Gabriel (Book 1)

Silence is Golden

SILENCE IS GOLDEN

August, 1st, 2015

This past week has been so very hard. We rely on Ryder for everything, he has to tell us what she wants and what she is thinking. Well, Jordan can tell us too but she finds it extremely sad to be around her friend who remembers nothing, and Johanna doesn't know who Jordan is. The only good thing is that it's nice to see how she was before I ruined her life with all of this talk of vampires and of Jane.

Speaking of the devil, she and Kali have been the worst teaming up on me. They wind their arms around my body, they whisper into my ear.

"I swear, if you've told Johanna anything bad about me, I will kill you." I tell Ryder as he comes out of the guest room.

"Chill, I haven't. But, how do you think we'll tell her about what you are and the world we live in?"

"You mean 'what WE are'? You're as much a monster as I am and I can't believe you have kept that secret from her. I really don't know, it was hard enough explaining it all to her the first time."

Ryder shrugs and walks away. I take this opportunity to enter the room he had just came from. Johanna sat near the window, perched on a stool and painting a canvas.

"Hello, Johanna. You look pretty today."

She waves back politely.

I look around the room at all of the canvases, they are painted in bright colors, some ones are dark.

"Mind if I look at your paintings?"

She shrugs and I walk around the room looking at all of them.

I didn't know what to think. There were paintings of her wedding dress, paintings of a pregnant woman which must have been her, and there was also the view from the house I built her. She remembers, I thought to myself. I moved to another stack. There I found pictures painted with darker colors. One that really scared me was three graves dug into the ground, I realized that was the night when Jane had attacked Johanna and her family.

She had painted the old Volturri Palace, and Kali's as well. At the very back I found one of me. I pulled it out of the stack and brought it to the window so I could properly see it. It was all dark colors; black, browns, and reds. I was standing against a stone wall, the shadows enveloping me. My head was tilted downwards, my eyes painted red and casting an evil glare. Half of my face was in the darkness, half was in the light.

"Johanna, what are all of these paintings from?" I ask as I stand behind her.

I don't get the chance to ask her further questions, I was too busy taking in the sight of her latest painting, the one she is still working on. It was large, emerald green eyes surrounded by cascading curly black hair, our daughter's face. Noticing my awe, she got up and ran over to another stack of paintings, first of all, I didn't know she was this well of a painter.

She comes back with a canvas and holds it in front of me.

Oh my God, she really does remember.

It was a painting of both our children, sleeping side by side on top of a white blanket.

I couldn't help it, blood started leaking from my eyes.

She had never seen my son! She had only seen Nikola once, how could she remember her?

"Where? Where did you see these pictures?" I ask, grabbing her shoulders, hope filling me.

Johanna got this scared look, her lower lip quivered.

"She dreamed of them," Ryder answers from behind me.

I slowly let go of her tiny shoulders.

"Ryder, I can't take it any longer. Does she or does she not remember? Because its killing me to see her this way!"

He shrugs and I just want to strangle him!

Johanna's tiny hands rest on my cheeks and turn my blood stained face to look at her.

"Why aren't you afraid of me?" I ask.

A few minutes of silence and then Ryder answers for her, "She says, 'I choose not to see the outside but rather what is on the inside.'"

Johanna nods in agreement with what he said.

I slowly take her hands from my face and hold them in mine, close to my heart, "There are some things I have to tell you. And I don't know how you will react to them, hopefully the same way you did the first time."

She gets this confused look and then I continue on, "My name is Gabriel, I love you very much, I would and almost did die for you, and we are married..."

So many hours later, after telling my gruesome tale, reliving my horrible past, and recounting the history of my kind, Johanna is sitting on the bed, shocked.

She and Ryder seem to have a conversation in her mind.

"What did she say?" I ask.

"She wants to know if its all true. The vampires, the werewolves, our parents, me. And it is."

My gaze drifts back to the pictures of our children, I notice Johanna looking at the one of the pregnant woman.

She stands up and goes over to it, lightly dragging her fingers over the dried paint.

"She asked if that was really her,"

"I guess, you never let me look at your stomach because you didn't want me to worry about the pain you were in."

She sinks to the floor, hands over her stomach and starts crying. It was the most horrible sound in the world, her eyes shut tight, not able to lock away her tears, her throat dry and sending choked sounds out.

"What is she thinking?"

Even Ryder looked upset, "Gabriel, I'm sorry that I came here to get rid of them. I didn't know how much she could love them. She doesn't even know them now and she's crying over them, over her love for them."

I keep looking at her, hands clutched over her stomach, eyes red and a constant waterfall of tears.

"She wants to know if that is why she feels so empty? Because those were her children and they are no longer part of her?"

Ryder leaves the room, unable to stand his sister's crying.

I rushed over to her, wrapping my arms around her, no matter if she hardly knew me, and I planted kisses on top of her head.

"Johanna, don't cry. You can do anything but cry! Its the worst sound in the world to me! I can't hear your unhappiness or feel your sadness!" I scoop her into my arms effortlessly and lay her in the bed, pulling the bed sheet over her trembling body. As I lay beside her and wrapped her in my arms, each tremble seemed to say 'I only want to remember.' I wished there was a way she could, and I wished there was a way that she could only remember the happy things.

-Gabriel