la belle dame sans merci | carlisle cullen

16

"It's a good thing Edward didn't come." Alice commented, sifting through her CD book when they got onto the highway, "He would hate all your music." Minerva laughed slightly as the younger girl slid a CD out of its sleeve and popped it into the stereo. Almost immediately, Elvis Costello's voice began to fill the car. "Besides, he's such a party pooper."

"He did seem rather serious." The older of the two commented, "How old is he?"

"We're both seventeen," Alice replied, bobbing her head along to the music, before adding with a grin, "I've got a couple months on him though, I refuse to let him forget it." 

"My brother was like that." Minerva commented, finding herself surprised at the admission. She stumbled over her words as she continued, "eleven months older and held a grudge about it his whole life."

"Does he live here too?"

Her throat tightened considerably, "No, no. He.. he went missing a few years ago. We weren't very close." Missing was a polite way to put it. Mars never stayed missing long.

Alice frowned, "He never turned up?"

"Nope." She popped the P, "I'm sure he's out there somewhere." He certainly was.

"How long ago was that?" The girl inquired, "if you don't mind talking about it."

Thirty years since the last time he turned up. "About four years, I think." She lied, though it didn't hurt as much to lie to Alice as it did to Carlisle. If it were Carlisle, she probably would have just told him. "He fell in with the wrong crowd." She added the nugget of truth with a shrug.

"Jeez." Alice murmured, "I'm so sorry."

"We weren't very close." Minerva hummed again, though that was another lie. "My younger sister and I were thick as thieves though." She wasn't sure why she added it. Perhaps it was after so long of keeping her secrets to herself, they were desperate to jump out.

"How old is she?"

Minerva sighed a little, "She would have been twenty three this year. Heart problems." Diana would have been 177 this June. Diana was the only human who's company Minerva had ever followed right to the end, besides her grandmother anyway. Her terminally normal sister, dying a normal death; Heart attack, aged 57. "Just two years younger than me."

"Gosh, Minerva. I'm sorry." Alice said gently.

Minerva just shrugged again, "It was a long time ago now." It was. "Enough about my depressing family history," she suggested, "What's new with you?"

Alice snorted a little in response, "School is totally kicking my ass." Conversation with Alice came easy, the hour drive into the city went like a flash. They wandered through downtown, arm in arm pointing at shop windows now and then.

"You said you wanted an antique shop?" Alice said pointing across the street, "That one has a superb collection."

"Let's scope it out." Perusing the antique shop in Port Angeles was much more fun than the one in Forks and that was largely due to Alice's company. Every once in a while they would pick up some haunting little object and turn it for the other's consideration.

"Oh, now.. I kind of like that one." Alice complained when Minerva held up a horribly little porcelain doll dressed as a clown, complete with awful red felt hair around the sides of its head. Alice snatched the doll from her hands and cradled it affectionately, "I'll name her Georgia the Gutter and she's coming home with me."

"Hello Georgia," Minerva Coo'd moving closer and poking at it like it was a real baby, before adding with complete affection, "I hate you."

Alice gasped dramatically and clutched the doll to her chest before they both dissolved into a fit of laughter only to be shhh'd by the shop owner who read in peace behind the counter. "Sorry." They whispered in tandem, continuing to laugh much quieter.