Good morning! I know it's been a while, but what can I say? This story is like my baby. It has to be perfect before I post it.

Won't bore you up here, but just to let you know, we've only got this chapter and one more before the end of this part of the story.

I don't own Twilight, but I do like to screw around with the timeline and the characters.

See you at the bottom!

Educated Guess

December, 1945

Keira

After breakfast, my mother informed me that she'd brought me clothes, and I was so relieved to not impose on Esme anymore that I immediately took what she brought me upstairs to change. My father wanted to take me home, and I could see my brothers agreed with him for once. It was the first time I'd seen the three of them agree on anything. But there was so much still needing to be done, and I wanted to help Carlisle find out what was happening to me. I couldn't tell my parents this, but I hoped Fisher and Kyle would at least try to understand.

"You need to be at home where we can help you," Fisher said to me as I finished getting dressed in Carlisle and Esme's room. "We're responsible for your well-being."

"And I'm fine now," I assured him. "I want to help figure all of this out."

He glanced at Kyle who was standing at the door like a guard. "That doesn't mean you can't go home for now and come back later. Everything needing to be done can wait for you to get used to this."

I sat on the bed, clasping my hands together. "That's not fair, Fisher. This is happening to me, not you. I can't sit idle by while the answers I need are just downstairs. In this house, with a man who can help me understand it. I know you talked to him yesterday before you left."

Fisher moved to my side, taking my hands in his. "You're being stubborn just like her," he reminisced with a smile. I knew he was talking about our grandmother. "She had very little patience to just slow down and take things easily. I sometimes wonder if that's what happened to her." His smile faded. "Did she become so involved in something that it prevented her from taking care of herself and listening to the people around her? Is that why she died?"

Slowly, I lifted my hand to his face, making him look at me. "We may never know why she got sick so fast. And you're a lot like her too, so it's something else we have in common. But I'm not going to stop taking care of myself because of this. And I won't wait to figure it out because it's happened so quickly. You're worried, and that's okay. You've always been that way, and it's one of the things I love about you most." I paused, moving forward and wrapping my arms around him. He followed immediately, and I spoke softly. "It's just for today. Edward and Emmett will bring me home tonight, and then I'm all yours."

Fisher sighed softly, holding me tighter. "When did my baby sister grow up so fast?" he whispered. A light chuckle followed, and he leaned back to look at me. "She would want you to do this. So I guess I can understand your stubbornness. And I won't deny that I don't want to know the truth as well." He paused and glanced at Kyle again. "I'll take to Dad. Just make sure you eat lunch, okay?"

I smiled and laughed quietly. "I will. Esme won't let me go too long before then."

The curious grin on his face grew as he stood, pulling me to my feet and then to the door. While he might have been suspicious of Edward before, it had changed. There was a slight amount of amusement on his face when I spoke of Carlisle and Esme. Would he eventually accept them even though it was clear he still knew very little about them?

Kyle followed us out of the room, and when our father saw us — me dressed but barefoot — the worried crease on his forehead deepened.

"Why aren't you wearing your shoes?" he asked me.

"Well," I said with a glance in Fisher's direction, "I'm not leaving yet."

"Absolutely not," he began to argue. "You need to come home."

My brother spoke before I could, stepping around me as Kyle followed him. "She wants to stay here," he said with a definitive tone. "And she'll be back home tonight. She's fine now so there's no reason to worry."

"Fisher Allen Jones, I think I'll be the one to decide when I worry about my sixteen-year-old daughter," our father chastised.

"But I'm not sick anymore," I insisted.

He sighed heavily. "Sweetheart, I know you're not sick anymore, but you haven't been home in two days. You can come back out here in a few days when everything has settled down."

Even though Fisher obviously wanted to handle this, I stepped around him to be in front of our father. "Daddy," I pleaded. "I know you're worried about me. And I know the last couple of days have been scary. Edward and Carlisle told me how concerned you were and how much you wanted me to come home. They took care of me then, and I'm fine now. I'm more than fine. Really. And they'll bring me home tonight. Please."

With a glance in Fisher and Kyle's direction and then my mother, he smirked and brought his hands to his waist, obviously pondering what I was saying.

