A Constant in The Darkness

Chapter Thirty-One - And the Painted Ponies Go Up and Down

Darlings,

We're officially over thirty, my how time flies. We will end around 35 chapters, plus a little epilogue.

Amers is my psychology officianado. Thank you for your help love.

n7of9 is beta and omega and everything in between.

Disclaimer: I don't own it.

...

APOV

Oh shit! This is not happening, it can't be happening! I cannot believe I didn't see this coming.

But then again, I totally did.

I knew something was going to break soon and, to be honest, I always thought it would be Edward. He can be so dramatic, I thought he'd be the one to pull a stunt like this. They really are so much alike, even in their inability to get over themselves.

I picked up the note again. My hands shook and my eyesight blurred as my mind replayed what I had witnessed. He looked so much like our father, the resemblance quite disturbing as he threw that dish against the wall, and all I wanted was for it to stop because for one fleeting moment, I felt it. Fear. The others did too, the way Rosalie crouched over her baby and Emmett tackled him to the ground, it was all out of fear. And it was understandable. He was acting crazy, I mean, who just lets ants parade across their coffee table like that? Who smashes a dish against the wall and attacks their cousin over a fucking letter? Who takes off running barefoot in Forks?

Edward. Edward would do all those things. And he's not crazy, I told my stupid brain. I shook the thought from my head. He's not crazy. This is Edward, my brother, the boy that used to braid my hair and make my lunch every day. He's just heartbroken, and it's okay, he should be heartbroken.

I can't believe she left us like this. I can't believe it! After all the shit we went through together, she leaves now? Why now? Why didn't she leave sooner, when this shit could have been salvaged, when my brother wasn't so emotionally invested and she wasn't so emotionally destroyed? They needed each other right now, couldn't she see that?

Then again, this all made perfect sense. Bella doesn't know how to deal. I know she had a lot to deal with and on occasion I wanted to shake the shit out of her myself, to smack some sense into her pretty little face, but she was my best friend and I loved her. It made sense that by the time she pulled her head out of her ass she'd be all wrong in her assumptions. This was a real mess, a real big mess. Did she think he'd just be able to get over it and move on, accept her excuse and just let her go? No, Edward wasn't exactly known for his ability to get over shit. He would wallow, he was a definitely a wallower.

"I'm gonna go get him," I said, grabbing the keys to the Volvo from the table by the window and rushing out the front door.

"Alice, wait, I'll come with you." Jasper trotted after me down the walkway. "He's kind of freaked out right now. I don't trust it."

"Him. You mean, you don't trust him," I said, opening the driver side door before turning to face him. He was being protective and I understood his concern, but Edward would never hurt me.

"I'll be okay. It's better if I go alone. You're right, he's freaked out right now, he's broken, and he doesn't want everyone to see that. Would you?" Jasper walked around the car to wrap his arm around my waist. He pushed the hair from my face, his fondness for the new length evident. I hadn't colored or cut my hair in ages. For some reason I felt like I needed this connection to my former self, a connection to my past, the copper coloring shared between siblings a physical link of our shared pain. I felt like I was ready to absolve this issue once and for all and now this was happening, drudging up those old miseries all over again.

"Be careful, please?" I kissed his lips quickly before jumping into the seat and rolling down the window. Jasper shoved his hands in his pockets, his face worried and dejected as I backed out of the driveway.

"Call Carlisle!" I shouted as I drove off to find my brother, heading in the direction he had taken off running.

Fuck. Where the fuck was he going? This wasn't a big neighborhood but Edward was fast, especially on a rage-induced adrenaline rush. I drove around the streets looking for his copper head and flying legs. Finally, I found him in a heap on the sidewalk, and my heart raced as I forced myself to control my emotions. The last thing he needed was me falling apart in front of him. I had learned long ago, when dealing with irrational Edward, being direct and to the point was the most efficient way to get him to listen. Beating around the bush left room for interpretation and Edward always interpreted things far worse than they really were. Being direct seemed to shock him out of his pessimistic pretense.

Once he was in the car, I had a chance to really look at him. He looked like shit, like he hadn't showered in days. His face was a mess of stubble and scrapes and his clothes were soggy and covered in filth. Oh God, this was bad, this was going to be really fucking bad. My eyes filled with tears and I gripped the steering wheel in an attempt to stave off any hysterics just a little longer. Oh, I was devastated, believe me, but right now my mind was in a complete 'fight or flight' response. And I would most definitely have to fight my brother through this every step of the way.

