I would like to apologise for not updating sooner, I was doing exams (which turned out well anyway, fingers crossed for the results) and then my laptop was broken. And then a lot of it was because of pure laziness, so sorry : (
Thank you to Ceejaylove01, writerchick1o, .Rawr, kr, I love twilight, AttackOfTheEvilPixies, bunnisie, EdwardzChick, HottestWolfOfJakesPack, xxRezxx, Catherine, Ankle Deep, Elle-Mai October, PrincessKae, yessika2003, sky, TygTag, BellaEve, charmed-rose, chatterbox21, Catch Me Salvatore, cookie-luvr999, gaby47, ella, Keri*, Rosalie Van De Woodson, ccoffey12, AliceHale, xosummerox, Elena, ana, Leah, FRK921, Forever Reading aka Meg, kc, Samantha, cullencutie747, firemooncat, FYInichole, HeartBreaker1023, Mrsjacobblack, singstar microphone, bonov, hkburton, peachberry98, guitarbabe2005, FICTIONAL-STAR, VeronicaD13, RubberDuck697, ConfusiuonPixie, 17Canada94, jutiev, ChrizziebelleCullen, Crazy Awesome Writer, M4troth, CrescentMoon12.
From now on guys if you want me to advertise your stories, would you mind pming the info to me, they are kinda getting lost in the reviews.
Random Point Of Interest: I have been without a laptop for a month and a half because it was broken, I brought it in for repairs 5 times, in the end I fixed it myself by just deleting Google Chrome, FML.
Disclaimer: I own nothing but a yummy poster of Edward that I still haven't gotten around to putting on my wall.
Edward Pov
Bella avoided me like the plague, as did Emmett who blamed me for her newfound rebellious streak. Alice in fact was the only one of my siblings that seemed to be able to stay for longer than ten minutes in a room with me. Jasper was Bella's confidant and was unwilling to push her away in favour of me.
Jasper, I noticed was the only one who was able to remain in Bella's presence without every conversation ending in screams and tantrums. But being the mediator was a heavy burden on his shoulders, especially considering he still struggled with his blood lust.
Esme and Rosalie were emotional messes, still mourning the loss of their precious baby who had turned into a hell raising demon, seemingly overnight. And Carlisle was literally putting holes in his study walls, he was banging his head against them so often.
Frustration and tension leaked from every inch of the Cullen home. I had offered/begged to put myself up in a hotel for a while, as my presence seemed only to add to it but Esme had missed me and wanted me close.
Oddly enough I was the only Cullen receiving any peace from Bella, because she put tremendous effort into pretending I didn't exist. Bella was the very entity of 'ice-queen'.
I had tried to talk to Carlisle about the way he and Esme allowed Bella to abuse them. I had not expected to be well received in my comments but Carlisle was willing to take any help offered to him. He told me that he had tried being strict, but that just gained him more abuse and, for the fist time since he had been changed, Carlisle was tired, exhausted.
"Has Jasper tried speaking to her?", I asked, concerned. Bella had once respected Carlisle to such a degree that she would have obeyed any rule he pressed on her, if it had come to her blatantly ignoring him then things must be bad.
"Jasper's dealt with newborns less temperamental", he replied wryly.
When I spoke to Esme and Rose, I could barely get out the words before Esme burst into tearless sobs and Rosalie began shouting at me that I had no idea how to raise a child and how difficult things had been for them.
I took her word for it and decided not to pursue the matter anymore with either Rose or Esme.
It was a week before I could convince Emmett to sit down and talk to me. He mostly ranted on about how this had all started when I left, but eventually there was a lull in conversation and Emmett rubbed a hand over his face, weary.
"You're different Em" I whispered to him, my voice as soothing as I could manage "less, like you".
He nodded, not removing his hand from his face. His words were muffled "It's done that to all of us, especially Bella. It's not even her fault, she can't help how she responded to the situation".
"It's my fault" I sated, straightening in my seat. Emmett eyed me closely for a moment before replying "No it's ours. We should have disciplined her instead of spoiling her".
