The Water Road
I was so sure. So sure.
And so, so wrong.
1918 Edward is no relation to the Edward I know at all.
Not great grandfather. Not even great grand-uncle. He was born and died an only child.
No Tuck Everlasting either. No ash tree. No holy water.
I cried myself to sleep last night. And all day today, I've carried this rock around in my chest.
I should never have imagined that boy with Edward's face. But I couldn't help it. I wanted him to live in the Edward I know. It wouldn't have been so far fetched. Traits can be passed down. Spirits can find a new house. I was so sure that was what Edward was looking for. A past. A trail to himself.
But none of that is true. There was no family heirloom tucked into his blanket when he was given to a foundling home. No attic treasure stolen and hidden under his shirt when they came to take him away.
Nothing.
Just some random boy who happened to have the same first name as him. Who lived and died a hundred years ago.
I wonder where he got this journal, then? Did he pick it up cheap from somebody's yard sale? Why would he even do that? Just because of the name? And why would he keep it?
Why lend it to me?
It doesn't make sense. It doesn't make any sense at all.
Unless.
Unless.
Did he fall in love with the dead boy just like I have?
Is that what the secret handshake is all about?
Find me.
Understand me.
I think of all the hateful things kids have said about Edward. The ugly words.
I can't believe he would take such a huge chance with me. To put that puzzle in front of me without a decoder ring. And then take the chance that if I did figure it out, I wouldn't make his life even more miserable than it is.
These thoughts are making me burn up inside. I'm sure I'm not just blushing, but flushed, as if I have a fever.
I think of Edward reading this journal, like I have. Finding his heart captured by the boy on the page, just like I was. I imagined that boy with Edward's face. I still do. I can't help it. I wonder what face Edward imagines?
And now I know what I want to do. How to show him that I walked the same road he did, and felt the same things he did. And that it's nothing to be ashamed of, no matter what anybody says.
I'm going to give him my scrapbook when I return the journal to him. There's one more page to write. The last one. For the last page of the journal.
It takes me all night, and all day at school trying to figure out what I want to say. Twenty three pages of my notebook paper are all covered with essays long and short about love and equality and all kinds of CRAP, now all wadded up and ready to get burned to ash. What if I've guessed wrong? All that stuff would freak him out.
What do I want to say to him, then?
Dad will be home soon. I should be getting dinner ready and doing my homework, but I can't do anything until this is finished.
I pull out the scrapbook and open it to the last page. If I had a rose tree, I would put its thorn against my heart, but all I have is my exacto-knife and my pinky finger.
Three drops of blood like poppy flowers on the page.
(I loved him and lost him, just like you.)
Keep it simple, Bella. Just simple.
(I don't think it's ugly that you love a boy.
You'll find someone, and someone will find you.)
I search for a way to say it that won't freak him out. In the end I just write:
"You don't have to be alone."
I hope he'll understand.
I should give a thank-you note to Mike and the gang. They've given me the perfect excuse. To be where I am right now. Standing by Edward's Volvo. It's not really an excuse. I really do want to invite him to come to La Push with us. It'll be nice. To do something normal. Something fun. He doesn't have to surf if he's not into that. He can hang out with me. I won't bother him. And maybe after we've all eaten barbecue and s'mores together the kids will realize that the Cullens aren't really any different from the rest of us.
In the mean time, I have the perfect cover for what I rushed out here at final bell to do.
I can't believe that I actually beat Edward to his car. But I did. And now, excuse or no excuse, my heart is pounding against the secret that I am holding to my chest. I've hidden it. The journal and the scrapbook are bound together, inside a Forks High School book cover. They look like they are one book. Like any other textbook. Not even Edward will know what it is until he opens it. And I've got the whole thing in a plastic bag, since it is drizzling just a little bit.
Kids are staring, loitering a little as they go to their cars. Waiting to see what happens. Nobody ever talks to the Cullens. I wonder what Jessica is thinking.
Here he comes. Here they come. All five of them. Holy crow. I feel like every little hair on my body is standing straight on end. I can hear my heart. I bet even they can, too. I'm not going to run. I didn't come out here just to run away at the last minute.
Breathe, Bella, breathe. Inhale. Exhale. They're not going to bite you.
