WITCHCRAFT

CHAPTER 16

Lucy's summer was uneventful. She had been painting the people from her dreams, two of them strikingly similar to her lawyer and her sister, two others very handsome men that she felt very different connections towards and two children, the same kids, between newborn age and twelve.

Not once had she drawn or painted Carlisle. Her sketchbook was filled with 'Papa', 'Mama', 'Mari' and 'Gen'. Another one filled with a man she had yet to identify, only flashes of images of him, sweaty, sometimes bloody, strong and usually tired. That sketchbook stayed hidden where no one could find it because upon further inspection she wanted neither her sister nor her father to see such fantasies.

She had gone on a run each morning, whether that morning was eight am or noon, she had developed a simple routine. Get up, go on a run, return with breakfast and coffee. Then the days were spent drawing, painting, gardening, reading, preparing the upcoming school year and just lounging around with Angela and/or Charlie.

Esme and Rosalie had stopped by some time earlier to bring her back her things, understanding by themselves that she likely didn't want to come over to pick it up herself. The women had helped her unpack everything as they chatted about a book one of them had recently read and it had become a bit of a routine.

While the rest of the Cullens were all but invisible to Lucy throughout the summer, Esme and Rosalie stopped by often, just to chat. They would talk about books, gardening, Emmett's most recent misadventures and both vampires soon opened up to her about their past.

In life, Rosalie had been a beauty of high society, promised to the most eligible bachelor of her time. During a drunken night though, he and some of his friends had hurt her, beaten her, raped her and left her to die. Carlisle had found and turned her, enabling her to dramatically kill and drain them all in the most extravagant wedding dress before joining Carlisle and Edward's coven and going their way.

Esme had met Carlisle when she was a teenager and he had cared for some injuries. At least he'd tried to but couldn't because even to him her blood was too irresistible, which had led him to believe she was his mate. Their lives had put them on separate paths for some years before he had found her after an attempted suicide when her child had died. He turned her and cared for her, soon realising that they weren't mates.

"Do you think that he got it wrong with me, too?", Lucy asked on another day.

"What do you mean, hun?", a nickname Esme had come to call her alongside a gentle motherly tone.

"Maybe Carlisle and I weren't mates after all", she shrugged, "If I got it correctly, not being with your mate, being hurt or rejected by them would cause a depression too great to conquer, right? I don't feel like that. Sure, I was upset at first, but I'm fine now."

Rosalie and Esme exchanged a look, unsure of what to tell her. Because Lucy hadn't been rejected by Carlisle. Yes, he had been the one to hurt her, but she had been the one to reject him. And now he was the one who hadn't moved all summer. He hadn't fed in weeks and his coven worried for him.

"Maybe", Rosalie started, "We're trying not to hurt you but- Carlisle hasn't moved all summer. He is depressed. His eyes are pitch black and he looks like a sick human almost."

"It's his own fault", Esme added immediately, "He shouldn't have let you walk in without a warning but you do deserve to know."

"Oh", Lucy looked down, feeling a little guilty. No, it wasn't guilty. The word was conflicted.

Because Esme was right, it wasn't her fault entirely. It was Carlisle's, or maybe the supernatural government's. But she could have prevented this. If she had been okay with turning. Or even if she had just decided to spend her last years with him.