We both reclined in our seats, still for moments until Emmett spoke finally "Your leaving was just the catalyst, you know. Suddenly Bella wanted to know more and more about her parents. We didn't really have any answers for her" Emmett sighed and cast his eyes to the ceiling, in the direction Bella was blasting Smashing Pumpkins from. "I think she feels abandoned".
-DB-
Forks High School had a frighteningly small population of only three hundred and fifty seven students, more than half of which was populated by girls. It did not take long after driving into the Forks High parking lot to realise that this would be a long semester.
Mrs. Cope, one of two of the school's office workers was a large woman who wore bright colours and far too much blush. I took my things from her and left without another word, though I did receive a wink and some rather unsavoury thoughts trailing after me.
By locating Alice's thoughts in the hum surrounding me I found that I would have French and homeroom with Alice and Biology with Bella. Which, oddly, I was not looking forward to. Bella had very frankly been a brat since I'd arrived home.
I also made it my personal mission to keep Mike Newton away from her. He was not difficult to find, I just had to follow the trail of perverted fantasies containing Bella. In that moment I was glad to be a vampire, I was going to enjoy torturing that boy.
I was sure Bella would hate knowing that I had every intention of making her a social outcast, it was nothing personal, I only sort of enjoyed the idea.
Alice bounced slightly in her seat in homeroom as she waited for me to join her. Gossip filled my mind as the young residents of Forks speculated over my sudden appearance. The story was simple and believable, I had won a scholarship to a boarding school abroad, but had missed my family so much I had returned.
It helped that my family had never denied having another brother, they always just said I wasn't living with them at the moment. They only found it odd because Bella had never mentioned me.
For us any high school would have been boring, they had nothing on Forks. Every lesson followed the example of whatever textbook they could find that would allow them to expel as little creativity and imagination as possible.
Alice informed me that even Bella found it boring and she hadn't done this about a hundred times before.
The cafeteria was small, cramped and had a distinct aroma of minced meat. The tables were round and stuffed into every available space. Most of them were rickety and had what seemed to be beer mats balancing the wobbly legs.
My own family sat as far away from the door as possible, all but Bella, who sat as far away from us as possible. She sat beside a girl named Jessica and Mike Newton, who kept trying to snake his hand onto her thigh. I was only mostly pleased by the sight of Bella slapping his hand away.
"Mike Newton is deluded", Jasper whispered to me as I sat down, but there was something in his expression that begged me to confirm his suspicions. "He definitely has quite the ego" I replied "But from what I can tell, he hasn't been getting anywhere so far". There was a collective sigh of relief around the table.
Lunch was generally torture for me anyway, having to chew on that garbage humans called food, but I was also forced to listen to Mike's inner monologue about Bella's legs and the benefits of Call Of Duty over Mass Effect, and then Mass Effect 2.
I then left for Biology when Jessica attempted to join in on Mike's conversation with Eric Yorkie about the merits of Playstation 3 over the Xbox 360.
It was also essential that we removed Emmett from the room when Mike said that the Playstation controls were more user friendly than that of the Xbox360. I could distinctly hear Emmett mumbling to himself that the play station could never measure up when it came to extensive free roam games. He looked like he wanted to punch Newton more for his criticism of the Xbox360 than for his obviously unwelcome groping of his little sister.
Rosalie shook her head as she rubbed Emmett's shoulder soothingly, mentally asking me to remind her why she married him, or the big oaf as she referred to him.
Mr. Banner was already in the room when I entered, along with only a handful of students. But he informed me that they had a system of assigned seating here, and every seat was taken but the one beside the student who had last moved here, and I knew that that was Bella.
He showed me to a seat in the very back, by the window. I was careful to leave a large amount of space for Bella's things, because I was sure that once she saw who her new lab partner was she was likely to snap at the smallest of things.
Bella walked into the room with Mike Newton and Tyler Crowley, both of which referred to Bella as their girlfriend in their own heads.
She flushed tomato red when she spotted me beside her seat and threw a filthy glare at Mr. Banner. Both of her lackeys were confused by her actions. They wondered why Bella would have such an aversion to sitting beside her own brother. I winced at the word 'brother', a brother did not have the thoughts I did about Bella.
