LIFE AND DEATH (edythe's pov)

Chapter 7 Melody

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Solar Midnight: Midnight Sun Reimagined (Life and Death, Book I) by beyondthedawn

 Books » Twilight Rated: T, English, Supernatural & Romance, Beau S., Edythe C., Words: 224k+, Favs: 59, Follows: 36, Published: Dec 26, 2020 15Chapter 7: MELODY

I had to wait when I got back to school. The final hour wasn't out yet. That was good, because I had things to think about and I needed the alone time.

His scent lingered in the car. I kept the windows up, letting it assault me, trying to get used to the feel of intentionally torching my throat.

Attraction.

It was a problematic thing to contemplate. So many sides to it, so many different meanings and levels. Not the same thing as love, but tied up in it inextricably.

I had no idea if Beau was attracted to me. (Would his mental silence somehow continue to get more and more frustrating until I went mad? Or was there a limit that I would eventually reach?)

I tried to compare his physical responses to others', like the receptionist and Jeremy Stanley, but the comparison was inconclusive. The same markers—changes in heart rate and breathing patterns—could just as easily mean fear or shock or anxiety as they did interest. Certainly other men, and women, too, had reacted to my face with instinctive apprehension. Many more had that response than the alternative. It seemed unlikely that Beau could be entertaining the same kinds of thoughts that Jeremy Stanley used to have. After all, Beau knew very well that there was something wrong with me, even if he didn't know exactly what it was. He had touched my icy skin, and then yanked his hand away from the chill.

And yet... I remembered those fantasies that used to repulse me, but remembered them with Beau in Jeremy's place.

I was breathing more quickly, the fire clawing up and down my throat.

What if it had been Beau imagining me with my arms wrapped around his fragile body? Feeling me pull him tightly against my chest and then cupping my hand under his chin? Brushing his hair back from his forehead? Tracing the shape of his full lips with my fingertips? Leaning my face closer to him, where I could feel the heat of his breath on my mouth? Moving closer still...

But then I flinched away from the daydream, knowing, as I had known when Jeremy had imagined these things, what would happen if I got that close to him.

Attraction was an impossible dilemma, because I was already too attracted to Beau in the worst way.

Did I want Beau to be attracted to me, a man to a woman?

That was the wrong question. The right question was should I want Beau to be attracted to me that way, and the answer was no. Because I was not a human woman, and that wasn't fair to him.

With every fiber of my being, I ached to be a normal woman, so that I could hold him in my arms without risking his life. So that I could be free to spin my own fantasies, fantasies that didn't end with his blood on my hands, his blood glowing in my eyes.

My pursuit of him was indefensible. What kind of relationship could I offer him, when I couldn't risk touching him?

I hung my head in my hands.

It was all the more confusing because I had never felt so human in my whole life—not even when I was human, as far as I could recall. In those days, my thoughts had all been turned to war. The Great War had raged through most of my adolescence, and in the heat of it, the influenza had struck. I had just vague impressions of those human years, murky memories that became less real with every passing decade. I remembered my mother most clearly and felt an ancient ache when I thought of her face. I recalled dimly how much she had hated my father's absence while he served in the army, praying every night when she said grace at dinner that the "horrid war" would end. I had no memories of another kind of yearning. Besides my mother's love, there was no other love that had made mourn for my human life when it ended.