About 3 weeks to a month later…. The time after Bella "dies" in Forks…(JPOV)
I watched Charlie cry on the couch from the outside, the sounds of his harsh sobs mixing with Bella's mother's and carrying through the wall. A slight wind picked up and carried the faint sounds of human mourning away. I swallowed dryly. Will still hadn't cried. The rest of us had, the day after they all left, mourning in our own ways.
I shifted nervously from paw to paw, waiting, worrying.
Why couldn't Bella just walk out of that tiny house and trip over the crack in the sidewalk like she used to? Why couldn't she smile up at Will and let the solitude that they radiated tell the rest of us that not every story was at tragedy?
I sighed through my large black nose and turned from the house, padding away. Nothing was going to happen here tonight. And besides, I had a funeral to go to tomorrow.
The Next Day…
(WPOV)
My eyes were darker somehow. They'd always been black but never dark, or at least not like this. The rest of me seemed the same, though maybe a bit older. But the eyes…
"You have secrets for eyes, Will. Dark and mysterious and so beautifully tempting it makes people ache with curiosity," her voice had been half serious, half teasing. I'd smiled and arched an eyebrow.
"Did you just say I was tempting?"
She'd grinned at the sarcastic amusement in my voice.
"Yes, you're very tempting."
"You're one to talk."
"I'm serious! Have you ever considered becoming a gigolo?"
The harmonic sounds of our long-dead laughter twisted together again as my mind replayed that blissful conversation. I desperately tried to focus again on the face staring back at me from the surface of the basin of water with lilies floating freely on it. My hair brushed against the bottom of my ears. I'd decided to grow it out in mourning instead of hacking it off like the others did traditionally. In my family our hair grew fast- Maria's was already curling at the bottom of her shoulder blades.
Said overly concerned sister was the one to break, my attempt at vanity.
"Staring at your face won't make it any prettier."
"It was worth a shot. Was that my voice? It was so flat. Nothing seemed real anymore.
"Will, stop this." Maria sounded hoarse, strained.
"Stop what?"
Maria snapped. Her stamina had been steadily eroded over the past weeks, as she was proving now.
"Stop this! Stop everything! This-this-this grief! This constant, unending agony over losing her," I stiffened. Don't say it, Maria; don't even think about- "Will! You can't bring her back; the Bella you loved is dead! Gone! Ashes to ashes, Will! Bella-"
"Don't." I hissed coldly, finally whirling to meet her angry, tear filled eyes. My own were not as emotionless as before, but I was too furious at the flippant se of her name to notice. My voice nearly cracked in sorrowful fury. "Don't say her name like that, putting it out tin the open for anyone to hear like it was any old word." I stalked forward, my hand flashing up to pin Maria to the wall by her windpipe. She maintained her answering glare as she struggled to breathe, "You do not get to say her name." With an anguished cry I shoved her hard once against the wall before releasing her neck and turning, panting with the effort not to scream and tear myself apart.
Maria slid down the wall with a sigh of relief.
I heard Maria wheezing slightly behind me, and she coughed once before the double doors at the end of the hallway burst open and the pack came in, clad in their various mourning clothing. Maria and I were in all black; Maria hadn't worn anything else since she'd left. I, on the other hand, had been wearing black too in an attempt to disconnect the memories of her.
Bella had hated black.
The new one, the vampire one, that was walking around in her beautiful, twisted body… I had no idea what she liked and didn't like.
But that was unimportant. At the time nothing had mattered much except for the way the pack looked from sullen, teary-eyed Maria on the ground to me, and then away, saying,
"The funeral's starting."
In stony silence I moved past Maria, still on the ground, ignoring the way Jacob hurried over to her like the whipped little puppy he was.
Through the double doors we strode as a pack, ignoring the odd looks we were getting from Bella's relatives.
Outside everyone was gathered around a black granite tombstone. I wanted to rip the thing out of the ground and use it to beat the first vampire I saw into nothingness.
At least that way I'd have company.
The priest was talking now, something about what a lovely, law-abiding girl she'd been and how she'd touched everyone she met, changed all their lives however briefly for the better.
What a bitch.
Who did he think he was, going on and on about her when he'd never even met her? I scowled through my tears; at the time I'd hated him almost as much as the leech that had killed her.
When he asked if anyone had a few words to say, I could repress my fury at this ignorant man no longer and stalked forward, dark eyes filled with a righteous anger that was more warmth than, even as a wolf, I'd felt in what seemed like centuries.
"Young man?"
He looked surprise and, underneath the calm mask, afraid. I was nearly twice his height, not so much in physical presence but in the way everything around me seemed to bend to my will.
