Luminosity Page 9

  Yes, yes, shallowness ahoy, but it mattered more to be correct than to pretend myself deep. If I tried to convince myself that I found Edward interesting for deep reasons, it would lead down a path of feedback loops and foolish reasoning that could literally kill me. I would be more likely to take stupid risks with Edward if I fancied myself up to my eyebrows in transcendent romantic adoration. I would be less likely to behave like an idiot around him if I recognized that he was a hot (well, cold), rich guy who sounded like an angel and had sexy superpowers and that these things were not irrelevant to me.

  Taking a step back from all of these admittedly relevant facts, I turned to more practical thoughts: none of the qualities on that list were unique to Edward. The combination wasn't unique to Edward. The combination wasn't even unique to Edward among people I knew, although his brothers were both taken and neither similarly approximated what I considered my "type" except for the fact that I'd never dated. Edward was not the only person interested in me, even as of the previous week and a half. If he had other, rarer personal traits that would also appeal to me, I didn't know about them yet.

  At any rate, there was simply no call to rush anything. We were both going to live forever. And once I was a vampire, too, I'd be better able to separate the part where maybe I wanted Edward from the part where maybe I didn't have any other choice.

  * * *

  "Time to go," Edward said after a very, very long conversational lull.

  "Alice said she'd call," I pointed out.

  Edward grinned. "I'm the phone," he said.

  Oh. "I see. You can drive if you promise not to speed."

  "I actually thought we'd go on foot. It would be hard to get your truck to the spot Alice sees us at, so we couldn't drive all the way there anyway."

  "I don't actually know how far away your house is -" I began, thinking to protest on behalf of my knees and feet and other parts easily made sore and inspired to rebellion.

  "Too far for you to walk," cut in Edward, and I made a small huffing noise, but he was telling me something I wanted to know, and I could always inform him later that he shouldn't interrupt me. "At least if you wanted to get there today. I'll take you."

  "You propose to carry me a distance of several miles," I said skeptically. Of course he could physically lift something of my size and run that far. But could he carry me like that - picking me up and hauling me around, putting me awfully near his nose - without wanting to take a bite just a bit too much? It didn't sound very comfortable, either.

  "I'm faster than your truck, Charlie would be as scandalized as could be if he knew that you're associating with vampires anyway and it won't get any worse if you let me cart you around, I can avoid any easily frightened onlookers, running very fast is not illegal, and the scenery at our destination is nicer than anything you'd see from the highway," he said, smiling patiently. "Besides, then we can skip the part of the tests where you have to find a good vantage point to watch us run an interesting distance."

  These things were likely all true. "Are you sure that this won't make me extra likely to arrive needing a visit to the Red Cross's juice and cookies table?"

  It took him a moment to piece that together, and then he looked solemn. "I won't hurt you, Bella," he said softly.

  I closed my eyes, screening off some distracting and irrelevant input about the color of his eyes (gold, still). "I am aware that you do not prefer to hurt me, that you know it would be wrong to hurt me, and that you will try not to hurt me. I'm also aware that when I was seven I did not prefer to steal, and knew it was wrong, and tried not to, and still wound up with Renée's bake sale contribution half on my face and half in my stomach, because chocolate is very delicious. And I'm aware that you find me very delicious."

  I opened my eyes again. Edward was looking at me sadly, hurt by my mistrust. "Alice doesn't see you dead," he reminded me.

  I frowned to myself, retrieved Alice's weather predictions from my pocket, and confirmed that it was misting just like she'd said to expect for this thirty-four minute period of Thursday afternoon. I folded up the paper again and put it away. "So I'm given to understand."

  "Is there anything else I can do to help you feel safe?" he asked.

  This was a fair question. And the obvious answer, don't eat me, was silly: if he ate me, I would not be afraid anymore. "Let me think," I requested, and he nodded.

