ዘመኑ ባፈራው የቴክኖሎጂ ግብአት በመጠቀም ለህብረተሰባችን ስራ ለሁሉም በሚል ግብ የተሻለ የስራ አማራጭ፣ ለተሻለ ኑሮ፣ ለተሻለ የገበያ ትስስር ፣ ለተቀናጀ የገበያ ተደራሽነት ገዥን ከደንበኛ የማስተሳሰሪያ የቴክኖሎጂ አማራጭ ይዘን መተናል በሁሉም የስራ መስክ በሁሉም የስራ እርከን ስራ ለሚገኙ ባለሙያዎች እና ድርጅቶች የስራ አጋጣሚን መፍጠር
ዘመኑ ባፈራው የቴክኖሎጂ ግብአት በመጠቀም ለህብረተሰባችን ስራ ለሁሉም በሚል ግብ የተሻለ የስራ አማራጭ፣ ለተሻለ ኑሮ፣ ለተሻለ የገበያ ትስስር ፣ ለተቀናጀ የገበያ ተደራሽነት ገዥን ከደንበኛ የማስተሳሰሪያ የቴክኖሎጂ አማራጭ ይዘን መተናል በሁሉም የስራ መስክ በሁሉም የስራ እርከን ስራ ለሚገኙ ባለሙያዎች እና ድርጅቶች የስራ አጋጣሚን መፍጠር
ዘመኑ ባፈራው የቴክኖሎጂ ግብአት በመጠቀም ለህብረተሰባችን ስራ ለሁሉም በሚል ግብ የተሻለ የስራ አማራጭ፣ ለተሻለ ኑሮ፣ ለተሻለ የገበያ ትስስር ፣ ለተቀናጀ የገበያ ተደራሽነት ገዥን ከደንበኛ የማስተሳሰሪያ የቴክኖሎጂ አማራጭ ይዘን መተናል በሁሉም የስራ መስክ በሁሉም የስራ እርከን ስራ ለሚገኙ ባለሙያዎች እና ድርጅቶች የስራ አጋጣሚን መፍጠር
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ዘመኑ ባፈራው የቴክኖሎጂ ግብአት በመጠቀም ለህብረተሰባችን ስራ ለሁሉም በሚል ግብ የተሻለ የስራ አማራጭ፣ ለተሻለ ኑሮ፣ ለተሻለ የገበያ ትስስር ፣ ለተቀናጀ የገበያ ተደራሽነት ገዥን ከደንበኛ የማስተሳሰሪያ የቴክኖሎጂ አማራጭ ይዘን መተናል በሁሉም የስራ መስክ በሁሉም የስራ እርከን ስራ ለሚገኙ ባለሙያዎች እና ድርጅቶች የስራ አጋጣሚን መፍጠር
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👁 :
A prolific Vietnamese people smuggler, who entered the UK illegally this year in a small boathe forges visa documents for other Vietnamese who plan to make the same crossing.
The man, whom we are calling Thanh, is now claiming UK asylum and told us he has spent almost 20 years - his entire adult life - in the smuggling industry.
He has been in prison, led a gang working on the northern coast of France, and claims to have helped more than 1,000 people to risk their lives to cross the Channel.
The self-confessed criminal mett a secret location to share detailed information about the mechanics of the international smuggling industry.
‘A very lucrative business’
Thanh walks into the room cautiously, dark eyes moving fast as if searching for possible exit routes. A small, neat, quietly authoritative figure in a black polo neck.
There are handshakes and he says “hello” in a soft, strongly accented voice. Beyond that, we speak almost exclusively through a Vietnamese translator.
After months of phone calls and one brief meeting, the interview takes place on a grey day in a small hotel room, in a northern English town that we are choosing not to name here.We decided there was a strong public interest in hearing about Thanh’s life in the smuggling trade, which could only be secured in return for agreeing to keep his identity confidential. He fears being recognised not only by the British authorities but by Vietnamese criminals in the UK.
Vietnam emerged in the first months of this year - suddenly and unexpectedly - as the largest single source of migrants seeking to cross the Channel to the UK illegally in small boats.
Many Vietnamese migrants have cited failing businesses and debts at home for their decision to seek work in the UK. Their first step, experts have suggested, is often to access Europe by taking advantage of a legal work visa system in Hungary and other parts of Eastern Europe.
This is where Thanh’s forgery operation comes in, he says. He helps create the fake paperwork needed to get the legitimate work visas.
“I can’t justify breaking the law. But it’s a very lucrative business,” Thanh said calmly, insisting he doesn’t provide forgeries for people seeking UK visas.We know from our interviews with Vietnamese smugglers and their clients that people pay between $15,000 (£11,570) and $20,000 (£15,470) to travel from Vietnam to mainland Europe and then to cross the Channel.
It is a dangerous business. More than 50 people have been killed crossing the Channel in small boats already this year, making 2024 the deadliest on record. For the first time, the figures include one Vietnamese.
When our team first made contact with Thanh in mainland Europe earlier this year, we knew he was going to attempt to get to the UK with other Vietnamese. He later let us know he had crossed the Channel from northern France, in a small boat.
Thanh told us he had first flown from Vietnam to Hungary on a legitimate visa - although he had acquired it using forged documents.
How many people cross the Channel in small boats and how many claim asylum?
He had then flown on to Paris and stayed for a few days in a “safe house”, organised by a Vietnamese smuggling gang on the city’s outskirts. Soon after then, he was taken in a group by minibus to the coast and, finally, put in the hands of one of the Kurdish gangs that control the small boat crossings.
“Once you’re on the boat, you get treated like everyone else,” he said. “It’s overcrowded.”
But the Vietnamese passengers pay three or four times more money to the gangs handling the crossing routes, he told us, “so we get the advantage of being given a place more quickly”.
In fact, our sources suggest the Vietnamese pay roughly twice the usual rate.
The journey Thanh described is now an established route from Vietnam to the UK - a path heavily promoted by smugglers on Facebook, who charge clients for forged documents, flights, buses, and a place on a flimsy rubber boat. Payment for a successful Channel crossing is only made after arrival in the UK.
And Thanh had been lucky, he told us, evading French police patrolling the beaches near Calais, and crossing in an inflatable boat on his first attempt.
Or perhaps he tried several times. Over the months that we were in contact with him, he changed elements of the story he told us - perhaps to cover his tracks and to avoid giving potential clues about his identity to the UK authorities.Yes. A lie. I was not trafficked’
Thanh asked for asylum when he was interviewed by a British immigration official - explaining he had left Vietnam because he had got into debt to gangsters when his business failed. His life, he said, was in danger.
He told the official he had been trafficked to the UK in order to work for a gang to pay off his debt.
We had heard similar stories from the Vietnamese we encountered in northern France.
When we first established contact with Thanh, he portrayed himself as a desperate migrant, first stuck in France, and then trapped in the UK’s asylum system, living in a crowded hotel, unable to work, and waiting to learn his fate.
But over time, we began to learn the truth. Or rather, Thanh began to reveal the extent to which his extraordinary life story has been built on a series of elaborate, even outrageous, lies.
Sitting opposite me on a sofa, Thanh admitted that he had not been trafficked to the UK. He had made up that story as part of his asylum claim. And he went much further, claiming that all the Vietnamese migrants he knew of had been told to offer a version of the same lie.
“Yes. A lie. I was not trafficked,” he said.
Migration experts and NGOs have a range of views about the scale of trafficking from Vietnam.
One French prosecutor told us that many Vietnamese were in debt to the smugglers and ended up working in UK cannabis farms. But he played down the idea of an organised supply chain, insisting the smuggling system was more like a haphazard series of stepping stones, with each stage controlled by separate gangs. Finding work in the UK was, he said, about luck and opportunism.
Other experts insist that many, if not most, Vietnamese migrants are victims of trafficking, and that those being taken across the Channel are in fact a cheap and easy source of labour for criminal gangs in the UK. A government registry of people suspected of being victims of modern slavery has consistently shown a high number of Vietnamese.
“It is often not possible, or helpful, to differentiate when a person has been trafficked or smuggled, especially as exploitation can happen at any time,” said Jamie Fookes, UK and Europe advocacy manager at Anti-Slavery International.
“Those crossing will often have to pay either through extortion, or from being exploited in some form of forced labour or criminality on the other side.”
Safe migration routes, he added, would be the only way to prevent traffickers taking advantage of people’s desperation.But Thanh maintains that most Vietnamese migrants aren’t trafficked, and that it is just a line used to claim asylum.
“That’s the way it’s done. [People lie about being trafficked] in order to continue the asylum process safely,” he said.
Thanh clearly has a motive to lie about this. If he were to be caught forging documents for people who went on to be trafficked, the penalties would be far more serious than for smuggling.
In our reporting we have sought to corroborate the details of Thanh’s story - and in many instances have done so successfully. But a cloud of doubt hangs, inevitably, over elements of it.
‘I claimed I was still a child’
Thanh says he first left Vietnam in 2007. He was in his late teens or early twenties. He had already dropped out of school to work in a textile factory in the south of the country. But his family wanted him to head abroad, to Europe, in search of higher wages.
“I borrowed $6,000 (£4,624) from relatives and neighbours [to pay for the trip]. A lot of people had already made the same journey. We Vietnamese have always travelled like this - to wherever it is easier to make money,” he told me.
That journey first took him to a farm outside Prague, in the Czech Republic. He spent more than a year picking spring onions and other vegetables before deciding he could do better in Germany. Crossing the border illegally in a minibus, Thanh says he threw away his passport and other documents, and chose a new name.
And he went a step further.
When he arrived in Berlin, he told the authorities he was 14 years old.
The smugglers who had charged him $1,000 (£771) to get him into Germany had advised him it would be easier if he claimed he was under 16.
“I looked young in those days. Nobody challenged me on that.”
And so, the German authorities promptly sent a man they took to be a boy to a children’s home 45 minutes’ drive from the German capital, where Thanh quickly got to work, selling black-market cigarettes in the local town.
Thanh says he stayed in Germany for about two years. He left the children’s home, found a girlfriend, and soon became a father. But a police crackdown started to affect his income from selling cigarettes. And so, in 2010, he decided to try to reach the UK.
Crossing into France without his new family, he tells us, he threw away his German documents and invented yet another false identity.
By then, thousands of migrants were trying to cross the Channel to the UK by hiding in lorries and shipping containers. Thanh says he made several attempts but was unsuccessful.
“I had bad luck. The patrols were very strict. They used dogs to detect us hiding in a container.” He claims to have reached Dover at one point, only for the truck to be returned with him and a group of other migrants still inside.
Stuck in France, camping in a forest near Dunkirk, Thanh was offered work by Vietnamese people smugglers. It was a job at which, he says, he soon excelled.
“I had to provide food and supplies and arrange to send people to the lorries at particular times. I did not recruit people, but I was paid €300 (£250) for each successful crossing,” said Thanh, insisting that none of his passengers were being trafficked or exploited.
“We just provided a service. No-one was forced. It was illegal, but it was very, very profitable.”
A few years later, the same gang - no longer linked to Thanh, he says - would be involved in the deaths of 39 Vietnamese migrants who were discovered, suffocated, inside a lorry trailer in Essex.
We need to gloss over some details of what Thanh says happened to him over the next few years in order to continue to hide his identity. He rose within a gang to become one of its senior members. But eventually, after being arrested, tried, and imprisoned for several years in Europe, he returned to Vietnam.
At which point, he might have left the smuggling world behind him. But, as he puts it now, his own reputation pulled him back in.
“People in Europe contacted me asking for help,” he told us.
“I’d already helped about 1,000 people to get to the UK successfully, so I was well known for that success.”
In 2017, he says he re-entered the smuggling trade - only this time, Thanh wasn’t smuggling people, he was forging documents for them.
Bank statements, payslips, tax invoices, anything that European embassies required to prove that people applying for student, or work, or business visas had the necessary funds to ensure they planned to return to Vietnam.
“I had a lot of clients. Depending on which embassy it was, we would provide forged bank statements or other documents.
“First, we would submit these online. If certain embassies needed to check with banks, then we’d put real cash into a bank account. We had arrangements with staff at certain banks,” Thanh explained.
“The clients couldn’t access the money themselves, but the bank staff would show the [falsified] details to embassy staff. We worked with lots of different types of Vietnamese banks.”
An expert in Vietnam told us that banking fraud is “quite common”, and there were instances of bank staff colluding with criminals to forge documents.Thanh tells us he is not proud of his work as a forger - that he had known it was illegal and that he had done it simply to support his family. But at times he sounds boastful, observing that “people trust me, I have never failed”, and insisting his work was “not a serious crime in Vietnam”.
By now, Thanh had a new family in Vietnam. But earlier this year, he decided to leave.
It is not entirely clear why. At one point, he tells us his business had been struggling. He also mentions problems with the Vietnamese police - but he plays them down. Perhaps it is caution. But it strikes us that a lifetime of deception might have affected his ability, or his desire, to distinguish truth from fiction.
So why talk to us? Why risk blowing his cover in the UK? And why continue with his forgery business here, even now?
Thanh portrays himself as a repentant figure who now regrets his life of crime and wants to speak out to prevent other Vietnamese people from making the same mistakes. Above all, he wants to warn them against coming to the UK illegally, saying it is simply not worth it.
“I just want people in Vietnam to understand that it’s not worth borrowing lots of money to travel here. It’s not so easy for illegal arrivals to find work or make money.
“And when they do make money it’s less than in the past. It’s no better than in Germany or other European countries. I’ve been trying to find work in the grey economy, but I’ve not been successful,” he told us.
“If you want to work on a cannabis farm, there are opportunities, but I don’t want to get involved in more illegal activities now. I don’t want to land up in prison.”
Thanh urges the UK and European governments to make a bigger effort to publicise the fact there are no jobs here for illegal migrants. He also blames smuggling gangs for lying to their clients about the realities and opportunities.
Home Office launches 'stop the boats' ad campaign in Vietnam
But he says people back in Vietnam are hard to dissuade, suspecting those trying to warn against travelling to Europe are “being selfish and trying to keep the job opportunities for themselves”.
When we confront Thanh, repeatedly, about his hypocrisy and his own continued involvement in the elements of smuggling industry, he shrugs. It is just business.
“We don’t force anyone to do what they do. They ask us for help, as they would from any business. There’s no trafficking involved. If you have a good reputation, the clients come to you, without threats or violence.”
But what about the dangers involved - the surging number of deaths in the Channel?
“My role is just a small one in a much bigger process.”
Thanh acknowledges that his life, and that of his family back in Vietnam, would be in danger if the smuggling gangs found out he had been talking to us. When pushed, he admits to some regrets.
“If I could start again, I would not leave Vietnam. I think my life would be much better if I had stayed at home. I’ve faced so many struggles. I don’t have a bright future.”
Was he telling the truth?
At the end of our interview, he stands up, ready to leave, and for the first time, a flicker of concern, or perhaps irritation, seems to flit across his face.
Perhaps he had said too much.
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👁 :
Israel has carried out what it described as “precise and targeted” airstrikes on Iran in retaliation for the barrage of missile strikes launched by Tehran against Israel earlier this month.
It is the latest in a series of exchanges between the two countries that for months have sparked fears of an all-out regional war.
But while Iran says Saturday's strikes against military sites killed four soldiers, early indications suggest the attacks were more limited than had been feared.
Here’s what we know.
How did the attacks unfold?
Around 02:15 local time (22:45 GMT on Friday), Iranian media reported explosions in and around the capital, Tehran.
Video uploaded to social media and verified by the BBC showed projectiles in the sky over the city, while residents in some areas reported hearing loud booms.
Shortly after, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed it was carrying out “precise” strikes on “military targets” in Iran.
The attacks involved scores of aircraft, including jets and drones. The targets included Iran’s air defences, as well as missile and drone production, and launch facilities.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Yoav Gallant followed the operation from the IDF’s command and control centre in Tel Aviv.
The strikes came in several waves, over a three-hour period. Just after 06:30 (03:00 GMT), the IDF said the strikes had concluded.
The White House described the strikes as an “exercise of self-defence”. A senior administration official said the US had worked with Israel to encourage a "targeted and proportional" response.
What was the scale of the attacks?
The extent of the attacks - and the damage caused - remains unclear at this stage.
The IDF said it hit around 20 targets, including missile manufacturing facilities, surface-to-air-missiles and other military sites.
The Iranian military confirmed that four soldiers had died, two “while battling projectiles”.
Iranian authorities said sites in Tehran, Khuzestan and Ilam provinces were targeted. The country’s air defence said it had “successfully intercepted” the attacks, but that “some areas sustained limited damage”.
BBC Verify has identified damage at a defence ministry base to the east of Tehran, and at an air defence base to the south.
A senior US administration official said the attacks did not damage Iranian oil infrastructure or nuclear facilities, targets President Joe Biden had urged Israel not to hit.
Syrian state media also reported strikes on military sites in central and southern Syria, though Israel has not confirmed striking the country.Why did Israel attack Iran?
Iran is the primary backer of a range of groups across the Middle East - often described as proxy groups - that are hostile to Israel, including Hamas and Hezbollah, which Israel is currently at war with.
In April, Iran launched its first direct attack on Israel, with about 300 missiles and drones, in retaliation for an Israeli air strike on an Iranian embassy compound in Syria that killed several top commanders from Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
Israel responded with a “limited” strike on a missile defence system in the Iranian region of Isfahan, which Iran chose not to respond to.
Later, in July, Israel killed a top Hezbollah commander in an airstrike on Beirut. The next day, Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh was killed in an explosion in Tehran. Iran blamed Israel, though Israel did not comment.
In late September, Israel assassinated Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and Brig-Gen Abbas Nilforoushan, a high-ranking Iranian official, in Beirut.
On October 1, Iran launched about 180 ballistic missiles at Israel, which it said was in response to the deaths of Haniyeh, Nasrallah and Nilforoushan.
This latest attack on Iran is Israel's response to that.What happens next?
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office denied a report by US outlet Axios that prior to the attacks, Israel sent Iran a message revealing certain details about the strikes, and warning Tehran not to respond.
"Israel did not inform Iran before the attack - not about the time, not about the targets, not about the strength of the attack," the prime minister's spokesperson said.
Still, early signs indicate this attack was not as serious as some had feared.
The IDF said in a statement that "we are focused on our war objectives in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon. It is Iran that continues to push for a wider regional escalation".
A senior US official said "this should be the end of this direct exchange of fire between Israel and Iran".
Iran’s foreign ministry said it was "entitled and obligated to defend itself" and described the attack as a violation of international law.
But it also said that Tehran recognises its "responsibilities towards regional peace and security".
What is the situation in Iran?
Images published by Iranian state media show life continuing in relative normality - with busy streets, people exercising in parks, and fruit and vegetable markets open as usual.
Iran closed its airspace for a few hours overnight, but it later reopened and commercial flights were in the air across the country by late afternoon.
But there are signs the Iranian government are keen to play down the impact of the attacks.
The IRGC has announced that it is a criminal offense to send “images or news” related to the attack to outlets that it deems "Israel-affiliated" or "hostile”. Usually, Iran refers to Western media as hostile.
Iranian media reported today that Tehran's Prosecutor Office has filed charges against an unnamed website for “covering issues counter to national security".
How has the world responded?
US National Security Council spokesman Sean Savett said Israel’s response “avoided populated areas and focused solely on military targets, contrary to Iran's attack against Israel that targeted Israel's most populous city".
But Washington’s aim, he added, is “to accelerate diplomacy and de-escalate tensions in the Middle East region".
UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said Israel had the right to defend itself, but urged all sides to “show restraint” and called for Iran not to respond.
Saudi Arabia condemned the attack, and warned against any action that "threatens the security and the stability” of the region.
Egypt's foreign ministry echoed those concerns, saying it was “gravely concerned” by the strikes.
Hamas described them as "a flagrant violation of Iranian sovereignty, and an escalation that targets the security of the region and the safety of its peoples".
👁 :
1. First Sight
My mother drove me to the airport with the windows rolled down. It was seventy-five degrees in Phoenix, the sky a perfect, cloudless blue. I was wearing my favorite shirt — sleeveless, white eyelet lace; I was wearing it as a farewell gesture. My carry-on item was a parka.
In the Olympic Peninsula of northwest Washington State, a small town named Forks exists under a near-constant cover of clouds. It rains on this inconsequential town more than any other place in the United States of America. It was from this town and its gloomy, omnipresent shade that my mother escaped with me when I was only a few months old. It was in this town that I'd been compelled to spend a month every summer until I was fourteen. That was the year I finally put my foot down; these past three summers, my dad, Charlie, vacationed with me in California for two weeks instead.
It was to Forks that I now exiled myself— an action that I took with great horror. I detested Forks.
I loved Phoenix. I loved the sun and the blistering heat. I loved the vigorous, sprawling city.
"Bella," my mom said to me — the last of a thousand times — before I got on the plane. "You don't have to do this."
My mom looks like me, except with short hair and laugh lines. I felt a spasm of panic as I stared at her wide, childlike eyes. How could I leave my loving, erratic, harebrained mother to fend for herself ? Of course she had Phil now, so the bills would probably get paid, there would be food in the refrigerator, gas in her car, and someone to call when she got lost, but still…
"I want to go," I lied. I'd always been a bad liar, but I'd been saying this lie so frequently lately that it sounded almost convincing now.
"Tell Charlie I said hi." "I will."
"I'll see you soon," she insisted. "You can come home whenever you want — I'll come right back as soon as you need me."
But I could see the sacrifice in her eyes behind the promise. "Don't worry about me," I urged. "It'll be great. I love you, Mom."
She hugged me tightly for a minute, and then I got on the plane, and she was gone. It's a four-hour flight from Phoenix to Seattle, another hour in a small plane up to Port
Angeles, and then an hour drive back down to Forks. Flying doesn't bother me; the hour in the car with Charlie, though, I was a little worried about.
Charlie had really been fairly nice about the whole thing. He seemed genuinely pleased that I was coming to live with him for the first time with any degree of permanence. He'd already gotten me registered for high school and was going to help me get a car.
But it was sure to be awkward with Charlie. Neither of us was what anyone would call verbose, and I didn't know what there was to say regardless. I knew he was more than a little confused by my decision — like my mother before me, I hadn't made a secret of my distaste for Forks.
When I landed in Port Angeles, it was raining. I didn't see it as an omen — just unavoidable. I'd already said my goodbyes to the sun.
Charlie was waiting for me with the cruiser. This I was expecting, too. Charlie is Police Chief Swan to the good people of Forks. My primary motivation behind buying a car, despite the scarcity of my funds, was that I refused to be driven around town in a car with red and blue lights on top. Nothing slows down traffic like a cop.
Charlie gave me an awkward, one-armed hug when I stumbled my way off the plane. "It's good to see you, Bells," he said, smiling as he automatically caught and steadied
me. "You haven't changed much. How's Renée?"
"Mom's fine. It's good to see you, too, Dad." I wasn't allowed to call him Charlie to his face.
I had only a few bags. Most of my Arizona clothes were too permeable for Washington. My mom and I had pooled our resources to supplement my winter wardrobe, but it was still scanty. It all fit easily into the trunk of the cruiser.
"I found a good car for you, really cheap," he announced when we were strapped in. "What kind of car?" I was suspicious of the way he said "good car for you" as opposed
to just "good car."
"Well, it's a truck actually, a Chevy." "Where did you find it?"
"Do you remember Billy Black down at La Push?" La Push is the tiny Indian reservation on the coast.
"No."
"He used to go fishing with us during the summer," Charlie prompted.
That would explain why I didn't remember him. I do a good job of blocking painful, unnecessary things from my memory.
"He's in a wheelchair now," Charlie continued when I didn't respond, "so he can't drive anymore, and he offered to sell me his truck cheap."
"What year is it?" I could see from his change of expression that this was the question he was hoping I wouldn't ask.
"Well, Billy's done a lot of work on the engine — it's only a few years old, really."
I hoped he didn't think so little of me as to believe I would give up that easily. "When did he buy it?"
"He bought it in 1984, I think." "Did he buy it new?"
"Well, no. I think it was new in the early sixties — or late fifties at the earliest," he admitted sheepishly.
"Ch — Dad, I don't really know anything about cars. I wouldn't be able to fix it if anything went wrong, and I couldn't afford a mechanic…"
"Really, Bella, the thing runs great. They don't build them like that anymore."
The thing, I thought to myself… it had possibilities — as a nickname, at the very least. "How cheap is cheap?" After all, that was the part I couldn't compromise on.
"Well, honey, I kind of already bought it for you. As a homecoming gift." Charlie peeked sideways at me with a hopeful expression.
Wow. Free.
"You didn't need to do that, Dad. I was going to buy myself a car."
"I don't mind. I want you to be happy here." He was looking ahead at the road when he said this. Charlie wasn't comfortable with expressing his emotions out loud. I inherited that from him. So I was looking straight ahead as I responded.
"That's really nice, Dad. Thanks. I really appreciate it." No need to add that my being happy in Forks is an impossibility. He didn't need to suffer along with me. And I never looked a free truck in the mouth — or engine.
"Well, now, you're welcome," he mumbled, embarrassed by my thanks.
We exchanged a few more comments on the weather, which was wet, and that was pretty much it for Conversation. We stared out the windows in silence.
It was beautiful, of course; I couldn't deny that. Everything was green: the trees, their trunks covered with moss, their branches hanging with a canopy of it, the ground covered with ferns. Even the air filtered down greenly through the leaves.
It was too green — an alien planet.
Eventually we made it to Charlie's. He still lived in the small, two-bedroom house that he'd bought with my mother in the early days of their marriage. Those were the only kind of days their marriage had — the early ones. There, parked on the street in front of the house that never changed, was my new — well, new to me — truck. It was a faded red color, with big, rounded fenders and a bulbous cab. To my intense surprise, I loved it. I didn't know if it would run, but I could see myself in it. Plus, it was one of those solid iron affairs that never gets damaged — the kind you see at the scene of an accident, paint unscratched, surrounded by the pieces of the foreign car it had destroyed.
"Wow, Dad, I love it! Thanks!" Now my horrific day tomorrow would be just that much less dreadful. I wouldn't be faced with the choice of either walking two miles in the rain to school or accepting a ride in the Chief's cruiser.
"I'm glad you like it," Charlie said gruffly, embarrassed again.
It took only one trip to get all my stuff upstairs. I got the west bedroom that faced out over the front yard. The room was familiar; it had been belonged to me since I was born. The wooden floor, the light blue walls, the peaked ceiling, the yellowed lace curtains around the window — these were all a part of my childhood. The only changes Charlie had ever made were switching the crib for a bed and adding a desk as I grew. The desk now held a secondhand computer, with the phone line for the modem stapled along the floor to the nearest phone jack. This was a stipulation from my mother, so that we could stay in touch easily. The rocking chair from my baby days was still in the corner.
There was only one small bathroom at the top of the stairs, which I would have to share with Charlie. I was trying not to dwell too much on that fact.
One of the best things about Charlie is he doesn't hover. He left me alone to unpack and get settled, a feat that would have been altogether impossible for my mother. It was nice to be alone, not to have to smile and look pleased; a relief to stare dejectedly out the window at the sheeting rain and let just a few tears escape. I wasn't in the mood to go on a real crying jag. I would save that for bedtime, when I would have to think about the coming morning.
Forks High School had a frightening total of only three hundred and fifty-seven — now fifty-eight — students; there were more than seven hundred people in my junior class alone back home. All of the kids here had grown up together — their grandparents had been toddlers together.
I would be the new girl from the big city, a curiosity, a freak.
Maybe, if I looked like a girl from Phoenix should, I could work this to my advantage. But physically, I'd never fit in anywhere. I should be tan, sporty, blond — a volleyball player, or a cheerleader, perhaps — all the things that go with living in the valley of the
sun.
Instead, I was ivory-skinned, without even the excuse of blue eyes or red hair, despite the constant sunshine. I had always been slender, but soft somehow, obviously not an athlete; I didn't have the necessary hand-eye coordination to play sports without humiliating myself — and harming both myself and anyone else who stood too close.
When I finished putting my clothes in the old pine dresser, I took my bag of bathroom necessities and went to the communal bathroom to clean myself up after the day of travel. I looked at my face in the mirror as I brushed through my tangled, damp hair. Maybe it was the light, but already I looked sallower, unhealthy. My skin could be pretty — it was very clear, almost translucent-looking — but it all depended on color. I had no color here.
Facing my pallid reflection in the mirror, I was forced to admit that I was lying to myself. It wasn't just physically that I'd never fit in. And if I couldn't find a niche in a school with three thousand people, what were my chances here?
I didn't relate well to people my age. Maybe the truth was that I didn't relate well to people, period. Even my mother, who I was closer to than anyone else on the planet, was never in harmony with me, never on exactly the same page. Sometimes I wondered if I was seeing the same things through my eyes that the rest of the world was seeing through theirs. Maybe there was a glitch in my brain. But the cause didn't matter. All that mattered was the effect. And tomorrow would be just the beginning.
I didn't sleep well that night, even after I was done crying. The constant whooshing of the rain and wind across the roof wouldn't fade into the background. I pulled the faded old quilt over my head, and later added the pillow, too. But I couldn't fall asleep until after midnight, when the rain finally settled into a quieter drizzle.
Thick fog was all I could see out my window in the morning, and I could feel the claustrophobia creeping up on me. You could never see the sky here; it was like a cage.
Breakfast with Charlie was a quiet event. He wished me good luck at school. I thanked him, knowing his hope was wasted. Good luck tended to avoid me. Charlie left first, off to the police station that was his wife and family. After he left, I sat at the old square oak table in one of the three unmatching chairs and examined his small kitchen, with its dark paneled walls, bright yellow cabinets, and white linoleum floor. Nothing was changed.
My mother had painted the cabinets eighteen years ago in an attempt to bring some sunshine into the house. Over the small fireplace in the adjoining handkerchief-sized family room was a row of pictures. First a wedding picture of Charlie and my mom in Las Vegas, then one of the three of us in the hospital after I was born, taken by a helpful nurse, followed by the procession of my school pictures up to last year's. Those were embarrassing to look at — I would have to see what I could do to get Charlie to put them somewhere else, at least while I was living here.
It was impossible, being in this house, not to realize that Charlie had never gotten over my mom. It made me uncomfortable.
I didn't want to be too early to school, but I couldn't stay in the house anymore. I donned my jacket — which had the feel of a biohazard suit — and headed out into the rain.
It was just drizzling still, not enough to soak me through immediately as I reached for the house key that was always hidden under the eaves by the door, and locked up. The sloshing of my new waterproof boots was unnerving. I missed the normal crunch of gravel as I walked. I couldn't pause and admire my truck again as I wanted; I was in a
hurry to get out of the misty wet that swirled around my head and clung to my hair under my hood.
Inside the truck, it was nice and dry. Either Billy or Charlie had obviously cleaned it up, but the tan upholstered seats still smelled faintly of tobacco, gasoline, and peppermint.
The engine started quickly, to my relief, but loudly, roaring to life and then idling at top volume. Well, a truck this old was bound to have a flaw. The antique radio worked, a plus that I hadn't expected.
Finding the school wasn't difficult, though I'd never been there before. The school was, like most other things, just off the highway. It was not obvious that it was a school; only the sign, which declared it to be the Forks High School, made me stop. It looked like a collection of matching houses, built with maroon-colored bricks. There were so many trees and shrubs I couldn't see its size at first. Where was the feel of the institution? I wondered nostalgically. Where were the chain-link fences, the metal detectors?
I parked in front of the first building, which had a small sign over the door reading front office. No one else was parked there, so I was sure it was off limits, but I decided I would get directions inside instead of circling around in the rain like an idiot. I stepped unwillingly out of the toasty truck cab and walked down a little stone path lined with dark hedges. I took a deep breath before opening the door.
Inside, it was brightly lit, and warmer than I'd hoped. The office was small; a little waiting area with padded folding chairs, orange-flecked commercial carpet, notices and awards cluttering the walls, a big clock ticking loudly. Plants grew everywhere in large plastic pots, as if there wasn't enough greenery outside. The room was cut in half by a long counter, cluttered with wire baskets full of papers and brightly colored flyers taped to its front. There were three desks behind the counter, one of which was manned by a large, red-haired woman wearing glasses. She was wearing a purple t-shirt, which immediately made me feel overdressed.
The red-haired woman looked up. "Can I help you?"
"I'm Isabella Swan," I informed her, and saw the immediate awareness light her eyes. I was expected, a topic of gossip no doubt. Daughter of the Chief's flighty ex-wife, come home at last.
"Of course," she said. She dug through a precariously stacked pile of documents on her desk till she found the ones she was looking for. "I have your schedule right here, and a map of the school." She brought several sheets to the counter to show roe.
She went through my classes for me, highlighting the best route to each on the map, and gave me a slip to have each teacher sign, which I was to bring back at the end of the day. She smiled at me and hoped, like Charlie, that I would like it here in Forks. I smiled back as convincingly as I could.
When I went back out to my truck, other students were starting to arrive. I drove around the school, following the line of traffic. I was glad to see that most of the cars were older like mine, nothing flashy. At home I'd lived in one of the few lower-income neighborhoods that were included in the Paradise Valley District. It was a common thing to see a new Mercedes or Porsche in the student lot. The nicest car here was a shiny Volvo, and it stood out. Still, I cut the engine as soon as I was in a spot, so that the thunderous volume wouldn't draw attention to me.
I looked at the map in the truck, trying to memorize it now; hopefully I wouldn't have to walk around with it stuck in front of my nose all day. I stuffed everything in my bag,
slung the strap over my shoulder, and sucked in a huge breath. I can do this, I lied to myself feebly. No one was going to bite me. I finally exhaled and stepped out of the truck.
I kept my face pulled back into my hood as I walked to the sidewalk, crowded with teenagers. My plain black jacket didn't stand out, I noticed with relief.
Once I got around the cafeteria, building three was easy to spot. A large black "3" was painted on a white square on the east corner. I felt my breathing gradually creeping toward hyperventilation as I approached the door. I tried holding my breath as I followed two unisex raincoats through the door.
The classroom was small. The people in front of me stopped just inside the door to hang up their coats on a long row of hooks. I copied them. They were two girls, one a porcelain-colored blonde, the other also pale, with light brown hair. At least my skin wouldn't be a standout here.
I took the slip up to the teacher, a tall, balding man whose desk had a nameplate identifying him as Mr. Mason. He gawked at me when he saw my name — not an encouraging response — and of course I flushed tomato red. But at least he sent me to an empty desk at the back without introducing me to the class. It was harder for my new classmates to stare at me in the back, but somehow, they managed. I kept my eyes down on the reading list the teacher had given me. It was fairly basic: Bronte, Shakespeare, Chaucer, Faulkner. I'd already read everything. That was comforting… and boring. I wondered if my mom would send me my folder of old essays, or if she would think that was cheating. I went through different arguments with her in my head while the teacher droned on.
When the bell rang, a nasal buzzing sound, a gangly boy with skin problems and hair black as an oil slick leaned across the aisle to talk to me.
"You're Isabella Swan, aren't you?" He looked like the overly helpful, chess club type. "Bella," I corrected. Everyone within a three-seat radius turned to look at me. "Where's your next class?" he asked.
I had to check in my bag." Um, Government, with Jefferson, in building six." There was nowhere to look without meeting curious eyes.
"I'm headed toward building four, I could show you the way…"Definitely over-helpful. "I'm Eric," he added.
I smiled tentatively. "Thanks."
We got our jackets and headed out into the rain, which had picked up. I could have sworn several people behind us were walking close enough to eavesdrop. I hoped I wasn't getting paranoid.
"So, this is a lot different than Phoenix, huh?" he asked. "Very."
"It doesn't rain much there, does it?" "Three or four times a year."
"Wow, what must that be like?" he wondered. "Sunny," I told him.
"You don't look very tan." "My mother is part albino."
He studied my face apprehensively, and I sighed. It looked like clouds and a sense of humor didn't mix. A few months of this and I'd forget how to use sarcasm.
We walked back around the cafeteria, to the south buildings by the gym. Eric walked me right to the door, though it was clearly marked.
"Well, good luck," he said as I touched the handle. "Maybe we'll have some other classes together." He sounded hopeful.
I smiled at him vaguely and went inside.
The rest of the morning passed in about the same fashion. My Trigonometry teacher, Mr. Varner, who I would have hated anyway just because of the subject he taught, was the only one who made me stand in front of the class and introduce myself. I stammered, blushed, and tripped over my own boots on the way to my seat.
After two classes, I started to recognize several of the faces in each class. There was always someone braver than the others who would introduce themselves and ask me questions about how I was liking Forks. I tried to be diplomatic, but mostly I just lied a lot. At least I never needed the map.
One girl sat next to me in both Trig and Spanish, and she walked with me to the cafeteria for lunch. She was tiny, several inches shorter than my five feet four inches, but her wildly curly dark hair made up a lot of the difference between our heights. I couldn't remember her name, so I smiled and nodded as she prattled about teachers and classes. I didn't try to keep up.
We sat at the end of a full table with several of her friends, who she introduced to me. I forgot all their names as soon as she spoke them. They seemed impressed by her bravery in speaking to me. The boy from English, Eric, waved at me from across the room.
It was there, sitting in the lunchroom, trying to make conversation with seven curious strangers, that I first saw them.
They were sitting in the corner of the cafeteria, as far away from where I sat as possible in the long room. There were five of them. They weren't talking, and they weren't eating, though they each had a tray of untouched food in front of them. They weren't gawking at me, unlike most of the other students, so it was safe to stare at them without fear of meeting an excessively interested pair of eyes. But it was none of these things that caught, and held, my attention.
They didn't look anything alike. Of the three boys, one was big — muscled like a serious weight lifter, with dark, curly hair. Another was taller, leaner, but still muscular, and honey blond. The last was lanky, less bulky, with untidy, bronze-colored hair. He was more boyish than the others, who looked like they could be in college, or even teachers here rather than students.
The girls were opposites. The tall one was statuesque. She had a beautiful figure, the kind you saw on the cover of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue, the kind that made every girl around her take a hit on her self-esteem just by being in the same room. Her hair was golden, gently waving to the middle of her back. The short girl was pixielike, thin in the extreme, with small features. Her hair was a deep black, cropped short and pointing in every direction.
And yet, they were all exactly alike. Every one of them was chalky pale, the palest of all the students living in this sunless town. Paler than me, the albino. They all had very dark eyes despite the range in hair tones. They also had dark shadows under those eyes — purplish, bruiselike shadows. As if they were all suffering from a sleepless night, or almost done recovering from a broken nose. Though their noses, all their features, were straight, perfect, angular.
But all this is not why I couldn't look away.
I stared because their faces, so different, so similar, were all devastatingly, inhumanly beautiful. They were faces you never expected to see except perhaps on the airbrushed pages of a fashion magazine. Or painted by an old master as the face of an angel. It was hard to decide who was the most beautiful — maybe the perfect blond girl, or the bronze- haired boy.
They were all looking away — away from each other, away from the other students, away from anything in particular as far as I could tell. As I watched, the small girl rose with her tray — unopened soda, unbitten apple — and walked away with a quick, graceful lope that belonged on a runway. I watched, amazed at her lithe dancer's step, till she dumped her tray and glided through the back door, faster than I would have thought possible. My eyes darted back to the others, who sat unchanging.
"Who are they ?" I asked the girl from my Spanish class, whose name I'd forgotten.
As she looked up to see who I meant — though already knowing, probably, from my tone — suddenly he looked at her, the thinner one, the boyish one, the youngest, perhaps. He looked at my neighbor for just a fraction of a second, and then his dark eyes flickered to mine.
He looked away quickly, more quickly than I could, though in a flush of embarrassment I dropped my eyes at once. In that brief flash of a glance, his face held nothing of interest
— it was as if she had called his name, and he'd looked up in involuntary response, already having decided not to answer.
My neighbor giggled in embarrassment, looking at the table like I did.
"That's Edward and Emmett Cullen, and Rosalie and Jasper Hale. The one who left was Alice Cullen; they all live together with Dr. Cullen and his wife." She said this under her breath.
I glanced sideways at the beautiful boy, who was looking at his tray now, picking a bagel to pieces with long, pale fingers. His mouth was moving very quickly, his perfect lips barely opening. The other three still looked away, and yet I felt he was speaking quietly to them.
Strange, unpopular names, I thought. The kinds of names grandparents had. But maybe that was in vogue here — small town names? I finally remembered that my neighbor was called Jessica, a perfectly common name. There were two girls named Jessica in my History class back home.
"They are… very nice-looking." I struggled with the conspicuous understatement. "Yes!" Jessica agreed with another giggle. "They're all together though — Emmett and
Rosalie, and Jasper and Alice, I mean. And they live together." Her voice held all the shock and condemnation of the small town, I thought critically. But, if I was being honest, I had to admit that even in Phoenix, it would cause gossip.
"Which ones are the Cullens?" I asked. "They don't look related…"
"Oh, they're not. Dr. Cullen is really young, in his twenties or early thirties. They're all adopted. The Hales are brother and sister, twins — the blondes — and they're foster children."
"They look a little old for foster children."
"They are now, Jasper and Rosalie are both eighteen, but they've been with Mrs. Cullen since they were eight. She's their aunt or something like that."
"That's really kind of nice — for them to take care of all those kids like that, when
they're so young and everything."
"I guess so," Jessica admitted reluctantly, and I got the impression that she didn't like the doctor and his wife for some reason. With the glances she was throwing at their adopted children, I would presume the reason was jealousy. "I think that Mrs. Cullen can't have any kids, though," she added, as if that lessened their kindness.
Throughout all this conversation, my eyes flickered again and again to the table where the strange family sat. They continued to look at the walls and not eat.
"Have they always lived in Forks?" I asked. Surely I would have noticed them on one of my summers here.
"No," she said in a voice that implied it should be obvious, even to a new arrival like me. "They just moved down two years ago from somewhere in Alaska."
I felt a surge of pity, and relief. Pity because, as beautiful as they were, they were outsiders, clearly not accepted. Relief that I wasn't the only newcomer here, and certainly not the most interesting by any standard.
As I examined them, the youngest, one of the Cullens, looked up and met my gaze, this time with evident curiosity in his expression. As I looked swiftly away, it seemed to me that his glance held some kind of unmet expectation.
"Which one is the boy with the reddish brown hair?" I asked. I peeked at him from the corner of my eye, and he was still staring at me, but not gawking like the other students had today — he had a slightly frustrated expression. I looked down again.
"That's Edward. He's gorgeous, of course, but don't waste your time. He doesn't date. Apparently none of the girls here are good-looking enough for him." She sniffed, a clear case of sour grapes. I wondered when he'd turned her down.
I bit my lip to hide my smile. Then I glanced at him again. His face was turned away, but I thought his cheek appeared lifted, as if he were smiling, too.
After a few more minutes, the four of them left the table together. They all were noticeably graceful — even the big, brawny one. It was unsettling to watch. The one named Edward didn't look at me again.
I sat at the table with Jessica and her friends longer than I would have if I'd been sitting alone. I was anxious not to be late for class on my first day. One of my new acquaintances, who considerately reminded me that her name was Angela, had Biology II with me the next hour. We walked to class together in silence. She was shy, too.
When we entered the classroom, Angela went to sit at a black-topped lab table exactly like the ones I was used to. She already had a neighbor. In fact, all the tables were filled but one. Next to the center aisle, I recognized Edward Cullen by his unusual hair, sitting next to that single open seat.
As I walked down the aisle to introduce myself to the teacher and get my slip signed, I was watching him surreptitiously. Just as I passed, he suddenly went rigid in his seat. He stared at me again, meeting my eyes with the strangest expression on his face — it was hostile, furious. I looked away quickly, shocked, going red again. I stumbled over a book in the walkway and had to catch myself on the edge of a table. The girl sitting there giggled.
I'd noticed that his eyes were black — coal black.
Mr. Banner signed my slip and handed me a book with no nonsense about introductions. I could tell we were going to get along. Of course, he had no choice but to send me to the one open seat in the middle of the room. I kept my eyes down as I went to
sit by him, bewildered by the antagonistic stare he'd given me.
I didn't look up as I set my book on the table and took my seat, but I saw his posture change from the corner of my eye. He was leaning away from me, sitting on the extreme edge of his chair and averting his face like he smelled something bad. Inconspicuously, I sniffed my hair. It smelled like strawberries, the scent of my favorite shampoo. It seemed an innocent enough odor. I let my hair fall over my right shoulder, making a dark curtain between us, and tried to pay attention to the teacher.
Unfortunately the lecture was on cellular anatomy, something I'd already studied. I took notes carefully anyway, always looking down.
I couldn't stop myself from peeking occasionally through the screen of my hair at the strange boy next to me. During the whole class, he never relaxed his stiff position on the edge of his chair, sitting as far from me as possible. I could see his hand on his left leg was clenched into a fist, tendons standing out under his pale skin. This, too, he never relaxed. He had the long sleeves of his white shirt pushed up to his elbows, and his forearm was surprisingly hard and muscular beneath his light skin. He wasn't nearly as slight as he'd looked next to his burly brother.
The class seemed to drag on longer than the others. Was it because the day was finally coming to a close, or because I was waiting for his tight fist to loosen? It never did; he continued to sit so still it looked like he wasn't breathing. What was wrong with him?
Was this his normal behavior? I questioned my judgment on Jessica's bitterness at lunch today. Maybe she was not as resentful as I'd thought.
It couldn't have anything to do with me. He didn't know me from Eve.
I peeked up at him one more time, and regretted it. He was glaring down at me again, his black eyes full of revulsion. As I flinched away from him, shrinking against my chair, the phra seif looks could kill suddenly ran through my mind.
At that moment, the bell rang loudly, making me jump, and Edward Cullen was out of his seat. Fluidly he rose — he was much taller than I'd thought — his back to me, and he was out the door before anyone else was out of their seat.
I sat frozen in my seat, staring blankly after him. He was so mean. It wasn't fair. I began gathering up my things slowly, trying to block the anger that filled me, for fear my eyes would tear up. For some reason, my temper was hardwired to my tear ducts. I usually cried when I was angry, a humiliating tendency.
"Aren't you Isabella Swan?" a male voice asked.
I looked up to see a cute, baby-faced boy, his pale blond hair carefully gelled into orderly spikes, smiling at me in a friendly way. He obviously didn't think I smelled bad.
"Bella," I corrected him, with a smile. "I'm Mike."
"Hi, Mike."
"Do you need any help finding your next class?"
"I'm headed to the gym, actually. I think I can find it."
"That's my next class, too." He seemed thrilled, though it wasn't that big of a coincidence in a school this small.
We walked to class together; he was a chatterer — he supplied most of the conversation, which made it easy for me. He'd lived in California till he was ten, so he knew how I felt about the sun. It turned out he was in my English class also. He was the nicest person I'd met today.
But as we were entering the gym, he asked, "So, did you stab Edward Cullen with a pencil or what? I've never seen him act like that."
I cringed. So I wasn't the only one who had noticed. And, apparently, that wasn't
Edward Cullen's usual behavior. I decided to play dumb.
"Was that the boy I sat next to in Biology?" I asked artlessly. "Yes," he said. "He looked like he was in pain or something." "I don't know," I responded. "I never spoke to him."
"He's a weird guy." Mike lingered by me instead of heading to the dressing room. "If I were lucky enough to sit by you, I would have talked to you."
I smiled at him before walking through the girls' locker room door. He was friendly and clearly admiring. But it wasn't enough to ease my irritation.
The Gym teacher, Coach Clapp, found me a uniform but didn't make me dress down for today's class. At home, only two years of RE. were required. Here, P.E. was mandatory all four years. Forks was literally my personal hell on Earth.
I watched four volleyball games running simultaneously. Remembering how many injuries I had sustained — and inflicted — playing volleyball, I felt faintly nauseated.
The final bell rang at last. I walked slowly to the office to return my paperwork. The rain had drifted away, but the wind was strong, and colder. I wrapped my arms around myself.
When I walked into the warm office, I almost turned around and walked back out.
Edward Cullen stood at the desk in front of me. I recognized again that tousled bronze hair. He didn't appear to notice the sound of my entrance. I stood pressed against the back wall, waiting for the receptionist to be free.
He was arguing with her in a low, attractive voice. I quickly picked up the gist of the argument. He was trying to trade from sixth-hour Biology to another time — any other time.
I just couldn't believe that this was about me. It had to be something else, something that happened before I entered the Biology room. The look on his face must have been about another aggravation entirely. It was impossible that this stranger could take such a sudden, intense dislike to me.
The door opened again, and the cold wind suddenly gusted through the room, rustling the papers on the desk, swirling my hair around my face. The girl who came in merely stepped to the desk, placed a note in the wire basket, and walked out again. But Edward Cullen's back stiffened, and he turned slowly to glare at me — his face was absurdly handsome — with piercing, hate-filled eyes. For an instant, I felt a thrill of genuine fear, raising the hair on my arms. The look only lasted a second, but it chilled me more than the freezing wind. He turned back to the receptionist.
"Never mind, then," he said hastily in a voice like velvet. "I can see that it's impossible. Thank you so much for your help." And he turned on his heel without another look at me, and disappeared out the door.
I went meekly to the desk, my face white for once instead of red, and handed her the signed slip.
"How did your first day go, dear?" the receptionist asked maternally. "Fine," I lied, my voice weak. She didn't look convinced.
When I got to the truck, it was almost the last car in the lot. It seemed like a haven, already the closest thing to home I had in this damp green hole. I sat inside for a while,
just staring out the windshield blankly. But soon I was cold enough to need the heater, so I turned the key and the engine roared to life. I headed back to Charlie's house, fighting tears the whole way there.
2. Open Book
The next day was better… and worse.
It was better because it wasn't raining yet, though the clouds were dense and opaque. It was easier because I knew what to expect of my day. Mike came to sit by me in English, and walked me to my next class, with Chess Club Eric glaring at him all the while; that was nattering. People didn't look at me quite as much as they had yesterday. I sat with a big group at lunch that included Mike, Eric, Jessica, and several other people whose names and faces I now remembered. I began to feel like I was treading water, instead of drowning in it.
It was worse because I was tired; I still couldn't sleep with the wind echoing around the house. It was worse because Mr. Varner called on me in Trig when my hand wasn't raised and I had the wrong answer. It was miserable because I had to play volleyball, and the one time I didn't cringe out of the way of the ball, I hit my teammate in the head with it. And it was worse because Edward Cullen wasn't in school at all.
All morning I was dreading lunch, fearing his bizarre glares. Part of me wanted to confront him and demand to know what his problem was. While I was lying sleepless in my bed, I even imagined what I would say. But I knew myself too well to think I would really have the guts to do it. I made the Cowardly Lion look like the terminator.
But when I walked into the cafeteria with Jessica — trying to keep my eyes from sweeping the place for him, and failing entirely — I saw that his four siblings of sorts were sitting together at the same table, and he was not with them.
Mike intercepted us and steered us to his table. Jessica seemed elated by the attention, and her friends quickly joined us. But as I tried to listen to their easy chatter, I was terribly uncomfortable, waiting nervously for the moment he would arrive. I hoped that he would simply ignore me when he came, and prove my suspicions false.
He didn't come, and as time passed I grew more and more tense.
I walked to Biology with more confidence when, by the end of lunch, he still hadn't showed. Mike, who was taking on the qualities of a golden retriever, walked faithfully by my side to class. I held my breath at the door, but Edward Cullen wasn't there, either. I exhaled and went to my seat. Mike followed, talking about an upcoming trip to the beach. He lingered by my desk till the bell rang. Then he smiled at me wistfully and went to sit by a girl with braces and a bad perm. It looked like I was going to have to do something about Mike, and it wouldn't be easy. In a town like this, where everyone lived on top of everyone else, diplomacy was essential. I had never been enormously tactful; I had no practice dealing with overly friendly boys.
I was relieved that I had the desk to myself, that Edward was absent. I told myself that repeatedly. But I couldn't get rid of the nagging suspicion that I was the reason he wasn't there. It was ridiculous, and egotistical, to think that I could affect anyone that strongly. It was impossible. And yet I couldn't stop worrying that it was true.
When the school day was finally done, and the blush was fading out of my cheeks from the volleyball incident, I changed quickly back into my jeans and navy blue sweater. I hurried from the girls' locker room, pleased to find that I had successfully evaded my retriever friend for the moment. I walked swiftly out to the parking lot. It was crowded now with fleeing students. I got in my truck and dug through my bag to make sure I had what I needed.
Last night I'd discovered that Charlie couldn't cook much besides fried eggs and bacon. So I requested that I be assigned kitchen detail for the duration of my stay. He was willing enough to hand over the keys to the banquet hall. I also found out that he had no food in the house. So I had my shopping list and the cash from the jar in the cupboard labeled FOOD MONEY, and I was on my way to the Thriftway.
I gunned my deafening engine to life, ignoring the heads that turned in my direction, and backed carefully into a place in the line of cars that were waiting to exit the parking lot. As I waited, trying to pretend that the earsplitting rumble was coming from someone else's car, I saw the two Cullens and the Hale twins getting into their car. It was the shiny new Volvo. Of course. I hadn't noticed their clothes before — I'd been too mesmerized by their faces. Now that I looked, it was obvious that they were all dressed exceptionally well; simply, but in clothes that subtly hinted at designer origins. With their remarkable good looks, the style with which they carried themselves, they could have worn dishrags and pulled it off. It seemed excessive for them to have both looks and money. But as far as I could tell, life worked that way most of the time. It didn't look as if it bought them any acceptance here.
No, I didn't fully believe that. The isolation must be their desire; I couldn't imagine any door that wouldn't be opened by that degree of beauty.
They looked at my noisy truck as I passed them, just like everyone else. I kept my eyes straight forward and was relieved when I finally was free of the school grounds.
The Thriftway was not far from the school, just a few streets south, off the highway. It was nice to be inside the supermarket; it felt normal. I did the shopping at home, and I fell into the pattern of the familiar task gladly. The store was big enough inside that I couldn't hear the tapping of the rain on the roof to remind me where I was.
When I got home, I unloaded all the groceries, stuffing them in wherever I could find an open space. I hoped Charlie wouldn't mind. I wrapped potatoes in foil and stuck them in the oven to bake, covered a steak in marinade and balanced it on top of a carton of eggs in the fridge.
When I was finished with that, I took my book bag upstairs. Before starting my homework, I changed into a pair of dry sweats, pulled my damp hair up into a pony-tail, and checked my e-mail for the first time. I had three messages.
"Bella," my mom wrote…
Write me as soon as you get in. Tell me how your flight was. Is it raining? I miss you already. I'm almost finished packing for Florida, but I can't find my pink blouse. Do you know where I put it? Phil says hi. Mom.
I sighed and went to the next. It was sent eight hours after the first. "Bella," she wrote…
Why haven't you e-mailed me yet? What are you waiting for? Mom. The last was from this morning.
Isabella,
If I haven't heard from you by 5:30 p.m. today I'm calling Charlie.
I checked the clock. I still had an hour, but my mom was well known for jumping the gun.
Mom,
Calm down. I'm writing right now. Don't do anything rash. Bella.
I sent that, and began again. Mom,
Everything is great. Of course it's raining. I was waiting for something to write about. School isn't bad, just a little repetitive. I met some nice kids who sit by me at lunch.
Your blouse is at the dry cleaners - you were supposed to pick it up Friday.
Charlie bought me a truck, can you believe it? I love it. It's old, but really sturdy, which is good, you know, for me.
I miss you, too. I'll write again soon, but I'm not going to check my e-mail every five minutes. Relax, breathe. I love you.
Bella.
I had decided to read Wuthering Heights — the novel we were currently studying in English — yet again for the fun of it, and that's what I was doing when Charlie came home. I'd lost track of the time, and I hurried downstairs to take the potatoes out and put the steak in to broil.
"Bella?" my father called out when he heard me on the stairs. Who else? I thought to myself.
"Hey, Dad, welcome home."
"Thanks." He hung up his gun belt and stepped out of his boots as I bustled about the kitchen. As far as I was aware, he'd never shot the gun on the job. But he kept it ready. When I came here as a child, he would always remove the bullets as soon as he walked in the door. I guess he considered me old enough now not to shoot myself by accident, and not depressed enough to shoot myself on purpose.
"What's for dinner?" he asked warily. My mother was an imaginative cook, and her experiments weren't always edible. I was surprised, and sad, that he seemed to remember that far back.
"Steak and potatoes," I answered, and he looked relieved.
He seemed to feel awkward standing in the kitchen doing nothing; he lumbered into the living room to watch TV while I worked. We were both more comfortable that way. I made a salad while the steaks cooked, and set the table.
I called him in when dinner was ready, and he sniffed appreciatively as he walked into the room.
"Smells good, Bell." "Thanks."
We ate in silence for a few minutes. It wasn't uncomfortable. Neither of us was bothered by the quiet. In some ways, we were well suited for living together.
"So, how did you like school? Have you made any friends?" he asked as he was taking seconds.
"Well, I have a few classes with a girl named Jessica. I sit with her friends at lunch. And there's this boy, Mike, who's very friendly. Everybody seems pretty nice." With one outstanding exception.
"That must be Mike Newton. Nice kid — nice family. His dad owns the sporting goods store just outside of town. He makes a good living off all the backpackers who come through here."
"Do you know the Cullen family?" I asked hesitantly. "Dr. Cullen's family? Sure. Dr. Cullen's a great man."
"They… the kids… are a little different. They don't seem to fit in very well at school."
Charlie surprised me by looking angry.
"People in this town," he muttered. "Dr. Cullen is a brilliant surgeon who could probably work in any hospital in the world, make ten times the salary he gets here," he continued, getting louder. "We're lucky to have him — lucky that his wife wanted to live in a small town. He's an asset to the community, and all of those kids are well behaved and polite. I had my doubts, when they first moved in, with all those adopted teenagers. I thought we might have some problems with them. But they're all very mature — I haven't had one speck of trouble from any of them. That's more than I can say for the children of some folks who have lived in this town for generations. And they stick together the way a family should — camping trips every other weekend… Just because they're newcomers, people have to talk."
It was the longest speech I'd ever heard Charlie make. He must feel strongly about whatever people were saying.
I backpedaled. "They seemed nice enough to me. I just noticed they kept to themselves. They're all very attractive," I added, trying to be more complimentary.
"You should see the doctor," Charlie said, laughing. "It's a good thing he's happily married. A lot of the nurses at the hospital have a hard time concentrating on their work with him around."
We lapsed back into silence as we finished eating. He cleared the table while I started on the dishes. He went back to the TV, and after I finished washing the dishes by hand — no dishwasher — I went upstairs unwillingly to work on my math homework. I could feel a tradition in the making.
That night it was finally quiet. I fell asleep quickly, exhausted.
The rest of the week was uneventful. I got used to the routine of my classes. By Friday I was able to recognize, if not name, almost all the students at school. In Gym, the kids on my team learned not to pass me the ball and to step quickly in front of me if the other team tried to take advantage of my weakness. I happily stayed out of their way.
Edward Cullen didn't come back to school.
Every day, I watched anxiously until the rest of the Cullens entered the cafeteria without him. Then I could relax and join in the lunchtime conversation. Mostly it centered around a trip to the La Push Ocean Park in two weeks that Mike was putting together. I was invited, and I had agreed to go, more out of politeness than desire.
Beaches should be hot and dry.
By Friday I was perfectly comfortable entering my Biology class, no longer worried that Edward would be there. For all I knew, he had dropped out of school. I tried not to think about him, but I couldn't totally suppress the worry that I was responsible for his continued absence, ridiculous as it seemed.
My first weekend in Forks passed without incident. Charlie, unused to spending time in the usually empty house, worked most of the weekend. I cleaned the house, got ahead on my homework, and wrote my mom more bogusly cheerful e-mail. I did drive to the library Saturday, but it was so poorly stocked that I didn't bother to get a card; I would have to make a date to visit Olympia or Seattle soon and find a good bookstore. I wondered idly what kind of gas mileage the truck got… and shuddered at the thought.
The rain stayed soft over the weekend, quiet, so I was able to sleep well.
People greeted me in the parking lot Monday morning. I didn't know all their names, but I waved back and smiled at everyone. It was colder this morning, but happily not
raining. In English, Mike took his accustomed seat by my side. We had a pop quiz on
Wuthering Heights. It was straightforward, very easy.
All in all, I was feeling a lot more comfortable than I had thought I would feel by this point. More comfortable than I had ever expected to feel here.
When we walked out of class, the air was full of swirling bits of white. I could hear people shouting excitedly to each other. The wind bit at my cheeks, my nose.
"Wow," Mike said. "It's snowing."
I looked at the little cotton fluffs that were building up along the sidewalk and swirling erratically past my face.
"Ew." Snow. There went my good day.
He looked surprised. "Don't you like snow?"
"No. That means it's too cold for rain." Obviously. "Besides, I thought it was supposed to come down in flakes — you know, each one unique and all that. These just look like the ends of Q-tips."
"Haven't you ever seen snow fall before?" he asked incredulously. "Sure I have." I paused." On TV."
Mike laughed. And then a big, squishy ball of dripping snow smacked into the back of his head. We both turned to see where it came from. I had my suspicions about Eric, who was walking away, his back toward us — in the wrong direction for his next class. Mike appatently had the same notion. He bent over and began scraping together a pile of the white mush.
"I'll see you at lunch, okay?" I kept walking as I spoke. "Once people start throwing wet stuff, I go inside."
He just nodded, his eyes on Eric's retreating figure.
Throughout the morning, everyone chattered excitedly about the snow; apparently it was the first snowfall of the new year. I kept my mouth shut. Sure, it was drier than rain
— until it melted in your socks.
I walked alertly to the cafeteria with Jessica after Spanish. Mush balls were flying everywhere. I kept a binder in my hands, ready to use it as a shield if necessary. Jessica thought I was hilarious, but something in my expression kept her from lobbing a snowball at me herself.
Mike caught up to us as we walked in the doors, laughing, with ice melting the spikes in his hair. He and Jessica were talking animatedly about the snow fight as we got in line to buy food. I glanced toward that table in the corner out of habit. And then I froze where I stood. There were five people at the table.
Jessica pulled on my arm.
"Hello? Bella? What do you want?"
I looked down; my ears were hot. I had no reason to feel self-conscious, I reminded myself. I hadn't done anything wrong.
"What's with Bella?" Mike asked Jessica.
"Nothing," I answered. "I'll just get a soda today." I caught up to the end of the line. "Aren't you hungry?" Jessica asked.
"Actually, I feel a little sick," I said, my eyes still on the floor.
I waited for them to get their food, and then followed them to a table, my eyes on my feet.
I sipped my soda slowly, my stomach churning. Twice Mike asked, with unnecessary
concern, how I was feeling.
I told him it was nothing, but I was wondering if I should play it up and escape to the nurse's office for the next hour.
Ridiculous. I shouldn't have to run away.
I decided to permit myself one glance at the Cullen family's table. If he was glaring at me, I would skip Biology, like the coward I was.
I kept my head down and glanced up under my lashes. None of them were looking this way. I lifted my head a little.
They were laughing. Edward, Jasper, and Emmett all had their hair entirely saturated with melting snow. Alice and Rosalie were leaning away as Emmett shook his dripping hair toward them. They were enjoying the snowy day, just like everyone else — only they looked more like a scene from a movie than the rest of us.
But, aside from the laughter and playfulness, there was something different, and I couldn't quite pinpoint what that difference was. I examined Edward the most carefully. His skin was less pale, I decided — flushed from the snow fight maybe — the circles under his eyes much less noticeable. But there was something more. I pondered, staring, trying to isolate the change.
"Bella, what are you staring at?" Jessica intruded, her eyes following my stare. At that precise moment, his eyes flashed over to meet mine.
I dropped my head, letting my hair fall to conceal my face. I was sure, though, in the instant our eyes met, that he didn't look harsh or unfriendly as he had the last time I'd seen him. He looked merely curious again, unsatisfied in some way.
"Edward Cullen is staring at you," Jessica giggled in my ear. "He doesn't look angry, does he?" I couldn't help asking.
"No," she said, sounding confused by my question. "Should he be?"
"I don't think he likes me," I confided. I still felt queasy. I put my head down on my arm.
"The Cullens don't like anybody…well, they don't notice anybody enough to like them. But he's still staring at you."
"Stop looking at him," I hissed.
She snickered, but she looked away. I raised my head enough to make sure that she did, contemplating violence if she resisted.
Mike interrupted us then — he was planning an epic battle of the blizzard in the parking lot after school and wanted us to join. Jessica agreed enthusiastically. The way she looked at Mike left little doubt that she would be up for anything he suggested. I kept silent. I would have to hide in the gym until the parking lot cleared.
For the rest of the lunch hour I very carefully kept my eyes at my own table. I decided to honor the bargain I'd made with myself. Since he didn't look angry, I would go to Biology. My stomach did frightened little flips at the thought of sitting next to him again.
I didn't really want to walk to class with Mike as usual — he seemed to be a popular target for the snowball snipers — but when we went to the door, everyone besides me groaned in unison. It was raining, washing all traces of the snow away in clear, icy ribbons down the side of the walkway. I pulled my hood up, secretly pleased. I would be free to go straight home after Gym.
Mike kept up a string of complaints on the way to building four.
Once inside the classroom, I saw with relief that my table was still empty. Mr. Banner
was walking around the room, distributing one microscope and box of slides to each table. Class didn't start for a few minutes, and the room buzzed with conversation. I kept my eyes away from the door, doodling idly on the cover of my notebook.
I heard very clearly when the chair next to me moved, but my eyes stayed carefully focused on the pattern I was drawing.
"Hello," said a quiet, musical voice.
I looked up, stunned that he was speaking to me. He was sitting as far away from me as the desk allowed, but his chair was angled toward me. His hair was dripping wet, disheveled — even so, he looked like he'd just finished shooting a commercial for hair gel. His dazzling face was friendly, open, a slight smile on his flawless lips. But his eyes were careful.
"My name is Edward Cullen," he continued. "I didn't have a chance to introduce myself last week. You must be Bella Swan."
My mind was spinning with confusion. Had I made up the whole thing? He was perfectly polite now. I had to speak; he was waiting. But I couldn't think of anything conventional to say.
"H-how do you know my name?" I stammered. He laughed a soft, enchanting laugh.
"Oh, I think everyone knows your name. The whole town's been waiting for you to arrive."
I grimaced. I knew it was something like that.
"No," I persisted stupidly. "I meant, why did you call me Bella?" He seemed confused. "Do you prefer Isabella?"
"No, I like Bella," I said. "But I think Charlie — I mean my dad — must call me Isabella behind my back — that's what everyone here seems to know me as," I tried to explain, feeling like an utter moron.
"Oh." He let it drop. I looked away awkwardly.
Thankfully, Mr. Banner started class at that moment. I tried to concentrate as he explained the lab we would be doing today. The slides in the box were out of order. Working as lab partners, we had to separate the slides of onion root tip cells into the phases of mitosis they represented and label them accordingly. We weren't supposed to use our books. In twenty minutes, he would be coming around to see who had it right.
"Get started," he commanded.
"Ladies first, partner?" Edward asked. I looked up to see him smiling a crooked smile so beautiful that I could only stare at him like an idiot.
"Or I could start, if you wish." The smile faded; he was obviously wondering if I was mentally competent.
"No," I said, flushing. "I'll go ahead."
I was showing off, just a little. I'd already done this lab, and I knew what I was looking for. It should be easy. I snapped the first slide into place under the microscope and adjusted it quickly to the 40X objective. I studied the slide briefly.
My assessment was confident." Prophase."
"Do you mind if I look?" he asked as I began to remove the slide. His hand caught mine, to stop me, as he asked. His fingers were ice-cold, like he'd been holding them in a snowdrift before class. But that wasn't why I jerked my hand away so quickly. When he touched me, it stung my hand as if an electric current had passed through us.
"I'm sorry," he muttered, pulling his hand back immediately. However, he continued to reach for the microscope. I watched him, still staggered, as he examined the slide for an even shorter time than I had.
"Prophase," he agreed, writing it neatly in the first space on our worksheet. He swiftly switched out the first slide for the second, and then glanced at it cursorily.
"Anaphase," he murmured, writing it down as he spoke. I kept my voice indifferent. "May I?"
He smirked and pushed the microscope to me.
I looked through the eyepiece eagerly, only to be disappointed. Dang it, he was right. "Slide three?" I held out my hand without looking at him.
He handed it to me; it seemed like he was being careful not to touch my skin again. I took the most fleeting look I could manage.
"Interphase." I passed him the microscope before he could ask for it. He took a swift peek, and then wrote it down. I would have written it while he looked, but his clear, elegant script intimidated me. I didn't want to spoil the page with my clumsy scrawl.
We were finished before anyone else was close. I could see Mike and his partner comparing two slides again and again, and another group had their book open under the table.
Which left me with nothing to do but try to not look at him… unsuccessfully. I glanced up, and he was staring at me, that same inexplicable look of frustration in his eyes.
Suddenly I identified that subtle difference in his face. "Did you get contacts?" I blurted out unthinkingly.
He seemed puzzled by my unexpected question. "No."
"Oh," I mumbled. "I thought there was something different about your eyes." He shrugged, and looked away.
In fact, I was sure there was something different. I vividly remembered the flat black color of his eyes the last time he'd glared at me — the color was striking against the background of his pale skin and his auburn hair. Today, his eyes were a completely different color: a strange ocher, darker than butterscotch, but with the same golden tone. I didn't understand how that could be, unless he was lying for some reason about the contacts. Or maybe Forks was making me crazy in the literal sense of the word.
I looked down. His hands were clenched into hard fists again.
Mr. Banner came to our table then, to see why we weren't working. He looked over our shoulders to glance at the completed lab, and then stared more intently to check the answers.
"So, Edward, didn't you think Isabella should get a chance with the microscope?" Mr. Banner asked.
"Bella," Edward corrected automatically. "Actually, she identified three of the five." Mr. Banner looked at me now; his expression was skeptical.
