Author's Notes: 1) I'm sorry this is so unbelievably late, I really have no excuse other than real life, 2) sorry if this gets confusing with the dialogue and all the italicizing, I hope it ends up making sense, 3) sorry for the lesser quality of this one, especially near the end, my brain is going to explode if I waited any longer to take care of this, and 4) sorry for not really exploring the possibilities of what's going to happen with Bella's own special powers or what's going happen with her newborn self craving blood and murder and whatnot. This is the longest running story I've ever taken on (pathetic, right?) and my brain can't tolerate much more of this one topic without going insane. Obviously, this is not what's going to happen in the book (Which! I don't own! DISCLAIMER), but it's sort of what I can imagine happening, I suppose. Enjoy. :D

&

It wasn't as I expected.

But to be fair, I didn't have many expectations to begin with. And to be truthful, not much about life—or death—is fair.

To say I was worried about Bella on the journey back to Forks is too grand of an understatement to be considered one. "Worry" seems like such an inadequate word in my centuries-old vocabulary and yet it was so common from her mouth during that trip that its despicable existence will be stuck in my mind forever. "Don't worry," she had repeated over and over. "Don't worry about me" was the string of nonsensical words that flowed from the softness of her mouth and the perfection of the song that is her voice. How could I not worry? How could I not be worried as we made the journey "home," be worried at the sight of her blazing eyes, glazed over with the reflection of passing dead trees and wilted, frozen flowers shining within them, or at the sight of her long, white, nimble fingers absentmindedly worrying the tiny wooden fringes of the wolfen charm on her wrist, or at the sight of her barely visible sharpened tooth worrying her perfect lips. Worry was inevitable.

We took the train. Bella is obsessed with maintaining mortal habits—feigning sleep, using public transportation, eating what little human food she can muster—way beyond the realm of keeping up appearances, though she can't admit it. I don't argue with her or discourage her from trying to retain her hold on humanity... I knew the same restless, disorienting feeling of losing it all too well. It always worries me, when I wonder if she made the right choice by relinquishing that hold. It worries me when I wonder what will happen when her will to continue her imitation of mortality will inevitably fade—as all of ours did—and all she is left with is the cold, hardened shell of life that I reduced her to. I worry not about "if" she will regret giving her life to me; I worry about when. Regret, like worrying, is inevitable.

I remember reaching for her hand on the train—her hand accepted it, held it, welcomed it, but her heart didn't notice it. Her heart was out in the woods searching for the naïve dog that I'd stolen her from, out beyond the trees in the depths of the forest beckoning Jacob Black to return her call. I had captured her heart with my icy embrace, contained it with a golden ring, and trapped it within a endless prison of death, but it should never have been mine to take. Bella stared out the window the entire trip, out into the dying forest.

When she stepped off the platform and onto the concrete floor of the train station, Bella was for just but a moment, unrecognizable. I had gotten off first, so as to help her off the final step and make the leap to cement, but when I looked up, my hand outstretched in an offer of assistance, I realized with a terrible suddenness that she really didn't need my help. She didn't me at all, not anymore, not like she used to.She took my hand and offered me a smile in return, but it was only to humor me, I gathered. She was amused by my traditional gentlemanly antics and my outdated sense of chivalry and thus, she acquiesced, but she made the final leap off the step all on her own. I stared at her for a few long moments after she released my grasp and continued to retrieve her luggage, ignoring the inquisitive looks from the other passengers exiting the train as I realized that this beautiful creature in front of me wasn't the clumsy, uncertain young girl I had known before, but a mystifying womanly creature full of undisputed grace and poise, full of a sense of subtle confidence that I had never noticed before.

"Come on, Edward," she had scolded me jokingly, noting the way I was blocking the exit. "Security will be here any minute, with you causing a disturbance like this."

And just like that, it was over. Bella had never really left me, but for a horrifying moment, I had the overwhelming fear that she was going to come to her senses and realize that—now more than ever—I was far less worthy of her than she could ever imagine. I didn't deserve her when she was alive. I don't deserve her now, now that I've killed her.

I had ignored those feelings for as long as possible, even after the transformation, but with the prospect of being surrounded by memories of her life, by being in her original environment, and by being around those who had known her before... well, before she met me, I couldn't avoid thinking about the deeper consequences of my actions any longer.

