For the past year I have been working 40 hours and taking 15 or more units at school. I have no clue where I left off in my other stories, so am re-reading them to figure it out. Once I've done that and figured things out, I'll start posting again. Until then, they are on hiatus.

I will try to translate anything unfamiliar, but if I forget something, feel free to ask about it. Ideas and suggestions are always appreciated. I LOVE reviews, but LOVE LOVE readers more. I firmly believe in critization for improvement. So, don't hesitate to critique my work. I can't improve my writing if I don't know what I'm doing wrong.

I will be taking some creative liberty with a few things.

Memories Led to You

by MysticIce24

Dear Diary,

Ugh! How cliché is that? Dear diary. Oh well, too late now, it's already written and in pen.

It's been a month. Tomorrow I start school. No more home studies, as nice as they've been. I've moved back to Forks, WA and in with Charlie. No more sunny Phoenix. No more brown. It's mostly green here. Though, right now it's all covered in white. It's not that I dislike the cold. I've lived comfortably in it before. It's just… The warmth of Phoenix always reminded me of the days when I would bask in the sun on the shores of the Nile. Arizona reminded me of the deserts that surrounded the Sultan's palace; the warmth of Arabia. The sun, despite my fair skin, calls to me. The cold… Not so much.

What choice do I have though? I have nowhere else I can go now. I have to live with Charlie and Charlie resides in Forks, the rainiest place in the continental USA. I can expect cloud cover nearly every day of the year and rain for a great majority of it.

The dreams have become more frequent since I came to Forks. I blame it on all the changes that have been happening in my life. I can't push it all to the back of my mind. Last night I dreamt of the hanamachi. I dreamt of my death. It was winter and I stood on a bridge looking across the pond at the snow that was covering the hanamachi. In fact, were I to look out my window now, I would see a sight so very similar. Sparkling snow in the fading light of day, just like on that fateful day.

Vampire. My death had been at the hands of a vampire. I knew I wasn't going crazy. In my dream, like on that day, I'd was walking to Onee-san's okiya. I was halfway between my okiya and hers. He came out of nowhere; a blur. I didn't even think ot scream. He took me out of town to a shack somewhere. I screamed then, I know I did, before he silenced me. The bite… So painful. Carlisle heard me. He… He rescued me. Tried to save me, but I was too far gone. I never knew what happed to Carlisle or the vampire responsible for my death. My last sight, I remember, was a last ray of setting sun shining through the dilapidated roof onto Carlisle. I spoke and he laughed. He always had such a musical laugh. What had I said? Anata wa yuki no yō ni kagayaki. You sparkle like the snow.

I had been Geisha then. A Geisha to an okiya in a hanamachi in Asakusa in Tokyo. Onee-san had named me Umeko, "plum blossom child," when I'd become a maiko. I wore such beautiful kimono. I remember I playing the shimasen. I wonder where mine is packed… I should find it and start playing again. I haven't played at all in the last month. How long has it been since I was Geisha? World War 1 hadn't even started. At least a century then. So long ago, yet the most recent life. I wonder how much the hanamachi has changed in the last decades? With the wartime bombing, probably a great deal. The okiya is probably gone.

How many lives can I remember? Consort to a Pharaoh – the only life in which I bore a child. Priestess to the Goddess Athena. A favorite of a Sultan – how luxurious harem life was. A cat – the most baffling. Commoner during the reign of Henry VIII. A lady at court sometime in the 1700s. I know there are some more in there. Is it normal to remember past lives with such clarity? I mean, it's not as though I can recall everything, but I remember so much. I know I spent all my other lives dying childless. I remember the vampire attack. I remember when as the consort to the Pharaoh, my son and I were murdered. I remember meeting Carlisle in another life. Italy. I saw him in Italy. Volterra, I THINK. I think in England in the 1700s as well. Or was it France? I remember meeting him before Japan.

Right now, staring at the snow, I miss being Umeko. I miss Onee-san. I miss Okaa-san. I miss Renee. I miss Phil. I miss the lives I've lost and left behind. Sometimes I hate being able to remember.

-Bella

Hanamachi - A district in which Geisha and courtasans live and work in Japan

Okiya - A house in which Geisha and Maiko live in for the length of their career or contract as Geisha

Maiko - An apprentice Geisha

Geisha - A performing artist who sells her art skills not her body, a little hard to explain

Onee-san - A respectful term for Sister

Okaa-san - A respectful term for Mother

Anata wa yuki no yō ni kagayaki. - You sparkle like the snow.

Asakusa, Tokyo, Japan - Tokyo's oldest Geisha district