Then he looked at me. "If you're not home by the time the sun goes down," he stipulated, "I'm coming out here to get you myself. Is that understood?"

I tried to hide my smile, nodding as I spoke. "I understand."

He moved forward then, taking me in his arms to hold me against him. My eyes found Edward as he watched from the living room entrance. A little smile played over his lips as he watched us, and when my father leaned back from me, he kissed my forehead.

"You're really okay?" he clarified with as much seriousness as he could.

I nodded. "I'm really okay. And I promise, I'll be home for dinner."

"You better be," he said, stroking my hair just once and then stepping away to get his coat.

My mother replaced him for several minutes, hugging me as tight as she had upon first seeing me that morning and promising she would cook my favorite meal for dinner. It made me that much more determined to find the answers I needed, so I could get home to be with her and my father.

Abigail and I also said goodbye, and since we knew school would be starting back in a few more days, I promised her we would catch up with everything that had happened over Christmas. She couldn't know about this . . . ability I apparently possessed now, but I hoped with time I would be able to not only tell her, but show her the way I'd shown Ephraim.

"Maybe I'll even help your mother make your dinner," she crooned as she followed Fisher to the door to get her own coat.

I laughed at that, remaining near the stairs as my family left the house reluctantly. Even Kyle looked apprehensive about leaving me with Edward and Carlisle, but he stepped out the front door after our father with a look in his eyes that told me we would both be okay now.

The instant they were gone, I became a little worried, wondering exactly what I wanted to find by remaining here with Carlisle to look through everything he'd discovered from Fisher. Was this really about me and what was happening to me? Was it about our grandmother? I had no answers, but I knew one thing for certain. I wanted answers, and I was certain that this place, this house with Edward and Carlisle was the right place for me to find them.

"Are you sure you want to do this today?" Edward asked, now standing at the bottom step only a few inches from me. "Fisher's right. We don't have to do this now."

I reached for his hand, which he took instantly, and pulled him to be beside me on the step so I could lift my eyes to his. "I could wait," I agreed, "and I probably should. But if I wait, I'll forget so much. I'll forget what it feels like to want this. Today will become tomorrow, and then a week will have gone by. Before you know it, too much time will have passed for this to be as urgent as it should be. I need to know what's happening to me. And right now, it's more important than adjusting or coming to terms with it. I was able to convince my father," I reminded him. "Do I need to convince you too?"

He held me closer, still holding my hand which happened to be the same hand I'd allowed him to cut the night before. "There will be no need to convince me of the urgency I see in your mind," he assured me. "And I won't deny that I wish to know what this is as well. But I still want to protect you from it. Old habits die hard, I suppose."

I cupped his cheek gently. "My father would agree with you. And the sooner we begin, the sooner we can put his worries to rest about me not making it home for dinner."

Bowing his head, Edward stepped back to allow me passage before he suddenly lifted me in his arms so swiftly that I shrieked.

Then I laughed, and within a split second, Carlisle and Rosalie were both in the foyer.

"Is everything all right?" Carlisle asked somewhat frantically.

I laughed still, holding Edward tighter. "It's fine," I giggled. "He just surprised me."

Edward smiled and kissed my cheek, his touch tender for the first time in two days. "Then I'll have to be quicker next time," he mused.

"That was not appropriate after everything that's happened," Rosalie exclaimed, though when I looked at her, she was smiling just as I was. "She is still human, Edward. Whether she heals quicker now or not."

A soft sigh passed Edward's upturned lips as he carried me from the stairs to the library as Carlisle and Rosalie followed closely behind us. "She's just never seen me like this," he whispered to me, opening the doors to the library easily and then gently setting me on the lounge chair I now considered mine.

Curiously, I gazed up at him — really looking at him as he stepped back to sit in the chair across from me. An image of him the first time I'd seen him flickered through my mind, and I was intrigued. He looked so different now — happier and lighter, even after the last two days. Was I really the cause of this change? Was this how I looked to him? Was I different because he was in my life now?

The smile on his face widened, but he said nothing as Carlisle moved into the room to his desk where several books and papers cluttered the space uncharacteristically.

