Chapter 3. Moral dilemma

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Rosalie's POV

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Rosalie stared dejectedly up at the ceiling. She hadn't moved an inch for two whole days. Her family had come and gone into her room, but no one could get a word out of her. Jasper had tried to console her during the first hour since she came home after the incident, but the blonde had merely growled at him and ordered him to keep his calm emotions to himself. In all truth, it would be best thing in the world to get some relief from her haunting state of mind, but she felt as if she didn't deserve it. She was the one who had repeatedly rejected the mate bond, refused to even look at Bella. Her stubborn pride had neglected to see that her mate had been hurting. She deserved to feel the repercussions of her failures. Sweet intriguing Bella, who managed an impossible feat with just one conversation; to turn the unflappable Rosalie Hale into a stuttering mess. That's all what it took, one conversation and Rosalie was hooked, but now her chance was gone forever.

"You're such an idiot," Rosalie whispered to herself. Flashes of dark brown eyes and a teasing smirk taunted her memory. "This is all my fault,"

"No, it's not," Edward walked in without knocking. Rosalie hated when people didn't respect her privacy and if she were not practically comatose, she would have thrown him out the window. "Her decision was not your fault," Edward pushed on.

"Not in the mood Edward," Rosalie's tone lacked its usual bite. The bronze haired boy frowned momentarily, seemingly unnerved by her reaction.

"I know you're not," her brother replied carefully. "Regardless, you need to hear this. While this whole event is tragic, you play no part in it. Bella Swan was an independent individual who made her own decisions. Don't take responsibility for her feelings or actions,"

"I know you think you're trying to be helpful Edward, but I swear to god I will rip off your own arms and beat you with them if you don't stop talking," Rosalie warned him.

"Eddie! We told you not to bother Rose," Emmett entered the room.

"I've told you to not call me Eddie!" Edward narrowed his eyes.

"And I never listen," Emmett replied without skipping a beat. "Now leave Rosalie alone,"

"But she's taking responsibility for what happened!" the mind reader almost pouted, which would have been a hilarious sight under any other circumstances.

"Let her grieve in peace," Jasper appeared next to Edward.

"Are you kidding me?" Rosalie sat up and glared at her brothers. "This isn't a fucking intervention, get out of my room!" she took small satisfaction with the way they all took a step back at her tone.

"We're just worried about you Rosalie," Edward exclaimed cautiously. "This isn't healthy,"

"My mate just died! I'm entitled to my grief!" Rosalie practically exploded.

"I got news!" Alice flashed into the room with a giddy expression. The blonde threw her hands up in frustration, not in the mood for the Brady Bunch vibes she was getting from her family. Edward, ever the dramatic one, gasped. Rosalie eyed him and Alice's beaming smiles with a mixture of irritation and apprehension.

"If you tell me, will you leave?" the blonde deadpanned.

"At once," Alice promised with a twinkle in her eye. Then she took an unnecessary breath. "Bella is alive," Rosalie froze at the words.

"If this is a joke Alice, I am not amused, and I will – "

"I swear," the pixie looked offended at the notion of her making this up. "I just had a vision!"

"I don't understand," Emmett frowned in confusion.

"Me neither but I just had a vision of her attending school tomorrow," A disbelieving silence followed her statement.

"Are you sure?" Rosalie locked eyes with her sister, terrified of getting her hopes up and not wholly comprehending the situation.

"Positive," Alice promised solemnly. Relief, hope, joy, confusion, incredulity and excitement hit Rosalie all at once and if she weren't a vampire, she would have fainted.

"How is that even possible?" the blonde breathed out.

"I guess Bella Bear has a trick up her sleeve," Emmett said giddily. "She's not the average bear,"

"You're an idiot," Edward told him with no small amount of exasperation.

"Don't be a such a sourpuss Eddie," the big man shot back.

"Don't call me Eddie!" the mind reader ordered but Emmett merely smirked.

"Thank you for the information Alice but will you all please get out of my room," Rosalie requested faintly, still trying to process everything. Her siblings exchanged worried glances but eventually nodded and left her alone.

Rosalie stared blankly at her wall for a long time. Did this mean she had another shot?

