I'M WITH YOU
WHEN I OPENED MY eyes in the morning, something was different. It was the light. It was still the gray-green light of a cloudy day in the forest, but it was clearer somehow. Still in bed, I dragged the curtain back against the glass — and lit up like a Christmas tree.
A fine layer of snow covered the stretch of grass on the side of the house that led to the backyard, the trees beyond it dusted on top like powdered sugar. But that wasn't the best part. All the rain from the day before had frozen solid — coating the needles on the trees in fantastic, gorgeous patterns. I'd never seen this before, not even in the movies. It was gorgeous.
I hoped it was cold enough for more snow later in the day. Thrilled by the possibility, I was cheerful that morning, at least until I left the heat of my room and saw the state of the driveway. While the rain froze over grass and pine needles beautifully, it turned concrete into a deadly ice slick. I was terrified about driving on ice, even on something as heavy and sturdy as the truck. I was even more terrified by the thought of my twin on ice. Bella resembled Bambi on ice even when she was on dry land, I didn't want to see what she'd be like on actual ice.
Charlie had already left for work. In a lot of ways, living with Charlie and Bella was like having my own place, and I loved it because it meant I could be out of the house with Adam as much as I wanted. Bella was in a sour mood when she came down, which was to be expected, and I ventured out first, testily, over the driveway, to check if the tires were iced over.
There were thin chains crisscrossed in diamond shapes around them, and I softened at once. Charlie had gotten up who knows how early to put snow chains on the truck. My throat suddenly felt tight. I wasn't used to being taken care of, and Charlie's unspoken concern caught me by surprise. I was still a little choked up when I trudged back into the house, but Bella didn't seem to notice, passing me the milk to pour into my cereal.
I felt excited to go to school now. I was still holding out for more snow.
At one point, on our slow trek across the icy driveway, I considered just giving Bella a piggyback ride to get it over with. But I knew she'd never agree to it, my sister was the most stubborn person I'd ever met. And with her luck, she'd tip us both over. Instead I catch her twice, asking if she was sure she could make it into the cab alone before I made my way around to the driver's side. Of course, as soon as I let go and she tugged the door handle harshly to get it to open, she slipped — and she would've smacked it face-first if it wasn't for the side mirror, which she clung to for dear life. I immediately burst into laughter, and she glowered at me. She didn't talk to me for the whole ride to school.
With Charlie's snow chains, the truck had no problem with the black ice that covered the roads. I still drove cautiously. I'd never dealt with snow chains before and they seemed too delicate to stop us from carving a path of destruction through Main Street. I took comfort in the idea that Bella and I probably wouldn't be crushed if we skidded into something. The same wary comfort a soldier might take in a solid iron tank.
We were early to school, which wasn't that surprising in my eagerness. I didn't see Adam's car in the parking lot yet, so I waited in the truck, staying nice and toasty in his worn leather jacket. Bella hopped out, unsteadily, offering me a soft 'bye' to head to class. This was a routine I was used to by now, my sister liked to avoid Adam and I's pre-school greetings. It meant I had the truck to myself for the seminal privacy it offered us to kiss somewhere warm and less constricting than his compact muscle car. Bench seats always win.
I was still hugging myself in Adam's jacket when I heard an odd sound.
It was a high-pitched screech, and it was fast becoming painfully loud. I looked up to my left from my driver's side window, startled, and then horrified.
I saw several things simultaneously. Nothing was moving in slow motion, the way it does in the movies. Instead, the adrenaline rush seemed to make my brain work much faster, and I was able to absorb in clear detail several things at once.
Edward Cullen was standing four cars down from me with his family, staring at something behind me in horror. His face stood out from a sea of faces, all frozen in the same mask of shock. But of more immediate importance was the dark blue van that was skidding, tires locked and squealing against the brakes, spinning wildly across the ice of the parking lot. It was going to hit the back corner of the truck, and my baby sister was standing between them. I didn't even have time to blink.
Just before I heard and felt the shattering crunch of the van folding around the truck bed, something hit Bella, hard, and she was out of the way. I could see her in the side mirror, lying on the pavement behind the tan car I'd parked next to. But I didn't have a chance to notice anything else, because the van was still coming. It had curled gratingly around the end of the truck and, still spinning and sliding, was about to collide with my miraculously alive sister again.
