DISCLAIMER – The Twilight saga and all the characters mentioned in it are the undisputed property of Stephanie Meyers. This story was written entirely for non-profit and the sheer love of the series and its memorable characters. Spoilers are included from pretty much included for every single book associated with Twilight. Proceed with caution if you haven't read everything, particularly The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner.
The (Not So) Short Second Life of Bree Tanner
By: Oy! Angelina
_Chapter 10_
Ashes and Opals
Alec was ruining climbing for me. It wasn't anything he said or did, it's just being privy to his problems got me wondering whether I had my own post-traumatic pastimes and climbing shot to the top of the list.
In the span of my short second life I was all-too aware of how easy it was to misplace memories from my human life but there were a few that stuck out; specifically anything I devoted a lot of attention to or did so often it became almost a reflex. Climbing was like that. As a kid I was always perched on the roof of my house or shimmying up the tallest tree I could find. Sometimes I did it for the sheer freedom and thrill but, more often than not, it was a necessity of survival.
Whenever Dad was in the mood to pick a fight and I wasn't in the mood to be a punching bag I would climb onto the tallest thing I could get a grip on. My plan was usually to hide from Dad until he cooled off or passed out but sometimes I didn't have the luxury of a big head start so all I could do was scurry up something and hope he couldn't follow. Unfortunately, my narrow escapes were as short-sighted as they were short-live because as soon as Dad got a hold of me he would make me pay for however long I made him wait.
It never occurred to me to stop hiding in trees but I did get the bright idea to leave backpacks filled with books, snacks and warm clothes up in their branches to help me bide my time as long as possible. Once I managed to finish a six-pack of soda and five-pound bag of gummy bears while reading two books cover-to-cover before I finally had to come down. The look on my dad's face and things he yelled at me were almost worth the fractured wrist he gave me later. Almost.
I ran away not long after that particular incident and a lot of it had to do with how it felt being out of Dad's reach for that long. When I was on top of something I was on top of the world with nothing looming over me or weighing me down. I could look down on my crappy life like I wasn't really part of it and see all the possibilities stretched before me. The world looked like such a huge place I figured it wouldn't be hard to find a little corner to fit into instead of constantly getting backed into one.
The joke was on me, though. When I left home I wasn't climbing my way out of rock-bottom; I was leaping into an early grave. Now, the only place I belong in this a big, beautiful world is the shadows with all the other Things-That-Go-Bump. It's not all bad, I guess. I can still climb, higher than ever, and I don't do it for any other reason than because I like to. Plus, my eyes are better so I can see farther than most humans can imagine. Maybe one of these days I'll see more possibilities for this life, too.
"Okay, so we've established your neighbors sucked but what were you like as a human?" I asked, wondering if Alec and I had anything else in common besides getting yelled and chased by angry people. "I mean, you grew up in a time I've only read about. That's got to be a lot different from my childhood."
I heard Alec sigh several footholds beneath me. I craned my neck and glimpsed the uncertainty beneath the shimmer of his alabaster face. "That was such a long time ago that anything I can recall from that life has eroded and scattered into specks. It's senseless to dwell on what's lost to me forever, especially since miss so little of it."
Alec's winding motions up the cliff side reminded me of the roses that grew along the terrace of my grandmother's house. Like so many of my human memories the images felt slippery in my brain so I couldn't even recall what color the roses were – in fact, I didn't know for sure if my grandmother was still alive. I figured she wasn't. That made the most sense otherwise I was a special kind of stupid for staying with my dad instead of her.
Even if the details were fuzzy I did remember how those roses made me feel. I would always get enchanted by the beauty and complexity of the rose vines and sometimes I was so entranced I forgot about how prickly they were. Alec was like that and I had to remind myself that, in spite of his elegant, vivid beauty and a few qualities I perceived as soft and alluring, handling Alec required caution and was easier to appreciate at a distance.
"There must be a few things you miss about being human," I persisted. That was what I wanted to believe, anyway. It was just too depressing to think Alec found nothing salvageable about his humanity. "What about Jane? Don't you remember anything about growing up with her?"
Although Jane retained no discernable traits I would identify with a human being she had been a part of Alec's human existence and was the only thing he cared about that survived from it. Thinking about Jane had to give Alec some kind of reminder of what it was like to be human once and - at the very least - his sister was a happy part of that. Why else would he be so attached to her?
