April

"Angela?" Bella's hesitant voice said into the phone. Charlie wasn't home from work yet so she didn't feel embarrassed using the landline to call someone. She never liked anyone being able to hear her have private conversations over the phone. "I know it's been a while since you offered but would like going somewhere for a coffee or a walk or something like that?"

"Bella!" Angela's voice said on the other side of the line. "Of course! How about Saturday afternoon, I can pick you up and we can go to Port Angeles?"

Bella released a breath, "That would be perfect. Thank you Angela."

The entire conversation only took about thirty seconds, but she already felt lighter. She realised that the usual always present pain had disappeared even if it had just been for half a minute. She smiled sadly and moved through the house to go to her room.

It had taken Bella over an hour to realise that Angela looked different than what she had looked like a few months ago. She instantly felt guilty.

"How have you been? I feel like all I've been talking about this past hour is myself."

"Oh, I don't mind." Angela said with a smile. "It's nice hearing you talk again."

Bella blushed and nodded. "I'm sorry it has taken me such a long time."

Angela looked at her with understanding eyes. "I guess," she started as she took a big gulp from the second cup of coffee warming her hands, "no one ever talks about how lonely healing can feel."

"That-" Bella stared at her with confused eyes, "is probably the best way anyone has described how I've been feeling lately."

Angela smiled sadly and looked down at her hands.

"How do you know?" Bella started carefully, "What it feels like."

Angela shook her head as she blushed slightly, shrugging at her. "I guess I've been feeling sad too lately, I just don't really know why."

Bella nodded, waiting for her friend to continue. Angela took a shaky breath before continuing.

"I've actually never talked to anyone about this before. I don't know where it came from, I just feel sad and lonely most of the time these days."

"Emotions are strange." Belle said gently, "They come and go without our permission."

Angela snorted into her coffee, wiping a drip away from her chin.

"Not to sound too dramatic but," Angela started with an embarrassed eye roll and red cheeks, "the loneliest feeling to me is when night comes and everyone goes to bed and the world is just so quiet."

"Well," Bella sighed deeply, "if we're being dramatic. I long to be the person I used to be."

Angela frowned, "What do you mean?

"I want to be the person I was before he left, I was so much happier then."

"Maybe we can work on being those people again together."

"I like those odds." Bella smiled.

Bella sighed as she sat down at her desk, her laptop slowly loading. She had forgotten to close her previous tabs before closing it earlier that day. The sight of the eighty-three similar emails always released a small pang in her stomach, it made her feel embarrassed.

They all had the same message:

Mail Delivery Failure – Failure Notice: Undelivered Mail Returned To Sender

Your message did not reach some or all of the intended recipients.

Straightened her back she started deleting them, one by one. She stared at the last email she had tried to send just over a month ago, she opened it sadly getting ready to delete the last one when she froze.

"It can't be." She whispered with wide eyes as she stared at the text of the last failure notice she had received.

Your message did not reach some or all of the intended recipients

"Calm down, Bella." She muttered to herself as she went back to her deleted emails. Every single one of them looked the same, all of them. This last one however didn't end with a full stop at the end of the sentence, there was also extra space at the top the email as if someone pressed enter one time too many. "Holy shit."

She stood up from her chair and paced the room, her heart beating in her chest as she looked. She had stopped sending everyone emails after the first few wouldn't deliver. But she had never stopped trying to reach Alice, she missed telling her about her life and feelings. So she had continued sending emails about how much their absence hurt and ached, about how she was doing at school, about Charlie and Renee, about how she visited their house every now and then or about how she had never felt so lonely before. Had she been reading all of them?

She stopped pacing when the see-through vision of Edward appeared in the corner of her eye. She stared at him as intensely as he stared at her. "Has she been reading all of my emails?"

The vision just stared at her with dead eyes. "Of course he doesn't answer." She murmured to herself. "I talk a lot to myself don't I?" She asked herself whilst she looked at him and sat down again.

She placed her hands on the keyboard and tried to calm down her frantic heart, her fingers were shaking with adrenaline as she typed.

Alice? Are you there?

I think that you're there and I also think that you've been reading all of these (mostly pathetic) emails about how sad I've been these past few months.

If not, fine. I've been going crazy for a long time now. I've been seeing your brother in my dreams but also as a ghost-like-person when I'm awake. Not imagining, but actually seeing him. I can actually see him right now, which is weird.

