AUTHOR NOTES:

Did I say literally one week ago that I was shooting for Friday uploads, then get really busy with real life and not come through...shhh

This chapter is like 10,000 works, but I honestly think it's really good, strap in!

Content Warning!: this is Edward's POV on his departure at the beginning of New Moon. As such, it is extremely moody and somewhat depressing, with mentions of suicide. If you've read Midnight Sun, you probably can guess what you're about to get into, proceed with caution.


So I prayed to her God for the strength I would need. I knew I wasn't strong enough in myself—the power would have to come from the outside…But I would have to do it. I had to learn the strength. I prayed to her God with all the anguish of my damned, lost soul that he —or she, or it—would help me protect Bella from myself…The future felt like it was pressing closer. I didn't know what the sign would be, but I knew I would recognize it when it came.

- Midnight Sun

Before Bella, With Bella. These were the versions of myself. When I tried to reexamine the haze of my existence in the before, I found vague impressions of my family, or of my brief humanity, vaguer still. My fledgling years with Carlisle, followed by the familial contentment that came with Esme. My time alone, as a 'real' vampire. Rosalie, and Emmett. Then later, Alice and Jasper. In the edges, the shadow of the Denali Coven. And the flashes of various things that had occupied my attention; literature, cars, languages, music. Unlike my fuzzy human recollections, I recalled my near-century as an immortal with perfect clarity. But the memories were not any easier to reexamine. My mind recoiled from them, like a human squinting to read in the dark.

This was a great consolation, as I prepared to return to the darkness. There would be a new, entirely black time for me, stretching into eternity. The After Bella. My mind could embrace my perfect memories of her, reliving the sight and smell and feel of her until I finally gave in to the end. Our kind never died peacefully, or happily. I expected to be the first, knowing her God had brought her back to heaven after a full, happy, human life, free from my poison and her fragile human memories of me long faded.

The strength to leave gathered, then receded through the summer. The Before version of me was never so changeable, but every moment I felt my impending decision creeping forward. I stood under the pressure to keep it from crushing Bella. We avoided the topic of her change, having come to an uneasy consensus to wait. She was waiting for me to change my mind, I knew, because she often spoke of it in her sleep. I'm ready and stay, forever, Edward mumbled softly into her dark bedroom as her warm, soft body curled against me.

I waited too, for something to change. For her to make things easier for me by changing her mind. Seeing her with my family was the largest impediment. I would forget everything joining us would cost her, and for a moment Alice's visions of her as one of us seemed almost palatable. But I hoped that the time she spent with her friends on the beaches in the sun, with Charlie and Jacob, would convince her that we were not worth it. She, stubborn as she was, never wavered. So I waited for the sign, for the strength.

I had been right, all those months ago when I'd told myself I would recognize God's intervention when it came. And that it would finally give me the strength I needed to leave her.

Her finger slid along the wrapping paper, the delicate skin split, blood welled. In an instant, the scent permeated the room, strong as ever. In the minds of my family, I heard as they caught the delicious air carrying it. All of them held their breath, except Jasper. He wasn't prepared.

The monster inside me raged, the bars of his cage buckled. I'd stopped breathing, but the scent of her blood was already inside my lungs, the memory of it on my tongue. Jasper's feral mind distracted me. I turned to see him approaching, through his mind, I saw his vision tunnel to the bead of blood still gathering on the tip of Bella's finger. I felt the agonizing dryness in his throat, compounded with my own, white-hot flames licking up from my chest.

My body acted without my mind's intervention. My instincts realigned to protect Bella. Jasper slammed into me, but he could not have gotten past me even if his strength had tripled. His snarls seemed to echo into my head from a great distance as I locked my arms around him and forced him backwards.

I did not come back to myself until I heard Emmett's devastated, "Come on, Jasper."

Bella was on the ground in a pool of glass. Blood pulsed from a gash in her arm, I could almost feel like the heat of it through the air. She stared at us, and I saw, for the first time, the fear that I had anticipated throughout all of our time together. Learning of my true nature, my history, James' torment, all of it had barely seemed to rattle her. But even my Bella had her limits.

Esme followed Rosalie and Emmett into the yard, dragging Jasper between them. I moved aside for Carlisle, who started to examine Bella's wounds. I reached into his mind and found only his clinical assessments of the situation, glass embedded in the skin, no damage to the muscles or arteries, I have local anesthetic in my bag, would she prefer the hospital? Esme will need bleach for the floor, the rug should be taken out before anyone returns.

Alice's mind was almost entirely consumed with her visions. As I carried Bella into the kitchen for Carlisle's care, I held my breath and kept my eyes from meeting hers. Alice stood next at the edge of the room, her eyes vacant. In her mind, she searched the future. The Bella I dreaded, with gaunt cheeks and a hollow sadness in gaze, filled every possibility Alice found. For the first time, I felt the vision strengthen, instead of debilitate me. Bella was strong, and human, she would survive my leaving. It was clear now that she could not survive my staying. Alice let out a tiny whimper as the vision solidified, the other possibilities receded. She relied on Jasper, in these moments when her gift overwhelmed her reality and she couldn't find her way back to the present. But Jasper was gone, far enough away that I could not find his mind when I searched.

I watched Carlisle work, without breathing. The memory of her blood, hot and fragrant in my mouth slowly crept into my perception. Just a taste, the monster inside me pleaded, I can stop, I've done it before, just a taste.

"Just go, Edward," Bella said, her voice wobbling.

"I can handle it," I said. It was the worst lie I'd ever told, and now reserves of air were low.

