Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight; it is the property of Stephenie Meyer. The original characters and plot are mine. I am in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.

Italicized means Bella's thoughts and those she can hear

Italicized bold means Edward can hear it also (wont be bolded unless Edward hears it!)

Chapter six

Safely Below

Without thinking I moved forward and crawled under the side of the piano, like I had in the only house to have a piano when I was still quite young. Edward watched me amused by my randomness no doubt. I lay there my head resting on my arms completely content. Edward played a soft melody before giving in with a sigh, obviously going to ask me why I was under the piano.

"It feels safe." I said before he could ask, "I lived in a house where there was a lot of yelling and anger. The piano never made the sounds they did, it only play wonderful music that made me feel better. So anytime they started I would go under the piano and hide." I told him thinking of the days of screaming and mean words that hurt as they repeated in my head. It was then that I decided that I would be silent instead of angry and screaming at people.

"That sounds horrible." Edward replied as he crawled into place beside me. I turned my head to look at him and nodded.

"I decided to never be like that. To hurt people when they hurt me or forgot something important to me. I never want to hear that tone come out of my mouth or those words." I said my eyes never leaving his face.

"How many homes have you been in where people responded that way?" he asked me, I guess Anna didn't give them all the info on me.

"A lot. More then half were like that. The others I was left alone." I said thinking of most of the places I had lived. "Some were true homes, like here. But most were fake, all about pretence. 'Oh look at my perfect family! Isn't what I have so much better then what you have! Don't you envy me!?' And yet they would take a child or two and ignore them. In many of them I took care of those younger then me, made sure they ate, were dressed for the weather, healthy and happy." I said a sad smile on my face. It had been hard to take care of children when I was only a child myself. There were times when I had too much to deal with to care for myself. Alastor was the one to help and care, without him and the others I don't know how I would have survived.

"Anna said that you moved around a lot. Her thoughts were sad, how many homes?" he asked I could hear the sadness that must have been in her thoughts echo in his voice.

"You number 47." I said a sharp gasp and knew that Esme had heard me; I hoped Carlisle was giving her a hug. "I forced her to move me around. The longest I stayed in one place was four and a half years in the home Alastor saved me from." I said my mind replaying the anger in that house on the inside of my eyes.

"I'm glad he was there for you." Edward said his voice as melancholy as my own.

"Yeah it was nice to throw that bully across the room." I said a smile on my face playing the memory of the look on his face I giggled.

"You threw him across the room?" Edward asked confused and happy, it was an odd mix.

"When Alastor joins with me I get some of his strength and speed and... hardness." I said, "No red eyes though thankfully." I said cringing at the red eyes looking out of my face in the mirror. I knew what those eyes meant. Alastor had eaten humans, lots in his years as a corporeal vampire.

"Alastor has red eyes?" He asked gently as I looked at him.

"Yup, he was a very bad vampire!" I called and heard him chuckle. He had apologised over and over to me though he couldn't really ever bite me. I smiled at that. "He knew no other way, finding your family has made him a little bitter that he didn't discover this option." I finished and knew Alastor agreed with my statement. Edward nodded absentmindedly trying to sort out the new information I had given him. "The 14 years as a ghost craving something and yet being able to touch nothing and then finding me has made him more human friendly." I said thinking about how horrible it must be to not be able to touch anything would be hellish.

"He found you?" Edward asked, "You said the same thing earlier but I don't think I understood correctly. They find you as in scoured the earth looking for you?" he looked really cute when he was confused.

"When they... die... they take some time to kinda get control of themselves. Once they appear they can see their own bodies, well the bodies I see, and they feel my call. I guess. They describe it as craving something indefinable and once they find me the craving vanishes, though if they go too far for too long they feel it again. I mean I see other people but they fade after a little while, the others seem to stay longer. Jillian left." I said thinking of the little girl who used to be my shadow. "She was 6 and I was 7 when she found me. But she faded when I was 8 and never came back." I said hoping she had gone somewhere better, maybe found her parents or someone else who loved her.

"I am sure she's safe." He said pulling me to his side. I nodded mutely praying that he was right. "How many people are in your invisible family?" he asked after a minute of silence.

"There are six. Three boys and three girls, excluding Jillian. Josephine Tally who I believe you know." I said enjoying talking about my family. He looked sad before he arranged his features.

"Actually I don't recall much other than her face." He said as if trying to force the memories to come back to him.

"She loved you. Well her family was close to yours and she had a crush on her but you wanted the glories of war and didn't return her feelings." I said remembering she comments from the other night. "She died from the Spanish Flu two years after you. She took a very long time to reappear and ever longer to find me. But she needed the extra time to find herself in this new life." I said remembering her fears that she was in hell or damned. 'Cast away from God's light' she had said. "For a long time she feared that she was damned, as she now fears for you." I said looking at him with an arched eyebrow, "You wouldn't happen to have the same idea stuck in that brain of yours would you?" I asked his face was shocked by my question then sad as he organized his brain. "You know I have a vampire in my collection of SOULS right?" I asked making it completely obvious what the correct conclusion was. He smiled at me.

