Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight.
This story has been adopted. The original was written and discontinued by Amiiix3. I was graciously given permission to continue the story as I saw fit. Thank you Amiiix3 for your trust.
There was silence for a few minutes. I picked at the dirt beneath my fingernails until they looked perfectly clean and white. I could not help myself glancing up at him from beneath my lashes every few seconds. He had turned his head back to the television where a grainy picture showed a stout man in a suit, his mouth moving occasionally to form complicated sentences.
"...economy... having dropped radically... with the Canadians fresh on the trail... and others cooperating... while many decimate totalitarian achievements..." They must have been rich to have a television so early.
I turned back to my fingernails, scratching at the sides of my smooth cuticles.
"So what are you doing up and about so late?" Edward grinned. The only light in the room was that of the faraway moon and the flickering glow of the television. Strands of dark hair rested on his long lashes and his eyes looked black, but warm.
It took me a moment to find my voice. I gulped away the lump in my throat. "I couldn't sleep." There. I had even managed a joke. I gave him a shy half-smile. He returned it with a crooked one of his own and turned his head halfway to look at the television. I ducked my head down and a curtain of hair fell over my shoulder, separating us. I peeked through it a few times to see him watching me from the corner of his eyes.
A smile sprang across my face of its own accord, and my glee at his watching me was so warm I did not even bother to slip beneath my shell, back into the cold, harsh world of reality.
We sat for another few minutes before Edward suddenly turned off the television. It was instantly dark, at least darker than it had been before, though with our sharp vision Edward and I could see perfectly in the dark. Edward turned to me, his outline glowing in my 'night vision'.
"Now what?" his voice was soft.
"Now what..." I repeated, mulling it over. He was suddenly beside me, our shoulders almost touching. A magnetic force made me hyper aware of every curve of his body, our knees barely inches apart, and our hands less than centimeters.
"Uh-" I tried not to jump back. The closeness was something I was not used to. And this strange awareness possessing me...
"I'm sorry about the trip." His voice was muted velvet- quiet, soft, alluring. "I'm not sure what it was that made me act so rudely toward you. But I do want you to know" -he turned to face me; I looked away- "that I truly enjoy your company. It is something I both enjoy and fear." My mind was in a frenzy. I could not steady the thing I had thought was long dead. Calming breaths did nothing.
"Maybe," I said slowly. "Maybe... you hadn't expected to want to go back home so quickly. And maybe when I said I was leaving you, were upset because you had thought you'd finally found someone to accompany you, someone that was not a bloodthirsty monster? And maybe the sadness surprised you, because you hadn't been expecting it?"
The thoughts were all my own, I only made it seem as though I were thinking them up on the spot; the truth was that they were the whispers that had spun around my head for a long time.
Edward's profile moved, his head bobbing up and down. "To the tee," he whispered, his words sharp in my ears.
His fingers were sending shivers up my shoulder, his knuckles grazing the skin of my neck for just a moment. "Thank you."
"For what?" I forced the pleasant shudder not to shake me.
"For helping me understand myself a little bit better."
"And after so long you don't think you understand yourself?"
"No more than you do," was his quick reply.
"What do you mean by that?" I turned to him and- to my intense displeasure- his fingers slipped off my shoulder.
"I apologize. I suppose I assumed you felt the same way I did." His eyes smoldered in the dark.
My cold heart sped up. "And what way do you feel?"
"Well, I feel as though there is so much I do not understand yet. I feel as though I do not understand myself. Often I feel very human emotions, and they surprise me." I leaned closer, fascinated. Edward was describing himself, and yet I felt as though he were reading my mind. Just as the thought whistled through my mind, I curled away from him.
"Are you reading my mind!" I hissed, the words cutting the darkness, sharper than knives.
"I'm sorry?" Edward was obviously confused.
"Are you reading my mind?"
"I can't read your mind."
"How do I know you're telling the truth?"
"Shouldn't you know yourself better than I do?" I was quiet for a long moment. Shouldn't I know myself better than he does? The obvious answer was 'Yes'. But it seemed as though, when Edward had been speaking half to himself of his emotions, it was as if he were describing me. Perhaps he did know me better than I knew myself. But I did not say that.
"No," I sighed. "You're not reading my mind."
"Of course not. I can't, and- well, if I could I can't promise that I wouldn't, because I am so curious about you. You are the only person I have ever known who's mind I cannot read." His sharp gaze simultaneously frightened and enticed me.
There was a crack behind us. I turned in time to see a white blur. Tanya sat on the sofa Edward had just moved from. Her body was stretched across the entire length of the it, her head closest to us and her endlessly long legs curving to the end of the piece of furniture.
