#idk what flower is the earring but it reminded me of white lilies so there

[redstrewn]

Whore.

[mysticalmusicwhispers]

lovers’ dreams

Summary: “A day fit for a spring dream.” And then he kisses Roshan, and they become lost in each other.

Characters: India (Aditya), China, Iran/Persia (Roshan, genderfluid). Human names used. Indran, Churan, and Indchu for ships!

Notes: 100% distilled surrealism! This was supposed to be a writing exercise that ran away from me rip. There are many footnotes that explain Many things. Enjoy!

also on AO3! (there are bonus thoughts and explanations there for anyone who’s interested or slightly confused 😅. everything necessary for you to understand the story is here too but I ramble about my thoughts going into the piece on AO3 lol)

———

The willow’s drooping branches hide Yao’s face like a beaded curtain, a bride’s sheer red veil. The spring breeze snakes through the tree, and the sound of wedding suona—sorna rings through the silence. A flutter of phoenix wings brushes past their ear, a whisper on the wind. Roshan walks languidly until they are in front of Yao; it takes a minute—it takes a month. Yao’s face is sharp and his eyes glint, like the jade in his belt. But the kiss is soft when they take his lips in theirs, and it tastes of the rose’s tender petals. The clean sweetness of flowers is warm against Roshan’s face and the fragrance of tea drifts into their nostrils. 

Yao pulls away, and Roshan opens their eyes to polished jade thorns sprouting up from the earth around them—crisp green, sharp-tipped; elegant, dangerous. So these are the fruits of our love. It is fitting. They lean to kiss Yao again, and this time, a laugh peals through the air when they part. It is not Roshan’s, and it isn’t Yao’s. But it is clear as spring water and tinkles like a bell, a joyous sound, and it makes Yao smile—a smile that is gentle, calculating; sweet, dangerous. A copper coin hides in the corner of his lips. “A day fit for a spring dream.” And then he kisses Roshan, and they become lost in each other.

When Roshan opens their eyes again, Yao is gone. They are standing in nothingness, a shell of a dream. A liminal plane. A wedding song echoes in the empty space, loud and cheerful, although there are no musicians to be seen playing the dohol, the sorna. Then sprung from the air, a mirror of fate, Aayeneh-ye Bakh, with its customary candelabras flanking it, and with their dots of golden light—miniature suns, sparkling stars. Its face shimmers, clear and gleaming: a pond on a full moon night—and in it, Yao stands, his reflection bright, splendid robes shimmering like gold scales and fine silk. Roshan reaches out a hand, and pulls him into a kiss.

“Welcome back, my dear.”

———

It is sunset, and a chill brushes past Yao’s shoulders and winds through his hair. The sky burns red, and fork tongued flames lick at the sun. A world bathed in fire, on the cusp of night. A lotus pond sits before him, and a figure is at its edge—Aditya, adorned in gold, the perfect figure of a prince. He, a dream of glittering palaces and beady emeralds, bright against the glow of the setting sun, sharp against the bloody sky. He holds a lotus blossom out, and Yao takes it. It is pure, tender in his calloused hands. A drop of blood drips from a petal. He lets it float into the water, and Aditya watches with him as the peach pink petals drop before their eyes—the lotus head balloons, then falls with the weight of seeds; it withers, a shell of its fruit. Divine beauty is short lived—seasons turn with the winds of change.  

Aditya loops an arm around him, bare skin on bare skin, the warmth of the sun hanging around them like a curtain. Their lips meet. The kiss is long, and lingers even after Yao pulls away; it is slightly bitter, but how could it not be? Aditya’s eyes are like black tea, and Yao tastes acrid lily bulbs. The sky has faded into burnt orange, the aftermath of a blaze. Autumn leaves fall from ginkgo trees, golden yellow, bright with memories of the past. Aditya closes his eyes, and Yao watches him sink into a dream.

The scene shifts before his eyes. The lotus pond morphs into a giant chessboard, and they are on opposite sides. Aditya plays white. Cream colored pawns meet chocolate brown knights, and they watch as kings rise and fall, as steady as the spinning of the world. Chariots race and elephants trumpet; the cavalry fight with long swords and bows, and the peasants use polearms, raised fists. Yao meets Aditya’s eyes, warm but gleaming with an ambition that has never gone away. He nods to his neighbor to the west, to his rival, lover, partner, equal. Aditya smiles.

“So we meet again.”

———

It is afternoon, and the sun is warm on his face. Roshan sits on a bench in the courtyard, holding a cup of coffee in one hand, a pomegranate in the other. Aditya nestles into their side, and they give him a feather light cheek kiss, gift him a wisp of air. They hold out the pomegranate, offers it, and Aditya takes a bite. Roshan takes the other half. They watch as the fruit regrows, seeds become jewels, glittering rubies in folds of red fabric. Roshan holds one up to the light with a critical eye. They spread tawny wings, amber eagle eyes alight with the pride of the past present future. A lion and the sun. The wings disappear—a trick of the light, reality fallen away. Then they hold up the cup of coffee.

“For you.” Aditya smiles, and offers a cup of black tea in return.

We have shared many things, and fought over equally many. How will it be in the future? He takes a sip, and falls through the cup.

