Huge thanks to my dear CoppertopJ and gabby1017, but also to each and every person who has the patience to read and review this story. I can't even explain how much that means to me!
Now let's get moving, this is a chapter I've been eager to write for months!
The erratic pitter-patter of the rain pouring down felt like the worst omen. It started soon after I ran past the Northern border of Anchorage and it hadn't stopped since. Finding a plane to Vancouver proved to be much easier, considering that there were several planes heading there - but that didn't change the fact that I was three hours behind Bella. Three hours in which she had all the time in the world to get further away. It was better than the five hours that would have separated us had I chosen to just run, but it was still not enough.
I was seated next to a pair of college boys who had not seen each other all summer and who were now catching up on what each of them had been doing. Normally, I would have tuned them out and carried on. But they were a little hard to ignore, given the fact that one of them kept telling the other every detail of the story of how he met his dream girl. A few months ago, I would have rolled my eyes at the heated naivety.
But right now, I felt some type of envy as I was listening. He met his girlfriend in a pub, where she was working part-time. When her shift was over, they danced all night and then he walked her home. The rest came naturally. And while this was by no means some grand epic tale of love - it rarely was for humans - its simplicity made me feel inadequate. It made me aware of how I could never have something simple with Bella.
Of course, it was a little presumptuous to think that Bella would even want to see my face again, after the way she left, let alone venturing into anything with me - simple or not. But I couldn't lose my hope, not after I heard her say loud and clear that she loved me too. Her voice saying those sacred words, her lips on mine, her body in my arms - those were the thoughts that kept me from spiraling into madness as the plane took off.
But that damned pitter-patter kept eating at me, like some warped form of Chinese water torture. It was almost mocking my slowness, my failure to reach Bella in time. It reminded me of everything that went wrong. Eventually, it subsided, once the plane broke through the thick cumulonimbus layer. I retreated into my large hoodie - a last-minute buy from the airport, that would soon prove to be very useful, since the sun was getting ready to rise - and kept my head down.
Without the rain pestering me, my body finally started to demand what it needed. The burning in my throat woke up slowly, but surely, triggering a surplus of venom to flood my mouth. Out of instinct, I started scanning the minds around me with a little more caution, hoping to find something alarming. But apart from a man who was contemplating going to the bathroom to get himself off after catching a revealing glimpse of a flight attendant's thigh, nothing got my attention. That, of course, did nothing to soothe my thirst.
Everyone smelled so good and I had not tasted human blood in what felt like forever. Being stuck with their pulsing, hot hearts in such dangerous proximity was an unwelcome challenge. Then the realization struck me: Bella was most likely facing the same issue, perhaps to an even greater extent, considering her lack of experience. I had been so caught up in the fact that we were separated after months of spending every waking moment in each other's presence, that I somehow omitted the most important thing.
If she slipped now, all would be lost. Hell, perhaps she had already slipped - it wasn't like I could know this from where I was sitting. This could so easily get us both in trouble with the Volturi - her for exposing who we were, me for not being careful enough with the vampire I had created. If this happened, I truly had no one to blame but myself. It seemed that I was the root of all evil: in my life, but especially in Bella's too.
Five hours of this and I might just go insane.
With my seat-mates talking incessantly about relationships, the air saturated with the heat of human blood and my brain drunk on dangerous thoughts of Bella and I, the flight dragged slowly, painfully. I didn't flinch through the turbulence that started at some point during the landing process. At that point, anything that could get me to the ground, where I could start searching for Bella, felt right - even a crash landing.
When the plane's wheels finally touched the tarmac, I felt ready to rip the emergency door out of its hinges and run as fast as possible. I felt just as ready to drain the flight attendants who were reminding us to remain seated throughout the interminable taxiing process. It felt like an entire eternity had passed when the plane finally stopped and people started standing up and looking for their bags in the overhead compartments. I stood up immediately, thankful that I had no baggage to delay me.
