Familiar Strangers (A Twilight Fanfic)

Chapter 20

Chapter Twenty:

Gabriel

“Gabriel, you’re not looking too good. Are you alright?” Aniya asked of me as I drove away from Forks. I tried to ignore the weakness I felt. I felt this way only once before and that was when my instincts told me that something was wrong with Bella. I couldn’t understand why that happened, but this time, I was acutely aware of why I felt this way. Something was wrong. Off. Just not right, but I knew it had to do with my abrupt departure. Leaving her... All that I am, everything that I had always been, the person I thought I was meant nothing now without her. A rainbow cannot be a rainbow with one of the brilliant colors missing. The essence of life still lingered within me after my change because of my father’s bloodline yet the most important piece always found a way of evading me until I met Bella.

Walking away from her was sinister in my book, something that I would never be able to take back. This I will never forgive myself for, but sadly it had to be done. If she was to love me, it had to be unconditional in every way and right now Bella was caught in the middle of a tightrope being pulled in two directions. I couldn’t do that to her. It was killing the very core of her that I appreciated the most.

I could feel what my departure was doing to Bella as I drove. The loss we both shared while apart was immense, crippling and between the both of us, it had slowly drained me of the strength that I had known. The force drawing me back to Forks was strong, but I had to fight it. If Edward was half the man Bella saw in him, he would make sure she would heal properly from the heartache we both shown her. With all the supernatural elements in all this, it would seem strange for one as I to pray, but that is exactly what I did. I prayed that Edward took care of the woman we loved so deeply.

“Hello…? Gabriel, have you heard a word I said?”

Aniya’s words had been lost in translation at first, but quickly became clear and I shook my head trying to stay clear-headed. “Sorry, I’m becoming weak again as I did before when I felt something was wrong with Bella and it’s hard to shake off, if at all.”

I looked over at Aniya as she heaved in a deep breath and rested her elbow on the inside of the door frame, looking out the passenger window. She wasn’t aware of the tension she had created by doing so. As if a dark mist surrounded her. This was unsettling to me. Something was wrong, something she was trying her best not to mention. I slowed my speed enough to speak with her. Her left hand rested tightly in her lap and I reached over to suppress her agitation,

“Aniya, what is troubling you? Confide in your old friend.”

Her worry lines deepened in her current old form as she looked upon my face. Her emerald green eyes darkened and fell in her unhappy state as she lightly squeezed my hand and rested the other atop mine. Aniya began to slowly speak,

“Gabriel, there are things that I must admit to and they’re long overdue…”

I wanted to hear what she had to say, but the ache in the pit of my stomach became intolerant. It began with a steady dull ache and quickly elevated into salt on a wound and now it graduated into all sorts of pain. The heat alone had become scorching hot, slithers of heavy steel slicing their way into my flesh, and the meaning of my existence began to slip away. I tried to speak but nothing came out but a wince of horror. I knew then that I was speaking a dead language, any language. Nothing mattered. I had given up and had no reason for feeling so helpless, lifeless.

Aniya’s frail form began to shift to her younger self. This was something that began to take its toll on her inner spirit. The older she actually became, the harder it was for her to keep this way, but whatever had happened to me gave her no choice but to use the strength of her younger being. She babbled incoherently in shock to what was happening,