A cemetery of swords surrounds them, a memory of things gone by. Afternoon sunlight filters through the trees, winds into Roshan’s hair. Idly peaceful. Flowers sprout through the earth; wither; climb up the rusted metal once again. A vine of roses twists around the hilt of a ceremonial spear, supple and full against cool, glinting steel. The leaves flicker, green yellow dead green again. Its blossom is still fresh red, like passion, like their love, pooling around them like a million memories, a still night in the river of time. Aditya looks at Roshan, different yet the same, a reflection of what they once were. Familiar, always, despite the changing tides and shifting dreams.

———

Notes

this part might actually be longer than the fic itself rip 😔 reminder that there’s extra rambling on ao3 lol

Suona/sorna: suona (唢呐) is a traditional wind instrument often played at wedding and funeral processions in northern China! (also used in Southeast China + Taiwan) It’s very loud and has a super brassy sound, but personally I think it sounds alright! The instrument came from Central Asia and is also used at weddings in Iran (where it’s spelled sorna/sarna), where it’s played with a dohol, a large cylindrical drum.

Phoenixes: wedding imagery in China, where a dragon symbolizes the groom and the phoenix the bride. There’s also an analogue to the phoenix in Persian mythology, a simurgh, which is a benevolent creature that is said to purify the land, roosts in the Tree of Knowledge, and apparently has seen the world be destroyed 3 times. Can symbolize healing, divinity, wisdom, and life. (the simurgh symbolism doesn't have much relevance to the fic but I thought it was incredibly interesting to read about lol)

Spring dream: very loosely referencing the Chinese phrase 一场春梦 (yi chang chun meng), which literally translates to an episode of a spring dream. It means the feeling that past predictions or events were actually totally wrong and fruitless, like you expected something (probably really good), but then woke up to reality not being up to your expectations? I can’t translate 😔

Mirror of Fate: In traditional Iranian weddings, a large, elaborate table with flowers and food and different spices is set up (sofreh aghd). A mirror of fate and 2 candelabras are also placed in the center of the table. The mirror represents how fate brought the bride and groom together, and the candelabras represent light and fire. The mirror is there so that when the groom looks into it, the first thing he should see is his betrothed's reflection.

Lotus blossoms: in China and India and many other parts of Asia, lotuses represent purity (they grow from dark mud but the flowers are pure white/pink), the divine, elegance, spiritual promise, the good part of humanity. so, a lotus with a drop of blood in Yao’s hands would be interesting.

Lily bulbs: this is purely self projection but lily bulbs (baihe) are used in Chinese medicine and I despise them. They're not super bitter but they taste starchy, bland, and off. Also lilies and lotuses are pretty similar and I thought that would be interesting :>

Chess: idk if I need a note for this but chess originated as an Indian game called Chaturanga and spread over to China and Iran, among many other places in Asia.

Tea and Coffee: nothing really special about this besides that Iranians Really Like tea. Decided to make India drink coffee instead for contrast; realistically he’d also be drinking tea lol

Eagle eyes: the Iranian/Persian symbol of the Faravahar, from Zoroastrianism has wings that are supposed to be eagle wings (I think? correct me if it’s just unspecified). You’ve probably seen it; it depicts a man with spread wings, half kneeling in a side view. Nowadays it’s also a symbol of Iranian culture, history, and national pride, besides being representative of Zoroastrianism.

Rose: national flower of Iran, and obv I don’t need to explain the other rose connotations. Also I’ve fully adopted the hc that Roshan and all their stuff smells like roses so that’s there too.

Lion and the sun: getting lazy with the explanations, but the short version is that it was a very important Iranian national symbol for many reasons, moreso tied to the state than culture (imo); it was also on the national flag up till the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Although I’m still debating how much Roshan is associated with the state, I also think sun and lion imagery fits them (glory, golden days, pride and courage). It’s super interesting, go search it up if you wanna read more!

This whole fic was somewhat inspired by this one, and the indchu bit was also somewhat inspired by this fanart.

If you made it down here, you have all my gratitude. Feedback is welcome and appreciated! Thanks for reading <3

[divinelyjude]

Title: for want of a meal nail

Summary: bruh idk, oc twilight fanfiction. just a one shot, but I’m posting it here so my darling friend @awkwardbobs will see it. Love you <3

           The sand and dirt are warm still, as night sets in Arizona. Cooling fast, and as the last bits of light fade to purple-blue-black, I stare up through layers of pollution to the stars above. I can make out every single one in the sky, and decades of stargazing allows me to instantly pinpoint some of the most popular constellations. For a brief moment, I arch my back off the sand and stretch my muscles out, curling my fingers in and out of the dirt, before falling limp back onto the ground.

           “I don’t mean to alarm you, miss, but you’re not wearing enough clothes to be sleeping in a public park.”

           I blinked slowly, the pale lavender of my eyelids doing nothing to conceal the stars from me, before turning my head to the side.

           There was a kid standing a few feet away from me, sitting on her bike, looking as though she had been just about to ride her bike away. Perhaps she had. It was perhaps best that she did, too, when there were creatures like me roaming the night.

           “Miss, are you drunk?” the little girl asks.

