And now for the conclusion of the last chapter which is obviously set directly after it. I know this will be a little confusing, but I plan on using Carlisle the same way JK Rowling used Dumbledore and Hermione. As long as he explains it, hopefully, it will make sense.

And this won't be one of those "I knew it!" moments. It will be very shocking and confusing for a lot of the characters.

I won't say much else until we're at the bottom.

Accident

December, 1945

Edward

There was blood everywhere as I hurried to where Keira had fallen, realizing how deep the shards of stone had punctured her body and doing everything I could to hold my breath even as I watched her slip into unconsciousness from losing so much blood. I lifted her in my arms, carefully removing her from the rocks she'd been impaled on and then carrying her to the ground. She was warm, dangerously so as I leaned over her and listened as she coughed up her own blood.

"Keira," I whispered, touching her forehead and then her cheek. "Keira, please. Keira!" I pleaded.

She either couldn't reply and didn't know how over the pain I was certain she was experiencing. I needed to get to her to Carlisle. Now.

I lifted her in my arms, cradling her against me even as blood poured from her wound. I realized the rocks had completely punctured her right lung, and I didn't know what Carlisle could do to fix it, but he would have to. I didn't want her to die because of something I'd done. I'd dropped her. I'd caused her to lose control. I'd decided to climbed a tree with her and put her in danger. I couldn't let her die like this.

I ran with her in my arms faster than I'd ever run in my life, making an unplanned path through the forest back to my house even though I knew we were more than two miles away. She never moved. She never spoke. I was afraid she was already dead and I was too late. I couldn't save her now — not like I'd wanted or needed to. I'd never wanted this for her, but it was all my fault that she was bleeding more heavily than any other person ever had around me — even Rosalie and Emmett.

The back porch of my house came into my view from five hundred feet away, and I yelled, knowing Carlisle would hear me. He needed to be ready, for whatever he would be able to do, and I didn't care how many of the others heard me. Rosalie's reluctance to at least accept Keira the way she was aside, this was much more important to me than appearances. I knew Keira was no damsel in distress. She'd never asked me to be her savior, to rescue her from the loneliness and sadness she'd possessed when we'd first met. I'd wanted to save her.

I saw Carlisle before I was within two hundred feet of the porch, and I could see the confusion in his face for the first few dozen feet until I knew he could see and smell the blood soaking through to most of my torso from Keira's body. He hurried inside, moving with lightening speed and returning with all his medical supplies, and he knelt to the porch as I arrived. I laid Keira on the porch, and he immediately leaned over her.

"What happened?" he asked softly, touching her face and then her neck before he moved his hands over her chest.

"We were in the forest," I said. "She fell. I — She slipped out of my hands. I didn't mean to drop her. I swear. Carlisle, please. Please tell me you can help her."

He didn't say anything, examining every centimeter of her wound until he was less than an inch from her body. Then he spoke confidently. "She's punctured her lung and several contributory blood vessels," he informed me. "You brought her here immediately?"

"Of course," I insisted incredulously. "What can I do? Please, Carlisle. She can't die."

He lifted her body from the porch, feeling her back and then lifting his eyes to mine. "I'm sorry, Edward. But we're too far from the hospital, and I would have to explain this to the authorities. And she's already lost several pints of blood. We would have to contact her parents, her father working closely with the police, and we shouldn't involve them in our lives. It was harmful enough that you involved her to begin with. I only wish I could've — "

The certainty on his face changed only minimally, but I still saw it, looking up as Esme and Rosalie came out onto the porch.

"Oh, my God," Esme gasped, kneeling beside Carlisle and then looking at me. "What's happened? Edward."

"It was an accident," I said softly, bowing my head almost shamefully. "I tried to get her here as soon as possible, but . . ." I looked at Carlisle as he still held his hand to Keira's back. "What's wrong? Is she . . ."

"I can't be for certain, but for a small second, it felt as though her wound was shrinking."

