Disclaimer: "Twilight" belongs to SMeyer. "Les Yeux de la Lune" belongs to Elysabeth.

All the typos, alas, belong to eiluned price.

Elysabeth sends you bisous (kiss, kiss!) for your reviews.

Chapter 3: Fissure

It all happened in three seconds.

In the first second, Bella lifted her head at the sound of squealing tires, searching for its origin, and when I saw her face freeze in horror, I knew that she had understood what was going to happen and that it was too late, even with the best human reflexes, to escape the careering van. In that second, I also heard the panicked, incoherent thoughts of Tyler, who saw the girl in his path. I looked through his eyes at Bella's face, closer to him than I was. There was terror and fear there, but even more, a sort of resignation that set me off.

Not her! No, not her!

In the next second, I flew. I was ahead of the van in a flash and at Bella's side. I took her in the circle of my arms, and I could see the fear give way to surprise when I pressed her against my chest. Had she understood who was at her side in that second? My intuition told me that, yes, she recognized me. Her four working senses allowed her to identify me, I was certain.

I felt her tense during that second when she realized that I wouldn't release her. She wanted to push me away. She had accepted her fate, and couldn't abide the idea that someone else would share it. Her efforts were unavailing, and when my hands tightened around her, she gave up. Through my hold, I wanted to send her a message to trust me. Did she feel that the arms around her were stronger than iron? Did she sense my superhuman force? Did she understand that there was no other place, in this second, safer for her than in my arms?

I couldn't read her face, because her head was nestled in the curve of my neck. Her movements spoke for her - her fingers released her cane and came to my chest to grip my jacket, but the rest of her body was pliant, cooperative, ready to follow me no matter where in the next second. The lamb trusted the lion.

In the third second, I spun with her body in my arms. I heard the wheels of Tyler's van run over the metal cane. It broke with a sinister crack that underlined that it could very well have been the bones of this girl under those wheels if I hadn't reacted in time.

Finally, I took the force of the collision on my back. The frame of the van bent as it hit me. I felt no pain but the impact sent me rolling on the asphalt. I slowed down my fall, but not enough to keep the girl from cracking her head on the ground. The shock reverberated in my own body. I cursed myself for not being able to control everything. I knew that she wasn't bleeding – the monster in me would have been screaming if she were – but I couldn't know if she had an internal injury.

In the final tenths of that second, I had a flash of realization about the dented frame of the van: somebody might try to figure out how it had been damaged. I quickly directed a solid kick at the door of the old Ford that Tyler's van would have been twisted around if I hadn't been there. We were lying between the two vehicles, so I slid us to the side so people would believe that I had pushed the girl out of the way, and not taken the force of the collision on me.

The precaution taken, I focused once more on Bella. I could hear her heart hammering in her chest, and her erratic breath blowing on my neck was extraordinarily painful. Before moving away so I could examine her, I wanted to satisfy the monster in me – by punishing him. I offered him a teasing hint of what he could never have: I closed my eyes and glided my nose along her jugular, inhaling her intoxicating fragrance. It was exquisite and scorching at the same time. The monster roared, but the Edward was too worried about the possibility having hurt the girl to pay further attention to the beast.

I pulled away just enough to scrutinize her ashen face. Her eyes were closed.

"Bella?" I asked, anguished.

She no longer moved, no longer breathed.

I was swept under by panic. Had I killed her? Had the blow to her head been fatal? Had my efforts these last days, these last instants, to keep her alive been in vain? I had ended up killing her, just not the way I had feared. The monster in me didn't even consider launching itself on the corpse, though I was expecting it to grumble impatiently: "She's dead, so what do you have to lose? Take her while her blood is still warm!" But there was nothing, only a bottomless hole into which I was plummeting … until I heard a whimper.

I resurfaced. The eyelids of the corpse were twitching, then opening.

Unconscious! She was merely unconscious! What a cretin I was! In my panic, I hadn't even thought to listen to her heart.

