A/N: Hey guys, this is my first ever fanfic so I hope you like it. Even if not, I'd still appreciate reviews. Constructive criticism is always good...I want as much of it as possible so that I can improve as much as possible :) Anyways, I'll stop blabberling now, pleeeeease R & R though, thanks!

A little piece of heaven.

Carlisle PoV

My day was coming to a close; it was 5.25am and I was filling out the last of my load of paperwork for the night. Being able to think and write at super-human speed came in extremely handy at insanely busy times like these at the hospital, though no-one else knew of my cheating, or supernatural ways. I'd been working at Columbus district hospital now for 7 months and had become quite the attraction with many of the female nurses. This, however, often disturbed me and made me feel uncomfortable, not to mention, it distracted me from my work. If it was possible, I would've preferred to work constantly; but for obvious reasons I couldn't. I had thought about working full time at two hospitals, alternating shifts so that I only took time out to hunt. But I had other responsibilities; Edward got lonely enough with me working normal shifts.

Edward sometimes accompanied me to work, claiming to be volunteering as part of his college degree; the reality was that sometimes I just needed another of our kind to watch out for me, someone present who understood. But today he stayed at home by himself; recently he'd been having difficulties containing himself around humans. He claimed it was because he didn't like the options on the food menu down here as much as he had in Canada. But I had my reservations about that explanation; my prognosis for his strange behaviour was that he was having second thoughts about our lives as "vegetarians", having a bit of a teenage rebellion, if you like. It had only been three years since I had turned Edward, and though he was through the worst part of eternity as a vampire, there were always bound to be teething problems. I did worry about my son though; I hoped he was not in pain because of his aversion to disappointing me, all I wanted was his safety and for him to find happiness.

"What will be will be, Carlisle…" I sighed and mumbled to myself, probably too low a pitch and fast for human ears to pick up, even if there had been any around. I walked out through my office door, flicking the lights as I went and slowly turned into the main foyer of the Emergency room. I'd been working the night shift out of convenience. Although it was mostly cloudy this time of year and almost every day passed by without a hint of sunlight, I didn't like to take chances. If I started taking days off because of a nice day, people would either start getting suspicious about what I really am, or think I was merely faining sickness in order to enjoy the sun. Either one was inacceptable in my eyes; we had just got settled down here. The longer we managed to keep our secret and blend in, the longer we could stay in one place.

I continued on and took the long corridor towards the morgue; I had to drop off some patient's notes before the end of my shift for them to go over. It was as I was pondering over the many thoughts flittering around my brain that I entered the main area of the morgue and saw Michael standing over a stretcher. I presumed this poor patient had recently died, but shortly after entering the room, I heard one tiny thud, followed by another a few seconds afterwards. I paused to make sure I was hearing correctly, though I'd never been wrong before. Michael's heart-beat was clear and regular, I could hear his heart perfectly and obviously my heart no longer beat. I could smell the blood being pumped ever so slightly through this patient's veins and realised at once that this poor person lying on the stretcher was still hanging on to life. Michael interrupted my stream of silent consciousness:

"Poor woman, eh Carlisle? Paramedics brought her straight down here a few minutes ago, didn't even bother hassling you guys. Too late for her, pronounced dead on arrival. Apparently some guy walking his dogs found her at the bottom of a cliff…sounds like she tried to off herself to me." He trailed off when I failed to answer; instead I gulped and nodded half-heartedly in his direction. Because I had just seen her. I was psychically unable to take my eyes from her face.

The reason for my living, for me being put on this earth, surely. She was so fragile, yet her heart kept beating, it was almost unbelievable that she should endure such pain and still make it through fighting now. Her body was covered with the typical blue medical sheet but I already knew her injuries would be horrific. I wasn't so stunned by the paramedics or Michael's failure to realise that although her condition was dire, she was still alive. It had happened before; but this time I was stunned by how utterly captivated I was by her. Her face took over my senses and it felt as though my entire universe has shifted slightly, but so very, very significantly. In that one moment everything I had been searching for fell into place and a fuzzy haze covered me from head to toe. I swear I felt my cold, dead heart swell a fraction of an inch. My breath caught in my throat…and I was in love.

I don't know how, or why, it happened. I had never believed in so-called "love at first sight", I thought it to be only for the naïve and shallowest of people; those who were so easily affected by a pretty face. Her face, the only one I had any desire to lay my eyes upon for the rest of my existence, screamed a million words. They crashed into me like a tidal wave of emotion, a human would have grabbed onto the side of something to hold themselves upright. A thousand feelings jolted through my dead, tight veins and I felt re-born. The most predominant of them all was a possessive instinct to protect her, forever, no matter what it took. It sounds ridiculous, cliché and over-dramatic, and I would have thought the same before that second. But I knew I would spend the rest of eternity loving, protecting and honouring this woman I didn't even know the name of.

She was perfect, absolutely incredible. I was rendered breathless and if my heart was able to break, it would have. I knew her; I knew she was the person I loved entirely on this planet, even before I laid eyes on her. But also, I knew her from somewhere; I could swear I had seen her before. I could hear from her faint heart-beat that she was barely holding on, that she would die very quickly. I felt so helpless for her, so utterly sad; had she tried to kill herself? Why? What or who could have possibly hurt this vision of perfection in front of me, so greatly that she wished to end her own life?

