She could drive well, when she kept the speed reasonable, I had to admit. Like so many things, it seemed to be effortless to her. She barely looked at the road, yet the tires never deviated so much as a centimeter from the center of the lane. She drove one-handed, holding my hand on the seat.
Sometimes she gazed into the setting sun, sometimes she glanced at me — my face, my hair blowing out the open window, our hands twined together.
She had turned the radio to an oldies station, and she sang along with a song I'd never heard. She knew every line.
"You like fifties music?" I asked.
"Music in the fifties was good. Much better than the sixties, or the seventies, ugh!" She shuddered.
"The eighties were bearable."
"Are you ever going to tell me how old you are?" I asked, tentative, not wanting to upset her buoyant humor.
"Does it matter much?" Her smile, to my relief, remained unclouded.
"No, but I still wonder…" I grimaced. "There's nothing like an unsolved mystery to keep you up at night."
"I wonder if it will upset you," she reflected to herself. She gazed into the sun; the minutes passed.
"Try me," I finally said.
She sighed, and then looked into my eyes, seeming to forget the road completely for a time. Whatever she saw there must have encouraged her. She looked into the sun — the light of the setting orb glittered off her skin in ruby-tinged sparkles — and spoke.
"I was born in Chicago in 1901." She paused and glanced at me from the corner of her eyes. My face was carefully unsurprised, patient for the rest. She smiled a tiny smile and continued. "Carlisle found me in a hospital in the summer of 1918. I was seventeen, and dying of the Spanish influenza." (Someone please call Chris Hansen)
She heard my intake of breath, though it was barely audible to my own ears. She looked down into my eyes again.
"I don't remember it well — it was a very long time ago, and human memories fade." She was lost in her thoughts for a short time before she went on. "I do remember how it felt, when Carlisle saved me. It's not an easy thing, not something you could forget."
"Your parents?"
"They had already died from the disease. I was alone. That was why he chose me. In all the chaos of the epidemic, no one would ever realize I was gone."
"How did he… save you?"
A few seconds passed before she answered. She seemed to choose her words carefully.
"It was difficult. Not many of us have the restraint necessary to accomplish it. But Carlisle has always been the most humane, the most compassionate of us… I don't think you could find his equal throughout all of history." She paused. "For me, it was merely very, very painful."
I could tell from the set of her lips, she would say no more on this subject. I suppressed my curiosity, though it was far from idle. There were many things I needed to think through on this particular issue, things that were only beginning to occur to me. No doubt her quick mind had already comprehended every aspect that eluded me.
Her soft voice interrupted my thoughts. "He acted from loneliness. That's usually the reason behind the choice. I was the first in Carlisle's family, though he found Esme soon after. She fell from a cliff.
They brought her straight to the hospital morgue, though, somehow, her heart was still beating."
"So you must be dying, then, to become…" We never said the word, and I couldn't frame it now.
"No, that's just Carlisle. He would never do that to someone who had another choice." The respect in her voice was profound whenever she spoke of her father figure. "It is easier he says, though," she continued, "if the blood is weak." She looked at the now-dark road, and I could feel the subject closing again.
"And Emmett and Rosalie?"
"Carlisle brought Rosalie to our family next. I didn't realize till much later that he was hoping she would be to me what Esme was to him — he was careful with his thoughts around me." She rolled her eyes.
"But she was never more than a sister. I don't particularly like blondes, and Rosalie prefers men, anyway. Elisabeth said with the ghost of a smile.
It was only two years later that she found Emmett. She was hunting — we were in Appalachia at the time — and found a bear about to finish him off. She carried him back to Carlisle, more than a hundred miles, afraid she wouldn't be able to do it herself. I'm only beginning to guess how difficult that journey was for her." She threw a pointed glance in my direction, and raised our hands, still folded together, to brush my cheek with the back of her hand.
"But she made it," I encouraged, looking away from the unbearable beauty of her eyes.
"Yes," she murmured. "She saw something in his face that made her strong enough. And they've been together ever since. Sometimes they live separately from us, as a married couple. But the younger we pretend to be, the longer we can stay in any given place. Forks seemed perfect, so we all enrolled in high school." She laughed. "I suppose we'll have to go to their wedding in a few years, again."
"Alice and Jasper?"
"Alice and Jasper are two very rare creatures. They both developed a conscience, as we refer to it, with no outside guidance. Jasper belonged to another… family, a very different kind of family. He became depressed, and he wandered on his own. Alice found him. Like me, she has certain gifts above and beyond the norm for our kind."