Alice is staring at me. They're all staring at me. Only Alice looks like she really wants to be my friend. I feel like she's hugging me with her eyes. Jasper looks like he's in pain. Maybe his heart is hurting him. He closes his eyes and I feel like I can breathe again. Emmett. God, he's so big, even standing in the back behind Rose and Jasper. Did he …? He winked at me! Rosalie looks like you wouldn't want to mess with her in a dark alley.
And Edward. Wearing his storm cloud eyes. Boring into me with them. He's stopped two feet in front of me.
"What do you want?"
Have I been even more wrong than I thought? He's being as mean and rude as the very first day.
We have an audience now. Mike actually has his cell phone out. Like he's going to call 911 if things get ugly.
I'm not turning back.
"So, the kids are going to the beach this Saturday. You … you guys wanna come?"
"Beach?" Edward actually sputters. I almost laugh. Emmett does it for me.
"Oh, Ed-boy, she got you!"
Edward shoots a truly venomous glare at Alice. What did she ever do? Emmett's the one who just called him "Ed-boy" – right in front of other people.
"So, yeah, there's supposed to be some pretty big surf coming in this weekend, the van is fixed, and Tyler's parents are letting him drive again. We're going to have a barbecue and stuff after – " What is Emmett's problem? Even Jasper is cracking a smile. Maybe they're all vegetarians or something?
"I'm taking the truck, too, so there's plenty of room." They're all standing right in front of me; I have to make it clear that they're all invited. "I've got a tarp in back, in case it rains."
My eyes go back to Edward. The one I really want to be talking to.
"Come. It'll be fun. You don't have to surf if you don't want to. There's rocks and tidal pools and driftwood and stuff. And sand, too. It's pretty."
"Pretty?"
"Yes. Have you ever been there?"
"Where?"
"La Push. First Beach."
"No."
"Come," I say again.
Everyone's faces are like stone.
"Esme needs us to do some work in the yard this weekend."
Even I know that's a flat out lie. Even if it wasn't written over all their faces. Even Alice, who looks more sad than anything else.
Fine. I can deal.
The thing in my arms weighs a million tons right now. But I still have to give it to him. The journal's not mine to keep, and the scrapbook ... My face is getting red and hot just thinking about it. All the things I found and cut out and pasted one by one. The words that I wrote on that last page.
And my blood. What was I thinking?
I think about him laughing over it with his brothers and sisters. I think about it getting all over the school. But it's too late to turn back. I can't separate the scrapbook out without blowing his cover about the journal. And I don't want to try to talk to him again. This time was enough of a disaster. It has to all go to him together, even though he doesn't want it, will laugh at me, and think I'm gross, and queer.
I was so, completely, wrong.
I don't understand him at all. I never have.
He's got his hands up, tented over his nose and mouth again, with a look of total terror on his face. The little girl with the big bad tears is scaring the crap out of the boy with fox-colored hair. Even his family is holding their breath, like they're smelling something god-awful. I swear I washed! I wash every night!
"Maybe some other time, then," I say.
Everyone in the whole parking lot is watching.
"Thanks for lending me the workbook."
And I hand it to him. The Edward who called to the air from a different time. And the heart that I gave in return, not just for the lost boy, but for the one in front of me, too. He has it all now. All of it. Even the cedar sprig.
Walk away. Hold your head up and walk away. Here in Forks you can say it's nothing, just rain in your face.
I am alone at last. Away from everyone.
Alice has seen what I am about to see, I'm sure. I hate that. This is private. I would rather be in my meadow for this, but it is misting there and I don't want any risk to the pages, so this abandoned logger's cabin will have to do.
I light the kerosene lantern beside me here on the gritty floor. I don't need it, but I want it.
This girl is as cunning as Alice. Wrapping my journal and its companion in a schoolbook cover. No wonder Alice is so enamored of her.
She still had no right to do what she did today. Waylaying us all so that Bella could get to my car first. Setting me up. Setting Bella up, too, doesn't she see that? She wants Bella so badly that she's willing to kill her to get her. Or rather, have me kill her. My sister fights as dirty as her mate. Shepherding this treasure into my hands.
And yet, rather than bury it here in the forest unseen, I am unpeeling the cover from the thing that Bella has given me.
Her art project.
Her blood.
She has offered me her blood. Even dried on the hidden page it calls to me.
How did Alice conceal all of this from me until it was too late? Until we were walking toward my car, and that girl. Until nothing could pull me away from taking it.
I set my journal aside on the unfurled wrappings, and look at this thing that Bella has made.
