"That's ridiculous, Bella," Edward said. "You're just imagining things. Maybe you need to hunt again. I'm going to make Alice suffer for even suggesting that you should have strained yourself by moving all the contents of our old house. You're obviously still not recovered from that yet. You're just imagining things."

"No, I'm not," I told him, looking up fearfully again. "That is plainly written on the wall. And I'm going to be the last to die. It says so. I'll have to watch all of you die! Oh, Edward!" I started dry sobbing again, and I clung to the front of Edward's shirt as I buried my face in his chest.

"Jasper," Edward called quietly.

A wave of calm spread throughout the house, but it didn't really help. I was still upset, still dry sobbing, so Edward picked me up and jumped off the balcony.

"I'm going to go look," Carlisle quietly announced once Edward brought me back in the front door. Edward sat down on an even patch of the floor and I curled into a ball on his lap. His arms encircled me, and I think he hoped that it would make me feel protected. It didn't work, but I didn't tell him that.

"You won't be able to see it," I warned Carlisle. "Only I can."

"Can vampire hallucinate?" Edward quietly asked Carlisle before our father left.

"I've never heard of it before," Carlisle answered just as quietly, hesitating by the door, "But if I don't see anything up there, then I may start to wonder if it's possible."

"I'm not hallucinating!" I protested as I got up. I ripped myself out of Edward's arms and stood off to the side, facing down my family, who all had identical looks of worry on their faces. But it wasn't worry about the house or that they were all going to die soon. I could tell it was the look of pity and worry that said they all thought I was imagining the message. "I saw that upstairs." I pointed up the stairs for emphasis. "I know it's there! Don't try to tell me I'm imagining it!"

"I'll go look," Carlisle repeated, and left this time.

Edward stood up and came to put his arms around me again. "Bella, we-" he started, but I cut him off and pulled out of his grasp.

"No," I told him. "I don't want to hear you say that you're worried about me. I'm not hallucinating, I'm not imaging it. It's there, and you can't see it because you won't be the last to die." I glared at him, and he put his arms at his side in defeat.

"Bella," Victoria started tentatively, "How would that work? How could you see something there and no one else could even tell that the wall had anything on it?"

"How can Alice see the future?" I demanded. "How can I call things to me? How can you confuse people? Can't it be someone's gift to hide things from others?" Carlisle walked back in the front door at that moment, and we all looked at him expectantly.

"Bella," Carlisle said sadly, "I didn't see anything"

"It's there," I insisted. "I know it is!"

"Bella, calm down," Edward told me. He tried to put his arms around me again.

"NO!" I shrieked, pulling away and running all the way across the room. I started yelling at them. "You all think I'm crazy! How can you expect me to calm down when that message just told me that you're all going to die before me, but then I will too, and then my family, MY FAMILY doesn't even believe me! They're all too closed minded to even consider the possibility that there could be something there that only one person can see!"

"Jasper," Carlisle commanded quietly. The next thing I knew, I was too tired to keep my eyes open, and I started to crumple to the ground. Edward caught me right before I hit the floor, and he picked me up effortlessly.

"Did you make her sleep?" Rosalie asked, impressed.

"No, vampires can't sleep," Jasper answered. "She's just too calm and relaxed to move. She's still aware of her surroundings. It will wear off in a few hours."

"Go lay her down in one of the cars, and we'll get started cleaning this mess up," Carlisle commanded. I felt Edward walk out the door.

"I'm sorry we had to do this to you, Bella," Edward told me as he walked. "But you were starting to lose control of your gift, and Carlisle didn't want the house to fall down. If you had lost control of your gift, you would have called the remaining walls to you, and that would have been the end of the house. When this wears off, you should feel a little better. We'll go hunting once you're a little less relaxed."

But when Edward came out to check on me a few hours later, I wasn't in the car. I was hiding in the woods, just out of his sight.

"Bella?" he called. I didn't answer.

"BELLA!" He called again, louder.

"What happened?" Jasper called worriedly out the door. He was obviously worried that he had done something wrong.

"She's gone!" Edward called back.

"She can't be far," Jasper told him. "I can still feel her, so she's not out of my range."

"Alice?" Edward asked.

There was a moment of silence while Alice tried to see a vision of where I could be, and then she screamed.

"No!!!" she shrieked. "Edward, you have to find her now!"

I took off running. If my family wanted to think that I was hallucinating instead of believe me, then they deserved to have to try to find me. I'd find someone who believed me, and then I'd come back. I heard Edward enter the woods behind me, but I had a good head start, and he wouldn't catch up for a long time.

I paid no heed to the fact that Alice was worried about what could happen to me. I assumed that she had seen me running, and wanted Edward to stop me.

I wasn't expecting to get clotheslined by a marble-hard arm or to fall backwards with such a force that it knocked the wind out of me. But that's what happened, and I couldn't catch my breath to scream. Two marble arms lifted me and we were running again, but this time I didn't want to. I wanted to go back to Edward, back to my family who thought I was hallucinating.

Even a family who thinks you're crazy is better than someone you don't know vampire-napping you.