If I could wake up in a different place, at a different time, could I wake up as a different person?

Fight Club, by Chuck Palahnuik


There is no love here, and there is no pain.
Every day is exactly the same.
I can feel their eyes are watching
In case I lose myself again.
Sometimes I think I'm happy here
(sometimes) sometimes,
Yeah, I still pretend.

Every Day Is Exactly The Same by Nine Inch Nails


For the first time in five years, I'm going back to Washington.

High school is over and I'm beginning college. But instead of going to a college in Florida, where I'd lived with my mom and her new husband for the past two years, I'd decided that it was time for me to go back to the state that had been haunting me for too long now.

I had repressed those memories of the day at La Push all through high school. Those confused memories that I couldn't explain to myself, much less anyone else, why I was even alive today; how I escaped the tempestuous, indifferent sea that I should have drowned in when I was fourteen.

Because every time I thought about those memories the memory of the cool breeze, of the ice would come back, and that scared me senseless, partly because I had no idea what to make of it. I had no idea what it was. It kept me up some nights; usually after I awoke screaming.

And what scared me more was how I obsessed over those memories when I let them out, pouring over them with not just fear in my broodings, but also curiosity and…almost gratitude.

And that was the real reason I was scared of it.

Because I wasn't scared of it. Not as scared of it as I should've been.

I stared at the scenery outside my plane window. I had literally traveled back in time - I had chased the sun. I'd watched the sun come up in Florida this morning; and now I was watching it come again in Washington. It was baffling.

But I knew the only reason I could even see the sun now was because we were flying above the rain clouds. As soon as we started to descend, the sun would disappear, leaving only thick, dark, gloomy weather.

I breathed in deeply, bravely, ready for it.

My curiosity over the chill was only half of my problem.

The other half of it was the fact that I was eighteen years old, almost nineteen, and not once in my entire life had I ever known what it felt like to be held tightly, in a lovers embrace - let alone having ever been kissed, and sex is practically a foreign word in my vocabulary.

After living this many years, a person should feel, or should at least have felt, if only once, like they were desirable.

You know, not even that.

A person should at least feel like they were touchable.

I didn't know what was wrong with me. Even when I had tried hugging people in the past, they had shied away from me, leaving me to drop my arms awkwardly at my sides, marveling at how stupid I was to even try. They would laugh about it later of course, play it off like a joke; but they wouldn't touch me. No one would. Not even my own mother.

The mystery of the ice is not the only reason I wake up screaming some nights.

I have a nightmare that reoccurs quite often. In this dream, my skin simply melts away, as if I'm toxic, and when I try to reach out to people they run away. And if I do manage to touch somebody, they burn away too.

It's an irrational dream. But it never ceases to make me shriek myself awake, rubbing my hands frantically all over me to make sure my skin is still there and not bubbling and dripping down to the floor.

In the beginning, my mom used to run into the room, scared for me. She'd rub my clothed shoulder, or my sweats-clad leg. But she never hugged me fully, never hugged me in a way that would bring our skin into contact. Eventually, I began wearing turtlenecks, full-length pants, socks, and gloves to bed, just so she would hug me at all. But I was grateful for it all the same. Even when I covered my skin completely, my parents were the only ones who would hug me.

And so my dreams continued. And I wondered, sometimes, if it wouldn't have been better if maybe I'd just drowned in the Pacific after all.

Anything was better than this.

Which was why I needed to go back to Washington. I needed to go back to the part of the country where it all started. Granted, I'd be living in Seattle, going to UW, not living in Forks, but something told me that it wouldn't matter. It was the essence of the place that would give me answers, if there were any answers to be gotten. It was the eerie, dripping, ancient forests. It was the damp, drenched greenery. It was the fog, it was the rain, it was the clouds, it was the darkness. It was the timeless magic around the place, where your darkest nightmares seem not only possible, but like they'd been waiting patiently for you all that time.

I'd been shying from my nightmares for too long. I'd been suppressing myself for so many years.