           I raised a single eyebrow, but I conceded that it was probably odd for me to be here, wearing little more than a pair of shirts and a sports bra, in the cool night air. “My clothes are in the laundromat.”

           The girl looked up to stare at the distinctly closed laundromat across the street, before her head swung back down to me. The movement dislodged her long, brown hair, and her sweet, flowery scent swept through my nose. I breathed deeply, and my throat lit up in a burn of thirst that might have been unbearable a few hours earlier. Now, dizzingly full and feeling distinctly like a water balloon of blood, I had no desire to actually feed on the girl.

           “Al-right,” she said slowly, dragging each syllable out, clearly disbelieving. “I guess you have it figure out then. Sorry for bothering you.”

           And with that, she turns her brown eyes up away from me and pedals as fast as her child-legs can. It’s almost amusing, to watch the girl’s brow furrow in what is clearly confusion. Her scent leaves a trail behind her like a neon sign to any hungry vampire. I breathe deeply, closing my eyes and turning my face back to the sky.

           She really does smell nice and it’s been a while since I’ve given myself a treat.

           Inside the laundromat, the dryer beeps to signal that it’s finished.

           I find her again barely a day later, in a library. She’s doing math homework – prealgebra, maybe, but it’s been too long since I studied it, and it definitely wasn’t one of the human memories to stick around. In fact, none had.

           I don’t bother thinking about how creepy it will look to anyone that a seemingly-adult has just sat across from a little girl. Human morals and societal expectations irritated me, backwards and ignorant. The girl recognizes me, that’s incredibly clear. I smile in satisfaction, breathing in her scent deeply. The library is set to close in the next ten minutes, the sun already set and the surrounding area mostly deserted.

           “You’re wearing clothes,” she states.

           My grin falters as I stare at her. Instantly, her heart speeds up and blood rushes under her skin, pooling at her cheeks and venom floods my mouth. Not yet, I remind myself. Soon. Withstanding the burn now would make her blood all that sweeter to me when I finally did feast.

           “Sorry,” she blurts out. “I just – um – actually… Should I be shouting for help?”

           “Do you want to?” I ask, careful with my tone as I relax in the chair as though I’m a boneless eel. A piece of my hair, long and gold, falls into my eyes before I blow it out of the way.

           “Kind of.” The girl fidgets, gathering up her notes and sheets slowly. “Are you following me?”

           “What if I am?” I ask, the corner of my mouth dragging up my cheek without thought.

           “Then I should probably leave,” the girl says, standing abruptly.

           I pout, pushing my bottom lip out childishly. “At least tell me your name before your disappearing act.”

           The girl shakes her head and walks away. I listen carefully, eyes following her slight figure. Her hair is, comparably, not as long as mine, but it brushes halfway down her back still. It leaves the scent of flowers and chocolate in its wake, just like its color.

           “Goodnight, Miss Asbury,” says the girl.

           “See you tomorrow, Bella dear,” Miss Asbury replies. My smirk blooms into a grin.

           I whisper her name, and decide that I like the way it rolls off the tongue. I wonder if her blood rolls just the same. I get up and grab a random book off a nearby shelf – about gardening, I note with a glance – and go to check it out. Miss Asbury is quite irritated by being made to wait an extra ten minutes to close up while I fill out a Library Card form. I whistle under my breath as I walk back to the abandoned house I’d been hiding in during the day to stash the book. 

           “Hello, Bella,” I greet with good cheer. “How nice to see you again.”

           Bella looks up from the display of baked goods, shopping cart nearly dwarfing her in size beside her. She scowls fiercely, twisting her lips. “Why are you doing this?”

           I smile slightly. “Not going to ask how I know your name?”

           “Miss Asbury told me about you,” she said with a derisive sniff. “What kind of fake name is Jane Doe, anyways?”

           The smile blooms wider on my cheeks. “So you were curious about me.”

           Her cheeks flood red, bright contrast on her pale, lily-white skin. She looks like she would bruise easily under my fingers, and I promise to be gentle when I kill her. Not that she’ll appreciate it, but it’s the thought that counts.

           Bella turns, pushing the shopping cart in front of her. “Please leave me alone.”

           “But that would be no fun,” I whined, following beside her easily. “Besides, color me curious – what’s a ten year old doing at Wal-Mart at ten in the evening?”

           “Shopping,” was her terse answer. “And I’m thirteen.”

           I wave my hands aflutter. “My apologize, miss teenager.”

           “How old are you anyways?” she asks suddenly, frowning at me. “You shouldn’t be stalking thirteen year old’s.”

           I look her in the eyes when I lie. “Why, can’t you tell? I’m fifteen. No, sixteen. Maybe seventeen?” Bella huffs and walks faster, but I keep up. “No, no, don’t leave, I’m sorry. Here’s the truth. I’m turning fifty soon, but I’m also seventeen.”

           Bella shakes her head, even though I told her the truth. Humans, I think, are irritating. For a moment, I ponder why I’m waiting to kill her. But then a man breezes past us with a clunky cell phone to his ears and the gush of air it pushes into Bella shakes up her scent like a gentle breeze. Flowers and chocolate. Breathing deeply, I remember why. I’d only ever met someone who smelled as good as Bella did a few times before – and in my experience, the wait made everything better. I was good at waiting.

