author note:
i like to think of this as the first official chapter, since the first two were super pathetically short :L a little nervous to upload, though. i think the longer the chapters, the less emphasis i put on the important parts. whelp, i guess i'm taking my chances. :o tell me if it's okay?
(try to) enjoy! c:
I've read plenty of books about love. It's essentially all varying degrees of acceptance, intrigue, passion, and attraction. I once read a love story, and I'll always remember the last chapter of it ending with, and they made love that night. Later, I found, the author was referring to the heartfelt kind of love; in theory, the love they made that night was simply a bond between words. A whispered promise of unrestrained passion for one another. I thought that was perfect, exactly how love should roll.
But can we forget about all the things I've read for a minute?
When I saw him, and them, I felt so many things. They were we lithe, graceful and perfect in their poetry as they moved. As if coordination weren't enough to get far in life, they were all inhumanly, devastatingly beautiful, as well. She shortest of the five twirled around in a blur of golden cache jewelry and black, spiky hair, and uncanny smile warming her eyes. She was short and thin in the extreme, with a bounce to her step that made her seem like a cheerful pixie. Beside her was a tall, lean boy framed by his mess of gleaming blond hair. He held her hand and looked at her like she was his treasure. I almost felt like an intruder, watching them, honestly. Thrown to the side was another couple, their eyes trained on each other as one spoke by what seemed to be a heated topic. Her hands graced the air around her as she talked, her face the complete epitome of beauty and her body an alien perfection next to anyone else's. She paused to breathe, flicking a strand of honey blonde hair away from her shoulder, while her partner cracked his knuckles and grinned over at someone in what seemed like disbelief. He was massive; a bear of a man with curly brown hair and spunkiness to his dimple that left me yearning to smile.
Like I said. A lot of feelings going on.
I don't know much about love, in practice. But I swear, that's the feeling that was enveloping me in that moment. Something inside of me wanted to be around them, like a magnetic pull fastening me in closer and closer. With this came undeniable embarrassment and shame for myself; I did not know these people. I didn't know them any better than Mike Newton's table. How could I so quickly name this...attraction off as love? I was acting like a shallow, pathetic girl.
Another part of me just wanted to cry, even more so than I already practically was. Simply because, whether or not I truly liked (or loved, ugh) this strange package of beauty, they would never accept me. I would never belong with them like they belonged with each other. I internally scolded myself, disgusted by my hopeful thoughts. Your thoughts aren't the only disgusting thing about you, I reminded myself. Of course not. Everything about me is disgusting. How could I forget, for even one second, that the whole of my existence is a revolting, selfish girl that ruins everything she touches? A nobody; one that didn't belong where she came from, and didn't belong where she was.
My eyes, glazed over with tears, weakly moved on to the person the bear was grinning at.
He was tall, and lean, something more boyish about him than the rest. His hair was bronze, falling in a flawless disarray around his face, which could have been carved from marble. Every curve and ridge in his face was angelic, almost glowing in its fanatic. Everything about him was beautiful, so much so, that I forgot about everything for just a moment. I forgot about the books I'd read and my recent internal barrage of disgust in myself. For just a moment, I wanted to look at him. My heart heaved, and my ears rang against a wild pulse that I hardly recognized as my own.
That's when he froze in place and returned my pathetic stare. With this came the realization that I was drowning again, drowning so badly tears were streaming down my cheeks and suffocating me as I knew it. I quickly turned away, to wipe away the tears with the back of my sleeve and get the hell out of here. But not without noticing the curious, almost frightened look he gave me. Well, I'd be frightened if I saw myself, too. I was a wreck.
I fumbled with the straps of my backpack and lifted a shaky leg over the lunchroom bench, trying to ignore how everyone, including that boy, was watching me.
"Sorry, Bella," I heard Mike Newton mumble hoarsely. His eyes looked so sad. I shook my head and turned away to stalk off in a haze towards the bathroom. I didn't even care if I wound up skipping the rest of the day anymore. What would it matter in two, three weeks, anyways?
I'd be long gone by then.
A hand closed around my wrist and jerked me back. I pried it away, and spun around to reveal a very guilty and frantic looking Mike Newton. A bell resounded around the lunchroom, signalling everyone's departure. My head was spinning; I hadn't eaten anything in a good two and a half days. I hardly processed anything that happened to me these days. It felt like one half of me might be here, while the other half of me was asleep. Maybe all of this was actually a dream. I squinted up at the ugly, blinding lights of the cafeteria, as if they'd give me the answer.
"Listen, I'm really sorry about that," He said. I looked back down at him, a tear simultaneously streaming down my face. He sucked in an unsteady breath. "That was...crazy! I feel like the bully in one of those cheap school films," He laughed unsteadily. He thinks he did this.
"No," I tried to say firmly, but my voice cracks. "It's okay. This is my fault." And it's true. I'm too sensitive. I'm completely inconveniencing him. I internally curse myself, wiping away at the tears for what feels like the hundredth time already. I feel uncomfortable and rude, crying like this in front of him. I need to stop it.