Thankfully, the light of the dawn was well hidden beneath the thick cloud layer hanging over Vancouver, which prompted me to pull the hood off of my head. A small part of me was aware that I should have been thankful for arriving on time, but I couldn't really feel grateful. Not yet. Once inside the terminal, I instinctively started scanning the minds around me, in a hopeless bid to find out if someone had seen my Bella. Unsurprisingly, nothing of interest showed up.
Another eternity ticked by as I made my way through the terminal. Passing by a pair of security guards, my thirst came back doubled. The veins on their necks called to me and I had to gather all my strength to keep my instincts in check. Instead, I did something that felt more logical - and also more necessary, at the moment.
"Gentlemen, do you have any idea if the Denali-Vancouver flight arrived safely, with no delays?" I asked. "It should have landed three hours ago."
"There have been no delays today yet, so my guess would be 'yes'," one of them responded, the other being a little too distracted thinking about the incoming breakfast to pay any attention to me.
The relief that came after hearing those words was heavenly. Because no delays meant no accidental carnage on Bella's part. I thanked the man and proceeded further, desperate to find a sign that she had been here: a stray whiff of her fragrance, her image in someone's mind, anything. I sampled the air carefully as I passed by the packed duty-free shops. Chocolate, plastic, booze, blood, cologne, leather, sweat - but no sign of Bella.
Through the amalgam of different smells, one in particular felt truly out of place: animal blood. It was dense and a little stale, competing to gain my attention simply by how unfit it was in the middle of everything else. It wasn't the blood of a rat or a cat or a dog either - its musty, corpulent undertones belonged to a wild animal. A mountain lion perhaps. But what would such a creature even do here? In the end, I decided to let it slide, despite the burning in my throat - at this point, even a tiny animal would have been a blessing, but I had a completely different mission.
Passing by a loud family, I inhaled deeply once again - my sense of smell was a friend and a foe at this point. On one hand, I depended on it to lead me on the right path. On the other hand, it was a horrifying reminder that I was starving. With nothing worth noting, I went on, my hope of finding anything useful in this airport growing thinner. But there was still another half of this building that I had not inspected, and I did not want to lose the chance.
The unappealing aroma of fried meats and freshly baked bread notified me that I was getting close to the food court. I was willing to bet that Bella wouldn't even have passed through this area - until the most faded gust of lavender percolated the atmosphere. It disappeared quickly, drowned out by the burned oil of the surrounding kitchens, almost making me believe that it had been nothing but a hallucination, but it was enough to make me pick up my pace.
Then once again, the musty fragrance of wild animal sap made its presence known. Its molecules carried some of Bella's scent too, and it almost drove me wild with need. She had been here. Not so long ago.
The noise around me was almost a buzz now, as I was putting every ounce of my attention into my sense of smell. I passed by several people, trying not to knock them down, scouring everything around me: the herds of travellers, the long fast food lines, the spilled drinks on the floor, the small tables, all of them occupied.
And it was there, at one of those tables, that I saw her.
At first, I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me, because it made no sense for her to still be here, three hours after her landing. Maybe I was going insane and I was simply projecting my own wishes, morphing reality into what I wanted it to be instead of accepting my defeat gracefully. But even if I couldn't see her face, I knew the pattern of her loose, disorderly curls all too well - how they flew freely down her back, only to tangle onto themselves at the ends, in a beautiful act of disobedience. I knew how her hair had unexpected red undertones under the sunlight and how it became just a hint darker under artificial lights. I knew the blue jacket she was wearing - the very same she was wearing when I held her in my arms for the last time, right before she ran away.
If I had tried to keep my cool until then, I could no longer do it. And I didn't give a damn.
I called out her name, ignoring all the heads that turned to me as soon as I opened my mouth. Not darting to her at full speed proved to be a challenge, especially when she finally turned to look at me. I couldn't decipher what the expression on her face meant when our eyes locked. I was taken aback by their colour - I expected them to be pitch black, much like mine, but they were a shade of brown that was eerily similar to the one she had when she was human.
