INTERROGATION
Outside of my stimulating conversation with Edward, calculus was entirely mind-numbing. If sleeping were possible, I would have been drooling on the desk. As it were, I let my mind wander and tumble off in whatever direction it chose. My thoughts flitted from one subject to the next, spending a generous amount of time on La's eyes, before moving on to the more general things about her. I was mooning like a schoolboy.
Beside me, Edward chuckled. "You might actually be hopeless."
As soon as the bell rang, I all but sprinted toward La's class but as we got close, I saw she had already been accosted by her friend, Jessica. I paused a few yards down the hallway and caught Edward's arm who had already turned away to give me space with La.
"Hang on a minute," I tilted my head in the girls' direction.
He didn't audibly sigh, but he may as well have. "You're giving Jessica opportunity."
"Yes," I grinned evilly. "Yes, I am."
"May I ask why?"
"I want to know what La's thinking as much as Jessica does, and since you won't tell me…" I elbowed him in the ribs.
The two of us turned back toward the girls just in time to catch La's dramatic exasperation, evident in a thunderous frown that lined her lovely face with deep crevices. I cackled loudly enough for her to hear me, and watched as Jessica dragged her down the hall.
"Come on," I cajoled Edward. "Walk with me."
"Why?" He asked archly. It was a rhetorical question, but I answered anyway.
Fill in the gaps for me.
"No, thank you," he started to walk in the opposite direction again, but I grabbed him and hauled him to a stop.
What can I do to convince you?
"You cannot convince me." He shook his head resolutely. "You know that."
Right. I was very aware that divulging other people's thoughts went against his ethos, but I didn't want exact thoughts, more like general reactions. I was walking a very thin line here.
There's nothing you want?
Edward narrowed his eyes and crossed his arms. "I want my car on Sunday."
"Goes without saying." There was no way that was all he wanted. He pulled his shirt straight and shoved his hands into his pockets. I was right!
"...And your signed Phatz Domino record."
Ah. My jaw clenched tightly. I nearly told him to go fuck himself, as I had to jump through several wild hoops to attain that record, which he would know very well, as it had been a close scrape he'd had to rescue me from. This was, no doubt, his point.
Fine, I reluctantly agreed.
Edward and I paced quickly to catch up with the duo, filling me in on what had been said along the way. They were walking arm in arm along a path between buildings when we caught them, heads bent together conspiratorially, dark curls mingling together as they bounced in time with their steps. It would have been a pretty picture if La wasn't so obviously miserable.
Jessica had asked all the basic questions first as Edward and I caught up; had La and I met in Port Angeles on purpose? Were the two of us secretly dating?
We fell into step behind them just as La mentioned that she found me "unbelievable." I raised my fist in a little "yes" motion. I waited a moment to get any input from my brother, but he remained resolutely silent. Anything?
"Nothing you don't already know," he murmured, but he looked at me strangely. It would seem, he'd seen or heard something unexpected. "She was thinking about the way you looked at her this morning."
"And?"
He opened his mouth to answer me but snapped it shut as La's next words registered.
"...maybe he's Mormon?" La was saying, with a dry, exasperated air. She was desperately pulling away from Jessica now, clearly finished with their conversation.
Edward snorted loudly.
Mormon?
"You're in so much trouble."
Indeed, La was furious when she joined me in chemistry lecture, but she managed to refrain from telling me off for the entire hour. While she didn't speak, her angry little glances every few seconds spoke plainly.
The silver lining was that my idea with the jacket seemed to have worked even better than I thought it might. While her scent was still a punch to the throat, it wasn't nearly as painful as it usually was after even a short separation.
The silence lasted even as the professor dismissed us. La's lips were sealed tightly, but she let me scoop up her bag and walk with her to the pavilion. On the walk, she concentrated on protecting herself from the lazy rain that had begun sometime in the last hour. I assumed she was too busy to talk, but I heard a loud huff emanate from under the hood she'd pulled over her hair.
By the time we had chosen a table and gotten settled, it seemed I was forgiven. It was also possible she was simply happy to no longer be out in the rain. Her moods swung with direct correlation to how much water was falling out of the sky, and her ability to get away from it.
I waited for her to start the conversation, wondering if she was going to tell me off, but she took her time laying out her snacks. Crackers on one side of a napkin, cheese on the other, carrots and dip above. Crumbs were brushed away from her space meticulously before she popped a cracker in her mouth and chewed thoughtfully.
"So, you were vicariously listening?" She asked calmly.
"Thanks for calling me unbelievable," I said by way of answer and asked for her phone with a motion of my hand. She rolled her eyes but unlocked the phone with a finger and handed it over.