"Really?" I interrupted, fascinated. "But you said you were the only one who could hear people's thoughts."
"That's true. She knows other things. She sees things — things that might happen, things that are coming. But it's very subjective. The future isn't set in stone. Things change."
Her jaw set when she said that, and her eyes darted to my face and away so quickly that I wasn't sure if I only imagined it.
"What kinds of things does she see?"
She saw Jasper and knew that he was looking for her before he knew it himself. She saw Carlisle and our family, and they came together to find us. She's most sensitive to non-humans. She always sees, for example, when another group of our kind is coming near. And any threat they may pose."
"Are there a lot of… your kind?" I was surprised. How many of them could walk among us undetected?
"No, not many. But most won't settle in any one place. Only those like us, who've given up hunting you people" — a sly glance in my direction — "can live together with humans for any length of time. We've only found one other family like ours, in a small village in Alaska. We lived together for a time, but there were so many of us that we became too noticeable. Those of us who live… differently tend to band together."
"And the others?"
"Nomads, for the most part. We've all lived that way at times. It gets tedious, like anything else. But we run across the others now and then, because most of us prefer the North."
"Why is that?"
We were parked in front of my house now, and she'd turned off the truck. It was very quiet and dark; there was no moon. The porch light was off so I knew my father wasn't home yet.
"Did you have your eyes open this afternoon?" she teased. "Do you think I could walk down the street in the sunlight without causing traffic accidents? There's a reason why we chose the Olympic Peninsula, one of the most sunless places in the world. It's nice to be able to go outside in the day. You wouldn't believe how tired you can get of nighttime in eighty-odd years."
"So that's where the legends came from?"
"Probably."
"And Alice came from another family, like Jasper?"
"No, and that is a mystery. Alice doesn't remember her human life at all. And she doesn't know who created her. She awoke alone. Whoever made her walked away, and none of us understand why, or how, he could. If she hadn't had that other sense, if she hadn't seen Jasper and Carlisle and known that she would someday become one of us, she probably would have turned into a total savage."
There was so much to think through, so much I still wanted to ask. But, to my great embarrassment, my stomach growled. I'd been so intrigued, I hadn't even noticed I was hungry. I realized now that I was ravenous.
"I'm sorry, I'm keeping you from dinner."
"I'm fine, really."
"I've never spent much time around anyone who eats food. I forget."
"I want to stay with you." It was easier to say in the darkness, knowing as I spoke how my voice would betray me, my hopeless addiction to her.
"Can't I come in?" she asked.
"Would you like to?" I couldn't picture it, this goddesslike creature sitting in my father's shabby kitchen chair.
"Yes, if it's all right." I heard the door close quietly, and almost simultaneously she was outside my door, opening it for me.
"Very human," I complimented her.
"It's definitely resurfacing."
She walked beside me in the night, so quietly I had to peek at her constantly to be sure she was still there.
In the darkness she looked much more normal. Still pale, still dreamlike in her beauty, but no longer the fantastic sparkling creature of our sunlit afternoon.
She reached the door ahead of me and opened it for me. I paused halfway through the frame.
"The door was unlocked?"
"No, I used the key from under the eave."
I stepped inside, flicked on the porch light, and turned to look at her with my eyebrows raised. I was sure I'd never used that key in front of her. (Cool, Bella stepped out of her oxy'd out stupor and noticed a red flag for once)
"I was curious about you."
"You spied on me?" But somehow I couldn't infuse my voice with the proper outrage. I was flattered. (nvm lol)
She was unrepentant. "What else is there to do at night?"
I let it go for the moment and went down the hall to the kitchen. She was there before me, needing no guide. She sat in the very chair I'd tried to picture her in. Her beauty lit up the kitchen. It was a moment before I could look away.
I concentrated on getting my dinner, taking last night's lasagna from the fridge, placing a square on a plate, heating it in the microwave. It revolved, filling the kitchen with the smell of tomatoes and oregano. I didn't take my eyes from the plate of food as I spoke.
"How often?" I asked casually.
"Hmmm?" She sounded as if I had pulled her from some other train of thought.
I still didn't turn around. "How often did you come here?"
"I come here almost every night."
I whirled, stunned. "Why?"
"You're interesting when you sleep." She spoke matter-of-factly. "You talk."
