A/N: hello my faithful readers. I hope you like this chapter and sorry I took so long to get it out.
Disclaimer: Yes, I realize I've forgotten these a lot. Let me say it again. DISCLAIMERS ARE OVERRATED. Anyways The twilight saga belongs to SM, but she has graciously allowed me to play around with her characters a bit. =)
Failing to Admit
Chapter 4- Light of the Shadows
Bella's POV
I could feel my body, but only just. It was like I was flying on some strange type of buzz. There was no way to really describe it. I remember thinking that it was weird that I could be so detached from my body. I had never felt this way before, even the time when I had gotten drunk- on one of Edward's hunting weekends. I couldn't move- I was paralyzed. It was an odd thing to feel. I hoped that he would come save me soon. I mentally shook my head. I felt like I was getting all of my memories sucked out of me. I was forgetting little details. Who was he? Where was I right now? Why couldn't I feel anything anymore?
My head felt empty for a few moments. I mentally shook myself again; I only remembered the basic facts. It was then that I heard it. It was more like it was in my head but at the same time it was in the outside world, of wherever I was, as an echo.
"STOP!"
Torrents of information, knowledge and emotions came flooding back into my head all at once-
and I remembered.
I then fell into darkness for the second time.
I started to wake up and I felt bare, not in a bad way, I just felt lighter. I blocked my consciousness, because I could feel the pull of pain waiting for me. I wanted to enjoy this feeling for just a little bit longer. I didn't want it to pull away, but at that moment I felt a wispy tug, almost as if a hand were trying to pull on me with the smallest amount of strength possible. I snapped back into consciousness. Surprisingly there was no pain.
I tried swatting the tug away, but whatever it was didn't come into contact with me. I tried again, but yet again came up with nothing other than thin air. I finally decided that it was inevitable that I would have to get up, even though I didn't want to have to face whatever was waiting for me. It was then that I remembered that I had absolutely no idea where I was.
My eyes shot open. I assumed I had been asleep for a while and I was expecting harsh, bright lights. All I saw was soft wavelengths, like on a really cold day when you can see heat in the air. It was beautiful. Everything was a soft white color. Nothing seemed to be out of balance. I looked around me and I saw a person. He was sitting next to me observing me as I observed my surroundings. It would have usually been creepy to see someone staring at you, but I didn't feel like that. It felt comforting, like he was looking out for my well-being instead of him being a stalker. I watched him for a moment before trying to speak.
"Umm, hello?" It came out sounding like a question. I surprised myself again. I expected my voice to be hoarse from being contained for an immeasurable amount of time, but it was the same as ever.
"Hello. I am the Keeper." He replied. It was slightly unnerving that he was so calm.
"I'm Bella." I said, he chuckled lightly, seemingly amused by my small introduction.
"Oh, I know who you are. You're the heart that has been lost. One that has been lost for a very long time at that." He said. I was confused by what he said. What did he mean he was the keeper? And how was I a heart? None of this was making sense. I found that when I looked back to some memories, I could only remember up until my first days of being in Forks with Charlie. Everything else was a blur. It was frustrating because I knew that there was something else behind the wall that was keeping me out. There was some hidden memory that I didn't have access to. I pushed harder.
The Keeper looked at me and tilted his head.
"It won't work you know." He said, confidently. It was as if he knew what was going on in my head. By the oddness of this conversation, I wouldn't doubt it.
I looked back at him steadily, "What do you mean?" I asked with a hint of irritation.
"You won't be able to force the memory back into your head." He said in a calm tone. Well, there, I knew he read my mind. This was just getting weirder and weirder.
"In time, you'll be able to revisit those particular memories, but for now, I think that it would be easier for you to handle your life before the chaos." He said.
I was officially perplexed. I was about to start screaming at the top of my lungs like a mental person if I didn't get some answers right now.
"Where am I?" I couldn't get anything else out. That was the main thing that I needed to know right now.
"You, Bella, are at the gates. Heaven and Hell exist, in your own way. This is how you perceive it. This is what is here. In your mind you are closed off. Here, it is open." He was speaking in riddles and I wasn't quite sure if I got what he said.
"What do you mean heaven and hell? My mind isn't closed off," I said, trying to convince myself as well, "The only thing that is closed off is my memories, which you have yet to explain to me." I said. This was so frustrating! I couldn't get this guy to give me a straight answer.
"Follow me." He said. I got up, feeling extremely light. I followed him through the black gates that were behind us.
For the next several years, the Keeper took care of me. He was more of an uncle or a father than anything else. Everything was explained to me. I had been a person on Earth. This place that I was in was neither Heaven nor Hell. It was a mix of the two. I was never punished, things didn't work that way. Here, I was just me. None of my past experiences were held against me, even though I could remember my past.
Keeper explained to me that I was a special case. He never explained why and I didn't learn why until my last year here, wherever here was.