  I thought. Edward already knew about the notebooks, so I supposed I could write without giving up information I wanted to keep to myself, but decided against it. First, it would be a poor choice to needlessly tease him with the fact that the notebooks were for my eyes only. Second, I'd heard of a trick where even a human could guess what was being written: one gave someone a big squeaky marker, looked away, and told them to write a number from one to ten, and listened for duration and number of strokes of the pen. It was a lot better than chance, and I guessed that vampire hearing could probably distinguish all the letters of the alphabet if the vampire in question cared to try. One trait I did not ascribe to Edward was the tendency to scrupulously avoid picking up on information that was available to him.

  "How often do humans smell extra tasty to vampires in general?" I asked.

  "Not often. You're the only one, for me - I've been a vampire since 1918," he supplied as I opened my mouth to ask. "Emmett says it's... happened... to him twice, since turning in 1935. One stronger than the other. No one else I know. But," he added reluctantly, "neither of Emmett's were as strong as you."

  "Did Emmett eat his two?" I asked baldly, and Edward nodded slightly, frowning and not looking at me. "And have you, Edward, personally ever eaten a human?" I was actually not sure what the answer to this would be. If Emmett belonged to the family and had eaten at least two people, Edward could too; clearly they did not eject relatives for small lapses like murder.

  He hesitated. Just a little too long.

  "I'm going to drive," I said. "Alice or someone else can meet us and carry me over the tricky section." And I got up and stalked towards my car.

  * * *

  Chapter 5: Vampires 101

  There was no point in hating, resenting, or even shouting at Edward, or Emmett, or any other Cullen family vampires who had slipped up in the past. It would not bring any victims back to life. To the extent that any of them thought much of my opinion, they could guess it. Adding strident yelling wouldn't be a significantly greater deterrent. And I didn't even know if it was reasonable to expect perfect behavior from vampires. How many were there in the world? It didn't matter very much. "Most" vampires ate humans. And all vampires were made from humans, most of whom were not actionably inclined to murder. Something about the transition - something I didn't know much about - turned humans into blood-drinking killers most of the time, and the Cullens, plus their friends from Denali, were doing their best to avoid it. They could not be turned back into a less bloodthirsty species. All that was left was damage control. I took a quick assessment of myself and determined that even if I'd had the ability, I hadn't the stomach to do the family in to protect future victims of unknown number.

  There was a point in seriously assessing whatever factor made it happen, and determining whether or not I could handle it, before I turned in my mortality. I had to ask them about that. I considered starting with Edward, but it would be too awkward - Alice seemed safer to start with.

  Edward obliged me with details anyway after we'd been on the road for a minute. "Left up here," he murmured. "It wasn't... as bad as you might be thinking," he said.

  "I didn't have a specific body count in mind," I said levelly. "Was it just one?"

  "No," he said. "No, it wasn't. But - I know you don't like that I can read minds, but I can, and that let me be selective in some ways." I made a skeptical face, although I didn't take my eyes off the road. Edward continued. "When Carlisle turned me, at first, of course I could read him. His perfect sincerity. I understood immediately why he lived the way he did. It was hard, but for almost a decade I had a perf
ect record. And then I decided - I'm not going to pretend to you that I snapped and in a fit of passion did what I did. I decided to experiment with a different way of life. But I was selective, like I said. I went to big cities, found some truly evil people. I told myself that if I happend to run across a murderer stalking a girl down an alley, and I saved her, then surely, I wasn't so terrible. It was only a rationalization. I'm still a murderer. But..." He paused, awaiting my reaction.

  "Oh," I breathed. That was... that was better. He seemed to think it was worse that it had been a conscious choice instead of a moment of failed control. I didn't agree. This was partly because it made me safer. If he decided to eat humans again, well, I was a little more appealing than some potential victims, but I was appealing in an impulse way more than in a deliberative way. If I wasn't in a room with him, and he mulled to himself that he really preferred to go back to munching humans, it would be more likely that he'd hie himself off to another big city, find another suitably depraved victim, and eat them instead. He knew I had family - in particular, Charlie could make things inconvenient; even a dead cop who went abruptly missing or dead-with-no-blood-left could get the attention of other police. And I suspected that Alice would be at least annoyed with him if he ate me.