"At least go hunt and take a shower before school tomorrow," Esme's voice called from a different room. "You can't let Bella see you in this state," Rosalie privately agreed, glancing down at her torn and muddied clothes. Esme's garden had taken a brutal hit when Rosalie had come back from the Swan Residence. She definitely needed a change of clothes.

"Wear that red shirt you love with the black skinny jeans," Alice piped up helpfully.

Even though they couldn't see her, Rosalie nodded and slowly rose from the bed. Alice's visions were rarely wrong, albeit subjective but her sister would never give her false hope.

"A second chance," Rosalie murmured with a ghost of a smile.

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"Will you calm down," Alice hissed under her breath, glancing at her fidgeting sister.

"Let her be, she's just nervous," Jasper told his wife, sending another wave of calm to Rosalie, who gave him a fleeting smile of gratitude.

"She needs to act casual," the pixie frowned. "Otherwise she'll scare Bella," Rosalie immediately straightened up and ceased fiddling with the bottom of her shirt. "That's better," Alice nodded in approval, ignoring the eye-roll from the blonde.

"She's here!" Emmett stage whispered and Rosalie's head snapped towards the beat-up truck, which slowly entered the parking lot. She waited with bated breath as Bella parked the car, physically straining herself to not blur over to see her mate.

"What happened to her?" Emmett asked no one in particular as the brunette exit the car. Rosalie sucked in a sharp breath, her enhanced sight taking in the state of the girl.

Bella looked pretty banged up, sporting a black eye and a split lip. There was a faint scar starting on her left temple, stretching down to her cheek. Rosalie watched her as she fumbled with her book back and noticed how stilted and awkward her movements were, as if she was hiding an injury underneath her clothes. She looked exhausted but alive.

As if by an invisible force, Rosalie's legs started moving on their own.

"Not yet," Alice's hand shot out and grabbed her arm. If Rosalie wasn't as prideful, she would have pouted at the command. "You'll get your chance," that settled some of her anxieties.

"Come on," Emmett gently pushed her towards the school building. Rosalie shot her mate a lingering look, before sighing and following her siblings.

The day passed at a snail pace and Rosalie grew more agitated by the hour. Her classes had never before seemed so useless and the endless chatter around her made her want to attack someone. Her siblings did their best to not antagonize her and opted to talk quietly amongst themselves, only shooting the blonde a few worried looks from time to time.

Lunch was the hardest. It was bad enough to be stuck in a room with every student; surrounded by the smell of sweat, hormones, all different kind of human food and being forced to listen to pointless conversation. But having Bella in her sights and not being able to talk to her mate, that was pure torture.

"Soon," Alice whispered soothingly, which did nothing to help Rosalie's frustration.

Instead of addressing her sister, Rosalie tuned in on the conversation at Bella's table. The girl in question had skilfully managed to avoid the subject of her obvious injuries; only giving her friends a short explanation of 'home invasion' and that she was 'Fine, don't worry. I'm tougher than I look,'. That was the extent of it and her friends started a new conversation about homework, although Angela Weber kept shooting Bella a concerned look, obviously not buying the story.

"She's definitely suspicious," Edward confirmed her theory. "She's planning on talking to her after school,"

"Not until I get to her first," Rosalie murmured stubbornly.

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Finally, after what seemed like the slowest day in Rosalie's vampire history, the last bell of the day rang. Rosalie had to force herself to walk calmly out of her last class, and not sprint like she wanted to.

"Help her up," Alice called out as she ran down the hallway, bumping into Bella, who dropped the books she had been carrying. The mischievous pixie yelled out an apology to the baffled brunette.

"Déjà vu much?" Rosalie muttered under her breath before walking over to her mate to help.

"I sense a pattern here," Bella exclaimed casually as she accepted Rosalie's help.

"Sorry about her," Rosalie did her best to keep her tone steady. Judging by Bella's unreadable look, she hadn't been successful.

"No worries," Bella shrugged but couldn't hide the small wince that accompanied the action. She was clearly in pain. Just as Rosalie was about to ask her about the injuries, dark brown eyes met hers and she fell silent. "I hope you're not here to punch me,"

"Punch you?" Rosalie asked appalled. "I would never!" she inwardly grimaced at the passion behind the statement. Luckily Bella found it amusing. "Why would I punch you?" the blonde added in a softer tone.

