Chapter 85 Chapter Notes

Edward loses control and bites Bella, nearly killing her, Charlie is hanging onto sanity with a single fingernail, and Bella's humanity is slipping away with every tick of the clock. But Alice is pissed because the family has decided not to celebrate Christmas with a tree this year.

The chapter title belongs to Arlo Guthrie

Chapter 85 Wake up Dead Tuesday, December 26th 10:15 pm

Well, that was fun. We should do this every night. Rosalie glares up at me and I snap. "Esme, take Bella upstairs, please."

She's on her feet in an instant and flits up the stairs, Bella cradled against her chest. I reach down and pick up the nearest thing I can get my hands on and chuck it at Rosalie, as hard as I can. A glass vase full of daisies hits her squarely in the forehead, shattering into a thousand pieces and spraying the room with droplets of water and shards of glass.

Everyone stops talking. Emmett and Rosalie are stunned and I leap at her, knocking her off the couch. We grapple with each other as we roll on the floor, spitting and yelling. As with Jasper when he attacked Bella, Emmett sorts it out and yanks us both up.

Rosalie is apoplectic with rage, spitting like a cobra. I break Emmett's hold and point a trembling finger at her. "You say one more word. Just one more fucking word and I will rip your goddamn head off!" After seeing Jacob dispatch Victoria in this way, I'd thought I would never be able to actually do it, but I was wrong. I could easily rid the world of this beautiful, odious creature.

"Now look here," Emmett growls. "I don't care what she thought, or even what she even might have said. You don't threaten my wife." He pulls himself up to his full height and glares at me. Murderous thoughts bounce around in his head and he begins to pound a meaty fist inside his palm.

I collect myself and look him in the eye. Every molecule in my body is trembling with rage. "Get her in line, Em. I am not joking. I have had enough. One more smart remark and I will end her."

Before Emmett and I can attack each other and destroy Esme's living room, the furnishings, and the lovely big screen TV, Alice says, "I see a terrible consequence at the end of this thread if Rosalie doesn't back off, Emmett. She pushes Edward too hard and he catches her alone. And it's over." Emmett's eyes grow wide as he looks at me, then Rosalie, and then back at me.

"You wouldn't." Emmett says, his voice a low snarl.

"Keep that bitch away from me."

I see it in Alice's mind. I'm at the edge of the river and Rosalie sneers at me. And I lose it. She doesn't see it coming, and then her head is rolling away, a shocked look on her lovely, hateful face.

Rosalie, DRT.

Jasper floats a blanket of calm over the room and I turn on him. "Will you stop that!" He shoots me a sad smile and gets up off the couch. He leads me into the dark hallway, away from Emmett's fading glare and Rosalie's permanent haughty sneer.

We're all on edge, here, Edward. Let's just calm down for a minute. If you want to rip Rosalie's head off later, then I applaud your fortitude. I'm sure you can make Emmett see things your way. But now's not the time. He grins at me and I punch him lightly on the arm.

Esme appears at the foot of the stairs. Her expression is severe. She glances at Carlisle, who had been poised to stop Emmett and me from harming each other and says, "Rosalie, Emmett, clean up that glass and water, and toss those." She points to the daisies. "Then go away until this is over with Bella. Don't come back for at least three days." Rosalie starts to object, but Emmett, seeing the look in my eye, pulls her up with him. They head into the kitchen for brooms, dustpans and rags.

I run upstairs to Bella, who is curled into a ball as tears stream down her face. I stroke her back as I try to calm myself. I think of what I should have told her to imagine. Fire. It doesn't need to be any more descriptive than that.

Esme walks back into my room. "Go for a run, Edward. I'll stay with Bella."

It's not a request, so I kiss Bella's tear-streaked face and walk to the door. Carlisle joins me and we race down the cleared expanse, jump the river, and run up the mountain. When we finally stop, the moon is making a feeble attempt to break through a heavy cloud layer, but it won't be successful. As the rain begins, we take refuge under two fallen trees, and sit to watch the drops patter down.

Carlisle can't stop thinking about Charlie's stricken face upon walking into the house and seeing Bella, fully immersed in her conversion. He'd run to her and had fallen on his knees, trying to get her to speak to him. We explained that in the midst of the process, we're not able to verbally communicate or understand much of what's going on in the outside world, but that hadn't stopped him from crying out to her, then taking her body into his arms and rocking her like a baby.

Carlisle clears his head and glances at me. "You thirsty?"

After what I drank earlier? My bride? So, not really, but I lie. "Yeah. I think there's a small herd of deer around the next bend." We take off running, and after snagging a couple each, head back home. Emmett and Rosalie aren't in the house, thank god. Jasper holds Alice in his lap by the fire, and in his mind is a relief so potent and expansive that I'm stunned by the depth and breadth of it. He'd thought Alice was lost to him, and the reality of her return overwhelms him.