"I was under the impression." He said laughing, "But you do seem to be more acquainted with the proof that contradicts my opinion." He finished and I smiled at him happily. I knew Joe had heard this and would take from it hopefully what Edward had.

"I shook my head, silly vampire." I said laughing both at him and with him. He smiled back and I felt like I melted in his gaze, he truly was an angel. I was completely dazed and didn't notice that he had asked me something until his second try. "Oops, sorry what?" I asked blushing at my line of thoughts.

"You were telling me about your family before we got sidetracked?" he asked wanting me to continue.

"Sure, my favourite topic actually, their all so fascinating I love having conversations with them!" I replied happily. "Okay so, what order? Hmmm... I think I'll start with Lenora Marks. She's the one that I was joined with for Alice's shopping spree?" I asked making sure he had heard our conversation, he nodded and I continued, "She's 27, had finished a BFA in fashion design and on her final semester of Fashion Merchandizing Management BS at FIT. She's very proud of that! She's been in charge of me since she arrived when I was nine, thanks to Alastor I had a bit of money to lend to the task." I said a smile on my face, "Len is African American with beautiful dark skin and near black eyes, a couple of inches taller then me. I guess she's nearly the physical opposite of Alice but she bounces like Alice and shops like Alice." I said knowing he had a good picture of Len in his mind. "She's the one under Joe in my picture." I said feeling lazy because he could recall the picture perfectly.

"Jillian in the center at the top, she looks like an angel." I said thinking of how I lit her and imagined her having beautiful white wings. Edward nodded he smiled as he thought of her. "Below Jillian is Alastor. Our oldest. He's 649 this year." I said as Edward nodded remembering my words from before. "He had to wait the longest, he was craving something that didn't exist yet, mean right?" I asked him as he smiled and nodded. "Fourteen years as you know he's physically about 26 loves to learn about new cultures, is my source for all vampire knowledge." I said with a grin before continuing, "Loves music and has a thing about history, he talks about the glory days and such." I said and Edward made a face, "No! The renaissance, the days when things were being created or uncovered everyday, he wishes he had been able to be around humans during these times but is happy he was at least present for it." I said sharply hitting Edward for his stupid thought and only managed to hurt my hand.

He chuckled and then made sure I hadn't actually hurt myself. "I'm fine." I stated pulling my hand out of his loose grip. "Next to Alastor on the left is Mary Elizabeth Warner age 38, she taught at a school in north Virginia for nearly 20 years and had four children that survive her still though their getting a bit up there in years, the youngest is 46 in May. She's also a really great poet; she was published twice in a magazine under her own name." I said proud of Mary she really had a great way with words and could paint an image in extreme detail in her poems. Edward nodded knowing first hand how big it was for a woman to be published in a rural area in that time. "Below her is Daniel Matthew Jamison, the resident geneticist." I said as Edward's eyebrows shot up. "What? I have no idea how you have survived this long without a geneticist in your head!" I said laughing his voice joined mine and I realised that they fitted together like Carlisle and Esme's two voices holding one note. My heart beat erratically at that thought and I tried to get myself back on track.

"You know I must agree with you, useful and necessary for all of life's daily activities." He said, for a moment I thought he was talking about how our laughter fitted together. I shook my head and smiled as I realised he was commenting on my last spoken comment. I was really glad he couldn't read my mind, I'm sure he would have been uncomfortable with my obvious crush on him.

"Daniel is physically the eldest at 43 but he only joined us three years ago making him the newest to the family. The last person in the right hand bottom of the page is Samuel Tomas the Artist! He is a painter, but with his help I drew the picture, and a philosopher." I finished with a smile. "That's my family." I looked at him, realising we had just spent who knows how long lying under his piano talking. I blushed as I pulled myself out from under the piano with him following suit.

"So the ages you gave me are the ages... they died at?" He asked and I nodded.

"Yup" I said popping the p.

"So Alastor was 649 before he passed?" Edward asked, I shook my head realising I had mixed facts.

"No Alastor is 649 years in total." I said clarifying my mistake.

"So what about the others?" he asked clearly interested.

"Um... Daniel is 46,... Joe is 108, Len is 38,... Mary is 79,... Samuel is 168." I said doing the math in my head Edward's eyes went wide at the last one. "Yeah Sam's old!" I said in mock horror giggling shortly after. Edward rolled his eyes but had a grin on his face at my antics. "Oh did you know that Alastor is a Greek name meaning 'Avenging spirit?'" I asked, leaving out the whole afflicting vengeance on children for the sins of the father part of the myths. He shook his head and stood, I raised my eyebrows in question.

"I think I ought to feed you." He answered like I was a potted plant or a small child.

"But I don't Wanna!" I cried like a two year old before cracking up. He smile down at me and eventually I got up and followed him to the kitchen. "Well that's what you get when you treat me like a potted plant." I said grinning as we entered the kitchen.

Esme looked confused by my comment but her eyes were on Edward which made me laugh as I sat down at the counter. She seemed to be pleased about something in his face, but I didn't see anything new there. I rested my chin on my arms; I had no idea what I wanted to eat and so sat to contemplate what to eat.

"I didn't know potted plants could whine." Edward commented drily and I was grinning again.