"You don't need to be a hero. Carlisle can fix me up without your help. Get some fresh air." Carlisle slid the anesthetic needle into her skin, Bella winced.

"I'll stay," I insisted. Even as Carlisle's control was rock solid and mine wavered, I could hardly bring myself to leave her in his and Alice's presence.

Bella huffed, "why are you so masochistic?"

Carlisle interceded. "Edward, you may as well go find Jasper before he gets too far. I'm sure he's upset with himself, and I doubt he'll listen to anyone but you right now." His mind's words were not so calm. Son, you are not in control. She'll be fine. You're only upsetting her.

Bella eagerly agreed, "Yes. Go find Jasper."

She had already recovered from her fear, as she had so quickly after James. Already thinking of my comfort ahead of her own safety, as always. I resolved to prove her and Carlisle wrong. I would be with her, the memory of the needle sliding through her delicate skin would fortify me for what came next.

Alice screamed at me through her mind, I froze as I watched the vision unfold. Just a few seconds from now, as Carlisle pulled the next piece of glass from Bella's arm. In our minds, we watched as I took a breath, deciding to show Bella nonexistent ease at the situation. I saw my eyes close as I inhaled the decadence of Bella's blood. Then my hand slammed into Carlisle's chest. He stumbled backwards, shock written across his face, then horror as I lunged for Bella's throat.

The vision ended, Alice's panic flooded my mind, you need to get out of here, now! For Bella, she said, "You might as well do something useful," then to me again I'll leave too, you know she'll be safe with Carlisle.

I left then, sprinting from the back door and into the forest. The others had taken Jasper east. They would run into the park until they found somewhere with no humans for miles before they let go of him. All of them had done it before. Alice would stay closer to the house, she saw that Jasper did not want to face her. He had slipped more than the rest of them put together, but she already knew the shame of this would weigh on him more than any sin of his past. I went south, I did not want Esme to comfort me. The only one of them I wanted to speak with was Rosalie, she and Jasper would be my closest allies in the coming days. Both of them against their own mates for my foolish, selfish recklessness with mine.

I ran to the meadow, Alice and Carlisle's minds fading behind me. The early-autumn sky was still light to the west, barely an hour had passed since Bella and I had left her house. The waxing gibbous moon glowed above me. Bella Blue, I called the color of the sky, as the darkness chased the sun and the stars began to emerge between the thin clouds. I would remember this, how the sky on the night my world ended had matched Bella's dress on the night I took her to the ballet. Her moonlight pale skin, painted with sapphire-blue satin.

My knees hit the damp ground, lingering summer floors crushed beneath me as I collapsed to the ground. I inhaled and exhaled the fresh air, and the memory of Bella's blood sang in my chest, burned in my throat. At last, I had the strength I needed to save her from myself, and I longed for the weakness I'd known before.

I traced the stem of a foxglove flower beside me, its fuchsia petals wilted and fading with the end of summer. Again, I thought of Romeo, envied him and his easy death. These flowers were poisonous, if I were human I could've followed his example so easily. But, my inhumanity was the problem, of course. So instead, I strategized. Which of my family members would be the hardest to convince? Which the easiest? How long would this strength hold? And therefore, how quickly did we need to leave? How would I keep myself from returning?

Alice and Esme would be the hardest, they loved Bella nearly as much as me. But I would be able to use that love against Esme, convince her to see my reasoning. I would enlist Jasper to help with Alice. Emmett would put up a fight, but he would not go against Rosalie. Carlisle would believe me when I told him I would leave her one way or another, either with all of them, or alone, for Italy. Either way, Bella's determination to join our soulless immortality would end.

I could not bring myself to think of what I would say to her. When I imagined it, I felt myself begin to waver. She would not accept my leaving easily. She would self-sacrifice. She knew how much I loved her, and she would try to convince me that her life was a good price to pay for that love. So, I stared up at the sky and planned.

Eventually, the cell phone in my pocket buzzed. I pulled it out in a daze and read, from Alice: B ready to go home.

The rest of the evening with Bella only confirmed my intentions. She had already forgiven me. She made me come upstairs by finally giving in to her birthday. When she opened the plane tickets from Esme and Carlisle, she went pink with delight at the idea of us visiting Jacksonville - my having to hide from the Florida sun and lie to her mother was no issue for her. She wept when I played the CD I'd made, all those musical declarations of my love for her haunted me. I would need to remove the physical evidence of myself, she would never let me go with such reminders of my devotion to her. She lied about the pain in her arm, begged me to kiss her again and again. I gave in like an addict, telling myself it would be easier to stay away with these memories of her to comfort me.

The music played softly from her CD player. It would have sounded better on vinyl, with the crackle and echo instead of the flatness of digital music. But then I'd have had to buy her a record player, which would have caused a fuss. It would all be gone from her room soon anyway. I shouldn't have let Emmett install the stereo in her truck, but now she'd told Charlie about it and he would notice if it disappeared. Bella pressed her arm against my cold skin. I heard the tiny quickenings in the beat of her heart when she moved and the wound stung, her forehead creased as she hid a wince.

I stayed beside her in the narrow bed until she was deep into unconsciousness. I kept my hand wrapped around her bandage, hoping it would ease the sting. In her sleep, Bella shifted towards me. Her hot breath fanned across the skin of my neck, I caught the lingering spearmint of her toothpaste.

Every detail of her was burned into my mind already, but I recorded each of them again as she slept. I listened to the slow pounding of her heart, this sound that consumed my entire world. I counted the eyelashes spread across her cheeks, and traced the curve of her ear with my fingers. I ran my thumb over her collarbone, then up the column of her throat, across her lips.

