I didn't go back to the meal. Instead I sat and enjoyed the cool breeze.

It was blissfully quiet, calming the storm that brewed in me each time I remembered the cause. Edward. His callous tone and the indignant way he spoke so valiantly, as if he owned everything, even people.

And Carmen was no better, just a bias accomplice to his sapid ways.

How could I live with people I was growing to dislike in a way that might evolve to hatred? How could I pretend I didn't care?

I counted who I had in the house of horrors to keep me from blowing my constant spinning top.

Two. Possibly three likely candidates. Esme, Carlise and Bree.

The rest could vanish into thin air or a poof of smoke. Either one would suffice.

They weren't going to treat Jake that way and get away with it.

If it hadn't been for his careful approach to each stab at his manhood, the whole event could have blown up in our faces, confirming the gossip that must have circulated around town about this so called of a family.

I for one knew they lived up to their name. The nut jobs from Thorncrest was a subtle if not kinder way to describe their temperamental ways, their blindness to co-exist with the majority of the world. All because they lived within their own bubble.

Jake wasn't the normality I craved though either. Even he was obsessed with the paranormal, and felt the need to discuss it openly over a glass of wine, which he drank like water.

I tried not to rewind back to the over reactive way I thought of him as mine. The way I imagined our names linked in some way.

He wasn't mine. There was probably someone special he was returning to. The uncle was probably a high school sweetheart from Idaho who visited him on the weekends. They probably made out with in his tent or a rented accommodation.

A sudden bitter wind struck me as I stood and marched back to the Manor. My heart raced. My palms sweated as I dragged my tired limbs up the steps and banged on the door. No one answered, so I used the lion's head door knocker a few excessive times, half hoping they had kicked me out for good.

When my hand lifted to knock again, the door creaked open slightly. No-one was on the other side to greet me, so I pushed my way through and stepped into the hall that was lit brightly from the large chandelier hanging just above my head. It was strangely beginning to sway as I stepped out from under it and into the dining room.

It was clear and tidied of dishes. The study door was closed, with no sounds coming from inside it. I had a feeling Isobel was in there counting her bills.

Esme and Carlise were busy in the kitchen, whistling some ornate tune as they clanked together dishes and silverware. There was nowhere I wanted to turn, not even to my room. There was a tingling need on the very ends of my fingertips, a frustration that wouldn't unwind until I wound it around something at fault.

My feet moved to the stairs off their own accord. The anxiety grew until I was unable to rationalize my move toward the door opposite my bedroom. It was happening against my will.

Acidic bile rose up to my dry throat. My heart pounded as I braced myself and allowed my knuckles to connect with the door and knock.

"Looking for me?"

I had sensed him all along. I had recognized his scent. My skin prickled with heat. I hadn't turned. I hadn't given myself the chance to turn around, since I was slinking back into myself, peering through an invisible shield that I thought could protect me from how I would automatically react.

"I wanted to speak to you," I said, sighed. The wind hadn't escaped my chest yet. At least that's what I told myself.

"So speak," he said coolly, but I detected a treble in his voice.

I turned slowly to find him standing too close to me, his chest directly in my field of vision. His standoffish chin was just an inch away. I allowed his cologne to sift through my nose, let the taste of it to settle at the very back of my lay too flat tongue.

"Tonight," I began, somehow precise. "You could have…shown restraint. At least some respect for a guest I invited solely for the purpose of…" I couldn't finish. I had actually forgotten in the mix of feelings washing over me with his heady but needed scent. I was losing myself all over again. And I had no way of controlling it.

"Becoming more enjoyable," he finished for me, his ragged voice sounding tired by something. Me? My need to speak? But then say nothing much at all? My defence always surrendered from the changing slur of his compressed, but hauntingly smooth voice.

I nodded. My tongue chose to lay uselessly flat again.

"His kind aren't welcome here.'

"His kind?" I repeated, keeping my gaze on the button of his shirt.

"And neither are you," he said, just as virulent.

"Me?"

"You…" He paused. "Who else?" I could hear him swallow.

"Have I…' I clenched my eyes closed. I couldn't think, hold the breath that wanted to say much more to him. Shout. Stomp, kick him in the crotch. But I couldn't do anything of it, just stand there motionless and unable to confront him.

He stepped away from me. My hand rose as if by itself and gripped his arm. We both shuddered, I think, just as I drew him back.

"Have I done something wrong?" I forced myself to look at him.

He kept blinking, and licked his lips for what seemed the tenth time.

"Have I done something to offend you?"

His arm expanded beneath my fingers. His shirt stretched at the shoulders as he leaned back. That same static travelled through me and into the pit of my stomach, filling my chest with a warmth that made me tingle. But I held on tighter, enjoying the sudden empowerment, the way he looked caught by me this time.

