{Everything in Time}

"Demetri! You scared the life out of me!" Bella whisper-yelled, now sitting up straight in her seat. Her heart, which had starting beating out of her chest at the first sight of those bright red eyes, settled into a more comfortable rhythm. A glance to her side showed Tanya watching on in amusement and Bella realised that Tanya had obviously known Demetri was nearby. She sent Tanya a semi-angry glare for not warning her and turned back to Demetri. "What are you doing here?"

"Concerning the recent… developments, Master Aro thought it was a good idea to put a few extra protections in place," Demetri said in a low voice. They were all very conscious of the curious humans that sat close by, and none of them wanted to alarm anyone.

Bella raised a brow. "A few?"

Demetri grinned. "It has been a while since Chelsea and Afton flew a plane. We didn't want them to get out of practice."

Bella let out a sigh at that information. A little voice in the back of her mind told her that everyone was doing too much; the chance of getting into trouble with a strange supernatural was very low. However, one glance at her dad had her arguing back to that voice. She would do absolutely anything to ensure his safety, even though it might seem a bit excessive.

The plane ride ended up being quite uneventful after that surprise at the start. Bella managed to fall asleep not too long after Demetri left them alone, only to be woken up a few hours later for a lovely airplane meal. Her head felt fuzzy, and was slowly starting to ache with the effort it took to keep her mental shield up.

Being in a close vicinity with so many people for hours on end was not pleasant.

All those hundreds of pasts and thoughts were within easy reach of Bella, which made repelling them much harder. By this point, she was afraid that even a simple accidental glance into someone's eyes would break through her shield. (Although Eleazar had told her many times that the chance of that happening was unlikely). It reminded her of why she had avoided travelling like this for so long.

Tanya, Demetri and even Charlie were a great help, though, and made sure she was as comfortable as she could be.

After a layover in Amsterdam it was not too long until they landed in Florence. Relief washed over Bella as she stepped off the plane – having said goodbye to Demetri – and into the tube that led them away from the cramped aircraft. It felt amazing to be able to stretch her limbs as they walked out of the hallway and into the wide open space of the airport.

Bella looked around, seeing other travellers mill about, and was suddenly very grateful for her travelling companions. On previous trips, some of which Bella tried very hard not to think too much about, she had often been handed the responsibility of making sure they got where they needed to be. That was not the kind of responsibility she should have been given at such a young age, she reminded herself, hearing the words of her therapist echo in her mind, but she had not known anything different. But now… Now she was in a situation where she could take a step back. Where she was expected to take a step back, to follow, instead of lead.

Which she was even more glad about at the moment, seeing as her head was aching like crazy. It could be the jetlag she told herself, but she knew that the main cause was her gift. She could see Tanya was keeping a close eye on her, and she knew she had not hidden her discomfort as much as she had hoped to do.

"Are we supposed to take a taxi to Mister Aro's home?" her dad asked once they finally stood in front of the luggage carousel. He was sweating a little as he pulled Bella's heavy suitcase up and put it on the floor, politely refusing help from an amused Tanya.

"I think we might be picked up?" Bella said, not entirely sure herself. Before she could tell her dad what exactly Aro had asked her, she was distracted by a notification on her phone. Her attention was pulled away from the conversation and towards the blinking text on her screen. The message earned a shy smile from Bella, headache temporarily forgotten.

Tanya nodded in agreement with Bella's statement. "He has sent one of his… employees to wait for us at the arrival gates."

"Good," her dad grunted, lifting the luggage onto their cart. "Well, in that case, let's keep on moving, right?"

Bella pouted when Tanya kept her from responding to Alice, pulling her along towards the exit of the luggage hall. Tanya's sharp gaze reminded Bella of her near-tripping incident back in Anchorage, and she resigned herself to turning her phone off for now. It wasn't like Alice didn't have the time to wait, after all.