I've always worried about what this death would do to her; it was all I could—all I can—think about. I love her too much. But there had always been a certain level of consideration that I've pushed away, a particular extent that my selfishness never let my mind reach. I watched Bella more closely than I'd ever watched her before that day. Not a single movement escaped my sight.

I noticed that her hands no longer shook from nerves. Here we were, arriving in the one place that she'd longed to see and dreaded seeing for years and her hands were as still as the quiet before a storm. Bella's hands had been known to shake, known to tremble with fright or excitement, known to gesture and point and wave, but now they merely swayed at her sides, in perfect conjunction with her steps.

"Goodness, Edward," she turned and told me. "No one would ever guess how fast you can really run by how slowly you're dragging your feet along now." I quickened my pace as we headed for the parking lot.

She had wanted to see Charlie first, which I thought was all for the better. It was a reunion like all the others that had taken place at Dartmouth: Charlie failed to find any distinct differences between the Bella of Past and the Bella of Present, though he would often send wary glances in her direction when he thought she wouldn't notice, for anyone could see that there was something inexplicably surreal about her now. He never spoke his suspicions outloud, for Bella's sake, as he always assumed her ill (and subsequently blamed me), but I didn't have to tell Bella for her to notice. She hid most of her paleness and diluted the brightness of her eyes through the wonders of cosmetics, but she couldn't rid herself of the ethereal grace that she now possessed. Charlie merely amounted the changes to Bella's growing up. And he couldn't stop saying how beautiful she'd grown.

It was during our time with Charlie—the long ride "home" from the train station, the hours spent "catching up" in the living room, and the torturous process of stomaching human food that I began to thoroughly wonder what was going to happen when Bella's parents grew inevitably older, but she remained dazzling and youthful—was she going to blame her beauty on plastic surgery? On some new fad involving green tea and grape juice? On having discovered the Fountain of Youth? What was going to happen when she was forced to explain that they would never be grandparents, explain why she ate so little and with such little fervor, explain why she couldn't travel to a tropical vacation spot with them or something else that's bound to happen and have no logical, natural explanation? I sat at the table, feeling heavy as Bella and her father laughed about some story from her childhood.

For the first time since I first saw her in the sunlight as a vampire, I allowed myself to wonder what she looked like to mortal eyes—she is beyond perfection to my heightened senses, she always was, but what about to those whose understanding of the world is dulled? Was she too bright and too beautiful for their minds to comprehend that they simply did not see her at all? I tried to see as a mortal would see, continuing my avid observation all throughout the visit at Charlie's.

Without warning, my feelings at the train station began to seep back into their horrible places in my mind and intensified. For the first time since her transformation—I can still barely allow myself to remember it, so loud and cutting were her screams—I allowed myself to really see her... As I looked at her, I wondered how I could deserve her, deserve to be around her when I had already taken so much from her. The soft blush that had painted her cheeks—and the deepened color of embarrassment that I loved so much—was replaced by smooth, stunning alabaster. The soft ring of her laughter was no longer audible to my ears—now it seems more like a beautiful song, a set of perfectly harmonized charms that float over the air. Before, they had been small clinking notes without pattern or key. Bella's breathing had been such a comfort when she was alive... it had longer, deeper strokes than most humans, reminiscent of the waves of the ocean. Now—I remembered Bella's horror and how futilely she tried to hide it when she first realized—she would sometimes forget to breathe at all. Now she had to force herself to maintain the pattern.

I know she loves me. There is no doubt. But no one, not me, especially, is worth giving up her love for life. I wanted to believe that it wasn't life itself that Bella loved... it was the familiarity of being alive that she missed. I wanted to believe her when she told me that she would grow used to it, that she would grow to love being undead as much as she had loved being alive, but I couldn't ever bring himself to do it.

I remember Bella suddenly rising and collecting the dinner plates then, preparing to wash the dishes. Charlie rose to help, but Bella shooed him away, smiling with such a smile of persuasion that anyone would have done anything she desired. And I, already having vowed to do so before seeing that smile, wondered again for the millionth time that night how I could deserve something like her. I sensed Charlie move to the living room and vaguely heard the television turn onto the sports channel, but I was watching Bella methodically rinse out a glass. I stood silently, barely aware of my own movements, and came to her side, taking hold of a dish towel and proceeding to dry. She smiled at me and I was reminded of why my selfishness had allowed me to keep her.

