I stared

He took a deep breath and stared, unseeingly, at the ground for a long moment. His mouth twisted the
tiniest bit. When he finally looked up, his eyes were different, harder—like the liquid gold had frozen
solid.

"Bella, I don't want you to come with me." He spoke the words slowly and precisely, his cold eyes on
my face, watching as I absorbed what he was really saying.

There was a pause as I repeated the words in my head a few times, sifting through them for their real
intent.

"You… don't… want me?" I tried out the words, confused by the way they sounded, placed in that
order.

"No."

I stared, uncomprehending, into his eyes. He stared back without apology. His eyes were like
topaz—hard and clear and very deep. I felt like I could see into them for miles and miles, yet nowhere in
rheir bottomless depths could I see a contradiction to the word he'd spoken.

"Well, that changes things." I was surprised by how calm and reasonable my voice sounded. It must be
because I was so numb. I couldn't realize what he was telling me. It still didn't make any sense.

He looked away into the trees as he spoke again. "Of course, I'll always love you… in a way. But what
happened the other night made me realize that it's time for a change. Because I'm… tired of pretending
to be something I'm not, Bella. I am not human." He looked back, and the icy planes of his perfect face
were not human. "I've let this go on much too long, and I'm sorry for that."

"Don't." My voice was just a whisper now; awareness was beginning to seep through me, trickling like
acid through my veins. "Don't do this."

He just stared at me, and I could see from his eyes that my words were far too late. He already had.

"You're not good for me, Bella." He turned his earlier words around, and so I had no argument. How
well I knew that I wasn't good enough for him.

I opened my mouth to say something, and then closed it again. He waited patiently, his face wiped clean
of all emotion. I tried again.

"If… that's what you want."

He nodded once.