Chapter 18 – Long Night
A/N – I know it's been ages since I've last updated. And my last chapter probably didn't leave much of y'all satisfied. So here is the next chapter, filled with lots and lots of well...emotion. Hope y'all enjoy. Oh, flashbacks are written in Italics, FYI.
The world was a quiet place. Beyond the yawning window lay a landscape shrouded in darkness, with only a single weak beam of silver-white light emanating from the moon. The moonlight stabbed a path through a thin sheet of rain, pouring weakly through a pane, illuminating an otherwise dark bedroom.
Twilight. It was Alice's favorite time of night, though a part of her felt reluctant to admit it lest she adhere to the vampire stereotype. Nevertheless, the witching hour, as some would call it, held a veil of mystery and magic that was more than appealing, it was seductive. Suspended between the current nightfall and the inevitable breaking of dawn, twilight hours brought about a sense of quiet that was both peaceful and disturbing.
Alice tracked molten gold eyes to the window; it offered a picturesque scene that could so easily be friend or foe. The stretch of trees that lay beyond the driveway was silent and foreboding. Only a light drizzle disturbed the mound of leaves that sprouted atop the thick tree trunks as it danced a rhythmic tune onto the soft wet earth below. There was also a slight mist, a result of the cooling weather and condensation. It floated, unobstructed by barriers and objects as it merely molded past them, snaking eerie gray-white fingers along and between trees and branches.
Some would view the scenery as ominous, what with the black smudged skies and looming greenery, coupled with the thin blanket of mist that wriggled about effortlessly in midair. However, for Alice, it brought a sense of romanticized nostalgia, a longing for the days when synthetic buildings and roads did not scar the earth and nature ran abundant, growing wild and free in any direction it pleased.
A slight shift from the bundle cradled so preciously in her arms brought the elfin vampire's attention back into the room. Alice glanced down to where Bella lay, slumbering fitfully in the circle of the vampire's arms. A frown marred the space between the brunette's eyebrow and clenched eyelids twitched in rapid succession in response to a rearing nightmare. Alice immediately cuddled Bella closer to her, a futile attempt to ward off the nightly demons that seemed intent on making sleep Bella's new personal hell. As the girl let loose a pained whimper, Alice couldn't help but be reminded of when the night terrors first began.
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A deafening scream rattled each housed vampire to the bone. The scream was so drenched in incomprehensible fear and tangible pain that had Alice been human, all the blood would have drained from her face. She would have undoubtedly experienced an adrenaline rush so fierce that it would have resulted in her blood pounding and her pulse beating a terrifying jingle in her ears. Knocking over the high stool she was perched on, Alice bolted out of the kitchen and up the stairs, skidding down the hallway and bursting into her room, half expecting to Bella lying in a burgundy red pool of her own blood. To her stark relief, she found the girl sitting ramrod straight up in the middle of the bed, hot tears dousing her cheeks as she clutched desperately at bed sheets that were slightly torn. The sight of Bella looking so scared and lost brought her relief to a screeching halt; it took a sharp turn straight into worry, which ensconced itself tightly around Alice like a noose.
The spiky haired vampire ran to Bella, her limbs moving on their own accord in response to her eyes witnessing the brunette's distress. She gathered Bella into her arms, hoping fervently that the shield of her embrace would make whatever demons that haunted the girl's dreams to vanish. Alice suppressed a slight wince as Bella gripped both her shoulders, nails digging painfully into the skin even as she buried her head into the crook of the vampire's shoulder, instantly wetting the collar of Alice's t-shirt with salty tears that fell like a flash flood.
Although technically not a vampire, Bella now possessed certain vampiric traits, thanks in part to the excess dose of venom administered straight to her heart by Alice in the heat of desperation. Carlisle had been unable to theorize exactly what Bella now was but he could only deduce that Bella's unique healing ability had prevented the girl from fully transforming into a full-fledged vampire. Instead, the venom mutated Bella's rapid cell regeneration ability to the point where she could now heal almost instantaneously. This discovery was made when the girl accidentally gave herself a paper-cut unfolding the newspaper. The pinprick of pain was quick and fleeting and the brunette had watched in utter disbelief as the cut scabbed over and healed to non-existence even before it fully formed.
