The Woods

"Bells. Bells. Wake up."

Oh my God, did I oversleep? How … I open my eyes, not to my room, but to my Dad's office at the station. And the whole day of yesterday comes rushing back to me. I feel like I've been hit by a train.

"I got some breakfast for you."

"You pulled an all-nighter?"

He shakes his head. "Got a fancy swivel chair." I see the blanket still crumpled over it.

My father's face is grey. I notice he only has one plate of food here, for me. Probably got it from the diner. Where Uncle Waylon always used to hang out, and always said "hi" to us whenever we'd eat there. All I will ever know or remember about this man is that he always needed a shave, and his breath smelled like whiskey. I get up and hug my Dad, still in my clothes from yesterday. The ones that Alice washed.

"It's okay, kid. It's okay." It's not. I know that. But he's not going to talk to me about it. I know that, too.

I see the clock on the wall. School started an hour ago. Dad kept his promise to let me play hooky after being up so late last night.

"I'm gonna be in and out all day, Bells. You can stay here and read or something. We got a television in the back, too."

"Dad, no. I can't – "

His face is all tense and set. He doesn't want me home all by myself.

"Let me go to school. It's okay."

"You sure?"

"Yeah."

"I'll come get you …" He's not sure when he can do it, how long I'll have to wait for him after the last bell.

"It's okay. I'll be in the library."

Everyone is talking about it at school. I don't want to listen, but nobody is talking about anything else. All of the things about yesterday that I want to remember – the Cullens' house, Alice's dress, the warm and cozy fire, Edward's music, him holding me in the cold, cold sea – I can't. It's all drowned out by the buzz of this awful death.

Deaths.

I feel Edward's eyes staring at me in Biology. Now I hate my seat. Hate that I can't look at him or see him without turning all the way around. I want to sit next to him. I wonder if he'll ever relent about that? But the semester is half over. What chance do I have?

Days pass. My Dad stays paranoid. I'm not allowed to be anywhere alone. And nowhere ever near the woods. He waits at home to see me off to school, and I have to be either at the school or the town library or the police station until he gets off from work. We shop together now.

I sleep in my bed. Leave the rocking chair for Edward. I don't know for sure if he comes or not. I can never catch him. But I always leave one of my quilts on the chair for him so he won't be cold. Maybe he never comes. The quilts only ever smell like me now. But I swear I smell his fragrance on the chair rungs. Maybe he just never uses the quilt. Maybe he puts it on me when he's there.

At school we still pretend to be strangers.

I don't dream at all.

Another day. Another last bell. I'm at my locker. Edward Cullen walks right by me. He stares at me as he passes. Same way he's been staring at me, all this time. Jessica was right. He can't take his eyes from me. I can't take mine from him, either. He's had all the advantage, staring at me from behind in our class. Only now do I get to look at him in return. Our eyes hold each other.

The moment passes, as he does too, down the hall. I'm not going to just stand here. Not any more. I leave all my stuff in my locker and I follow him out. I'm not supposed to do this. My Dad will panic if I'm not here when he comes for me. But it's almost April. The days are longer than the nights now. Even with clouds, daylight saving time makes it light out until almost eight o'clock. I've got time. Time to follow him. Time for answers.

I follow Edward out the doors, across the parking lot, and into the waiting woods.

I know this path. I walked it before.

In the future, try not to get yourself soaked and chilled on the same day that you decide to skip lunch.

He's stopped in front of the tree. The very same one. He did follow me that day. When I got soaked and chilled, and he brought me medicine the next morning. I'm standing beside a ledge of rock a few paces behind him, and I feel the world and my life and these days all moving in circles. Everything is wet. It's not quite raining. But the mist is drifting through in curtains, heavy enough that the trees are dripping. The tall, straight trees all around us. The green and the black. The voices of the school are very far away, and the sound of the mist fills the almost silence. A bird cries.

"What are you doing, Bella?"

"You told me to follow you." Without words, but that's stronger, isn't it?

"I suppose if I told you to jump off a cliff, you'd do that, too?"

I roll my eyes, but he can't see, because he's still facing the tree, not me.

"What do you want from me?" he asks. His voice is soft. Sad. Afraid.

'What do you want from me?' That's my question. He's the one who has been stalking me. Whenever I'm in danger. Or asleep.

"I want the truth. That's all I've ever wanted. All I ever asked."

"It isn't pretty."