His thoughts centered around the few of his patients who'd come into the hospital with similar injuries, but this time it was different. I could tell as the milliseconds ticked by that he was experiencing something he never had. I didn't know exactly what he was talking about, but what he was saying didn't make any sense. How could the wound that had punctured her back and exited her chest shrink?

"Carlisle," Rosalie said, "what do you see?" she asked, kneeling behind him near where I was sitting at Keira's side holding her hand.

He was silent for another several half-seconds, long enough for the confusion on his face to intensify. "I'm almost certain of it now," he said with a nod. "Her wound is smaller now than it was a few seconds ago. I'm not sure how, but I can feel it."

"How is that possible?" Rosalie asked. "She's human. No human can do that."

Carlisle took his next few movements very carefully as he unbuttoned the front of her shirt to uncover her wound as blood soaked her shirt and the pants she'd worn on our trek through the woods. Drops of Keira's blood were splattered over her face, and she was already pale from losing so much of her blood. I was still covered in enough of her blood to make the burn in my throat worse than it had been at my most thirsty, but I paid no attention. What he was saying didn't make any sense, but the more I looked, the more I realized he was right. The large hole punched through her chest was shrinking. Minimally so, but still.

"Edward, I need your hand here," Carlisle instructed, pulling my hand and laying it over the right side of her chest. Almost as soon as I applied pressure to her wound, the most amazing thing happened as she burst back to life beneath my hand with the loudest, most beautiful gasp I'd ever heard in my entire life.

Rosalie jumped to her feet within a split second, and Esme followed her. They backed away from where we'd settled, but Carlisle didn't move. He didn't look surprised, but there was no way he could've predicted anything like this happening. He continued to press his hand into her back, and after a few more seconds, she opened her eyes, pulling in and pushing out air like a marathon runner would after a long race. She lifted her hand to my arm, clenching her teeth and obviously in more pain than she had been upon initially being injured.

I couldn't hide my amazement, touching her face gently. "It's okay," I whispered. "You're okay. I'm here. Keira."

Her breathing became ragged and she coughed up more blood as Carlisle worked to keep her still. He injected her with what I hoped was something for her pain, and even though she looked at me, she said nothing, her hand on my arm going slack as her eyes closed slowly. For an even smaller half-second, I was afraid again. But then I heard her heart beat softly. It stuttered for a second, and then it beat again.

Carlisle worked more quickly than I thought he possibly could, using what supplies he had to suture the wound in her back despite the damage done to the inside of her body, and he instructed me to turn her to her side so he could tape a bandage to her back. Then he pressed another piece of gauze to her chest.

"We should take her upstairs," he told me. "I'll need to look at this more closely, and we'll all need to keep a very close eye on her."

I didn't wait, lifting her in my arms and moving into the house as Rosalie watched me more closely than she ever had since I'd known her. She kept her arms wrapped around her chest tightly, thinking the only thing she could about what she'd just seen.

It's just not human! Never in all my life, have I ever seen something so . . .

I didn't respond to her thoughts, glancing at Esme and then stepping inside to make it up to my room. Just four or five days earlier before Christmas, we'd been sitting over the lounge chair reading for our English class. Now I was going to be laying her blood-soaked body over that same lounge chair. There was an immense sadness in that.

Emmett was waiting on the stairs when I came into the foyer, and I walked passed him without paying attention to what he was thinking. He looked at me and then Keira, but he didn't say anything, looking passed me at Carlisle. I continued on up the stairs, looking at Keira as she laid unconscious in my arms. I could feel her breathing about as shallow as any human could, and her heart was barely beating. But she was alive. I was confused, but I was grateful. I didn't know how it was possible, but I didn't care.

Carlisle stepped into my room behind me, moving around to the lounge chair and kneeling beside it as I laid her down as gently as I possibly could. He laid his fingers over her neck, gauging her pulse and temperature at the same time. "I have no basis for comparison in this situation," he said gravely. "I've never encountered a human who could do this, but I believe I understand what's happening."

"What's happening to her?" I pleaded, kneeling at her other side and still holding her hand.

