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This is kind of a filler.

Next Chapter: Bella finally breaks her chapters long silence.

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We stayed there, in the hospital. They ran an innumerable amount of tests, having us cough, checking our reflexes, going through every sneeze or headache since childhood.

But I saw my father.

It was…different…and painful to see him there. His once ample girth was gone, as if the head of my father was on a much thinner man; but, my father's face wasn't his own anymore. It was as if the influenza took more than the person's health, but it destroyed the person as well. It tore into its victim and changed him or her so utterly that it was impossible for anything to remain of what was once a life. Maybe that was why the sickness had this extreme death toll; the poor prey was altered so absolutely that the person it had been no longer recognized the pitiful, shattered shell as its own, and thus, it was left to wander.

That was the way it seemed with my father. His skin was the same blue tinge that I had seen on Mrs. Snow, and I remembered all too well how she had turned out. The whites of his eyes were yellow, and the corners were crusty. His hair was thinning out, more than I remembered, and he was confined to a bed.

We were kept at a distance of course, and wore masks that apparently lessoned the chance of catching the contagion itself, yet he could still see us.

If you could call it seeing.

Edward Mason Sr. was no longer the man that I remembered. For one, he wasn't conscious. His eyes were open, but that meant nothing. He didn't hear my mother's sobs, didn't feel her tears coursing over his face, didn't see the nurses' poor attempt to drag her away. She argued, the sickness was probably already in her, why should she try to stop what was impossible to deny?

But then Dr. Cullen stepped in to witness the hysteria on that first day.

"What is going on?" the doctor inquired, an eyebrow raised, a knowing look on his face. He had seen this before, and did not need any real answer.

"Dr. Cullen, Mrs. Mason is not cooperating; she will not leave her husband," a flustered nurse answered, her face red.

Dr. Cullen's golden eyes turned very soft, meltingly warm, and very sad, "Mrs. Mason, you must consider your son," he nodded towards me, "what will happen to him if you were to fall ill?"

Mother's face was shocked; I don't believe she had even thought of me in her hysteria at witnessing my father. I wasn't offended, I knew what I would do if I were in her position; if something of that magnitude had ever happened to Bella, I squeezed her hand, I wouldn't think anything but how to get her better. And I would remember. I would remember memories of our times together. The park, that first day, our first kiss, and even now while she silently held my hand obstinately, unwilling to let go even under her mother's disapproving stare.

Mother's green eyes slowly turned towards mine, just as she slowly, hesitantly withdrew her arms from around my father. Her face, red from the exertion of trying to keep close to my father, started to pale at a fast rate, and finally, her bloodless lips moved, "Never," she glanced from me to Dr. Cullen frantically, "nothing will ever happen to him of that magnitude." Her eyes, the unnatural green of clouds before they are ripped apart in the rain's wake, bored into the doctor's. A message was passed then; a promise was made, and it seemed as if I had missed something very important.

Guys, if you want me to update quicker, review more.

This is kind of a filler.

Next Chapter: Bella finally breaks her chapters long silence.

Not many chapters left.

TwilightSnowStar