Bella was my best friend, and she was gone. Never mind the fact that she was sick or that she had lost a baby and had been told she'd never have children in the same fucking week. Never mind that she had lost her father just as she was getting to know him, and finding out her mother was the reason she hadn't known him in the first place. Never mind the fact that my brother was having a full-on mental breakdown because of this and that seeing him suffer was probably the hardest thing I had to do. Putting all that shit aside, my best friend was gone and I had no idea where she was.

I wanted details. I needed to know when she had left and what had happened, but when I asked Edward, his eyes blazed into my mine and I quickly shut my mouth. There was something so familiar in that blaze, something that scared the living shit out of me, something I rarely admitted even to myself, but saw more and more of recently. Edward looked so much like our father.

But he wasn't our father. Edward and I both had a chance of developing that disease, but shit, we also had a chance of developing cancer or being killed in a freak accident. I didn't think Edward would ever be schizophrenic, but then again, people never expect cancer or freak accidents. I wasn't going to waste my life waiting for it to end, though.

So I begged, I begged him to tell me and he finally obliged. "She left on Sunday morning. I don't know what time, but it was after one and before eight. I woke up and she was-" He couldn't even finish his sentence and the tears in my eyes blubbered over. Sunday? Right after Charlie was born. He'd been sitting there for three days. He looked like he'd been sitting there for three days. Shit, this was bad. It was happening all over again, like when our parents died.

Beside me, Edward muttered unintelligibly. His breathing accelerated and his fingers clutched at the door, words mumbling from his lips as he gasped and tried to breath. Oh fuck, he was hyperventilating. His hands found the door handle and he started to open it.

I swerved and ran into the gravel ditch on the side of the highway. I swiftly locked the doors so he couldn't get out. I was scared and my heart was pounding and my hands shaking at the thought of what he had almost done. He wasn't even wearing his seatbelt, for fuck's sake, and here he was trying to open the door of a moving vehicle. Edward was acting so strange, so uncontrollable and irrational that I just prayed I would make it home before he did something really drastic. Maybe I should have brought Jasper with me, after all.

"I can't breathe Alice, can you roll down the fucking window or something?" he mumbled, and I stared at him. He didn't see anything wrong with his behavior. He was actually acting like it was a completely logical thing to do. I pressed the button to roll down the window and let the cool air fill the car, causing me to shiver as the cold invaded.

Edward just leaned his head against the headrest and closed his eyes. He breathed with easy cadence now, placated and content with the fresh air. I had to get him home to Carlisle.

I saw it again, like it had just happened now rather than four years ago, vivid and clear and brilliant images of the beginning of our time here in Forks. It had started as merely running in the rain, then came the cuts and bruises, a ride home in the cruiser from Charlie once in a while, and then, before any of us realized what was happening, he was passed out in the front lawn, his body frozen over. I blinked, trying to erase the persistent memory, his eyes vacant and glazed over and rolling back in his head as I tried to wake him.

At the time, it was all Carlisle could take. Edward was enrolled into cooking classes, and I went along too, for support. I had thought it could be something that Edward and I did together, but I quickly discovered that cooking was not one of my talents. Instead, I shuffled my tarot cards while Edward breezed through the classes. Eventually, he stopped taking his meds and he was okay. He wasn't great, but he was making the best of it, we all were.

But I didn't know if he could do it again, if he could come back again. Maybe he had just been suppressing it, and losing Bella would be the final trigger.

No. This is Edward, your brother that used to let you sleep in his bed when you got scared. He's fine. He's going to be fine!

Edward chuckled beside me, his eyes vacant and glazed as he stared up at the white house in front of us. I looked over at him but he didn't acknowledge me, just fell out of the car and stumbled his way up to the house. The door was already open and Carlisle and Esme were poised at the entry.

I followed them inside, running a wash cloth under the faucet and handing it to Esme. She had tears in the corners of her eyes, but her hands were gentle as she tended to my brother.

"Alice? What happened? How did this happen?" she whispered. I pulled my hair from my face and ran my fingers through my bangs, and I felt the devastation I had been repressing slowly begin to creep under my skin.

"She left him." I let the tears fall now. Carlisle took over tending to Edward, cleaning his face and shoulder, the skin grated and bloodied. He didn't even flinch. He was detached, he had removed himself from the situation and was drowning in the pain. Vacant and glazed.

"She? Who, Bella?" Esme gasped, and I nodded my head as Esme wrapped me in her arms. I poured my tears into her soft cotton shirt as her hands pulled through my hair and her lips pressed into the top of my head, the smell of jojoba and eucalyptus filling my lungs.

"Shit!" Esme cursed into my hair, and it just made me cry harder. Esme never cursed but she knew it was going to be bad, bad enough to warrant expletives.

