And come dawn did.
Somehow, the world still turned.
Morning faded into afternoon, and noon melded into night.
The wind still bothered the stillness of the trees
The bees still filled the lethargic silence with an endless droning hum
The underbrush still grew, pushing its way towards the sunlight none of it would ever reach…
At least my presence had warranted a lack of birds.
Somehow, the sun still set, continuing its path in an utterly predictable blaze of glory.
As impossible as it was, all of nature seemed oblivious to the fact that the world had ended.
For days I didn't move, waiting for this reality to warrant a change in atmosphere. Why was there calm when there should have been pandemonium? My world had been plunged into hell, but where was the chaos?
And the sun rose and set.
Rose, and set
I barely noticed. How could I be expected to pay attention to the mundane details of the ordinary when I had given up something so far reaching from even the extraordinary?
The softly filtered forest light that broke amber through the dense, high foliage couldn't touch the soul I lacked, nor did I care for the ethereal glow that was imbued upon my surroundings, nor the shafts of golden light with the strange penchants to stray upon trickling waterfalls or wet, moss-covered stones. The subdued radiance threw faintly glowing emeralds off of my exposed skin and into the shallow, clear chartreuse rock ponds that lay scattered in perfect disarray.
There was no point to any of it.
What was the reward of the of the tall too-patient trees, so long in age ago having lain their foundations, so long a wait to get to the ancient stages of life in which they now stood proud… Only to have life ended by the deep jade vines which clung to them, slowly strangling them to death. It was a strange truth of nature, the fact that there was always something there to kill the were the vines but choking parasites, destined to die themselves after they had killed the only reason they existed in the first place? To look pleasant while killing another, weaker and infinitely nobler creation. I knew all to well about these parallels in natural order. Another mockery perhaps, Gaia herself deciding to mirror all the pain there could exist in a place of such calm down to the one lone point.
Myself.
Everything else stood in stark contrast, teetering dangerously on the verge of unnatural, tranquil harmony. What could be more contrary to the blinding red turmoil that bubbled and heaved beneath my surface? Heat, pressure, time…To what else was marble and stone susceptible? Perhaps, having endured them all, I had finally cracked. The only other trace of sorrow that kept this place a reality was the mournful chirping of crickets, shallowly lamenting the loss of the summer that would undoubtabley return in a year's time.
None of the genesiacal beauty touched me; I had grown to learn how it meant nothing. How it never would, and never truly had.
The only thing I could feel were the effects of the one image I could never forget, undisputedly the last moment of my life.
All I saw was her face.
There was no doubt that the image would be seared forever into my eyelids, destined to be the only thing I would see any time I dared close my eyes.
I could recall in perfect detail the moment the blood had drained from her cheeks, the stark pause in which the light had retreated from her eyes;The choke in which her trust had broken, and the sharp breath in which her heart had fractured.
Run, Bella, run! Stay Bella, stay!
But what could it be to her by this point? She would have hurt for a few days-my breath caught at the thought of my being the cause of her pain-But then someone would have undoubtedly taken my place. How many people had there been in line behind me, jockeying for position?
And now it was fair game. Romeo had left after the first act, and Juliet had a ball full of suitors to make her forget about the unwelcome Montague who had wandered, uninvited, into their midst.
Suddenly, a shrill, unearthly shriek pierced the silence.
It took me a moment to realize that the noise was my phone.
When had I switched it from vibrating mode to a ring? The fact that I couldn't remember worried me slightly, and I considered simply leaving it. The ringing eventually stopped…Only to restart the sequence a few moments later. Obviously, someone was persistent enough to have hit redial.
Eventually , the realization that my family would leave me alone unless it was important permeated the many levels that clouded my consciousness…After all, I hadn't been gone very long…Yet.
Without saying a word, I flipped the phone open.
A moment of silence.
"Edward? Edward, please say something."
It was Alice. I took a long time to consider my next words.
"What, Alice." I muttered, my voice seeming too loud after the silence of so many days.
She exhaled in relief. "You're okay."
"It depends what you consider 'okay'. "
"Alright, so you're not okay. But at least you aren't-I mean, I thought I saw… something, but it doesn't matter. You're fine…Physically, anyways."
I didn't respond.
"You said you'd check in every once in a while." She continued undaunted.
What had it been, ten days? That was hardly cause for panic. "Alice, I've been gone for a week and a half, maybe two. I've been gone hunting for longer than that. Exactly how often did you want me to check in?"
But all had gone silent on the other line.
It was my turn to worry.
"…Alice? Look, I'm sorry if I'm-"
"What did you say?" She whispered, her tone receding to a horrified whisper.
I huffed. "If you're going to get sarca-"
"Edward, what did you say about…about how long you've been gone?"
She had obviously heard me. Far was it for a vampire to forget anything, let alone words that had been spoken not even moments before."What are you getting at?"
"Edward…You've been gone for nearly two monthes."