I navigated to her contacts and tapped my number in slowly. Her screen was a little hesitant to accept my cold hard touch. I had to be careful to use the flat of my finger.
"Did you mean it?" I asked her earnestly. It seemed impossible, but I so desperately wanted to know. I needed to hear it from her mouth, to see her speak the words.
"Of course I did," she said. Her answer was simple and matter-of-fact like it should have been obvious to me and everyone else. Maybe it was, and I was just a hopelessly clueless man in love. The ground could have opened up and swallowed us whole. I never would have noticed as long as I could see her face.
"What did you mean about me being Mormon?" She'd raised her hand to touch me, but let it drop onto the table between us. Her fingers were slender and elegant. One ring ornamented her middle finger, while a narrow triangular design decorated the first knuckle of her ring finger.
I gazed at the hand, fighting the urge to take it up in mine and feel the heat emanating from her palm. It may have been cowardice, but even after her admission of feelings for me, I was sure she would recoil from the iciness of my touch.
"That," she motioned with her left hand. "You don't like it when I touch you."
Oh, that wasn't true, though. I just… Oh! I studied her. A flush suffused her cheeks and she withdrew her hand to her lap. As I watched, her embarrassment grew. She meant she wanted me to touch her as well. She wanted me to… Oh no.
I fell down a dizzying spiral of beautiful things that could never happen. I imagined that I was human and we didn't have to worry about life-ending choices and then realized she never would have spent time on the type of dolt I had been before my transition, anyway. Instead, I thought about how wonderful it would be if she was a vampire, too. We would have all the time in the world to do exactly the types of things she had just implied.
Did I just say something? Or did she?
"Seattle will be fun," she mentioned, and picked at a nail bed on one of her hands - a nervous habit, along with squeezing her fingers until they cracked.
I grabbed at the subject change wildly. Anything was better than the topic we had strayed perilously close to.
"Saturday is supposed to be beautiful, actually…." And I had just thought of the perfect place to go. Behind me I caught the fidgeting and whispering of my siblings. Alice gave a soft gasp, and Edward asked for clarification. I continued my conversation with La, but diverted my attention to puzzling out what it was they were harping about.
Edward, I thought. Wanna fill me in?
"Tell him," I heard Edward mutter. Alice heaved a mighty sigh but answered low enough that only another vampire would be able to pick up the whisper.
"It's the meadow, Emmett. The one I keep seeing in my visions. First during the family meeting, and then again last night."
She didn't need to clarify. I distinctly remembered the visions. Alice had Seen only two outcomes; La would die or become undead. Whatever happened in the meadow would seal La's fate.
"Unless you'd rather not be alone with me," I amended to La. It was meant as a hail mary, and it seemed La took it as seriously as I meant it, though she seemed to find the warning unnecessary. She considered it, but ultimately brushed it off, as though she wouldn't even acknowledge the danger.
I tried a few more times to get her to reconsider but with little effort. She was the sort of person that stuck to a decision once made. I wouldn't have been able to reason with her had I tried, though her nonchalance was infuriating. I worried she didn't quite grasp the permanence of her choices, so I would have to show her.
La let her gaze wander from me, delicately touching the faces surrounding us. The group she normally sat with during break was watching us intently, whispering between themselves at our every move. Jessica was explaining to Angela why my body language was positive, and that I was clearly "into" their friend.
Angela was nodding noncommittally, and making tiny noises to indicate she was paying attention when actually she was watching a short kid with glasses at the other end of the table.
Behind me, my siblings had gone quiet. La's wandering gaze had settled in their direction. I turned to see what was holding her attention to find all three siblings gazing at us. Edward and Jasper were both concentrating on me. Edward gave me a slight grimace and a minute shrug, while next to him Jasper was rigid with anger… because I never got around to warning him.
He must have expected that La would figure out what we were, or assumed I would give in and tell her, but I should have told him before it came to that. Now, he would only see the risk this posed to Alice. Though his worry would be moot if I ended up killing La on Saturday as Alice foresaw. Regardless, I really should have told him as soon as I got home from Port Angeles, despite my distraction. As soon as La was safely home after school, I would have to make an extra effort to apologize.
Alice was peering at us seriously, though she seemed to only see La. Her eyes roamed over La's face, absorbing every detail, as if to ensure she remembered even the tiniest feature. I suddenly realized that Alice really didn't know which way her vision would go, regardless of where she assured me she placed her bets and the uncertainty scared her.