She shuffled along with her dad, who was now pushing the luggage cart, leading her and Tanya out of the hall, the soles of her sneakers squeaking on the tiled floor. They went through the last security check like a breeze and finally, finally, they found themselves in front of the automatic doors that slid open as soon as they were close enough.

Bella spotted their lift within seconds. Tanya looked on in amusement as Bella's eyes lit up. "That's-"

"Felix," Tanya nodded.

Felix had obviously seen them as well – he had been the one waiting for them, after all – and every so slightly raised the tablet he was holding in his hands. 'Swan family' it read in capital letters. Just like those fancy chauffeurs did when they were trying to find the guests from their hotels.

Her dad looked impressed, which fuelled Bella's own amusement at the entire situation. She would not deny being at least somewhat instinctively afraid of Felix (the Volturi, as a whole, tended to give her that feeling) but she had known them for long enough to consciously accept that they were not a threat. At least not to her. She had come to know most of the Volturi as a weird type of acquaintance or friend, perhaps. Long-lost family, in Aro's case.

It was a mutually beneficial relationship. They had helped her out when she was in a bad situation, and now she was helping them.

"Welcome to Italy," Felix said when they were close. He kept his professional mask on, but Bella could see the twinkle in his eyes that revealed he was definitely having too much fun playing this role.

Her dad shook Felix's hand, introducing himself and making small talk. Faking unfamiliarity, both Tanya and Bella followed his example before they made their way out of the arrival bay and towards the garage where Felix had parked.

Bella was quiet as Tanya inserted herself into the conversation with her dad and Felix, feeling tiredness creeping up on her even though she had slept through the airplane journey. Her headache was still very much present, not doing much good for her aching eyes. At least the pressure she had been feeling slowly ebbed away the further they walked from the busy airport.

"Please, get in," Felix said, opening the car door with much flourish, motioning for Bella to climb in. Tanya followed, leaving Bella's dad to sit up front.

Felix started the car, turning down the volume of the radio ever so slightly, before backing out of the parking spot and driving out of the garage, onto the road.

Bella sighed and sagged into her chair, pressing her aching head against the cool glass of the window for a moment in attempt to soothe the pain.

They were in Italy now. That was a weird realisation.

Whereas Bella had been nervous about it all – the interview with the Volturi's prisoner and the prospect of her dad being brought into the know – now she could not bring herself to muster up any excitement. All she wanted to do was rest, watch a movie, listen to some music and sleep off the awful jetlag.

And maybe talk to Alice a bit.

Speaking of Alice, now that she was sitting down, it was safe for her to finish the text she had wanted to send. She pulled her phone out of her pocket and turned on her data, hoping it would not end up costing her all her allowance.

The soft sound of her fingers tapping against the screen caught Tanya's attention, but once the vampire understood what Bella was doing, she turned back to the conversation.

As it turned out, Alice had been watching them (or more so Tanya, probably) closely in her mind's eye, because she had gathered that they had landed safely. Still, Bella sent her a text confirming all of that before launching into a fun conversation about dragons that would surely make no sense to any outsider who took a look at it.

Halfway through their journey up to Volterra, Tanya handed Bella a white pill and a bottle of water from her backpack. Bella gratefully took it, swallowing the medicine down with a big gulp of cold water. Hopefully it would settle her headache. That was always a bit of a wild guess when something particularly 'supernatural' affected her body in a way that it manifested a physical symptom or ailment.

But since apparently no one had made any supernatural medicine, this would have to do.

Bella knew her dad must have been just as tired as she was, if not more, from his sagging posture and the lack of polite conversation flowing from his mouth. Although he was not one to fill up a silence unnecessarily, Bella knew that he must have been interested in getting a feel of Felix's personality.

Bella's gaze left her dad and instead turned to the view that she could see from her window. It was absolutely wonderful; the hilly landscape, farms and small clusters of trees. It was so different from what she was used to seeing back home. This was the third time she was travelling in this particular area, but she had yet to get tired of it.

There was just something about the atmosphere here that calmed her down.