"Your brother was an immense help yesterday," Carlisle began without acknowledging the way Rosalie had chastised Edward. "He was able to get me started with names and dates. As I said to him and Kyle — and to Ephraim — it will be a few more days before I'll have the resources to adequately track your family's history, but he did say you were much closer to your grandmother and might know a little more about your ancestors — her ancestors."

"I want to help," I pressed. "Just tell me what you need."

Carlisle shuffled the papers on his desk around without saying anything for probably a minute, the blank expression on his face changing to determination as he found what he was looking for and brought a small notepad to where I was sitting. "Fisher was able to give me names and birthdates for your father's parents and your mother's, along with your great-grandparents on both sides of your family," he said, handing me the notepad. "But he couldn't think of how any of them were connected to what was happening to you. Did your father's mother ever tell you anything that stood out to you when she was alive?"

Looking over Fisher's handwriting, I was reminded of our grandmother's habit of telling me stories of when she'd been my age. She'd given me my first journal, but she'd also left me all the journals she'd kept since she was almost thirteen. Even knowing that, I couldn't really think of anything she'd ever told me about something like this being in our family. But for a reason I couldn't explain, I knew that's where the answer was.

"She kept journals," I said after probably a minute. "But they're packed away in our house."

"Did you ever read them?" Carlisle asked.

I shook my head. "I never needed to. She always told me stories about when she was younger."

Carlisle glanced at Edward, and I watched them communicate silently before Edward nodded without saying anything. Then Carlisle looked at me. "Start with her. Your father's mother. How old was she when she passed?"

Dim memories of the last time I'd seen her filled my mind, and without realizing it, I lifted my fingers to my neck where my locket usually rested. "She was sixty-eight," I said softly. "We didn't even know she was sick."

He lowered his voice, speaking delicately. "Did she have any siblings?"

I tucked my hair behind my ear, still thinking. "A brother. But he died as a small child. She only had a few pictures of him."

"What about your grandfather, Philip? Did you know him?"

"He died when I was four," I said a little louder. "But she told me about him. She said after he died, there was no one else for her, so she focused on her grandchildren."

Carlisle laughed softly, comforting me as he scooted closer to me. "It sounds like she loved him very much. Did you and your brothers spend a lot of time with her?"

A smile crossed my face, and I nodded. "She had a small farm outside Seattle where we spent our summers. I loved it there. She had all kinds of animals, and there was so much space. I think it's why my dad wanted to move us here. The last few years, I started spending more time with her when I wasn't in school. I don't know why." I paused, frowning and bowing my head. "I just wanted to be with her."

The ticking clock in the foyer overpowered the silence as it settled over the library slowly, and Carlisle glanced at Edward a second time before he spoke again.

"Can you tell me about your mother's family?" he asked gently.

I tried to compose myself, quietly clearing my throat. "They live back east. In Cleveland. We visited them last Christmas, but they live so far away. My mother still writes them."

He shook his head. "So you're not very close with them?"

I responded with a shrug and a shake of my own head.

"Do you know much about your father's family? About your grandmother's family?"

"Only what she told me," I shrugged. "But she told me about them whenever I asked."

Carlisle paused for a minute, taking the notepad and seeming to study the names as they stared back at him.

I recognized a few of the names. It looked like Fisher had been able to remember the last few generations of our grandmother's family — all the way back to my namesake, but there was so much more than that.

"How much more is there?" Edward asked.

His voice startled me, but I recovered quickly, reaching for the notepad as Carlisle released it. "Our grandmother talked about her family all the time," I said with a smile. "She had a way of talking about them like they were — some of them were still alive. She talked about her mother, Rachel, like I would meet her any day, but I never did. There were others. I always thought she meant they were alive in her memories, but now . . ."

Carlisle stood up to step to his desk, retrieving paper and a pen before he returned to my side. "Can you write down what you remember?" he requested gently.

Taking the pen and looking over what Fisher had begun, it was easy to continue, filling in the names and birthdates of my own grandmothers and grandfathers from the last three hundred years. Anyone else probably would've thought it was odd for me to know their names, but when I was seven or eight, I'd asked my grandmother about our family — her family, and without hesitation, she'd begun telling me about them. I wrote until I was able to remember her own namesake, and when I wrote her birthdate which had been around the mid-1600s, Carlisle spoke.

