The Journals
By Everleigh Allen
Chapter 12
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"Tell us about yourself," Esme smiles softly at Jasper. I see Jasper's mind race and as I sit holding my pen in hand, I watch his memories play out. I carefully pen them down to give me something to do.
The others sit and dance around their histories which I've heard a thousand times before. I try to concentrate on what they say and don't say.
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Texas
Sometime in 1940
Deep in the night, Maria laid in the bed, covered by the white sheet. Her dark skin contrasts beautifully in the moonlight. Her eyes were coaled black while her lips were red and glossy. Long, black hair wisped in sequence with the breeze. It was an illusion of seduction and she mastered it; a submissive gesture meant to lure in her prey; human and vampire alike.
Maria laughed with her husky voice, murmuring in Spanish- the sweet flowing words that drew you in as her body moved over the bed. Her burgundy eyes widened as a pout plumped her lips. She would sit and wait for your move, giving you that false sense of trust and control. But Jasper could see the wickedness behind her grin, the way her fingers curled, drawing her lovers into her lair as they took in her fiery scent. He had witnessed it first and second hand, countless times before.
But those who refused her never made it back out the door and sometime neither did those who didn't refuse her.
Maria did allow a certain amount of dominance in her partners as she did enjoy the wicked dance with the devil,herself. But she had rules about it and never let her guard down enough to fall victim to anyone. Because all else aside, she enjoyed being the predator. She liked the hunt, the seduction, the sex and then the meal; a true succubus.
She moaned as the warm air breezed through out the room. She lay on her back, writhing under him; his arms were splayed on either side. His eyes were almost closed but he was concentrating on his emotions. He didn't want her to feel the disdain he had for her. Not yet. So he made the emotions lustful and was careful to keep it that way.
There was a time when he gave his emotions freely to her. He showed her the love and lust and affections he had and he expected her to feel the same way for him. And there was a time that he thought she did, but she put on a good show, He soon he realized she was really just feeding off of his emotions toward her.
She was incapable of love or even any amorous, affectionate emotions.
She wanted lust, not love. She wanted sex, not love. However, she wanted to feel his love and devotion for her, but refused to give anything in return. To her, love was a submissive release of power and she was neither willing nor capable of it. And Maria had made that perfectly clear long ago when he found out sex with her was something most of the men in their coven took part in, too.
He was not anything special to her.
Sex with her was part of the job description. Jasper scoffed, disgusted with himself.
She whispered erotic Spanish words, that past in the Texas breeze. They were as empty as the air.
"Tell me, mi amor," She cooed.
His jaw clenched, steadily thrusting into her, trying to get it over with. Her eyes widened, watching him, waiting.
"Tell you…what?" he gasped. He knew she wanted to hear his love for her, his devotion to her. They were words he couldn't say anymore.
He would take the repercussions.
He moved slowly over her, the motion was systematic, unfeeling. But she moaned as her eyes rolled backward and her hands groped his chest, moving over his pecks, hooking behind his neck. He shook off the embrace moving more quickly in and out of her as her arms clutched his shoulders piercing him with her nails. He growled angrily, narrowing his dark eyes on her as she smiled.
"Jasper, quiero oirlo," I want to hear it, she says, but she means feel it and her aggressive tone softens slightly as Jasper sends out a minimal amorous mood.
She pulls his shoulder to her face and he snaps backward, exiting her body. He stands naked across the room. His glare was a warning.
"I mean what I say." She says roughly, her legs move seductively. It's a command but he was unwaveringly glaring at her, allowing the passion dissipate at his will, and the true evil angry-excitement permeating from her to consume them. He let his loathing flow freely off of him.
She felt the change instantly.
"You want my submission, not my love."
She smiles again, pleased with the game, but clucks her tongue. "Jasper," she scolds. "I have your heart. As I always have."
Jasper made a disgusted sound and Maria's burgundy eyes glinted with anger for a moment before she caught the reaction. But he could feel it rippling off of her, though she smiled sweetly. It was a fine line of lust and violence.
"Jasper, you love me. I can feel your love."
"You felt what I let you feel. What I thought I felt for you. The love was unrequited. I don't love you, Maria nor do you love me. You know that."
"You still love." Her accent curled off her tongue, easily dismissing his comments, "I want to hear… it." She says again, in English. She plays with a lock of dark hair and bites her lip.