I shuddered and changed the subject again. I could cancel, but I knew I would end up right back here so I would just have to trust myself. La peppered questions at me about my family, our hunting practices, and our diet. Her enthusiasm was catching. I let myself settle into this new version of normal; sitting out in public with a human, discussing the intricacies of hunting grizzly.
It was weird, but it was fun too. La continued to amaze me with her lack of any reaction. Nothing fazed her, try as I might.
Our easy camaraderie continued through lunch and into chemistry lab. I loved watching the way she worked. Her movements were so precise like she planned everything before she acted, down to the smallest touch.
Curiosity got the better of me as I watched her fold a cloth, place it carefully behind her buret, and set a pipette on top of it. As with everything else, these movements were tiny and calculated.
"Why do you do that?" I asked her.
"Hmm?" she wasn't paying attention, focused on calibrating her experiment. "Do what?"
"Move like you have a plan for everything…."
She paused, freezing in place like a deer in headlights. "I definitely don't have a plan for everything. There are some things you can't plan for."
"Like an undead giant asking you on a date?"
"Yes, exactly like that," she relaxed, grinned, and returned her attention to her work.
"What else?" I gave up on my experiment and sat back to watch her perform hers. I could probably recreate this experiment from memory. Watching La was way more interesting.
By way of an answer, I got the same sad smile she had offered the day she'd been sick from seeing blood. Like last time, it halted any further questioning I may have had and she quickly redirected our conversation.
Alice and Jasper caught up with me at the door to our Latin classroom. Jasper turned away from me, cold and angry, while Alice was positively alight with excitement; a direct one-eighty from the solemnity she had exhibited at lunch. I eyed her critically as she arranged her props on her desk. She had a new set of fountain pens and a leather-bound notebook full of heavy, unblemished parchment paper.
"A little much for Latin, don't you think?" I asked her. "You know it's a dead language, right?"
She chirruped a little sound of dismissal and went back to fidgeting excitedly. Jasper only shrugged at my questioning glance and returned to glaring at the front of the room. He was definitely upset with me about telling La the truth.
"This can't be about showing off the car, can it?" I asked Alice.
She grinned widely. "It's so nice to drive again!"
"This is about La, isn't it?" She grinned wider at my resignation.
"Just a couple of days now!"
"I thought you weren't sure if she would survive the weekend?"
"Technically I'm not," she gave up on her desk arrangement. "But I'm still betting on you."
It should have been annoying that she was so adamant about getting to know La that she was willing to throw caution to the winds for the chance. It should have been annoying, or frustrating at the very least, but I found it helpful. Her faith in me bolstered my confidence.
Our professor had started lecture, but I could feel Jasper's cold shoulder next to me. I would have to deal with this now rather than wait until we were home, as I initially had intended.
"I'm sorry I didn't tell you," I whispered.
"It's not just you," he glowered. "I'm the only one that didn't know."
"It wasn't up to them to tell you, this is on me."
He turned to me and whispered harshly under his breath. "This was not the deal. We were supposed to wait and see if she said anything, or wait and see if you brought her into the family. There was never any discussion of leaving her human, and giving her all of our secrets!"
"We're still waiting to see!" I hissed back. "Alice's vision hasn't changed."
"It's clearer," she added helpfully. "You'll have to take me to that meadow one day, Emmett. It's pretty."
"No," Jasper and I said together. She pouted and started sketching out a figure with her pens. Apparently, each one carried a different color ink.
"I'm sorry, brother," I tried again. "Forgive me?"
He shook his head. "I do, I always will, but I'm worried you're not thinking clearly. She knows now. It's time to make a decision. Ask Carlisle to help you."
"I will," I said. "But not yet. It has to be La's choice, and I'm not convinced she understands the gravity of that choice yet."
"We've already talked about this-"
"I know," I sighed, and like I'd begged of his wife that morning, again I pleaded, "Give me the weekend."
"Alright, man," he agreed. "But don't wait too long. You might lose the choice altogether."
On that, I couldn't argue.
The worst part about the ride to La's cottage was how ridiculously short it was. I listened to her chat amiably about silly things, doing my best to listen to the space between sentences, the pause before a thought. There wasn't much to learn, she was inscrutable as usual.
The tight proximity in the confines of the car was as much of a wonderful rush now as it had been that morning and the night before. I could feel the heat of her across the center console even through my jacket. She was leaning slightly to the left. One knee bent with a heel hooked on the seat bottom. She looked comfortable and casual, and absolutely beautiful. If I could freeze this precise moment and live in it forever, I would have done it in an instant.
This perfect image was exactly what I wanted my forever to look like; easy, companionable, and cheerful. I hoped beyond anything for it to come true.