Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight.
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"Tell you what, darlings, you are free to go and browse the books while I find the perfect bottle to gift Carlisle for Christmas. I will meet you back here when I am done."
They had found the first drive through car wash after driving past two self-service ones (Bella intuitively sensing they were categorically out of the question, the bright human), gotten their car back to its former pristine condition and decided to take a little pause in their journey to Forks to 'stretch their legs' for a bit after the two hour drive and follow the example of the masses of scurrying humans, which were milling around the streets and stores, getting the last of their Christmas shopping done.
Bella had expressed her wish to visit the bookshop they had driven past earlier while Aro, having seen the quaint liquor store near the coast, was struck by inspiration (and a credible excuse to finally find a meal for himself) to gift Carlisle with a bottle of wine, for old times' sake. After all, it was a common and appropriate human custom to gift wine when visiting friends, was it not? And Fate, did he know exactly how much Carlisle loved to play human. Even so, Aro easily recalled Carlisle indulging in raiding the Castle's wine cellars together with him or his brothers on one hundred and fifty-nine occasions during his twenty year long stay in Volterra. It would be a most excellent gift for Carlisle, a warm reminder, of sorts, of their time well spent together, close to three centuries ago.
"Sounds good to me." Seemed like Bella had a genuine sweet tooth for books. She'll fall in love with their library in Volterra, he had not the slightest doubt about it.
Presently, they were standing on the pavement by their blood red car (Bella had parked in a conveniently empty space on the street right in front of the windows of 'Port Book and News') and discussing their plans of splitting up.
"Alright. Bella, I'll keep you company, if you don't mind. Uncle can get lost all by himself looking for a drink in this cosy little town." Even though Renata went along with this splendidly, Aro could see she was not comfortable with him wandering off alone by himself, looking for a meal. Sometimes she allowed her fears to override common sense (or she just loved him too much and was worried about him. Constantly). However, there was good reason she had been brought along with him.
"I shall not take longer than half an hour."
Too quietly for the human to hear, Renata whispered, "Please, be careful, Master."
"You worry too much, darling." He pressed a quick kiss to her cheek, and then to Bella's warmer one (and was rewarded with a muffled squeak of surprise and a lovely tangerine scented crimson blush) and set out in the direction of the ocean and the liquor store he had seen a few minutes earlier.
The store in question was located practically by the ocean side and he reached it (at a human pace, of course) in no time at all, gliding through the herd which immediately and unconsciously parted in his way. The sun had been shining through the partly clouded sky for the last hour, since one o'clock, so he had plenty of time (not that he needed more than a single moment) to make sure venom had retracted from the immediate outer layer of his skin. (As had Renata. Evidently). It was a very old practice, he had gotten the idea from a monk in his sixty second year of his immortal life, when he was still adapting to his new existence, and had decided to 'see the sights' with his sis-.
Anyway.
It was all to do with reaching a particular state of mind when intentional mental manipulation and pure will transcended to tangible changes in the physical body. When one became the master of the monster within, not the other way around. When one controlled the bloodlust, not the other way around. Existence became much more pleasurable, when a vampire became the master of their bloodlust and not its slave.
It did wonders to the quality of their immortal life, when one mastered complete power over the venom that infused all vampire bodies. The essence of vampirism. The poison of and the cure to Death, the Elixir of Immortality. For it was truly a magnificent piece of Magic and thus not limited to the most basic things such as turning humans and… turning humans. Fate have mercy on the unenlightened souls because that's about all some vampires ever imagined and thus believed their venom could accomplish.
Truth be told, he'd met many, many an individual of his kind over his long existence, and the vast majority, most between the ages of two to four hundred (some more intuitive vampires within the first decades), had figured the truth out for themselves sooner or later, with more or less instruction. How not to let the venom react to and reflect direct rays of sun, for starters.