"No!" I gasped, heat flooding my face all the way to my hairline. I gripped the kitchen counter for support. I knew I talked in my sleep, of course; my mother teased me about it. I hadn't thought it was something I needed to worry about here, though.
Her expression shifted instantly to chagrin. "Are you very angry with me?"
"That depends!" I felt and sounded like I'd had the breath knocked out of me.
She waited.
"On?" she urged.
"What you heard!" I wailed.
Instantly, silently, she was at my side, taking my hands carefully in hers.
"Don't be upset!" she pleaded. She dropped her face to the level of my eyes, holding my gaze. I was embarrassed. I tried to look away.
"You miss your mother," she whispered. "You worry about her. And when it rains, the sound makes you restless. You used to talk about home a lot, but it's less often now. Once you said, 'It's too green.'"
She laughed softly, hoping, I could see, not to offend me further.
"Anything else?" I demanded.
She knew what I was getting at. "You did say my name," she admitted.
I sighed in defeat. "A lot?"
"How much do you mean by 'a lot,' exactly?"
"Oh no!" I hung my head.
She pulled me against her chest, softly, naturally.
"Don't be self-conscious," she whispered in my ear. "If I could dream at all, it would be about you. And I'm not ashamed of it."
Then we both heard the sound of tires on the brick driveway, saw the headlights flash through the front windows, down the hall to us. I stiffened in her arms.
"Should your father know I'm here?" she asked.
"I'm not sure…" I tried to think it through quickly.
"Another time then…"
And I was alone.
"Elisabeth!" I hissed.
I heard a ghostly chuckle, then nothing else.
My father's key turned in the door.
"Bella?" he called. It had bothered me before; who else would it be? Suddenly he didn't seem so far off base.
"In here." I hoped he couldn't hear the hysterical edge to my voice. I grabbed my dinner from the microwave and sat at the table as he walked in. His footsteps sounded so noisy after my day with Elisabeth.
"Can you get me some of that? I'm bushed." He stepped on the heels of his boots to take them off, holding the back of Elisabeth's chair for support.
I took my food with me, scarfing it down as I got his dinner. It burned my tongue. I filled two glasses with milk while his lasagna was heating, and gulped mine to put out the fire. As I set the glass down, I noticed the milk trembling and realized my hand was shaking. Charlie sat in the chair, and the contrast between her and its former occupant was comical.
"Thanks," he said as I placed his food on the table.
"How was your day?" I asked. The words were rushed; I was dying to escape to my room.
"Good. The fish were biting… how about you? Did you get everything done that you wanted to?"
"Not really — it was too nice out to stay indoors." I took another big bite.
"It was a nice day," he agreed. What an understatement, I thought to myself.
Finished with the last bite of lasagna, I lifted my glass and chugged the remains of my milk.
Charlie surprised me by being observant. "In a hurry?"
"Yeah, I'm tired. I'm going to bed early."
"You look kinda keyed up," he noted. Why, oh why, did this have to be his night to pay attention?
"Do I?" was all I could manage in response. I quickly scrubbed my dishes clean in the sink, and placed them upside down on a dish towel to dry.
"It's Saturday," he mused.
I didn't respond.
"No plans tonight?" he asked suddenly.
"No, Dad, I just want to get some sleep."
"None of the boys in town your type, eh?" He was suspicious, but trying to play it cool.
"No, none of the boys have caught my eye yet." I was careful to over-emphasize the word boys with Charlie, he knew I was gay.
"I thought maybe that Mike Newton… you said he was friendly."
"He's Just a friend, Dad."
"Well how about Jessica Stanley? I've heard you talk about her a few times."
"I don't want to sound like a broken record, Dad."
"Well, you're too good for them all, anyway. Wait till you get to college to start looking."
Every father's dream, that his daughter will be out of the house before the hormones kick in.
"Sounds like a good idea to me," I agreed as I headed up the stairs.
"'Night, honey," he called after me. No doubt he would be listening carefully all evening, waiting for me to try to sneak out.
"See you in the morning, Dad." See you creeping into my room tonight at midnight to check on me.
I worked to make my tread sound slow and tired as I walked up the stairs to my room. I shut the door loud enough for him to hear, and then sprinted on my tiptoes to the window. I threw it open and leaned out into the night. My eyes scanned the darkness, the impenetrable shadows of the trees.
"Elisabeth?" I whispered, feeling completely idiotic.