"Jane and I were always content onto ourselves and managed to amuse ourselves in quiet ways," Alec said over the crunch of his climb. "Jane enjoyed drawing, painting and needlepoint where as I preferred to read, study nature or make crafts."
"That's pretty cool," I said. The strange thing was that didn't sound all that different from the average kid living in this day and age. Sure, there were televisions and video games but I never met a person whose childhood didn't include art projects. Though, for want of other entertainment, I was willing to bet Jane and Alec did more than make lumpy potholders and popsicle birdhouses. "What kind of crafts did you make?"
"Mostly gifts for my mother or Jane," said Alec. I could see him struggling to remember some examples and appreciated his effort considering how little he seemed to enjoy his human life. "I once used some of Jane's old hair ribbons and shaped them like butterflies and birds to hang over the bed we shared with our mother. I remember carving Mother wind chimes and lanterns with colored glass and images of…flowers, perhaps. Or were they stars? I'm afraid can't picture it anymore. I do recall Mother hung them in every window. Our cottage whispered with the night breeze and the light danced shadows everywhere. I may have loathed my village but I was happy when I was home with Jane and our mother."
I didn't realize it until then but I had stopped climbing. I was too enrapt by hearing Alec's childhood memories to do more than simply listen, not merely to what he said but the affection he spoke with. Even if the details of his youth escaped him, Alec genuinely loved the moments he mentioned. I could almost picture those innocent, happy days myself and it reminded me of something I couldn't afford to forget – we were all human once. Even Jane and Alec.
"Which was your favorite thing to make? Was it the wind chimes, the lanterns or the mobile?" I asked, trying to encourage Alec to remember what little fragments of his humanity that he could.
These were the things the Cullens fought to preserve and recreate as best as their immortal condition could allow. I knew Alec saw it all as nonsense and playacting but these asinine acts and trivial pursuits served as reminders that human life was worth living and we could be more than predators if we worked at is.
Alec closed his eyes, concentrating on those distant, dim memories with greater effort than it would take a human to climb the Carpathian Mountains. "It was none of those things. The craft I liked most was the bird cage I made for Jane. She found a dove…no, it was a sparrow. It had flown into the side of our cottage and injured its wing. It couldn't do more than flutter and it wouldn't have survived on its own. Jane pitied the creature and decided to keep it...her. Yes, it was a female. Anyway, I made a cage for the sparrow and we hung it by the hearth so she wouldn't get cold. Jane called her…what was it? It wasn't a proper name…Little Sparrow? Little Singer…oh, Little Sister! Yes, that was Jane's joke – she said she had a brother and a sister. I remember being jealous of the attention Jane would pay our Little Sister over me but she made Jane so happy and sang so pretty I found it easy to forgive the bird."
My brain wanted desperately to reject the image of Jane – the girl who tortured me twice because she could – nursing wounded animals to health and cooing over them. I naturally assumed if Jane had a soft-side she killed it years ago for being weak, now I wasn't so confident. Maybe Jane needed a map and a compass to find my good graces but I could at least be fair enough to see where she ended up.
"Does Jane still paint and sew?" I asked.
"From time to time," Alec said, smiling fondly at the thought of his twin. "She always had a flare for both but now her skills make the Mona Lisa look like a finger-painting."
I nodded along, trying to imagine how Jane applied those darling talents now. All I came up with were blood-soaked canvases and people with their mouth's stitched shut. At this point I had to wonder if I was irrationally vilifying Jane based on a horrible first impression or if I just wasn't naïve enough to confuse endearing traits with redeeming qualities.
"One of Jane's favorite hobbies was sewing dolls to resemble some of the other children in our village," Alec went on. "When finished, she would leave them as presents for the children to find and keep."
I felt a throb in my chest that reminded me vaguely of how my heart would skip a beat. Had that been Jane's little way of trying to encourage the other children like her and Alec better? It saddened me to think of any girl – even one as terrifying as Jane – struggling so hard to make friends that she would spend hours making toys for the kids who bullied her.
"That was really nice of Jane," I said, unable to believe that combination of words just came out of my mouth.