  So I was likely to be safer from him than I'd thought. It would still be foolish to tempt impulse too rashly. For example, I still did not think it would make sense to have him carry me at high speed when the wind would waft extra-concentrated Essence of Bella right into his lungs.

  "So after a little under five years of that," said Edward guiltily, "I went home to Carlisle and Esme. They welcomed me back with open arms. Like the prodigal son. It was far more than I deserved."

  "That actually makes me feel considerably safer," I said honestly. I was about to ask why he didn't make a habit of going on with the Batman routine sans complimentary beverages - at night, perhaps, when he didn't have to sleep and for the thematic appropriateness - but then I realized. That would be conspicuous. To eat humans was fine, and the Volturi apparently cared not a whit for selection algorithm. To tie them up and deposit them unbloodied with lists of their crimes pinned to their shirts, at the doorstep of the local police department... would probably put a dent in the collective vampire artifice.

  Edward looked bewildered. I clarified: "I feel safer in comparison to when I didn't know the details. Not in comparison to when I didn't realize you'd killed anybody at all."

  "You're a very puzzling girl, Bella Swan," Edward muttered. "Take this exit. Must you drive so slowly?"

  I was going precisely the speed limit. "I don't think my truck could take much more, honestly," I said. "Perhaps I should have let you drive, given that - since you do have the better reflexes between the two of us."

  "I think that would be worse. I like to drive fast," said Edward, grinning slightly. "It's not quite as awful to be driven slowly as it would be to drive this pokey thing myself."

  "All right, then I'm the designated driver," I said.

  "Next time you should just let me run you there."

  I wasn't aware of plans for a next time, but I supposed the way things were going I'd visit the vampires again eventually. "I'm not sure you ought to pick me up, even with the feeling safer bit," I said. "If you run, that'll just blow my scent in your face unless I ride piggyback - and I'm not at all confident I could hold on piggyback at high speed."

  "Did Alice tell you during Vampires 101 that we don't actually have to breathe?" asked Edward.

  Oh, that was interesting. "You don't breathe?"

  "We do," he corrected. "We can smell, which requires breathing, and we talk, which requires air. But if we don't care to do either of those things, it won't harm us to simply stop breathing." He paused. "That's how I managed the first day you came to Biology. As soon as I got ahold of myself I didn't breathe until the class ended."

  "And this wouldn't make it any harder for you to run?"

  He shook his head and smiled. "Air isn't fuel to us the same way it is to humans."

  "Perhaps, then, although I have to admit it doesn't sound comfortable." That part would apply to his siblings just as much, though. "But if you were doing that we couldn't be having this charming conversation about how you can do that."

  That got an outright laugh, which added charming color to the sentence "pull in at the big house there". I rolled up the driveway, admiring the home. It was indeed big. I'd noticed that we'd actually left Forks proper, having bridged the Calawah River and continuing north through scarcely marked roads. A good chunk of the drive had been through very thick forest. I wondered if the vampires had had to clear a lot of trees to make driving possible. The ride was surprisingly smooth; they probably didn't care to jostle their pretty car every time they drove to school. The house itself was a faded white, with graceful architecture, and when I got out of the truck I noticed that the entire south wall was one enormous window: just glass. The effect was very striking.

  "Do you like it?" asked Edward, shutting the passenger behind him after he hopped out. I nodded, smiling. "Esme has a fondness for architecture," he said affectionately.

  "She built this house?" I could see it now - a vampire easily lifting beams, pushing nails into their proper places by tapping them like piano keys, cutting glass by stroking it with one of those stony fingers.

