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Death to the Non-Believer

Chapter 4

Luckily, the Cullens left their table long before the end of lunch, leaving me to enjoy my pasta in relative peace, (though there was no escape from Jessica's ever-running mouth). This was going to be interesting. I couldn't deny that Edward Cullen was attractive, especially compared to what I'd imagined, but I wasn't harboring any outlandish school-girl fantasies, either; and regardless of how intriguing the real Edward Cullen might be, I needed to find a way out of this book and back to the real world before things started getting hairy. My only advantage in Twilight's world was my pre-knowledge of the plot – to a point - but I had only skimmed a part of the book, and I knew that even that vague information was going to run out somewhere towards the middle chapters. I didn't even know if the book would stick to the original plot, without its original Bella.

I sat anxiously chewing on my fork for several minutes after I had finished eating, trying to think of something – anything – that I could do. After all, I still had no clue how I'd even gotten here, let alone how I could get back. As my grandma would've said, I was in one dilly of a pickle.

"Um, w-what's your next class, Bella?" My fork fell from my mouth, and I looked up to try to identify the speaker, but instead met the confused and somewhat wary eyes of the entire table. I needed to stop spacing out in public, or I was going to spend the rest of this story in a psych ward, if Forks even had one.

"Bella?" Ah, it was Angela. She was looked nervous. I smiled.

"Sorry, I was thinking about something that Señora said in class," I lied. "What did you say?"

"I, um, I was wondering what your next class was. I thought… I thought maybe I could point it out if you needed help." I was starting to love this girl.

"That would be great, thanks!" I dug in my bag for my schedule as Jessica looked on, frowning. Apparently she didn't want to share her new toy with anyone. The bell rang and the rest of our lunchmates departed as I pulled a crumpled pink paper out of my bag. "Looks liiiiike… oh, biology!" It was a pleasant surprise. I liked biology: I'd taken enough AP and college level bio to ignore whatever they would be teaching in this tiny backwater high school. I was looking forward to taking a long, relaxing nap: I seriously needed to de-stress.

"Oh! Me too!" Angela piped, before blushing and falling silent again. The day was looking up. "It's just over this way, shall we go together?" she asked. I smiled again as I stood and collected my tray.

"I'd love to."

We walked briskly through a long hallway with lockers on both sides, collecting the gaze of fellow students as we passed. Some smiled, some waved, a few bold ones even came up to me and said "Hi, Bella!" or tried to high five me. I was already familiar with how fast word travels in a small town, but this was something else. We arrived at a doorway towards the end of the hall with a placard that read "Mr. Banner" overhead, and one of the boys going in before us kindly held the door as we stepped into biology. I scanned the room as I headed down the aisle to the teacher's desk. I had been hoping that I could sit with Angela, but as I surveyed the room I saw that there was only one empty seat, next to-

I made a disgruntled face as I passed a heating vent that blasted me with hot air – I'd always been fonder of the cold - but as I looked at him, I saw Edward make a face as well. It wasn't from discomfort. If I hadn't been staring at him, I would have missed it: the momentary twist of his lips, the sudden twitch of his body as every muscle in it snapped abruptly to attention, and his eyes, so darkly beautiful just seconds before, seeping into a deep, soulless black. I froze. Maybe it was some kind of animal instinct? The prey stiffening wide-eyed in the face of the predator.

It was a mistake.

The fan continued to blow through my hair, past me and towards Edward, sending gusts of hot air laden with my – with Bella's – scent across the room. I was in trouble, and I knew it. I racked my brain. Why hadn't I remembered the fan?? Struggling through panic, I reclaimed my body: I stepped futilely out of the vent's path, and turned to Mr. Banner to ask if I could sit somewhere else – anywhere else. But there was only one empty seat, and the script to this drama was already pre-set. There was nothing I could do. But… Bella didn't die in the first chapter, right?? My stomach was somersaulting as I gathered my books and marched up the aisle toward my seat – and hopefully not to my demise. It was all as I remembered: Edward was curled up in his seat, as if even by taking up less space he could avoid ruining the "vegetarian" life he'd no doubt worked so hard to create, as if every millimeter further from me made me – made both of us – safer from him. The chair creaked in his effort to huddle away from me, like he was a cornered rabbit. How ironic.