"Bella! Can you hear me?"

She started when my voice managed to penetrate her mind. I locked my eyes on hers even she couldn't look back.

"Edward?'

Her weak voice tormented me beyond endurance.

She seemed disoriented, lost. I could tell she was making an effort to recall what happened before she blacked out, and I could tell when her memory suddenly returned to her. She remembered everything. She took in a big breath as if to calm herself. One of her hands moved from my jacket and I was unable to anticipate what she would do next, unable to avoid it: she touched my face. Fortunately, she was wearing mittens. But that didn't prevent me from feeling her fingers on my marble cheek or sensing her warmth.

"My God! Are you hurt? Are you okay?"

I understood that this tactile contact was her way of assuring herself that I was in one piece. She was in the shadows, and touch was the only way she had to be sure what condition I was in.

At that moment, I learned something else about Bella Swan: she put the well-being of others above her own. When I took her in my arms, she had first sought to push me away, to let her fend for herself with the van heading straight toward her. And now, instead of worrying about herself, she was worrying about me.

I brushed off her concern.

"I'm fine," I said brusquely.

She withdrew her hand, reassured – and surely worried that I was offended by her touching my face. It was better that she didn't touch me. Paradoxically, I would have liked her hand to stay where it was … and that desire didn't come from the monster.

"What happened? Didn't the van hit us?"

"No, Bella, I pushed you out of the way."

"I … I felt the impact."

"You're in shock. You hit your head pretty hard."

She seemed confused. My version of the accident didn't make sense to her. Still, she had no choice but to believe it.

The thoughts around us were chaotic, frightened. The mind closest to us, Tyler's, was only half- conscious. If he had hit the car, he would have barely been injured. I, however, was a more solid obstacle than a car. I felt a twinge of guilt toward this human, but it didn't last long: this way, he'd learn his lesson about speeding off in such dangerous conditions.

I saw nothing from where we were lying, hidden by the two vehicles, but I knew that everyone was running toward us, teachers and students. I immediately located my family in the tide of human thoughts. I could read in their minds that they had seen everything.

Alice was angry with herself for not having predicted the accident. She had been focusing too much on me to see anything else.

Emmett didn't understand why I had done what I had done. Humans died in accidents every day. If we started playing the hero each time a catastrophe threatened, we would spend all our time saving them.

Jasper was more pragmatic. If the girl had died, the temptation of her blood would have died with her. There'd be no more risk that I would attack her and reveal what we were. I had thwarted Fate and he was unhappy about it.

Rosalie followed the same line of reasoning as Jasper, or almost. She was furious: "Great, what if someone saw you? We'd be in real trouble." Her thoughts grated on me, but she was right.

I had to make sure that I hadn't made an enormous mistake. There had been spectators, but a dip into their minds showed me that they hadn't seen me literally fly toward Bella. I had been too fast. They believed that I simply had already been next to the girl when the van started skidding. I had halted the vehicle quite close to the old Ford, and I had dented the car door almost simultaneously so that it appeared that the two had made contact. No, I hadn't made any mistakes.

I heard a siren. The ambulance would arrive in 20 seconds.

I returned my attention to Bella. I still hadn't released her, and I had no desire to, but I had to move away from her before her warm body next to mine ended up reawakening the monster.

I started to pull away. Bella tried also to stand up, but I held her down by her shoulders.

"I can get up," she protested.

"No. Don't move."

"I'm fine."

She tried to free herself, but then she grimaced in pain.

"Ow, my head."

"I told you not to move."

The EMTs were here. I let go of Bella and stood up. It was clear to everyone that I didn't need to be examined, and the paramedics focused on Tyler and Bella.

The spectators formed a circle around the scene of the accident. The ambulance was soon ready to leave, the injured on stretchers. The back door closed upon a Bella who was protesting, "I told you that I'm fine!"