"I don't love you, Maria. You feel what I want you to feel." He cocked his head, watching her, "Is that what you wanted to hear?"
Her excitement grows at his tone as she pulls at her hair and then casually lowered her gaze over his manhood, "Such games you play. You belong to me. I own you." Then she looked up at his face, smiling at his reaction.
"I don't belong to you any more than you have ever belonged to me."
Maria frowned at his words. She drew her legs together, watching him carefully. Jasper had once been convinced he was her mate but he could feel the same feelings from other males as he destroyed them for her.
"You do. And I asked you a question," She snarled, her eyes narrowed. "I won't ask again."
"And I won't make love- without feelin' it."
"You can't be with the others, Jasper! Only me."
"We are not mated." He scoffs. "Besides, I don't want the others." He lowered his voice and his glare, "or you."
She moved over the bed, trying again to seduce him. "Your words are not well chosen." She hisses like the viper she is, "Perhaps someday you won't be here any longer." She looked off to the side of his face, "I will mourn you," and curved a wicked smile.
He scoffed at that. He was not easily killed. All of her attempts and all of his challengers were in vain He didn't know why he allowed her to live. "You may get your wish, darlin'."
Maria laughed at that. She crawled over the bed toward him, her heavy, voluptuous breasts hanging vertically and swaying with her movements.
Jasper growled, deep within his chest.
It was aggressive and it made his body rigid. She moaned gasping his name but all he could see was his past eighty five years under her control.
He was a fabricated commander of her 'Army' after she had taken his human life.
They killed countless people with future. Killed whole families, some they fed off of, others were turned for Maria's selfish needs.
He trained countless men and women who trusted him, who were his friends, and given her command he destroyed them without question.
He had even killed her sisters after Maria expressed fear of them, as they were a threat, and demanded their deaths.
He had done it all without question. He had done it to prove his love, his devotion to her, always longing and expecting her affection. Never once had she given it.
He felt everything.
"Maria?"
"Si Jasper!"
"I hate you."
"The sex game is over, Jasper. Come lay." Her words were empty. He would be able to feel them if they were true. So he lifted his eye brows, in question, pulling on his shirt. She had a frown, her head cocked to the side as her hair spilled over one of her breasts, leaving the other exposed.
He stood silent, defiant. Jasper pulled on his boots, one eye trained on her, always. Her eyes glinted with anger and he could feel her temper and the rejection immediately. But they were just another manipulation as she didn't really care about him or whether he came to her and when… just as long as he did.
There was a shuffling of boots on the wooden porch. Jasper moved his head minutely, sensing eagerness and desire.
"Ah, I guess it's too late, sweetheart, looks like your next lover has arrived," He smirked, winking at her.
She glared at him harshly, her lip twitched.
The door got two knocks and opened to a tall, dark haired man. He wore an anxious grin, his eyes were bright red and he looked with confusion and jealousy between Maria and Jasper.
A look Jasper had seen a thousand times.
And oh, how Maria loved having a jealous lover. She was going to have fun with him.
The man reminded him of himself, so long ago. Jasper thought, he just hoped Aaron survived to see it through.
"Good luck son," Jasper patted the man's shoulder, as Aaron smiled brightly.
"Thanks!"
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Edward looked at Jasper for a moment before the next memory played out. As soon as his pen hit the paper, it all played out.
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Julio's laughter interrupted Jasper as soon as he closed Maria's door.
"What's it matter?"
"Well," Julio's eyes were wild, "Seems to me you've had some fun with her."
"She's my mate-"
"Your mate," Julio scoffed, "she tell ya that?"
Jasper hissed at his words knowing full well his words were empty but he raised his arms defensively anyway. Julio laughed at the motion.
"Gonna fight me Jazz? Gonna teach me a lesson? That's rich! You're the one marked for death."
Jasper froze at the words, his mind raced back to the way she had moved with him, touched him, and pleased him. She had laughed at his candor, smiled as she seduced him, and mirrored his words and actions. He watched Julio, his eyes tightening.
"Got yourself a mark there… on your neck. Don't cha know what that means? Didn't she train you, herself?"
Jasper's jaw clenched as he remembered how she trained him, how she moved, teaching him offences and defenses. There wasn't anything he could recall about marking someone, other than seeing the mark on someone.
