Ch. 5 Slow Going

I stared back into Alice's eyes. She could have been a ghost for how I was reacting, but I couldn't believe it. Mary Alice Cullen was standing right in front of me. My former best friend. The one girl who I thought loved me and would have fought for me no matter what, but she didn't. She abandoned me just like the rest of them. She didn't love me anymore than he did... which was not at all. The realization hit me like a freight train, and I gasped.

"Excuse me? 'How've ya been?!'" I was fuming. "I've been fantastic. Better than great, really. Now get the hell out of my apartment."

"Wait! Bella, I'm sorry. I...I didn't know what to say after all this time. I shouldn't have said that..." her voice went up a few octaves if that were even possible. She had venom lining the rims of her eyes.

I closed my eyes and sighed. I never could resist her before, but I had to be strong. I had to protect myself. "No, Alice. It's been a long time with no word from any of you, and now you both just appear out of nowhere? Just...things are different now. I'm different now."

"I see." She eyed me speculatively.

That was it, the judgement in her face. Even after all I had done, I still wasn't good enough for the perfect Cullens. "Are you kidding me? You disappeared for three and half years. You left me, remember? You don't get to look at me like that, and act like you know anything about me! Leave. Now." I was trying my hardest to keep my breathing smooth and regular.

"Bella—"

"Go." I pointed to the door. Seeing Edward earlier and now Alice and hearing the hurtful way they were able to distance themselves emotionally from anything we had been through together all those years ago sparked the world's greatest epiphany. I would never be anything to them. I really was just a human distraction, a blip on their eternal radar. It ripped me to shreds, but I couldn't let her see how it was affecting me. I had come too far for this.

Alice looked me in the eyes seriously for about half a minute. I don't know if she was searching for something in my face or if she was searching my future, but whatever she found, she finally decided to leave me. "I'll be around if you change your mind and want to talk. I'll leave my number on the kitchen counter for you. Sorry for everything, Bella...really." She sounded upset, but I knew from experience that these vampires were the best actors I would ever meet. I stood silently and turned my head away so that I didn't have to look into her face of false innocence.

After a few moments of complete silence, I assumed that she had left, and I allowed myself to look that way. She was gone, and it was strangely desolate as if she had never been there at all. My lower lip began to tremble, and a single tear dropped from my eye. 'Forget her. Forget him.'

My phone, which never seemed to stay quiet for long, started ringing, and real life caught back up to me.

"Hello?" My voice had just a little bit too much bite to it.

"Toni, baby. Where ya been? Look, I needed to talk to you about that last chapter you wrote. You can't kill off the main character that way. The readers want a happy ending. Just keep 'em happy, and give 'em what they want. We've been over this." Stan, my agent, was a good guy. He'd been with me from the beginning, but he was in this for the money, the success. I just wanted to be done. I was already a billionaire. I could disappear into the shadows of anonymity, and go on to live a happy, human life, just like a particular vampire always wanted for me. Jerk.

"Keep them happy? Them?! What about me? What about what I want? Don't I get a say in anything? What if the readers don't know what they want until they actually see it in writing? What if they liked my ending? MINE, the one that I want! We won't really know until we try it out, right? Maybe we've been feeding ourselves the lie about a happy ending for so long that we've gotten off track of what could have been a great thing?! Huh? What about that?" I sounded like a raving lunatic, but I was tired of being steamrolled.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. What are you talking about? The editors just needed a little editing on that last chapter..." He was clearly taken aback by my uncharacteristic aggression. I was usually pretty laid back about things.

I sighed, feeling guilty for my outburst. If I was being honest with myself, I wasn't really upset about the book. I wanted a happily ever after for the characters too, but that wouldn't stay true to the real story, now would it? But it wasn't my agent's fault that a certain family of vampires were trying to ruin my life. "Sorry, Stan. You're right...I'm just...I'm a little stressed about the release coming up. You really think it will go well?"

The relief in Stan's voice at my shift in demeanor was nearly palpable. "It's gonna be great! Look, come over to my place around seven, and we'll talk about it. I gotta go. There's a guy I gotta see about another client. See ya soon."