"I did kiss you out of the blue," Bella explained with a sheepish expression, which melted Rosalie's heart; although she would deny it if asked. "I have a feeling most people would be sporting a limp by now or maybe a black eye,"

"Pretty sure you managed that without my help," Rosalie stated dryly.

"Touché," Bella let out a light laugh, gingerly touching her face in a self-conscious move.

"Home invasion was it?" Rosalie asked innocently, almost smiling when Bella's eyes narrowed playfully.

"News travel fast," the brunette gave her a scrutinising look, long enough to make Rosalie shift uncomfortably on the spot. Something about Bella made her feel nervous. "That seems like a logical explanation doesn't it?" Rosalie frowned, unsure if she was actually asking her of it had been a rhetorical question.

"Is that the truth?" the blonde hedged carefully. "You certainly seem like you were attacked," she decided to not mention the fact that she had been there when this so-called home invasion was to take place.

"You should see the other guy," Bella chuckled humourlessly.

"What actually happened?"

"Do you think what we do in order to survive, defines us?" Rosalie blinked in surprise at the unexpected question. It was a bit alarming to hear someone ask a vampire that particular question, someone who drank blood to survive, albeit on an animal diet. She wasn't sure what to answer.

"I want to say no," Bella continued. "I think we do desperate things when our survival instincts kick in. We have no control over our primal brain after all. I will not try to argue that point. I just sometimes wonder how much has to happen for the line to get blurry?" Bella looked straight into her eye with unusual clarity. "When does the thing you convince yourself is a necessary evil, become natural to you? Where does it stop? What do you do when you lose your identity?" Bella looked away, oblivious to the way Rosalie let out a breath of relief. She felt as if those dark brown eyes were staring into her soul and that unnerved her.

"What do you do if your moral compass fails you?" the young woman whispered to herself. Rosalie was at loss. Bella as clearly burdened by many things, awful things, and there was nothing Rosalie could say that would ease her pain.

"I like to think that our moral compass never fully goes away," the blonde mused out loud. "After all, everything points to it when the fact that you're wondering about it in the first place. If you didn't have it – the thought wouldn't even occur to you,"

"I suppose that's a fair point," Bella nodded faintly. "You can also argue that the environment shapes you. Society dictates what's right or wrong. The unwritten rules that everyone know. It can be difficult to enter such a society as an outsider. The line becomes blurry,"

Rosalie noticed that the words were more for her own benefit than Rosalie's. Still it was interesting to listen to her. It seemed as if her mate was set on changing her world view with every conversation. "It's not an excuse of course, but an explanation," Rosalie nodded faintly in agreement, even though Bella was not looking at her anymore. The blonde didn't know what to say and felt completely out of her depth. Bella seemed too small in that moment, as if she were carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders. It was obvious that something terrible had happened to her and she was having a hard time coping. Rosalie was intimately familiar with an existential crisis, it came with the package of being an almost hundred-year-old self-loathing vampire, but she felt Bella was a bit young for those type of thoughts.

"I'm sorry," the brunette said in an awkwardly endearing manner with a small blush. "I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable," It was impressive how she went from solemn to adorable in the spam of two seconds. Rosalie's heart fluttered. "I'm also sorry for my dark mood and depressing disposition," Bella continued in the same apologetic tone.

"Don't be," Rosalie gave her playful wink. "It takes more than that to make me uncomfortable," Bella chuckled lowly in appreciation.

"That bodes well for me," the brunette sent a wink back, albeit a more flirtatious one. It flustered the vampire enough for Rosalie to drop the book she was holding. Feeling completely mortified, the blonde quickly snatched the book from the floor and avoided her smirking mate. "You okay?" the question was innocent enough but the playfulness in dark brown eyes betrayed her amusement.

"Peachy," Rosalie drawled, thanking every deity out there for the fact that she was incapable of blushing.

"Come on," Bella took pity on her and gently grasped her arm and led her outside. Rosalie followed in a daze, hyper aware of the heat emitting from her mate's hand.