Which was why, even though my mother cried and begged me not to go back, still thinking of me as that fourteen-year-old girl who foolishly fell of a cliff face (or, as I knew she partly believed, jumped off) I was going anyway. There was something deep in my heart tugging me towards it, telling me that this was necessary, that this was what I had to do.

My heart hadn't felt anything but emptiness and desolation for such a long time, that when I finally felt this, when I finally felt that tug, that feeling that said 'this is right'…I couldn't ignore it. Because what if I never felt anything like it ever again?

I couldn't keep living like this. I had to convince myself that it was a good thing I had survived all those years ago. And maybe figure out how I had.

And more than that, I needed to be touched. I needed human contact. I longed for it with every fiber of my being. People took touch for granted. I'd see people in the hallways at high school, their forearms brushing accidentally, fingertips sliding across one another. Couples holding hands. Friends with their arms thrown over each others shoulders. What I wouldn't give for someone to just play with my hair.

I was very alone.

Which was why I'd decided that once I settled into Washington I was going to have sex with someone. I didn't understand the strange behavior that had followed me these past five years. Didn't understand peoples avoidance of touching me. But logically, there was nothing really stopping anyone. It wasn't like I had a force-field around me. And even though my skin-melting dream still scared me, in my right frame of mind I knew that that too wasn't real.

Maybe there'd just been something wrong with me that everyone had seen. That made them want to avoid me.

But I was hoping I could rectify that here. I mean there had to be some nice guy looking to get laid. Because yes, desperate as I was, I still had standards, though they'd broken down over the years. I used to think I wanted to wait until I fell in love. Now that was almost laughable. I figured as long as he was a nice guy, I would be fine. It would be fine. And maybe whatever curse I was under would lift. Maybe if someone would just touch me.

The plane landed bumpily at the Seattle airport, the thick clouds effectively blocking the sun, as I knew they would. I pulled on my coat and my gloves. I wrapped my scarf around the bottom half of my face. I pulled my ski cap out and tucked all of my hair under it, pulling it as far down as I could on my neck. I put big sunglasses on.

I was as good as I could make myself to be hugged by my father.

I put on my backpack and lifted my carry-on off the plane with me. People were jostling together in front of me and behind me, eager to get off. But there was a clear circle of free inches of space around me, a remarkable amount in a plane this size. I sighed against my scarf. This wasn't off to a good start.

After going through all the hoops and hurtles of security, I finally made my way out to the terminal to search for my dad. I saw him standing there awkwardly against a pillar. I lifted my sunglasses up for a better look. He looked healthy enough. A little thin, but nothing a couple of home-cooked meals couldn't cure.

"Dad!" I called, waving my hand around until he noticed me. We walked towards each other and I put my sunglasses back on, effectively blocking the rest of my face. Charlie hugged me a little awkwardly, not putting too much pressure into it. My eyes stung a bit but I blinked them back, used to them. I'd really like to be pressed tightly against someone's chest though.

We walked over to the baggage claim and Charlie took my sizeable bag for me. Although it was big, it really wasn't that much when you considered I had everything I'd be living with in it. Whatever I didn't have in there I would have to buy.

"Are you ready for this, Bella?" Charlie asked me in his dry, gruff voice. That hadn't changed. He carried my carry-on bag for me and rolled my big suitcase too. "Moving into a dorm…out of the house…starting college. You know you can come visit me whenever you want right?" he reassured me for the thousandth time. I didn't blame him. He was just being my dad.

"I know," I said patiently. "And if I ever feel the need to I won't hesitate to do so. But I think I'll be fine Dad. I'm all grown up now, remember?"

"Alright…this is just the first time you've been back since…and I don't want you to be nervous."

"I appreciate that. I'm not."

"And I also got you something too."

I eyed him warily. Charlie wasn't a man of surprises; this was new for him. "What is it?" I asked carefully.

"See for yourself," he said, pointing ahead of him. We'd been walking toward his cruiser and right next to it was a beat-up red Chevy truck.

A very familiar beat-up red Chevy truck. I tried my hardest not to think who owned it last because I didn't want to cry.