"Bella," I whispered, so soft she wouldn't have heard me even if she'd been awake. Heartbreak, humans called this feeling. From what I'd seen of it in their simple minds, the word was sufficient enough for them. For a vampire, with our heightened senses, memories, emotions, and brains, the agony that was beginning to rip through my chest was better described as apocalypse. A black hole was opening inside of me, sucking all the air and light and color out from the world. I would carry it while Bella lived, and when she died I would finally allow it to swallow me whole.

I stood from the bed and pressed a soft kiss to her forehead. Her breathing remained steady as I stroked her hair. Again I whispered, "I'm sorry. That I was too weak to stay away from you. I hope this will be enough for your forgiveness," it was as much a prayer for her God as an apology for her. I kissed her forehead again. "I love you, I love you, I love you. Forever." I told myself it would be enough.

Leaving her house that night felt like a dress rehearsal. Already my body screamed at me to return to her.

I ran towards my family's house. Their distressed cacophony of their minds filled my head as I approached, but I passed them and followed Jasper's distant mental voice. He sat on a rock near the river, his bare feet dangling into the rushing water. We were far enough from the house for privacy, if we spoke quietly. Alice would see us, part of her mind watched her mate's future constantly, but she would let us speak. Shame and guilt came off Jasper in waves. As I neared him, I felt the same emotions rise to the surface in myself.

In his mind I saw Bella's face, as it had been when he lunged for her. She looked shocked for a second, then terror came over her. All the grace and acceptance of our true nature gone. In that moment, finally, she saw us as we are. As he reexamined the image, he chided himself constantly. How could I? That was Bella! My weakness nearly killed her, Edward's Bella. Briefly, he imagined the situation reversed, me lunging for Alice with no thought or reason in my eyes. His mind recoiled from the thought, but he remained focused on this betrayal, of Bella, of me, of our entire family. He had always seen our peaceful, sedentary existence as unattainable for himself. It was a precaution he took for his own wellbeing and Alice's safety. But tonight he'd found himself to be one of the greatest dangers that familial peace had ever faced. Just a little girl, his mind lingered on Bella's terrified face. To Jasper, all of us were so young and innocent, even Carlisle, but Bella most of all.

Jasper's thoughts clarified as I approached, an instinctive reaction. He stood from the rock and faced me. His mind shifted to my body, would I attack first? Or try to speak with him? He'd just hunted and had the tactical advantage, but my gift had always put us on even footing. In another life, he might have accepted my killing him. But then he thought of Alice, as she'd been when she first found him, constantly lost between the future and the present, terrified of the black-hooded Volturi coming after her for her gift.

"I'm not going to fight you, Jasper," I said.

He narrowed his eyes. Bella's face reappeared in his mind. I attacked your mate.

"More my fault than yours," I said. I was within arm's reach of him now. A million times I'd witnessed the love and devotion swell between him and Alice, and now his gift did the same to our mutual devastation. "I should never have brought her into our world."

He began to untangle my knot of emotions. The lack of vengeful anger surprised him. Resignation? No, determination, he thought, and then he caught the thread of reassurance at his assessment. He felt the hot shame and guilt and self-loathing, his mind worked to protect himself from those feelings. At the core of me, Jasper recognized the love I held for Bella, weaved into every atom of my body. It had remade me entirely, as surely as Carlisle's venom. And now my grief at losing her was spreading through my cold veins, with all the agony of my transformation. Jasper took a step back, mentally and physically, trying to distance himself from the black hole in my chest.

"Don't," I hissed as he prepared to soothe the pain.

Edward, his mind was full of pity for me. He did not think I had the strength to bear this. What will you do?

"I'm leaving," I said, the words nearly caught in my throat. I continued gracelessly, halfway to pleading with him, "we all are. This has gone on long enough, Bella isn't safe with us."

It's too late for that. A cascade of moments flashed in his mind, all the times he'd seen Bella and I together, the bond he felt between us. Parents with their children, that's the only human emotion I've ever felt stronger than what Bella feels for you. Change her and be done with all of this.

"No!"

"Not all of us end up like Rosalie," Jasper growled.

I saw the next objection forming in his mind, this should be her decision. I stared at him and said, "all humans make decisions they regret when they're so young."

The hit landed, a fuzzy, nearly indecipherable human memory of him enlisting in the Confederate Army. He'd been a year older than Bella was now, his family so poor the conditions in the army felt like an upgrade. He'd marked the contract with an 'X' because he couldn't read or write. He went to war for propagandic, racist lies and promises of glory that ended with him carried back to Maria's den, screaming with the agony of his transformation.

His mind struggled with the reminder, I saw him begin to agree with me. How quickly he'd realized his mistake when he left his family's farm and tiny village for the first time. Would Bella have the same reaction if I changed her? He'd known more new vampires than the rest of us combined, and he knew the toll losing their human lives had taken. The thrill of immortality, superhuman strength, and heightened senses, it faded with each day spent hiding alone in the dark. His mind landed on the only surety it could find, this will break both of you.

"She's human, she will move on" I said. I heard the doubt in his mind, but I twisted the knife, "but what happened tonight will happen again. How many of our slips can she survive?" Bella was already thinking of this as an accident, but it was inevitable.