The quiet, laughing response came from behind me. "Yes?"
I whirled, one hand flying to my throat in surprise.
She lay, smiling hugely, across my bed, her hands behind her head, feet dangling off the end, the picture of ease.
"Oh!" I breathed, sinking unsteadily to the floor.
"I'm sorry." She pressed her lips together, trying to hide her amusement.
"Just give me a minute to restart my heart."
She sat up slowly, so as not to startle me again. Then she leaned forward and reached out with her long arms and sat me on the bed beside her.
"Why don't you sit with me," she suggested, putting a cold hand on mine. "How's the heart?"
"You tell me — I'm sure you hear it better than I do."
I felt her quiet laughter shake the bed.
We sat there for a moment in silence, both listening to my heartbeat slow. I thought about having Elisabeth in my room, with my father in the house.
"Can I have a minute to be human?" I asked.
"Certainly." She gestured with one hand that I should proceed.
"Stay," I said, trying to look severe.
"Yes ma'am." She made a show of becoming a statue on the edge of my bed.
I hopped up, grabbing my pajamas from off the floor, my bag of toiletries off the desk. I left the light off and slipped out, closing the door.
I could hear the sound from the TV rising up the stairs. I banged the bathroom door loudly, so Charlie wouldn't come up to bother me.
I meant to hurry. I brushed my teeth fiercely, trying to be thorough and speedy, removing all traces of lasagna. But the hot water of the shower couldn't be rushed. It unknotted the muscles in my back, calmed my pulse. The familiar smell of my shampoo made me feel like I might be the same person I had been this morning. I tried not to think of Elisabeth, sitting in my room, waiting, because then I had to start all over with the calming process. Finally, I couldn't delay anymore. I shut off the water, toweling hastily, rushing again. I pulled on my holey t-shirt and gray sweatpants. Too late to regret not packing the Victoria's Secret silk pajamas my mother got me two birthdays ago, which still had the tags on them in a drawer somewhere back home.
I rubbed the towel through my hair again, and then yanked the brush through it quickly. I threw the towel in the hamper, flung my brush and toothpaste into my bag. Then I dashed down the stairs so Charlie could see that I was in my pajamas, with wet hair.
"'Night, Dad."
"'Night, Bella." He did look startled by my appearance. Maybe that would keep him from checking on me tonight.
I took the stairs two at a time, trying to be quiet, and flew into my room, closing the door tightly behind me.
Elsiabeth hadn't moved a fraction of an inch, a carving of Aphrodite perched on my faded quilt. I smiled, and her lips twitched, the statue coming to life.
Her eyes appraised me, taking in the damp hair, the tattered shirt. She raised one eyebrow. "Nice."
I grimaced.
"No, it looks good on you."
"Thanks," I whispered. I went back to her side, sitting cross-legged beside her. I looked at the lines in the wooden floor.
"What was all that for?"
"Charlie thinks I'm sneaking out."
"Oh." She contemplated that. "Why?" As if she couldn't know Charlie's mind much more clearly than I could guess.
"Apparently, I look a little overexcited."
She lifted my chin, examining my face.
"You look very warm, actually."
She bent her face slowly to mine, laying her cool cheek against my skin. I held perfectly still.
"Mmmmmm…" she breathed.
It was very difficult, while she was touching me, to frame a coherent question. It took me a minute of scattered concentration to begin.
"It seems to be… much easier for you, now, to be close to me."
"Does it seem that way to you?" she murmured, her nose gliding to the corner of my jaw. I felt her hand, lighter than a moth's wing, brushing my damp hair back, so that her lips could touch the hollow beneath my ear.
"Much, much easier," I said, trying to exhale.
"Hmm."
"So I was wondering…" I began again, but her fingers were slowly tracing my collarbone, and I lost my train of thought.
"Yes?" she breathed.
"Why is that," my voice shook, embarrassing me, "do you think?"
I felt the tremor of her breath on my neck as she laughed. "Mind over matter."
I pulled back; as I moved, she froze — and I could no longer hear the sound of her breathing.
We stared cautiously at each other for a moment, and then, as her clenched jaw gradually relaxed, her expression became puzzled.
"Did I do something wrong?"
"No — the opposite. You're driving me crazy," I explained.
She considered that briefly, and when she spoke, she sounded pleased. "Really?" A triumphant smile slowly lit her face.
"Would you like a round of applause?" I asked sarcastically.
She grinned.