I don't know why I've never told you about that. I guess I didn't want you to think that I was crazy. But I guess that's what has been happening over these past few months. I miss you guys, a lot. The pain that you all left is slowly becoming unbearable, but I know I need to start living with it now. Charlie has been getting more worried so I called Angela to go get some coffee today. Turns out she's also sad, we make quite a pair. It was nice talking to her again, it sort of felt like my mind thawed after being frozen for a long time. I guess you guys don't know what that feels like since you're always on top of things in the blink of an eye. I guess those are some of the perks of being like you.

If you read this I want you to know that I went to your house, yet again. I can't promise to not go back there. I've made that false promise more than a dozen times to myself now. But whenever it all gets too much I find myself sitting in the middle of his old room. I hate that he took away my voice. He just left without letting me speak, he fled as I was turning around to talk to him. I wrote him a letter and left it in his room. I don't know if you guys will ever go back to that house, I'm hoping you will even if it's long after I'm dead. I know you've been to Forks before, so maybe you'll all be back one day. Maybe you can visit my grave one day? God, that sounds really depressing and cynical. I mean when I've died of old age and you're all back by then. If you guys remember me then of course.

I don't know what to believe, I know I've told you before but I don't know whether you all actually cared for me or if I was just a way to pass the time whilst you were stuck in Forks. Depending on the day my mind shifts to one or the other. I guess you wouldn't have gone through all the trouble of protecting me in Phoenix if you hadn't cared. But then again Edward did do everything in his power so I wouldn't be like you all.

I guess the thought of me being there for all of eternity made him freak out in the end. It sucks that he didn't figure it out earlier though.

This is the last time I'm going to be writing you Alice. I don't even know if you're actually reading these, maybe you're reading them out loud to your siblings. Maybe they make you smile or feel sad. I'm just hoping you're not reading them and laughing at how stupid I've been through all of this. If you guys really never cared about me, I guess this could be funny to all of you.

I guess I'll never know.

With all my heart and love,

Bella

"Oof," Bella sighed emotionally, "I've never been good with words but I think this is okay." She said as she glanced at Edward's stoic, frozen face. She closed her eyes and counted to ten before opening them again and sending it.

The failure notice never arrived. Making Bella's heart soar with glee and unimaginable heartbreak at the same time. Somewhere, in a different state across the country, a tiny pixy-haired vampire was dry-sobbing against her boyfriend's chest. The honey-haired man's jaw was tense as he crushed her against his chest from the side, reading the words on the screen as his girlfriend gasped for air she didn't need.

It was extraordinarily warm for April, especially in the afternoon. The sun had been shining brightly for days, the mornings had been kind of chilly but once it reached eleven o'clock the sun warmed the greenery around them. Leaving the grass in front of Bella's high school dry by noon, perfect for sitting in and reading during lunch.

"I've got something for you." Angela said as she moved closer to Bella. She was about to hand her a glass mason jar filled with a light brown liquid when she dropped it due to the damp drops of water clinging onto the side of it. Angela yelped as the jar slipped from her grip and gaped at her friend with wide eyes when Bella caught it smoothly right before it should've crashed against the ground.

"Wow, Bella. Who knew you were hiding a coordinated person inside of you." Bella frowned at the jar in her hand. She was usually the one to drop or not catch anything.

"I don't know." She said seriously, "This has never happened to me before."

"Anyway," she started as she sat down and pulled out a similar jar, "I made us some iced coffee this morning."

Bella was stunned for a few seconds before she replied. "That's really sweet of you, thank you Angela."

"Don't thank me yet, my previous tries have all turned out to be horrible. Mom said this batch tastes nice though, which is why I brought you one."

They brought the jars to their mouths and took a tentative slip, "This is really good Angela!" Bella exclaimed happily.

"Shit," Angela said as she looked at the jar in her hand, "I can't believe it actually tastes good."

They both laughed and talked for a while before they fell in a comfortable silence.

"It's weird knowing the Cullens wouldn't have been here today."

"What do you mean?" Bella said quietly as she slowly brought the mason jar to her lips again.

"They were never at school when the sun was out." Angela said as she stared at the blue sky above them, "Not even when the weather forecast was wrong and sun would come out against all expectations."

"Yeah, they were kind of strange like that weren't they." Bella said with a tense smile, bringing the jar back to her mouth to take a sip of the sweet bitterly liquid so Angela couldn't read her face.

"Don't laugh, but I always used to joke that they were vampires." She said with a teasing voice.

Bella choked on the coffee, spluttering coffee over the shirt she was wearing.

"Oh my God, are you okay Bella?"

"Yeah," she wheezed, "just went down the wrong pipe."

Angela kept checking if her friend was okay throughout the day, her eyes turned back to their usual hollow and absent state she had gotten used to over these past few months. She wondered if it was something she had said.

Bella smiled at her the next day, her smile still not reaching her eyes.