storypaint | Lives (Edward/Bella)

Comm: none
Words: 565
Title: Lives
Fandom: Twilight series
Pairing: Edward/Bella
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Vague spoilers for Book 3
Disclaimer: Twilight is the property of Stephenie Meyer. This fanfic is a derivative of canon material that is not my property. I do not profit from these writings. The opinions and actions expressed in these stories are not necessarily the views and beliefs of the original author or me.

Excerpt: The time draws near and one by one, they try to talk her out of it. They appeal to the part of her that is still a little human, but she is already one of them, in everything but the details.

The time draws near and one by one, they try to talk her out of it. They appeal to the part of her that is still a little human, but she is already one of them, in everything but the details and the way she misses Jacob. She may be young, but that is the point, she says, laughing, and she laughs as they come to her and try to argue. She is still young, but she won't stop living when she's dead, right? She'll be young forever, and Edward's besides. And you know, Alice, there would never have been a wedding otherwise.

There was no choice, they all replied, inevitably, and what they mean is that it wasn't their choice, and hindsight is perfect. But still, Bella reminds, remaining unusually cheerful, they chose to live anyway, and that is what she is choosing, because it isn't life without Edward in it.

They hold long conversations with Edward in which he is the only one speaking, It isn't that they don't trust him, but is he sure? You don't kill someone this thoroughly without being sure. Even Alice asks, and that hurts him most of all, because she can see how happy they will all be one day. But then again, she has always envied life a little.

They can't understand how she can choose her death so easily. They chose to live, and she chooses to die and to live in dying, a painful aching rebirth that they all wish they could spare her, and a baptism in blood, and the bets are still on, no matter how Edward protests.

And then it is done. She is too sick, still, to come to her own funeral, and Edward stays with her, listening to her fever-dreams and regretting that he'll never listen to her sleepy mumbles again. He watches the color bleed out of her skin and he loves her for doing this for him, but he can't tell her that little selfish thing, and she wouldn't comprehend it right now anyway. He doesn't go to the funeral either and afterwards in a fury, Charlie rips all of Bella's photographs up, because they all have him in them and somehow in his mind this is Edward's fault. For once he is right, and Bella would laugh at the irony if she were conscious.

She wakes into death with eyes redder than any blood that used to flow in her body, but she still smells perfect to Edward, and he cries (no tears, but for once he misses them) to have her back with him. Somehow, she is the same Bella. She made it through.

In fifty years there is a little girl lying in a hospital bed, with no hope of cure, and it's been a while since one has gotten to Carlisle like this, but he is so silent around the house, and he sits by himself. He shouldn't have become a pediatrician, he thinks, but he can't hide the truth from Edward.

So one night there is a beautiful woman standing by Micki's bed, and she says, "Death can be a great adventure," gently resting Micki's hand on her silent heart, and when the girl nods, Bella takes her away and teaches her how to make death a choice for living. She is better at it than Carlisle was.

And so Bella lives.