Happy Monday and Happy (belated) New Year! I forgot to mention this when I posted chapters on Christmas (yikes, that was a while ago now), but due to the enthusiastic response I got for chapter forty-seven, I'll definitely have Carlisle recover and read Esme's letters at some point. Thanks so much for all your great reviews, and here's the first of two chapters today (this semester, I don't have class or work on Mondays, so look for Monday updates ). Quick note on this one: it focuses on Rosalie, and how her relationship with Esme might have helped to temper her initial hatred of Carlisle (if only slightly).

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer is the author of "Twilight," and did you know that there are only 169 more days until "Eclipse"? (And there are even fewer days until "New Moon" comes out on DVD! Huzzah!)

1934: Patience

Rosalie's POV

Esme was out shopping, and Edward had gone to the library, so much to her irritation, Rosalie had no one but Carlisle to help her with the fastenings of the dress she was trying on in preparation for her first day at school. Normally, Rosalie would have waited for Esme to return, or she might have even asked Edward if he came home first, but under the circumstances, her dislike of Carlisle was overcome by her impatience to make sure that the dress fit as perfectly as she remembered it had in the shop. It was a lovely shade of blue, and the cut was such that though Esme hadn't exactly disapproved of it, she'd implied that her own mother would have been scandalized by such a dress. Rosalie had thought privately that her own mother's reaction would have been one of equal shock, but thinking about her parents was never productive, so she'd bought the dress both as an act of rebellion and in an attempt to appear carefree. After all, she'd been a Cullen for over a year now, and experience had taught her that no displays of bad temper or sullenness could change that.

The dress, in addition to being rather short, was made of a beautiful, though rather flimsy fabric. As a human, Rosalie would have worried that it would be too cold to wear such a gown in the middle of winter, but now she was only concerned with inadvertently destroying the delicate clasps that held it together, as she had with so many dresses before it. That fear led her (slowly and reluctantly) to seek out someone she'd spent most of her immortal life so far trying to ignore.

As she made her way toward Carlisle's office, another thought occurred to her: perhaps here, at last, was a chance to irritate the infuriatingly calm Dr. Cullen, who, despite Rosalie's best efforts, had yet to react to her angry outbursts and accusations with anything but tolerance and quiet acceptance. No one born in the seventeenth century as Carlisle had been, Rosalie reasoned, could possibly approve of this dress.

"Yes?" Carlisle called as she opened the door and stepped into the room—Rosalie thought it was slightly ironic that as the member of the family who liked him least, she was the only one who ever entered his study without knocking first. Of course, part of the affection that Edward and Esme felt for Carlisle was shown through respect for his privacy, but as usual, Carlisle didn't seem bothered by her abruptness.

"Rosalie," he said, nodding at her and smiling gently. Another annoying thing about Carlisle: he never went out of his way to ingratiate himself with her, but neither did he ever stop being friendly, in spite of countless past rebuffs on Rosalie's part that had made her dislike very clear. "Did you need something?"

"Fasten this for me," she said curtly, raising her eyebrows and nodding at the dress before turning her back. To her further irritation, his expression hadn't changed at the sight of her outfit, and he didn't comment when, as soon as she felt the fastenings close, she plucked a small mirror from the top of his desk and examined her reflection.

"I'm going to wear this to school tomorrow," she said idly, glancing at him as he returned to the chair behind his desk. Again, no reaction but that gracious smile, though his expression was slightly concerned now.

"And you're quite sure, Rosalie, that—"

"I'm not going to hurt anyone," she snapped, but then she smiled grimly. "I've gotten all that out of my system."

He nodded, his expression steady, but she saw him wince a little at her casual allusion to what she'd done in Rochester.

"I'm sorry that I discouraged you before," he said suddenly. "But I do think you're ready this time."

Rosalie frowned at the reminder of her last attempt to start school—she'd been just six months old at the time, and Edward had had to all but drag her home after she'd caught her first whiff of their classmates. She was about to leave the office in a huff (which was really the only way she ever left a room that Carlisle occupied) when he spoke again.

"Here," Carlisle said suddenly, opening the top drawer of his desk and producing a small box. "For school tomorrow."

Rosalie frowned. It was galling enough, living in his house and knowing that she was spending his money every time she went shopping, but having him give her gifts was beyond irritating. However, Rosalie suppressed the urge to toss the box away—she was too curious to stop herself from opening it. Inside, she was surprised to find a small silver bracelet, set with stones the same color as her dress.

"Esme picked it out," Carlisle said, his voice almost apologetic.

Rosalie had already slipped the bracelet on, but when she heard this, she struggled to stop herself from tearing it off. This was fast becoming a familiar tactic on the part of her adopted mother: Rosalie knew that her unshakeable dislike of Carlisle pained Esme more than she wanted to admit, so in the past few months, she'd taken to trying to help win Rosalie's favor for her husband through gifts. Of course, Esme's strategy wasn't really so simplistic—trinkets like this bracelet were just a means of prolonging a conversation between her daughter and her husband. They were Esme's attempt to coax Rosalie into behaving almost civilly to Carlisle, which she always did in these situations, though not for his sake, of course, but for Esme's. Having known her for nearly a year now, there were moments now when Rosalie could feel that her fondness for Esme could almost overcome her loathing of Carlisle. Almost.

"I'll be sure to thank her for it then," Rosalie said coolly, unable to keep the note of disdain out of her voice. "It was nice of you to hold onto it for her while she's out shopping."

Carlisle nodded, obviously unsurprised by her reaction, and as usual, Rosalie was more annoyed by his calm acceptance of her determined antipathy than she thought she would have been if he'd even once risen to her attempts to anger him. Without a word, she turned to leave, and she heard Carlisle return to whatever book he'd set aside to speak with her. As she was about to leave, she noticed the calendar on the wall and sighed when she saw the date.

She thought about Esme, who was so eager for her to somehow learn to like a person she'd resolved to hate forever: Carlisle had apologized for changing her without her consent on more than one occasion, but what good had that done? 'Sorry' wasn't going to make her human again—nothing could…including hating Carlisle and upsetting Esme as a result.

That thought made Rosalie pause uneasily by the door. She wasn't ready to stop hating Carlisle—she'd killed the villains she'd known in life, and now, in death, she needed someone to be responsible for her unhappiness. Without that, it would be harder to justify why she stayed with the Cullens. It was far easier to tell herself that she stayed because in changing her, Carlisle had made himself responsible for her, and worthy of all her bad moods, than it would be to admit to herself that she stayed because she would have been lonely without them, that she loved Esme as a second mother, and because she wanted to be part of a family—even if she could barely stand two of the three other Cullens.

Finally, Rosalie reached a compromise with herself: she could pretend to be kind to him, occasionally, but only for Esme's sake. That thought was what made her speak to Carlisle again.

"Edward told me the significance of tomorrow's date," she said stiffly, not looking at him. "In case I don't see you, happy anniversary."

Before he could respond, Rosalie left the office and shut the door behind her. There, I was nice to him, Esme, she thought, her disgust lessening slightly at the sight of her new bracelet—she felt certain that no amount of jewelry or other such bribes were ever going to make Carlisle seem less hateful to her, but Esme's strategy certainly had its benefits, Edward had told her more than once that Carlisle had the patience of a saint, but Rosalie was determined: in a few decades, she imagined that she might be able to endure his company, but for the foreseeable future at least, she was resolved to make her dislike of Carlisle as obvious as possible. After saying something so civil, almost kind to him today, Rosalie decided that she wasn't going to speak to him again for at least a week.