I smiled. Bella detested being the center of attention, even injured.

Injured ...

I strode to my Volvo, noting in passing Rosalie's mental warning: "Tonight we have to talk. All of us."

Oh, yes, I was going to have to explain myself. And I would. Later.

My siblings guessed where I was headed, and I sensed their curiosity, their puzzlement. Why would I follow her there? Hadn't I done enough damage today?

They were right, I knew it, yet it beyond my strength to stop myself.

I arrived at the hospital before the ambulance. I rushed to Carlisle's office, and fortunately, he didn't have a patient. Seeing me burst into his office, dismay on my face, he misinterpreted the situation.

"Edward - you didn't - ?"

He noted my still-golden eyes with relief. "No, of course not. Pardon me for -"

He feared that I had succumbed, but I didn't have time to be hurt by his assumption.

"It's nothing," I interrupted him. "But something has indeed happened to her."

I quickly explained the situation. "I'm sorry to have done that in front of everyone," I finished. "But I took precautions. I swear to you that nobody will suspect anything ..."

Carlisle smiled and put his hand on my shoulder. In his mind I found indulgence and understanding. He had worked for so long in an atmosphere where humans died everyday without his being able to help that he couldn't rebuke me for having reacted as I did.

"It's okay. Let's discuss it tonight. For the moment, it seems that I have a patient to examine," he said with a smile.

"Please."

My father had realized that I wanted him to take charge of her. The least I could do for the girl I had hurt was to provide her with the care of a doctor who had hundreds of years of experience.

"I'm so angry with myself for hurting her ... she's blind, too. What if until now her handicap had been only temporary, and she still had the possibility of seeing again? And I've destroyed that possibility by damaging her brain, or an optic nerve or -"

"Calm down, Edward. I'll have her medical history sent to me to see if that could be. She surely had a specialist in Phoenix."

We both heard the siren announcing the arrival of the ambulance.

"I'm going."

He laughed gently. "It's been an interesting day for you, hasn't it?"

I could read the irony of my situation in his mind. I had been transformed from killer to protector. IT was indeed something to laugh at. I had been certain that I was the greatest danger that Bella Swan could encounter, and all it took was three seconds to change everything.

"Go home," Carlisle told me. "We'll go over everything later."

"I should stay. I should listen in to see if anyone thinks -"

"You told me yourself that you took all the necessary precautions, didn't you?"

"Yes -"

"Well, then, there's no reason to stay. Go to the house, son."

So I did. My family greeted me with silence, but their thoughts assailed me.

Rosalie's anger: "You owe us a good explanation!"

Emmett's teasing: "Edward, the vampire hero. Hah!"

Alice's tranquil assurance: "You did well, Edward. Imagine all the blood if the van had crushed her … All of us would have had difficulty controlling ourselves."

Jasper's worry: "I hope that the repercussions of what you've done don't ruin everything."

Esme was the only one to not be judgmental. She loved me too much to criticize me. She stepped to me and kissed my forehead. "You did what you felt was right," she thought with an affectionate smile. My mother had enough faith in me to not worry about the repercussions Jasper was thinking about.

The hours that followed were atrociously long. How was the girl? And what version of the accident was she telling?

When Carlisle arrived, he wore a reassuring smile. We all awaited him at the table we used for family meetings.

I mentally threw myself on him, seeking information.

The girl was fine. Her X-rays were good. Her medical records had been faxed from Phoenix: her blindness was irreversible and permanent. I hadn't damaged her eyesight more than it already was. She had been released from the hospital, while Tyler, who was in worse shape, was spending the night. The boy was overflowing with remorse, but I didn't care about him. All that mattered was that Bella was better.

Carlisle sat at one end of the table, in the seat reserved for the head of the family.

I was the first to speak. "I'm sorry for having taken a risk, but I would do it again," I said.

Alice stared into the distance, lost in her visions.

"It would have been horrible for Chief Swan if something had happened to her. She's all that he has."