Jasper understood this, he'd warned me to stay away from Bella in the beginning, but now he was thinking of Alice. He'd been with her when she had the first vision of Bella as one of us, he remembered her giddy excitement. He would have to hurt his mate to save mine, and the prospect repulsed him. I saw his resolve faltering as he anticipated Alice's reaction. Among my family, we tried to pretend I could not hear their thoughts. All these years I'd kept their secrets and respected their privacy. But tonight I would use my gift to my advantage, I knew what to say to each of them to get them to agree to what was necessary.

I began with Jasper. "Alice will recover from losing Bella to a normal, human life. She will not recover from you accidentally killing her best friend."

Jasper flinched, I continued, "If we stay, Alice and I will spend the rest of Bella's life protecting her from your lack of control. Alice will have to search the future constantly, she'll never have a moment of peace again."

Then just change her! Jasper shouted at me in his head.

"Bella's life for our weakness? Doom her to this existence because we couldn't be strong enough to leave her alone? Or keep her human, and wait for another accident? Or for the others to find us out?"

Jasper's hands flew to his hair, the stoic soldier's demeanor cracked as ran his hands through his hair. My mention of the Volturi was doing its work in his head. His strategy shifted from how to prevent the coming storm to how to recover from it. He thought back to the family's debate about Bella months ago, when Alice had convinced him not to kill Bella to protect us from exposure. He loved Bella now too, in the distant way he cared for all of us, but he regretted allowing Alice to get so attached to a human. I stepped forward and put my hand on his shoulder, "Alice will be fine. You'll make sure of it, like you always do."

I heard the acceptance in Jasper's mind a split second before he nodded.

The minds of my family assaulted me as I approached the house. Esme and Carlisle's thoughts were concerned with Alice, her expression was completely blank as she searched the future, she hadn't moved in hours. The vision of Bella in the chair staring at nothing was as solid in her head as if it'd been happening right in front of her, but Alice was still desperately searching for other possibilities. Rosalie's internal voice fumed at me, no surprise there. She was the first to hear my approach, and immediately began a litany of I told you so! Emmett was attempting to distract himself from the tension in the house with a textbook of Cantonese grammar, but his mind kept returning to the well of blood on Bella's finger, he'd been close to losing control too.

Alice's mind focused on a future a few moments from now, Jasper and I walking through the door. She met us outside. She ignored me and ran straight into Jasper's arms. She stared up at him and whispered, "Jasper, it was an accident. It won't happen again, I'll make sure it doesn't."

It was the wrong thing to say. For a moment, Jasper imagined Alice constantly stuck between himself and Bella. Above everything, he thought of himself as her protector, and the idea grated against his nerves like nothing else. He didn't reply, just pulled her against his chest and pressed all of his love and devotion for her into her small frame. It was an apology, and a final decision. She wrapped her arms around him and pleaded, "please, please. Don't let him do this."

Alice's voice wavered and she began to shake. They were human reactions that our bodies remembered and imitated under extreme emotions. Clenched fists, struggles for breath, stinging behind the eyes for tears that never came.

I continued inside, where the rest of my family sat around the dining table. The whole house reeked of bleach and alcohol, erasing all traces of Bella's presence. All evidence of the party had been cleared away too, the flowers and cake and candles all gone. We sat around the table, a sick imitation of the first time my family had sat around to debate Bella's future. I promised myself this would be the last time.

Carlisle sat at the head of the table with Esme to his right, their hands clasped together on the polished wood surface. I sat across from Esme, with Emmett to my right and Rosalie on his other side. He was expecting to play peacemaker between the two of us, as he had last time, but there would be no need. Rosalie was already expecting the outcome of this conversation, and she would side with my leaving Bella, despite how her mind raged against me. Alice and Jasper followed behind me. He pulled out the chair across from Emmett and sat in it himself, Alice let herself be pulled into his lap. Her eyes were shifting constantly, in her mind I saw the scattered chaos of the conversation we were about to have.

"Alice, are you with us?" Carlisle asked, his concern for her was clear in his voice and even clearer in his mind. We'd seen Alice like this before, when someone slipped and killed a human, forcing us to cover evidence and make what amends we could before leaving town. But her current state was especially severe. Jasper was worried too, which only solidified his determination to get her as far from this situation as possible.

"Hmm?" She blinked, her vision focused on Carlisle.

"Are you with us?" He repeated.

"Yes," she said. For a tense moment everyone watched her, waiting for her to dissociate again, but I saw the resolution in her mind. She'd seen no possibility of changing the current course, but she would try anyway.

"Good," Carlisle said, "We need to discuss what occurred tonight."

"Edward has already decided for us," Alice said. She glared at me, but I looked away.

I folded my hands on the table and said, chest cracking with grief, "I take responsibility for my mistake. I should have kept Bella away from us. We need to leave, before she gets hurt again."

My declaration sank onto my family, and I used my gift to assess the best way to convince them. I knew from Alice's vision that I would succeed.

Emmett spoke first, entirely devoid of his characteristic lightheartedness. "Why are we discussing this? Bella wants to be changed, so change her, problem solved."

"That is not a solution to anything," I growled.

Carlisle's mind flashed to his conversation with Bella earlier. He hadn't wanted to get in the middle of that debate between us. He said, "Bella is too high-profile in town to disappear without notice. Charlie would raise an investigation, the Quileutes might get involved, and Edward would be a suspect. Her change will have to wait until she moves away for college, at least."

"So, wait for her to move away for college," Emmett said, "it's only a year."

"In that year, she risks her life every time she's near any of us," I said, "How many times has she nearly died in the last six months?" The idea twisted my stomach, another memory of human reactions.

"We leave for now," Esme proposed, though she hated the idea of leaving Bella alone, "and when Bella moves away from home she can join us."

