Chapter 004
I spent Thursday morning trying to convince myself that everything was normal.
Normal was sitting with Angela in English, discussing our assignment on Wuthering Heights. Normal was Jessica's endless commentary about Mike's obvious crush on me. Normal was the mundane rhythm of high school life—passing notes, worrying about quizzes, complaining about the rain.
The problem was that nothing felt normal anymore.
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw that dent in the van's bumper. Edward's cold hand. Alice's knowing smile. The impossible is just possible.
"Maya? You're spacing out again." Angela waved a hand in front of my face, concerned.
"Sorry. Just tired." The lie came easily now.
But I wasn't tired. I was hyper-aware. My senses felt heightened, like I'd been living in a fog and someone had suddenly turned on all the lights. The fluorescent hum overhead seemed louder. The musty smell of old books more pronounced. Even the scratching of pencils on paper sounded amplified.
By lunch, my nerves were frayed.
Alice was waiting for me at the Cullens' table, her smile bright and welcoming. The rest of the family was already seated—Emmett telling some story that had Jasper smirking, Rosalie looking bored and beautiful, and Edward...
Edward wasn't there.
"He's talking to Mr. Banner about makeup work," Alice said before I could ask. Her tone was light, but something flickered in her eyes. "He'll be here soon."
I slid into my usual seat—when had I started having a usual seat at the Cullens' table?—and tried to act like this was fine. Like sitting with the most mysterious family in Forks was completely normal.
"So, Maya," Emmett leaned forward with a grin. "Alice tells us you're good at Biology. Maybe you can help Edward finally get an A."
"Edward doesn't need help," Rosalie said coldly. "He's perfectly capable."
"Rose," Alice's voice carried a warning.
"What? It's true." Rosalie turned her amber eyes to me. "Don't get too comfortable. Edward's interest in people is usually... temporary."
The words stung more than they should have. I barely knew Edward Cullen. His opinion of me shouldn't matter.
But it did.
"Rosalie," Jasper said quietly, his southern accent more pronounced. "That's enough."
She rolled her eyes but fell silent, returning to pushing food around her tray with elegant disinterest.
I felt my face flush. "Maybe I should—"
"Stay right there." Alice grabbed my hand. Her fingers were ice-cold, just like Edward's had been, but her grip was gentle. "Rose is just protective. She'll warm up to you. Eventually."
"In about fifty years," Emmett added with a laugh.
The strange sensation started then. A tingling at the base of my skull, like static electricity building up. I shook my head slightly, trying to clear it, but the feeling only intensified.
"You okay?" Alice's eyes sharpened with concern.
"Yeah, I just—" The words died in my throat.
For a split second, I wasn't sitting in the cafeteria anymore. I was standing in a forest clearing, surrounded by enormous trees. The smell of pine and earth overwhelmed my senses. And I felt... angry. No, not angry. Frustrated. Protective. Scared.
Then I was back, blinking in the fluorescent light of the cafeteria, my heart racing.
"Maya?" Alice's voice seemed distant. "What just happened?"
"I don't know." My hands were shaking. "I saw... or felt... I'm not sure."
Alice and Jasper exchanged a look I couldn't interpret.
"Maybe you should get some air," Jasper suggested, his tone careful. "The cafeteria can be overwhelming sometimes."
I nodded numbly and stood, my legs unsteady. Alice squeezed my hand once before letting go.
I made it to the bathroom and splashed cold water on my face, staring at my reflection in the scratched mirror. My eyes looked different somehow. Brighter. More alert.
What's happening to me?
Biology felt like walking into a lion's den.
Edward was already at our table when I arrived, his posture rigid, his eyes fixed on the lab manual in front of him. He didn't look up as I sat down, but I saw his hands tighten on the book's edges.
"Hi," I said quietly.
"Hello." His voice was controlled, careful.
Mr. Banner started his lecture on mitosis, and I tried to focus. But that tingling sensation was back, stronger now, centered at the base of my skull like a persistent itch I couldn't scratch.
I pulled out my notebook and started taking notes, but my handwriting looked shaky even to me.
"Are you alright?" Edward's voice was so quiet I almost missed it.
"Fine." Another lie. "Just a weird day."
He turned to look at me then, really look at me, and the intensity in his golden eyes made my breath catch. "Define weird."
"I'm not sure I can." I set down my pencil. "Have you ever felt like something was... changing? Inside you? Like you're becoming aware of things you never noticed before?"
Edward's expression shifted—surprise, then something darker. Concern, maybe. Or fear.