           “Leave me alone,” Bella nearly shouts, and a woman looks up from the meat aisle. “Seriously, I don’t know you and you’re creepy.”

           The woman is watching now, so I take a step back, holding my hands up in non-aggression. Bella practically stomps off, all preteen anger and child-like fury. The woman puts her meat back on the shelf and not-so-nonchalantly watches me over her shoulder as I turn to lock eyes with a snarl on my lips.

           She backs off with a terrified jump in her pulse and I take a deep breath, memorizing her scent. She smelled like oranges. I hated oranges. The world would be a better place without someone who smelled like oranges in it.

           “Fuck,” someone cursed loudly, and the floor shook under my feet. “Oh shit. Oops.”

           In one of the aisles far down, a shelf toppled to the side, crashing into the one next to it. Glass shattered as merchandise fell off the shelf and broke, people screamed as they ran out of the aisles like ants fleeing a picnic as shelf after shelf fell prey to it.

           I laughed under my breath. Humans.

           “Holy crow,” a familiar voice whispered as the next shelf began to fall.

           For a vampire, a second is all the time you need to think of a million things at once. In a split second, I thought about where Bella was and what would probably happen to her if she was crushed by an industrial Wal-Mart shelf and what I would do if she was crushed by said shelf. A rampage is what I would do.

           It took half a second for me to be by her side, grabbing her frail body with my hands and throwing her to the ground, covering her frail body with my own. I manhandled her arms and legs into the fetal position, tucking her head under my chin, just as the shelf slammed into my body after dropping jam jars on me.

           For what seemed like forever, the shelfs continued crashing, one after the other, until they reached the end and crashed into the floor with a reverberating clang. Under me, her side pressed entirely to my torso, Bella wasn’t breathing. I shifted, metal groaning above me, giving her what space I could. She looked up at me, still curled up and teary eyed, and gasped for breath.

           She looked fine. No visible wounds, and I couldn’t hear any bones crackling underneath her skin. Still. “Bella, are you alright?”

           She nods, a jerking motion nowhere near smooth. “You…you were by aisle five…”

           I nod. “Yep.”

           “This is aisle 12.”

           “Was,” I corrected. “Are you sure you’re alright?”

           Wouldn’t do for her to get hurt.

           Before I killed her, I added as a near afterthought.

           “I’m fine,” she snapped, and I decided that she probably wasn’t. “How did you get here so fast?”

           “Oh,” I said as I realized the implications of just what I’d done. Hopefully I could kill her before the Volturi found out. “I’m in track.”

           “I want the truth,” Bella spit, staring dead in my eyes. Irrational anger. She probably had a concussion.

           “I wasn’t that far away,” I tried to convince her half-heartedly. People were shouting around us, trying desperately to move everything.

           The metal shelf creaked and groaned on top of my body. Bella’s eyes shot to it – to where it was resting on my back. Then to her shopping car, toppled over and bent where the shelf had managed to crush some of it.

           “Are you- are you holding up the shelf?” she asked, voice cracking and high pitched.

           I winced. Definitely a concussion.

           “Nope,” I lied. “Oh hey, they’re lifting it up.”

           And they were – the strength of tens of humans, all working together to lift metal off victims. Amazing, what little bugs could do together. I moved off of Bella and she uncurled, the two of us crawling on our hands and knees out of the wreckage. We were the last ones, apparently.

           Humans crowded us on every side, ripping Bella and I apart as workers forced us into chairs along with anyone else who’d been trapped. Ambulances were coming, apparently, and there was a man sobbing in a chair, mumbling apologies. Poor guy.

           Convincing the paramedics that arrive that I’m in no need of medical attention is easy enough. Smiling and charming your way through anything is a vampire’s prerogative, after all. Instead, I turn the paramedic’s focus to Bella, stating that I was her babysitter and that she needed more help, she probably had a concussion. They picked up the story and ran with it, allowing me to ride in the ambulance with her all the way to the hospital.

           Bella glared at me the entire time, a neck brace around her neck and forced to lay on the ambulance bed-thing.

           I’d never actually been to a hospital, now that I thought about it. Or at least, not as far as I could remember in my vampiric life. Control had always been my strong suit, though, strangely. It was how I had refrained from instantly killing any of the ‘singers’ I came across after the first one – like Bella. Stepping into the hospital made my throat burn tenfold, especially after they took blood from Bella. But I refrained.

           It was whilst sitting in a plastic chair, after Bella’s mother had been called, and the room was empty aside from Bella and I, that I wondered what I was still doing here.

           I didn’t need to be here, yet I found myself reluctant to leave.

           “Later, Bella,” I said, standing and walking out.

           I… needed to think.

           After I left Bella to her own devices, I stayed away from her for a week. I had immediately went and killed Miss Orange Scent, broke into Wal-Mart and erased their footage of the incident, and spent five days in New Mexico.

           Being far from the small human I’d taken such interest in was hard. Unbearable, even. Bella was constantly on my mind, as to where she was, how she was doing, if any other accidents had befallen her, if she understood math yet.

           Quite the predicament I’d gotten myself into.