"Well, okay," He says, blowing out a breath of relief. He folded me into his arms, a very intimate gesture on his part. I resist the urge to shrink away from him. Maybe he notices my hesitance, because he releases me and takes my shoulders in his hands instead, looking at me right in the eye. I wish he would stop touching me.
"I think you should come to class," He said. Damn, he knew my plan. "What's next for you?"
I deliberate for a second. "Biology," I say slowly, testing my memory. That earns me a smile.
"Same here. Come on," He throws his arm around my shoulders. I look off towards the bathrooms longingly, and sigh. Again, I wish he would stop touching me. I move stiffly down the near-empty hallways along with him. Maybe I could get through the day without any more...complications. I could do that much. I could be strong.
As we approached the room, he took his arm back, thank goodness, and led the way in. He gave me an encouraging smile before he moved into the classroom. I took a deep breath, and walked in behind him.
"Isabella Swan! Mr. Newton! So glad you could finally join us."
"Sorry, sir. Just trying to show her around a little bit," Mike said. He glanced back at me before he left to his seat, leaving me stranded near the doorway awkwardly. I slipped a hand up my sleeve, rubbing anxiously at the scabs in my wrist's place. A habit I'd developed to distract myself from my emotions, since trying not to feel usually didn't do the trick, obviously. I usually avoided doing this at all costs since it often left me with open wounds and a bloody sleeve right in the middle of class. But this time, I just let myself go. I dragged my nails up and down every scab and fresh wound. Wait, fresh wound? I tried to remember the night before. I had a faint recollection of moving desperately around my new room after Charlie had gone to bed. I was everywhere, holding me head in my hands, sobbing hysterically. Ah. That's when it must have happened.
It's strange the way it just happens like that. One minute the concept crosses your mind, and the next you're laid out on the floor, confused and bleeding.
"Introduce yourself," The teacher said impatiently. I flushed, and made my way to the front of the room. Well, if it hadn't happened at lunch time, it would have happened in Biology. I took another deep breath. Another breath, another scratch. Another breath, another scratch. Whoa. I just took off a whole chunk.
"Call me Bella," was all I said. The teacher nodded, turning back to his desk. Good, that was enough.
"Thank you, Bella. Take the empty seat. You can be partners with Cullen."
I was so preoccupied with the floor, I hadn't really looked at the classroom at all. I raised my head hesitantly, seeking out the empty seat he spoke of.
And then my heart sunk.
It was by him.
Except, this time, he didn't look curious like he did in the cafeteria. Every flawless feature on his face was contorted in deep, rigid disgust. I frantically searched the room for another empty seat, but not a single other one was available. I wrung my hand against the beads of blood I could feel trickling out of the picked-at scabs, trying to soothe my heart out of its erratic rhythm. He looked even more disgusted now, if possible, and almost...in pain. I pushed on towards the table, watching my feet glide unsteadily along the floor. He thinks I'm that disgusting. Well, doesn't everybody? I reminded myself. Tears welled up in my eyes again. Blood collected under my fingernails. Get over it, Bella.
I sat right on the edge of my seat, avoiding eye contact with him even though he was the one staring at me. The teacher, whose name I can't remember, launched into his lesson. I tried to focus, but I couldn't help but notice the way Cullen sat on the extreme edge of his chair, as far away from me as possible, with his hands gripping the table so tightly, tendons stuck out over his pasty skin. He was completely rigid. I felt like puking.
Cullen never seemed to breathe, or move. It was a wakeup call of sorts. Maybe two or three weeks were a long shot. Maybe I would put this poor, beautiful boy out of his misery and end it all tonight. I tilted my head up to steal a look at him, only to find that he was already watching. His eyes were black, his mouth curled up to reveal blinding, ultra-white teeth. Was he...growling at me? I whipped my head back to the front of the room. Shit! He looked like he wanted to...to attack me.
I was then that he rose suddenly, saying in a strained voice, "Sir, I'm feeling sick." Despite his manner, I still picked up the perfect quality of it, like velvet. The teacher paused in the middle of his lesson, looking stumped.
"What's that, Edward?"
"I'm feeling sick," He repeated in a mangled voice. The look on his face dared anyone to defy him, and the classroom looked anything but ready to. By the looks of it, he didn't usually talk much. The teacher froze in place, probably feeling as confused and frightened as I was.
"Can Bella escort me to the office, sir?"
What?
The teacher looked between me and him, debating. But Edward's face was downright lethal. The teacher nodded hesitantly, his worried eyes on Edward. I wouldn't dare go against him, either. I looked up at him in question, to which he returned by motioning behind him as he moved stiffly towards the door. Way to give mixed signals, Cullen. I rose uncertainly.
As soon as I stepped out that door, everything happened in a blur.
I registered his cold hands on my skin, and moving at a speed that left me lightheaded. Before I had any sense for what was really happening, though, I was pressed up against a brick wall, the wind throwing my hair all around my face. I tried to escape to the ground, but two, icy hands pinned my wrists to the wall. The wind tossed my hair out of my eyes, and there it was, his face, an inch away from mine.