"Have you done this lab before?" he asked. I smiled sheepishly. "Not with onion root." "Whitefish blastula?"
"Yeah."
Mr. Banner nodded. "Were you in an advanced placement program in Phoenix ?" "Yes."
"Well," he said after a moment, "I guess it's good you two are lab partners." He
mumbled something else as he walked away. After he left, I began doodling on my notebook again.
"It's too bad about the snow, isn't it?" Edward asked. I had the feeling that he was forcing himself to make small talk with me. Paranoia swept over me again. It was like he had heard my conversation with Jessica at lunch and was trying to prove me wrong.
"Not really," I answered honestly, instead of pretending to be normal like everyone else. I was still trying to dislodge the stupid feeling of suspicion, and I couldn't concentrate.
"You don't like the cold." It wasn't a question. "Or the wet."
"Forks must be a difficult place for you to live," he mused. "You have no idea," I muttered darkly.
He looked fascinated by what I said, for some reason I couldn't imagine. His face was such a distraction that I tried not to look at it any more than courtesy absolutely demanded.
"Why did you come here, then?"
No one had asked me that — not straight out like he did, demanding. "It's… complicated."
"I think I can keep up," he pressed.
I paused for a long moment, and then made the mistake of meeting his gaze. His dark gold eyes confused me, and I answered without thinking.
"My mother got remarried," I said.
"That doesn't sound so complex," he disagreed, but he was suddenly sympathetic. "When did that happen?"
"Last September." My voice sounded sad, even to me.
"And you don't like him," Edward surmised, his tone still kind. "No, Phil is fine. Too young, maybe, but nice enough."
"Why didn't you stay with them?"
I couldn't fathom his interest, but he continued to stare at me with penetrating eyes, as if my dull life's story was somehow vitally important.
"Phil travels a lot. He plays ball for a living." I half-smiled. "Have I heard of him?" he asked, smiling in response.
"Probably not. He doesn't play well. Strictly minor league. He moves around a lot." "And your mother sent you here so that she could travel with him." He said it as an
assumption again, not a question.
My chin raised a fraction." No, she did not send me here. I sent myself."
His eyebrows knit together. "I don't understand," he admitted, and he seemed unnecessarily frustrated by that fact.
I sighed. Why was I explaining this to him? He continued to stare at me with obvious curiosity.
"She stayed with me at first, but she missed him. It made her unhappy… so I decided it was time to spend some quality time with Charlie." My voice was glum by the time I finished.
"But now you're unhappy," he pointed out. "And?" I challenged.
"That doesn't seem fair." He shrugged, but his eyes were still intense.
I laughed without humor. "Hasn't anyone ever told you? Life isn't fair."
"I believe I have heard that somewhere before," he agreed dryly.
"So that's all," I insisted, wondering why he was still staring at me that way.
His gaze became appraising. "You put on a good show," he said slowly. "But I'd be willing to bet that you're suffering more than you let anyone see."
I grimaced at him, resisting the impulse to stick out my tongue like a five-year-old, and looked away.
"Am I wrong?"
I tried to ignore him.
"I didn't think so," he murmured smugly.
"Why does it matter to you ?" I asked, irritated. I kept my eyes away, watching the teacher make his rounds.
"That's a very good question," he muttered, so quietly that I wondered if he was talking to himself. However, after a few seconds of silence, I decided that was the only answer I was going to get.
I sighed, scowling at the blackboard.
"Am I annoying you?" he asked. He sounded amused.
I glanced at him without thinking… and told the truth again." Not exactly. I'm more annoyed at myself. My face is so easy to read — my mother always calls me her open book." I frowned.
"On the contrary, I find you very difficult to read." Despite everything that I'd said and he'd guessed, he sounded like he meant it.
"You must be a good reader then," I replied.
"Usually." He smiled widely, flashing a set of perfect, ultrawhite teeth.
Mr. Banner called the class to order then, and I turned with relief to listen. I was in disbelief that I'd just explained my dreary life to this bizarre, beautiful boy who may or may not despise me. He'd seemed engrossed in our conversation, but now I could see, from the corner of my eye, that he was leaning away from me again, his hands gripping the edge of the table with unmistakable tension.
I tried to appear attentive as Mr. Banner illustrated, with transparencies on the overhead projector, what I had seen without difficulty through the microscope. But my thoughts were unmanageable.
When the bell finally rang, Edward rushed as swiftly and as gracefully from the room as he had last Monday. And, like last Monday, I stared after him in amazement.
Mike skipped quickly to my side and picked up my books for me. I imagined him with a wagging tail.
"That was awful," he groaned. "They all looked exactly the same. You're lucky you had Cullen for a partner."
"I didn't have any trouble with it," I said, stung by his assumption. I regretted the snub instantly. "I've done the lab before, though," I added before he could get his feelings hurt.
"Cullen seemed friendly enough today," he commented as we shrugged into our raincoats. He didn't seem pleased about it.
I tried to sound indifferent. "I wonder what was with him last Monday."
I couldn't concentrate on Mike's chatter as we walked to Gym, and RE. didn't do much to hold my attention, either. Mike was on my team today. He chivalrously covered my position as well as his own, so my woolgathering was only interrupted when it was my turn to serve; my team ducked warily out of the way every time I was up.
The rain was just a mist as I walked to the parking lot, but I was happier when I was in the dry cab. I got the heater running, for once not caring about the mind-numbing roar of the engine. I unzipped my jacket, put the hood down, and fluffed my damp hair out so the heater could dry it on the way home.
I looked around me to make sure it was clear. That's when I noticed the still, white figure. Edward Cullen was leaning against the front door of the Volvo, three cars down from me, and staring intently in my direction. I swiftly looked away and threw the truck into reverse, almost hitting a rusty Toyota Corolla in my haste. Lucky for the Toyota, I stomped on the brake in time. It was just the sort of car that my truck would make scrap metal of. I took a deep breath, still looking out the other side of my car, and cautiously pulled out again, with greater success. I stared straight ahead as I passed the Volvo, but from a peripheral peek, I would swear I saw him laughing.
3. Phenomenon
When I opened my eyes in the morning, something was different.
It was the light. It was still the gray-green light of a cloudy day in the forest, but it was clearer somehow. I realized there was no fog veiling my window.
I jumped up to look outside, and then groaned in horror.
A fine layer of snow covered the yard, dusted the top of my truck, and whitened the road. But that wasn't the worst part. All the rain from yesterday had frozen solid — coating the needles on the trees in fantastic, gorgeous patterns, and making the driveway a deadly ice slick. I had enough trouble not falling down when the ground was dry; it might be safer for me to go back to bed now.
Charlie had left for work before I got downstairs. In a lot of ways, living with Charlie was like having my own place, and I found myself reveling in the aloneness instead of being lonely.
I threw down a quick bowl of cereal and some orange juice from the carton. I felt excited to go to school, and that scared me. I knew it wasn't the stimulating learning environment I was anticipating, or seeing my new set of friends. If I was being honest with myself, I knew I was eager to get to school because I would see Edward Cullen. And that was very, very stupid.
I should be avoiding him entirely after my brainless and embarrassing babbling yesterday. And I was suspicious of him; why should he lie about his eyes? I was still frightened of the hostility I sometimes felt emanating from him, and I was still tongue- tied whenever I pictured his perfect face. I was well aware that my league and his league were spheres that did not touch. So I shouldn't be at all anxious to see him today.
It took every ounce of my concentration to make it down the icy brick driveway alive. I almost lost my balance when I finally got to the truck, but I managed to cling to the side mirror and save myself. Clearly, today was going to be nightmarish.
Driving to school, I distracted myself from my fear of falling and my unwanted speculations about Edward Cullen by thinking about Mike and Eric, and the obvious difference in how teenage boys responded to me here. I was sure I looked exactly the same as I had in Phoenix. Maybe it was just that the boys back home had watched me pass slowly through all the awkward phases of adolescence and still thought of me that way. Perhaps it was because I was a novelty here, where novelties were few and far between. Possibly my crippling clumsiness was seen as endearing rather than pathetic, casting me as a damsel in distress. Whatever the reason, Mike's puppy dog behavior and Eric's apparent rivalry with him were disconcerting. I wasn't sure if I didn't prefer being ignored.
My truck seemed to have no problem with the black ice that covered the roads. I drove very slowly, though, not wanting to carve a path of destruction through Main Street.
When I got out of my truck at school, I saw why I'd had so little trouble. Something silver caught my eye, and I walked to the back of the truck — carefully holding the side for support — to examine my tires. There were thin chains crisscrossed in diamond shapes around them. Charlie had gotten up who knows how early to put snow chains on my truck. My throat suddenly felt tight. I wasn't used to being taken care of, and Charlie's unspoken concern caught me by surprise.
I was standing by the back corner of the truck, struggling to fight back the sudden wave
of emotion the snow chains had brought on, when I heard an odd sound.
It was a high-pitched screech, and it was fast becoming painfully loud. I looked up, startled.
I saw several things simultaneously. Nothing was moving in slow motion, the way it does in the movies. Instead, the adrenaline rush seemed to make my brain work much faster, and I was able to absorb in clear detail several things at once.
Edward Cullen was standing four cars down from me, staring at me in horror. His face stood out from a sea of faces, all frozen in the same mask of shock. But of more immediate importance was the dark blue van that was skidding, tires locked and squealing against the brakes, spinning wildly across the ice of the parking lot. It was going to hit the back corner of my truck, and I was standing between them. I didn't even have time to close my eyes.
Just before I heard the shattering crunch of the van folding around the truck bed, something hit me, hard, but not from the direction I was expecting. My head cracked against the icy blacktop, and I felt something solid and cold pinning me to the ground. I was lying on the pavement behind the tan car I'd parked next to. But I didn't have a chance to notice anything else, because the van was still coming. It had curled gratingly around the end of the truck and, still spinning and sliding, was about to collide with me again.
A low oath made me aware that someone was with me, and the voice was impossible not to recognize. Two long, white hands shot out protectively in front of me, and the van shuddered to a stop a foot from my face, the large hands fitting providentially into a deep dent in the side of the van's body.
Then his hands moved so fast they blurred. One was suddenly gripping under the body of the van, and something was dragging me, swinging my legs around like a ragdoll's, till they hit the tire of the tan car. A groaning metallic thud hurt my ears, and the van settled, glass popping, onto the asphalt — exactly where, a second ago, my legs had been.
It was absolutely silent for one long second before the screaming began. In the abrupt bedlam, I could hear more than one person shouting my name. But more clearly than all the yelling, I could hear Edward Cullen's low, frantic voice in my ear.
"Bella? Are you all right?"
"I'm fine." My voice sounded strange. I tried to sit up, and realized he was holding me against the side of his body in an iron grasp.
"Be careful," he warned as I struggled. "I think you hit your head pretty hard." I became aware of a throbbing ache centered above my left ear.
"Ow," I said, surprised.
"That's what I thought." His voice, amazingly, sounded like he was suppressing laughter.
"How in the…" I trailed off, trying to clear my head, get my bearings. "How did you get over here so fast?"
"I was standing right next to you, Bella," he said, his tone serious again.
I turned to sit up, and this time he let me, releasing his hold around my waist and sliding as far from me as he could in the limited space. I looked at his concerned, innocent expression and was disoriented again by the force of his gold-colored eyes. What was I asking him?
And then they found us, a crowd of people with tears streaming down their faces,
shouting at each other, shouting at us. "Don't move," someone instructed.
"Get Tyler out of the van!" someone else shouted.
There was a flurry of activity around us. I tried to get up, but Edward's cold hand pushed my shoulder down.
"Just stay put for now."
"But it's cold," I complained. It surprised me when he chuckled under his breath. There was an edge to the sound.
"You were over there," I suddenly remembered, and his chuckle stopped short. "You were by your car."
His expression turned hard. "No, I wasn't."
"I saw you." All around us was chaos. I could hear the gruffer voices of adults arriving on the scene. But I obstinately held on to our argument; I was right, and he was going to admit it.
"Bella, I was standing with you, and I pulled you out of the way." He unleashed the full, devastating power of his eyes on me, as if trying to communicate something crucial.
"No." I set my jaw.
The gold in his eyes blazed. "Please, Bella." "Why?" I demanded.
"Trust me," hepleaded, his soft voice overwhelming.
I could hear the sirens now. "Will you promise to explain everything to me later?" "Fine," he snapped, abruptly exasperated.
"Fine," I repeated angrily.
It took six EMTs and two teachers — Mr. Varner and Coach Clapp — to shift the van far enough away from us to bring the stretchers in. Edward vehemently refused his, and I tried to do the same, but the traitor told them I'd hit my head and probably had a concussion. I almost died of humiliation when they put on the neck brace. It looked like the entire school was there, watching soberly as they loaded me in the back of the ambulance. Edward got to ride in the front. It was maddening.
To make matters worse, Chief Swan arrived before they could get me safely away. "Bella!" he yelled in panic when he recognized me on the stretcher.
"I'm completely fine, Char — Dad," I sighed. "There's nothing wrong with me."
He turned to the closest EMT for a second opinion. I tuned him out to consider the jumble of inexplicable images churning chaotically in my head. When they'd lifted me away from the car, I had seen the deep dent in the tan car's bumper — a very distinct dent that fit the contours of Edward's shoulders… as if he had braced himself against the car with enough force to damage the metal frame…
And then there was his family, looking on from the distance, with expressions that ranged from disapproval to fury but held no hint of concern for their brother's safety.
I tried to think of a logical solution that could explain what I had just seen — a solution that excluded the assumption that I was insane.
Naturally, the ambulance got a police escort to the county hospital. I felt ridiculous the whole time they were unloading me. What made it worse was that Edward simply glided through the hospital doors under his own power. I ground my teeth together.
They put me in the emergency room, a long room with a line of beds separated by pastel-patterned curtains. A nurse put a pressure cuff on my arm and a thermometer under
my tongue. Since no one bothered pulling the curtain around to give me some privacy, I decided I wasn't obligated to wear the stupid-looking neck brace anymore. When the nurse walked away, I quickly unfastened the Velcro and threw it under the bed.
There was another flurry of hospital personnel, another stretcher brought to the bed next to me. I recognized Tyler Crowley from my Government class beneath the bloodstained bandages wrapped tightly around his head. Tyler looked a hundred times worse than I felt. But he was staring anxiously at me.
"Bella, I'm so sorry!"
"I'm fine, Tyler — you look awful, are you all right?" As we spoke, nurses began unwinding his soiled bandages, exposing a myriad of shallow slices all over his forehead and left cheek.
He ignored me. "I thought I was going to kill you! I was going too fast, and I hit the ice wrong…" He winced as one nurse started dabbing at his face.
"Don't worry about it; you missed me."
"How did you get out of the way so fast? You were there, and then you were gone…" "Umm… Edward pulled me out of the way."
He looked confused. "Who?"
"Edward Cullen — he was standing next to me." I'd always been a terrible liar; I didn't sound convincing at all.
"Cullen? I didn't see him… wow, it was all so fast, I guess. Is he okay?"
"I think so. He's here somewhere, but they didn't make him use a stretcher."
I knew I wasn't crazy. What had happened? There was no way to explain away what I'd seen.
They wheeled me away then, to X-ray my head. I told them there was nothing wrong, and I was right. Not even a concussion. I asked if I could leave, but the nurse said I had to talk to a doctor first. So I was trapped in the ER, waiting, harassed by Tyler 's constant apologies and promises to make it up to me. No matter how many times I tried to convince him I was fine, he continued to torment himself. Finally, I closed my eyes and ignored him. He kept up a remorseful mumbling.
"Is she sleeping?" a musical voice asked. My eyes flew open.
Edward was standing at the foot of my bed, smirking. I glared at him. It wasn't easy — it would have been more natural to ogle.
"Hey, Edward, I'm really sorry —"Tyler began. Edward lifted a hand to stop him.
"No blood, no foul," he said, flashing his brilliant teeth. He moved to sit on the edge of Tyler 's bed, facing me. He smirked again.
"So, what's the verdict?" he asked me.
"There's nothing wrong with me at all, but they won't let me go," I complained. "How come you aren't strapped to a gurney like the rest of us?"
"It's all about who you know," he answered. "But don't worry, I came to spring you."
Then a doctor walked around the corner, and my mouth fell open. He was young, he was blond… and he was handsomer than any movie star I'd ever seen. He was pale, though, and tired-looking, with circles under his eyes. From Charlie's description, this had to be Edward's father.
"So, Miss Swan," Dr. Cullen said in a remarkably appealing voice, "how are you feeling?"
"I'm fine," I said, for the last time, I hoped.
He walked to the lightboard on the wall over my head, and turned it on.
"Your X-rays look good," he said. "Does your head hurt? Edward said you hit it pretty hard."
"It's fine," I repeated with a sigh, throwing a quick scowl toward Edward.
The doctor's cool fingers probed lightly along my skull. He noticed when I winced. "Tender?" he asked.
"Not really." I'd had worse.
I heard a chuckle, and looked over to see Edward's patronizing smile. My eyes narrowed.
"Well, your father is in the waiting room — you can go home with him now. But come back if you feel dizzy or have trouble with your eyesight at all."
"Can't I go back to school?" I asked, imagining Charlie trying to be attentive. "Maybe you should take it easy today."
I glanced at Edward. "Does he get to go to school?"
"Someone has to spread the good news that we survived," Edward said smugly. "Actually," Dr. Cullen corrected, "most of the school seems to be in the waiting room." "Oh no," I moaned, covering my face with my hands.
Dr. Cullen raised his eyebrows. "Do you want to stay?"
"No, no!" I insisted, throwing my legs over the side of the bed and hopping down quickly. Too quickly — I staggered, and Dr. Cullen caught me. He looked concerned.
"I'm fine," I assured him again. No need to tell him my balance problems had nothing to do with hitting my head.
"Take some Tylenol for the pain," he suggested as he steadied me. "It doesn't hurt that bad," I insisted.
"It sounds like you were extremely lucky," Dr. Cullen said, smiling as he signed my chart with a flourish.
"Lucky Edward happened to be standing next to me," I amended with a hard glance at the subject of my statement.
"Oh, well, yes," Dr. Cullen agreed, suddenly occupied with the papers in front of him. Then he looked away, at Tyler, and walked to the next bed. My intuition flickered; the doctor was in on it.
"I'm afraid that you'll have to stay with us just a little bit longer," he said to Tyler, and began checking his cuts.
As soon as the doctor's back was turned, I moved to Edward's side.
"Can I talk to you for a minute?" I hissed under my breath. He took a step back from me, his jaw suddenly clenched.
"Your father is waiting for you," he said through his teeth. I glanced at Dr. Cullen and Tyler.
"I'd like to speak with you alone, if you don't mind," I pressed.
He glared, and then turned his back and strode down the long room. I nearly had to run to keep up. As soon as we turned the corner into a short hallway, he spun around to face me.
"What do you want?" he asked, sounding annoyed. His eyes were cold.
His unfriendliness intimidated me. My words came out with less severity than I'd intended. "You owe me an explanation," I reminded him.
"I saved your life — I don't owe you anything."
I flinched back from the resentment in his voice. "You promised."
"Bella, you hit your head, you don't know what you're talking about." His tone was cutting.
My temper flared now, and I glared defiantly at him. "There's nothing wrong with my head."
He glared back. "What do you want from me, Bella?"
"I want to know the truth," I said. "I want to know why I'm lying for you." "What do you think happened?" he snapped.
It came out in a rush.
"All I know is that you weren't anywhere near me —Tyler didn't see you, either, so don't tell me I hit my head too hard. That van was going to crush us both — and it didn't, and your hands left dents in the side of it — and you left a dent in the other car, and you're not hurt at all — and the van should have smashed my legs, but you were holding it up…" I could hear how crazy it sounded, and I couldn't continue. I was so mad I could feel the tears coming; I tried to force them back by grinding my teeth together.
He was staring at me incredulously. But his face was tense, defensive.
"You think I lifted a van off you?" His tone questioned my sanity, but it only made me more suspicious. It was like a perfectly delivered line by a skilled actor.
I merely nodded once, jaw tight.
"Nobody will believe that, you know." His voice held an edge of derision now.
"I'm not going to tell anybody." I said each word slowly, carefully controlling my anger. Surprise flitted across his face. "Then why does it matter?"
"It matters to me," I insisted. "I don't like to lie — so there'd better be a good reason why I'm doing it."
"Can't you just thank me and get over it?" "Thank you." I waited, fuming and expectant. "You're not going to let it go, are you?"
"No."
"In that case… I hope you enjoy disappointment."
We scowled at each other in silence. I was the first to speak, trying to keep myself focused. I was in danger of being distracted by his livid, glorious face. It was like trying to stare down a destroying angel.
"Why did you even bother?" I asked frigidly.
He paused, and for a brief moment his stunning face was unexpectedly vulnerable. "I don't know," he whispered.
And then he turned his back on me and walked away.
I was so angry, it took me a few minutes until I could move. When I could walk, I made my way slowly to the exit at the end of the hallway.
The waiting room was more unpleasant than I'd feared. It seemed like every face I knew in Forks was there, staring at me. Charlie rushed to my side; I put up my hands.
"There's nothing wrong with me," I assured him sullenly. I was still aggravated, not in the mood for chitchat.
"What did the doctor say?"
"Dr. Cullen saw me, and he said I was fine and I could go home." I sighed. Mike and Jessica and Eric were all there, beginning to converge on us. "Let's go," I urged.
Charlie put one arm behind my back, not quite touching me, and led me to the glass doors of the exit. I waved sheepishly at my friends, hoping to convey that they didn't need to worry anymore. It was a huge relief— the first time I'd ever felt that way — to get into the cruiser.
We drove in silence. I was so wrapped up in my thoughts that I barely knew Charlie was there. I was positive that Edward's defensive behavior in the hall was a confirmation of the bizarre things I still could hardly believe I'd witnessed.
When we got to the house, Charlie finally spoke.
"Um… you'll need to call Renée." He hung his head, guilty. I was appalled. "You told Mom!"
"Sorry."
I slammed the cruiser's door a little harder than necessary on my way out.
My mom was in hysterics, of course. I had to tell her I felt fine at least thirty times before she would calm down. She begged me to come home — forgetting the fact that home was empty at the moment — but her pleas were easier to resist than I would have thought. I was consumed by the mystery Edward presented. And more than a little obsessed by Edward himself. Stupid, stupid, stupid. I wasn't as eager to escape Forks as I should be, as any normal, sane person would be.
I decided I might as well go to bed early that night. Charlie continued to watch me anxiously, and it was getting on my nerves. I stopped on my way to grab three Tylenol from the bathroom. They did help, and, as the pain eased, I drifted to sleep.
That was the first night I dreamed of Edward Cullen.
4. Invitations
In my dream it was very dark, and what dim light there was seemed to be radiating from Edward's skin. I couldn't see his face, just his back as he walked away from me, leaving me in the blackness. No matter how fast I ran, I couldn't catch up to him; no matter how loud I called, he never turned. Troubled, I woke in the middle of the night and couldn't sleep again for what seemed like a very long time. After that, he was in my dreams nearly every night, but always on the periphery, never within reach.
The month that followed the accident was uneasy, tense, and, at first, embarrassing. To my dismay, I found myself the center of attention for the rest of that week. Tyler Crowley was impossible, following me around, obsessed with making amends to me
somehow. I tried to convince him what I wanted more than anything else was for him to forget all about it — especially since nothing had actually happened to me — but he remained insistent. He followed me between classes and sat at our now-crowded lunch table. Mike and Eric were even less friendly toward him than they were to each other, which made me worry that I'd gained another unwelcome fan.
No one seemed concerned about Edward, though I explained over and over that he was the hero — how he had pulled me out of the way and had nearly been crushed, too. I tried to be convincing. Jessica, Mike, Eric, and everyone else always commented that they hadn't even seen him there till the van was pulled away.
I wondered to myself why no one else had seen him standing so far away, before he was suddenly, impossibly saving my life. With chagrin, I realized the probable cause — no one else was as aware of Edward as I always was. No one else watched him the way I did. How pitiful.
Edward was never surrounded by crowds of curious bystanders eager for his firsthand account. People avoided him as usual. The Cullens and the Hales sat at the same table as always, not eating, talking only among themselves. None of them, especially Edward, glanced my way anymore.
When he sat next to me in class, as far from me as the table would allow, he seemed totally unaware of my presence. Only now and then, when his fists would suddenly ball up — skin stretched even whiter over the bones — did I wonder if he wasn't quite as oblivious as he appeared.
He wished he hadn't pulled me from the path of Tyler 's van — there was no other conclusion I could come to.
I wanted very much to talk to him, and the day after the accident I tried. The last time I'd seen him, outside the ER, we'd both been so furious. I still was angry that he wouldn't trust me with the truth, even though I was keeping my part of the bargain flawlessly. But he had in fact saved my life, no matter how he'd done it. And, overnight, the heat of my anger faded into awed gratitude.
He was already seated when I got to Biology, looking straight ahead. I sat down, expecting him to turn toward me. He showed no sign that he realized I was there.
"Hello, Edward," I said pleasantly, to show him I was going to behave myself.
He turned his head a fraction toward me without meeting my gaze, nodded once, and then looked the other way.
And that was the last contact I'd had with him, though he was there, a foot away from me, every day. I watched him sometimes, unable to stop myself— from a distance,
though, in the cafeteria or parking lot. I watched as his golden eyes grew perceptibly darker day by day. But in class I gave no more notice that he existed than he showed toward me. I was miserable. And the dreams continued.
Despite my outright lies, the tenor of my e-mails alerted Renée to my depression, and she called a few times, worried. I tried to convince her it was just the weather that had me down.
Mike, at least, was pleased by the obvious coolness between me and my lab partner. I could see he'd been worried that Edward's daring rescue might have impressed me, and he was relieved that it seemed to have the opposite effect. He grew more confident, sitting on the edge of my table to talk before Biology class started, ignoring Edward as completely as he ignored us.
The snow washed away for good after that one dangerously icy day. Mike was disappointed he'd never gotten to stage his snowball fight, but pleased that the beach trip would soon be possible. The rain continued heavily, though, and the weeks passed.
Jessica made me aware of another event looming on the horizon — she called the first Tuesday of March to ask my permission to invite Mike to the girls' choice spring dance in two weeks.
"Are you sure you don't mind… you weren't planning to ask him?" she persisted when I told her I didn't mind in the least.
"No, Jess, I'm not going," I assured her. Dancing was glaringly outside my range of abilities.
"It will be really fun." Her attempt to convince me was halfhearted. I suspected that Jessica enjoyed my inexplicable popularity more than my actual company.
"You have fun with Mike," I encouraged.
The next day, I was surprised that Jessica wasn't her usual gushing self in Trig and Spanish. She was silent as she walked by my side between classes, and I was afraid to ask her why. If Mike had turned her down, I was the last person she would want to tell.
My fears were strengthened during lunch when Jessica sat as far from Mike as possible, chatting animatedly with Eric. Mike was unusually quiet.
Mike was still quiet as he walked me to class, the uncomfortable look on his face a bad sign. But he didn't broach the subject until I was in my seat and he was perched on my desk. As always, I was electrically aware of Edward sitting close enough to touch, as distant as if he were merely an invention of my imagination.
"So," Mike said, looking at the floor, "Jessica asked me to the spring dance."
"That's great." I made my voice bright and enthusiastic. "You'll have a lot of fun with Jessica."
"Well…" He floundered as he examined my smile, clearly not happy with my response. "I told her I had to think about it."
"Why would you do that?" I let disapproval color my tone, though I was relieved he hadn't given her an absolute no.
His face was bright red as he looked down again. Pity shook my resolve. "I was wondering if… well, if you might be planning to ask me."
I paused for a moment, hating the wave of guilt that swept through me. But I saw, from the corner of my eye, Edward's head tilt reflexively in my direction.
"Mike, I think you should tell her yes," I said.
"Did you already ask someone?" Did Edward notice how Mike's eyes flickered in his
direction?
"No," I assured him. "I'm not going to the dance at all." "Why not?" Mike demanded.
I didn't want to get into the safety hazards that dancing presented, so I quickly made new plans.
"I'm going to Seattle that Saturday," I explained. I needed to get out of town anyway — it was suddenly the perfect time to go.
"Can't you go some other weekend?"
"Sorry, no," I said. "So you shouldn't make Jess wait any longer — it's rude." "Yeah, you're right," he mumbled, and turned, dejected, to walk back to his seat. I
closed my eyes and pressed my fingers to my temples, trying to push the guilt and sympathy out of my head. Mr. Banner began talking. I sighed and opened my eyes.
And Edward was staring at me curiously, that same, familiar edge of frustration even more distinct now in his black eyes.
I stared back, surprised, expecting him to look quickly away. But instead he continued to gaze with probing intensity into my eyes. There was no question of me looking away. My hands started to shake.
"Mr. Cullen?" the teacher called, seeking the answer to a question that I hadn't heard. "The Krebs Cycle," Edward answered, seeming reluctant as he turned to look at Mr.
Banner.
I looked down at my book as soon as his eyes released me, trying to find my place. Cowardly as ever, I shifted my hair over my right shoulder to hide my face. I couldn't believe the rush of emotion pulsing through me — just because he'd happened to look at me for the first time in a half-dozen weeks. I couldn't allow him to have this level of influence over me. It was pathetic. More than pathetic, it was unhealthy.
I tried very hard not to be aware of him for the rest of the hour, and, since that was impossible, at least not to let him know that I was aware of him. When the bell rang at last, I turned my back to him to gather my things, expecting him to leave immediately as usual.
"Bella?" His voice shouldn't have been so familiar to me, as if I'd known the sound of it all my life rather than for just a few short weeks.
I turned slowly, unwillingly. I didn't want to feel what I knew I would feel when I looked at his too-perfect face. My expression was wary when I finally turned to him; his expression was unreadable. He didn't say anything.
"What? Are you speaking to me again?" I finally asked, an unintentional note of petulance in my voice.
His lips twitched, fighting a smile. "No, not really," he admitted.
I closed my eyes and inhaled slowly through my nose, aware that I was gritting my teeth. He waited.
"Then what do you want, Edward?" I asked, keeping my eyes closed; it was easier to talk to him coherently that way.
"I'm sorry." He sounded sincere. "I'm being very rude, I know. But it's better this way, really."
I opened my eyes. His face was very serious.
"I don't know what you mean," I said, my voice guarded. "It's better if we're not friends," he explained. "Trust me."
My eyes narrowed. I'd heard that before.
"It's too bad you didn't figure that out earlier," I hissed through my teeth. "You could have saved yourself all this regret."
"Regret?” The word, and my tone, obviously caught him off guard. "Regret for what?" "For not just letting that stupid van squish me."
He was astonished. He stared at me in disbelief.
When he finally spoke, he almost sounded mad. "You think I regret saving your life?" "I know you do," I snapped.
"You don't know anything." He was definitely mad.
I turned my head sharply away from him, clenching my jaw against all the wild accusations I wanted to hurl at him. I gathered my books together, then stood and walked to the door. I meant to sweep dramatically out of the room, but of course I caught the toe of my boot on the door jamb and dropped my books. I stood there for a moment, thinking about leaving them. Then I sighed and bent to pick them up. He was there; he'd already stacked them into a pile. He handed them to me, his face hard.
"Thank you," I said icily. His eyes narrowed.
"You're welcome," he retorted.
I straightened up swiftly, turned away from him again, and stalked off to Gym without looking back.
Gym was brutal. We'd moved on to basketball. My team never passed me the ball, so that was good, but I fell down a lot. Sometimes I took people with me. Today I was worse than usual because my head was so filled with Edward. I tried to concentrate on my feet, but he kept creeping back into my thoughts just when I really needed my balance.
It was a relief, as always, to leave. I almost ran to the truck; there were just so many people I wanted to avoid. The truck had suffered only minimal damage in the accident. I'd had to replace the taillights, and if I'd had a real paint job, I would have touched that up. Tyler 's parents had to sell their van for parts.
I almost had a stroke when I rounded the corner and saw a tall, dark figure leaning against the side of my truck. Then I realized it was just Eric. I started walking again.
"Hey, Eric," I called. "Hi, Bella."
"What's up?" I said as I was unlocking the door. I wasn't paying attention to the uncomfortable edge in his voice, so his next words took me by surprise.
"Uh, I was just wondering… if you would go to the spring dance with me? " His voice broke on the last word.
"I thought it was girls' choice," I said, too startled to be diplomatic. "Well, yeah," he admitted, shamefaced.
I recovered my composure and tried to make my smile warm. "Thank you for asking me, but I'm going to be in Seattle that day."
"Oh," he said. "Well, maybe next time."
"Sure," I agreed, and then bit my lip. I wouldn't want him to take that too literally. He slouched off, back toward the school. I heard a low chuckle.
Edward was walking past the front of my truck, looking straight forward, his lips pressed together. I yanked the door open and jumped inside, slamming it loudly behind me. I revved the engine deafeningly and reversed out into the aisle. Edward was in his car
already, two spaces down, sliding out smoothly in front of me, cutting me off. He stopped there — to wait for his family; I could see the four of them walking this way, but still by the cafeteria. I considered taking out the rear of his shiny Volvo, but there were too many witnesses. I looked in my rearview mirror. A line was beginning to form. Directly behind me, Tyler Crowley was in his recently acquired used Sentra, waving. I was too aggravated to acknowledge him.
While I was sitting there, looking everywhere but at the car in front of me, I heard a knock on my passenger side window. I looked over; it was Tyler. I glanced back in my rearview mirror, confused. His car was still running, the door left open. I leaned across the cab to crank the window down. It was stiff. I got it halfway down, then gave up.
"I'm sorry, Tyler, I'm stuck behind Cullen." I was annoyed — obviously the holdup wasn't my fault.
"Oh, I know — I just wanted to ask you something while we're trapped here." He grinned.
This could not be happening.
"Will you ask me to the spring dance?" he continued.
"I'm not going to be in town, Tyler." My voice sounded a little sharp. I had to remember it wasn't his fault that Mike and Eric had already used up my quota of patience for the day.
"Yeah, Mike said that," he admitted. "Then why —"
He shrugged. "I was hoping you were just letting him down easy." Okay, it was completely his fault.
"Sorry, Tyler," I said, working to hide my irritation. "I really am going out of town." "That's cool. We still have prom."
And before I could respond, he was walking back to his car. I could feel the shock on my face. I looked forward to see Alice, Rosalie, Emmett, and Jasper all sliding into the Volvo. In his rearview mirror, Edward's eyes were on me. He was unquestionably shaking with laughter, as if he'd heard every word Tyler had said. My foot itched toward the gas pedal… one little bump wouldn't hurt any of them, just that glossy silver paint job. I revved the engine.
But they were all in, and Edward was speeding away. I drove home slowly, carefully, muttering to myself the whole way.
When I got home, I decided to make chicken enchiladas for dinner. It was a long process, and it would keep me busy. While I was simmering the onions and chilies, the phone rang. I was almost afraid to answer it, but it might be Charlie or my mom.
It was Jessica, and she was jubilant; Mike had caught her after school to accept her invitation. I celebrated with her briefly while I stirred. She had to go, she wanted to call Angela and Lauren to tell them. I suggested — with casual innocence — that maybe Angela, the shy girl who had Biology with me, could ask Eric. And Lauren, a standoffish girl who had always ignored me at the lunch table, could ask Tyler; I'd heard he was still available. Jess thought that was a great idea. Now that she was sure of Mike, she actually sounded sincere when she said she wished I would go to the dance. I gave her my Seattle excuse.
After I hung up, I tried to concentrate on dinner — dicing the chicken especially; I didn't want to take another trip to the emergency room. But my head was spinning, trying
to analyze every word Edward had spoken today. What did he mean, it was better if we weren't friends?
My stomach twisted as I realized what he must have meant. He must see how absorbed I was by him; he must not want to lead me on… so we couldn't even be friends… because he wasn't interested in me at all.
Of course he wasn't interested in me, I thought angrily, my eyes stinging — a delayed reaction to the onions. I wasn't interesting. And he was. Interesting… and brilliant… and mysterious… and perfect… and beautiful… and possibly able to lift full-sized vans with one hand.
Well, that was fine. I could leave him alone. I would leave him alone. I would get through my self-imposed sentence here in purgatory, and then hopefully some school in the Southwest, or possibly Hawaii, would offer me a scholarship. I focused my thoughts on sunny beaches and palm trees as I finished the enchiladas and put them in the oven.
Charlie seemed suspicious when he came home and smelled the green peppers. I couldn't blame him — the closest edible Mexican food was probably in southern California. But he was a cop, even if just a small-town cop, so he was brave enough to take the first bite. He seemed to like it. It was fun to watch as he slowly began trusting me in the kitchen.
"Dad?" I asked when he was almost done. "Yeah, Bella?"
"Um, I just wanted to let you know that I'm going to Seattle for the day a week from Saturday… if that's okay?" I didn't want to ask permission — it set a bad precedent — but I felt rude, so I tacked it on at the end.
"Why?" He sounded surprised, as if he were unable to imagine something that Forks couldn't offer.
"Well, I wanted to get few books — the library here is pretty limited — and maybe look at some clothes." I had more money than I was used to having, since, thanks to Charlie, I hadn't had to pay for a car. Not that the truck didn't cost me quite a bit in the gas department.
"That truck probably doesn't get very good gas mileage," he said, echoing my thoughts. "I know, I'll stop in Montesano and Olympia — and Tacoma if I have to."
"Are you going all by yourself?" he asked, and I couldn't tell if he was suspicious I had a secret boyfriend or just worried about car trouble.
"Yes."
"Seattle is a big city — you could get lost," he fretted.
"Dad, Phoenix is five times the size of Seattle — and I can read a map, don't worry about it."
"Do you want me to come with you?" I tried to be crafty as I hid my horror.
"That's all right, Dad, I'll probably just be in dressing rooms all day — very boring." "Oh, okay." The thought of sitting in women's clothing stores for any period of time
immediately put him off. "Thanks." I smiled at him.
"Will you be back in time for the dance?"
Grrr. Only in a town this small would a father know when the high school dances were. "No — I don't dance, Dad." He, of all people, should understand that — I didn't get my
balance problems from my mother.
He did understand. "Oh, that's right," he realized.
The next morning, when I pulled into the parking lot, I deliberately parked as far as possible from the silver Volvo. I didn't want to put myself in the path of too much temptation and end up owing him a new car. Getting out of the cab, I fumbled with my key and it fell into a puddle at my feet. As I bent to get it, a white hand flashed out and grabbed it before I could. I jerked upright. Edward Cullen was right next to me, leaning casually against my truck.
"How do you do that?" I asked in amazed irritation.
"Do what?" He held my key out as he spoke. As I reached for it, he dropped it into my palm.
"Appear out of thin air."
"Bella, it's not my fault if you are exceptionally unobservant." His voice was quiet as usual — velvet, muted.
I scowled at his perfect face. His eyes were light again today, a deep, golden honey color. Then I had to look down, to reassemble my now-tangled thoughts.
"Why the traffic jam last night?" I demanded, still looking away. "I thought you were supposed to be pretending I don't exist, not irritating me to death."
"That was for Tyler 's sake, not mine. I had to give him his chance." He snickered. "You…" I gasped. I couldn't think of a bad enough word. It felt like the heat of my
anger should physically burn him, but he only seemed more amused. "And I'm not pretending you don't exist," he continued.
"So you are trying to irritate me to death? Since Tyler 's van didn't do the job?"
Anger flashed in his tawny eyes. His lips pressed into a hard line, all signs of humor gone.
"Bella, you are utterly absurd," he said, his low voice cold.
My palms tingled — I wanted so badly to hit something. I was surprised at myself. I was usually a nonviolent person. I turned my back and started to walk away.
"Wait," he called. I kept walking, sloshing angrily through the rain. But he was next to me, easily keeping pace.
"I'm sorry, that was rude," he said as we walked. I ignored him. "I'm not saying it isn't true," he continued, "but it was rude to say it, anyway."
"Why won't you leave me alone?" I grumbled.
"I wanted to ask you something, but you sidetracked me," he chuckled. He seemed to have recovered his good humor.
"Do you have a multiple personality disorder?" I asked severely. "You're doing it again."
I sighed." Fine then. What do you want to ask?"
"I was wondering if, a week from Saturday — you know, the day of the spring dance
—"
"Are you trying to be funny ?" I interrupted him, wheeling toward him. My face got drenched as I looked up at his expression.
His eyes were wickedly amused. "Will you please allow me to finish?"
I bit my lip and clasped my hands together, interlocking my fingers, so I couldn't do anything rash.
"I heard you say you were going to Seattle that day, and I was wondering if you wanted
a ride."
That was unexpected.
"What?" I wasn't sure what he was getting at. "Do you want a ride to Seattle ?"
"With who?" I asked, mystified.
"Myself, obviously." He enunciated every syllable, as if he were talking to someone mentally handicapped.
I was still stunned. "Why?"
"Well, I was planning to go to Seattle in the next few weeks, and, to be honest, I'm not sure if your truck can make it."
"My truck works just fine, thank you very much for your concern." I started to walk again, but I was too surprised to maintain the same level of anger.
"But can your truck make it there on one tank of gas?" He matched my pace again. "I don't see how that is any of your business." Stupid, shiny Volvo owner.
"The wasting of finite resources is everyone's business."
"Honestly, Edward." I felt a thrill go through me as I said his name, and I hated it. "I can't keep up with you. I thought you didn't want to be my friend."
"I said it would be better if we weren't friends, not that I didn't want to be." "Oh, thanks, now that's all cleared up. "Heavy sarcasm. I realized I had stopped
walking again. We were under the shelter of the cafeteria roof now, so I could more easily look at is face. Which certainly didn't help my clarity of thought.
"It would be more…prudent for you not to be my friend," he explained. "But I'm tired of trying to stay away from you, Bella."
His eyes were gloriously intense as he uttered that last sentence, his voice smoldering. I couldn't remember how to breathe.
"Will you go with me to Seattle ?" he asked, still intense. I couldn't speak yet, so I just nodded.
He smiled briefly, and then his face became serious.
"You really should stay away from me," he warned. "I'll see you in class." He turned abruptly and walked back the way we'd come.
5. Blood Type
I made my way to English in a daze. I didn't even realize when I first walked in that class had already started.
"Thank you for joining us, Miss Swan," Mr. Mason said in a disparaging tone. I flushed and hurried to my seat.
It wasn't till class ended that I realized Mike wasn't sitting in his usual seat next to me. I felt a twinge of guilt. But he and Eric both met me at the door as usual, so I figured I wasn't totally unforgiven. Mike seemed to become more himself as we walked, gaining enthusiasm as he talked about the weather report for this weekend. The rain was supposed to take a minor break, and so maybe his beach trip would be possible. I tried to sound eager, to make up for disappointing him yesterday. It was hard; rain or no rain, it would still only be in the high forties, if we were lucky.
The rest of the morning passed in a blur. It was difficult to believe that I hadn't just imagined what Edward had said, and the way his eyes had looked. Maybe it was just a very convincing dream that I'd confused with reality. That seemed more probable than that I really appealed to him on any level.
So I was impatient and frightened as Jessica and I entered the cafeteria. I wanted to see his face, to see if he'd gone back to the cold, indifferent person I'd known for the last several weeks. Or if, by some miracle, I'd really heard what I thought I'd heard this morning. Jessica babbled on and on about her dance plans — Lauren and Angela had asked the other boys and they were all going together — completely unaware of my inattention.
Disappointment flooded through me as my eyes unerringly focused on his table. The other four were there, but he was absent. Had he gone home? I followed the still-babbling Jessica through the line, crushed. I'd lost my appetite — I bought nothing but a bottle of lemonade. I just wanted to go sit down and sulk.
"Edward Cullen is staring at you again," Jessica said, finally breaking through my abstraction with his name. "I wonder why he's sitting alone today."
My head snapped up. I followed her gaze to see Edward, smiling crookedly, staring at me from an empty table across the cafeteria from where he usually sat. Once he'd caught my eye, he raised one hand and motioned with his index finger for me to join him. As I stared in disbelief, he winked.
"Does he mean you ?" Jessica asked with insulting astonishment in her voice. "Maybe he needs help with his Biology homework," I muttered for her benefit. "Um,
I'd better go see what he wants."
I could feel her staring after me as I walked away.
When I reached his table, I stood behind the chair across from him, unsure. "Why don't you sit with me today?" he asked, smiling.
I sat down automatically, watching him with caution. He was still smiling. It was hard to believe that someone so beautiful could be real. I was afraid that he might disappear in a sudden puff of smoke, and I would wake up.
He seemed to be waiting for me to say something. "This is different," I finally managed.
"Well…" He paused, and then the rest of the words followed in a rush. "I decided as long as I was going to hell, I might as well do it thoroughly."
I waited for him to say something that made sense. The seconds ticked by. "You know I don't have any idea what you mean," I eventually pointed out.
"I know." He smiled again, and then he changed the subject. "I think your friends are angry with me for stealing you."
"They'll survive." I could feel their stares boring into my back.
"I may not give you back, though," he said with a wicked glint in his eyes. I gulped.
He laughed. "You look worried."
"No," I said, but, ridiculously, my voice broke. "Surprised, actually… what brought all this on?"
"I told you — I got tired of trying to stay away from you. So I'm giving up." He was still smiling, but his ocher eyes were serious.
"Giving up?" I repeated in confusion.
"Yes — giving up trying to be good. I'm just going to do what I want now, and let the chips fall where they may." His smile faded as he explained, and a hard edge crept into his voice.
"You lost me again."
The breathtaking crooked smile reappeared.
"I always say too much when I'm talking to you — that's one of the problems." "Don't worry — I don't understand any of it," I said wryly.
"I'm counting on that."
"So, in plain English, are we friends now?" "Friends…" he mused, dubious.
"Or not," I muttered.
He grinned. "Well, we can try, I suppose. But I'm warning you now that I'm not a good friend for you." Behind his smile, the warning was real.
"You say that a lot," I noted, trying to ignore the sudden trembling in my stomach and keep my voice even.
"Yes, because you're not listening to me. I'm still waiting for you to believe it. If you're smart, you'll avoid me."
"I think you've made your opinion on the subject of my intellect clear, too." My eyes narrowed.
He smiled apologetically.
"So, as long as I'm being… not smart, we'll try to be friends?" I struggled to sum up the confusing exchange.
"That sounds about right."
I looked down at my hands wrapped around the lemonade bottle, not sure what to do now.
"What are you thinking?" he asked curiously.
I looked up into his deep gold eyes, became befuddled, and, as usual, blurted out the truth.
"I'm trying to figure out what you are."
His jaw tightened, but he kept his smile in place with some effort. "Are you having any luck with that?" he asked in an offhand tone. "Not too much," I admitted.
He chuckled. "What are your theories?"
I blushed. I had been vacillating during the last month between Bruce Wayne and Peter Parker. There was no way I was going to own up to that.
"Won't you tell me?" he asked, tilting his head to one side with a shockingly tempting smile.
I shook my head. "Too embarrassing."
"That's really frustrating, you know," he complained.
"No," I disagreed quickly, my eyes narrowing, "I can't imagine why that would be frustrating at all — just because someone refuses to tell you what they're thinking, even if all the while they're making cryptic little remarks specifically designed to keep you up at night wondering what they could possibly mean… now, why would that be frustrating?"
He grimaced.
"Or better," I continued, the pent-up annoyance flowing freely now, "say that person also did a wide range of bizarre things — from saving your life under impossible circumstances one day to treating you like a pariah the next, and he never explained any of that, either, even after he promised. That, also, would be very non-frustrating."
"You've got a bit of a temper, don't you?" "I don't like double standards."
We stared at each other, unsmiling.
He glanced over my shoulder, and then, unexpectedly, he snickered. "What?"
"Your boyfriend seems to think I'm being unpleasant to you — he's debating whether or not to come break up our fight." He snickered again.
"I don't know who you're talking about," I said frostily. "But I'm sure you're wrong, anyway."
"I'm not. I told you, most people are easy to read." "Except me, of course."
"Yes. Except for you." His mood shifted suddenly; his eyes turned brooding. "I wonder why that is."
I had to look away from the intensity of his stare. I concentrated on unscrewing the lid of my lemonade. I took a swig, staring at the table without seeing it.
"Aren't you hungry?" he asked, distracted.
"No." I didn't feel like mentioning that my stomach was already full — of butterflies. "You?" I looked at the empty table in front of him.
"No, I'm not hungry." I didn't understand his expression — it looked like he was enjoying some private joke.
"Can you do me a favor?" I asked after a second of hesitation. He was suddenly wary. "That depends on what you want." "It's not much," I assured him.
He waited, guarded but curious.
"I just wondered… if you could warn me beforehand the next time you decide to ignore me for my own good. Just so I'm prepared." I looked at the lemonade bottle as I spoke, tracing the circle of the opening with my pinkie finger.
"That sounds fair." He was pressing his lips together to keep from laughing when I looked up.
"Thanks."
"Then can I have one answer in return?" he demanded.
"One."
"Tell me one theory." Whoops. "Not that one."
"You didn't qualify, you just promised one answer," he reminded me. "And you've broken promises yourself," I reminded him back.
"Just one theory — I won't laugh."
"Yes, you will." I was positive about that.
He looked down, and then glanced up at me through his long black lashes, his ocher eyes scorching.
"Please?" he breathed, leaning toward me.
I blinked, my mind going blank. Holy crow, how did he do that? "Er, what?" I asked, dazed.
"Please tell me just one little theory." His eyes still smoldered at me.
"Um, well, bitten by a radioactive spider?" Was he a hypnotist, too? Or was I just a hopeless pushover?
"That's not very creative," he scoffed.
"I'm sorry, that's all I've got," I said, miffed. "You're not even close," he teased.
"No spiders?" "Nope."
"And no radioactivity?" "None."
"Dang," I sighed.
"Kryptonite doesn't bother me, either," he chuckled. "You're not supposed to laugh, remember?"
He struggled to compose his face.
"I'll figure it out eventually," I warned him.
"I wish you wouldn't try." He was serious again. "Because… ?"
"What if I'm not a superhero? What if I'm the bad guy?" He smiled playfully, but his eyes were impenetrable.
"Oh," I said, as several things he'd hinted fell suddenly into place. "I see."
"Do you?" His face was abruptly severe, as if he were afraid that he'd accidentally said too much.
"You're dangerous?" I guessed, my pulse quickening as I intuitively realized the truth of my own words. He was dangerous. He'd been trying to tell me that all along.
He just looked at me, eyes full of some emotion I couldn't comprehend.
"But not bad," I whispered, shaking my head. "No, I don't believe that you're bad." "You're wrong." His voice was almost inaudible. He looked down, stealing my bottle
lid and then spinning it on its side between his fingers. I stared at him, wondering why I didn't feel afraid. He meant what he was saying — that was obvious. But I just felt anxious, on edge… and, more than anything else, fascinated. The same way I always felt when I was near him.
The silence lasted until I noticed that the cafeteria was almost empty. I jumped to my feet. "We're going to be late."
"I'm not going to class today," he said, twirling the lid so fast it was just a blur.
"Why not?"
"It's healthy to ditch class now and then." He smiled up at me, but his eyes were still troubled.
"Well, I'm going," I told him. I was far too big a coward to risk getting caught. He turned his attention back to his makeshift top. "I'll see you later, then."
I hesitated, torn, but then the first bell sent me hurrying out the door — with a last glance confirming that he hadn't moved a centimeter.
As I half-ran to class, my head was spinning faster than the bottle cap. So few questions had been answered in comparison to how many new questions had been raised. At least the rain had stopped.
I was lucky; Mr. Banner wasn't in the room yet when I arrived. I settled quickly into my seat, aware that both Mike and Angela were staring at me. Mike looked resentful; Angela looked surprised, and slightly awed.
Mr. Banner came in the room then, calling the class to order. He was juggling a few small cardboard boxes in his arms. He put them down on Mike's table, telling him to start passing them around the class.
"Okay, guys, I want you all to take one piece from each box," he said as he produced a pair of rubber gloves from the pocket of his lab jacket and pulled them on. The sharp sound as the gloves snapped into place against his wrists seemed ominous to me. "The first should be an indicator card," he went on, grabbing a white card with four squares marked on it and displaying it. "The second is a four-pronged applicator —" he held up something that looked like a nearly toothless hair pick "— and the third is a sterile micro- lancet." He held up a small piece of blue plastic and split it open. The barb was invisible from this distance, but my stomach flipped.
"I'll be coming around with a dropper of water to prepare your cards, so please don't start until I get to you." He began at Mike's table again, carefully putting one drop of water in each of the four squares. "Then I want you to carefully prick your finger with the lancet…" He grabbed Mike's hand and jabbed the spike into the tip of Mike's middle finger. Oh no. Clammy moisture broke out across my forehead.
"Put a small drop of blood on each of the prongs." He demonstrated, squeezing Mike's finger till the blood flowed. I swallowed convulsively, my stomach heaving.
"And then apply it to the card," he finished, holding up the dripping red card for us to see. I closed my eyes, trying to hear through the ringing in my ears.
"The Red Cross is having a blood drive in Port Angeles next weekend, so I thought you should all know your blood type." He sounded proud of himself. "Those of you who aren't eighteen yet will need a parent's permission — I have slips at my desk."
He continued through the room with his water drops. I put my cheek against the cool black tabletop and tried to hold on to my consciousness. All around me I could hear squeals, complaints, and giggles as my classmates skewered their fingers. I breathed slowly in and out through my mouth.
"Bella, are you all right?" Mr. Banner asked. His voice was close to my head, and it sounded alarmed.
"I already know my blood type, Mr. Banner," I said in a weak voice. I was afraid to raise my head.
"Are you feeling faint?"
"Yes, sir," I muttered, internally kicking myself for not ditching when I had the chance.
"Can someone take Bella to the nurse, please?" he called.
I didn't have to look up to know that it would be Mike who volunteered. "Can you walk?" Mr. Banner asked.
"Yes," I whispered. Just let me get out of here, I thought. I'll crawl.
Mike seemed eager as he put his arm around my waist and pulled my arm over his shoulder. I leaned against him heavily on the way out of the classroom.
Mike towed me slowly across campus. When we were around the edge of the cafeteria, out of sight of building four in case Mr. Banner was watching, I stopped.
"Just let me sit for a minute, please?" I begged. He helped me sit on the edge of the walk.
"And whatever you do, keep your hand in your pocket," I warned. I was still so dizzy. I slumped over on my side, putting my cheek against the freezing, damp cement of the sidewalk, closing my eyes. That seemed to help a little.
"Wow, you're green, Bella," Mike said nervously. "Bella?" a different voice called from the distance.
No! Please let me be imagining that horribly familiar voice.
"What's wrong — is she hurt?" His voice was closer now, and he sounded upset. I wasn't imagining it. I squeezed my eyes shut, hoping to die. Or, at the very least, not to throw up.
Mike seemed stressed. "I think she's fainted. I don't know what happened, she didn't even stick her finger."
"Bella." Edward's voice was right beside me, relieved now. "Can you hear me?" "No," I groaned. "Go away."
He chuckled.
"I was taking her to the nurse," Mike explained in a defensive tone, "but she wouldn't go any farther."
"I'll take her," Edward said. I could hear the smile still in his voice. "You can go back to class."
"No," Mike protested. "I'm supposed to do it."
Suddenly the sidewalk disappeared from beneath me. My eyes flew open in shock. Edward had scooped me up in his arms, as easily as if I weighed ten pounds instead of a hundred and ten.
"Put me down!" Please, please let me not vomit on him. He was walking before I was finished talking.
"Hey!" Mike called, already ten paces behind us.
Edward ignored him. "You look awful," he told me, grinning.
"Put me back on the sidewalk," I moaned. The rocking movement of his walk was not helping. He held me away from his body, gingerly, supporting all my weight with just his arms — it didn't seem to bother him.
"So you faint at the sight of blood?" he asked. This seemed to entertain him.
I didn't answer. I closed my eyes again and fought the nausea with all my strength, clamping my lips together.
"And not even your own blood," he continued, enjoying himself.
I don't know how he opened the door while carrying me, but it was suddenly warm, so I knew we were inside.
"Oh my," I heard a female voice gasp.
"She fainted in Biology," Edward explained.
I opened my eyes. I was in the office, and Edward was striding past the front counter toward the nurse's door. Ms. Cope, the redheaded front office receptionist, ran ahead of him to hold it open. The grandmotherly nurse looked up from a novel, astonished, as Edward swung me into the room and placed me gently on the crackly paper that covered the brown vinyl mattress on the one cot. Then he moved to stand against the wall as far across the narrow room as possible. His eyes were bright, excited.
"She's just a little faint," he reassured the startled nurse. "They're blood typing in Biology."
The nurse nodded sagely. "There's always one." He muffled a snicker.
"Just lie down for a minute, honey; it'll pass."
"I know," I sighed. The nausea was already fading. "Does this happen a lot?" she asked.
"Sometimes," I admitted. Edward coughed to hide another laugh. "You can go back to class now," she told him.
"I'm supposed to stay with her." He said this with such assured authority that — even though she pursed her lips — the nurse didn't argue it further.
"I'll go get you some ice for your forehead, dear," she said to me, and then bustled out of the room.
"You were right," I moaned, letting my eyes close.
"I usually am — but about what in particular this time?" "Ditching is healthy." I practiced breathing evenly.
"You scared me for a minute there," he admitted after a pause. His tone made it sound like he was confessing a humiliating weakness. "I thought Newton was dragging your dead body off to bury it in the woods."
"Haha." I still had my eyes closed, but I was feeling more normal every minute. "Honestly — I've seen corpses with better color. I was concerned that I might have to
avenge your murder."
"Poor Mike. I'll bet he's mad."
"He absolutely loathes me," Edward said cheerfully.
"You can't know that," I argued, but then I wondered suddenly if he could. "I saw his face — I could tell."
"How did you see me? I thought you were ditching." I was almost fine now, though the queasiness would probably pass faster if I'd eaten something for lunch. On the other hand, maybe it was lucky my stomach was empty.
"I was in my car, listening to a CD." Such a normal response — it surprised me.
I heard the door and opened my eyes to see the nurse with a cold compress in her hand. "Here you go, dear." She laid it across my forehead. "You're looking better," she added. "I think I'm fine," I said, sitting up. Just a little ringing in my ears, no spinning. The
mint green walls stayed where they should.
I could see she was about to make me lie back down, but the door opened just then, and Ms. Cope stuck her head in.
"We've got another one," she warned.
I hopped down to free up the cot for the next invalid.
I handed the compress back to the nurse. "Here, I don't need this."
And then Mike staggered through the door, now supporting a sallow-looking Lee Stephens, another boy in our Biology class. Edward and I drew back against the wall to give them room.
"Oh no," Edward muttered. "Go out to the office, Bella." I looked up at him, bewildered.
"Trust me — go."
I spun and caught the door before it closed, darting out of the infirmary. I could feel Edward right behind me.
"You actually listened to me." He was stunned.
"I smelled the blood," I said, wrinkling my nose. Lee wasn't sick from watching other people, like me.
"People can't smell blood," he contradicted.
"Well, I can — that's what makes me sick. It smells like rust… and salt." He was staring at me with an unfathomable expression.
"What?" I asked. "It's nothing."
Mike came through the door then, glancing from me to Edward. The look he gave Edward confirmed what Edward had said about loathing. He looked back at me, his eyes glum.
"You look better," he accused.
"Just keep your hand in your pocket," I warned him again.
"It's not bleeding anymore," he muttered. "Are you going back to class?" "Are you kidding? I'd just have to turn around and come back."
"Yeah, I guess… So are you going this weekend? To the beach?" While he spoke, he flashed another glare toward Edward, who was standing against the cluttered counter, motionless as a sculpture, staring off into space.
I tried to sound as friendly as possible. "Sure, I said I was in."
"We're meeting at my dad's store, at ten." His eyes flickered to Edward again, wondering if he was giving out too much information. His body language made it clear that it wasn't an open invitation.
"I'll be there," I promised.
"I'll see you in Gym, then," he said, moving uncertainly toward the door.
"See you," I replied. He looked at me once more, his round face slightly pouting, and then as he walked slowly through the door, his shoulders slumped. A swell of sympathy washed over me. I pondered seeing his disappointed face again… in Gym.
"Gym," I groaned.
"I can take care of that." I hadn't noticed Edward moving to my side, but he spoke now in my ear. "Go sit down and look pale," he muttered.
That wasn't a challenge; I was always pale, and my recent swoon had left a light sheen of sweat on my face. I sat in one of the creaky folding chairs and rested my head against the wall with my eyes closed. Fainting spells always exhausted me.
I heard Edward speaking softly at the counter. "Ms. Cope?"
"Yes?" I hadn't heard her return to her desk.
"Bella has Gym next hour, and I don't think she feels well enough. Actually, I was thinking I should take her home now. Do you think you could excuse her from class?"
His voice was like melting honey. I could imagine how much more overwhelming his eyes would be.
"Do you need to be excused, too, Edward?" Ms. Cope fluttered. Why couldn't I do that? "No, I have Mrs. Goff, she won't mind."
"Okay, it's all taken care of. You feel better, Bella," she called to me. I nodded weakly, hamming it up just a bit.
"Can you walk, or do you want me to carry you again?" With his back to the receptionist, his expression became sarcastic.
"I'll walk."
I stood carefully, and I was still fine. He held the door for me, his smile polite but his eyes mocking. I walked out into the cold, fine mist that had just begun to fall. It felt nice
— the first time I'd enjoyed the constant moisture falling out of the sky — as it washed my face clean of the sticky perspiration.
"Thanks," I said as he followed me out. "It's almost worth getting sick to miss Gym." "Anytime." He was staring straight forward, squinting into the rain.
"So are you going? This Saturday, I mean?" I was hoping he would, though it seemed unlikely. I couldn't picture him loading up to carpool with the rest of the kids from school; he didn't belong in the same world. But just hoping that he might gave me the first twinge of enthusiasm I'd felt for the outing.
"Where are you all going, exactly?" He was still looking ahead, expressionless.
"Down to La Push, to First Beach." I studied his face, trying to read it. His eyes seemed to narrow infinitesimally.
He glanced down at me from the corner of his eye, smiling wryly. "I really don't think I was invited."
I sighed. "I just invited you."
"Let's you and I not push poor Mike any further this week. We don't want him to snap." His eyes danced; he was enjoying the idea more than he should.
"Mike-schmike." I muttered, preoccupied by the way he'd said "you and I." I liked it more than I should.
We were near the parking lot now. I veered left, toward my truck. Something caught my jacket, yanking me back.
"Where do you think you're going?" he asked, outraged. He was gripping a fistful of my jacket in one hand.
I was confused. "I'm going home."
"Didn't you hear me promise to take you safely home? Do you think I'm going to let you drive in your condition?" His voice was still indignant.
"What condition? And what about my truck?" I complained.
"I'll have Alice drop it off after school." He was towing me toward his car now, pulling me by my jacket. It was all I could do to keep from falling backward. He'd probably just drag me along anyway if I did.
"Let go!" I insisted. He ignored me. I staggered along sideways across the wet sidewalk until we reached the Volvo. Then he finally freed me — I stumbled against the passenger door.
"You are so pushy !" I grumbled.
"It's open," was all he responded. He got in the driver's side.
"I am perfectly capable of driving myself home!" I stood by the car, fuming. It was
raining harder now, and I'd never put my hood up, so my hair was dripping down my back.
He lowered the automatic window and leaned toward me across the seat. "Get in, Bella."
I didn't answer. I was mentally calculating my chances of reaching the truck before he could catch me. I had to admit, they weren't good.
"I'll just drag you back," he threatened, guessing my plan.
I tried to maintain what dignity I could as I got into his car. I wasn't very successful — I looked like a half-drowned cat and my boots squeaked.
"This is completely unnecessary," I said stiffly.
He didn't answer. He fiddled with the controls, turning the heater up and the music down. As he pulled out of the parking lot, I was preparing to give him the silent treatment
— my face in full pout mode — but then I recognized the music playing, and my curiosity got the better of my intentions.
"Clair deLune?" I asked, surprised.
"You know Debussy?" He sounded surprised, too.
"Not well," I admitted. "My mother plays a lot of classical music around the house — I only know my favorites."
"It's one of my favorites, too." He stared out through the rain, lost in thought.
I listened to the music, relaxing against the light gray leather seat. It was impossible not to respond to the familiar, soothing melody. The rain blurred everything outside the window into gray and green smudges. I began to realize we were driving very fast; the car moved so steadily, so evenly, though, I didn't feel the speed. Only the town flashing by gave it away.
"What is your mother like?" he asked me suddenly.
I glanced over to see him studying me with curious eyes.
"She looks a lot like me, but she's prettier," I said. He raised his eyebrows. "I have too much Charlie in me. She's more outgoing than I am, and braver. She's irresponsible and slightly eccentric, and she's a very unpredictable cook. She's my best friend." I stopped. Talking about her was making me depressed.
"How old are you, Bella?" His voice sounded frustrated for some reason I couldn't imagine. He'd stopped the car, and I realized we were at Charlie's house already. The rain was so heavy that I could barely see the house at all. It was like the car was submerged under a river.
"I'm seventeen," I responded, a little confused. "You don't seem seventeen."
His tone was reproachful; it made me laugh. "What?" he asked, curious again.
"My mom always says I was born thirty-five years old and that I get more middle-aged every year." I laughed, and then sighed. "Well, someone has to be the adult." I paused for a second. "You don't seem much like a junior in high school yourself," I noted.
He made a face and changed the subject. "So why did your mother marry Phil?"
I was surprised he would remember the name; I'd mentioned it just once, almost two months ago. It took me a moment to answer.
"My mother… she's very young for her age. I think Phil makes her feel even younger.
At any rate, she's crazy about him." I shook my head. The attraction was a mystery to me. "Do you approve?" he asked.
"Does it matter?" I countered. "I want her to be happy… and he is who she wants." "That's very generous… I wonder," he mused.
"What?"
"Would she extend the same courtesy to you, do you think? No matter who your choice was?" He was suddenly intent, his eyes searching mine.
"I-I think so," I stuttered. "But she's the parent, after all. It's a little bit different." "No one too scary then," he teased.
I grinned in response. "What do you mean by scary? Multiple facial piercings and extensive tattoos?"
"That's one definition, I suppose." "What's your definition?"
But he ignored my question and asked me another. "Do you think that I could be scary?" He raised one eyebrow, and the faint trace of a smile lightened his face.
I thought for a moment, wondering whether the truth or a lie would go over better. I decided to go with the truth. "Hmmm… I think you could be, if you wanted to."
"Are you frightened of me now?" The smile vanished, and his heavenly face was suddenly serious.
"No." But I answered too quickly. The smile returned.
"So, now are you going to tell me about your family?" I asked to distract him. "It's got to be a much more interesting story than mine."
He was instantly cautious. "What do you want to know?" "The Cullens adopted you?" I verified.
"Yes."
I hesitated for a moment. "What happened to your parents?" "They died many years ago." His tone was matter-of-fact. "I'm sorry," I mumbled.
"I don't really remember them that clearly. Carlisle and Esme have been my parents for a long time now."
"And you love them." It wasn't a question. It was obvious in the way he spoke of them. "Yes." He smiled. "I couldn't imagine two better people."
"You're very lucky." "I know I am."
"And your brother and sister?"
He glanced at the clock on the dashboard.
"My brother and sister, and Jasper and Rosalie for that matter, are going to be quite upset if they have to stand in the rain waiting for me."
"Oh, sorry, I guess you have to go." I didn't want to get out of the car.
"And you probably want your truck back before Chief Swan gets home, so you don't have to tell him about the Biology incident." He grinned at me.
"I'm sure he's already heard. There are no secrets in Forks." I sighed. He laughed, and there was an edge to his laughter.
"Have fun at the beach… good weather for sunbathing." He glanced out at the sheeting rain.
"Won't I see you tomorrow?"
"No. Emmett and I are starting the weekend early."
"What are you going to do?" A friend could ask that, right? I hoped the disappointment wasn't too apparent in my voice.
"We're going to be hiking in the Goat Rocks Wilderness, just south of Rainier." I remembered Charlie had said the Cullens went camping frequently.
"Oh, well, have fun." I tried to sound enthusiastic. I don't think I fooled him, though. A smile was playing around the edges of his lips.
"Will you do something for me this weekend?" He turned to look me straight in the face, utilizing the full power of his burning gold eyes.
I nodded helplessly.
"Don't be offended, but you seem to be one of those people who just attract accidents like a magnet. So… try not to fall into the ocean or get run over or anything, all right?" He smiled crookedly.
The helplessness had faded as he spoke. I glared at him.
"I'll see what I can do," I snapped as I jumped out into the rain. I slammed the door behind me with excessive force.
He was still smiling as he drove away.
6. Scary Stories
As I sat in my room, trying to concentrate on the third act of Macbeth, I was really listening for my truck. I would have thought, even over the pounding rain, I could have heard the engine's roar. But when I went to peek out the curtain — again — it was suddenly there.
I wasn't looking forward to Friday, and it more than lived up to my non-expectations. Of course there were the fainting comments. Jessica especially seemed to get a kick out of that story. Luckily Mike had kept his mouth shut, and no one seemed to know about Edward's involvement. She did have a lot of questions about lunch, though.
"So what did Edward Cullen want yesterday?" Jessica asked in Trig.
"I don't know," I answered truthfully. "He never really got to the point." "You looked kind of mad," she fished.
"Did I?" I kept my expression blank.
"You know, I've never seen him sit with anyone but his family before. That was weird." "Weird," I agreed. She seemed annoyed; she flipped her dark curls impatiently — I
guessed she'd been hoping to hear something that would make a good story for her to pass on.
The worst part about Friday was that, even though I knew he wasn't going to be there, I still hoped. When I walked into the cafeteria with Jessica and Mike, I couldn't keep from looking at his table, where Rosalie, Alice, and Jasper sat talking, heads close together.
