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CHAPTER THREE

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A/N:- Banner by FatesLoveQueen http:/yfrog(dot)com/oed60p

I own nothing. Boydblog helped and I'll be forever thankful.

She fixed. I fiddled. Any mistakes that remain are on me.

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My palm was starting to ache.

I opened my eyes and stared down at my clenched fist. I knew something was wrapped within my fingers; I just couldn't remember what it was.

I pushed myself up from the black leather, warmed by my body, and looked around.

I blinked in confusion as I saw blank white shelves in front of me. Shelves which I knew once held an impossible number of books and CDs, as well as a state of the art stereo system. I was in a room that I had once associated with love: first love, new love, eternal love. Only nothing of the former inhabitant, or the love I thought we shared, was present any more.

I closed my eyes again and took a deep breath, willing myself to be back in the real world. I wanted to return to the place where vampires existed only in books and movies. Where Edward and I lived happily as a couple and where I'd never had to endure the heartbreak of his words.

I opened my eyes again, and was greeted once more by expansive empty, white shelves. I sighed, thinking that maybe it was just a dream after all. Maybe that perfect world I'd created was nothing more than my mind granting me wish fulfillment.

The things Edward had done to me though, I never knew such things were possible. I never imagined sensations so intense. I couldn't see how my mind could possibly have dreamt up such pleasure.

As if to pull me from my dream, I felt a twinge in my palm. It was a protest over the pain of whatever object I had fisted into it. I opened my fingers slowly, frowning as I saw the glint of silver.

A key.

A key to what?

The phone downstairs started to ring and I shook my head to clear it. Everything that had happened in the moments before my sleep came flooding back to me. I had no idea how long I had lay catatonic, but I knew Charlie must have been out of his mind with worry.

I stumbled to my feet, my legs wobbly from disuse. I took one last look at the sofa and the bedroom, and wondered whether I would ever be back there again. Then I wondered whether he would be.

I turned and walked down the stairs. There would be plenty of time to fall in a heap when I was home, but at the moment I needed to get out of the Cullen house.

My legs were jelly by the time I reached the ground floor. The phone had long stopped ringing, but it didn't matter. It had been the excuse I'd needed to raise from the sofa.

I walked toward the now silent phone. I wanted to pick it up and call Charlie so that he could come and get me, but I had to gather the courage first. I knew he would be concerned, but I knew his worry would quickly give way to anger. I just wasn't sure whether that anger would be directed at me or Edward.

Does it matter?

I took another deep breath and stared at the key in my palm as if it would somehow give me strength. I began to question my sanity that something so small and meaningless, so cold and shiny could have quickly become a source of comfort.

My breathing spiked as I dialed home.

"Hello?" Charlie's voice was pinched and tired.

"It's me…"

"Bella?"

I heard my name repeated again and again in the background getting further away with each new murmur, like a ripple spreading from an epicenter.

"Are you okay?" he asked quietly.

Am I okay? I thought about the question. I was okay when I was dreaming, or whatever that was. I was okay yesterday when Edward was still at my side. As fresh tears slid from my eyes and the twisting in my chest made the pain evident again, I didn't think I was. I tried to answer aloud, but it came out as a hitched sob.

"Bella!" Charlie called to me urgently. The stress was even more evident in his voice than before. "Where are you?"

"I'm at…Edward's." It had tumbled from my lips without any thought. It hurt so badly just saying his name. I squeezed the key in my hand, the sharpness drawing the pain from my chest just a little.

"Wait there."

It was obvious that Charlie had his 'Chief Swan' hat on. He didn't even say good-bye before he was barking orders to all and sundry. I held the phone at my ear as a fresh round of sobs ripped through my body. Before he'd even hung up the phone, I sank to the ground against the wall. I clutched my hand tightly around the phone in one hand and the key in the other. Sob after sob left me in agony. I brought my arms around my body, desperate to hold myself together.

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"Bella!"

Charlie pounded on the front door, but it was too hard for me to get to my feet and cover the short distance. I had no idea how long I had sat wrapping myself up to try to hold the pieces together, but I hadn't succeeded. Every ticking second was another fissure in my heart.

"Bella! Are you in there?"

I wanted to call out to him, but my grief had stolen my voice. I could barely breathe with the sobs ripping through my chest.

"Go check if any of the doors are unlocked."

I raised my head and tried again to call out to him. I saw shapes move passed the drawn blinds on the windows. I could hear people rattling the doors and windows, trying to find a way in.

"I'm in here," I called as loudly as I could. It came out as a tired whisper. Knowing that Charlie was there waiting for me somehow made the last of the fight leave my body. My head slumped forward onto my knees and my arms wrapped everything into a tight bundle.

Arms enveloped mine and held me tightly.

"Bells."

I raised my head when I heard the voice.

"Jacob?" I croaked. "What are you doing here?"

"Your Dad's had half the town looking for you. I had to beg, but he let me join in too."

"He left me," I murmured, unable to contain the horrid truth a moment more.

Jacob rested his cheek on the top of my head. "I know."

Another set of tears, and horrid, gut-wrenching sobs, wracked my body as I took comfort in the arms of my friend.