She emphasized her words by showing me images of Charlie's agony, of possibilities now happily rendered moot. Charlie adored his daughter and losing her would have slowly killed him. She sought to support me for having saved Bella, but I couldn't help feel a wave of remorse: Charlie still ran the risk of losing his daughter, because I was still here, still thirsty for her blood.

Emmett, impatient, wanted facts. "So, are we in danger or not?" he demanded.

"The girl said nothing." Carlisle spoke with conviction. "Bella Swan was asked several times to describe what happened, and she said only what you told her, Edward: you pushed her out of the way before the van could hit her."

He relived for me what happened while he was studying – or rather, pretending to study – Bella's X-rays, and Chief Swan burst into the examining room.

"Bella!"

I now understood Alice's vision even more. Chief Swan was worried, anguished, upset and furious.

"Char – Dad?"

"I just heard on the radio. Bella, are you all right? Good God!"

"I'm completely fine. It's just a lot of fuss over nothing, I promise you."

"And that bump on your head, that's nothing too?"

I saw through Carlisle's eyes the bump that alarmed her father. Her injury had had time to swell, and it appeared enormous to me. Another wave of guilt swept over me. I told myself that I had averted something worse, but it was little consolation. How strange it was to feel so culpable. I wasn't used to that. Nor was I used to being so wrapped up in someone else's well-being, especially a human's.

"Tyler's in worse shape than me, Dad."

"He definitely will be once I'm finished with him."

"It wasn't his fault."

"I owe a lot to the Cullen boy, it appears."

"Yeah … he was there at the right time."

I noted her hesitation and held my breath.

"He pushed me out of the way," she said.

That was it.

She had apparently decided that my version was the right one, but I felt even worse. To lie to the girl, to play on her blindness, was reprehensible.

Carlisle stepped over with the X-rays and I was absurdly happy that his proximity allowed me a better view of her face through his memories.

"Dr. Cullen!" Charlie hastily shook Carlisle's hand, fortunately covered in a plastic glove. "I owe a lot to your son. Thank him for me."

My father gave Charlie his well-practiced friendly smile that put humans at ease instead of frightening them.

"I'll be sure to do that."

Carlisle's recollection was interrupted by Rosalie, who exclaimed vehemently: "It's not the girl we have to worry about. She can't see anything, and nobody will believe her. We need to know if there were witnesses. Inconvenient witnesses."

I met her angry stare.

"There are none. We're safe."

I was certain of that. Nobody had seen anything. I had been too fast. But I knew Bella had suspicions. She had decided to stick to my version when people questioned her, but what did she really think? What part of the truth had she grasped? I just couldn't know without reading her thoughts.

Rosalie immediately saw the doubt in my eyes.

"You don't seem completely sure."

"It's just that …. I can trust only my intuition. I …"

It was tremendously difficult for me to confess my inability to read her, to admit to another weakness. I hadn't yet told my family because I was ashamed of my failure. But it bothered me that my family underestimated Bella, believed her inferior, classified her as unimportant. She had seen nothing, but she had sensed what had happened.

"I can't read Bella Swan's thoughts."

Everyone was shocked.

"What?" Rosalie shrieked.

"Don't you realize," Jasper asked, "we have no guarantee she'll stay silent?"

"It doesn't matter what she saw – or rather perceived – because she won't say anything." I said.

I didn't know exactly why I had this conviction, but it was there, deep in me. Bella Swan wouldn't talk, even though she had noticed that I wasn't normal. Had she not told me, fiercely, that she didn't listen to gossip? No, I couldn't imagine Bella starting a rumor about anything, including vampires.

Carlisle put his elbows on the table and knotted his hands. "I've seen for myself that her version of the accident was the same as yours," he said. "She's holding to your truth. For the moment. But is she asking questions? Could one day she draw different conclusions than the official version? Has she accepted your explanations?"