"I figured you wouldn't want to have to rely on your old man's cop car," Charlie explained awkwardly, his cheeks turning pink. "Thought it'd be a nice present for you."

"It is," I assured him, swallowing the lump in my throat. "Thank you so much Dad. This is great. I was worried about what I was going to do for transportation."

"Well I got you covered," he said gruffly. He cleared his throat and put my luggage in the pick-ups bed, using a utility cord to strap it down. "Erm, you'll have to drive it to the college, but I figured that would be good for you, so you can get the hang of it. I'll drive behind so I can - "

"Uh Dad," I interrupted, blushing. "You don't have to come with me now. I mean…I don't really have that much stuff. I can kinda get set up on my own." And start scoping out the area.

For a dad, he seemed to catch on pretty fast. "Oh - would it be embarrassing if I went with you?"

"In a cop car? Yeah, I think it would give the wrong impression."

"Right." He rubbed the back of neck, which was pink too I noticed. "Well, I'm going to stay in town for the rest of the day. If you do need anything, call me alright?"

"I will," I promised as he gave me the keys to my new car. I felt a small smile light my face. At least that was one less thing I would have to worry about. "I'll call you later though, to let you know how I'm doing and so you can rest easy."

"That's all I'm asking for," he told me, patting my heavily-padded shoulder. I got in my new truck before I had the chance to long for more.

I'd been to Seattle before, and I had heavily studied the area beforehand, so finding the college was not that hard. Finding my dorm was a little bit trickier, but I was used to handling things on my own and I figured it out soon enough, going to the appropriate office, getting registered in, and obtaining my key. And since my luggage had wheels, taking it up to my dorm was not that hard either.

Though the dorms were buzzing with students and adults, excitement and running around, people getting settled in, still no one brushed against me. My hopes were getting crushed one second at a time.

I fumbled the key into the lock and opened my door, entering an empty room with just beds set up. The two beds were unnecessary though. I had already received a letter about my room assignment a long time ago. Apparently they had an uneven number of girls, so there would only be one girl in one of the rooms. Guess which lucky girl that was.

Actually, most people might consider that lucky. But I was tired of being alone. This was not fortunate in any way to me.

I set out on the tedious duty of unpacking and making sure everything was in order, making a list of things I would need to acquire at some point and listening to the rumble and chatter of hundreds of students outside my door and my window.

I had planned on walking around when I was done setting up; mainly for checking out the male population and seeing who be a good enough choice to try to sleep with. But I was much more exhausted than I thought I was. In the end, I just called Charlie and let him know that I was done and that I was alright, and then I passed out on my bed, only removing my shoes, scarf, and sunglasses. I kept everything else on out of habit.

~*~

My alarm didn't wake me up for my first day of college. My eyes just sort of popped open ten minutes before I had to wake up, and I stared up at my ceiling, grey light streaming in through the Venetian blinds. Classes started much later than they did in high school, or else I would've been waking up to the dark.

I turned my alarm off when it rang and got started getting ready for the day, feeling nervousness start to billow and break in my stomach, lapping up at the sides of my intestines sickeningly. Like a hungry ocean.

I hoped I'd be able to keep up with the course work. Because if nothing else worked in my life, I needed to be able to, at the very least, have my education. But I'd always been in the AP and Honors classes, so hopefully I'd be fine. I'd make myself be fine.

But course work was a fleck of dust from an eraser shaving compared to my nervousness of how I would be treated. Would my new location have helped at all? So far that answer was no. But I hadn't really tried to get to know anybody yet either.

So many maybes. So many speculations. No answers.

Slipping on my grey turtleneck, jeans, and leather gloves, I went through my schoolbag one last time, making sure I had everything in it I could possibly dream of needing, before slinging it over my shoulder, reaching for my doorknob, the entrance to the outside world. Trepidation made my hand shake a bit.

My first class was my history course, a class that specialized in the Middle Ages.

Upon entering the room, I found that it was only half full. I guessed people were still at breakfast. There were a couple of students that obviously knew each other, milling about and chatting quietly enough. The new people were easy to pick out. They sat by themselves, pouring over pamphlets and checking their cell phones, or some other solitary activity.