And I couldn't stop the gloom that engulfed me as I realized I didn't know how long I would have to wait before I saw him again.
At my usual table, everyone was full of our plans for the next day. Mike was animated again, putting a great deal of trust in the local weatherman who promised sun tomorrow. I'd have to see that before I believed it. But it was warmer today — almost sixty. Maybe the outing wouldn't be completely miserable.
I intercepted a few unfriendly glances from Lauren during lunch, which I didn't understand until we were all walking out of the room together. I was right behind her, just a foot from her slick, silver blond hair, and she was evidently unaware of that.
"…don't know why Bella" — she sneered my name — "doesn't just sit with the Cullens from now on."
I heard her muttering to Mike. I'd never noticed what an unpleasant, nasal voice she had, and I was surprised by the malice in it. I really didn't know her well at all, certainly not well enough for her to dislike me — or so I'd thought. "She's my friend; she sits with us," Mike whispered back loyally, but also a bit territorially. I paused to let Jess and Angela pass me. I didn't want to hear any more.
That night at dinner, Charlie seemed enthusiastic about my trip to La Push in the morning. I think he felt guilty for leaving me home alone on the weekends, but he'd spent too many years building his habits to break them now. Of course he knew the names of all the kids going, and their parents, and their great-grandparents, too, probably. He seemed to approve. I wondered if he would approve of my plan to ride to Seattle with Edward Cullen. Not that I was going to tell him.
"Dad, do you know a place called Goat Rocks or something like that? I think it's south of Mount Rainier," I asked casually.
"Yeah — why?"
I shrugged. "Some kids were talking about camping there."
"It's not a very good place for camping." He sounded surprised." Too many bears. Most people go there during the hunting season."
"Oh," I murmured. "Maybe I got the name wrong."
I meant to sleep in, but an unusual brightness woke me. I opened my eyes to see a clear yellow light streaming through my window. I couldn't believe it. I hurried to the window to check, and sure enough, there was the sun. It was in the wrong place in the sky, too low, and it didn't seem to be as close as it should be, but it was definitely the sun. Clouds ringed the horizon, but a large patch of blue was visible in the middle. I lingered by the window as long as I could, afraid that if I left the blue would disappear again.
The Newtons ' Olympic Outfitters store was just north of town. I'd seen the store, but I'd never stopped there — not having much need for any supplies required for being outdoors over an extended period of time. In the parking lot I recognized Mike's Suburban and Tyler's Sentra. As I pulled up next to their vehicles, I could see the group standing around in front of the Suburban. Eric was there, along with two other boys I had class with; I was fairly sure their names were Ben and Conner. Jess was there, flanked by Angela and Lauren. Three other girls stood with them, including one I remembered falling over in Gym on Friday. That one gave me a dirty look as I got out of the truck, and whispered something to Lauren. Lauren shook out her cornsilk hair and eyed me scornfully.
So it was going to be one of those days. At least Mike was happy to see me.
"You came!" he called, delighted. "And I said it would be sunny today, didn't I?" "I told you I was coming," I reminded him.
"We're just waiting for Lee and Samantha… unless you invited someone," Mike added. "Nope," I lied lightly, hoping I wouldn't get caught in the lie. But also wishing that a
miracle would occur, and Edward would appear. Mike looked satisfied.
"Will you ride in my car? It's that or Lee's mom's minivan." "Sure."
He smiled blissfully. It was so easy to make Mike happy.
"You can have shotgun," he promised. I hid my chagrin. It wasn't as simple to make Mike and Jessica happy at the same time. I could see Jessica glowering at us now.
The numbers worked out in my favor, though. Lee brought two extra people, and suddenly every seat was necessary. I managed to wedge Jess in between Mike and me in the front seat of the Suburban. Mike could have been more graceful about it, but at least Jess seemed appeased.
It was only fifteen miles to La Push from Forks, with gorgeous, dense green forests edging the road most of the way and the wide Quillayute River snaking beneath it twice. I was glad I had the window seat. We'd rolled the windows down — the Suburban was a bit claustrophobic with nine people in it — and I tried to absorb as much sunlight as possible.
I'd been to the beaches around La Push many times during my Forks summers with Charlie, so the mile-long crescent of First Beach was familiar to me. It was still breathtaking. The water was dark gray, even in the sunlight, white-capped and heaving to the gray, rocky shore. Islands rose out of the steel harbor waters with sheer cliff sides,
reaching to uneven summits, and crowned with austere, soaring firs. The beach had only a thin border of actual sand at the water's edge, after which it grew into millions of large, smooth stones that looked uniformly gray from a distance, but close up were every shade a stone could be: terra-cotta, sea green, lavender, blue gray, dull gold. The tide line was strewn with huge driftwood trees, bleached bone white in the salt waves, some piled together against the edge of the forest fringe, some lying solitary, just out of reach of the waves.
There was a brisk wind coming off the waves, cool and briny. Pelicans floated on the swells while seagulls and a lone eagle wheeled above them. The clouds still circled the sky, threatening to invade at any moment, but for now the sun shone bravely in its halo of blue sky.
We picked our way down to the beach, Mike leading the way to a ring of driftwood logs that had obviously been used for parties like ours before. There was a fire circle already in place, filled with black ashes. Eric and the boy I thought was named Ben gathered broken branches of driftwood from the drier piles against the forest edge, and soon had a teepee-shaped construction built atop the old cinders.
"Have you ever seen a driftwood fire?" Mike asked me. I was sitting on one of the bone-colored benches; the other girls clustered, gossiping excitedly, on either side of me. Mike kneeled by the fire, lighting one of the smaller sticks with a cigarette lighter.
"No," I said as he placed the blazing twig carefully against the teepee.
"You'll like this then — watch the colors." He lit another small branch and laid it alongside the first. The flames started to lick quickly up the dry wood.
"It's blue," I said in surprise.
"The salt does it. Pretty, isn't it?" He lit one more piece, placed it where the fire hadn't yet caught, and then came to sit by me. Thankfully, Jess was on his other side. She turned to him and claimed his attention. I watched the strange blue and green flames crackle toward the sky.
After a half hour of chatter, some of the boys wanted to hike to the nearby tidal pools. It was a dilemma. On the one hand, I loved the tide pools. They had fascinated me since I was a child; they were one of the only things I ever looked forward to when I had to come to Forks. On the other hand, I'd also fallen into them a lot. Not a big deal when you're seven and with your dad. It reminded me of Edward's request — that I not fall into the ocean.
Lauren was the one who made my decision for me. She didn't want to hike, and she was definitely wearing the wrong shoes for it. Most of the other girls besides Angela and Jessica decided to stay on the beach as well. I waited until Tyler and Eric had committed to remaining with them before I got up quietly to join the pro-hiking group. Mike gave me a huge smile when he saw that I was coming.
The hike wasn't too long, though I hated to lose the sky in the woods. The green light of the forest was strangely at odds with the adolescent laughter, too murky and ominous to be in harmony with the light banter around me. I had to watch each step I took very carefully, avoiding roots below and branches above, and I soon fell behind. Eventually I broke through the emerald confines of the forest and found the rocky shore again. It was low tide, and a tidal river flowed past us on its way to the sea. Along its pebbled banks, shallow pools that never completely drained were teeming with life.
I was very cautious not to lean too far over the little ocean ponds. The others were
fearless, leaping over the rocks, perching precariously on the edges. I found a very stable- looking rock on the fringe of one of the largest pools and sat there cautiously, spellbound by the natural aquarium below me. The bouquets of brilliant anemones undulated ceaselessly in the invisible current, twisted shells scurried about the edges, obscuring the crabs within them, starfish stuck motionless to the rocks and each other, while one small black eel with white racing stripes wove through the bright green weeds, waiting for the sea to return. I was completely absorbed, except for one small part of my mind that wondered what Edward was doing now, and trying to imagine what he would be saying if he were here with me.
Finally the boys were hungry, and I got up stiffly to follow them back. I tried to keep up better this time through the woods, so naturally I fell a few times. I got some shallow scrapes on my palms, and the knees of my jeans were stained green, but it could have been worse.
When we got back to First Beach, the group we'd left behind had multiplied. As we got closer we could see the shining, straight black hair and copper skin of the newcomers, teenagers from the reservation come to socialize.
The food was already being passed around, and the boys hurried to claim a share while Eric introduced us as we each entered the driftwood circle. Angela and I were the last to arrive, and, as Eric said our names, I noticed a younger boy sitting on the stones near the fire glance up at me in interest. I sat down next to Angela, and Mike brought us sandwiches and an array of sodas to choose from, while a boy who looked to be the oldest of the visitors rattled off the names of the seven others with him. All I caught was that one of the girls was also named Jessica, and the boy who noticed me was named Jacob.
It was relaxing to sit with Angela; she was a restful kind of person to be around — she didn't feel the need to fill every silence with chatter. She left me free to think undisturbed while we ate. And I was thinking about how disjointedly time seemed to flow in Forks, passing in a blur at times, with single images standing out more clearly than others. And then, at other times, every second was significant, etched in my mind. I knew exactly what caused the difference, and it disturbed me.
During lunch the clouds started to advance, slinking across the blue sky, darting in front of the sun momentarily, casting long shadows across the beach, and blackening the waves. As they finished eating, people started to drift away in twos and threes. Some walked down to the edge of the waves, trying to skip rocks across the choppy surface.
Others were gathering a second expedition to the tide pools. Mike — with Jessica shadowing him — headed up to the one shop in the village. Some of the local kids went with them; others went along on the hike. By the time they all had scattered, I was sitting alone on my driftwood log, with Lauren and Tyler occupying themselves by the CD player someone had thought to bring, and three teenagers from the reservation perched around the circle, including the boy named Jacob and the oldest boy who had acted as spokesperson.
A few minutes after Angela left with the hikers, Jacob sauntered over to take her place by my side. He looked fourteen, maybe fifteen, and had long, glossy black hair pulled back with a rubber band at the nape of his neck. His skin was beautiful, silky and russet- colored; his eyes were dark, set deep above the high planes of his cheekbones. He still had just a hint of childish roundness left around his chin. Altogether, a very pretty face.
However, my positive opinion of his looks was damaged by the first words out of his mouth.
"You're Isabella Swan, aren't you?"
It was like the first day of school all over again. "Bella," I sighed.
"I'm Jacob Black." He held his hand out in a friendly gesture. "You bought my dad's truck."
"Oh," I said, relieved, shaking his sleek hand. "You're Billy's son. I probably should remember you."
"No, I'm the youngest of the family — you would remember my older sisters." "Rachel and Rebecca," I suddenly recalled. Charlie and Billy had thrown us together a
lot during my visits, to keep us busy while they fished. We were all too shy to make much progress as friends. Of course, I'd kicked up enough tantrums to end the fishing trips by the time I was eleven.
"Are they here?" I examined the girls at the ocean's edge, wondering if I would recognize them now.
"No." Jacob shook his head. "Rachel got a scholarship to Washington State, and Rebecca married a Samoan surfer — she lives in Hawaii now."
"Married. Wow." I was stunned. The twins were only a little over a year older than I was.
"So how do you like the truck?" he asked. "I love it. It runs great."
"Yeah, but it's really slow," he laughed. "I was so relived when Charlie bought it. My dad wouldn't let me work on building another car when we had a perfectly good vehicle right there."
"It's not that slow," I objected. "Have you tried to go over sixty?" "No," I admitted.
"Good. Don't." He grinned.
I couldn't help grinning back. "It does great in a collision," I offered in my truck's defense.
"I don't think a tank could take out that old monster," he agreed with another laugh. "So you build cars?" I asked, impressed.
"When I have free time, and parts. You wouldn't happen to know where I could get my hands on a master cylinder for a 1986 Volkswagen Rabbit?" he added jokingly. He had a pleasant, husky voice.
"Sorry," I laughed, "I haven't seen any lately, but I'll keep my eyes open for you." As if I knew what that was. He was very easy to talk with.
He flashed a brilliant smile, looking at me appreciatively in a way I was learning to recognize. I wasn't the only one who noticed.
"You know Bella, Jacob?" Lauren asked — in what I imagined was an insolent tone — from across the fire.
"We've sort of known each other since I was born," he laughed, smiling at me again. "How nice." She didn't sound like she thought it was nice at all, and her pale, fishy eyes
narrowed.
"Bella," she called again, watching my face carefully, "I was just saying to Tyler that it
was too bad none of the Cullens could come out today. Didn't anyone think to invite them?" Her expression of concern was unconvincing.
"You mean Dr. Carlisle Cullen's family?" the tall, older boy asked before I could respond, much to Lauren's irritation. He was really closer to a man than a boy, and his voice was very deep.
"Yes, do you know them?" she asked condescendingly, turning halfway toward him. "The Cullens don't come here," he said in a tone that closed the subject, ignoring her
question.
Tyler, trying to win back her attention, asked Lauren's opinion on a CD he held. She was distracted.
I stared at the deep-voiced boy, taken aback, but he was looking away toward the dark forest behind us. He'd said that the Cullens didn't come here, but his tone had implied something more — that they weren't allowed; they were prohibited. His manner left a strange impression on me, and I tried to ignore it without success.
Jacob interrupted my meditation. "So is Forks driving you insane yet?"
"Oh, I'd say that's an understatement." I grimaced. He grinned understandingly.
I was still turning over the brief comment on the Cullens, and I had a sudden inspiration. It was a stupid plan, but I didn't have any better ideas. I hoped that young Jacob was as yet inexperienced around girls, so that he wouldn't see through my sure-to- be-pitiful attempts at flirting.
"Do you want to walk down the beach with me?" I asked, trying to imitate that way Edward had of looking up from underneath his eyelashes. It couldn't have nearly the same effect, I was sure, but Jacob jumped up willingly enough.
As we walked north across the multihued stones toward the driftwood seawall, the clouds finally closed ranks across the sky, causing the sea to darken and the temperature to drop. I shoved my hands deep into the pockets of my jacket.
"So you're, what, sixteen?" I asked, trying not to look like an idiot as I fluttered my eyelids the way I'd seen girls do on TV.
"I just turned fifteen," he confessed, flattered.
"Really?" My face was full of false surprise. "I would have thought you were older." "I'm tall for my age," he explained.
"Do you come up to Forks much?" I asked archly, as if I was hoping for a yes. I sounded idiotic to myself. I was afraid he would turn on me with disgust and accuse me of my fraud, but he still seemed flattered.
"Not too much," he admitted with a frown. "But when I get my car finished I can go up as much as I want — after I get my license," he amended.
"Who was that other boy Lauren was talking to? He seemed a little old to be hanging out with us." I purposefully lumped myself in with the youngsters, trying to make it clear that I preferred Jacob.
"That's Sam — he's nineteen," he informed me.
"What was that he was saying about the doctor's family?" I asked innocently.
"The Cullens? Oh, they're not supposed to come onto the reservation." He looked away, out toward James Island, as he confirmed what I'd thought I'd heard in Sam's voice.
"Why not?"
He glanced back at me, biting his lip. "Oops. I'm not supposed to say anything about that."
"Oh, I won't tell anyone, I'm just curious." I tried to make my smile alluring, wondering if I was laying it on too thick.
He smiled back, though, looking allured. Then he lifted one eyebrow and his voice was even huskier than before.
"Do you like scary stories?" he asked ominously.
"I love them," I enthused, making an effort to smolder at him.
Jacob strolled to a nearby driftwood tree that had its roots sticking out like the attenuated legs of a huge, pale spider. He perched lightly on one of the twisted roots while I sat beneath him on the body of the tree. He stared down at the rocks, a smile hovering around the edges of his broad lips. I could see he was going to try to make this good. I focused on keeping the vital interest I felt out of my eyes.
"Do you know any of our old stories, about where we came from — the Quileutes, I mean?" he began.
"Not really," I admitted.
"Well, there are lots of legends, some of them claiming to date back to the Flood — supposedly, the ancient Quileutes tied their canoes to the tops of the tallest trees on the mountain to survive like Noah and the ark." He smiled, to show me how little stock he put in the histories. "Another legend claims that we descended from wolves — and that the wolves are our brothers still. It's against tribal law to kill them.
"Then there are the stories about the cold ones." His voice dropped a little lower. "The cold ones?" I asked, not faking my intrigue now.
"Yes. There are stories of the cold ones as old as the wolf legends, and some much more recent. According to legend, my own great-grandfather knew some of them. He was the one who made the treaty that kept them off our land." He rolled his eyes.
"Your great-grandfather?" I encouraged.
"He was a tribal elder, like my father. You see, the cold ones are the natural enemies of the wolf—well, not the wolf, really, but the wolves that turn into men, like our ancestors. You would call them werewolves."
"Werewolves have enemies?" "Only one."
I stared at him earnestly, hoping to disguise my impatience as admiration.
"So you see," Jacob continued, "the cold ones are traditionally our enemies. But this pack that came to our territory during my great-grandfather's time was different. They didn't hunt the way others of their kind did — they weren't supposed to be dangerous to the tribe. So my great-grandfather made a truce with them. If they would promise to stay off our lands, we wouldn't expose them to the pale-faces." He winked at me.
"If they weren't dangerous, then why… ?"I tried to understand, struggling not to let him see how seriously I was considering his ghost story.
"There's always a risk for humans to be around the cold ones, even if they're civilized like this clan was. You never know when they might get too hungry to resist." He deliberately worked a thick edge of menace into his tone.
"What do you mean, 'civilized'?"
"They claimed that they didn't hunt humans. They supposedly were somehow able to prey on animals instead."
I tried to keep my voice casual. "So how does it fit in with the Cullens ? Are they like the cold ones your great grandfather met?"
"No." He paused dramatically. "They are the same ones."
He must have thought the expression on my face was fear inspired by his story. He smiled, pleased, and continued.
"There are more of them now, a new female and a new male, but the rest are the same. In my great-grandfather's time they already knew of the leader, Carlisle. He'd been here and gone before your people had even arrived." He was fighting a smile.
"And what are they?" I finally asked. "What are the cold ones?" He smiled darkly.
"Blood drinkers," he replied in a chilling voice. "Your people call them vampires."
I stared out at the rough surf after he answered, not sure what my face was exposing. "You have goose bumps," he laughed delightedly.
"You're a good storyteller," I complimented him, still staring into the waves.
"Pretty crazy stuff, though, isn't it? No wonder my dad doesn't want us to talk about it to anyone."
I couldn't control my expression enough to look at him yet. "Don't worry, I won't give you away."
"I guess I just violated the treaty," he laughed.
"I'll take it to the grave," I promised, and then I shivered.
"Seriously, though, don't say anything to Charlie. He was pretty mad at my dad when he heard that some of us weren't going to the hospital since Dr. Cullen started working there."
"I won't, of course not."
"So do you think we're a bunch of superstitious natives or what?" he asked in a playful tone, but with a hint of worry. I still hadn't looked away from the ocean.
I turned and smiled at him as normally as I could.
"No. I think you're very good at telling scary stories, though. I still have goose bumps, see?" I held up my arm.
"Cool." He smiled.
And then the sound of the beach rocks clattering against each other warned us that someone was approaching. Our heads snapped up at the same time to see Mike and Jessica about fifty yards away, walking toward us.
"There you are, Bella," Mike called in relief, waving his arm over his head.
"Is that your boyfriend?" Jacob asked, alerted by the jealous edge in Mike's voice. I was surprised it was so obvious.
"No, definitely not," I whispered. I was tremendously grateful to Jacob, and eager to make him as happy as possible. I winked at him, carefully turning away from Mike to do so. He smiled, elated by my inept flirting.
"So when I get my license…" he began.
"You should come see me in Forks. We could hang out sometime." I felt guilty as I said this, knowing that I'd used him. But I really did like Jacob. He was someone I could easily be friends with.
Mike had reached us now, with Jessica still a few paces back. I could see his eyes appraising Jacob, and looking satisfied at his obvious youth.
"Where have you been?" he asked, though the answer was right in front of him.
"Jacob was just telling me some local stories," I volunteered. "It was really interesting." I smiled at Jacob warmly, and he grinned back.
"Well," Mike paused, carefully reassessing the situation as he watched our camaraderie. "We're packing up — it looks like it's going to rain soon."
We all looked up at the glowering sky. It certainly did look like rain. "Okay." I jumped up. "I'm coming."
"It was nice to see you again," Jacob said, and I could tell he was taunting Mike just a bit.
"It really was. Next time Charlie comes down to see Billy, I'll come, too," I promised. His grin stretched across his face. "That would be cool."
"And thanks," I added earnestly.
I pulled up my hood as we tramped across the rocks toward the parking lot. A few drops were beginning to fall, making black spots on the stones where they landed. When we got to the Suburban the others were already loading everything back in. I crawled into the backseat by Angela and Tyler, announcing that I'd already had my turn in the shotgun position. Angela just stared out the window at the escalating storm, and Lauren twisted around in the middle seat to occupy Tyler 's attention, so I could simply lay my head back on the seat and close my eyes and try very hard not to think.
7. Nightmare
I told Charlie I had a lot of homework to do, and that I didn't want anything to eat. There was a basketball game on that he was excited about, though of course I had no idea what was special about it, so he wasn't aware of anything unusual in my face or tone.
Once in my room, I locked the door. I dug through my desk until I found my old headphones, and I plugged them into my little CD player. I picked up a CD that Phil had given to me for Christmas. It was one of his favorite bands, but they used a little too much bass and shrieking for my tastes. I popped it into place and lay down on my bed. I put on the headphones, hit Play, and turned up the volume until it hurt my ears. I closed my eyes, but the light still intruded, so I added a pillow over the top half of my face.
I concentrated very carefully on the music, trying to understand the lyrics, to unravel the complicated drum patterns. By the third time I'd listened through the CD, I knew all the words to the choruses, at least. I was surprised to find that I really did like the band after all, once I got past the blaring noise. I'd have to thank Phil again.
And it worked. The shattering beats made it impossible for me to think — which was the whole purpose of the exercise. I listened to the CD again and again, until I was singing along with all the songs, until, finally, I fell asleep.
I opened my eyes to a familiar place. Aware in some corner of my consciousness that I was dreaming, I recognized the green light of the forest. I could hear the waves crashing against the rocks somewhere nearby. And I knew that if I found the ocean, I'd be able to see the sun. I was trying to follow the sound, but then Jacob Black was there, tugging on my hand, pulling me back toward the blackest part of the forest.
"Jacob? What's wrong?" I asked. His face was frightened as he yanked with all his strength against my resistance; I didn't want to go into the dark.
"Run, Bella, you have to run!" he whispered, terrified.
"This way, Bella!" I recognized Mike's voice calling out of the gloomy heart of the trees, but I couldn't see him.
"Why?" I asked, still pulling against Jacob's grasp, desperate now to find the sun.
But Jacob let go of my hand and yelped, suddenly shaking, falling to the dim forest floor. He twitched on the ground as I watched in horror.
"Jacob!" I screamed. But he was gone. In his place was a large red-brown wolf with black eyes. The wolf faced away from me, pointing toward the shore, the hair on the back of his shoulders bristling, low growls issuing from between his exposed fangs.
"Bella, run!" Mike cried out again from behind me. But I didn't turn. I was watching a light coming toward me from the beach.
And then Edward stepped out from the trees, his skin faintly glowing, his eyes black and dangerous. He held up one hand and beckoned me to come to him. The wolf growled at my feet.
I took a step forward, toward Edward. He smiled then, and his teeth were sharp, pointed.
"Trust me," he purred.
I took another step.
The wolf launched himself across the space between me and the vampire, fangs aiming for the jugular.
"No!" I screamed, wrenching upright out of my bed.
My sudden movement caused the headphones to pull the CD player off the bedside table, and it clattered to the wooden floor.
My light was still on, and I was sitting fully dressed on the bed, with my shoes on. I glanced, disoriented, at the clock on my dresser. It was five-thirty in the morning.
I groaned, fell back, and rolled over onto my face, kicking off my boots. I was too uncomfortable to get anywhere near sleep, though. I rolled back over and unbuttoned my jeans, yanking them off awkwardly as I tried to stay horizontal. I could feel the braid in my hair, an uncomfortable ridge along the back of my skull. I turned onto my side and ripped the rubber band out, quickly combing through the plaits with my fingers. I pulled the pillow back over my eyes.
It was all no use, of course. My subconscious had dredged up exactly the images I'd been trying so desperately to avoid. I was going to have to face them now.
I sat up, and my head spun for a minute as the blood flowed downward. First things first, I thought to myself, happy to put it off as long as possible. I grabbed my bathroom bag.
The shower didn't last nearly as long as I hoped it would, though. Even taking the time to blow-dry my hair, I was soon out of things to do in the bathroom. Wrapped in a towel, I crossed back to my room. I couldn't tell if Charlie was still asleep, or if he had already left. I went to look out my window, and the cruiser was gone. Fishing again.
I dressed slowly in my most comfy sweats and then made my bed — something I never did. I couldn't put it off any longer. I went to my desk and switched on my old computer.
I hated using the Internet here. My modem was sadly outdated, my free service substandard; just dialing up took so long that I decided to go get myself a bowl of cereal while I waited.
I ate slowly, chewing each bite with care. When I was done, I washed the bowl and spoon, dried them, and put them away. My feet dragged as I climbed the stairs. I went to my CD player first, picking it up off the floor and placing it precisely in the center of the table. I pulled out the headphones, and put them away in the desk drawer. Then I turned the same CD on, turning it down to the point where it was background noise.
With another sigh, I turned to my computer. Naturally, the screen was covered in pop- up ads. I sat in my hard folding chair and began closing all the little windows. Eventually I made it to my favorite search engine. I shot down a few more pop-ups and then typed in one word.
Vampire.
It took an infuriatingly long time, of course. When the results came up, there was a lot to sift through — everything from movies and TV shows to role-playing games, underground metal, and gothic cosmetic companies.
Then I found a promising site — Vampires A—Z. I waited impatiently for it to load, quickly clicking closed each ad that flashed across the screen. Finally the screen was finished — simple white background with black text, academic-looking. Two quotes greeted me on the home page:
Throughout the vast shadowy world of ghosts and demons there is no figure so terrible, no figure so dreaded and abhorred, yet dight with such fearful fascination, as the vampire, who is himself neither ghost nor demon, but yet who partakes the dark natures and possesses the mysterious and terrible qualities of both. —Rev. Montague Summers
If there is in this world a well-attested account, it is that of the vampires. Nothing is
lacking: official reports, affidavits of well-known people, of surgeons, of priests, of magistrates; the judicial proof is most complete. And with all that, who is there who believes in vampires? —Rousseau
The rest of the site was an alphabetized listing of all the different myths of vampires held throughout the world. The first I clicked on, the Danag, was a Filipino vampire supposedly responsible for planting taro on the islands long ago. The myth continued that the Danag worked with humans for many years, but the partnership ended one day when a woman cut her finger and a Danag sucked her wound, enjoying the taste so much that it drained her body completely of blood.
I read carefully through the descriptions, looking for anything that sounded familiar, let alone plausible. It seemed that most vampire myths centered around beautiful women as demons and children as victims; they also seemed like constructs created to explain away the high mortality rates for young children, and to give men an excuse for infidelity.
Many of the stories involved bodiless spirits and warnings against improper burials. There wasn't much that sounded like the movies I'd seen, and only a very few, like the Hebrew Estrie and the Polish Upier, who were even preoccupied with drinking blood.
Only three entries really caught my attention: the Romanian Varacolaci, a powerful undead being who could appear as a beautiful, pale-skinned human, the Slovak Nelapsi, a creature so strong and fast it could massacre an entire village in the single hour after midnight, and one other, the Stregoni benefici.
About this last there was only one brief sentence.
Stregoni benefici: An Italian vampire, said to be on the side of goodness, and a mortal enemy of all evil vampires.
It was a relief, that one small entry, the one myth among hundreds that claimed the existence of good vampires.
Overall, though, there was little that coincided with Jacob's stories or my own observations. I'd made a little catalogue in my mind as I'd read and carefully compared it with each myth. Speed, strength, beauty, pale skin, eyes that shift color; and then Jacob's criteria: blood drinkers, enemies of the werewolf, cold-skinned, and immortal. There were very few myths that matched even one factor.
And then another problem, one that I'd remembered from the small number of scary movies that I'd seen and was backed up by today's reading — vampires couldn't come out in the daytime, the sun would burn them to a cinder. They slept in coffins all day and came out only at night.
Aggravated, I snapped off the computer's main power switch, not waiting to shut things down properly. Through my irritation, I felt overwhelming embarrassment. It was all so stupid. I was sitting in my room, researching vampires. What was wrong with me? I decided that most of the blame belonged on the doorstep of the town of Forks — and the entire sodden Olympic Peninsula, for that matter.
I had to get out of the house, but there was nowhere I wanted to go that didn't involve a three-day drive. I pulled on my boots anyway, unclear where I was headed, and went downstairs. I shrugged into my raincoat without checking the weather and stomped out the door.
It was overcast, but not raining yet. I ignored my truck and started east on foot, angling across Charlie's yard toward the ever-encroaching forest. It didn't take long till I was deep enough for the house and the road to be invisible, for the only sound to be the squish of
the damp earth under my feet and the sudden cries of the jays.
There was a thin ribbon of a trail that led through the forest here, or I wouldn't risk wandering on my own like this. My sense of direction was hopeless; I could get lost in much less helpful surroundings. The trail wound deeper and deeper into the forest, mostly east as far as I could tell. It snaked around the Sitka spruces and the hemlocks, the yews and the maples. I only vaguely knew the names of the trees around me, and all I knew was due to Charlie pointing them out to me from the cruiser window in earlier days.
There were many I didn't know, and others I couldn't be sure about because they were so covered in green parasites.
I followed the trail as long as my anger at myself pushed me forward. As that started to ebb, I slowed. A few drops of moisture trickled down from the canopy above me, but I couldn't be certain if it was beginning to rain or if it was simply pools left over from yesterday, held high in the leaves above me, slowly dripping their way back to the earth. A recently fallen tree — I knew it was recent because it wasn't entirely carpeted in moss
— rested against the trunk of one of her sisters, creating a sheltered little bench just a few safe feet off the trail. I stepped over the ferns and sat carefully, making sure my jacket was between the damp seat and my clothes wherever they touched, and leaned my hooded head back against the living tree.
This was the wrong place to have come. I should have known, but where else was there to go? The forest was deep green and far too much like the scene in last night's dream to allow for peace of mind. Now that there was no longer the sound of my soggy footsteps, the silence was piercing. The birds were quiet, too, the drops increasing in frequency, so it must be raining above. The ferns stood higher than my head, now that I was seated, and I knew someone could walk by on the path, three feet away, and not see me.
Here in the trees it was much easier to believe the absurdities that embarrassed me indoors. Nothing had changed in this forest for thousands of years, and all the myths and legends of a hundred different lands seemed much more likely in this green haze than they had in my clear-cut bedroom.
I forced myself to focus on the two most vital questions I had to answer, but I did so unwillingly.
First, I had to decide if it was possible that what Jacob had said about the Cullens could be true.
Immediately my mind responded with a resounding negative. It was silly and morbid to entertain such ridiculous notions. But what, then? I asked myself. There was no rational explanation for how I was alive at this moment. I listed again in my head the things I'd observed myself: the impossible speed and strength, the eye color shifting from black to gold and back again, the inhuman beauty, the pale, frigid skin. And more — small things that registered slowly — how they never seemed to eat, the disturbing grace with which they moved. And the way be
sometimes spoke, with unfamiliar cadences and phrases that better fit the style of a turn-of-the-century novel than that of a twenty-first-century classroom. He had skipped class the day we'd done blood typing. He hadn't said no to the beach trip till he heard where we were going. He seemed to know what everyone around him was thinking… except me. He had told me he was the villain, dangerous…
Could the Cullens be vampires?
Well, they were something. Something outside the possibility of rational justification
was taking place in front of my incredulous eyes. Whether it be Jacob's cold ones or my own superhero theory, Edward Cullen was not… human. He was something more.
So then — maybe. That would have to be my answer for now.
And then the most important question of all. What was I going to do if it was true?
If Edward was a vampire — I could hardly make myself think the words — then what should I do? Involving someone else was definitely out. I couldn't even believe myself; anyone I told would have me committed.
Only two options seemed practical. The first was to take his advice: to be smart, to avoid him as much as possible. To cancel our plans, to go back to ignoring him as far as I was able. To pretend there was an impenetrably thick glass wall between us in the one class where we were forced together. To tell him to leave me alone — and mean it this time.
I was gripped in a sudden agony of despair as I considered that alternative. My mind rejected the pain, quickly skipping on to the next option.
I could do nothing different. After all, if he was something… sinister, he'd done nothing to hurt me so far. In fact, I would be a dent in Tyler's fender if he hadn't acted so quickly. So quickly, I argued with myself, that it might have been sheer reflexes. But if it was a reflex to save lives, how bad could he be? I retorted. My head spun around in answerless circles.
There was one thing I was sure of, if I was sure of anything. The dark Edward in my dream last night was a reflection only of my fear of the word Jacob had spoken, and not Edward himself. Even so, when I'd screamed out in terror at the werewolf's lunge, it wasn't fear for the wolf that brought the cry of "no" to my lips. It was fear that he would be harmed — even as he called to me with sharp-edged fangs, I feared for him.
And I knew in that I had my answer. I didn't know if there ever was a choice, really. I was already in too deep. Now that I knew —if I knew — I could do nothing about my frightening secret. Because when I thought of him, of his voice, his hypnotic eyes, the magnetic force of his personality, I wanted nothing more than to be with him right now. Even if… but I couldn't think it. Not here, alone in the darkening forest. Not while the rain made it dim as twilight under the canopy and pattered like footsteps across the matted earthen floor. I shivered and rose quickly from my place of concealment, worried that somehow the path would have disappeared with the rain.
But it was there, safe and clear, winding its way out of the dripping green maze. I followed it hastily, my hood pulled close around my face, becoming surprised, as I nearly ran through the trees, at how far I had come. I started to wonder if I was heading out at all, or following the path farther into the confines of the forest. Before I could get too panicky, though, I began to glimpse some open spaces through the webbed branches. And then I could hear a car passing on the street, and I was free, Charlie's lawn stretched out in front of me, the house beckoning me, promising warmth and dry socks.
It was just noon when I got back inside. I went upstairs and got dressed for the day, jeans and a t-shirt, since I was staying indoors. It didn't take too much effort to concentrate on my task for the day, a paper on Macbeth that was due Wednesday. I settled into outlining a rough draft contentedly, more serene than I'd felt since… well, since Thursday afternoon, if I was being honest.
That had always been my way, though. Making decisions was the painful part for me, the part I agonized over. But once the decision was made, I simply followed through —
usually with relief that the choice was made. Sometimes the relief was tainted by despair, like my decision to come to Forks. But it was still better than wrestling with the alternatives.
This decision was ridiculously easy to live with. Dangerously easy.
And so the day was quiet, productive — I finished my paper before eight. Charlie came home with a large catch, and I made a mental note to pick up a book of recipes for fish while I was in Seattle next week. The chills that flashed up my spine whenever I thought of that trip were no different than the ones I'd felt before I'd taken my walk with Jacob Black. They should be different, I thought. I should be afraid — I knew I should be, but I couldn't feel the right kind of fear.
I slept dreamlessly that night, exhausted from beginning my day so early, and sleeping so poorly the night before. I woke, for the second time since arriving in Forks, to the bright yellow light of a sunny day. I skipped to the window, stunned to see that there was hardly a cloud in the sky, and those there were just fleecy little white puffs that couldn't possibly be carrying any rain. I opened the window — surprised when it opened silently, without sticking, not having opened it in who knows how many years — and sucked in the relatively dry air. It was nearly warm and hardly windy at all. My blood was electric in my veins.
Charlie was finishing breakfast when I came downstairs, and he picked up on my mood immediately.
"Nice day out," he commented. "Yes," I agreed with a grin.
He smiled back, his brown eyes crinkling around the edges. When Charlie smiled, it was easier to see why he and my mother had jumped too quickly into an early marriage. Most of the young romantic he'd been in those days had faded before I'd known him, as the curly brown hair — the same color, if not the same texture, as mine — had dwindled, slowly revealing more and more of the shiny skin of his forehead. But when he smiled I could see a little of the man who had run away with Renée when she was just two years older than I was now.
I ate breakfast cheerily, watching the dust moats stirring in the sunlight that streamed in the back window. Charlie called out a goodbye, and I heard the cruiser pull away from the house. I hesitated on my way out the door, hand on my rain jacket. It would be tempting fate to leave it home. With a sigh, I folded it over my arm and stepped out into the brightest light I'd seen in months.
By dint of much elbow grease, I was able to get both windows in the truck almost completely rolled down. I was one of the first ones to school; I hadn't even checked the clock in my hurry to get outside. I parked and headed toward the seldom-used picnic benches on the south side of the cafeteria. The benches were still a little damp, so I sat on my jacket, glad to have a use for it. My homework was done — the product of a slow social life — but there were a few Trig problems I wasn't sure I had right. I took out my book industriously, but halfway through rechecking the first problem I was daydreaming, watching the sunlight play on the red-barked trees. I sketched inattentively along the margins of my homework. After a few minutes, I suddenly realized I'd drawn five pairs of dark eyes staring out of the page at me. I scrubbed them out with the eraser.
"Bella!" I heard someone call, and it sounded like Mike.
I looked around to realize that the school had become populated while I'd been sitting
there, absentminded. Everyone was in t-shirts, some even in shorts though the temperature couldn't be over sixty. Mike was coming toward me in khaki shorts and a striped Rugby shirt, waving.
"Hey, Mike," I called, waving back, unable to be halfhearted on a morning like this.
He came to sit by me, the tidy spikes of his hair shining golden in the light, his grin stretching across his face. He was so delighted to see me, I couldn't help but feel gratified.
"I never noticed before — your hair has red in it," he commented, catching between his fingers a strand that was fluttering in the light breeze.
"Only in the sun."
I became just a little uncomfortable as he tucked the lock behind my ear. "Great day, isn't it?"
"My kind of day," I agreed.
"What did you do yesterday?" His tone was just a bit too proprietary.
"I mostly worked on my essay." I didn't add that I was finished with it — no need to sound smug.
He hit his forehead with the heel of his hand. "Oh yeah — that's due Thursday, right?" "Um, Wednesday, I think."
"Wednesday?" He frowned. "That's not good… What are you writing yours on?" "Whether Shakespeare's treatment of the female characters is misogynistic."
He stared at me like I'd just spoken in pig Latin.
"I guess I'll have to get to work on that tonight," he said, deflated. "I was going to ask if you wanted to go out."
"Oh." I was taken off guard. Why couldn't I ever have a pleasant conversation with Mike anymore without it getting awkward?
"Well, we could go to dinner or something… and I could work on it later." He smiled at me hopefully.
"Mike…" I hated being put on the spot. "I don't think that would be the best idea." His face fell. "Why?" he asked, his eyes guarded. My thoughts flickered to Edward,
wondering if that's where his thoughts were as well.
"I think… and if you ever repeat what I'm saying right now I will cheerfully beat you to death," I threatened, "but I think that would hurt Jessica's feelings."
He was bewildered, obviously not thinking in that direction at all. "Jessica?" "Really, Mike, are you blind ?"
"Oh," he exhaled — clearly dazed. I took advantage of that to make my escape.
"It's time for class, and I can't be late again." I gathered my books up and stuffed them in my bag.
We walked in silence to building three, and his expression was distracted. I hoped whatever thoughts he was immersed in were leading him in the right direction.
When I saw Jessica in Trig, she was bubbling with enthusiasm. She, Angela, and Lauren were going to Port Angeles tonight to go dress shopping for the dance, and she wanted me to come, too, even though I didn't need one. I was indecisive. It would be nice to get out of town with some girlfriends, but Lauren would be there. And who knew what I could be doing tonight… But that was definitely the wrong path to let my mind wander down. Of course I was happy about the sunlight. But that wasn't completely responsible for the euphoric mood I was in, not even close.
So I gave her a maybe, telling her I'd have to talk with Charlie first.
She talked of nothing but the dance on the way to Spanish, continuing as if without an interruption when class finally ended, five minutes late, and we were on our way to lunch. I was far too lost in my own frenzy of anticipation to notice much of what she said. I was painfully eager to see not just him but all the Cullens — to compare them with the new suspicions that plagued my mind. As I crossed the threshold of the cafeteria, I felt the first true tingle of fear slither down my spine and settle in my stomach. Would they be able to know what I was thinking? And then a different feeling jolted through me — would Edward be waiting to sit with me again?
As was my routine, I glanced first toward the Cullens ' table. A shiver of panic trembled in my stomach as I realized it was empty. With dwindling hope, my eyes scoured the rest of the cafeteria, hoping to find him alone, waiting for me. The place was nearly filled — Spanish had made us late — but there was no sign of Edward or any of his family.
Desolation hit me with crippling strength.
I shambled along behind Jessica, not bothering to pretend to listen anymore.
We were late enough that everyone was already at our table. I avoided the empty chair next to Mike in favor of one by Angela. I vaguely noticed that Mike held the chair out politely for Jessica, and that her face lit up in response.
Angela asked a few quiet questions about the Macbeth paper, which I answered as naturally as I could while spiraling downward in misery. She, too, invited me to go with them tonight, and I agreed now, grasping at anything to distract myself.
I realized I'd been holding on to a last shred of hope when I entered Biology, saw his empty seat, and felt a new wave of disappointment.
The rest of the day passed slowly, dismally. In Gym, we had a lecture on the rules of badminton, the next torture they had lined up for me. But at least it meant I got to sit and listen instead of stumbling around on the court. The best part was the coach didn't finish, so I got another day off tomorrow. Never mind that the day after they would arm me with a racket before unleashing me on the rest of the class.
I was glad to leave campus, so I would be free to pout and mope before I went out tonight with Jessica and company. But right after I walked in the door of Charlie's house, Jessica called to cancel our plans. I tried to be happy that Mike had asked her out to dinner — I really was relieved that he finally seemed to be catching on — but my enthusiasm sounded false in my own ears. She rescheduled our shopping trip for tomorrow night.
Which left me with little in the way of distractions. I had fish marinating for dinner, with a salad and bread left over from the night before, so there was nothing to do there. I spent a focused half hour on homework, but then I was through with that, too. I checked my e-mail, reading the backlog of letters from my mother, getting snippier as they progressed to the present. I sighed and typed a quick response.
Mom,
Sorry. I've been out. I went to the beach with some friends. And I had to write a paper. My excuses were fairly pathetic, so I gave up on that.
It's sunny outside today - I know, I'm shocked, too - so I'm going to go outside and soak up as much vitamin D as I can. I love you,
Bella.
I decided to kill an hour with non-school-related reading. I had a small collection of
books that came with me to Forks, the shabbiest volume being a compilation of the works of Jane Austen. I selected that one and headed to the backyard, grabbing a ragged old quilt from the linen cupboard at the top of the stairs on my way down.
Outside in Charlie's small, square yard, I folded the quilt in half and laid it out of the reach of the trees' shadows on the thick lawn that would always be slightly wet, no matter how long the sun shone. I lay on my stomach, crossing my ankles in the air, flipping through the different novels in the book, trying to decide which would occupy my mind the most thoroughly. My favorites were Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility.
I'd read the first most recently, so I started into Sense and Sensibility, only to remember after I began three that the hero of the story happened to be named Edward. Angrily, I turned to Mansfield Park, but the hero of that piece was named Edmund, and that was just too close. Weren't there any other names available in the late eighteenth century? I snapped the book shut, annoyed, and rolled over onto my back. I pushed my sleeves up as high as they would go, and closed my eyes. I would think of nothing but the warmth on my skin, I told myself severely. The breeze was still light, but it blew tendrils of my hair around my face, and that tickled a bit. I pulled all my hair over my head, letting it fan out on the quilt above me, and focused again on the heat that touched my eyelids, my cheekbones, my nose, my lips, my forearms, my neck, soaked through my light shirt…
The next thing I was conscious of was the sound of Charlie's cruiser turning onto the bricks of the driveway. I sat up in surprise, realizing the light was gone, behind the trees, and I had fallen asleep. I looked around, muddled, with the sudden feeling that I wasn't alone.
"Charlie?" I asked. But I could hear his door slamming in front of the house.
I jumped up, foolishly edgy, gathering the now-damp quilt and my book. I ran inside to get some oil heating on the stove, realizing that dinner would be late. Charlie was hanging up his gun belt and stepping out of his boots when I came in.
"Sorry, Dad, dinner's not ready yet — I fell asleep outside." I stifled a yawn. "Don't worry about it," he said. "I wanted to catch the score on the game, anyway."
I watched TV with Charlie after dinner, for something to do. There wasn't anything on I wanted to watch, but he knew I didn't like baseball, so he turned it to some mindless sitcom that neither of us enjoyed. He seemed happy, though, to be doing something together. And it felt good, despite my depression, to make him happy.
"Dad," I said during a commercial, "Jessica and Angela are going to look at dresses for the dance tomorrow night in Port Angeles, and they wanted me to help them choose… do you mind if I go with them?"
"Jessica Stanley?" he asked.
"And Angela Weber." I sighed as I gave him the details.
He was confused. "But you're not going to the dance, right?"
"No, Dad, but I'm helping them find dresses — you know, giving them constructive criticism." I wouldn't have to explain this to a woman.
"Well, okay." He seemed to realize that he was out of his depth with the girlie stuff. "It's a school night, though."
"We'll leave right after school, so we can get back early. You'll be okay for dinner, right?"
"Bells, I fed myself for seventeen years before you got here," he reminded me.
"I don't know how you survived," I muttered, then added more clearly, "I'll leave some
things for cold-cut sandwiches in the fridge, okay? Right on top."
It was sunny again in the morning. I awakened with renewed hope that I grimly tried to suppress. I dressed for the warmer weather in a deep blue V-neck blouse — something I'd worn in the dead of winter in Phoenix.
I had planned my arrival at school so that I barely had time to make it to class. With a sinking heart, I circled the full lot looking for a space, while also searching for the silver Volvo that was clearly not there. I parked in the last row and hurried to English, arriving breathless, but subdued, before the final bell.
It was the same as yesterday — I just couldn't keep little sprouts of hope from budding in my mind, only to have them squashed painfully as I searched the lunchroom in vain and sat at my empty Biology table.
The Port Angeles scheme was back on again for tonight and made all the more attractive by the fact that Lauren had other obligations. I was anxious to get out of town so I could stop glancing over my shoulder, hoping to see him appearing out of the blue the way he always did. I vowed to myself that I would be in a good mood tonight and not ruin Angela's or Jessica's enjoyment in the dress hunting. Maybe I could do a little clothes shopping as well. I refused to think that I might be shopping alone in Seattle this weekend, no longer interested in the earlier arrangement. Surely he wouldn't cancel without at least telling me.
After school, Jessica followed me home in her old white Mercury so that I could ditch my books and truck. I brushed through my hair quickly when I was inside, feeling a slight lift of excitement as I contemplated getting out of Forks. I left a note for Charlie on the table, explaining again where to find dinner, switched my scruffy wallet from my school bag to a purse I rarely used, and ran out to join Jessica. We went to Angela's house next, and she was waiting for us. My excitement increased exponentially as we actually drove out of the town limits.*********************************cont***************************
Author name:Stephenie Meyer
👁 :
IN DOWNTOWN MANHATTAN, in courtroom thirty-seven of the Supreme Court Criminal Term building at 180 Centre Street, the trial of Anthony (Tony) Altieri was in session. The large, venerable courtroom was filled to capacity with press and spectators.
At the defendant's table sat Anthony Altieri, slouched in a wheelchair, looking like a pale, fat frog folding in on itself. Only his eyes were alive, and every time he looked at Diane Stevens in the witness chair, she could literally feel the pulse of his hatred.
Next to Altieri sat Jake Rubenstein, Altieri's defense attorney. Rubenstein was famous for two things:
his high-profile clientele, consisting mostly of mobsters, and the fact that nearly all of his clients were acquitted.
Rubenstein was a small, dapper man with a quick mind and a vivid imagination. He was never
the
same in his courtroom appearances. Courtroom histrionics were his stock-in-trade, and he was highly skilled. He was brilliant at sizing up his opponents, with a feral instinct for finding their weaknesses. Sometimes Rubenstein imagined he was a lion, slowly closing in on his unsuspecting prey, ready to pounce ... or a cunning spider, spinning a web that would eventually entrap them and leave them
helpless. . . Sometimes he was a patient fisherman, gently tossing a line into the water and slowly moving it back and forth until the gullible witness took the bait.
The lawyer was carefully studying the witness on the stand. Diane Stevens was in her early thirties.
An aura of elegance. Patrician features. Soft, flowing blonde hair. Green eyes. Lovely figure. A girl-next-door kind of wholesomeness. She was dressed in a chic, tailored black suit. Jake Rubenstein knew that the day before she had made a favorable impression on the jury. He had to be careful how
he handled her. Fisherman, he decided.
Rubenstein took his time approaching the witness box, and when he spoke, his voice was gentle. "Mrs. Stevens, yesterday you testified that on the date in question, October fourteenth, you were driving south on the Henry Hudson Parkway when you got a flat tire and pulled off the highway at
the One Hundred and Fifty-eighth Street exit, onto a service road into Fort Washington Park?" "Yes." Her voice was soft and cultured.
"What made you stop at that particular place?"
"Because of the flat tire, I knew I had to get off the main road and I could see the roof of a cabin through the trees. I thought there might be someone there who could help me. I didn't have a spare."
"Do you belong to an auto club?" Yes.
"And do you have a phone in your car?" Yes. "Then why didn't you call the auto club?"
"I thought that might have taken too long."
Rubenstein said sympathetically, "Of course. And the cabin was right there." "Yes."
"So, you approached the cabin to get help?" "That's right."
"Was it still light outside?"
"Yes. It was about five o'clock in the afternoon." "And so, you could see clearly?"
"I could."
"What did you see, Mrs. Stevens?" "I saw Anthony Altieri—"
"Oh. You had met him before?" "No."
"What made you sure it was Anthony Altieri?" "I had seen his picture in the newspaper and—"
"So, you had seen pictures that resembled the defendant?" "Well, it—"
"What did you see in that cabin?"
Diane Stevens took a shuddering breath. She spoke slowly, visualizing the scene in her mind. "There were four men in the room. One a of them was in a chair, tied up. Mr. Altieri seemed to be questioning him while the two other men stood next to him." Her voice shook. "Mr. Altieri pulled out
a gun, yelled something, and—and shot the man in the back of the head."
Jake Rubenstein cast a sidelong glance at the jury. They were absorbed in her testimony. "What did you do then, Mrs. Stevens?"
"I ran back to my car and dialed 911 on my cell phone." "And then?""I drove away." "With a flat tire?" "Yes.
Time for a little ripple in the water. "Why didn't you wait for the police?"
Diane glanced toward the defense table. Altieri was watching her with naked malevolence.
She looked away. "I couldn't stay there because I—I was afraid that the men might come out of the
cabin and see me."
"That's very understandable." Rubenstein's voice hardened. "What is not understandable is that when
the police responded to your 911 call, they went into the cabin, and not only was no one there, Mrs. Stevens, but they could find no sign that anyone had been there, let alone been murdered there."
"I can't help that. I—" "You're an artist, aren't you?"
She was taken aback by the question. "Yes, I—" "Are you successful?"
"I suppose so, but what does—?" It was time to yank the hook.
"A little extra publicity never hurts, does it? The whole country watches you on the nightly news report on television, and on the front pages of—"
Diane looked at him, furious. "I didn't do this for publicity. I would never send an innocent man to
—"
"The key word is innocent, Mrs. Stevens. And I will prove to you and the ladies and gentlemen of the jury that Mr. Altieri is innocent. Thank you. You're finished."
Diane Stevens ignored the double entendre. When she stepped down to return to her seat, she was
seething. She whispered to the prosecuting attorney, "Am I free to go?" "Yes. I'll send someone with you."
"That won't be necessary. Thank you."
She headed for the door and walked out to the parking garage, the words of the defense attorney ringing in her ears.
You're an artist, aren't you?. . . A little extra publicity never hurts, does it? It was degrading. Still,
all in all, she was satisfied with the way her testimony had gone. She had told the jury exactly what
she had seen, and they had no reason to doubt her. Anthony Altieri was going to be convicted and sent to prison for the rest of his life. Yet Diane could not help thinking of the venomous looks he had given her, and she felt a little shiver.
She handed the parking attendant her ticket and he went to get her car.
Two minutes later, Diane was driving onto the street, heading north, on her way home.
* * *
THERE WAS A stop sign at the corner. As Diane braked to a halt, a well-dressed young man standing
at the curb approached the car. "Excuse me. I'm lost. Could you—?" Diane lowered her window.
"Could you tell me how to get to the Holland Tunnel?" He spoke with an Italian accent. "Yes. It's very simple. Go down to the first—"
The man raised his arm, and there was a gun with a silencer in his hand. "Out of the car, lady. Fast!"
Diane turned pale. "All right. Please don't—" As she started to open the door, the man stepped back,
and Diane slammed her foot down on the accelerator and the car sped away. She heard the rear window smash as a bullet went through it, and then a crack as another bullet hit the back of the car.
Her heart was pounding so hard that it was difficult to breathe.Diane Stevens had read about carjackings, but they had always been remote, something that happened
to other people. And the man had tried to kill her. Did carjackers do that? Diane reached for her cell phone and dialed 911. It took almost two minutes before an operator answered.
"Nine one one. What is your emergency?"
Even as Diane was explaining what had happened, she knew it was hopeless. The man would be long gone by now.
"I'll send an officer to the location. May I have your name, address, and phone number?"
Diane gave them to her. Useless, she thought. She glanced back at the shattered window and shuddered. She desperately wanted to call Richard at work and tell him what had happened, but she knew he was working on an urgent project. If she called him and told him what had just occurred, he would get upset and rush to her side—and she did not want him to miss his deadline. She would tell him what happened when he got back to the apartment.
Suddenly a chilling thought occurred to her. Had the man been waiting for her, or was this just a coincidence? She remembered the conversation she had had with Richard when the trial began: I don't think you should testify, Diane. It could be dangerous.
Don't worry, darling. Altieri will be convicted. They'll lock him away forever. But he has friends and—
Richard, if I didn't do this, I couldn't live with myself.
What just happened had to be a coincidence, Diane decided. Altieri wouldn 't be crazy enough to do anything to me, especially now, during his trial.
Diane turned off the highway and drove west until she reached her apartment building on East Seventy-fifth Street. Before she pulled into the underground garage, she took a last careful look in the rearview mirror. Everything seemed normal.
* * *
THE APARTMENT WAS an airy, ground-floor duplex, with a spacious living room, floor-to- ceiling windows, and a large, marble fireplace. There were upholstered floral sofas, armchairs, a built-in bookcase, and a large television screen. The walls were rainbowed with colorful
paintings. There was
a Childe Hassam, a Jules Pascin, a Thomas Birch, a George Hitchcock, and, in one area, a group of Diane's paintings.
On the next floor were a master bedroom and bathroom, a second guest bedroom, and a sunny atelier, where Diane painted. Several of her paintings were hanging on the walls. On an easel in the center of
the room was a half-finished portrait.
The first thing Diane did when she arrived home was to hurry into the atelier. She removed the half-finished portrait on the easel and replaced it with a blank canvas. She began to sketch the face
of the man who had tried to kill her, but her hands were trembling so hard that she had to stop.
* * *
DRIVING TO DIANE STEVEN'S apartment, Detective Earl Greenburg complained, "This is the part
of the job I hate most."
Robert Praegitzer said, "It's better that we tell them than have them hear about it on the evening news." He looked at Greenburg. "You going to tell her?"
Earl Greenburg nodded unhappily. He found himself remembering the story of the detective who had gone to inform a Mrs. Adams, the wife of a patrolman, that her husband had been killed.
She's very sensitive, the chief had cautioned the detective. You'll have to break the news carefully. Don't worry. I can handle it.
The detective had knocked on the door of the Adams home, and when it was opened by Adams's wife, the" detective had asked, Are you the widow Adams?
* * *
DIANE WAS STARTLED by the sound of the doorbell. She went to the intercom. "Who is it?" "Detective Earl Greenburg. I'd like to speak to you, Mrs. Stevens."
It's about the carjacking, Diane thought. The police got here fast.
She pressed the buzzer and Greenburg entered the hallway and walked to her door. "Hello."
"Mrs. Stevens?"
"Yes. Thank you for coming so quickly. I started to draw a sketch of the man, but I ..." She took a deep breath. "He was swarthy, with deep-set light brown eyes and a little mole on his cheek. His gun
had a silencer on it, and—"
Greenburg was looking at her in confusion. "I'm sorry. I don't understand what—"
"The carjacker. I called 911 and—" She saw the expression on the detective's face. "This isn't about
the carjacking, is it?"
"No, ma'am, it's not." Greenburg paused a moment. "May I come in? "Please."
Greenburg walked into the apartment.
She was looking at him, frowning. "What is it? Is something wrong?"
The words would not seem to come. "Yes. I'm sorry. I—I'm afraid I have some bad news. It's about your husband."
"What's happened?" Her voice was shaky. "He's had an accident."
Diane felt a sudden chill. "What kind of accident?"
Greenburg took a deep breath. "He was killed last night, Mrs. Stevens. We found his body under a
bridge along the East River this morning."
Diane stared at him for a long moment, then slowly shook her head. "You have the wrong person, Lieutenant. My husband is at work, in his laboratory."
This was going to be even more difficult than he had anticipated. "Mrs. Stevens, did your husband
come home last night?"
"No, but Richard frequently works all night. He's a scientist." She was becoming more and more agitated.
"Mrs. Stevens, were you aware that your husband was involved with the Mafia?" Diane blanched. "The Mafia? Are you insane?"
"We found—"
Diane was beginning to hyperventilate. "Let me see your identification." "Certainly." Detective Greenburg pulled out his ID card and showed it to her.
Diane glanced at it, handed it back, and then slapped Greenburg hard across his face. "Does the city
pay you to go around trying to scare honest citizens? My husband is not dead! He's at work." She was shouting.
Greenburg looked into her eyes and saw the shock and denial there. "Mrs. Stevens, would you like
me to send someone over to look after you and—?"
"You're the one who needs someone to look after you. Now get out of here." "Mrs. Stevens—"
"Now!"
Greenburg took out a business card and put it on a table. "In case you need to talk to me, here's my number."
As he walked out the door, Greenburg thought, Well, I handled that brilliantly. I might as well have
said, "Are you the widow Stevens?"
* * *
WHEN DETECTIVE EARL Greenburg left, Diane locked the front door and took a deep, shivering breath. The idiot! Coming to the wrong apartment and trying to scare me. I should report him. She
looked at her watch. Richard will be coming home soon. It's time to start getting dinner ready
She
was making paella, his favorite dish. She went into the kitchen and started to prepare it.
* * *
BECAUSE OF THE secrecy of Richard's work, Diane never disturbed him at the laboratory, and if
he did not call her, she knew it was a signal that he was going to be late. At eight o'clock, the paella
was ready. She tasted it and smiled, satisfied. It was made just the way Richard liked it. At ten o'clock, when he still had not arrived, Diane put the paella in the refrigerator and stuck a Post-it note on the refrigerator door: Darling, supper is in the fridge. Come and wake me up. Richard would be hungry
when he came home.
Diane felt suddenly drained. She undressed, put on a nightgown, brushed her teeth, and got into bed.
In a few minutes, she fell sound asleep.
* * *
AT THREE O'CLOCK in the morning, she woke up screaming.
Author name:SIDNEY SHELDON
👁 :
1. PARTY
I WAS NINETY-NINE POINT NINE PERCENT SURE I WAS dreaming.
The reasons I was so certain were that, first, I was standing in a bright shaft of sunlight–the kind of blinding clear sun that never shone on my drizzly new hometown in Forks, Washington–and second, I was looking at my Grandma Marie. Gran had been dead for six years now, so that was solid evidence toward the dream theory.
Gran hadn't changed much; her face looked just the same as I remembered it. The skin was soft and withered, bent into a thousand tiny creases that clung gently to the bone underneath. Like a dried apricot, but with a puff of thick white hair standing out in a cloud around it.
Our mouths–hers a wizened picker–spread into the same surprised half-smile at just the same time. Apparently, she hadn't been expecting to see me, either.
I was about to ask her a question; I had so many–What was she doing here in my cream? What had she been up to in the past six years? Was Pop okay, and had they found each other, wherever they were?–but she opened her mouth when I did, so I stopped to let her go first. She paused, too, and then we Goth smiled at the little awkwardness.
"Bella!"
It wasn't Gran who called my name, and we both turned to see the addition to our small reunion. I didn't have to look to know who it was; this was a voice I would know anywhere–know, and respond to, whether I was awake or asleep… or even dead, I'd bet. The voice I'd walk through fire for–or, less dramatically, slosh every day through the cold and endless rain for.
Edward.
Even though I was always thrilled to see him–conscious or otherwise–and even though I was almost positive that I was dreaming, I panicked as Edward walked toward us through the glaring sunlight.
I panicked because Gran didn't know that I was in love with a vampire–nobody knew that–so how was I supposed to explain the fact that the brilliant sunbeams were shattering off his skin into a thousand rainbow shards like he was made of crystal or diamond?
Well, Gran, yon might have noticed that my boyfriend glitters. It's just something he does in the sun. Don't worry about it…
What was he doing? The whole reason he lived in Forks, the rainiest place in the world, was so that he could be outside in the daytime without exposing his family's secret. Yet here he was, strolling gracefully toward me–with the most beautiful smile on his angel's face–as if I
were the only one here.
In that second, I wished that I was not the one exception to his mysterious talent; I usually felt grateful that I was the only person whose thoughts he couldn't hear just as clearly as if they were spoken aloud. But now I wished he could hear me, too, so that he could hear the warning I was screaming in my head.
I shot a panicked glance back at Gran, and saw that it was too late. She was just turning to stare back at me, her eyes as alarmed as mine.
Edward–still smiling so beautifully that my heart felt like it was going to swell up and burst through my chest–put his arm around my shoulder and turned to face my grandmother.
Gran's expression surprised me. Instead of looking horrified, she was staring at me sheepishly, as if waiting for a scolding. And she was standing in such a strange position–one arm held awkwardly away from her body, stretched out and then curled around the air. Like she had her arm around someone I couldn't see, someone invisible…
Only then, as I looked at the bigger picture, did I notice the huge gilt frame that enclosed my grandmother's form. Uncomprehending, I raised the hand that wasn't wrapped around Edward's waist and reached out to touch her. She mimicked the movement exactly, mirrored it. But where our fingers should have met, there was nothing but cold glass…
With a dizzying jolt, my dream abruptly became a nightmare. There was no Gran.
That was me. Me in a mirror. Me–ancient, creased, and withered.
Edward stood beside me, casting no reflection, excruciatingly lovely and forever seventeen. He pressed his icy, perfect lips against my wasted cheek.
"Happy birthday," he whispered.
I woke with a start–my eyelids popping open wide–and gasped. Dull gray light, the familiar light of an overcast morning, took the place of the blinding sun in my dream.
Just a dream, I told myself. It was only a dream. I took a deep breath, and then jumped again when my alarm went off. The little calendar in the corner of the clock's display informed me that today was September thirteenth.
Only a dream, but prophetic enough in one way, at least. Today was my birthday. I was officially eighteen years old.
I'd been dreading this day for months.
All through the perfect summer–the happiest summer I had ever had, the happiest summer anyone anywhere had ever had, and the rainiest summer in the history of the Olympic Peninsula–this bleak date had lurked in ambush, waiting to spring.
And now that it had hit, it was even worse than I'd feared it would be. I could feel it–I was older. Every day I got older, but this was different, worse, quantifiable. I was eighteen.
And Edward never would be.
When I went to brush my teeth, I was almost surprised that the face in the mirror hadn't changed. I stared at myself, looking for some sign of impending wrinkles in my ivory skin. The only creases were the ones on my forehead, though, and I knew that if I could manage to relax, they would disappear. I couldn't. My eyebrows stayed lodged in a worried line over my anxious brown eyes.
It was just a dream, I reminded myself again. Just a dream… but also my worst nightmare.
I skipped breakfast, in a hurry to get out of the house as quickly as possible. I wasn't entirely able to avoid my dad, and so I had to spend a few minutes acting cheerful. I honestly tried to be excited about the gifts I'd asked him not to get me, but every time I had to smile, it felt like I might start crying.
I struggled to get a grip on myself as I drove to school. The vision of Gran–I would not think of it as me–was hard to get out of my head. I couldn't feel anything but despair until I pulled into the familiar parking lot behind Forks High School and spotted Edward leaning motionlessly against his polished silver Volvo, like a marble tribute to some forgotten pagan god of beauty. The dream had not done him justice. And he was waiting there for me, just the same as every other day.
Despair momentarily vanished; wonder took its place. Even after half a year with him, I still couldn't believe that I deserved this degree of good fortune.
His sister Alice was standing by his side, waiting for me, too.
Of course Edward and Alice weren't really related (in Forks the story was that all the Cullen siblings were adopted by Dr. Carlisle Culler and his wife, Esme, both plainly too young to have teenage children), but their skin was precisely the same pale shade, their eyes had the same strange golden tint, with the same deep, bruise-like shadows beneath them. Her face, like his, was also startlingly beautiful. To someone in the know–someone like me–these similarities marked them for what they were.
The sight of Alice waiting there–her tawny eyes brilliant with excitement, and a small silver-wrapped square in her hands–made me frown. I'd told Alice I didn't want anything, anything, not gifts or even attention, for my birthday. Obviously, my wishes were being ignored.
I slammed the door of my '53 Chevy truck–a shower of rust specks fluttered down to the wet blacktop–and walked slowly toward where they waited. Alice skipped forward to meet me, her pixie face glowing under her spiky black hair.
"Happy birthday, Bella!"
"Shh!" I hissed, glancing around the lot to make sure no one had heard her. The last thing I wanted was some kind of celebration of the black event.
She ignored me. "Do you want to open your present now or later?" she asked eagerly as we made our way to where Edward still waited.
"No presents," I protested in a mumble.
She finally seemed to process my mood. "Okay… later, then. Did you like the scrapbook your mom sent you? And the camera from Charlie?"
I sighed. Of course she would know what my birthday presents were. Edward wasn't the only member of his family with unusual skills. Alice would have "seen" what my parents were planning as soon as they'd decided that themselves.
"Yeah. They're great."
"I think it's a nice idea. You're only a senior once. Might as well document the experience." "How many times have you been a senior?"
"That's different."
We reached Edward then, and he held out his hand for mine. I took it eagerly, forgetting, for a moment, my glum mood. His skin was, as always, smooth, hard, and very cold. He gave my fingers a gentle squeeze. I looked into his liquid topa2 eyes, and my heart gave a not-quite-so-gentle squeeze of its own. Hearing the stutter in my heartbeats, he smiled again.
He lifted his free hand and traced one cool fingertip around the outside of my lips as he spoke. "So, as discussed, I am not allowed to wish you a happy birthday, is that correct?"
"Yes. That is correct." I could never quite mimic the flow of his perfect, formal articulation. It was something that could only be picked up in an earlier century.
"Just checking." He ran his hand through his tousled bronze hair. "You might have changed your mind. Most people seem to enjoy things like birthdays and gifts."
Alice laughed, and the sound was all silver, a wind chime. "Of course you'll enjoy it. Everyone is supposed to be nice to you today and give you your way, Bella. What's the worst that could happen?" She meant it as a rhetorical question.
"Getting older," I answered anyway, and my voice was not as steady as I wanted it to be. Beside me, Edward's smile tightened into a hard line.
"Eighteen isn't very old," Alice said. "Don't women usually wait till they're twenty-nine to get upset over birthdays?"
"It's older than Edward," I mumbled. He sighed.
"Technically," she said, keeping her tone light. "Just by one little year, though."
And I supposed… if I could be sure of the future I wanted, sure that I would get to spend forever with Edward, and Alice and the rest of the Cullens (preferably not as a wrinkled little old lady)… then a year or two one direction or the other wouldn't matter to me so much. But Edward was dead set against any future that changed me. Any future that made me like him–that made me immortal, too.
An impasse, he called it.
I couldn't really see Edward's point, to be honest. What was so great about mortality? Being a vampire didn't look like such a terrible thing–not the way the Cullens did it, anyway.
"What time will you be at the house?" Alice continued, changing the subject. From her expression, she was up to exactly the kind of thing I'd been hoping to avoid.
"I didn't know I had plans to be there."
"Oh, be fair, Bella!" she complained. "You aren't going to ruin all our fun like that, are you?" "I thought my birthday was about what I want."
"I'll get her from Charlie's right after school," Edward told her, ignoring me altogether. "I have to work," I protested.
"You don't, actually," Alice told me smugly. "I already spoke to Mrs. Newton about it. She's trading your shifts. She said to tell you 'Happy Birthday.'"
"I–I still can't come over," I stammered, scrambling for an excuse. "I, well, I haven't watched
Romeo and Juliet yet for English."
Alice snorted. "You have Romeo and Juliet memorized."
"But Mr. Berty said we needed to see it performed to fully appreciate it–that's how Shakespeare intended it to be presented."
Edward rolled his eyes.
"You've already seen the movie," Alice accused.
"But not the nineteen-sixties version. Mr. Berty said it was the best."
Finally, Alice lost the smug smile and glared at me. "This can be easy, or this can be hard, Bella, but one way or the other–"
Edward interrupted her threat. "Relax, Alice. If Bella wants to watch a movie, then she can. It's her birthday."
"So there," I added.
"I'll bring her over around seven," he continued. "That will give you more time to set up."
Alice's laughter chimed again. "Sounds good. See you tonight, Bella! It'll be fun, you'll see." She grinned–the wide smile exposed all her perfect, glistening teeth–then pecked me on the cheek and danced off toward her first class before I could respond.
"Edward, please–" I started to beg, but he pressed one cool finger to my lips. "Let's discuss it later. We're going to be late for class."
