At first, I assumed Edward would come back.
Something had obviously happened, I told myself. He would be here if he could. So in the meantime I just had to concentrate. I had to be the best vampire I could. For Edward, for when he got back.
The first few weeks were a mind-numbing routine. I was thirsty all of the time, something Jasper was at pains to tell me was completely normal. We hunted grizzly bears, wolves and moose in the boreal forest surrounding the cabin. I became increasingly disgusted with myself.
"I'm just a parasite!" I complained to Alice, "and a messy one at that! I do nothing but eat."
"You're not a parasite, you're a predator," she said tactfully, helping me to my feet as she kicked away the elk carcass I had mangled. "And it will get easier. You're already loads better than when you started. Jasper is really impressed."
"You're a terrible liar."
Jasper was very patient. Day after day, he spent hours in the forest with me high above the MacKenzie River, helping me adjust to my new way of life. I no longer crashed into trees while running, and I stopped breaking most things I picked up, but it felt like mediocre progress.
Alice gave me an impulsive squeeze. "It takes time, Bella. And we've got plenty of that."
Guilt washed over me. Here I was, depressed and complaining, when the two of them had dropped everything to move to the Arctic indefinitely and help me adjust. I didn't deserve a sister like Alice, and I told her so.
"Don't be ridiculous. I wouldn't be anywhere else."
No one had mentioned Edward since that first night. There was no phone in the cabin, but Alice and Jasper had a laptop, and Alice gave me regular updates from Carlisle and Esme. They had packed up the house in Forks and moved to Chicago, claiming publicly that Carlisle had been offered a job that was too good to refuse.
Alice would occasionally swing the computer around to show me pictures that Emmett had emailed. Rose somewhere along the Inca Trail; Emmett with his foot on the neck of an alligator he had wrestled. I looked at the photos with disinterest. If they were sending holiday snaps, they hadn't found Edward. Nothing else mattered.
Carlisle and Rose had worked hard on the cover story. My truck was crashed off a ravine a few hours north of Phoenix. Carlisle had taken a Jane Doe from a local morgue, and ensured that the truck became a fiery inferno that would prevent my "body" from being correctly identified. As far as Charlie and Renee knew, I'd become a victim of my own teen angst. Alice told me that Esme and Rose had attended the funeral. I swore at her that I never wanted to hear anything about it, and slammed the door to my room so hard that a hinge shot off and through a window.
Alice came into my room without knocking.
"Jasper made me this cabin, Bella. He made it with his own bare hands. So I will thank you not to smash it, regardless of what you're going through right now."
I stared open-mouthed at this revelation, reaching out instinctively to run my hand across the rough log wall. I felt immediately sheepish, like a small child after a particularly unreasonable tantrum.
"He made this?"
Alice shrugged. "We'd had a fight. He was making it up to me. That's not the point."
If I'd had a heart still, it might have cracked wide open. Spending so much time with the two of them had awed me. Their quiet devotion, their selfless love for each other. It was hard to picture them fighting. I felt suddenly and hopelessly alone.
"I've lost everything, Alice."
"No you haven't," she insisted fiercely. "You have gained a family, Bella. It's only a matter of time and we can move to Chicago, and live with Carlisle and Esme again... and Rose & Emmett will come back..." she trailed off slightly. The elephant in the room did a little dance. Alice, ever the optimist.
"And it's hard to imagine right now, but you'll be able to at least see Charlie and Renee from a distance. See that they are okay, that they are moving on from their grief."
I nodded slightly, inexplicably wishing I could cry. It felt like it would be cathartic, or at least appropriate.
"I won't smash things anymore, I promise. I'll get this temper under control."
Alice hugged me tightly.
"It seems impossible, I know. But I've seen it, Bells. I've seen us in New York. I've seen us shopping at Barneys!"
I shuddered a little. What fresh hell that would be, but Alice's enthusiasm was a balm.
"It won't always be like this," she insisted.
"He's not coming back, is he?" My voice sounded tiny, like a child's.
Alice didn't answer.
This story is largely complete, and with my amazing beta. It will be about 20 chapters in total, and I hope to post them over the next two or three weeks. Let me know what you think. It's my first story in this fandom, and I'd love the feedback.