It was in that moment that I realised what I intended, what I needed to do. I would turn her. Turn her into one of us, I would bite her, let my venom pass through her veins, put her through all that unbearable pain and make her one of us. I would make her like me and Edward. I would kill her. It was the only way to save her; and right now, that's all my mind would focus on. I tried to convince myself that it was because I wanted to save this beautiful woman, to give her another chance at life. But I knew the truth, deep down inside: this was a purely selfish act. My intentions were mainly to keep her alive, yes. But because I wanted to know her, to know what hurt her so much, I wanted to touch her, see her smile. Oh, I so badly wanted to see her smile. I wanted ever so badly for her to be part of my life.

Although all my thoughts only took a matter of seconds to process, I realised that Michael was waiting for me to say something and stop acting like a crazed, obsessed, sick fool who was staring quite disturbingly at what he thought was a dead, mangled woman.

Shoot. I have to lie. I hate doing that…

I walked briskly over to where she was laid and pulled back the blue cotton sheet that was draped over her lifeless body. I almost recoiled in horror. I had expected a monstrosity, but not to this extent; even thinking or trying to describe how her limbs were contorted is too hard to bear. I gulped back my sudden wave of horror and covered her back up.

"I don't think there was anything we could have done anyway. Poor, poor woman…" My voice trailed off and with that Michael nodded, sighed and took the files out of my hand that I had completely forgotten about, he got back to work. It's what we do, what you have to do in a hospital; you detach yourself and get on with your job. But not this time, that was simply impossible; what I was about to do was certainly not written in my contract as an obligation of the job. In fact, it was strictly against the rules. Part of me wondered if I should just let this sleeping beauty slip under, allow her to die after all this pain she was put through, to put her out of her suffering, for I knew that if I chose my selfish path she would face much worse pain in the next few days.

I told Michael that I would wait with the body until the family arrived, to explain her injuries and console them, whilst he went to process the files I had given him. What I actually did was shocking even to me, I had no plan, or even any rational thoughts about how to handle this; all I knew was that I needed her to be ok. So I snatched her, like some obsessed stalker…and I ran. I ran faster than I even thought possible, faster than I had ever seen Edward sprint and he was by far much quicker than me. I practically flew, so fast that no human eyes would be able to see me; especially not in the husky darkness of early morning. Night is at its darkest just moments before dawn breaks, after all. All the way home I kept my eyes glued to her face, my ears listening only for her heart-beat, she consumed me, completely and fully. I felt as though nothing could stop me, nothing else mattered, as long as I saved my Esme.

I had hurriedly dug around the morgue looking for her notes, finding them within a matter of milliseconds. She was Esme Anne Evenson, but when I first saw her at the tender age of 16, she had been Esme Anne Platt; I remember her captivating me then. She had fallen out of a tree, breaking her leg, but whilst I examined her she apologised almost constantly for taking up so much of my time. I chuckled under my breath remembering her, those ten years ago; it seemed like only yesterday.

EDWARD! Help me get her strapped to the bed, I'll explain everything later!

I only thought what I wanted to scream out of convenience and for Esme's sake; I didn't want to scare her if she by some miracle could hear what was going on around her. Edward merely nodded, he trusted me with his life, even from the first moment, even though I had put him through so much pain and presented him with such a terrifying fate at such a young age. He trusted and listened to me from the first second. I could see the excitement burning through his golden eyes as he strapped my Esme down. He stared down intently at her face, his golden eyes dancing, as if they were flickers of fire.

"She looks like my mother used to…" He almost whimpered, but then composed himself, I knew it was hard for him losing all his family; he was still coming to terms with this new life. "What has happened Carlisle? Did you find her like this?" There was pain in his voice, but nothing to the degree of which I felt at that very moment. Edward was such a sensitive creature, perhaps because he could hear into the very corners of one's mind, he knew everyone's secrets.

I explained faster than the speed of light in my mind and he simply replied with "Oh, I see." His brow was furrowed as his eyes darted from me to Esme. "Carlisle, I can't hear her thoughts, it's just wordless pain and darkness. If you're going to do this, it has to be now!" He exclaimed, the panic mixed with excitement clear in his voice.

"I know son, I know. Just give me a second, you know how difficult this will be. And Edward" I gestured and rested a hand on his shoulder, "If this is too much for you, please don't feel embarrassed. You can leave at any moment, you know the last thing I want is to make you feel –"

"Carlisle, calm down" he interrupted me with a sly grin and nodded in Esme's direction.

It was now or never; I couldn't stand the image in front of my eyes any longer, but nor could I stand the thought of inflicting such pain to this fragile, delicate, beautiful woman who lay before me. If it were possible for me to feel her pain for her, I would have gladly taken it, a hundred times worse. I would have burned for her, I would have done anything, and I still would.

I sighed and resigned myself to the fact I had to do this, there was no going back now. But my mind still struggled against me, it would not matter what decision I made, I was torn between my selfishness and my morals.

I think it's safe to say, we all know which one won.

I leant down over her beautiful face, swept her golden brown hair from her face and whispered "Esme, I am so eternally sorry". I braced myself for the blood-rush I would feel after biting her; although my 200 years of abstinence helped a great deal with my general thirst, sinking my teeth into flesh flowing with blood was a different matter. It had been insanely difficult after biting Edward. But I knew this time would prove to be easier, or at least I hoped.

With a large exhale, I lowered myself to Esme's throat, my lips lingered on her skin a little longer than was necessary. And then I was engulfed with the taste of her intoxicating blood...

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