No one bothered to stare at us as we took our usual seats in the back of the classroom (we had almost every class together now–it was amazing the favors Edward could get the female administrators to do for him). Edward and I had been together too long now to be an object of gossip anymore. Even Mike Newton didn't bother to give me the glum stare that used to make me feel a little guilty. He smiled now instead, and I was glad he seemed to have accepted that we could only be friends. Mike had changed over the summer–his face had lost some of the roundness, making his cheekbones more prominent, and he was wearing his pale blond hair a new way; instead of bristly, it was longer and gelled into a carefully casual disarray. It was easy to see where his inspiration came from–but Edward's look wasn't something that could be achieved through imitation.
As the day progressed, I considered ways to get out of whatever was going down at the Cullen house tonight. It would be bad enough to have to celebrate when I was in the mood to mourn. But, worse than that, this was sure to involve attention and gifts.
Attention is never a good thing, as any other accident-prone klutz would agree. No one wants a spotlight when they're likely to fall on their face.
And I'd very pointedly asked–well, ordered really–that no one give me any presents this year. It looked like Charlie and Renee weren't the only ones who had decided to overlook that.
I'd never had much money, and that had never bothered me. Renee had raised me on a kindergarten teacher's salary. Charlie wasn't getting rich at his job, either–he was the police
chief here in the tiny town of Forks. My only personal income came from the three days a week I worked at the local sporting goods store. In a town this small, I was lucky to have a job. Every penny I made went into my microscopic college fund. (College was Plan B. I was still hoping for Plan A, but Edward was just so stubborn about leaving me human…)
Edward had a lot of money–I didn't even want to think about how much. Money meant next to nothing to Edward or the rest of the Cullens. It was just something that accumulated when you had unlimited time on your hands and a sister who had an uncanny ability to predict trends in the stock market. Edward didn't seem to understand why I objected to him spending money on me–why it made me uncomfortable if he took me to an expensive restaurant in Seattle, why he wasn't allowed to buy me a car that could reach speeds over fifty-five miles an hour, or why I wouldn't let him pay my college tuition (he was ridiculously enthusiastic about Plan B). Edward thought I was being unnecessarily difficult.
But how could I let him give me things when I had nothing to reciprocate with? He, for some unfathomable reason, wanted to be with me. Anything he gave me on top of that just threw us more out of balance.
As the day went on, neither Edward nor Alice brought my birthday up again, and I began to relax a little.
We sat at our usual table for lunch.
A strange kind of truce existed at that table. The three of us–Edward, Alice, and I–sat on the extreme southern end of the table. Now that the "older" and somewhat scarier (in Emmett's case, certainly) Cullen siblings had graduated, Alice and Edward did not seem quite so intimidating, and we did not sit here alone. My other friends, Mike and Jessica (who were in the awkward post-breakup friendship phase), Angela and Ben (whose relationship had survived the summer), Eric, Conner, Tyler, and Lauren (though that last one didn't really count in the friend category) all sat at the same table, on the other side of an invisible line. That line dissolved on sunny days when Edward and Alice always skipped school, and then the conversation would swell out effortlessly to include me.
Edward and Alice didn't find this minor ostracism odd or hurtful the way I would have. They barely noticed it. People always felt strangely ill at ease with the Cullens, almost afraid for some reason they couldn't explain to themselves. I was a rare exception to that rule. Sometimes it bothered Edward how very comfortable I was with being close to him. He thought he was hazardous to my health–an opinion I rejected vehemently whenever he voiced it.
The afternoon passed quickly. School ended, and Edward walked me to my truck as he usually did. But this time, he held the passenger door open for me. Alice must have been taking his car home so that he could keep me from making a run for it.
I folded my arms and made no move to get out of the rain. "It's my birthday, don't I get to drive?"
"I'm pretending it's not your birthday, just as you wished."
"If it's not my birthday, then I don't have to go to your house tonight…"
"All right." He shut the passenger door and walked past me to open the driver's side. "Happy birthday."
"Shh," I shushed him halfheartedly. I climbed in the opened door, wishing he'd taken the other offer.
Edward played with the radio while I drove, shaking his head in disapproval. "Your radio has horrible reception."
I frowned. I didn't like it when he picked on my truck. The truck was great–it had personality.
"You want a nice stereo? Drive your own car." I was so nervous about Alice's plans, on top of my already gloomy mood, that the words came out sharper than I'd meant them. I was hardly ever bad-tempered with Edward, and my tone made him press his lips together to keep from smiling.
When I parked in front of Charlie's house, he reached over to take my face in his hands. He handled me very carefully, pressing just the tips of his fingers softly against my temples, my cheekbones, my jawline. Like I was especially breakable. Which was exactly the case–compared with him, at least.
"You should be in a good mood, today of all days," he whispered. His sweet breath fanned across my face.
"And if I don't want to be in a good mood?" I asked, my breathing uneven. His golden eyes smoldered. "Too bad."
My head was already spinning by the time he leaned closer and pressed his icy lips against mine. As he intended, no doubt, I forgot all about my worries, and concentrated on remembering how to inhale and exhale.
His mouth lingered on mine, cold and smooth and gentle, until I wrapped my arms around his neck and threw myself into the kiss with a little too much enthusiasm. I could feel his lips curve upward as he let go of my face and reached back to unlock my grip on him.
Edward had drawn many careful lines for our physical relationship, with the intent being to keep me alive. Though I respected the need for maintaining a safe distance between my skin and his razor-sharp, venom-coated teeth, I tended to forget about trivial things like that when he was kissing me.
"Be good, please," he breathed against my cheek. He pressed his lips gently to mine one more time and then pulled away, folding my arms across my stomach.
My pulse was thudding in my ears. I put one hand over my heart. It drummed hyperactively under my palm.
"Do you think I'll ever get better at this?" I wondered, mostly to myself. "That my heart might someday stop trying to jump out of my chest whenever you touch me?"
"I really hope not," he said, a bit smug.
I rolled my eyes. "Let's go watch the Capulets and Montagues hack each other up, all right?" "Your wish, my command."
Edward sprawled across the couch while I started the movie, fast-forwarding through the opening credits.
When I perched on the edge of the sofa in front of him, he wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me against his chest. It wasn't exactly as comfortable as a sofa cushion would be, what with his chest being hard and cold–and perfect–as an ice sculpture, but it was definitely preferable. He pulled the old afghan off the back of the couch and draped it over me so I wouldn't freeze beside his body.
"You know, I've never had much patience with Romeo," he commented as the movie started.
"What's wrong with Romeo?" I asked, a little offended. Romeo was one of my favorite fictional characters. Until I'd met Edward, I'd sort of had a thing for him.
"Well, first of all, he's in love with this Rosaline–don't you think it makes him seem a little fickle? And then, a few minutes after their wedding, he kills Juliet's cousin. That's not very brilliant. Mistake after mistake. Could he have destroyed his own happiness any more thoroughly?"
I sighed. "Do you want me to watch this alone?"
"No, I'll mostly be watching you, anyway." His fingers traced patterns across the skin of my arm, raising goose bumps. "Will you cry?"
"Probably," I admitted, "if I'm paying attention."
"I won't distract you then." But I felt his lips on my hair, and it was very distracting.
The movie eventually captured my interest, thanks in large part to Edward whispering Romeo's lines in my ear–his irresistible, velvet voice made the actor's voice sound weak and coarse by comparison. And I did cry, to his amusement, when Juliet woke and found her new husband dead.
"I'll admit, I do sort of envy him here," Edward said, drying the tears with a lock of my hair. "She's very pretty."
He made a disgusted sound. "I don't envy him the girl–just the ease of the suicide," he clarified in a teasing tone. "You humans have it so easy! All you have to do is throw down one tiny vial of plant extracts…"
"What?" I gasped.
"It's something I had to think about once, and I knew from Carlisle's experience that it wouldn't be simple. I'm not even sure how many ways Carlisle tried to kill himself in the beginning… after he realized what he'd become…" His voice, which had grown serious, turned light again. "And he's clearly still in excellent health."
I twisted around so that I could read his face. "What are you talking about?" I demanded. "What do you mean, this something you had to think about once?"
"Last spring, when you were… nearly killed…" He paused to take a deep breath, snuggling to return to his teasing tone. "Of course I was trying to focus on finding you alive, but part of my mind was making contingency plans. Like I said, it's not as easy for me as it is for a human."
For one second, the memory of my last trip to Phoenix washed through my head and made me feel dizzy. I could see it all so clearly–the blinding sun, the heat waves coming off the concrete as I ran with desperate haste to find the sadistic vampire who wanted to torture me to death. James, waiting in the mirrored room with my mother as his hostage–or so I'd thought. I hadn't known it was all a ruse. Just as James hadn't known that Edward was racing to save me; Edward made it in time, but it had been a close one. Unthinkingly, my fingers traced the crescent-shaped scar on my hand that was always just a few degrees cooler than the rest of my skin.
I shook my head–as if I could shake away the bad memories–and tried to grasp what Edward meant. My stomach plunged uncomfortably. "Contingency plans?" I repeated.
"Well, I wasn't going to live without you." He rolled his eyes as if that fact were childishly obvious. "But I wasn't sure how to do it–I knew Emmett and Jasper would never help… so I was thinking maybe I would go to Italy and do something to provoke the Volturi."
I didn't want to believe he was serious, but his golden eyes were brooding, focused on something far away in the distance as he contemplated ways to end his own life. Abruptly, I was furious.
"What is a Volturi?" I demanded.
"The Volturi are a family," he explained, his eyes still remote. "A very old, very powerful
family of our kind. They are the closest thing our world has to a royal family, I suppose. Carlisle lived with them briefly in his early years, in Italy, before he settled in America–do you remember the story?"
"Of course I remember."
I would never forget the first time I'd gone to his home, the huge white mansion buried deep in the forest beside the river, or the room where Carlisle–Edward's father in so many real ways–kept a wall of paintings that illustrated his personal history. The most vivid, most wildly colorful canvas there, the largest, was from Carlisle's time in Italy. Of course I remembered the calm quartet of men, each with the exquisite face of a seraph, painted into the highest balcony overlooking the swirling mayhem of color. Though the painting was centuries old, Carlisle–the blond angel–remained unchanged. And I remembered the three others, Carlisle's early acquaintances. Edward had never used the name Volturi for the beautiful trio, two black-haired, one snow white. He'd called them Aro, Caius, and Marcus, nighttime patrons of the arts…
"Anyway, you don't irritate the Volturi," Edward went on, interrupting ray reverie. "Not unless you want to die–or whatever it is we do." His voice was so calm, it made him sound almost bored by the prospect.
My anger turned to horror. I took his marble face between my hands and held it very tightly.
"You must never, never, never think of anything like that again!" I said. "No matter what might ever happen to me, you are not allowed to hurt yourself!"
"I'll never put you in danger again, so it's a moot point."
"Put me in danger! I thought we'd established that all the bad luck is my fault?" I was getting angrier. "How dare you even think like that?" The idea of Edward ceasing to exist, even if I were dead, was impossibly painful.
"What would you do, if the situation were reversed?" he asked. "That's not the same thing."
He didn't seem to understand the difference. He chuckled.
"What if something did happen to you?" I blanched at the thought. "Would you want me to go off myself?"
A trace of pain touched his perfect features.
"I guess I see your point… a little," he admitted. "But what would I do without you?" "Whatever you were doing before I came along and complicated your existence."
He sighed. "You make that sound so easy." "It should be. I'm not really that interesting."
He was about to argue, but then he let it go. "Moot point," he reminded me. Abruptly, he pulled himself up into a more formal posture, shifting me to the side so that we were no longer touching.
"Charlie?" I guessed.
Edward smiled. After a moment, I heard the sound of the police cruiser pulling into the driveway. I reached out and took his hand firmly. My dad could deal with that much.
Charlie came in with a pizza box in his hands.
"Hey, kids." He grinned at me. "I thought you'd like a break from cooking and washing dishes for your birthday. Hungry?"
"Sure. Thanks, Dad."
Charlie didn't comment on Edward's apparent lack of appetite. He was used to Edward passing on dinner.
"Do you mind if I borrow Bella for the evening?" Edward asked when Charlie and I were done.
I looked at Charlie hopefully. Maybe he had some concept of birthdays as stay-at-home, family affairs–this was my first birthday with him, the first birthday since my mom, Renee, had remarried and gone to live in Florida, so I didn't know what he would expect.
"That's fine–the Mariners are playing the Sox tonight," Charlie explained, and my hope disappeared. "So I won't be any kind of company… Here." He scooped up the camera he'd gotten me on Renee's suggestion (because I would need pictures to fill up my scrap-book), and threw it to me.
He ought to know better than that–I'd always been coordinationally challenged. The camera glanced off the tip of my finger, and tumbled toward the floor. Edward snagged it before it could crash onto the linoleum.
"Nice save," Charlie noted. "If they're doing something fun at the Cullens' tonight, Bella, you should take some pictures. You know how your mother gets–she'll be wanting to see the pictures faster than you can take them."
"Good idea, Charlie," Edward said, handing me the camera.
I turned the camera on Edward, and snapped the first picture. "It works."
"That's good. Hey, say hi to Alice for me. She hasn't been over in a while." Charlie's mouth pulled down at one corner.
"It's been three days, Dad," I reminded him. Charlie was crazy about Alice. He'd become attached last spring when she'd helped me through my awkward convalescence; Charlie would be fore'ter grateful to her for saving him from the horror of an almost-adult daughter who needed help showering. "I'll tell her."
"Okay. You kids have fun tonight." It was clearly a dismissal. Charlie was already edging toward the living room and the TV.
Edward smiled, triumphant, and took my hand to pull me from the kitchen.
When we got to the truck, he opened the passenger door for me again, and this time I didn't argue. I still had a hard time finding the obscure turnoff to his house in the dark.
Edward drove north through Forks, visibly chafing at the speed limit enforced by my prehistoric Chevy. The engine groaned even louder than usual as he pushed it over fifty.
"Take it easy," I warned him.
"You know what you would love? A nice little Audi coupe. Very quiet, lots of power…"
"There's nothing wrong with my truck. And speaking of expensive nonessentials, if you know what's good for you, you didn't spend any money on birthday presents."
"Not a dime," he said virtuously. "Good."
"Can you do me a favor?" "That depends on what it is."
He sighed, his lovely face serious. "Bella, the last real birthday any of us had was Emmett in 1935. Cut us a little slack, and don't be too difficult tonight. They're all very excited."
It always startled me a little when he brought up things like that. "Fine, I'll behave." "I probably should warn you…"
"Please do."
"When I say they're all excited… I do mean all of them."
"Everyone?" I choked. "I thought Emmett and Rosalie were in Africa." The rest of Forks was under the impression that the older Cullens had gone off to college this year, to Dartmouth, but I knew better.
"Emmett wanted to be here." "But… Rosalie?"
"I know, Bella. Don't worry, she'll be on her best behavior."
I didn't answer. Like I could just not worry, that easy. Unlike Alice, Edward's other "adopted" sister, the golden blond and exquisite Rosalie, didn't like me much. Actually, the feeling was a little bit stronger than just dislike. As far as Rosalie was concerned, I was an unwelcome intruder into her family's secret life.
I felt horribly guilty about the present situation, guessing that Rosalie and Emmett's prolonged absence was my fault, even as I furtively enjoyed not having to see her Emmett, Edward's playful bear of a brother, I did miss. He was in many ways just like the big brother I'd always wanted… only much, much more terrifying.
Edward decided to change the subject. "So, if you won't let me get you the Audi, isn't there anything that you'd like for your birthday?"
The words came out in a whisper. "You know what I want."
A deep frown carved creases into his marble forehead. He obviously wished he'd stuck to the subject of Rosalie.
It felt like we'd had this argument a lot today. "Not tonight, Bella. Please."
"Well, maybe Alice will give me what I want."
Edward growled–a deep, menacing sound. "This isn't going to be your last birthday, Bella," he vowed.
"That's not fair!"
I thought I heard his teeth clench together.
We were pulling up to the house now. Bright light shined from every window on the first two floors. A long line of glowing Japanese lanterns hung from the porch eaves, reflecting a soft radiance on the huge cedars that surrounded the house. Big bowls of flowers–pink roses–lined the wide stairs up to the front doors.
I moaned.
Edward took a few deep breaths to calm himself. "This is a party," he reminded me. "Try to be a good sport."
"Sure," I muttered.
He came around to get my door, and offered me his hand. "I have a question."
He waited warily.
"If I develop this film," I said, toying with the camera in my hands, "will you show up in the picture?"
Edward started laughing. He helped me out of the car, pulled me up the stairs, and was still laughing as he opened the door for me.
They were all waiting in the huge white living room; when I walked through the door, they greeted me with a loud chorus of "Happy birthday, Bella!" while I blushed and looked down. Alice, I assumed, had covered every flat surface with pink candles and dozens of crystal bowls filled with hundreds of roses. There was a table with a white cloth draped over it next to Edward's grand piano, holding a pink birthday cake, more roses, a stack of glass plates, and a small pile of silver-wrapped presents.
It was a hundred times worse than I'd imagined.
Edward, sensing my distress, wrapped an encouraging arm around my waist and kissed the top of my head.
Edward's parents, Carlisle and Esme–impossibly youthful and lovely as ever–were the closest to the door. Esme hugged me carefully, her soft, caramel-colored hair brushing against my cheek as she kissed my forehead, and then Carlisle put his arm around my shoulders.
"Sorry about this, Bella," he stage-whispered. "We couldn't rein Alice in."
Rosalie and Emmett stood behind them. Rosalie didn't smile, but at least she didn't glare. Emmett's face was stretched into a huge grin. It had been months since I'd seen them; I'd forgotten how gloriously beautiful Rosalie was–it almost hurt to look at her. And had Emmett always been so… big?
"You haven't changed at all," Emmett said with mock disappointment. "I expected a perceptible difference, but here you are, red-faced just like always."
"Thanks a lot, Emmett," I said, blushing deeper.
He laughed, "I have to step out for a second"–he paused to wink conspicuously at Alice–"Don't do anything funny while I'm gone."
"I'll try."
Alice let go of Jasper's hand and skipped forward, all her teeth sparkling in the bright light. Jasper smiled, too, but kept his distance. He leaned, long and blond, against the post at the
foot of the stairs. During the days we'd had to spend cooped up together in Phoenix, I'd thought he'd gotten over his aversion to me. But he'd gone back to exactly how he'd acted before–avoiding me as much as possible–the moment he was free from that temporary obligation to protect me. I knew it wasn't personal, just a precaution, and I tried not to be overly sensitive about it. Jasper had more trouble sticking to the Cullens' diet than the rest of them; the scent of human blood was much harder for him to resist than the others–he hadn't been trying as long.
"Time to open presents," Alice declared. She put her cool hand under my elbow and towed me to the table with the cake and the shiny packages.
I put on my best martyr face. "Alice, I know I told you I didn't want anything–"
"But I didn't listen," she interrupted, smug. "Open it." She took the camera from my hands and replaced it with a big, square silver box.
The box was so light that it felt empty. The tag on top said that it was from Emmett, Rosalie, and Jasper. Selfconsciously, I tore the paper off and then stared at the box it concealed.
It was something electrical, with lots of numbers in the name. I opened the box, hoping for further illumination. But the box was empty.
"Um… thanks."
Rosalie actually cracked a smile. Jasper laughed. "It's a stereo for your truck," he explained. "Emmett's installing it right now so that you can't return it."
Alice was always one step ahead of me. "Thanks, Jasper, Rosalie," I told them, grinning as I remembered Edward's complaints about my radio this afternoon–all a setup, apparently. "Thanks, Emmett!" I called more loudly.
I heard his booming laugh from my truck, and I couldn't help laughing, too.
"Open mine and Edward's next," Alice said, so excited her voice was a high-pitched trill. She held a small, flat square in her hand.
I turned to give Edward a basilisk glare. "You promised."
Before he could answer, Emmett bounded through the door. "Just in time!" he crowed. He pushed in behind Jasper, who had also drifted closer than usual to get a good look.
"I didn't spend a dime," Edward assured me. He brushed a strand of hair from my face, leaving my skin tingling from his touch.
I inhaled deeply and turned to Alice. "Give it to me," I sighed.
Emmett chuckled with delight.
I took the little package, rolling my eyes at Edward while I stuck my finger under the edge of the paper and jerked it under the tape.
"Shoot," I muttered when the paper sliced my finger; I pulled it out to examine the damage. A single drop of blood oozed from the tiny cut.
It all happened very quickly then. "No!" Edward roared.
He threw himself at me, flinging me back across the table. It fell, as I did, scattering the cake and the presents, the flowers and the plates. I landed in the mess of shattered crystal.
Jasper slammed into Edward, and the sound was like the crash of boulders in a rock slide.
There was another noise, a grisly snarling that seemed to be coming from deep in Jasper's chest. Jasper tried to shove past Edward, snapping his teeth just inches from Edward's face.
Emmett grabbed Jasper from behind in the next second, locking him into his massive steel grip, but Jasper struggled on, his wild, empty eyes focused only on me.
Beyond the shock, there was also pain. I'd tumbled down to the floor by the piano, with my arms thrown out instinctively to catch my fall, into the jagged shards of glass. Only now did I feel the searing, stinging pain that ran from my wrist to the crease inside my elbow.
Dazed and disoriented, I looked up from the bright red blood pulsing out of my arm–into the fevered eyes of the six suddenly ravenous vampires.
2 STITCHES
CARLISLE WAS NOT THE ONLY ONE WHO STAYED calm. Centuries of experience in the emergency room were evident in his quiet, authoritative voice.
"Emmett, Rose, get Jasper outside."
Unsmiling for once, Emmett nodded. "Come on, Jasper."
Jasper struggled against Emmett's unbreakable grasp, twisting around, reaching toward his brother with his bared teeth, his eyes still past reason.
Edward's face was whiter than bone as he wheeled to crouch over me, taking a clearly defensive position. A low warning growl slid from between his clenched teeth. I could tell that he wasn't breathing.
Rosalie, her divine face strangely smug, stepped in front of Jasper–keeping a careful distance from his teeth–and helped Emmett wrestle him through the glass door that Esme held open, one hand pressed over her mouth and nose.
Esme's heart-shaped face was ashamed. "I'm so sorry, Bella," she cried as she followed the others into the yard.
"Let me by, Edward," Carlisle murmured.
A second passed, and then Edward nodded slowly and relaxed his stance.
Carlisle knelt beside me, leaning close to examine my arm. I could feel the shock frozen on my face, and I tried to compose it.
"Here, Carlisle," Alice said, handing him a towel.
He shook his head. "Too much glass in the wound." He reached over and ripped a long, thin scrap from the bottom of the white tablecloth. He twisted it around my arm above the elbow to form a tourniquet. The smell of the blood was making me dizzy. My ears rang.
"Bella," Carlisle said softly. "Do you want me to drive you to the hospital, or would you like me to take care of it here?"
"Here, please," I whispered. If he took me to the hospital, there would be no way to keep this from Charlie.
"I'll get your bag," Alice said.
"Let's take her to the kitchen table," Carlisle said to Edward.
Edward lifted me effortlessly, while Carlisle kept the pressure steady on my arm.
"How are you doing, Bella?" Carlisle asked.
"I'm fine." My voice was reasonably steady, which pleased me. Edward's face was like stone.
Alice was there. Carlisle's black bag was already on the table, a small but brilliant desk light plugged into the wall. Edward sat me gently into a chair, and Carlisle pulled up another. He went to work at once.
Edward stood over me, still protective, still not breathing. "Just go, Edward," I sighed.
"I can handle it," he insisted. But his jaw was rigid; his eyes burned with the intensity of the thirst he fought, so much worse for him than it was for the others.
"You don't need to be a hero," I said. "Carlisle can fix me up without your help. Get some fresh air."
I winced as Carlisle did something to my arm that stung. "I'll stay," he said.
"Why are you so masochistic?" I mumbled.
Carlisle decided to intercede. "Edward, you may as well go find Jasper before he gets too far. I'm sure he's upset with himself, and I doubt he'll listen to anyone but you right now."
"Yes," I eagerly agreed. "Go find Jasper."
"You might as well do something useful," Alice added.
Edward's eyes narrowed as we ganged up on him, but, finally, he nodded once and sprinted smoothly through the kitchen's back door. I was sure he hadn't taken a breath since I'd sliced my finger.
A numb, dead feeling was spreading through my arm.
Though it erased the sting, it reminded me of the gash, and I watched Carlisle's face carefully to distract me from what his hands were doing. His hair gleamed gold in the bright light as he bent over my arm. I could feel the faint stirrings of unease in the pit of my stomach, but I was determined not to let my usual squeamishness get the best of me. There was no pain now, just a gentle tugging sensation that I tried to ignore. No reason to get sick like a baby.
If she hadn't been in my line of sight, I wouldn't have noticed Alice give up and steal out of the room. With a tiny, apologetic smile on her lips, she disappeared through the kitchen doorway.
"Well, that's everyone," I sighed. "I can clear a room, at least."
"It's not your fault," Carlisle comforted me with a chuckle. "It could happen to anyone." "Could" I repeated. "But it usually just happens to me."
He laughed again.
His relaxed calm was only more amazing set in direct contrast with everyone else's reaction. I couldn't find any trace of anxiety in his face. He worked with quick, sure movements. The only sound besides our quiet breathing was the soft plink, plink as the tiny fragments of glass dropped one by one to the table.
"How can you do this?" I demanded. "Even Alice and Esme…" I trailed off, shaking my head in wonder. Though the rest of them had given up the traditional diet of vampires just as absolutely as Carlisle had, he was the only one who could bear the smell of my blood without suffering from the intense temptation. Clearly, this was much more difficult than he made it seem.
"Years and years of practice," he told me. "I barely notice the scent anymore."
"Do you think it would be harder if you took a vacation from the hospital for a long time. And weren't around any blood?"
"Maybe." He shrugged his shoulders, but his hands remained steady. "I've never felt the need for an extended holiday." He flashed a brilliant smile in my direction. "I enjoy my work too much."
Plink, plink, plink. I was surprised at how much glass there seemed to be in my arm. I was tempted to glance at the growing pile, just to check the size, but I knew that idea would not be helpful to my no-vomiting strategy.
"What is it that you enjoy?" I wondered. It didn't make sense to me–the years of struggle and self-denial he must have spent to get to the point where he could endure this so easily. Besides, I wanted to keep him talking; the conversation kept my mind off the queasy feeling in my stomach.
His dark eyes were calm and thoughtful as he answered. "Hmm. What I enjoy the very most is when my… enhanced abilities let me save someone who would otherwise have been lost. It's pleasant knowing that, thanks to what I can do, some people's lives are better because I exist. Even the sense of smell is a useful diagnostic tool at times." One side of his mouth pulled up in half a smile.
I mulled that over while he poked around, making sure all the glass splinters were gone. Then he rummaged in his bag for new tools, and I tried not to picture a needle and thread.
"You try very hard to make up for something that was never your fault," I suggested while a
new kind of tugging started at the edges of my skin. "What I mean is, it's not like you asked for this. You didn't choose this kind of life, and yet you have to work so hard to be good."
"I don't know that I'm making up for anything," he disagreed lightly. "Like everything in life, I just had to decide what to do with what I was given."
"That makes it sound too easy."
He examined my arm again. "There," he said, snipping a thread. "All done." He wiped an oversized Q-tip, dripping with some syrup-colored liquid, thoroughly across the operation site. The smell was strange; it made my head spin. The syrup stained my skin.
"In the beginning, though," I pressed while he taped another long piece of gauze securely in place, sealing it to my skin. "Why did you even think to try a different way than the obvious one?"
His lips turned up in a private smile. "Hasn't Edward told you this story?" "Yes. But I'm trying to understand what you were thinking…"
His face was suddenly serious again, and I wondered if his thoughts had gone to the same place that mine had. Wondering what I would be thinking when–I refused to think if–it was me.
"You know my father was a clergyman," he mused as he cleaned the table carefully, rubbing everything down with wet gauze, and then doing it again. The smell of alcohol burned in my nose. "He had a rather harsh view of the world, which I was already beginning to question before the time that I changed." Carlisle put all the dirty gauze and the glass slivers into an empty crystal bowl. I didn't understand what he was doing, even when he lit the match. Then he threw it onto the alcohol-soaked fibers, and the sudden blaze made me jump.
"Sorry," he apologized. "That ought to do it… So I didn't agree with my father's particular brand of faith. But never, in the nearly four hundred years now since I was born, have I ever seen anything to make me doubt whether God exists in some form or the other. Not even the reflection in the mirror."
I pretended to examine the dressing on my arm to hide my surprise at the direction our conversation had taken. Religion was the last thing I expected, all things considered. My own life was fairly devoid of belief. Charlie considered himself a Lutheran, because that's what his parents had been, but Sundays he worshipped by the river with a fishing pole in his hand. Renee tried out a church now and then, but, much like her brief affairs with tennis, pottery, yoga, and French classes, she moved on by the time I was aware of her newest fad.
"I'm sure all this sounds a little bizarre, coming from a vampire." He grinned, knowing how their casual use of that word never failed to shock me. "But I'm hoping that there is still a point to this life, even for us. It's a long shot, I'll admit," he continued in an offhand voice.
"By all accounts, we're damned regardless. But I hope, maybe foolishly, that we'll get some measure of credit for trying."
"I don't think that's foolish," I mumbled. I couldn't imagine anyone, deity included, who wouldn't be impressed by Carlisle. Besides, the only kind of heaven I could appreciate would have to include Edward. "And I don't think anyone else would, either."
"Actually, you're the very first one to agree with me."
"The rest of them don't feel the same?" I asked, surprised, thinking of only one person in particular.
Carlisle guessed the direction of my thoughts again. "Edward's with me up to a point. God and heaven exist… and so does hell. But he doesn't believe there is an afterlife for our kind." Carlisle's voice was very soft; he stared out the big window over the sink, into the darkness. "You see, he thinks we've lost our souls."
I immediately thought of Edward's words this afternoon: unless you want to die–or whatever it is that we do. The lightbulb flicked on over my head.
"That's the real problem, isn't it?" I guessed. "That's why he's being so difficult about me."
Carlisle spoke slowly. "I look at my… son. His strength, his goodness, the brightness that shines out of him–and it only fuels that hope, that faith, more than ever. How could there not be more for one such as Edward?"
I nodded in fervent agreement.
"But if I believed as he does…" He looked down at me with unfathomable eyes. "If you believed as he did. Could you take away his soul?"
The way he phrased the question thwarted my answer.
If he'd asked me whether I would risk my soul for Edward, the reply would be obvious. But would I risk Edward's soul? I pursed my lips unhappily. That wasn't a fair exchange.
"You see the problem."
I shook my head, aware of the stubborn set of my chin. Carlisle sighed.
"It's my choice," I insisted.
"It's his, too." He held up his hand when he could see that I was about to argue. "Whether he is responsible for doing that to you."
"He's not the only one able to do it." I eyed Carlisle speculatively.
He laughed, abruptly lightening the mood. "Oh, no! You're going to have to work this out with him." But then he sighed. "That's the one part I can never be sure of. I think, in most other ways, that I've done the best I could with what I had to work with. But was it right to doom the others to this life? I can't decide."
I didn't answer. I imagined what my life would be like if Carlisle had resisted the temptation to change his lonely existence… and shuddered.
"It was Edward's mother who made up my mind." Carlisle's voice was almost a whisper. He stared unseeingly out the black windows.
"His mother?" Whenever I'd asked Edward about his parents, he would merely say that they had died long ago, and his memories were vague. I realized Carlisle's memory of them, despite the brevity of their contact, would be perfectly clear.
"Yes. Her name was Elizabeth. Elizabeth Masen. His father, Edward Senior, never regained consciousness in the hospital. He died in the first wave of the influenza. But Elizabeth was alert until almost the very end. Edward looks a great deal like her–she had that same strange bronze shade to her hair, and her eyes were exactly the same color green."
"His eyes were green?" I murmured, trying to picture it.
"Yes…" Carlisle's ocher eyes were a hundred years away now. "Elizabeth worried obsessively over her son. She hurt her own chances of survival trying to nurse him from her sickbed. I expected that he would go first, he was so much worse off than she was. When the end came for her, it was very quick. It was just after sunset, and I'd arrived to relieve the doctors who'd been working all day. That was a hard time to pretend–there was so much work to be done, and I had no need of rest. How I hated to go back to my house, to hide in the dark and pretend to sleep while so many were dying.
"I went to check Elizabeth and her son first. I'd grown attached–always a dangerous thing to do considering the fragile nature of humans. I could see at once that she'd taken a bad turn. The fever was raging out of control, and her body was too weak to fight anymore.
"She didn't look weak, though, when she glared up at me from her cot.
"Save him!' she commanded me in the hoarse voice that was all her throat could manage.
"I'll do everything in my power,' I promised her, taking her hand. The fever was so high, she probably couldn't even tell how unnaturally cold mine felt. Everything felt cold to her skin.
"You must," she insisted, clutching at my hand with enough strength that I wondered if she wouldn't pull through the crisis after all. Her eyes were hard, like stones, like emeralds. 'You must do everything in your power. What others cannot do, that is what you must do for my Edward."
"It frightened me. She looked it me with those piercing eyes, and, for one instant, I felt certain that she knew my secret. Then the fever overwhelmed her, and she never regained consciousness. She died within an hour of making her demand.
"I'd spent decades considering the idea of creating a companion for myself. Just one other creature who could really know me, rather than what I pretended to be. But I could never justify it to myself–doing what had been done to me.
"There Edward lay, dying. It was clear that he had only hours left. Beside him, his mother, her face somehow not yet peaceful, not even in death."
Carlisle saw it all again, his memory unblurred by the intervening century. I could see it clearly, too, as he spoke–the despair of the hospital, the overwhelming atmosphere of death. Edward burning with fever, his life slipping away with each tick of the clock… I shuddered again, and forced the picture from my mind.
"Elizabeth's words echoed in my head. How could she guess what I could do? Could anyone really want that for her son?
"I looked at Edward. Sick as he was, he was still beautiful. There was something pure and good about his face. The kind of face I would have wanted my son to have.
"After all those years of indecision, I simply acted on a whim. I wheeled his mother to the morgue first, and then I came back for him. No one noticed that he was still breathing. There weren't enough hands, enough eyes, to keep track of half of what the patients needed. The morgue was empty–of the living, at least. I stole him out the back door, and carried him across the rooftops back to my home.
"I wasn't sure what had to be done. I settled for recreating the wounds I'd received myself, so many centuries earlier in London. I felt bad about that later. It was more painful and lingering than necessary.
"I wasn't sorry, though. I've never been sorry that I saved Edward." He shook his head, coming back to the present. He smiled at me. "I suppose I should take you home now."
"I'll do that," Edward said. He came through the shadowy dining room, walking slowly for him. His face was smooth, unreadable, but there was something wrong with his eyes–something he was trying very hard to hide. I felt a spasm of unease in my stomach.
"Carlisle can take me," I said. I looked down at my shirt; the light blue cotton was soaked and spotted with my blood. My right shoulder was covered in thick pink frosting.
"I'm fine." Edward's voice was unemotional. "You'll need to change anyway. You'd give Charlie a heart attack the way you look. I'll have Alice get you something." He strode out the kitchen door again.
I looked at Carlisle anxiously. "He's very upset."
"Yes," Carlisle agreed. "Tonight is exactly the kind of thing that he fears the most. You being put in danger, because of what we are."
"It's not his fault." "It's not yours, either."
I looked away from his wise, beautiful eyes. I couldn't agree with that.
Carlisle offered me his hand and helped me up from the table. I followed him out into the main room. Esme had come back; she was mopping the floor where I'd fallen–with straight bleach from the smell of it.
"Esme, let me do that." I could feel that my face was bright red again. "I'm already done." She smiled up at me. "How do you feel?"
"I'm fine," I assured her. "Carlisle sews faster than any other doctor I've had." They both chuckled.
Alice and Edward came in the back doors. Alice hurried to my side, but Edward hung back, his face indecipherable.
"C'mon," Alice said. "I'll get you something less macabre to wear."
She found me a shirt of Esme's that was close to the same color mine had been. Charlie wouldn't notice, I was sure. The long white bandage on my arm didn't look nearly as serious when I was no longer spattered in gore. Charlie was never surprised to see me bandaged.
"Alice," I whispered as she headed back to the door.
"Yes?" She kept her voice low, too, and looked at me curiously, her head cocked to the side.
"How bad is it?" I couldn't be sure if my whispering was a wasted effort. Even though we were upstairs, with the door closed, perhaps he could hear me.
Her face tensed. "I'm not sure yet." "How's Jasper?"
She sighed. "He's very unhappy with himself. It's all so much more of challenge for him, and he hates feeling weak."
"It's not his fault. You'll tell him that I'm not mad at him, not at all, won't you?"
"Of course."
Edward was waiting for me by the front door. As I got to the bottom of the staircase, he held it open without a word.
"Take your things!" Alice cried as I walked warily toward Edward. She scooped up the two packages, one half-opened, and my camera from under the piano, and pressed them into my good arm. "You can thank me later, when you've opened them."
Esme and Carlisle both said a quiet goodnight. I could see them stealing quick glances at their impassive son, much like I was.
It was a relief to be outside; I hurried past the lanterns and the roses, now unwelcome reminders. Edward kept pace with me silently. He opened the passenget side for me, and I climbed in without complaint.
On the dashboard was a big red ribbon, stuck to the new stereo. I pulled it off, throwing it to the floor. As Edward slid into the other side, I kicked the ribbon under my seat.
He didn't look at me or the stereo. Neither of us switched it on, and the silence was somehow intensified by the sudden thunder of the engine. He drove too fast down the dark, serpentine lane.
The silence was making me insane.
"Say something," I finally begged as he turned onto the freeway. "What do you want me to say?" he asked in a detached voice.
I cringed at his remoteness. 'Tell me you forgive me."
That brought a flicker of life to his face–a flicker of anger. "Forgive you? For what?" "If I'd been more careful, nothing would have happened."
"Bella, you gave yourself a paper cut–that hardly deserves the death penalty." "It's still my fault."
My words opened up the floodgate.
"Your fault? If you'd cut yourself at Mike Newton's house, with Jessica there and Angela and your other normal friends, the worst that could possibly have happened would be what? Maybe they couldn't find you a bandage? If you'd tripped and knocked over a pile of glass plates on your own–without someone throwing you into them–even then, what's the worst? You'd get blood on the seats when they drove you to the emergency room? Mike Newton could have held your hand while they stitched you up–and he wouldn't be righting the urge
to kill you the whole time he was there. Don't try to take any of this on yourself, Bella. It will only make me more disgusted with myself."
"How the hell did Mike Newton end up in this conversation?" I demanded.
"Mike Newton ended up in this conversation because Mike Newton would be a hell of a lot healthier for you to be with," he growled.
"I'd rather die than be with Mike Newton," I protested. "I'd rather die than be with anyone but you."
"Don't be melodramatic, please." "Well then, don't you be ridiculous."
He didn't answer. He glared through the windshield, his expression black.
I racked my brain for some way to salvage the evening. When we pulled up in front of my house, I still hadn't come up with anything.
He killed the engine, but his hands stayed clenched around the steering wheel. "Will you stay tonight?" I asked.
"I should go home."
The last thing I wanted was for him to go wallow in remorse. "For my birthday," I pressed.
"You can't have it both ways–either you want people to ignore your birthday or you don't. One or the other."
His voice was stern, but not .is serious as before. I breathed a silent sigh of relief. "Okay. I've decided that I don't want you to ignore my birthday. I'll see you upstairs." I hopped out, reaching back in for my packages. He frowned.
"You don't have to take those."
"I want them," I responded automatically, and then wondered if he was using reverse psychology.
"No, you don't. Carlisle and Esme spent money on you."
"I'll live." I tucked the presents awkwardly under my good arm and slammed the door behind me. He was out of the truck and by my side in less than a second.
"Let me carry them, at least." he said as he took them away. "I'll be in your room." I smiled. "Thanks."
"Happy birthday," he sighed, and leaned down to touch his lips to mine.
I reached up on my toes to make the kiss last longer when he pulled away. He smiled my favorite crooked smile, and then he disappeared into the darkness.
The game was still on; as soon as I walked through the front door I could hear the announcer rambling over the babble of the crowd.
"Bell?" Charlie called.
"Hey, Dad," I said as I came around the corner. I held my arm close to my side. The slight pressure burned, and I wrinkled my nose. The anesthetic was apparently losing its effectiveness.
"How was it?" Charlie lounged across the sofa with his bare feet propped up on the arm. What was left of his curly brown hair was crushed flat on one side.
"Alice went overboard. Flowers, cake, candles, presents–the whole bit." "What did they get you?"
"A stereo for my truck." And various unknowns. "Wow."
"Yeah," I agreed. "Well, I'm calling it a night." "I'll see you in the morning."
I waved. "See ya."
"What happened to your arm?"
I flushed and cursed silently. "I tripped. It's nothing." "Bella," he sighed, shaking his head.
"Goodnight, Dad."
I hurried up to the bathroom, where I kept my pajamas for just such nights as these. I shrugged into the matching tank top and cotton pants that I'd gotten to replace the holey sweats I used to wear to bed, wincing as the movement pulled at the stitches. I washed my face one-handed, brushed my teeth, and then skipped to my room.
He was sitting in the center of my bed, toying idly with one of the silver boxes. "Hi," he said. His voice was sad. He was wallowing.
I went to the bed, pushed the presents out of his hands, and climbed into his lap. "Hi." I snuggled into his stone chest. "Can I open my presents now?"
"Where did the enthusiasm come from?" he wondered. "You made me curious."
I picked up the long flat rectangle that must have been from Carlisle and Esme.
"Allow me," he suggested. He took the gift from my hand and tore the silver paper off with one fluid movement. He handed the rectangular white box back to me.
"Are you sure I can handle lifting the lid?" I muttered, but he ignored me.
Inside the box was a long thick piece of paper with an overwhelming amount of fine print. It took me a minute to get the gist of the information.
"We're going to Jacksonville?" And I was excited, in spite of myself. It was a voucher for plane tickets, for both me and Edward.
"That's the idea."
"I can't believe it. Renee is going to flip! You don't mind, though, do you? It's sunny, you'll have to stay inside all day."
"I think I can handle it," he said, and then frowned. "If I'd had any idea that you could respond to a gift this appropriately, I would have made you open it in front of Carlisle and Esme. I thought you'd complain."
"Well, of course it's too much. But I get to take you with me!"
He chuckled. "Now I wish I'd spent money on your present. I didn't realize that you were capable of being reasonable."
I set the tickets aside and reached for his present, my curiosity rekindled. He took it from me and unwrapped it like the first one.
He handed back a clear CD jewel case, with a blank silver CD inside. "What is it?" I asked, perplexed.
He didn't say anything; he took the CD and reached around me to put it in the CD player on the bedside table. He hit play, and we waited in silence. Then the music began.
I listened, speechless and wide-eyed. I knew he was waiting for my reaction, but I couldn't talk. Tears welled up, and I reached up to wipe them away before they could spill over.
"Does your arm hurt?" he asked anxiously.
"No, it's not my arm. It's beautiful, Edward. You couldn't have given me anything I would love more. I can't believe it." I shut up, so I could listen.
It was his music, his compositions. The first piece on the CD was my lullaby.
"I didn't think you would let me get a piano so I could play for you here," he explained. "You're right."
"How does your arm feel?"
"Just fine." Actually, it was starting to blaze under the bandage. I wanted ice. I would have settled for his hand, but that would have given me away.
"I'll get you some Tylenol."
"I don't need anything," I protested, but he slid me off his lap and headed for the door.
"Charlie," I hissed. Charlie wasn't exactly aware that Edward frequently stayed over. In fact, he would have a stroke if that fact were brought to his attention. But I didn't feel too guilty for deceiving him It wasn't as if we were up to anything he wouldn't want me to be up to.
Edward and his rules…
"He won't catch me," Edward promised as he disappeared silently out the door . . and returned, catching the door before it had swung back to touch the frame. He had the glass from the bathroom and the bottle of pills in one hand.
I took the pills he handed me without arguing–I knew I would lose the argument And my arm really was starting to bother me.
My lullaby continued, soft and lovely, in the background.
"It's late," Edward noted. He scooped me up off the bed with one arm, and pulled the cover back with the other. He put me down with my head on my pillow and tucked the quilt around me. He lay down next to me–on top of the blanket so I wouldn't get chilled–and put his arm over me.
I leaned my head against his shoulder and sighed happily. "Thanks again," I whispered.
"You're welcome."
It was quiet for a long moment as I listened to my lullaby drift to a close. Another song began. I recognized Esme's favorite.
"What are you thinking about?'" I wondered in a whisper.
He hesitated for a second before he told me. "I was thinking about right and wrong, actually."
I felt a chill tingle along my spine.
"Remember how I decided that I wanted you to not ignore my birthday?" I asked quickly, hoping it wasn't too clear that I was trying to distract him.
"Yes," he agreed, wary.
"Well, I was thinking, since it's still my birthday, that I'd like you to kiss me again." "You're greedy tonight."
"Yes, I am–but please, don't do anything you don't want to do," I added, piqued.
He laughed, and then sighed. "Heaven forbid that I should do anything I don't want to do," he said in a strangely desperate tone as he put his hand under my chin and pulled my face up to his.
The kiss began much the same as usual–Edward was as careful as ever, and my heart began to overreact like it always did. And then something seemed to change. Suddenly his lips became much more urgent, his free hand twisted into my hair and held my face securely to his. And, though my hands tangled in his hair, too, and though I was clearly beginning to cross his cautious lines, for once he didn't stop me. His body was cold through the thin quilt, but I crushed myself against him eagerly.
When he stopped it was abrupt; he pushed me away with gentle, firm hands.
I collapsed back onto my pillow, gasping, my head spinning. Something tugged at my memory, elusive, on the edges.
"Sorry," he said, and he was breathless, too. "That was out of line." "I don't mind," I panted.
He frowned at me in the darkness. "Try to sleep. Bella." "No, I want you to kiss me again."
"You're overestimating my self-control."
"Which is tempting you more, my blood or my body?" I challenged.
"It's a tie." He grinned briefly in spite of himself, and then was serious again. "Now. why don't you stop pushing your luck and go to sleep?"
"Fine," I agreed, snuggling closer to him. I really did feel exhausted. It had been a long day in so many ways, yet I felt no sense of relief at its end. Almost as if something worse was coming tomorrow. It was a silly premonition–what could be worse than today?' Just the shock catching up with me, no doubt.
Trying to be sneaky about it, I pressed my injured arm against his shoulder, so his cool skin would sooth the burning. It felt better at once.
I was halfway asleep, maybe more, when I realized what his kiss had reminded me of: last spring, when he'd had to leave me to throw James off my trail, Edward had kissed me goodbye, not knowing when–or if–we would see each other again. This kiss had the same almost painful edge for some reason I couldn't imagine. I shuddered into unconsciousness, as if I were already having a nightmare.
3. THE END
I FELT ABSOLUTELY HIDEOUS IN THE MORNING. I HADN'T slept well; my arm
burned and my head ached. It didn't help my outlook that Edward's face was smooth and remote as he kissed my forehead quickly and ducked out my window. I was afraid of the time I'd spent unconscious, afraid that he might have been thinking about right and wrong again while he watched me sleep. The anxiety seemed to ratchet up the intensity of the pounding in my head.
Edward was waiting for me at school, as usual, but his face was still wrong. There was something buried in his eyes that I couldn't be sure of–and it scared me. I didn't want to bring up last night, but I wasn't sure if avoiding the subject would be worse.
He opened my door for me. "How do you feel?"
"Perfect," I lied, cringing as the sound of the slamming door echoed in my head.
We walked in silence, he shortening his stride to match mine. There were so many questions I wanted to ask, but most of those questions would have to wait, because chey were for Alice: How was Jasper this morning? What had they said when I was gone? What had Rosalie said? And most importantly, what could she see happening now in her strange, imperfect visions of the future? Could she guess what Edward was thinking, why he was so gloomy? Was there a foundation for the tenuous, instinctive fears that I couldn't seem to shake?
The morning passed slowly. I was impatient to see Alice, though I wouldn't be able to really talk to her with Edward there. Edward remained aloof. Occasionally he would ask about my arm, and I would lie.
Alice usually beat us to lunch; she didn't have to keep pace with a sloth like me. But she wasn't at the table, waiting with a tray of food she wouldn't eat.
Edward didn't say anything about her absence. I wondered to myself if her class was running late–until I saw Conner and Ben, who were in her fourth hour French class.
"Where's Alice?" I asked Edward anxiously.
He looked at the granola bar he was slowly pulverizing between his fingertips while he answered. "She's with Jasper."
"Is he okay?"
"He's gone away for a while." "What? Where?"
Edward shrugged. "Nowhere in particular."
"And Alice, too," I said with quiet desperation. Of course, if Jasper needed her, she would go.
"Yes. She'll be gone for a while. She was trying to convince him to go to Denali."
Denali was where the one other band of unique vampires–good ones like the Cullens–lived. Tanya and her family. I'd heard of them now and again. Edward had run to them last winter when my arrival had made Forks difficult for him. Laurent, the most civilized member of James's little coven, had gone there rather than siding with James against the Cullens. It made sense for Alice to encourage Jasper to go there.
I swallowed, trying to dislodge the sudden lump in my throat. The guilt made my head bow and my shoulders slump. I'd run them out of their home, just like Rosalie and Emmett. I was a plague.
"Is your arm bothering you?" he asked solicitously. "Who cares about my stupid arm?" I muttered in disgust. He didn't answer, and I put my head down on the table.
By the end of the day, the silence was becoming ridiculous. I didn't want to be the one to break it, but apparently that was my only choice if I ever wanted him to talk to me again.
"You'll come over later tonight?" I asked as he walked me–silently–to my truck. He always came over.
"Later?"
It pleased me that he seemed surprised. "I have to work. I had to trade with Mrs. Newton to get yesterday off."
"Oh," he murmured.
"So you'll come over when I'm home, though, right?" I hated that I felt suddenly unsure about this.
"If you want me to."
"I always want you," I reminded him, with perhaps a little more intensity than the conversation required.
I expected he would laugh, or smile, or react somehow to my words. "All right, then," he said indifferently.
He kissed my forehead again before he shut the door on me. Then he turned his back and loped gracefully toward his car.
I was able to drive out of the parking lot before the panic really hit, but I was hyperventilating by the time I got to Newton's.
He just needed time, I told myself. He would get over this. Maybe he was sad because his family was disappearing. But Alice and Jasper would come back soon, and Rosalie and Emmett, too. If it would help, I would stay away from the big white house on the river–I'd never set foot there again. That didn't matter. I'd still see Alice at school. She would have to come back for school, right? And she was at my place all the time anyway. She wouldn't want to hurt Charlie's feelings by staying away.
No doubt I would also run into Carlisle with regularity–in the emergency room.
After all, what had happened last night was nothing. Nothing had happened. So I fell down–that was the story of my life. Compared to last spring, it seemed especially unimportant. James had left me broken and nearly dead from loss of blood–and yet Edward had handled the interminable weeks in the hospital much better than this. Was it because, this time, it wasn't an enemy he'd had to protect me from? Because it was his brother?
Maybe it would be better if he took me away, rather than his family being scattered. I grew slightly less depressed as I considered all the uninterrupted alone time. If he could just last through the school year, Charlie wouldn't be able to object. We could go away to college, or pretend that's what we were doing, like Rosalie and Emmett this year. Surely Edward could wait a year. What was a year to an immortal? It didn't even seem like that much to me.
I was able to talk myself into enough composure to handle getting out of the truck and walking to the store. Mike Newton had beaten me here today, and he smiled and waved when I came in. I grabbed my vest, nodding vaguely in his direction. I was still imagining pleasant scenarios that consisted of me running away with Edward to various exotic locales.
Mike interrupted my fantasy. "How was your birthday?" "Ugh," I mumbled. "I'm glad it's over."
Mike looked at me from the corners of his eyes like I was crazy.
Work dragged. I wanted to see Edward again, praying that he would be past the worst of this, whatever it was exactly, by the time I saw him again. It's nothing, I told myself over and over again. Everything will go back to normal.
The relief I felt when I turned onto my street and saw Edward's silver car parked in front of my house was an overwhelming, heady thing. And it bothered me deeply that it should be that way.
I hurried through the front door, calling out before I was completely inside. "Dad? Edward?"
As I spoke, I could hear the distinctive theme music from ESPN's SportsCenter coming from the living room.
"In here," Charlie called.
I hung my raincoat on its peg and hurried around the corner.
Edward was in the armchair, my father on the sofa. Both had their eyes trained on the TV. The focus was normal for my father. Not so much for Edward.
"Hi," I said weakly.
"Hey, Bella," my father answered, eyes never moving. "We just had cold pizza. I think it's still on the table."
"Okay."
I waited in the doorway. Finally, Edward looked over at me with a polite smile. "I'll be right behind you," he promised. His eyes strayed back to the TV.
I stared for another minute, shocked. Neither one seemed to notice. I could feel something, panic maybe, building up in my chest. I escaped to the kitchen.
The pizza held no interest for me. I sat in my chair, pulled my knees up, and wrapped my arms around them. Something was very wrong, maybe more wrong than I'd realized. The sounds of male bonding and banter continued from the TV set.
I tried to get control of myself, to reason with myself.
What's the worst that can happen? I flinched. That was definitely the wrong question to ask. I was having a hard time breathing right.
Okay, I thought again, what's the worst I can live through? I didn't like that question so much, either. But I thought through the possibilities I'd considered today.
Staying away from Edward's family. Of course, he wouldn't expect Alice to be part of that. But if Jasper was off limits, that would lessen the time I could have with her. I nodded to myself–I could live with that.
Or going away. Maybe he wouldn't want to wait till the end of the school year, maybe it would have to be now.
In front of me, on the table, my presents from Charlie and Renee were where I had left them, the camera I hadn't had the chance to use at the Cullens' sitting beside the album. I touched
the pretty cover of the scrapbook my mother had given me, and sighed, thinking of Renee. Somehow, living without her for as long as I had did not make the idea of a more permanent separation easier. And Charlie would be left all alone here, abandoned. They would both be so hurt…
But we'd come back, right? We'd visit, of course, wouldn't we? I couldn't be certain about the answer to that.
I leaned my cheek against my knee, staring at the physical tokens of my parents' love. I'd known this path I'd chosen was going to be hard. And, after all, I was thinking about the worst-case scenario–the very worst I could live through.
I touched the scrapbook again, flipping the front cover over. Little metal corners were already in place to hold the first picture. It wasn't a half-bad idea, to make some record of my life here. I felt a strange urge to get started. Maybe I didn't have that long left in Forks.
I toyed with the wrist strap on the camera, wondering about the first picture on the roll. Could it possibly turn out anything close to the original? I doubted it. But he didn't seem worried that it would be blank. I chuckled to myself, thinking of his carefree laughter last night. The chuckle died away. So much had changed, and so abruptly. It made me feel a little bit dizzy, like I was standing on an edge, a precipice somewhere much too high.
I didn't want to think about that anymore. I grabbed the camera and headed up the stairs.
My room hadn't really changed all that much in the seventeen years since my mother had been here. The walls were still light blue, the same yellowed lace curtains hung in front of the window. There was a bed, rather than a crib, but she would recognize the quilt draped untidily over the top–it had been a gift ROM Gran.
Regardless, I snapped a picture of my room. There wasn't much else I could do tonight–it was too dark outside–and the feeling was growing stronger, it was almost a compulsion now. I would record everything about Forks before I had to leave it.
Change was coming. I could feel it. It wasn't a pleasant prospect, not when life was perfect the way it was.
I took my time coming back down the stairs, camera in hand, trying to ignore the butterflies in my stomach as I thought of the strange distance I didn't want to see in Edward's eyes. He would get over this. Probably he was worried that I would be upset when he asked me to leave. I would let him work through it without meddling. And I would be prepared when he asked.
I had the camera ready as I leaned around the corner, being sneaky. I was sure there was no chance that I had caught Edward by surprise, but he didn't look up. I felt a brief shiver as something icy twisted in my stomach; I ignored that and took the picture.
They both looked at me then. Charlie frowned. Edward's face was empty, expressionless. "What are you doing, Bella?" Charlie complained.
"Oh, come on." I pretended to smile as I went to sit on the floor in front of the sofa where Charlie lounged. "You know Mom will be calling soon to ask if I'm using my presents. I have to get to work before she can get her feelings hurt."
"Why are you taking pictures of me, though?" he grumbled.
"Because you're so handsome," I replied, keeping it light. "And because, since you bought the camera, you're obligated to be one of my subjects."
He mumbled something unintelligible.
"Hey, Edward," I said with admirable indifference. "Take one of me and my dad together."
I threw the camera toward him, carefully avoiding his eyes, and knelt beside the arm of the sofa where Charlie's face was. Charlie sighed.
"You need to smile, Bella," Edward murmured. I did my best, and the camera flashed.
"Let me take one of you kids," Charlie suggested. I knew he was just trying to shift the camera's focus from himself.
Edward stood and lightly tossed him the camera.
I went to stand beside Edward, and the arrangement felt formal and strange to me. He put one hand lightly on my shoulder, and I wrapped my arm more securely around his waist. I wanted to look at his face, but I was afraid to.
"Smile, Bella," Charlie reminded me again.
I took a deep breath and smiled. The flash blinded me.
"Enough pictures for tonight," Charlie said then, shoving the camera into a crevice of the sofa cushions and rolling over it. "You don't have to use the whole roll now."
Edward dropped his hand from my shoulder and twisted casually out of my arm. He sat back down in the armchair.
I hesitated, and then went to sit against the sofa again. I was suddenly so frightened that my hands were shaking. I pressed them into my stomach to hide them, put my chin on my knees and stared at the TV screen in front of me, seeing nothing.
When the show ended, I hadn't moved an inch. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Edward
stand.
"I'd better get home," he said.
Charlie didn't look up from the commercial. "See ya."
I got awkwardly to my feet–I was stiff from sitting so still–and followed Edward out the front door. He went straight to his car.
"Will you stay?" I asked, no hope in my voice.
I expected his answer, so it didn't hurt as much. "Not tonight."
I didn't ask for a reason.
He got in his car and drove away while I stood there, unmoving. I barely noticed that it was raining. I waited, without knowing what I waited for, until the door opened behind me.
"Bella, what are you doing?" Charlie asked, surprised to see me standing there alone and dripping.
"Nothing." I turned and trudged back to the house. It was a long night, with little in the way of rest.
I got up as soon as there was a faint light outside my window. I dressed for school mechanically, waiting for the clouds to brighten. When I had eaten a bowl of cereal, I decided that it was light enough for pictures. I took one of my truck, and then the front of the house. I turned and snapped a few of the forest by Charlie's house. Funny how it didn't seem sinister like it used to. I realized I would miss this–the green, the timelessness, the mystery of the woods. All of it.
I put the camera in my school bag before I left. I tried to concentrate on my new project rather than the fact that Edward apparently hadn't gotten over things during the night.
Along with the fear, I was beginning to feel impatience. How long could this last?
It lasted through the morning. He walked silently beside me, never seeming to actually look at me. I tried to concentrate on my classes, but not even English could hold my attention. Mr. Berty had to repeat his question about Lady Capulet twice before I realized he was talking to me. Edward whispered the correct answer under his breath and then went back to ignoring me.
At lunch, the silence continued. I felt like I was going to start screaming at any moment, so, to distract myself, I leaned across the table's invisible line and spoke to Jessica.
"Hey, Jess?" "What's up, Bella?"
"Could you do me a favor?" I asked, reaching into my bag. "My mom wants me to get some pictures of my friends for a scrapbook. So, take some pictures of everybody, okay?"
I handed her the camera.
"Sure," she said, grinning, and turned to snap a candid shot of Mike with his mouth full.
A predictable picture war ensued. I watched them hand the camera around the table, giggling and flirting and complaining about being on film. It seemed strangely childish. Maybe I just wasn't in the mood for normal human behavior today.
"Uh-oh," Jessica said apologetically as she returned the camera. "I think we used all your film."
"That's okay. I think I already got pictures of everything else I needed."
After school, Edward walked me back to the parking lot in silence. I had to work again, and for once, I was glad. Time with me obviously wasn't helping things. Maybe time alone would be better.
I dropped my film off at the Thriftway on my way to Newton's, and then picked up the developed pictures after work. At home, I said a brief hi to Charlie, grabbed a granola bar from the kitchen, and hurried up to my room with the envelope of photographs tucked under my arm.
I sat in the middle of my bed and opened the envelope with wary curiosity. Ridiculously, I still half expected the first print to be a blank.
When I pulled it out, I gasped aloud. Edward looked just as beautiful as he did in real life, staring at me out of the picture with the warm eyes I'd missed for the past few days. It was almost uncanny that anyone could look so… so… beyond description. No thousand words could equal this picture.
I flipped through the rest of the stack quickly once, and then laid three of them out on the bed side by side.
The first was the picture of Edward in the kitchen, his warm eyes touched with tolerant amusement. The second was Edward and Charlie, watching ESPN. The difference in Edward's expression was severe. His eyes were careful here, reserved. Still breathtakingly beautiful, but his face was colder, more like a sculpture, less alive.
The last was the picture of Edward and me standing awkwardly side by side. Edward's face was the same as the last, cold and statue-like. But that wasn't the most troubling part of this
photograph. The contrast between the two of us was painful. He looked like a god. I looked very average, even for a human, almost shamefully plain. I flipped the picture over with a feeling of disgust.
Instead of doing my homework, I stayed up to put my pictures into the album. With a ballpoint pen I scrawled captions under all the pictures, the names and the dates. I got to the picture of Edward and me, and, without looking at it too long, I folded it in half and stuck it under the metal tab, Edward-side up.
When I was done, I stuffed the second set of prints in a fresh envelope and penned a long thank-you letter to Renee.
Edward still hadn't come over. I didn't want to admit that he was the reason I'd stayed up so late, but of course he was. I tried to remember the last time he'd stayed away like this, without an excuse, a phone call… He never had.
Again, I didn't sleep well.
School followed the silent, frustrating, terrifying pattern of the last two days. I felt relief when I saw Edward waiting for me in the parking lot, but it faded quickly. He was no different, unless maybe more remote.
It was hard to even remember the reason for all this mess. My birthday already felt like the distant past. If only Alice would come back. Soon. Before this got any more out of hand.
But I couldn't count on that. I decided that, if I couldn't talk to him today, really talk, then I was going to see Carlisle tomorrow. I had to do something.
After school, Edward and I were going to talk it out, I promised myself. I wasn't accepting any excuses.
He walked me to my truck, and I steeled myself to make my demands.
"Do you mind if I come over today?" he asked before we got to the truck, beating me to the punch.
"Of course not."
"Now?" he asked again, opening my door for me.
"Sure," I kept my voice even, though I didn't like the urgency in his tone. "I was just going to drop a letter for Renee in the mailbox on the way. I'll meet you there."
He looked at the fat envelope on the passenger seat. Suddenly, he reached over me and snagged it.
"I'll do it," he said quietly. "And I'll still beat you there." He smiled my favorite crooked smile,
but it was wrong. It didn't reach his eyes.
"Okay," I agreed, unable to smile back. He shut the door, and headed toward his car.
He did beat me home. He was parked in Charlie's spot when I pulled up in front of the house. That was a bad sign. He didn't plan to stay, then. I shook my head and took a deep breath, trying to locate some courage.
He got out of his car when I stepped out of the truck, and came to meet me. He reached to take my book bag from me. That was normal. But he shoved it back onto the seat. That was not normal.
"Come for a walk with me," he suggested in an unemotional voice, taking my hand.
I didn't answer. I couldn't think of a way to protest, but I instantly knew that I wanted to. I didn't like this. This is bad, this is very bad, the voice in my head repeated again and again.
But he didn't wait for an answer. He pulled me along toward the east side of the yard, where the forest encroached. I followed unwillingly, trying to think through the panic. It was what I wanted, I reminded myself. The chance to talk it all through. So why was the panic choking me?
We'd gone only a few steps into the trees when he stopped. We were barely on the trail–I could still see the house.
Some walk.
Edward leaned against a tree and stared at me, his expression unreadable. "Okay, let's talk," I said. It sounded braver than it felt.
He took a deep breath. "Bella, we're leaving."
I took a deep breath, too. This was an acceptable option. I thought I was prepared. But I still had to ask.
"Why now? Another year–"
"Bella, it's time. How much longer could we stay in Forks, after all? Carlisle can barely pass for thirty, and he's claiming thirty-three now. We'd have to start over soon regardless."
His answer confused me. I thought the point of leaving was to let his family live in peace. Why did we have to leave if they were going? I stared at him, trying to understand what he meant.
He stared back coldly.
With a roll of nausea, I realized I'd misunderstood. "When you say we–," I whispered.
"I mean my family and myself." Each word separate and distinct.
I shook my head back and forth mechanically, trying to clear it. He waited without any sign of impatience. It took a few minutes before I could speak.
"Okay," I said. "I'll come with you."
"You can't, Bella. Where we're going… It's not the right place for you." "Where you are is the right place for me."
"I'm no good for you, Bella."
"Don't be ridiculous." I wanted to sound angry, but it just sounded like I was begging. "You're the very best part of my life."
"My world is not for you," he said grimly.
"What happened with Jasper–that was nothing, Edward! Nothing!" "You're right," he agreed. "It was exactly what was to be expected." "You promised! In Phoenix, you promised that you would stay–" "As long as that was best for you," he interrupted to correct me.
"No! This is about my soul, isn't it?" I shouted, furious, the words exploding out of me–somehow it still sounded like a plea. "Carlisle told me about that, and I don't care, Edward. I don't care! You can have my soul. I don't want it without you–it's yours already!"
He took a deep breath and stared, unseeingly, at the ground for a long moment. His mouth twisted the tiniest bit. When he finally looked up, his eyes were different, harder–like the liquid gold had frozen solid.
"Bella, I don't want you to come with me." He spoke the words slowly and precisely, his cold eyes on my face, watching as I absorbed what he was really saying.
There was a pause as I repeated the words in my head a few times, sifting through them for their real intent.
"You… don't… want me?" I tried out the words, confused by the way they sounded, placed in that order.
"No."
I stared, uncomprehending, into his eyes. He stared back without apology. His eyes were like topaz–hard and clear and very deep. I felt like I could see into them for miles and miles, yet nowhere in rheir bottomless depths could I see a contradiction to the word he'd spoken.
"Well, that changes things." I was surprised by how calm and reasonable my voice sounded. It must be because I was so numb. I couldn't realize what he was telling me. It still didn't make any sense.
He looked away into the trees as he spoke again. "Of course, I'll always love you… in a way. But what happened the other night made me realize that it's time for a change. Because I'm… tired of pretending to be something I'm not, Bella. I am not human." He looked back, and the icy planes of his perfect face were not human. "I've let this go on much too long, and I'm sorry for that."
"Don't." My voice was just a whisper now; awareness was beginning to seep through me, trickling like acid through my veins. "Don't do this."
He just stared at me, and I could see from his eyes that my words were far too late. He already had.
"You're not good for me, Bella." He turned his earlier words around, and so I had no argument. How well I knew that I wasn't good enough for him.
I opened my mouth to say something, and then closed it again. He waited patiently, his face wiped clean of all emotion. I tried again.
"If… that's what you want." He nodded once.
My whole body went numb. I couldn't feel anything below the neck. "I would like to ask one favor, though, if that's not too much," he said.
I wonder what he saw on my face, because something flickered across his own face in response. But, before I could identify it, he'd composed his features into the same serene mask.
"Anything," I vowed, my voice faintly stronger.
As I watched, his frozen eyes melted. The gold became liquid again, molten, burning down into mine with an intensity that was overwhelming.
"Don't do anything reckless or stupid," he ordered, no longer detached. "Do you understand what I'm saying?"
I nodded helplessly.
His eyes cooled, the distance returned. "I'm thinking of Charlie, of course. He needs you. Take care of yourself–for him."
I nodded again. "I will," I whispered. He seemed to relax just a little.
"And I'll make you a promise in return," he said. "I promise that this will be the last time you'll see me. I won't come back. I won't put you through anything like this again. You can go on with your life without any more interference from me. It will be as if I'd never existed."
My knees must have started to shake, because the trees were suddenly wobbling. I could hear the blood pounding faster than normal behind my ears. His voice sounded farther away.
He smiled gently. "Don't worry. You're human–your memory is no more than a sieve. Time heals all wounds for your kind."
"And your memories?" I asked. It sounded like there was something stuck in my throat, like I was choking.
"Well"–he hesitated for a short second–"I won't forget. But my kind… we're very easily distracted." He smiled; the smile was tranquil and it did not touch his eyes.
He took a step away from me. "That's everything, I suppose. We won't bother you again."
The plural caught my attention. That surprised me; I would have thought I was beyond noticing anything.
"Alice isn't coming back," I realized. I don't know how he heard me–the words made no sound–but he seemed to understand.
He shook his head slowly, always watching my face.
"No. They're all gone. I staved behind to tell you goodbye." "Alice is gone?" My voice was blank with disbelief.
"She wanted to say goodbye, but I convinced her that a clean break would be better for you."
I was dizzy; it was hard to concentrate. His words swirled around in my head, and I heard the doctor at the hospital in Phoenix, last spring, as he showed me the X-rays. You can see it's a clean break, his finger traced along the picture of my severed bone. That's good. It will heal more easily, more quickly.
I tried to breathe normally. I needed to concentrate, to find a way out of this nightmare. "Goodbye, Bella," he said in the same quiet, peaceful voice.
"Wait!" I choked out the word, reaching for him, willing my deadened legs to carry me forward.
I thought he was reaching for me, too. But his cold hands locked around my wrists and pinned them to my sides. He leaned down, and pressed his lips very lightly to my forehead for the briefest instant. My eyes closed.