She spotted Volterra when they were not too far away. Since the town was quite literally built on top of a hill, it was easy to find among the roads and grassy fields. Felix drove them up the hill along the circling road with ease, speaking of his familiarity with the place.

Bella herself experienced a strange sense of recognition, now that she got closer. Although she had not spent that much time here, her mind had retained the little bits of information she had of this place and they slowly fit into the puzzle as they neared the town walls.

Felix steered them towards one of the town's gates, pressing a button to roll his window down before speaking to a nearby human in a low voice.

Bella had no idea what he was saying, seeing as she did not speak Italian – no matter Aro's insistence she learnt the language, she was just not built to be bilingual – but she understood that everything must have been fine, since Felix rolled his window back up and drove through the gate.

The roads in the town were slanted, curved along with the hill it was built upon. Bella felt herself being pressed to the back of her seat as gravity came into play. She knew they were nearly at the Palazzo, but she was not sure what Aro's plan was. The question was whether he would want to see them immediately, or whether he had actually remembered that they were human and might need some time to adjust to the time difference.

Bella had experienced both sides of Aro's chaotic brain, but she must say she preferred it when he took her human needs into account. His own human life had come to an end so long ago, that he had needed to relearn quite a bit of everything that came with being human since Bella came into the Volturi's lives.

When they parked right in front of a hotel, Bella let out a sigh of relief. Human needs first, then. She climbed out of the car, not waiting for Felix to open the door for her, and took in a deep breath of fresh air. After having been enclosed in confined spaces for hours on end – first the airplane, then the car – she was glad to have finally arrived. To be free of those places again. For a while at least, since she would have to fly back to the US at some point, but she pushed that thought to the back of her mind for now.

The checking-in process went by without any trouble. Felix did all the talking for them, speaking in such rapid Italian that it all just became a buzz in Bella's ears. Aro had booked them a suite with three separate bedrooms, giving all of them the privacy and space they needed, which she was very grateful for. She very much felt the need to be by herself, to recharge and process everything that had happened.

When she finally let herself fall down on her back on the soft bed, that was exactly what she did. Going through the familiar motions of her bedtime routine – it was late enough at night here for it to be acceptable for her to go to sleep – she took care of all her needs. A hot shower later, she changed into some of her pajamas and slipped under the heavy duvet of her bed.

It felt heavenly, especially after her last sleep on the airplane. Nothing, not even a luxury airplane seat, compared to an actual bed.

Bella turned to her side and reached for her phone, which was charging on the nightstand. Comfortably situation herself in the bed, she scrolled through her Instagram feed before inevitably returning to her conversation with Alice. It was a funny thought that she could pick up her phone tomorrow morning, text Alice, and get a quick response in return even though there was a time difference between them now.

Perks of being friends with a vampire.

What if they could be more? a little voice at the back of her mind whispered.

Bella shook the thought away immediately, and continued her search for the emoji she wanted to add to her message.

There was no way.

"Everything, in time."

A/N: Has it really been 5 months since I updated this story? Apparently, yes lmao. I hadn't realised it had been that long! Anyway, I hope y'all enjoy this chapter :) I wrote it a while back and had some motivation to edit it today, so that's what I did in the hour before the moment that I am posting it now. There's a bunch of transition here as we move on with the story and find ourselves moving with the plot! Now we are in the beautiful Volterra (have I mentioned before that I've actually visited that town? It's pretty noice) And Bella is starting to consider our lovely Alice as a potential option in a way that is different than just ~friendship~ ;)

I'm not gonna promise a quick update, because let's face it, life can be pretty shitty and motivation comes and goes for me, but I'll try and update before I hit another 5 month mark XD. If, in the meantime, you find yourself craving more gay twilight content, check out my works The Bittersweet Dance of Life and the sequel Soul Searching for the Lost, which are OC(Charlotte Swan)/Rosalie. You can find those on my page :)

If you have some time and love to spare, please, please leave me a review! They make me very happy and they tend to spark some motivation, so that could lead to a quicker update ;)

Sending you all lots of love,

- Laura