It was not that hard, not really. He and Did- they learned the basics, such as consciously changing the concentration of the venom in the outer surface of their bodies in under a year (about ninety-seven per cent reduction of venom from the skin tissue had to be achieved, meaning no shiny disco balls all over the place, they looked 'perfectly ordinary', if a tad pale, but it posed no real side effect to the invulnerability of the body, as the venom was right there, just a bit further inside, which made all the difference in terms of not being in a committed relationship with glitter).
It was practically second nature for him to not sparkle in the sun or to bite humans without releasing venom or create a sort of anti-venom by filtering the venom's essence, which allowed to seal flesh wounds, without the risk of the human starting the transformation, to release a natural anaesthetic in the venom, which allowed a vampire turning to be completely painless… etcetera etcetera.
He had mastered the art to perfection in a decade. His sist- she did it in eight years. (It had taken a lot of trial and error, a lot of meditation and countless humans). The basics could be learnt in a year, if one had a good teacher and the willingness to succeed. The younger ones did not know better, especially if their sires were absent, young themselves, or were, for some reason, unwilling to share the knowledge, or did not possess it in the first place. Some just did not have the patience or the temperament. Like Felix, that good for nothin-
Some thought it was impossible, only a fairy tale, told in deep shadows of a sunny day. And never really tried.Sloths. The lot of them.
Anyway.
He opened the door to the unassuming establishment and suddenly found himself gently catching an armful of a divinely smelling human (she smelled like ozone and pine tree needles in a chilly spring morning, so very alike fresh air) and a bottle of 1998 Chateau Margaux, Bordeaux, France from a sure death by concrete, in his gloved hands.
"Careful." He chided in a pleasantly sweet voice. The human had yet to fully register what had happened, or had almost happened.
"Oh, shoot! I'm so very sorry, sir! It was completely my fault." The dark haired Native American? girl looked up to him with a grateful smile on her half-scarred face, "Thank you for catch-" the human fell silent, the words and her smile dying on her lips as recognition bled into fear in her eyes for a fraction of a second before she promptly extracted herself from his grasp and muttered a quiet "Sorry" and quickly headed to the parking lot beside the little wine shop.
Without her bottle. Who did that? Leave their wine in the hands of perfect strangers.
"Tut-tut." Aro shook his head. Children these days.
She had almost reached the door of her light blue vehicle, feverishly fumbling with her car keys when he darted with inhuman speed (there were no other people around, strange, as well as any security cameras in sight) and stepped right in between the girl and her car door.
This only seemed to frighten the human more, as she let out a strangled scream and ran the opposite direction – to the oceanfront.
A scared, fleeing human, one whose blood smelled sublimely… Of all the things a dreadfully parched vampire had to deal with on a sunny Wednesday afternoon…
He picked up the keys she had dropped in her haste to get away, leisurely unlocked the door and set her freshly purchased bottle of red wine on the passenger seat. Then he put the keys in the ignition. Perfect.
He let her get away as far as the shoreline. Before instantly appearing in front of her, resulting in her stopping in her tracks as not to collide with him, for the second time. (He was so fast, no one could dream of seeing him move with a naked, half blind human eye. It would seem as if he had materialised out of thin air.)
She looked positively terrified. All wide eyes and cold sweat. How very… The Christmas Mystery.
Aro tilted his head to one side and unnecessarily voiced, "You know what I am."
The girl stood frozen before him. Silent as a grave. "Answer me."
"Vampire. You're a v-vampire." she whispered, terrified.
"Good. Now… tell me. Why is it that you know about my kind? Are you spoken for? Is that way?" he was slowly gliding closer to the frightened human girl, who was by now paralysed by her fear of him.
"I. I'm -" It was clear the girl did not, in fact, catch his drift.
"Ah. I've frightened you. I should apologise but…" Aro gave the girl a lazy smile. "You should not be privy to this information, young lady. It's supposed to be a secret, you know. But… worry not." Aro modulated his voice to inhabit a reassuring note. "I'll just take a quick look. It will save us both some time and… trouble."