Rosalie interjected, "we make her wait around for us? How is that better? Either we stay and change her, or give her a chance at a human life."

Carlisle's thumb ran along Esme's knuckles. "Rosalie is right, no half measures."

"I will not change her," I said, and Rosalie's ire towards me faded slightly. "We leave her and never return, her life can continue as if we never existed."

"No!" Alice objected, "you know that's not true," she threw the familiar vision of Bella's devastation at me, "she loves you, she wants to be like us!"

"She does now," Rosalie said, "because she's a child in love, not because she understands what she'd be losing."

"You're not talking about Bella!" Alice's face twisted with anger, her voice rose. "She's not you! She wants to be with Edward. In all of my visions, she's happy as one of us."

"Your visions?" Rosalie questioned, "which change constantly? Have you seen Bella in a hundred years? When everyone she knew in her life is dead and she's still eighteen years old? You do not understand what it is to lose all of that."

"Rose," Emmett whispered. Jasper glared at our sister.

Alice erupted. "Bella staying human won't make you any less a vampire, Rosalie! You wouldn't be so miserable if you stopped clinging to the childish fantasy of marriage and babies with the man who murdered you, and saw what you have right in front of you!"

"Excuse me?!" Rosalie stood halfway from her chair, hands planted on the table. Jasper pulled Alice backwards against his chest and growled in warning.

"Girls!" Esme said, "calm down, now."

"This is ridiculous!" Alice huffed, "Bella wants to be changed, I'll do it myself!"

"No!" I shouted.

Carlisle grabbed me by the arm to stop me from standing. His action drew everyone's attention. "Alice, you will not change Bella. This is Edward's decision."

"Should be Bella's decision," Emmett muttered.

"This life is not something to be taken lightly, nor is Bella's safety," Carlisle said. His voice was calm, but his mind roiled. He loved Bella as a daughter. He'd thought of her change as inevitable, and now he felt himself losing her. "We cannot continue with things as they are without risking exposure. Edward has nearly lost his control with Bella countless times, James nearly killed her, and now this. The choice now is whether we leave and wait for her, or leave forever."

"I'm not leaving!" Alice insisted.

My sister's mind was a blur of rage and sorrow and guilt, she'd missed the incident tonight and she blamed herself. Visions of the future began to cloud the edge of her consciousness. Our gifts were, before anything else, a defense mechanism against the only real risk we faced: each other. Alice had always lived by her visions. Her visions and Jasper were her two guiding stars. Now she found herself fighting against her husband as he sided with me, and her gift was attempting to protect her from the consequences.

"Alice," I said. I reached across the table and she took my hand, her breathing was shortening, like a human going into a panic attack. Jasper rubbed her back and spread his artificial calm over her. "I'm so sorry."

"She's my best friend," Alice said shakily.

"I know." I rubbed her hand. "I know you love her too. But we have to do what's best for her."

Her eyes shifted back between focus and disconnection. When she spoke again her voice was thick with hurt. "You won't even let us say goodbye."

"Edward," Esme gasped.

"Clean breaks heal faster," Jasper said.

Alice wrenched her hand away from mine, then stood abruptly from Jasper's lap.

"You're ruining this," she told me. Our eyes met and she showed me a vision, or a memory of a vision she could no longer find in our future. All of us in a different house. Bella with pale white skin. She and I waltzed around the room as Rosalie played the piano, Alice's happily ever after for all of us. "You're ruining everything!"

"Alice," Carlisle started, intending on comforting her, but she was already storming out of the house.

Jasper stood to follow her, in his mind he told me I'll take her and leave tonight. Don't draw things out more than necessary. Tell Carlisle I'll bring her to wherever they settle next.

The remaining five of us waited in silence as Alice and Jasper's footsteps retreated through the forest.

"You're doing the right thing, Edward," Rosalie said, not unsympathetically. The approval barely touched me, the black hole was reopening in my chest, some weak part of me had hoped my family would offer some magic solution. Her words took the wind out of Emmett's objection entirely, he wouldn't go against her or me, but any reminder of Rosalie's unhappiness with this life hurt him. Alice's words had barely touched Rosalie, but they'd wounded Emmett.

"The day after tomorrow, that should be enough time to get things in order," I said coldly.

Emmett and Carlisle nodded sadly, this part was familiar. Though I'd never been the reason for such an escape. The two of them stood and Rosalie followed, the house needed to be prepared for our departure. Notices given to the school and hospital, precautions taken for if anyone else tried to find us wherever we went, the cars and personal belongings moved, a new location decided.

Esme stayed across from me at the table. Through her hazy human memories, she saw a small boy with her caramel colored hair and brown eyes, her son Arthur. Her memories of him always held a tender ache. They were painful to look at, but she did often because she didn't want them to fade. The pain she felt now was similar, another child lost. She stood from the table and came over to me. I love you, no matter what happens, she told me.

I let her pull me into an embrace, my face pressed into her stomach. She stroked my hair and thought of her son. Carlisle would have saved her so much from so much pain and grief if he'd taken her away when they first met. But she had never once wished for that. She would have endured all the abuse of her first marriage and agony of losing her son all over again for the brief time she had with her baby boy. Carlisle and I found our way back to one another, she thought, please, if the same happens for you and Bella, don't throw it away a second time.

I nodded into her soft sweater. I would not allow the possibility to arise, because if it did, I would not be able to stay away. I barely had the strength to leave Bella once.

My family set about their work, Alice and Jasper already gone from the range of my gift. I didn't stay or offer any help. They could do what they liked with all of my things, I would not join them in this exile. Let them heal from the loss of Bella and I together, and proceed into their blissful eternity without their seventh wheel.

