It's Either War or Peace

A week passed. July was almost here. I never told Alice what Jackson thought; I told nobody actually. I didn’t want to start any more drama so I kept it to myself. Besides, Taylor would’ve bitten my head off for sure if I said something negative about her mate.

Is there a good thing to this? Yup. The wall was repaired. Luckily, the construction workers just gave us weird and confused looks instead of asking what happened. And don’t worry, the Chicago Coven and I hid our red eyes from them.

Alice and I were in my room. She wore black flats and navy blue skinny jeans. Her white blouse was covered by some fancy black vest thing I couldn’t remember the name for. She told me about five times but to be honest I had no desire to remember its name. I’m not a fashionista like she is. If I was one, I would’ve remembered the name and I wouldn’t be thinking that her outfit was really fancy for just sitting around the house right now.

We were on the floor and my back was to her while she did my hair. She said she was putting some fancy braid in it and I had a feeling it was a fishtail braid. I still don’t know how to do those…

“So Katie,” Alice said. She tugged on my hair while she was flipping stands all over the place. “Let’s talk about those powers.”

“You already know about them,” I said.

Alice smiled. “Let’s talk about how strong they are.”

“My only really strong power is the future telling,” I said. “The rest are just as weak or strong as the rest of your families. Future telling is my best because I can see werewolves too.”

“Hmm. Rip told me about that,” Alice said.

“Why do you think I can see them?” I asked.

Alice shrugged. “Maybe you were just lucky and just got a stronger power than me. What I’m wondering is why you have more than one power. Everyone I know has only one. Some have none for that matter.”

I didn’t reply.

“Alright. It’s finished,” Alice said.

I turned around to face her. I crossed my legs and then touched my hair. Yup. Definitely a fishtail braid. I leaned back, holding myself up with my hands.

“You know what?” I said. “The Chicago Coven never told me how and when they became vampires.”

Alice chuckled. “Seriously?”

I nodded.

“Well, Renee was bitten in 1830s because she was dying. A horse trampled all over her and broke a lot of bones. It crushed some of her skull too. A vampire just walking by bit her,” Alice explained. “In the 1920s, she found Rip dying of starvation. So she bit him. Demi and Joe came to them in 1930. Both of them were bitten in the early 1700s. They forgot why. You know how human memories are a little fuzzy once you’re a vampire right?”

I nodded, lying. Mine were actually perfectly clear.

Alice continued. “Jackson was shot during the Civil War by a Union soldier. An unknown vampire bit him. Jasper actually knew Jackson before any of us did. Jackson found Taylor as a vampire. She was bitten in 1940 because of a vampire hunting accident. They sucked the blood out of everyone around her but they forgot to finish her. They met the Chicago Coven in 1952.”

“Alice, why do you know so much about them?” I asked.

Alice smiled slyly. “Well…”

I raised an eyebrow at her.

“Rip and Renee were telling Carlisle and Esme about themselves and I decided to eavesdrop,” Alice said quickly, still smiling.

I smiled too. “You naughty child.”

“I try.”

We both laughed.

“Okay,” I said, “I like the Chicago Coven and all but I wanna talk about you now.”

“What do you want to know?” Alice asked.

“Everything. Your past. Why you were bitten. When you met Jasper. When you met the Cullens.”

Alice raised an eyebrow at me. “How many Twilight books did you read?”

“All of them,” I said. “Even The Official Illustrated Guide Steph – I mean – Bella wrote.”

Alice chuckled. “Jacob told you about the whole Stephenie Meyer scenario?”

I nodded.

“You should know everything about me then.”

“But I wanna hear it come out of your mouth. Just to make sure it wasn’t a whole bunch of lies.”

Alice sighed. “Fine. I was born in Biloxi, Mississippi in 1901 by the name of Mary Alice Brandon. When I was nine my sister was born. Her name was Cynthia. When I was about nineteen, my mom died and my dad married some chick who was only ten years older than me. Ten. Can you believe it?”

I shook my head.

