A Realm Apart

Edward and I sat on the side of the rode for several minutes in complete silence. I could feel the wetness of the pavement soaking into my denim pants. Occasionally, I’d look over towards the stoic vampire sitting beside me and my dissipating anger would resurface. In the stillness of the forest, my mind started to digest my current circumstances. I, Violet Velez, just punched Edward Cullen, a person that was fictional until 3 days ago, in Forks while in his stupid Volvo. I currently was sitting in a universe where vampires and werewolves existed. I shook my head. My eyes began to water from disillusion.
“It’s incredibly frustrating that I can’t read your thoughts,” Edward muttered under his breath. “It’s usually a reprieve that Bella is so silent to me. She calms me. But with you, Violet… it’s incredibly exasperating.”
I inhaled deeply and fought the urge to be argumentative, “I’m not thinking about anything you wouldn’t be able to guess on your own.”
Edward shifted his face towards me and gazed at my face, looking for facial cues to diagnose my thoughts. It was extremely uncomfortable having him critique my body language so close beside me. “You’re heart is beating faster,” he noted.
I looked away and shrugged, “It’s uncomfortable.”
“What is?”
“I don’t know;” I prefaced, “it’s uncomfortable having you try to read my mind.”
Edward lowered his gaze and softly confessed, “I realize that you’re not Bella, but your words still feel like they’re coming from her.” Heaviness fell onto my heart. Without noticing, I dehumanized Edward without a second thought. Of course my venomous words would wound him coming out of the mouth of his lover. I felt ashamed for my lack of empathy.
“I,” the apology lingered on the tip of my tongue but I couldn’t bring myself to say it. “I know this all sucks,” I mentally cursed myself for my lack of sensitivity. “I can’t imagine what it’s like seeing Bella in front of you but not having the ability to be with her.”
“It’s hell.”
I let a few heartbeats pass before I spoke again. “I don’t want to be Bella, Edward.” I shifted the face of my body towards him, “I don’t know how long I’m going to be here but it might be better if we accept the worst sooner rather than later.”
He exhaled, “I keep saying we will find a way to switch you back.” He stood up and clenched his fists, “But the truth is we have no idea how to do that.” Edward’s chest began to shake. Edward was crying. “She’s lost to me.” He sighed in misery.
“Edward…”
“Don’t say my name, Violet!” He shouted. “Don’t say my name because I can’t hear her call for me. It’s agonizing!” I was mad at Edward and my opinion of him hadn’t changed but regardless I wanted to comfort him. There was something about his vulnerability that demanded nurturing. I opened my mouth to speak but paused in fear of hurting him more. I stood up and took a step towards him. Edward naturally took a step back. I looked around hoping something would trigger an idea of how to raise his spirits. I saw Bella’s backpack sitting in the car though the windshield. I went to the car and grabbed the little black phone resting in the front pocket of the bag. “What are you doing,” Edward questioned. I searched the phone and pressed play.
“Let’s just stop thinking about all of this heavy bullshit and just dance!” I started awkwardly moving to the song quietly playing from the cheap phone.
He looked at my incredulously, “This isn’t a joke, Violet!”
I kept awkwardly dancing, “It’s not meant to be funny,” I raised my hands above my head. “I just don’t know what to do or what to say and I just feel awkward. I thought since you couldn’t read my mind that physically showing you would be helpful… I guess.” His face was judgmental at best. “You want to know what I’m honestly thinking,” I began whilst still dancing, “I’m really scared. I’ve been really scared. I’m scared of dying and I’m scared of never seeing anyone I once knew ever again. I’m scared of not seeing Jackson ever again. I’m scared of having to start over. I’m scared of never being able to just be myself again. I’m scared that I’m losing my mind and this is all just some sick hallucination. I’m so fucking sca--” Edward pulled me close into his chest.
“I won’t let you die.” I searched for a heartbeat with my ear was pressed against Edward’s chest but heard nothing. “I’ll keep you safe.”
I peeled myself away from Edward’s body, “Why?” I questioned. “So you can preserve Bella’s body or to protect me?”
“Both.” He stated. “I will always hope that Bella will somehow return but you don’t deserve to die because of things you had no control over.” He rested his hand on my shoulder. “I know it was wrong of me to coerce you to be Bella’s placeholder but understand it was my attempt of maintaining normalcy.”
“We can compromise,” I offered. “I have to live out my life as Bella and I’ll need your help but if I’m still here after graduation then I’ll leave for college and making my own decisions. I won’t go to the University of Alaska to be with you and I won’t be a vampire. I won’t live my life making decisions according to Bella’s preferences.”
“Fine;” he halfheartedly agreed, “but until graduation you will allow me and my family to protect you against Victoria and you will pretend to be Bella as best as you can in front of Charlie.” He extended his hand. I grasped it and winced in pain. “Jesus, Violet! All this time and you haven’t noticed you’ve severely injured your hand?!”
I looked down at Bella’s small fragile hand. It was black and blue, and throbbing. I tried to bend my fingers with no luck. “I’ve been distracted.” I hid my hand behind me. “It’ll be fine. I’ll put some ice on it when I get back to Charlie’s.”
