Chapter 3: Alone Time
Left, right, left, right, left, right. One foot in front of the other. I tried not to think. But my sweatpants felt saggy and heavy on my legs. My t-shirt was a burden on my back. I wanted to move even faster than the normal vampire speed. I wanted to get further away from the love I had left behind me.
After a full 24 hours of running away from my loved ones, I felt guilty that I had just left Jacob without an explanation. And my Renesmee. What did she think of my loss of control? Did she miss me? Was she miserable about my absence? Or did they expect that something like this would happen eventually?
I slowed to a walk, and wandered through nowhere. These unforgiving thoughts pounded persistently through my head for the next few long, lonely days I spent in the wilderness, until I couldn't take it any longer. I wished I could sleep the thoughts away. Lately I had been wishing I wasn't such a—well, a vampire. I didn't want to stay alive forever if he wasn't with me. And I wanted to die easily, not at the hands of the Volturi.
Thinking about them, I remembered how he had left me once before. He had promised to never, ever leave again. How could I have believed him? He didn't love me. It was all some kind of fluke.
I grew angry as I realized this. I had let him slide the last time—how could he do it again? He should have stayed away. He didn't love me. He didn't love me. Edward didn't love me. That bastard. Edward!
I thought his name with ferocity. Then I said it out loud. "Edward. Edward! EDWARD!" I growled. It didn't hurt to say his name anymore. He was a fucked up son-of-a bitch vampire who had impregnated me and left me—with a child he had believed to be a monster! If Renesmee was such a monster, why did he leave me alone with her?! How did he expect me to deal with a monster on my own?
I tried to calm myself. After all, Renesmee was definitely not a monster—a very low-maintenance child most of the time, actually. Then why wouldn't he have stayed? Because he didn't want a child. And he didn't love me enough to stay and deal with the child. No. Of course not. How could I have failed to see this earlier? It was so plainly obvious that I felt a fool for being so depressed the last year.
Well, I would have to do something about this, now wouldn't I? I wasn't just going to leave him alone after all the misery he had put me through! I would destroy him! No, I couldn't kill him. I owed him my life several times over. And it would be too heart wrenching, after all that we had been through. I could never live with myself if I did that.
It would have to be something terribly devious. Something thoroughly humiliating. Something that would make him regret all that he had ever done to me.
First, I would have to return home. I could face Jacob and Renesmee now. Love didn't scare me anymore. When I reached Forks, I could organize my thoughts better and make arrangements with Jake.
So I sped off through the trees to plot my revenge.