Carlisle finished in silence, bandaging the abrasion on his shoulder and tossing the swabs and packaging into a pile. Finally, Carlisle spoke to Edward, a speech I'd heard him give a thousand times, and Edward just nodded and left us in the kitchen as he climbed the stairs to his bedroom.

I recounted the events for Carlisle and Esme and they listened and nodded. They both knew how Edward could be when he was upset. He had a hot temper, he always had. The cooking classes and running only helped to channel that energy by keeping his mind and body focused.

And Bella, she had kept him distracted. Instead of worrying about himself, he poured all his apprehension and fear into worrying about her. I had witnessed first-hand how he had changed since meeting her. When she was in the hospital and there was nothing he could do, I thought for sure he was going to destroy something, tear down the hospital to get to her, but instead, he waited. He controlled his impulses and harnessed his anger and filed it under 'frustration' because he refused to channel any of that anger toward her. He loved her too much.

But now that she was gone, so was the distraction, and I feared he would return to his old destructive patterns. And I wasn't the only one with this fear.

Maybe she'll come back. It's only been three days. Maybe she'll come back.

I heard the front door open and close and Emmett and Jasper marched their way into the kitchen. Esme hugged them both before setting herself to work making some sandwiches. It was only four in the afternoon, too early for dinner, but that was how we Cullens coped, a long talk over a good meal.

Jasper walked over to me and kissed my forehead. "You okay?" he asked, and I just stared into his blue-gray eyes, pushing his messy blond hair behind his ear. "It'll be okay, you know? This is just a curve ball and he doesn't know how to handle it."

A curve ball. The phrase pinged around in my head and I had a memory of the words as they played out in my cards. I had seen this. My memory was failing me at the moment, but I knew I had seen this. I ran upstairs as Jasper called my name and followed. I found my notebook and, taking a seat on my bed, I flipped through the pages. Curve ball. Three of swords.

The pages slid beneath my fingers as I looked for the reading. It had been a while ago, maybe even a year, and I quickly threw this notebook to floor and searched for my old one.

"Alice, are you okay?" Jasper was still standing in the doorway. "What are you looking for?"

"Something you said downstairs, curve ball, it reminded me of something I saw in the cards a while ago," I murmured. And it was something that had freaked me out at the time but hadn't made any sense, until now.

"Here. Here it is." I hesitantly skimmed the page, my shaded pencil drawings in the margins little reminders of the cards pulled and of my confusion and panic. The fear all came tumbling off the page to strike me in the face all over again. I recoiled, actually flinched away from my own handwriting scratched into the notebook.

Justice, decisions, a past mistake.

Temperance, comforting and centered, a need for moderation and balance.

The Tower, sudden change, a revelation, a crash.

The Five of Cups, bereavement, loss, bathed in grief.

And there is was, the Three of Swords, heartbreak. Betrayal. Terrifying curve balls that life throws at us, an open wound when you least expect it.

God, it's like it was spelled out right there on the page, but only now did the cryptic messages make sense. I needed to read again. I needed to do it now.

"I need my cards. Where's my tote? Did you bring my tote? It was in Rose's car. Did you grab it?" I asked Jasper as confusion clouded his normally serene features.

"Emmett brought me home is the jeep. I…I didn't know you didn't have your bag," Jasper stuttered. I moved to the dresser and frantically looked through my underwear drawer.

"It's okay. I still have my old deck. I couldn't throw it out, it's like a part of me, you know?" Jasper just smiled and I smiled back because he did know. It's the reason he still keeps his very first guitar pick in his wallet. We're just sentimental, the two of us.

I quickly found the silk stashed amongst the cotton and lace and I unwrapped the parcel, spreading the scarf out onto the bed with the deck of cards secured in my hand. Shuffling and reshuffling the deck, I spread them out on the scarf, raking my hands through the worn paper, gently touching some and leaving others unblemished.

Jasper shut the door to my bedroom quietly and softly turned the lock. He was going to smoke and under normal circumstances I would have joined him, but I was intent now, absolutely trembling to see what the cards had to say about this.

Quickly lighting a stick of incense, Jasper opened my cedar box, a gift for my twelfth birthday from my father. I remember he had wanted me to keep my drawings in it. I rarely sketched now, the mere penciling of a twelve-year-old was as accomplished as I became in the skill, but I remember this part of my father vividly. He always remembered details like this, little stupid shit like the fact I liked to draw, things that didn't really matter in the long run but letting you think that maybe, just maybe, he had been paying attention the whole time. It was his way of instilling hope in a hopeless situation.

Jasper pulled a few of the bags from the box and searched the contents, letting the familiar seedy scent waft through the air.

"Didn't you just roll a bunch of joints? Like yesterday?" Jasper murmured as he dug through the bags searching for the white twisted paper.