Aro lifted his gloved hand to his mouth and, using his razor sharp, glistening teeth to carefully hold the black glove still, freed his right hand and quickly pocketed the glove in his coat. The girl was petrified, her eyes widened in silent horror.
Usually, the prey started to experience real, consuming fear only when his teeth were already buried in their throats. This little display of perfect terror only strengthened his resolve to find answers to this minor curiosity. Such Wonderful Christmas Time He Was Having This Year. Full of unexpected surprises. (Note to self: Should travel more often. He'd missed out on a lot, it seemed.)
He slowly neared his palm to her face and saw the exact moment when she was about to let out a shrill-
"Scream and I'll rip your throat out." Aro kindly and matter of factly informed her.
Fortunately, that did the trick. The scream died before it could be heard by anyone. No necessary attention drawn to them, for now.
His right palm softly enclosed the unscarred side of her face, which was still very warm despite the fact her blood had retreated deeper in her body. He could feel her pulse racing, her body trembling under his touch. So very afraid. Out of her mind with fright. (She reminded him of that large (compared to normal feline standards) grey coated Maine coon specimen he had seen five years ago in Milan when Jane had dragged him to yet another cat exhibition. The miserable creature had been faring rather poorly and had been visibly shaking in the owner's arms, out of its mind with fright, despite the reassuring nonsense that had spilled from the human's mouth. Its eyes completely round-
He was maintaining eye contact with the human (she too had pure black coloured eyes, similar to his current shade, a true rarity to be found in this time anymore, and he saw himself reflected in her orbs, sun shining on his white skin and in his blue hair, into his similarly deep black eyes, but not lingering there, registered his slight crimson smile, his curious expression), but at the same time saw her life, permanently engraved in her unconscious mind, play 'behind' his eyes. He has had so very-awfully-unimaginably-madly-long time to perfect his gift. All the boring, quotidian happenings of her life was brushed over but still scanned diligently for anything interesting or suspicious; however, this time he was paying a smidgeon closer attention to her thoughts, for he should not miss (as if that was even a possibility) a thing.
(She was Native American, just as he'd predicted, 21 years old, an only child, recently returned to the reservation of La Push where the Quileute people lived, after finishing college, had been told the legends by her tribe's elders, passed down to the younglings, of cold shiny things that would eat her people on sight, of wolves (not the real ones, something different-) that changed back into their fathers and brothers and uncles and cousins and protected their people from the Cold Ones. Her finding out very recently that it was All True (well, to an extent, he supposed) as one of the wolves claimed he had imprinted (such a peculiar a notion) on her and professed his undying, forever and ever and ever-ever-lasting love to her, right before losing his temper and leaving forever and ever and ever-ever-lasting claw marks on her beautiful face.
"Emily Young." Her heart spiked and eyes widened in surprise.
"Do you know what happened to My Darling, Emily Young?" he asked as if discussing the weather.
"N-no."
"No. Of course, you don't. How could you? She was killed, you see, bitten, really, by a werewolf."
The young woman's already sprinting heart began to race even faster. Fear was thickening the air around them and made her very clean smelling blood all the more sweeter for it.
"That's right." he grinned, showing off his razor sharp teeth. "It was 1903. December. Just as it is now. My sweet darling wife and her friend, her sister really, were attacked by a group of werewolves. Five against two. Not the fairest of odds… Do you agree? " he was still looking in the girl's eyes and after a long moment she nodded. Aro began to nod along her.
"I thought you might. The wolves, not the overgrown puppies you have play in your backyard, the real werewolves, the Children of the Moon, we call them… They were seeking revenge, you see." The girl was looking in his eyes, as if hypnotised. He knew the girl will be able to recount this quaint little encounter of theirs to the smallest detail; to the very last word spoken (if she lived to tell the tale, that is; he was still undecided and so. very. hungry).