"Yes," he said finally. "I have."
We stared at each other for a long moment. The classroom noise faded into background static, and all I could focus on was Edward—the sharp line of his jaw, the way his hair fell across his forehead, the impossible beauty of him that still made my brain stumble.
And then it happened.
The sensation exploded through me like a dam breaking. It wasn't pain, exactly, but it was overwhelming—a flood of emotions and images that crashed into my consciousness without warning.
Thirst. Burning, aching thirst that never ends.
Fear. Constant, gnawing fear of hurting someone.
Loneliness. Decades of it, stretching back further than I could comprehend.
And something else. Something new and terrifying and wonderful. A pull toward—
I gasped, my hand shooting out to grip the edge of the table. The lab manual fell to the floor with a thud that seemed to echo.
"Maya?" Edward's hand was on my arm, his touch ice-cold through my sleeve. "What's wrong?"
"I—" I couldn't form words. The emotions were still there, swirling in my head like a storm. But they weren't mine. They couldn't be mine.
They were his.
I jerked back, breaking contact, and the flood stopped instantly. I was left shaking, my heart pounding so hard I thought it might burst.
Edward stared at me with something close to horror. "What did you feel?"
"I don't—" My voice cracked. "How did I—"
"Miss Reeves?" Mr. Banner's concerned voice cut through the chaos. "Do you need to see the nurse?"
"No, I'm fine." I forced the words out. "Just a headache. I'm fine."
But I wasn't fine. Nothing was fine.
Edward had gone completely still beside me, his face a careful mask. But his eyes betrayed him—they were wide with shock and something else. Something that looked almost like recognition.
"We need to talk," he said under his breath. "After class. Please."
I could only nod.
The rest of the period was torture. I couldn't focus on anything Mr. Banner said. My mind kept replaying those emotions, trying to make sense of them. The thirst—what kind of thirst felt like that? Like dying of dehydration in the desert, except permanent. Eternal.
And that last emotion. That pull. It had been connected to something. To someone.
To me.
When the bell finally rang, I gathered my books with trembling hands. Edward was already standing, waiting, his expression unreadable.
"Come with me," he said. Not a request. Not quite a command. Something in between.
I followed him out of the classroom, ignoring Mike's confused look and Angela's concerned wave. Edward led me through the hallway, moving with that fluid grace that no longer seemed quite human, until we reached a quiet alcove near the library—a space I'd never noticed before, tucked away from the main flow of students.
He turned to face me, and I saw emotions warring on his face. Concern. Fear. And something that might have been hope.
"Tell me exactly what you felt," he said.
"I felt—" I struggled for words. "Your emotions. Your feelings. Like they were my own, except I knew they weren't. I felt your thirst, your fear, your loneliness." I met his eyes. "And I felt... something else. Something about me."
Edward closed his eyes briefly, his jaw clenched. When he opened them again, the gold seemed brighter somehow. More intense.
"This shouldn't be possible," he said, more to himself than to me.
"What shouldn't be possible? Edward, what's happening to me?"
"I don't know." He ran a hand through his hair, agitated. "But we need to figure it out. Quickly."
"Why? Is it dangerous?"
"Everything about this situation is dangerous, Maya." His voice dropped to barely a whisper. "But especially this. If you can feel what I feel, if you can sense what I am..." He shook his head. "Alice needs to know about this. Carlisle too. They'll have answers I don't."
"Carlisle? Your father?"
"Yes." He looked at me with an intensity that made my knees weak. "Can you come to our house? After school? I know it's a lot to ask, but—"
"Yes." The word came out before I could think it through. "Yes, I'll come."
Relief flooded his features. "Thank you. I'll tell Alice. She can drive you—your truck would have trouble with the road."
"Edward." I grabbed his arm without thinking, and the moment my fingers made contact, I felt it again—that rush of emotion, but softer this time. Controlled. Like he was trying to contain it. "What am I?"
He looked at our joined hands, then at my face. When he spoke, his voice was gentle but serious.
"I think, Maya Reeves, that you're something none of us expected. And that scares me more than anything has in a very long time."
Before I could respond, the bell rang, signaling the start of the next period. Students began flooding the hallway, and Edward stepped back, putting careful distance between us.
"After school," he said. "Don't be late."
Then he was gone, disappearing into the crowd with impossible speed, leaving me standing there with my hand still tingling from where I'd touched him and my mind racing with questions I couldn't answer.
What was I becoming? And why did Edward look so afraid?
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