"There's been some documentation among circles of the medical community that claimed they'd seen random people develop the ability for their body to heal like this. The human body can heal itself already, but these random people were able to heal their bodies at an alarming rate, sometimes within days, but sometimes within hours and seconds, depending on the severity of their injuries. I've never seen it myself, but this, what I'm seeing and feeling, seems to be exactly what I've read. I'll have to do more research, and we'll more than likely need samples of her blood to run chemical analysis, but I believe she's developed this ability. This ability to heal her body very quickly and from even the most serious of injuries."

I looked at Keira, seeing her still unconscious and trying to process what Carlisle was saying. The way he explained it made it seem a little more possible, but it was still unbelievable. How did those people develop this ability? Was it in their DNA? Had it been a part of their genetic make-up? Did they inherit it from a family member? Or was it really random?

"I'll ask Esme to clean her up," Carlisle announced, rising slowly. "We'll need to keep an eye on her over the next several hours, at least until she wakes up. I'll call her parents after we've gotten a clearer idea of what to say that will allow her to remain here until she's completely healed. I'll be back," he swore, moving to the door and leaving me alone with Keira.

When it was just me with Keira, everything I'd just gone through played over again in my head — kissing her and feeling her heart fly as our lips touched, her feet slipping from the tree limb beneath her and my hand flying out to catch her, that insufferable eagle squawking and taking my eyes off Keira for the fraction of a second it had taken me to lose my grip on her, watching her fall nearly a hundred feet to the rocks below. How could I have been so stupid? What had I been thinking taking her out into the woods and climbing a tree with her? Had I already forgot how fragile she was in the few months we'd been close to each other? What was wrong with me?

And now she was laying unconscious on the lounge chair in my room with a gaping hole in her chest the size of my fist. I couldn't even imagine what it must have felt like for her — to fall and then become impaled on the rock I'd pulled her from. She must have been so scared, and I'd done nothing to prevent it. I'd been unable to prevent it. I'd never felt so helpless than I did now, watching her face and her eyes and her chest as it rose gently with her slight breathing. In a world with Vampires and Werewolves and shape-shifters, the idea of this — a human who could heal herself from such a massive wound — had never crossed my mind. And why should it? I'd never seen it before in the whole of my existence on this earth. Even Carlisle hadn't believed it until he'd seen it with his own eyes, skilled as they were to the Human Condition.

Suddenly, I was remembering Christmas only a couple of days earlier when Keira and her family had come to my house for the holiday. Things had been so perfect then, with Esme finally able to talk to someone who understood the intricacies of house decor, and Carlisle able to interact with a man who was for all intents and purposes the most down-to-earth person any of us had ever encountered. Emmett and Rosalie had even enjoyed having Fisher and Kyle in the house, and I had to admit, I'd enjoyed it as well. It had made us feel almost normal. It had snowed that day, also sleeting enough to make it slightly dangerous to travel on the roads. Mr. Jones, or Walter as he'd insisted I call him, had been completely prepared with a fresh set of tires and chains on his car for the foul weather to keep his family safe.

Even mimicking the action of eating and drinking had been surprisingly easy enough to simulate and gloss over with humans in the house. Rosalie had refused to eat, deciding to decorate the tree in our living room instead and then only pretending to drink a cup of tea while she and Fisher stood in the living room talking about a stray English paper. Kyle's attitude had improved slightly over the last month of watching me and his sister interact, and it had been interesting to listen to him and Emmett debate over baseball and football teams even though it wasn't even baseball or football season. They also compared favorite basketball teams, and I knew it was an enjoyable experience for Emmett to finally talk to someone whom he could still argue and laugh with. It had been a precarious experience to say the least, but it had felt like a new tradition in the making.

Until now.

It felt like a million years had passed since that day, and Keira's birthday was just a couple of days away. And today could've been her last had it not been for some strange anomaly in her body that had allowed her to heal from the massive wound that, for all intents and purposes, I'd inflicted on her myself without any real regard for her safety. At the very least, that should've been paramount to everything else I'd done so far. I should have at least known something bad could've happened to her with the way things had been between us. I was a vampire. And she was human. That fact alone should've meant more to me than anything else. And it had been the very thing to cause her to fall and get hurt.