But he wasn't about to tell Julio all that.
"Guess she kept that biddy to herself round you." He sighed shaking his head, "Maria taught us… some were marked for a reason."
He still felt the tension rippling off Julio. He was restraining himself now from attacking… for the moment.
"So why are you here, Julio? Go back to your quarters." Jasper put command in his voice.
"Can't."
Jasper nodded in understanding. He had enough military training to know Julio saw Jasper now as the enemy. He was marked. She had marked him to be destroyed. Julio would challenge him for his rank, for command of the army, for Maria.
He was ready when Julio lunged for him.
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Jasper and I stared at each other, both with mirrored expressions of tension as he continued to pick out memories for me to see. To everyone else, I imagine, we looked like we may go at each other at any moment, but that couldn't be farther from the truth.
Of course, I've heard stories and have seen others take a person as their perceived mates, but I always thought it was something felt mutually to work out. Never did I realize that one more dominant could keep another with the thoughts and manipulations that they were mated when they weren't. Was it something to do with an older, more experienced person and the newer one just felt that connection because of venom?
But there was also the fact that Carlisle and Alice didn't know who changed them and both are seemingly happily mated. Perhaps if they were to come across the one whom changed them they would feel some kind of pull?
But if that were also true, Rosalie, Emmett, and I would feel a pull towards Carlisle.
And I feel zero pull to Carlisle other than a friendship or kinship with him- with any of them. Rosalie feels even less than that. Emmett and Rosalie only feel strongly for each other. They have no issue coming and going... I stay because-
Well, I don't know why I stay.
Perhaps it's because it's just easier that way?
I pull my thoughts away from the concept of mating and try to pick it out from Alice's head, but she seems to block me as best as she can.
From what I see it won't be for a while.
Alice's eyes meet mine and she gives me a soft nod as if she read my thoughts.
She probably saw me asking.
She gives another nod.
"Can you stop doing that secret conversation? It's really annoying." Rosalie spits and I honestly forgot she was even there.
I slink back in my chair but can see Alice's amusement as she explains to Rosalie that I was going to inquire on my mate.
Rosalie instantly rolls her eyes, bored.
I think Alice said that on purpose because instantly I see Emmett bound up from the floor and start hammering out questions pertaining to all things sexual in nature with mating.
Looking at Jasper I can see his eyes roll as his thoughts go back to his history.
I watch since it's vastly more interesting than Emmett.
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Jasper dismissed his comment. "Did you know that you're marked?" Jasper mirrored Julio's same conversation.
"Marked?" Aaron faltered, but recovered, fists clenched.
"Yessir', "The rouge on your neck…" He lifted his hand to point to Aaron's left. "It's a mark that Maria gives those she wishes exterminated. Look if you want."
Aaron didn't need to see it. Her spicy scent saturated his mind; it was all over his skin and her words still whispered in his mind. He knew Jasper was jealous of their relationship. He knew that Jasper had tried to win over Maria, to no avail. But the words still bit at him. Aaron stammered, unmoving, remembering how she kissed his neck, how she pleased him with her mouth, he loved her mouth on him. He had given himself to her, made love to her, soft and smooth. He relished in these feelings.
Aaron loved watching her being pleased by his touch, by his body.
"I apologize that I had not taught you well enough, Aaron." Jasper said as he shook his head, deeply sorrowed and took a step forward. Aaron's hands lifted defensively, but Jasper ignored it.
"Yer jealous!" he said body rigid and one hand pointing, "Yer just tryin' to get me to turn against her!"
"No. I just know the game." Jasper sighed deeply, calm. "Aaron, think about how many people-"
There was so much pain warring within him with his anger and jealousy, "She said… she said I'm her mate."
"I doubt that she said that. Besides, wasn't I supposed to be her mate?"
"You use her!" Aaron was yelling and causing a scene around the camp.
"You and I both know I don't use her, Aaron. It's another manipulation. She wants you to think that way. She wants your submission… your death. She marked you-"
"She marked you, too." Aaron seethed. "I saw you wipe it off."
He was right. Jasper couldn't argue.
"Perhaps she wishes for us to destroy each other?" Jasper mused, smirking. "Perhaps you could just leave and save yourself."
That sent him over the edge. His eyes were feral.
"She is my mate. I will not leave her."
