he edge of the third floor.
You're leaving again,
she accused me.
I sighed and nodded.
I can't see where you're going this time.
"I don't know where I'm going yet," I whispered.
I want you to stay.
I shook my head.
Maybe Jazz and I could come with you?
"They'll need you all the more, if I'm not here to watch out for them.  And think
of Esme.  Would you take half her family away in one blow?"
© 2008 Stephenie Meyer
  
55
You're going to make her so sad.
"I know.  That's why you have to stay."
That's not the same as having you here, and you know it.
"Yes.  But I have to do what's right."
There are many right ways, and many wrong ways, though, aren't there?
For a brief moment she was swept away into one of her strange visions; I watched
along with her as the indistinct images flickered and whirled.  I saw myself mixed in with
strange shadows that I couldn't make out-hazy, imprecise forms.  And then, suddenly,
my skin was glittering in the bright sunlight of a small open meadow.  This was a place I
knew.  There was a figure in the meadow with me, but, again, it was indistinct, not
there
enough to recognize.  The images shivered and disappeared as a million tiny choices
rearranged the future again.
"I didn't catch much of that," I told her when the vision went dark.
Me either.  Your future is shifting around so much I can't keep up with any of it.  I
think
, though...
She stopped, and she flipped through a vast collection of other recent visions for
me.  They were all the same-blurry and vague.
"I
think
something is changing, though," she said out loud.  "Your life seems to be
at a crossroads."
I laughed grimly.  "You do realize that you sound like a bogus gypsy at a carnival
now, right?"
She stuck her tiny tongue out at me.
"Today is all right, though, isn't it?" I asked, my voice abruptly apprehensive.
"I don't see you killing anyone today," she assured me.
"Thanks, Alice."
"Go get dressed.  I won't say anything-I'll let you tell the others when you're
ready."
She stood and darted back down the stairs, her shoulders hunched slightly.
Miss
you.  Really.
Yes, I would really miss her, too.
© 2008 Stephenie Meyer
  
56
It was a quiet ride to school.  Jasper could tell that Alice was upset about
something, but he knew that if she wanted to talk about it she would have done so
already.  Emmett and Rosalie were oblivious, having another of their moments, gazing
into each others' eyes with wonder-it was rather disgusting to watch from the outside.
We were all quite aware how desperately in love they were.  Or maybe I was just being
bitter because I was the only one alone.  Some days it was harder than others to live with
three sets of perfectly matched lovers.  This was one of them.
Maybe they would all be happier without me hanging around, ill-tempered and
belligerent as the old man I should be by now.
Of course, the first thing I did when we reached the school was to look for the
girl.  Just preparing myself again.
Right.
It was embarrassing how my world suddenly seemed to be empty of everything
but her-my whole existence centered around the girl, rather than around myself
anymore.
It was easy enough to understand, though, really; after eighty years of the same
thing every day and every night, any change became a point of absorption.
She had not yet arrived, but could I hear the thunderous chugging of her truck's
engine in the distance.  I leaned against the side of the car to wait.  Alice stayed with me,
while the others went straight to class.  They were bored with my fixation-it was
incomprehensible to them how any human could hold my interest for so long, no matter
how delicious she smelled.
The girl drove slowly into view, her eyes intent on the road and her hands tight on
the wheel.  She seemed anxious about something.  It took me a second to figure out what
that something was, to realize that every human wore the same expression today.  Ah, the
road was slick with ice, and they were all trying to drive more carefully.  I could see she
was taking the added risk seriously.
That seemed in line with what little I had learned of her character.  I added this to
my small list: she was a serious person, a responsible person.
She parked not too far from me, but she hadn't noticed me standing here yet,
staring at her.  I wondered what she would do when she did?  Blush and walk away?
© 2008 Stephenie Meyer
  