But the mindset only stayed for a few minutes. Our silent system of washing the dishes returned my thoughts back to my observations. Bella always joked about how death had failed to take her clumsiness... but she didn't realize how fluid her movements had grown. Just by watching her work her fingers through the cloth and slide it along the edge of the plate, I had to force my hands to restrain themselves, had to keep every muscle in my being in line in order to keep myself from making her drop the insignificant dish and reaching out to her and holding her and never letting her go. It was the younger days all over again... I was forced to maintain self-control, I was never going to be satisfied with the amount of time I was going to be around her, was never going to be content with our proximity, was never completely satiated unless I was always around her, beside her, within her. Such was my selfishness.

"Careful," she warned me suddenly. "You're going to turn that glass into sand if you keep rubbing it like that."

I looked down at the exceptionally shiny glass before putting it in the cabinet and taking up the plate she'd finished washing. Bella continued on with her chores and I continued on with my thoughts. Before, the light bounce that had been evident in her step had reflected her cheerfulness, her happiness... and now, it was as if she glided across the ground. In comparison, her step beforehand might as well have been hindered by cement blocks bound to her feet. Now... Now Bella floated almost, her unyielding grace making almost every step seem a dance that no one else could hope to perform.

What did Charlie see when he saw her? It was obviously Bella—her face, her demeanor, her essence, and yet it wasn't. When I see Bella, I see Bella, my love for whom will never change—it can't grow, it's too all-consuming that I can't imagine it spreading any deeper into my being, can't imagine it swelling any larger as it already envelopes all of my senses, all of my thoughts, all of me. But who is Bella now? What does her father see, when he gazes upon his undead daughter?

I'd ignored it long enough in my selfishness, but my love for her has finally let me acknowledge the truth that I'd known and avoided all along: I killed her. Not the surface of murder that was obvious from the three days of pain and change and death and not the surface of murder that is reflected in her flashing eyes, but the inexcusable murder that is killing the small things about a person that made them who they are, even if the substitutes are just as easy to love because they are not and will never be the same. It sounds horribly inadequate, even now, but I realized in that one moment, years after she became my wife and my eternal lover, the extent of what I'd done. Bella was Bella; I loved her as I had when I first fell in love with her, but she was not that girl anymore.

And suddenly, I allowed my mind to take one step further and ask the question that I'd been dreading for the both of us for as long as I can remember: What would Jacob see?

I heard the sound of the plate shattering before I felt it in my hand. Bella shrieked in shock, but the sound was dull in comparison to the shrillness of her earlier days—she could probably sense the plate breaking before it actually happened. The moments before Charlie was at the entrance to the kitchen felt like an eternity to us; by the time he was there, the mess was safely disposed of and we were back to our business of cleaning the next set of dishes. He demanded to know what had happened, but Bella placated him with a quick story (she could lie now, she had never been a good liar) of how he must have imagined the noise and the sound from her had only been caused by a seemingly dangerous spider. Calm enough, it wasn't long before Charlie returned to the couch and it wasn't much longer before he fell asleep. Bella turned on me at once, however, with such burning eyes that I didn't know whether to sweep her away into the woods where we could be alone or to fall to the ground and beg on my knees, though for what exactly, I had no idea. Instead, I regrettably decided to continue drying my dish and merely whispered, "You and I need to talk."

Bella looked at me then with such an expression that I could never properly describe. I so wished, not for the first time, that I could read her mind, hear the millions of questions running through her thoughts. Instead I dealt with what I could see: the slight nod of her head, the slight furrowing of her perfect brow, and the small tilt of the frown that plagued her lips.

The trek up her staircase felt surreal—I had hardly ever traveled it in the years before, but for some reason it seemed more familiar than ever. It was being in Bella's room that was the real foreign experience. Everything had remained in its rightful place; nothing had been moved a fraction of an inch.

"He misses you," I said quietly, taking in the sight as Bella moved to sit on the bed. I leaned against the doorframe, not for the support, but because I couldn't bring myself to take another step closer to what used to be my sanctuary. "It's hard for him, being able to see you only so often." Bella shifted uncomfortably on the covers.