Not everything that's pretty is good.

"I'll take my chances."

"You don't know what you're saying."

"Then tell me, Edward. Just tell me."

He doesn't answer for a long time. The tree stands in front of both of us, reaching all the way up to the sky. Fresh pine and spruce and fir smells are all around, like sacred incense.

"I'm a vampire."

I stare at his back with owl eyes. I've guessed a million things but never this.

The bird cries again, and I feel as if the real world has gapped open, like melting celluloid, and left me standing here in the dreamtime. Except it's the dreamtime that has been real all along.

The half-eaten bodies mean something completely different now.

Not a bear. Not a mountain lion. Not wolves. Not even the chupacabra.

Edward.

And his family.

I think of them, each so beautiful. Like jaguars and tigers, red-tailed hawk and snowy owl. I'd seen a baby rabbit once, killed by a hawk, its body splayed open, the fur in tufts on the ground. They live in their beautiful house, go to school, work in the hospital. They have perfect camouflage. To live among their prey, and strike at will.

But their kindness - how am I supposed to make sense of that? Dr. Cullen saving lives. Mrs. Cullen's blush without color. Emmett winking. Alice's arm brushing mine as we did homework side by side on the rug. Edward's … everything. This family, and their strangeness, is a knot that I don't know how to unravel.

Finally the boy in front of me turns. I just look at him. He's still Edward to me. Though his face is in shadow.

"Don't you understand?" he cries. He makes claws of his hands, and puts on a false Transylvania accent: "I want to suck your blood!" And his golden cat eyes burn so intensely that what he said isn't funny at all. His hands drop, and his face falls. "Really." Barely a whisper now, "More than you can possibly imagine."

"I don't care."

"Are you crazy?"

"No."

"Bella, you're not safe with me. You can never be safe with me. Not ever." The words, and his voice, hurt.

"Without you I'd be dead already, Edward. Twice over. Maybe more." I can feel my own heartbeat as I think of myself like the girl in the snow. Splayed open. Strewn. "I'll take my chances."

He approaches me slowly, and I stand my ground. God only knows what's going on in his mind. These may be my last moments on earth. The drumming in my chest is much too loud, and much, much too fast. I remember my dream. The first one. This is what it meant. He is my mountain lion. I am his doe. Not enemies. Lovers. Ready to become one flesh. I won't struggle. Though my heart is hammering, now. Haven't I always wanted him to hold me? Didn't I say I would give my life? It will only hurt for a little while. And then my blood will live forever, in him.

Suddenly, he is crouched in front of me, offering me his back. I never even saw him turn.

"Get on."

We are back in the sea again. He is telling me to climb onto his back. But this is not then. Then he was taking me back to land. Now he is going to take me away from everything I know. Something in me lets go. I climb onto his back, and wrap my arms around him. My face is in his hair, at the back of his neck. It is as cool as the air around us – silky, and fragrant, and fine. His flesh is unnaturally firm, and as cold as I remember – like the rocks beneath the ocean. Like the tree that stands above us. My face has burrowed down against his neck until my nose and lips are touching his skin. So smooth. His scent surrounds me. He smells like clean, clean skin; like hints of the forest; like frankincense and myrrh –yes, I finally found the scent that is like him – but most of all, he smells like my heart's desire.

And I. What do I smell like? Compared to him, I must smell like old mutton.

"Edward?"

"I'm here, Bella." He has hooked his arms under my knees, drawing my legs tightly around his waist.

"Do I smell bad to you?"

"No." He stands. "Hold on."

I do. And in an instant, we are running, no, flying through the forest.

Edward defies the laws of physics. Clinging to his back, I do, too. I can't tell if he is taking seven league strides, or just pumping his legs really, really fast. The trees are nothing but a dark blur, the spaces between them making an eerie flicker of pearly light. We are crossing the lines of light and dark. The air rushes past us, sharp as a knife, and from time to time I hear terrifying cracks. It takes me a while to realize that these are tree branches, maybe even tree TRUNKS, that Edward is breaking with one hand, clearing a path for the fragile thing he is carrying on his back.

CRACK!

CRACK, CRACK!

"Edward, stop! Please stop!"

He hears me, and does slow down, then comes to a stop. I feel him take a small breath to speak, and in that instant realize that all through the super-speed run, he hadn't breathed at all.

"What's wrong, Bella?"

"You're breaking the trees. I don't want to break the trees."