Seemingly out of nowhere, a pair of arms surrounded her shoulders, getting her attention. A closer look made me realize that she was not alone. A girl that couldn't have been much older than either of us was by her side at the table. With short, spiky hair that reminded me of a raven, she looked like a cross between a pixie and a warrior princess. Her thoughts were focused solely on Bella when she murmured a soft 'Go, you're all right' her way - not that I could give them a second look when I saw Bella standing up from her table, turning to face me fully.
A few seconds later, my arms were around her, and her feet were no longer on the floor when I lifted her up. I didn't hold back at all, wrapping her as tightly as possible in my embrace, to the point she would have been ripped in half had she been human, letting the powerful relief of the reunion sheath me fully. Bella was here. And she was safe. And her own arms felt reluctant as they circled my shoulders, but it didn't matter, because she was here.
I murmured her name, again and again - an avowal of my solace.
"I felt so lost without you," I admitted in a breathless whisper, burying my face in the crook of her neck, where I felt most at home.
She didn't say a word, but she did pull my face up, to get me to look at her - and I did. I couldn't guess whether her anger was as intense as it had been in Denali. There were so many things left unspoken between us, all of them floating freely in her brown-clad eyes. One thing, however, felt like a good place to start - and I was more than willing to take the first step.
"I really want to kiss you right now," I said. "Would it be terribly awful if I did?"
She hesitated, but this was not the sweet hesitation of being close again after a fight. Her stalling seemed to be stemming from a different place - a place of fearful betrayal. The understanding of that fact hit me like a hammer and it made me loosen my grip on her, slowly letting her down back on the ground. I still had one lingering hand on her waist when the elfin-like girl from earlier joined us.
"Well, Romeo, you got here just a few minutes earlier than I predicted," she chimed in with a sing-song voice, a little too happy to suit my mood.
"And you are?"
I saw Bella exchanging a quick look with her, sharing the shortest smile before the new girl glanced back at me.
"I'm Alice Cullen. And I'm about to be your favourite sister in the world."
I took another long sip through the black straw, feeling absolutely ridiculous. The barely translucent bottle was halfway full at this point - and it would have been empty seconds after receiving it if I had it my way. The mountain lion blood inside was cold and by no means fresh, but it was a necessary power-up at the moment.
And both Bella and I had to thank Alice for that, for she had brought several of these bottles with her.
Alice Cullen. Adoptive daughter of Esme and Carlisle Cullen, as I had found out. Definitely not my sister, despite her misplaced optimism. Her intense friendliness was a tad frightening - but not as frightening as her power was; or how it manifested itself. Her mind worked like most people's. I could hear a constant inner monologue, as expected. She was awfully focused on all sorts of random aesthetic details: if her avant-garde dress flowed symmetrically down her body, how Bella's jacket was a little ripped at the side, how my hair looked too disheveled. But every once in a while, the monologue got interrupted by sudden, bright flashes.
These flashes were not memories, nor figments of her imagination. It took me a little while to understand that they were small pieces of the future. The first time it happened I saw myself and Bella laying in an unknown bed, our hands on each other's faces, our bodies keeping a safe distance. The second time it was something more insignificant, but all the more telling: a brief shot of Alice freaking out over getting her outfit stained by spilled coffee, merely a minute before a waitress tripped while carrying a tray of freshly-brewed espressos. Alice had already moved her seat further away from the impact area, saving her clothes just in time.
"Interesting," I observed.
"I see things before they happen," she shrugged, as if it was the most natural thing in the world to do.
I raised an eyebrow, taking another generous sip of blood.
"Just like you can read my mind, right?" Alice added.
"How do you know this?"
"Please, Bella and I had plenty of time to catch up. And I knew about this from Carlisle anyway."
I left the bottle back on the table, feeling as if my head was going to explode. Seeing Bella again was the only thing I had hoped for throughout my run and my plane ride. I had prepared myself for a generous range of scenarios: for her to curse me when she saw me again, for her to slap me, for her to kiss me. But not for her to be accompanied by the daughter of those who had been, at one point, my parents.