"Edward," Esme called, and I looked back to see her standing in the cracked door alone.

I bowed my head then, listening to Keira's heartbeat and her lungs, and Esme stepped into the room with a set of clothes in her arms along with a pitcher of water and a washcloth. I didn't need her to say anything to me — not even the notion that any of this wasn't my fault. I knew it was all my fault. I knew Keira had never really been safe around me. The fact that she'd discovered my secret the hard way and gotten chased down by Emmett in the middle of the woods should've been the first indicator. But I'd allowed it all to continue, believing that I would do everything I could to inform her of how cautious she had to be and how hard I would work to keep her protected from that side of me.

"The water's warm," Esme said, "if you want to help me. I know it's not the best thing, but you shouldn't really blame yourself for this. We're all responsible."

She dipped the washcloth in the water then, moving it over the side of Keira's face and wiping away the few drops of blood staining her skin. I watched silently, seeing a small improvement in her coloring and seeing an image of Fisher flash through her mind. I knew we would have to come up with an especially good story to tell her family, but Fisher more than anyone else. He was so protective of her. I wasn't sure he would ever forgive me if he knew this had happened while she'd been in my care. She wasn't even sixteen yet. I didn't even know what this meant for her.

Esme eased the washcloth over the whole of Keira's face, smiling even as she cleaned out the cloth in the pitcher. "She really is very beautiful," she said softly. "I haven't had a chance to really look at her until now."

"This should never have happened," I whispered. "I knew this would happen; I just foolishly hoped it wouldn't — like I could control the hands of fate."

"Edward, don't do that," Esme chastised, prompting me to look at her. "It was just as much Keira's choice to be near you as it was your choice to be near her. You might not want to hear it from me, but she's just as responsible in all of this as you are. And she chose to be with you today. When she wakes up, I'm sure she'll tell you just as much."

"But I decided to climb that tree," I argued. "I decided to take her with me. We could've gone anywhere else. We could've done anything else."

"And you'll always wonder if this hadn't happened, would she have developed this incredible ability? But the reality and miracle of it is that she did."

I bowed my head again, hearing Carlisle's steady foot steps coming up the stairs and resigning myself to sit next to Keira and wait for her to awaken. He came in with more bandages and a small syringe. Emmett and Rosalie were waiting on the other side of the door, and they were both getting anxious — for two completely different reasons.

"How is she?" Carlisle asked, kneeling behind Esme and gazing at Keira's bandage. "She's stopped bleeding, I see." Her pulse and breathing have come back up to normal, he thought with a small glance in my direction. That's a very good sign. I believe she'll be just fine now.

"No thanks to me, I'm sure," I whispered. I didn't need to look at him to see the sympathetic expression on his face.

Neither Carlisle nor Esme said anything as he pulled out a new set of bandages and antiseptic. Esme helped him tie a tourniquet around her arm so he could draw some of her blood. Once that was done, he began working to clean around the edge of her wound on her chest which was now a few centimeters smaller than it had been upon first inspection. A rather intrigued expression crossed his face, and I'm not sure what caused it as the words came out of my mouth.

"Could you perhaps not look at her like she's a new project for you to study?" I pleaded, not meaning to sound angry and failing as Carlisle lifted his eyes to mine.

I apologize, son, he thought gently. But we do need to know how this happened. I didn't mean to appear indelicate. It's the curious nature I possess, I suppose.

I huffed looking away as he and Esme moved Keira's shirt out of the way so they could replace the bandage on her wound. If I'd been able, I'm certain I would have blushed knowing her bare chest was less than a couple of feet from me. But she was hurt, and it was inappropriate for me to look at her that way. At least that part of my upbringing was still intact.