"Take care of yourself," he breathed, cool against my skin.
There was a light, unnatural breeze. My eyes flashed open. The leaves on a small vine maple shuddered with the gentle wind of his passage.
He was gone.
With shaky legs, ignoring the fact that my action was useless, I followed him into the forest. The evidence of his path had disappeared instantly. There were no footprints, the leaves were still again, but I walked forward without thinking. I could not do anything else. I had to keep moving. If I stopped looking for him, it was over.
Love, life, meaning… over.
I walked and walked. Time made no sense as I pushed slowly through the thick undergrowth. It was hours passing, but also only seconds. Maybe it felt like time had frozen because the forest looked the same no matter how far I went. I started to worry that I was traveling in a circle, a very small circle at that, but I kept going. I stumbled often, and, as it grew darker and darker, I fell often, too.
Finally, I tripped over something–it was black now, I had no idea what caught my foot–and I stayed down. I rolled onto my side, so that I could breathe, and curled up on the wet bracken.
As I lay there, I had a feeling that more time was passing than I realized. I couldn't remember how long it had been since nightfall. Was it always so dark here at night? Surely, as a rule, some little bit of moonlight would filter down through the clouds, through the chinks in the canopy of trees, and find the ground.
Not tonight. Tonight the sky was utterly black. Perhaps there was no moon tonight–a lunar eclipse, a new moon.
A new moon. I shivered, though I wasn't cold.
It was black for a long time before I heard them calling.
Someone was shouting my name. It was muted, muffled by the wet growth that surrounded me, but it was definitely my name. I didn't recognize the voice. I thought about answering, but I was dazed, and it took a long time to come to the conclusion that I should answer. By then, the calling had stopped.
Sometime later, the rain woke me up. I don't think I'd really fallen asleep; I was just lost in an unthinking stupor, holding with all my strength to the numbness that kept me from realizing what I didn't want to know.
The rain bothered me a little. It was cold. I unwrapped my arms from around my legs to cover my face.
It was then that I heard the calling again. It was farther away this time, and sometimes it sounded like several voices were calling at once. I tried to breathe deeply. I remembered that I should answer, but I didn't think they would be able to hear me. Would I be able to shout loud enough?
Suddenly, there was another sound, startlingly close. A kind of snuffling, an animal sound. It sounded big. I wondered if I should feel afraid. I didn't–just numb. It didn't matter. The snuffling went away.
The rain continued, and I could feel the water pooling up against my cheek. I was trying to gather the strength to turn my head when I saw the light.
At first it was just a dim glow reflecting off the bushes in the distance. It grew brighter and brighter, illuminating a large space unlike the focused beam of a flashlight. The light broke through the closest brush, and I could see that it was a propane lantern, but that was all I could see–the brightness blinded me for a moment.
"Bella."
The voice was deep and unfamiliar, but full of recognition. He wasn't calling my name to search, he was acknowledging that I was found.
I stared up–impossibly high it seemed–at the dark face that I could now see above me. I was vaguely aware that the stranger probably only looked so tall because my head was still on the ground.
"Have you been hurt?"
I knew the words meant something, but I could only stare, bewildered. How could the meaning matter at this point?
"Bella, my name is Sam Uley."
There was nothing familiar about his name. "Charlie sent me to look for you."
Charlie? That struck a chord, and I tried to pay more attention to what he was saying. Charlie mattered, if nothing else did.
The tall man held out a hand. I gazed at it, not sure what I was supposed to do.
His black eyes appraised me for a second, and then he shrugged. In a quick and supple notion, he pulled me up from the ground and into his arms.
I hung there, limp, as he loped swiftly through the wet forest. Some part of me knew this should upset me–being carried away by a stranger. But there was nothing left in me to upset.
It didn't seem like too much time passed before there were lights and the deep babble of many male voices. Sam Uley slowed as he approached the commotion.
"I've got her!" he called in a booming voice.
The babble ceased, and then picked up again with more intensity. A confusing swirl of faces moved over me. Sam's voice was the only one that made sense in the chaos, perhaps because my ear was against his chest.
"No, I don't think she's hurt," he told someone. "She just keeps saying 'He's gone.' " Was I saying that out loud? I bit down on my lip.
"Bella, honey, are you all right?"
That was one voice I would know anywhere–even distorted, as it was now, with worry. "Charlie?" My voice sounded strange and small.
"I'm right here, baby."
There was a shifting under me, followed by the leathery smell of my dad's sheriff jacket. Charlie staggered under my weight.
"Maybe I should hold on to her," Sam Uley suggested. "I've got her," Charlie said, a little breathless.
He walked slowly, struggling. I wished I could tell him to put me down and let me walk, but I couldn't find my voice.
There were lights everywhere, held by the crowd walking with him. It felt like a parade. Or a funeral procession. I closed my eyes.
"We're almost home now, honey," Charlie mumbled now and then.
I opened my eyes again when I heard the door unlock. We were on the porch of our house, and the tall dark man named Sam was holding the door for Charlie, one arm extended toward us, as if he was preparing to catch me when Charlie's arms failed.
But Charlie managed to get me through the door and to the couch in the living room. "Dad, I'm all wet," I objected feebly.
"That doesn't matter." His voice was gruff. And then he was talking to someone else. "Blankets are in the cupboard at the top of the stairs."
"Bella?" a new voice asked. I looked at the gray-haired man leaning over me, and recognition came after a few slow seconds.
"Dr. Gerandy?" I mumbled.
"That's right, dear," he said. "Are you hurt, Bella?"
It took me a minute to think that through. I was confused by the memory of Sam Uley's similar question in the woods. Only Sam had asked something else: Have you been hurt? he'd said. The difference seemed significant somehow.
Dr. Gerandy was waiting. One grizzled eyebrow rose, and the wrinkles on his forehead deepened.
"I'm not hurt," I lied. The words, were true enough for what he'd asked.
His warm hand touched my forehead, and his fingers pressed against the inside of my wrist. I watched his lips as he counted to himself, his eyes on his watch.
"What happened to you?" he asked casually.
I froze under his hand, tasting panic in the back of my throat.
"Did you get lost in the woods?" he prodded. I was aware of several other people listening. Three tall men with dark faces–from La Push, the Quileute Indian reservation down on the coastline, I guessed–Sam Uley among them, were standing very close together and staring at me. Mr. Newton was there with Mike and Mr. Weber, Angela's father; they all were watching me more surreptitiously than the strangers. Other deep voices rumbled from the kitchen and outside the front door. Half the town must have been looking for me.
Charlie was the closest. He leaned in to hear my answer. "Yes," I whispered. "I got lost."
The doctor nodded, thoughtful, his fingers probing gently against the glands under my jaw. Charlie's face hardened.
"Do you feel tired?" Dr. Gerandy asked. I nodded and closed my eyes obediently.
"I don't think there's anything wrong with her," I heard the doctor mutter to Charlie after a moment. "Just exhaustion. Let her sleep it off, and I'll come check on her tomorrow," he paused. He must have looked at his watch, because he added, "Well, later today actually."
There was a creaking sound as they both pushed off from the couch to get to their feet.
"Is it true?" Charlie whispered. Their voices were farther away now. I strained to hear. "Did they leave?"
"Dr. Cullen asked us not to say anything," Dr. Gerandy answered. "The offer was very sudden; they had to choose immediately. Carlisle didn't want to make a big production out of leaving."
"A little warning might have been nice," Charlie grumbled.
Dr. Gerandy sounded uncomfortable when he replied. "Yes, well, in this situation, some warning might have been called for."
I didn't want to listen anymore. I felt around for the edge of the quilt someone had laid on top of me, and pulled it over my ear.
I drifted in and out of alertness. I heard Charlie whisper thanks to the volunteers as, one by one, they left. I felt his fingers on my forehead, and then the weight of another blanket. The phone rang a few times, and he hurried to catch it before it could wake me. He muttered reassurances in a low voice to the callers.
"Yeah, we found her. She's okay. She got lost. She's fine now," he said again and again. I heard the springs in the armchair groan when he settled himself in for the night.
A few minutes later, the phone rang again.
Charlie moaned as he struggled to his feet, and then he rushed, stumbling, to the kitchen I pulled my head deeper under the blankets, not wanting to listen to the same conversation again.
"Yeah," Charlie said, and yawned.
His voice changed, it was much more alert when he spoke again. "Where?'" There was a pause. "You're sure it's outside the reservation?" Another short pause. "But what could be burning out there?" He sounded both worried and mystified. "Look, I'll call down there and check it out."
I listened with more interest as he punched in a number.
"Hey, Billy, it's Charlie–sorry I'm calling so early… no, she's fine. She's sleeping… Thanks, but that's not why I called. I just got a call from Mrs. Stanley, and she says that from her
second-story window she can see fires out on the sea cliffs, but I didn't really… Oh!" Suddenly there was an edge in his voice–irritation… or anger. "And why are they doing that? Uh huh. Really?" He said it sarcastically. "Well, don't apologize to me. Yeah, yeah. Just make sure the flames don't spread… I know, I know, I'm surprised they got them lit at all in this weather."
Charlie hesitated, and then added grudgingly. "Thanks for sending Sam and the other boys up. You were right–they do know the forest better than we do. It was Sam who found her, so I owe you one… Yeah, I'll talk to you later," he agreed, still sour, before hanging up.
Charlie muttered something incoherent as he shuffled back to the living room. "What's wrong?" I asked.
He hurried to my side.
"I'm sorry I woke you, honey." "Is something burning?"
"It's nothing," he assured me. "Just some bonfires out on the cliffs." "Bonfires?" I asked. My voice didn't sound curious. It sounded dead.
Charlie frowned. "Some of the kids from the reservation being rowdy," he explained. "Why?" I wondered dully.
I could tell he didn't want to answer. He looked at the floor under his knees. "They're celebrating the news." His tone was bitter.
There was only one piece of news I could think of, try as I might not to. And then the pieces snapped together. "Because the Cullens left," I whispered. "They don't like the Cullens in La Push–I'd forgotten about that."
The Quileutes had their superstitions about the "cold ones," the blood-drinkers that were enemies to their tribe, just like they had their legends of the great flood and wolf-men ancestors. Just stories, folklore, to most of them. Then there were the few that believed. Charlie's good friend Billy Black believed, though even Jacob, his own son, thought he was full of stupid superstitions. Billy had warned me to stay away from the Cullens…
The name stirred something inside me, something that began to claw its way toward the surface, something I knew I didn't want to face.
"It's ridiculous," Charlie spluttered.
We sat in silence for a moment. The sky was no longer black outside the window. Somewhere behind the rain, the sun was beginning to rise.
"Bella?" Charlie asked.
I looked at him uneasily.
"He left you alone in the woods?" Charlie guessed.
I deflected his question. "How did you know where to find me?" My mind shied away from the inevitable awareness that was coming, coming quickly now.
"Your note," Charlie answered. surprised. He reached into the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out a much-abused piece of paper. It was dirty and damp, with multiple creases from being opened and refolded many times. He unfolded it again, and held it up as evidence. The messy handwriting was remarkably close to my own.
Going for a walk with Edward, up the path, it said. Back soon, B.
"When you didn't come back, I called the Cullens, and no one answered," Charlie said in a low voice. "Then I called the hospital, and Dr. Gerandy told me that Carlisle was gone."
"Where did they go?" I mumbled.
He stared at me. "Didn't Edward tell you?"
I shook my head, recoiling. The sound of his name unleashed the thing that was clawing inside of me–a pain that knocked me breathless, astonished me with its force.
Charlie eyed me doubtfully as he answered. "Carlisle took a job with a big hospital in Los Angeles. I guess they threw a lot of money at him."
Sunny L.A. The last place they would really go. I remembered my nightmare with the mirror… the bright sunlight shimmering off of his skin–
Agony ripped through me with the memory of his face.
"I want to know if Edward left you alone out there in the middle of the woods," Charlie insisted.
His name sent another wave of torture through me. I shook my head, frantic, desperate to escape the pain. "It was my fault. He left me right here on the trail, in sight of the house… but I tried to follow him."
Charlie started to say something; childishly, I covered my ears. "I can't talk about this anymore, Dad. I want to go to my room."
Before he could answer, I scrambled up from the couch and lurched my way up the stairs.
Someone had been in the house to leave a note for Charlie, a note that would lead him to find me. From the minute that I'd realized this, a horrible suspicion began to grow in my
head. I rushed to my room, shutting and locking the door behind me before I ran to the CD player by my bed.
Everything looked exactly the same as I'd left it. I pressed down on the top of the CD player. The latch unhooked, and the lid slowly swung open.
It was empty.
The album Renee had given me sat on the floor beside the bed, just where I'd put it last. I lifted the cover with a shaking hand.
I didn't have to flip any farther than the first page. The little metal corners no longer held a picture in place. The page was blank except for my own handwriting scrawled across the bottom: Edward Cullen, Charlie's kitchen, Sept. 13th.
I stopped there. I was sure that he would have been very thorough.
It will be as if I'd never existed, he'd promised me.
I felt the smooth wooden floor beneath my knees, and then the palms of my hands, and then it was pressed against the skin of my cheek. I hoped that I was fainting, but, to my disappointment, I didn't lose consciousness. The waves of pain that had only lapped at me before now reared high up and washed over my head, pulling me under.
I did not resurface.
OCTOBER NOVEMBER DECEMBER JANUARY
4. WAKING UP
TIME PASSES. EVEN WHEN IT SEEMS IMPOSSIBLE. EVEN when each tick of the
second hand aches like the pulse of blood behind a bruise. It passes unevenly, in strange lurches and dragging lulls, but pass it does. Even for me.
CHARLIE'S FIST CAME DOWN ON THE TABLE. "THAT'S IT, Bella! I'm sending you
home."
I looked up from my cereal, which I was pondering rather than eating, and stared at Charlie in shock. I hadn't been following the conversation–actually, I hadn't been aware that we were having a conversation–and I wasn't sure what he meant.
"I am home," I mumbled, confused.
"I'm sending you to Renee, to Jacksonville," he clarified.
Charlie watched with exasperation as I slowly grasped the meaning of his words.
"What did I do?" I felt my face crumple. It was so unfair. My behavior had been above reproach for the past four months. After that first week, which neither of us ever mentioned, I hadn't missed a day of school or work. My grades were perfect. I never broke curfew–I never went anywhere from which to break curfew in the first place. I only very rarely served leftovers.
Charlie was scowling.
"You didn't do anything. That's the problem. You never do anything."
"You want me to get into trouble?" I wondered, my eyebrows pulling together in mystification. I made an effort to pay attention. It wasn't easy. I was so used to tuning everything out, my ears felt stopped up.
"Trouble would be better than this… this moping around all the time!"
That stung a bit. I'd been careful to avoid all forms of moroseness, moping included. "I am not moping around."
"Wrong word," he grudgingly conceded. "Moping would be better–that would be doing
something. You're just… lifeless, Bella. I think that's the word I want."
This accusation struck home. I sighed and tried to put some animation into my response.
"I'm sorry, Dad." My apology sounded a little flat, even to me. I'd thought I'd been fooling him. Keeping Charlie from suffering was the whole point of all this effort. How depressing to think that the effort had been wasted.
"I don't want you to apologize."
I sighed. "Then tell me what you do want me to do."
"Bella," he hesitated, scrutinizing my reaction to his next words. "Honey, you're not the first person to go through this kind of thing, you know."
"I know that." My accompanying grimace was limp and unimpressive. "Listen, honey. I think that–that maybe you need some help."
"Help?"
He paused, searching for the words again. "When your mother left," he began, frowning, "and took you with her." He inhaled deeply. "Well, that was a really bad time for me."
"I know, Dad," I mumbled.
"But I handled it," he pointed out. "Honey, you're not handling it. I waited, I hoped it would get better." He stared at me and I looked down quickly. "I think we both know it's not getting better."
"I'm fine."
He ignored me. "Maybe, well, maybe if you talked to someone about it. A professional."
"You want me to see a shrink?" My voice was a shade sharper as I realized what he was getting at.
"Maybe it would help."
"And maybe it wouldn't help one little bit."
I didn't know much about psychoanalysis, but I was pretty sure that it didn't work unless the subject was relatively honest. Sure, I could tell the truth–if I wanted to spend the rest of my life in a padded cell.
He examined my obstinate expression, and switched to another line of attack. "It's beyond me, Bella. Maybe your mother–"
"Look," I said in a flat voice. "I'll go out tonight, if you want. I'll call Jess or Angela."
"That's not what I want," he argued, frustrated. "I don't think I can live through seeing you
try harder. I've never seen anyone trying so hard. It hurts to watch."
I pretended to be dense, looking down at the table. "I don't understand, Dad. First you're mad because I'm not doing anything, and then you say you don't want me to go out."
"I want you to be happy–no, not even that much. I just want you not to be miserable. I think you'll have a better chance if you get out of Forks."
My eyes flashed up with the first small spark of feeling I'd had in too long to contemplate. "I'm not leaving," I said.
"Why not?" he demanded.
"I'm in my last semester of school–it would screw everything up." "You're a good student–you'll figure it out."
"I don't want to crowd Mom and Phil."
"Your mother's been dying to have you back." "Florida is too hot."
His fist came down on the table again. "We both know what's really going on here, Bella, and it's not good for you." He took a deep breath. "It's been months. No calls, no letters, no contact. You can't keep waiting for him."
I glowered at him. The heat almost, but not quite, reached my face. It had been a long time since I'd blushed with any emotion.
This whole subject was utterly forbidden, as he was well aware.
"I'm not waiting for anything. I don't expect anything," I said in a low monotone. "Bella–," Charlie began, his voice thick.
"I have to get to school," I interrupted, standing up and yanking my untouched breakfast from the table. I dumped my bowl in the sink without pausing to wash it out. I couldn't deal with any more conversation.
"I'll make plans with Jessica," I called over my shoulder as I strapped on my school bag, not meeting his eyes. "Maybe I won't be home for dinner. We'll go to Port Angeles and watch a movie."
I was out the front door before he could react.
In my haste to get away from Charlie, I ended up being one of the first ones to school. The
plus side was that I got a really good parking spot. The downside was that I had free time on my hands, and I tried to avoid free time at all costs.
Quickly, before I could start thinking about Charlie's accusations, I pulled out my Calculus book. I flipped it open to the section we should be starting today, and tried to make sense of it. Reading math was even worse than listening to it, but I was getting better at it. In the last several months, I'd spent ten times the amount of time on Calculus than I'd ever spent on math before. As a result, I was managing to keep in the range of a low A. I knew Mr. Varner felt my improvement was all due to his superior teaching methods. And if that made him happy, I wasn't going to burst his bubble.
I forced myself to keep at it until the parking lot was full, and I ended up rushing to English. We were working on Animal Farm, an easy subject matter. I didn't mind communism; it was a welcome change from the exhausting romances that made up most of the curriculum. I settled into my seat, pleased by the distraction of Mr. Berty's lecture.
Time moved easily while I was in school. The bell rang all too soon. I started repacking my bag.
"Bella?"
I recognized Mike's voice, and I knew what his next words would be before he said them. "Are you working tomorrow?"
I looked up. He was leaning across the aisle with an anxious expression. Every Friday he asked me the same question. Never mind that I hadn't taken so much as a sick day. Well, with one exception, months ago. But he had no reason to look at me with such concern. I was a model employee.
"Tomorrow is Saturday, isn't it?" I said. Having just had it pointed out to me by Charlie, I realized how lifeless my voice really sounded.
"Yeah, it is," he agreed. "See you in Spanish." He waved once before turning his back. He didn't bother walking me to class anymore.
I trudged off to Calculus with a grim expression. This was the class where I sat next to Jessica.
It had been weeks, maybe months, since Jess had even greeted me when I passed her in the hall. I knew I had offended her with my antisocial behavior, and she was sulking. It wasn't going to be easy to talk to her now–especially to ask her to do me a favor. I weighed my options carefully as I loitered outside the classroom, procrastinating.
I wasn't about to face Charlie again without some kind of social interaction to report. I knew I couldn't lie, though the thought of driving to Port Angeles and back alone–being sure my odometer reflected the correct mileage, just in case he checked–was very tempting. Jessica's
mom was the biggest gossip in town, and Charlie was bound to run into Mrs. Stanley sooner rather than later. When he did, he would no doubt mention the trip. Lying was out.
With a sigh, I shoved the door open.
Mr. Varner gave me a dark look–he'd already started the lecture. I hurried to my seat. Jessica didn't look up as I sat next to her. I was glad that I had fifty minutes to mentally prepare myself.
This class flew by even faster than English. A small part of that speed was due to my goody-goody preparation this morning in the truck–but mostly it stemmed from the fact that time always sped up when I was looking forward to something unpleasant.
I grimaced when Mr. Varner dismissed the class five minutes early. He smiled like he was being nice.
"Jess?" My nose wrinkled as I cringed, waiting for her to turn on me.
She twisted in her seat to face me, eyeing me incredulously. "Are you talking to me, Bella?" "Of course." I widened my eyes to suggest innocence.
"What? Do you need help with Calculus?" Her tone was a tad sour.
"No." I shook my head. "Actually, I wanted to know if you would… go to the movies with me tonight? I really need a girls' night out." The words sounded stiff, like badly delivered lines, and she looked suspicious.
"Why are you asking me?" she asked, still unfriendly.
"You're the first person I think of when I want girl time." I smiled, and I hoped the smile looked genuine. It was probably true. She was at least the first person I thought of when I wanted to avoid Charlie. It amounted to the same thing.
She seemed a little mollified. "Well, I don't know." "Do you have plans?"
"No… I guess I can go with you. What do you want to see?"
"I'm not sure what's playing," I hedged. This was the tricky part. I racked my brain for a clue–hadn't I heard someone talk about a movie recently? Seen a poster? "How about that one with the female president?"
She looked at me oddly. "Bella, that one's been out of the theater forever." "Oh." I frowned. "Is there anything you'd like to see?"
Jessica's natural bubbliness started to leak out in spite of herself as she thought out loud. "Well, there's that new romantic comedy that's getting great reviews. I want to see that one. And my dad just saw Dead End and he really liked it."
I grasped at the promising title. "What's that one about?"
"Zombies or something. He said it was the scariest thing he'd seen in years." "That sounds perfect." I'd rather deal with real zombies than watch a romance.
"Okay." She seemed surprised by my response. I tried to remember if I liked scary movies, but I wasn't sure. "Do you want me to pick you up after school?" she offered.
"Sure."
Jessica smiled at me with tentative friendliness before she left. My answering smile was just a little late, but I thought that she saw it.
The rest of the day passed quickly, my thoughts focused on planning for tonight. I knew from experience that once I got Jessica talking, I would be able to get away with a few mumbled responses at the appropriate moments. Only minimal interaction would be required.
The thick haze that blurred my days now was sometimes confusing. I was surprised when I found myself in my room, not clearly remembering the drive home from school or even opening the front door. But that didn't matter. Losing track of time was the most I asked from life.
I didn't fight the haze as I turned to my closet. The numbness was more essential in some places than in others. I barely registered what I was looking at as I slid the door aside to reveal the pile of rubbish on the left side of my closet, under the clothes I never wore.
My eyes did not stray toward the black garbage bag that held my present from that last birthday, did not see the shape of the stereo where it strained against the black plastic; I didn't think of the bloody mess my nails had been when I'd finished clawing it out of the dashboard.
I yanked the old purse I rarely used off the nail it hung from, and shoved the door shut.
Just then I heard a horn honking. I swiftly traded my wallet from my schoolbag into the purse. I was in a hurry, as if rushing would somehow make the night pass more quickly.
I glanced at myself in the hall mirror before I opened the door, arranging my features carefully into a smile and trying to hold them there.
"Thanks for coming with me tonight," I told Jess as I climbed into the passenger seat, trying to infuse my tone with gratitude. It had been a while since I'd really thought about what I was saying to anyone besides Charlie. Jess was harder. I wasn't sure which were the right
emotions to fake.
"Sure. So, what brought this on?" Jess wondered as she drove down my street. "Brought what on?"
"Why did you suddenly decide… to go out?" It sounded like she changed her question halfway through.
I shrugged. "Just needed a change."
I recognized the song on the radio then, and quickly reached for the dial. "Do you mind?" I asked.
"No, go ahead."
I scanned through the stations until I found one that was harmless. I peeked at Jess's expression as the new music filled the car.
Her eyes squinted. "Since when do you listen to rap?" "I don't know," I said. "A while."
"You like this?" she asked doubtfully. "Sure."
It would be much too hard to interact with Jessica normally if I had to work to tune out the music, too. I nodded my head, hoping I was in time with the beat.
"Okay…" She stared out the windshield with wide eyes.
"So what's up with you and Mike these days?" I asked quickly. "You see him more than I do."
The question hadn't started her talking like I'd hoped it would.
"It's hard to talk at work," I mumbled, and then I tried again. "Have you been out with anyone lately?"
"Not really. I go out with Conner sometimes. I went out with Eric two weeks ago." She rolled her eyes, and I sensed a long story. I clutched at the opportunity.
"Eric Yorkie? Who asked who?"
She groaned, getting more animated. "He did, of course! I couldn't think of a nice way to say no."
"Where did he take you?" I demanded, knowing she would interpret my eagerness as interest. "Tell me all about it."
She launched into her tale, and I settled into my seat, more comfortable now. I paid strict attention, murmuring in sympathy and gasping in horror as called for. When she was finished with her Eric story, she continued into a Conner comparison without any prodding.
The movie was playing early, so Jess thought we should hit the twilight showing and eat later. I was happy to go along with whatever she wanted; after all, I was getting what I wanted–Charlie off my back.
I kept Jess talking through the previews, so I could ignore them more easily. But I got nervous when the movie started. A young couple was walking along a beach, swinging hands and discussing their mutual affection with gooey falseness. I resisted the urge to cover my ears and start humming. I had not bargained for a romance.
"I thought we picked the zombie movie," I hissed to Jessica. "This is the zombie movie."
"Then why isn't anyone getting eaten?" I asked desperately.
She looked at me with wide eyes that were almost alarmed. "I'm sure that part's coming," she whispered.
"I'm getting popcorn. Do you want any?" "No, thanks."
Someone shushed us from behind.
I took my time at the concession counter, watching the clock and debating what percentage of a ninety-minute movie could be spent on romantic exposition. I decided ten minutes was more than enough, but I paused just inside the theater doors to be sure. I could hear horrified screams blaring from the speakers, so I knew I'd waited long enough.
"You missed everything," Jess murmured when I slid back into my seat. "Almost everyone is a zombie now."
"Long line." I offered her some popcorn. She took a handful.
The rest of the movie was comprised of gruesome zombie attacks and endless screaming from the handful of people left alive, their numbers dwindling quickly. I would have thought there was nothing in that to disturb me. But I felt uneasy, and I wasn't sure why at first.
It wasn't until almost the very end, as I watched a haggard zombie shambling after the last shrieking survivor, that I realized what the problem was. The scene kept cutting between the
horrified face of the heroine, and the dead, emotionless face of her pursuer, back and forth as it closed the distance.
And I realized which one resembled me the most. I stood up.
"Where are you going? There's, like, two minutes left," Jess hissed. "I need a drink," I muttered as I raced for the exit.
I sat down on the bench outside the theater door and tried very hard not to think of the irony. But it was ironic, all things considered, that, in the end, I would wind up as a zombie. I hadn't seen that one coming.
Not that I hadn't dreamed of becoming a mythical monster once–just never a grotesque, animated corpse. I shook my head to dislodge that train of thought, feeling panicky. I couldn't afford to think about what I'd once dreamed of.
It was depressing to realize that I wasn't the heroine anymore, that my story was over.
Jessica came out of the theater doors and hesitated, probably wondering where the best place was to search for me. When she saw me, she looked relieved, but only for a moment. Then she looked irritated.
"Was the movie too scary for you?" she wondered. "Yeah," I agreed. "I guess I'm just a coward."
"That's funny." She frowned. "I didn't think you were scared–I was screaming all the time, but I didn't hear you scream once. So I didn't know why you left."
I shrugged. "Just scared."
She relaxed a little. "That was the scariest movie I think I've ever seen. I'll bet we're going to have nightmares tonight."
"No doubt about that," I said, trying to keep my voice normal. It was inevitable that I would have nightmares, but they wouldn't be about zombies. Her eyes flashed to my face and away. Maybe I hadn't succeeded with the normal voice.
"Where do you want to eat?" Jess asked. "I don't care."
"Okay."
Jess started talking about the male lead in the movie as we walked. I nodded as she gushed
over his hotness, unable to remember seeing a non-zombie man at all.
I didn't watch where Jessica was leading me. I was only vaguely aware that it was dark and quieter now. It took me longer than it should have to realize why it was quiet. Jessica had stopped babbling. I looked at her apologetically, hoping I hadn't hurt her feelings.
Jessica wasn't looking at me. Her face was tense; she stared straight ahead and walked fast. As I watched, her eyes darted quickly to the right, across the road, and back again.
I glanced around myself for the first time.
We were on a short stretch of unlit sidewalk. The little shops lining the street were all locked up for the night, windows black. Half a block ahead, the streetlights started up again, and I could see, farther down, the bright golden arches of the McDonald's she was heading for.
Across the street there was one open business. The windows were covered from inside and there were neon signs, advertisements for different brands of beer, glowing in front of them. The biggest sign, in brilliant green, was the name of the bar–One-Eyed Pete's. I wondered if there was some pirate theme not visible from outside. The metal door was propped open; it was dimly lit inside, and the low murmur of many voices and the sound of ice clinking in glasses floated across the street. Lounging against the wall beside the door were four men.
I glanced back at Jessica. Her eyes were fixed on the path ahead and she moved briskly. She didn't look frightened–just wary, trying to not attract attention to herself.
I paused without thinking, looking back at the four men with a strong sense of déjà vu. This was a different road, a different night, but the scene was so much the same. One of them was even short and dark. As I stopped and turned toward them, that one looked up in interest.
I stared back at him, frozen on the sidewalk. "Bella?" Jess whispered. "What are you doing?"
I shook my head, not sure myself. "I think I know them…" I muttered.
What was I doing? I should be running from this memory as fast as I could, blocking the image of the four lounging men from my mind, protecting myself with the numbness I couldn't function without. Why was I stepping, dazed, into the street?
It seemed too coincidental that I should be in Port Angeles with Jessica, on a dark street even. My eyes focused on the short one, trying to match the features to my memory of the man who had threatened me that night almost a year ago. I wondered if there was any way I would recognize the man, if it was really him. That particular part of that particular evening was just a blur. My body remembered it better than my mind did; the tension in my legs as I tried to decide whether to run or to stand my ground, the dryness in my throat as I struggled to build a decent scream, the tight stretch of skin across my knuckles as I clenched my hands into fists, the chills on the back of my neck when the dark-haired man called me "sugar."…
There was an indefinite, implied kind of menace to these men that had nothing to do with that other night. It sprung from the fact that they were strangers, and it was dark here, and they outnumbered us–nothing more specific than that. But it was enough that Jessica's voice cracked in panic as she called after me.
"Bella, come on!"
I ignored her, walking slowly forward without ever making the conscious decision to move my feet. I didn't understand why, but the nebulous threat the men presented drew me toward them. It was a senseless impulse, but I hadn't felt any kind of impulse in so long… I followed it.
Something unfamiliar beat through my veins. Adrenaline, I realized, long absent from my system, drumming my pulse faster and fighting against the lack of sensation. It was strange–why the adrenaline when there was no fear? It was almost as if it were an echo of the last time I'd stood like this, on a dark street in Port Angeles with strangers.
I saw no reason for fear. I couldn't imagine anything in the world that there was left to be afraid of, not physically at least. One of the few advantages of losing everything.
I was halfway across the street when Jess caught up to me and grabbed my arm. "Bella! You can't go in a bar!" she hissed.
"I'm not going in," I said absently, shaking her hand off. "I just want to see something…" "Are you crazy?" she whispered. "Are you suicidal?"
That question caught my attention, and my eyes focused on her.
"No, I'm not." My voice sounded defensive, but it was true. I wasn't suicidal. Even in the beginning, when death unquestionably would have been a relief, I didn't consider it. I owed too much to Charlie. I felt too responsible for Renee. I had to think of them.
And I'd made a promise not to do anything stupid or reckless. For all those reasons, I was still breathing.
Remembering that promise. I felt a twinge of guilt.
but what I was doing fight now didn't really count. It wasn't like I was taking a blade to my wrists.
Jess's eyes were round, her mouth hung open. Her question about suicide had been rhetorical, I realized too late.
"Go eat," I encouraged her, waving toward the fast food. I didn't like the way she looked at me. "I'll catch up in a minute."
I turned away from her, back to the men who were watching us with amused, curious eyes. "Bella, stop this right now!"
My muscles locked into place, froze me where I stood. Because it wasn't Jessica's voice that rebuked me now. It was a furious voice, a familiar voice, a beautiful voice–soft like velvet even though it was irate.
It was his voice–I was exceptionally careful not to think his name–and I was surprised that the sound of it did not knock me to my knees, did not curl me onto the pavement in a torture of loss. But there was no pain, none at all.
In the instant that I heard his voice, everything was very clear. Like my head had suddenly surfaced out of some dark pool. I was more aware of everything–sight, sound, the feel of the cold air that I hadn't noticed was blowing sharply against my face, the smells coming from the open bar door.
I looked around myself in shock.
"Go back to Jessica," the lovely voice ordered, still angry. "You promised–nothing stupid."
I was alone. Jessica stood a few feet from me, staring at me with frightened eyes. Against the wall, the strangers watched, confused, wondering what I was doing, standing there motionless in the middle of the street.
I shook my head, trying to understand. I knew he wasn't there, and yet, he felt improbably close, close for the first time since… since the end. The anger in his voice was concern, the same anger that was once very familiar–something I hadn't heard in what felt like a lifetime.
"Keep your promise." The voice was slipping away, as if the volume was being turned down on a radio.
I began to suspect that I was having some kind of hallucination. Triggered, no doubt, by the memory–the deja vu, the strange familiarity of the situation.
I ran through the possibilities quickly in my head.
Option one: I was crazy. That was the layman's term for people who heard voices in their heads.
Possible.
Option two: My subconscious mind was giving me what it thought I wanted. This was wish fulfillment–a momentary relief from pain by embracing the incorrect idea that he cared whether I lived or died. Projecting what he would have said if A) he were here, and B) he would be in any way bothered by something bad happening to me.
Probable.
I could see no option three, so I hoped it was the second option and this was just my subconscious running amuck, rather than something I would need to be hospitalized for.
My reaction was hardly sane, though–I was grateful. The sound of his voice was something that I'd feared I was losing, and so, more than anything else, I felt overwhelming gratitude that my unconscious mind had held onto that sound better than my conscious one had.
I was not allowed to think of him. That was something I tried to be very strict about. Of course I slipped; I was only human. But I was getting better, and so the pain was something I could avoid for days at a time now. The tradeoff was the never-ending numbness. Between pain and nothing, I'd chosen nothing.
I waited for the pain now. I was not numb–my senses felt unusually intense after so many months of the haze–but the normal pain held off. The only ache was the disappointment that his voice was fading.
There was a second of choice.
The wise thing would be to run away from this potentially destructive–and certainly mentally unstable–development. It would be stupid to encourage hallucinations.
But his voice was fading.
I took another step forward, testing. "Bella, turn around," he growled.
I sighed in relief. The anger was what I wanted to hear–false, fabricated evidence that he cared, a dubious gift from my subconscious.
Very few seconds had passed while I sorted this all out. My little audience watched, curious. It probably looked like I was just dithering over whether or not I was going to approach them. How could they guess that I was standing there enjoying an unexpected moment of insanity?
"Hi," one of the men called, his tone both confident and a bit sarcastic. He was fair-skinned and fair-haired, and he stood with the assurance of someone who thought of himself as quite good-looking. I couldn't tell whether he was or not. I was prejudiced.
The voice in my head answered with an exquisite snarl. I smiled, and the confident man seemed to take that as encouragement.
"Can I help you with something? You look lost." He grinned and winked.
I stepped carefully over the gutter, running with water that was black in the darkness.
"No. I'm not lost."
Now that I was closer–and my eyes felt oddly in focus–I analyzed the short, dark man's face. It was not familiar in any way. I suffered a curious sensation of disappointment that this was not the terrible man who had tried to hurt me almost a year ago.
The voice in my head was quiet now.
The short man noticed my stare. "Can I buy you a drink?" he offered, nervous, seeming flattered that I'd singled him out to stare at.
"I'm too young," I answered automatically.
He was baffled–wondering why I had approached them. I felt compelled to explain. "From across the street, you looked like someone I knew. Sorry, my mistake."
The threat that had pulled me across the street had evaporated. These were not the dangerous men I remembered. They were probably nice guys. Safe. I lost interest.
"That's okay," the confident blonde said. "Stay and hang out with us."
"Thanks, but I can't." Jessica was hesitating in the middle of the street, her eyes wide with outrage and betrayal.
"Oh, just a few minutes."
I shook my head, and turned to rejoin Jessica.
"Let's go eat," I suggested, barely glancing at her. Though I appeared to be, for the moment, freed of the zombie abstraction, I was just as distant. My mind was preoccupied. The safe, numb deadness did not come back, and I got more anxious with every minute that passed without its return.
"What were you thinking?" Jessica snapped. "You don't know them–they could have been psychopaths!"
I shrugged, wishing she would let it go. "I just thought I knew the one guy." "You are so odd, Bella Swan. I feel like I don't know who you are."
"Sorry." I didn't know what else to say to that.
We walked to McDonald's in silence. I'd bet that she was wishing we'd taken her car instead of walking the short distance from the theater, so that she could use the drive-through. She was just as anxious now for this evening to be over as I had been from the beginning.
I tried to start a conversation a few times while we ate, but Jessica was not cooperative. I
must have really offended her.
When we go back in the car, she tuned the stereo back to her favorite station and turned the volume too loud to allow easy conversation.
I didn't have to struggle as hard as usual to ignore the music. Even though my mind, for once, was not carefully numb and empty, I had too much to think about to hear the lyrics.
I waited for the numbness to return, or the pain. Because the pain must be coming. I'd broken my personal rules. Instead of shying away from the memories, I'd walked forward and greeted them. I'd heard his voice, so clearly, in my head. That was going to cost me, I was sure of it. Especially if I couldn't reclaim the haze to protect myself. I felt too alert, and that frightened me.
But relief was still the strongest emotion in my body–relief that came from the very core of my being.
As much as I struggled not to think of him, I did not struggle to forget. I worried–late in the night, when the exhaustion of sleep deprivation broke down my defenses–that it was all slipping away. That my mind was a sieve, and I would someday not be able to remember the precise color of his eyes, the feel of his cool skin, or the texture of his voice. I could not think of them, but I must remember them.
Because there was just one thing that I had to believe to be able to live–I had to know that he existed. That was all. Everything else I could endure. So long as he existed.
That's why I was more trapped in Forks than I ever had been before, why I'd fought with Charlie when he suggested a change. Honestly, it shouldn't matter; no one was ever coming back here.
But if I were to go to Jacksonville, or anywhere else bright and unfamiliar, how could I be sure he was real? In a place where I could never imagine him, the conviction might fade… and that I could not live through.
Forbidden to remember, terrified to forget; it was a hard line to walk.
I was surprised when Jessica stopped the car in front of my house. The ride had not taken long, but, short as it seemed, I wouldn't have thought that Jessica could go that long without speaking.
"Thanks for going out with me, Jess," I said as I opened my door. "That was…fun." I hoped that fun was the appropriate word.
"Sure," she muttered.
"I'm sorry about… after the movie."
"Whatever, Bella." She glared out the windshield instead of looking at me. She seemed to be growing angrier rather than getting over it.
"See you Monday?" "Yeah. Bye."
I gave up and shut the door. She drove away, still without looking at me. I'd forgotten her by the time I was inside.
Charlie was waiting for me in the middle of the hall, his arms folded tight over his chest with his hands balled into fists.
"Hey, Dad," I said absentmindedly as I ducked around Charlie, heading for the stairs. I'd been thinking about him for too long, and I wanted to be upstairs before it caught up with me.
"Where have you been?" Charlie demanded.
I looked at my dad, surprised. "I went to a movie in Port Angeles with Jessica. Like I told you this morning."
"Humph," he grunted. "Is that okay?"
He studied my face, his eyes widening as if he saw something unexpected. "Yeah, that's fine. Did you have fun?"
"Sure," I said. "We watched zombies eat people. It was great." His eyes narrowed.
"'Night, Dad."
He let me pass. I hurried to my room.
I lay in my bed a few minutes later, resigned as the pain finally made its appearance.
It was a crippling thing, this sensation that a huge hole had been punched through my chest, excising my most vital organs and leaving ragged, unhealed gashes around the edges that continued to throb and bleed despite the passage of time. Rationally, I knew my lungs must still be intact, yet I gasped for air and my head spun like my efforts yielded me nothing. My heart must have been beating, too, but I couldn't hear the sound of my pulse in my ears; my hands felt blue with cold. I curled inward, hugging my ribs to hold myself together. I scrambled for my numbness, my denial, but it evaded me.
And yet, I found I could survive. I was alert, I felt the pain–the aching loss that radiated out
from my chest, sending wracking waves of hurt through my limbs and head–but it was manageable. I could live through it. It didn't feel like the pain had weakened over time, rather that I'd grown strong enough to bear it.
Whatever it was that had happened tonight–and whether it was the zombies, the adrenaline, or the hallucinations that were responsible–it had woken me up.
For the first time in a long time, I didn't know what to expect in the morning.
5. CHEATER
"BELLA, WHY DON'T YOU TAKE OFF," MIKE SUGGESTED, his eyes focused off to the side, not really looking at me. I wondered how long that had been going on without me noticing.
It was a slow afternoon at Newton's. At the moment there were only two patrons in the store, dedicated backpackers from the sound of their conversation. Mike had spent the last hour going through the pros and cons of two brands of lightweight packs with them. But they'd taken a break from serious pricing to indulge in trying to one-up each other with their latest tales from the trail. Their distraction had given Mike a chance to escape.
"I don't mind staying," I said. I still hadn't been able to sink back into my protective shell of numbness, and everything seemed oddly close and loud today, like I'd taken cotton out of my ears. I tried to tune out the laughing hikers without success.
"I'm telling you," said the thickset man with the orange beard that didn't match his dark brown hair. "I've seen grizzlies pretty close up in Yellowstone, but they had nothing on this brute." His hair was matted, and his clothes looked like they'd been on his back for more than a few days. Fresh from the mountains.
"Not a chance. Black bears don't get that big. The grizzlies you saw were probably cubs." The second man was tall and lean, his face tanned and wind-whipped into an impressive leathery crust.
"Seriously, Bella, as soon as these two give up, I'm closing the place down," Mike murmured. "If you want me to go…" I shrugged.
"On all fours it was taller than you," the bearded man insisted while I gathered my things together. "Big as a house and pitch-black. I'm going to report it to the ranger here. People ought to be warned–this wasn't up on the mountain, mind you–this was only a few miles from the trailhead."
Leather-face laughed and rolled his eyes. "Let me guess–you were on your way in? Hadn't eaten real food or slept off the ground in a week, right?"
"Hey, uh, Mike, right?" the bearded man called, looking toward us. "See you Monday," I mumbled.
"Yes, sir," Mike replied, turning away.
"Say, have there been any warnings around here recently–about black bears?"
"No, sir. But it's always good to keep your distance and store your food correctly. Have you seen the new bear-safe canisters? They only weigh two pounds…"
The doors slid open to let me out into the rain. I hunched over inside my jacket as I dashed for my truck. The rain hammering against my hood sounded unusually loud, too, but soon the roar of the engine drowned out everything else.
I didn't want to go back to Charlie's empty house. Last night had been particularly brutal, and I had no desire to revisit the scene of the suffering. Even after the pain had subsided enough for me to sleep, it wasn't over. Like I'd told Jessica after the movie, there was never any doubt that I would have nightmares.
I always had nightmares now, every night. Not nightmares really, not in the plural, because it was always the same nightmare. You'd think I'd get bored after so many months, grow immune to it. But the dream never failed to horrify me, and only ended when I woke myself with screaming. Charlie didn't come in to see what was wrong anymore, to make sure there was no intruder strangling me or something like that–he was used to it now.
My nightmare probably wouldn't even frighten someone else. Nothing jumped out and screamed, "Boo!" There were no zombies, no ghosts, no psychopaths. There was nothing, really. Only nothing. Just the endless maze of moss-covered trees, so quiet that the silence was an uncomfortable pressure against my eardrums. It was dark, like dusk on a cloudy day, with only enough light to see that there was nothing to see. I hurried through the gloom without a path, always searching, searching, searching, getting more frantic as the time stretched on, trying to move faster, though the speed made me clumsy… Then there would come the point in my dream–and I could feel it coming now, but could never seem to wake myself up before it hit–when I couldn't remember what it was that I was searching for. When I realized that there was nothing to search for, and nothing to find. That there never had been anything more than just this empty, dreary wood, and there never would be anything more for me… nothing but nothing…
That was usually about when the screaming started.
I wasn't paying attention to where I was driving–just wandering through empty, wet side roads as I avoided the ways that would take me home–because I didn't have anywhere to go.
I wished I could feel numb again, but I couldn't remember how I'd managed it before. The nightmare was nagging at my mind and making me think about things that would cause me pain. I didn't want to remember the forest. Even as I shuddered away from the images, I felt my eyes fill with tears and the aching begin around the edges of the hole in my chest. I took one hand from the steering wheel and wrapped it around my torso to hold it in one piece.
It will be as if I'd never existed. The words ran through my head, lacking the perfect clarity of my hallucination last night. They were just words, soundless, like print on a page. Just words, but they ripped the hole wide open, and I stomped on the brake, knowing I should not drive while this incapacitated.
I curled over, pressing my face against the steering wheel and trying to breathe without
lungs.
I wondered how long this could last. Maybe someday, years from now–if the pain would just decrease to the point where I could bear it–I would be able to look back on those few short months that would always be the best of my life. And, if it were possible that the pain would ever soften enough to allow me to do that, I was sure that I would feel grateful for as much time as he'd given me. More than I'd asked for, more than I'd deserved. Maybe someday I'd be able to see it that way.
But what if this hole never got any better? If the raw edges never healed? If the damage was permanent and irreversible?
I held myself tightly together. As if he'd never existed, I thought in despair. What a stupid and impossible promise to make! He could steal my pictures and reclaim his gifts, but that didn't put things back the way they'd been before I'd met him. The physical evidence was the most insignificant part of the equation. I was changed, my insides altered almost past the point of recognition. Even my outsides looked different–my face sallow, white except for the purple circles the nightmares had left under my eyes. My eyes were dark enough against my pallid skin that–if I were beautiful, and seen from a distance–I might even pass for a vampire now. But I was not beautiful, and I probably looked closer to a zombie.
As if he'd never existed? That was insanity. It was a promise that he could never keep, a promise that was broken as soon as he'd made it.
I thumped my head against the steering wheel, trying to distract myself from the sharper pain.
It made me feel silly for ever worrying about keeping my promise. Where was the logic in sticking to an agreement that had already been violated by the other party? Who cared if I was reckless and stupid? There was no reason to avoid recklessness, no reason why I shouldn't get to be stupid.
I laughed humorlessly to myself, still gasping for air. Reckless in Forks–now there was a hopeless proposition.
The dark humor distracted me, and the distraction eased the pain. My breath came easier, and I was able to lean back against the seat. Though it was cold today, my forehead was damp with sweat.
I concentrated on my hopeless proposition to keep from sliding back into the excruciating memories. To be reckless in Forks would take a lot of creativity–maybe more than I had. But I wished I could find some way… I might feel better if I weren't holding fast, all alone, to a broken pact. If I were an oath-breaker, too. But how could I cheat on my side of the deal, here in this harmless little town? Of course, Forks hadn't always been so harmless, but now it was exactly what it had always appeared to be. It was dull, it was safe.
I stared out the windshield for a long moment, my thoughts moving sluggishly–I couldn't
seem to make those thoughts go anywhere. I cut the engine, which was groaning in a pitiful way after idling for so long, and stepped out into the drizzle.
The cold rain dripped through my hair and then trickled across my cheeks like freshwater tears. It helped to clear my head. I blinked the water from my eyes, staring blankly across the road.
After a minute of staring, I recognized where I was. I'd parked in the middle of the north lane of Russell Avenue. I was standing in front of the Cheneys' house–my truck was blocking their driveway–and across the road lived the Markses. I knew I needed to move my truck, and that I ought to go home. It was wrong to wander the way I had, distracted and impaired, a menace on the roads of Forks. Besides, someone would notice me soon enough, and report me to Charlie.
As I took a deep breath in preparation to move, a sign in the Markses' yard caught my eye–it was just a big piece of cardboard leaning against their mailbox post, with black letters scrawled in caps across it.
Sometimes, kismet happens.
Coincidence? Or was it meant to be? I didn't know, but it seemed kind of silly to think that it was somehow fated, that the dilapidated motorcycles rusting in the Markses' front yard beside the hand-printed FOR SALE, AS IS sign were serving some higher purpose by existing there, right where I needed them to be.
So maybe it wasn't kismet. Maybe there were just all kinds of ways to be reckless, and I only now had my eyes open to them.
Reckless and stupid. Those were Charlie's two very favorite words to apply to motorcycles.
Charlie's job didn't get a lot of action compared to cops in bigger towns, but he did get called in on traffic accidents. With the long, wet stretches of freeway twisting and turning through the forest, blind corner after blind corner, there was no shortage of that kind of action. But even with all the huge log-haulers barreling around the turns, mostly people walked away. The exceptions to that rule were often on motorcycles, and Charlie had seen one too many victims, almost always kids, smeared on the highway. He'd made me promise before I was ten that I would never accept a ride on a motorcycle. Even at that age, I didn't have to think twice before promising. Who would want to ride a motorcycle here? It would be like taking a sixty-mile-per-hour bath.
So many promises I kept…
It clicked together for me then. I wanted to be stupid and reckless, and I wanted to break promises. Why stop at one?
That's as far as I thought it through. I sloshed through the rain to the Markses' front door and
rang the bell.
One of the Marks boys opened the door, the younger one, the freshman. I couldn't remember his name. His sandy hair only came up to my shoulder.
He had no trouble remembering my name. "Bella Swan?" he asked in surprise.
"How much do you want for the bike?" I panted, jerking my thumb over my shoulder toward the sales display.
"Are you serious?" he demanded. "Of course I am."
"They don't work."
I sighed impatiently–this was something I'd already inferred from the sign. "How much?"
"If you really want one, just take it. My mom made my dad move them down to the road so they'd get picked up with the garbage."
I glanced at the bikes again and saw that they were resting on a pile of yard clippings and dead branches. "Are you positive about that?"
"Sure, you want to ask her?"
It was probably better not to involve adults who might mention this to Charlie. "No, I believe you."
"You want me to help you?" he offered. "They're not light." "Okay, thanks. I only need one, though."
"Might as well take both," the boy said. "Maybe you could scavenge some parts."
He followed me out into the downpour and helped me load both of the heavy bikes into the back of my truck. He seemed eager to be rid of them, so I didn't argue.
"What are you going to do with them, anyway?" he asked. "They haven't worked in years."
"I kind of guessed that," I said, shrugging. My spur-of-the-moment whim hadn't come with a plan intact. "Maybe I'll take them to Dowling's."
He snorted. "Dowling would charge more to fix them than they'd be worth running."
I couldn't argue with that. John Dowling had earned a reputation for his pricing; no one went to him except in an emergency. Most people preferred to make the drive up to Port Angeles, if their car was able. I'd been very lucky on that front–I'd been worried, when Charlie first
gifted me my ancient truck, that I wouldn't be able to afford to keep it running. But I'd never had a single problem with it, other than the screaming-loud engine and the fifty-five-mile-per-hour maximum speed limit. Jacob Black had kept it in great shape when it had belonged to his father, Billy…
Inspiration hit like a bolt of lightning–not unreasonable, considering the storm. "You know what? That's okay. I know someone who builds cars."
"Oh. That's good." He smiled in relief.
He waved as I pulled away, still smiling. Friendly kid.
I drove quickly and purposefully now, in a hurry to get home before there was the slightest chance of Charlie appearing, even in the highly unlikely event that he might knock off early. I dashed through the house to the phone, keys still in hand.
"Chief Swan, please," I said when the deputy answered. "It's Bella." "Oh, hey, Bella," Deputy Steve said affably. "I'll go get him."
I waited.
"What's wrong, Bella?" Charlie demanded as soon as he picked up the phone. "Can't I call you at work without there being an emergency?"
He was quiet for a minute. "You never have before. Is there an emergency?"
"No. I just wanted directions to the Blacks' place–I'm not sure I can remember the way. I want to visit Jacob. I haven't seen him in months."
When Charlie spoke again, his voice was much happier. "That's a great idea, Bells. Do you have a pen?"
The directions he gave me were very simple. I assured him that I would be back for dinner, though he tried to tell me not to hurry. He wanted to join me in La Push, and I wasn't having that.
So it was with a deadline that I drove too quickly through the storm-darkened streets out of town. I hoped I could get Jacob alone. Billy would probably tell on me if he knew what I was up to.
While I drove, I worried a little bit about Billy's reaction to seeing me. He would be too pleased. In Billy's mind, no doubt, this had all worked out better than he had dared to hope. His pleasure and relief would only remind me of the one I couldn't bear to be reminded of. Not again today, I pleaded silently. I was spent.
The Blacks' house was vaguely familiar, a small wooden place with narrow windows, the
dull red paint making it resemble a tiny barn. Jacob's head peered out of the window before I could even get out of the truck. No doubt the familiar roar of the engine had tipped him off to my approach. Jacob had been very grateful when Charlie bought Billy's truck for me, saving Jacob from having to drive it when he came of age. I liked my truck very much, but Jacob seemed to consider the speed restrictions a shortcoming.
He met me halfway to the house.
"Bella!" His excited grin stretched wide across his face, the bright teeth standing in vivid contrast to the deep russet color of his skin. I'd never seen his hair out of its usual ponytail before. It fell like black satin curtains on either side of his broad face.
Jacob had grown into some of his potential in the last eight months. He'd passed that point where the soft muscles of childhood hardened into the solid, lanky build of a teenager; the tendons and veins had become prominent under the red-brown skin of his arms, his hands. His face was still sweet like I remembered it, though it had hardened, too–the planes of his cheekbones sharper, his jaw squared off, all childish roundness gone.
"Hey, Jacob!" I felt an unfamiliar surge of enthusiasm at his smile. I realized that I was pleased to see him. This knowledge surprised me.
I smiled back, and something clicked silently into place, like two corresponding puzzle pieces. I'd forgotten how much I really liked Jacob Black.
He stopped a few feet away from me, and I stared up at him in surprise, leaning my head back though the rain pelted my face.
"You grew again!" I accused in amazement.
He laughed, his smile widening impossibly. "Six five," he announced with self-satisfaction. His voice was deeper, but it had the husky tone I remembered.
"Is it ever going to stop?" I shook my head in disbelief. "You're huge."
"Still a beanpole, though." He grimaced. "Come inside! You're getting all wet."
He led the way, twisting his hair in his big hands as he walked. He pulled a rubber band from his hip pocket and wound it around the bundle.
"Hey, Dad," he called as he ducked to get through the front door. "Look who stopped by."
Billy was in the tiny square living room, a book in his hands. He set the book in his lap and wheeled himself forward when he saw me.
"Well, what do you know! It's good to see you, Bella." We shook hands. Mine was lost in his wide grasp.
"What brings you out here? Everything okay with Charlie?"
"Yes, absolutely. I just wanted to see Jacob–I haven't seen him in forever."
Jacob's eyes brightened at my words. He was smiling so big it looked like it would hurt his cheeks.
"Can you stay for dinner?" Billy was eager, too. "No, I've got to feed Charlie, you know."
"I'll call him now," Billy suggested. "He's always invited."
I laughed to hide my discomfort. "It's not like you'll never see me again. I promise I'll be back again soon–so much you'll get sick of me." After all, if Jacob could fix the bike, someone had to teach me how to ride it.
Billy chuckled in response. "Okay, maybe next time." "So, Bella, what do you want to do?" Jacob asked.
"Whatever. What were you doing before I interrupted?" I was strangely comfortable here. It was familiar, but only distantly. There were no painful reminders of the recent past.
Jacob hesitated. "I was just heading out to work on my car, but we can do something else…" "No, that's perfect!" I interrupted. "I'd love to see your car."
"Okay," he said, not convinced. "It's out back, in the garage."
Even better, I thought to myself. I waved at Billy. "See you later."
A thick stand of trees and shrubbery concealed his garage from the house. The garage was no more than a couple of big preformed sheds that had been bolted together with their interior walls knocked out. Under this shelter, raised on cinder blocks, was what looked to me like a completed automobile. I recognized the symbol on the grille, at least.
"What kind of Volkswagen is that?" I asked. "It's an old Rabbit–1986, a classic."
"How's it going?"
"Almost finished," he said cheerfully. And then his voice dropped into a lower key. "My dad made good on his promise last spring."
"Ah," I said.
He seemed to understand my reluctance to open the subject. I tried not to remember last May at the prom. Jacob had been bribed by his father with money and car parts to deliver a message there. Billy wanted me to stay a safe distance from the most important person in my life. It turned out that his concern was, in the end, unnecessary. I was all too safe now.
But I was going to see what I could do to change that. "Jacob, what do you know about motorcycles?" I asked.
He shrugged. "Some. My friend Embry has a dirt bike. We work on it together sometimes. Why?"
"Well…" I pursed my lips as I considered. I wasn't sure if he could keep his mouth shut, but I didn't have many other options. "I recently acquired a couple of bikes, and they're not in the greatest condition. I wonder if you could get them running?"
"Cool." He seemed truly pleased by the challenge. His face glowed. "I'll give it a try."
I held up one finger in warning. "The thing is," I explained, "Charlie doesn't approve of motorcycles. Honestly, he'd probably bust a vein in his forehead if he knew about this. So you can't tell Billy."
"Sure, sure." Jacob smiled. "I understand." "I'll pay you," I continued.
This offended him. "No. I want to help. You can't pay me."
"Well… how about a trade, then?" I was making this up as I went, but it seemed reasonable enough. "I only need one bike–and I'll need lessons, too. So how about this? I'll give you the other bike, and then you can teach me."
"Swee-eet." He made the word into two syllables. "Wait a sec–are you legal yet? When's your birthday?"
"You missed it," he teased, narrowing his eyes in mock resentment. "I'm sixteen." "Not that your age ever stopped you before," I muttered. "Sorry about your birthday." "Don't worry about it. I missed yours. What are you, forty?"
I sniffed. "Close."
"We'll have a joint party to make up for it." "Sounds like a date."
His eyes sparkled at the word.
I needed to reign in the enthusiasm before I gave him the wrong idea–it was just that it had been a long time since I'd felt so light and buoyant. The rarity of the feeling made it more difficult to manage.
"Maybe when the bikes are finished–our present to ourselves," I added. "Deal. When will you bring them down?"
I bit my lip, embarrassed. "They're in my truck now," I admitted. "Great." He seemed to mean it.
"Will Billy see if we bring them around?" He winked at me. "We'll be sneaky."
We eased around from the east, sticking to the trees when we were in view of the windows, affecting a casual-looking stroll, just in case. Jacob unloaded the bikes swiftly from the truck bed, wheeling them one by one into the shrubbery where I hid. It looked too easy for him–I'd remembered the bikes being much, much heavier than that.
"These aren't half bad," Jacob appraised as we pushed them through the cover of the trees. "This one here will actually be worth something when I'm done–it's an old Harley Sprint."
"That one's yours, then." "Are you sure?" "Absolutely."
"These are going to take some cash, though," he said, frowning down at the blackened metal. "We'll have to save up for parts first."
"We nothing," I disagreed. "If you're doing this for free, I'll pay for the parts." "I don't know…" he muttered.
"I've got some money saved. College fund, you know." College, schmollege, I thought to myself. It wasn't like I'd saved up enough to go anywhere special–and besides, I had no desire to leave Forks anyway. What difference would it make if I skimmed a little bit off the top?
Jacob just nodded. This all made perfect sense to him.
As we skulked back to the makeshift garage, I contemplated my luck. Only a teenage boy would agree to this: deceiving both our parents while repairing dangerous vehicles using
money meant for my college education. He didn't see anything wrong with that picture. Jacob was a gift from the gods.
6. FRIENDS
THE MOTORCYCLES DIDN'T NEED TO BE HIDDEN ANY further than simply placing them in Jacob's shed. Billy's wheelchair couldn't maneuver the uneven ground separating it from the house.
Jacob started pulling the first bike–the red one, which was destined for me–to pieces immediately. He opened up the passenger door of the Rabbit so I could sit on the seat instead of the ground. While he worked, Jacob chattered happily, needing only the lightest of nudges from me to keep the conversation rolling. He updated me on the progress of his sophomore year of school, running on about his classes and his two best friends.
"Quil and Embry?" I interrupted. "Those are unusual names."
Jacob chuckled. "Quil's is a hand-me-down, and I think Embry got named after a soap opera star. I can't say anything, though. They fight dirty if you start on their names–they'll tag team you."
"Good friends." I raised one eyebrow.
"No, they are. Just don't mess with their names."
Just then a call echoed in the distance. "Jacob?" someone shouted. "Is that Billy?" I asked.
"No." Jacob ducked his head, and it looked like he was blushing under his brown skin. "Speak of the devil," he mumbled, "and the devil shall appear."
"Jake? Are you out here?" The shouting voice was closer now. "Yeah!" Jacob shouted back, and sighed.
We waited through the short silence until two tall, dark-skinned boys strolled around the corner into the shed.
One was slender, and almost as tall as Jacob. His black hair was chin-length and parted down the middle, one side tucked behind his left ear while the right side swung free. The shorter boy was more burly. His white T-shirt strained over his well-developed chest, and he seemed gleefully conscious of that fact. His hair was so short it was almost a buzz.
Both boys stopped short when they saw me. The thin boy glanced swiftly back and forth between Jacob and me, while the brawny boy kept his eyes on me, a slow smile spreading across his face.
"Hey, guys," Jacob greeted them halfheartedly.
"Hey, Jake," the short one said without looking away from me. I had to smile in response, his grin was so impish. When I did, he winked at me. "Hi, there."
"Quil, Embry–this is my friend, Bella."
Quil and Embry, I still didn't know which was which, exchanged a loaded look. "Charlie's kid, right?" the brawny boy asked me, holding out his hand.
"That's right," I confirmed, shaking hands with him. His grasp was firm; it looked like he was flexing his bicep.
"I'm Quil Ateara," he announced grandly before releasing my hand. "Nice to meet you, Quil."
"Hey, Bella. I'm Embry, Embry Call–you probably already figured that out, though." Embry smiled a shy smile and waved with one hand, which he then shoved in the pocket of his jeans.
I nodded. "Nice to meet you, too."
"So what are you guys doing?" Quil asked, still looking at me.
"Bella and I are going to fix up these bikes," Jacob explained inaccurately. But bikes seemed to be the magic word. Both boys went to examine Jacob's project, drilling him with educated questions. Many of the words they used were unfamiliar to me, and I figured I'd have to have a Y chromosome to really understand the excitement.
They were still immersed in talk of parts and pieces when I decided that I needed to head back home before Charlie showed up here. With a sigh, I slid out of the Rabbit.
Jacob looked up, apologetic. "We're boring you, aren't we?"
"Naw." And it wasn't a lie. I was enjoying myself–how strange. "I just have to go cook dinner for Charlie."
"Oh… well, I'll finish taking these apart tonight and figure out what more we'll need to get started rebuilding them. When do you want to work on them again?"
"Could I come back tomorrow?" Sundays were the bane of my existence. There was never enough homework to keep me busy.
Quil nudged Embry's arm and they exchanged grins. Jacob smiled in delight. "That would be great!"
"If you make a list, we can go shop for parts," I suggested.
Jacob's face fell a little. "I'm still not sure I should let you pay for everything."
I shook my head. "No way. I'm bankrolling this party. You just have to supply the labor and expertise."
Embry rolled his eyes at Quil.
"That doesn't seem right," Jacob shook his head.
"Jake, if I took these to a mechanic, how much would he charge me?" I pointed out. He smiled. "Okay, you're getting a deal."
"Not to mention the riding lessons," I added.
Quil grinned widely at Embry and whispered something I didn't catch. Jacob's hand flashed out to smack the back of Quil's head. "That's it, get out," he muttered.
"No, really, I have to go," I protested, heading for the door. "I'll see you tomorrow, Jacob." As soon as I was out of sight, I heard Quil and Embry chorus, "Wooooo!"
The sound of a brief scuffle followed, interspersed with an "ouch" and a "hey!"
"If either of you set so much as one toe on my land tomorrow…" I heard Jacob threaten. His voice was lost as I walked through the trees.
I giggled quietly. The sound made my eyes widen in wonder. I was laughing, actually laughing, and there wasn't even anyone watching. I felt so weightless that I laughed again, just make the feeling last longer.
I beat Charlie home. When he walked in I was just taking the fried chicken out of the pan and laying it on a pile of paper towels.
"Hey, Dad." I flashed him a grin.
Shock flitted across his face before he pulled his expression together. "Hey, honey," he said, his voice uncertain. "Did you have fun with Jacob?"
I started moving the food to the table. "Yeah, I did."
"Well, that's good." He was still cautious. "What did you two do?"
Now it was my turn to be cautious. "I hung out in his garage and watched him work. Did you know he's rebuilding a Volkswagen?"
"Yeah, I think Billy mentioned that."
The interrogation had to stop when Charlie began chewing, but he continued to study my face as he ate.
After dinner, I dithered around, cleaning the kitchen twice, and then did my homework slowly in the front room while Charlie watched a hockey game. I waited as long as I could, but finally Charlie mentioned the late hour. When I didn't respond, he got up, stretched, and then left, turning out the light behind him. Reluctantly, I followed.
As I climbed the stairs, I felt the last of the afternoon's abnormal sense of well-being drain from my system, replaced by a dull fear at the thought of what I was going to have to live through now.
I wasn't numb anymore. Tonight would, no doubt, be as horrific as last night. I lay down on my bed and curled into a ball in preparation for the onslaught. I squeezed my eyes shut and… the next thing I next I knew, it was morning.
I stared at the pale silver light coming through my window, stunned.
For the first time in more than four months, I'd slept without dreaming. Dreaming or
screaming. I couldn't tell which emotion was stronger–the relief or the shock.
I lay still in my bed for a few minutes, waiting for it to come back. Because something must be coming. If not the pain, then the numbness. I waited, but nothing happened. I felt more rested than I had in a long time.
I didn't trust this to last. It was a slippery, precarious edge that I balanced on, and it wouldn't take much to knock me back down. Just glancing around my room with these suddenly clear eyes–noticing how strange it looked, too tidy, like I didn't live here at all–was dangerous.
I pushed that thought from my mind, and concentrated, as I got dressed, on the fact that I was going to see Jacob again today. The thought made me feel almost… hopeful. Maybe it would be the same as yesterday. Maybe I wouldn't have to remind myself to look interested and to nod or smile at appropriate intervals, the way I had to with everyone else. Maybe… but I wouldn't trust this to last, either. Wouldn't trust it to be the same–so easy–as yesterday. I wasn't going to set myself up for disappointment like that.
At breakfast, Charlie was being careful, too. He tried to hide his scrutiny, keeping his eyes on his eggs until he thought I wasn't looking.
"What are you up to today?" he asked, eyeing a loose thread on the edge of his cuff like he wasn't paying much attention to my answer.
"I'm going to hang out with Jacob again."
He nodded without looking up. "Oh," he said.
"Do you mind?" I pretended to worry. "I could stay…"
He glanced up quickly, a hint of panic in his eyes. "No, no! You go ahead. Harry was going to come up to watch the game with me anyway."
"Maybe Harry could give Billy a ride up," I suggested. The fewer witnesses the better. "That's a great idea."
I wasn't sure if the game was just an excuse for kicking me out, but he looked excited enough now. He headed to the phone while I donned my rain jacket. I felt self-conscious with the checkbook shoved in my jacket pocket. It was something I never used.
Outside, the rain came down like water slopped from a bucket. I had to drive more slowly than I wanted to; I could hardly see a car length in front of the truck. But I finally made it through the muddy lanes to Jacob's house. Before I'd killed the engine, the front door opened and Jacob came running out with a huge black umbrella.
He held it over my door while I opened it.
"Charlie called–said you were on your way," Jacob explained with a grin.
Effortlessly, without a conscious command to the muscles around my lips, my answering smile spread across my face. A strange feeling of warmth bubbled up in my throat, despite the icy rain splattering on my cheeks.
"Hi, Jacob."
"Good call on inviting Billy up." He held up his hand for a high five. I had to reach so high to slap his hand that he laughed.
Harry showed up to get Billy just a few minutes later. Jacob took me on a brief tour of his tiny room while we waited to be unsupervised.
"So where to, Mr. Goodwrench?" I asked as soon as the door closed behind Billy.
Jacob pulled a folded paper out of his pocket and smoothed it out. "We'll start at the dump first, see if we can get lucky. This could get a little expensive," he warned me. "Those bikes are going to need a lot of help before they'll run again." My face didn't look worried enough, so he continued. "I'm talking about maybe more than a hundred dollars here."
I pulled my checkbook out, fanned myself with it, and rolled my eyes at his worries. "We're covered."
It was a very strange kind of day. I enjoyed myself. Even at the dump, in the slopping rain and ankle-deep mud. I wondered at first if it was just the aftershock of losing the numbness, but I didn't think that was enough of an explanation.
I was beginning to think it was mostly Jacob. It wasn't just that he was always so happy to see me, or that he didn't watch me out of the corner of his eye, waiting for me to do something that would mark me as crazy or depressed. It was nothing that related to me at all.