Aaron's reaction was commendable, yet dense to reality. Jasper had seen this countless times. It was getting old.
"She is everyone's mate," Jasper scoffed, watching Aaron carefully, "even if it was just for a moment. Who do you reckon is in with her now?"
That was all it took.
Aaron lunged for Jasper, twisting through the air with the same moves that Jasper had taught him, it was unfortunate and made defending himself simple. Jasper turned away, quickly grasping Aaron's neck and threw him to the ground. The ground quaked, loudly, as birds in the distance squawked their annoyance as they flew away.
Aaron lay decapitated on the ground.
"Such a waste of life," Jasper said in a murmur and then distress and anxiety pulsed through him at the word, life. Countless faces filtered through his mind, so- so many… destroyed.
By him.
It needed to end.
Slowly, he looked around him; taking in the sporadic homes and tents that littered Maria's land. His soldiers, some friends, most of them were newborns or slightly older and many of them had mates… true lovers. All were created for her, for her greed, power and control.
The wind rustled through his hair, it was cool, crisp. He looked up at the horizon at the purple pastel colors painting the grass, teasing it with light. It was close to dawn. He fumbled with his front pocket, pulled out the small hand rolled cigarette and held it between his lips. Cupping it with his hand, he lit it, breathing in the warmth before the smoke settled in his empty lungs. He flicked the cigarette onto the pyre and after a few moments, flames licked at Aaron's marble skin as little finger plumes of purple smoke danced upward to the sky. It could almost be poetically construed that it was as if Aaron's soul was lifting into the heavens as his ashes seeped back into Hell.
Soul.
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"Jasper-" She smiled coolly moving a step closer.
"No Maria. You cannot seduce me. I have not felt anythin' but hatred for you in years. To me, you're just a whore. I should have left with Peter and Charlotte two years ago."
"I am no whore!" She spat. Her arms lifted defensively into a crouch and he mirrored her actions, again welcoming the challenge.
"Now Maria," Jasper scolded, smiling. "You'll bed anything that moves. But you don't get paid for your sex, do you? Perhaps whore is too kind a word then." He wanted to taunt her as he matched her steps with his own; it was a wicked dance with the devil. "Perhaps harlot is more fittin'?" He mused.
"You defile me with words?" Maria lunged at him as he laughed at her actions, taunting her with his own.
"I'm sorry. I apologize that I've resorted to name callin' as I expect it's all I know ya to be. You're only power, perhaps, is that you're only use is as a succubus and I apologize for ever thinkin' more of ya."
She growled at him so he continued, "You're a shell of a woman… perhaps the only way you can feel, is when you're filled with a cock. Perhaps that is why you need to filled so often. If I had realized that's all you were, I'd have left a long time ago."
"This is a silly game you play with me now," But she was seething inside, barely able to contain her anger. It radiated off of her.
"Is it now?" He scoffed.
"You think you'll find someone to love you? Look at your body, filled of scars. They will fear you, Jasper. You do not deserve love."
"Now ya see? That's none of your concern." He smiled, yet her words had touched a nerve. "I feel sorry for you, Maria, I really do."
Maria hissed, "Sorry for me?" her hair flaring like a lion's man in motion, her claws recoiled into her hands in anger as she moved in a semi-circle in their continual dance for the upper hand.
But Jasper just smiled. "Yes, you've killed or have had me kill those who have loved you. But you will never feel real love. You are an empty vessel of a being. A soulless queen of the damned, and after I leave here, there will be no one to left to protect you from the others. They know your history. They'll come after you. They'll demand their freedom, even if it means to destroy you to get it. Your reign of terror is over, Maria."
"You're a bastard!"
He stared at her calmly, shaking his head with disapproval as if he was reprimanding a child, "Now who's callin' names oh, treacherous one? The coven knows I don't matter to ya and they know they don't matter neither."
"I will send out units to destroy your beloved friends, Peter and his mate, again, Jasper." She smiled at her threat that for so long caused him to back down to her, but not today. He felt another wave of urgency as if fate was demanding his departure.
"No need, they are on their way here."
"I will kill them if they come."
"You may try, Maria," He nodded, "you may try… as they expect you will. They'll be ready. The whole coven will be ready. I'm leavin'."
