I pushed the glass sliding door aside, stepped inside, and swiftly closed it behind me. Then I rushed up the stairs.

"Edward," Alice said as I reached the top step. "Explain to me why I saw you drinking that girl's blood." She looked up, into my eyes. "You didn't actually do it."

I scoffed. "Of course not. What do you think I am? A..." I had been about to say "monster", but that is exactly what I am. A soulless monster. "Forget it. But she's alive, and asleep."

Sleep. Something that I have wished to be able to do ever since it had been taken away from me. And to add to my problem: I don't own a bed.

I brushed past Alice and the banister, and made way to my room. I switched the light on. A desk, loveseat, and, of course, a bookshelf welcomed me. I picked up the first book that I laid eyes on, and stood with my back against the wall. I started reading, not caring what the words were, only reading to fill my mind so that I couldn't think.

After a minute and seventeen seconds, I impatiently slid the book back to its place on the shelf.

Although over the years I had learned how to block out others' thoughts, I have never known peace from my own. I need to stop thinking about her. A girl. A human. My past—

Think about something else. Anything.

The mental image of the grand piano that sat in a room downstairs came to mind.

I wanted to head there and let my fingers flow freely over the keys of the grand piano, thinking about nothing else besides the next key that I would gently press down on. But I risked being seen by my family members. I decided to risk it anyway.

I turned the doorknob as quietly as I could muster, but doors tend to make noise—especially when you don't want them to.

Within seconds, I was seated on the piano bench, the cloth that protected the keys from dust laying on the floor.

I shut my eyes, and my fingers took over, skillfully playing each note by memory. I didn't have to think much, yet I couldn't think about anything that didn't concern my playing.

Each note gave me a feeling of satisfaction, like the quenching of a thirst. Thirst. I had almost killed her earlier. If it weren't for that juvenile fox, she would've been laying on the cold, leaf filled ground, her motionless body void of blood. As I imagined the scene, my stomach churned.Animal blood will never be enough, I thought.

My fingers lost their placement, and the keys they touched all sounded so wrong together. How could I have messed up? I had been playing this piece ever since I could read music! My hands formed into fists, cracking a handful of key tops and probably denting the wooden key parts, too.

I picked up the cloth and laid it back over the keys, then lowered the fallboard down. I groaned and exited the room to go back into my own. The cracks could wait.

When the sun had fully risen, the light that shone above the trees shone into my "bedroom" window, and Madison's thoughts suddenly pierced through my own, even though I had previously tuned down her dreams of picking wildflowers. It's going to be a fun weekend! I hope Amelia won't make a fuss out of her parents leaving. Now, what should I wear? she thought, then pictured a loose fitting, light pink dress with miniature daisies on it. Found it!

Accidentally, I had let the others' mental voices fill my head. It was a mess of speech that could only be understood if I focused on one voice at a time. Almost immediately, though, I had shut them out again. Megan Yeager's had been a bit quieter, so I assumed she had gone out to be by the river—as she likes listening to it when the water levels are low.

I focused extra strength on making sure that Madison's mental voice was as quiet as I could possibly make it to be.

I replay last night's events in my head. Why had I led her into the woods and told her what I was? If I hadn't told her that I really remembered her, maybe it would've made it easier for her to go on with her life and forget about me. Or the mere idea of the boy who she still believes me to be, anyway.

Venom pooled in my mouth as I recalled the urge that I had had to let my lips touch her skin.Why are you thinking of such things? Just ask Carlisle to move again and be done with her. We could come back to Forks in a century, after she will have passed.But the idea didn't exactly appeal to me as much as the one that I had when I had first met her.

To love her.

Edward! Alice thought. I just saw Megan going to Madison's home.

I didn't let another second pass before I slid the window screen up and jumped down. My weight created an indentation in the grass.

When I reached the Yeagers' door, it had been opened. Which I hadn't expected, considering both Madison and her cousin had locked the door when they went out.