"I'm going to need a few more explanations, Alice," I sighed. "For instance, I thought Carlisle's family was in Granite Falls. Why are you here?"
"He's just as grumpy as in my visions. Cute."
"Our family is in Granite Falls," she clarified. "I'm alone here. I wanted to bring Jasper along, but he is having a hard time being around humans, with him being the newest vegetarian and an empath."
"Jasper?"
"Oh, yes, my husband and my mate. I'm sorry, I've been having so many visions with you lately, that I feel like you know everybody already. You'll love him."
Her brain conjured the face of a blonde man with warm honey eyes, whose jaw and neck were covered in thin scars. In the deep recesses of her mind, I saw another image: me and him, rushing at full speed through a forest I didn't know and simply laughing. The second image disappeared all too quickly, as Alice shook her head and went on.
"As I was saying, they're all home. They think I'm a little crazy for coming all the way here, but it is exactly how it was supposed to happen."
"What do you mean by that?" I demanded, feeling myself getting a little restless. The fact that Bella was right by my side, yet she felt so far away, was a little distracting. I searched for her hand under the table, but she kept her palms pressed to her thighs, not moving one inch, not even when I traced the contour of her wrist with my finger. Clearly, I was not welcome there, so I retreated.
Would I ever be welcome again? The possibility of the answer to that question being 'no' made me shudder with dread.
"Where do I even begin with this? Rose's birthday, I suppose. I guess that's when it all began."
"I'm listening," I assured her, having no clue whoever Rose was.
"All right," she said. "It wasn't until the end of August that I saw either of you - and even then, it was all… foggy. You see, having visions of someone you have never truly met can be next to impossible. It's why I could never tell Carlisle and Esme what you, Edward, were up to, whenever they asked."
"And oh, did they ask a lot…"
"Wait," I interrupted. "They… wanted to know about me?"
"Of course they did, they still consider you their son. But with us never having met and you being nowhere near in the future of our family... it used to be impossible to even catch a glimpse of you."
"Until August," Bella added softly.
"Until August," Alice smiled her way, and it was clear as day that Bella knew this story already. "That's when I had my first vision of you."
I said nothing, as I was still trying to recover from finding out that Carlisle and Esme kept asking about me after all these years. I couldn't recognize the feeling that was being born in my chest. It was sweet and bitter at the same time, walking the fine balance between relief and remorse.
"It was Rose's birthday - Rose is our sister by the way," Alice clarified, using the word 'our' with way too much ease. "We were celebrating her birthday a little later than usual, because she had been away on holiday with Emmett - oh, you'll love Emmett!"
There was so much enthusiasm behind every word she said, and I wished there was a way to reciprocate it, but my mind wouldn't let me. Bella was now silently studying a strand of her hair and I would have gladly paid a fortune to know what went through her head as she did this.
"The vision hit me before Rosalie got to open her first present. Usually I can go about my day when I have a vision, but that one… it was powerful. I couldn't ignore it. It was nothing huge, just you two arriving at our house, but it felt different somehow, as if there was something greater, deeper behind it. And of course I recognized Edward from the pictures, but Bella… I had never seen her before. She was a surprise."
"That was the last night we went to our pond," I told Bella, carefully nudging her knee with mine, hoping to get at least a smile from her. She didn't react.
"This seemingly simple vision kept coming back, each time adding a new little piece to the puzzle," Alice explained.
Then with her mind, she showed me what her words couldn't - one vision after the other, explaining everything that led her to this strange meeting: Bella and I arriving in Denali; Bella on a mountain crest with William, his hands on her waist, her hands pushing him away; my confession, in all its abominable glory; Bella leaving and catching the first plane to Vancouver; me following right after her; Alice waiting for Bella in the airport.
And I realized - Alice had truly seen everything. Even before she got to meet either of us, she knew we would somehow cross paths. Not only that, but going from the little snippets of the future she had seen, there was more coming: a rush of embraces as soon as Carlisle and Esme saw me again; a piano and a song I had never heard before; Bella and Esme on a couch, talking.