Maria's eyes searched him, he thought he saw a flicker of fear momentarily, but she was so good at shielding her emotions, if she had a sincere emotion, that they were easily covered within her mask.
"I will not let you leave, Jasper."
He tipped his hat to her and smiled, still moving in their dance, "Now darlin', you ain't got no choice in the matter," He straightened his form for a moment, playing with a silver jewel case on her chest of drawers and smiled his devilish grin as her eyes narrowed on him. She was about to say something snide when there was a commotion vehicles and then talking outside, but neither Jasper nor Maria acknowledged the disturbance, both waiting for the other to attack at any moment.
"Darlin', I think you got company. Perhaps you should welcome them the way you usually do… by openin' your thighs."
Maria sneered, her lip twitching. She was not one to allow trespassers on her property but she was not one to back down, especially from Jasper.
"Go to them!" She thrashed her arm in the air, pointing her finger at the door.
He shook his head; the blond waves softly followed the gesture. "Not my guests. Not my claim. Not my home. Not my mate. Not my problem."
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"I want to hunt the Alligators!" Emmett boasted as Rosalie rolled her eyes. "I heard of the Cajun's down south. We should go this winter."
Instantly, I was brought out of Jasper's memories with Emmett's booming voice. I watched Alice scrunch her nose at the thought. "My alligator wrestling days are over Emmett, but you go on ahead." She laughed.
In an instant I could see some thoughts and fantasies about Alice wrestling alligators caked in mud flowing through Jasper's mind and I quickly stop my writing to give him a blank stare.
He smirks.
I moved from the room without another word and stepped out the back door towards my little stone cabin, journal in hand.
The prairie and lake always made me think of Marie. I can't help seeing her taking a long walk around the meadow as if she was memorizing every inch of it, plucking the flowers and sliding the prettiest ones in her hair.
-EAMC
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Bella gave a long sigh before she grabbed up a cookie. She couldn't even guess how many she had throughout the day, but it probably didn't matter. It was curbing her appetite a bit and would hold her out until dinner.
She turned the page and saw the next entry.
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I don't know what was worse.
Is it worse not having a mate for a hundred years- yet not really seeking her out, either? Or was it worse having a relationship with a perceived "mate" for over eighty years and have them use, abuse, and withhold affection to a person gifted with empathy?
It was something that took me around my small pond three times as I contemplated it and as I write it- I still have no real answer.
All I can consider is that I will wait for her- as Alice waited for Jasper.
She only had to wait a couple decades, at least.
-EAMC
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"Hello brother," Alice grins from behind a tree. She's clearly not used to my mind reading as I could hear her thoughts of surprising me just as she ducked into the forest. "Walk with me?"
"What about Jasper?"
She scoffs. "It's not like that. We trust each other. He knows I've been waiting to talk to you for years."
It was a foggy day and we moved through the forest easily without worry about needing any cover. It was that sense of freedom, perhaps, that kept us here long after we should've left.
But we'd go soon; I could see it all play out in Alice's mind.
That wasn't what she wanted to talk about.
"I need your help." Alice stops and I pause with her waiting for her to continue. "I can't remember before I was changed. The memories are blotchy at best. I was hoping you could help me put them together more. Find my family someday?"
"Sure," I give her a nod and she's thrilled, trilling along about fate and how we're destined to be a great family but wonderful friends. I get lost in her thoughts and words easy and it's a welcome distraction.
"What do you remember, but without you waking up changed."
Memories flow in flashes and I tell her to concentrate on one as I write it down.
.
Alice slipped into the private sanatorium without anyone really noticing. She resembled an unkempt patient and no one was willing to acknowledge her and thus be responsible for her care.
She padded over the cold floor, down the hall and into a linen closet. She pulled out some fresh linens and a nurse uniform. Carefully, she closed the door. She shimmied quickly down the hall and ducked into a room, shutting herself in.
Ten seconds… male walks into the room… brunette will walk in 2 minutes later. She saw the pictures clearly, knowing that she needed to find a place to hide Alice searched frantically only seeing the exit and the closet. She was trapped.
The closet door closed just as the other opened.
"This room needs to be prepared for another patient."
"Excuse me?"
"Did you have a question?"
"Pardon me, but is it true she's gone missing?"
"The patient has been discharged."
The voices were just outside the door. Alice listened, thinking they must be talking about her.