"He wouldn't have been able to see me anymore often if I were alive, Edward," Bella said with finality, as if that would erase my guilt and ease my suffering. "I still would have a limited amount of visitation time in college as a mortal, so don't you dare try to put the blame on yourself."

"But what about after you graduate?" I asked, forcing myself to stare out the window. How many times had I climbed through to her side? "What will your new excuse be?" Bella was having none of it; she still wasn't allowing herself to think that far ahead.

"You haven't told me what happened in the kitchen," she said gently, but with a seriousness that made it all the more difficult for me not to look at her.

"Isn't it the weirdest thing," I said slowly, still staring at the tree outside her window. "I used to watch you fall sleep in this room, from out there. This is where I first decided I was going to protect you for forever."

Bella was silent for a moment. Then she stood up, gracefully as always, and glided towards me—how one glides in jeans and sneakers is beyond me, but my Bella can, I assure you—turning my chin away from the window and forcing my gaze to meet hers. She was silent but a minute more, but it might as well have been a century.

"What's going on, Edward?" She stroked my cheek with her finger; it used to hold such warmth. "What's wrong?" She slid closer. "Why won't you tell me?"

I stared down at her, willing her eyes to look at me without sadness, without concern, but they didn't comply. I slowly pulled my hand up to cover hers, taking hold of her fingers and pulling them to my lips, taking the time to kiss each knuckle, to feel each line in her palm, to trace my mouth with each of her fingertips. Bella waited, her eyes darting about back and forth as she watched my movements with with more patience than I had ever given her credit for. Finally, I had reached my limit, pulling her in for the first kiss we'd shared since we left our home that morning.

No matter how many times we kiss, each kiss with Bella is like a new experience, like our first kiss. She may be undoubtedly predictable in so many aspects—her compassion, her kindness, her understanding, her selflessness—but there is such a sense of unpredictability about her movements—she's so impulsive, so impetuous, never thinking things through—that makes each time different than the last.

And suddenly, I could hear Charlie shifting downstairs. Bella must have sensed it too, for she instantly tensed and waited for me to read his thoughts upon wakening. With a small, amused smile, I told her, "Charlie would greatly appreciate it if you and I were to sleep in separate bedrooms tonight." I tightened my hold around her and pressed a kiss to her forehead.

"Oh, he thought that, did he now?" In return, Bella pressed herself further against me. .

"He might have used a different choice of words, perhaps, but the gist is the same." There is hardly a greater feeling in the world than resting my chin on the top of her head and taking in the scent of her hair.

"Then I suppose we'll have to answer his request then, won't we?"

I nodded. "It would be the respectful, ethical thing to do." Charlie's string of thought was taking on a much clearer perspective now and the words were becoming all the more clear and colorful and he began adjusting himself.

"It would be, wouldn't it," Bella began mischievously. "If sleep was what we were actually planning on doing. Sleep, however, isn't exactly an appropriate term, as we are no longer capable of accomplishing it. Thus, as we are not planning on sleeping, the whole request is null."

"Bella..."

"Oh, all right, all right," Bella pressed her nose into the folds of my shirt, ignoring the fact that we could sense Charlie making his way for the staircase. "But just until he falls asleep." She sighed. "Goodness, you and your morality need to take a break once and awhile, you know."

I looked down at her wedding ring; her pale, bloodless fingers were almost as hard and cold as the diamond she wore. "I think my morality has been lax enough as it is."

"Ah, if only it were more so," Bella smiled happily into my chest. "And traditional matters of sleeping separately would be the least of Charlie's, if only he knew what really went on between you and I," she laughed. She had meant it to be light, but all I could see were her cold fingers and my obtrusive diamond resting on her pale skin.

"...do you mean the nights where I ravish you with kisses or ravish you by sucking the very life out of you with your blood?"

She pulled back instantly, demanding an explanation with her eyes, but I wouldn't meet her gaze. I kept my own eyes fixed across the room, on some clock with an obnoxiously loud ticking function. I regretted the loss of contact instantly, but I told myself I had to be strong and deal with it. There were far more important issues at hand.

"Edward..."

"Charlie's coming," I managed.

