A/N: Hi. So, I have some news to share but I know some readers don't like long author notes so I'll put it at the end. It's only really pertinent to any long time readers I might still have. A sort of apology/explanation.

This chapter was not beta'd. I thought I had gotten a beta but then she seemed to kind of disappear so I guess I still need one. That goes for any of my pulled work too. I really would rather have that old stuff beta'd before passing it back out to people.

Anyway, I hope some of you are still reading. I know this isn't a happy story (yet) but I hope you enjoy it in as much as one can enjoy this sort of tale. Reviews would really mean a lot but regardless, I thank you for reading. For anyone who might have missed it but might be interested I did also post a Warm Bodies one-shot. That was my first foray into a different fandom so that's why I note it.

Hope you are all well. Reviews are love and we all need love. Thank you for reading.

All characters are property of Stephenie Meyer. No copyright infringement intended.

Charlie knew right away that something was wrong. All the lights were off in the Swan home and Bella's truck was nowhere to be seen.

God damn it…he thought.

He slammed the cruiser's door shut and jogged up the walk to his house. "Bella?" he called out as he opened the front door. He flicked the hall light switch on. Everything was quiet.

A dozen scenarios flashed through his mind. They started out hopeful. Maybe Bella was finally hanging out with her friends. Maybe she was involved in some school project. But they quickly devolved to worst case scenarios. She's run away. She's finally tried to do herself in.

For a brief moment he thought about using his radio to check in with the station but then decided to check the phone first. Charlie never was much of one for gadgets. He still had an old rotary phone in the kitchen complete with a tape recording answering machine, something Bella used to tease him about before that bastard broke her heart and she lost all sense of humor. He was just about to hit play when he heard the front door open and shut. He peeked around the corner but didn't see anything.

Over the years he'd developed what some cops called the "sixth sense syndrome", kind of like a butterfly feeling in the stomach, a sense of something not quite right. It had saved his life on more than one occasion. He was getting that feeling now.

Slowly, steadily, he reached down to his gun holster and flicked the snap open with his thumb. He placed his hand on his weapon, ready to draw, and edged his way down the hall towards the front door. Just as he reached the door Bella burst through it.

"Christ, Bella!" declared Charlie. He leaned back against the wall and let out a long sigh.

"Wh-what's going on?" she asked, freezing in her tracks.

Charlie turned to look at her. He took mental notice of her appearance, noting that she looked fine; nothing about her seemed off or out of place. Satisfied that she appeared healthy and safe, anger began to seep in.

"Where the hell have you been?" he asked her.

She winced. He never used to swear in front of her but ever since things had changed…since she had changed, he'd kind of let go and she hated seeing that side of him, hated that she was causing it. Part of her wanted to hold him, to call him "Daddy" like she had when she was a kid and tell him how sorry she was. But that part was small, hidden, buried deeply under days and months of pain and yawning years to come. She saw her future as an empty chasm and the only thing she could do to keep it at bay was steel herself, cut herself off, and protect herself. That meant letting no one in.

"Out," she replied, coldly, as she tried to shoulder past him and up the stairs.

"Now wait a minute, young lady." He tried to stop her, tried to block her way up the stairs, and instead managed to trip her. She stumbled onto the stairs, crying out as her knee struck the edge of one of the steps.

She cradled her knee, rubbing the pain away.

"Thanks, Dad…" she said, sarcastically.

Immediately, he felt guilty.

"I'm sorry. I was just worried about you."

He took a step towards her.

She stood. "Well, apart from my knee, I'm fine."

She hobbled up the stairs without another word.

It was a lie. She wasn't fine.

Earlier that day…

Bella stood on the cliff's edge staring down at the roiling grey ocean. The waves pounded the rocks creating huge splashes of white sea foam. The water seemed angry to her, as though it had a bone to pick with the earth beneath her feet. The salty air made tangles of her hair and stung her skin. She stood there with her hands jammed deep in her pockets and wondered if she should just go ahead and do it. She didn't often have these feelings but after that talk with her father this morning she wondered. Maybe this would be better. Maybe it would make people happy. Maybe this is what Edward wanted her to do. But every time she took a step forward something held her back. She didn't quite know what it was; just a sort of nagging, almost like a voice telling her not to.

She listened. For now.

x x x

She sat in front of her computer staring at that damned flashing cursor. She wanted to write about her day but everything she typed came out wrong. She wanted to say she'd gone to Edward's house after nearly jumping off the cliff. That it was the first time she'd been there since they'd left. She wanted to talk about how she's pried away the plywood covering the back window and snuck in; how the stale air and pin drop quiet nearly punched her in the gut. Even their house felt dead to her.

She'd walked around, running her hand over the dusty surfaces, fumbling in the darkness as her eyes adjusted. Mostly everything was still there, just covered in white sheets like a bunch of ghosts. It hit her then. They'll be back. When I'm good and long dead, decades from now, they'll be back. She realized that's why they hadn't sold the house. They were just waiting for her to die. She fell to her knees and started to cry, really big heaving sobs that swelled up her eyes and stuffed up her nose. Being in there was like standing in her own tomb. It was a physical reminder of all she'd lost because what it was really saying was: We'll go on without you. In time.

Images of each of them flashed through her mind, a catalogue of familiar faces she'd grown to love. In her mind she saw them happy, laughing, holding each other, all without her. Even Edward. She knew he'd find someone else. What happened between them was a fluke; some vampire instinct gone wrong, a crossed wire. That's all she was: a crossed wire, a mixed signal, easily forgotten, never important.

She shouldn't have gone there.

She'd cried all the way home. She wasn't fine. She wasn't ever going to be fine.

A/N: If you've been reading my work for a while you know that I haven't been very good about updating, nor have I been good at communication. Outwardly, to some of you, it may have appeared that everything in my life was fine aside from occasional bouts of depression. I have many times said that part of my reason for not writing as much has been my lack of a beta and that has been true. But there's been another reason. For the past two years I have been in an abusive relationship. I just got out of it this month. I do not tell you this for pity. In fact, I'm quite ashamed of it which is why I never mentioned it before. I tell you simply because it is the major reason my writing has gone so downhill. My life became about daily survival. I never knew what each day was going to bring and it took all my time, effort, and energy simply to try to make him happy and keep him from flipping out. It was a full-time job and left no room for writing or anything else. He's gone now though I am still dealing with the aftermath. The police were/are involved. It's not all over yet. But as I continue to rearrange the puzzle pieces of my life I am confident that will mean more time for writing. I don't see why it wouldn't. I wrote quite a bit before I got into this situation. Now that I'm out of it the goal is to get back to normal as much as I can.

So that's what's been going on. You have my sincerest apologies and my promise to try to set things right. I'm trying to be braver about posting things without a beta. And I'm going to try to update things more often now. If you've stuck with me, thank you. If you're a new reader, well, sorry for dumping this info on you but I do hope you stick around.