know he'll come. I know my days are numbered, but the wait is making me paranoid.
While walking to the train station in Jersey, I constantly looked over my shoulder. Waiting for the bus on Manhattan, every dark-dressed man was an enemy. I feel no safer on this bus. I know no metal can stop him.
The bus stops again, and a business man steps on, struggling with several shopping bags. Bags filled with last-minute presents, covered in red bows and cards.
It makes me think of another life… an alternative universe where vampires don't exist, and my brother never died. Tyler would be what, fourteen? In junior high, awkward and lanky and adorable. My dad once told me us Swans are late bloomers, and I imagine my little brother short and frustrated. Frustrated because of his height not being ideal for a basketball player; his favorite sport. He'd be a bench warmer, but rise in the ranks and become point guard on the varsity team. Our own family baller. Perhaps get scouted for college.
I'd be home for Christmas, maybe with a long-term boyfriend in tow. We'd sit around the table and stuff ourselves with ham and eye the presents under the tree. I'd be a college graduate, fulfilling my dream by working at a fine bakery in Seattle. Or work as a line chef at a restaurant. Either way, working with food, but having enough of discipline not to eat myself back to obesity. I'd be beautiful. Thin. And happy.
Or, I could live here in New York, talking Jasper into leaving his wife. Or better yet, he wouldn't be married or have kids. He'd be all mine. And on Christmas Day I'd wake up in his arms, still glowing from a night of celebrations - because he proposed. We'd get married in the summer, and have kids, and…
None of that will ever be true.
I kick myself for even thinking up those scenarios.
It only makes the pain worse, knowing I'll never see my brother grow up, or experience true love with Jasper - never be his wife, or the mother of his children.
Because, like Tyler, he's dead.
Buried.
Grieved.
Their common point?
Me.
My vision blurs with tears that fall rapidly down my cheeks, and I try my best not to make any sound. My stop is still ten blocks away. But apparently the sound of my balking is let out, because suddenly a woman sits down beside me.
"Are you alright?" she asks, worried. I can't focus on her words; my head is filled with thoughts of a better life, and seeing myself with bloodied hands, tarnishing those Hallmark-scenes. "Isabella?"
My sobbing continues, and minutes pass before I even register my own name being said. But when I look up, no one's there. I must have imagined it. My paranoia is messing with my mind. I straighten up in my seat, and the black man across from me is openly staring.
I blush.
My chest aches with embarrassment.
The bus stops again, and I step off quickly, even though it's not my stop. The chill digs into my body, tremors overtaking me for the millionth time of the day. It's not because of the cold, but everything. I'm overwhelmed. I'm torn down.
There's nothing left.
Buildings are grey and the sky is black. Life is a constant shadow, and there is a moon standing in the way of the sun - keeping me from the light. My skin turns pale, and I turn my back to the moon. Even the moon's light is too bright, too full of hope.
Hope is a lost cause.
The sidewalk become my confidant, as I pour my distress into my steps.
-.-
Depression creeps up on me like the tide. Inch by inch, the briny depths drown me slowly. Salt stains my cheeks, and my eyes turn red. Blood-shoot. My reflection returns to the shell of a woman I was when I first came to this sleepless city. My eyes have no light in them. My expression is flat and emotionless. Three days worth of tears have rendered me grey.
Three days have passed since I went to Jasper's grave, and I haven't moved outside my apartment. At night I keep the bedroom window open, as an act of defeat, but Edward never comes to claim me, and I realize that he never will.
The third morning's light shatters me.
It's Monday.
Four days left until the new millennia begins. And where will I be? Who will I be with? The uncertainty of my future drives me to the bottle, and at eight am, I sit in my bed with a bottle of rum. It burns in my throat, and fills my empty stomach with fluid coals. The night has been wasted away with booze and silence, with me staring at the open window. I'm more or less begging for pneumonia, but I don't care.
Let me get sick.
Let me die in this bed.
Alone, drunk, and shivering.
"Merry Christmas!" I say bitterly. Depressing. I should be with my family, my friends. I should be home and happy. Even the Copes would go to visit their family during Christmas, leaving me a present before they'd go. This Christmas is without gifts. Without cheer. Without celebration. Just me and this bottle of golden liquid.
