*Excerpt from Carter's Diary*
It has been two months since Samuel changed me… two hard months filled with pain and struggle, a fight against my own nature. Even so, I honestly cannot remember a happier time in my life. Because I never have to sleep, every second of my time has been consumed with learning. My - studies, if you will, have been as follows: working to control the blood-lust that burns in my throat, mastery of the arts of tracking and hunting animals and other vampires, and learning about the gift I possess, as well as those talents wielded by other vampires.
Samuel is an excellent teacher, always patient, always kind. Only within the past week have I been able to ignore the burn well enough to truly appreciate how much strength it takes to deal with a newborn vampire. I now realize how moody and unpredictable I have been since my conversion. It amuses me that Samuel says I am showing an incredible amount of self control compared to other newborns; I can't imagine being more out of control than I have been in the past months. It is a testament to Samuel's self-control that he's been able to put up with me at all.
And there's more… to us, I mean. A few days after I had gained some semblance of control over myself, Samuel told me how strong emotions affect vampires. He explained how we become frozen, physically and emotionally after we have been changed, and how only extremely strong emotions can change our temperaments. He had the strangest look on his face as he spoke, almost like he was scared. When I finally got him to admit what was bothering him, he told me that he'd experienced one of these strong emotions when he changed me. Then he hesitated, took a deep breath, looked me in the eyes, and told me that he had fallen in love with me.
I saw the truth shining from him and it was like everything that had been missing from my life just fell into place. In that one moment of clarity, I knew that I loved him, too. After that, everything became a little confusing; I don't know how I managed to stammer out that I loved him, too, but somehow I did. And then, everything changed for us. I mean, things went on fairly normal, but we became a – couple, I guess you could say. He tells me that he once heard one of the Cullens describe a vampire relationship as something like gravity, moving when the other moves, thinking the same. The strong emotions that change us so permanently tie us together in a way that no human can comprehend. We differ in only one way from most other vampire couples: we are going to get married before we… sleep together. It may seem funny since I'm a vampire now, but I still have my faith. Samuel says that Christian vampires, or vampires of any faith are rare. Faithful vampire couples are even more scattered, but some do exist.
Still, it will be awhile before I can go anywhere near a wedding chapel without trying to kill the minister. But, I guess that gives me something to look forward to.