"They should be in there," I remarked, only partially paying attention to his dilemma as I began to lay the cards, my mind beginning to fog over in slight disorientation. The cards would come, they would lay themselves, no rhyme, no patterns, just snippets of information laid out in specific succession.

The aromas began to sift together as I laid the first card, the hazy smoke of the incense and weed intermingling as I inhaled deeply, pulling the aura of the room into my being and letting it calm me. A soft lull of light rain gently thud against the window and roof, and I found myself focusing on the harmless storm outside instead of the torrential one sleeping upstairs.

The Hermit. The card fell from my fingers, yet this was not a surprise. Introspection, seeking solitude, the search for one's sense of self. Yes, my brother's past had been a lonely one and the hermit often showed itself in relation to Edward.

Fear, illusion, bewilderment, as The Moon now made an appearance. This is a time of confusion, a time of outlandish and bizarre behavior, and my stomach twisted as I thought of the line of ants crawling across the coffee table and Edward frozen on the couch.

The next card fell from my hand, ten blades pierced through the back of a body laid out upon the sand. The Ten of Swords. Bottoming out, self pity, sacrifice. The martyr. I froze. I knew my brother liked dramatics and this appearance caused my skin to crawl. When Edward decided upon self-sacrifice, it took tremendous effort to convince him otherwise.

My fingers twitched toward the deck against my palm, hesitation lulling as the next card disclosed itself to me. I felt the bed shift as Jasper sank into the mattress beside me and caressed my back, and I closed my eyes, letting his touch calm my nerves. I always worried what the cards would say, but really, so much was left to interpretation. I just needed to be clear on what the cards were trying to tell me. Focus with an open mind.

Jasper handed me the joint and I placed the paper between my lips and inhaled, letting the smoke fume into my lungs, accepting it into my body, and I handed the rolled weed back to him. I would see clearly now.

My hesitation now at bay, I pulled another card: The Star, reversed. Faith in the future, fond expectations and hope. Reversed.

"Fuck!" I gasped, under my breath. He was losing hope, being denied, blocked and restricted. I felt myself begin to sway, my fingers moving on their own as the next card made itself known.

Four of Pentacles. Wanting to possess, maintaining control and blocking change. Holding onto the present. The cards fell in waves now, the meanings pouring from my lips as I spoke the words aloud.

"Overemotional and temperamental, the Knight of Cups." Again, I'd seen this card many times in relation to my brother. This wasn't so much of a surprise.

"The Hanged Man," I mumbled, as I released the tears that had been building behind my lids, the realization beginning to sink in. "Letting go. Ending the struggle." This card caused my fingers to shake. It could be the end of just this one thing, Bella's departure a turned page in our future, or it could be the end of everything, my whole world crumbling as a result of her decision. My vision was beginning to cloud over as I took another hit from Jasper's joint and exhaled forcefully. One more, one last card. Seven. There would be seven.

With trembling fingers, I flicked the last card to the pile. Withdrawing from involvement, approaching a closed-off area, being aware of a larger reality, I ran my finger across the High Priestess, confusion adding to the jumbled mess of cards, the first thing from my lips shocking the hell out of even me.

"She's not coming back. And it's going to destroy him."

…

I feel like I live in a state of perpetual worry and fear, wondering what else could go wrong, wondering when karma was going to throw her next curve ball. When would it be enough? When would it fucking be over, when would karma be satisfied with her retribution?

Bella had been gone for two months and still it was like she had left yesterday. Two months without my best friend, two months of wondering where she was or if she was okay. I had sent her emails that she hadn't responded to. I hadn't received a delivery failure notice yet, but I didn't get any replies either. The closest thing to contact I had received was a read receipt on an email I had sent from Carlisle's email address. She had at least opened it and I clung to the hope that maybe she would know that we still loved her and wanted her to come home. This was her home, here with us, and I told her so in every email. Every email ended the same; come home, we miss you. I never gave her too much information about Edward. I didn't want her coming back because she felt obligated to help save him, I wanted her to come back because she knew this was the place she was supposed to be. Yet she never responded. And she never came home.

And it was killing him. When Jasper had found him in the kitchen, a clean cut right down the middle of his wrist and palm, my heart had plummeted straight to the soles of my feet. Edward's eyes were circled in black, his skin dewed with sweat and his hair plastered against his forehead. He had said it was an accident but he was completely stoned, the skunky smell permeating from him, and it scared the shit out of me. To Edward, smoking pot was the equivalent of drinking battery acid, or something. To Edward, marijuana meant schizophrenia. Marijuana meant psychosis, hallucinations, destruction, death. To Edward, marijuana was suicide.