           Analyzing my feelings had never led me to good things, but it was a must now. Somehow, Bella had stopped being a meal for me, and started to be something else. What that something else was, I had no idea, but I didn’t like it. But I didn’t want to change it either.

           I returned to Phoenix seven days after I left. I followed Bella’s scent all the way to her home – a quaint two-story bedroom home that attempted to make up for the lack of greenery outside by filling the inside with it. Pretty, well-decorated, and cluttered. Lived-in. I broke in through the kitchen window, and stood inside for a few minutes on the linoleum floor. It smelled like Bella and another person – someone who smelled like vanilla and citrus.

           I walked through the house, at three in the morning, carefully touching every plant. Every leaf. Every cushion and tabletop and banister.

           I ignored the only other person in the house that wasn’t Bella and went to her room.

           It was…overwhelmingly purple. I might have gagged. I was a pink-gal myself, but even I wouldn’t decorate a bedroom so heavily in a single color. At least the carpet was white, stained here and there from a spill.

           Bella slept in her bed surrounded by pillows of all shapes and sizes. They seemed to swallow her up whole with how many there were. The room was saturated in her scent and simply standing here was already making me dizzy with thirst. Vampires, though, are good at standing still. Had anyone looked in, they might have wondered why a thirteen-year-old had a marble statue with a wig on it.

           Bella tossed and turned and mumbled under her breath. I caught only a few words.

           “Jane…no…” she whispered.

           I was gone from the house before the final syllable had left her throat.

           I killed three people that night.

           The next time I saw Bella, it was at the park where she had first found me. It was a startlingly similar position to be in, though in complete reverse. Bella laid on the ground eagle-spread, staring up at the night sky, and in the distance, only a sliver of sun was left. I stood above her, looking down at her curiously.

           “Miss, I don’t mean to alarm you, but I don’t think you’re dressed to spend a night in the park,” I mimed in a high-pitched tone.

           Bella glared at me. “I don’t sound like that.”

           “Sure you don’t,” I agreed civilly. “How’s the concussion?”

           “I didn’t have one,” she said. “Thanks to you. Thanks.”

           I blinked, unsure of how to take that. Was it an insult? Had she wanted a concussion? Instead of addressing the sarcastic thanks, I sat down by her head.

           “Where have you been, anyways, Jane?” Bella demanded. “You can’t just…do that and disappear!”

           I thought about correcting her on my name. “I’m sorry.”

           Why was I apologizing? Somehow, I felt bad – even when she had no hold over me! A mere human, able to control when and where I went? As if. Still, I found myself guilty at leaving her so suddenly like I had. Not even an explanation.

           Bella was quiet. “It’s fine.”

           Neither of us spoke. We sat in the dark as the moon rose and the first stars appeared in the sky.

           “I have some ideas about what you are.” Bella fiddles with the zipper of her jacket, tugging it up as the temperature drops lower.

           She doesn’t continue, and I drop my eyes from the sky to her. She’s staring at me curiously. “Hit me with them.”

           “Radioactive spider,” falls from her lips along with a blush. A laugh bursts from my chest. “Shut up. Um. Any radiation at all?”

           I shook my head with a laugh. “No, no radiation. Also, I’m not from Krypton.”

           Bella looked like she eagerly wanted to either strangle me or herself. “Okay. One more. Vampire.”

           I turned to look back at the stars. Orion twinkled down at us, as though laughing at my predicament. “How’d you come up with that one?”

           The Volturi were going to kill me. They were going to rip my head from my shoulders, my limbs from their sockets, and they were going to burn me.

           “You’re too fast,” Bella started. “And you’re pale as a sheet – paler than me! And your eyes are red, but sometimes they’re dark, almost black. And you’re cold. I never see you during the day.”

           Well shit. “If I’m a vampire, shouldn’t you be running away in fear?” I asked curiously, not looking at her. Her heart beat picks up.

           “I don’t think you want to eat me.”

           I laughed, low and hearty, and in a heartbeat I had her pinned to the ground, her wrists in one hand and the other cupping her jaw. Ducking low, I pressed my lips and nose to her neck and inhaled, venom pooling on my tongue as fire burst inside me. It was beautiful, this pain, this scent, this girl. I wanted to devour her.

           “That’s where you’re wrong, Bella,” I mumbled, before disappearing to stand ten feet away.

           Her heartbeat was like a rabbits. She scrambled off the ground to stare at my, a hand clutched to her throat and her eyes wide in fear. It wasn’t more than a few seconds before she relaxed and dropped her hand, though, and some primal part of me hissed at the lack of survival instinct.

           “Don’t leave,” she whispered. “Please.”

           What about Bella made me submit? It was only three words and I was crouched in front of her again.

           “It’s Gloria,” I told her.

           “Gloria…” she whispered, reaching out a hand to brush a tangled lock of my hair away. Her skin was like fire against mine. Fragile and easy to snuff out. “How old are you, Gloria?”

           “Old enough to know you’re too young for this,” nearly blurted from my lips. Instead, I said to her, “Seventeen. Have been since 1950.”

           She blinked. “You’re older than my mom.”

           I don’t know why, but I laughed. Of course that’s what she’d focus on. Humans. Bella flushed bright red, and I carefully did not breath.