"Angeline," he said.

I nodded and smiled. "She was named after a family member just like I was," I said with a light laugh, lifting my head to look at him and seeing the most peculiar look on his face. "What did I say?"

He turned his eyes to Edward, and just by their hesitation, I knew they were coming to a new conclusion.

I looked at Edward. "What is it?"

The library turned silent again, and Edward stood up from his chair to step in front Carlisle's desk. He shuffled the papers around, finding what he needed and then speaking as he knelt in front of me.

"Carlisle's father wrote of an Angeline who came to his church when she was 18," he said to me. "He wrote that she had a gift and wanted God to take it back."

He lifted his eyes to mine, and in that moment, everything fell into place.

Slowly, every story my grandmother had ever told me meant something else. She'd always told me I was special, but I'd always believed she meant it because I was her granddaughter and she loved me. Why wouldn't I believe that? I thought she told us all that we were special, but now I knew she'd paid more attention to me than she had Fisher or Kyle. It hadn't been because she didn't love them. All my memories of her had changed. She hadn't spent time with me for just that purpose. Now it felt like she'd been watching me. But for what? For this?

Edward replaced Carlisle beside me, taking the notepad and giving it to his father before he turned me to face him. "She was your grandmother, Keira," he whispered, lifting his hand to my face to make me look at him. "Of course she loved you. But it might have been that she was so worried about you that she felt she had to keep an eye on you. Perhaps she knew this was always a possibility, and she wanted to keep you safe. You shouldn't think anything she did wasn't out of love. Whatever this is, it shouldn't change the way you see her."

I focused on his voice and the way it soothed my nerves. He was right, and I couldn't let this new development pollute the way I remembered my grandmother or how she'd treated me.

He pulled me into his arms and comforted me the way Carlisle had tried , and another heavy silence filled the room as we all seemed to process my revelation. Carlisle moved back to his desk with the notepad and the paper I'd written on, studying it intensely for several seconds before he spoke again.

"That you remember this so accurately is incredible," Carlisle said with a slight grin.

I shrugged slightly. "I've always been able to remember what she told me. Along with anything else I thought was important."

Edward laughed, squeezing me gently. "So that's why it took you so long to learn French?" he teased.

I blushed easily.

"When did your family come to this country?" Carlisle asked, changing the subject seamlessly as he sat at his desk.

Shifting my concentration, I again thought of how I'd been told the story. "Well, my grandmother and her family moved to Washington State when she was a little girl, from Michigan in the 1870s. Her father's family settled there when they immigrated from England. That was in the mid 1700s. Before that they lived near Oxford. She said we had family members in England going back hundreds of years."

"And her namesake? Angeline. Did she ever tell you about her?"

The paintings I'd seen of her flashed through my mind. "Only that she was one of the first women in our family to be taught in a real school. Her father was different from most of his neighbors and the townspeople around him, and he wanted her to be able to take care of herself. My grandmother had a few paintings of her. She looked a lot like me."

"Did your grandmother ever mention what might've happened to her?" Edward asked softly.

"No," I replied, almost whispering.

"Keira," Carlisle said, "do you think you would be able to remember more about Angeline if you read your grandmother's journals?"

"I could try. Why? Is it important?"

Carlisle sighed, and a second later, Edward did as well. It was clear what they were thinking, and after a minute, I knew it was right.

"You're thinking that's where it began, aren't you?" I asked them.

A sympathetic grin creased Carlisle's cheek. "It's what makes the most sense," he admitted. "It might be a few more days before we know for sure, but if what Edward sees in your mind is right, then it would be the most logical conclusion. And I don't mean to diminish your grandmother's memory, but she must have known this ability would be inside you. It's very possible she wanted to protect you if something like this ever happened. And it's possible Angeline was only the first documented case in your father's family. This could've been happening for millennia."

He stood up from his desk, moving around to where I was and replaced Edward a second time. "This doesn't change anything," he promised. "We'll figure this out together. This has never happened to our family, but now that you're a part of it, the same protection we give each other is now yours. You have my word."

His proclamation astonished me, but I believed him. He'd always been so honest with me. Of course he would help me now. He glanced at Edward and then beyond the doors of the library as they stood cracked open.