That first day back to school had been miserable. He didn't speak to me all day, even during lunch. I went straight to the school day-smoking restroom, my anxiety overwhelming, but he followed me.

"What are you doing in here?" I had asked him as he looked around, obviously unimpressed and confused.

"This looks just like the boys restroom, only without the urinals," he had responded. He leaned against the tile wall, his hands in his jean pockets. "So this is where it all went down, huh?"

I wasn't sure what he was referring to, the smoking, the puking, or the talking, but I knew it was specific to Bella, so I nodded and he nodded in acceptance even though his eyes were trained on the floor.

"Do you have any cigarettes in your bag?" Again, I nodded, not exactly sure where he was going with this, but I pulled them out and he took the pack from my hand, pulling one from the packaging and turning it over and over in his fingers before placing it in his mouth.

"Lighter?" he asked, his hand outstretched, the cigarette bobbing between his lips as he spoke.

I pulled it from my bag and placed it in his hand with a sigh. I didn't really want to give it to him, not because I didn't want him to smoke, but because this wasn't his normal behavior. This was because of Bella, and I didn't know what else his depression would lead him to.

He swiftly lit the cigarette, a swirl of smoke around his face as he inhaled a long drag before a loathing exhale. I quickly hopped up on the toilet to open the window before he pocketed the pack and lighter.

"What the hell, Edward. You don't even smoke," I mumbled. It wasn't about the cigarettes, I had another pack in my tote and I had multiple lighters, I just didn't like seeing him like this, indulging because it reminded him of her. It made me uneasy.

"Nope. I sure don't." He quickly finished the cigarette, tossing the butt in the sink and running the tap. "But I think I might start."

"You shouldn't," I muttered.

"What, every fucking person on this planet can smoke but me?" Edward snorted, pulling another cigarette from the pack in his pocket and lighting it as he had the other. He exhaled, his eyes somber and dull as he picked at the stitches in his hand while the cigarette burned between his lips, the black thread now scabbed over.

I sighed, but Edward just handed me his cigarette. I pulled in the flavor, the smoke forming interesting patterns in the small, dingy bathroom, and exhaled before handing it back to him.

"Fair enough," I said. "I get it." He was calling me a hypocrite, and he was right.

I waited for him to speak next, rubbing the toe of my black boots into a crack in the concrete floor, cigarette smoke still swirling in the air, unsure of what else to say. He hadn't said two words to any of us since he cut his hand. I didn't know if he was embarrassed or pissed or whatever, I just didn't like this monumental void between us.

"Did you know she was leaving?" Edward said after several minutes of silence. I looked up at him, and the pain I saw in his eyes was unlike anything I'd ever witnessed from my brother. He just looked so distraught, his agonized, red-rimmed eyes glassy and creased, his forehead tight with frustration. I let the tears I had been suppressing quietly slide down my cheeks.

I shook my head no, unable to speak for fear of complete emotional breakdown, so instead I wrapped my arms around him while we both wept.

We left early after that, but spent nearly every day in the restroom during lunch, smoking cigarettes and not really talking, just sparse conversation between grieving siblings. It was more comfortable than sitting in the lunch room. At least in here, nobody was staring.

That was another thing. Eventually, everyone at school had found out Bella had left and the rumors started flying. They knew she had been in the hospital, and now that she was gone all kinds of fucking dumbass stories started cropping up. Tyler told Eric during Algebra that he had heard that Bella was pregnant and left to go live in a convent until she had the baby. Jessica Stanley told Lauren during gym that Edward had beaten up Bella and that was why she was in the hospital and that her mom had found out and taken her to live in Florida. Some freshman that I didn't even know had told me one morning that she had heard that Edward was a serial killer and killed Bella and buried her in the woods. I wanted to rip her head off. Instead, I just rolled my eyes and walked away, and continued counting the days until June, when school would be over.

I just didn't know what to do. Edward's behavior kept getting worse. He lived in a zombie-like state, smoking and moping around and adopting a complete disregard for personal hygiene. The cut along his wrist had healed nicely but there was now a scar, a constant reminder of his slip. Edward was so skilled with his knives, it's not like we were dealing with some amateur here. He knew how to handle the blade and he was always so careful. This just wasn't like him. Unless…unless this wasn't really him, unless the psychosis had already begun to invade and we were just writing it off as him being overdramatic. I just kept thinking of that trail of ants and of him sitting on a couch for three fucking days. I couldn't let it go.

I needed answers, reassurance. I needed to talk to Carlisle. I found him in his office late one night, pouring over his books, his blue eyes worn and tired.

I walked into the room but was unsure of how to start my questioning. Carlisle looked up from his book. "Alice! What's wrong?" he had asked.