           “Sorry,” she mumbled. “Just…why did you save me? If you want to eat me, that is.”

           Up close, her eyes were a million different shades of brown, each interwoven with the next and completely different from any other. “I don’t know. Originally, I just wanted to eat you – but then I heard your heart skip at the store. And I couldn’t… You dead just wasn’t an option.”

           It wasn’t a good explanation, but it didn’t need to be.

           I needed to leave. Now, before things got more complicated than they already were. But my feet stayed rooted to the ground. Where would I go? I was a nomad, a lone one without even a single other vampire to keep me moving, keep me occupied, away from this girl.

           We stood there until the moon was passed the highest point in the sky, not talking, just staring at each other.

           I considered my options as the sun rose and I disappeared from where I had been hiding outside Bella’s house. She’d gotten tired near five am and I had walked her home. Now it was my turn to ‘rest,’ though I doubted I would have a peaceful mind.

           The Volturi had strict rules on humans knowing of our kind. Either they were turned, or they died. And Bella dying, as I’d already admitted to her, wasn’t an option to me. But a thirteen-year-old? I was pretty sure that was younger than what the infamous Jane and Alec were – and even those two were borderline Immortal Children, barely allowed by the Volturi because they were such an asset.

           I couldn’t turn her, I couldn’t kill her.

           All I could really do, I decided, was wait. At least two years.

           Turning her was the only reasonable option. At least two years was enough time to teach her about everything before hand.

           Bella was, in all respects, quite… reasonable with this.

           “Why do I have to die?” she demanded, red in the face from anger rather than embarrassment for once. They’re sitting in the living room of her house, surrounded by plants.

           The more I interact with plants, the more I want one. Maybe a succulent of some kind, the book from the library said they were generally easy to care for.

           Bella’s mother, Renée Higginbotham, (and wasn’t that a mouthful) was out teaching at a local elementary, and Bella had played sick. I had been hiding in her closet all night and even with the curtains drawn on the windows now, it was the most populated area I’d been in during the day. Generally, if a vampire wanted to roam in the sun, they went to places with lots of rain and clouds. Not Arizona. I’d only meant to be here a day, passing through towards Greenland.

           That was before Bella.

           “Because the Volturi would kill both of us, or just you, and that can’t happen,” I told her for the umpteenth time. “And besides, it’s not dying! It’s…undying.”

           She rolled her eyes. “There’ll be a funeral and I’ll never see my parents again.”

           I closed my eyes to the frustration that was dealing with a preteen. “Think of it this way, Bella. Either you actually die now, causing your parents a bunch of suffering and you’ll never know if they live to their hundreds – or you wait two years, get your shit in order, and live to your hundreds.”

           Honestly, I wasn’t seeing a downside to this.

           Bella didn’t agree. Arguing with a thirteen-year-old girl apparently wasn’t one of my strong suits, either, because Bella ended up shouting at me to leave before realizing I couldn’t exactly do that during the day, and instead exiled herself to her room to sulk. Kids.

           I lounged on the couch until Renée came home, watching cooking shoes and watering the plants that seemed dehydrated. After that, I hid in the basement and snuck out in the night. I returned the next night, though, through Bella’s window – the girl wasn’t even asleep, so it was less creepy.

           She had a spiral notebook in her hand, too. Her eyes looked red like she’d been crying, but she seemed…resolved. Hopefully to my idea, because killing her was absolutely not something I was going to do, and eventually the Volturi would do it for me.

           Bella didn’t so much as glance up when I entered, nor when I sat next to her.

           Written on the paper at the top in thick black marker were the words Things To Do Before I Undie.

           At the very top of the list was that she wanted to turn 18.

           “I think I can hold out for five years,” I told her quietly. “Why 18, though?”

           “Because then I’ll be older than you,” she said, a tired hint of smugness in her tone.

           I rolled my eyes and playfully shoved her. “Yeah, that’s never gonna happen.”

           Staying in Arizona for five years was probably the hardest thing I’d ever done in my life. Confined to the night or Bella’s house, forced to travel far to feed but always having to come back… Hell, the best thing that had happened was that Renée got a boyfriend and was out more, leaving Bella and I more free reign of the house together.

           Despite this, it was also the best thing I’d ever done in my life. Bella got older seemingly like a lightning strike before my eyes. Fourteen passed like a blink, fifteen hit like a truck with menstrual cycles – sixteen was a bitch, to be honest. This was when Bella kissed me for the first time. Something I’d been waiting to do since she was shorter than my boobs. She was still short, though.

           Bella’s Undying Bucket List had things crossed off and added at an alarming rate. Planning her mother’s wedding was written and crossed off within a week of either option. It was sad that I couldn’t go, either, because the beach wedding had sounded awesome. Instead, I stayed back and watered the plants. I’d adopted them all as my own after Renée gave up gardening but kept the ‘death defying’ plants around for good luck.

           There was one bullet point on her list that I promised wouldn’t happen until the night of her eighteenth birthday, which got me a poke to the ribs and flushed cheeks for days.

           And then Bella decided to move in with her dad in Forks, Washington, not only to let Renée travel with Phil, but also to spend the last year of her life with her dad before she became like me that fall. It was something that we’d both been waiting on for years, and the closer that her birthday got, the more anxious we both became.

