After draining the last red drop of a bear I killed, I dropped the carcass to the ground and it sounded with a thud. I closed my eyes, preparing myself for a small test. I had to see if I could control myself when I was in a presence of humans. In the past however long, I had never trusted myself to be even anywhere near humans. I needed to be civilized. Sane. Yet, today, I felt different, I felt prepared. I felt like I could control the monster in me. Tamed.
I turned and faced where I knew the road to be and ran. I allowed myself to breathe normally for the first time while I ran. It felt exhilarating and liberating. True, it was uncomfortable to hold my breath at first when I traveled, but then my body adjusted, but maybe that was a bad idea, not getting used to being a vampire properly. But what was done is done and it was my only way to perfect control and I had to test myself now.
Breathing carefully, I smelled a beautiful smell, I twitched. Shaking my head to clear my head, I knew I was near the roads now, but I congratulated myself for keeping a coherent thought about myself. Stopping about a half mile away, I stood on a branch of a tree, closing my eyes as I smelled the humans driving by. I had no idea how long I stood there, my throat thirsting for the human blood. Still, I held fast to the tree, refusing to move an inch, or I would lose control. I lost count of how many humans drove by, while I watched my reaction to each delicious smell. In these moments, when I watched myself carefully, I lost all sense of time. Sometimes the thirst grew so much I had to hunt a large game. I did so, and then resumed my desensitization to human blood.
After a long while, my thirst returned to my usual levels of what I was used to in these forests when another human passed by.
Smiling, I opened my eyes, I felt even more proud of myself, briefly wondering how would the Cullens think. It was almost time to search for them, to find out if they wanted me back, or demand answers, but not yet. I was patient, and I was not about to overestimate my control over the monster in me. I jumped off the tree, and hunted a deer first to satiate the thirst, and then continued my run, this time, parallel to the road to a town.
My second test.
Stopping before I reached the perimeter, I looked at myself, wondering what to do with the clothes. I had worn these clothes since the day I turned. The color of my t-shirt had faded to grey from a brilliant blue, heavily stained with dirt and blood, the ends of shirt were frayed. The few times I had bears and lions had a go at me mercifully did not shred the important parts of my cloths. My jeans had faded also, covered in dirt and blood, filled with tear holes and some shreds. My undergarments were better protected. Shaking my head, at least my clothes weren't completely torn up. I wondered where I would get money in the first place to get new clothes. Both accounts of my father and mine were closed because we were both deceased, and I couldn't simply ask my mother to lend me some, I would probably only give her a heart attack—if she was still around. I was sure the time did not pass that much.
With a sigh, I decided to continue on with my test. I entered town, spotting several humans on the sidewalks. Some noticed me, but I ignored them, looking around, watching myself for any cracks in my self-control. It was all I could do, being this close to them, not focusing on anything else. An hour of walking later, I began shuddering, needing to feed, I couldn't remain any longer, the smell was getting too much now and turned around to go back. Two male humans stood in my way and I glowered, hardly registering what they looked like as I made my way around them.
"Hello!" one greeted, "You look pretty, but did you come out of the woods or something? Living off the land, eh? I love those types of women!"
I ignored them, unable to keep control anymore and began running once I entered the woods, barely hearing what they said behind me.
"Damn, what a bitch," he muttered.
Using my nose, I quickly found a pack of wolves and kidnapped one from the pack before they even realized I had come and gone and one of their own number missing. Sitting on a branch, I began draining the blood away from the body, mulling over my self-control with humans today. Yes, my practice over my self-control was worth the wait. Finished, I dropped the carcass to the ground several feet below and stood up, deciding to try again in another town nearby.
Maybe I am pushing my luck here... I thought with a slight frown. But no time like the present, I kept running. I needed to overexpose myself to the humans in order to be desensitized quickly.
I repeated this process for what seemed many months until I ran into a young woman who took pity on me and insisted on giving me me clothes. I tried to refuse but she would have none of it. Grudgingly, I accepted her gift, expressing my gratitude. I was glad for new clothes, I was getting too many stares.
"Please, if you wish, you can stay with me for as long as you need," she said suddenly, smiling, "I would love some company."
I blinked, wondering how she knew I had no place to stay and then wondered if I should take this step. Hesitantly, I accepted the offer, knowing that I may have to 'consume' human food to keep up my act. Edward had shown me that this could be done.
"Thank you for your generosity. It's been so long that I've been around people... I don't quite know how to act right now," I said, preparing the woman for any manners I may exhibit as a vampire.