"Probably a twenty-eighth of the tissue damage has already healed itself," Carlisle revealed, his voice upbeat and hopeful. "By this rate, she might heal herself within the next several days. We'll know more as the hour passes. Esme, darling, would you clean the edge of her wound here, and I'll lay a new bandage down."

She's still so fragile, Esme thought, her eyes finding mine as I glanced at her. It seems she is still human, just less delicate.

They worked together silently, removing Keira's shirt completely and then replacing the bandage on her back before Carlisle wrapped a compression bandage around Keira's torso from her waist to the space under her arms.

"Not too tight," Esme said softly. "Just enough to help the clotting. We'll have to wait for the bath until she can sit up."

"She should only need a few days rest at the rate she's healing," Carlisle gauged. "Edward."

I looked at him.

"You could probably lay down with her in our room," he offered. "We should destroy this before the smell gets too far. We have other things to worry about now that she's healing."

"The clothes also," Esme said. She looked at me. "I'll change her before you lie down."

"Edward, you should change," Carlisle suggested, reminding me that I was sitting there in the clothes that were still soaked through with Keira's blood. The smell had somehow permeated my senses and no longer tickled the edges of my thirst. I wasn't sure how I would react the next time I smelled it.

I didn't argue with Carlisle, watching him and Esme handle Keira and then rising with them as they left my room, and consequently the bloody lounge chair, to meet Emmett and Rosalie in the hallway. Carlisle nodded to Emmett, whom immediately entered my room for the furniture we would be destroying. Rosalie took it upon herself to direct me into the bathroom, and for the time being, I was forced to leave Keira in far more capable hands than my own.

I undressed mechanically, depositing the bloody clothes in a waste basket Rosalie provided and then stepping up in the shower which was already running and steaming up the bathroom with scorching hot water. It wasn't as easy as I'd hoped to close my eyes and attempt to wash away the memory no matter how hot the water was, and all I could do was stand there and think over it again and again. The blood that had soaked my marble-like skin washed down the drain, filling the bathroom with her smell and almost sending me into convulsions. I'd caused this. I'd nearly killed her — all because I had to climb a tree with her and kiss her more than a hundred feet from the ground where we would have been just as content and much more safe. I was so stupid.

Clothes were waiting for me when I stepped out of the shower, and I changed into the cotton pants and shirt unceremoniously as the door opened to reveal Rosalie there waiting. I didn't listen to anything she thought, stepping out of the bathroom and turning to step into Carlisle and Esme's room even as she spoke.

"She's just as responsible for this for you are," she told me, her voice unapologetic and her thoughts just as harsh.

"So you would prefer we would be arranging a funeral for her now," I demanded, facing her with my fists clenched. "As opposed to discovering something about her just as dangerous as anything she knows about us. Does none of this affect you at all? I'm the one who's a hundred times stronger than she is. I'm the one who's a thousand times faster than she is, and I'm supposed to be smarter than she could ever hope to be. I should've known better than to subject her to this existence, and now, she will never be the same. This is my fault. And I don't care how you wish I'd never brought her here. It won't change the fact that I'm never going to be able to erase this for her memory. It won't change the fact that we all have to protect her now, the same way we need her to protect us. I believe she's just made up for merely being human," I grit out, glaring at Rosalie and then turning to move into Carlisle and Esme's room where they were currently tending to Keira's bandages.

They both looked up from Keira when I stepped into the room, and I bowed my head when I realized they were still dressing her in some of Esme's clothes. The clothes she'd been wearing before were now in a pile on the floor, and her bare shoulders and her hips were exposed to the cool air of the room. I couldn't tell if she was cold or not, but Esme pulled a long-sleeved shirt over her head and then summoned me forward silently. Carlisle was still sitting at Keira's side, taking her pulse and mentally marveling at the fact that she was now breathing evenly despite there being a shrinking hole in her right lung.

"She seems to be healing at a very good rate," Carlisle said confidently. "It's still only a small rate percent, but that could change once she's had enough rest." He glanced at Esme, and then at me again. "We'll leave you two alone for the time being. We'll have to wait until nightfall to burn the chair and all the clothes. I'll check on you then. Before we leave."