“People later thought I’ve gone mad,” Alice continued. “See, I was able to see the future as a human. People began to think I was the cause of my mom’s death. My father and stepmother sent me to an insane asylum. They shaved my hair off because of Tuberculosis outbreak.” Alice ran her hand through her hair that was about two inches longer than what she was talking about now. “They gave me electric shocks, thinking that was going to make my visions disappear. It didn’t work the way they wanted it to. It just made me forget everything. Some unknown vampire working at the asylum took me out of there once I told him about James coming for me. Once I was a newborn, the only thing that helped my sanity was the vision I had of Jasper and the Cullens. If I didn’t have that vision, I would’ve gone crazy. I had no memory of my human life. All of the things I just told you about were found through research. Jasper came into my life when I found him at a diner in the 1930s. We met the Cullens in the 1950s and we were married shortly after.”

“So everything was true,” I said quietly.

“Well duh. I wouldn’t lie to Bella,” Alice said. She smiled.

I laughed. “Another thing.”

“Spill it.”

“When did you first start having visions of me?”

“Didn’t Rip tell you?”

“Yeah but-”

Alice interrupted me. “You wanna hear it coming out of my mouth.”

I nodded.

“Since you were ten,” Alice said. “I kept having visions of those gangbangers killing you. Only Edward and Carlisle knew about the visions.”

“You didn’t tell Jasper?” I asked.

Alice shook her head. “Nope. Edward and Carlisle weren’t even supposed to know. I tried blocking my mind from Edward but one day I slipped and he saw everything. He went running to Carlisle shortly after.”

“What did Carlisle say?” I asked.

“Nothing really,” Alice said. “He just said to watch out for you.”

“But didn’t you have a vision about biting me?”

“Actually, no.” Alice shifted in her seat. “That was a last minute decision.”

Thoughts of the demigods began to flood Alice’s mind. She imagined her body being burned to ashes. I was in the background watching helplessly. Why was I going to get a second chance but not Alice?

“Katie?” Alice’s voice was quiet.

I looked at her. She was hugging her knees and looking down at the floor. “Yeah?”

“It’s normal for me to worry about the demigods right?”

I sighed. “Of course Alice. You rely on your future seeking skills and they’re not helping much here. I would be scared too.”

Alice breathed out a deep sigh. She came over and hugged me.

“It’s been on my mind a lot lately,” Alice whispered.

“I know. I’m a mind reader you know,” I said, hugging her back.

Alice giggled.

“Don’t worry about it too much though,” I said. “We gotta live every day like it’s our last still.”

Alice pulled away from me. “But the demigods are more powerful than you think!”

“So?”

Alice frowned slightly. “We gotta be prepared. What if they just randomly show up? They never told me when they’re coming.”

“Then we’ll worry about them when they get here,” I said.

“But then we won’t be-” Alice yelled but a vision interrupted her. Her wide eyes stared at the wall behind me. In her head was the Volturi – the closest thing vampires have to royalty. When she was able to control what she was thinking, she began to think about random songs to block the vision from me. I scowled. That bitch. Seconds later she finally blinked and looked at me.

“What did you see?” I asked.

“The Volturi are gonna come for you in five years. They don’t know about you now but they will,” Alice explained.

“Alright. Then I better live the rest of my life the best way possible before I’m dead.” I chuckled a little.

A deep frown formed on Alice’s face. “Katie, can’t you take these things seriously?”

“Lighten up Alice,” I said. “I’m not gonna mope around for the next five years and neither are you.”

“If I even live till then,” Alice whispered, looking at the ground again.

I put both my hands on Alice’s face and forced her to look at me. “Alice,” I said, “let’s not think negative. Think positive. Even if you do die do you wanna die an unhappy person?”

When I removed my hands from her face, she shook her head.

“Good,” I said with a smile. I relaxed in my seat. I haven’t realized how tense I was until now. “You know Alice, I like talking to you.”

Alice smiled. “That’s because I was your favorite character in the Twilight books.”

I raised an eyebrow at her. “How do you know that?”

“Dude, you’ve been in my visions since you were ten. Obviously I was going to see other things about you other than your incident with the gangbangers!” Alice exclaimed.

I giggled.

“Edward was jealous,” Alice added. “He still is. He’s also jealous because you’re on Team Jacob and not his team.”

I laughed. “I’m on Team Alice! I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

Alice laughed too.

My mind suddenly turned to something else. “So why did you bite me Alice?”

Alice frowned a little but that lasted for about a second. She then smiled slightly. “You were in my visions long enough to become a friend of mine.”

“Did you know your family would be mad at you?”

Alice nodded.

I smiled. “I feel loved!”

Alice laughed. “You should.”