"I need to know," I demanded, edging confidently closer. "I need to know why you dislike me so much."

His other hand was raised a little, as if he wanted to reach up and grab my arm and toss me aside. I could see the need in his strange color changing eyes, see puce appear and churn to a fiery gold, his lips tremble and the corners lift into a snarl.

"I've done nothing to you," I said, clenching the front of his shirt. "I've done nothing, but you still you keep taunting me." The rage from earlier return.

"I try, but you get worse. You blank me then won't stop staring," I yelled, frustrated.

His gaze fell to my lips, the shake in my hands as they crawled up to his neck.

"Why do you keep doing it?"

He shivered as I let go and pushed him away to grasp at my throat. It felt like it had grown in width.

I wheezed as he straightened himself. His eyes were relaxed yet somehow also wide open, ringed purple, searching me, looking too far inside of me.

"I have my reasons." I think I heard him say. His mouth hadn't moved as he spoke. His hands seemed to come toward me and stay hanging by his sides all at once.

His eyes never left mine, though his gaze was never readable. His sighs never real. I fell against the door to my room and reached for the handle. Turning it, I stumbled inside and slammed the door on his face.

The divide made it easier to forget his last parting words.

"You should thank me."

Scebe break. wont let me put thre stars.

I was sitting in the study with my back to the sunlight streaming in through the open window.

I was dreaming. I knew because I felt above myself, floating somewhere between two worlds: the past, the present, as myself and someone else: Irina.

I was carrying out her day as she would have, but somewhere new, somewhere welcoming, even if she was afraid of the invitation.

I perspired so much, sweat trickled down to my ringlets and the crease of my open

Petticoat. Patting myself dry with a laced handkerchief, I read the scriptures of a book entitled, The Stone, sensing I wasn't alone.

"Will you never ask?" It was the voice that had become imprinted to my memory.

"Ask you what?" I replied, keeping my gaze on the book.

"Where I have been all day."

"It is no concern of mine." I turned another page, careful not to tear the delicate pages.

Large, booted feet stepped toward me, distressing the wood floor. "Would you be so kind as to look at me when I am speaking to you?"

I moved my carefully erect posture to face the towering shadow. My eyes met with those that had haunted me even in my sleep.

It was Edward stood before me, tall and abrasive, his lucid brown eyes mirroring my reflection.

"I have been to the parish," he began, his voice calming some type of inner battle. "To pray, spare you my sins."

He bowed, clasping the tip of a sword by his thigh. His leather attire crunched noisily between my silent gasps for breath. He had lowered himself as if in worship, when in all truth, I knew in this dream, I was a peasant who was unworthy of his approval or attention.

"Then you have spared me the trouble," I replied, keeping my true feelings aside.

"And do you spare me your heart?" he asked, holding out his hand for me. Mine shook from the mere thought of physical contact.

I obliged and placed my hand in his. The touch both soothed and ached my guilty conscience.

He kissed my fingers, sending a tingle of warmth after the initial iciness of his breath. "You must come with me."

"Where?" I noticed ice forming around my fingernails.

"Anywhere you wish, far from here." He kissed my hand and held it to his face, held it as if it were dearer to him than his life.

"I must stay. Face your mother," I proclaimed with sudden authority.

"My mother will never understand."

He rose swiftly, brought me to my feet and pressed me to the matching pound of his heart.

The coolness of his breath froze my lips until they stung. "Please," I begged. "We mustn't."

"You shall not come to any harm." He moaned against my neck, knotting his fingers in the loose curls of my hair. He kissed me. Hard.

It broke my defences, splitting my thoughts into two halves: my will to stop what we were doing and my will to carry on and face the consequences.

Easing me against a bookshelf, he rained kisses down to my waist. His mouth moved savagely to my neck with a sharp graze of teeth.

"Bella ." He sighed. "Bella be mine. I shall save you, even from myself."

I opened my eyes. The Edward I knew was holding me, dressed as himself. I was myself, too, wearing my own clothes, confused and…aroused. But I was afraid of it. We hardly knew each other.

I tried to struggle free. Edward was strong. I couldn't escape. Yet a weaker part of me still wanted to fall into his arms.

He pushed me onto the desk. Ornaments and framed photographs clattered to the floor. They were of children or black foetuses. Others were of mothers clasping beating hearts. My face was in one of the photographs, partially shadowed by slivering creatures roaming in and out of my mouth.

Edward crouched over me and I screamed. He brushed back my hair and kissed my face. "Shhh. It will be fine. I have you now." He smothered me with more kisses. For a moment, his voice was making me want to give in and kiss him back, but the sudden murderous look in his eyes made me back away.