I stayed here for seven years. I always had an ache. I didn't know why and Keeper would only tell me that it was part of my past and my "special case". Whenever I asked about it he would tell me that I would learn in due time. It seemed cruel, to me, that he kept part of my past from me. Then again, he was he only one with the power to do that, so I suppose he knew what he was doing.
Let me explain. Keeper was a very special person around here. He kept the memories. He often told me that it could be a burden if he didn't handle it correctly. When people 'died' they came to their own place. It looked different to everyone, with the exception of the black gates. Well, it looked different to everyone until they were cleaned.
When someone was cleaned their memories were swiped away. It was to renew a spirit, or that's what Keeper told me anyways. He was the person who cleaned a spirit. He took away the good and bad memories alike so that when the spirit was sent back for reincarnation, there would be no biased actions. I once asked him why I was never cleaned. He would only tell me that I was a special case.
I wanted to scream at him when he refused to tell me anything. I don't know why it was so important to me, I could just feel that my spirit, my soul, whatever was inside of me- perhaps it was my intuition- but something told me that it was the key to my entire being. I told the Keeper this once and all that he would say was that my spirit was stronger than he believed it to be. He told me that my memories were trying to break through to me, even though he held them.
During the seven years that I spent there, I could always count on Keeper. My subconscious knew that he was a God or some type of superior begin, but he treated me with respect as if I were on the same status level as him. I was honored, but he never acknowledged the fact that he was a God; therefore, I left the topic alone.
I didn't belong up here, I knew that. The only thing that held me here was Keeper and the fact that I didn't have a clue as to how I was supposed to get back to Charlie, to Forks. Apparently that was the only place that I would go. It was all that I knew of Earth or, at least, it was the only home that I knew. Renee had been my mother, I may have gone back to her, but whatever memory was being kept from me had all to do with Forks. The only problem in that full proof plan was that neither Charlie nor Renee was around anymore. They had gone to meet their black gates long before I had. I had nowhere to go.
It wasn't until my last year in Heaven/Hell that I finally learned of the memory that was kept from me, and what was awaiting me as soon as I was returned to Earth.
It was three days before the end of my seventh year in Heaven/Hell and I was talking to Keeper. He suddenly stopped mid-sentence as we were talking about the new cleared souls that had just been sent of to Reincarnation.
"You are ready," he announced. I looked at him, stunned.
"Ready for what?" I asked as soon as I had regained my composure from his outburst.
"For your final memory." He told me. He seemed to be debating the matter as he spoke.
"The final memory?" I had an idea of what he was talking about but I kept myself from being completely hopeful, in case it wasn't what I wanted to see.
"Yes the final memory. You are ready, I can feel it. This is the time when you can finally take seeing it." I didn't like the way he said "seeing it" it made it sound as if there was something terribly wrong.
"Now the only question is, are you ready to see it?" He asked me. I was excited. I nodded my head enthusiastically. There was no way that I was going to miss seeing this. It could possibly hold the key to my entire past and future.
He got up and led me to a sieve at the back of the black gate's entrance. It was a great round, rock bowl with hundreds of symbols and markings from all different times and places. Inside there were swirls of silver and blue floating around. Besides that it could have been a great black hole kept in a bowl. Even though there was nothing completely remarkable about it, it was captivating.
It was quiet and dark back here. It was the place I had grown to know as the knowledge room. It was where all pasts were kept. All of the knowledge of spirits that had been cleaned ended up in here. It was quite the place to be. The first time I had seen it, it had freaked me out. I didn't want to know what things other people had seen. It seemed rude to just go glancing at private things that other people had kept to themselves. Good and bad memories alike went into that sieve and I didn't want to be the person to see the bad.
Keeper lead me to the side of the sieve that had the marking 20.78~. It was an odd marking that didn't really mean anything to me. In the earlier years Keeper had taught me how to read the sieve. According to the markings that he had lead me to, he was about to let me look into my memories from before and during November 2078. He had always told me that my life had ended eighty-eight years after my birth. Since I had been born in the year 1990 it would have been that year. I had no idea why he was showing me any of this but I was anxious to see whatever it was. If it had been seven years since my initial death, then this year was going to be 2085. I looked over to Keeper. He nodded to me, showing me that it was okay.
Slowly I dipped my right hand into the cool swirls of color. I could feel myself changing.
The shock of knowledge coming at me I invited. What I didn't expect was the pain that came along with it. While I was in Heaven/Hell there was no sense of time. I didn't feel old, I didn't feel young. I was just a being of knowledge. There was no distinguishable difference between years. Now I could feel that I was old. The memories sucked me in. I was 20, getting married to Edward. I was 35, letting Alice torture me with clothes, even though she looked like she could be my daughter. I was 46, being dragged to a birthday party that made me feel hopelessly lost among beautiful, eternally young people. I was 63, sitting at a chair looking at pictures of me and Edward at our high school prom. I was 74, letting Edward kiss me on the cheek and feeling incredibly awkward. I was 80, thinking about how I was too ugly to stay with Edward anyways.
