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by
Jessica L
Things have been going much smoother lately. It seems like scaring that poor boy was so long ago, it is hard to believe that was the last time I've written. To catch up on current events, we popped in on the trouble-making boy every now and then, trying to keep the thought fresh in his mind that he needed to keep quiet. Over the course of the summer, I monitored his thoughts and if it ever seemed like he was starting to get too comfortable, or feel too safe with the idea of telling someone about us, we paid him a surprise visit. It worked like a charm.
Rosalie and Emmett have been attending Mountain State University, like they planned, and Alice and Jasper are at Marshall University. Being the loner that I am, decided to take a year off to go do some travelling, but eventually ended up joining Alice and Jasper at Marshall. People don't really notice us there, as the classes are large, and the campus is diverse. We are just your typical college students to them, with our faces stuck in books, pale and withdrawn from too much studying, as far as anyone would assume. Since Alice and my last name is different from Jasper's, people usually assume that Alice and I are brother and sister and she is his girlfriend. We don't offer the foster story, and people really don't get nosy. It is nice to be with an older crowd that at is too caught up in themselves to worry about others. Or at least pretends to be.
Rosalie and Emmett are planning another wedding. It is going to be a big, gaudy affair in Paris this time. We will all fly out there, but they have been travelling back and forth to set things up. I swear Rosalie never gets worn out. At least this time she has managed to be gracious about the whole thing, and with Alice helping, it has been quite entertaining for the three girls to plan. We all have a week off in the spring, which is exactly when Rosalie plans on having the wedding. She wants lots of flowers blooming and tree blossoms for the photographs. Even Emmett is excited, despite the fact that Alice has picked out a light blue tuxedo with a big, ruffled shirt for him to wear. It is supposed to match the flowers perfectly, whatever that means. Girls.
When I'm not busy vocalizing how glad I am that I'm not Emmett in his powder blue suit (which usually lands me in a wrestling match in which Jasper gets involved to referee, because it is such a close match between Emmett's strength and my mind reading), I am usually studying. I actually get to take classes now that I haven't taken a million times already. College finally has something to offer me that high school did not. My favorite classes, of course, are humanities and philosophy. I love learning how how people think, why perhaps they think why they do, and how they lived the ways they did. It is incredible when you combine these classes with my innate ability for understanding the human thought process. When you can read minds, it brings philosophy to a new level.
Homework gives me something to do at night, at the least. I am usually a favorite among my professors, naturally. This tends to happen when everyone else in your house has other ways to spend their dusk hours and you are trying to kill time. My papers are always long, well thought out, and above par. I go beyond what is expected of me. In fact, now that I am thinking about it, I just got an idea for tonight's assignment. I should probably get started. Who knew- Edward, drowning his sorrows in schoolwork. I feel like a nerd. I wonder how long this will last? If I am lucky I can stretch it out a decade or so. Then again my luck never seems to take me far. Anyway, that is it for now. Be back when I have more to talk about.
by
Jessica L
Things are pretty boring these days on the college front. I have been attending classes, hanging out with Alice and Jasper on campus, and being a regular guy. It is very weird to be looked at like everyone else. This is the first time since my creation- since any of our creation actually- that we haven't turned any heads. People really don't notice us in any odd way. It is hard to get used to, almost like losing a part of your personality.
The women here are all over me also, but not in the obsessive, girly way the high school group I had to deal with earlier was. These women are older and more direct, more intense. I have learned how to get certain things from them, such as if I need access to the library after hours, or a coffee for the professor when I don't have any money on hand. It surprises me how often a professor will just pick a student out of the front row and order them to leave class to fetch them a coffee or a water. I stopped sitting in the front row a month or two into the first semester.
Anyway, at first I felt bad for manipulating women like this, and then I started dissecting it further. I wondered why I was able to do this. None of the others seem to do it and I wondered if it was a power unique to me. I didn't want to tell anyone what I was doing, however, as it didn't seem very nice. I wasn't really forcing anyone to do anything. I was merely leaning closer to the woman, making sure their heart beat faster and their ability to think started getting fuzzy, and then I asked for what I wanted. It usually worked. The first few tries were trials. Practices. Then I knew what I was doing. The women seem more than happy to oblige to my needs.
After a while, my curiosity about the whole thing got the better of me, and I couldn't keep quiet about it any longer. I finally confided in Carlisle about what I was doing. I tried to read his thoughts as I was telling him about my adventures, but all I was getting from him was surprise. Then imagine my shock when he started laughing. He actually laughed at me.
He said that he was surprised that it took me so long to figure this little trick out. It was the oldest vampire trick in the book. Human manipulation. It sounded horrible when he said it, of course. Then he really knocked my socks off. He said the Denali sisters were true professionals at it. They manipulated men like an art form. In fact, their exploits with men caused the Denali sisters to grow quite fond of men in general, which gave them a love for the human kind, and in turn, a sense of guilt when they fed on humans- especially the men they found to be so amazing in the first place. I had heard the short version of that story, but this version was much better.
Carlisle went on to say that there were always times when vampires needed to use a little sense of "charm" to get their way with the humans. Sometimes, if he had a particularly difficult patient it came in handy. The trick was to know the difference between when to use it and when to use your conscience. Carlisle was also surprised that I hadn't discovered this sooner, but after some contemplation on the matter, he figured that my lack of interest in the opposite sex probably distracted me from trying to manipulate them, or ask them for anything. Therefore I wouldn't have discovered this neat little trick.