In the typical teenage way of showing her frustration, Bella slammed her book bag down on the table. Every head turned to look at her and Banner considered rebuking her, but decided against it, her expression told him that conversation wouldn't end well for him.
Bella stared straight ahead while Banner wrote notes, studiously ignoring me. Banner began handing out microscopes for the lab and Bella scowled at him as he handed me ours and I smiled apologetically at him.
"Bella…" I began, but my words were cut off by Bella furiously whispering at me, never turning to actually look at me "Shut up, just shut up".
I stared at her in shock, those being the only words she had spoken to me since I'd returned, actually they were the only words she had spoken to me in years.
"We need to talk" I tried but Bella again cut me off "No we don't! I have nothing to say to you".
I rolled my eyes at her behaviour and swiftly checked the microscope again. "No" Bella suddenly exclaimed, turning to me, fury in her eyes "You don't get to act like this is just me being ridiculous. You don't get to".
"What is this then?" I mumbled under my breath, passing the microscope to her.
"This is you not existing". I'm sure I looked at Bella like she was insane but she continued on "The moment you left you ceased to exist to me". "This isn't me not talking to you, this is you not existing", to emphasize her point Bella did not pass the microscope back to me and continued to do the lab entirely without my help.
When the bell rang Mike and Tyler jumped from their seats and sprinted back to where Bella was furiously stuffing her books into her bag. Clearly trying to make a good impression Mike asked Bella to introduce him to her brother, but Bella merely replied with a breezy "I'm sure I have no idea what you're talking about" and stalked past me out of the room.
-DB-
As a child my mother had been the centre of my world, as a human teenager I had been the centre of my world, as a newborn my prey was the centre of my world and now Bella was the centre of my world, ironically she was also my prey.
"You're going to have to find a way to fix things Edward" Alice said gently, crawling over a tall tree above me. I grinned up at her, as she leapt down to land lithely beside me.
"I don't think Bella's in a very forgiving mood right now" I laughed, directing Alice to the right where four or so deer were grazing. Alice again leapt up to another tall branch hanging directly above the deer. So as not to disturb our prey she communicated now through her thoughts.
How can you laugh about this Edward. Feeling the way you do about her. You laugh and joke more every time the situation gets worse.
I chuckled under my breath "Black humour I guess" I replied lazily as I watched Alice pounce on one of her unsuspecting prey, she reached out one hand and drove her sharp nails into the flesh of another near deer, it keened shrilly and it's peers took off in a gallop.
"That one's yours", Alice said, pointing to the trashing, bleeding deer she had pierced with her nails. I swiftly snapped the creatures neck as Alice's teeth tore apart the flesh of her own prey.
We drank quickly, and when we finished we buried the carcasses, so as not to attract any more dangerous wild animals to the wilds of Forks.
Alice fingered a small drop of blood on her dress and sighed, thinking of the bother of replacing it. "But I'm serious Edward" Alice suddenly turned to me "how can you be so light hearted when Bella treats you like this, when she rejects and hurts you?".
I pondered over this a moment before Alice spoke again "Aren't you afraid Edward? Aren't you afraid that maybe things won't change." I said nothing and Alice didn't speak again as we ran home.
When the house came into view we spotted Bella lounging on Carlisle's balcony, reading. When she saw us, or rather me she turned and stalked away, back into the house.
We slowed to a walk and as Alice was about to enter the house I grasped her shoulder, stopping her in her path, and nodded to the balcony where we could still see Bella's retreating back, her hair swinging.
"I have faith Alice", I murmured in a low tone "I have faith that one day she will forgive me." and in the barest whisper "and I have faith that one day she will love me".
I nodded at my sister gravely "You should have some faith too".
Review Please! I tried making this longer then usual, and I suppose it is but I couldn't really write much more without ruining the next chapter.
Chapter Song: I will possess your heart by Death Cab For Cutie.
Today's Advertised Story
In Silent Darkness by FICTIONAL-STAR
Rated T, EdwardxBella, supernatural, angst.
It's a suicide gone wrong. "My future was supposed to be death..." It's a new chance in life. "I wanted death." Bella craved an escape from pain, and she finds it. But if she died that day, why is she still here?