"I'm just pleasantly surprised," she clarified. "In the last hundred years or so," her voice was teasing, "I never imagined anything like this. I didn't believe I would ever find someone I wanted to be with… in another way than my brothers and sisters. And then to find, even though it's all new to me, that I'm good at it… at being with you…"
"You're good at everything," I pointed out.
She shrugged, allowing that, and we both laughed in whispers.
"But how can it be so easy now?" I pressed. "This afternoon…"
"It's not easy," she sighed. "But this afternoon, I was still… undecided. I am sorry about that, it was unforgivable for me to behave so."
"Not unforgivable," I disagreed.
"Thank you." She smiled. "You see," she continued, looking down now, "I wasn't sure if I was strong enough…" She picked up one of my hands and pressed it lightly to her face. "And while there was still that possibility that I might be… overcome" — she breathed in the scent at my wrist — "I was… susceptible. Until I made up my mind that I was strong enough, that there was no possibility at all that I would… that I ever could…"
I'd never seen her struggle so hard for words. It was so… human.
"So there's no possibility now?"
"Mind over matter," she repeated, smiling, her teeth bright even in the darkness.
"Wow, that was easy," I said.
She threw back her head and laughed, quietly as a whisper, but still exuberantly.
"Easy for you!" she amended, touching my nose with her fingertip.
And then her face was abruptly serious.
"I'm trying," she whispered, her voice pained. "If it gets to be… too much, I'm fairly sure I'll be able to leave."
I scowled. I didn't like the talk of leaving.
"And it will be harder tomorrow," she continued. "I've had the scent of you in my head all day, and I've grown amazingly desensitized. If I'm away from you for any length of time, I'll have to start over again.
Not quite from scratch, though, I think."
"Don't go away, then," I responded, unable to hide the longing in my voice.
"That suits me," she replied, her face relaxing into a gentle smile. "Bring on the shackles — I'm your prisoner." But her long hands formed manacles around my wrists as she spoke. She laughed her quiet, musical laugh. She'd laughed more tonight than I'd ever heard in all the time I'd spent with her.
"You seem more… optimistic than usual," I observed. "I haven't seen you like this before."
"Isn't it supposed to be like this?" She smiled. "The glory of first love, and all that. It's incredible, isn't it, the difference between reading about something, seeing it in the pictures, and experiencing it?"
"Very different," I agreed. "More forceful than I'd imagined."
"For example" — her words flowed swiftly now, I had to concentrate to catch it all — "the emotion of ealousy. I've read about it a hundred thousand times, seen actors portray it in a thousand different plays and movies. I believed I understood that one pretty clearly. But it shocked me…" She grimaced.
"Do you remember the day that Mike asked you to the dance?"
I nodded, though I remembered that day for a different reason. "The day you started talking to me again."
"I was surprised by the flare of resentment, almost fury, that I felt — I didn't recognize what it was at first. I was even more aggravated than usual that I couldn't know what you were thinking, why you refused him. Was it simply for your friend's sake? Was there someone else? I knew I had no right to care either way. I tried not to care."
"And then the line started forming," she chuckled. I scowled in the darkness.
"I waited, unreasonably anxious to hear what you would say to them, to watch your expressions. I couldn't deny the relief I felt, watching the annoyance on your face. But I couldn't be sure."
"That was the first night I came here. I wrestled all night, while watching you sleep, with the chasm between what I knew was right, moral, ethical, and what I wanted. I knew that if I continued to ignore you as I should, or if I left for a few years, till you were gone, that someday you would say yes to Mike, or someone like him. It made me angry."
"And then," she whispered, "as you were sleeping, you said my name. You spoke so clearly, at first I thought you'd woken. But you rolled over restlessly and mumbled my name once more, and sighed. The feeling that coursed through me then was unnerving, staggering. And I knew I couldn't ignore you any longer." She was silent for a moment, probably listening to the suddenly uneven pounding of my heart.
"But jealousy… it's a strange thing. So much more powerful than I would have thought. And irrational!
Just now, when Charlie asked you about that Mike Newton…and Jessica Stanley.." She shook her head angrily.
"I should have known you'd be listening," I groaned.
"That made you feel jealous, though, really?"
"I'm new at this; you're resurrecting the human in me, and everything feels stronger because it's fresh."
"But honestly," I teased, "for that to bother you, after I have to hear that Rosalie — Rosalie, the incarnation of pure beauty, Rosalie — was meant for you. Emmett or no Emmett, how can I compete with that?"
