First beach was… I've never seen the ocean before. It was supposed to be old hat to Bella. I don't even know how to swim. The water was as big as the sky. It was freezing. I know Bella doesn't go in the water but it was the ocean! I wanted to touch it. It smelled like it's very own thing. I filled my pockets with shells that everyone seemed to think were sea trash. I made a pebble mermaid with seaweed hair. Got stung by an odd ocean tide pool thing. Jacob thought I was an idiot for touching it and laughed a bit while my hand swelled up so fat that I couldn't move my fingers but he also helped get the spine out and found me some aspirin. I completely forgot I was supposed to talk to Jacob about vampires and wolves but we had a good time splashing in the shallows.

I admit I spent about a month of repeat days just exploring the ocean shore. It's beautiful. I did eventually get the wolfie/cold one thing out of Jacob. By then I'd explored the whole area and my twilights were getting kind of torturously painful. I only get to keep things from days that advance. The shells from before were all back in their place on the beach. I went back to where I found the prettiest one and put it in my coat pocket wrapped in my emergency tissues. It was pearl on the inside and had sort of blue and green bands of colour on the outside.

At school the next day, Edward asked me about the beach. He's like a Bella klutz detective. He was way too alarmed by skinned knees and scraped knuckles.

"Edward, you need to chill out. It's not like I was cutting lemons with paper cuts or something." Oops Lexi, dial back the sass I remembered.

"The beach was fun," I explained. "One day I'm going to go to a real sunshine and sand beach where the water is actually warm. I should probably learn to swim first though."

"You don't know how to swim?" Edward asked.

I shrugged. I'd never learned to swim. Lexi land from before was landlocked. I suspect Bella in the books could swim or cliff diving would have definitely been a no, no. "Swimming pools in the desert are really taxing to the environment. Can you swim?"

"Like a fish," Edward admitted. "I could teach you."

"I don't even own a bathing suit," I answered. I needed to change the subject fast. "Wanna see the shell I found? It was the prettiest one on the whole beach. It was my favourite. It reminds me of my nanna's antique fan. I want it back so be careful."

I watched as he unwrapped it from the tissue and it occurred to me that vampires live forever and he wasn't allowed to go to First Beach and this wasn't really even my world. If he had the shell, he'd have it forever and ever. Bella might have been perfect for Edward but I'm just some stupid lying kid that he's stuck with because some cosmic game designer tortures me if I don't play along.

"Actually, you can have it Edward," I mumbled. Then I fled.

I played A Canon in D that night. It was my Nan's favourite song. It kind of has a spinning cyclical feel to it much like my days on repeat. It wasn't really meant to be played alone. It sounds best played by a quartet.

It's hard to meaningfully connect with people when they don't remember most of my days. I feel so alone sometimes.

I would really love to know what people think would have been going through Edward's head during this conversation. I wonder what he thinks of the shell?