Ms. Swan
Bella woke up at began her day the way she began every day. She opened her eyes stared at the ceiling and said "Five Years, one month, and three days" it wasn't that she was trying to keep track. First it was that it had become ritual for her and second that it had been over five years since Edward had left her in the woods and she still woke up every morning and in that brief moment before truly gaining consciousness she would hang on to her dream, her dream of him. She would feel his arms still wrapped around her, the chill of his lips as they graced her forehead, at the beginning she could still hear his voice and see his crocked smile but those memories had long since faded and now she worked to hang on to the few remaining ones she had left. But as she woke to the day and the crashing reality dawned on her she would count. To remind the sensible part of her that he was gone and that he had been gone for a long time. And every morning she tried to rid herself of the hope that he might come back, that way maybe some morning she might be able to wake up from a dream that wouldn't leave her miserable and disappointed.
Bella took a moment to let the number settle in and to push the sick hallow feeling out of her stomach before sitting up and making her way to the bathroom to get ready for the day. Now Bella did not suffer from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (or if she did it had not yet been diagnosed) but a stranger would assume so after walking through her house and observing her morning routine. It was the same routine every morning, every movement was memorized, and she lived on autopilot. After Bella was dressed and had eaten breakfast she checked her watch, 7:30 exactly, picked up her keys from their spot at the end of the counter, pulled on her jacket, hanging on its hook, and picked up her bag from its place next to the door. She went outside locked the door and turned the handle twice just to make sure it was locked and made her way to her car.
It was a gloomy day in Washington, which was where Bella lived, not in Forks but just outside of it. She knew she never could live in Forks, the torture would be too great, but so too would be living a great distance from Charlie or Jacob, it was this dilemma that led her to live in Filmore. Bella kept her eyes on the road as she drove to work. It was her work which really made it impossible to live in Forks. It was painful to be in Forks when she visited Charlie or Jacob but if she could stand it when visiting she may have been able to stand living there, but she knew that this would not be the case. She could not stand to spend everyday in the place where she had spent so much of her time with Edward. Bella was an English teacher now, and the thought of once again walking the halls of Forks High School was more than she could bear.
Bella pulled into the parking lot and parked in her usual spot. She grabbed her bag and stepped out of her car shutting the door. Bella clicked her car's key chain lock twice, the lights flashed and she heard the locks of the car click down; just the same she reached down and pulled the handle of the driver's car door just to double check that the car was locked. Bella checked her watch, 7:44 as always, as she walked up to the school. Next she opened her bag and fingered through all of the folders containing everything she needed for the day, just to double check that she hadn't forgotten anything the night before when she packed her. As always the bag was perfect.
Double checking was a big thing for Bella. Perhaps it was the feeling that she was always missing something or perhaps she never felt as though she could trust that she had done it right the first time, maybe it was that she wanted to be perfectly certain that things would be just as she left them when she returned or perhaps it was just another piece of her robotic life, whatever the reason Bella had become a machine. Bella had not done this intentionally rather it was a something that had just happened, a form of self preservation that she discovered by accident and was not even completely aware of. Bella was not cold or cruel but warm in a false and forced way, as if by programming. This was only discovered when someone attempted to get to know Bella. The attempts were eventually seen to be utterly hopeless and were given up, when that happened Bella would retreat back into herself, checking the time, her lists, and any task she had just completed, just incase.
Bella walked into her school, down the hallway beginning to fill with students and into her classroom. There she sat down pulling her rolling chair into its place; she then sat her bag down in its place next to her desk, and pulled out the book being studied and her notes for the day. She began to run through her lesson plans, checking and double checking each of her four lesson plans making sure that they were correct and long enough to fill the period. She settled into the routine she had perfected from over a year's worth of practice. She assumed that today would be just like every other day she had worked at this high school. She could not have been more wrong.