"I have something I would like to say," I took the final step forward, the step that put me not a yard away from the black granite slab with my love's name spelled out on it in uncaring letters," Bella," I whispered before going on, "Isabella was, very simply, none of the things the kind, but sadly ignorant in this matter, Father said. She wasn't just a beautiful girl who never J-Walked or whatever. She… she was endless. Endless and stunning and exactly what I wanted, but more. She was magnificent; clumsy with her big brown eyes and long brown hair and dazzling smile. She was Bella. And I love her.," my voice was quieter now, soft as I gazed at her 'grave.' "And now she's…" I trailed off. I'd been going to say 'a horrible, blood-sucking, demonically gorgeous creature' but instead I said, "dead."
Momentary silence filled the damp air, clouds rolled gently overhead before Sam summoned me away with a look and the pack left this scene of human despair.
We were into the woods just out of sight of the small, mourning gathering quickly, each of us exploding into wolves before we'd even taken a second step into the woods. As we ran back to the reservation, Maria spoke to me.
Are you surviving?
No.
Somehow she managed to roll her eyes through her thoughts.
Oh yeah because that whole heartbeat thing is just in our imaginations.
Most likely.
Shut up.
There was a pause as she flicked over my past actions and current predictions about what I would most likely do.
Where will you go?
Away.
To our cousins?
Depends. Which cousins?
The ones in South-eastern Europe?
Sure. They're not much for conversation anyway, so we should get along just fine.
And what about me? The tone of her thoughts betrayed the fear she felt at living without me there, even though technically I was the younger sibling.
You have the Pack.
But I don't want the Pack to talk to and watch Monty Python with, I want you. You're my brother, who else?
Jake.
Jacob? Why would I watch movies and eat things that will kill us one day with him? Her thoughts were suspicious. I felt the flicker of awkwardness pass through the minds of the others' as they politely held their silence.
No reason.
Stay.
No. There is nothing for me here.
There is me, and the Pack, like you said… thought, whatever.
No. Without her nothing is worth staying for. At least there I'll be able to avoid any reminder of what was.
Don't you mean who was? Maria's thoughts were irritated now, partially at my weakness, partially at her own.
It doesn't matter. I will find George in Maine and his pack can hook me up with a boat to Croatia or somewhere near it and I'll hunt the rest of us from there.
It could take you weeks, do you really want to risk never actually finding them? You do remember what happened the last time one of us tried to seek them out without a guide-
Yes. Of course I remember. But I am, shockingly enough, smart enough not to wander into Volturi territory unawares. I know the way.
Then I'm coming too.
No.
We were still running, Maria desperately keeping pace with me. We'd long since broken away from the main group and she was trying unsuccessfully to guide me off my course to Maine.
Yes, I am.
If you try it you'll leave behind everything and everyone you've spent these past months befriending.
So will you, William.
Maria. My thoughts were accompanied by a low growl. Stop being ridiculous. What's left of my heart and mind aren't enough to maintain a healthy relationship with anyone here. Hopefully the wolves in Europe and the Middle East or whatever will be just as emotionally damaged.
They're feral! Will! Maria whirled on me now, snarling and bristling. I towered over her and merely looked down with a cold, flat expression. Don't do this! William, Brother, if you so much as take one-
Fine. Come with.
Her fur flattened in shock, ears twitching back. I tilted my head lazily, waiting for her to let me move forward again. After a minute of pondering she turned and we started running again, covering miles in minutes.
We didn't converse again for a long time, which was probably good.
Nothing I could've said would've done anything but depress her, and Maria had had enough of that. Hollowly I'd decided to focus what was left of my conscious mind on three things: running to Maine and then to the other Pack, Maria's sanity, and not ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever see any sign of Bella again.
The earth sped away beneath my dark, silver, somehow metallic furred paws.
I urged myself forward, ignoring the way my muscles burned, or how-through Maria's thoughts- I could feel her limbs burning as well. But neither of us stopped.
All that was left was the earth beneath and the night above and the blinding loneliness Bella had left behind.
In the back of Maria's mind common sense whispered to stop for the night.
No such voice spoke in mine; it was long gone.
All I heard in the back of my mind was the part of me that couldn't seem to stop sobbing, saying,
Bella, oh Bella…
Who knows why we kept running; I assume Maria did it because to run meant to hold on to the only thing left of our family: me. All I know is that I ran, pushing myself past what should have been the limit as night turned into days, and days into weeks, before we reached Maine. And I knew that I did it because the giving into the almost feral desire to do so meant that I could ignore the very feral desire to howl my anguish out and hunt until I dropped from starvation. The urge to hunt- anything and every thing- had not been that strong before, not even when I first phased and even Charlie had smelled good in a disturbing way for a little while.
My black eyes reflected nothing despite the scenery flashing past, simply glared coldly out at the world.
We were on a ship now, George's pack having successfully hooked us up with an ocean barge headed for the Mediterranean. George's spare, uniform black sweatpants and oddly military black turtleneck unnecessarily kept out the spray. Maria herself was clad in a similar, but somehow feminine, outfit, also courtesy of George, or rather, his cousin.
Bella…
Late, I know, but I've been trying. R&R pleeease.