His thoughts stray to the sad scene that played out at the house earlier with Charlie, how sobering it is to see a once-powerful man reduced to a sobbing, angry convalescent. I frown. "I'm surprised you didn't blanket the house with calm tonight. Charlie might have benefited from that."

Jasper looks thoughtful. "I considered it, but I think that it's time Charlie confronted the situation. It's been happening around him but he hasn't let himself see or hear it. Tonight, he finally did. I didn't think that making him feel warm and fuzzy about it would have helped him come to terms with the reality."

Carlisle sits beside the fire. "Could you really destroy Rosalie?" he asks. "I know she's a pain, but could you do something that…permanent?"

I nod slowly. "She is a hateful bitch. Not just to me, but to everyone. I'm not putting up with any more of her shit. And Emmett needs to keep her away from me, unless you want the family to be short one member." I can hear Esme squirming upstairs, her concern about 'keeping the family together'. Whatever.

I go upstairs and thank Esme. "I'll stay with her," I say. I sit on the floor and stroke Bella's face, feeling her body tremble as the venom burns through her tender flesh.

And now there is nothing to do but wait.

Downstairs, Alice stirs. She gets up off of Jasper's lap and narrows her eyes. "What day is it?"

When Jasper tells her, she looks around, perplexed. "Where's the Christmas tree?"

The family congregates in my bedroom so we can all visit. We can do it from anywhere in the house, but it's nice to be able to see each other. Jasper and I decide to sit Alice down and tell her what went on when she was out of it, from Charlie selling the house to Bella and me, our marriage, and the refurbishment.

Her face falls when she hears this. "I missed it all! I could have done all the prep for the wedding, gotten the venue, arranged entertainment and the guest list, gotten Bella's dress and Edward's tux." She wrinkles her brow. "How did you manage without me?"

Everyone laughs at that but me. I can only manage a weak smile. Jasper and I each shake our heads, not wanting to be the one to tell Alice just how mundane the whole thing was. This goes on for over ten seconds, until Alice stares us both down. "You are such a coward," I complain, to Jasper's grin. I pull up wedding pics on my phone and Alice looks at them intently, then scrolls on to the ones of the house.

"I missed it all," she says again. We're all trying desperately to think of something that she can contribute. When Esme says we'll need her to tell us when a three-day span of dry weather is coming up so we can paint the house exterior, she drops Jasper's hand and walks into her own room. We hear her plop down on the bed and Jasper races after her, relieved to find that she's still awake, but disheartened.

I know how she feels. I missed October. I missed Bella nearly committing suicide. She just missed a small wedding and a re-do of a structure.

The family leaves to their own past times, and I'm left alone with Bella, now curled into a protective ball. I'm rubbing her back as Alice walks in and hands me a box. I open it and find a lovely dark blue wool skirt, a cream-colored silk blouse, and navy flats. A separate bag holds navy pantyhose with matching silk underwear and bra. A small box holds two exquisite oval barrettes, navy and silver, with strings of beads that hang down. Yet another box holds an antique brush and comb set with its own mirror.

"This is what I bought for Bella's graduation. I don't guess she'll be there, so give these to her when she wakes up."

I look up at my once-vivacious sister, now sad and introspective. I wonder what it will take for her to let go of the past and move forward again? "Thank you so much for these thoughtful gifts," I say, as I clasp her hand.

She nods and gives a depressed sigh, still thinking about the lack of a Christmas tree. She seems to have forgiven the family for not observing Christmas this year, although her manner is still aloof whenever the holiday is mentioned. She won't accept the fact that she is the Christmas spirit in the Cullen household, and bristles at the idea that they couldn't decorate because she was AWOL. It makes her feel even worse, thinking that she deprived her family of decorating and gift-giving that they'd all enjoyed for decades.

The next couple of days are off and on terrible. Sometimes there's shrieking and hands, getting stronger by the hour, trying to pull out hair. Other times there's silence, with gritting of teeth and clenching of fists.

There is always trembling. There are always tears.

I hate myself.

I call Charlie and tell him that Bella is progressing normally through the process. He breathes fast and as always, sounds on the edge of tears. "We'll let you know as soon as it's over," I promise.

"Can I see her then?" he asks hopefully.

How can I tell him that his blood will madden her? That she might slip and kill him? That it will never be the same between them?

I prevaricate. "We'll see. Might have to be a phone call in the beginning." I beg off and then call Maya, who says Charlie has quit eating. Wonderful. Briefly I wonder if I'll still be sane when this is finally over with.