57
That was my first guess.  But maybe she would stare back.  Maybe she would come to
talk to me.
I took a deep breath, filling my lungs hopefully, just in case.
She got out of the truck with care, testing the slick ground before she put her
weight on it.  She didn't look up, and that frustrated me.  Maybe I would go talk to her...
No, that would be wrong.
Instead of turning toward the school, she made her way to the rear of her truck,
clinging to the side of the truck bed in a droll way, not trusting her footing.  It made me
smile, and I felt Alice's eyes on my face.  I didn't listen to whatever this made her
think-I was having too much fun watching the girl check her snow chains.  She actually
looked in some danger of falling, the way her feet were sliding around.  No one else was
having trouble-had she parked in the worst of the ice?
She paused there, staring down with a strange expression on her face.  It
was...tender?  As if something about the tire was making her...
emotional?
Again, the curiosity ached like a thirst.  It was as if I
had
to know what she was
thinking-as if nothing else mattered.
I would go talk to her.  She looked like she could use a hand anyway, at least until
she was off the slick pavement.  Of course, I couldn't offer her that, could I?  I hesitated,
torn.  As adverse as she seemed to be to snow, she would hardly welcome the touch of
my cold white hand.  I should have worn gloves-
"NO!" Alice gasped aloud.
Instantly, I scanned her thoughts, guessing at first that I had made a poor choice
and she saw me doing something inexcusable.  But it had nothing to do with me at all.
Tyler Crowley had chosen to take the turn into the parking lot at an injudicious
speed.  This choice would send him skidding across a patch of ice...
The vision came just half a second before the reality.  Tyler's van rounded the
corner as I was still watching the conclusion that had pulled the horrified gasp through
Alice's lips.
No, this vision had nothing to do with me, and yet it had
everything
to do with
me, because Tyler's van-the tires right now hitting the ice at the worst possible angle-
© 2008 Stephenie Meyer
  
58
was going to spin across the lot and crush the girl who had become the uninvited focal
point of my world.
Even without Alice's foresight it would have been simple enough to read the
trajectory of the vehicle, flying out of Tyler's control.
The girl, standing in the exactly wrong place at the back of her truck, looked up,
bewildered by the sound of the screeching tires.  She looked straight into my horror-
struck eyes, and then turned to watch her approaching death.
Not her!
The words shouted in my head as if they belonged to someone else.
Still locked into Alice's thoughts, I saw the vision suddenly shift, but I had no
time to see what the outcome would be.
I launched myself across the lot, throwing myself between the skidding van and
the frozen girl.  I moved so fast that everything was a streaky blur except for the object of
my focus.  She didn't see me-no human eyes could have followed my flight-still
staring at the hulking shape that was about to grind her body into the metal frame of her
truck.
I caught her around the waist, moving with too much urgency to be as gentle as
she would need me to be.  In the hundredth of a second between the time that I yanked
her slight form out of the path of death and the time that I crashed into to the ground with
her in my arms, I was vividly aware of her fragile, breakable body.
When I heard her head crack against the ice, it felt like I had turned to ice, too.
But I didn't even have a full second to ascertain her condition.  I heard the van
behind us, grating and squealing as it twisted around the sturdy iron body of the girl's
truck.  It was changing course, arcing, coming for her again-like she was a magnet,
pulling it toward us.
A word I'd never said before in the presence of a lady slid between my clenched
teeth.
I had already done too much.  As I'd nearly flown through the air to push her out
of the way, I'd been fully aware of the mistake I was making.  Knowing that it was a
mistake did not stop me, but I was not oblivious to the risk I was taking-taking, not just
for myself, but for my entire family.
Exposure.
© 2008 Stephenie Meyer
  
59
And
this
certainly wasn't going to help, but there was no way I was going to
allow the van to succeed in its second attempt to take her life.
I dropped her and threw my hands out, catching the van before it could touch the
girl.  The force of it hurled me back into the car parked beside her truck, and I could feel
its frame buckle behind my shoulders.  The van shuddered and shivered against the
unyielding obstacle of my arms, and then swayed, balancing unstably on the two far tires.
If I moved my hands, the back tire of the van was going fall onto her legs.
Oh, for the
love
of
all
that was
holy
, would the catastrophes never end?  Was there
anything else that could go wrong?  I could hardly sit here, holding the van in the air, and
wait for rescue.  Nor could I throw the van away-there was the driver to consider, his
thoughts incoherent with panic.
With an internal groan, I shoved the van so that it rocked away from us for an
instant.  As it fell back toward me, I caught it under the frame with my right hand while I
wrapped my left arm around the girl's waist again and drug her out from under the van,
pulling her tight up against my side.  He