I chose a seat in the middle, close to the side of the room. In front of me was a blond guy chatting amiably to a raven-haired guy. I pulled out my textbook and put up the appearance of looking through that, but I was looking up at them surreptitiously from underneath my eyelashes. The raven-haired boy had one of those classic 'geek' looks going on. Oily hair, sweater vest, glasses. I put him in the maybe pile. The blond-haired guy had his hair brushed back, but I could see many tufts of it sticking up like cowlicks all over his head, as if they were used to being styled differently. His face, from what I could see, was actually pretty good-looking, and he seemed nice enough from his conversation with the black-haired boy. I put him a little higher up on the maybe pile.

His gaze accidentally flickered to meet mine while he was talking and I hurriedly dropped my eyes back to my book, blushing at getting caught. He paused for a brief second but then continued his conversation.

Class finally began and the professor spent the majority of class time explaining to us how this class would run and what we were going to be doing this semester. He briefly touched upon an introduction to the Middle Ages before class was over, and gave us a reading assignment. I pulled out my planner and wrote it down quickly before stuffing everything into bag, slinging it over my shoulder and trying to leave with everybody else. I somehow still ended up at the end of the line anyway.

As was my luck, just as I was walking out the door, my foot caught on the threshold and I went sprawling down to the floor, my backpack crashing down heavily beside me, having fallen off my shoulder. I muted my groan of pain, and looked up, my embarrassment far worse. The people at the end of the line that were still around the door were staring, including the blond-boy.

I wanted to squeeze my eyes shut and sink into the floor.

What made it worse was when another girl, hurrying along, apparently didn't see me or my stuff lying on the floor. Her foot caught the strap of my book bag and it hooked around her ankle, sending her down to the floor too.

A couple people let out chuckles, which I guess was understandable. They held it in remarkably well when I fell.

"I'm so sorry!" I rushed to say, scrambling to my feet and getting on my knees next to the girl who fell. She sat up dazedly, her short black hair falling into her big, grey eyes. She was such a tiny thing I felt immensely worse. "Are you okay?"

She got to her feet, brushing herself off. "Yeah I'm fine," she muttered. I rushed to my feet too and hauled the traitorous bag off the floor, slinging it to my back before it could do any more damage.

"Um, I'm really sorry," I apologized lamely again. "I'm Bella."

I tentatively held my hand out, hoping it wouldn't be rejected as usual. I still had my gloves on; I hoped that would help.

"I'm Alice," she said brightly, now that she had finished wiping the dirt from her clothes. Her very nice, stylish clothes. "And it's no big deal, I was just rushing is all…"

She reached her hand out to shake mine and my heart started hammering so hard I was sure it was going to fall out of my chest. As she neared my hand, her brow furrowed. With some obvious effort, she shook my hand.

I could've screamed from joy.

But when her eyes met mine, they were filled with confusion. I saw her glance around me but didn't know what she was looking for. Her eyes were way too serious for a first meeting and I was starting to feel like I was doing something wrong again.

She leaned her head a little closer to me. "What did you say your name was again?" she asked quietly.

"Um…Bella," I answered hesitantly. "Bella Swan."

She scratched her head absent-mindedly as a wide smile started to stretch her small, pixie-like features. Her eyes were much brighter. "That might explain it," she said gleefully. "Well, I'll see you around Bella Swan. It was excellent to meet you."

"Uh…yes?" I asked, not quite sure what had happened, but she was already walking away. Well, dancing really. I was left staring after her, baffled.

"Your name is Bella?" a masculine voice asked from behind me.

Gasping inaudibly, I whirled around. It was the blond-haired boy, apprehension in his eyes. "Oh, uh, yes," I stuttered. I wasn't used to this much human interaction. I may have been asking for it, but I didn't think it would happen so suddenly.

"I'm Mike, Mike Newton," he told me, stretching his hand out. My heart started pounding again, getting lodged in my throat. If only one person would touch me, then that might lift my curse. It seemed like it was working.