"Not really –"

Rosalie slammed her fist on the table, cracking the wood. "She has suspicions!"

I lowered my head, avoiding the eyes fixed on me.

Rosalie directed the conversation to her own concerns. "We're going to have to move! To begin again!"

Jasper's expression was suddenly determined. "We can't move," he argued. "In any case, not immediately. We've always left behind us only rumors, never witnesses."

I saw his intent in his mind: eradicate the risks.

I snarled and jumped from my chair.

"NO!"

Jasper didn't even raise an eyebrow. He was decided.

"I warn you, Jasper, I won't let you do that," I said, teeth gritted.

Emmett snorted in exasperation. "What? What is he thinking of doing?"

"Killing her," Alice murmured.

I had a double perspective of what Jasper was planning. In his mind, he was calculating how he was going to do it, and in Alice's vision I saw him put his plan in action.

I let loose a growl of rage.

Why so much rage?

The rational part of my mind reminded me: I was enraged because for days I had been torturing myself, restraining myself so this human would stay alive. And now all my efforts were in vain because of my brother who wanted to eliminate the direct witness of the incident that put our whole family in danger. It was frustrating to know that I had done all that for nothing, that I had suffered pointlessly.

But the other part of my mind, that which was hidden and whose existence I had never known existed, had an entirely different explanation: If I was enraged, it was because Jasper sought to destroy something that I had long searched for, something I didn't want to lose. And it was my fault that he was set on this fatal solution. It was my fault for putting my family in danger.

"She should have died today anyway. It was her destiny," my brother said.

I tried to recover my sangfroid and he helped me with a wave of calm.

"I don't want to fight you, Jasper," I warned him, "but if it's necessary, I will make it so that you never touch the Swan girl."

We stared at each other and he let me see his fears: he loved Alice above all else, and worried about what would happen to her if our secret was discovered.

"You can't read the human's intentions, and that makes us vulnerable," he said. "We are at her mercy."

"She won't say anything!"

"You have no proof of that except your own belief. I will not allow Alice to be in danger."

But Alice stood up, suddenly smiling.

"I know that you want to protect me, and I appreciate it," she said. "I love you and I don't want anything to happen to you either." She looked at us both affectionately. "I don't want you to fight. In any case, we have nothing to fear."

She appeared confident and I saw in her mind why.

"I don't see us moving in the immediate future," she announced.

"Because I'm going to take care of the problem," Jasper interjected.

"No, Bella Swan is still alive from what I can see. Though it's not clear, because everything turns on you, Edward."

Turns on me? What could that mean?

I tried to see it for myself, but Alice was right: her visions were too indistinct to understand fully. All that I could see was that we continued our human lives as before and that Bella Swan was still at school.

Alice had proved to us more than once that we could count on her judgment, and that soothed the fears of my family and put a brake on Jasper's need for action. At least for now.

Esme rose and put one hand on Jasper's shoulder and the other on mine, a gentle encouragement for us to reach a truce.

Carlisle looked at all of us and declared: "The Swan girl is innocent. It would be a shame to use such radical means to protect ourselves, Jasper. I know that your intentions are good, but … I would like our family to be worth protecting. The … the occasional accident or loss of control is a regrettable part of who we are."

It was very like Carlisle to include himself in the plural, even though he had never had such a lapse himself.

"To murder an innocent child in cold blood is another thing entirely. I believe that the risk she represents, whether she voices her suspicions or not, is nothing to the greater risk. If we make exceptions to protect ourselves, we risk something even more important: we risk losing sight of who we are, of what distinguishes us for the rest of our kind."

It was well said, and everyone agreed, or nearly so. Jasper was the most pragmatic member of our family. He had spent a century viewing things in a clinical, impersonal, detached manner. He couldn't change his old habits, and I saw that he hadn't changed his opinion. He would act as he saw best. The end justified the means.

