Chapter 3: Feel Nothing...Feel Everything (Part 2)

*The lovely Stephenie Meyer obviously owns all things Twilight.

1944, Jasper's POV

My cocoon was not the peaceful shell for which I'd been aiming. Still, I pondered lying here forever. It seemed better than getting up and repeating the horror story of my life time and time again.

Peter approached me several hours after the hunt (or was attack the more apt term?). He was still filled with the ecstasy of blood. I was jealous; my euphoria evaporated as soon as I swallowed the last mouthful. He also radiated lust and desire, presumably a remnant of his typical post-hunt dalliance with Charlotte. I felt his curiosity, confusion, and amusement flare as he stood above me.

"Jas! What are you doing down there?" he said with a laugh.

"Go away," I muttered, knowing that he could hear me even though I spoke directly into the muddy ground. I considered sending out feelings of anger, sadness, or boredom - anything to make him leave me alone - but I didn't have the energy.

Peter's amusement at my appearance dimmed and was replaced with concern. He sat down on the ground next to me and poked my shoulder with a small branch he pulled off the tree in front of me. "Come on, Jasper. Get up. Get ahold of yourself." I grabbed the stick from his hand and threw it back at him without lifting my head. It was a testament to the trust between us and the peaceful atmosphere of the North that I allowed myself to remain in a vulnerable position when he was so close. I never would have turned my back on anyone in the South, not even Peter, my closest friend.

"Fine," Peter said, still feeling more concern than annoyance. "You can lay there as long as you like, but I'm not leaving until you get up." I didn't respond, and we both stayed in the same position for the next twenty minutes. Finally, I sighed and rose up on my elbows to glare at him.

"That's more like it," he smiled, patting me on the head as though I was a child. "Come on, the car's all ready to go. We have at least four hours until dawn to drive around." He held out his hand, and I took it, letting him pull me to my feet. It was irresponsible to make my friends suffer, because of my own misery. I needed to put up a wall to block off all the emotions roiling through me, from them at least, but hopefully from myself as well.

I stepped out of body-shaped hole where I'd been lying and kicked the dirt back in that I'd removed. Peter's mirth grew as he watched me. When I turned around, he was shaking with laughter.

"Look at you, Jasper. You're beyond filthy." He reached over to brush the dirt out of my hair, but I jumped back from his touch and crouched down, knees bent, arms clawed in front of me. The North had not quelled all my fighting instincts; sometimes, the smallest, most insignificant movement threw me into full self-defense mode. Peter understood and backed a few steps away. "There's a creek about a half mile that way," he said, pointing to the northwest. "Go clean up. I'm not letting you step foot in my car looking like that."

I straightened up slowly, embarrassed by my overreaction to a friendly gesture. I played along with Peter's attempts to relieve the tension. "Your car?" I asked, raising my eyebrows. "I believe it was a team effort."

"No, sir." Peter said, grinning. "He who changes the tire, claims the car." I rolled my eyes and shoved him before running to the creek. We both knew that I had zero interest in automobiles. Even though they'd been commonplace for more than thirty years, they still felt like an odd novelty to me. I'd never ridden in one until I began traveling with Peter and Charlotte last year. Traveling in an enclosed box watching the world inch by felt unnatural. I'm sure I rode in carriages as a human, but I had no memory of such experiences. Instead, I remembered the exhilaration of riding horseback with the wind whipping against my face, the marvelous feeling of freedom. It was almost as fun as running is now.

I reached the creek and stared at my reflection in the water. I was, indeed, a sight to behold. My face, clothes, hands, and feet were streaked with dirt. My eyebrows and eyelashes, typically golden blonde, were thick and black. My hair was relatively clean, but the locks closest to my face lay long and straight, well past my chin,weighed down with clumps of mud. A few twigs were caught in the tangled strands. I looked like a scarecrow.

I jumped into the creek, clothes and all, and scrubbed the mud off my body. The dirt stubbornly stuck to my shirt and pants. The water only made the stained fabric look worse. I would have to find some new clothes before venturing near humans again. New shoes as well. I was now barefoot since the soles of my last pair wore out. Charlotte enjoyed walking through the shops when we wandered through towns on cloudy days and typically dragged us with her. I would be far too conspicuous barefoot and filthy. We already received more than enough stares from the sunglasses we wore after we'd recently fed. Perhaps Peter's new car had a few suitcases in it.

I stepped out of the creek and shook off as much water as I could. Peter would have to settle for letting me into his precious Oldsmobile soaked but clean. I ran back to the car. Charlotte was leaning over the open trunk rifling through a few suitcases of clothing. Peter was sitting in the driver's seat fascinated by something, probably the latest features on the dashboard.

"Is there anything there I could wear?" I asked. Charlotte turned around and looked me up and down. She clearly was amused to see me looking like a wet rat, but worry was her primary emotion. Peter must have told her about my strange behavior. She pursed her lips and turned back to the suitcases. She pulled out a few shirts.