The clock in the library chimed then, twelve times signaling that it was noon. I jumped a little, and the doors opened wider then to allow Esme inside.

"You three have been in here all morning," she exclaimed with a smile. "I think it's time Keira had a break from all the research."

Her rich brown eyes found us, and her smile fell a little. "Is everything all right?" she asked.

I looked at Edward, and he moved in to help me up. "Everything's fine," I assured her.

She chuckled softly and stepped in to take my hands in hers. "Then we'll just go into the kitchen where I've already prepared lunch for you," she insisted, pulling me from the library and leaving Edward and Carlisle there alone.

The kitchen was much brighter than the library, and I sat up at the bar island as Esme presented me with a plate of baked chicken and mashed potatoes. She poured me a glass of sweet tea and then proceeded to clean up the dishes she'd used, and I stayed quiet, eating the food she'd cooked.

"It's cold outside," Esme said after a minute. "But perhaps you and Edward could get some fresh air after you eat. You've been inside all morning."

"That sounds like a wonderful idea," I agreed.

After that, she silently worked in front of the sink, and I ate without prompting her anymore.

My mind wandered while I consumed the food in front of me, and I found myself thinking of all the stories I'd been told by my grandmother. It wasn't easy to differentiate the times she'd tried to teach me about our family and the ways she would treat me like I was somehow more important than Fisher or Kyle. They were her grandchildren as much as I was. For all I knew, they possessed this ability just as I did but hadn't done anything so drastic to make it work for them the way it now worked for me.

If Carlisle could find out more after he went back to the hospital, what would he find? Would I eventually die the way I was meant to? Or did this mean I couldn't die? Was it supposed to be this way?

The food disappeared without me really paying attention to it, and Esme sat at the bar beside me once she'd taken my plate to put it in the sink.

"Your appetite has increased," she commented, lifting her eyes to mine and seeing that I was conflicted. She sighed softly and laid her hand over mine. "Try not to be so worried," she pleaded with a gentle squeeze. "Carlisle will figure this out. You're as important to him now as Edward or Emmett or Rosalie. He wants to protect you just as much as them, and he'll do everything he can to make sure you're safe."

A smile spread across my face, and I bowed my head. "I know," I said with a nod. "And I'm very appreciative. So much has happened in such a short amount of time. I'm just trying to make sense of it. And I know he's doing everything he can to help."

"Well," she said squeezing my hand again and rising to finish her washing, "if you need someone to talk to, I'm here for you, dear. All right?"

"Thank you," I replied.

She turned to the sink then, and I watched her for a few minutes before speaking softly.

"Did you ever have children?" I asked without knowing where the question came from.

Her hands paused as she cleaned the few dishes in front of her. At first, I thought I'd asked something that wasn't my business, and I tried to apologize.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I shouldn't have asked — "

"No, it's all right," she interrupted, drying her hands and turning to face me. Her expression was more pained now than I'd ever seen, and I instantly hated causing it. She moved closer to the bar island, her eyes downcast as she obviously thought about what I'd asked. "I did," she answered.

The silence that followed was different from what I'd experienced with Carlisle and Edward. She didn't continue for several minutes after her soft response, and I did nothing to prompt anything further. Then she spoke again.

"What did Edward tell you about me?" she asked, much like Rosalie had the day before.

I remembered this part of our conversations very clearly, recalling every word he'd said. "Edward told me Carlisle found you a few years after finding him. But he also said you and Carlisle had met when you were my age. He said you were dying and Carlisle saved you." I paused, unconsciously grinning. "But there's more, isn't there?"

She smiled and reached for my hand again, squeezing gently as I laid it in hers. "My son, the gentleman. I understand he was very delicate in the things he told you about the rest of us. Even after all these years, old habits die hard, I suppose. And yes, there is much more." A thoughtful, almost penitent expression crossed her face. "I did meet Carlisle when I was sixteen. But he was in and out of my life in such a short amount of time. He left such an impression on me. Over the last thirty years, not much has changed in society, but when I was sixteen, Carlisle still treated me as an adult, and he was genuinely attentive to what was best for me. And I never forgot him."

I smiled with her. "That's what Edward said."