"Yes, of course." Meg knew the orderly must have been lying. Her eyebrows drew together in judgment but bit at her cheeks in silence and walked into the room. It felt warring with an odd scent in it. She knew she shouldn't linger too long.
"I'm sorry, but-" Meg said but the man lifted a hand to silence her.
"I have other matters to attend to," he said the nurse. "Like disposing of an unearthly demon needing to be burned." He laughed as Meg's face contorted in fear. "Kidding, doll." But Alice knew he wasn't. Alice could see the twitching remains that moved within the bag that contained him. It was the same one whom begged him to save Alice by placing her in solitary.
He remembered his friend going in after her, apologizing, trying to sooth her cries and watched as he bit the patient on her neck, then licked the wound. It seemed to disappear before his eyes.
With a gasp from the orderly, the male looked up at him, narrowed his odd golden eyes and hissed his warning.
The orderly stepped back, listening to the girls shrieking cries, as the male kissed her lips and left.
He didn't want to understand. His mind was already polluted with images he'd never forget, so he just locked in the screaming girl, who seemed to be writhing in pain, in the room.
There was commotion in another room, warranting his attention and as he ran toward it, he felt rock hard arms grab him and pull him into another patient's room. The woman was mumbling what sounded like "hello demon", but overall ignored their presence.
He would not forget his friend's eyes. They were full of fear.
"You need to check on her!" he demanded, bruising the orderly on his chest with his unworldly strength, "He's coming for her, but I've already changed her. She will be different when she comes out of it… be wary of her so she won't kill you. She shouldn't… she shouldn't kill you." The man shook his head as if he were trying to convince himself of that.
There were screams just beyond the room as if something was searching for someone and his friend turned from the door, back to him.
"Promise me. You'll take care of her, promise me you'll get her out of here?"
The orderly nodded and his friend pulled out his wallet filled with bills. "Give this to her. I tried to help her. Tried to save her from him… I am so sorry."
His friend released his shirt completely as if he heard something that the orderly didn't and steeled himself for an unseen attack.
.
Did you get a good look at him?" Alice asks me but I shake my head. Somehow she's blocked the golden eyed man out.
The visions continue.
.
That is when the door splinters before them. There was a monster, a true demon shaped as a human with blonde hair and blood red eyes. He was fuming hatred. The orderly watched as his head cocked back smelling the air with enlarged nostrils as he lowered his glare at them.
The female patient rocked herself steadily mumbling her chilling greetings with acute anxiety, "Hello demon, hello demon, hello demon…"
His friend stood rigid against the demon.
"Where is she?" The demon seethed.
The orderly watched his friend cock his head before he crouched at the demon, hissing.
"You changed her." the demon snickered, "You changed her to keep me from her?" He laughed but couldn't hide his anger. The demon wanted to possess the little intuitive human, use her… take her. He would have to find someone else. He growled.
"You brought a snack." The demon mused looking now at the orderly. He licked his lips as the patient stilled her movements.
.
I stared at Alice as she stared back at me.
"Anything?" She asked in her mind. I gave a curt shake of the head.
I could see me asking for her to continue and she did without me asking. This was a convenient gift.
.
Alice frowned. She couldn't fathom killing someone. She could see each one of their lives stretched out in front of them, then without notice she would imagine how they would taste if she were to attack them, and that life would be gone.
Dead.
By her.
She wasn't a murderer, but as her visions turned more grotesque and violent, she worried that maybe she really was.
Maybe that is why she was held away from everyone and everything. Maybe that's why she didn't have a name or a family, or even a previous life that she could recall. Maybe she was a demon from Hell to prey on people?
She felt like crying but no tears ever came.
"Maybe demons can't cry," she mused, putting her hand on her chest, but there was no longer the thump or noise of each pump. "And maybe demons don't have heartbeats?" Her body toppled over with tearless sobs. She didn't know if she could take being a demon.
Sometime later she sighed; she wouldn't think about it, too much, she decided. Her crying was nonproductive and wasted time. She pulled the suitcase up to sit atop the table, opened it, and pulled the dresses out of the case. She needed to make something out of these dresses before she went back down to find out when she'd start her job. She needed money. She needed clothes and shoes and…
Blood.