I didn't say anything to them as they left, watching Keira sleep from the end of the bed as she breathed in and out so softly a normal human wouldn't have been able to hear her. I wanted to hold her, but I didn't want to hurt her. She moved slightly, groaning softly, and I moved instantly, at her side before she could turn completely to her back. I caught her as smoothly and gently as I could, holding her against me as she groaned again.

"You're all right," I whispered, the tip of my nose touching hers. "I'm here. I'm not going anywhere."

I'd never laid this close to a girl before in my life, not even a human girl. Though I'd been seventeen when Carlisle had turned me, I'd only had trivial contact with the opposite sex, instead deciding to focus on the news of the times and wanting so desperately to sign up for the war as soon as I was old enough. My parents had been reluctant more than anything else. My father had wanted me to be a lawyer, and my mother had wanted me to be married to a nice girl. But then we'd all become sick, and all the hopes and plans they'd had for my future had been replaced by something neither of them could've possibly imagined.

Carlisle and Esme, just like my mother and father, had wanted only the best for me, and when Rosalie and Emmett had come along, they'd amended that to want nothing but for me to be happy. They'd never really thought I might be happy with a human girl, but laying here with Keira healing in my arms was making me think that was exactly what they'd thought. Maybe they'd known all along that this is what I wanted. She was what I wanted. And the fact that she'd just survived one of the worst accidents I'd ever seen only meant the future of her life was uncertain. Mine had just come back into focus.

I laid with Keira most of the rest of the afternoon, listening to Carlisle as he phoned into town to talk with Keira's parents. He told them she'd eaten a bad batch of fish, and he didn't feel comfortable moving her at the moment. Keira's father asked to speak to her, but Carlisle smoothly dodged him by saying she was currently medicated and unable to talk. Carlisle assured him of her well-being, and when it sounded like everything had been established, they said good-bye for the time being. But I knew that would only keep until the next morning, and then I knew we would all have to reevaluate the situation in front of us. I wondered if Keira would be healed enough by morning to go home or if she would need several days to heal completely the way Carlisle wanted her to before she left him. I knew I would go with her if she did. I couldn't be away from her now, and I had to protect her in case her mother or Fisher happened to see what had happened to her.

It was just getting dark outside when Keira moved again, and this time, her thoughts aligned easily with her consciousness. She inhaled deeply, easily even though the right side of her chest shook with discomfort, and she lifted her hand to my face as I still laid in front of her. She opened her eyes slowly then, the irises of her eyes still hidden as she seemed to take in the fact that I was so close, and when she lifted her eyes to mine, I saw a glimmer of relief as she lowered her hand to my neck and then grasped onto the shirt I was wearing.

"You're here," she whispered, her voice gravelly and filled with phlegm in the back of her throat. She attempted to clear it, failing as she laid her head against the front of my shoulder.

I held her closer, moving my face in front of hers and laying my forehead over hers. "I'm here. And I'm never leaving you again. I swear." I paused, and she seemed to remember the fall and the pain and my face. I inhaled slowly, whispering softly. "Keira, I'm so sorry. If I'd held onto you tighter . . ."

"How long have I been . . . asleep?" she whispered hoarsely.

"All afternoon. Nearly five hours. The sun is setting now. Keira, what are you feeling right now? I mean, physically. Are you in pain?"

She thought about it nearly a minute, remembering the pain in her back and then her chest and the blood in her mouth. "My chest feels heavy," she said finally. "And my throat is dry."

As if on cue, the door opened then, allowing Carlisle and Esme inside with fresh bandages and a pitcher of water with lemon in it. They smiled when they saw us, their thoughts the same as the images played back in their minds. I was really going to have to talk to them about things like this.

Esme approached us first, sitting behind Keira and then switching on the bedside lamp before she spoke softly. "You're awake," she said cheerfully, and then she smiled at me. "How long?"

"Just a few moments," I replied softly. "She's thirsty."