She turned onto her belly and settled her chin on the arm of the sofa, watching us closely. A giggle tumbled from her lips, and though her smile was bright and innocent, her eyes remained narrowed suspiciously.
"What are you two doing down here so late?"
"Television," Edward and I mumbled at the same time. I refused to look at him. My head pounded, Edward's onyx eyes still smoldering at me from beneath my own eyelids.
"Hmmm... Bella, did you ever finish unpacking? I could help you with that now if you want?" Tanya seemed so innocent.
I fell into her trap. Or she might have realized I was not after her beloved Edward and backed away. Whatever it was, I felt flattered by the blonde vampire before me.
I nodded my head, but thinking of the small black bag and the few items in it, I changed direction. "No, that's alright. There's nothing to unpack anyway. What kind of channels do you have on your television?"
"Just one." Tanya was obviously not satisfied. A smile flicked across her face as she turned to quiet one beside me. "Edward, would you like my help in unpacking?" His lips were pursed, his eyes sharp on hers. She shrank back from his fiery stare.
"Or not..." she muttered, downcast.
"I apologize Bella, but may I speak to Tanya alone?" Edward looked down at me with a strange sincerity, and I could hardly pry my eyes away from his.
"That's fine. Of course. I'll be upstairs. Perhaps I'll come down later." The words whipped out after me as I made my hasty exit. I was back in my room before I allowed myself to think of what might be happening downstairs.
Head-pounding images of inhumanly handsome Edward and seductively beautiful Tanya wrapped around each other and rolling passionately over the soft, leather sofas filled my mind. I swatted them away with a growl and squeezed my eyes shut until I saw only darkness behind my lids. The images faded away slowly, though their shadows remained, etched in my mind.
Feeling guilty beyond measure, I leant down as quietly as I could, and pressed myself flat against the bedroom floor. As soon as my fingertips met the floor, the near silent vibrations of their words shook my fingers. With my ear almost inside the wooden planks themselves, I shut my eyes and allowed myself to slip beneath.
"...like what you're doing...," Edward whispered.
"I can't stop," Tanya breathed fiercely.
"Last time I told you to try harder."
"That was forever ago. Can't you give it another go?" I pulled myself off the floor as if it had burnt me. I stumbled backwards until I hit the bed, then catapulted myself onto it and buried my head beneath the piles of pillows.
Their passionate words echoed in my ears. The images of their love rolled through my mind, right off the leather couches and onto the floor. "No, no, no, no, no..." I whispered, shaking my head fiercely. If only the tears could fall.
Why had I allowed myself to be so attached. Without even knowing I was attached, the very first moment I had seen him- golden-eyed Edward, so many years before, I had become attached.
"Why?" My unanswered question was muffled in the bedding. "Why?"
I felt the morning light before I saw it. A tickle began on on bare ankle and spread slowly to the other, sliding up my calf. When it hit the back of my knees, I realized the slight warm I felt was the sun. I lifted my head slowly, pushing through the piles of pillows with ease. My hair felt a mess and my face sagged. The skin on my legs, from knee down, sparkled as if dusted with powdered diamonds.
Despite the golden orb of sunshine sitting high in the sky, the ground was covered in thick, white snow, gleaming beautifully. Perhaps it was an omen for a good day.
"Good morning, Bella," Carlisle greeted happily. We had both walked out our bedroom doors at the same moment. I allowed myself to embarrassed at the attire I wore, the same as the night before.
"Thank you, Carlisle." He was wearing a strange white coat that stretched to his ankles. A thick silver necklace of sorts hung around his shoulders.
"Where are you going?" I wondered, hoping it was not rude to pry.
"To the hospital," he answered calmly.
I thought of all the blood and people. My nose wrinkled. "Why would you go there?"
"I work there." He said it as though it should be obvious.
It was not. "What...?"
He was surprised. "Edward didn't tell you that I work at the hospital?" I shook my head vigorously. Edward had certainly not mentioned that. I kept my face impassive at the thought of another secret he had kept from me. I hoped Carlisle could not see through my mask.
"Well then, I work at the hospital."
"How?" It seemed nearly impossible to me. No, completely impossible. It
was one thing to only drink from animals, but completely another to handle human blood with your own bare hands.
"Many years of practice. And never a taste of human blood," he added, standing proudly. My eyes must have widened, because he let out a chuckle, his golden eyes amused.
"I hope soon I may be able to help you learn abstinence as well. Good day, Bella." And with those words he was down the stairs, out the door, and slipping into a round, black car.
I watched as it rumbled down a thin trail and out of the circular forest. I shook my head and descended the stairs with a sigh- this coven was the strangest I had ever encountered.