Why was it always 'what's wrong'? Something was always wrong and I felt heartsick at his assumption, but he was completely accurate. Something was very, very wrong.

"I'm worried about Edward," I said, taking a seat in one of the plush chairs and pulling my knees into my chest. "Is he going to be okay?"

"Your first heartbreak is a deafening sting. It doesn't ever leave you. But this wound will heal, with time." He gave me a small smile but I knew he wasn't being completely honest. I may only be seventeen, but I can fucking read people like shit's written on their forehead. It's a gift, or a curse, depending on the person and situation. Sometimes, I longed for the comfort of ignorance.

I continued to stare at my uncle, my disbelief in his words evident as I glared. I knew he was feeding me a line of bullshit and eventually he sighed, conceding to my skepticism.

"So that's it? He just has to get over it? What if he can't? What if he-" I couldn't say it. What if he ends up like my father? What if he hurts someone? What if he hurts himself?

"What happens now, Carlisle?" I asked.

"Now, we wait and we watch," he said calmly. How could he be so nonchalant about this? My brother was acting so unhinged and Carlisle was just accepting it as some lovesick child's play.

"That's it? We're going to play passive again? The last time we did this he almost O.D'd on painkillers. He's going to hurt himself, Carlisle," I said exasperated, my eyes beginning to mist over. Fuck! I was so tired of crying.

"I know, Alice. I know. You don't think I've felt this same panic? I'm just as scared as you are. I'm going to phone a colleague of mine in the morning, a psychologist, and I will see what he has to say about the matter, but the truth is, I don't have the answers you're looking for. Not yet," Carlisle stressed, his voice wavering under the duress, and I was taken aback by the uncertainty in his words. I realized this must be difficult for him too. Carlisle had watched my father fall apart, he might be reliving that misery all over again.

"What was it like? With my dad. Was he ever like this, like Edward? What…what was he like?" I was suddenly intent on knowing every little detail concerning this disease and how it had manifested itself in my father. I had seen the psychosis first hand, I had seen that glazed look in my father's eyes, detached and flat. But I hadn't known him when he was just a man, when he was charismatic and brilliant and won the affections of so many.

Carlisle paused, his face creased as he pondered my questions. I had never asked for this information before, I had never really wanted to know, actually. When everything had first happened, Edward and I attended some counseling. Edward started acting out and I started acting in. I internalized all my fears and all my pain and I cut myself off from that life. It had just seemed easier that way, and I was able to cope. I went to the counseling but I never allowed myself to attach to that life again. I poured myself into being proactive. I learned how to do stuff, learned how to sew, how to read cards. I learned everything I could about Tarot and Astrology, immersing myself with solutions and predictions, trying to protect today and the future instead of worrying about the past. It was a clean break, and I had benefited from the lack of knowledge.

Until now.

Now I was ignorantly making judgments about a situation I knew nothing about. The extent of my knowledge about schizophrenia only spanned what Carlisle had told us and what I had seen as a child. Edward had discovered the fact that it could be genetic or triggered by recreational drug use, and that developing the disease could be stress related. But to me, they were all could be's, non-conclusive and based on the individual. Just like my cards, nothing was set in stone, right? The future was always changing.

"Well, your father was my best friend as well as my brother. We were very close. He was very much like Edward in that he had a flare for the theatrics. He liked to make a statement, that's for sure. I remember the day he met your mother, actually. I think I was sixteen or so and we were at a park that had a community pool. He was going to jump from the high dive to try to impress her but when he got to the top he chickened out. He had to climb back down the steps, and he was mortified. I remember your mother telling him she thought his decision was very sensible." Carlisle smiled, the recount of their childhood together in Chicago enthralling. I had known my parents had gone to high school together, but other than that my knowledge of how they met and everything about them before they were my parents was limited.

"I remember how he was diagnosed. I had just started college and he came to visit me at my dorm. It had been raining and he had walked to my school, thirteen miles from the house. He was sopping wet and freezing but I remember that blaze in his face. He was so confident, so sure of himself. Anyway, it was well past midnight and we weren't allowed to have visitors and here comes my seventeen year old brother, waving around a revolver he had stolen, using it to blow the lock off the front door. He broke in, rushed to my room, and started tearing the place apart. He said they were listening and they would come for me. At this point, I wasn't sure what the hell he was talking about. It was the early-eighties and I honestly couldn't tell if he was on one of his tirades about government spies or social injustice. And he had always been fond of recreational drugs, marijuana, cocaine, hallucinogens, we all did it. I just thought he was high and being overdramatic." Carlisle spoke in a low, quiet voice.