"I expected she would be," Esme laughed softly, lifting a glass and the pitcher to pour half a glass of water before she moved forward a few inches to help Keira sit up.

Keira groaned again, and I sat up with her, allowing her lean back into my and feeling something wet soak through to my chest. I smelled blood and looked down to see a spot of blood now on my shirt the size of a baseball.

"She's bleeding again," I told Carlisle, and he moved to sit beside me so he could look over her bandages.

Together, the three of us tended to Keira as Esme allowed her to drink the water in tiny sips while Carlisle removed her shirt to pull the bandage off. The sutures he'd put in earlier were gone, and in their place, new skin had healed over even though a part of her back nearly the width of her ribs was still exposed. There was no infection, no dead skin the way there should've been. Before my eyes, I could see her muscles and bones healing themselves gently. It was more incredible than anything I'd ever seen.

"Edward, keep her still," Carlisle whispered, reaching into his medical bag and retrieving more suture supplies.

I removed my own shirt, gazing over Keira's wound. "I don't think she needs those," I told him, touching the parts of her back that had already healed. "Don't you see? They've all dissolved. I think it will only hinder her."

Keira was surprisingly silent during my and Carlisle's quiet talk, and Esme poured her another half glass while keeping an eye on the two of us. I realized Keira was sitting there without a shirt to cover her torso, and I nodded to Esme to find her something to cover her chest while Carlisle continued assessing the situation silently.

"Are you all right?" I asked Keira softly, turning so that I was at her side while Carlisle still looked over her back. "You're not scared, are you?"

She clutched the glass in her hand, keeping the shirt Esme had given her over her chest despite the large hole over her right lung. "I'm . . . confused. I can't remember how I got here."

I lifted my fingers to her forehead, moving strands of her hair from her face. "What do you remember last?" I whispered.

"A tree. You. We kissed. There was a bird. The wind blew passed me so fast. There was this pain — heavy, instant. Something warm was in my mouth. And then I woke up in here."

I turned her face to look at her, and she took a sip of her water. "So you don't remember waking up downstairs on the porch?"

She shook her head.

I leaned forward, kissing her forehead and then laying mine against hers. Her thoughts were centered around Carlisle's hands as he touched various healing places over her back, but every few seconds, I could see my face the way I'd looked when she'd burst to life on the porch beneath my hands. Every few seconds, I could see me dropping to the ground near her and then above her as I touched her face and called for her. But there was no sound. No sound but that of her pounding heart.

"Everything's going to be all right," I promised her. "I'm right here."

I didn't know if she was purposefully pushing all the thoughts of the accident away, but I didn't care. She was alive, and that was all that really mattered. Beyond that, I knew we would figure everything else out in time.

"If I can't suture her wound," Carlisle said after a moment of silence, "we'll have to keep it covered as tightly as possible until she stops bleeding. I'll need another bandage to wrap around her, and she'll need antibiotics in the event that she might get an infection. I don't want to leave her, but I need more supplies than I have here, and the hospital — "

"I'll go."

Emmett's voice startled me as he appeared at the door more determined than I'd seen in a long time.

Carlisle rose from the bed, and Emmett moved further into the room.

"Tell me what you need," Emmett pleaded. "I'll get it for you if it means you can stay here where she needs you."

After a glance in my direction and a responsive nod from me, Carlisle guided Emmett out of the room, whispering to him the several items he would need from the hospital for Keira. His voice faded the farther away he got, and I remained next to Keira, more grateful for Emmett's presence than I had been since meeting him ten years earlier.

It became obvious to me then that she was just as important a figure in his life as she was in mine. I couldn't have asked for a more precious gift than that.

So, does this make up for the last chapter being so short? I hope so. I know a lot of you read, and I'm grateful anyone reads it but me, but I'd really like to hear from you.

What do you think of this? How does it sit with you? Tell me.

Next chapter might be a little while, but if you want it, I'll get it out as soon as I can.

See ya later. Have a Happy New Year!