I went hunting, hoping strength of body would help build strength of will. I regretted telling my family the day after tomorrow, I should've planned this morning to say my goodbyes to Bella. The dreading and waiting for it would be worse than anything, with her mere presence threatening to cripple me completely. I covered the evidence of my kill. The deer population of the Olympic Peninsula would be happy with our departure. To erase the scent and dirt of my hunt, I went for a swim in Lake Crescent. The campground was full with the season's final visitors, asleep in their tents and RVs. I stripped to my underwear on the shore and rinsed my clothes in the water, then hung them on a tree branch.

The water grew colder as I swam to the bottom. My skin registered the frigid temperature without feeling any pain, and my lungs quickly adjusted to the lack of air. No screaming for oxygen as humans experienced, just an instinctive discomfort with the lack of my sense of smell. The fish scattered from me, their scales glinting in the muted moonlight.

When I emerged, the sky was just beginning to lighten in the east. I stood on a rock and let the cool air dry my skin, then pulled on my clothes. I'd have to go home and change, they were still damp. A few humans in the campground had begun to stir. A woman's sleep-raspy voice sang a lullaby to her baby. In her mind I saw the familiar haze of adoration parents felt for their children, there was something similar in the child's simple thoughts too. An older man rose to walk his wife to the bathroom, his groggy thoughts concerned about the state of her hip after a surgery. A college-aged couple had woken early, and their thoughts were already a lustful haze of kisses and quiet touches. I pushed the image from my mind and ran faster. There was nothing I wanted more than a human life with Bella, but it was impossible. I'd been pretending for far too long.

My family's house was noisy and active. Esme was on the phone with a real estate agent, they'd decided on Ithaca. Upstate New York was decent for climate and hunting, Carlisle could find night shifts easily, Esme her historic houses. The last time we'd been in the area was Rochester, but any local history enthusiast might have recognized Rosalie there. Her disappearance, and Royce King's murder soon after, had dominated the local news cycle for half a year. I went into my room through the balcony to avoid the others. In my distraction, I didn't prepare myself. Bella's scent was all over my bedroom. The cushions and blankets of my sofa, the carpet, even the clothes I pulled from the closet. All of them held the memories of time I'd spent with her, showing her my favorite music and books. I held my breath while I changed clothes and fled through the window again.

I reached Bella's house as the sun began to crest the horizon.

"Edward, stay," Bella murmured in her sleep. The plea gutted me to my core. I stood just below her window and listened to the sounds of her life in the room above. Her heartbeat, her breathing, the rustle of her sheets as she shifted in her sleep. The little proofs of her life and humanity were the only comfort to the chasm cracking open in my chest. I would cling to them until the moment I left, as a reminder of all that was at stake.

The day passed in agony. Bella knew something was wrong with me, as I attempted to put some distance between us. I could not allow her too close, or my will would start to unravel. She lied about the pain in her arm, and asked about Jasper and Alice. I posed for a picture with her - knowing it would never make it into her scrapbook - and snapped one of her and Charlie together. Her heart rate never quite seemed to settle, my mood putting her on edge. Still, she asked me to stay the night in her room. I refused, because my chest was screaming out for some release from the agony of our impending separation.

When I returned home that night, Rosalie and Emmett were already gone. They'd rented a truck to transport all of the cars and set off for Ithaca that morning. Carlisle and Esme would follow in the morning with all of the things we brought with us. I helped Carlisle wrap up all of the paintings in his office, carefully sliding them into boxes. His mind stayed focused on the task. He examined each piece of art and recalled the story behind it, never once allowing his mind to consider the daughter he was leaving behind. I was glad for it. I'm sure he and Esme shared the same opinion: that God or my own weakness would bring me back to Bella, this separation would not last long. But I would not allow anything to put Bella in danger again, especially myself. I would prove them wrong

Esme enlisted me to help with covering the furniture. To humor her, I filled a box with CDs I would never listen to again, my collection of sheet music I'd never play again, and favorite books I'd never read again. We carried everything into the truck, and pulled down the security shutters on the windows. Carlisle shut off the power and water. Esme collected all the food from the kitchen. Her mind held for a while on the bliss of mothering Bella. This one is Bella's favorite, she thought of a box of dry pasta, I wonder why? I should have asked her. Arthur never ate pasta, would he have liked it? He was a picky eater–

I pulled out of Esme's head quickly, and followed Carlisle around as he did the final checks on the house. We would never return here, no one would want to revisit the loss of the place. But the routine kept us all sane. I asked Carlisle, "Will you take my car?"

"Don't you need it?"

I shrugged, "I'll carpool with Bella for school, and I'd prefer to run…afterwards."

He nodded, keeping his mind carefully neutral. We'll see you in Ithaca. He knew there was little hope of that, but he was a stubborn optimist, especially when it came to his first companion.

I watched them disappear down the driveway from the front lawn. When I turned to look at the house again, I felt the black hole sucking the joy and life from this place. It was all steel and concrete and glass, Esme's first foray into modernism. It would stand until someone tore it town or nature intervened, this monument to the greatest joys and pains of my existence.

I waited outside Bella's house until she drove away, then snuck into her room. I collected my family's gifts for her, and ripped the proof of myself from her scrapbook. I hadn't planned for what to do with any of the things. I had no need for the photos, she was perfectly preserved in my memories. The weak part of me that wanted to give in and stay intervened. A new kind of monster that fought for the preservation of my sanity over Bella's life and soul. There was a loose floorboard at the edge of her room. I pried it open to access the dusty space underneath. There, I stored all of the evidence of our relationship. There was little chance of her finding any of it, but it soothed some part of me, to leave it here. Our love had been real, even if the whole thing was my greatest folly, in the end.