But Edward Cullen was with her. Two long, white hands shot out protectively in front of her, and the van shuddered to a stop a foot from Bella's face, the large hands fitting providentially into a deep dent in the side of the van's body. What I was watching was impossible. Then his hands moved so fast they blurred. One was suddenly gripping under the body of the van, and he was dragging her with the other, swinging her legs around like a rag doll's, till they hit the tire of the tan car. A groaning metallic thud rang through the air, and the van settled, glass popping, onto the asphalt — exactly where, a second ago, Bella's legs had been. It was absolutely silent for one long second before the scream ripped from my throat. I wasn't the only one. I literally flew out of the truck, hot tears blurring my vision as I leaped athletically over the van to check on them both.
"I'm fine." Bella was trying to sit up, only to realize Edward was holding her in an iron grip.
"Be careful." He warned as I got to them. "I think you hit your head pretty hard."
I crouched down beside her, gingerly checking her head for blood before attacking her in a fierce hug. Edward had let go to let me get there. "Ow."
"Sorry, I—" It only came out as a breath, and then I was sobbing wretchedly. Bella patted my shoulder awkwardly.
"How in the..." She trailed off over my shoulder while I cried. "How did you get over here so fast?"
"I was standing right next to you, Bella." He said somewhere behind me.
And then they found us, a crowd of people with tears streaming down their faces like mine, shouting at each other, shouting at us.
"Don't move." Someone instructed.
"Get Tyler out of the van!" Someone else shouted. There was a flurry of activity around us.
"Baby?! Baby!"
Adam's voice jolted me out of my childish mewling, gasping as I got off Bella. He was fighting his way through the crowd, white terror on his face.
"I'm fine, we're fine!" I shout back, struggling to get back up to my feet in the tiny space the three of us were stuffed into. How the hell did I get in here? I saw the state of Tyler then, inside the van, people struggling to pull him out from the other side. Panic and clarity set in together, my heartbeat thrumming hotly in my ears. "Someone call an ambulance!"
"Just stay put for now." Edward was telling Bella by my feet.
"But it's cold." I thought I heard her say.
"Tyler? Tyler, wake up. Come on buddy, you gotta wake up." I was hitting the glass from his side of the van, but he wasn't stirring. I panicked more, struggling to pull open the back door to the van to help the kids trying to get him out.
All around us was chaos. I could hear gruffer voices of adults arriving on the scene, much to my relief. They stopped us from our mission — it was safer not to move him until the EMTs arrived, apparently. I ripped off my jacket and then my flannel shirt, using the latter to staunch the bleeding on his head from the back of the van. I was worried, but my mind was racing two-time. Tyler was a wreck — it was impossible that my sister was fine. It wasn't long before I heard the sirens.
It took six EMTs and two teachers — Mr. Varner and Coach Clapp — to shift the van far enough away from them to bring the stretchers in. Edward Cullen vehemently refused his, but when Bella tried to do the same he told them she'd hit her head and probably had a concussion. I didn't even laugh at Bella's face when they put on the neck brace, I was so worried for her. It looked like the entire school was there, watching soberly as they loaded her in the back of the ambulance. They let me sit with Bella, who refused to hold my hand, insisting she was fine over and over again. Edward got into the front. Chief Swan arrived before they could take us away.
"Bella!" He yelled in panic when he recognized her on the stretcher.
"I'm completely fine, Char — Dad." Bella sighed, aggravated now. "There's nothing wrong with me."
"Jury's still out on that." I snort, and she gives me the best side eye she can manage in her brace.
Charlie turned to the closest EMT for a second opinion, hugging me openly when I hopped out to talk to him. I explained what had happened, or at least Edward's version. He was standing with Bella by the truck, I was still inside. Tyler lost control of the van. Edward pulled Bella to safety. He bought it, of course, because this sequence of events made sense. But my mind kept replaying what I saw in the rearview mirror. I knew I didn't have a concussion. I hadn't imagined seeing everything.
When I'd struggled to push open the side door of the van to get to Tyler, I'd noticed a deep dent in the tan car's bumper — a very distinct dent that fit the contours of Edward Cullen's shoulders... as if he had braced himself against the car with enough force to damage the metal frame. And then there was his family, looking on from the distance, with expressions that ranged from disapproval to fury but held no hint of concern for their brother's safety. Rosalie Hale's murderous expression only softened when she caught my gaze.