"Yeah...ok...see you later." I hung up, and stared at my phone. Within a matter of hours, I had gone from being totally in control and sure of how things were going, to totally neurotic. Ugh. The Cullens.

I looked to the clock on the wall. It was just four now. I still had time to shower and swing by the editorial office at school and drop off my latest article to Eric. He asked me to do a filler piece for the paper, so I wrote a self-improvement article of course. Write what you know, and you can't fail. That's my motto.

When I arrived at the school, I caught Eric just as he was leaving the office.

"Hey, Be—Marie. Sorry. It's so weird that you changed your name. Are you sure you're not a spy?" He laughed.

"No...just wanted a change. I think Marie suits me better anyway." I shrugged.

"Whatever you say, babe." He kissed me on my cheek. Things were moving kind of slow between us. It had been nearly a month ago that we went on our coffee date, and there had only been one other date—a lunch—since. Everyone knows that lunch is not a real date. He was very difficult to read, though. He seemed interested, but he just wouldn't make the move. Oh well, maybe he was waiting on me. Game on.

"Here, I brought the article you asked for. It a self-help type called 'Five Fun and Fast Ways to the New You.' You wanted fluff, right?"

"Sounds great...so, did you hear the news?" He was grinning widely, almost bursting at the seams with whatever information he wanted to share.

I narrowed my eyes thinking. I tried to stay as in-touch with the outside world as I could, but I was really busy now working on multiple things—work, school, work... Eric could be referencing anything from current events to a sports match at the school. "Remind me and I'll tell you."

"They're bumping up the release date on 'Date with Destiny.' You know, the new Toni Byrd book? They announced it online like an hour ago."

"What?!" I nearly choked on my own spit when I heard the title of my next book, and then when I replayed what he said in mind I wanted to vomit. No one had even mentioned anything about a change in the date of release to me, the author.

"Yeah! Isn't that great! So anyway, I suggested to the team that in order to increase reader loyalty we could do a series of articles on the author of the series to reel them in. You know an exposé on him, a 'who done it' type. Each week we will update our readers about what we have found. It's going to be so cool."

"What? No one knows who the author is. That's half the fun of the series." Eric had no idea that he was looking right at her...

"You're right, except you're also wrong. One of my buddies at U-dub said he had a lead on who it might be. He didn't want to get involved in my exposé though, something about contractural clause...Apparently the author used a publishing house out of Seattle originally, and when they moved buildings they left some of their documents behind. My buddy was doing some renovations to the building when he worked in construction last month, and he found some interesting stuff..." Eric wagged his brows at me conspiratorially. "How amazing would that be if we figured it out?! Our article could be featured on the national line-up! We could work anywhere we wanted after graduation! So how about it? You want to go in with me 50/50?"

Now I really wanted to vomit. I didn't want this. I was supposed to stay in the dark. This story was WAY too close to home. While the public might not be able to decipher the meaning, a certain...species...of people would, and this could only end badly. "I don't really think that's a good idea. The author obviously wants to stay hidden. I mean, shouldn't we respect that?"

"Hey, calm down..." He reached across to tuck a strand of my hair behind my ear, and I had a flashback of Edward doing the same so many times all those years ago.

"I don't feel very good. Look, I have a meeting at...errr...work. I'll just call you later if I'm feeling any better. Just...please don't do anything yet. We don't even know the legal implications of printing something like that. There's a reason your friend didn't want to get involved." I silently pleaded with my eyes.

"You're really worried about this, huh?"

"Yes, I just don't want you to get into trouble. You're such a brilliant journalist, and while this might seem like a good idea now, it could really mess things up for you if it's not legal. Just be careful."

"Yeah...ok." He furrowed his brow and looked down awkwardly. "Please call me later for real if you're feeling better. There's a party here on campus that I wanted to invite you to. It will be a lot of fun."

"I don't know..." Large parties had never really been my "thing."

"Aww come on! You never want to go out and do things like a normal college student. Lighten up, Swa—Higginbotham...so weird." He laughed again at my name change.

"Ok, I'll think about it if it's that important to you."

"Really? Yes!" I had to giggle at his excitement. He was like an eager puppy, always wanting attention but also so easy to please.

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