"Guess ya shoulda just let 'im take ya," I slur aloud.
But the thought only angers me, and I throw the bottle at the wall. It breaks and the glass falls haphazardly to the floor by the door. The rum taints the wooden floor, bleeding into the hungry cracks and crevices. I stare at it, and my head is filled with images of my mother, doing the exact same thing.
"It should have been you!" she yells, and I cower against the wall, crying.
"I'm sorry mom! You have no idea how-"
"No idea what? How it feels to have your son ripped away from you? You left him to die, you worthless little girl!" she cries, and the anger on her face morphs into a tell-tale sign of accusation. Her drunkenness is no longer directed at her grief, but at me. "How could you do that, Isabella? How could you…"
Shards of glass cut my arm as the bottle hits the wall, and I stand terrified. My own mother threw a bottle at me.
There is no forgiveness left. No hope. She truly wishes it had been me who died.
My mother hates me.
My dad wants nothing to do with me.
The vampire who wanted to claim me has abandoned me.
My lover is dead.
The Copes are dead.
The only ones left are… Sue at the bar, and Jessica.
But are they truly my friends? As far as I know, no one has claimed me missing. No one's been looking for me. No notes on the door, or signs of police intrusion - if so, Stavros would have mentioned it. And I'm alone. So fucking alone.
I let out a scream, agonized and pissed off, and jump out of my bed. Stepping on the glass shards on my way out, I ignore the pain in my feet, and make my way to the kitchen. It's clean now, scrubbed down with lemon and salt, and the smell of mold is gone. It's still disgusting. Opening up the closest cupboard, I grab a plate and throw it at the wall.
The sound exhilarates me.
The shards give me a kick.
I grab another, and another, until all my mismatched, yard-sale plates are broken, and I have to move to the next cupboard of second hand-dishes. I break it all. Glasses, plates, and casseroles that have seen better days. My blood-stained feet leave marks on the floor as I move around the kitchen, tearing it all down.
My stomach clenches.
I drop the vase in my hands, and watch it hit the floor in slow motion, blooming like a mushroom cloud of diamond dust as it cuts up my legs even more. The smell of blood makes me nauseous, and I huddle over the sink wetly heaving. I empty my stomach there, in a torn-down kitchen, with bleeding feet, wearing nothing but my underwear.
I open my eyes, and the sight of my stomach contents makes me feel even worse, and again I buck out whatever is left inside me.
Just a drop.
Rum.
Clear.
I settle on the floor, surrounded by broken dishes.
Like the so many jagged, fetid memories of my life, my apartment is shattered and torn down. Everything bleeds.
And there, huddled into myself, I sit for hours, the pain in my legs only increasing by the minute. When the traffic outside starts to pile up, I know noon has arrived, and I force myself to stand.
Wincing.
I get myself to the bathroom and clean out my wounds, wondering for a split second if Edward would have pounced on me at the smell. Like the one who attacked me did. But I shake my head. The image of him only fuels the tears.
I'm so confused.
I'm actually missing the person - no, the monster - who kidnapped me and kept me captive for over a month. Something in my chest constricts at the thought of his face, and I hate myself for it. It's disgusting. Who can love a vampire?
No one.
No one should.
It's wrong.
But it can't be love.
It's an attraction.
An illusion - a manifested belief that his lust for my blood is actually love for me. But no, he's a dead man walking, and I am nothing but an entertaining meal for him. Or, I used to be. Not even he wants me anymore.
It's a pathetic want.
He's a last resort, but to become immortal is a need inexistent in me. Like I could live forever, knowing I was the reason for so many deaths. And then what, be a murderer like he is? Kill to feed, to survive, with no conscience at all!
No.
It's not love.
It's an attraction.
A mere fascination.
My true love was, and always will be, the fair haired man with the gift of making me feel beautiful.
My Jasper.
With a fresh bottle of rum, I fall back into bed, ignoring the world, and drink myself to sleep in the middle of the day.
-.-
Friday.
The last day of the year.