The later visions were blurrier, almost making me question their accuracy, but they existed nonetheless.
"This is incredible," I admitted. "Seeing everything like that…"
"I know," Alice agreed, with no modesty in her voice. "I can't imagine living without knowing what happens next."
"Of course, unlike us, simple plebs."
She laughed out loud at my tongue-in-cheek remark. I was hoping Bella would laugh too, but her gaze was lost somewhere in the distance.
"Tell him how you met the Cullens," she said, grabbing her own bottle from the table and draining the remaining blood through the thin straw.
"Oh, of course, that's a fun story!"
With an excitement that would have been contagious in other circumstances, she started narrating the events that led her to the Cullens. It all began when she woke up with no memories whatsoever of her human life and no clue about her creator, near a mental health asylum in 1920. The thirst was a most commanding memory - but so was her first vision. Jasper's face was the first piece of the future she had ever seen. Her uncanny gift made her realize that she had a mate before she even knew his name. Soon after, a vision of them living together with a clan of vampires, drinking nothing but animal blood, showed her what her life could be.
It took her decades to perfect her control, to reign in her lust for human blood. It wasn't until 1948 that she and Jasper met in a diner, where sparks flew instantly. Two years after that, they officially met the Cullens - all four of them: Carlisle, Esme, Rosalie and Emmett. Their arrival had taken everyone aback - especially the girl named Rosalie, who had to give up her vanity room to make room for the newcomers - but it didn't take them long at all to get used to each other. Esme always had room in her heart for more love. Carlisle loved with deep admiration any vampire who managed to rise above their condition. Nobody else joined the family afterwards, leaving their little clan of six to wander around the world, as the decades passed and they had to move from one place to another.
The Cullens seemed to have a pattern, one that didn't exist when I was around. They had learned to exist among humans for longer than a few years at a time. Ten years had been the longest they stayed anywhere, according to Alice. Carlisle and Esme pretended to be the adoptive parents of the younger members of the family; the idea itself seemed a little farcical - after all, they were ridiculously young for that charade to work. Alice, Jasper, Rosalie and Emmet went to highschool at first. Then they headed to college. Throughout all this, Carlisle worked as a doctor, while Esme stayed at home, working on interior designs. No one else joined their coven, but there was no need to - because from what I could see from Alice's memories, they were doing pretty damn amazing on their own.
I didn't know what to make of all this. A part of me found comfort in the fact that Carlisle's and Esme's world hadn't stopped moving after my leaving - they deserved to be happy, that much I knew. But a smaller, more egotistical side of me felt left out, because I realized just how much I had been missing out on throughout my years of being away. Alice seemed pleased with the life she was living, no real worry looming over her head. I wondered for a bit what that would look like.
A life without worries meant a life in which Bella could look past my mistakes and accept my love. I had been so caught up in keeping up with my lies that we never got the chance to enjoy each other without obeying to a label that did not encompass the magnitude of what we meant for each other. For countless reasons, that I now regretted, I had never taken her out on a proper date. I knew about all the little places she had never been to and I wanted to take her wherever her heart pleased more than anything - to the opera, in the middle of the desert, to the British countryside, on an island… so many places, so many chances, all of them lost for the sake of my ego.
"It's an incredible story," I sighed after Alice finished, trying to escape my own mental torment. "And an incredible bond you all have."
"It's too soon to hug him. But he's my brother! No, I'll calm down, he still considers me a stranger," her string of thoughts continued erratically, visions of a future in which I ruffled her hair playfully clashing with how she saw me now: tense, with my hands clenched into fists and a deep frown darkening my gaze.
"You're not a stranger," I offered, making an effort to change my posture and smile. "You're a bit of a manic elf, but I can deal with that."