"But, My Darling and her friend. They were innocent. They were not the ones to be taken revenge against."
"Nevertheless, they managed to eliminate all of the wolves, two against five, but in the very end, My Darling was bitten, while saving her friend." He was recounting the dreadful event like a congenial professor, whilst the horrifying memory he had glimpsed from Athenodora and Sulpicia both, played round and round and around in the back of his mind.
Swirling.
"I confess I've never liked dogs much since." Her breath caught in her throat. Bella did that a lot too, quite often. But Bella wasn't scared. She did it for a different reason altogether, didn't she? "So now you see. My dilemma."
He drew her in, flush against him and leaned down, tilting his head so that he could lightly press his lips to the silky skin of her delicate throat.
"…Don't. Please. Please-"
"I am tempted." Aro drew his face up and quietly spoke in her ear, after inhaling a lungful of pine needle and ozone fragrance that permeated her refreshingly smelling blood. "To take you away from him."
Aro exhaled a sigh.
"Just the same as My Darling had been taken from me by those wolves, only a hundred years ago. Barely a moment ago." He could hear her heart drumming heavily in her chest. The partial cloud cover was doing a poor job of keeping the sun at bay, and the beach was lit in sunlight. Any observers would think them lovers, enjoying a rare sunny afternoon this Fate forsaken place was graced with from time to time.
"What to do, what to do… with you."
"Please." It was spoken so softly and so quietly. So desperately. If he was not what he was, he wouldn't have been able to hear her.
"I hear you, sweet girl. You and your Sam are very lucky I am not inclined on stealing you away from this world today." For the girl had been a fount of information about the Quileute legends of the Cold Ones, the Tribe, Vampires in Forks, white skin sparkling in sunlight, bias about Carlisle Cullen the new doctor in Forks Community Hospital, Charlie Swan spending this Christmas with his best friend Billy Black at the reservation (good to know), the shifter gene, so many vampires at Forks at once, Leeches, not myths after all, the Treaty, Ephraim Black, The Treaty … Someone's been very naughty, Carlisle, the faces and names of every member of the shifter tribe, and, perhaps, the most crucial one yet – the fact she did not despise him or vampires in general, for what they were, for their very nature, she did not condemn or hate his kind on principle like so many of her people did. She feared them, was terrified of being drained dry by one of them, but hadn't told their secret to a soul outside of her people…
She understood, unbelievably so, but still true. Perhaps he should reward such open-mindedness…
"For you too are an innocent, are you not, sweet girl?" He drew back and looked in her tearful eyes. "You mean so much to him, I could see. As much as My Darling meant to me."
"But... I am still so very hungry. I haven't had a drop of blood for a month." Aro softly traced her delicate cheekbone, just below her left eye. "You'll allow me to take a little from you, won't you? I promise, I don't need much."
A single tear finally spilled over, for her eyes were swimming in them, and rolled down her paled cheek. Which he promptly caught and brushed away with his thumb. So very, very afraid.
Intoxicating.
"Will you allow me this, dear? I promise to do you no harm. You'll be free to go… Momentarily." Honestly, the girl had only two options here. He would drink from her or he would drink from her and kill her. She just had to choose right. It was that simple.
She looked to him as if staring death in the eye, which she was, in an abstract way, if he chose to look at it in this way.
Her Angel of Death, she called him in her mind (she was not the first and won't be the last to liken him to that particular Divine Being. For he was so otherworldly beautiful to her human eyes, and brought only death to her kind, as far as she knew).
The girl nodded her assent, almost imperceptibly, but he saw without difficulty, heard without difficulty, her muted agreement.
"Thank you, dear. It won't hurt. Much." Aro wickedly teased and made a deep incision in her left outer carotid artery with a very sharp nail (so scalpel-like and the action so swift the girl did not even comprehend he had done anything to her already) and immediately pressed his lips over the wound and allowed the warm, sweet, ozone and pine needle flavoured blood to flood his mouth and throat.
