I wish I could explain it to you right so that you would understand. I can’t hurt him any more than I could pick up a gun and shoot you. I love him.

I wish treating humans were this instantaneously gratifying.

I would have been happy to lie here forever, to never disturb this moment, but my body had other ideas. I laughed at my impatient stomach. It seemed sort of prosaic to be hungry after all that had passed last night. Like being brought back down to earth from some great height.

I wouldn’t use the word beautiful. Not with you standing here in comparison.

I’d been planning on needing years just to somewhat organize the overwhelming passion I felt for him physically. And then centuries after that to enjoy it. If we had only a month left together… Well, I didn’t see how I could stand to have this end. For the moment I couldn’t help but be selfish. All I wanted was to love him as much as possible in the limited time given to me.

I’m just here to be your friend. Your best friend, one last time.

I’m not going down without a fight.

I’m sorry, but you need to know the public story more than you need to know the truth. If you’re going to be part of this secret, the public story is the one that counts. It’s to protect Bella and Renesmee as well as the rest of us. Can you go along with the lies for them?

In that moment, as the minister said his part, my world, which had been upside down for so long now, seemed to settle into its proper position. I saw just how silly I’d been for fearing this – as if it were an unwanted birthday gift or an embarrassing exhibition, like the prom. I looked into Edward’s shining, triumphant eyes and knew that I was winning, too. Because nothing else mattered but that I could stay with him.

In truth, young Bella, immortality does become you most extraordinarily. It is as if you were designed for this life.

It is your own life, certainly, to spend as you choose.

He had the most beautiful soul, more beautiful than his brilliant mind or his incomparable face or his glorious body.

It was harder not to answer this voice, but I stayed paralyzed. I knew that the pain in his voice now was nothing compared to what it could be. Right now he only feared that I was suffering.

It was like he’d never kissed me – like this was our first kiss. And, in truth, he’d never kissed me this way before. It almost made me feel guilty. Surely I was in breach of the contract. I shouldn’t be allowed to have this, too.

It was not going to be the end of the world. Just the end of the Cullens. The end of Edward, the end of me. I preferred it that way – the last part anyway. I would not live without Edward again; if he was leaving this world, then I would be right behind him.