"C'mon," he said finally. "Let's get you back out to Charlie."

I nodded, but had no strength to help him as he lifted me to my feet. He pried the phone out of my hand and placed it back onto the bench before wrapping his arms around me. He held me tightly as he guided me from the house. He called for Charlie a couple of times, and Charlie rushed to my side, brushing Jacob off with a quick thanks.

"Are you okay?" he asked. I could almost feel his eyes burning into the partially unwoven bandage around the wound on my arm.

What could I say? Physically, I was fine. Emotionally, I couldn't be certain. I had a vision which not only seemed real, but felt real. Unfortunately, it was something I could never tell anyone else about. I nodded. "I just want to go home."

Charlie looked like he was going to argue for a moment, but then he nodded.

The drive back to our house was silent, despite the look on Charlie's face which told me he had a thousand questions burning him just below the surface. I was glad the fire of them was contained for the moment. I certainly wasn't ready to face the inquisition that I knew would come soon.

The car had stopped. I had no idea how long we'd been parked, but I sat immobile as everything ran through my head on repeat. Edward's words in the forest, in his bedroom, the strange dream I'd had and then the desolation of knowing he was gone. A biting pain stabbed my palm and I stared at my hand, wondering what had caused it.

I turned my fist over and forced my fingers open. They felt like they'd been clenched for hours on end. A glint of silver made me remember what I was holding.

The key.

But the key to what?

I remember picking up a key in my fantasy, or dream, or whatever that was, but I wasn't certain that this was the same key. I turned it over on my palm, and then turned it again. I became mesmerized by the way the rare Forks sunlight reflected from the key and into my eyes. Almost the way the light would reflect off the Cullens skin, but nowhere near as dazzling.

"Bella?" Charlie's voice broke through my thoughts.

"Huh?"

"I asked if you needed help."

I shook my head, before clenching my fingers around the small sliver of silver. The key had become something of a talisman for me, something tangible I could hold onto.

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"Are you sure this is the best thing for her?"

"Bella has experienced a severe trauma. In order for her arm to heal, her body needs a chance to recover. These will help that."

"What about the…other thing."

"I'm afraid only time will tell how she will respond to that. She is extremely emotionally withdrawn. She wouldn't say what happened to her while she was missing. I would like to schedule an appointment with her in a month to assess her overall condition."

I listened intently to Charlie's and Dr Gerandy's hushed conversation.

I had spent the last hour being assessed and analyzed by Dr Gerandy. He wanted to know everything that had happened since I left the note telling Charlie I was going for a walk in the forest. He'd looked at me strangely when I asked which note. As soon as I saw the almost-perfect replica of my handwriting I'd realized Edward had planned everything. He had even counted on me being reckless, leaving the note so Charlie knew where I was.

Dr Gerandy wanted to know how I'd ended up at Edward's house and why I was there alone. He asked questions about what Edward had done to me. His questions started out gentle, but as they went unanswered, he pressed for more details. He questioned whether Edward had forced himself onto me. I flushed as he asked, thinking about the fantasy I'd had of my human Edward. If I closed my eyes, I could almost feel his lips burning across my heated skin. The memories of his gentle caresses made the absence of his touch, his voice, even his face, that much more excruciating. I sobbed softly as his cruel goodbye taunted me in my mind.

After asking the same questions in a hundred different ways, and getting no response to any of them, Dr Gerandy had simply nodded and thanked me for my time. He'd been whispering in the hall with Charlie since.

"What if she won't take them?" Charlie sounded like he was just outside my door now, leaning in closer.

I hated that they were discussing me and my life so freely, making decisions for me, just outside of my bedroom door, I didn't have enough of anything left in me to argue or make a fuss. Instead, I pulled my blanket over my head and curled myself up into a tight ball.

I let my tears have me.

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I heard my bedroom door swing open.

"Bella, are you hungry?" Charlie asked quietly.

I shook my head, hoping that he would see the movement despite the layers covering me. I still wasn't ready to face him. I kept expecting to experience his wrath for staying out for so long without letting him know where I was. Instead, he was being very delicate with me; as if he was afraid I would shatter if he spoke the wrong word.

I wondered whether I really looked that fragile, before realizing I was that fragile.

"Dr Gerandy left some pills to help you sleep."

I shook my head again.

"Please, Bella. Let us help you."

I didn't want their help. There was only one person who could mend the wound in my chest and he was probably thousands of miles away already. Or in my fantasy.

I wondered whether sleep would bring nightmares of Edward leaving me, or the blissfulness of my earlier dream. I couldn't help but think that maybe the risk of nightmares would be worth it. Maybe I could live the rest of my days in slumber, living out a human life with Edward.

I pushed the blanket off of me.

"Okay," I whispered to Charlie. "I'll try."

The relief that washed over his features was palpable. I hadn't realized how much older he looked in less than twenty-four hours.

I swallowed the tiny pills and washed them down with some water before lying down, back into the fetal position. I hoped I wasn't making a mistake. The terror of relieving Edward's words in the forest or the in his room was unimaginable. It left me breathless and shaking. I was sweating and crying by the time the fuzziness of the drugs began to settle over me. My eyes became heavier and heavier until finally I sank under the weight of them.

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