The funny thing is that Carlisle is going crazy trying to document all my stories, asking me every detail about every time I've used any form of persuasion on a human. He finds it truly fascinating to combine the natural ability of vampire persuasion with my extra talent of mind reading. Surprise surprise. Anything to give Carlisle something to study I suppose. Now he has me asking a girl for something silly once a week. Last week I asked this woman at the cafeteria for a free piece of apple pie. I don't even eat. She gave it to me of course, then I had to pretend it was the most delicious thing. All for Carlisle. He got such a laugh out of it. Next week I will be smarter about my choices, but the cafeteria was right there, and the day was almost over. Oh well.
I guess that's it for now. I am tired of writing, so I should probably sign off. I am working on a new song that needs my attention anyway. Better get back to it.
by
Jessica L
Who knew something so simple could cause such a big disaster? Alice, Jasper and I had all decided to take a couple classes together this semester. Nothing major, just two fun electives: photography and art. Alice wanted to take the photography one, and I wanted to take the art. It is astounding how many electives you need for a college degree. Almost half of our college credits end up being electives, it is a rather large waste of money when you think about it, a student could take useless class after useless class and then take only a few meaningful classes to really get the education they need. It must be how the university makes its money.
Anyway, for our art class, we had a field trip to an art museum. It seemed easy enough. I am sure all three of us could have identified every piece of art in the entire building. It wasn't anything new, it was all reproductions of every classic painting, sculpture and pottery work from most major cultures. All the big names were there, Renoir, Monet, Picasso, Cezanne, Chagall, Gauguin, DaVinci. We were pretending to be awed and inspired the whole way through, of course, and it was harder than you might think.
The best part of the entire trip was lunch hour where we all got to sit on the grass lawn outside for an hour in the middle of the day. That's when the three of us managed to slip away for the entire hour without being noticed. We sat on the rented bus and goofed around, out of sight and out of earshot. It wasn't really necessary, but it was a nice break. When the break was over, we all had to resume our tour of the museum.
Some touchy feel-y kid decided that just looking at a Greek vase wasn't enough of a good art-learning experience for him. So he reached out and grabbed it. The professor tried quickly to stop him, and in her haste, the vase fell to the ground and shattered. As most people stared at the two in shock, the three of us saw the action in slow motion. Or perhaps because of our ability to do things with great speed, it just seemed like slow motion.
As the vase fell to the ground and shattered, the professor reached out to grab it. The student- a tall, lanky kid in his early twenties with an oversized backpack on his back- also bent down to grab it, but saw the professor and instead reached out to grab the professor as the vase shattered. Although the initial reflex to protect the professor was good, the professor had no smart reflexes, because she flinched at the student's touch and went the opposite direction, sending an elbow in the student's face. Blood spurted from the boy's nose, all over the front of his shirt and speckling the first few students nearby.
I saw the thoughts before I saw him flinch. The thought was in my mind at the same time. Jasper wanted to go for the blood and so did I. Alice was the one who pulled us both back. It was a split second of hesitation, of doubt. In that split second, she grabbed the front of our jackets and pushed us backward out of the room. No-one else even noticed our movements. They were all too focused on the commotion of the vase and the bloody nose. As quickly as we wanted to go for the blood, we were alert again. Jasper grabbed Alice's hand and bolted for the front door.
Even as I was out of the room I could smell the blood. I looked around the room and noticed my reflection in a mirror a few feet away from me. My perfect vampire vision reflected only a few small droplets of the boy's blood on the side of my face. No human would probably have even seen it. I could not only see it, but the smell was driving me crazy. I dived for the nearest bathroom, and threw my face under the faucet. I dried my face with some paper towels and took a few deep breaths.
Just as I started to get my bearings, the boy with the bloody nose came rushing into the bathroom, holding his nose. A couple of the other male students were huddled around him, helping him. They were debating whether he should go to the doctor. Everything in my world froze at that moment. I couldn't think. My only concern at that time was how many people had seen them enter the bathroom. Could I take all three of them down before they screamed loud enough for others to come running? Could I get out of the bathroom before I was seen? Carlisle would be so disappointed in me.
This was the thought that killed it. Right there. I was sane again in that moment. Carlisle. I ran some more water over my face, and looked at myself in the mirror. How on earth did Carlisle stand being around so much blood every day? I could barely handle one person getting a bloody nose. Good grief. I dried my face again with more paper towels, threw them in the trash basket and walked out of the bathroom. Alice was standing a few feet away from the bathroom door. Her posture was very tense, and her thoughts were questioning.
"I didn't do it." I answered her thoughts. She smiled.
"You had me worried for a minute there." She said.
It was one hell of a day. I think that I will skip field trips for now on. They really aren't that spectacular anyway. That's about it for now. Emmett and Rosalie are still doing their same old thing at their smaller university on the other side of town, only a week left until the wedding. Jasper got roped into being the best man. Glad I got out of that one, considering the tuxedo. It was his turn anyway. Carlisle and Esme are back from Isle Esme and ready for the wedding of the century- again. At least Paris should be pretty. I guess that's it for now, be back later.