The ability to heal rapidly was not the only skill Bella required; she was now also stronger than the average human. Due to her current physical state, Carlisle could not estimate just how much physical strength Bella now possessed but there was the assumption that she could be as strong as the average vampire. The fact that her own human blood still ran through her veins combined with the lingering venom all served to act as a well of batteries that would never run out of juice. Bella's five senses were also enhanced; her vision was now crystal sharp, her hearing irritatingly acute. She could smell the moisture of rain in the air long before the skies openly wept and her taste buds had taken to deciphering each food molecule it came into contact with. Her sense of touch was incredibly attuned to whatever surface and texture it met, feeling each thread and fiber, noting the smoothness and roughness with alarming accuracy. These new attributes had disconcerted Bella to a point where she became jittery of each newly discovered sensation but after a week of flinching at every new smell or hearing a car swerving recklessly on the nearby highway, the girl had come to accept these new abilities with a hangdog stoic resignation of one who realized that these changes were irreversible.
Alice was violently jolted out of her musings as a ragged sob, bruised with fear, ripped itself out from the confines of Bella's throat. The elfin vampire felt scalding tears dripping and sliding down the crook of her neck and instinctively drew Bella closer to her regrettably cool body.
"What is it, Bella?" Alice questioned softly. She did not expect an answer; on the contrary, she phrased the question as a soothing kind of mantra, allowing her dulcet tones, husky with worry, to blanket Bella in a cocoon of comfort. She repeated the question at intermittent intervals, murmuring it into the sobbing girl's sweat matted hair before pressing feather light kisses to Bella's temple. One arm securely curled itself over Bella's trembling shoulder blades that jutted out from a still too thin body. The other rubbed soothing circles along the expanse of the girl's back, conveying her presence and offering her strength. Alice noted the frantic way Bella clung to her, as though she were the last lifebuoy on a sinking ship. The brunette's entire lanky frame heaved and shuddered with the force of her cries and her thin tank top stuck wetly to her torso, soaked through with perspiration and terror.
It seemed an eternity before Bella quieted down but even when the gut wrenching sobs gave way to the occasional gulp of air and unprepared hiccup, Alice was hard pressed to get the girl to speak. Silence hung between them like an uninvited guest and as the minutes trickled by with an almost audible "drip drip", Alice felt her concern metamorphose up into a panicked level.
"Bella," Alice crooned out, her voice caressing the name like a reverent prayer that was meant to sooth, to bring peace. "Baby, you need to talk to me," she continued softly, keeping her voice shy above a whisper. "Please," she implored the girl, when Bella failed to respond. Pressing a firm kiss into Bella's hair, she allowed her lips to linger on its silky softness as she waited for some verbal signal from the girl lying in her arms.
Bella sucked in a juddering breath, her body taut with trepidation as she mentally calculated her options. A part of her wanted to tell Alice everything, spill out every dark, shameful, humiliating secret that would no doubt scar her for the rest of her life. She wanted to tell Alice that despite the talk she had with the petite vampire on what happened when she declared amnesia on the subject, she had begun to remember more than she bargained for. The memories, though distorted and jumbled attacked her subconscious, piercing through the cloak of sleep at the midnight hour when her mental defenses were at its weakest. It drenched her sleep with dreams infused with horror, helplessly and all encompassing pain. She was forced to relieve the horror that had become her sleep each night, fighting tooth and nail to hold onto her sanity as buried memories of her past crawled its way to the opening of her mind's eye, drowning her in all its wicked sensations. But tonight, this night, was the first time Bella had lost control completely. She had awoken screaming, coated in sweat and suffocating under a knot of terror that acted like a creeping poison, eroding her self-control and chewing her nerves raw.
The brunette shivered out of the cobweb of her prickly thoughts as Alice prompted her with yet another question. Deciding resolutely that she had burdened Alice and the Cullens enough with all her tragic nonsense, she began untangling herself from the cool embrace that Alice was so readily offering.