I tried to think of a logical solution that could explain what I had just seen — a solution that excluded the assumption that I was insane. Naturally, the ambulance got a police escort to the county hospital. By the time they unloaded Bella from the back, I was a little more put together. Adam had driven out with Ed and Toby, but he lingered back when he saw Dad. Edward simply walked through the hospital doors ahead of us. I didn't worry over him. He seemed fine.
They put Bella in the emergency room, and we weren't allowed to go with her. I filled out the paperwork for my twin, used to it. Charlie might not know what her allergies were or her exact height and weight, but I'd had to do this before with Mom too, who should've known everything. The humor of the situation was starting to sink in now, after I was certain my sister was fine. Only Bella would end up in the ER this many times in her life. I'd filled out so many of these forms in Phoenix one of the security guards knew me by name.
I stayed vigil in the waiting room. Charlie flit in and out, talking to the doctors, the nurses, the EMTs and his own squadron unit. It seemed like the entire police force had arrived on scene. I'd get introduced to people, briefly, as 'my eldest, Gracie', but other than that I mostly just lingered in a corner with a paper cup of coffee nestled in my hands, Adam and the boys trying to keep me distracted with jokes. They made me smile. It was too soon for car crash humor, but somehow the terrible timing made it even funnier.
And then Edward Cullen glided past us through to the ER, sparing a bare glance my way as he did. He didn't give me a smile, but it was a look of acknowledgement. And just like that, my mind was back to what had happened, playing it over, over and over again like a video referee playback. I felt like if I thought about it hard enough I'd crack the code, understand how my sister was alive. But there was still no explanation. How could a teenage boy do what he did today?
It wasn't long before the others started arriving. Pretty soon I'd had to repeat the same lie over and over again to everybody, who seemed intent on comforting me as if I had lost Bella. My patience grew short quickly.
It was hours before Bella walked out through the exit, freezing as soon as she did. I forgot about the crowd in that moment, surging to her side; she put up her hands.
"There's nothing wrong with me." She assured me sullenly. She sounded aggravated, actually. I could see Charlie step in closer in my peripheral view.
"What did the doctor say?" He asked her.
"Dr. Cullen saw me, and he said I was fine and I could go home." She sighed. She glanced at something over my shoulder. "Let's go." She urged.
Charlie put one arm behind her back, not quite touching her, and led her to the glass doors of the exit. I lingered behind to wave Adam and our friends goodbye, following after my family.
We drove in silence. It was actually a little tense this time, not the usual awkwardness of two people who didn't know how to hold a conversation to save their life. When we got to the house, I finally broke it. "Um...you'll need to call Mom."
I grimaced, bracing for impact. My twin looked at me with utter betrayal. "You told Mom!"
"Sorry."
Bella slammed the cruiser's door a little harder than necessary on her way out. Mom was in hysterics, of course. I stayed on the stairs next to my sister, grimacing over and over again every time she gave me a deathly glare, dealing with the blubbering on the other end of the line. Bella had to tell her she felt fine at least thirty times before she would calm down. She begged Bella to come home, forgetting that home was empty at the moment, but my sister denied her far easier than I expected. The surprise must've shown on my face, because she blushed, and my mood dropped. Edward. Edward Cullen was why.
"He wasn't anywhere near the truck." I said, as soon as we had escaped up to her bedroom and shut the door, ignoring the way Charlie hovered downstairs.
"I know." My sister's tone conveyed her frustration. "He won't tell me anything. He told me to thank him and get over it, and he tried to convince me I hit my head too hard."
"I didn't hit anything." I defend. "I saw everything. He lifted — those dents —"
"I know." Bella looked relieved at my spluttering disbelief. "He's only worried we're going to tell people."
"What're we gonna tell them, that Edward Cullen can bench press a van?" I snort derisively, and she blushes. "Our own Clark Kent. Look, don't get me wrong, I'm grateful. I really am. But what the fuck Bells?"
"I know."
Bella went to sleep early, clearly disgruntled by the way Charlie and I kept fussing. I couldn't sleep at all. Charlie got a ride to school and drove the truck back, insisting I stayed home with Bella even if I wasn't hurt. To be fair to him, I was still shaken. I kept staring at the dent in the back of the truck blankly, imagining that this was where my sister's body should have splattered. I should no longer be a twin today. But Edward Cullen changed that, and from the expressions on his siblings' faces, they were in on it.
That was the first night I dreamt of Rosalie Hale.