"No it wasn't," Alec chuckled darkly. "She would stuff them with insect eggs, poison oak and other toxic plants. I helped her find specimens that were non-fatal but very irritating. All these years and I can still remember Catherine breaking into hysterics during church because millions of spiders came pouring out of the doll she had been hugging. Unfortunately, we laughed so hard people quickly guessed who the doll came from."
My mouth swung open as I gaped at Alec, aghast by what he just told me. I definitely spoke too soon about Jane. She was sick. Fundamentally, vilely, irrevocably sick. What little girl thought of things like that? More importantly, what little boy helped his sister do something so heinous? Even though it was completely irrational I scratched at phantom itches prickling my skin as I imagined what Catherine must have felt during Jane and Alec's bad joke.
Alec noted the judgment on my face with an unpitying expression. "Before you feel too sorry for poor little Catherine I think you should know also had a pet – a ginger tabby – and she put it in Little Sister's cage while Jane watched. I don't remember what made the other children laugh harder – Jane's sobs, my threats or Little Sister's shrieks. So, yes, I absolutely delight in knowing Catherine suffered the same terror, agony and humiliation she put Jane through."
I didn't think it was possible but my jaw dropped a little more. The sheer level of cruelty was so mindboggling and infuriating I could barely form coherent words in my head. I snapped my mouth shut and hissed through my teeth as that famous newborn rage swelled in my head, crushing out anything that passed for reasonable thoughts or merciful nature. The dark, blood-soaked impulse roiling through me made it a good thing that Alec and I were extremely far away from people because I could not be trusted to control myself. All I could see was red and the only thing I heard was thudding, like the hammer of my heart or blood rushing to my ears even though I knew both were impossible.
"Bree…" Alec spoke calmly, his voice somehow slinking past the repetitive pounding that was starting to annoy me. "…if you keep punching the mountain you're going to cause an avalanche."
I stilled and the jack-hammering noise instantly stopped. Blinking, I sobered from the rage that occasionally claimed my common sense and took stock of what my body did in its absence this time. I was dangling from my left-hand, which was clawed knuckle-deep into the mountain, directly over the gaping hole I apparently beat into the face of the stone. It was roughly as large as a basketball and extended as long as my arm, which was still planted inside. I pulled hand free tentatively and shook off the dust with a sheepish look.
"Sorry. I wasn't paying attention," I mumbled lamely.
"It happens to the best of us," said Alec like had just I spilled some milk rather than doing a freakishly strong woodpecker impersonation. "Shall we continue?"
"Yeah, sure," I pried my hand out of the rock, flexed my fingers and resumed our climbed to the top. "Okay, new rule – in addition to not discussing food or covens, I don't want to hear any more stories that make me want to jump off a ledge or punch a wall."
"Alright," Alec agreed. "I would hate to see the geography suffer in addition to your delicate psyche and fragile emotional state."
"Good to know you're an environmentalist in addition to being such a humanitarian," I snorted with no true conviction. My thoughts were too preoccupied with finding an explanation for why I just flipped out. The short, catch-all answer was newborns were notoriously unstable when it came to controlling their tempers but they didn't have meltdowns for no reason whatsoever. Or, at least, I didn't. The only trigger I could name was how sadistically Catherine tortured Jane with murdering her pet just to see her cry.
That kind of memory caused more torment than Jane's talent could ever inflict on another person and, for all I knew, Jane spent the last three and a half centuries making everyone else pay for what a mean little girl did to a small bird in a handmade cage. As despicable as Jane's behavior now perhaps she was the biggest victim of her terrible ability. I thought Irina was the saddest vampire I met - so bitter and melancholy – but I couldn't imagine being like Jane with a personal hell burning with a need to share a lifetime of pain for the remainder of eternity.
Still, I didn't like Jane enough to beat a wall on her behalf so why did I?
Since the answer wasn't making itself readily available to me I concentrated on reaching the mountain peak. Its shape reminded me of a pyramid and, now that we reached the end of our vertical climb, Alec and I could walk right up the rest of the mountain like it was a flight of stairs.
"Does this part of the mountain have a specific name?" I asked as my hands closed over the lip of the slope.
"Gerlachovský štít," Alec rhymed off.