He gently pressed the trembling girl even closer to him; her hands had cramped in his coat lapels in a feeble, unconscious attempt to stop what was happening. Aro tangled his right hand in her soft hair, his left on the small of her back, in a perfect lovers' embrace, and allowed himself to take two more long blissful mouthfuls of the delicious red redredredredred essence of life that coursed through her veins, nothing that would harm the human; even less than a donation at a blood bank would have drawn from her.
In his third and last mouthful of her uniquely flavoured blood, he sucked away any venom that may have tried to surreptitiously seep into her blood-stream and consciously released the coagulant part of the venom and the anaesthetic (vampire venom was not exactly a pleasant substance for humans, even in its altered form) after swallowing the toxic one (to her), which would initiate the change, and licked the wound on her neck shut. It sealed over instantly and flawlessly, right before his eyes. Excellent work.
Mouth still full with venom in its alternate state, he regarded her terrified face and made a split second decision; he swiftly and precisely scratched her face over the ugly claw marks (the girl let out an unbidden scream of pain that he quickly smothered with his right palm), completely reopening the healed scars and momentarily licked the bleeding wounds on her face closed shut.
The girl whimpered and he cradled her head to his chest, "Hush, child."
After a short moment, all that was left on her neck and on the right side of her face in place of the damaged flesh was a lighter toned, perfectly smooth skin, which needed only a bit of sun for the difference to disappear completely. Very excellent work.
Aro took her head in his hands and lightly brushed the black hair away from her face.
"There." The girl was visibly shaking; the shock finally setting in. "As good as new."
He leaned in and with a smile on his lips, whispered in her ear, "You tasted wonderful, dear."
Finally, he released her and took three steps back from the frozen human, "Perhaps Fate will have us meet again. Run along now. Emily Young."
It was as if a switch had been flipped, because the human finally let the adrenaline take over and bolted from the sandy beach to the parking lot, where her car had been beckoning her all this time. Hopefully, she won't be so stupid as to attempt to drive her vehicle in her current state. It would be such an unfortunate turn of events, her driving off a cliff or into a ditch somewhere (or rather an exceptionally delicious meal wasted for no good reason, Aro).
Aro slipped his hand in his coat pocket and withdrew Renata's generously obtained box of deep black contacts from the HQ, specifically designed to withhold the damaging effects of venom for up to two weeks. Their company did research not only for humans (that would be such an absurd waste of resources); Valerian Inc. was in excellent position to study vampire biology as well. Another reason Carlisle's continued silence continued to continuously (bother) perplex him. Because, at the end of the night, Carlisle was a friend. Sometimes vampires went even centuries without hearing from each other while not experiencing a loosening of their established bonds to each other in the slightest. So what had happened?)
He carefully inserted one pair of lenses and blinked. He hated having these things in his eyes. They were the best there was, but still reminded of their presence for a few minutes, before his subconscious took over and made him forget all about them. (A timer, however, was always ticking in a separate train of thought at the back of his mind, counting down minutes, so that he did not forget to replace them, when time eventually run short).
He felt so much better already.
Honesty time! - really old vampires, like him, did not need much blood. A few sips from a human once every two weeks would do. That, of course, did not mean that they (vampires, even five (give or take a few) millennia year old ones, like him) did not indulge, regularly. Sometimes it was the opposite. He could grow so depressed-
-bored and tired of eating the same thing all over and over again and again and again…, he did it only when hunger forced his 'fangs'. Like now. But she was a truly delicious one. He'd gotten lucky. Or was it Fate, playing favourites again?
A ping sounded from his blackberry phone and he retrieved it to open a new message… from Renata.
We're at the hospital. Olympic Medical Center.
Please don't kill me. Renata.
Aro closed his eyes and slowly counted to one hundred and seventy-four in his mind. Slipped the phone back in his pocket and set out for the liquor store. For future reference: Refrain from jinxing himself so often.