           Before the move, I got a hair cut – a new start for Bella might as well mean a fashion change for me. The many inches I cut off left my hair at a messy, layered bob around my chin that Bella promised I looked cute in. Bella was untrustworthy on this, though, as she thought I was cute in everything.

           I actually went to Forks a day before Bella. I was scoping out the hiding places and such, seeing if I would have any difficulty during the day. Happily, the place seemed to have a near-constant rain and no sunshine, so I finally got to walk around like an actual person.

           Unfortunately, I was apparently expected.

           The Cullens were only vampires I’d heard of, never met. Until now. 

           The girl in front of me, the vampire who was shorter than even Bella, had cornered me whilst I was hopping for a van. I wanted something that I could, potentially, live out of, with enough space for a bed because Bella needed to sleep now, but maybe also for other activities once she was turned. The car lot was mostly deserted, the salesman inside after I’d assured him he needn’t help me look.

           The vampire had hair shorter than mine, nearly shaved to her skull and oddly grown out, inky black to contrast with her amber-topaz eyes. She was beautiful, I noted, but nowhere near Bella. She was dressed impeccably, too, and held a bright red umbrella over her head. It even looked more expensive than my plain, stolen black one.

           “I’ve been expecting you,” she said, her voice like music. “You’ve been changing the future quite a lot. That’s okay, though, because you’re bringing us Bella.”

           My eyes were like steel then. “What do you mean by that, sweet cheeks?”

           She blinked, before laughing. It was odd, because I’d never seen another vampire so… friendly. “Oh, no, we’re not stealing her from you. It’s just that I see that we’re all going to be friends. Like family. I’m Alice, Alice Hale, or Cullen if you’d prefer. I’d like you to come meet my coven.”

           I narrowed my eyes. “How can I be sure that you’re not just going to kill me?”

           Alice smiled. “You’re not. Now, the van you’re going to like best is three rows down and the color of an orange monstrosity. Let’s go.”

           When it came time to pay for the van – which was an obnoxious orange color with carpeting on the inside and removable seats – Alice pulled out a shiny black Amex credit card. I stared at it, stuffing the stolen one right back into the stolen wallet and back into my stolen jeans. I’d heard the Cullens were rich…

           We drove my new van, which I had decided to name Gail, to the Cullen house. It was more like a mansion, situation far in the woods and all white wood and marble, with large French windows everywhere.

           We were met outside the porch by a tall, blonde vampire who was absolutely covered in scars in a way I hadn’t ever seen before. It scared me, right to my bones, even after Alice flounced up to the giant (in comparison to her) and kissed his cheek.

           “Gloria, this is my husband, Jasper Hale,” Alice introduced. “Jasper, this is Gloria, she’s going to be yours and Rosalie’s sister.”

           News to me, and apparently to him.

           Their front door opened, a redhead standing in the doorway with a scowl on his face.

           “Alice,” he said quietly, before sighing. “Come inside, Carlisle is waiting.”

           What followed was perhaps the strangest experience in my entire life.

           There were four other vampires waiting in an extravagantly decorated living room, and all in all, I was the only human-eater it seemed in the room. Odd, but not unusual, after being the only human-eater in Bella’s human house.

           There was a woman with caramel-colored hair sitting next to a man who was clearly the idea for Anne Rice’s Lestat, beauty-wise. A vivacious blonde sat next to a behemoth of a vampire with short, dark hair and a smile on his face, contrasting wildly to her scowl.

           “Gloria,” said the blonde man, when he stood from his seat on one of the couches, walking forward to shake my hand. “I’m Carlisle Cullen. I apologize for Alice’s rash actions – she should have given everyone a bit of warning to all of this, and you a choice.”

           Alice rolled her eyes as I answered. “That’s fine, it’s all okay. I’m just glad I’m not accidently barging in on a coven’s territory and stuff.”

           I’d have said shit, but something about cursing in front of this man left me leery.

           “How about we all sit down and we’ll explain,” said Carlisle, motioning to the couches. I’d never felt more out of place in my old, worn out clothing.

           Surrounded by vampires I didn’t know, I realized only belatedly after sitting next to Alice that I should be anxious. They could kill me at any moment, and I could do little to stop them. One vampire against seven? Nothing I did would save my ass.

           Yet all I felt was calm. I didn’t like it, I didn’t want to feel calm, but even my anger was calm.

           “I think it would be best to explain that Alice can see the future,” Carlisle began. “Only bits, and the future changes often enough that nothing is set in stone, but Alice saw you coming. You and your mate.”

           Bella.

           A burst of protective fury and fear overrode the calm for a second because if they even so much as touched a hair on Bella’s head-

           “She’s safe from us, don’t worry,” said the red head. “We don’t kill humans.”

           The calm washed over me, like a wave that I choked under and tried to fight. I glared around me, still trying to be as uncomfortable as I knew I should be.

           “Jasper, stop,” said the red head, and Alice’s husband shot him a look. Suddenly, I could feel again, all the anxiety and fear and anger. “I’m sorry, Gloria. We just wanted you to feel welcome.”            “Dandy job you’re all doing,” I bit out, grinding my teeth together. “Now finish explaining.”