I stretched my hand out and he automatically recoiled his, like he wasn't even thinking about it. My heart dropped to the pit of my stomach. "Oh…sorry," he laughed awkwardly, and after eyeing my gloved hand, he hesitantly stretched his hand out to mine and lightly grasped it. Funny. He looked like someone who would use more pressure.

He let go quickly.

"So uh, are you friends with that girl?" he asked, looking troubled again. "Hey, what class do you have next?" he suddenly switched before I could answer.

"Um, my science class. It's a couple buildings away." I glanced at my watch. "I think I actually need to go start heading over there."

"That's cool, I'm going in the same direction." And somehow, against all odds, I started walking to class with another person. "Anyway, you friends with that girl? Alice?"

I guess he knew her too. "Oh uh…I don't know, we just met when she tripped over my stuff."

"Okay good." I looked up at him, startled. He leaned down a little "I would stay away from her," he muttered. "Seriously, she's really weird. We went to high school together and…" He paused. "Well, I'm only going to tell you this since I think it's only fair you're forewarned."

"Okay…" I trailed off. I wasn't sure how much I was liking this gossiping stuff. He was slowly getting notched down on my maybe list. But he sounded like he was seriously concerned.

"Well alright. Basically, she's certifiably insane." I stared at him, raising an eyebrow. Way to exaggerate. He seemed to read the skepticism in my face. "No, really! She tried to kill herself at the beginning of high school, and she got taken out during freshman year for it; her parents took her to a nuthouse. I don't think it helped. In fact, I think it made things worse. When she came back, she was talking to herself. She still does, even now," he confided in me. "All the time. In the halls, at lunch, walking to her car. I don't even know how she has a license."

"I doubt she's talking to herself," I said, frowning. Admittedly, my encounter with Alice had been strange, but I didn't get bad feelings about her. "She's probably just talking out loud. And I bet she had reasons for…trying to kill herself too."

"I know she had reasons," he said, affronted. "I'm not saying this because I have anything against her. I used to actually like her. But now…she really worries me. I'm serious, I think she really went crazy. Trust me, she's not talking out loud. If you ever saw it…well, you would know she's not talking out loud too. Look, I'm just trying to warn you so you know what you're getting into."

"Thanks…" I was still skeptic. "I really appreciate your concern. I think I'll be fine though."

He shrugged, disgruntled. "It's up to you. Anyway, it's a shame our first conversation had to be about this. Maybe see you around, so we can try again?" That was the second time today someone had said that - an implied promise to see me again. My heart started pounding again.

"Yeah, yeah of course," I agreed, hoping I didn't sound too eager.

He grinned and waved, stepping into the building before mine.

The rest of the day passed without nearly so much excitement happening. No one else touched or talked to me, but that was okay. A bird in the hand versus two in the nest and all that…

When I went to sleep that night, my mind was swimming with my morning encounters. Questions rolled around my head, but I was used to that, and I fell into a restless sleep in which my skin turned into acid. But this time, Alice was there purposefully pressing my hand to her face, and Mike was calling out warnings from the background, wearing my gloves on his hands as he held them out like a stop sign.


A/N:

Haha, it's so funny listening to people's theories. I'm not worried yet. No one really knows or has come very close. Some people were headed in the right direction, but you'll never get there without more information.

I wish I could add one more genre to this story, and that would be Mystery. You guys can try to guess, but I think it'll be more fun if you just sit back and enjoy the suspense. Don't worry; only the first half of this story is spent figuring out all the major stuff.

I really hope you listen to the music for each chapter, because I seriously think it adds something. I'm finding that I prefer instrumentals for this story, because they capture the mood while not being distracting with lyrics. Very easy to listen to and read the chapter at the same time. Obviously this chapter has lyrics, but there will be plenty of instrumental-onlys.

Thank you for all your great, supportive reviews! I appreciate them completely and utterly! Again, I've already started the next chapter for this story, so that should be out soon. Reviews save the planet, recycle, re-use grocery bags, and reverse global-warming with their love =]

- The Romanticidal Edwardian