I took Alec's word for it and flipped my body up into a handstand before planting my feet on the surface of the peak. Being a vampire could be a bum deal sometimes but I would never get tired of moving my body like a double-jointed gold-medal Olympic gymnast teeming with PCP and speed.
A second after my landing, Alec swung himself onto the peak without any flashy gymnastics but there was still poetry to his motion. Alec probably thought I was an immature dork for making a big deal out of my new and natural athleticism. After three and a half centuries as a Volturi vampire Alec was likely bored by all the little cool stunts that still amused me.
It got me wondering why Alec even wanted to hang out considering how old and worldly he was compared to me. By all logic my company should have put Alec in a deeper stupor than his power could ever achieve yet he didn't seem bothered our age difference at all. Maybe my appeal to him was like those people who thought babies were precious even though they spent half the time doing nothing of interest and the rest screaming or making a mess of things.
"I'm so tired of being a newborn," I announced suddenly. "This whole routine of binge-eating, psychotic breakdowns and graphic violence is really wearing thin."
"You just need to look for the humor in the situation," Alec said as we progressed on foot.
"Not everyone thinks of mindless carnage as a punch line, you know," I told him, punctuating the comment by sticking out my tongue.
I collected the sandals I tossed up earlier and dangled them off my finger. My perfect equilibrium would have compensated for the poor traction of their pretty soles but I was fine barefoot. The combination of snow and granite reminded me of walking on a gym mat – firm, but flexible.
Human mountaineers would have needed to crawl their way to the top with picks and ropes but Alec and I moved as if it wasn't mandatory for us to observe the rules of gravity. I took a casual inventory of all the things that preoccupied and intimidated humans. The air was thin and cold compared to the summit but I reveled in the clean taste of it. Normally there was always a trace of metal, chemicals and a million other scents clouding every breath but – up here – all I could smell was nothing but snow and stone.
Well, and Alec. His scent was so potent and fragrant I half-expected to stumble upon an orchard or botanical garden. All vampires smelled amazing but Alec's scent had a special quality I didn't notice amongst the Cullens or any other vampires I encountered. The only person who ever smelled half as good in a non-edible way was Diego. I frowned at the thought of Alec somehow smelling more appealing than Diego. It seemed wrong or disrespectful to the few memories I had of him.
I brought my fingers to the pendant bobbing around my neck and wondered which places Fred, Diego and I would have seen together if life was remotely fair. All of them, eventually, but where would we have gone first? The north pole, maybe? From there we could have swam to Russia then wandered around China for a while. Where would we have gone next? Europe? India? Australia? Would we each have had our own favorite country or had friendly debates over what continent was the best?
It was heartbreaking that I could live long enough to watch the sun burn out but I would never know the answer to that agonizing chain of "what ifs." It hurt worse than I had words for. Why didn't I just rip my useless dead heart out of my chest? That way everyone could see how empty my ribcage felt any time my thoughts strayed to Diego.
"Whose ashes are those?" I heard Alec ask.
I closed my fist around my pendant as if taking it out of sight would put it out of Alec's mind. Once I realized how stupid that was I forced my hands to my side and skipped up the slope as if I didn't have a care in the world. It was better than having another pity-party with Alec.
"Who said they're ashes?" I trilled out.
Alec didn't look convinced by my breezy display. "I know what vampire ashes look like, Bree."
"Of course you do," I dropped my cheerful façade since Alec wasn't buying it anyway. "It was a friend from my old coven."
"What was your friend's name?" Alec pressed.
"Diego," my lips formed around his name so sadly it almost sounded like a sob. It felt life forever since I eve spoke Diego's name outside the sanctity of my miserable thoughts.
Alec studied me carefully. "How did Diego die?"
"Slow and painfully would be my guess," I said bitterly, closing my fists into matching tight balls. I heard a snap and saw my sandals now resembled a crumpled candy bar more than footwear. Sighing, I pitched them over my head since they were useless to me now and continued my lament. "It was Riley and Victoria. They killed Diego because he found out none of those dumbass vampire myths were true. Riley told us we would burn in the sunlight. It was his way of keeping us in line and dependant on him. If my old coven knew they were free to go wherever they wanted, whenever they wanted I guarantee none of them would have stuck around to be Victoria's pawns."