I swallowed at the mention of the word which had been applied to my brother over and over again.

"I had no idea, Alice. He was arrested for breaking and entering, and a psychologist confirmed what we never expected to hear. Mental illness. Schizophrenia. He was put on meds and went to therapy, and things got better for a while. At this point, I was his only family and so I took responsibility for him. Your father was a brilliant man, Alice. But he was arrogant. He thought he could control the disease. He went off his meds and end up beating some poor bastard to within an inch of his life, a completely random stranger for no reason. Your mother couldn't handle him at all and he was dangerous to everyone around him, so I called the police. I wanted him thrown in jail.

Your mother was furious with me. But he went back on his meds and everything would be better, until it happened again. Eventually, I realized I couldn't help him. Your mother hated me because I was constantly interfering. My brother didn't want me in his life, he thought I was out to ruin him. So I left Chicago, for his sake and mine, or so I thought. And I didn't hear from him nor hear anything about him until I got the phone call that he was dead." I sat dumbfounded, reliving this pain, reliving my uncle's pain, because I knew this all too well.

I couldn't help my brother. I couldn't help Bella. And it killed me because everyone around them could see the choices they should be making. All of us knew what they should do, but that didn't mean that they would or that they even could. Love does fucked-up things to people. It makes you completely insane and irrational, taking even the most driven and emotionally stable beings, like my mother, and turning them into coddling enablers, and half the time, you don't even know it's happening.

"I will talk to him in the morning and we will see what our next course of action should be," Carlisle said. "For the record, I don't think Edward has schizophrenia. I think he has your father's passion and brilliance, but he makes irrational decisions sometimes. He's depressed and heart broken and I'm sure that given some time, this will resolve itself. But since it is a threat, and I know it worries him so much, we'll take all necessary precautions. I promised your brother if the time came, I would take care of everything. I promised I would protect him, and I intend on following through with that promise."

Carlisle did set up an appointment for Edward to meet with his psychologist friend, surprisingly upon Edward's request. He went to three sessions and when it was evident the doctor wasn't going to give Edward meds, he bailed. I knew what he was doing, he didn't want help, he just wanted drugs. He thought he was so discreet, he thought he was fooling everyone, but I could see right through him, his intentions glowing in bright neon, the most offensive hue of denial.

Desperate for self medication, Edward started drinking again. I had found him in the upstairs bathroom passed out on the floor with vomit all over the fucking place. The first time I had Jasper drag him to his bed and I cleaned up his mess, but the second time, I let him sleep on the floor. He told me he had the flu and I started to get pretty upset, because now he was lying about it. I confronted him and he moved out, away from Carlisle's watchful eye, away from me, and into Charlie's house with Rosalie and Emmett and the baby. I begged Carlisle to make him come home, to cut him off financially, take his car, anything, but like Carlisle said, it wouldn't have mattered. Edward had money, money our mother had left for us for college, money that we could access when we turned eighteen. He didn't need Carlisle anymore.

"I don't know what else I can do, Alice. Emmett and Rosalie are keeping a close eye on him. Trust me, Rosalie isn't going to let him get away with anything," Carlisle had said, and I felt better knowing Rosalie was watching out for him, if not for his own benefit, for her family's.

But then graduation came and Carlisle found out Edward's grades had plummeted. Edward failed English. He failed, like with an F. Luckily, he hadn't really needed the credit and was only taking the class so he could drive Bella to and from school.

I think Carlisle had thought Edward would be able to get over Bella, or at least be able to compartmentalize his suffering like he had in the past, but this time it was different. Edward wasn't doing anything with his time. He either slept or sat on the fucking couch watching television. Every so often, he'd leave and we wouldn't see him for hours.

Once, he disappeared for two days, and it eventually came out that he had slept in his car at the beach because he had been too wasted to drive home. Another time, he had gotten into a fight with some guy in a parking lot over something completely ridiculous. He came home with a fat lip and a black eye. He would take off running and come home hours later, drenched in sweat and collapsing on the porch from exhaustion. He went grocery shopping but he hardly cooked anymore, preparing meals only if we asked him to. He would oblige, but it was like he was hardly even here. There was no fire, no passion in the act like before. He was still smoking, stealing my pot when he thought I wasn't looking. I asked him about it so he just started getting it from my supplier directly. And then there was the drinking. Emmett had tried to keep it under control, to the extent of drinking and smoking with him so he would stay home, but nothing was helping, none of it was getting any better, and it was now the end of June.

I was trying to spend my free time with Edward, reminding him that he still had us, a family that loved him and were worried about him. We'd play cards, chess, video games, anything really, just to get his mind off Bella. He'd play, but he just always seemed so detached, so vacant. Even now, he was kicking my ass in cribbage and he hadn't even gloated once. He just sat there, mindlessly placing his cards and fully engrossed in his dreamlike state.