           Everyone looked to Alice and Carlisle.

           Alice sighed and went first. “Okay, so there was a chance that you and Bella could have totally lived without us, but the thing is, you’ll both be so much happier being part of our family! Plus, it will so much easier for you to integrate into human society with our help! Plus, it feels like we’re already friends, and it hurts seeing a friend in need.”

           I still didn’t get any of it, but I was starting to. Alice could see the future. Jasper….emotions. Red head could read my mind. Maybe the others had powers, too, but I’d never been one of those lucky vampires.

           And for some reason, they all expected me to become part of their family.

           “Convince me,” I said, leaning back into the seat with ill-contained worry.

           Alice lit up. “Okay, so if you become part of our coven, you’ll be able to enroll in high school here – date Bella publicly! You’ll have access to money and housing and we know how to deal with newborns, so when Bella’s turned you won’t have to worry about keeping an eye on her. Plus, Bella will love the idea of vegetarianism, and while I know you won’t like it, you’ll suffer through it for her.”

           She put up a strong case, I guess. Still, I didn’t like the idea of just… recreating my life. I was fifty-five, and while there were vampires much, much older than me, I still felt like I was getting on in years. If I could have a stress-induced heart attack, you bet I would have already.

           The redhead snorted.

           “Sorry,” he said. “I’m Edward. The brunette is Esme, that’s Rosalie, and that’s Emmett.”

           I nodded as Alice gasped. “Oh! Yeah! If you join our coven, you can have as many plants as you want! CD’s! Books! And you and Bella can leave whenever you want, we won’t keep you prisoner or anything like that.”

           It was bribery, plain and simple, but it was bribery I liked the sound of.

           “Okay,” I said, nodding. “So, who’s my daddy?” 

           Of course, no one predicted that Bella was Edward’s singer.

           I had nearly gone after him to make sure he never touched Bella when he ran off to Alaska.

           Bella stopped me, though, saying that I of all people should know how hard it was to be around a singer. Unfortunately, Bella was right, and I didn’t get to get in a fight with Edward. Instead, I sparred with Jasper to get rid of my frustration.

           In public, Bella couldn’t interact with the Cullens much until I ‘came into the picture,’ which was in February. Outside of school, she was almost always at the Cullens, settling in with me into what would be our room in the future, decorate in shades of pink, yellow, and blue to suit us, covered in plants, and with the softest bed imaginable in it. Edward was forced to get over his bloodlust fast, not only because of proximity but also because I wouldn’t let him within ten feet of Bella otherwise, which was bad because they sat next to each other in Biology.

           Then Bella almost got hit by a car, and Edward saved her life.

           To be quite honest, I had no issue with the mind-reader after that. It reminded me almost strangely of the time in Wal-Mart when Bella was a preteen, and it was only a week or two later that I made my social debut.

           (Gloria Hale, younger sister to the Hale twins, who had been taken in by their grandparents instead of their aunt due to social services interfering until their grandparents died. Now living with her remaining family, she was enrolled into Forks High as a junior. By the first week, she and Bella had become ‘friends’. The third week was their debut as a couple, and despite a few bumps in the road, nobody had much a problem with them. )

           The biggest problem for me was the diet. Animal blood was absolutely disgusting, and it sucked to be surrounded by what was essentially a gourmet buffet everyday whilst living on vampire-saltines. But, just as I had controlled myself all my life, I didn’t even go near anyone for their blood.

           (Apparently, Carlisle thought it was my superpower. Control. According to Edward, though, that was Carlisle’s superpower, so everything is yet to be seen.)

           Life went on.

           The dance came and went, Bella and I dancing the night away before I watched her get smashed on vodka and she pouted at my inability to get drunk. However, we crossed another thing off her bucket list. Only a few left.

           Bella’s 18th birthday rolled around in September, days before senior year started. It was on her 18th birthday that Bella publicly ‘died,’ after a brutal car accident in Seattle where she was shopping for a dress to the party being thrown the next day.

           Forks was shook to its core at the death of the Chief’s daughter, and everyone mourned, and everyone pitied me. In public, I ‘cried’ and grieved and raged, attending a funeral and only a few days of school before Carlisle withdrew me and sent me to boarding school. No one blamed him, or me, after everything. Charlie Swan even greeted me at the airport with a hug, saying that I was always welcome at his home.

           The morning after a week after Bella’s death, I arrived on a private island owned by Carlisle where Bella had clearly been living it up. We crossed that one, special thing off her bucket list and the next day, I tasted her blood for the first time ever. Rosalie, Emmett, Jasper, and Esme were all there to help for the weeks following, just until Carlisle could respectfully move the family to somewhere for the time being.

           If I had thought Bella as a human was incredible, Bella as a vampire was…spectacular.

           Not to mention, the sex was pretty great, too. 

           (Somewhere in the world, three vampire nomads roam where one should’ve been dead, one should’ve been living a lie, and the last should’ve been building an army. Dozens of homeless teenagers across the coast wonder why they get shivers at the thought of red hair. Jacob Black turns into a wolf, never becomes Alpha, and never Imprints.)

This was just really self-indulgent okay, I regret nothing.