Throughout the school day, I maintained my distance from Bella. She was more accepting than yesterday, though her panicked expression when she looked at me made the black hole scream within me.

I walked her to her truck at the end of the day, and asked to accompany her home. Her usual flushed excitement was absent, she agreed anxiously.

We slid into the cab of the truck. I let her drive, which seemed to unnerve her more than anything so far. She moved an envelope from the seat to the dashboard. "I need to drop this at the post office, birthday photos for Renee."

I nodded, and stared out the window. Looking at her made my chest hurt. When she pulled up to the office, I grabbed the envelope and jumped from the car. "I've got it."

On the walk to the blue box, with my body angled to block her vision, I quickly opened the envelope and looked through the photos. I removed the ones of myself, and hid them in the interior pocket of my jacket. I resealed the envelope, slid it into the box, and returned to the car.

The world seemed to close in around me as we approached Bella's house. Her heart was beating faster than usual, my behavior making her anxious. I felt the phantom pounding between my ribs, my body remembering the sensation. I had only moments to decide what to actually say to her. She wouldn't believe that I wanted to leave. She had already started to brush off the incident with Jasper, my concerns about her safety had never convinced her of anything. I would start with practical reasons for our leaving, suspicions about Carlisle's age, or tensions with the Quileutes if she doubted that.

By the time she pulled into her parking spot, I had a plan. We could not go inside, the close quarters would make it harder for me to leave quickly after our conversations. I got out of the truck, and rounded to her door as she unfastened her seatbelt. She reached for her backpack, I'd left mine in a dumpster outside the high school.

"Come for a walk with me," I said. She paused, released her grip on the bag, and nodded.

Her heart pounded anxiously. I felt her eyes burning against my back as I led her a few feet into the forest. Here, we could talk without any neighbors witnessing, and it would be easy for me to disappear.

I stopped a few steps down the path and turned to face her. The side of Charlie's house was still in view through the trees, Bella looked backwards, obviously suspicious. She stared at me with all the love and trust I'd never deserved. I avoided her eyes and forced myself to begin, telling myself now the only thing was to get it over with. The sooner I left, the sooner her life could begin anew without me. "We have to leave Forks."

Bella tried to breathe evenly, I made myself still as stone to resist the urge to comfort her. "Why?"

"Carlisle's supposed to be ten years older than he looks, people are starting to notice," I said coldly. Lying to her felt like poison on my tongue.

Bella took a shaky breath, but nodded in understanding. "Okay, I–I've gotta think of something to say to Charlie."

The chasm split further. I was being torn in two. The part of myself that wanted to stay trying to rip away from the part that knew I needed to leave. My love for her was my greatest strength and my greatest weakness, but I needed to be the strong one here. Bella was so eager to throw away her life for me, her family, her future. I would not allow it. I remained silent as she began to understand. My cold reaction was doing its work.

When she spoke again, her voice wobbled. "When you say we?"

Had I really thought myself strong for resisting her blood? That was nothing compared to this. I took a breath, her lovely scent tangling with the smells of the forest, the burn in my throat felt like a pinprick compared to the breaking in my chest. I said, "I mean my family and myself."

The weak part of myself tried to fight the words as they passed through my lips. They landed like a mortar shell between us. Bella shook her head, her heart rate quickened. She seemed to collect herself and said, "Edward, what happened with Jasper, it's nothing."

"You're right, it was nothing," I said. For once I spoke honestly, "Nothing but what I always expected. And nothing compared to what could have happened."

She kept shaking her head, but I continued, "You just don't belong in my world, Bella."

"I belong with you," she said.

"No, you don't." That, at least, was true. Nothing so pure and good as her belonged anywhere close to me.

She clenched her fists. "I'm coming!"

"Bella, I don't want you to come." I want you to live, and fall in love normally, and see your parents grow old, and have children, and spend days in the sun, and have all the human joys and sorrows you would have if I'd never derailed your life.

She flinched from my words. "You don't…want me?"

The pain was clear on her face. It had always made so little sense to me, how Bella saw me as the prize and herself as unworthy. But if it made her believe that I would never return, I would use that too. "No."

"Well," she said weakly, "that changes things. A lot."

"But if it's not too much to ask, can you promise me something?" She nodded, the damage was done. But I would need this assurance to stay away. "Don't do anything reckless. For Charlie's sake."

Bella nodded dazedly, and I continued surgically, "And I'll promise you something in return. This is the last time you'll ever see me. I won't come back." I had to look away from her obvious heartbreak. "And you can go on with your life without any interference from me. It'll be like I never existed, I promise."

Those promises would have to be enough. For her to move on, and me to resist the urge to return to her, already swelling at the center of the black hole.

Bella sucked in a breath and took a step towards me. "If this is about my soul, take it! I don't want it without you!"

"It's not about your soul," I lied, and lied, and lied, "you're just not good for me."

I watched her slowly shattering, and could only hope the breaks were clean. She whispered, "not good enough for you…"

I wanted so badly to convince her otherwise, but that would not help. Let her look back on this and see me as the horrible, toxic monster I was.

"I'm just sorry I let this go on for so long," I said. This needed to be done, while my will held.

"Please," Bella whimpered, her breathing accelerated, her eyes watering, "don't."