“No, we’re going to see Carlisle.” He asserted.
“Edward, please reframe from trying to control me. The less you do that, the better we will get along.”
He sighed in frustration, “Violet, you’re hand is broken.” I shot him an angry glare. “Okay, okay! Violet, would you like to get medical attention from the free, extremely qualified physician back at my house?”
I looked at my hand again. It was starting to puff and the blue areas were turning green. “Sure, but only because you asked so nicely.”

I could hear Alice scolding Edward in the living room. Carlisle was mending my hand that I did break thanks to Edward’s hard head. Emmett popped through the door way, “I know you’re not Bella but Edward definitely had a slap coming from her.” Carlisle, Emmett and I chuckled together at the comment. “I can’t read his mind but I have a feeling he’s just pissed because you’re not giving into his ‘charm,’” Emmett emphasized the word ‘charm’ with air quotes.
“Yeah, you know I just prefer my partners to have a matte finish. I find sparkles just a little ostentatious.” I joked.
“Hey! Sparkles are cool!” Carlisle asserted.
Rosalie entered the room and I could feel myself naturally getting ready to be verbally attacked. “I, for one, think it’s refreshing to see someone act logically for once.” I looked to Carlisle to verify that I heard her correctly. He looked just as shocked. “Violet doesn’t have a death wish and Edward should treat that as a positive not a negative. He’s always whining about wanting to keep Bella alive and he’s finally got his wish.”
Carlisle rolled his eyes out of view from Rosalie. “This might hurt a bit,” Carlisle stated, while ignoring Rosalie’s comments.
“What are you going to do?”
“I can sense a bone out of alignment. If it’s going to heal properly, you’ll need it put back in place.”
I felt a cold hand press against my back for support. I turned to see Alice but found Edward instead. “Is that necessary?” Edward asked Carlisle.
“Unfortunately, yes. This is Bella and Violet’s prominent hand. She’ll develop chronic pain otherwise. Distract her while I do this, Edward.”
Edward ushered me to sit on one of the kitchen chairs. I had insisted on standing to better handle the pain, but I noted that this would be a procedure best done sitting down. I sat. Carlisle and Edward exchanged looks. “Aren’t you supposed to distract me?” I posed towards Edward. He placed his hand against my cheek and quickly touched his lips to mine. Before I could feel his touch, I felt a hot, shooting pain travel up my arm. I screamed at the intensity of the pain and at the sudden invasion of my personal space. “What was that?” I shrieked. I raised my hand.
“Violet, please don’t hit Edward again. I just put your hand all back in place!” Carlisle pleaded.
“You kissed her?” Alice exclaimed as she fluttered to my side. “I told you not make this any worse!”
“I was just distracting, Violet.” Edward explained nonchalantly.
“So, you decided kissing me would be the best method?” I looked at him incredulously.
“It worked, so I would deem it the best method—yes.”
Carlisle was placing a bandage around my hand. I could sense his strong urge to exit the room. “I can wrap the rest of this, Carlisle.” He looked at me and I could see Carlisle’s gratitude in his eyes. “I always thought you were insane in the books because you were under a lot of pressure but you’re just plainly out of your mind, aren’t you!”
Edward rolled his eyes, “It’s not a big deal.”
“It’s a big deal,” Everyone that was left in the room said in unison. Emmett and Rosalie sent me empathic looks as they walked out of the room, finally having their fill of Edward’s insanity.
“What would even make you want to kiss me? I broke my hand…while assaulting you!”
Edward looked at Alice and she left the room. I felt slightly betrayed that she left me alone with Edward. “I kissed you;” he began, “because you looked so much like Bella in that moment.” He walked over towards me and rested against the counter next to me. “Bella is accident prone. I’ve seen Carlisle fixing Bella multiple times and I, for a second, felt like she was here. So I kissed you.”
I was again dumbfounded by Edward’s honesty. I felt again like an asshole. “If this is too hard for you, then maybe we shouldn’t see each other for a while… You know, until you become more comfortable with seeing me not as Bella.”
Irritation flew over Edward’s face, “Violet, you agreed to allowing me to protect you!”
“You can protect me!” I looked away, trying to avoid his intense glower. “You can protect me from a distance. Alice can stay with me, if she wants to.”
“Is that honestly what you want?”
“I don’t relish the idea of torturing you, no matter how annoying I think you are!”
“I can handle it.”
“You obviously can’t!” I stressed, “and, if I need any extra protection Bella has a werewolf friend waiting to help.”
“Violet, Jacob is dangerous.”
“And so is Victoria!” I stood up and headed towards the door, “Take some time to figure out how to cope with everything. It’s okay that you need time to mentally process some things. Let me take care of myself for a couple days and prove to you that I’m more capable of not dying than Bella. I can call you, if I need you.”
Edward stared at me for a while, searching for something to say. In response, he nodded. I waved goodbye and walked towards the driveway where Alice was already waiting with the car running.
“Are you okay?” Alice questioned as I climbed into the car.
I shrugged, “I’ll survive.”