I could hear the beeping and whirring of a heart-rate monitor. And the air carried a fresh trail of Megan's scent: a mix of venom, the laundry detergent that the Yeagers used—as she still wore her old clothes—and Esme's shampoo.

I followed her scent—which only became stronger with each step I took—into a room. I looked to my right and I saw the heart rate monitor, the lines climbing higher and higher. I looked down and saw Megan (light brown hair with some gray strands) crouched over the bed.

It took me a second to realize what was happening. But when I did, I jumped at Megan and pulled her back with such force that we had fallen onto the floor and slid towards the wall, under an open window.

She turned to look at me, her eyes a deep red and her lips blood stained. She glared at me. "YOU—"

Her husband shrieked and squirmed around as if he hoped that moving would stop the pain. She turned her head towards him, her expression shifting into one of regret and worry. "Oh... What have I done?" she cried, making a move to go over to him.

I held her back. "It'll be better for you if you stayed here."

I shouted loudly and quickly for anyone of my family members to come over to help. My voice was so high-pitched that even if any humans heard what I had said, their minds would convince them that it was just a bird's cry.

Within the next moment, Alice appeared at the doorway. "I came as soon as the vision ended."

"I was too late. Her venom's already in his bloodstream." I stood up, shaking my head, my eyes on the pine floorboards.

Megan sat with her back pressed against the wall, hugging her knees to her chest as she rocked back and forth. "I...I killed him," she murmured.

I had wanted to tell her that she didn't really kill him. But what she had done was worse than killing him.

Alice went over to comfort her. "You've been doing really well. He'll be fine."

"What should we do?" I asked myself, looking at Thomas Yeager as he screamed and jerked in pain. If I had been just a little bit faster, perhaps he wouldn't be suffering this fate.

"We need to get him out of the house and get Carlisle to make up an excuse," Alice said. "Do you know when Brianna and Madison will get back home?"

I went over to close the window and bedroom door in hope that it would be harder for outsiders to hear Mr. Yeager's screams. "Madison won't be returning until tomorrow afternoon—she's babysitting. As for Brianna, I don't know."

The door opened, and Jasper walked in. He stopped in his tracks, smelling that blood that stained Megan's lips.

I hurried towards him. "Jasper, I don't think you should be in here."

He nodded and I took him out of the house. "Can you please tell Carlisle to get here as soon as possible? I'll try to get Mr. Yeager out as quickly as I can.."

"Yes. And also, Edward, Megan regrets doing it."

"I know."

"You're angry at her. I'll get going now."

Megan was standing up now, in the corner of the room furthest away from where Tom laid. "I can't believe I had done that. It was so stupid. I didn't even try to resist!"

"Tell us what had happened exactly," Alice said softly.

"You know how I'm basically not allowed to go anywhere without one of you accompanying me, right? Well at morning I snuck out to go donate the used clothes without telling anyone to prove that I could go out by myself. I didn't think about drinking any blood at the Thrift shop, but when I was walking past here my mouth filled with venom and I guess instinct took over."

"We have preferences in flavors, just like humans. His blood type probably just smells better to you." I unplugged the heart-rate monitor. It was useless now.

"How...long will he be like this?"

"Usually three or four days," I said. "We should probably leave. I'll try to carry him back home."

Carlisle had told Brianna that Thomas had woken up when he came to check on him and was sent to the rehabilitation center. Basically the same story he had told them about Megan.

When Madison had returned from her babysitting on Sunday, Brianna told her what had happened and she immediately suspected that he had been turned, just like Megan. Though she couldn't figure out why, as he had seemed to be perfectly healthy, unlike her mother. She went straight to bed even though it had only been the afternoon and started dreaming about having the company of a horse who could fish.

Someone had knocked on the door. "Edward, can you please answer it?" Alice said.

I opened the door to reveal Madison. She shivered, and kept her hands in her pockets. Her wavy black hair had been straightened out by the rain. Alice had probably seen her coming. "What are you doing here?"