I shower and eat, finally filling my stomach with something other than cheap booze. The day is clear, but consistently grey. Monotone. As I finally make my way to the streets, it's starting to get dark, and most people are at home having dinner. Some have already started the celebrations. At almost every street corner, mad men are crying over Y2K, and the impending doom. A man in disregarded priest-clothing preaches about redemption, and a few people are gathered around him, their heads bowed in silent prayer. I don't know if it's true, and I have little knowledge about computers, but I don't see the downside. The world ending… seems like a good thing to me. No more suffering, poverty, war… the earth would have a new chance at becoming great, with no human interference.
No more damnation.
Just… nothing.
But as the rest of the pedestrians I ignore them and walk past them without a second glance, and march forward. And forward. Until I reach the den of the hopeless and homeless. My old workplace - Billy's Bar.
Located at the end of the Brooklyn bar district, Billy's is one of many Irish bars dating back to the early 1900s. But it's worn and old, and haven't seen good business since the Depression. Now, the owner Billy - the fourth generation named Bill - runs it on loans. I talked to him once, after finding him in the storage room with a lone bottle of Kilkenny, and he told me that selling would be failure. It would make him a disgrace. So it's up and running, barely.
When I enter, it's as if nothing has changed over the past month. When entering, you're momentarily blinded by the sudden dimness. The ceiling lamps are few, and spread out in the small venue, only highlighting the round tables spread around. Wooden stools by the long bar. Behind, I see Sue working hard, trying to keep up with the once-a-year rush. Christmas is always the hardest - I learned that two years ago. I wasn't expecting it at all, having spent hours almost sleeping at my post the previous days, when a clatter of people started to come by.
The liquor is watered-down.
The beer is cheap.
But every Christmas Eve and New Years Eve, the loneliest and most depressed patrons take their seats.
Every table is full, and the bar is buzzing - albeit low, and morose - so I sneak undetected to a free table in the corner. There, I sit for hours, just staring into the crowd of holey jackets, caps, and raggedy old men. Five o'clock shadows and full grown beards. Flannel shirts and wool gloves. Few women enter, and when they do, they leave quickly on the arm of the best-looking men - and even they break mirrors at the sight of them.
A drink arrives at my table, brought by a girl who looks oddly familiar.
It's me.
The same broken down expression and emotionless eyes.
The same look on her face - like at anytime, someone's going to walk up to her and kill her. Scared. Alone.
But a red-head. Taller.
"From the blonde guy at the bar," she mutters and turns around.
She's my replacement.
Billy sure knows how to pick 'em.
I look up and scout the bar, but no one is blonde. They're all facing down, staring at their drinks. Nursing them.
I feel pathetic and get up to leave. The clock over the bar show's 10:15, but I know that clock is way off. If anything, it's almost midnight, and I refuse to be in this rat hole at the turn of the New Year. I might be all alone, a drunk, and a reject, but this is hell, and I'm not ready to turn myself over to the devil.
So I surrender to the streets, making my way down the old familiar sidewalk. Drunk people pass me on the way, stumbling and giggling. Singing. Kissing. A young couple walks past me, and I smile at their joy. Fresh-faced, in love, and without a care in the world. Their hands intertwined… it's so sweet it makes me want to cry. But I don't.
I put my head down and stick my hands in my pockets. The December wind gives me chills, I speed up.
At midnight, I want to rejoin with my lover - Morgan. The Captain knows how to sooth my sorrows and bring me into the New Year. Except for Jasper, he's the only one who's made me forget about my problems.
"Hey, cutie!"
I find myself on a nearly vacant street, standing at the gap of an alley between two closed restaurants. Lee's Chinese on the right, Funkle's Doughnuts on the left. The street lamp isn't lit, and glass shards lay on the ground around me, crushing beneath my soles.
I step forward. Crunch.
Then I stand still, staring at a blonde haired man.
He smiles wide, staring with green menacing eyes, and images of a yet-to-be crime starring me reflect in them.
I step back. Crunch.
"No where do you think you're going, cutie?" he asks, and steps forward, but a little to the side. It's too dark for me to make him out perfectly, but the smell of decay and despair on him makes me want to wretch. He's young, but older than me at the looks of it - his face slightly wrinkled and filled with traces of nightmares.
