I Believe That You Belong to Me

I sat there at the lunch table, with my heart pounding. I was nervous, I was embarrassed, and I have to admit that I was a little scared. I sat beside a vampire who looked like she was plotting ways to kill me. I sat across from a vampire who found my answers to his “twenty questions” amusing, and who also had a creepy stare. I sat next to a bubbly vampire who couldn’t take no for an answer; I didn’t want her to give me a make-over, I didn’t want to go shopping with her, and I didn’t want to go to her house. And lastly, and worst of all, the god that I promised myself I would never go near, had changed his position.

Jasper now sat beside his brother, on the other side of the table, and he too was giving me an intense stare. I avoided eye contact with him, he wasn’t speaking to me anyway, but I could still feel his concentrated gaze…it made me feel uncomfortable.

“So what exactly do you like?” Emmett asked after he realized I didn’t have an interest in much of anything.

“I like San Francisco,” I sighed, remembering the times I had there with my father. A time when I didn’t feel like such a loser, an outcast sure, but I didn’t feel dead.

“Explain.” He urged seemingly intrigued by my answer.

“Well I like the beaches, the plays, the cable cars, the amount of people, the fact that the people there don’t stare so much, the museums, the sun.” I left out the fact that I also liked to shop, I didn’t want to give Alice any ammo.

“You can have fun here too, we’ll show you.” I didn’t think that was possible, but I nodded my head nonetheless. Shortly after our conversation about San Francisco ended, Edward finally decided to show up with his girlfriend on his arm.

I couldn’t help, but notice that the air had changed the moment they both sat down. Everything turned for the worse. I felt better that they were there, but Emmett lost his humorous attitude, Alice’s bubbles were popped, and Jasper’s eyes darted to the table. I liked that I was no longer being stared at, but I felt that something was wrong.

I could tell that Edward was in a cross mood, from how dark his eyes were and from how they were set and avoiding mine. His body was tense and he greeted no one at the table. And then there was Bella, she held onto Edward so tightly I feared her arms would snap and she looked like she’d been crying.

For the remainder of the lunch break no one said anything. The table was silent and that didn’t change when Bella left to go to her next class, or when the married members of the Cullen family did the same. I followed suit, I wanted to get out of the thick air and distract the awkwardness with science, and that’s all it was. A distraction.

When school ended the strange aura picked up where it left off in the Volvo. Edward said nothing as he drove and did not bid Bella a goodbye when he’d dropped her off.

“Edward what happened?” I finally asked, his strange behavior beginning to get on my nerves.

“Nothing,” He answered, as if I couldn’t tell when he was lying by now.

“It has nothing to do with you.” Something deep down told me that this was also a lie, so I pushed further.

“I thought friends told friends these things.” He stopped the car on the side of the road. My house was nowhere in sight, all I could see were the woods and the black tar of the road. I figured this meant he was going to open up to me.

“Let's make a deal, I’ll tell you, if you tell me what happened yesterday.” But I was wrong.

The box in my mind, I could feel it jostle, but even so I only thought about the demon. I wouldn’t let him know, he couldn’t know.

“I told you, a demon bit me.” Technically, this was the truth. I was bitten, I could still feel the cold on my neck.

“And that was a lie.” He stared me down. I couldn’t beat him in a staring contest and keep my box locked at the same time, so I looked away. Unfortunately, looking away only gave him proof that I had lied.

“No deal…” I fixed my gaze back on the road and waited for him to start the car.

“Edward just take me home.” I asked when he made no attempt to start the Volvo.

“Not until you tell me.”

“I did tell you, it’s not my fault that you don’t believe me.”

“Acerielle, as your fr-

I didn’t wait to hear the end of his sentence. I wasn’t going to tell him anything and he needed to accept that, just as I accepted that he wasn’t going to tell me anything. I grabbed my bag and stepped out into the rain. It was stupid of me to do, for he had me back in the car before I’d even taken a step.

“You just keep forgetting what I am, don’t you? You can’t jump out of the car and expect me to do nothing about it. If you want to go home, then you’ll tell me what happened.”

“I can’t…” I whispered, struggling to keep my thoughts on the different colors of the rainbow.

“Why can’t you?”

“Because nothing happened,” I whispered again. Edward sighed beside me and started the car. I kept my thoughts away from the jostling box and focused on the blurs passing outside. It was tiring, but I kept it up until the car stopped in front of my house.

“Acerielle,” I turned back around after stepping out of the car and met Edward’s agitated gaze.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have tried to force you, but when you’re ready…I’m here.”

“I know and when something does happen, I’ll be sure to tell you.” I was lying and I knew that he knew that I was lying, but I couldn’t risk him finding out.

I had just gotten a friend. After fifteen years of only having my father, I had finally gotten a friend. He’d hate me if he found out I was no longer just mildly dirty, but completely tainted. He wouldn’t want to be my friend, he wouldn’t speak to me, he wouldn’t even look at me. My mother told me that’s what my dad would do if he ever found out, which is why I’d kept him in the dark. It’s selfish, but I’m just not ready for the whole world to hate me.

I felt my body begin to tremble the moment I entered my room. It didn’t take me long to realize the reason was because I had started to cry. I buried my head into my pillow to muffle my pathetic sounds and prayed that Edward wouldn't feel my misery and decide to show up.

I cried for what felt like hours and felt no better. I sat up after a while and wiped my eyes. I felt pathetic. I didn’t even know what I was crying for. I didn’t know whether it was because of yesterday or that I had sort of gotten in a fight with my only friend. I just didn’t know.

What I did know though, was that there wasn’t supposed to be anyone in my room, yet sitting in my desk chair was someone. He had dark hair of medium length and a smirk playing upon his lips. I could tell from his pale skin that he was a vampire and I could also tell that with his eyes being redder than my lips, that he also wasn’t a good one.

The vampire didn’t move or speak, he only stared at me with that same smirk and I prayed that he wasn’t the same one that had come yesterday.

I blinked several times, hoping that this was all a dream, that I was not going to be attacked a second time, but my prayer went unanswered…

He lunged and pushed me back onto the bed. My heart began its race even as I begged it not to, the vampire, hearing it, smirked as he straddled over me.

“She’s crazy...nothing about you is ugly...” His breathed, lowering his lips to my neck. It was the same vampire (I would never forget his eerie song), but deep down I had already known that.

I waited, with my heart pounding, for his bite, but it never came. The beast only sucked at my neck, in the very same place that he’d bitten me the day before.

He was playing with me.

“Please…if y-you’re going to kill me...pl-

The beast silenced me with his icy lips, causing my stomach to turn, and pulled away with that same smirk.

“I can’t kill you, she wouldn’t allow that.”

“Then what are you-

“I came back to check your progress, you should be writhing on the floor in pain right now. You should be becoming one of us—why are you still human?” His eyes grew dark as he peered into mine for an answer. I didn’t have one, I didn’t even know how to become a vampire let alone how to stop it from happening.

“I don’t know…” I finally let out.

“Of course you don’t. You’re just an infant.”

“Wha-what are you going to do to me?”

The beast didn’t answer me, instead he lowered back down to my neck, this time making sure to penetrate my skin. And much like before I was enveloped in darkness soon after.