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Aro walked through the automatic sliding glass doors of the hospital in hurried steps. He quickly observed the lobby and all of the thirty-two waiting humans and hurrying nurses, as well as the receptionist behind the desk a little further down the hall, right before the stairs, lifts and a Very Important Looking Door that led to the emergency rooms. It was exactly the same as from Patrick's memories (he had taken the liberty of surreptitiously gleaning the full map of the city from the wine shop owner's memories and now knew the locations of all the important buildings and places in this petite town), except for a huge, ugly decorated fake Christmas tree with neon blue lights that was placed in the left corner from the main entrance he'd just stepped through.
Aro quickly approached the receptionist. She looked slightly overworked with the evident increase of injured humans, a very common occurrence during the Christmas holiday season, statistically speaking.
She lifted her eyes to him but froze as her brain seemed to short circuit for a beat. They were such pitiful creatures. Humans. Pretty face, sweet smile and nice shoes and they all lost their modicum of marbles.
"Merry Christmas… Cynthia."
"Hey…Uh.. H-hello. Sir." A smidgeon of professionalism regained. Fantastic. "What can I do for you Mr…?" The receptionist leaned forward and twirled a lock of her bleached blond hair around her finger.
Aro gave her a small, indulging, but, at the same time, nervous smile.
"Swan. I just got the call that my niece, Isabella Swan, has been admitted here. I came as soon as I heard."
"Let me check… Swan…Sw… Oh, yes. I remember now, the girl was brought in around twenty minutes ago, unconscious, with her arm broken." Broken arm. A broken arm?
"A broken arm?" he did not even need to fake his disbelief.
"And a possible concussion," he's going to kill Renata. He was gone for thirty minutes. How hard could it possibly be to guard one tiny little human for thirty minutes? After all, she did it all the time to him. What had happened?
"What happened?" He couldn't believe 'the curse of hastened death' had already activated, this early. The girl had not even figured them out, not properly. Likely she just had a healthy amount of questions and suspicions about them. Unbelievable. It hasn't even been a full day yet, for Fate's sake.
"She fell down the stairs from the second floor of a bookshop. Such an awful accident. Right before Christmas too."
"¡Dios Santo!" he even crossed himself. "Can I see her?"
"Of course, if you're family." She seemed uncertain, and he was running out of patience. Didn't he say already? Suddenly he was dearly reminded of the lovely Ms Camilli's high professionalism. That girl was a gem. Unlike-
"I'm her uncle." He repeated slower this time, which prompted a blush to rise on her face.
"Oh! Right… of course. Um, right through those doors, sir. She should be in one of the ERs, Mr Sw-"
"Thank you, Cynthia."
He found Bella and Renata soon after. Bella's forearm had already been set and stitches were being carefully placed over bruised and broken skin by an orthopaedic doctor in a white lab coat. Behind the doctor on the opposite wall was a led screen on which an x-ray of a left forearm with a cleanly broken ulna was displayed for all to see.
Bella was half-sitting, half-resting on the hospital bed with her eyes closed and breathing evenly through the whole procedure, although… an IV drip had been put in her other arm and- was that morphine he was smelling in her blood?
Aro quietly sat beside Renata (the doctor throwing him a quick glance before refocusing on finishing the stitches) and carefully took Bella's warm, uninjured hand with his own, colder one. This prompted Bella to open her eyes and show fully blown pupils. Oh, dear.
"Aro!" Bella's face split into a sunny smile, "You're here! You made it!" she giggled.
"I did, my dear." He gently squeezed her hand. "I even brought wine." He nodded to Carlisle's Christmas present of a 1998 Chateau Margaux, Bordeaux, France that he'd placed in the empty seat beside him.
"How did this happen?" he asked Renata, but Bella answered before Renata could manage to utter a word-
"St'mbl'd on books and flew down the stairs! 't was fan-fucking-tassstic! You should try it, Aro! No, wait, we can try it together!"