I'm scared.
My heart thumps faster.
"I don't have any money," I muster to say, but he only smiles. Yellow teeth. "So just go. I don't have anything for you."
One step closer. Crunch. I step backwards. Crunch. My back hits the brick wall behind me, and the darkness of the alley makes it harder to see.
I never see the blade in his hand.
Not until he's pushing me down, ripping my coat open, and twisting it into my chest.
I scream. The pain is excruciating, and the blood seeps. It stays there, a long blade, trapped inside my chest. My body feels like it's on fire, and I lose all power to protest as he rips up shirt. The blood continues to pour, and my calls for help are muffled by his hand.
In the city behind us, the clock turns twelve and the sound of cheer echoes off the skyscrapers.
But here, no one knows I exist.
No one knows I'm dying.
And no one will ever care.
No one will ever care about the girl lying in an alleyway, bleeding, dying, and with a stranger on top of her, holding her down.
He coos, and the sound of his voice makes me sick. "Sshh, it will be over. Just don't resist."
I feel his hand on my pants, and I close my eyes, waiting for the pain.
But it never comes.
**Instead, his weight is pushed off me, and my faith in God is restored.
For a second.
Until I open my eyes, and find God's reject at my feet, towering over me.
Alec.
"Now what do we have here?"
"Please," I beg. "Let me die."
He grins, and there is a light in his eyes that I've seen before, in the room with the red headed woman.
"When you're as old as me, Isabella, you find pleading for death or life amusing. Edward begged too, if I understood him right. He never wanted my life. But that doesn't matter now, does it? I'm God, child. I decide who lives and who dies."
He crouches down, and press his fingers down on my chest next to the knife. I hold back my scream. To what use can it be - no man can kill this creature.
"Little human girl, danced on the ledge, one foot in, the other wedged. Rooted to the floor, it didn't let go – so she's living on the edge, dancing to and fro'. Monsters, predators, evil things were a-lurking. In the mind of blood thirsty men, cruel things were a-churning. He saw a pretty girl, followed her scent – and knew right away, the blood was to him meant."
His evil cackle turns my bones to ice, and I begin to shiver. Blood seeping from my wounds.
"Help."
"Ah, but there is no help. Not then, not now," he bows down to whisper in my ear. Why he's being silent, I don't know. "It didn't help you in those woods, and it won't help you in this concrete jungle…"
No, it can't be. No. No. How?
How?
"Yes. It was me. While your blood sings to my brother, your brother's sang to me."
The world ends. Crashing down around me. I pale from the blood loss and his confession. Staring wide-eyed at the Italian predator, I try to muster up something to say, but words fail me. I'm mute. Motionless. Emotionless.
"It was interesting, actually. One might call it fate, to stumble upon you again."
The pain increases, but not because of the knife still wedged in my chest. No, his words hurt more than a thousand knives.
"How? The su-" I start to say, but he cuts me off.
"I was scouting. The sun came too fast and warmed too much, it took me by surprise. Your brother was just playing by the tree line, and I pushed him back into the shadows. His blood was enough to give me the strength to go on - but then you showed up, and I wasn't able to finish. But here you are - and," he muses, tracing a line of blood leading down my chest, "I'll finally see if the sister tastes the same as the brother."
I scream, lightly, but then it fades. With one hand holding my head to the side, I feel his teeth slice through my flesh, cutting it like it's butter. Lapping. I hear him swallowing. Then I don't feel him anymore.
My surroundings cease to exist. At first, I'm aware of the gritty brick walls, the green trash containers lined up against them, and the sound of the city behind us, but then the pain increases, and my vision turns white. There is only wretched pain. Thumping. Running. Setting my body on fire.
Am I screaming? Am I writhing? Am I begging?
I can't feel my own body.
Only the pain.
Shooting through me like needles filled with acid. Knives up my spine. A torch down my throat, settling in my stomach, and spreading to my bones.
Somewhere in the distance I hear my name being called, chanted, and then my body hurts even more, and there is an icy wind scorching my flesh.
Turning to ashes.
My body… decomposing.
I am nothing.
I am only a chasm of pain.
Let it end.
Let it end.
Let my blood line end tonight.