"I know he is, I can sense him too, you know—"

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean anything against you, force of habit—"

But she and I were already in our proper positions before I had time to finish or Charlie had time to open the door. I sat comfortably in her computer chair, pretending to be interested in some trinket from her previous life while Bella sat on the bed with a magazine and was laughing and telling me some some joke she found near the back of the issue. It amazed me, how easily she feigned surprise when he entered. She had never been a very good liar. But apparently we weren't skilled enough actors to lessen the tension that surely must have been visible to Charlie when we entered—he seemed in a surprisingly good mood when he informed me that the couch was in as good a shape as ever for my presence. I'm sure he was glowing with joy when I left with a mere unenthusiastic goodnight to the both of them, as well.

I would have waited longer after I was sure Charlie was asleep to return, but I was sure that if I tried, she would come to me. I didn't creep up the stairs so much as I flew, but that didn't stop Bella:

"You're late," she said tersely. Her arms were crossed and I was going to receive no mercy, I was sure of it.

"It appears that even marriage isn't enough to prove our love to your father," I said ungracefully, at the lack of anything better to say. "Apparently he still wants me gone."

"His marriage ended, if you remember," Bella continued staring at me. "And I don't understand what makes you think he'd want you gone."

I wondered if she'd noticed the smile that lit up his face when he returned to his room, hoping to have confirmed a disturbance in our happiness. I didn't think it wise to mention it at that point, however. I wanted to tell her that her mother and father didn't share a love like ours, too, but with the look on her face, I decided it might be best not to. I expected her to ask me what was wrong again, but she didn't.

"You still feel guilty," Bella said quietly. "You still regret turning me."

I didn't know what to say. Any other day I would have whole-heartedly denied it, disagreed, but after today, after looking at the cold shell I'd left her with, I couldn't bring myself to find something to say. She took my silence as her answer.

"It's my fault," Bella said suddenly, to my horror. My head snapped up instantly, but I hadn't completely understood what she'd said. "I still feel terrible for making such a fuss during my transformation—if I had only just controlled myself from being such a baby about it and from, from screaming so loudly about it you wouldn't—"

Word wouldn't quiet her fast enough, so I did so with my lips. I remained there, so as not to give her another chance to speak, so as not to allow her to continue on with her words of madness. When at last I pulled away, I could barely contain the sadness in my voice, "What are you talking about, you silly girl?" She shook her head and buried her face in my shirt, clutching the folds as I rocked her back and forth on the bed. In that moment, she had quelled all of my concerns.

Bella was Bella. It didn't matter what color or how warm her skin was because she would always be inside and anyone who couldn't see that was a fool. I may have taken some things from her and made her sacrifice others, but I can spend the rest of forever making it up to her with things that she would never have been able to have before, I will make sure of it.

"Listen to me," I told her. "I love you. I love you and I will never stop and I love what you were and I love what you've become and that will never change... but I can't help but wonder if that goes for everyone. You've changed, Bella." I kissed her temple, the bridge of her nose, the corners of her eyes, the tips of her ears, the hills of her mouth, anywhere I could find. She had shut her eyes against my words, but she heard them and knew they were true. "These things don't make me love you any less—they couldn't, not ever... but you realize that I've killed you." Bella tried to interrupt, but I silenced her once more. "Of course I killed you, I killed parts of you that were yours and yours alone." I stroked her hair gently, as we laid back on the covers. "I can't imagine what Jacob will think," I heard her sharp intake of breath, but continued. "I suspect that I deserve everything that Jacob could ever wish to do to me, for what I've done to you... but I don't regret it. I don't regret giving you an opportunity to experience what so many will never know exists, I don't regret allowing you to become what you've become, and I don't regret having what we have." I kissed her hair gently. "I don't have any regrets with you."

And I meant it.

&

She went to La Push the very next morning, before the sun had even begun to rise. We weren't going to be able to see it no matter what time it was, so cloudy was the sky that day, but it for one, the added security of the remaining nighttime comforted Bella and two, she simply couldn't wait any longer.

The circumstances surrounding their reunion was tricky. Bella was no longer neutral territory—Switzerland—and whether or not she was still safe on werewolf territory was completely unknown. But she went—without even bothering to ask Charlie to call Billy, without permission, without warning. She left in her truck—Charlie had kept it up and running—just before daylight and that was it. She forbid me to go with her. It was just her and Jacob and I could run and wait for her on the border and meet her at sunset, if I pleased. But this was just her and Jacob. I kissed her goodbye, and she went.