"There's no competition." Her teeth gleamed. She drew my trapped hands around her back, holding me to her chest. I kept as still as I could, even breathing with caution.
"I know there's no competition," I mumbled into her cold skin. "That's the problem."
"Of course Rosalie is beautiful in her way, but even if she wasn't like a sister to me, even if Emmett didn't belong with her, she could never have one tenth, no, one hundredth of the attraction you hold for me."
She was serious now, thoughtful. "For almost ninety years I've walked among my kind, and yours… all the time thinking I was complete in myself, not realizing what I was seeking. And not finding anything, because you weren't alive yet."
"It hardly seems fair," I whispered, my face still resting on her chest, listening to her breath come and go. "I haven't had to wait at all. Why should I get off so easily?"
"You're right," she agreed with amusement. "I should make this harder for you, definitely." She freed one of her hands, released my wrist, only to gather it carefully into her other hand. She stroked my wet hair softly, from the top of my head to my waist. "You only have to risk your life every second you spend with me, that's surely not much. You only have to turn your back on nature, on humanity… what's that worth?"
"Very little — I don't feel deprived of anything."
"Not yet." And her voice was abruptly full of ancient grief.
I tried to pull back, to look in her face, but her hand locked my wrists in an unbreakable hold.
"What —" I started to ask, when her body became alert. I froze, but she suddenly released my hands, and disappeared. I narrowly avoided falling on my face.
"Lie down!" she hissed. I couldn't tell where she spoke from in the darkness.
I rolled under my quilt, balling up on my side, the way I usually slept. I heard the door crack open, as Charlie peeked in to make sure I was where I was supposed to be. I breathed evenly, exaggerating the movement.
A long minute passed. I listened, not sure if I'd heard the door close. Then Elisabeth's cool arm was around me, under the covers, her lips at my ear.
"You are a terrible actress — I'd say that career path is out for you."
"Darn it," I muttered. My heart was crashing in my chest.
She hummed a melody I didn't recognize; it sounded like a lullaby.
She paused. "Should I sing you to sleep?"
"Right," I laughed. "Like I could sleep with you here!"
"You do it all the time," she reminded me.
"But I didn't know you were here," I replied icily.
"So if you don't want to sleep…" she suggested, ignoring my tone. My breath caught.
"If I don't want to sleep… ?"
She laughed. "What do you want to do then?"
I couldn't answer at first.
"I'm not sure," I finally said.
"Tell me when you decide."
I could feel her cool breath on my neck, feel her nose sliding along my jaw, inhaling.
"I thought you were desensitized."
"Just because I'm resisting the wine doesn't mean I can't appreciate the bouquet," she whispered. "You have a very floral smell, like lavender… or freesia," she noted. "It's mouthwatering."
"Yeah, it's an off day when I don't get somebody telling me how edible I smell."
She laughed again, and then sighed.
"I've decided what I want to do," I told her. "I want to hear more about you."
"Ask me anything."
I sifted through my questions for the most vital. "Why do you do it?" I said. "I still don't understand how you can work so hard to resist what you… are. Please don't misunderstand, of course I'm glad that you do. I just don't see why you would bother in the first place."
She hesitated before answering. "That's a good question, and you are not the first one to ask it. The others — the majority of our kind who are quite content with our lot — they, too, wonder at how we live. But you see, just because we've been… dealt a certain hand… it doesn't mean that we can't choose to rise above — to conquer the boundaries of a destiny that none of us wanted. To try to retain whatever essential humanity we can."
I lay unmoving, locked in awed silence.
"Did you fall asleep?" she whispered after a few minutes.
"No."
"Is that all you were curious about?"
I rolled my eyes. "Not quite."
"What else do you want to know?"
"Why can you read minds — why only you? And Alice, seeing the future… why does that happen?"
I felt her shrug in the darkness. "We don't really know. Carlisle has a theory… he believes that we all bring something of our strongest human traits with us into the next life, where they are intensified — like our minds, and our senses. He thinks that I must have already been very sensitive to the thoughts of those around me. And that Alice had some precognition, wherever she was."
"What did he bring into the next life, and the others?"