"Miss Swan, please be seated so that we may begin." I didn't even realize I'd been standing in the aisle, putting off that inevitable moment which might set everything off. What could I do? What could I do?

I sat. Unlike the Bella from the story, I knew exactly what caused my new lab partner to give me the cold shoulder, and I had the same thing on my mind as he did: distance, and fast. I scraped my chair as far as I could to the right, edging so that I was almost halfway into the aisle. I watched Edward as he unknowingly mirrored my movements. I shoved my hair – Bella's hair – into my hood, threw it over my head, and zipped the jacket to the top, covering every inch of skin and hair I could, sealing in the fatal scent like a Tupperware container. Afraid to catch his eye, I stared at Edward's hands, which rhythmically stretched and then clenched into fists in his lap, as if keeping time with the heartbeat he didn't have. I watched out of the corner of my eye as they slipped beneath the table, and nearly jumped when I heard the table give a whispered crunch somewhere beneath my fists. This was going downhill fast.

I sidled even further away, leaning over the side of the lab table, straining to put even more space between us, as Edward began to tap-tap-tap his foot. It made me even more nervous. I wanted to be further than the end of the lab table would allow: out of the room, out of town – the ends of the earth didn't seem distant enough. Edward's hands reappeared from beneath the desk, grains of sawdust stuck to the tips of his long fingers. I needed to escape, and soon. My head reeled, rambling through the possibilities.

All I had to do was get out of class, just out of the room. A few minutes without my scent pressing on him, that would be enough for Edward to talk himself into keeping his distance. Right? I was hoping that the desire for his family's safety out-weighed Edward's desire for my blood. Bella. I corrected myself. Not mine, Bella's. I could play sick, go to the nurse, make a run for the truck… I raised my hand in relief.

To my horror, the movement tossed my hood off my head, sending hair spinning in his direction, fanning the air...

Shit.

He didn't turn, didn't blink. Maybe he hadn't— his foot slammed silently to a stop.

SHIT.

My pulse thudded in my throat, but I dared not look at him. Dared not even breathe. Surely he wouldn't kill me here, now, in class? From what my frantic thoughts could recall he and his family were flying below the radar, and brutally slaughtering and devouring the new girl wasn't exactly low-profile; so maybe I was somewhat safe. I let out a tiny sigh, though the thought did little to comfort me. I was sitting just a few feeble inches away from a killing machine.

As if he'd heard me, Edward's head snapped towards me so quickly that at first I didn't even realize he'd moved. The look in his eyes let my body confirm what my brain had already sorted out: the only thing that had been keeping me alive even thus far was this room full of some two dozen innocent witnesses. It wouldn't take long for word to spread about the Cullen boy eating a girl in Bio, and to silence them he'd have to kill at least everyone in the room. Safety in numbers. But once I was separated from the others, after class, after school, maybe on the road on the way home… he would take the opportunity and kill me somewhere where no one would see or hear, where he would have to silence no one but me. Only then would the creature inside him, burning out at me through his black, black eyes, be satisfied. I stared unblinking and quietly horrified at him and knew that it was true in a sinking part of my gut that I'd never noticed before. My stomach lurched: if I left to play hooky, wandering all alone on the unfamiliar school grounds, it would be all too easy for him to...

My heart was pounding so hard in my throat that I could scarcely breathe. I was sure he could hear it. Was this terror? This pressure of impending death, the lamb before the slaughter. That saying about the lion and the lamb that I'd seen plastered over so many t-shirts and icons in the past months seemed sickeningly laughable now. I couldn't strike out alone, but I couldn't stay here either. How long could Edward cage his beast? I was going to die if I stayed here, in this seat, in this classroom, in this book with this monster who craved my blood. With every second that passed I became more and more certain.

And I hated him. In that minute, with every fiber of my being, I hated Edward Cullen as I have never hated another human being – if you could call him that – before or since. Why did he even have to be here? In this world, in this town, this school, this damn class… why was I in this book? Had I been throttled into this fiction just to face my own end?? It wasn't fair. It wasn't fair! If I died in the book, would the real me die, too? Was my real existence tied to Bella's? Or was it all just a dream, and Bella's death would find me in my bed at home in a cold sweat?