Alice felt the disengagement of their bodies the second Bella shifted and had to stamp down the primordial instinct to haul the girl back into her arms. The pull away was more than just physical; Alice could feel Bella closing a heavyset door on her emotions, shutting the vampire out and closing the emotional channels of communications that ran so efficiently between them. The seed of desperation that began blossoming at the pit of Alice's stomach sudden indulged in a growth spurt and Alice reacted by reaching down to entwine her fingers tightly with Bella's.
Bella barely resisted the urge to flinch when Alice reached for her hand. Damn the elfin vampire for being so intuitive. The brunette looked down at their joint hands, one a pale snowy white, the other the pallor of clouded milk. Alice's vice-like grip spoke of a quiet hopelessness, a burning need to understand something that she loath to admit was far out of her depth. Overwhelmed with emotion, guilt at the fore, Bella lifted their tangled hands and brushed her lips gently over Alice's knuckles, missing the way the vampire's eyelids fluttered shut at the contact as she then abruptly shook off Alice's hold. Aware of the thickening tension that curdled the air in the room, Bella offered Alice a watery smile that spoke volumes and yet gave away nothing. Shifting so that she could recline back on the bed, Bella turned onto her side, facing away from Alice and her concerned inquisitive stare as she forced herself to drop back into the abyss of sleep.
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A tortured moan forced Alice back to the present. Shaking away the stained cloud thoughts overcastting her mind, Alice turned honey hued eyes onto the girl sleeping restlessly in her arms. Worry encased the vampire like a well worn pair of leather gloves; it had been a constant companion ever since Bella had come into her life and though she resolutely refused to blame the girl, she hated the way the emotion wormed so easily past her defenses, washing through her veins like toxic fumes.
Alice clenched granite hard teeth, grinding them into submission as Bella began crying in her sleep, rivulets of tears stubbornly squeezing out from behind tightly clenched lids. She pulled Bella impossibly closer to her, nosing a path into the girl's chestnut brown hair and depositing minute kisses, as though hoping that each press of her lips against the top of Bella's head would subdue the prickly nightmares, dethrone their dominance over the girl's sleep. However, when Bella cried out, Alice felt her heart tear and her brain turn into a battlefield as two options argued their case. There was a part of Alice that so desperately wanted to wake Bella up from wherever her subconscious had thrown her into, to snatch the girl away from the jaws of nightmares that were insistent on gnashing their teeth into the soft folds of Bella's sleep. But there was another part of her that was shrieking blue bloody murder, pointedly reminding Alice just what had happened when she had first hauled Bella out of her nightmare induced sleep.
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The elfin vampire with the tousled unruly hair paced edgily in the confines of her room. She had an air about her that fairly screamed of an agitated caged tiger that was severely unhappy at being locked up. Alice's head shot up when an almost incoherent "stop it!" floated over from the bed that lay on the far side of the room.
Ever since Bella had started falling asleep to what was obviously hellish nightmares, Alice had developed an uncanny sixth sense to when they would start. This was precisely why she was currently wearing a hole into the wooden floorboards with her pacing. Her family had long grown accustomed to Alice suddenly drop or cease whatever activity she was doing to sprint upstairs and disappear around the corner. Whimpers and near heart-stopping screams would usually follow minutes after; the pain soaked cries would sometimes become so unbearable that even Rosalie, whose animosity toward Bella was never made secret, would leave the house for the refuge of the forest, tears wetting and blurring the gold of her eyes.
A disturbing thud alerted Alice's attention to Bella; one of the girl's arms had lashed out and smacked erect knuckles against the headboard, no doubt hard enough to leave bruises. Bruises that would color and smudge a distorted stain on the sallow skin of Bella's hand before melting away split seconds later thanks to the girl's rapid healing ability. Nevertheless, the way Bella's still too thin frame flopped and twitched on the bed was a never-ending source of heartache for Alice. The others had the opportunity of escape; school had restarted and with the changing weather, the hospital was swarming with people complaining of this or that illness, which kept Carlisle on constant call. But for Alice, for Alice, the vampire had taken leave from school, solidifying her absence via Carlisle, who's authority as a doctor had allowed him to fabricate a serious enough sickness to confirm Alice's homebound state for the rest of the semester. Both her adopted parents frowned upon her decision but neither had the will nor the heart to dissuade her.