"Oh, Bella!" And he laughs. It uses up the rest of his breath, but it's a real laugh – the first time I've ever heard him laugh – and the sound is so sweet.

"They grow back, you know." It comes out as a gasp.

"I know that, but it takes a long time, and you're hurting them."

He lets me down off of his back, and stands a few paces away. So he can breathe enough to talk normally. I don't care what he says; my smell does bother him. Badly.

"You think the trees have feelings?" His face is incredulous.

"Of course they do." The trees all around us are standing in witness. "Look around you." All by themselves, my arms have stretched outward, so that I look like a tree, too. I turn slowly, in the dark, green cathedral, with the dead lying down and the living stretching up. "Feel their soul." I feel it, and I have to kneel. Right there between the slick, wet rock on my right, and the ancient log on my left - all gone to rot, and moss, and ferns, and a long row of saplings, slender and strong.

Edward is crouched down, too, there on his side of the little space that was made by the giant's fall. He's looking at me like he thinks I've gone insane.

"You think plants have souls?"

"Yes." And I'm speaking with the breath of them all, the tall and the small, singing through my veins. "Listen."

He does listen. And I learn that there is nothing more silent than a vampire holding still. The drops of the mist patter down through the pine needles. They're loud compared to him. In the stillness, a spotted beetle crawls up the stem of a ghost pipe fungus. From another valley, a raven croaks.

Edward shakes his head, grimacing, and looks at me with intent and intense curiosity.

"How do you eat, then," he asks, "if you think that even plants have souls? You can't even be a vegetarian."

"Everything that lives has to eat another living thing, Edward. Except … except the plants. They make life … from light and air and water and earth."

I don't know where these words are coming from. I've never said them before. Never even thought them before. And yet … "Maybe that's where soul began … brought into the world by the plants." My hands are still resting, one on the rock, and one on the log. "They're the grandfathers," I whisper.

A long wind sighs through the treetops, releasing a shower of tiny, cold drops on us both.

"But you eat them. Your … 'grandfathers' …"

"It's life. We're connected."

Edward crumples in front of me. His face is in his hands, and he doubles over until his forehead touches the earth. His shoulders are shaking and he is making choked sobbing sounds that just tear at my heart.

I don't understand why he is crying. Is it because he wants to eat me? Doesn't he know that in this place that isn't a sin? Can't he feel the branches above and the roots below, holding us in a perfect circle? Or is it because he can't belong to that circle? Because he can't die?

I want to help, but I don't know how. My hand doesn't care, and reaches out to touch his hair. His hair really is beautiful. It's like a bronze flame against the dark colors all around us.

The shower of drops comes down harder, and I realize that the mist has turned into rain. Whatever spell had bound us is getting washed away now, by the simple ordinariness of rain.

Edward looks up. His face is hurt, but tearless.

"We can't stay here, Bella. You'll catch your death. And we have a long way to go."

He offers me his back again.

"Get on," he says. So softly, this time. "I'll try not to break anything along the way."

Nearly there.

Bella thinks that trees have souls. I wonder what she thinks of me? Now that she knows.

Nearly there. What seemed like a passage through misty forest, has in fact been an ascent through cloud. Now, though the forest is still thick around us, the clouds are behind us. Below us. In deference to Bella's wish, I have run the remainder of this journey slowly, weaving my way between the trees so as not to harm them. But not too slowly. I glance at the sky. Yes. I have succeeded. The place to which I am taking her will still be hospitable.

But something is wrong. Bella's arms and legs are clamped tightly around me, more so even than when I had run at full speed. Her breathing is shallow and rapid, and her heart beats like a trip-hammer between my shoulder blades.

Has she finally, FINALLY realized how insanely dangerous it was to follow me into the woods? To let me carry her off like this? Is she regretting, at last, her foolhardiness?

I slow to a stop, and put her down. I want to move a safe distance away. So long as I was running, it was as if I was running out from under her, running away from her scent, away from the venom that flooded my mouth, the overpowering urge to just sink my teeth into every pulse point on her body. And suck and rip and pull …

Oh dear God don't let me hurt her.

But now that we are stopped, I have to step away.

And she won't let me.

She's still holding onto me.

It makes no sense. If she has finally realized the danger I am to her, shouldn't she let go? Shouldn't she run away screaming?

"Bella, what's wrong?"

I feel her looking up, to the left and to the right.