Rosalie and Emmett stay away, Carlisle goes to work and Esme stays in her office. Jasper and Alice are inseparable. Alice hunts more than normal, to replenish what she'd missed in her six-week sojourn into what she calls 'her sleep'. She sits with Bella while I hunt with Jasper, although I'm still not thirsty, and probably won't be for weeks.

When we're alone in the woods, he says, "What happened exactly, with Bella?"

I tell him the whole awful story. How I buried my face in the wound and lapped up the blood. How I bit her and damn near killed her. "How do you feel now, after the human blood? Is it as good as you remember?"

I make a face and nod my head. "Even better, because it was her blood. I've never had anything even close to that. It was…" I take a deep breath, not able to come up with the proper adjective to even describe it.

"I still think about it all the time," he confesses. "You know that. It is so much better than animal blood." He thinks about the different humans he's killed, how much he enjoyed the struggle. Before he met Alice, he would seduce human women, bed them carefully and then kill them.

"Are you only a vegetarian because of Alice?"

He nods his head slowly. "Just for Alice. Anything, for Alice."

Back at the house, I watch Alice for a moment, tending to Bella. She's brushing her hair and talking to her, the way we did for her when she was in her 'sleep'. "It won't be long now, Bella. It'll get bad when the venom nears your heart, so when you feel it beat really hard, then start to skip, you're near the end. I predict that you have exactly eleven hours and ten minutes left."

December 29th

Early in the morning, before the sun has risen, Bella goes through a quiet period. I get up from her side to try and finish the job in this room that Bella and I started three days ago. In the closet I find thirty-one bags of items that Alice or I bought for Bella. Shoes. Socks. Jewelry. And no fewer than twenty shirts. Twenty. Why couldn't she have chosen a bag out of this closet?

Sometimes the Universe is patently unfair.

Bella's twitching has stopped, which alternately worries and elates me. She has just a few hours left and then I'll have to confess what happened. I feel wretched. Guilty. Terrible. But I will tell all, then we'll put it behind us. But at least at that point she'll have climbed out of the pit of fire, and her suffering will be over.

I've dressed Bella in some old jeans and a tee shirt, so she'll be in familiar clothes when she wakes up. Carlisle has taken the afternoon off, and they're all waiting downstairs, with the exception of Emmett and Rosalie, and I don't give a fuck where they are.

Ten minutes before the time that Alice has foreseen, they all come upstairs to wait. Alice sees Bella, dressed as if she's planning on washing her car, and gives a huff of disgust. She pictures the perfect outfit for her to wake up in: a mid-calf, split-seam sheath made out of a shiny satin. The neckline plunges to her navel.

"As if Bella would be caught dead in that," I scoff. I am immediately contrite. Caught dead. Caught dead in that.

I see my shocked, tortured face in every mind. Jasper is a realist. Bella is technically dead. But it's okay. Alice is trying to look forward to see how Bella feels about the fact that she is technically dead. Carlisle ponders the fragility of the human body, how many patients he's lost to death. And Esme, of course, is worrying about me, about how I'm coping with all these changes, how I'll feel when I have to confess my lapse to Bella.

Esme loves Bella, but I'm her baby, even though in reality I'm a few Immortal years older than she is.

I sigh, vowing to choose my words more carefully, then glare at Alice in exasperation. "Gah! Never. Bella would hate it." Alice sticks her tongue out at me and sits cross-legged on the floor beside the bed. The family, accustomed to this odd interplay between Alice and myself, ignores us as usual. But they're all so relieved that things are back to normal that the blanket of calm floating over us is almost as potent as if Jasper had interceded.

I look to him with a raised eyebrow. He smiles and shakes his head. Not me, bro. I guess we're all just relieved that Alice is back and Bella is just about done with the pain.

Seventy-four hours and twelve minutes after I'd found Bella lying in a pool of blood at the bottom of the stairs, her heart begins to beat erratically. The screaming, which had abated, has returned with a vigorous intensity. We knew it would, but I fear that if she doesn't open her eyes soon, I will slip into insanity and start sucking my thumb.

The venom has erased microscopic lines on Bella's face, healed the jagged tear in her scalp, knitted the crack in her skull, smoothed the zig-zag scar on her inner arm, and made her hair more lustrous, her skin more radiant, and her complexion as smooth as glass.

Beautiful, she is. Fragile, she is not.

A few minutes later, her heart begins to beat only a few times every minute, finally stopping altogether at 12:59 pm, December 29th, 2006, forever marked as the time of her rebirth.

It's the life that lies sleeping when you think you're awake
Forever is real and the rest is just fake
And though volumes are written on this subject alone
She used three simple words and she brought it all home

Wake up, wake up, wake up, she said,

Wake up dead.