Another bruised whimper sliced through the air. Though technically unbeating, the spiky haired vampire could feel the phantom thumps of her heart beating in response to that pained sound; the way the muscle battered an insistent beat against her ribcage as if it were incensed at being detained behind rows of curved rigid bones. Yet another moan followed the whimper; Alice clomped down hard on her bottom lip, feeling it crack under the pressure of her teeth before the wound closed up on itself. She began making silent steps toward the bed, halting midway when Bella fell silent, her body collapsing back onto the bed, as though exhausted from its recent activity. Stillness overtook Bella; for a terrifying second Alice thought she had stopped breathing, so quiet was the girl, her limbs unmoving and lifeless.
The brief respite did not last. An ear piercing scream sprung from the head of the bed; Bella's head thrashed erratically on the dented pillow, twin rivers of tears meandering down flushed cheeks. The brunette's lips were shaped oval, mouth gaping open to release cries that shoved its way out from a throat that was rapidly becoming abused. The same lips would then relax, bend back to curved lines, sealing together to momentarily contain the screams that would brutally slice through the seam between the lips to fire off another round.
The sounds ripped into Alice like a tangle of barbwires coiling itself around her petite frame, its sharp thorns tearing neat, relentless holes into her soul. Unable to withstand it any longer, Alice rushed toward the bed, knelt by the bedside table and placed both hands on either side of Bella's shoulders, shaking her roughly.
"Bella, stop! Stop it!" Alice's voice rang out, tinged with despair and fright. She pushed harder against the resistant, flailing body, knowing that she was hurting the girl but lost in her sudden frenzy, she failed to notice the finger-shaped bruises that began to appear on Bella's milky white skin. Instead, she continued shaking Bella like a rag doll, venom soaked tears blurring her vision. "Please," she begged over the din of Bella's screams. "PLEASE!"
What happened next was completely unexpected yet so ruthless in its consequences. Bella awoke to the sound of her own shouts; dazed from the nightmares and drunk on terror, she thrust out both hands, intent on pushing her attacker away from her. Her open palms came in contact with something that was crystal hard and the combination of the solidity of Alice's body and the extreme force with which Bella put behind her frenzied push splintered all the bones in both arms. The girl screamed, pain a thick coat over the horrendous sound.
The crash of the opening door was a momentary distraction as the cavernous hole that lay in wake of the now open door poured in a harried looking Carlisle. Before his golden dipped eyes could assess the scene, Alice was in front of him, talking a mile a minute.
"She hurt her hands," she blurted out, panic a persistent mask over her pixie features. "Something cracked, I heard something crack," she continued, speaking so fast that her words were being jumbled together. "She hit me. With her hands. Something cracked. I heard something crack."
The repeated sentence was a cause of great concern but Carlisle had to now focus on Bella who was wincing and gritting her teeth with such ferociousness that even from across the room, Carlisle could see the muscles in her jaw jump with each clench. Gently nudging his still rambling daughter aside, the doctor made his way over to Bella. He took in her deathly pale face, the sweat matted hair and the discoloration that smudged the skin on both her arms, with the merged colors of blue, purple, green and sickly yellow running almost up to her elbows.
"Broken bones," the patriarch murmured, more to himself than to Bella. Experimentally he lifted one arm, doing his best to keep his face impassive as he cradled the limb, examining it with a well trained eye. He almost jumped in surprise when he felt movement beneath the bruised skin but knew what was now happening. "The bones are already beginning to knit itself back together," he informed the bed-ridden girl. Setting the arm gingerly back down on the bed, he got up and ran out of the room, returning seconds later with two splints, which he began administering on one arm before doing the same with the other.
"There," he said. "I think your bones will fully heal in a few hours, given the way it's already re-knitting itself. The splints are just to ensure it heals properly."
