Forget Me Not | ✓

04 | Checkmate

04
Twilight
C h e c k m a t e

IT WAS AROUND midnight and Bella lay wide awake in bed when she heard a low rapping on her bedroom window. She left the window open so Edward could come during the night but Edward had already come - and even if he hadn't, he wouldn't knock. Bella threw the covers off of herself and made her way to the window. She stuck her head out to take a look but saw nothing unusual; she only heard the chirping of crickets in the distance and the wind rustling the leaves in the tree right by her window. Must be the wind. She walked back to her bed and just as she climbed under her covers, an angelic voice broke the silence.

"You have a cozy home." She looked at the window again to see Adele sitting on her windowsill in the same pair of skinny jeans and wedges as earlier. She flipped her curls over and smiled at Bella.

"Adele?" Bella was clearly taken by surprise, "What are you doing here?"

"Edward sent me to - shall I say - keep an eye on you."

"That's sounds like him." she rolled her eyes and looked at the alarm clock on her nightable, "But he's picking me up in the morning."

"He does not seem to care."

Bella looked back at Adele and noticed her still lingering on the windowsill, "Oh, I'm sorry! Come in."

Adele entered the room gracefully and sat on the end of her bed, "I figured it would be more appropriate to notify you of my presence instead of scaring you half to death."

"Oh, yeah. Yeah, totally."

"I also wanted to apologize for Rose's behavior today."

Bella quirked an eyebrow. "You know, you seem to always be the one to apologize on your family's behalf."

"Rosalie definitely wouldn't." Adele looked around Bella's room. Four pale green walls were decorated with photographs of Bella with her friends and family and plastered behind her double bed was a montage of posters. A white wooden desk was pushed to the corner of the room beside a small bookshelf. "Edward is too proud to do so."

"Well, thanks, but you didn't need to. She had every right to feel the way she did."

"It's really just her hatred for humankind that made her react the way she did. She finds them mistrustful and conniving - greedy, too." Adele frowned as she remembered how they first found Rosalie left for dead in the streets. "It's because of how she was turned into one of us."

"Oh."

"Yeah...well I'll let you sleep." she clapped her hands together, "I'll hear an earful from Edward if I don't keep an eye out for you so I'll just stay in the tree line or something. Goodnight-"

"-No, stay." Bella insisted, making room on her bed for Adele to sit and get comfortable. "Please, I insist."

"Alright." she sat back down and folded her hands over her lap, "So, tell me, what's life like for Isabella Swan?"

"Don't you already know?" Bella pointed to her temple.

"Yes, but I figure it's good conversation. I could always use my ability to read your mind, but what fun is that?"

"Do you...do you think you could show me?" she asked shyly.

"What, my abilities?" she chuckled, "I have many abilities within one." She wanted Bella to work up the courage to ask her - she didn't want to be feared or feel uncomfortable around her.