"Sounds like Cullens swept the board regardless…" Alec nodded along like pieces were falling together in his head. "Couldn't you tell Riley was lying?"
"It's one thing to know someone's trying to deceive you, it's another thing to know how or why they're tricking you. The moment I met Riley I knew he wanted something from me, I just never knew what until it was too late," I was still mad at myself for not trusting those instincts better.
I wondered about the ones "lost to the sun" – Adam, Doug, Shelley and Steve. I hadn't thought about them since Diego and I figured out the sunlight stuff was all myth. Had they all just bolted as soon as they realized the truth or did Riley and Victoria destroy them the same way they did Diego? I knew Riley said he saw the ashes of those who never returned but I taxed my perfect memory to recall how he said it and what I felt when he did. Unsurprisingly, the words felt insincere but what had Riley been lying about – how the four had died or whether they were dead at all?
I grumbled to myself, frustrated that my talent wasn't more specific. Why was using my ability a shot in the dark when everyone else seemed so precise with theirs? Was it a question of practice? Could my talent reveal more about people's motives if I concentrated harder? I hoped so; otherwise, my talent was just super-paranoia.
"So you didn't know we just shimmered in the sunlight until you met the Cullens," Alec surmised.
I shook my head, which sent my hair flipping haphazardly through the already wind-torn hair. I lifted my hands up and made a vain effort at getting my mane of hair under control. "No, I learned the truth when Diego did."
Alec looked confused by that. "Then why weren't you killed as well?"
"Because Diego wouldn't let me go with when he told Riley," I said harshly. "Diego respected Riley and trusted him so he thought Riley was just misinformed about what happened to us in the sun."
"Instead of assuming that Riley was purposefully supplying the misinformation," said Alec. I didn't care for his tone at all.
"Diego wasn't being stupid, he just had faith in Riley… misplaced as it was," I told Alec pointedly.
"It's not a question of stupidity so much as naiveté," said Alec with a shrug. "You're fortunate you had enough sense not to get dragged down with him."
I growled at Alec's assessment even though I wasn't blind to the truth of his statement. Instead of getting angry with Alec I felt sudden a surge of hate for Diego. I hated him for being foolish and macho by not letting me come along. We were supposed to be a team but, in the end, Diego just left me behind like some tag-along kid sister who wasn't allowed to do grown-up stuff, like get myself killed by an avenging whack-job and her pathologically lying goon. Maybe I wasn't a ninja master but I might have been useful somehow if Diego had trusted me to at least hold my own.
Was that it? Did Diego just assume I would be useless in a fight because I was small and hid behind Fred all the time? Maybe if I hadn't been so pathetic and showed a little spine to jerks like Kristie and Raoul Diego would have known I could be tough – outrun-werewolves-and-kick-Volturi-off-a-roof tough – if I needed to be. Diego was an idiot to think Riley gave a damn about him, he was a moron for thinking the runt-of-the-litter couldn't help, he was a traitor for telling Riley about our BFF club so Riley could manipulate me with the information and Diego just plain sucked for leaving me alone; not just in the tree but the whole rotten world. Diego abandoned me and he didn't even teach me our secret handshake first!
Before I considered what I was doing, my fingers closed around the cord of my pendant and snapped it off my neck. I swung my arm back and flung it with a growl that was more feral than human. I wanted it to hit the mountain and pulverize so not even a vampire could tell the difference between the crystal and ash. Why should I carry Diego with me everywhere when he didn't even care enough about me not to die in the first place? At least if I had gone Victoria and Riley wouldn't have had to torture him. They would have killed us quick and I would be alone with grief and guilt over a boy I barely knew.
I waited for the satisfying crunch of my ninja star pendant shattering against granite but it didn't come. Instead all I heard was a rush of wind as Alec chased my necklace and caught it by the frayed cord just a few millimeters shy of destruction. He held it up and gave me a quizzical look with wide, burgundy eyes.
"Why did you do that?" I snapped.
"I could ask you the same," said Alec, giving the pendant a ponderous look. "It would be a shame to lose something forever on account of a newborn impulse."
"What do you care" I shrieked at Alec. "You told me you've killed more vampires than I've met so don't pretend you care that some vampire you never knew means anything to you."