  "Restored it," Edward said. "She likes to fix up old historical places. But there's a lot of her in it." He cocked his head slightly. "Here she comes now," he went on. "Bella, it looks like it's time for you to meet my parents."

  * * *

  Carlisle and Esme exited their house, closed the doors behind them, and then - having no reason to hide their speed - appeared before us, from thirty feet away, too quick for me to follow their paths. When they stopped, Carlisle had an arm around Esme's shoulders and she had one around his waist; they looked very picturesque indeed.

  The good doctor looked like his biggest problem in life was probably having nurses and patients hit on him. He looked like he was in his twenties - his early twenties. The only way I could imagine him ever passing for thirty-five would be by living someplace for fifteen years and betting on the sheer unbelief of the people around him. He was blond, his skin the same chalk color as the others, and his eyes were black - not gold. I needed to ask what that meant - it probably wasn't random. He wore a warm, paternal smile, which he turned on Edward first before looking at me.

  Esme looked a little older, and that probably helped with the subterfuge, but she was still clearly young and lovely. (Did no one ever turn octogenarians? Or did the turning process cure wrinkles?) Her hair was a dark reddish blond - sort of butterscotch - and she had topaz-colored eyes, darker than the golden color on Edward but not as black as Carlisle's. She was roundish - not heavy, but huggable-looking (which I knew wasn't accurate) and several inches shorter than her husband. Everything about her face - heart-shaped and every bit as pretty as Alice's - made her look motherly; it didn't surprise me that it was the role she occupied.

  "Welcome, Bella," said Esme in a warm, loving voice to match her appearance. "We're so glad to finally meet you." I felt comfortable at once - no Jasperish sorcery, just my lie detectors going completely quiet as they listened to Esme express that she was pleased to have me at her home. I smiled back, nearly grinning, and thanked her.

  Carlisle extended his hand for me to shake. "It's good of you to come," he said. "I understand we'll be demonstrating various features of the species for you?" He had a kind, soft voice, which I imagined helped greatly with his bedside manner.

  "That's the plan, although I'm beginning to think they're redundant," I admitted. "I'm pretty sure you're all actually vampires who actually have superpowers and will be able to pick up any heavy object I happen to point out to you, plus everything else my list calls for. I mostly haven't canceled just because you were all led to expect the tests to happen, and so I don't feel like an idiot in the unlikely event that you later turn out to be stage magicians with poor cir
culation."

  Carlisle laughed. "It's no trouble," he said, "and it will give us a chance to get to know you better. Alice has informed us that you're going to be part of the family."

  I wasn't sure if he meant that Alice thought I'd be a vampire, or that she had recently seen me marrying Edward or something like that - and with Edward standing right there, I couldn't ask. So I just smiled back at him and said, "Where are we headed?"

  "The clearing where we play baseball," Edward said. "Emmett, Alice and Jasper are already there." He paused, and then said, "Esme, would you carry her?"

  I had not expected that. We'd discussed the fact that he didn't need to breathe - was there some other reason it was dangerous that he'd only just thought of? He'd been all for the idea minutes earlier. Esme didn't look like it made a lot of sense to her either, but she looked to me for confirmation, and I nodded. She took two steps toward me and then scooped me up gently in her arms, one behind my back and one under my knees. It wasn't as uncomfortable as I would have thought, although I wouldn't have chosen to sit that way while trying to read or otherwise relax.

  Esme looked to Carlisle, who nodded, and the three vampires took off.

  * * *

  Esme was fast. And she didn't even seem to be pushing herself. The impression I had of her gait was that it resembled a jog more than a run, even as she moved through the trees so fast that they blurred around me and wind forced me to close my eyes to the indistinguishable color. But her strides were very level - I bobbed up and down a little bit, but overall found the experience less physically exhilarating than a typical roller coaster. On a mental level, it was really cool that a vampire was carrying me through the woods at high speed. I'd expected to be terrified, but Esme was calming. Perhaps that was why Edward had asked her to be the one to carry me.