"I came over to invite you and your family to a Christmas party I will be hosting next week, on the 23rd." Her teeth clattered.

"I'll walk you home."

"Bu—"

"I'll take less time, and then you can dry yourself off. You shouldn't be here."

As soon as Madison locked the bathroom door, I left. What part of "forget me" does that girl not understand? I thought as I went back into my room.

Mr. Yeager screamed in pain every so often. Carlisle had given Megan a dose of morphine when the venom had entered her system, in hopes to get rid of some (if not all) of the pain, but it only paralyzed her, and she told us that it had actually hurt more after the morphine had entered her system.

If only I had paid attention to the fact that Megan's mental voice was further away this morning, all of this could've been avoided. I needed to do something.

The broken piano keys came to mind. I would be able to spend some time in the attic looking for the replacements, which I knew that we had.

I had been able to locate the replacement key tops in under five minutes, in a small cardboard box that also had my tuning kit stored in it along with some other equipment. I took the entire box down to the music room.

I removed the music desk and fallboard, setting them both aside on the floor. Then I took off the black pieces at the sides and front of the keyboard that prevented it from coming out. I started to pull the keyboard out of its place when I realized that I didn't have a table in the room.

Getting a table was a minor inconvenience, but I was grateful for it; it occupied me for longer.

Although I've had over a century of practice for tuning my piano and a decent amount of times to replace my key tops (so that all the ivory ones had been replaced with plastics), it still took me over an hour to get everything done. That hour was nice and peaceful though, with my mind only on the piano.

I assembled the piano back together, and played a few scales. Though it wouldn't've been noticeable to a human's ears, I could hear the slight difference now that the piano had been tuned to perfection.

Edward, thought Madison. I tried to ignore her thoughts, but it didn't work. It never does work when someone mentions my name. Edward, I know you can hear this.Well, I wished that I couldn't. None of this would've happened if I could. At least I would've been oblivious to the fact that she remembered her past life. A life that involved me.

Edward, please. Can you come over? I shouldn't've told her that I could read her mind. Now she's just taking advantage of that knowledge. Edwarddddd. Eddieeeee~

"ALL RIGHT! I WILL! NOW STOP IT!" I shouted, slamming the door shut as I walked out.

"Are you okay, Edward?" Esme called from the library.

"Yes, I'm fine. I'll just be out for a while." And with that said, I left.

I jumped up onto a tree and sat on a thick branch that grew right in front of Madison's window. I tapped on the window gently, but it was enough to get her attention: I heard her heart skip a beat and her pulse quicken. Surely a bird didn't try to fly in at this hour, she thought. She stood up and came to the window to investigate. Her dark gray eyes possessed a hint of fear in them.

"Oh, it's you," she whispered as she leaned over her desk to push the window open, then pushed the insect screen up. "Why hadn't you knocked on the door like a sensible person?"

"Your door has a bell that Brianna will surely hear, even through her slumber."

I climbed in through the window, onto her desk.

Her room was exactly as she pictured it in her mind: with the wardrobe to the left of the room, the bed exactly in the middle, facing the window, the door between the left of her bed and the wardrobe, a nightstand to the right of the bed, and the doors to a built-in closet on the right wall. Except her sheets had been changed from a solid mint green to a floral pattern made up of so many different flowers that even I didn't bother to remember them.

She sat down at the foot of her bed.

"Why did you come over earlier?"

She exhaled. "You know that it wasn't just to invite you over don't you?"

"You've been wondering if the same thing had happened to your father. Well you're right." I said as I strode around the room. I could've stood still without moving a limb for a very long time without getting uncomfortable—if you ignored the fact that I would be thirsty—but walking around was just a habit I had to appear more human. Along with placing my hands in my pockets then taking them out from time to time.

"But why was he? I know that Meg couldn't make it out alive as human—"

"She isn't alive."