"Hmm...Some of these shirts may fit you. He was a head shorter than you, but fat enough that the size may be about right. Peter was swimming in his clothes. Here, try this on." She handed me a red and white plaid button-down shirt. I pulled my shirt off and gave it to Charlotte. She held the soiled, wet garment with two fingers, wrinkling her nose in distaste. The new shirt was large enough to fit my tall frame, but the sleeves ended several inches short of my wrists.

"It's a bit bulky, but just roll the sleeves up, and you'll be good enough," Charlotte noted. "Not that one though. You look like a tablecloth. Off, off!" She tugged at the shirt until I removed it and put on the dark blue one she gave me instead. "Much better. And it will hide the dirt next time you decide to play in the mud."

Peter leaned out the window. "This is why you need to find a mate, Jasper. Charlotte doesn't have anyone to play dress-up with other than us." Charlotte ran over to the driver's window and tossed my wet shirt into his face. Peter laughed and threw his arms around Charlotte's neck, pulling her toward him until their lips were touching. Their kiss rapidly became more and more amorous, with Charlotte tangling her fingers through Peter's hair as he ran his hands up and down her chest. I jolted them apart with a strong wave of embarrassment.

"Some of us are trying to keep a meal down here," I grumbled. Charlotte looked appropriately chagrined, but Peter just laughed.

"Well, get in the car then. We only have a few hours until daylight. I want to see how fast this baby can really go. I bet I can get it up to 70 or 75." Charlotte and I got in the car as Peter revved the engine. I rolled the window down. When I first started riding with Peter, I would lean my head out the window as we drove, but stopped after Peter repeatedly howled and called me Fido. Still, it was nice to feel a slight breeze. It helped me forget that I was trapped in a moving box.

Charlotte kissed Peter on the cheek as she sat down in the front passenger seat. "Let's see if you can keep it running until dawn this time," she teased.

Peter was a car's worst nightmare. His normally calm, cautious temperament disappeared when he sat behind the wheel of an automobile. He insisted upon driving as fast as possible and preferred curves where he could take sharp turns, often at speeds even faster than he drove on straight roads. He usually ended up crashing a car within a few hours of driving, flipping it over on a curve or smashing into a tree when the brakes locked. Our heightened reflexes could respond instantly to the slightest change in pitch or torque, naturally making us better drivers than humans. But automobiles were not designed to handle the level of stress Peter subjected them to and lost control regardless of his ability to drive.

Peter managed to keep the car in one piece tonight. Just before dawn, he pulled the car into an empty campground. We usually abandoned a car after only a few hours of driving to avoid being seen in the vehicle during daylight. Today, the cloud cover and the lack of passing cars allowed Peter to indulge in his second favorite activity: tinkering. If an automobile survived Peter's driving, it inevitably succumbed to Peter's mechanical ability, or lack thereof.

I sat nearby on a branch of an ancient oak tree, about thirty feet above ground. Peter had removed the engine from the car and had various parts strewn on the grass. I listened to him and Charlotte swap their favorite car stories from human days.

"I went on a date with the most handsome boy in my school," Charlotte recounted. She was sitting on the ground next to Peter, a finger curled around one of his belt loops, handing him tools. "What was his name? Daniel? No, Dale, I think. He was the only boy in school with enough money to have his own car. It was brand new, and I was the first girl to ride in it. We were driving to the lake north of town, and the car broke down halfway there. I had to steer while he and someone else pushed it to the nearest farm."

"Handsome Dale, huh?" Peter grinned at Charlotte as he pulled the engine apart piece by piece. "Should I be jealous?"

"I think not," Charlotte laughed. "As I recall, he talked more about the car than he did about me. The entire time I was steering he was yelling at me to be more careful and to not touch anything on the dashboard. Besides, I'm sure he's bald and married with two kids by now. Not quite my type."

I leaned against the tree trunk, sighing as I listened to my friends. It always amazed me how many memories they had of their human lives. They were cloudy and confused, but still there. Nearly all of my memories were gone. The few that remained were from my military days or random events from my childhood tied to particularly strong emotions. Charlotte and Peter were fortunate to be young and have nothing but free time. They were only seven and nine years old, respectively. And they'd been free from fighting for six of those years. When I was their age, I was consumed with warfare. In my first ten years, I only had one day entirely free of any obligations. The battles descended into occasional skirmishes as the years went on, but my days were busy with managing newborns and scouting our territory for intruders. Time to reflect was a rare luxury. It didn't matter that my life was now full of leisure. My human past was lost forever.

We stayed in the campground until the clouds dissipated around midday. The campground was too close to the main road to safely be in the sunlight. And by that time, even Peter admitted that the rebuilt engine was never going to run. We gathered the few clothes and belongings from the car that would be useful to us and moved on.

Please, please R&R. And tell friends. :-)