"Let's wait to see what happens," Carlisle continued. "We will see how the situation evolves. At the least doubt, we'll reconsider."

Jasper looked at me again, distressed and determined at the same time. "At the least doubt, I'm going to act, Edward, I assure you," he said.

Having a confrontation was the last thing we wanted. We loved each other like brothers. But unity, the preservation of our family, and the love he had for Alice were much more powerful than brotherly love.

I answered in the same melancholy voice as his. "Then you'll find me blocking your path."

As Alice had foretold, we returned to school the next day to find no compromising gossip about my exploits. Of course, the accident was the happening of the century, and everyone was assailing Bella. I was the hero of the story, but the wariness of the humans spared me the questions that Bella couldn't escape.

Once more, she was the center of attention, and I didn't need to read her mind to know that it embarrassed her enormously. She nonetheless repeated my version of the story to everyone, which reassured my siblings.

At lunch, however, she did something I didn't expect.

She stepped into the cafeteria slowly – her cane was ruined and she apparently didn't have another one. But she must have made a mental map of the high school, for she walked with more confidence. She didn't go buy something to eat. She went to her usual table, but remained standing.

"Angela? Could you tell me what direction the Cullen table is in?" she asked.

My brothers and sisters were listening along with me.

Emmett muttered, "What does she want?"

Jasper interrogated our walking radar. "Alice?"

"I didn't see anything!" she wailed. "She just decided, on impulse. She didn't warn me!"

"Don't look as if you can hear everything! Play human, for Chrissakes!" Rosalie hissed.

As for me, I was listening to Angela, who was looking at Bella with astonishment. I saw through her surprised eyes a Bella who was nervous but determined. That augured nothing good.

Angela gaped for a few seconds – nobody went visited the Cullen table.

"Perhaps she wants to thank Edward for having saved her," she concluded. I hoped she was right.

"Ummm … you're sure?"

"Yes."

"Well, okay."

Angela took Bella by the shoulders and turned her toward us, taking care not to look directly at our table.

"Go straight ahead and in 30 feet you'll be there."

"Thanks a lot."

My family and I pretended not to notice her, forcing ourselves to converse like everyone else. When she approached us, we affected surprise at seeing her stop at our table and adopted the same politely interested expression – a useless precaution for Bella, but we knew that all eyes were fixed on us. It wasn't every day that a student took the initiative to talk to the Cullens.

Bella smiled, but it was a smile too tense to be sincere.

"Hello," she said, addressing herself to all of us.

Alice responded with her joyous, chiming voice, "Hi, Bella!"

Bella's smile grew. It was sincere this time. Alice's voice had pleased her.

Under the table, I stepped on my sister's foot, hard, to show her my disapproval. We should be distant, not friendly!

"Ow! Come on, Edward, we have to be polite!" she thought, repressing a grimace.

"Hi, Edward. Are you okay?"

The sound of her voice saying my name should not have been so appealing.

"Why wouldn't I be?"

I was brusque. I had to be. I had to push away any new effort by her to be friendly with me. Saving her from the van was not an excuse for establishing a relationship with her. She had to understand this. I had to stay away from her to ensure my family's safety. I was becoming stronger, but I could still succumb. Alice's visions were of a living Bella, but that was perhaps only in a context in which Jasper no longer needed to put his plan into execution. As for me – the killer thirsty for her blood – there was still nothing clear about Bella's future. Or her death.

She flinched at my brutal tone, but continued on.

"No post-traumatic stress or anything like that?"

"Nothing at all."

"That's good."

Courtesy demanded that I ask her the same questions in return, did her head hurt, was she traumatized… and I wanted to know that she was fine, but I couldn't let her think I cared.

"Can I speak to you a moment … in private?" she went on.

Jasper's eyes widened. "Say no!"

Rosalie glared at me. "Don't let her get you alone to ask you questions. You might let something slip."