"What are you doing?" I snarled, struggling to free my hands. It was a fruitless effort; he was literally as hard as a rock. His eyes flashed to the wrist he was holding in one of his hands, and he dragged it up to his nose, inhaling the fresh blood. He barred his teeth like he did in the classroom, exposing what you could normally figure to be unremarkable, naturally pointed teeth. But something about having such inhumanly cold hands locked around your wrists the way they were and being carried by the speed of light makes you figure things from a less than normal perspective. So it was then that I realized with a sinking feeling in my stomach, that this bizarre, beautiful boy was not unremarkable or natural at all, like humans. He was something else. My throat restricted, and I was suddenly afraid, more afraid than I had ever been in my entire life.
"Edward!" a shrill, bell-like voice expanded over the parking lot. It was the people I saw with him at lunch today, and all of them were here in a matter of seconds. Then, with the same blinding speed I had felt before, he was off of me, and I was tossed onto the concrete.
I scrambled back on my legs as the petite, pixie-like creature dancing in the school cafeteria only thirty minutes before transformed into an amazingly strong, beast of a girl. She eventually had Edward in a headlock, while the others held various parts of his body back. Every time it seemed like they had him under control, his arm would come flying out of someone's hand or something and he'd wriggle out of the pixie's hold. For the most part he was under control. But that didn't stop me from flinching every time he'd lose himself and go berserk in their arms. His eyes were wild, a predator gone after his prey. No, he was definitely not human.
"Get her out of here," The blonde one instructed towards the other girl, a faint southern accent lining his tongue. His eyes wheeled over to me, appraising and black. "She smells way to good." He said darkly. I swallowed. This was so fucked up.
The blonde beauty swept me off of my feet ruggedly, and the world danced past my eyes like tricks of the light. All too soon, I was being strangled by a too-tight seatbelt in the passenger seat of an unfamiliar car. I tried to breathe, but it felt like more air left my lungs than in. My head was pounding, my pulse racing where his icy hands once were. I held my hand against my heart as I gazed dazedly through the windshield where the three of them moved in perfect sync with each other, dragging Edward off towards the trees by every other limb in his body.
Renee used to always talk about the trees in Forks. She said she always felt like they were watching her wherever she went. 'Turns out that was just the neighbors,' she said bitterly, dipping a finger into her favorite chocolate milk and chipped mug. 'I thought those trees were my guardians. My friends. But friends don't hold you like that, they aren't meant to close in on you so tightly you feel like you're suffocating.'
"Bella?" The girl said softly, with a voice like honey. I averted my eyes from the now empty parking lot to meet her gaze. Her eyes held specks of gold and amber framed by a, naturally, heavy set of ideal, black lashes. Every ridge in her face was undeniably the most angular and purest of beauty I had ever had the excuse to see up close. She reminded me of Edward in that way, though I had never had the chance to fully appreciate his beauty since it was only ever looking at me under threatening circumstances.
"Yes?"
"Do you know my name?"
"No. Why do you know mine?" I asked thoughtfully. She chuckled softly at that, but it didn't reach her amber eyes.
"Everyone knows your name," She reminded me.
"Oh yeah," I said, and sniffled. Her smile became pained. My first day of school had gone from social injustice to a monster encounter, and I wasn't sure how to come to terms with that yet. I just wanted to close my eyes and leave everything behind me in my dreams; to just wake up comfortably numb. A hiccup escaped my quivering lips, and tears rolled down my cheeks. I looked out the windshield at those too-green trees, aware of her watching me but finding it hard to care. The car kicked into reverse.
"The short one is Alice," She began suddenly. "And the one that's always around her, that's Jasper." She smiled to herself, accentuating her cheekbones in a way that almost looked painful. "I think they were made for each other," She said, as if it were a secret.
She paused then, and I think she was waiting for me to say something. I quickly choked out some garbled means of agreement. She went on, nevertheless, stomping on the gas as she did.
"And Emmett, I think we're made for eachother, too. He's the big one. You know, with the biceps and everything," She rolled her eyes. I nodded my head in response. She continued to glance over at me with soft eyes, like she expected me to crumple onto the floor at any moment. I kind of wanted to.
"Then," her smooth, creamy voice fell a few decibels, "There's Edward. I think you know him," She said quietly. I wasn't sure how to answer that, so I didn't. I wrung my hands in my lap.
"My family, we're..." she struggled to find the right words. "We're different. I think you know that, too," she added. "and sometimes...we do things that we don't mean to do. I want you to know that what Edward was going to do or already did to you will never happen again. Because he only means good," she said firmly. We had arrived in the front of Charlie's house now, and my skin was crawling. I never told her where I lived. She was making sense and yet she wasn't. I just wanted to escape and put an end to reality as fast as humanly possible.
I nodded as politely as I could manage without seeming in too much of a hurry, and reached to open the door. She captured my arm in her icy grip, and cursed under her breath.
"Dammit, Bella, listen please," She begged.
"No," I breathed. "Don't tell me. Don't tell me," I mashed my eyes closed, hoping that would soften the blow somehow. But it was too late for that, anyways. I already knew.
"Bella..." she took a deep breath, and released it, the atmosphere descending into a cold, minty hell. "We're vampires."