It was Jacob himself. Jacob was simply a perpetually happy person, and he carried that happiness with him like an aura, sharing it with whoever was near him. Like an earthbound sun, whenever someone was within his gravitational pull, Jacob warmed them. It was natural, a part of who he was. No wonder I was so eager to see him.
Even when he commented on the gaping hole in my dashboard, it didn't send me into a panic like it should have.
"Did the stereo break?" he wondered. "Yeah," I lied.
He poked around in the cavity. "Who took it out? There's a lot of damage…" "I did," I admitted.
He laughed. "Maybe you shouldn't touch the motorcycles too much." "No problem."
According to Jacob, we did get lucky at the dump. He was very excited about several grease-blackened pieces of twisted metal that he found; I was just impressed that he could tell what they were supposed to be.
From there we went to the Checker Auto Parts down in Hoquiam. In my truck, it was more than a two hour drive south on the winding freeway, but the time passed easily with Jacob. He chattered about his friends and his school, and I found myself asking questions, not even pretending, truly curious to hear what he had to say.
"I'm doing all the talking," he complained after a long story about Quil and the trouble he'd stirred up by asking out a senior's steady girlfriend. "Why don't you take a turn? What's going on in Forks? It has to be more exciting than La Push."
"Wrong," I sighed. "There's really nothing. Your friends are a lot more interesting than mine. I like your friends. Quil's funny."
He frowned. "I think Quil likes you, too." I laughed. "He's a little young for me."
Jacob's frown deepened. "He's not that much younger than you. It's just a year and a few months."
I had a feeling we weren't talking about Quil anymore. I kept my voice light, teasing. "Sure, but, considering the difference in maturity between guys and girls, don't you have to count that in dog years? What does that make me, about twelve years older?"
He laughed, rolling his eyes. "Okay, but if you're going to get picky like that, you have to average in size, too. You're so small, I'll have to knock ten years off your total."
"Five foot four is perfectly average." I sniffed. "It's not my fault you're a freak."
We bantered like that till Hoquiam, still arguing over the correct formula to determine age–I lost two more years because I didn't know how to change a tire, but gained one back for being in charge of the bookkeeping at my house–until we were in Checker, and Jacob had to concentrate again. We found everything left on his list, and Jacob felt confident that he could make a lot of progress with our haul.
By the time we got back to La Push, I was twenty-three and he was thirty–he was definitely weighting skills in his favor.
I hadn't forgotten the reason for what I was doing. And, even though I was enjoying myself more than I'd thought possible, there was no lessening of my original desire. I still wanted to cheat. It was senseless, and I really didn't care. I was going to be as reckless as I could possibly manage in Forks. I would not be the only keeper of an empty contract. Getting to spend time with Jacob was just a much bigger perk than I'd expected.
Billy wasn't back yet, so we didn't have to be sneaky about unloading our day's spoils. As soon as we had everything laid out on the plastic floor next to Jacob's toolbox, he went right to work, still talking and laughing while his fingers combed expertly through the metal pieces in front of him.
Jacob's skill with his hands was fascinating. They looked too big for the delicate tasks they performed with ease and precision. While he worked, he seemed almost graceful. Unlike when he was on his feet; there, his height and big feet made him nearly as dangerous as I was.
Quil and Embry did not show up, so maybe his threat yesterday had been taken seriously.
The day passed too quickly. It got dark outside the mouth of the garage before I was expecting it, and then we heard Billy calling for us.
I jumped up to help Jacob put things away, hesitating because I wasn't sure what I should touch.
"Just leave it," he said. "I'll work on it later tonight."
"Don't forget your schoolwork or anything," I said, feeling a little guilty. I didn't want him to get in trouble. That plan was just for me.
"Bella?"
Both our heads snapped up as Charlie's familiar voice wafted through the trees, sounding closer than the house.
"Shoot," I muttered. "Coming!" I yelled toward the house.
"Let's go." Jacob smiled, enjoying the cloak-and-dagger. He snapped the light off, and for a moment I was blind. Jacob grabbed my hand and towed me out of the garage and through the trees, his feet finding the familiar path easily. His hand was rough, and very warm.
Despite the path, we were both tripping over our feet in the darkness. So we were also both laughing when the house came into view. The laughter did not go deep; it was light and superficial, but still nice. I was sure he wouldn't notice the faint hint of hysteria. I wasn't used to laughing, and it felt right and also very wrong at the same time.
Charlie was standing under the little back porch, and Billy was sitting in the doorway behind them.
"Hey, Dad," we both said at the same time, and that started us laughing again.
Charlie stared at me with wide eyes that flashed down to note Jacob's hand around mine. "Billy invited us for dinner," Charlie said to us in an absentminded tone.
"My super secret recipe for spaghetti. Handed down for generations," Billy said gravely. Jacob snorted. "I don't think Ragu's actually been around that long."
The house was crowded. Harry Clearwater was there, too, with his family–his wife, Sue, whom I knew vaguely from my childhood summers in Forks, and his two children. Leah was a senior like me, but a year older. She was beautiful in an exotic way–perfect copper skin, glistening black hair, eyelashes like feather dusters–and preoccupied. She was on Billy's phone when we got in, and she never let it go. Seth was fourteen; he hung on Jacob's every word with idolizing eyes.
There were too many of us for the kitchen table, so Charlie and Harry brought chairs out to the yard, and we ate spaghetti off plates on our laps in the dim light from Billy's open door. The men talked about the game, and Harry and Charlie made fishing plans. Sue teased her husband about his cholesterol and tried, unsuccessfully, to shame him into eating something green and leafy. Jacob talked mostly to me and Seth, who interrupted eagerly whenever Jacob seemed in danger of forgetting him. Charlie watched me, trying to be inconspicuous about it, with pleased but cautious eyes.
It was loud and sometimes confusing as everyone talked over everyone else, and the laughter from one joke interrupted the telling of another. I didn't have to speak often, but I smiled a lot, and only because I felt like it.
I didn't want to leave.
This was Washington, though, and the inevitable rain eventually broke up the party; Billy's living room was much too small to provide an option for continuing the get-together. Harry had driven Charlie down, so we rode together in my truck on the way back home. He asked about my day, and I told mostly the truth–that I'd gone with Jacob to look at parts and then watched him work in his garage.
"You think you'll visit again anytime soon?" he wondered, trying to be casual about it. "Tomorrow after school," I admitted. "I'll take homework, don't worry."
"You be sure to do that," he ordered, trying to disguise his satisfaction.
I was nervous when we got to the house. I didn't want to go upstairs. The warmth of Jacob's presence was fading and, in its absence, the anxiety grew stronger. I was sure I wouldn't get away with two peaceful nights of sleep in a row.
To put bedtime off, I checked my e-mail; there was a new message from Renee.
She wrote about her day, a new book club that rilled the time slot of the meditation classes she'd just quit, her week subbing in the second grade, missing her kindergarteners. She wrote that Phil was enjoying his new coaching job, and that they were planning a second honeymoon trip to Disney World.
And I noticed that the whole thing read like a journal entry, rather than a letter to someone else. Remorse flooded through me, leaving an uncomfortable sting behind. Some daughter I was.
I wrote back to her quickly, commenting on each part of her letter, volunteering information of my own–describing the spaghetti party at Billy's and how I felt watching Jacob build useful things out of small pieces of metal–awed and slightly envious. I made no reference to the change this letter would be from the ones she'd received in the last several months. I could barely remember what I'd written to her even as recently as last week, but I was sure it wasn't very responsive. The more I thought about it, the guiltier I felt; I really must have worried her.
I stayed up extra late after that, finishing more homework than strictly necessary. But neither sleep deprivation nor the time spent with Jacob–being almost happy in a shallow kind of way–could keep the dream away for two nights in a row.
I woke shuddering, my scream muffled by the pillow.
As the dim morning light filtered through the fog outside my window, I lay still in bed and tried to shake off the dream. There had been a small difference last night, and I concentrated on that.
Last night I had not been alone in the woods. Sam Uley–the man who had pulled me from the forest floor that night I couldn't bear to think of consciously–was there. It was an odd, unexpected alteration. The man's dark eyes had been surprisingly unfriendly, filled with some secret he didn't seem inclined to share. I'd stared at him as often as my frantic searching had allowed; it made me uncomfortable, under all the usual panic, to have him there. Maybe that was because, when I didn't look directly at him, his shape seemed to shiver and change in my peripheral vision. Yet he did nothing but stand and watch. Unlike the time when we had met in reality, he did not offer me his help.
Charlie stared at me during breakfast, and I tried to ignore him. I supposed I deserved it. I couldn't expect him not to worry. It would probably be weeks before he stopped watching for the return of the zombie, and I would just have to try to not let it bother me. After all, I would be watching for the return of the zombie, too. Two days was hardly long enough to call me cured.
School was the opposite. Now that I was paying attention, it was clear that no one was watching here.
I remembered the first day I'd come to Forks High School–how desperately I'd wished that I could turn gray, fade into the wet concrete of the sidewalk like an oversized chameleon. It seemed I was getting that wish answered, a year late.
It was like I wasn't there. Even my teachers' eyes slid past my seat as if it were empty.
I listened all through the morning, hearing once again the voices of the people around me. I tried to catch up on what was going on, but the conversations were so disjointed that I gave up.
Jessica didn't look up when I sat down next to her in Calculus.
"Hey, Jess," I said with put-on nonchalance. "How was the rest of your weekend?"
She looked at me with suspicious eyes. Could she still be angry? Or was she just too impatient to deal with a crazy person?
"Super," she said, turning back to her book. "That's good," I mumbled.
The figure of speech cold shoulder seemed to have some literal truth to it. I could feel the warm air blowing from the floor vents, but I was still too cold. I took the jacket off the back of my chair and put it on again.
My fourth hour class got out late, and the lunch table I always sat at was full by the time I arrived. Mike was there, Jessica and Angela, Conner, Tyler, Eric and Lauren. Katie Marshall, the redheaded junior who lived around the corner from me, was sitting with Eric, and Austin
Marks–older brother to the boy with the motorcycles–was next to her. I wondered how long they'd been sitting here, unable to remember if this was the first day or something that was a regular habit.
I was beginning to get annoyed with myself. I might as well have been packed in Styrofoam peanuts through the last semester.
No one looked up when I sat down next to Mike, even though the chair squealed stridently against the linoleum as I dragged it back.
I tried to catch up with the conversation.
Mike and Conner were talking sports, so I gave up on that one at once.
"Where's Ben today?" Lauren was asking Angela. I perked up, interested. I wondered if that meant Angela and Ben were still together.
I barely recognized Lauren. She'd cut off all her blond, corn-silk hair–now she had a pixie cut so short that the back was shaved like a boy. What an odd thing for her to do. I wished I knew the reason behind it. Did she get gum stuck in it? Did she sell it? Had all the people she was habitually nasty to caught her behind the gym and scalped her? I decided it wasn't fair for me to judge her now by my former opinion. For all I knew, she'd turned into a nice person.
"Ben's got the stomach flu," Angela said in her quiet, calm voice. "Hopefully it's just some twenty-four hour thing. He was really sick last night."
Angela had changed her hair, too. She'd grown out her layers.
"What did you two do this weekend?" Jessica asked, not sounding as if she cared about the answer. I'd bet that this was just an opener so she could tell her own stories. I wondered if she would talk about Port Angeles with me sitting two seats away? Was I that invisible, that no one would feel uncomfortable discussing me while I was here?
"We were going to have a picnic Saturday, actually, but… we changed our minds," Angela said. There was an edge to her voice that caught my interest.
Jess, not so much. "That's too bad," she said, about to launch into her story. But I wasn't the only one who was paying attention.
"What happened?" Lauren asked curiously.
"Well," Angela said, seeming more hesitant than usual, though she was always reserved, "we drove up north, almost to the hot springs–there's a good spot just about a mile up the trail. But, when we were halfway there… we saw something."
"Saw something? What?" Lauren's pale eyebrows pulled together. Even Jess seemed to be
listening now.
"I don't know," Angela said. "We think it was a bear. It was black, anyway, but it seemed… too big."
Lauren snorted. "Oh, not you, too!" Her eyes turned mocking, and I decided I didn't need to give her the benefit of the doubt. Obviously her personality had not changed as much as her hair. "Tyler tried to sell me that one last week."
"You're not going to see any bears that close to the resort," Jessica said, siding with Lauren. "Really," Angela protested in a low voice, looking down at the table. "We did see it." Lauren snickered. Mike was still talking to Conner, not paying attention to the girls.
"No, she's right," I threw in impatiently. "We had a hiker in just Saturday who saw the bear, too, Angela. He said it was huge and black and just outside of town, didn't he, Mike?"
There was a moment of silence. Every pair of eyes at the table turned to stare at me in shock. The new girl, Katie, had her mouth hanging open like she'd just witnessed an explosion. Nobody moved.
"Mike?" I muttered, mortified. "Remember the guy with the bear story?"
"S-sure," Mike stuttered after a second. I didn't know why he was looking at me so strangely. I talked to him at work, didn't I? Did I? I thought so…
Mike recovered. "Yeah, there was a guy who said he saw a huge black bear right at the trailhead–bigger than a grizzly," he confirmed.
"Hmph." Lauren turned to Jessica, her shoulders stiff, and changed the subject. "Did you hear back from USC?" she asked.
Everyone else looked away, too, except for Mike and Angela. Angela smiled at me tentatively, and I hurried to return the smile.
"So, what did you do this weekend, Bella?" Mike asked, curious, but oddly wary. Everyone but Lauren looked back, waiting for my response.
"Friday night, Jessica and I went to a movie in Port Angeles. And then I spent Saturday afternoon and most of Sunday down at La Push."
The eyes flickered to Jessica and back to me. Jess looked irritated. I wondered if she didn't want anyone to know she'd gone out with me, or whether she just wanted to be the one to tell the story.
"What movie did you see?" Mike asked, starting to smile.
"Dead End–the one with the zombies." I grinned in encouragement. Maybe some of the damage I'd done in these past zombie months was reparable.
"I heard that was scary. Did you think so?" Mike was eager to continue the conversation. "Bella had to leave at the end, she was so freaked," Jessica inserted with a sly smile.
I nodded, trying to look embarrassed. "It was pretty scary."
Mike didn't stop asking me questions till lunch was over. Gradually, the others were able to start up their own conversations again, though they still looked at me a lot. Angela talked mostly to Mike and me, and, when I got up to dump my tray, she followed.
"Thanks," she said in a low voice when we were away from the table. "For what?"
"Speaking up, sticking up for me." "No problem."
She looked at me with concern, but not the offensive, maybe-she's-lost-it kind. "Are you okay?"
This is why I'd picked Jessica over Angela–though I'd always liked Angela more–for the girls' night movie. Angela was too perceptive.
"Not completely," I admitted. "But I'm a little bit better." "I'm glad," she said. "I've missed you."
Lauren and Jessica strolled by us then, and I heard Lauren whisper loudly, "Oh, joy Bella's back."
Angela rolled her eyes at them, and smiled at me in encouragement. I sighed It was like I was starting all over again.
"What's today's date?" I wondered suddenly. "It's January nineteenth."
"Hmm."
"What is it?" Angela asked.
"It was a year ago yesterday that I had my first day here," I mused.
"Nothing's changed much," Angela muttered, looking after Lauren and Jessica. "I know, I agreed I was just thinking the same thing."
7 REPETITION
I WASN'T SURE WHAT THE HELL I WAS DOING HERE Was I trying to push myself back into the zombie stupor? Had I turned masochistic–developed a taste for torture? I should have gone straight down to La Push I felt much, much healthier around Jacob This was not a healthy thing to do.
But I continued to drive slowly down the overgrown lane, twisting through the trees that arched over me like a green, living tunnel My hands were shaking, so I tightened my grip on the steering wheel.
I knew that part of the reason I did this was the nightmare, now that I was really awake, the nothingness of the dream gnawed on my nerves, a dog worrying a bone.
There was something to search for. Unattainable and impossible, uncaring and distracted… but he was out there, somewhere. I had to believe that.
The other part was the strange sense of repetition I'd felt at school today, the coincidence of the date. The feeling that I was starting over–perhaps the way my first day would have gone if I'd really been the most unusual person in the cafeteria that afternoon.
The words ran through my head, tonelessly, like I was reading them rather than hearing them spoken:
It will be as if I'd never existed.
I was lying to myself by splitting my reason for coming here into just two parts. I didn't want to admit the strongest motivation. Because it was mentally unsound.
The truth was that I wanted to hear his voice again, like I had in the strange delusion Friday night. For that brief moment, when his voice came from some other part of me than my conscious memory, when his voice was perfect and honey smooth rather than the pale echo my memories usually produced, I was able to remember without pain. It hadn't lasted; the pain had caught up with me, as I was sure it would for this fool's errand. But those precious moments when I could hear him again were an irresistible lure. I had to find some way to repeat the experience… or maybe the better word was episode.
I was hoping that déjà vu was the key. So I was going to his home, a place I hadn't been since my ill-fated birthday party, so many months ago.
The thick, almost jungle-like growth crawled slowly past my windows. The drive wound on and on. I started to go faster, getting edgy. How long had I been driving? Shouldn't I have reached the house yet? The lane was so overgrown that it did not look familiar.
What if I couldn't find it? I shivered. What if there was no tangible proof at all?
Then there was the break in the trees that I was looking for, only it was not so pronounced as before. The flora here did not wait long to reclaim any land that was left unguarded. The tall ferns had infiltrated the meadow around the house, crowding against the trunks of the cedars, even the wide porch. It was like the lawn had been flooded–waist-high–with green, feathery waves.
And the house was there, but it was not the same. Though nothing had changed on the outside, the emptiness screamed from the blank windows. It was creepy. For the first time since I'd seen the beautiful house, it looked like a fitting haunt for vampires.
I hit the brakes, looking away. I was afraid to go farther. But nothing happened. No voice in my head.
So I left the engine running and jumped out into the fern sea. Maybe, like Friday night, if I walked forward…
I approached the barren, vacant face slowly, my truck rumbling out a comforting roar behind me. I stopped when I got to the porch stairs, because there was nothing here. No lingering sense of their presence… of his presence. The house was solidly here, but it meant little. Its concrete reality would not counteract the nothingness of the nightmares.
I didn't go any closer. I didn't want to look in the windows. I wasn't sure which would be harder to see. If the rooms were bare, echoing empty from floor to ceiling, that would certainly hurt. Like my grandmother's funeral, when my mother had insisted that I stay outside during the viewing. She had said that I didn't need to see Gran that way, to remember her that way, rather than alive.
But wouldn't it be worse if there were no change? If the couches sat just as I'd last seen them, the paintings on the walls–worse still, the piano on its low platform? It would be second only to the house disappearing all together, to see that there was no physical possession that tied them in anyway. That everything remained, untouched and forgotten, behind them.
Just like me.
I turned my back on the gaping emptiness and hurried to my truck. I nearly ran. I was anxious to be gone, to get back to the human world. I felt hideously empty, and I wanted to see Jacob. Maybe I was developing a new kind of sickness, another addiction, like the numbness before. I didn't care. I pushed my truck as fast as it would go as I barreled toward my fix.
Jacob was waiting for me. My chest seemed to relax as soon as I saw him, making it easier to breathe.
"Hey, Bella," he called.
I smiled in relief. "Hey, Jacob," I waved at Billy, who was looking out the window. "Let's get to work," Jacob said in a low but eager voice.
I was somehow able to laugh. "You seriously aren't sick of me yet?" I wondered. He must be starting to ask himself how desperate I was for company.
Jacob led the way around the house to his garage. "Nope. Not yet."
"Please let me know when I start getting on your nerves. I don't want to be a pain." "Okay." He laughed, a throaty sound. "I wouldn't hold your breath for that, though."
When I walked into the garage, I was shocked to see the red bike standing up, looking like a motorcycle rather than a pile of jagged metal.
"Jake, you're amazing," I breathed.
He laughed again. "I get obsessive when I have a project." He shrugged. "If I had any brains I'd drag it out a little bit."
"Why?"
He looked down, pausing for so long that I wondered if he hadn't heard my question. Finally, he asked me, "Bella, if I told you that I couldn't fix these bikes, what would you say?"
I didn't answer right away, either, and he glanced up to check my expression.
"I would say… that's too bad, but I'll bet we could figure out something else to do. If we got really desperate, we could even do homework."
Jacob smiled, and his shoulders relaxed. He sat down next to the bike and picked up a wrench. "So you think you'll still come over when I'm done, then?"
"Is that what you meant?" I shook my head. "I guess I am taking advantage of your very underpriced mechanical skills. But as long as you let me come over, I'll be here."
"Hoping to see Quil again?" he teased. "You caught me."
He chuckled. "You really like spending time with me?" he asked, marveling.
"Very, very much. And I'll prove it. I have to work tomorrow, but Wednesday we'll do something nonmechanical."
"Like what?"
"I have no idea. We can go to my place so you won't be tempted to be obsessive. You could bring your schoolwork–you have to be getting behind, because I know I am."
"Homework might be a good idea." He made a face, and I wondered how much he was leaving undone to be with me.
"Yes," I agreed. "We'll have to start being responsible occasionally, or Billy and Charlie aren't going to be so easygoing about this." I made a gesture indicating the two of us as a single entity. He liked that–he beamed.
"Homework once a week?" he proposed.
"Maybe we'd better go with twice," I suggested, thinking of the pile I'd just been assigned today.
He sighed a heavy sigh. Then he reached over his toolbox to a paper grocery sack. He pulled out two cans of soda, cracking one open and handing it to me. He opened the second, and held it up ceremoniously.
"Here's to responsibility," he toasted. "Twice a week." "And recklessness every day in between," I emphasized. He grinned and touched his can to mine.
I got home later than I'd planned and found Charlie had ordered a pizza rather than wait for me. He wouldn't let me apologize.
"I don't mind," he assured me. "You deserve a break from all the cooking, anyway."
I knew he was just relieved that I was still acting like a normal person, and he was not about to rock the boat.
I checked my e-mail before I started on my homework, and there was a long one from Renee. She gushed over every detail I'd provided her with, so I sent back another exhaustive description of my day. Everything but the motorcycles. Even happy-go-lucky Renee was likely to be alarmed by that.
School Tuesday had its ups and downs. Angela and Mike seemed ready to welcome me back with open arms–to kindly overlook my few months of aberrant behavior. Jess was more resistant. I wondered if she needed a formal written apology for the Port Angeles incident.
Mike was animated and chatty at work. It was like he'd stored up the semester's worth of
talk, and it was all spilling out now. I found that I was able to smile and laugh with him, though it wasn't as effortless as it was with Jacob. It seemed harmless enough, until quitting time.
Mike put the closed sign in the window while I folded my vest and shoved it under the counter.
"This was fun tonight," Mike said happily.
"Yeah," I agreed, though I'd much rather have spent the afternoon in the garage. "It's too bad that you had to leave the movie early last week."
I was a little confused by his train of thought. I shrugged. "I'm just a wimp, I guess." "What I mean is, you should go to a better movie, something you'd enjoy," he explained. "Oh," I muttered, still confused.
"Like maybe this Friday. With me. We could go see something that isn't scary at all." I bit my lip.
I didn't want to screw things up with Mike, not when he was one of the only people ready to forgive me for being crazy. But this, again, felt far too familiar. Like the last year had never happened. I wished I had Jess as an excuse this time.
"Like a date?" I asked. Honesty was probably the best policy at this point. Get it over with. He processed the tone of my voice "If you want. But it doesn't have to be like that."
"I don't date," I said slowly, realizing how true that was. That whole world seemed impossibly distant.
"Just as friends?" he suggested. His clear blue eyes were not as eager now. I hoped he really meant that we could be friends anyway.
"That would be fun. But I actually have plans already this Friday, so maybe next week?" "What are you doing?" he asked, less casually than I think he wanted to sound. "Homework. I have a… study session planned with a friend."
"Oh. Okay. Maybe next week."
He walked me to my car, less exuberant than before. It reminded me so clearly of my first months in Forks. I'd come full circle, and now everything felt like an echo–an empty echo, devoid of the interest it used to have.
The next night, Charlie didn't seem the smallest bit surprised to find Jacob and me sprawled across the living room floor with our books scattered around us, so I guessed that he and Billy were talking behind our backs.
"Hey, kids," he said, his eyes straying to the kitchen. The smell of the lasagna I'd spent the afternoon making–while Jacob watched and occasionally sampled–wafted down the hall; I was being good, trying to atone for all the pizza.
Jacob stayed for dinner, and took a plate home for Billy. He grudgingly added another year to my negotiable age for being a good cook.
Friday was the garage, and Saturday, after my shift at Newton's, was homework again. Charlie felt secure enough in my sanity to spend the day fishing with Harry. When he got back, we were all done–feeling very sensible and mature about it, too–and watching Monster Garage on the Discovery Channel.
"I probably ought to go." Jacob sighed. "It's later than I thought." "Okay, fine," I grumbled. "I'll take you home."
He laughed at my unwilling expression–it seemed to please him.
"Tomorrow, back to work," I said as soon as we were safe in the truck. "What time do you want me to come up?"
There was an unexplained excitement in his answering smile. "I'll call you first, okay?" "Sure." I frowned to myself, wondering what was up. His smile widened.
I cleaned the house the next morning–waiting for Jacob to call and trying to shake off the Litest nightmare. The scenery had changed. Last night I'd wandered in a wide sea of ferns interspersed with huge hemlock trees. There was nothing else there, and I was lost, wandering aimless and alone, searching for nothing. I wanted to kick myself for the stupid field trip last week. I shoved the dream out of my conscious mind, hoping it would stay locked up somewhere and not escape again.
Charlie was outside washing the cruiser, so when the phone rang, I dropped the toilet brush and ran downstairs to answer it.
"Hello?" I asked breathlessly.
"Bella," Jacob said, a strange, formal tone to his voice. "Hey, Jake."
"I believe that… we have a date" he said, his tone thick with implications.
It took me a second before I got it. "They're done? I can't believe it!" What perfect timing. I needed something to distract me from nightmares and nothingness.
"Yeah, they run and everything."
"Jacob, you are absolutely, without a doubt, the most talented and wonderful person I know. You get ten years for this one."
"Cool! I'm middle-aged now." I laughed. "I'm on my way up!"
I threw the cleaning supplies under the bathroom counter and grabbed my jacket. "Headed to see Jake," Charlie said when I ran past him. It wasn't really a question. "Yep," I replied as I jumped in my truck.
"I'll be at the station later," Charlie called after me. "Okay," I yelled back, turning the key.
Charlie said something else, but I couldn't hear him clearly over the roar of the engine. It sounded sort of like, "Where's the fire?"
I parked my truck off to the side of the Blacks' house, close to the trees, to make it easier for us to sneak the bikes out. When I got out, a splash of color caught my eye–two shiny motorcycles, one red, one black, were hidden under a spruce, invisible from the house. Jacob was prepared.
There was a piece of blue ribbon tied in a small bow around each of the handlebars. I was laughing at that when Jacob ran out of the house.
"Ready?" he asked in a low voice, his eyes sparkling.
I glanced over his shoulder, and there was no sign of Billy.
"Yeah," I said, but I didn't feel quite as excited as before; I was trying to imagine myself actually on the motorcycle.
Jacob loaded the bikes into the bed of the truck with ease, laying them carefully on their sides so they didn't show.
"Let's go," he said, his voice higher than usual with excitement. "I know the perfect spot–no one will catch us there."
We drove south out of town. The dirt road wove in and out of the forest–sometimes there was nothing but trees, and then there would suddenly be a breathtaking glimpse of the
Pacific Ocean, reaching to the horizon, dark gray under the clouds. We were above the shore, on top of the cliffs that bordered the beach here and the view seemed to stretch on forever.
I was driving slowly, so that I could safely stare out across the ocean now and then, as the road wound closer to the sea cliffs. Jacob was talking about finishing the bikes, but his descriptions were getting technical, so I wasn't paying close attention.
That was when I noticed four figures standing on a rocky ledge, much too close to the precipice. I couldn't tell from the distance how old they were, but I assumed they were men. Despite the chill in the air today, they seemed to be wearing only shorts.
As I watched, the tallest person stepped closer to the brink. I slowed automatically, my foot hesitating over the brake pedal.
And then he threw himself off the edge. "No!" I shouted, stomping down on the brake.
"What's wrong?" Jacob shouted back, alarmed.
"That guy–he just jumped off the cliff! Why didn't they stop him? We've got to call an ambulance!" I threw open my door and started to get out, which made no sense at all. The fastest way to a phone was to drive back to Billy's. But I couldn't believe what I'd just seen. Maybe, subconsciously, I hoped I would see something different without the glass of the windshield in the way.
Jacob laughed, and I spun to stare at him wildly. How could he be so calloused, so cold-blooded?
"They're just cliff diving, Bella. Recreation. La Push doesn't have a mall, you know." He was teasing, but there was a strange note of irritation in his voice.
"Cliff diving?" I repeated, dazed. I stared in disbelief as a second figure stepped to the edge, paused, and then very gracefully leaped into space. He fell for what seemed like an eternity to me, finally cutting smoothly into the dark gray waves below.
"Wow. It's so high." I slid back into my seat, still staring wide-eyed at the two remaining divers. "It must be a hundred feet."
"Well, yeah, most of us jump from lower down, that rock that juts out from the cliff about halfway." He pointed out his window. The place he indicated did seem much more reasonable. "Those guys are insane. Probably showing off how tough they are. I mean, really, it's freezing today. That water can't feel good." He made a disgruntled face, as if the stunt personally offended him. It surprised me a little. I would have thought Jacob was nearly impossible to upset.
"You jump off the cliff?" I hadn't missed the "us."
"Sure, sure." He shrugged and grinned. "It's fun. A little scary, kind of a rush."
I looked back at the cliffs, where the third figure was pacing the edge. I'd never witnessed anything so reckless in all my life. My eyes widened, and I smiled. "Jake, you have to take me cliff diving."
He frowned back at me, his face disapproving. "Bella, you just wanted to call an ambulance for Sam," he reminded me. I was surprised that he could tell who it was from this distance.
"I want to try," I insisted, start ing to get out of the car again.
Jacob grabbed my wrist. "Not today, all right? Can we at least wait for a warmer day?"
"Okay, fine," I agreed. With the door open, the glacial breeze was raising goose bumps on my arm. "But I want to go soon."
"Soon." He rolled his eyes. "Sometimes you're a little strange, Bella. Do you know that?" I sighed. "Yes."
"And we're not jumping off the top."
I watched, fascinated, as the third boy made a running start and flung himself farther into the empty air than the other two. He twisted and cartwheeled through space as he fell, like he was skydiving. He looked absolutely free–unthinking and utterly irresponsible.
"Fine," I agreed. "Not the first time, anyway." Now Jacob sighed.
"Are we going to try out the bikes or not?" he demanded.
"Okay, okay," I said, tearing my eyes away from the last person waiting on the cliff. I put my seat belt back on and closed the door. The engine was still running, roaring as it idled. We started down the road again.
"So who were those guys–the crazy ones?" I wondered.
He made a disgusted sound in the back of his throat. "The La Push gang." "You have a gang?" I asked. I realized that I sounded impressed.
He laughed once at my reaction. "Not like that. I swear, they're like hall monitors gone bad. They don't start fights, they keep the peace." He snorted. "There was this guy from up somewhere by the Makah rez, big guy too, scary-looking. Well, word got around that he was selling meth to kids, and Sam Uley and his disciples ran him off our land. They're all about our land, and tribe pride… it's getting ridiculous. The worst part is that the council takes them seriously. Embry said that the council actually meets with Sam." He shook his head,
face full of resentment. "Embry also heard from Leah Clearwater that they call themselves 'protectors' or something like that."
Jacob's hands were clenched into fists, as if he'd like to hit something. I'd never seen this side of him.
I was surprised to hear Sam Uley's name. I didn't want it to bring back the images from my nightmare, so I made a quick observation to distract myself. "You don't like them very much."
"Does it show?" he asked sarcastically.
"Well… It doesn't sound like they're doing anything bad." I tried to soothe him, to make him cheerful again. "Just sort of annoyingly goody-two-shoes for a gang."
"Yeah. Annoying is a good word. They're always showing off–like the cliff thing. They act like… like, I don't know. Like tough guys. I was hanging out at the store with Embry and Quil once, last semester, and Sam came by with his followers, Jared and Paul. Quil said something, you know how he's got a big mouth, and it pissed Paul off. His eyes got all dark, and he sort of smiled–no, he showed his teeth but he didn't smile–and it was like he was so mad he was shaking or something. But Sam put his hand against Paul's chest and shook his head. Paul looked at him for a minute and calmed down. Honestly, it was like Sam was holding him back–like Paul was going to tear us up if Sam didn't stop him." He groaned. "Like a bad western. You know, Sam's a pretty big guy, he's twenty. But Paul's just sixteen, too, shorter than me and not as beefy as Quil. I think any one of us could take him."
"Tough guys," I agreed. I could see it in my head as he described it, and it reminded me of something… a trio of tall, dark men standing very still and close together in my father's living room. The picture was sideways, because my head was lying against the couch while Dr. Gerandy and Charlie leaned over me… Had that been Sam's gang?
I spoke quickly again to divert myself from the bleak memories. "Isn't Sam a little too old for this kind of thing?"
"Yeah. He was supposed to go to college, but he stayed. And no one gave him any crap about it, either. The whole council pitched a fit when my sister turned down a partial scholarship and got married. But, oh no, Sam Uley can do no wrong."
His face was set in unfamiliar lines of outrage–outrage and something else I didn't recognize at first.
"It all sounds really annoying and… strange. But I don't get why you're taking it so personally." I peeked over at his face, hoping I hadn't offended him. He was suddenly calm, staring out the side window.
"You just missed the turn," he said in an even voice.
I executed a very wide U-turn, nearly hitting a tree as my circle ran the truck halfway off the road.
"Thanks for the heads-up," I muttered as I started up the side road. "Sorry, I wasn't paying attention."
It was quiet for a brief minute.
"You can stop anywhere along here," he said softly.
I pulled over and cut the engine. My ears rang in the silence that followed. We both got out, and Jacob headed around to the back to get the bikes. I tried to read his expression. Something more was bothering him. I'd hit a nerve.
He smiled halfheartedly as he pushed the red bike to my side. "Happy late birthday. Are you ready for this?"
"I think so." The bike suddenly looked intimidating, frightening, as I realized I would soon be astride it.
"We'll take it slow," he promised. I gingerly leaned the motorcycle against the truck's fender while he went to get his.
"Jake…"I hesitated as he came back around the truck. "Yeah?"
"What's really bothering you? About the Sam thing, I mean? Is there something else?" I watched his face. He grimaced, but he didn't seem angry. He looked at the dirt and kicked his shoe against the front tire of his bike again and again, like he was keeping time.
He sighed. "It's just… the way they treat me. It creeps me out." The words started to rush out now. "You know, the council is supposed to be made up of equals, but if there was a leader, it would be my dad. I've never been able to figure out why people treat him the way they do. Why his opinion counts the most. It's got something to do with his father and his father's father. My great-grandpa, Ephraim Black, was sort of the last chief we had, and they still listen to Billy, maybe because of that.
"But I'm just like everyone else. Nobody treats me special… until now." That caught me off guard. "Sam treats you special?"
"Yeah," he agreed, looking up at me with troubled eyes. "He looks at me like he's waiting for something… like I'm going to join his stupid gang someday. He pays more attention to me than any of the other guys. I hate it."
"You don't have to join anything." My voice was angry. This was really upsetting Jacob, and that infuriated me. Who did these "protectors" think they were?
"Yeah." His foot kept up its rhythm against the tire. "What?" I could tell there was more.
He frowned, his eyebrows pulling up in a way that looked sad and worried rather than angry. "It's Embry. He's been avoiding me lately."
The thoughts didn't seem connected, but I wondered if I was to blame for the problems with his friend. "You've been hanging out with me a lot," I reminded him, feeling selfish. I'd been monopolizing him.
"No, that's not it. It's not just me–it's Quil, too, and everyone. Embry missed a week of school, but he was never home when we tried to see him. And when he came back, he looked… he looked freaked out. Terrified. Quil and I both tried to get him to tell us what was wrong, but he wouldn't talk to either one of us."
I stared at Jacob, biting my lip anxiously–he was really frightened. But he didn't look at me. He watched his own foot kicking the rubber as if it belonged to someone else. The tempo increased.
"Then this week, out of nowhere, Embry's hanging out with Sam and the rest of them. He was out on the cliffs today." His voice was low and tense.
He finally looked at me. "Bella, they bugged him even more than they bother me. He didn't want anything to do with them. And now Embry's following Sam around like he's joined a cult.
"And that's the way it was with Paul. Just exactly the same. He wasn't friends with Sam at all. Then he stopped coming to school for a few weeks, and, when he came back, suddenly Sam owned him. I don't know what it means. I can't figure it out, and I feel like I have to, because Embry's my friend and… Sam's looking at me funny . . and…" He trailed off.
"Have you talked to Billy about this?" I asked. His horror was spreading to me. I had chills running on the back of my neck.
Now there was anger on his face. "Yes," he snorted. "That was helpful." "What did he say?"
Jacob's expression was sarcastic, and when he spoke, his voice mocked the deep tones of his father's voice. "It's nothing you need to worry about now, Jacob. In a few years, if you don't… well, I'll explain later." And then his voice was his own. "What am I supposed to get from that? Is he trying to say it's some stupid puberty, coming-of-age thing? This is something else. Something wrong."
He was biting his lower lip and clenching his hands. He looked like he was about to cry.
I threw my arms around him instinctively, wrapping them around his waist and pressing my face against his chest. He was so big, I felt like I was a child hugging a grown-up.
"Oh, Jake, it'll be okay!" I promised. "If it gets worse you can come live with me and Charlie. Don't be scared, we'll think of something!"
He was frozen for a second, and then his long arms wrapped hesitantly around me. "Thanks, Bella." His voice was huskier than usual.
We stood like that for a moment, and it didn't upset me; in fact, I felt comforted by the contact. This didn't feel anything like the last time someone had embraced me this way. This was friendship. And Jacob was very warm.
It was strange for me, being this close–emotionally rather than physically, though the physical was strange for me, too–to another human being. It wasn't my usual style. I didn't normally relate to people so easily, on such a basic level.
Not human beings.
"If this is how you're going to react, I'll freak out more often." Jacob's voice was light, normal again, and his laughter rumbled against my ear. His fingers touched my hair, soft and tentative.
Well, it was friendship for me.
I pulled away quickly, laughing with him, but determined to put things back in perspective at once.
"It's hard to believe I'm two years older than you," I said, emphasizing the word older. "You make me feel like a dwarf." Standing this close to him, I really had to crane my neck to see his face.
"You're forgetting I'm in my forties, of course." "Oh, that's right."
He patted my head. "You're like a little doll," he teased. "A porcelain doll."
I rolled my eyes, taking another step away. "Let's not start with the albino cracks."
"Seriously, Bella, are you sure you're not?" He stretched his russet arm out next to mine. The difference wasn't flattering. "I've never seen anyone paler than you… well, except for–" He broke off, and I looked away, trying to not understand what he had been about to say.
"So are we going to ride or what?"
"Let's do it," I agreed, more enthusiastic than I would have been half a minute ago. His unfinished sentence reminded me of why I was here.
8. ADRENALINE
"OKAY, WHERE'S YOUR CLUTCH?"
I pointed to the lever on my left handlebar. Letting go of the grip was a mistake. The heavy bike wobbled underneath me, threatening to knock me sidewise. I grabbed the handle again, trying to hold it straight.
"Jacob, it won't stay up," I complained.
"It will when you're moving," he promised. "Now where's your brake?" "Behind my right foot."
"Wrong."
He grabbed my right hand and curled my fingers around the lever over the throttle. "But you said–"
"This is the brake you want. Don't use the back brake now, that's for later, when you know what you're doing."
"That doesn't sound right," I said suspiciously. "Aren't both brakes kind of important?"
"Forget the back brake, okay? Here–" He wrapped his hand around mine and made me squeeze the lever down. "That is how you brake. Don't forget." He squeezed my hand another time.
"Fine," I agreed. "Throttle?"
I twisted the right grip. "Gearshift?"
I nudged it with my left calf.
"Very good. I think you've got all the parts down. Now you just have to get it moving."
"Uh-huh," I muttered, afraid to say more. My stomach was contorting strangely and I thought my voice might crack. I was terrified. I tried to tell myself that the fear was pointless. I'd already lived through the worst thing possible. In comparison with that, why should anything frighten me now? I should be able to look death in the face and laugh.
My stomach wasn't buying it.
I stared down the long stretch of dirt road, bordered by thick misty green on every side. The road was sandy and damp. Better than mud.
"I want you to hold down the clutch," Jacob instructed. I wrapped my fingers around the clutch.
"Now this is crucial, Bella," Jacob stressed. "Don't let go of that, okay? I want you to pretend that I've handed you a live grenade. The pin is out and you are holding down the spoon."
I squeezed tighter.
"Good. Do you think you can kick-start it?"
"If I move my foot, I will fall over," I told him through gritted teeth, my fingers tight around my live grenade.
"Okay, I'll do it. Don't let go of the clutch."
He took a step back, and then suddenly slammed his foot down on the pedal. There was a short ripping noise, and the force of his thrust rocked the bike. I started to fall sideways, but Jake caught the bike before it knocked me to the ground.
"Steady there," he encouraged. "Do you still have the clutch?" "Yes," I gasped.
"Plant your feet–I'm going to try again." But he put his hand on the back of the seat, too, just to be safe.
It took four more kicks before the ignition caught. I could feel the bike rumbling beneath me like an angry animal. I gripped the clutch until my fingers ached.
"Try out the throttle," he suggested. "Very lightly. And don't let go of the clutch."
Hesitantly, I twisted the right handle. Though the movement was tiny, the bike snarled beneath me. It sounded angry and hungry now. Jacob smiled in deep satisfaction.
"Do you remember how to put it into first gear?" he asked. "Yes."
"Well, go ahead and do it." "Okay."
He waited for a few seconds.
"Left foot," he prompted.
"I know," I said, taking a deep breath.
"Are you sure you want to do this?" Jacob asked. "You look scared." "I'm fine," I snapped. I kicked the gearshift down one notch.
"Very good," he praised me. "Now, very gently, ease up on the clutch." He took a step away from the bike.
"You want me to let go of the grenade?" I asked in disbelief. No wonder he was moving back.
"That's how you move, Bella. Just do it little by little."
As I began to loosen my grip, I was shocked to be interrupted by a voice that did not belong to the boy standing next to me.
"This is reckless and childish and idiotic, Bella," the velvet voice fumed. "Oh!" I gasped, and my hand fell off the clutch.
The bike bucked under me, yanking me forward and then collapsing to the ground half on top of me. The growling engine choked to a stop.
"Bella?" Jacob jerked the heavy bike off me with ease. "Are you hurt?" But I wasn't listening.
"I told you so," the perfect voice murmured, crystal clear. "Bella?" Jacob shook my shoulder.
"I'm fine," I mumbled, dazed.
More than fine. The voice in my head was back. It still rang in my ears–soft, velvety echoes.
My mind ran swiftly through the possibilities. There was no familiarity here–on a road I'd never seen, doing something I'd never done before–no deja vu So the hallucinations must be triggered by something else… I felt the adrenaline coursing through my veins again, and I thought I had the answer. Some combination of adrenaline and danger, or maybe just stupidity.
Jacob was pulling me to my feet. "Did you hit your head?" he asked.
"I don't think so." I shook it back and forth, checking. "I didn't hurt the bike, did I?" This thought worried me. I was anxious to try again, right away. Being reckless was paying off better than I'd thought. Forget cheating. Maybe I'd found a way to generate the hallucinations–that was much more important.
"No. You just stalled the engine," Jacob said, interrupting my quick speculations. "You let go of the clutch too fast."
I nodded. "Let's try again." "Are you sure?" Jacob asked. "Positive."
This time I tried to get the kick-start myself. It was complicated; I had to jump a little to slam down on the pedal with enough force, and every time I did that, the bike tried to knock me over. Jacob's hand hovered over the handlebars, ready to catch me if I needed him.
It took several good tries, and even more poor tries, before the engine caught and roared to life under me. Remembering to hold on to the grenade, I revved the throttle experimentally. It snarled at the slightest touch. My smile mirrored Jacob's now.
"Easy on the clutch," he reminded me.
"Do you want to kill yourself, then? Is that what this is about?" the other voice spoke again, his tone severe.
I smiled tightly–it was still working–and ignored the questions. Jacob wasn't going to let anything serious happen to me.
"Go home to Charlie," the voice ordered. The sheer beauty of it amazed me. I couldn't allow my memory to lose it, no matter the price.
"Ease off slowly," Jacob encouraged me.
"I will," I said. It bothered me a bit when I realized I was answering both of them. The voice in my head growled against the roar of the motorcycle.
Trying to focus this time, to not let the voice startle me again, I relaxed my hand by tiny degrees. Suddenly, the gear caught and wrenched me forward.
And I was flying.
There was wind that wasn't there before, blowing my skin against my skull and flinging my hair back behind me with enough force that it felt like someone was tugging on it. I'd left my stomach back at the starting point; the adrenaline coursed through my body, tingling in my
veins. The trees raced past me, blurring into a wall of green.
But this was only first gear. My foot itched toward the gearshift as I twisted for more gas. "No, Bella!" the angry, honey-sweet voice ordered in my ear. "Watch what you're doing!"
It distracted me enough from the speed to realize that the road was starting a slow curve to the left, and I was still going straight. Jacob hadn't told me how to turn.
"Brakes, brakes," I muttered to myself, and I instinctively slammed down with my right foot, like I would in my truck.
The bike was suddenly unstable underneath me, shivering first to one side and then the other. It was dragging me toward the green wall, and I was going too fast. I tried to turn the handlebar the other direction, and the sudden shift of my weight pushed the bike toward the ground, still spinning toward the trees.
The motorcycle landed on top of me again, roaring loudly, pulling me across the wet sand until it hit something stationary. I couldn't see. My face was mashed into the moss. I tried to lift my head, but there was something in the way.
I was dizzy and confused. It sounded like there were three things snarling–the bike over me, the voice in my head, and something else…
"Bella!" Jacob yelled, and I heard the roar of the other bike cut off.
The motorcycle no longer pinned me to the ground, and I rolled over to breathe. All the growling went silent.
"Wow," I murmured. I was thrilled. This had to be it, the recipe for a hallucination–adrenaline plus clanger plus stupidity. Something close to that, anyway.
"Bella!" Jacob was crouching over me anxiously. "Bella, are you alive?"
"I'm great!" I enthused. I flexed my arms and legs. Everything seemed to be working correctly. "Let's do it again."
"I don't think so." Jacob still sounded worried. "I think I'd better drive you to the hospital first."
"I'm fine."
"Um, Bella? You've got a huge cut on your forehead, and it's gushing blood," he informed me.
I clapped my hand over my head. Sure enough, it was wet and sticky. I could smell nothing but the damp moss on my face, and that held off the nausea.
"Oh, I'm so sorry, Jacob." I pushed hard against the gash, as if I could force the blood back inside my head.
"Why are you apologizing for bleeding?" he wondered as he wrapped a long arm around my waist and pulled me to my feet. "Let's go. I'll drive." He held out his hand for the keys.
"What about the bikes?" I asked, handing them over.
He thought for a second. "Wait here. And take this." He pulled off his T-shirt, already spotted with blood, and threw it to me. I wadded it up and held it tightly to my forehead. I was starting to smell the blood; I breathed deeply through my mouth and tried to concentrate on something else.
Jacob jumped on the black motorcycle, kicked it to a start in one try, and raced back down the road, spraying sand and pebbles behind him. He looked athletic and professional as he leaned over the handlebars, head low, face forward, his shiny hair whipping against the russet skin of his back. My eyes narrowed enviously. I was sure I hadn't looked like that on my motorcycle.
I was surprised at how far I'd gone. I could barely see Jacob in the distance when he finally got to the truck. He threw the bike into the bed and sprinted to the driver's side.
I really didn't feel bad at all as he coaxed my truck to a deafening roar in his hurry to get back to me. My head stung a little, and my stomach was uneasy, but the cut wasn't serious. Head wounds just bled more than most. His urgency wasn't necessary.
Jacob left the truck running as he raced back to me, wrapping his arm around my waist again. "Okay, let's get you in the truck."
"I'm honestly fine," I assured him as he helped me in. "Don't get worked up. It's just a little blood."
"Just a lot of blood," I heard him mutter as he went back for my bike.
"Now, let's think about this for a second," I began when he got back in. "If you take me to the ER like this, Charlie is sure to hear about it." I glanced down at the sand and dirt caked into my jeans.
"Bella, I think you need stitches. I'm not going to let you bleed to death."
"I won't," I promised. "Let's just take the bikes back first, and then we'll make a stop at my house so I can dispose of the evidence before we go to the hospital."
"What about Charlie?"
"He said he had to work today."
"Are you really sure?"
"Trust me. I'm an easy bleeder. It's not nearly as dire as it looks."
Jacob wasn't happy–his full mouth turned down in an uncharacteristic frown–but he didn't want to get me in trouble. I stared out the window, holding his ruined shirt to my head, while he drove me to Forks.
The motorcycle was better than I'd dreamed. It had served its original purpose. I'd cheated–broken my promise. I'd been needlessly reckless. I felt a little less pathetic now that the promises had been broken on both sides.
And then to discover the key to the hallucinations! At least, I hoped I had. I was going to test the theory as soon as possible. Maybe they'd get through with me quickly in the ER, and I could try again tonight.
Racing down the road like that had been amazing. The feel of the wind in my face, the speed and the freedom… it reminded me of a past life, flying through the thick forest without a road, piggyback while he ran–I stopped thinking right there, letting the memory break off in the sudden agony. I flinched.
"You still okay?" Jacob checked.
"Yeah." I tried to sound as convincing as before.
"By the way," he added. "I'm going to disconnect your foot brake tonight."
At home, I went to look at myself in the mirror first thing; it was pretty gruesome. Blood was drying in thick streaks across my cheek and neck, matting in my muddy hair. I examined myself clinically, pretending the blood was paint so it wouldn't upset my stomach. I breathed through my mouth, and was fine.
I washed up as well as I could. Then I hid my dirty, bloody clothes in the bottom of my laundry basket, putting on new jeans and a button-up shirt (that I didn't have to pull over my head) as carefully as I could. I managed to do this one-handed and keep both garments blood-free.
"Hurry up," Jacob called.
"Okay, okay," I shouted back. After making sure I left nothing incriminating behind me, I headed downstairs.
"How do I look?" I asked him. "Better," he admitted.
"But do I look like I tripped in your garage and hit my head on a hammer?"
"Sure, I guess so." "Let's go then."
Jacob hurried me out the door, and insisted on driving again. We were halfway to the hospital when I realized he was still shirtless.
I frowned guiltily. "We should have grabbed you a jacket."
"That would have given us away," he teased. "Besides, it's not cold." "Are you kidding?" I shivered and reached out to turn the heat on.
I watched Jacob to see if he was just playing tough so I wouldn't worry, but he looked comfortable enough. He had one arm over the back of my seat, though I was huddled up to keep warm.
Jacob really did look older than sixteen–not quite forty, but maybe older than me. Quil didn't have too much on him in the muscle department, for all that Jacob claimed to be a skeleton. The muscles were the long wiry kind, but they were definitely there under the smooth skin. His skin was such a pretty color, it made me jealous.
Jacob noticed my scrutiny.
"What?" he asked, suddenly self-conscious.
"Nothing. I just hadn't realized before. Did you know, you're sort of beautiful?"
Once the words slipped out, I worried that he might take my impulsive observation the wrong way.
But Jacob just rolled his eyes. "You hit your head pretty hard, didn't you?" "I'm serious."
"Well, then, thanks. Sort of."
I grinned. "You're sort of welcome."
I had to have seven stitches to c lose the cut on my forehead. After the sting of the local anesthetic, there was no pain in the procedure. Jacob held my hand while Dr. Snow was sewing, and I tried not to think about why that was ironic.
We were at the hospital forever. By the time I was done, I had to drop Jacob off at his home and hurry back to cook dinner for Charlie. Charlie seemed to buy my story about falling in Jacob's garage. After all, it wasn't like I hadn't been able to land myself in the ER before with no more help than my own feet.
This night was not as bad as that first night, after I'd heard the perfect voice in Port Angeles. The hole came back, the way it always did when I was away from Jacob, but it didn't throb so badly around the edges. I was already planning ahead, looking forward to more delusions, and that was a distraction. Also, I knew I would feel better tomorrow when I was with Jacob again. That made the empty hole and the familiar pain easier to bear; relief was in sight. The nightmare, too, had lost a little of its potency. I was horrified by the nothingness, as always, but I was also strangely impatient as I waited for the moment that would send me screaming into consciousness. I knew the nightmare had to end.
The next Wednesday, before I could get home from the ER, Dr. Gerandy called to warn my father that I might possibly have a concussion and advised him to wake me up every two hours through the night to make sure it wasn't serious. Charlie's eyes narrowed suspiciously at my weak explanation about tripping again.
"Maybe you should just stay out of the garage altogether, Bella," he suggested that night during dinner.
I panicked, worried that Charlie was about to lay down some kind of edict that would prohibit La Push, and consequently my motorcycle. And I wasn't giving it up–I'd had the most amazing hallucination today. My velvet-voiced delusion had yelled at me for almost five minutes before I'd hit the brake too abruptly and launched myself into the tree. I'd take whatever pain that would cause me tonight without complaint.
"This didn't happen in the garage," I protested quickly. "We were hiking, and I tripped over a rock."
"Since when do you hike?" Charlie asked skeptically.
"Working at Newton's was bound to rub off sometime," I pointed out. "Spend every day selling all the virtues of the outdoors, eventually you get curious."
Charlie glared at me, unconvinced.
"I'll be more careful," I promised, surreptitiously crossing my fingers under the table. "I don't mind you hiking right there around La Push, but keep close to town, okay?" "Why?"
"Well, we've been getting a lot of wildlife complaints lately. The forestry department is going to check into it, but for the time being…"
"Oh, the big bear," I said with sudden comprehension. "Yeah, some of the hikers coming through Newton's have seen it. Do you think there's really some giant mutated grizzly out there?"
His forehead creased. "There's something. Keep it close to town, okay?"
"Sure, sure," I said quickly. He didn't look completely appeased.
"Charlie's getting nosy," I complained to Jacob when I picked him up after school Friday.
"Maybe we should cool it with the bikes." He saw my objecting expression and added, "At least for a week or so. You could stay out of the hospital for a week, right?"
"What are we going to do?" I griped.
He smiled cheerfully. "What ever you want."
I thought about that for a minute–about what I wanted.
I hated the idea of losing even my brief seconds of closeness with the memories that didn't hurt–the ones that came on their own, without me thinking of them consciously. If I couldn't have the bikes, I was going to have to find some other avenue to the danger and the adrenaline, and that was going to take serious thought and creativity. Doing nothing in the meantime was not appealing. Suppose I got depressed again, even with Jake? I had to keep occupied.
Maybe there was some other way, some other recipe… some other place.
The house had been a mistake, certainly. But his presence must be stamped somewhere, somewhere other than inside me. There had to be a place where he seemed more real than among all the familiar landmarks that were crowded with other human memories.
I could think of one place where that might hold true. One place that would always belong to him and no one else. A magic place, full of light. The beautiful meadow I'd seen only once in my life, lit by sunshine and the sparkle of his skin.
This idea had a huge potential for backfiring–it might be dangerously painful. My chest ached with emptiness even to think of it. It was hard to hold myself upright, to not give myself away. But surely, there of all places, I could hear his voice. And I'd already told Charlie I was hiking…
"What are you thinking about so hard?" Jacob asked.
"Well…" I began slowly. "I found this place in the forest once–I came across it when I was, um, hiking. A little meadow, the most beautiful place. I don't know if I could track it down again on my own. It would definitely take a few tries…"
"We could use a compass and a grid pattern," Jacob said with confident helpfulness. "Do you know where you started from?"
"Yes, just below the trailhead where the one-ten ends. I was going mostly south, I think." "Cool. We'll find it." As always, Jacob was game for anything I wanted. No matter how
strange it was.
So, Saturday afternoon, I tied on my new hiking boots–purchased that morning using my twenty-per-cent-off employee discount for the first time–grabbed my new topographical map of the Olympic Peninsula, and drove to La Push.
We didn't get started immediately; first, Jacob sprawled across the living room floor–taking up the whole room–and, for a full twenty minutes, drew a complicated web across the key section of the map while I perched on a kitchen chair and talked to Billy. Billy didn't seem at all concerned about our proposed hiking trip. I was surprised that Jacob had told him where we were going, given the fuss people were making about the bear sightings. I wanted to ask Billy not to say anything about this to Charlie, but I was afraid that making the request would cause the opposite result.
"Maybe we'll see the super bear," Jacob joked, eyes on his design. I glanced at Billy swiftly, fearing a Charlie-style reaction.
But Billy just laughed at his son. "Maybe you should take a jar of honey, just in case."
Jake chuckled. "Hope your new boots are fast, Bella. One little jar isn't going to keep a hungry bear occupied for long."
"I only have to be faster than you."
"Good luck with that!" Jacob said, rolling his eyes as he refolded the map. "Let's go." "Have fun," Billy rumbled, wheeling himself toward the refrigerator.
Charlie was not a hard person to live with, but it looked to me like Jacob had it even easier than I did.
I drove to the very end of the dirt road, stopping near the sign that marked the beginning of the trailhead. It had been a long time since I'd been here, and my stomach reacted nervously. This might be a very bad thing. But it would be worth it, if I got to hear him.
I got out and looked at the dense wall of green.
"I went this way," I murmured, pointing straight ahead. "Hmm," Jake muttered.
"What?"
He looked at the direction I'd pointed, then at the clearly marked trail, and back. "I would have figured you for a trail kind of girl."
"Not me." I smiled bleakly. "I'm a rebel." He laughed, and then pulled out our map.
"Give me a second." He held the compass in a skilled way, twisting the map around till it angled the way he wanted.
"Okay–first line on the grid. Let's do it."
I could tell that I was slowing Jacob up, but he didn't complain. I tried not to dwell on my last trip through this part of the forest, with a very different companion. Normal memories were still cangerous. If I let myself slip up, I'd end up with my arms clutching my chest to hold it together, gasping for air, and how would I explain that to Jacob?
It wasn't as hard as I would have thought to keep focused on the present. The forest looked a lot like any other part of the peninsula, and Jacob set a vastly different mood.
He whistled cheerfully, an unfamiliar tune, swinging his arms and moving easily through the rough undergrowth. The shadows didn't seem as dark as usual. Not with my personal sun along.
Jacob checked the compass every few minutes, keeping us in a straight line with one of the radiating spokes of his grid. He really looked like he knew what he was doing. I was going to compliment him, but I caught myself. No doubt he'd add another few years to his inflated age.
My mind wandered as I walked, and I grew curious. I hadn't forgotten the conversation we'd had by the sea cliffs–I'd been waiting for him to bring it up again, but it didn't look like that was going to happen.
"Hey… Jake?" I asked hesitantly. "Yeah?"
"How are things… with Embry? Is he back to normal yet?"
Jacob was silent for a minute, still moving forward with long paces. When he was about ten feet ahead, he stopped to wait for me.
"No. He's not back to normal," Jacob said when I reached him, his mouth pulling down at the corners. He didn't start walking again. I immediately regretted bringing it up.
"Still with Sam." "Yup."
He put his arm around my shoulder, and he looked so troubled that I didn't playfully shake it
off, as I might have otherwise.
"Are they still looking at you funny?" I half-whispered. Jacob stared through the trees. "Sometimes."
"And Billy?"
"As helpful as ever," he said in a sour, angry voice that disturbed me. "Our couch is always open," I offered.
He laughed, breaking out of the unnatural gloom. "But think of the position that would put Charlie in–when Billy calls the police to report my kidnapping."
I laughed too, glad to have Jacob back to normal.
We stopped when Jacob said we'd gone six miles, cut west for a short time, and headed back along another line of his grid. Everything looked exactly the same as the way in, and I had a feeling that my silly quest was pretty much doomed. I admitted as much when it started to get darker, the sunless day fading toward a starless night, but Jacob was more confident.
"As long as you're sure we're starting from the right place…" He glanced down at me. "Yes, I'm sure."
"Then we'll find it," he promised, grabbing my hand and pulling me through a mass of ferns. On the other side was the truck. He gestured toward it proudly. "Trust me."
"You're good," I admitted. "Next time we bring flashlights, though."
"We'll save hiking for Sundays from now on. I didn't know you were that slow."
I yanked my hand back and stomped around to the driver's side while he chuckled at my reaction.
"So you up for another try tomorrow.'" he asked, sliding into the passenger seat. "Sure. Unless you want to go without me so I don't tie you down to my gimpy pace."
"I'll survive," he assured me. "If we're hiking again, though, you might want to pick up some moleskin. I bet you can feel those new boots right now."
"A little," I confessed. It felt like I had more blisters than I had space to fit them. "I hope we see the bear tomorrow. I'm sort of disappointed about that."
"Yes, me, too," I agreed sarcastically. "Maybe we'll get lucky tomorrow and something will eat us!"
"Bears don't want to eat people. We don't taste that good." He grinned at me in the dark cab. "Of course, you might be an exception. I bet you'd taste good."
"Thanks so much," I said, looking away. He wasn't the first person to tell me that.
9. THIRD WHEEL
TIME BEGAN TO TRIP ALONG MUCH MORE QUICKLY than before. School, work, and Jacob–though not necessarily in that order–created a neat and effortless pattern to follow. And Charlie got his wish: I wasn't miserable anymore. Of course, I couldn't fool myself completely. When I stopped to take stock of my life, which I tried not to do too often, I couldn't ignore the implications of my behavior.
I was like a lost moon–my planet destroyed in some cataclysmic, disaster-movie scenario of desolation–that continued, nevertheless, to circle in a tight little orbit around the empty space left behind, ignoring the laws of gravity.
I was getting better with my bike, which meant fewer bandages to worry Charlie. But it also meant that the voice in my head began to fade, until I heard it no more. Quietly, I panicked. I threw myself into the search for the meadow with slightly frenzied intensity. I racked my brain for other adrenaline-producing activities.
I didn't keep track of the days :hat passed–there was no reason, as I tried to live as much in the present as possible, no past fading, no future impending. So I was surprised by the date when Jacob brought it up on one of our homework days. He was waiting when I pulled up in front of his house.
"Happy Valentine's Day," Jacob said, smiling, but ducking his head as he greeted me. He held out a small, pink box, balancing it on his palm. Conversation hearts.
"Well, I feel like a schmuck," I mumbled. "Is today Valentine's Day?"
Jacob shook his head with mock sadness. "You can be so out of it sometimes. Yes, it is the fourteenth day of February. So are you going to be my Valentine? Since you didn't get me a fifty-cent box of candy, it's the least you can do."
I started to feel uncomfortable. The words were teasing, but only on the surface. "What exactly does that entail?" I hedged.
"The usual–slave for life, that kind of thing."
"Oh, well, if that's all…" I took the candy. But I was trying to think of some way to make the boundaries clear. Again. They seemed to get blurred a lot with Jacob.
"So, what are we doing tomorrow? Hiking, or the ER?"
"Hiking," I decided. "You're not the only one who can be obsessive. I'm starting to think I imagined that place…" I frowned into space.
"We'll find it," he assured me. "Bikes Friday?" he offered.
I saw a chance and took it without taking time to think it through.
"I'm going to a movie Friday. I've been promising my cafeteria crowd that I would go out forever." Mike would be pleased.
But Jacob's face fell. I caught the expression in his dark eyes before he dropped them to look at the ground.
"You'll come too, right?" I added quickly. "Or will it be too much of a drag with a bunch of boring seniors?" So much for my chance to put some distance between us. I couldn't stand hurting Jacob; we seemed to be connected in an odd way, and his pain set off little stabs of my own. Also, the idea of having his company for the ordeal–I had promised Mike, but really didn't feel any enthusiasm at the thought of following through–was just too tempting.
"You'd like me to come, with your friends there?"
"Yes," I admitted honestly, knowing as I continued that I was probably shooting myself in the foot with my words. "I'll have a lot more fun if you're there. Bring Quil, and we'll make it a party."
"Quil's gonna freak. Senior girls." He chortled and rolled his eyes. I didn't mention Embry, and neither did he. I laughed, too. "I'll try to get hin a good selection."
I broached the subject with Mike in English.
"Hey, Mike," I said when class was over. "Are you free Friday night?"
He looked up, his blue eyes instantly hopeful. "Yeah, I am. You want to go out?"
I worded my reply carefully. "I was thinking about getting a group"–I emphasized the word–"together to go see Crosshairs." I'd done my homework this time–even reading the movie spoilers to be sure I wouldn't be caught off guard. This movie was supposed to be a bloodbath from start to finish. I wasn't so recovered that I could stand to sit through a romance. "Does that sound like fun?"
"Sure," he agreed, visibly less eager. "Cool."
After a second, he perked back up to near his former excitement level. "How about we get Angela and Ben? Or Eric and Katie?"
He was determined to make this some kind of double date, apparently.
"How about both?" I suggested "And Jessica, too, of course. And Tyler and Conner, and maybe Lauren," I tacked on grudgingly. I had promised Quil variety.
"Okay," Mike muttered, foiled.
"And," I continued, "I've got a couple of friends from La Push I'm inviting. So it sounds like we'll need your Suburban if everyone comes."
Mike's eyes narrowed in suspicion.
"These are the friends you spend all your time studying with now?"
"Yep, the very ones," I answered cheerfully. "Though you could look at it as tutoring–they're only sophomores."
"Oh," Mike said, surprised. After a second of thought, he smiled. In the end, though, the Suburban wasn't necessary.
Jessica and Lauren claimed to be busy as soon as Mike let it slip that I was involved in the planning. Eric and Katie already had plans–it was their three-week anniversary or something. Lauren got to Tyler and Conner before Mike could, so those two were also busy. Even Quil was out–grounded for fighting at school. In the end, only Angela and Ben, and, of course Jacob, were able to go.
The diminished numbers didn't dampen Mike's anticipation, though. It was all he could talk about Friday.
"Are you sure you don't want to see Tomorrow and Forever instead?" he asked at lunch, naming the current romantic comedy that was ruling the box office. "Rotten Tomatoes gave it a better review."
"I want to see Crosshairs" I insisted. "I'm in the mood for action. Bring on the blood and guts!"
"Okay." Mike turned away, but not before I saw his maybe-she's-crazy-after-all expression.
When I got home from school, a very familiar car was parked in front of my house. Jacob was leaning against the hood, a huge grin lighting up his face.
"No way!" I shouted as I jumped out of the truck. "You're done! I can't believe it! You finished the Rabbit!"
He beamed. "Just last night. This is the maiden voyage." "Incredible." I held my hand up for a high five.
He smacked his hand against mine, but left it there, twisting his fingers through mine. "So do I get to drive tonight?"
"Definitely," I said, and then I sighed.
"What's wrong?"
"I'm giving up–I can't top this one. So you win. You're oldest." He shrugged, unsurprised by my capitulation. "Of course I am."
Mike's Suburban chugged around the corner. I pulled my hand out of Jacob's, and he nude a face that I wasn't meant to see.
"I remember this guy," he said in a low voice as Mike parked across the street. "The one who thought you were his girlfriend. Is he still confused?"
I raised one eyebrow. "Some people are hard to discourage."
"Then again," Jacob said thoughtfully, "sometimes persistence pays off." "Most of the time it's just annoying, though."
Mike got out of his car and crossed the road.
"Hey, Bella," he greeted me, and then his eyes turned wary as he looked up at Jacob. I glanced briefly at Jacob, too, trying to be objective. He really didn't look like a sophomore at all. He was just so big–Mike's head barely cleared Jacob's shoulder; I didn't even want to think where I measured next to him–and then his face was older-looking than it used to be, even a month ago.
"Hey, Mike! Do you remember Jacob Black?" "Not really." Mike held out his hand.
"Old family friend," Jacob introduced himself, shaking hands. They locked hands with more force than necessary. When their grip broke, Mike flexed his fingers.
I heard the phone ringing from the kitchen.
"I'd better get that–it might be Charlie," I told them, and dashed inside.
It was Ben. Angela was sick with the stomach flu, and he didn't feel like coming without her. He apologized for bailing on us.
I walked slowly back to the waiting boys, shaking my head. I really hoped Angela would feel better soon, but I had to admit that I was selfishly upset by this development. Just the three of us, Mike and Jacob and me, together for the evening–this had worked out brilliantly, I thought with grim sarcasm.
It didn't seem like Jake and Mike had made any progress towards friendship in my absence. They were several yards apart, facing away from each other as they waited for me; Mike's expression was sullen, though Jacob's was cheerful as always.
"Ang is sick," I told them glumly. "She and Ben aren't coming."
"I guess the flu is making another round. Austin and Conner were out today, too. Maybe we should do this another time," Mike suggested.
Before I could agree, Jacob spoke.
"I'm still up for it. But if you'd rather to stay behind, Mike–"
"No, I'm coming," Mike interrupted. "I was just thinking of Angela and Ben. Let's go." He started toward his Suburban.
"Hey, do you mind if Jacob drives?" I asked. "I told him he could–he just finished his car. He built it from scratch, all by himself," I bragged, proud as a PTA mom with a student on the principal's list.
"Fine," Mike snapped.
"All right, then," Jacob said, as if that settled everything. He seemed more comfortable than anyone else.
Mike climbed in the backseat of the Rabbit with a disgusted expression.
Jacob was his normal sunny self, chattering away until I'd all but forgotten Mike sulking silently in the back.
And then Mike changed his strategy. He leaned forward, resting his chin on the shoulder of my seat; his cheek almost touched mine. I shifted away, turning my back toward the window.
"Doesn't the radio work in this thing?" Mike asked with a hint of petulance, interrupting Jacob mid-sentence.