She rolled her eyes. "You know what I mean. Anyway was it same for him?"

"Not really." I didn't want to talk about it. It reminded me of the times when I had gone against my family's feeding habits. "By the way, you had invited us to a Christmas celebration?"

She frowned at the subject change, but then smiled and nodded. "Remember on Christmas Eve of 1917?" she asked after a few seconds.

"Yes," I said, rather firmly.So that's why she had smiled. Because it gave her a chance to talk about our past, I thought.

With not much else that I could do even if I left, I decided to go along with her conversation. "It's a bit hazy in my memory, but I do remember the gist of it: I had finally gathered the courage to ask your father permission to court you, and had been too eager to wait another moment before asking you."

"Yes. I remember the day even more vividly now. After supper, we had snuck outside. Sitting beneath the apple tree, you asked me to promise to be your wife." She looked out of the window. In her mind, she was replaying how that very day (a hundred and two years ago) had gone by for her.

I stood by the back door with my hands in my pants pockets, wearing a scarf only because my mother had ordered me to. "Elle, would you like to step out with me for a while?" I asked in a hushed voice, only wanting her for company.

"Of course," she replied, closing her book. "I'll be back in a moment." She hurried to her room, the book in her hands.

She returned with a navy blue hat on her head, and her knit shawl that she had grown quite proud of—"It's the first thing that I've completed without mother telling me to!"—draped over her shoulders.

I turned the doorknob slowly, and opened the door. I let her step out first. Flakes of snow spiraled down from the sky, and every breath we took was as visible as smoke.

"Sarah had been worried that it would be a green Christmas just like the past few years. Which is really more of an ugly yellow"—she held out her gloved palm to allow snowflakes to fall on it—"She'll be delighted when she looks out of the window in the morning."

I laughed, taking a seat on one of the stones beneath the bare braced apple tree. "You know, I've realized that Green Christmases aren't so bad as long as I can be with you."

She turned to look at me. "Oh, I must tell you that I saw you talking with Father outside my window this forenoon, you seemed excited..."

I let out an exaggerated sigh. "So you know then."

"What? No! I didn't eavesdrop! Just...watched." She blushed.

"So you spied then," I teased, giggling. The ground now had a thin layer of snow covering it.

"Of course not!"

"About that conversation I had with your father earlier I want to ask you something."

Flakes of snow littered her hair. It was a rather charming effect, especially as she smiled. "Yes?"

"I know that we're both quite young, but..."

She twirled part of her hair with her finger, let it loose, then twirled it again.

I breathed in deeply, trying to calm my racing heart. "But every time that I imagine what my future would look like well...you're in it."

"I'm in it? Of course I'll be in it! We'll always be friends Eddie."

I shook my head lightly. "No, Elle. I meant it differently. That I—"

She clasped her hands over her mouth. "Surely you can't be saying—"

A small smile inevitably crept onto my face. "That I love you and I want you to promise to be my wife someday?"

She took her hair that had been tucked behind her ears and slyly covered her mouth with it. "I can't believe—that you're actually asking me this."

I didn't know what to make of her response, especially since she hid part of her face behind her hair. I couldn't help but let my face fall a little. I stood up. "I'm sorry—"

"You don't have to be." She hopped off of the stone and wrapped her arms around me.

I looked down at her, shocked by her powerful embrace. I quickly hugged her back.

She looked up at me, smiling with her set of pearly whites. I couldn't help myself: before I knew it, I had placed my lips on hers. But only for a moment; as the kiss had been short, but sweet, like eating something that satisfied a craving.

A first kiss that I should've been able to remember for a lifetime.

"We had kissed?!" I asked, genuinely shocked. I moved to create as much distance as I could between us.

"Huh?" Madison looked at her closet's doors, where I now leaned against. "Yeah, you don't remember?"

"Apparently I don't..."

She stood up and strode over to me, her movements full of intention. "Well maybe I could show—" She raised her hands up in the air. "I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to say that!"