"You're right; Diego means absolutely nothing to me but he was important to you," said Alec calmly. "Important enough to hold onto his ashes this long. Can you really be so casual about throwing them away now?"
"I can break my own stuff if I want to!" I stalked over to Alec with my hand outstretched. "Give it back."
"I think not," said Alec, putting the pendant in the pocket of his jacket. "I may as well keep it if you have no desire to."
My knees folded like they had a mind of their own and lowered me into a crouch. I curled my fingers in anticipation and barred my teeth. "If you don't give it to me I will take it from you. Don't think I won't."
Alec's expression told me he took my threat seriously but he still didn't seem to think much of it. "Bree, that won't accomplish anything and it certainly won't change what happened with Diego. Why don't you take a slow breath and think about what you want to do next?"
I inhaled sharply just to spite Alec's request then expelled the air in a rumbling growl. Alec understood he wasn't going to talk me down from my elevated temper and readied himself for my attack. Most vampires would have dropped into a crouch of their own to either counter the assault or leap clear from it but Alec's pose was straight as a rail.
A remote corner of my brain processed this information in a way that was distinct from my other instincts for fighting and self-defense. Once finished with their evaluation, these unfamiliar thoughts informed me that Alec had no hostile intentions but was prepared to defend himself if necessary. Alec intended to play bullfighter and let me charge him but would sidestep at the last instant – to the left by the posture of his body. He was counting on my rage and momentum to carry me straight into the debilitating web he extended behind him.
In the eighth of a second it took me to assess the situation it occurred to me that my talent for detecting the motives of others might actually extend to combat as well. Could I really size people up and anticipate their moves right before they initiated it? I no longer cared about getting the pendant back but I was curious if I was right or just imagining what Alec intended to do next.
I abandoned my crouch and received a bewildered look from Alec. He obviously didn't think I had the self-control to take the fight out of myself and I would have agreed a second ago but now I was more interested in picking Alec's brain instead of a fight.
"Were you going to let me rush you then side-step to the left so I would barrel straight into paralysis?" I wondered conversationally.
The question made Alec's eyes pop open with shock. That was all the response I needed to know I was right on the money. Clapping my hands together giddily, I felt both triumphant and smug despite doing nothing of actual consequence. In a blink, Alec was right in front of me and delivered a probing look. I thought that was pretty bold of him considering a couple seconds ago I was prepared to beat him like a piñata.
"How did you know what I was planning?" Alec demanded breathlessly.
"I 'm not positive but I think it might have something to do with my talent," I said awkwardly.
Alec shook his head as if to disagree. "You told me your abilities focus on detecting and expressing sincerity. How does predicting what I intend to do before I do it apply into that?"
I pointed at him. "That's it! I knew what you intended to do. My talent gages the demeanor of other people, not their actual words. Like I would sense if you wanted to manipulate or kill me but I wouldn't know your reasons for doing it. I must have just assumed it was sincerity-based because I'm so hung up on people trying to use or kill me all the time."
I rolled my eyes at myself. After everything with my dad and Riley was it any surprise I had trust issues?
Alec considered my theory. "It could be possible you're acutely aware of the little tics and tells people project when they're expressing or concealing their emotions. For example, think of how some people are excellent at card games. They put on a good poker-face to bluff their opponents while others are giving away their hand through subtle quirks. You know how to size people up, Bree; but it seems like the only practice you've had with your talent so far is in social situations."
"But how could I know any of that?" I wondered aloud.
"It's as much a mystery as any of our kind's uncanny talents," Alec said, shrugging as though the details didn't concern him. "There's no scientific explanation for why I can nullify a person's senses and mobility but I do it all the same. Vampires can never be accused of underutilizing our brainpower so, perhaps, whatever makes it possible for us to have photographic memories, hyper analysis and multifaceted cognitive thought allows some of us to do other extraordinary things."
I nodded, deciding not to over-think the matter too much. Like Alec said, half of our kind defied reason or the laws of nature using their talents so how mindboggling was being people-savvy supposed to be?
"We should conduct a few experiments," Alec suggested amiably. "Perhaps a little practice will give us a better idea of what your talent is capable of."
