Empty Veins | Quil Ateara [4]

douze

The thing about being seventeen was that sometimes she had to go home to see her dad, and it wasn't that she didn't want to, it was just that she thought that sometimes her attention was better focused back at the Cullen home and all the issues that were arising there.

But it was a nice, relaxing trip regardless as she passed out on the couch before supper was even made, Lynn curled up next to her as the both squished themself into the cushions. Charlie had only woken them to eat, prodding at them with an understanding smile, politely not bringing any attention the dark bags under both of their eyes or the sluggish weight to their movements.

Truly, they looked like zombies, or at least like the undergrad student that she ought to have been right now as she drowned under school work.

Andy often wondered how different things would have turned out if she had gone to college instead of taking the time out to stay here. Honestly, she could have gone anywhere she wanted, but at the time she didn't want to go anywhere -- she still didn't want to go anywhere.

At least now she knew what she wanted to do, or at least had an idea of what she wanted to do. Really, she wanted to have her own clinic, whether as a regular doctor or a licenced psychiatrist, she didn't care, but she knew that she wanted some sort of medical license so that she was free to help others in a way that she could control.

Though, it would be cool to work as a pediatrician.

Still, it didn't matter quite yet, not when she had more than enough time to get to it. Sure, it would take years of studying, but she was fine with pushing all that back if it meant she could spend as much time with the Cullen's that she could before they were gone.

Because leaving with them didn't seem right no matter how badly she wanted to and staying here didn't' work either.

Andy was in a state of not belonging, in this limbo of not knowing what to do or where she was meant to be. With Quil, things simply didn't work, the differences growing too extreme, too big to ignore. With the Cullen's she couldn't stay, her human timeline fleeting as they stayed eternal. Forcing them to watch her age would kill her just as much as it would her sister.

Staying here while they left her behind, left her without them in their lives would be just as painful.

Turning into a vampire, changing, was an attractive option, but it would hurt her just as much to leave behind Lynn and Quil, to force them into that position of watching her become the thing they hated most.

It was a limbo, a careful balance that would topple everything the moment that she made her choice, yet it was still all that she could think about when left alone to her thoughts when she wasn't occupied with by her automatic distressed state over Bella's wellbeing.

That was her current state of mind as she drove up to the Cullen house in the old beat-up truck, Lynn beside her idly picking the cat hair off her clothes as they hopped out of the cab. It was later in the day, well, not exactly so late that she wanted it to be, but late enough that Charlie was going to be getting off from work soon and the girls didn't want to be there when he came back to sit by the phone to wait for news.

It had been horrible as it was having to lie to her father about not having heard from her sister, that the Cullen phone was receiving radio silence just as he was with only the reassurance that the doctor treating her was a friend of Carlisle's that he trusted implicitly. They had known that it wasn't true, but it still sucked.

"You need to brush your cat," Lynn grumbles, wiping her hands down the front of her shirt repeatedly. "Poor thing is shedding up a storm."

"I know, but I haven't been around to brush him and I don't really think it's a good idea to bring him here."