"It's fine, Maddie." The second I finished my sentence, she yawned. "You're just tired. You should get some sleep."

"What about you? Don't you have to get back to your coffin?" She asked, looking over her shoulder as she climbed into bed. "And why are you active during the day?"

"Ah, I forgot that I had left you thinking that I am the same monster from those myths. Iama monster, mind you, just not one that sleeps in coffins. Or sleep anywhere, really."

She fluffed her pillow, and put it behind her back. "May you smile?"

"Why?" Silence. "Oh." Then I smiled, showing her all my teeth, none of which were fangs. "No fangs."

"You and your family are always absent from school when it's sunny. Do you burn, at least?" There was a hint of hope in her voice as she asked her question.Hope!

"You would be amused if we did. But sorry to break it to you, we don't. Now, if you go to sleep, I'll—"Why had I been about to say that? I don't usually slip up like this. What else is wrong with me? I thought.

"Are you okay?"

I found my hands placed on the edge of Madison's bed, and I leaned as if I had been trying to get closer to her. I took my hands off her bed, and moved backwards quickly.

She looked away as she yawned again.What had he been about to say? Forget that. What had he been about todo?

"I'll get going." I closed the window and its screen as I sat on a tree branch, then jumped down.

"Good night." She said as I reached the road. I heard the pulling of her lamp's beaded chain.

"G'night," I muttered, fully knowing that she wouldn't be able to hear me.

"Emmett, meet me out back in a minute."

I changed into a pair of sweatpants and a dark blue T-shirt. Even if I hadn't gotten mud on the clothes that I had been wearing, they wouldn't be as comfortable to wrestle in.

Throughout the fight, Madison's dream intrigued me, as it took place in her house, rather than in a forest as they usually do.

Every time my focus shifted away from the fight, I would hear Emmett think of something with my name in it and so my attention would return to the real world, always narrowly dodging his attacks.

One moment, I leaned all the way to the left to avoid Emmett's punch. The next, I threw a small stone at him, but he (as I expected) just caught it in his left hand.

And the moment after that, I watched as I leaned over Madison's bed, held her face in my hands, and kissed her.I can't believe he's actually allowed himself to do that, she thought before kissing me back and putting her right hand to the back of my head, combing through my hair with fingers.

She felt her heart beating against her chest, then finally pulled back to take in a deep breath of air.

I looked down at her, smiling. Something looks off with me, I thought, standing in the middle of the field as Emmett stared at me in confusion.

Madison looked at me as she breathed for another second, then leaned in to kiss me again.

I pushed her down into her bed, and the mattress bounced. She giggled, and looked into my eyes for a long moment. That's when I realized what was off: my eyes were green. Not gold nor amber nor black. Green. And my heart pumped blood, exposed by how red my face was.

I laid on top of her as she pulled me onto another kiss. Even through her blanket, she could feel the coolness that my body emitted.

I pulled back to let her breath. Then I leaned in again, and bit into her neck.

I didn't know it at the time, but I had wished that it was really me, and that it hadn't happened in her dream.

"Yo, you alright?" Emmett snapped his fingers next to my left ear. When I didn't reply, he wrapped his arm around my neck and "choked" me (I don't need to breathe; it's just a habit).

"I'm fine. Sorry. I was thinking about something." If my heart pumped blood, I knew that I would be blushing at that moment.

"You looked troubled. You sure you're okay, man? And I've never seen you lose focus like that in a fight before." He patted me in the back.

"Forget about it," I said. I started walking back to the house. "We can rematch tomorrow if you want."

Had I really just...enjoyed her dream?I thought as I leaned against my bedroom wall, really wishing that I could fall asleep.

Author's note: I had posted this last night (this morning?) on AO3 and Wattpad, but I always have to fix the format when I upload my chapters onto here. So I didn't bother, lol. Hope you guys enjoyed this!