The way Alec spoke eerily echoed Diego's words in the underwater cave as we determined just how many of the vampire rules applied. I didn't have to worry about burning to ash if our experiments failed here but I still felt nervous, like I wasn't going to meet Alec's expectations – whatever they were – or my ability wasn't as cool as we hoped it might be. Why did I care whether I impressed Alec, though? It's not like I was auditioning to join the Volturi but, all the same, I wanted Alec to see me as someone who could be useful to him. It wasn't like Diego seemed to have that opinion of me; otherwise, he wouldn't have ditched me so easy.
"What did you have in mind?" I asked, trying to sound more enthusiastic than wary.
With a smile and no word of warning, Alec lunged at me. The alarms rang in my head, screaming at my reflexes jump back but they were drowned out by a different instinct that blared over my senses like an air raid siren. It warned me that Alec wanted to get behind me, not grab me, and if I jumped back I would be doing exactly what he wanted. I had fractions of a second to consider an alternative so I ducked down and grabbed Alec's ankle before he could pass, wrenching him to the ground with a booming thud. Before the earth had a chance to stop trembling I was sitting on top of Alec with my knees in the small of his back.
"How did your experiment go?" I asked, grinning.
"Depends on your definition of success," Alec's voice was muffled in the fresh crater his impact created. "Suffice to say, you can manage close combat well enough."
"Why aren't you better at it?" I snickered, leaning into Alec's shoulder-blades with my elbows. "I would think after three hundred and fifty years with the Volturi you would be a lot tougher."
"Three hundred and forty-seven; quit rounding up" Alec said, blowing a strand of hair from his face. "And – as you may have noticed – my talents are better served avoiding confrontations rather than engaging in them."
"Right, I forgot you're such a pacifist," I prodded the back of Alec head with my finger. "I bet you taught Gandhi everything he knew, too."
I was using just the pad of my finger but Alec's hair still felt extremely soft to me. So much so it made bunnies feel like steel wool wrapped in sandpaper. I withdrew my hand before I did something stupid like run my fingers through Alec's dark brown hair and – just to be safe – rolled off Alec's back.
As soon as my weight was removed Alec sprang to his feet and dusted the snow and rubble from his clothes. "You should talk. For someone who abhors violence you certainly resort to it often enough."
"You attacked me," I snorted.
"And did I attack you atop the church as well?" Alec asked, arching his eyebrows.
"You're still upset about that?" I rolled my eyes. "Little girls with skinned knees complain less than you do."
A lazy smile spread across Alec's face. "I may not be the best fighter after three hundred and forty-seven years but I do control my temper better than a newborn vampire."
"I'll sign up for anger management as soon as I get home," I promised sarcastically.
"Hmm," Alec said, motioning towards the rest. "In the meantime, you may as well enjoy the sunset while you're here."
I turned towards the sky and watched the red sun slowly tug the night sky down like it was tucking itself in bed with a blanket of stars. What little daylight remained transformed the clouds overhead into a kaleidoscope of every color I could name and a few I couldn't. Alec held out his pale hand and rolled it lazily through the air, admiring the prismatic light beaming from it. He lifted his eyes from his own twinkling skin to gaze upon mine.
"People always compares are flesh to diamonds but yours reminds me more of opals," Alec told me softly.
I examined the back of my hand, trying to see what Alec did. "Really? It just looks the same as everyone else's to me."
"No, it's softer and smoother and absolutely radiant," said Alec, shaking his head to himself. "I never noticed it on anyone else before you."
"Thanks," I said as someone released a swarm of butterflies in my stomach.
What was Alec saying? I didn't look any different from other vampires, right down to the normal-pretty most of our kind inherited with the change. Even if I was Rosalie-gorgeous I still wouldn't be much to look at with my bare feet, windswept hair and pumpkin-colored eyes. I didn't even qualify as a normal vampire thanks to my animal diet. I wasn't special, I was just weird and I wasn't even very good at that.
I turned to tell Alec as much but, midway through the motion, my talent tuned in to Alec's demeanor. He wanted to get close to me. It wasn't to spar, like before, but I still got the impression Alec wanted to grapple me. Unsure of how to interpret Alec's intentions, I braced myself for whatever Alec did next but no amount of warning could take the edge off my surprise when Alec slipped his hand along my jaw, leaned in and pressed his lips to mine.
AUTHOR'S NOTE
Yeah…so that happened lol