Bella's Point of View
Time passes. Even when it seems impossible. Even when each tick of the second hand aches like the pulse of blood behind a bruise. It passes unevenly, in strange lurches and dragging lulls.
Time passes when you no longer want it to, longing for the clock to stop, the stage lights to dim, the curtains to close. It passes when you want the play to be over, the costumes to be put away, the seats to be emptied.
Time passes, and it drags, like the waves of the ocean crashing down upon me, each one growing stronger than the last, pulling me under, just barely above the surface but unable to catch a breath for relief. It passes when the emotions are so far past anguish that you wish there was another word in the English language, something more fitting—something that could make another person understand.
Time passes even when there's nothing left of your soul to keep putting into it.
Oh, pass it does.
Even for me.
Life with Charlie was simple, but I found comfort in the simplicity.
Since graduating high school, I had found myself growing stagnant. With not much left to do, I dove headfirst into the books on my bookshelf, finishing each within months. I filled every notebook I could find with poetry, scrawled down my own stories, and neatly wrote out memories of the Cullens in the hopes that I would never forget them.
I had become a dreamer of sorts, immersing myself in whatever art form I could to keep the terrible thoughts at bay. But painting… painting had been a mistake. My hands betrayed me, never able to capture them as they were. The lines blurred, the details slipped, and my feeble human memory reduced them to faded, unrecognizable figures. It was infuriating. The last thing I had left of them, and even that was slipping from my grasp.
I sigh, shaking the thought from my mind as I pull into the driveway. I nervously walked up the steps, trying to shake the unsettling feeling away from myself. The house is dark, but that isn't unusual. Charlie often left the lights off when he worked late shifts, not wanting to waste electricity. But his car was in the driveway.
I open the door carefully, peeking inside. "Dad?"
Silence.
I step inside, shrugging my coat off and hanging it beside his police jacket, still untouched. It smells like home—coffee, rain-soaked wood, and the faintest trace of the aftershave Charlie always used.
I try again, a little louder this time. "Are you there?"
Nothing.
Something about the silence feels… off. It isn't just the quiet of an empty house—it's hollow, deafening. An absence where something should be.
I pull my phone from my pocket, checking the time. 11:33 PM.
A small, irrational prickle of worry creeps up my spine, but I push it aside yet again.
It's Charlie.
He's fine.
Still, my stomach churns as I make my way into the kitchen.
I round the corner.
And my world ends.
A sound rips from my throat—somewhere between a gasp and a sob—as I drop to my knees from the force of the sight in front of me.
Charlie is there. But he isn't.
His body is wrong, twisted in ways no body should be, as if something had taken him apart and put him back together without understanding how human anatomy was supposed to work. His arms are at unnatural angles, his legs—what's left of them—crushed beyond recognition. The white linoleum is drowned in red.
His tendons hang loose, his ribs shattered, his chest caved inward as though something impossibly strong had collapsed him like a brittle shell.
My breath is gone.
My lungs don't work.
The world spins as my eyes trail lower, taking in the details I should not be seeing.
And then I see it.
Drawn across the floor in thick, gleaming strokes of Charlie's blood is a single word.
YOU.
The scream that tears from me is something raw, something feral. My hands hit the ground as I fumble, smearing blood as I begin to slip. I finally manage to bring my shaky hands to my pockets as I bring out my cellphone.
I can't think.
I can't breathe.
I press the device to my ear, my entire body convulsing, fingers stained crimson as I dial the only number that makes sense.
"911, what is the address of your emergency?"
My voice is barely human to my own ears when it comes out, broken and breathless. "My— my dad—" My throat closes, refusing to let the words form. My thoughts blur as I try to make sense of what the voice on the other end is saying. I sputter out my address between sobs, the only thing I'm able to get out.
I squeeze my eyes shut, willing myself to wake up, for this to be a dream, for this to be anything but real.
But when I open them again, Charlie is still there.
This is real.
Time passes, even when the strings attaching you to this Earth are gone.
Oh, pass it does.