And I did exactly that. I waited enough time to be sure that she would have made it to La Push and then I ran. I ran and found her truck on the border and sat and waited. Until sunset.

And then I saw them. Bare silhouettes at the edge of the trees, close together.

Apparently, Jacob had forgotten what it was like to monitor and control his thoughts around me. Upon seeing me, his subconscious retraced his entire experience with Bella. His thoughts flooded mine, a mixture of dialogue and ideas and feelings meshing together so quickly that my own head began to spin. I had to steady myself against the side of Bella's truck with my right hand and placate my throbbing temple with my left. Sure enough, Jacob's memory was as vivid as ever. Flashes and fragments and suddenly—I was there.

&

Bella was leaning forward hesitantly, one hand clasped tightly over her nose and the other clenched into a tiny fist at her side. She swallowed roughly, obviously having to work exceptionally hard not to break eye contact and not to grimace in disgust. She looked like she was in pain.

Jacob's perspective of her was low, from the ground—from a dangerous crouch, from someone on the offensive, from someone prepared to strike. Bella's beautiful face was crumpling slightly, most likely from the intense stare Jacob was brewing.

&

Oh God, it's just like—just like I thought—she's right there—it's her. Her scent is still under that disgusting—

&

"You can take your hand away," Jacob spit viciously under his breath. "At least, if you can handle it. This ain't no picnic for me either." His voice was different. Acidic.

Bella's hand dropped instantly, but it revealed an ashamed, involuntary frown. Her intakes of breath were so short and brief that they were mere sniffs, but her exhales always lasted four times as long.

"Who says you even have to bother to smell it?" Jacob's malicious voice carried over the whole beach. Bella was at least twenty yards away. "I hear breathing is only option for your kind."

&

This isn't her—this can't be. It's worse than I imagined—everything—it's all—she's gone. She's gone. She's gone. Bella's gone.

&

"I didn't come back just to see Charlie, you know."

"Oh, what, you came back to get a glance at the scenery? You sure know how to pick your vacation spots. Too bad you couldn't have gone to Hawaii like all the other newlyweds. I'm sure you would have enjoyed the sun a bit more there."

"Dammit, Jacob, you know I wanted to see you too."

"Well, now you have. Why don't you leave?"

&

"You know, it's one thing, what Sam and Billy did, still upholding the treaty after what you've done, but it's another for you to completely disregard what they did for you and your fucking swarm of insects to come parading around and showing off your inability to keep up your side of the bargain."

"Jake—"

"Don't. You never were good at keeping promises. Why should that have been any different, right?"

&

Different—she's different—then why can I still smell her?

&

"My body betrays this fact, but I'm colder than your boyfriend now, my dear Bella." The added venom made it sound like profanity. Jacob spit into the rocky sand, as if uttering the name left an unbearably dirty taste in his mouth. The heat rolled off of him in waves and Bella was fighting to stand her ground. "Or should I say, your husband." He eyed the ring on her finger, glinting in the sun.

&

I can't take this. I'm going insane, I have to be.

&

"I see you still have that charm. Oh, don't worry, keep it, it was a gift. It suits you actually. You know, savagely cut out of a living being to be carved and transformed into a mere shadow and reminder of its former life, but became far prettier in the end. Fits, right?"

"Is that what you were thinking of, Jacob, when you decided to make it for me?" Bella was much closer—a mere five feet away. She was holding up the charm to examine it thoughtfully.

"No," Jacob said coldly. "I made it because you didn't seem to like anything else I had to give."

"That's not fair." She turned to him—Oh God, herbrowneyesaregonewherearethey? "You knew how I felt about both of you."

A deep, calming breath. "Doesn't make any difference."

&

What am I doing?

&

She was next to him. They were sitting on a stump or a log of some sort—Our place, this was our place, it's ours—and they were only a mere foot apart, leaning their elbows on their knees and looking at the water.

"Do you really wish that I would have just died instead?"

&

What the hell am I doing?

&

"Remember how you promised that you would never, ever hurt me?"

"Vividly."

"...do you still think you've kept that promise?"

"…you're still not upset about that time you broke your hand, are you?"

&

This is wrong. This is more than wrong. This is beyond wrong. I should hate her again—I should hate her for coming here—I should hate her for what she did to herself—I should hate her for letting him do what he he did—I should hate her for keeping that charm—I should—

&

"What's it like... without the sun?"