I was reliving every part of my past from the year 2008 and up. Finally I reached 2078, I was old. Eighty-eight years old to be exact, and my perfect vampire husband was…not.
I could feel my breaths becoming shorter. I could feel my body shutting down. My time was running out and there was no way that I could stop it. I could see myself looking in a mirror, cursing the fact that I had to get old. At the back of the reflection I could see Edward looking at me. He was trying to hide his emotions but I could see the pain.
He was angry that he had to be with me. Angry that he had to stay until I died. He never wanted any part of me. There was disgust in the depths of his golden orbs. His eyes said it all. I should have died long ago. The most probable reason that he was still there was that Alice wanted to play dress up with me. I shuddered. I wanted to pull out of the memory but I was stuck there until the hidden memories were released.
Everything was clear now. Why I was here. Why I was a special case. Why nothing had made sense at first. And most importantly, why I had felt as if there was a piece of me missing since I got here.
It was apparent that I had loved Edward with all my heart and soul. But the one thing that was even clearer was that Edward didn't love me back in return. I had been hopelessly lost in my fantasies of having a perfect life. I hadn't looked past my plans to see that they were never going to happen.
The memory was over now. I pulled out. The memories had exhausted me and I really didn't want to face the reality that I had been begging to know about since I had gotten here. It seemed foolish that I had wanted to know now. I could have lived peacefully throughout the rest of my non-life without him ever crossing my mind, but I had to be a masochistic, idiotic, big-headed know-it-all, instead of choosing that life. Figures.
I turned my head to Keeper. He didn't say anything. I doubt that he knew that I was in agonizing pain right now. I had known him too long to let him see that. I kept my face blank and my tone pain-free.
"Well that was interesting," I murmured. He must have been hoping for a different reaction because his face fell, but he quickly composed his features.
"So what do you think about Earth," he asked in a nonchalant tone. I saw right through it. He was desperate to know something, and I had no idea what he wanted me to tell him.
"I think that it can be a cruel place," I hedged. That was the most that I could think of. What did he want me to say? Fate was harsh and evil? I was never going to spend another day in Heaven/Hell thinking about it? Both of those things had occurred to me but there was something in Keeper's gaze that kept me from saying it.
"It may be cruel, but at least love exists there." He said. He made it well know to me that he was sour about the fact that there was no love up here. There was only loss.
"People lose memories of loved ones and comfort," he told me, "there's nothing to gain."
"There may be love, but it's not really possible to find it, is it?" I spat out harshly. He tilted his head as if he were confused at my statement.
"What are you talking about, you just saw it with your own eyes, he loves you!" Keeper told me.
"Don't you understand!? That's not love- it's pity! He didn't love me, he only felt guilty about bringing me into danger. If he had loved me, he would have changed me! He would have done something rather than let me grow old and die! He would have done anything to keep me! I know that's what I would have done for him; I can even feel it now!" I shouted, trying to keep my temper under control, and failing miserably. Keeper sat still and silent.
"He loves you." Was all that he said. I was getting ready to shout at him some more, but then I stopped. I found no point in carrying on with this argument. I sighed.
"Believe what you will, but I don't think you're completely right no matter what you say. It's ridiculous that he would have given me such hope only to dash it by being incredibly obtuse. I looked back at him- he had a weird expression. It was like he thought I was crazy.
The next day, Keeper told me that I would come to my senses eventually but I think he was just trying to convince me about something. He wanted me to look back at the memory and look closer, for what I have no idea. This time I didn't want to know. Every time that Keeper told me something new it seemed to have a burn to the back of it.
Keeper told me that I didn't have to do anything today. Not that I did anything rather than talk to him anyway. Either way, things seemed different. There was more of a weight on every single thing that he said. It was intimidating.
The third day after Keeper had shown me the memory; I was starting to get really anxious. Keeper didn't say much of anything. He stood still and quiet next to the sieve at the back of the black gates. He didn't say anything. Whenever he had to clear a spirit he did his work and kept quiet. I was worried that something was actually really wrong this time. I couldn't keep away the feeling that he was going to do something drastic.
All day I was on the receiving end of odd looks. He would look at me and his face would twist into a quick knowing smile.
The only and last thing that he had said to me was, "You shall see, your future includes your past. You have remembered everything and now you must put it to good use. Use what you know wisely and keep to yourself."
It was then that I saw darkness, thoughts of my past and future glowing before my eyes.
A/N: SO I hope you liked this chapter and PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE give me some reviews. I seriously want to know what you guys think. Suggestion and constructive critism are welcome!