"Oh it's fine, I can help you with that," she said with a grin, taking my hand, the first human contact, leading me. I was very acutely aware of how warm the hand was, and my mouth began watering with its venom. I began shuddering a little and focused hard on not losing my control.
"My name is Kiley, what's yours?" she asked, looking back at me.
"...Bella," I replied, momentarily taken aback that it took me a moment to recall my name. I looked over the woman, she was shorter than me, almost the same height as Alice. With a pang, I hoped to see her too. The woman's hair was long, light brown hair, held back with a half ponytail. She looked like one of the people who might be active in church activities. Her outfit looked very reserved for someone her age. Then again, I had no idea what current fashions were these days, for all I knew, this could be the in thing now.
"That's a nice name, Isabella, right?" Kiley asked, looking at me again, as though she couldn't keep her eyes off me. I smiled, nodded in answer. "I have a friend name Isabella and she hates being called Bella," she said and laughed. I quirked an eyebrow at that and then said nothing.
We stopped at a car, presumably hers, and after she unlocked it, we both got in. The first thing I was aware, was the fact that the car had been completely remodeled from what I was used to. There were only two dials on the dashboard, and no key was required as she swiped her finger through a pad, starting the car. I figured they now use fingerprint as a key these days. I hoped the technology was still hard or expensive to create fingerprints so that common thieves couldn't just steal cars if they made a three-dimensional model of fingerprints, as I recalled a scene in a movie, something Angel. Or angels, who knew.
Another thing I was acutely aware was that the car was not running on gas, but solar-powered, it made for a silent drive. And all dashboard was lit up with a LCD when she turned the car on, easily adjusted to view different gauges with a tap of a finger or one of the two dials. I shook my head, marveling at the technology today. I wondered how much else changed and what decade I was living in now. I blinked at the question.
"...I know this is going to sound odd, but what is today?"
"September tenth," she replied with a smile, "it's Sunday now."
"Oh... what I really meant is, well, what year?" I said, realizing that it was almost my birthday.
"What year?" she repeated, frowning as she looked at me. I waited, and she realized I was being serious. "Where have you been...? Living under a rock?" she muttered to herself curiously and then replied. "It's 2049."
My jaw slacked open mentally at the answer. Time did have different meaning to vampires. Especially since I didn't need to sleep, which blended the days together all too easily.
"Really? Wow... Time flew," I said, shaking my head and began counting the years. I had been in the wilderness for about forty-two years. And I would be sixty in three days. Marveling, I continued to shake my head. How did I remain in the wilderness for that long? It felt like only ten years, fifteen if I pushed it. Time really meant differently to us than humans.
For the next two months, ignoring the passing of my birthday, I watched Kiley's movements and how my body acted, mimicking her, such as the cross of my legs, or twirling my hair. These movements felt awkward at first, but necessary to prevent myself from looking like a statue. As her sentiments had been after the first three days living at her two-storied house.
"Are you all right? You sit and stand around like a statue... you're sure you're not hurt or... anything?" she said on the third day during lunch, chuckling nervously.
"Oh, I'm sorry Kiley, I didn't realize..." I said, blinking at her observations as I sipped lemonade, ignoring the awful taste.
So, I had to copy some of her mannerisms to make myself look natural, unable to truly rely on my human memory of how I had normally acted. These actions were normally not really thought about when I was human after all. So, I practiced, twirled my hair occasionally, biting my lip if I was in thought, resting my head on my hand on the table if I was bored. These motions felt awkward, but I had to do them so I could blend in. I was glad she never asked me anything about myself or my past. I really had no cover story. I wasn't that creative. She didn't tell me much about herself either and she seemed fine by that—not knowing much about each other.
And of course, each night, I would slip out to feed, after emptying out the human food I had consumed each day. Yes, it was uncomfortably disgusting, but I really was grateful to Kiley, and she, unknowingly, helped with my tolerance to human blood, in such close proximity for an extended period of time.
But, at the end of two months, I decided I had to move on, once I could abstain from feeding for nearly eight days (and emptying the human food down the toilet when she was out). I was pleased with my self-control. I had pretended to sleep each night by reading a book while Kiley slept. I was not allowing my thoughts to drift of what to do next during the night. Though, lately, was growing impatient, and these past few days, she looked as though she wondered when I was going to leave. I took that as my cue. So, on this last night, I prepared myself for goodbyes in the morning.