Alice ducked into a store on the way to SeaTac and returned with a lighter and several sets of colored contacts. "The lighter is for setting Victoria on fire once you've ripped her into pieces," she explained. "The contacts are for you. You'll have to put new ones in every few hours, because the venom in your eyes will slowly dissolve them."

I nodded and slid them into place, grimacing at the distracting glass in front of my vision. I checked the result in the hand mirror. The resultant muddy color of my eyes wasn't the same shade of brown that they'd been before, but at least it was a vaguely human color. Then it occurred to me: "Alice, what am I going to do about a photo ID?" My skin had always been pale, and my hair was unchanged, but my face really didn't look the same. My driver's license was with my wallet in my backpack, but it might as well belong to a different person. One who was plain instead of supernaturally beautiful.

"Wear your hair so it covers more of your face," she instructed, "and I'll dazzle the TSA agent."

I frowned. "There is no way that works."

She raised her eyebrows and tapped her forehead. Okay. It would work.

We ran the rest of the way to SeaTac, taking a slightly inefficient route to avoid populated areas as long as possible. I inhaled for the last time a mile away from the airport. As long as I didn't have to talk to anyone, I wouldn't need to breathe in for the whole trip, and it would be much easier to be among humans if I couldn't smell them. Running without air felt strange; breathing was such a deeply ingrained habit that I had to consciously refrain.

Alice wrapped her hand tightly around my wrist as we spotted our first human, a Korean woman in her mid thirties. The pressure helped keep me grounded. I could see her blood pulsing in her neck, and the temptation to sink my fangs in was strong, but not overwhelming. I moved mechanically, matching my gait to Alice's, keeping my eyes straight ahead. More humans came into view as we passed through the revolving door into the airport.

We were walking so slowly that I wanted to scream, but it must have seemed like speed-walking to the mortals around us. It honestly took me a moment to realize that the moving walkway wasn't broken–the people on it might as well have been standing still. "Please watch your step," it advised us unnecessarily as we strode past.

We collected our tickets and entered the security line without incident. The queue shuffled glacially forward. I was positive that a snail could have outpaced us. A tide of humans surrounded us, and I tried not to look at their flushed cheeks or exposed jugulars, but every time I glanced away there were more waiting to catch my eye. I clenched Alice's hand tightly.

She worked her magic on the security guard; I smiled shyly at him from under my hair, and he waved us through in a daze. I was briefly surprised that the x-ray machines didn't complain about my rock-solid skin, but in retrospect, it wasn't Alice's first time on a plane.

We were halfway to the gate when Alice yanked me aside into the bathroom. She dragged me into the handicapped stall and pushed the flimsy lock into position. Since I couldn't talk without breathing, I raised an eyebrow at her questioningly. "There's someone with an open wound out there," she answered. "Don't think too hard about it."

Too late: I was already picturing blood flowing. Would it be a papercut, or a larger injury? Would their blood taste as sweet as the refrigerated bags I'd had for lunch, or would it be even better fresh from the source? Venom welled up in my mouth. I was a heartbeat away from inhaling to scent my prey when Alice slapped me. "Edward," she reminded me.

Right. There was one thing infinitely more important than my thirst. I could not get on the plane if I murdered someone in public. I could not make it in time to save Edward if I missed this flight.

Also, I valued human life.

Distract me, I mouthed at Alice. She launched into an explanation of Portuguese verb tenses and basic vocabulary, speaking too quickly and softly for any humans to hear us. Once I had memorized the basics, she started explaining the rest while speaking Portuguese, and translating consumed more of my attention. It was unlikely that I'd actually need to speak to anyone in Rio de Janeiro, but it was a good way to pass the time. Ten minutes later, the coast was clear, and I had already learned more than in four years of high school language classes.