There is a drawing on the cover – her own naïve and lovely work. In colored pencil and metallic pen.
It is very dark: a night sky, and a sea cliff, with wild, wind-shaped pines, haunting the right-hand edge. The water is not stormy, but a low moon has set a broad white ribbon upon it, leading from shore to horizon. A single white bird, a swan, flies out, following the path over the water. She has titled this book "The Water Road", in golden letters.
Alice, you don't fight fair. You don't fight fair at all.
I open the book carefully. This thing must last me for a very long time.
Her inscription is short.
Who can follow a road on water? It's always changing, moving; you can never quite see it for sure.
I hope you find your Ithaka.
I cannot move. I cannot even breathe. Fire runs through my veins.
She wrote this.
She wrote this for me. For me. Not for the dead boy. For me.
What does she know? How does she know?
I am done for.
And so is she.
I turn the pages one by one.
Every entry in my old journal is commemorated here. In images. In snippets of music. Scraps of news and statistics even. Following me every step of my water road.
Oh, Bella.
I remember her, night after night, lying on her stomach on her narrow bed, ankles crossing and uncrossing in the air, feet smoothing absently over each other, sometimes even down one calf and then the other, the errant doves.
I remember her laptop and all manner of papers beside her. Using my journal as a distraction from her homework, I'd thought.
I was wrong. So completely wrong.
How many souls are there like this on this earth?
One. Only one.
Only one.
I must guard her journey through this life. Let no harm come to her until she reaches her safe and peaceful passing. To do anything else would be beyond monstrous. A crime against all that is good.
I don't want to go forward, don't want to reach the end of the pages, don't want there to be no more.
But just as my journal had an end, so must hers, and, God help me, the scent of her blood is luring me on. I have already guessed on which page it is that she spilled it out for me.
The convergence, the horrid symbolism – Alice you are dastardly and heartless to make sure that this came into my hands!
And still I turn the page.
Three perfect drops. Like flower petals.
Still fresh. Of course I know they are fresh. It was only three nights ago that I watched her cry herself to sleep. The color is still quite red. Though mostly absorbed by the paper fibers, I'm sure I could scrape some up with my fingernail. I could have a taste, however fleeting.
But it is her words, her words that set the hook of my damnation.
"You don't have to be alone."
She can't have meant it. Not like that. With her blood right there. Inviting me to take her.
The images flood me, dark and violent. Her softness filling my arms. Her blood filling my mouth, as mine filled Carlisle's. Yes, I remember, because he cannot forget. One gulp, two gulps, three.
And then I will lie beneath her; I will be her ferry, across the river of Resentment, the river of no return.
Whatever she meant – and I can hardly know, since her mind is a mystery – it cannot be that.
But it doesn't matter, because now I can think of nothing else.
The cedar sprig that marked the page slips out and falls to the floor.
A/N:
~~~ If I had a rose tree, I would put its thorn against my heart … ~~~
Bella is remembering the story of the Nightingale and the Rose.
h t t p : / / ebooks . adelaide . edu . au/w/wilde/oscar/happy/chapter2 . html
It would seem that she has read Oscar Wilde, too …
~~~~ So the Nightingale flew over to the Rose-tree that was growing beneath the Student's window.
"Give me a red rose," she cried, "and I will sing you my sweetest song."
But the Tree shook its head.
"My roses are red," it answered, "as red as the feet of the dove, and redder than the great fans of coral that wave and wave in the ocean-cavern. But the winter has chilled my veins, and the frost has nipped my buds, and the storm has broken my branches, and I shall have no roses at all this year." "One red rose is all I want," cried the Nightingale, "only one red rose! Is there no way by which I can get it?"
"There is a way," answered the Tree; "but it is so terrible that I dare not tell it to you."
"Tell it to me," said the Nightingale, "I am not afraid."
"If you want a red rose," said the Tree, "you must build it out of music by moonlight, and stain it with your own heart's-blood. You must sing to me with your breast against a thorn. All night long you must sing to me, and the thorn must pierce your heart, and your life-blood must flow into my veins, and become mine." ~~~~
"River of Resentment" = The River Styx. "Styx" means "shuddering", such as that induced by the loathing of death. It is a cognate of "stygos", which means hatred/ abhorrence.
h t t p : / / www . britannica . com/EBchecked/topic/570397/Styx
h t t p : / / www . theoi . com/Khthonios/PotamosStyx . html