Then the mail came. And Edward woke up.

I signed for Rosalie's package because I wanted to know what would be sent to Edward and Rosalie both at an address that wasn't really registered to either of them. When Edward opened his envelope and that rectangular slip of paper fluttered to the table, I froze. Bella still thought he'd be going to school, but we'd all kind of figured that was on the backburner at this point, if not forgotten altogether. Regardless, I wouldn't trust Edward to go anywhere in his condition, not only because of the threat of mental illness, but because he was completely self-destructive right now and I just didn't put anything past him at this point. I honestly didn't know how far he would go to drown out his heartbreak, I didn't know the depths of his depression. The drugs, the alcohol, the self-destructive behavior, even suicidal tendencies, none of it was off the table anymore, and the thought of what he might do if left completely alone in an unfamiliar city seriously scared the shit out of me.

Bella was wishful thinking, underestimating how much she meant to Edward, underestimating his devotion to her if she honestly hoped he'd be able to get over her and continue with the life they had planned together. Maybe she thought Edward would be able to do it just because she asked, and this may have worked in the past. But not now, not now that his heart was broken and shattered all over hell.

She had sent Jasper and I checks too, and the house went to Rose and Emmett. It was generous and cowardly. Why couldn't she come back to tell us herself? Why send a courier? This seemed like important shit, shit you need a lawyer to procure, shit you need to make sure is carried out according to your wishes. I wished she would, for one moment, just see herself clearly, see what she meant to this family and what she really meant to my brother. And I just wanted my best friend back.

It was this thought that I was stewing on when Edward raced out the front door. He was in no condition to drive, his emotions flooding. He thought she had given up, that she was never coming back, and I agreed it did seem to be the case. I mean, that's the kind of thing people do before they die, they give away all their shit. Did Bella think she was going to die? Did she know she was going to die? Oh God, Edward must be panicking and it only dawned on me what he must be thinking after he had peeled out of the driveway and disappeared in a silver flash down the pavement.

I immediately called Carlisle and he called the police department. There wasn't much they could do until he was missing for more than twenty-four hours, but this was somewhat of a novelty to us. When Charlie had been Chief, he always seemed to find Edward before he got into trouble. Now that he was gone, we'd have to wait like everyone else.

I was in my room pouring over old readings of cards I had pulled in the last two months, and Jasper strummed his guitar, perfecting a few new songs he was working on as he sat on my bed.

Death. It was always there, almost every reading signaled the end. Death is a tricky card to read because right away it evokes panic. But it's not as foreboding as it seems. It can simply mean the end, or a transition. It can mean putting the past behind you, or shedding old ways and eliminating the excess in our lives. It can mean change, the forging of a new path. Death is the inevitable and is happening continually throughout our lives, at many levels of existence, whether it is the sloughing of dead scabbed skin to make way for the new, or laying old fears and pains to rest so that we may bask in newfound emotional freedom. To grow and move, we must set aside those ancient hurts, perish the old and find rebirth in the new.

No, Death was not something to recoil from, it was downright necessary. And it was here, always in Edward's future. I had always thought Bella had been Edward's "death", that she was his change, his new path, the reason he was able to let his fear of schizophrenia fall away. It was only now, as I waited to find out what kind of destruction my brother had found tonight, the anxiety only quelled by the falling of cards and the strumming of a guitar, that I realized I may have been completely wrong in my interpretation.

I closed my eyes, the possibilities of every horrible thing that could happen flashing through my head. I thought of the packages we had all received today, the house that was no longer Bella's, the money that Bella had sent to make sure we were comfortable. Had Bella given up? Was it possible that the Death here in my lap could very well mean death? Oh, God, what if my metaphorical musings were all wrong, what if-

A chime from downstairs sounded, the house phone ringing through the large house. Jasper silenced his guitar and I froze, trying to hear Esme on the phone downstairs.

I could only make out her voice, but I knew something was horribly, horribly wrong. The hushed tone and frantic tenor sent a shocking warning up the stairs. I moved to sit by Jasper, panic now causing my hands to shake, and he folded his hands over mine as we heard Esme trudging up the steps. She was coming to tell us and I braced myself for the worst, the image of a dark skeleton knight on a white horse flashing behind my eyes.

Finally, she reached the landing and she appeared in my doorway, her ruby eyes overwhelming the soft blue. The room swayed around me, her voice fading into hollow echoes.

"There's been an accident."

...

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Yes, but you already knew that, didn't you ;)

Title is from "The Circle Game"

Love bbs, all you need is love...