We reached the gate just as they were making the final boarding call–there was no reason to be around humans even a minute longer than necessary. I silently presented my boarding pass and walked down the jet bridge to the plane. Alice had paid a hefty sum to get us first-row seats, and I took the spot next to the window. I turned my head so that I couldn't see or smell any humans. If I tried to move toward any of them, she would block me. But I couldn't turn off my hearing. I could pick out individual heartbeats for several aisles, and every pump of human blood reminded me of my thirst. The burn in my throat wasn't nearly as torturous as my transformation, but knowing that I could do something about it made it harder to bear.

The minutes ticked by. Alice was still doing her best to occupy my brain with other things. She was quite a good language teacher, explaining relevant etymologies and morphologies so that I could predict when verb tenses would be irregular. Learning the linguistic principles also made for a much better distraction than simple memorization. When I was fluent in Portuguese, she moved on to French.

The stewardess stopped by. "Can I get you anything to drink?"

I shook my head, still staring out the window.

"I'll have a Bloody Mary," Alice requested sweetly.

Hilarious. I kicked her in the leg gently. There was a crunching noise as her heel pushed into the metal seat frame. Oops.

We resumed language lessons. French was easy to learn now that I had Portuguese down. Half the time I could predict what a word meant before Alice told me. The grammar was similar too. Unfortunately, that meant it wasn't keeping my mind as busy. I suddenly realized I was paying more attention to the pulse of the businesswoman behind me than to the uses of the subjunctive.

Edward needs you! I screamed at myself mentally, forcing myself to refocus. I pictured his face, blurry like all my human memories, but still precious to me above all else. I tapped out a complex beat with my foot, drowning out the nearby heartbeats. Then I stole Alice's napkin and wrote, "Non-Romance language instead?" She obliged, listing five options; none of them was even Indo-European.

I considered the choices. Sign language was the most obviously practical for my current situation, but in order to learn it I would have to look over at Alice–and inevitably, I would see past her to the humans on the other side of the aisle. A spoken language seemed safer. I picked the first on her list.

I was three hours into learning Mandarin when the plane touched down. As soon as it was off the runway and preparing for taxi, Alice and I stood up. I hastily stuffed the napkin and pen into my bag and stepped out into the aisle. Ignoring the stewardess' rebuke, we shoved open the exit and jumped out of the plane. As soon as we were out of sight of the windows, we started running at full speed out of the city.

We crashed through the jungle, following the faint traces of Edward's scent. The newborn blood in me made me faster than Alice by a good deal on an open plain, but the thick foliage slowed me down. She could always tell which path was fastest, deciding on a route and then changing her mind over and over as she foresaw the obstacles in the way. After my first few times sinking into muck or tangling with thick branches, I learned to follow her steps. All the while she was mentally shouting for Edward, knowing that he would pick up on her thoughts at a wider range than he could hear our voices.

And then, suddenly, I saw him running toward us. He was impressively fast even by vampire standards, but no longer a blur to my enhanced eyes. Our paths met in a small clearing.

I stared.

He was the most breathtakingly beautiful creature I'd ever laid eyes on. My human memories had done him no justice.

Every facet of his face was sculpted to perfection. Where the sunlight filtered down through the leaves and touched him, he sparkled, and the radiance perfectly accentuated his angelic lips. His eyes were a shade so captivating that I couldn't believe I'd ever assigned it the single word 'amber.'

He was staring at me too, disbelieving, lips parted slightly.

I could have spent eternity memorizing the lines of his chin, but I regained enough of my awareness to wonder that we had made it with time to spare. Alice's visions didn't account for themselves, I realized; she could see how long it would take us to get somewhere with no additional future information, but she couldn't see how long it would take if she made iterative improvements based on her visions. It was the sort of thing that would have made my head spin when I was a mere mortal, and I marveled for a moment at the speedup in my thinking. Some tiny part of me wondered if Mr. Varner's calculus lessons would make any sense now. Not that I would ever find out.

Before any of us spoke, there was a rustle at the far end of the clearing, and Victoria stepped out.