Bella was quiet for a moment. "It's not really the actual sunlight from the sky that I miss... though I do miss that from another sun. You know... my own sun." My sun. She looked at Jacob hesitantly. "The sun I used to get from a rather, large, obnoxious sort of creature?" She looked down and her hair veiled her face like it used to, when she wanted to hide the fact that she was crying, but tears were impossible now. "That's the sun that really matters... the other one's just for show."

"And yet you've got yourself that eternal eclipse," Jacob spoke slowly. "Is it worth it?"

"Is what worth it?"

"Is going through eternity without your sun, the sun that matters, worth the darkness?"

Bella took a moment to respond. She whispered, but with conviction. "...it's not completely dark. Even during an eclipse you can still see a little of the sun underneath. Even during an eclipse as strong as that... well, the sun behind it still shines just as brightly... and you can still see it around the edges... burning its way around into view."

&

"What's the worst part?" Jacob asked. His voice was low and quiet and sad. He stared at the horizon as he sat on the rocky beach, Bella beside him, her finger drawing patterns on his palm, which was cradled in her lap. She didn't hesitate, but her voice was just as quiet.

"Losing you." Who says you lost me? Who says you have to lose me?

&

I did.

&

"No, really. What was the worst part?" He repeated. Bella paused and licked her lips... such a mortal habit that didn't escape Jacob's notice and he shifted uncomfortably on the rocks.

"You never said goodbye."

Jacob chuckled sadly. "It would never have been enough."

&

"It would have been less painful if you'd been completely different... if all of you were gone, rather than you still being inside."

If you didn't still smell like you. If you didn't still look like you. If you still didn't act, didn't sound, didn't feel like you—even if your hair is brighter and your skin is colder and your eyes are warmer and your laugh is softer it wouldn't hurt so much if I couldn't tell it was you.

&

"How long did it take before you... before you decided to cut your hair?"

&

They were together.

It was hard to see with Jacob's eyes watering and then suddenly it there was only darkness and the sound of voices as he closed his eyes. But Jacob was holding Bella more tightly than ever before—she used to be so fragile—and Bella was holding him back and there's no better feeling in the universe than being like this with my chin on her head and my nose in her hair.

"You... you came? To the wedding? You were there and I—I never..."

"You were distracted by other things."

"But Leah told me—she said that you weren't coming, that you weren't going to go—"

"...would it have changed anything if you had seen me there?"

A pause. "I could have seen you. Just one more time."

"So nothing would have changed." Nothing would have changed. His grip tightened. "You know, it was the last time I really saw you. The time before that was when you came to visit me, when I was injured. But you were all... all made up. And I couldn't think of anything except how beautiful you were... well, sort of beautiful, anyway." Nothing would have changed.

&

Nothing would have changed.

&

Jacob's head was resting against Bella's but his eyes were still closed and his breathing had suddenly become very ragged and torn and there was something wet running down his cheeks. Bella's grasp was painful, even for Jacob.

&

Nothing's going to change. But we have to change—we have to make it change—we have to—

&

"Damn, I forgot how much I hate that." Jacob swore loudly. "Stay the fuck out of my head, Cullen."

It took me a moment for my eyesight to readjust. And then I realized that Jacob had caught on to my front-row seat preview into his memory bank. I nodded and muttered an apology, somehow dazed from the transaction. Bella was moving to my side, releasing the hand that she had been holding to walk to the passenger side of the car and let herself in. Jacob watched her go—longingly, regretfully, relievedly... I made sure to stay out of his head, to grant him his privacy as best I could. Though I couldn't help imagining how much more meaning the look had held. She sent him a glance as she got in the car, a small trace of a small smile and he turned and was gone.

"Are you all right?" I had asked her, immediately, as I got into the car and began looking her over for any signs of abnormality or distress. "How did it go?"

That barest trace of a smile still graced her lips. "We were just... mending some broken ends." She turned back to look at the edge of the forest that led back down to La Push. "They haven't all been fixed yet." Her voice was soft and fragile. "There's still a few that we have to take care of, but... it's okay." She turned to me and locked and laced her fingers with mine. "After all," she smiled and pulled me along, away from the line of trees. "I have the rest of forever to make it up to him."