Maybe I should be brave, and walk out of the class before he snapped, and was forced — by his reasoning — to kill everyone in the room to prevent them from outing him and his family for what my death would prove they were: monsters. Maybe I should sacrifice myself — my dream self, or whatever me-Bella was — for these people. They didn't need to die just because I'd had the unfortunate luck of falling into Forks this morning—

I shook my head. People? Were they even that? Could these fictional characters (and very possibly figments of my imagination) even die?

"Yes, Miss Swan?" I froze, and my eyes flew wide as I snapped out of my stupor.

"Did you have a question?" I looked up at Mr. Banner, panicked, but puzzled why — and then I realized that my arm, my traitorous, sinister arm, was still raised high above my head.

SHIT!!!

"Um…" Edward tensed beside me. No doubt my breath would drive him even crazier. Please hold your breath, I thought as loudly as I could, screaming it in my head, please hold your breath! I knew he couldn't hear me.

"Um…" I couldn't ask to leave. Oh, God, I couldn't ask to leave. But I had no idea what were even talking about. SO MUCH FOR NOT SPACING OUT ANYMORE, GENIUS.

"Don't be shy, Miss Swan," said Mr. Banner kindly from the front of the room. "Don't worry, I won't bite," he continued with a little chuckle. Too bad your teeth aren't the ones I have to worry about, I thought. I looked at the classmates around me, doing some kind of lab, chatting amongst themselves, oblivious.

"Um… well…" Edward's eyes flicked to me, and I nearly bit off my own tongue. Was his lip curling, or was it just my imagination?

"Yes, Miss Swan?" The seconds ticked by like hours. Edward's black gaze was unrelenting, pressing down on me until I couldn't speak, couldn't breathe, couldn't stand it, his hands shot onto the table-

"EDWARD!!" I cried.

The class went dead silent. Edward froze. I froze, terrified, trapped in the gaze of the predator like a deer in headlights. The silence dragged on. The time that had been flooding by just heartbeats before had slowed to a molasses-crawl.

"…what about Edward, Miss Swan?" I couldn't move. The next time I turned my head, Edward was going to tear it off my shoulders. I stared at Edward. Edward glared at me. The entire class stared at us. No one moved.

"E-Edward…" It came out as an almost inaudible whisper, our eyes still locked, his thirst bubbling to the surface. "Edward, h-he…" My voice cracked. Shit, THINK. "He…H-he……" SHIT!! "He… uh… he…" Think, think, THIN –

"THE NURSE!" I yelled, startling the class.

"What?"

"Th-the nurse, sir!!" I repeated, more evenly but no less frantic. My gaze was still ensnared by his as I continued. "Edward is… um, not feeling well, sir. He needs to go to the nurse." Edward blinked, for what seemed like the first time all day, and I was able to turn my eyes toward Mr. Banner, though I kept every other muscle frozen. "He needs to go now, sir." Mr. Banner took one look at Edward's smoldering gaze and conceded.

"Very well, Mr. Cullen, you may report to the Health Office, you can just –" In a single fluid motion, Edward thrust himself up from the desk and was already halfway out the door. He didn't look back.

Mr. Banner rushed outside after him, yelling something about a note. I nearly fainted with relief.

"What was that all about?" I turned to find Mike leaning in from behind me.

"Yeah," offered a bland-looking boy to his left "what was his deal? I've never seen Edward like that." I was hoping the questions were meant to be supportively rhetorical. I could tell by the boys' expectant faces that they were not.

"U-um… uh, well…" their eyes were merciless. "Uh, I think…" God, I hated this stupid book. "Um, to tell you the truth…" I leaned in conspiratorially as they did the same, their eyes widening. I looked from one to the other. I didn't need rocket science to pull one over on these two. "I think he smelled… I think he smelled kind of bad, and he didn't want anyone to sit next to him because he didn't want anyone to know."

For a few seconds they were silent, and I worried that maybe they were smarter than I gave them credit for, but when I looked at Mike, he burst out laughing, joined by a number of students around him.

"HA!" Mike said, hands wrapped around his chest. "FIGURES!"

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A/N: Sorry, this really needs to be edited more, but I'm tired. lol. Oh, and I STILL NEED A PDF OF TWILIGHT. IF ANYONE HAS IT. PLEEEEASE.