Bella nodded her thanks, too exhausted from the pain to produce a verbal response. Carlisle patted her on the head in a fatherly fashion before turning his attention to Alice who had decided to imitate a statue. She stood stock still in front of the doorway, eyes unblinking as they zeroed in on Bella's splinted arms. Carlisle moved in front of her, placed a loving hand on her shoulder, bent down and whispered something in her ear before brushing a soft kiss on her forehead. Then without a backward glance, he left the room, closing the door softly behind him.
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Again, Alice was jolted out of memory lane by Bella's pitiful whimpers. Having learned the hard way not to restrain the girl, she simply held Bella, expertly moving away from arms that whipped out, even in her current position. She began humming under her breath, letting her naturally melodious voice ease out from full lips that vibrated gently against the soothing tunes. Bella continued her mewling, salty tears still descending from closed eyes but Alice noted that her body had begun to relax against hers, growing stiller until she was a dead weight against Alice's tiny frame.
Hoping that this was sudden wave of calm was not a prelude to another bout of screams and kicks, Alice continued her almost hypnotizing hum, the beautiful yet somewhat haunting melody floating carelessly throughout the room. As she started a slow, subtle rocking motion of her arms, Bella held so dearly, so gently to her chest, she noticed the first pinprick of sunlight. The weak amber ball was slowly climbing over the horizon, igniting the nearby clouds with colors of yellow-red and golden-orange. As it ascended higher into the sky, it threw the sky into hues of violet, reddish-pink and the beginnings of Prussian blue. These colors streaked across the expanse of the sky, chasing away the blanket of darkness that was night and revealing clouds that seemed pristine white, as though they had been bleached.
Alice's low humming never ceased even as her eyes took in mother nature's painting of the sky. It was as if an invisible hand held an invisible brush, sweeping colors across the sky, coating over the veil of blue-black that dominated at night. As the sun crept higher, it washed a brilliant wild orange over the already multi-colored sky. The scenery was beautiful as it was unique. Alice had seen many a sunrise and each was different, never following its predecessor as it came up with new colors, new waves of patterns that never failed to awe Alice with its brilliance.
"Hello."
Alice looked down. Bella was awake and staring up at the vampire with sleepy, heavy lidded eyes. "Good morning," Alice whispered, bending down to press a soft kiss to the girl's forehead.
Bella's eyes involuntarily closed at the contact. But the instant darkness invaded her vision and erased the lines and planes of Alice's face, she wrenched them open again, looking back up into the elfin vampire's face with the heartbreaking intensity.
"What is it, Bella?" Alice inquired softly. The way the girl was looking at her set off warning bells at the back of her head and she closed a steel door over the reminder of the vision she had when she had been told that Bella had finally awoken. Now was not the time for speculation.
Bella sucked in a shaky breath. She knew her nightmares were setting all the Cullens on edge, especially Alice. They were as much a torture for the spiky haired vampire as they were for Bella. And if she was being honest with herself, she knew that she owed Alice an explanation. After everything Alice and the Cullens had done for her, the least she could do was to come clean about everything. Reaching up, she grasped Alice's hand, squeezing the vampire's cool fingers tightly. She looked straight into Alice's eyes, searching for reassurance, for strength and as always, Alice projected her needed desires back to her.
Drawing another deep breath, Bella spoke, her voice, husky from sleep and crying cutting through the quiet air with ease. "I remember," she began. Her eyes filled up with tears as she dredged up the memories that she wished she could bury and forget. When Alice opened her mouth to protest, Bella reached up to place a lone finger on her lips. "Please," she said.
Alice could hear the tears and sorrow in Bella's trembling voice but felt powerless to do anything under Bella's instruction to remain silent. So she simply nodded even as dread filled up her pores.
"You deserve to know." Bella paused, turning away to look at the still rising sun before returning her resigned gaze to Alice. "You need to know."
Alice nodded again, though her body was now taut with trepidation. As Bella began her tale, Alice knew that the long night of screams and haunted memories had now bled into what would now be a long morning filled with streams of tears and painful heartache.
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