"Your family seems to be waiting for you," the words startled Rosalie back to reality. As a replica of their first conversation, Rosalie's family and Bella's friends were the only one left on the parking lot.

"They share a bad habit of not being able to mind their own business," Rosalie addressed her siblings pointedly.

"Family is nice. Bad habits and all," a ghost of a bitter smile touched Bella's lips, as if she were lost in a memory. "You are close with them?"

"I suppose," Rosalie replied reluctantly, feeling awkward all of the sudden.

"You're lucky," Bella told her seriously. Rosalie paused at her tone, cursing herself for forgetting that Bella had none.

"What about you? Any family?" she asked in return, knowing it was pretty stalkerish for her to know Bella's personal history.

"Not anymore," the brunette shook her head. "They're all gone," Despite already knowing that, Rosalie's heart still dropped. Pity flared up for her mate. She was so young but had lost so much already. "It's okay," Bella must have recognized her expression, for she gave her a reassuring smile. Rosalie nodded unsurely.

"Fuck," Edward's voice floated over the parking lot. "She's planning on doing it again tonight," terror seized Rosalie at the news.

"Are you busy tonight?" the blonde blurted out, shifting nervously on the spot when dark brown eyes shot to her.

"I haven't scared you away yet?" Bella teased, although there was something strange in her tone.

"No," Rosalie swallowed thickly.

"If I had known all it took was philosophical ramblings, I might have tried my luck ages ago," Bella smirked.

"You're not too late," Rosalie flirted back, the irony of the words not lost on her.

"But I am," the sad smile she received was heart wrenching. "You're too good for my sullen company Miss Hale," the words were meant to be teasing, but they sounded foreboding if anything. Rosalie couldn't help but to let out a dark chuckle of her own. If only Bella knew she was talking to a bloodthirsty creature.

"I think you underestimate yourself," Rosalie argued. It was Bella who deserved much more than she had to offer.

"Which brings us back to a full circle. Does what we do in order to survive, define us?" Bella looked at her. Rosalie opened her mouth and closed it several times. The brunette stared at her imploringly for what seemed like ages.

"No," Rosalie decided finally. "What we do and who we are, is not the same. We often do things out of necessity and not moral conviction. It's all about context,"

"Very good," a small smile tugged Bella's lips and for the first time Rosalie wondered if she was being tested. If Bella was asking her not for her own benefit, but for Rosalie's as well. That food for thought left Rosalie speechless. It was as if she knew who she was, what she was.

"How did you…" Rosalie trailed off.

"I suppose I saw a kindred spirit in you," Bella admitted. The vampire didn't know what to say. "I think I should get going," the brunette smiled. Then she let go of Rosalie's arm, who missed the contact right away.

"Thank you for an enlightening conversation and pleasant company. If I may leave you with a few words of wisdom?" Rosalie nodded her head faintly.

"Life is complicated. For some of us it's fleeting and complicated, but for others it's longer but no less complicated, if not more so. What we all share is the occasional moral dilemma and the explicit need to find ourselves and more importantly, define ourselves. The most overused philosophical question is: What's the purpose in life? I'm no academic but I believe there is no one truth to that question, but each answer is different for every individual. Find your passion and what brings you the most joy and hold on to it," dark brown eyes stared deeply into topaz ones. "Laugh a lot, make new memories, never stop being curious about the world and always ask a lot of question. But most importantly," Bella paused there for theatricals. "Cherish your loved ones. You are lucky in that regard Rosalie, so don't take them for granted," Rosalie nodded when she realised Bella was waiting for a reaction.

That brought a charming smile to Bella's lips and she leaned in and planted a soft kiss on Rosalie's cheek. "I wish you all the best that this world has to offer," she said sincerely before giving a final nod and walked away, leaving a stunned blonde in her wake.

"Well… that was unexpected," Emmett summed up Rosalie's thoughts, who simply stared after the departing brunette. Rosalie felt raw and oddly exposed after the whole ordeal.

It wasn't until Bella's truck drove away that she realised that her mate had never answered her question of what happened or what her plans were for tonight. In fact, she left Rosalie with more questions.

"I guess we need a new plan," Jasper said hesitantly. Rosalie blinked at the statement and groaned out loud.

"Fuck,"

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To be continued...