"Carlisle brought his compassion. Esme brought her ability to love passionately. Emmett brought his strength, Rosalie her… tenacity. Or you could call it pigheadedness." she chuckled. "Jasper is very interesting. He was quite charismatic in his first life, able to influence those around him to see things his way. Now he is able to manipulate the emotions of those around him — calm down a room of angry people, for example, or excite a lethargic crowd, conversely. It's a very subtle gift."
I considered the impossibilities she described, trying to take it in. She waited patiently while I thought.
"So where did it all start? I mean, Carlisle changed you, and then someone must have changed him, and so on…"
"Well, where did you come from? Evolution? Creation? Couldn't we have evolved in the same way as other species, predator and prey? Or, if you don't believe that all this world could have just happened on its own, which is hard for me to accept myself, is it so hard to believe that the same force that created the delicate angelfish with the shark, the baby seal and the killer whale, could create both our kinds together?"
"Let me get this straight — I'm the baby seal, right?"
"Right." She laughed, and something touched my hair — her lips?
I wanted to turn toward her, to see if it was really her lips against my hair. But I had to be good; I didn't want to make this any harder for her than it already was.
"Are you ready to sleep?" she asked, interrupting the short silence. "Or do you have any more questions?"
"Only a million or two."
"We have tomorrow, and the next day, and the next…" she reminded me. I smiled, euphoric at the thought.
"Are you sure you won't vanish in the morning?" I wanted this to be certain. "You are mythical, after all."
"I won't leave you." Her voice had the seal of a promise in it.
"One more, then, tonight…" And I blushed. The darkness was no help — I'm sure she could feel the sudden warmth under my skin.
"What is it?"
"No, forget it. I changed my mind."
"Bella, you can ask me anything."
I didn't answer, and she groaned.
"I keep thinking it will get less frustrating, not hearing your thoughts. But it just gets worse and worse."
"I'm glad you can't read my thoughts. It's bad enough that you eavesdrop on my sleep-talking."
"Please?" Her voice was so persuasive, so impossible to resist.
I shook my head.
"If you don't tell me, I'll just assume it's something much worse than it is," she threatened darkly.
"Please?"
Again, that pleading voice.
"Well," I began, glad that she couldn't see my face.
"Yes?"
"You said that Rosalie and Emmett will get married soon… Is that… marriage… the same as it is for humans?"
She laughed in earnest now, understanding. "Is that what you're getting at?"
I fidgeted, unable to answer.
"Yes, I suppose it is much the same," she said. "I told you, most of those human desires are there, just hidden behind more powerful desires."
"Oh," was all I could say.
"Was there a purpose behind your curiosity?"
"Well, I did wonder… about you and me… someday…"
She was instantly serious, I could tell by the sudden stillness of her body. I froze, too, reacting automatically.
"I don't think that… that… would be possible for us."
"Because it would be too hard for you, if I were that… close?"
"That's certainly a problem. But that's not what I was thinking of. It's just that you are so soft, so fragile. I have to mind my actions every moment that we're together so that I don't hurt you. I could kill you quite easily, Bella, simply by accident."
Her voice had become just a soft murmur. She moved her palm to rest it against my cheek. "If I was too hasty… if for one second I wasn't paying enough attention, I could reach out, meaning to touch your face, and crush your skull by mistake. You don't realize how incredibly breakable you are. I can never, never afford to lose any kind of control when I'm with you."
She waited for me to respond, growing anxious when I didn't. "Are you scared?" she asked.
I waited for a minute to answer, so the words would be true. "No. I'm fine."
She seemed to deliberate for a moment. "I'm curious now, though," she said, her voice light again. "Have you ever… ?" She trailed off suggestively.
"Of course not." I flushed. "I told you I've never felt like this about anyone before, not even close."
"I know. It's just that I know other people's thoughts. I know love and lust don't always keep the same company."
"They do for me. Now, anyway, that they exist for me at all," I sighed.
"That's nice. We have that one thing in common, at least." She sounded satisfied.
"Your human instincts…" I began. She waited. "Well, do you find me attractive, in that way, at all?"
She laughed and lightly rumpled my nearly dry hair.
"I may not be a human, but I am a woman," she assured me.
I yawned involuntarily.
"I've answered your questions, now you should sleep," she insisted.
"I'm not sure if I can."
"Do you want me to leave?"
"No!" I said too loudly.
She laughed, and then began to hum that same, unfamiliar lullaby; the voice of an archangel, soft in my ear.
More tired than I realized, exhausted from the long day of mental and emotional stress like I'd never felt before, I drifted to sleep in her arms.