"Yeah, isn't that nice of her," Jacob chuckled.

"I suppose it is later," I agreed unwillingly.

I parked in front of her house, tensing as I tried to think of how to explain...without making my monstrous nature too evident, without frightening her again. Or was that wrong? To minimalize my darkness?

She waited with the same politely interested mask she'd worn at lunch. If I'd been less anxious, her preposterous calm would have made me laugh.

"And you still want to know why you can't see me hunt?" I asked.

"Well, mostly I was wondering about your reaction," she said.

"Did I frighten you?" I asked, positive that she would deny it.

"No."

I tried not to smile, and failed. "I apologize for scaring you." And then my smile vanished with the momentary humor. "It was just the very thought of you being there...while we hunted."

Jacob shivered at that.

"That would be bad?"

The mental picture was too much - Bella, so vulnerable in the empty darkness; myself, out of control... I tried to banish it from my head.

"Well, you don't have to send it our way," Jacob snapped.

"Extremely."

"Because...?"

I took a deep breath, concentrating for one moment on the burning thirst. Feeling it, managing it, proving my dominion over it. It would never control me again - I willed that to be true. I would be safe for her. I stared at the welcome clouds without seeing them, wishing I could believe that my determination would make any difference if I were hunting when I crossed her scent.

"When we hunt...we give ourselves over to our senses," I told her, thinking through each word before I spoke it. "Govern less with our minds. Especially our sense of smell. If you were anywhere near me when I lost control that way..."

Jacob and Bella both shivered at that. No, she could definitely never see him hunt.

I shook my head in agony at the thought of what would - not what could, but what would - surely happen then.

I listened to the spike in her heartbeat, and then turned, restless, to read her eyes.

Bella's face was composed, her eyes grave. Her mouth was pursed just slightly in what I guessed was concern. But concern for what? Her own safety? Or my anguish? I continued to stare at her, trying to translate her ambiguous expression into sure fact.

"Your anguish, I'm sure," Jacob mumbled. "She puts others before herself."

"You don't have to make it sound like a bad thing," Bella sighed.

She gazed back. Her eyes grew wider after a moment, and her pupils dilated, though the light had not changed.

My breathing accelerated, and suddenly the quiet in the car seemed to be humming, just like in the darkened biology room this afternoon. The pulsing current raced between us again, and my desire to touch her was, briefly, stronger even than the demands of my thirst.

"Um... this really is pretty freaky," Jacob muttered and Bella rolled her eyes, curious to know what this really meant.

The throbbing electricity made it feel like I had a pulse again. My body sang with it. Like I was human. More than anything in the world, I wanted to feel the heat of her lips against mine. For one second, I struggled desperately to find the strength, the control, to able to put my mouth so close to her skin...

Bella froze in place... waiting in anticipation... heart hammering.

Jacob shifted uncomfortably and was wary about how dangerous that would be.

She sucked in a ragged breath, and only then did I realize that when I had started breathing faster, she had stopped breathing altogether.

I closed my eyes, trying to break the connection between us.

No more mistakes.

Bella sighed sadly.

Bella's existence was tied to a thousand delicately balanced chemical processes, all so easily disrupted. The rhythmic expansion of her lungs, the flow of oxygen, was life or death to her. The fluttering cadence of her fragile heart could be stopped by so many stupid accidents or illnesses or...by me.

I did not believe that any member of my family would hesitate if he or she were offered a chance back - if he or she could trade immortality for mortality again. Any one of us would stand in fire for it. Burn for as many days or centuries as were necessary.

"But you can't go back," Bella said sadly, which meant that if they were ever going to be equal she would have to change...

Most of our kind prized immortality above anything else. There were even humans who craved this, who searched in dark places for those who could give them the blackest of gifts...

Not us. Not my family. We would trade anything to be human.

"Right," Jacob said, and he believed what Edward was saying, it really did explain why they did what they did.

But none of us had ever been as desperate for a way back as I was now.

I stared at the microscopic pits and flaws in the windshield, like there was some solution hidden in the glass. The electricity had not faded, and I had to concentrate to keep my hands on the wheel.

My right hand began to sting without pain again, from when I'd touched her before.

"Bella, I think you should go inside now."

She obeyed at once, without comment, getting out of the car and shutting the door behind herself. Did she feel the potential for disaster as clearly as I did?

"Um... I'm sure I felt the electricity... and noticed that you don't want to touch me," Bella sighed, "I'm probably just following your lead."

Did it hurt her to leave, as it hurt me to let her go? The only solace was that I would see her soon. Sooner than she would see me. I smiled at that, then rolled the window down and leaned across to speak to her one more time - it was safer now, with the heat of her body outside the car.

She turned to see what I wanted, curious.

Still curious, though she'd asked me so many questions today.

"Oh there're so many more questions I have for you," Bella said.

My own curiosity was entirely unsatisfied; answering her questions today had only revealed my secrets -

"It looks like he's thinking the same thing," Jacob chuckled.

I'd gotten little from her but my own conjectures. That wasn't fair.

"Oh, Bella?"

"Yes?"

"Tomorrow it's my turn."

Her forehead puckered. "Your turn to what?"

"Ask the questions." Tomorrow, when we were in a safer place, surrounded by witnesses, I would get my own answers. I grinned at the thought, and then I turned away because she made no move to leave. Even with her outside of the car, the echo of the electricity zinged in the air. I wanted to get out, too, to walk her to her door as an excuse to stay beside her...