"I already know how to fly, angel." The girl snorted, Renata stilled and the doctor drew her eyes from her work on Bella's arm to him and slightly lifted an amused eyebrow. He could almost hear the "Do you, now?"
"'Course you do. You're purrrr'fffect." The girl slurred. "You an' your stupid blue hair," how could she tell his hair was blue? humans usually couldn't tell the difference , "and your fuckin' gorgeous eyes…" The doctor's eyebrows kept climbing higher and higher, as did her amusement. "… And your stupid… amazing… purr'fume." the human sniffled. "And your perfect ass, and-" Aro covered her mouth with his palm.
"Isabella. We get the picture." He gently smiled at her. As amusing her unfiltered speech was and as pleasant it was to finally get a glimpse of what the human thought about him his appearance, he had a feeling she will be beyond mortified once the drugs finally wore off.
"Aro. It happened so fast, I turned away for one second, and Bella had already fallen all the way down… " Renata looked so very guilty and embarrassed. As she should. She'll never live this down, once the Guard hears about this, "and then she just fainted."
"Blood makes me sq- sque- squeamish." Say what now? Squeamish? Squeamish? From blood? Blood?! He wasn't sure what his face was doing but it must have looked exceptionally funny.
"Did… I break… your brain, Aro?" the girl laughed.
"Oh, shush, dear. Of course, you did not. I just. Did not know that about you. You continue to surprise me, is all."
"It's em- embarrrr-assing." Bella began to sniffle again; the doctor started on the last stitch. "I'm such a- a k-kl-klutz." And big crocodile tears started to stream down her cheeks.
"Don't cry, angel. It was no fault of yours." He brushed away the tears from her face. He was doing this a lot recently. What has his life become. Caius would be rolling on the floor and making a dashing imitation of a laughing hyena … "Just a tiny accident. Could have happened to anybody."
"Don't lie," her voice broke on the word 'lie', "It's the fif-fifth time I've had an an arm brok-en... and God knows which 'cussion."
"All done. And you don't have a concussion, sweetheart. We checked." The doctor started to clear away the medical instruments, "It's just your arm that's busted, this time."
"I'm s-so sorry. I didn't mean-"
"Bella. It's alright. Nobody's blaming you. It was an accident."
"This happen often?" The doctor asked as she opened one of the cabinets and extracted a white box after perusing the labels of at least ten of them.
"Um. Yeah. More or less. Once… I fell out of the second floor window of my bedroom. This is not. Not so bad, in comparison…"
"Dio Cristo, Bella." It seemed Renata had slightly underestimated the challenge that was keeping this highly accident prone human unharmed.
"I'm sorry for being so much trouble," the human looked to Renata and to him with sad, red eyes. "You're probably regretting taking me al-along now." Bella exhaled a heavy, miserable breath and looked away from them, up to the ceiling.
"Nonsense, angel. It's just the morphine talking. You're no trouble at all."
The doctor turned her gaze to Renata and Aro, "It was a clean break, however, the skin was still broken from the fall." She looked to the upset human then back to them and added in a serious voice. "She was very lucky."
The doctor turned her attention back to Bella.
"Now we just need to get your arm in a splint, sweetheart, and you'll be free to go."
Thirty minutes later found Bella discharged and safely buckled in the back seat behind Renata, with Aro sitting next to the sleepy girl on her right and holding her non-broken hand in his. Complete silence. He could get used to this.
Aro caught Renata's eyes with a meaningful look before she started the car.
Their charade had come to an end, at long last. No more pretending. It felt liberating, even if he'd quite enjoyed the play, while it had lasted, but…
It was time.
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Notes:
¡Dios Santo! (Spanish) – Dear God!
Dio Cristo, Bella. (Italian) – Jesus Christ, Bella.
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Thank you for reading. :)