The thoughtful look on her face evolved in one of sadness and longing as she continued. "It was expected of me to have a husband and to give him children, but I never wanted anyone after I met Carlisle. I wanted to become a school teacher, but my father didn't think it was appropriate. So instead, I did what I could to make him happy. And when I met my first husband, Charles, he charmed me until I felt I had no choice but to oblige him."

I leaned in closer. "You were married before?" I was stunned. The idea of Esme being married to someone else didn't make any sense to me.

She nodded and squeezed my hand. "Yes. It wasn't the picture perfect facade it appeared to be at the time, and I wasn't happy. He was . . . different after we were married, and he behaved like many men did then. I tried to ask my parents for help, but they believed the problem was something I had created. And when I became pregnant, I knew I had to do something before the baby was born. I tried to run, but he found me. I made it all the way to Ashland, and for a little while, until my baby was born, everything seemed to be all right. But he died only a few days after being born. Afterward, I didn't believe I had anything to live for. And I tried to end my own life by jumping off a cliff on the outskirts of town."

Horror replaced my astonishment, and I couldn't speak for a few minutes as I processed this new piece of information. It must've been so horrible for her — carrying her child for nine months and giving birth to him, only for him to die before he could even begin to live.

"The fall, however, didn't kill me," she said after those quiet moments. "I remember pain afterward, but it was a burning I'd never felt in my life. And I was stunned to see Carlisle there with me. When I woke from my transformation, he told me what he'd done. He told me he'd turned me into a vampire because he couldn't let me die. I wasn't angry the way he expected. Edward was there already. They helped me. And that's how I know they'll help you. If at any moment beyond this one you become worried, always know that we're here for you."

Overwhelmed, I bowed my head, taking in all of her words and amazed at how she'd been able to connect what had happened to her to the situation before us all now. But she was right. I couldn't allow this to ruin the memories of my grandmother, and I didn't want it to. For whatever reason, she'd tried to prepare me for this, so I would know what to do next.

That moment wouldn't be as clearly dictated as anything else had been so far, but I knew I could do it. And now I had more than enough people helping me.

"Is everything all right in here?" Edward asked, stepping just inside the kitchen alone.

I looked back to see him, and he moved to my side slowly as Esme released my hand. "Everything's fine," I assured him. "Did you and Carlisle finish talking?"

He nodded. "For now. I wanted to make sure you were all right. You've been cooped up in the house for too long. We should get you some fresh air."

Glancing at Esme and seeing her smile, I turned to Edward and allowed him to take my hands and pull me from the kitchen. We left the house silently, only stepping out on the porch and sitting on the front steps as the sun attempted to peek out from behind intermittent clouds lingering from the day before.

"Are you sure you're all right?" Edward asked as we sat down.

I shivered from the cold, but it only lasted a moment before it no longer bothered me. "I'm fine. Really."

He scooted closer, still holding my hands. "It just seemed to upset you when we were talking about your grandmother and Angeline. Carlisle didn't mean to cause you any distress. He can sometimes get carried away. We really do just want to understand this. It will help us keep you safe."

"He didn't upset me," I said as I shook my head. "I was just surprised. Things were so much simpler not so long ago, and I'm still trying to make sense of it. You're . . . one of the best friends I've ever had, and I don't know what this means for us."

Edward smiled slightly. "Well, I'm not going anywhere. And I want to help you figure this out. It might be so simple, and we're only making it more complicated than it really should be."

I held his hands a little tighter. "Then I will hope for that more than anything," I chuckled softly.

It made everything much clearer as we sat there close together, and I pushed all the doubts I'd had out of my mind. They didn't matter anymore now that I had him to help me however he believed he could.

So now we know a little bit more about Keira's family, well, her father's family. And now we've heard a little bit of Esme's story. I used a few of the tidbits about her from the Guide. I don't own any of it, but I gave my own little spin.

Like I said, this chapter and the next are the last of this part, and after this part, a new one could be on its way. Who decides if I post it? You do.

Believe me when I say I have dozens of stories that I'm writing, and I want to get all of them out here, but you're the only one who can decide if you want to read them. So tell me.

I've also got a poll on my profile for you to look at some new story ideas. So go vote!

See ya next time!