A vision of a family in the woods near Canada hugging her as she opened the door suddenly came to mind. There was a man next to her, holding her hand and only had love for her in his eyes. Her mate. The family was like her, but their eyes were not red, but gold. She saw them all happily hunting animals together, avoiding eating humans.
That night, she found herself sucking her alligators dry.
Demons didn't sleep, anyway.
.
The vision shifted.
.
The orderly quickly left the nurse in the room alone.
Meg glanced behind her nervously but she couldn't see anything there. It's in your head Meg she chided herself with a frown. She had had that feeling continually since her conversation with Victoria that morning but as the afternoon air twisted around her and the birds chirped their nightly songs she dismissed the feelings along with the ominous feeling of being watched.
Soon she looked out the window of the patient that had gone missing. It had befallen on her to go change the bedding to allow another patient, but Meg still wondered what had happened to her since she had left solitary.
It was as if she was an apparition to the place, now.
One of many.
But Meg decided that the girl's life would not be in vain. She planned on seeking the doctor that day to issue a proper death certificate and even possibly a headstone. Otherwise it was entirely possible it would be swept under the rug and soon forgotten.
She wouldn't forget.
.
A headstone flashed in my mind for a moment and we could see the blurry blocked letters together, at the same time.
Alice gasped, clapping her hands.
"It's coming back?"
"I'm not sure. Was that a memory? Did you see the headstone yourself or did you see it in the mind of the nurse, Meg?"
Alice paused for a moment.
"I didn't go back there so I didn't see it."
I nodded and watched as that moment played through her mind from the nurse's mind over and over but it was blurry.
"What about the file she holds?"
Alice gasped and closed her eyes, concentrating, but there wasn't much there either. I continue to write it all out in case there's some clue we're missing.
.
With a sigh Meg remembered what she should be doing. It was nearly dusk and she needed to start preparing for home. There was a clicking noise and Meg turned slightly as if she heard the door, feeling haunted or watched, but there didn't seem to be anyone.
With a heavy sigh and a shake of her head Meg moved out of the room with the sheets and the file that was the only thing left of the small girl with kind eyes. Meg rolled the sheets up to her chest which was heavy with sadness.
"Good bye Mary-Alice," she whispered and swiftly left the room.
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I write "Mary-Alice" down as the name soaks into Alice's mind and falls from her lips. I don't see any memory triggering with the name.
"We were probably going to have to go back to the asylum someday." I tell her.
Almost instantly, the visions change in Alice's mind. We both watch as she sees us walking through the graveyard.
.
There are countless plots, none of which seemed to resonate with Alice, nor looked like the stone in her head. Emmett is jumping from stone to stone as Rosalie wanders the plots with Esme. Carlisle is inside the abandoned Asylum looking for any clues from the archives. Jasper wandered off into the nearby woods. He sees a small number of plots just beyond the tree line. It was overgrown and forgotten, but it was there.
BRANDON
Mary-Alice
1901-1920
Biloxi, Mississippi
Jasper calls us over and we look at the headstone knowing the plot below it is empty.
Alice looks at the headstone, but there are no memories that flow from her mind, just darkness.
.
"So we don't have to go there for your visions to provide clues?" I ask curiously.
"I see us going, yes. Probably once we move again. But we have some information to start."
"I want to go to northern California." I say, but any visions of the move there are carefully blocked with musical lyrics. I can't hide my frustration and she senses it instantly.
"It's not time." She whispers. "Soon."
"How soon?"
"A couple more decades should do it." She giggles. But I fail to see what's so funny. "Look, you're mate isn't even born yet, Edward. You have a wait ahead of you, for sure. I'm sorry."
"Give me something?"
Alice closes her eyes and I can see a blurry vision of my quilt around a woman with long brown hair sitting in the library it then shifts to a run through the woods where it's cut off.
"It could all change with a different choice." She says softly. "Even though we just met, please trust me."
I nod and we both stand.
"I'll help you find her, just as you helped me find myself."
I laugh, shaking my head at how quirky our new sister is.
"How do you feel about the Stock Market?"
"I have some ideas."
"Excellent!" She jumps up, clapping her hands together. "Let's tell the family it's time for a move to New York!"
-EAMC
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A/N: Thank you for reading and your kind reviews. I hope you're all doing well.
There may be a bit more here and there about Alice and other Cullen backgrounds but it's for historical insight and it helps Bella understand the pasts of her new family as she learns about them.