"Yes," Jacob answered. "But Bella doesn't like music." I stared at Jacob, surprised. I'd never told him that. "Bella?" Mike asked, annoyed.
"He's right," I mumbled, still looking at Jacob's serene profile. "How can you not like music?" Mike demanded.
I shrugged. "I don't know. It just irritates me." "Hmph." Mike leaned away.
When we got to the theater, Jacob handed me a ten-dollar bill.
"What's this?" I objected.
"I'm not old enough to get into this one," he reminded me.
I laughed out loud. "So much for relative ages. Is Billy going to kill me if I sneak you in?" "No. I told him you were planning to corrupt my youthful innocence."
I snickered, and Mike quickened his pace to keep up with us.
I almost wished that Mike had decided to bow out. He was still sullen–not much of an addition to the party. But I didn't want to end up on a date alone with Jacob, either. That wouldn't help anything.
The movie was exactly what it professed to be. In just the opening credits, four people got blown up and one got beheaded. The girl in front of me put her hands over her eyes and turned her face into her date's chest. He patted her shoulder, and winced occasionally, too. Mike didn't look like he was watching. His face was stiff as he glared toward the fringe of curtain above the screen.
I settled in to endure the two hours, watching the colors and the movement on the screen rather than seeing the shapes of people and cars and houses. But then Jacob started sniggering.
"What?" I whispered.
"Oh, c'mon!" he hissed back. "The blood squirted twenty feet out of that guy. How fake can you get?"
He chuckled again, as a flagpole speared another man into a concrete wall.
After that, I really watched the show, laughing with him as the mayhem got more and more ridiculous. How was I ever going to fight the blurring lines in our relationship when I enjoyed being with him so much?
Both Jacob and Mike had claimed the armrests on either side of me. Both of their hands rested lightly, palms up, in an unnatural looking position. Like steel bear traps, open and ready. Jacob was in the habit of taking my hand whenever the opportunity presented itself, but here in the darkened movie theater, with Mike watching, it would have a different significance–and I was sure he knew that. I couldn't believe that Mike was thinking the same thing, but his hand was placed exactly like Jacob's.
I folded my arms tightly across my chest and hoped that both their hands fell asleep.
Mike gave up first. About halfway through the movie, he pulled his arm back, and leaned forward to put his head in his hands. At first I thought he was reacting to something on the screen, but then he moaned.
"Mike, are you okay?" I whispered.
The couple in front of us turned to look at him as he groaned again.
I could see the sheen of sweat across his face in the light from the screen.
Mike groaned again, and bolted for the door. I got up to follow him, and Jacob copied me immediately.
"No, stay," I whispered. "I'll make sure he's okay." Jacob came with me anyway.
"You don't have to come. Get your eight bucks worth of carnage," I insisted as we walked up the aisle.
"That's okay. You sure can pick them, Bella. This movie really sucks." His voice rose from a whisper to its normal pitch as we walked out of the theater.
There was no sign of Mike in the hallway, and I was glad then that Jacob had come with me–he ducked into the men's bathroom to check for him there.
Jacob was back in a few seconds.
"Oh, he's in there, all right," he said, rolling his eyes. "What a marshmallow. You should hold out for someone with a stronger stomach. Someone who laughs at the gore that makes weaker men vomit."
"I'll keep my eyes open for someone like that."
We were all alone in the hallway. Both theaters were halfway through the movie, and it was deserted–quiet enough for us to hear the popcorn popping at the concession counter in the lobby.
Jacob went to sit on the velveteen-upholstered bench against the wall, patting the space beside him.
"He sounded like he was going to be in there for a while," he said, stretching his long legs out in front of him as he settled in to wait.
I joined him with a sigh. He looked like he was thinking about blurring more lines. Sure enough, as soon as I sat down, he shifted over to put his arm around my shoulders.
"Jake," I protested, leaning away. He dropped his arm, not looking bothered at all by the minor rejection. He reached out and took my hand firmly, wrapping his other hand around my wrist when I tried to pull away again. Where did he get the confidence from?
"Now, just hold on a minute, Bella," he said in a calm voice. "Tell me something."
I grimaced. I didn't want to do this. Not just not now, but not ever. There was nothing lett in my life at this point that was more important than Jacob Black. But he seemed determined to ruin everything.
"What?" I muttered sourly. "You like me, right?" "You know I do."
"Better than that joker puking his guts out in there?" He gestured toward the bathroom door. "Yes," I sighed.
"Better than any of the other guys you know?" He was calm, serene–as if my answer didn't matter, or he already knew what it was.
"Better than the girls, too," I pointed out.
"But that's all," he said, and it wasn't a question.
It was hard to answer, to say the word. Would he get hurt and avoid me? How would I stand that?
"Yes," I whispered.
He grinned down at me. "That's okay, you know. As long as you like me the best. And you think I'm good-looking–sort of. I'm prepared to be annoyingly persistent."
"I'm not going to change," I said, and though I tried to keep my voice normal, I could hear the sadness in it.
His face was thoughtful, no longer teasing. "It's still the other one, isn't it?"
I cringed. Funny how he seemed to know not to say the name–just like before in the car with the music. He picked up on so much about me that I never said.
"You don't have to talk about it," he told me. I nodded, grateful.
"But don't get mad at me for hanging around, okay?" Jacob patted the back of my hand. "Because I'm not giving up. I've got loads of time."
I sighed. "You shouldn't waste it on me," I said, though I wanted him to. Especially if he was willing to accept me the way I was–damaged goods, as is.
"It's what I want to do, as long as you still like to be with me."
"I can't imagine how I could not like being with you," I told him honestly. Jacob beamed. "I can live with that."
"Just don't expect more," I warned him, trying to pull my hand away. He held onto it obstinately.
"This doesn't really bother you, does it?" he demanded, squeezing my fingers.
"No," I sighed. Truthfully, it felt nice. His hand was so much warmer than mine; I always felt too cold these days.
"And you don't care what he thinks." Jacob jerked his thumb toward the bathroom. "I guess not."
"So what's the problem?"
"The problem," I said, "is, that it means something different to me than it does to you." "Well." He tightened his hand around mine "That's my problem, isn't it?"
"Fine," I grumbled. "Don't forget it, though."
"I won't. The pin's out of the grenade for me, now, eh?" He poked me in the ribs. I rolled my eyes. I guess if he felt like making a joke out of it, he was entitled.
He chuckled quietly for a minute while his pinky finger absently traced designs against the side of my hand.
"That's a funny scar you've got there," he suddenly said, twisting my hand to examine it. "How did that happen?"
The index finger of his free hand followed the line of the long silvery crescent that was barely visible against my pale skin.
I scowled. "Do you honestly expect me to remember where all my scars come from?"
I waited for the memory to hit–to open the gaping hole. But, as it so often did, Jacob's presence kept me whole.
"It's cold," he murmured, pressing lightly against the place where James had cut me with his teeth.
And then Mike stumbled out of the bathroom, his face ashen and covered in sweat. He looked horrible.
"Oh, Mike," I gasped.
"Do you mind leaving early?" he whispered.
"No, of course not." I pulled my hand free and went to help Mike walk. He looked unsteady. "Movie too much for you?" Jacob asked heartlessly.
Mike's glare was malevolent. "I didn't actually see any of it," he mumbled. "I was nauseated before the lights went down."
"Why didn't you say something?" I scolded as we staggered toward the exit. "I was hoping it would pass," he said.
"Just a sec," Jacob said as we reached the door. He walked quickly back to the concession stand.
"Could I have an empty popcorn bucket?" he asked the salesgirl. She looked at Mike once, and then thrust a bucket at Jacob.
"Get him outside, please," she begged. She was obviously the one who would have to clean the floor.
I towed Mike out into the cool, wet air. He inhaled deeply. Jacob was right behind us. He helped me get Mike into the back of the car, and handed him the bucket with a serious gaze.
"Please," was all Jacob said.
We rolled down the windows, letting the icy night air blow through the car, hoping it would help Mike. I curled my arms around my legs to keep warm.
"Cold, again?" Jacob asked, putting his arm around me before I could answer. "You're not?"
He shook his head.
"You must have a fever or something," I grumbled. It was freezing. I touched my fingers to his forehead, and his head was hot.
"Whoa, Jake–you're burning up!"
"I feel fine." He shrugged. "Fit as a fiddle."
I frowned and touched his head again. His skin blazed under my fingers. "Your hands are like ice," he complained.
"Maybe it's me," I allowed.
Mike groaned in the backseat, and threw up in the bucket. I grimaced, hoping my own stomach could stand the sound and smell. Jacob checked anxiously over his shoulder to make sure his car wasn't defiled.
The road felt longer on the way back.
Jacob was quiet, thoughtful. He left his arm around me, and it was so warm that the cold wind felt good.
I stared out the windshield, consumed with guilt.
It was so wrong to encourage Jacob. Pure selfishness. It didn't matter that I'd tried to make my position clear. If he felt any hope at all that this could turn into something other than friendship, then I hadn't been clear enough.
How could I explain so that he would understand? I was an empty shell. Like a vacant house–condemned–for months I'd been utterly uninhabitable. Now I was a little improved. The front room was in better repair. But that was all–just the one small piece. He deserved better than that–better than a one-room, falling-down fixer-upper. No amount of investment on his part could put me back in working order.
Yet I knew that I wouldn't send him away, regardless. I needed him too much, and I was selfish. Maybe I could make my side more clear, so that he would know to leave me. The thought made me shudder, and Jacob tightened his arm around me.
I drove Mike home in his Suburban, while Jacob followed behind us to take me home. Jacob was quiet all the way back to my house, and I wondered if he were thinking the same things that I was. Maybe he was changing his mind.
"I would invite myself in, since we're early," he said as we pulled up next to my truck. "But I think you might be right about the fever. I'm starting to feel a little… strange."
"Oh no, not you, too! Do you want me to drive you home?"
"No." He shook his head, his eyebrows pulling together. "I don't feel sick yet. Just… wrong. If I have to, I'll pull over."
"Will you call me as soon as you get in?" I asked anxiously.
"Sure, sure." He frowned, staring ahead into the darkness and biting his lip.
I opened my door to get out, but he grabbed my wrist lightly and held me there. I noticed again how hot his skin felt on mine.
"What is it, Jake?" I asked.
"There's something I want to tell you, Bella… but I think it's going to sound kind of corny." I sighed. This would be more of the same from the theater. "Go ahead."
"It's just that, I know how you're unhappy a lot. And, maybe it doesn't help anything, but I wanted you to know that I'm always here. I won't ever let you down–I promise that you can always count on me. Wow, that does sound corny. But you know that, right? That I would never, ever hurt you?"
"Yeah, Jake. I know that. And I already do count on you, probably more than you know."
The smile broke across his face the way the sunrise set the clouds on fire, and I wanted to cut my tongue out. I hadn't said one word that was a lie, but I should have lied. The truth was wrong, it would hurt him. I would let him down.
A strange look crossed his face. "I really think I'd better go home now," he said. I got out quickly.
"Call me!" I yelled as he pulled away.
I watched him go, and he seemed to be in control of the car, at least. I stared at the empty street when he was gone, feeling a little sick myself, but not for any physical reason.
How much I wished that Jacob Black had been born my brother, my flesh-and -blood brother, so that I would have some legitimate claim on him that still left me free of any blame now. Heaven knows I had never wanted to use Jacob, but I couldn't help but interpret the guilt I felt now to mean that I had.
Even more, I had never meant to love him. One thing I truly knew–knew it in the pit of my stomach, in the center of my bones, knew it from the crown of my head to the soles of my feet, knew it deep in my empty chest–was how love gave someone the power to break you.
I'd been broken beyond repair.
But I needed Jacob now, needed him like a drug. I'd used him as a crutch for too long, and I was in deeper than I'd planned to go with anyone again. Now I couldn't bear for him to be hurt, and I couldn't keep from hurting him, either. He thought time and patience would change me, and, though I knew he was dead wrong, I also knew that I would let him try.
He was my best friend. I would always love him, and it would never, ever be enough. I went inside to sit by the phone and bite my nails.
"Movie over already?" Charlie asked in surprise when I came in. He was on the floor, just a foot from the TV. Must be an exciting game.
"Mike got sick," I explained. "Some kind of stomach flu." "You okay?"
"I feel fine now," I said doubtfully. Clearly, I'd been exposed.
I leaned against the kitchen counter, my hand inches from the phone, and tried to wait patiently. I thought of the strange look on Jacob's face before he drove away, and my fingers started drumming against the counter. I should have insisted on driving him home.
I watched the clock as the minutes ticked by Ten. Fifteen. Even when I was driving, it took only fifteen minutes, and Jacob drove faster than I did. Eighteen minutes. I picked up the phone and dialed.
It rang and rang. Maybe Billy was asleep. Maybe I'd dialed wrong. I tried again. On the eighth ring, just as I was about to hang up, Billy answered.
"Hello?" he asked. His voice was wary, like he was expecting bad news.
"Billy, it's me, Bella–did Jake make it home yet? He left here about twenty minutes ago." "He's here," Billy said tonelessly.
"He was supposed to call me." I was a little irritated. "He was getting sick when he left, and I was worried."
"He was… too sick to call. He's not feeling well right now." Billy sounded distant. I realized he must want to be with Jacob.
"Let me know if you need any help," I offered. "I could come down." I thought of Billy, stuck in his chair, and Jake fending for himself…
"No, no," Billy said quickly. "We're fine. Stay at your place." The way he said it was almost rude.
"Okay," I agreed. "Bye, Bella."
The line disconnected. "Bye," I muttered.
Well, at least he'd made it home. Oddly, I didn't feel less worried. I trudged up the stairs, fretting. Maybe I would go down before work tomorrow to check on him. I could take soup–we had to have a can of Campbell's around here somewhere.
I realized all such plans were canceled when I woke up early–my clock said four thirty–and sprinted to the bathroom. Charlie found me there a half hour later, lying on the floor, my cheek pressed against the cold edge of the bathtub.
He looked at me for a long moment. "Stomach flu," he finally said. "Yes," I moaned.
"You need something?" he asked.
"Call the Newtons for me, please," I instructed hoarsely. "Tell them I have what Mike has, and that I can't make it in today. Tell them I'm sorry."
"Sure, no problem," Charlie assured me.
I spent the rest of the day on the bathroom floor, sleeping for a few hours with my head on a crumpled up towel. Charlie claimed that he had to work, but I suspected that he just wanted access to a bathroom. He left a glass of water on the floor beside me to keep me hydrated.
It woke me up when he came back home. I could see that it was dark in my room–after nightfall. He clumped up the stairs to check on me.
"Still alive?" "Sort of," I said.
"Do you want anything?" "No, thanks."
He hesitated, clearly out of his element. "Okay, then," he said, and then he went back down to the kitchen.
I heard the phone ring a few minutes later. Charlie spoke to someone in a low voice for a moment, and then hung up.
"Mike feels better," he called up to me.
Well, that was encouraging. He'd only gotten sick eight hours or so before me. Eight more hours. The thought made my stomach turn, and I pulled myself up to lean over the toilet.
I fell asleep on the towel again, but when I woke up I was in my bed and it was light outside my window. I didn't remember moving; Charlie must have carried me to my room–he'd also put the glass of water on my bedside table. I felt parched. I chugged it down, though it tasted funny from sitting stagnant all night.
I got up slowly, trying not to trigger the nausea again. I was weak, and my mouth tasted horrible, but my stomach felt fine. I looked at my clock.
My twenty-four hours were up.
I didn't push it, eating nothing but saltine crackers for breakfast. Charlie looked relieved to see me recovered.
As soon as I was sure that I wasn't going to have to spend the day on the bathroom floor again, I called Jacob.
Jacob was the one who answered, but when I heard his greeting I knew he wasn't over it. "Hello?" His voice was broken, cracking.
"Oh, Jake," I groaned sympathetically. "You sound horrible." "I feel horrible," he whispered.
"I'm so sorry I made you go out with me. This sucks."
"I'm glad I went." His voice was still a whisper. "Don't blame yourself. This isn't your fault." "You'll get better soon," I promised. "I woke up this morning, and I was fine."
"You were sick?" he asked dully. "Yes, I got it, too. But I'm fine now." "That's good." His voice was dead.
"So you'll probably be better in a few hours," I encouraged.
I could barely hear his answer. "I don't think I have the same thing you did." "Don't you have the stomach flu?" I asked, confused.
"No. This is something else." "What's wrong with you?"
"Everything," he whispered. "Every part of me hurts." The pain in his voice was nearly tangible.
"What can I do, Jake? What can I bring you?"
"Nothing. You can't come here." He was abrupt. It reminded me of Billy the other night.
"I've already been exposed to whatever you have," I pointed out.
He ignored me. "I'll call you when I can. I'll let you know when you can come down again." "Jacob–"
"I've got to go," he said with sudden urgency. "Call me when you feel better."
"Right," he agreed, and his voice had a strange, bitter edge.
He was silent for a moment. I was waiting for him to say goodbye, but he waited too.
"I'll see you soon," I finally said. "Wait for me to call," he said again. "Okay… Bye, Jacob." "Bella," he whispered my name, and then hung up the phone.
Author name :Stephenie Meyer
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BELOVED MASTER,
THE JAPANESE MASTER NAN-IN GAVE AUDIENCE TO A PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY.
SERVING TEA, NAN-IN FILLED HIS VISITOR'S CUP, AND KEPT POURING.
THE PROFESSOR WATCHED THE OVERFLOW UNTIL HE COULD RESTRAIN HIMSELF NO LONGER:
STOP!
THE CUP IS OVERFULL, NO MORE WILL GO IN. NAN-IN SAID:
LIKE THIS CUP,
YOU ARE FULL OF YOUR OWN OPINIONS AND SPECULATIONS. HOW CAN I SHOW YOU ZEN
UNLESS YOU FIRST EMPTY YOUR CUP?
You have come to an even more dangerous person than Nan-in, because an empty cup won't do; the cup has to be broken completely. Even empty, if you are there, then you are full. Even emptiness fills you. If you feel that you are empty you are not empty at all, you are there. Only the name has changed: now you call yourself emptiness. The cup won't do at all; it has to be broken completely. Only when you are not can the tea be poured into you. Only when you are not is there no need really to pour the tea into you. When you are not the whole existence begins pouring, the whole existence becomes a shower from every dimension, from every direction. When you are not, the divine is.
The story is beautiful. It was bound to happen to a professor of philosophy. The story says a professor of philosophy came to Nan-in. He must have come for the wrong reasons because a professor of philosophy, as such, is always wrong. Philosophy means intellect, reasoning, thinking, argumentativeness. And this is the way to be wrong, because you cannot be in love with existence if you are argumentative. Argument is the barrier. If you argue, you are closed; the whole existence closes to you. Then you are not open and existence is not open to you.
When you argue, you assert. Assertion is violence, aggression, and the truth cannot be known by an aggressive mind, the truth cannot be discovered by violence. You can come to know the truth only when you are in love. But love never argues. There is no argument in love, because there is no aggression. And remember, not only was that man a professor of philosophy, you are also the same. Every man carries his own philosophy, and every
man in his own way is a professor, because you profess your ideas, you believe in them. You have opinions, concepts and because of opinions and concepts your eyes are dull, they cannot see; your mind is stupid, it cannot know.
Ideas create stupidity because the more the ideas are there, the more the mind is burdened. And how can a burdened mind know? The more ideas are there, the more it becomes just like dust which has gathered on a mirror. How can the mirror mirror? How can the mirror reflect? Your intelligence is just covered by opinions, the dust, and everyone who is opinionated is bound to be stupid and dull. That's why professors of philosophy are almost always stupid. They know too much to know at all. They are burdened too much. They cannot fly in the sky, they can't have wings. And they are so much in the mind, they can't have roots in the earth. They are not grounded in the earth and they are not free to fly into the sky.
And remember, you are all the same. There may be differences of quantity, but every mind is qualitatively the same, because mind thinks, argues, collects and gathers knowledge and becomes dull. Only children are intelligent. And if you can retain your childhood, if you continuously reclaim your childhood, you will remain innocent and intelligent. If you gather dust, childhood is lost, innocence is no more; the mind has become dull and stupid. Now you can have philosophies. The more philosophies you have, the more you are far away from the divine.
A religious mind is a nonphilosophical mind. A religious mind is an innocent, intelligent mind. The mirror is clear, the dust has not been gathered; and every day a continuous cleaning goes on. That's what I call meditation.
This professor of philosophy came to Nan-in. He must have come for wrong reasons: he must have come to receive some answers. Those people who are filled with questions are always in search of answers. And Nan-in could not give an answer. It is foolish to be concerned with questions and answers. Nan-in could give you a new mind, Nan-in could give you a new being, Nan-in could give you a new existence in which no questions arise, but Nan-in was not interested in answering any particular questions.He was not interested in giving answers. Neither am I.
You must have come here with many questions. It is bound to be so, because the mind gives birth to questions. Mind is a question-creating mechanism.Feed anything into it, out comes a question, and many questions follow. Give an answer to it, and immediately it converts it into many questions. You are here filled with many questions, your cup is already full. No need for Nan-in to pour any tea into it, you are already overflowing.
I can give you a new existence - that's why I have invited you here - I will not give you any answers. All questions, all answers, are useless, just a wastage of energy. But I can transform you, and that is the only answer. And that one answer solves all questions.
Philosophy has many questions, many answers -- millions. Religion has only one answer; whatsoever the question the answer remains the same. Buddha used to say: You taste sea water from anywhere, the taste remains the same, the saltiness of it.
Whatsoever you ask is really irrelevant. I will answer the same because I have got only one answer. But that one answer is like a master key; it opens all doors. It is not concerned with any particular lock -- any lock and the key opens it. Religion has only one answer and that answer is meditation. And meditation means how to empty yourself.
The professor must have been tired, walking long, when he reached Nan-in's cottage. And Nan-in said, "Wait a little." He must have been in a hurry. Mind is always in a hurry,
and mind is always in search of instantaneous realizations. To wait, for the mind, is very difficult, almost impossible. Nan-in said, "I will prepare tea for you. You look tired. Wait a little, rest a little, and have a cup of tea. And then we can discuss."
Nan-in boiled the water and started preparing the tea. But he must have been watching the professor. Not only was the water boiling, the professor was also boiling within. Not only was the tea kettle making sounds, the professor was making more sounds within, chattering, continuously talking. The professor must have been getting ready -- what to ask, how to ask, from where to begin. He must have been in a deep monologue. Nan-in must have been smiling and watching: This man is too full, so much so that nothing can penetrate into him. The answer cannot be given because there is no one to receive it. The guest cannot enter into the house-there is no room. Nan-in must have wanted to become a guest in this professor.
Out of compassion, a buddha always wants to become a guest within you. He knocks from everywhere but there is no door. And even if he breaks a door, which is very difficult, there is no room. You are so full with yourself and with rubbish and all types of paraphernalia which you have gathered in many, many lives, you cannot even enter into yourself; there is no room, no space. You live just outside of your own being, just on the steps. You cannot enter within yourself, everything is blocked.
Then Nan-in poured tea into the cup. The professor came to be uneasy because he was continuously pouring tea. It was overflowing; soon it would be going out on the floor. Then the professor said, "Stop! What are you doing? Now this cup cannot hold any more tea, not even a single drop. Are you mad? What are you doing?"
Nan-in said, "The same is the case with you. You are so alert to observe and become aware that the cup is full and cannot hold any more, why are you not so aware about your own self? You are overflowing with opinions, philosophies, doctrines, scriptures. You know too much already; I cannot give you anything. You have traveled in vain. Before coming to me you should have emptied your cup, then I could pour something into it." But I tell you, you have come to a more dangerous person. No, an empty cup I won't allow, because if the cup is there you will fill it. You are so addicted and you have become so habituated that you cannot allow the cup to be empty even for a single moment. The moment you see emptiness anywhere you start filling it. You are so scared of emptiness, you are so afraid.: emptiness appears like death. You will fill it with anything, but you will fill it. No, I have invited you to be here to break down this cup completely, so that even if you want to you cannot fill it.
Emptiness means there is no cup left. All the walls have disappeared, the bottom has fallen down; you have become an abyss. Then I can pour myself into you.
Much is possible, if you allow. But to allow is arduous, because to allow you will have to surrender. Emptiness means surrender.
Nan-in was saying to that professor: Bow down, surrender, empty your head. I am ready to pour. That professor had not even asked the question and Nan-in had given the answer, because really there is no need to ask the question. The question remains the same.
You ask me or not, I know what the question is. So many of you are here but I know the question, because deep down the question is one: the anxiety, the anguish, the meaninglessness, the futility of this whole life - not knowing who you are. But you are filled. Allow me to break this cup. This camp is going to be a destruction, a death. If you are ready to be destroyed something new will come out of it. Every destruction can
become a creative birth. If you are ready to die you can have a new life, you can be reborn.
I am here just to be a midwife. That's what Socrates used to say -- that a master is just a midwife. I can help, I can protect, I can guide, that's all. The actual phenomenon, the transformation, is going to happen to you. Suffering will be there, because no birth is possible without suffering. Much anguish will come up, because you have accumulated it and it has to be thrown. A deep cleansing and catharsis will be needed.
Birth is just like death, but the suffering is worth taking. Out of the darkness of suffering a new morning arises, a new sun arises. And the dawn is not very far when you feel darkness too much. When suffering is unbearable, bliss is very near. So don't try to escape from suffering -- that is the point where you can miss. Don't try to avoid it, pass through it. Don't try to find some way which goes round about- no, that won't do- pass through it. Suffering will burn you, destroy you, but really you cannot be destroyed. All that can be destroyed is just the rubbish that you have gathered. All that can be destroyed is something that is not you. When it is all destroyed, then you will feel that you are indestructible, you are deathless. Passing through death, consciously passing through death, one becomes aware of life eternal.
These few days you will be here with me many things are possible, but the first step to remember is to pass through suffering. Many times I create suffering for you; many times I create the situation in which all that is suppressed within you comes up. Don't push it down, don't repress it. Allow it, free it. If you can free your suffering, your suppressed suffering, you will become free of it. And you can come to the state of bliss only when all suffering has been passed through, thrown, completely dropped. And I can see through you: the flame of bliss is just near the corner. Once glimpsed, that flame becomes yours. I will push you in many ways to have a glimpse of it. If you miss you will be responsible, no one else. The river is flowing, but if you cannot bow down, if you cannot come down from your egoistic state of mind, you may go back thirsty. Don't blame the river. The river was there but you were paralyzed by your ego.
Empty the cup- that's what Nan-in said. That means empty the mind. Ego is there, overflowing and when ego is overflowing nothing can be done. The whole existence is around you but nothing can be done. From nowhere can the divine penetrate you, you have created such a citadel. Empty the cup. Rather, throw the cup completely. When I say throw the cup completely I mean be so empty that you don't have even the feeling that "I am empty."
Once it happened, a disciple came to Bodhidharma and said, "Master, you told me to be empty. Now I have become empty. Now what else do you say?"
Bodhidharma hit him hard with his staff on the head, and he said, "Go and throw this emptiness out."
If you say "I am empty," the "I am" is there, and the "I" cannot be empty. So emptiness cannot be claimed. No one can say, "I am empty," just as no one can say, "I am humble." If you say, "I am humble," you are not. Who claims this humility? Humbleness cannot be claimed. If you are humble, you are humble, but you cannot say it. Not only can you not say it, you cannot feel that you are humble because the very feeling will give birth to the ego again. Be empty, but don't think that you are empty otherwise you have deceived yourself.
You have brought many philosophies with you. Drop them. They have not helped you at all, they have not done anything for you. It is time enough, the right time. Drop them wholesale; not in parts, not in fragments. For these few days you will be here with me just be without any thinking. I know it is difficult but still I say it is possible. And once you know the knack of it, you will laugh at the whole absurdity of the mind that you were carrying so long.
I have heard about a man who was traveling in a train for the first time, a villager. He was carrying his luggage on his head, thinking, "Putting it down will be too much for the train to carry, and I have paid only for my own self. I have purchased the ticket but I have not paid for the luggage." So he was carrying the luggage on his head. The train was carrying him and his luggage, and whether he carried it on his head or put it down made no difference to the train. Your mind is unnecessary luggage. It makes no difference to this existence that is carrying you; you are unnecessarily burdened. I say drop it.
The trees exist without the mind and exist more beautifully than any human being; the birds exist without the mind and exist in a more ecstatic state than any human being. Look at children who are still not civilized, who are still wild. They exist without the mind, and even a Jesus or a Buddha will feel jealous of their innocence. There is no need for this mind. The whole world is going on and on without it. Why are you carrying it? Are you just thinking that it will be too much for God, for existence? Once you can put it down, even for a single minute, your whole existence will be transformed. You will enter into a new dimension, the dimension of weightlessness.
That's what I'm going to give you: wings into the sky, into the heaven -- weightlessness gives you these wings- and roots into the earth, a groundedness, a centering. This earth and that heaven : they are two parts of the whole. In this life, your so-called ordinary life, you must be rooted; and in your inner space, in the spiritual life, you must be weightless and flying and flowing, floating.
Roots and wings I can give to you- if you allow, because I am only a midwife. I cannot force the child out of you. A forced child will be ugly, and a forced child may die. Just allow me. The child is there, you are already pregnant. Everybody is pregnant with God. The child is there and you have already carried too long. Long ago the period of nine months passed. That may be the root cause of your anguish -- that you are carrying something in the womb which needs birth, which needs to come out, which needs to be born. Think of a woman, a mother, carrying a child after the ninth month. Then it becomes more and more burdensome, and if the birth is not going to happen the mother will die, because it will be too much to bear. That may be the reason why you are in so much anxiety, anguish, tension. Something needs to be born out of you; something needs to be created out of your womb.
I can help. This Samadhi Sadhana Shibir this camp for inner ecstasy and enlightenment is just going to be a help for you so that which you have carried like a seed up to now can come out of your soil and become an alive thing, an alive plant. But the basic thing will be that if you want to be with me you cannot be with your mind. Both cannot happen simultaneously. Whenever you are with your mind you are not with me; whenever the mind is not there, you are with me. And I can work only if you are with me. Empty the cup. Throw the cup away completely; destroy it.
This camp is going to be in many ways different.This night I start a completely new phase of my work. You are fortunate to be here because you will be witnesses to a new type of inner work. I must explain it to you because tomorrow morning the journey starts. The first meditation, which you will be doing in the morning, is related to the rising sun. It is a morning meditation. When the sleep is broken the whole of nature becomes alive. The night has gone, the darkness is no more, the sun is coming up, and everything becomes conscious and alert. So this first meditation is a meditation in which you have to be continuously alert, conscious, aware, whatsoever you do. The first step, breathing; the second step, catharsis; the third step, the mantra, the mahamantra: HOO.
Remain a witness. Don't get lost. It is easy to get lost. While you are breathing you can forget; you can become one with the breathing so much that you can forget the witness. But then you miss the point. Breathe as fast, as deep as possible, bring your total energy to it, but still remain a witness. Observe what is happening as if you are just a spectator, as if the whole thing is happening to somebody else, as if the whole thing is happening in the body and the consciousness is just centered and looking. This witnessing has to be carried in all the three steps. And when everything stops- and in the fourth step you have become completely inactive, frozen-then this alertness will come to its peak.
In the afternoon meditation -- kirtan, dancing, singing -- another inner work has to be done. In the morning you have to be fully conscious; in the afternoon meditation you have to be half conscious, half unconscious. It is a noontide meditation -- when you are alert, but you feel sleepy. It is just like a man who is under the influence of some intoxicant. He walks, but cannot walk rightly; he knows where he is going, but everything is dim. He is conscious and not conscious. He knows he has taken alcohol, he knows his feet are wavering, but he knows this half-asleep, half-awake. So in the afternoon meditation remember this -- act as if you are intoxicated, drunk, ecstatic.
Sometimes you will forget yourself completely like a drunkard, sometimes you will remember, but don't try to be conscious just like the morning, no. Move with the day -- half-half in the noon. Then you are in tune with nature.
In the night, just the opposite of the morning -- be completely unconscious; don't bother at all. The night has come, the sun has set, now everything is moving into unconsciousness. Move into unconsciousness. This whirling, Sufi whirling, is one of the most ancient techniques, one of the most forceful. It is so deep that even a single experience can make you totally different. You have to whirl with open eyes, just like small children go on twirling, as if your inner being has become a center and your whole body has become like a wheel, moving- a potter's wheel, moving. You are in the center, but the whole body is moving. Start slowly, clockwise. If somebody feels it is very difficult to move clockwise then anti-clockwise, but the rule is to move clockwise. If a few people are left-handed then they may feel it difficult; they can move anti-clockwise. And almost ten percent of people are left-handed, so if you find that clockwise you feel uneasy, move anti-clockwise; but start with clockwise, then feel. Music will be there, slow, just to help you. In the beginning move very slowly; don't go fast, but very slowly, enjoying. And then, by and by, go faster. The first fifteen minutes, go slowly; the second fifteen minutes, fast; the third fifteen minutes, faster; the fourth fifteen minutes, just completely mad. And then your total energy, you, become a whirlpool, an energy whirlpool, lost completely in it: no witnessing, no effort to observe. Don't try to see; be the whirlpool, be the whirling. One hour.
In the beginning you may not be able to stand so long, but remember one thing, don't stop by yourself, don't stop the whirling. If you feel it is impossible the body will fall down automatically, but don't you stop. If you fall down in the middle of the hour there is no problem; the process is complete. But don't play tricks with yourself, don't deceive; don't think that now you are tired so it is better to stop. No, don't make it a decision on your part. If you are tired, how can you go on? You will fall automatically. So don't stop yourself; let the whirling itself come to a point where you fall down. When you fall down, fall down on your stomach; and it will be good if your stomach is in direct touch with the earth. Then close the eyes. Lie down on the earth as if lying down on the breast of your mother, a small child lying down on the breast of the mother. Become completely unconscious. And this whirling will help.
Whirling gives intoxication to the body. It is a chemical thing, it gives you intoxication, to be exact. That's why sometimes you may feel giddy just like a drunkard. What is happening to the drunkard? Hidden behind your ears is a sixth sense, the sense of balance. When you take any drink, any alcoholic thing, any intoxicating drug, it goes directly to the center of balance in the ear and disturbs it. That's why a drunkard cannot walk, feels dizzy. The same happens in whirling. If you whirl, really, the effect will be the same: you will feel intoxicated, drunk. But enjoy this drunkenness is worth something. This being in a drunken state is what Sufis have been calling ecstasy, masti. In the beginning you may feel giddy, in the beginning sometimes you may feel nausea, but within two, three days, these feelings will disappear and by the fourth day you will feel a new energy in you that you have never known before. Then giddiness will disappear, and just a smooth feeling of drunkenness will be there. So don't try to be alert about what is happening. Let it happen and become one with the happening.
In the morning, alert; in the afternoon, half alert, half unalert; in the night, completely unalert. The circle is complete.
And then fall down on the ground on your stomach. If anybody feels any sort of pain in the navel center lying down on the ground, then he can turn on the back, otherwise not. If you feel something, a very deep painful sensation in the stomach, then turn on your back, otherwise not. The navel in contact with the earth will give you such a blissful feeling -- just the same as once you had, but now you have forgotten, when you were a child lying down on your mother's breast, completely unaware of any worry, any anxiety, so one with the mother, your heart beating with her heart, your breath in tune with her breath.
The same will happen with the earth because earth is the mother. That's why Hindus have been calling earth the mother and sky the father. Be rooted in it. Feel a merger as if you have dissolved. The body has become one with the earth; the form is there no more. Only earth exists; you are not there. This is what I mean when I say break the cup completely: forget that you are. The earth is, and dissolve in it.
During the one hour of whirling the music will continue. Many will fall before the hour but everybody has to fall by the time the music stops. So if you feel that you are still not in the state of falling then go faster and faster. After forty-five minutes go completely mad, so by the time the hour is complete you have fallen. And the feeling if falling is beautiful, so don't manipulate it. Fall, and when you have fallen then turn on your stomach, be merged, close your eyes. This merger has to be there for one hour.
So the night meditation will be of two hours, from seven o'clock to nine o'clock. Don't eat anything before it. At nine o'clock the suggestion will be given to come out of this deep
drunkenness, this ecstasy. Even out of it you may not be able to walk correctly, but don't be disturbed, enjoy it. Then take your food and go to sleep.
Another new thing, I will not be there; only my empty chair will be there. But don't miss me because in a sense I will be there, and in a sense there has always been an empty chair before you. Right now the chair is empty because there is no one sitting in it. I am talking to you but there is no one who is talking to you. It is difficult to understand, but when the ego disappears processes can continue. Talking can continue, sitting and walking and eating can continue, but the center has disappeared. Even now, the chair is empty. But I was always with you up till now in all the camps because you were not ready. Now I feel you are ready. And you must be helped to get more ready to work in my absence, because feeling that I am there you may feel a certain enthusiasm that is false. Just feeling that I am present you may do things which you never wanted to do; just to impress me you may exert more. That is not of much help, because only that can be helpful which comes out of your being. My chair will be there, I will be watching you, but you feel completely free. And don't think that I am not there because that may depress you, and then that depression will disturb your meditation.
I will be there, and if you meditate rightly whenever your meditation is exactly tuned, you will see me. So that will be the criterion of whether you are really meditating or not.
Many of you will be able to see me more intensely than you can see me right now, and whenever you see me, you can be certain that things are happening in a right direction. So this will be the criterion. By the end of this camp I hope ninety percent of you will have seen me. Ten percent may miss because of their minds. So if you see me don't start thinking about it, what is happening, don't start thinking whether it is imagination or a projection or am I really there. Don't think, because if you think immediately I will disappear; thinking will become a barrier. The dust will come on the mirror and there will be no reflection. Whenever the dust is not there, suddenly you will become aware of me more than you can be aware here right now. To be aware of the physical body is not much awareness; to be aware of the nonphysical being is real awareness.
You must learn to work without me. You cannot be here always, you will have to go far away; you cannot hang around me forever, you have other works to do. You have come from different countries all over the world; you will have to go. For a few days you will be here with me, but if you become addicted to my physical presence then rather than being a help it may become a disturbance, because then when you go away, you will miss me. Your meditation should be such here that it can happen without my presence, then wherever you go the meditation will not be in any way affected.
And this too has to be remembered: I cannot always be in this physical body with you; one day or another the physical vehicle has to be dropped. My work is complete as far as I am concerned. If I am carrying this physical vehicle, it is just for you; some day, it has to be dropped. Before it happens you must be ready to work in my absence, or in my nonphysical presence which means the same. And once you can feel me in my absence you are free of me, and then even if I am not here in this body the contact will not be lost. It always happens when a Buddha is there: his physical presence becomes so meaningful. and then he dies. Everything is shattered. Even a disciple like Ananda, his most intimate disciple, started crying and weeping when Buddha said, "Now I have to leave this body." For forty years Ananda was with Buddha, twenty-four hours, just like a shadow. He started crying and weeping like a child; suddenly he had become an orphan.
Buddha asked," What are you doing?"
Ananda said, "It will be impossible now for me to grow. I couldn't grow when you were there so how can I grow now? It may be now millions of lives before I come across a buddha again, so I am lost."
Buddha said, "My understanding is different, Ananda. When I am not there you may become enlightened immediately, because this has been my feeling -- you have become too much attached to me, and that attachment is working like a block. You have become too much attached to me; that very attachment is working like a barrier." And this happened as Buddha said. The day Buddha died, Ananda became enlightened. There was nothing to cling to then. But why wait? When I die, then you will become enlightened?
Why wait?
My chair can be empty; you can feel my absence. And remember, only when you can feel my absence can you feel my presence. If you cannot see me while my physical vehicle is not there, you have not seen me at all. This is my promise: I will be there in the empty chair, the empty chair will not really be empty. So behave! The chair will not be empty, but it is better that you learn to be in contact with my nonphysical being. That is a deeper, more intimate touch and contact.
That is why I say a new phase of my work starts with this camp, and I am calling it a Samadhi Sadhana Shibir. It is not only meditation, it is absolute ecstasy that I am going to teach to you. It is not only the first step, it is the last. Only no mind on your part is needed and everything is ready. Just be alert not to think much. The remaining time between these three meditations, remain more and more silent, don't talk. If you want to do something, laugh, dance: do something intense and physical but not mental. Go for a long walk, go jogging on the grounds, jump under the sun, lie down on the earth, look at the sky, enjoy, but don't allow the mind to function much. Laugh, cry, weep, but don't think. If you can be without thinking for these three meditations and the time between them, then after three, four days you will feel suddenly a burden has disappeared. The heart has become light, the body weightless and you are ready to take a jump into the unknown.
Anything more?
Question 1 OSHO,
THE LAST PART OF WHAT YOU SAID TO US IS VERY BEAUTIFUL AND BLISSFUL, BUT THE FIRST PART IS VERY FRIGHTENING -- BREAKING THE CUP, SUFFERING, FALLING DOWN ON THE GROUND, YOU NOT BEING THERE.
THEN OUR MINDS COME IN AND WE PLAY TRICKS WITH OUR BODIES. WE SAY, "I HAVE THIS PAIN. I HAVE THIS BLISTER."
CAN YOU GIVE US SOME CLUE AS TO HOW WE CAN GET OVER THE BARRIERS WE CREATE FOR OURSELVES WHEN WE COME UP AGAINST FEAR?
Any conflict will create more barriers. If there is fear and you start doing something about it, then a new fear has entered: fear of the fear. It has become more complex. So the one thing to be done is, if fear is there, accept it. Don't do anything about it because doing will not help. Anything that you do out of fear will create more fear; anything that you do
out of confusion will add more to confusion. Don't do anything. If fear is there note down that fear is there and accept it. What can you do? Nothing can be done; fear is there. See, if you can just note down the fact that fear is there, where is the fear then? You have accepted it; it has dissolved. Acceptance dissolves; only acceptance, nothing else. If you fight you create another disturbance and this can go on ad infinitum, then there is no end to it. People come to me and they say, "We are very afraid, what should we do?" If I give them something to do they will do it with the being which is full of fear, so action will come out of their fear. And the action that comes out of fear cannot be anything other than fear.
I have heard that Adolf Hitler was suffering from deep depression, melancholy, and psychologists were saying that it was due to some hidden inferiority complex. So all the Aryan psychologists were called. They tried but they couldn't help, nothing came out of their analysis. So they suggested that a Jewish psychoanalyst should be called. Hitler was not ready in the beginning to call a Jew, but seeing no way out of it he had to yield. A great Jewish psychoanalyst was called. He analyzed, penetrated deep into Hitler's mind, dreams, and then he suggested, "Nothing much is a problem. Simply repeat one thing continuously,'I am important, I am significant, I am indispensable.' Let it be a mantra.
Night, day, whenever you remember, repeat 'I am important, I am significant, I am indispensable.'"
Hitler said, "Stop! You are giving me bad advice."
The psychoanalyst couldn't understand. He said"What do you mean? Why do you call this bad advice?"
Hitler said, "Because whatsoever I say, I am such a liar, I cannot believe it. I am such a liar, whatsoever I say, I cannot believe it. If you say: Repeat 'I am indispensable,' I know that this is a lie. I am saying it. I am a liar."
Out of lies, if you repeat something it will become a lie; out of fear, if you do something it will become a fear again. Out of hate, if you try to love that love will just be a hidden hate; it cannot be anything else-you are full of hate. Go to the preachers and they will say, "Try to love." They are talking nonsense because how can a person who is full of hate try to love? If he tries to love, this love will come out of hatred; it will be poisoned already, poisoned from the very source. And this is what the misery of all preachers is.
Gandhi said to people who were violent: Try to be nonviolent. Then their nonviolence comes out of violence, so their nonviolence is just a facade, just a face to show. Deep down, they are boiling with violence. If your brahmacharya, your celibacy, comes out of too much sexuality, it will be perverted sex, nothing else.
So please don't create any conflict. If you have one problem, don't create another; remain with the one, "don't fight and create another. It is easier to solve one problem than to solve another; and the first is near the source, the second will be removed. The further removed, the more impossible it becomes to solve it.
If you have fear, you have fear- why make a problem out of it? Then you know that you have fear, just as you have two hands. Why create a problem out of it- as if you have only one nose, not two? Why create a problem out of it? Fear is there: accept it, note it. Accept it, don't bother about it. What will happen? Suddenly you will feel it has disappeared.
And this is the inner alchemy -- a problem disappears if you accept it, and a problem grows more and more complex if you create any conflict with it. Yes, suffering is there, and suddenly fear comes- accept it. It is there and nothing can be done about it. And
when I say nothing can be done about it, don't think that I am talking about pessimism to you. When I say nothing can be done about it I am giving you the key to solve it.
Suffering is there. It is part of life and part of growth; nothing is bad in it. Suffering becomes evil only when it is simply destructive and not creative at all; suffering becomes bad only when you suffer and nothing is gained out of it. But I am telling you the divine can be gained through suffering; then it becomes creative. Darkness is beautiful if the dawn is coming out of it soon; darkness is dangerous if it is endless, leads to no dawn, simply continues and continues and you go on moving in a rut, in a vicious circle. This is what is happening to you. Just to escape from one suffering you create another; then to escape from another, another. And this goes on and on and all those sufferings which you have not lived are waiting for you. You have escaped but you escape from one suffering to another, because a mind which was creating a suffering will create another. So you can escape from this suffering to that, but suffering will be there because your mind is the creative force.
Accept the suffering and pass through it; don't escape. This is a totally different dimension to work in. Suffering is there: encounter it, go through it. Fear will be there, accept it. You will tremble, so tremble. Why create a facade that you don't tremble, that you are not afraid? If you are a coward, accept it.
Everyone is a coward. People you call brave are just facades. Deep down they are as cowardly as anyone else,
rather, more cowardly because just to hide that cowardliness they have created a bravery around them, and sometimes they act in such a way that everyone knows they are not cowards. Their bravery is just a screen. How can man be brave- because death is there. How can man be brave- because man is just a leaf in the winds. How can the leaf help not to tremble? When the wind blows the leaf will tremble. But you never say to the leaf, "You are a coward." You only say that the leaf is alive. So when you tremble and fear takes grip of you, you are a leaf in the wind. Beautiful- why create a problem out of it?
But society has created problems out of everything.
If a child is afraid in the dark, we say, "Don't be afraid, be brave." Why? The child is innocent- naturally he feels fear in the dark. You force him: "Be brave." So he also forces, then he becomes tense. Then he endures the darkness but now tense; now, his whole being is ready to tremble and he suppresses it. This suppressed trembling will follow him now his whole life. It was good to tremble in the darkness, nothing was wrong. It was good to cry and run, nothing was wrong. The child would have come out of darkness more experienced, more knowing. And he would have realized, if he passed through darkness trembling and crying and weeping, that there was nothing to fear.
Suppressed, you never experience the thing in its totality, `you never gain anything out of it. Wisdom comes through suffering and wisdom comes through acceptance. Whatsoever the case, be at ease with it.
Don't look to society and its condemnation. Nobody is to judge you here and nobody can pretend to be a judge. Don't judge others and don't be perturbed and disturbed by others' judgment. You are alone and you are unique. You never were before, you never will be again. You are beautiful. Accept it. And whatsoever happens, allow it to happen and pass through it. Soon, suffering will be a learning; then it has become creative.
Fear will give you fearlessness. Out of anger will come compassion. Out of the understanding of hate, love will be born to you. But this happens not in a conflict, this
happens in a passing-through with alert awareness. Accept, and pass through it. And if you make it a point to pass through every experience, then there will be death, the most intense experience. Life is nothing before it because life cannot be so intense as death. Life is spread out over a long time -- seventy years, one hundred years. Death is intense because it is not spread out -- it is in a single moment. Life has to pass one hundred years or seventy years, it cannot be so intense. Death comes in a single moment; it comes whole, not fragmentary. It will be so intense you cannot know anything more intense. But if you are afraid, if before death comes you have escaped, if you have become unconscious because of the fear, you have missed one of the golden opportunities, the golden gate. If your whole life you have been accepting things, when death comes, patiently, passively you will accept and enter into it without any effort to escape. If you can enter death passively, silently, without any effort, death disappears. When Krishna, Christ, Buddha, Mahavir say you are deathless, they are not talking about a doctrine, they are talking about their own experience.
This can happen here in this camp also, because samadhi is death, dhyan is death, meditation is death. Many times there will be moments when you will suddenly feel you are dying. Don't escape, allow it to happen. If you allow it to happen, death has gone, death is there no more, and the inner flame, beginningless, endless, has come into being. It has always been there, now you can feel it. So this should be the sutra. With fear, hate, jealousy, anything whatsoever, don't create a problem out of it. Accept it, allow it, pass through it, and you will defeat all suffering, all death. And you will become a Jaina- a victorious one.
Anything more?
Question 2 OSHO,
WHEN YOU TALK ABOUT OUR HAVING TO SUFFER, YOU TELL US TO BE JOYFUL AT THE SAME TIME. TRYING TO COMPROMISE THESE TWO THINGS SEEMS DIFFICULT.
When I say suffer joyfully it looks paradoxical and your mind starts thinking how to compromise both, because to you they are contradictory. They are not, they only appear contradictory. You can enjoy suffering.
What is the secret- how to enjoy suffering? The first thing is: if you don't escape, if you allow the suffering to be there, if you are ready to face it, if you are not trying somehow to forget it, then you are different. Suffering is there but just around you; it is not in the center, it is on the periphery. It is impossible for suffering to be in the center; it is not in the nature of things. It is always on the periphery and you are the center. So when you allow it to happen, when you don't escape, you don't run, you are not in a panic, suddenly you become aware that suffering is there on the periphery, as if happening to someone else, not to you, and you are looking at it. A subtle joy spreads all over your being because you have realized one of the basic truths of life: that you are bliss and not suffering.
So when I say enjoy it I don't mean become a masochist; I don't mean create suffering for yourself and enjoy it. I don't mean: go on, fall down from a cliff, have fractures and then
enjoy it- no. There are people of that type and many of them have become ascetics, tapasvis, and they are creating suffering for themselves. They are masochists, they are ill. They are very dangerous people. They wanted to make others suffer but they are not so courageous. They wanted to kill others, be violent with others, cripple others, but they are not so courageous, so their whole violence has turned within. Now they are crippling themselves, torturing themselves, and enjoying it.
I am not saying be a masochist; I am simply saying suffering is there, you need not seek for it. Enough suffering is there already, you need no go in search. Suffering is already there; life by its very nature creates suffering. Illness is there, death is there, the body is there- by their very nature suffering is created. See it, look at it with a very dispassionate eye. Look at it -- what it is, what is happening. Don't escape. Immediately the mind says, "Escape from here, don't look at it." But if you escape then you cannot be blissful.
Next time you fall ill and the doctor suggests to remain in bed, take it as a blessing. Close your eyes and rest on the bed and just look at the illness. Watch it, what it is. Don't try to analyze it, don't go into theories, just watch it, what it is. The whole body tired, feverish -
- watch it. Suddenly, you will feel that you are surrounded by fever but there is a very cool point within you; the fever cannot touch it, cannot influence it. The whole body may be burning but that cool point cannot be touched.
I have heard about one Zen nun. She died, but before she died she asked her disciples, "What do you suggest? How should I die?" It is an old tradition in Zen that masters ask; they can die consciously, so they can ask. And they are so playful even about death, so humorous about it, joking, laughing, they enjoy devising methods how to die. So disciples may suggest, "Master, this will be good, if you die standing on your head." Or someone suggests, "Walking, because we have never seen anyone die walking." So this Zen nun asked," What do you suggest?"
They said, "It will be good if we prepare a fire, and you sit in it and die meditating."
She said, " This is beautiful, and never heard of before." So they prepared a funeral pyre, the nun made herself comfortable in it, sat in a Buddha posture, and then they lit the fire. One man from the crowd asked, "How does it feel there? It is so hot that I cannot even come nearer to ask you- that's why I am shouting. How does it feel there?"
The nun laughed and said, "Only a fool can ask such a question -- How does it feel there? There it always feels cool, perfectly cool." She is talking of her inner being, her center. There it is always cool and only a foolish person can ask. It is obvious. When a person is ready to sit in a pyre meditating, and then the pyre is burnt and she is sitting silently, obviously it shows that this person must have achieved the innermost cool point which cannot be disturbed by any fire. Otherwise, it is not possible.
So when you are lying on your bed, feverish, on fire, the whole body burning, just watch it. Watching, you will recede towards the source. Watching, not doing anything What
can you do? The fever is there, you have to pass through it; it is no use unnecessarily fighting with it. You are resting, and if you fight with the fever you will become more feverish, that's all. So watch it. Watching fever, you become cool; watching more, you become cooler. Just watching, you reach to a peak, such a cool peak, even the Himalayas will feel jealous; even their peaks are not so cool. This is the Gourishankar, the Everest within. And when you feel that the fever has disappeared It has never really been there;
it has only been in the body, very, very far away.
Infinite space exists between you and your body -- infinite space, I say. An unbridgeable gap exists between you and your body. And all suffering exists on the periphery. Hindus say it is a dream because the distance is so vast, unbridgeable. It is just like a dream happening somewhere else -- not happening to you -- in some other world, on some other planet.
When you watch suffering suddenly you are not the sufferer, and you start enjoying. Through suffering you become aware of the opposite pole, the blissful inner being. So when I say enjoy, I am saying: Watch. Return to the source, get centered. Then, suddenly, there is no agony; only ecstasy exists.
Those who are on the periphery exist in agony. For them, no ecstasy. For those who have come to their center no agony exists. For them, only ecstasy.
When I say break the cup it is breaking the periphery. And when I say be totally empty it is coming back to the original source, because through emptiness we are born, and into emptiness we return. Emptiness is the word, really, which is better to use than God, because with God we start feeling there is some person. So Buddha never used "God" he always used sunyata -- emptiness, nothingness. In the center you are a nonbeing, nothingness, just a vast space, eternally cool, silent, blissful. So when I say enjoy I mean watch, and you will enjoy. When I say enjoy, I mean don't escape.
A Bird on the Wing Chapter #2
Chapter title: No Mind, No Truth 11 June 1974 am in Buddha Hall
Archive code: 7406110 ShortTitle: WING02 Audio: Yes Video: No
Length: 86 mins
BELOVED OSHO,
THE STUDENT DOKO CAME TO THE MASTER AND SAID, "IN WHAT STATE OF MIND SHOULD I SEEK THE TRUTH?",
THE MASTER REPLIED, " THERE IS NO MIND, SO YOU CANNOT PUT IT IN ANY STATE, AND THERE IS NO TRUTH, SO YOU CANNOT SEEK IT." DOKO SAID, "IF THERE IS NO MIND AND NO TRUTH, WHY DO ALL THESE STUDENTS GATHER BEFORE YOU EVERY DAY TO STUDY?"
THE MASTER LOOKED AROUND AND SAID, "I DON'T SEE ANYONE." THE INQUIRER ASKED, "THEN WHO ARE YOU TEACHING?"
"I HAVE NO TONGUE, SO HOW CAN I TEACH?", REPLIED THE MASTER. THEN DOKO SAID SADLY, "I CANNOT FOLLOW YOU; I CANNOT UNDERSTAND."
THE MASTER SAID, "I DON'T UNDERSTAND MYSELF."
Life is such a mystery, no one can understand it, and one who claims that he understands it is simply ignorant. He is not aware of what he is saying, of what nonsense he is talking. If you are wise, this will be the first realization: life cannot be understood. Understanding is impossible. Only this much can be understood -- that understanding is impossible.
That is what this beautiful Zen anecdote says.
The master says, " I don't understand it myself." If you go and ask the enlightened ones this will be their answer. But if you go and ask the unenlightened ones they will give you many answers, they will propose many doctrines; they will try to solve the mystery which cannot be solved. It is not a riddle. A riddle can be solved, a mystery is unsolvable by its very nature- there is no way to solve it. Socrates said, "When I was young, I thought I knew much. When I became old, ripe in wisdom, I came to understand that I knew nothing."
It is reported of one of the Sufi masters, Junnaid, that he was working with a new young man. The young man was not aware of Junnaid's inner wisdom, and Junnaid lived such an ordinary life that it needed very penetrating eyes to realize that you were near a buddha. He worked like an ordinary laborer, and only those who had eyes would recognise him. To recognise Buddha was very easy -- he was sitting under a Bodhi tree; to recognise Junnaid was very difficult -- he was working like a laborer, not sitting under a Bodhi tree. He was in every way absolutely ordinary.
One young man working with him, and that young man was continually showing his knowledge, so whatsoever Junnaid would do, he would say, "This is wrong. This can be done in this way, it will be better" -he knew about erverything. Finally Junnaid laughed and said:," Young man, I am not young enough to know so much."
This is really something. He said, "I am not young enough to know so much." Only a young man can be so foolish, so inexperienced. Socrates was right when he said, "When I was young, I knew too much. When I became ripened, experienced, I came to realize only one thing -- that I was absolutely ignorant."
Life is a mystery; that means it cannot be solved. And when all efforts to solve it prove futile, the mystery dawns upon you. Then the doors are open; then you are invited. As a knower, nobody enters the divine; as a child, ignorant, not knowing at all- the mystery embraces you. With a knowing mind you are clever, not innocent. Innocence is the door. This Zen master was right when he said, "I don't understand it myself." It was very deep, really deep, the deepest answer possible. But this is the last part of the anecdote. Start from the very beginning The disciple came to the Zen master and said, "In what state
of mind should I seek the truth?" The master said, "There is no mind so there cannot be any state of mind."
Mind is the illusion that which is not but appears, and appears so much that you think that you are the mind. Mind is maya, mind is just a dream, mind is just a projection a soap
bubble floating on a river. The sun is just rising, the rays penetrate the bubble; a rainbow is created and nothing is there in it. When you touch the bubble it is broken and everything disappears -- the rainbow, the beauty- mothing is left. Only emptiness becomes one with the infinite emptiness. Just a wall was there, a bubble wall. Your mind is just a bubble wall -- inside, your emptiness; outside, my emptiness. It is just a bubble, prick it, and the mind disappears.
The master said, "There is no mind, so what type of state are you asking about?" It is difficult to understand. People come to me and they say, "We would like to attain a silent
state of mind." They think that the mind can be silent; mind can never be silent. Mind means the turmoil, the illness, the disease; mind means the tense, the anguished state. The mind cannot be silent; when there is silence there is no mind. When silence comes, mind disappears; when mind is there, silence is no more. So there cannot be any silent mind, just as there cannot be any healthy disease. Is it possible to have a healthy disease? When health is there, disease disappears. Silence is the inner health; mind is the inner disease, inner disturbance.
So there cannot be any silent mind, and this disciple is asking, "What type, what sort, what state of mind should I achieve?" Point blank, the master said, "There is no mind, so you cannot achieve any state." So please drop this illusion; don't try to achieve any state in the illusion. It's as if you are thinking to travel on the rainbow and you ask me, "What steps should we take to travel on the rainbow?" I say, "There is no rainbow. The rainbow is just an appearance, so no steps can be taken." A rainbow simply appears; it is not there. It is not a reality, it is a false interpretation of the reality.
The mind is not your reality; it is a false interpretation. You are not the mind, you have never been a mind, you can never be the mind. That is your problem- you have become identified with something which is not. You are like a beggar who believes that he has a kingdom. He is so worried about the kingdom -- how to manage it, how to govern it, how to prevent anarchy. There is no kingdom, but he is worried.
Chuang Tzu once dreamt that he had become a butterfly. In the morning he was very much depressed. His friends asked, "What has happened?.- we have never seen you so depressed." Chuang Tzu said, "I am in a puzzle, I am at a loss, I cannot understand. In the night, while asleep, I dreamt that I had become a butterfly."
So the friends laughed: "Nobody is ever disturbed by dreams. When you awake, the dream has disappeared, so why are you disturbed?"
Chuang Tzu said, "That is not the point. Now I am puzzled: if Chuang Tzu can become a butterfly in the dream, it is possible that now the butterfly has gone to sleep and is dreaming that she is Chuang Tzu." If Chuang Tzu can become a butterfly in the dream, why not the other? - the butterfly can dream and become Chuang Tzu. So what is real -- whether Chuang Tzu dreamt that he has become a butterfly or the butterfly is dreaming that she has become Chuang Tzu? What is real? Rainbows are there. You can become a butterfly in the dream. And you have become a mind in this bigger dream you call life.
When you awaken you don't achieve an awakened state of mind, you achieve a no-state of mind, you achieve no-mind.
What does no-mind mean? It is difficult to follow but sometimes, unknowingly, you have achieved it, but you may not have recognized it. Sometimes, just sitting ordinarily, not doing anything, there is no thought in the mind -- for mind is just the process of thinking. It is not a substance, it is just a procession. You are here, I can say a crowd is here, but is there really something like a crowd? Is a crowd substantial or are only individuals there? By and by individuals will go away, then will there be a crowd left behind? When individuals have gone, there is no crowd.
The mind is just like a crowd; thoughts are the individuals. And because thoughts are there continuously you think the process is substantial. Drop each individual thought and finally nothing is left. There is no mind as such, only thinking.
But thoughts are moving so fast, that between two thoughts you cannot see the interval. But the interval is always there. That interval is you. In that interval there is neither
Chuang Tzu nor the butterfly -- for the butterfly is a sort of mind and Chuang Tzu is also a sort of mind. A butterfly is a different combination of thoughts, Chuang Tzu again a different combination, but both are minds. When the mind is not there, who are you -- Chuang Tzu or a butterfly? Neither. And what is the state? Are you in an enlightened state of mind? If you think you are in an enlightened state of mind this is, again, a thought, and when thought is there you are not. If you feel that you are a buddha, this is a thought. The mind has entered; now the process is there, again the sky is clouded, the blueness lost. The infinite blueness you can see no more.
Between two thoughts try to be alert; look into the interval, the space in between. You will see no mind; that is your nature. For thoughts come and go -- they are accidental -- but that inner space always remains. Clouds gather and go, disappear -- they are accidental -- but the sky remains.You are the sky.
Once it happened that a seeker came to Bayazid, one Sufi mystic, and asked, "Master, I am a very angry person. Anger happens to me very easily; I become really mad and I do things. I cannot even believe later on that I can do such things; I am not in my senses. So, how to drop this anger, how to overcome it, how to control it?"
Bayazid took the head of the disciple in his hands and looked into his eyes. The disciple became a little uneasy, and Bayazid said, "Where is that anger? I would like to see into it. The disciple laughed uneasily and said, "Right now, I am not angry. Sometimes it happens." So Bayazid said, "That which happens sometimes cannot be your nature. It is an accident, It comes and goes. It is like clouds -- so why be worried about the clouds?
Think of the sky which is always there."
This is the definition of Atma -- the sky which is always there. All that comes and goes is irrelevant; don't be bothered by it, it is just smoke. The sky that remains eternally there never changes, never becomes different. Between two thoughts, drop into it; between two thoughts it is always there. Look into it and suddenly you will realize that you are in no- mind.
The master was right when he said, "There is no mind, so there cannot be any state of mind. What nonsense are you talking?"
But the nonsense has its own logic. If you think that you have a mind, you will start thinking in terms of states -- an ignorant state of mind, an enlightened state of mind. Once you accept mind, the illusory, you are bound to go on dividing it. And once you accept that the mind is there, you will start seeking something or other.
The mind can exist only if you continuously seek something. Why? It is because seeking is desire, seeking is moving into the future, seeking creates dreams. So somebody is seeking power, politics, somebody is seeking riches, kingdoms, and then somebody is seeking the truth. But seeking is there and seeking is the problem, not what you are seeking. The object is never the problem, any object will do. The mind can hang on to any object, any excuse is enough for it to exist.
The master said, "There is no state of mind because there is no mind. And there is no truth, so what are you talking about? There can be no seeking."
This is one of the greatest messages ever delivered.It is very difficult; the disciple cannot conceive that there is no truth. What is the meaning of this master when he says that there is no truth? Does he mean that there is no truth? No, he is saying that for you, who are a seeker, there can be no truth.
Seeking always leads into the untrue. Only a nonseeking mind realizes that which is, for whenever you seek you have missed that which is. Seeking always moves into the future, seeking cannot be here and now. How can you seek here and now? You can only be.
Seeking is desire -- future enters, time comes in... and this moment, this here and now is missed. Truth is here, now.
If you go to a buddha and ask, "Is there God?" he will deny it immediately: "There is no God." If he says there is, he creates a seeker; if he says there is God, you will start seeking. How can you remain quiet when there is God to be sought? Where will you run? You have created another illusion.
So Buddha said there is no God. Nobody understood him, people thought he was an atheist. He was not denying God, he was simply denying the seeker. But if he had said that there is God the seeker would have been there. And the seeker is the world; seeking is all that maya is. For millions of lives you have been a seeker, after this or after that, this object, that object, this world or that world, but a seeker. Now you are a seeker after truth but the master says there is no truth. He cuts away the very ground of seeking, he pulls away the very ground where you are standing, where your mind is standing. He simply pushes you into the abyss.
The inquirer said, "Then why these many seekers all around you? If there is nothing to seek and no truth, then why this crowd?" You must have been there, sitting around the master. Somebody comes to me and I say, "There is no seeking. Nothing is to be sought, because there is nothing to seek. "He is bound to ask, "Then why are these people here, why are these sannyasis here? What are they doing here?"
But the inquirer went on missing the point. The master looked around and said, "I don't see anyone there is no one here." The inquirer went on missing the point for the intellect always goes on missing. He could have looked. This was the fact: There was no one.
You can be in two ways but just one if you are seeking. If you are not seeking you are not, for seeking gives you the ego. Right this moment if you are not seeking anyone, anything, you are not here, there is no crowd. If I am not teaching anything- because there is nothing to be taught, no truth to be taught -- if I am not teaching anything and if you are not learning anything, who is here? Emptiness exists and the bliss of pure emptiness. Individuals disappear and it becomes an oceanic consciousness. Individuals are there because of individual minds. You have a different desire, that's why you differ from your neighbor; desires create distinctions. I am seeking something, you are seeking something else; my path differs from yours, my goal differs from yours. That's why I differ from you. If I am not seeking and you are not seeking, goals disappear, paths are no more there. How, then, can the minds exist? The cup is broken. My tea flows into you and your tea flows into me. It becomes an oceanic existence.
The master looked around and said, "I don't see anyone there is no one." The intellect goes on missing, and the inquirer said, "then whom are you teaching? If there is no one, then whom are you teaching?" And the master said, "I have got no tongue, so how can I teach?" He goes on giving hints to become alert, to look, but the inquirer is engulfed in his own mind. The master goes on hitting, hammering on his head; he is talking nonsense just to bring him out of his mind.
If you had been there you would have been convinced by the inquirer, not by the master. The inquirer would have appeared exactly right. This master seemed to be mad, absurd. He was talking and he said, "There is no tongue, so how can I talk?" He was saying,
"Look at me, I am without form. Look at me, I am not embodied. The body appears to you but I am not that, so how can I talk?" The mind goes on missing. This is the misery of the mind. You push, it again gathers itself; you hit it, and for a moment there is a sinking and a trembling, and again it is established.
Have you seen a Japanese doll? They call it a daruma doll. You throw it, in whatsoever way -- topsy-turvy, head upside-down -- but whatsoever you do the doll sits in a buddha posture. The bottom part is so heavy you cannot do anything. Throw it in any way and the doll again sits in a buddha posture. The name daruma comes from Bodhidharma; in Japan, Bodhidharma's name is Daruma. Daruma used to say, this Bodhidharma used to say, that your mind is just like this doll. He would throw it, kick it, but whatsoever he did he could not disturb the doll; the bottom part was so heavy. You throw it upside-down, it will be right-side-up.
So this master went on pushing. A little shaking and the doll sat again, missed the point. Finally, desperate, the inquirer said, "I don't follow, I don't understand." And with the ultimate hit, the master said, "I don't understand myself."
I go on teaching you, knowing well there is nothing to be taught. That's why I can go on infinitely. If there were something to be taught I would have finished already. Buddhas can go on and on because there is nothing to be taught. It is an endless story, it never concludes, so I can go on and on. I will never be finished; you may be finished before my story ends, for there is no end to it.
Somebody was asking me, "You go on talking every day?" I said, "Because there is nothing to be taught." Some day you will suddenly feel it -- that I am not talking, that I am not teaching. You have realized there is nothing to be taught because there is no truth. What discipline am I giving to you? None. A disciplined mind is again a mind, even more stubborn, more adamant; a disciplined mind is more stupid. Go and see the disciplined monks all over the world Christian, Hindu, Jain. Whenever you see a man who is absolutely disciplined you will find a stupid mind behind it. The flowing has stopped. He is so much concerned with finding something that he is ready to do whatsoever you say. If you say, "Stand on your head for an hour," he is ready to stand on his head. It is because of desire. If God can be achieved only through standing on his head for hours, he is ready, but he must achieve.
I am not giving you any achieving, any desiring; there is nowhere to reach and nothing to achieve. If you realize this you have achieved this very moment. This very moment, you are perfect; nothing is to be done, nothing is to be changed. This very moment, you are absolute Brahma.
That's why the master said, "I don't understand it myself." It is difficult to find a master who says, "I don't understand it myself," for a master must claim that he knows, only then will you follow him. A master must not only claim that he knows, he must claim that only he knows, nobody else: "All other masters are wrong, I alone know." Then will you follow. You must be absolutely certain, then you become a follower. The certainty gives you the feeling that here is the man, and if you follow you will reach.
I will tell you one story. It happened once, a so-called master was traveling. In every village he would go, he would declare, "I have achieved, I have known the divine. If you want, come and follow me."
People would say, "There are many responsibilities. Some day, we hope we will be able to follow you." They would touch his feet, give him respect, serve him, but nobody
would follow because there were many other things to be done first before one went to seek the divine. First things first. The divine is always the last, and the last thing never comes because the first are so infinite they are never finished. But in one village, a madman -- mad he was, otherwise who would follow this master -- said, "Right. Have you have found?"
