Dear Readers:

Well, you guys voted a UNANIMOUS continuation. There will be a few changes however (I am changing the rating to T due to the fact that Alice was burned alive and other strong emotional scenes to come). But anyways, THANK YOU! The flood of emails into my inbox was a huge bolster!

The song for this chapter is Tonight I Wanna Cry by Keith Urban.

Disclaimer: Once upon a time, a really good author with loveable vampire characters had a dream and wrote an international bestselling series. Yeah, not me.

Chapter Four: Tonight I Wanna Cry

Bella POV:

I climbed into the silver Audi that the Cullens had bought for me when I arrived in Utah and leaned my head back against the seat. The small hole that existed from losing Edward and Alice throbbed painfully against my chest. I took slow, deep breaths as I tried not to focus on what my best friend would have said about today's dance class.
"Bella, if you want to learn how to dance, I can arrange for someone more qualified than that."

"Alice," I whispered, trying to hold myself together. Lately, I had felt like I was losing my grip on my composure, my self control. I had managed to keep such a tight hold on not focusing on the fact that I was in Utah without my best friend, without anyone. And if I was being honest with myself, I knew that I hadn't really realized how lonely I was until I started writing Jasper more and more, finding a friend, a confidant in a source I had never expected.

We had been writing each other as fast as the mail could come. I briefly considered using more instant means of gratification but there was something more personal about handwritten letters delivered with the text in his handwriting that made our correspondence seem magical, special. Every letter was more eagerly written than the last, each reply more anticipated. Through our letters I realized that though I had hoped to call him brother, I barely knew Jasper. For all that he was my best friend's husband and a part of the family that I hoped to join, I couldn't have told you what his favorite color was before my leaving.

After our correspondence, I could have told you not only his favorite color, but why he loved it so much. I could have told you all the reasons he fell in love with Alice and she with him, his interests, his favorite animal to hunt, his real feelings about almost any topic. I had found someone who knew me better than only Edward and as the months had passed, I couldn't have been sure he really even knew me at all. Edward could not tell me why I loved to read Jane Austen so much but Jasper could. Jasper's refined and yet rugged Southern charm had made it so easy for me to open up to him. I felt that there was no menial task I could not tell him about, no secrets to keep for fear of his reaction. And in turn, he had opened up to me. He told me about what life was like without Alice, not in the superficial terms that I used to describe life without Edward. His letters made me cry, made the pain of losing Alice that I felt seem inconsequential compared to his. I could not say anything to make him feel better and I didn't try. One of the beauties of our new friendship was that we both understood that the pain we felt was necessary and that the innocent nothings that most people said when faced with a pain they cannot fix were unnecessary to speak to each other.

No one could make me feel so much pain and yet erase all of my sadness like Jasper had. To an outsider our letters might have appeared bipolar and random but the honest truth was that we were both riding emotional rollercoasters and we wrote like we were having a conversation with each other face to face. It was easy to forget that he wasn't there with me when I was reading his letters. Of course, after I finished them, it crashed upon me all too well that I was living a lonely, solitary life. In those moments, I usually threw myself into a new hobby or task. My cooking skills had greatly improved, as had my dancing. I called Esme every Saturday and we talked about gardens and plants. The cabin now had even more perfectly kept gardens than when I had arrived. These temporary distractions kept me occupied and the emptiness at bay for a few days, weeks if I was lucky.

I opened my eyes and started the car. The engine purred to life and I pulled away from the curb I was parked against and took off down the road, not fast enough that a vampire would be satisfied but fast enough that a cop could have pulled me over and ticketed me without hesitation. As I entered the canyon, I hit the accelerator and sped up even faster. I was feeling reckless in light of the lonely emptiness that I could not seem to rid myself of. I wished for the millionth time that I could ask Jasper to at least come see me. But Forks was the last place that Alice had lived, breathed. No matter the pain I was in, I could not ask him to leave what remained of her and come save me from my petty feelings.

I drove through the canyon, numbly passing the beautiful countryside. I turned onto the private drive that twisted up the mountains and into the secluded grove of trees where the log cabin the Cullens were letting me stay in sat. In the setting sun, the logs and stones glowed a ruby color and I parked the car in front and got out. I breathed in the fresh, clean mountain air and felt my pain ease a little. The rich smell of soil and leaves seemed to fill my very soul. I looked at the now changing greenery and felt a little calmer. These trees had stood here for decades, had weathered storms and winters and still managed to grow, to become stronger. I was like a tree in a way. I was trying to grow, to become a sheltering, unmoving force despite the winters and storms that threatened to do away with me. I looked down the drive at the lake that glittered pink in the light of the dying sun. Even if I loved nothing else about my new home, nothing could compare to the sun setting over the mountains and trees. I sighed and turned back to the porch.

I unlocked the door and walked inside. I dropped my dance bag in the corner and kicked my shoes off while simulataneously hanging my keys up on the hook. I had grabbed the mail from the box when I turned off the highway and I sorted through it while heading for the kitchen. No letter from Jasper awaited me and I bit back a feeling of abandonment. My last letter should have arrived two days ago. His letter should have been here by now. Maybe at last he had grown tired of listening to my human dilemmas and thoughts and had retreated back into himself. I doubted that, after getting to know him over the past few months but I couldn't deny that if I were him, I wouldn't want to talk to a weak human who's pain would end in a few years.

I poured myself a glass of water and sipped it, staring at the clock on the wall without seeing it. Maybe something had gone wrong with the mail and his letter had been lost. Yes, that must have been it. I snapped myself back to reality and realized that I only had a few hours to send Renee an email before she worried about me and started calling me and the police to check on me. I trudged towards the huge office that served Carlisle during the day on their hunting trips to Utah. As I moved past the den, I glanced in and then stopped.

He was still and unmoving, a pale statue on the tan couch. In the faint light of the dying sun from the windows, he gave off a sort of ruby luminescence like standing in an enclosed space when the sun hits a brightly colored t-shirt you're wearing, turning the walls that shade. His bronze eyes were staring at me, unfaltering. He was holding an old, ratty t-shirt in his hands and I was briefly distracted from my shock long enough to wonder what it was. His blonde hair, tousled and still the same length, just above the collar, was like some strange sort of metal, glowing in the light.

I could only stare at him.

He stood up and shuffled from foot to foot, awkward from my lack of response, I guessed.

"Surprise," he said with a faint smile on his lips, raising his hands up in a 'ta-da' sort of gesture.