"Bella!" Let me go. Before I …

"The sun is out."

"What?"

Suddenly, she moves, remarkably quickly for a human. In an instant, she is standing on top of a large fallen trunk beside me.

Oh, Bella, if you fall … if you even skin your knee ….

But she is standing there, holding her jacket spread open to her sides, looking (ah, forgive me) like a human-sized flying squirrel.

"Bella, what are you doing?"

"I'm making shade for you."

With her jacket open like that, every breath that she takes, every beat of her heart, sends waves of her beautiful scent washing over me. The sweet thrum of her blood, making my jaw just ache with anticipation. And the delicate native fragrance of her skin and flesh. Mimosa. The bashful leaf.

I struggle to keep my mind on her words.

Shade? Good grief!

"Bella. It's a myth. Sunlight doesn't hurt us."

Her brow furrows. But she keeps her jacket open. She is blocking the sun from hitting me. She has chosen the spot exactly right.

"Are you sure?" she asks, with a dubious little frown.

"Yes, I'm sure."

"Have you ever gone out in the sun before?"

I can't help but laugh. I hope she doesn't think I'm laughing at her.

"Lots of times," I say.

"Then how come you and your brothers and sisters are never at school when it's sunny out?"

How does she know this? I don't care. I have to get her to close her jacket. And get down off of her perch. Safely.

"Bella, come down."

I reach my hands toward her. Yes. I put them on her waist. I lift her down. Carefully. Safely. Out of the stray bars of sunlight that fall through the trees.

I take a step away from her. Even though my hands want to stay on her waist. Everything about her is soft. Everything about her is warm. Everything about her is everything that I want. In every horrible way.

But her jacket is now hanging normally about her body, covering her just enough. Just as the shade of the forest covers me, just enough. I hold out one hand to her.

"I'll show you."

She takes my hand without flinching, but her brow remains furrowed, doubtful.

"I'm not going to immolate myself in front of you, Bella."

"You promise?"

"I promise."

Her hand is warm in my dead-cold one. I am not coarsely made, oh, but her fingers are so slender in my grasp.

I lead her through the stands of trees, a winding path avoiding the patches of sunlight. How shameless I am, building up the suspense like this. But I can't help it. I want so desperately to not be what I am.

I stop short at the edge of the little meadow. It is hardly at its best. Going up a mountain is like going backward in time. While the lowlands are already starting to bloom with spring, this altitude is still locked in the dregs of winter. The grass lies dead and flattened. The ghosts of its summer flowers exist only in my memory. But the sun has been on it all day. It is dry, and almost warm. And the view, upwards, and outwards …

Bella is gripping my hand tightly, here in the shadow of the last rank of trees. She is staring at my meadow with a strange expression on her face.

"You found this?" she asks, her voice a hushed whisper.

"Yes."

Her fingers twine softly, tightly, with mine, trembling ever so slightly. Minutes pass, like the red and black beetle climbing up the wax-white stem.

"It's … your place," she says at last.

Something leaps in my chest. She knows. She understands. Perhaps she has kept such a place herself – a haven for her solitude. But solitude is not the true purpose. Solitude is in waiting. And now I want to clasp her about the waist and twirl her around me, and carry her to the center of this patch of sleeping grass, and watch together for an entire year as every color of sun and wind and rain passes across it, and the flowers bloom in their day, and the woods change their deep hues of green and brown and black, and the stars wheel above, and the mists rise below, until winter sets forth every dark branch with a white edge of snow. She cannot, of course, but I would. I could. Sit like a statue, as still as a stone. At rest, at last, from the frenzies of hunger and thirst. To just be.

With her.

With her, I would.

A new scent assaults me. Like her blood, but purer. I look at her and see that her eyes have filled with tears.

Why? What have I said? What have I done? It doesn't matter. All I know is that I want to take away those tears. One has overflowed, and made a trail to her cheek. In my mind's eye I see myself approach her, bend to kiss that one trembling drop, suddenly bright with a glancing flash of sun. What would it be like to be so close, to have her full scent flood into me point blank? How warm would her cheek be? How soft? Would she blush? Would her skin suffuse with that ravishing red …? I can almost feel myself daring to place my mouth upon her, my eyes closing, lips parting, tongue venturing forward to taste that tear … but it's not enough. Right there, her blood! Right there my teeth! Right there her flesh! Parting, opening! A hot waterfall of crimson heaven, down her ruined face –

NO!