"Goodbye," I forced myself to say. Time heals all wounds for her kind, and I would condemn myself to the black hole's pull, for her.

"Wait!" She lunged forward, her arms reaching to wrap around my neck. I caught her wrists and held them to her sides, I would not be able to resist falling into her again if she touched me. I allowed myself to lean down and press a kiss to her forehead. Her skin was warm under my lips, a reminder of the life I was preserving with this sacrifice. Bella's eyes fluttered shut as her heart broke.

"Take care of yourself," I pleaded against her skin.

My body fought leaving, but I pulled my fingers away from her wrists, then my lips from her forehead. In the time it took her to draw her next shaking breath, I ran.

The chasm in my chest cracked and fizzed as I forced my legs to carry me away from her. All the remembered human reactions to pain flooded my body, a useless sob caught in my throat, the back of my eyes stung. I stopped breathing entirely because my lungs were seizing.

"Edward!" Her desperate shout seemed to follow me as I ran. I clamped my hands over my ears and kept moving. With every step, the world seemed to grow darker around me. The abyss opened inside me as I left pieces of myself behind. Whatever life remained to me without my soul was leaking out of me as I left her. The parts of me still capable of laughter and love and joy died and fell away behind me.

I ran until the ground disappeared from beneath me. I'd reached the ocean, somehow avoiding human notice. The black waters of the Pacific spread before me under the roiling gray sky. Storm clouds gathered in the distance, they would break apart into weak rainfall by the time they reached the shore. My name on Bella's lips seemed to follow me all this way, I already felt my strength failing. Every second of the rest of my life would be spent fighting the desperate urge to return to her.

The water broke beneath me as I leapt into the waves. I swam out into where the water was rushing under the storm. Then I allowed myself to sink, further and further and further into the depths until the sky was only a shimmer of light on the surface far above me. The bubbles from my clothes and hair rose as I settled on the ocean floor. The pressure of the water above me made resisting easier, like a blanket pinning me to the bottom. I pressed my fingers into the sand and closed my eyes.

Thinking of Bella helped relax me enough to ease the desperation to go back.

I revisited my memories of her a million times each, every blink and breath and laugh and kiss. When those lost their anesthetic potency, I began to fantasize. About her life without me, college and marriage and children that shared her chocolate eyes. Briefly, I allowed myself to picture the life we could have had if I'd been human. I introduced her to the fuzzy memories of my human parents and imagined her with a suffragette badge on her collar. Then I pictured a human version of myself in the biology lab. Would I have been overly confident or blushing at the pretty new girl sitting beside me? Would she have noticed me at all if I'd blended in with the rest of the boys? How would Charlie have reacted to me if his instincts hadn't screamed danger? Would we fly out to Florida for me to meet Renee? I imagined endless careers and weddings and children and houses and family vacations and conversations for this impossible Bella and Edward.

The burn in my throat began to spread up my head and down my chest, then through my arms and legs. It was an easy distraction from the black hole slowly swallowing me. Distantly, from the world of my fantasies, I felt the currents shift with the seasons. The water grew slightly warmer, then colder again. I never opened my eyes, if I had, I might have seen the shadows of migrating whales above me. I heard the slow thud of their massive hearts, but blood held no appeal. Even the fish that passed grew used to me, as humans did. A sinister statue lurking in the depths, I never moved and they learned to tolerate my presence. The salt began to wear on my clothes, I felt the changes in the fabrics against my skin as they began to disintegrate. My body adjusted to the black hole's agony, and it grew easier to keep myself still. If I moved, I would run straight back to Bella, so I didn't move.

I drifted further and further into my delusions, conjuring alternate realities for myself and Bella, her parents, my family. They would keep me distracted in my watery tomb until I felt Bella leave the world. And then I would go to Volterra.


Author Notes:

Putting this here because I have several things.

General chauvinism: Yes, I see it. The way the Cullens, particularly Edward, Carlisle, and Jasper talk about Bella without her input is very outdated and paternalist. It is intentional, and it will be addressed later in the story.

Alice and Jasper: In my head, I've made several changes to their backstory as a couple, which may or may not appear later. Basically, I like Jasper's dominant, protector, caretaker vibe. I'm interested in the idea of Alice's gift as a really challenging thing for her to deal with, especially without any human memories to ground her to reality.

Confederate Jasper, my beloathed: This, like so many of the whack things in the saga, is really difficult to un-problematic. The idea of vampires and the Southern Wars is very interesting, but that means Jasper has to be southern. It makes sense that Maria would want to take advantage of the chaos of the Civil War, but I don't see why she would change a random civilian when she had the option of soldiers. But then those soldiers kind of have to be confederates. I considered changing his location to somewhere other than Texas (such as Virginia or Maryland) to put him on the other side of the conflict, but then the Southern Wars would feel distinctly American, instead of including all of Mexico, idk. This resolution to make human Jasper an uneducated, ignorant young man who essentially fell for all the propaganda spouted by the white aristocracy of the antebellum south is my best resolution (rich people convincing poor people their problems are because of other poor people is the oldest trick in the book). I welcome any of your thoughts on this!

Esme: I've named her son Arthur, since he doesn't have a name in canon (as far as I'm aware). I like the idea of romantic, school teacher Esme giving her baby a sort of fairytale, legend name. I've also made some changes to her story, which again, we'll see if they have a reason to come up in full later on.

If you've made it this far, thank you!

I know this was a sort of jagged vibe shift, we'll be leaving Edward here for a while. But don't worry, I would never plan for anything other than a happy ending!

I'd love to know your thoughts, leave a comment/review!