"No! Let go! Please! Don't!"

Jake appeared at the doorway, his hair soiled, his clothes were torn from where he bled with deep incisions to his torso and legs.

"Jake" I called out, reaching out for him.

"He's no good for you Bella" replied Jake, his eyes blank, his voice emotionless.

"Ignore him," growled Edward, gripping my head to kiss me painfully on the lips.

I tried to struggle free, but he was getting stronger. I couldn't, even when half of me still wanted to keep him with me.

"Bella you must come with me," Jake called out from several sections of the room. His voice still displaced from any feeling.

Edward untied his belt.

Jake stayed at the doorway, upside down and unmoving as I screamed for him to help me. "You have to save yourself," he kept saying, never blinking or reverting his gaze from Edward tearing at my clothes, muttering it was the only way.

He hushed my cries, smothering me with more kisses, his tongue forcing my lips to part open. But he wasn't who I wanted it with. He wasn't Edward.

"Let go," I screamed. "Please, please' I begged, tears blurring my sight.

His eyed became a solid black, a dark shell of his former self. "I can't change what I am." He bit into my shoulder, tearing out chunks of me. I screamed, sharp, shuddering screams that popped and muted all sound.

Scene break

I switched on the bedside lamp and scanned the room, breaking into a hot and cold sweat as I clung to the sheets, wiping away actual tears. I grabbed the day old glass of water from my bedside table and took a large gulp, spilling it onto my night-shirt. But I didn't move to change. I couldn't.

There was something counting my every move just like in the dream. Only I couldn't see it. I wasn't physically aware or even mentally connected to the presence. Only certain with a sixth sense. A hunch. Maybe even a premonition, a mind over matter that had me cradling myself and rocking back and forth, listening to the creak of my bed post to drown out the noise of something else pacing the room.

I pulled the sheet over my head and waited for it to stop, keeping my head under my pillow and muffling my screams.

It was all in my mind I repeated over and over again, chanting the words like a prayer. But then a vicious growl vibrated beneath the bed, snapping and tearing up the floorboards and shattering the windows. The thunder resolved to an offbeat thud on my door.

I covered my ears, humming my favourite melody. A childhood hymn played to me on a grand piano at the group home when it rained. The lull of Mrs Langley's voice singing its rhyming verse.

Hush, hush don't you cry

When the windmills turn you fly

Away. To the sky

Where the moon and stars divide

For...you...and…I...

I imagined the windmill painted blue and white with yellow turning vanes, blending into a blur of creamy peaks and bubbles of gold that floated up to the morning sky of pink.

A kite flew from my hand and disappeared into the clouds. I watched the windmill turn, the hayfield changed to vines of berries, black and blue. I picked one and held it to my lips, inhaling the sweet and bitter aroma inducing me into a sleep.

The thudding in my room stopped, replaced by a subtle buzzing through my chest, my birthmark in particular, until the fruit burst into pure red segments between my fingertips, trickling down to my arm and staining the ground so that it transpired into a sea of red. It smelled delectable and sour, watering my mouth the instant it touched my lips.

"Stop," growled a voice.

I convulsed. The voice reawakened my other self. But I lay back in the river of red, allowing myself to be drenched by its flavours, cold, yet somehow hot in my mouth.

"Stop," ranted a voice. I shuddered by the familiarity of it, thrashing and kicking, becoming injected by a source of renewal strength entering me with each sip.

"Stop moving," echoed the voice.

I opened my eyes. My bed sheets were whipped from my face. I was pinned down against my mattress. Edward's teeth were gritted. His eyes were as black as coal.

"No," I screamed. "No please…leave me alone!'

He dugs his fingers into my arms, squeezing till I winced.

"Please don't…don't hurt me!' I begged him. "Don't kill me!

"Shhhh!"

"Help me! Somebody help!'

A bright light stung my eyes as my screams became tired gasps. My hands still clawed at his face.

"Oh my" shrilled a voice. It sounded like Isobel.

Edward let go and I curled myself into a ball, protecting my face from the stabbing lights and the flecks of green and white flashing behind my closed eyelids.

"Edward your face," she cried.

"What the hell happened to you?" Bree gasped.

"Let's get a look at you," Esme offered. I felt better knowing she was there.

I peered out from under my sheets. Edward had shrugged away from Esme's hand and stormed out of the room, tailed by a weeping Carmen.

Esme eased Bree out of the room as I tried to brace myself for the lecture. She then scurried over to my bed, re-tying her house coat.

"We're here now, Bella. There is no need to worry." She took my hand and kissed it, rubbing away the cold.