A grin spread on her face and I returned it sincerely - but my brittle repose crashed when I realized that Bella was back to staring in the distance. Right as I was searching for the right words to get her to talk to me in private, Alice stood up from the table, already having seen my intention.
"I'll go fix my lipstick and then we can go?" she asked.
"Where are we going?"
"Home, of course. Everyone's expecting you."
I glanced up at Bella and she nodded, looking a little more alive than a few seconds ago.
"Yes, let's do that," she added out loud and I could not contradict her - if the home of the Cullens was where Bella wanted to be, that was where we were going. "And wait, I'll join you… with the lipstick thing."
"Lipstick is a private affair, so you remain seated, girl," Alice chirped and glided gracefully away from us and into the crowd of travellers.
For a few seconds, I didn't know whether to thank her or curse her for leaving me alone with Bella. On one hand, having some privacy was exactly what I wanted. On the other hand, Bella was so clearly bothered by everything I was doing, that it made me feel as if I was walking on the thinnest eggshells as I was trying to come up with something to break the ice. In the end, I knew there was no right or wrong thing to say - not at this point anyway, since I had already disappointed her to an incomprehensible degree.
"Can we talk?" I tried.
"I've got nothing to say to you."
"I happen to have a lot of things to say to you."
"You should've figured that out a little earlier."
The ice in her voice left no room for compromises.
"I… absolutely agree. But I hate this, Bella. I don't want us to be like this. Why did you run away from me?"
She seemed to ponder for a bit, before answering me.
"Because I don't know how to deal with… all this mess."
"So you'll ignore me for the foreseeable future?"
"I'm not ignoring you, for God's sake!" she burst out, her eyes flying to meet mine. Finally. "I needed space to think, Edward. I think I still do. I don't know… it's all so confusing."
"What's confusing?"
"A few days ago you would've died on that friends with benefits hill. And last night… it changed everything, in the blink of an eye. I feel like I don't know you anymore."
As gently as I could, fighting my own desperation, I grabbed one of her hands and captured it in between my palms. The warmth of that touch made it difficult to concentrate on what I was going to say next, but not impossible.
"Bella, I love you. I love you today and I loved you a few days ago and I will love you for the rest of my days, even if you decide to keep me at a distance. I know I deserve this, after how I played with your expectations. And I'm sorry, so incredibly sorry for what I've done to you… to us. There's really no taking back my mistakes, so I don't expect you to forgive me easily, or at all, but… it would be an absolute honour if you allowed me to just be by your side, to pick up the pieces."
In the distance, I heard the sharp sound of Alice's heels. Bella looked at our connected hands, before moving her eyes back to my face.
"I love you too," she said. "Still doesn't change everything else."
Alice reached us before I could say anything else. Bella's words loitered in the air, heavy and poignant, settling into my conscience. She removed her hand from between my palms, grabbed the bottles on the table and stood up.
"Ready to meet everyone?" Alice trilled, grabbing her waist.
No. That was the least of my worries right now.
"Let's go," I said, avoiding to sweeten the reality with a lie, despite the temptation. I had done enough lying to last me a lifetime.
Once outside, a light autumn rain started soaking our clothes, as Alice led the way to her car. For the second time that day, I could not escape the fear that this was no ordinary rain.
It was a harbinger of trouble.
All right, no cliffhangers this time around, especially after the last two chapters!
You know how much I looove reading and responding to your reviews, and this time is no exception! I can't wait to find out what you've thought of this chapter :).
Were you excited to see Alice?
Do you think Bella will forgive Edward anytime soon?
Are you ready to meet the Cullens?
Now, a little announcement: a few days ago I won two awards for my newest story, "The Devil Next Door", if you can believe it! I won the "Best Dirty Talk" and "Cliffhanger Queen" awards in the Bodice Ripper's Contest.
So if you don't mind extremely filthy stories, go check it out and let me know if you like it! There are two more chapters coming the next few days, since everything is already written. Once "Stuck in Limbo" is finished, I might turn "The Devil Next Door" into something more, so stick around ;)!
Until next time, stay safe and happy!