Perpetual Existence

On the Line

I spend the next hour watching Bella from various minds, avoiding most males since their thoughts were...typical of any hormonal teenage boy. It was becoming increasingly difficult not to tear them apart for fantasizing about her, but their daydreaming was nothing in comparison to the men I killed in a previous loop. They were still out there.

As if Bella read my mind, she sends me a text. I realized something, Edward. We need to do something.

It worries me that she's thinking of those vile excuses for men, so I look for her in Angela Weber's mind. It's pleasing to find Angela's thoughts lean toward friendship and not hostile like Jessica or Lauren. Bella, however, appears nervous, biting her lips and constantly looking at the clock on the wall.

I reply to her message, just in case something else is bothering her. What do you mean?

Her reply comes in faster than expected. Those men are still out there.

The men who tried to rape her in Port Angeles. Her fear seems to be rolling off her, enough for Angela to notice. It instantly puts my instincts on alert. My hands ball into fists as if those creeps were right in front of me. A part of me knows they are far from the school, nowhere near Bella. Yet, the monster within taunts me with the fact they're alive.

I'll take care of it.

I ignore ping after ping of messages, making my way to the car before Alice has a chance to see what I'm about to do. Although, due to the strange phenomenon, I doubt she could. I know what I want to do. Tear the men apart and bathe the concrete with their blood, let them live long enough to feel the pain delivered by my hands.

My cell phone rings a quarter of the way to PA. I answer silently, the breathless sound of Bella's voice on the other end.

"What are you going to do? Kill them?" I could hear her soft footfalls and two leaky faucets, and my mind instantly pinpoints her location on the campus. She's calling me from the girls' restroom in the east building, an isolated hangout for students.

I wish I could see her, but I know where that kind of thinking will lead. To combat the desire to turn around and go to her, I conjure the image of her lying on the dingy, white subway tiles of the bathroom, the mirror splattered with her blood.

The monster laughs at the morbid image. I would never waste a drop of it.

I push my car faster, to its limits, though it does nothing to dispel its cackle.

"Edward?" Her soft voice brings me under some control, only just.

"I won't kill them." Having said it out loud, I know I need to restrain myself further. "Distract me."

"How?" she asks, her pacing coming to a standstill. The rustle of fabric starts and ends as if she slid down against a wall to sit.

I simply need to hear her voice. For some reason, it soothes me, while simultaneously provoking the beast. "Talk to me, about anything."

"Can you tell me why?" The slight tremor in her voice gives her away.

To stop me from killing them or you. "You know why, Bella." I sigh, closing my eyes for a moment, tormented by the images I find in the darkness. There will never be any peace for me.

"Your family seems to be the talk of the town, despite only you and Alice being in school right now." She makes a sound that resembles a feline's growl. "It's so damn annoying to hear about them every day...I mean today, ugh, you know what I mean. Like it matters that you're all dating, you're all adopted."