That was insulting. I was a very good liar. I was used to it. But then, with Bella I had that uncontrollable desire not to lie to her…

Emmett shrugged. "Go ahead, Edward. Smooth things over. Convince her."

I agreed with my brother.

"If you wish," I said.

I rose and the mental warnings of my siblings trailed after me into the hallway.

I turned around, making sure not to breathe, and saw Bella following me hesitantly.

"Edward?"

Her head swiveled around. She was searching for me.

"I'm here."

She turned to the sound of my voice.

"Huh. I thought my hearing was good, but I didn't hear your footsteps," she said, perplexed.

Of course, she hadn't heard them. I was more furtive and silent than a cat. I just made another mistake that would lead Bella to believe that I wasn't … normal.

I was deeply irritated by my error, and my bad mood made my response crueler than needed.

"I can't help it if you're unobservant."

She flinched. Again.

Could a heart that was already dead break? I was sure that mine just did.

I ignored it the best as I could and continued with the same brutality.

"What do you want?"

"Are we alone in the hallway?"

There were no human thoughts within 10 yards of us. We were alone.

"Yes."

"Good."

Her chin jutted with determination. "So just what happened in the parking lot yesterday?"

My suspicions were correct. Bella Swan hadn't swallowed my story.

I had to make myself convincing. I adopted a detached tone.

"You know as much as I do, Bella. You were there."

"No, I missed things. I'm sure of it. We were struck squarely by the van. "

I sighed to show my boredom with the subject. "Bella, you hit your head, that's all. The impact made you imagine things."

Her face hardened.

"I'm blind, not stupid. We were hit by the van!"

I took on the necessary incredulous, mocking tone. "You really think that we'd be talking here right now if we had been struck by the van?"

This time, she was angry.

"Don't pretend that I'm an idiot. You took the impact on yourself. You stopped the van."

I answered coldly. "Say what you want, nobody will believe you."

"I wasn't going to say anything."

I was relieved, though I reflexively hid it behind an indifferent expression. She would say nothing. My instinct was right. Jasper didn't have any reason to kill her.

She lowered her head, now more unhappy than angry. "I just want to understand," she said.

"There is nothing to understand."

Her voice became pleading. "Please. I'm already in darkness. Give me a little light, Edward."

I realized that it wasn't the desire to figure out what I was that motivated her questions. Bella lived in a world of shadows, and she was frustrated not to be able to visualize what she had experienced.

If she only knew how it tortured me to disappoint her!

"You can't just thank me and forget about it?"

She jumped.

"Thank you," she said instantly, but not with any sense of finality.

"You won't let this go, will you?" I said.

"Not until you have explained it to me."

"In that case, I hope you like disappointment," I answered, and stalked away.

After that day, I never spoke to her. In biology, she greeted me a couple of times, at first with a certain hope that filled me with remorse, then out of politeness. When she realized that I wouldn't answer, she gave up.

She got the message. I had done what I had to do. The farther she stayed from me, the less risk that I would kill her. I was rejecting her for her own good.

Why, then, did I feel so uncomfortable? I shouldn't feel guilty. I had hurt her for a good cause: her survival.

And I should rejoice that the episode with the van didn't have any repercussions, shouldn't I? Bella kept silent. She knew some things, had surely guessed others, but she wouldn't talk. She would never get answers to her questions. She would stay in the shadows. Her lifeless eyes had protected her in a way: she didn't know what had happened, but at least she was alive.

With time, she would forget all about the accident, forget her questions and suspicions. Edward Cullen, the strange classmate who had saved her life, would soon have no interest for her. I had gone from friendly to forbidding, but she would forget all about that too. It was better that way.

To be forgotten by Bella Swan was the best thing that could happen to us both. So why did the idea of that tear me in two?

T/N: Seriously, if you see typos, let me know – it's easy to make them in this type of work.

Laurie: I see what you did there :). If you have time, read one of these chapters, then read Elysabeth's original; you'll be surprised to see how much you understand, I bet.