The master hesitated a little, looking at the madman -- because this man seemed dangerous, he might follow and create trouble -- but before the whole village he couldn't deny it, so he said, "Yes."
The madman said, "Now, initiate me. I will follow you to the very end. I want to realize God myself." The so-called master became perturbed, but what to do? The madman started following him, he became a shadow. One year passed. The madman said, "How far, how far is the temple?" He said, "I am not in a hurry but how much time will be needed?" By this time the master had become very uncomfortable and uneasy with this man. This madman would sleep with him, he would move with him; he had become his shadow. And because of him his certainty was dissolving. Whenever he would say, in a village, "Follow me," he would become afraid, because this man would look at him and say, "I am following you, master, and still I have not reached."
The second year passed, the third year passed, the sixth year passed, and the madman said, "We have not reached anywhere. We are simply traveling in villages and you go on telling people, "Follow me." I am following- whatsoever you say, I do it, so you cannot say I am not following the discipline." The madman was really mad, so whatever was said he would do. So the master couldn't deceive him by saying that he was not doing well. Finally, one night, the master said to him, "Because of you I have lost my own path. Before I met you I was certain; now I am no more. Now you please leave me."
Whenever there is someone certain and you are mad enough, you start following. Can you follow this type of man who says, "I myself don't know. I myself don't understand?" If you can follow this man, you will reach. You have already reached if you decide to follow this man, for the mind asks for certainty, the mind asks for knowledge. The mind also asks for dogmatic assertions, so if you can be ready to follow a man who says, "I don't know myself," seeking has stopped, for now you are not asking for knowledge. One who is asking for knowledge cannot ask for being. Knowledge is rubbish; being is life.
When you stop asking for knowledge you have stopped asking about the truth, for truth is the goal of knowledge. If you don't inquire what is, rather you become so silent, so mindless, that which is, is revealed.
I myself say I don't know; you cannot come across a more ignorant man than me. There is no truth and there is no way. I have not reached anywhere, I am simply here and now. If you can follow this ignorant man your mind will drop. For the mind always follows knowledge, and when the mind drops there is no need to go anywhere. Everything is available, has been available always; you have never missed it. But just because of your seeking of the future, of the goal, you cannot look. The truth surrounds you, you exist in it. Just like the fish exist in the ocean, you exist in the truth. God is not a goal, God is what is here and now. These trees, these winds blowing, these clouds moving, the sky, you, I -- this is what God is. It is not a goal.
Drop the mind and the divine. God is not an object, it is a merger. The mind resists a merger, the mind is against surrender; the mind is very cunning and calculating.
This story is beautiful. You are the inquirer. You have come to me to inquire about how to achieve truth, you have come to me to inquire about how to achieve a state of mind which is blissful. You have come to acquire knowledge, to solve the mystery, and I repeat to you: There is no state of mind, because there is no mind; there is no truth, so no seeking is allowed. All seeking is futile; search as such is foolish. Seek and you will lose, don't seek and it is there, run and you will miss. Stop: it has always been there. And don't try to understand- be. Understanding is superficial. Under the Bodhi tree, Buddha has not known more. You may know more.
Many scholars came to Buddha; they knew more than Buddha. Mahakashyap came; he was a great pundit. Sariputra came, he was a great pundit. Sariputra came and five hundred disciples came with him, disciples of Sariputra. When Sariputra came to Buddha he came for more than knowledge, for of knowledge he had had enough. Really, he may have known more than Buddha; he was a very deep, penetrating scholar. He knew all the scriptures, he was a great Brahmin pundit and all the Vedas were on his tongue. He could have recited them. But he asked Buddha, "Give me something that is more than knowledge. Of knowledge I have got enough, and I am fed up with it."
And what did Buddha say to Sariputra? He said, "Unlearn. Drop knowledge, and that which is more will happen to you."
A real master teaches you unlearning; it is never learning. You have come to me to unlearn whatsoever you know, never learning. You have come to me learned, so whatsoever you know, please drop it. Become ignorant, become like a child. Only the heart of a child can knock at the doors of the divine, and only the heart of a child is heard. Your prayers cannot be heard; they are cunning. Only a child, only a heart which doesn't know can be.
This is the meaning of this anecdote, and it is good for you, for the same is the case with you.
Anything more?
Question 1 OSHO,
YOU JUST TOLD US YOU HAVE NOTHING TO TEACH US, AND LAST NIGHT IT WAS A GREAT SHOCK WHEN YOU SAID AS FAR AS YOU ARE CONCERNED YOUR WORK IS DONE, THAT YOU'RE CARRYING YOUR BODY FOR US. A YOUNG JESUS ALSO SAID, "WIST YE NOT THAT I AM ABOUT MY FATHER'S BUSINESS." WHAT IS OR WHAT WAS YOUR BUSINESS?
When I say my work is done I mean I am finished with any seeking; I mean I have come to realize that there is nothing to be realized, nothing to be known, nowhere to go. This moment is enough, this moment is eternity. When I say my work is done I mean now there is no desire.
Desire is business. You have to do something, only then will you be happy. I am simply happy; it is not concerned with any doing, it is now uncaused. That is the difference between happiness and bliss. Happiness is caused -- you have a friend and you are happy; your beloved has returned and you are happy; you have won a lottery and you are happy. Causes are there; they are beyond you, they are outside you, so your happiness comes from the outside. It is caused, and that which is caused cannot be forever. The
beloved may go back, the friend may turn enemy -- friends turn enemy -- and whatsoever you have achieved may be lost. That which is caused cannot always be there, cannot be eternal.
When I say my work is done I mean now my happiness is uncaused. There is nothing that is helping me to be blissful, I am simply blissful. It cannot be taken away. You cannot uncause it if it is not caused. You cannot do anything to it; it is simply beyond, it cannot be destroyed. My business is finished. And when I say my business is finished, I am finished, because I can exist only with the business. Then why am I here? This is one of the oldest questions.
Buddha lived for forty years after he became enlightened. After his business was finished he lived for forty years more. Many times it was asked, "Why are you?" When the business is finished you should disappear. It looks illogical: why should Buddha exist within the body even for a moment? When there is no desire, how can the body continue? There is something very deep to be understood. When desire disappears the energy that was moving in desire remains; it cannot disappear. Desire is just a form of energy. That's why you can turn one desire into another. The anger can become sex, the sex can become anger. Sex can become greed, so whenever you find a very greedy person he will be less sexual. If he is really perfectly greedy he will not be sexual at all. He will be a brahmachari, a celibate, because the whole energy is moving into greed. And if you find a very sexual person you will always find he is not greedy, because nothing is left. If you see a person who has suppressed his sex he will be angry; anger will be always ready.
You can see in his eyes, in his face, that he is just angry; the whole sex energy has become anger. That's why your so-called monks and sadhus are always angry. The way they walk they show their anger; they way they look at you they show their anger. Their silence is just skindeep -- touch them and they will become angry. Sex becomes anger. These are forms; life is the energy. What happens when all desires disappear? Energy cannot disappear, energy is indestructible. Ask the physicists; even they say that energy cannot be destroyed.
A certain energy was existing in Gautam Buddha when he became enlightened. That certain energy was moving in sex, anger, greed in millions of ways. All forms disappeared, so what became of that energy? Energy cannot go out of existence, and when desires are not there it becomes formless, but it exists. Now, what is the function of it? That energy becomes compassion.
You cannot be in compassion because you have no energy. All your energy is divided, sometimes in sex, sometimes in anger, sometimes in greed. Compassion is not a form. Only when all your desires disappear does that energy become compassion, KARUNA. You cannot cultivate compassion. When you are desireless, compassion happens; your whole energy moves into compassion. And this movement is very different. Desire has a motivation in it, a goal; compassion is nonmotivated, there is no goal to it, it is simply overflowing energy.
So when I say I exist for you I don't mean that I am doing something to exist for you. Now I am not doing anything; forms of desire have disappeared. Now the energy is there, without me. The energy is moving and overflowing, and you can partake, you can feed on it. That is what Jesus meant when he said, "Eat me. Let me become your blood, let me become your food." This overflowing energy can become food to you, food of the eternal. I am not doing anything. When I say I exist for you it is only language, for there
is no other language. I am not doing anything, this is how it is happening. My forms have disappeared; now a formless energy has remained, and it will go on overflowing. Those who are wise can partake, because soon it will become bodiless also. First energy becomes formless, desireless, and then it becomes bodiless.
The body has its own momentum. When one is born, when a buddha is born, he is born out of a communion of two bodies, the father and the mother; then particular chromosomes, particular cells, create his body. Those cells have a built-in momentum. That built-in momentum means that this body will exist for seventy or eighty years; this is a body blueprint. For eighty years this body can exist. The body doesn't know, cannot know, that the soul that has entered is going to become enlightened. This house cannot know that the person who has entered this house to live will become enlightened. And when this man becomes enlightened, even then this house will not know. The house will continue; it has its own life. The body has its own life, and the body is completely unaware that a person has become enlightened. It continues, it has its own momentum, its own fuel.
At the age of forty Buddha became enlightened. The body became irrelevant but it continued. It continued, it completed its circle; it was there for eighty years. It is good, for these forty years were the overflowing years, and we were able to know what enlightenment is. If Buddha had disappeared that very moment there would have been no religion. If the body had dropped, if Buddha had become enlightened and the body had dropped, he would not have been -- even to tell what had happened. This was good; existence was very compassionate. Buddha lived for forty years more, not with any motivation, but with the momentum of the body he just went on overflowing. This body will also disappear; the momentum has to be completed.
I am not doing anything for you; for that too is sort of egoistic, anybody thinking he is doing something for you. It is happening. The form of desires disappears and energy becomes compassion. The body has to complete its momentum; it has to complete its momentum, it has to complete its blueprint. This gap will be an overflowing. It is a feast, not given by me to you, it is a feast given by the whole.
Language creates problems. Language is always dualistic, language is always of this world. Language belongs to desire and it carries all the connotations, so it is very difficult to say anything about that which is not of this world. Either you have to be silent -- even then, silence too can be misunderstood -- or you have to use language. And every word is loaded.
If I say I am here for you, you can interpret it in such a way that it looks like a business, looks like a work. It is not, it is none of it; it is simply an overflowing of love. And I am not the doer for if I am the doer, there can be no love. Just a light is burning. You may find the path the light is there. You may use it, it may become a flame for you, it may kindle a light within you, but that depends on you. I am simply here.
You are initiated, not by me but the energy itself. Eat me as much as you can, let me become part of you. Celebrate this occasion.
Jesus' words again create problems- words always create problems. Had Jesus been here, had he been here in the country of the Upanishads, Buddha and Mahavir, the language would have been totally different. Jesus was born a Jew; he had to use Jewish language, myth, phraseology. So he said, "The work, the business,
that was given from my father to me, is done." If he had been here he would never have talked about "the father." The father is a Jewish concept; it is good, beautiful, but very anthropomorphic. God is not the father, God is not a person, and God is not in any sort of business. But Jews are businessmen, and their God is also a businessman, the super- businessman- controlling, managing, manipulating. And just as with a businessman you can seduce him, you can bribe him. He is a very real person. He will be angry: if you don't surrender to him he will throw you in hell; if you follow him, you will achieve paradise -- heaven and heavenly pleasures.
This whole language belongs to the world of profit, business. But every language has its own problems. This language is concrete and gives a very family-type appearance to existence: the father, son and the work.... You can reach the father through the son....
Jesus was simply using the language available.
In this country we have tried many linguistic patterns. Hindus use millions of types for Hinduism is not a religion, it is many religions. All types of religions exist in Hinduism; it is a crowd, it is a phenomenon in itself. Every type that has ever existed in the world exists in Hinduism. This is a miracle. Even an atheist can be a Hindu -- an atheist cannot be a Christian -- and even an atheist can become enlightened. Buddha was an atheist, he didn't believe in God. He said there is no God, and even more mysterious, he said there is no soul. He said nothing exists, and he became one of the incarnations of a Hindu God. It is really mysterious. This atheist, Gautam Buddha, became the Tenth avatar. He said there is no God and Hindus said: This man is God's incarnation he is Bhagwan.
Hindus say even a denial is a way of assertion; Hindus say even to say no is to say yes. This is very mysterious. They say even to say there is no God is to say God in a negative way. If God can be asserted in positive language, why not in negative? "It" is a word, "nothing" is also a word, and one is just as relevant as the other. Buddha said no; then no became absolute, nothingness became the nature. Shankara said yes; then yes became absolute, that "yesness," Brahma, became the source. But Hindus say both mean the same. Each language, each pattern of expressing it, has its own benefits and its own dangers and pitfalls.
I myself am inclined towards the negative, hence so much emphasis on Zen masters. I have really loved these anecdotes -- no mind, no truth, no understanding.
Your desire is positive. If God is asserted in a positive way your desire will not die, your desire will turn towards God and you will start desiring God. Negativity is to say no to all your desires, to all your objects of desire. Then all desires and all objects disappear and only you are left in your purity. That purity, that innocence- the benediction of it- is what I want you to enjoy with me. It is not a teaching; I am not a teacher. It is not a doctrine, it is just you enjoying with me. I am available here, and if you put your mind aside we can celebrate. I am in an inner dance; you can also become a partner in it. You may call this my business.
My work is done as far as I am concerned because I am done. Now the energy has become a compassion and an overflowing, and all those who really want to taste are invited to do so without any condition. You are not to give anything, you simply are to take. No discipline, no bargain- nothing is expected on your part. It is a gift. It has always been so, it will always be so; the ultimate bliss is always a gift. That's why we have been calling it grace, PRASAD as if the divine gives to you out of his overflowing energy.
I will tell you one story Jesus used to say. He repeated it many times- he must have loved this story. He said, "Once it happened, a very rich man needed some laborers in his garden to work, so he sent a man to the marketplace. All the laborers who were available were called and they started working in the garden. Then others heard and they came in the afternoon. Then others heard and they came just when the sun was setting. But he employed them. And when the sun went down, he gathered all of them and paid them equally. Obviously those who had come in the morning became disappointed and said, "What injustice! What type of injustice is this? What are you doing? We came in the morning and we worked the whole day and these fellows came in the afternoon; just for two hours they worked. And a few have just come, they have not worked at all. This is injustice!"
The rich man laughed and said, "Don't think of others. Whatever I have given to you is it not enough?" They said, "It is more than enough, but it is injustice. Why are these people getting when they have just come?"
The rich man said, "I give them because I have got too much, out of my abundance I give them. You need not be worried about this. You have got more than you expected so don't compare. I am not giving them because of their work, I am giving them because I have got too much... out of my abundance."
Jesus said some work very hard to achieve the divine, some come just in the afternoon and some when the sun is setting, and they all get the same divine. Those who had come in the morning must object: "this is too much!"
You just see: you have been meditating so much and suddenly someone comes just at evening and becomes enlightened. And you have been such a great ascetic. Just look: if all the ascetics reach and see that sinners are sitting just by the side of the throne of God, what will happen? They will become so sad: "What is happening?- these sinners never disciplined their lives, they never worked and they are here; and we were thinking they would be in hell!" There is no hell; there cannot be. How can hell exist? Out of God's abundance everything is heaven. It should be so, it must be so, it has to be so. Out of his abundance is heaven, there can be no hell. Hell was created by these ascetics because they cannot conceive of sinners in heaven. They have to make compartments; they cannot think that you will be there.
It is reported that one Hassid, a rabbi, Baal Shem, was visited by a woman. She was about seventy, h er husband was eighty, and now, by and by, was becoming a virtuous man. His whole life he had been a sinner so she had come to give her thanks that he had finally converted her husband -- which was impossible as he had been a sinner his whole life. But now he was turning so she was very thankful to Baal Shem. She had always been a pious lady, never wavered, never went wrong, always had been on the right track and always thinking that heaven was just waiting to welcome her, and always knowing well that this husband of hers was going to hell. So she said to Baal Shem, "There can be hope now- even my husband may reach heaven."Baal Shem laughed and said, "The greater the sinner, the greater the saint."
The woman became sad and said, "Then why didn't you tell me before? You should have told me forty years before."
The greater the sinner, the greater the saint. This woman will be in such hell if she finds her husband in heaven. These so-called virtuous people have created hell; otherwise, out of divine abundance, hell cannot exist. Saints will receive for they come in the morning;
sinners will receive and they may have come in the evening. Everyone is going to receive. It is a gift.
I am here, not as a business but as a gift. But you are so afraid and fearful. You can understand business; you know the terms; you cannot understand a gift, you don't know the terms. You can understand if you have to fulfill some condition. If nothing is required of you, you are simply at a loss.
All expectations belong to the mind, all disciplines belong to the mind, all so-called saintliness and so-called sin belong to the mind. When there is no mind, there is no sinner and no saint, and the gift simply showers on you.
A Bird on the Wing Chapter #3
Chapter title: The Gates of Heaven and Hell 12 June 1974 am in Buddha Hall
Archive code: 7406120 ShortTitle: WING03 Audio: Yes Video: No
Length: 104 mins
BELOVED OSHO,
A WARRIOR CAME TO THE ZEN MASTER HAKUIN AND ASKED "IS THERE SUCH A THING AS HEAVEN AND HELL?"
HAKUIN SAID "WHO ARE YOU?"
THE WARRIOR REPLIED "I AM CHIEF SAMURAI TO THE EMPEROR." HAKUIN SAID "YOU, A SAMURAI? WITH A FACE LIKE THAT, YOU LOOK MORE LIKE A BEGGAR."
AT THIS THE WARRIOR BECAME SO ANGRY HE DREW HIS SWORD. STANDING CALMLY IN FRONT OF HIM, HAKUIN SAID "HERE OPEN THE GATES OF HELL."
PERCEIVING THE MASTER'S COMPOSURE, THE SOLDIER SHEATHED HIS SWORD AND BOWED.
HAKUIN THEN SAID "AND HERE OPEN THE GATES OF HEAVEN."
Heaven and hell are not geographical. If you go in search of them you will never find them anywhere. They are within you, they are psychological. The mind is heaven, the mind is hell, and the mind has the capacity to become either. But people go on thinking everything is somewhere outside. We always go on looking for everything outside because to be inwards is very difficult. We are outgoing. If somebody says there is a god, we look at the sky. Somewhere, sitting there, will be the divine person.
One psychologist in an American school asked small children what they thought about God. Children have clearer perception: they are less cunning, more truthful. They are more representative of the human mind, they are unperverted. So he asked the children and the answers were collected. The conclusions were very ridiculous. Almost all the
children depicted God something like this -- an old man, very tall, bearded and very dangerous. He created fear. If you didn't follow him he would throw you into hell; if you prayed and followed him he would give you paradise and all the pleasures. He was sitting on a throne in the sky watching everybody. You couldn't escape him; even in your bathroom he was looking.
The outgoing mind projects everything outside. This is YOUR God too. Don't laugh, don't think this is a child's conception -- no, this is you.
This is how you think about God -- as a cosmic spy, always searching to condemn, to punish, to throw you into hell... as very ferocious, revengeful. That's why all religions are based on fear. Religions say if you do this you will be appreciated, rewarded; if you don't do this, you will be punished. The base seems to be fear. God just seems to be a very powerful emperor sitting on a throne in heaven. The whole concept is foolish but human; the human mind is foolish. The whole concept is anthropocentric.
In the Bible it is said God created man in his own image. In reality, it seems to be quite otherwise: man created God in his own image. We have projected God in our own image; he is just a blow-up of the human mind. He is a bigger human mind, that's all. Remember, if you think God is somewhere outside you, you have not even taken the first step towards being religious.
The same happens with all such concepts. We say heaven is without, hell is without; it is as if there exists nothing within. What is within you? The moment you think of the within it seems that everything goes empty. What is within? The world is without, sex is without, sin is without, virtue is without. God, heaven, hell -- everything is without. What is within you? Who are you? The moment you think of the within your mind goes blank, there is nothing. In reality, everything is within; the outer is just a projection. Fear is within you; it is projected as a hell. Hell is just a projected image on the screen -- of the fear that is within you, of the anger, of the jealousy, of all that is poisonous in you, of all that is evil in you. Heaven is, again, a projected image on the screen -- of all that is good and beautiful, of all that is blissful within you. The Devil is the fallen human being, God is the risen human being. God is the ultimate possibility of your beatitude; the Devil is your ultimate fall. There is nobody like the Devil existing somewhere. You will never meet him unless you become him. And you will never encounter God unless you become God.
In the East religions transcended this anthropocentric attitude very long ago, in the past. Eastern religions are non-anthropocentric. They say "you cannot encounter God, you can become God. They say "When you reach to the ultimate point of existence, there will be no God to receive you and welcome you. Only you will be there in your godliness. So this can be said, and I go on insisting: There exists no God -- existence is divine. There exists no one like a person, a super-person, no one. God is nonexistential, godliness is existential. The moment I say godliness... it becomes something inward; the moment you say God, you have projected it.
This story is beautiful. The Zen master Hakuin is one of the rare flowerings. A warrior came to him, a samurai, a great soldier, and he asked "Is there any hell, is there any heaven? If there is hell and heaven, where are the gates? Where do I enter from? How can I avoid hell and choose heaven?" He was a simple warrior. Warriors are always simple.
It is difficult to find a businessman who is simple. A businessman is always cunning, clever; otherwise he cannot be a businessman. A warrior is always simple; otherwise he
cannot be a warrior. A warrior knows only two things, life and death -- nothing much. His life is always at stake, he is always gambling; He is a simple man. That's why businessmen could not create a single Mahavir, a single Buddha. Even Brahmins could not create a Ram, a Buddha, a Mahavir. Brahmins are also cunning, cunning in a different way. They are also businessmen -- of a different world, of the other. They deal in business not of this world, but of the other world. Their priesthood is a business; their religion is mathematics, arithmetic. They are also clever, more clever than businessmen. The businessman is limited to his world, their cunningness goes beyond. They always think of the other world, of the rewards they are going to get there. Their rituals, their whole mind is concerned with how to achieve more pleasures in the other world. They are concerned with pleasure: they are businessmen. Even Brahmins could not create a Buddha. This is strange. All the twenty-four Jaina tirthankaras were kshatriyas, warriors. Buddha was a warrior; Rama and Krishna were warriors. They were simple people, with no cunning in their minds, with no arithmetic. They knew only two things -- life and death.
This simple warrior came to Hakuin to ask where is heaven and where is hell. He had not come to learn any doctrine. He wanted to know where the gate was so he could avoid hell and enter heaven. And Hakuin replied in a way only a warrior could understand. If a brahmin had been there, scriptures would have been needed; he would have quoted the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Bible, the Koran, then a Brahmin would have understood. All that exists for a brahmin is in the scriptures; scriptures are the world. A brahmin lives in the word, in the verbal. If a businessman had been there, he would not have understood the answer, the response Hakuin gave, the way he acted with this warrior. A businessman always asks "What is the price of your heaven? What is the cost? How can I attain it?
What should I do? How virtuous should I be? What are the coins? What should I do so heaven can be attained?" He always asks for the price.
I have heard one beautiful story -- it happened in the beginning when God created the world. God came to earth to ask different races about the ten commandments, the ten rules of life. The Jews have given so much significance to those ten rules -- Christians also, Mohammedans also. All these religions are Jewish, the source is the Jew, and the Jew is the perfect businessman.
So God came to ask, he came to the Hindus and asked, "Would you like to have ten commandments?" The Hindus said, "What is the first? We must have a sample. We don't know what these ten commandments are." God said, "Thou shalt not kill."
The Hindus said, "It will be difficult. Life is complex, killing is involved. It is a great cosmic play: there is birth, death, fighting, competition. If all the competition is taken away the whole thing will become flat, dull. We don't like these commandments -- they will destroy the whole game."
Then he went to the Mohammedans and said, "Thou shalt not commit adultery." He also gave them one example -- they had also asked for a sample. The Mohammedans said, "This will be difficult... life will lose all beauty. At least four wives are needed. You call it adultery, but this is all that life can give, all that a virtuous man should have. Who knows of the other world? This is the world; you have given it to us to enjoy and now you have come with these ten commandments. This is contradictory."
God went around and around. Then he came to Moses, leader of the Jews. Moses never asked for a sample, and God was afraid: if Moses said no, nobody was left; Moses was
the last hope. When God asked Moses -- the moment God said, "I have ten commandments" -- what did Moses reply? He said, "How much do they cost?" This is how a businessman thinks: the first thing he wants to know is the cost.
God said, "They cost nothing." And Moses said, "Then I will have ten. If they cost nothing, there is no problem." That's how the ten commandments were born.
But this samurai was not a Jew; he was not a businessman, he was a warrior. He had come with a simple question. He was not interested in scriptures, not in cost, not in any verbal answer. He was interested in reality. And what did Hakuin do? He said, "Who are you?" And the warrior replied, "I am a samurai." It is a thing of much pride to be a samurai in Japan. It means being a perfect warrior, a man who will not hesitate a single moment to give his life. For him, life and death are just a game.
He said, "I am a samurai, I am a leader of samurais. Even the emperor pays respect to me."
Hakuin laughed and said, " You, a samurai? You look like a beggar."
The samurai's pride was hurt, his ego hammered. He forgot what he had come for. He took out his sword and was just about to kill Hakuin. He forgot that he had come to this master to ask where is the gate of heaven, to ask where is the gate of hell. Then Hakuin laughed and said, "This is the gate of hell. With this sword, this anger, this ego, here opens the gate." This is what a warrior can understand. Immediately he understood: This is the gate. He put his sword back in its sheath. And Hakuin said, "Here opens the gate of heaven."
Hell and heaven are within you, both gates are within you. When you are behaving unconsciously there is the gate of hell; when you become alert and conscious, there is the gate of heaven.
What happened to this samurai? When he was just about to kill Hakuin, was he conscious? Was he conscious of what he was about to do? Was he conscious of what he had come for? All consciousness had disappeared. When the ego takes over, you cannot be alert. Ego is the drug, the intoxicant that makes you completely unconscious. You act but the act comes from the unconscious, not from your consciousness. And whenever any act comes from the unconscious, the door of hell is open. Whatsoever you do, if you are not aware of what you are doing the gate of hell opens. Immediately the samurai became alert. Suddenly, when Hakuin said, "This is the gate,
you have already opened it --" the very situation must have created alertness.
Just imagine what would have happened if you had been the warrior, if you had been the samurai, sword in hand, just about to kill. A single moment more and Hakuin's head would have been severed; a single moment more and it would have been separated from the body. And Hakuin said, "This is the gate of hell." This is not a philosophical answer; no master answers in a philosophical way. Philosophy exists only for mediocre, unenlightened minds. The master responds but the response is not verbal, it is total. That this man may have killed him is not the point. "If you kill me and it makes you alert, it is worth it" -- Hakuin played the game. If a single moment had been lost this man would have killed him. But at the right moment Hakuin said, "This is the gate."
You may not have heard about samurais. Say you are about to kill a samurai: your sword is in your hand, it is just about to touch his neck. He is standing before you, unprotected, without any weapon. Samurais have a particular sound, a mantra. He will just say a single word so loudly that all your energy will go. You will become as if dead, a statue. He may
simply say, "Hey!" You will become static, your hand will not move. That sound will hammer the heart, which controls everything. Your hand will become static, your mind will be shocked; all activity will disappear. You cannot kill a samurai, even if he is without weapons. A sound becomes a protection. If you have a gun, your hands cannot move or you will miss the aim. It is just a sound, a sound that has to be made in a particular way, so that it goes deep into your heart and changes your activity completely, changes the pattern of your activity.
When Hakuin said, "This is the gate," the samurai must have remained static. In that static state, when all activity ceases, you become alert. Some activity is needed... otherwise your unconscious would break and you would become conscious. Zen says if a person can sit for six hours without doing anything he will become enlightened. Just for six hours... but six hours is really too long; I say six minutes is enough. Even six seconds will do if you can be absolutely without activity. When you are not occupied, you cannot be unconscious; when you are unoccupied your whole energy becomes consciousness. A tremendous release occurs.
Your energy is engaged in occupation. Your mind is thinking, your body is working, you are occupied. Your whole energy is moving in activity, is being dissipated into the world. When you think, you are dissipating energy; each thought takes energy, needs energy.
You are continuously thinking and dissipating energy for nothing -- just dissipating energy. Activity needs energy, and your infinite source of energy is continuously being dissipated. You are leaking from everywhere. That's why you feel so weak, so frustrated, so impotent. This impotence feels like helplessness; you are omnipotent and you feel impotent. You have all the sources of infinite energy within you, you are related to the cosmic source, but you feel impotent because you are continuously dissipating energy. If thought stops even for a single moment and activity is no more, if you have become like a statue, unmoving within or without, if there is no movement, either of body or of mind, then tremendous energy is released. Where will it go now there is no activity? It cannot go without. You become a pillar of energy, a flame of energy. Everything becomes conscious inside, everything is lighted; your whole being is filled with light.
This must have happened to the warrior -- stopped, sword in hand with Hakuin just before him, with a master, an enlightened master, before him. The eyes of Hakuin were laughing, the face was smiling, and the gate of heaven opened. He understood: the sword went back into its sheath. While putting the sword back into the sheath he must have been totally silent, peaceful. The anger had disappeared, the energy moving in anger had become silence. If you suddenly awake in the middle of anger, you will feel a peace you have never felt before. Energy was moving and suddenly it stops. You will have silence, immediate silence. You will fall into your inner being and the fall will be so sudden, you will become aware. It is not a slow fall, it is so sudden that you cannot remain unaware.
You can remain unaware only with routine things, with gradual things; you move so slowly you can't feel movement. This was sudden movement -- from activity to no- activity, from thought to no-thought, from mind to no-mind. As the sword was going back into its sheath, the warrior realized. And Hakuin said, "Here open the doors of heaven."
Silence is the door. Inner peace is the door.
Non-violence is the door.
Love and compassion are the doors.
Heaven and hell are not geographical, they are psychological, they are your psychology. And this is not a question to be decided on the day of judgment. The human mind is so clever: in avoiding, in escaping, Christians, Mohammedans and Jews have created a concept of the last day when everybody is to be judged -- you will be taken out of your grave and judged. Those who have followed Jesus, who have been good, who have believed, will go to heaven; those who have misbehaved, who have not followed Jesus, who have not been to church, will be thrown into hell. Christian hell is one of the most ridiculous things. It is eternal, there is no end to it. This seems injustice, sheer injustice; whatsoever sin you have committed no punishment which is eternal can be just. Bertrand Russell somewhere has joked, "If I calculate all my sins, sins that I have committed and sins that I have not committed, only brooded over -- if even they are included -- the hardest judge can't send me to jail for more than four years. And Christianity sends you to hell forever." Bertrand Russell has written a book, Why I am not a Christian; this is one of his arguments. It is a beautiful argument because the whole thing seems to be ridiculous.
If, as Hindus say, you have committed millions of sins in millions of lives, it may look logical to send a person to hell for eternity. But Christians believe in only one life, a life of seventy years. How can you commit so much sin that you deserve eternal hell? If you commit sin continuously for seventy years, even then eternal hell doesn't look just. The whole thing seems to be revengeful: so God is throwing you into hell because of your sins, because you were disobedient, because you were rebellious, because you didn't listen to him. It seems to be revenge, but revenge can be unjust. Is it punishment? It seems ridiculous.
The human mind has created a last judgment day. Why? - why wait for the last day? The mind always postpones, pushes things ahead: the problem is not right here and now, it is a question of the last day, so we will see. The problem is not urgent, we will see what happens. There are ways and means... In the last moment you can follow Jesus, in the last moment you can surrender and say to God, "I was a sinner." You can confess and be forgiven. God is infinite compassion, God is love; he is going to forgive you.
Christians have evolved a technique of confession. You commit sin, and then you go to the priest and confess; confessed, you are relieved. If you confess honestly, you are ready to sin again; the past sin is forgiven. Once you know the trick, the key -- that you can commit a sin and be forgiven -- who is going to prevent you from committing more? So the same people keep on coming to the priest every Sunday and go on confessing.
Sometimes the ego is such that people confess sins they never committed. The ego is such that if you start confessing, you may become so involved in it that you may start confessing sins you never committed. To be a greater sinner is so ego-filling -- the greater the sinner, the greater will be the forgiveness of the divine.
It has been said by those studying Leo Tolstoy's autobiographical notes deeply, that many sins he says he committed he never committed at all. He is enjoying. Jean-Jacques Rousseau has written Confessions, his autobiography; the sins he confesses, he never committed. The same is possible with Mahatma Gandhi; in his autobiography the things he depicts himself as committing may be exaggerations. This is how the ego works: whatever you say you take to the extreme, then there is the beautiful feeling that you have confessed. Last judgment, confession are tricks of the mind. Heaven and hell are not at
the end, they are here and now. Every moment the door opens; every moment you go on wavering between heaven and hell. It is a moment-to-moment question, it is urgent; in a single moment you can move from hell to heaven, from heaven to hell.
This is the meaning of the story. Not even a single moment had passed and Hakuin said, "This is the gate of hell. Now the gate of hell opens." And not a single moment had passed and he said, "Look, this is the gate of heaven." Heaven and hell are not very distant, they are neighbors; only a small fence divides them. You can jump that fence, even without a gate. You go on jumping from this to that. In the morning you may be in heaven; by evening you are in hell. This moment heaven, that moment hell. It is just an attitude, just a state of your mind, just how you are feeling. Many times, in a single life, you may visit hell, and many times you may visit heaven. In a single day also...
There is a beautiful story of a disciple of Mahavira. He was a great king, he renounced and became a disciple of Mahavira. He was very ascetic, austere, and did whatever Mahavira said to the very extreme. His name spread all over the country -- it was Prasannachandra. Even kings started coming to pay homage to him. One king, Bimbasar, who had been a friend of Prasannachandra when he was also a king, came to the cave where he was standing naked under the sun, with his eyes closed. Bimbasar bowed down before Prasannachandra and thought, "When will the time come when I will also become so peaceful, so silent, blissful? This man has achieved!" Then he went to Mahavira, Prasannachandra's master -- he was near, somewhere in the same forest. He said to Mahavira, "Bhagwan, just before coming to you I went to Prasannachandra. He was standing with his eyes closed, so blissful, so heavenly. He has achieved. When will the moment come for me? I am not so fortunate -- I feel jealous. I have another question: If Prasannachandra had died that very moment when I was there, paying my respects to him, where would he reach? Which heaven would he attain?" Jainas say there are seven heavens and seven hells.
Mahavira said, "He will fall to the seventh hell." Bimbasar couldn't understand, he was puzzled and confused. He said, "What are you saying, the seventh hell? Prasannachandra was standing so silently, so peacefully, so meditatively; he was in such ecstasy. If he falls to the seventh hell what will happen to me? Are there more hells beyond the seventh? No, you must be joking, tell me the truth."
Mahavira said, "This is the truth. Just before you a few people had passed by; they also went to pay homage to Prasannachandra. They started gossiping around him; he heard, and the doors of hell opened. Those people were coming from his capital where he had been king. They said, "This fool has renounced all! The prime minister, to whom he has given the whole responsibility for running the kingdom, is a thief. He is looting, he is destroying. When Prasannachandra's son comes of age, when he comes to be king, there will be nothing left. And this fool is standing here with his eyes closed." Prasannachandra heard this. Suddenly the door of hell opened. He forgot. He was also a samurai, a warrior, a kshatriya. He completely forgot that he had renounced, he forgot
that there was no sword; he completely forgot that he was now a monk. The samurai who had gone to Hakuin had a sword. Prasannachandra had none, he was standing naked. He pulled out his sword -- the sword was not there, it was just an illusion -- and completely forgot that he was a sannyasin. The whole thing was so burdensome, so much anxiety was created by the news, that he pulled his sword out of the sheath and said, "I am alive! What does that prime minister think? I will go and cut off his head. I am still here!"
Whenever he used to become angry in the old days he would always touch his crown, so he touched his crown. There was no crown, just a shaven head. Suddenly he remembered, "What am I doing? There is no sword; I am a sannyasin and have renounced all." Mahavira said, "If he had died at the very moment he realized this he would have achieved the seventh heaven. Prasannachandra realized what he had been imagining. Just through imagination the door of hell was opened, now it had closed. If he had died at this moment, he would have achieved the seventh heaven."
Hell and heaven are within you. The doors are very close: with the right hand you can open one, with the left hand you can open another. With just a change of your mind, your being is transformed -- from heaven to hell and from hell to heaven. This goes on continuously. What is the secret? The secret is whenever you are unconscious, whenever you act unconsciously, without awareness, you are in hell; whenever you are conscious, whenever you act with full awareness, you are in heaven. If this awareness becomes so integrated, so consolidated, that you never lose it, there is no hell for you; if unconsciousness becomes so consolidated, so integrated, that you never lose it, there is no heaven.Fortunately unconsciousness can never become so consolidated; a part always remains conscious.
When your whole being seems to be unconscious, even then a witnessing part always remains conscious. Even while asleep, a part is witnessing. That's why in the morning you sometimes say the sleep was beautiful. Sometimes you say the sleep was disturbed, nightmarish; sometimes you say, "I slept so deeply, so peacefully, it was such great happiness." Who knows this? You were asleep -- who knows that you were so happy? A part has witnessed; a part was continuously alert, knowing. Who knows that you were disturbed, uneasy, uncomfortable? You were asleep -- even in sleep a part of you knows. You cannot become completely unconscious. Once achieved, consciousness cannot be lost, you cannot reverse the process. You cannot be eternally in hell -- this Christian doctrine is absolutely false -- but you can be eternally in heaven. This is the Hindu doctrine: hell can only be temporary, it can be only for the time being; it is temporal.
Heaven can be eternal.
To make a distinction between the momentary heaven and the eternal heaven Hindus have a different word -- MOKSHA. Hindus have three words; Christians, Mohammedans, Jews have only two words. Heaven and hell are the two words for Mohammedans, Christians and Jews. Hindus say naraka for hell, swarga for heaven, and moksha -- beyond both. A third word. Hindus say heaven is not worth achieving; it can be lost. When the state of heaven becomes permanent, when it cannot be lost, it is moksha, it is absolute freedom. Then bliss has become your nature then heaven and hell have disappeared. Then wherever you are, it will make no difference. This third state is the aim. But you cannot reach the third if you are flickering, if you are wavering between heaven and hell; then nothing can be consolidated, integrated. Then you live in a flux, there is no crystallization, your being is liquid. Sometimes it moves to heaven, sometimes, to hell. Crystallization means you become more and more conscious, you become more and more centered, more and more grounded. Less asleep, you become more aware, and a moment comes -- even when you are asleep, you are conscious.
Ananda used to sleep with Buddha in his room. A buddha is worth watching, even in his sleep, so Ananda used to watch sometimes. A buddha asleep is such a beautiful phenomenon: he looks like a small child, innocent, with no burden of the day.
You dream only because you carry a burden, only because the day is incomplete. You have left many things incompleted; they have to be completed in the dream. You looked at a woman, you desired her, but it was not possible. Society, the law, the state, morality, your own conscience, diverted your attention. You escaped from the woman but she will follow you in the dream; the act has to be completed. You must make love to this woman, if not in reality then in the dream; only then will you feel at ease. The incomplete act becomes a burden.
A buddha sleeps dreamlessly because nothing is incomplete. There is no desire, no passion. Nothing arises and nothing remains; things pass as if in front of a mirror. A woman passes and Buddha looks but no passion arises. The woman has passed, the mirror is vacant again; there is no trace, no mark of it. He is dreamless. Even a child is not dreamless, even a child has desires. Maybe the desire is not for a woman, it may be for a new toy or for something else, but even a child dreams. Even a cat, a dog dreams. Look at a cat and you will feel it is dreaming of rats. It is jumping, catching; it is sometimes frustrated and sometimes very happy if the rat is caught. Look at a dog sleeping. You can feel it is dreaming about flies, about bones, about fighting. Sometimes it is tense, sometimes relaxed. The sleep is disturbed.
To look at a buddha while he is asleep is very beautiful, so Ananda used to watch. Buddha would go to sleep, and Ananda would sit and look at him. He was such a silent pool of being. Nothing was incomplete, everything, every moment was complete and perfect. There was no dream, there were no traces left; his mind was a clean mirror. The stream of consciousness was never muddled, it was crystal clear. Ananda became puzzled because Buddha always slept in the same posture. He would remain the whole night in the same posture; he would not change, he would remain in the same posture. That posture has become very famous -- it is called the lying posture. You may have seen Buddha's pictures. There are many statues in Ceylon, China, Japan and India. If you go to Ajanta, there is a statue of Buddha lying down. That posture, how Buddha lay, has been reported by Ananda. Buddha slept in the same posture the whole night, not even changing sides.
So one day Ananda asked, "Bhagwan, everything is okay, but one thing puzzles me: you remain in the same posture the whole night. Are you asleep or not? If someone is asleep he will change his posture. Are you asleep or not? Even while you are asleep or appear to be asleep, it appears you are alert. It seems you know what the body is doing; you will not even change your posture unconsciously.
Buddha said, "Yes, when the mind is silent, not dreaming, only the body sleeps. Consciousness remains alert." Krishna has said to Arjuna in the Gita, "While you sleep the yogi remains alert." Even in the night his sleep is not sleepy. His sleep is only in the body, a rest in the body, a relaxation in the body; his consciousness is alert. In reality a yogi's consciousness needs no relaxation; it is always relaxed, There is no tension.
Relaxation is needed because of tension. You are so tense the whole day, your consciousness has to be relaxed. A yogi's body relaxes because the body gets tired. His body is a mechanism; his consciousness is always alert, continually alert. It is a continuum of alertness.
When your consciousness becomes a continuum
there are no gaps in consciousness; when there is no darkness within you, your whole inner temple has become enlightened. The light has reached to every corner and no part of your inner house is in darkness. You are a mukta, a free man.
This is the meaning of a christ. You are Christ arisen, resurrected. Now there is no night for you, only the day exists; now the sun never sets. Heaven means consciousness, hell means unconsciousness: there is the possibility to move to either. When the possibility disappears there is no hell, no heaven -- there is a third; the ultimate opens the door. You become free, you become freedom. This is the goal.
Hakuin did well, but this could only have been done with a warrior. The warrior responded immediately -- he became angry, totally angry. If he had been a businessman, he would have smiled; anger would have been inside. He would not have been ready, immediately, to cut off Hakuin's head. Hakuin's response would have been useless. You do this also: when you are angry, you smile. You are so inauthentic and false, even in anger, you lie. Your love cannot be believed because even your anger is unbelievable.
Your whole life is a continuous lie: whatsoever you do, you are not truthful. Angry, you are not truthful; you smile, you paint it on, you hide it -- you show something else. Then you cannot be made alert that this is the gate of hell.
This warrior was like a child -- he became totally angry. He became so angry he was going to kill this man he had come to as a disciple. He had come in search of a master and he was going to kill this man. He was total. This totalness helped. If you are total in your anger you will be total when the anger disappears; if you are false in your anger you cannot be real in your silence.
Hakuin said, "Look, you have opened the door of hell." Immediately the samurai realized. This can be realized only if you are total and truthful, otherwise it cannot be realized.
You are such a deceiver you would have deceived Hakuin. You would have smiled. That means the door of hell would have been open but painted with the signboard of heaven. It would have looked from the outside as if it were heaven but inside it would have been hell. You would have divided and fragmented. No, it would not have been of much help. This warrior became so total in his anger, he lost all his consciousness. He became angry. He was not angry -- there was no one who was angry -- he simply became anger; his whole energy became anger, he was mad. At such a peak things can be realized. Then they become penetrative, then somebody can be made alert.
Hakuin said, "Look!" And the warrior could look. He was a truthful man. Then Hakuin said, "This is the gate of hell." and he could realize. When you are total, you can realize. Suddenly the anger disappeared. Because it was total, it disappeared; because it was total, it disappeared totally. If it had been fragmentary it could not have disappeared totally. It totally disappeared, totally. A deep silence was left behind. This is what I have been telling you continuously: Be total, be authentic, be true. If you are a sinner, be a true sinner; don't try to create a facade of being a saint. A true sinner is bound to become a true saint, sooner or later. Time is irrelevant. A true sinner is true, that is the point; sin is not the point.
I have heard, a peddler was caught and brought to court. He was peddling without a license. He was a new man in town but knew that a license was needed. There were a few other persons standing before the magistrate -- three women had also been caught. They were prostitutes without licenses. This is really a wonderful world -- governments even
issue licenses for prostitution. They were caught without licenses, so the magistrate asked the first woman, "What do you say? Who are you and what are you doing?" The woman said, "I am a model." She was lying. The magistrate sentenced her to thirty days hard labor.
He asked the second woman. She said, "Somewhere something is wrong. I have been caught wrongly; I am an actress." The magistrate sent her for sixty days.
He looked at the third woman. The third woman said, "My lord, I am a prostitute." The magistrate could not believe that anybody could be so truthful, that anybody could confess so truly. He said, "Authenticity has become so rare that you have shocked me. I have never encountered anyone who is truthful. Go, I forgive you. I'll not give you any punishment."
Then came the number of the peddler. The magistrate asked, "What were you doing?" He said, "To be frank, I am also a prostitute."
This is what is going on -- faces. False faces all over... deception. You are not even aware of how you deceive and who you are deceiving. There is no one to be deceived; you are deceiving yourself trying to escape, trying to hide.
That warrior was a true man; this untruthfulness was not there. He was ready to kill or to die; he became so inflamed he was a fire. The door was open. Your door is never completely open -- you sneak through the holes. Your heaven is also never open -- you enter from the back door. To be total is a basic thing for any seeker, for anyone in search of silence and truth.
When you are angry, be angry. Don't think of the consequences; let the consequences be there, suffer them, but don't deceive yourself. When entering hell, enter totally. Don't leave half your mind outside; go into it, pass through it, suffer it. Pain is going to be there but pain gives maturity; suffering is going to be there but you can transcend it if you understand. Only a total mind can understand. And when anger disappears, you will become so silent, so meditative. If you love, love totally; if you hate, hate totally. Don't be fragmentary; suffer the consequences. Because of consequences you try to deceive -- you are a peddler and you say you are a prostitute -- because of consequences, you are never angry, never hateful. Then you will miss heaven also. One who is incapable of opening the door of hell completely, will be incapable of opening, completely, the door of heaven. Go through hell. The path passes through there; heaven is achieved through hell.
This is the meaning of the anecdote. Hakuin first created hell for the warrior; hell must be created first. Hell is easy to create -- you are always ready, always knocking at the door. You are afraid but always ready; you are not courageous but always ready; you are not daring, but always ready. There is continuous turmoil inside. Hakuin could not have created heaven first; that is impossible, no one is ready. Heaven is very far away; hell is nearby, just around the corner. You move and you are in it.
I, also, cannot create heaven for you. That is why all my meditation techniques are designed to create hell first. People come to me and say, "Make us silent. Why do you insist on us going mad?" I cannot open the doors of heaven first and you cannot become silent. Be totally mad first. I create hell for you and you will have to pass through it. It is the nearest thing you can easily do. Heaven is very far away, and one who has not traveled through hell cannot reach heaven. My insistence is a very considered one.
You can understand the story now. Hakuin said to the warrior, "You, a samurai? Your
face looks like a beggar's." The samurai could not tolerate this, it was too much. A beggar? He would never beg, not even for his life. Immediately he was touched to his very core. A beggar? Impossible! The sword came out.
I am touching you, hitting you, hammering you in all my meditation techniques just to bring your hell out. But you are such cowards that even if you bring your hell out it will not be total. You play with it, you are not involved in it; you are fragmentary, you only become lukewarm. Lukewarm won't do. You have to be boiling, only then can you evaporate. The ego evaporates only at the boiling point, not before. You just become lukewarm. It is of no use, it is an unnecessary waste of heat; again, you will become cold. After meditation you will become cold, cold to the extreme. In your catharsis open the door of hell. I promise you, if you can open it I will open the other door immediately. It is always open; once you open the door of hell, it is near.
To say this much is enough: "Look, this is the gate of hell." Then the gate closes. And the other gate opens.
Anything more? Question 1 BELOVED OSHO,
HOW DOES WHAT YOU SAID ABOUT HEAVEN AND HELL TIE IN WITH WHAT YOU'VE BEEN SAYING ABOUT ROOTS AND WINGS? WHEN YOU SAY ROOTS INTO THIS EARTH AND WINGS INTO THAT HEAVEN, I'VE GOT A FEELING OF BEING INFINITELY STRETCHED -- THAT THIS EARTH IS CLOSE AND THAT HEAVEN IS FAR AWAY. WHAT IS THE SIGNIFICANCE OF "THIS" AND "THAT"?
This earth is close, not because it is close but because of you. That heaven is far away, not because it is far away, but because of you.
"This" means the world, "This" means the body -- these desires, these passions, the physical, the visible. "This" means all that has been condemned by religions. They are always against "this" and for "that." "That" means Brahma, "That" means moksha, "That" means the divine. "This" means the material world -- this devilish world, this which is condemned. All the religions have condemned this world.
I don't condemn it. I want to give you roots into this world.
All the religions have said unless you are uprooted from "this," you will not get wings into "that." They are against "this," against the world, the body, against the material, the visible. All you feel as near, they are against. They are for something very far away, something abstract -- God, Brahma, moksha. Nobody knows, nobody is in contact with it; there is no communion, no touch with it. It looks like a dream, like poetry, it looks imaginary. All religions have condemned "this." They say, "Be uprooted." That's why they call sannyas renouncing the world, renouncing "this." I do not. They have created a dualism... not only dualism, they have created antagonism between "this" and "that," between the physical and the spiritual.
To me, roots into "this" will help to give you wings into "that." I don't create any antagonism where there is none. Antagonism comes from a mind in conflict, from a mind in duality. Out of conflict, dual theories are created, conflicting theories. I am not dual; I create no conflict. I see "that" not against "this" but as a flowering of "this." I see wings not against roots but as a flowering of the roots. Trees have wings into the sky -- their
branches are their wings. They have roots into the earth and branches into the sky. I would like you to be a strong tree -- with roots into "this" and wings into "that."
My God is not against the world. My God is in the world. My God is the world. This earth is not against that heaven; they are two polarities of the same phenomenon.
"This" appears near you because your mind is not yet in a state to see the invisible. Your mind is so disturbed, so coarse, that you can see only the visible, the rough; the subtle escapes you. If your mind becomes silent, thoughtless, the subtle will become visible.
God is not invisible; he is visible everywhere. But your mind is not yet tuned to the subtle, to the invisible. The invisible can be seen. The word means that which cannot be seen, but no, the invisible can be seen; only you need more subtle, more refined eyes. A blind man cannot see, he cannot see that which is visible to you but his eyes can be cured and then he can see the sunlight, colors, rainbows. All that was invisible before has not become visible.
God is not invisible. You don't have the right eyes, that's all; You are not a tuned being for which the subtle opens its doors.
"This" and "that," for me, are not divided; "This" reaches into "that", "that" comes into "this." For you, "that" means the far away -- not for me. For me, "This" is "that" and someday it will be the case for you also: "this" will be "that." This world is God. The visible hides the invisible. That's why my sannyas is not a renunciation. My sannyas is not against anything; it is for the totality, for the whole.
Be rooted in the earth so that you can stretch to the sky; be rooted in the visible so that you can reach into the invisible. Don't create duality and don't create any antagonism. If I am against anything, I am against antagonism. I am against being against anything; I am for the whole, the complete circle. The world and God are not divided anywhere. There is no boundary: the world goes on spreading into God and God goes on spreading into the world. Really, to use two words is not good but language creates problems. We say the creator and the created, we divide. Language is dualistic; in reality there is no created and no creator, only creativity, only a process of infinite creativity. Nothing is divided.
Everything is one -- undivided.
Language is just like a political map. India, Pakistan, Bangladesh are divided on the political map, and if you ask the earth where India begins and Pakistan ends, the earth will laugh and think you mad. The earth is round, it is one; only on political maps is it not and maps are false. And politicians are madmen, madmen who have attained power. They are more dangerous than madmen who live in madhouses, because they have power.
Where do you end and I begin? Where is the point where we can draw a line between you and me? Where? There cannot be any demarcation. The air goes on flowing in you. You breathe: if even for a moment the air is not flowing in you, if the breath is not coming, you will be dead. And the air in me just a moment before has left me and entered you. It was my life just a moment before, now it is your life; and your breath has returned to me. It was your life, now it is my life. Where are we divided?
Life goes on flowing; life is something in between you and me. The tree goes on creating oxygen and you breathe it. If the trees disappear, you will disappear. The trees go on changing cosmic rays into food -- that is what fruit and vegetables are -- and if they disappear, you will be no more. They are constantly creating food for you, that's how you exist. Greenery is in a constant process of creating food for you; you depend on it.
The clouds go on moving, bringing water for you. The whole is connected. The faraway sun sends its rays to you and those rays are life. If the sun disappears, all life will disappear. Even the sun gets its energy from some source; scientists have not yet been able to find that source, but if that source disappears everything will disappear.
Everything is related, joined together. This world does not exist in fragments, it exists as a whole, one whole.
To me, "this" plus "that" is God. That's why I say very contradictory things. I would like to give you two things: roots into this earth, into all that is earthly, and wings into that heaven, into all that is abstract for you now, into all that you cannot even comprehend, that cannot be conceptualized. Roots into the finite, wings into the infinite... And you need not renounce "this." If you renounce "this," you are renouncing your roots. That has happened; that is why your monks, your sadhus, look so dead. They have renounced "this;" they are uprooted beings. Uproot a tree and you are exposing the part that was hidden in the earth. Soon the flowers will die, the branches will die, the leaves will start falling.
That's what is happening to your sannyasins, the so-called old sannyasins. They destroy their roots because they are against this earth and then their flowering stops. Have you ever seen an old sannyasin in a flowering state? -- one who is blossoming every day, one who is giving anew every day, one who is flowering into the unknown every day. No, you will find a rigid, patterned, disciplined being there, a dead being. Mahavira may have been alive but look at the followers of Mahavira. Look at their faces -- you cannot see any flowers there. Their eyes are dull and dead; they are uprooted trees. They have to be pitied; they need much help, much compassion. They are ill. Without roots they are bound to be ill. They may have destroyed their sex but they don't know that they have destroyed their love also. Sex is "this"; love is "that." When you destroy sex, you destroy love. I say go so deep into sex that it becomes love -- so deep that your very roots start flowering, that your very roots become blossoms. The beginning becomes the end, the seed becomes the tree. Go so deep into it that the other is found hidden there. It is always there. You can control your anger but then there will be no compassion. Go so deep into anger that your anger becomes compassion. Then something, a miracle, has happened to you. Then you will be blessed, then there will be benediction; then, only, there will be ecstasy.
This earth symbolizes all that has been condemned, and that heaven, all that has been desired. But I don't divide; to me, both are one. And the day will soon come for you too when you will be able to see that "this" is pregnant with "that." this world is just a womb for the divine; the earthly is just a cover, a protective cover, for the unearthly. The seed, the cell of the seed, is not against the tree, it is a protection. Matter is just a protection for the Divine.
Look, and always try to find the unity. In unity is religion, in disunity religion is lost. And avoid being against. If you are against, you will become rigid, hard, and the harder you become the more dead you will be.
I have heard that it once happened that a gang of robbers, by mistake, entered a monastery. They thought this house belonged to some rich man -- the monastery had a look of richness -- so they entered. But the monks gave them such a hard fight they were happy when they succeeded in escaping. When they met again outside the town, one of the robbers philosophized, "Not bad, we have a hundred rupees among us." The leader
said, "You fools! I have always told you to avoid monks. We had five hundred rupees when we entered the monastery!" I also say to you: avoid monks. If you enter the monastery with five hundred flowers, you will have only one hundred when you come out. They are enemies, enemies of "this," and I say those who are enemies of "this" are bound to be enemies of "that" -- whether they know it or not.
Love "this" and love it so deeply that your love transcends "this" and reaches "that." That's what I mean: roots into this earth, and wings into that heaven.
A Bird on the Wing Chapter #4
Chapter title: Have a Cup of Tea. 13 June 1974 am in Buddha Hall
Archive code: 7406130 ShortTitle: WING04 Audio: Yes Video: No
Length: 95 mins
BELOVED OSHO,
JOSHU, THE ZEN MASTER, ASKED A NEW MONK IN THE MONASTERY, "HAVE I SEEN YOU BEFORE?"
THE NEW MONK REPLIED, "NO SIR." JOSHU SAID, "THEN HAVE A CUP OF TEA."
JOSHU THEN TURNED TO ANOTHER MONK, "HAVE I SEEN YOU HERE BEFORE?
THE SECOND MONK SAID, "YES SIR, OF COURSE YOU HAVE." JOSHU SAID, "THEN HAVE A CUP OF TEA."
LATER THE MANAGING MONK OF THE MONASTERY ASKED JOSHU, "HOW IS IT YOU MAKE THE SAME OFFER OF TEA TO ANY REPLY?"
AT THIS JOSHU SHOUTED, "MANAGER, ARE YOU STILL HERE?" THE MANAGER REPLIED, "OF COURSE, MASTER."
JOSHU SAID, "THEN HAVE A CUP OF TEA.
The story is simple, but difficult to understand. It is always so. The more simple a thing the more difficult it is to understand. To understand, something complex is needed; to understand, you have to divide and analyze. A simple thing cannot be divided and analyzed; there is nothing to divide and analyze -- the thing is so simple. The simplest always escapes understanding, that is why God cannot be understood. God is the simplest thing, absolutely the simplest thing possible. The world can be understood; it is very complex. The more complex a thing is, the more the mind can work in it. When it is simple there is nothing to grind, the mind cannot work.
Logicians say simple qualities are indefinable. For example, somebody asks you what yellow is. It is such a simple quality, the color yellow, how will you define it? You will say, "Yellow is yellow." The man will say, "That I know, but what is the definition of
yellow?" If you say yellow is yellow you are not defining, you are simply repeating the same thing again. It is a tautology.
G.E. Moore, one of the most penetrating minds of this century, has written a book, Principia Ethica. The whole book consists of a very persistent effort to define what is good. Making efforts from all directions, in two or three hundred pages -- and two, three hundred pages of G.E. Moore is worth three thousand pages of anybody else -- he came to the conclusion that good is indefinable. Good cannot be defined -- it is such a simple quality. When something is complex there are many things in it; you can define one thing by another that is present there. If you and I are in a room and you ask me, "Who are you?" I can at least say I am not you. This will become the definition, the indication. But if I am alone in a room and I ask myself the question, "Who am I?" the question resounds but there is no answer. How to define it?
That is why God has been missed. Intellect denies it, reason says no. God is the simplest denominator in existence -- the simplest and the most basic. When the mind stops there is nothing other than God, so how to define God? He is alone in the room. That is why religions try to divide, then definition is possible. They say, "This world is not that; God is not the world, God is not matter, God is not body, God is not desire." These are ways to define.
You have to put something against something, then a boundary can be drawn. How do you draw a boundary if there is no neighbor? Where do you place the fence of your house if there is no neighborhood? If there is no one beside you how can you fence in your house? Your house boundary consists of the presence of your neighbor. God is alone, he has no neighbor. Where does he begin? Where does he end? Nowhere. How can you define God? Just to define God, the Devil was created. God is not the Devil -- at least this much can be said. You may not be able to say what God is but you can say what he is not: God is not the world.
I was just reading one Christian theologian's book. He says God is everything except evil. This, too, is enough to define. He says, "All except evil." This much will draw a boundary. He is not aware, if God is everything then from where does this evil come? It must be coming from everything. Otherwise there is some other source of existence besides God, and that other source of existence becomes equivalent to God. Then evil can never be destroyed, then it has its own source of existence; then evil is not dependent on God so how can God destroy it? God will not destroy it. Once evil is destroyed God cannot be defined. To define him he needs the Devil to be there always, just around him. Saints need sinners, otherwise they would not be there. How will you know who is a saint? Every saint needs sinners around him; those sinners make the boundary.
The first thing to be understood is that complex things can be understood, simple things cannot. A simple thing is alone. This Joshu story is very simple. It is so simple it escapes you: you try to grip it, you try to grab it -- it escapes. It is so simple that your mind cannot work on it. Try to feel the story. I will not say try to understand because you cannot understand it -- try to feel the story. Many things are hidden if you try to feel them; if you try to understand it nothing is there -- the whole anecdote is absurd.
Joshu saw one monk and asked, "Have I seen you before?"
The man said, "No sir, there is no possibility. I have come for the first time, I am a stranger -- you could not have seen me before.
Joshu said, "Okay, then have a cup of tea."Then he asked another monk, "Have I seen you before?"
The monk said, "Yes sir, you must have seen me. I have always been here; I am not a stranger."
The monk must have been a disciple of Joshu's, and Joshu said, "Okay, then have a cup of tea."
The manager of the monastery was puzzled: with two different persons responding in different ways, two different answers were needed. But Joshu responded in the same way
-- to the stranger and to the friend, to one who has come for the first time and to one who has been here always. To the unknown and to the known Joshu responded in the same way. He made no distinction, none at all. He didn't say, "You are a stranger. Welcome! Have a cup of tea." He didn't say to the other, "You have always been here, so there is no need for a cup of tea." Nor did he say, "You have always been here so there is no need to respond."
Familiarity creates boredom; you never receive the familiar. You never look at your wife. She has been with you for many, many years and you have completely forgotten that she exists. What is the face of your wife? Have you looked at her recently? You may have completely forgotten her face. If you close your eyes and meditate and remember, you may remember the face you looked on for the first time. But your wife has been a flux, a river, constantly changing. The face has changed; now she has become old. The river has been flowing and flowing, new bends have been reached; the body has changed. Have you looked at her recently? Your wife is so familiar there is no need to look. We look at something which is unfamiliar; we look at something which strikes us as strange. They say familiarity breeds contempt: it breeds boredom.
I have heard one anecdote: two businessmen, very rich, were relaxing on Miami Beach. They were lying down, taking a sunbath. One said, "I can never understand what people see in Elizabeth Taylor, the actress. I don't understand what people see, why they become so mad. What is there? You take her eyes away, you take her hair away, you take her lips away, you take her figure away, and what is left, what have you got?"
The other man grunted, became sad and replied, "My wife -- that's what's left."
That is what has become of your wife, of your husband -- nothing is left. Because of familiarity, everything has disappeared. Your husband is a ghost; your wife is a ghost with no figure, with no lips, with no eyes -- just an ugly phenomenon. This has not always been so. You fell in love with this woman once. That moment is there no longer; now you don't look at her at all. Husbands and wives avoid looking at each other. I have stayed with many families and watched husbands and wives avoid looking at each other. They have created many games to avoid looking; they are always uneasy when they are left alone. A guest is always welcome; both can look at the guest and avoid each other. Joshu seems to be absolutely different, behaving in the same way with a stranger and a friend. The monk said, "I have always been here sir, you know me well."
And Joshu said, "Then have a cup of tea." The manager couldn't understand. Managers are always stupid; to manage, a stupid mind is needed. And a manager can never be deeply meditative. It is difficult: he has to be mathematical, calculating; he has to see the world and arrange things accordingly. The manager became disturbed. What is this?
What is happening? This looks illogical. It's okay to offer a cup of tea to a stranger but to
this disciple who has always been here? So he asked, "Why do you respond in the same way to different persons, to different questions?"
Joshu called loudly, "Manager, are you here?" The manager said, "Yes sir, of course I am here."
And Joshu said, "Then have a cup of tea." This asking loudly, "Manager, are you here?" is calling his presence, his awareness. Awareness is always new, it is always a stranger, the unknown. The body becomes familiar not the soul -- never. You may know the body of your wife; you will never know the unknown hidden person. Never. That cannot be known, you cannot know it. It is a mystery; you cannot explain it. When Joshu called, "Manager, are you here?" suddenly the manager became aware. He forgot that he was a manager, he forgot that he was a body; he responded from his heart. He said, "Yes sir." This asking loudly was so sudden, it was just like a shock. And it was futile, that's why he said, "Of course I am here. You need not ask me, the question is irrelevant." Suddenly the past, the old, the mind, dropped. The manager was there no more -- simply a consciousness was responding. Consciousness is always new, constantly new; it is always being born; it is never old. And Joshu said, "Then have a cup of tea." The first thing to be felt is that for Joshu, everything is new, strange, mysterious. Whether it is the known or the unknown, the familiar or the unfamiliar, it makes no difference. If you come to this garden every day, by and by you will stop looking at the trees. You will think you have already looked at them, that you know them. By and by you will stop listening to the birds; they will be singing, but you will not listen. You will have become familiar; your eyes are closed, your ears are closed. If Joshu comes to this garden -- and he may have been coming every day for many, many lives -- he will hear the birds, he will look at the trees. Everything, every moment, is new for him.
This is what awareness means. For awareness everything is constantly new. Nothing is old, nothing can be old. Everything is being created every moment -- it is a continuous flow of creativity. Awareness never carries memory as a burden.
The first thing: a meditative mind always lives in the new, in the fresh. The whole existence is newly born -- as fresh as a dewdrop, as fresh as a leaf coming out in the spring. It is just like the eyes of a newborn babe: everything is fresh, clear, with no dust on it. This is the first thing to be felt. If you look at the world and feel everything is old, it shows you are not meditative. When you feel everything is old, it shows you have an old mind, a rotten mind. If your mind is fresh, the world is fresh. The world is not the question, the mirror is the question. If there is dust on the mirror the world is old; if there is no dust on the mirror how can the world be old? If things get old you will live in boredom; everybody lives in boredom; everybody is bored to death.
Look at people's faces. They carry life as a burden -- boring, with no meaning. It seems that everything is just a nightmare, a very cruel joke, that somebody is playing a trick, torturing them. Life is not a celebration, it cannot be. With a mind burdened by memory life cannot be a celebration. Even if you laugh, your laughter carries boredom. Look at people laughing: they laugh with an effort. Their laugh may be just to be mannerly, their laugh may be just etiquette.
I have heard about one dignitary who went to Africa to visit a community, a very old, primitive community of aborigines. He gave a long lecture. He told a very long anecdote
-- for almost half an hour the anecdote continued -- then the interpreter stood up. He spoke only four words and the primitives laughed heartily. The dignitary was puzzled. He
had been telling the anecdote for half an hour, how could it be translated in four words? It seemed impossible. And people understood; they were laughing, a belly laugh. Puzzled, he said to the interpreter, "You have done a miracle. You have spoken only four words. I don't know what you said but how can you translate my story, which was so long, into only four words?"
The interpreter said, "Story too long, so I say, 'He says joke -- laugh.' "
What type of laughter will come out? Just mannerly etiquette will come out, and this man has been laboring for half an hour. Look at people's laughter. It is a mental thing, they are making an effort; their laughter is false. It is painted, it is just on the lips, it is an exercise of the face. It is not coming from their being, from the source, it is not coming from the belly; it is a created thing. It is obvious that we are bored, and whatsoever we do will come out of this boredom and will create more boredom. You cannot celebrate.
Celebration is possible only when existence is a continuous newness, and existence is always young. When nothing grows old, when nothing really dies -- because everything is constantly reborn -- it becomes a dance. Then it is an inner music flowing. Whether you play an instrument or not is not the point, the music is flowing.
I have heard a story. It happened in Ajmer... You must have heard about one Sufi mystic, Moinuddin Chishti, whose dargah, whose tomb, is in Ajmer. Chishti was a great mystic, one of the greatest ever born, and he was a musician. To be a musician is to be against Islam because music is prohibited. He played on the sitar and on other instruments. He was a great musician and he enjoyed it. Five times every day, when a Mohammedan is required to pray the five ritual prayers, he wouldn't pray, he would simply play on his instrument. That was his prayer.
This was absolutely anti-religious but nobody could say anything to Chishti. Many times people would come to tell him so and he would start singing, and the song would be so beautiful they would forget completely why they had come. He would start playing on his instrument and it would be so prayerful that even scholars and pundits and maulvis who had come to object, wouldn't object. They would remember at home; when they were back at home they would remember why they had come.
Chisthi's fame spread over the world. From every part of the world, people started coming. One man, Jilani, himself a great mystic, came from Baghdad just to see Chishti. When Chishti heard that Jilani was coming he felt, "To pay respect to Jilani it will not be good to play my instrument now. Because he is such an orthodox Mohammedan, it will not be a good welcome. He may feel hurt." So only for that day, in his whole life, he decided he would not play, he would not sing. He waited from morning and in the afternoon Jilani came. Chishti had hidden his instruments.
When Jilani came and they both sat in silence, the instruments started to make music -- the whole room was filled. Chishti became very puzzled over what to do. He had hidden them, and such music he had never known before. Jilani laughed and said, "Rules are not for you, you need not hide them. Rules are for ordinary people, rules are not for you -- you should not hide them. How can you hide your soul? Your hands may not play, you may not sing from your throat, but your whole being is musical. And this whole room is filled with so much music, with so many vibrations that now the whole room is playing by itself."
When your mind is fresh the whole existence becomes a melody. When you are fresh, freshness is everywhere and the whole existence responds. When you are young, not
burdened by memory, everything is young and new and strange. This Joshu is wonderful. This has to be felt deeply, then you will be able to understand. But that understanding will be more like feeling than understanding -- not mental but from the heart. Many more dimensions are hidden in this story. Another dimension is that when you come to an enlightened person whatsoever you say makes no difference, his response will be the same. Your questions, your answers are not meaningful, not relevant; his response will be the same. To all the three Joshu responded in the same way because an enlightened person remains the same. No situation changes him; the situation is not relevant. You are changed by the situation, you are completely changed; you are manipulated by the situation. Meeting a person who is a stranger, you behave differently. You are more tense, trying to judge the situation: What type of man is this? Is he dangerous, not dangerous? Will he prove friendly or not? You look with fear. That's why with strangers you feel an uneasiness.
If you are traveling in a train, the first thing you will see is passengers asking each other what they do, what their religion is, where they are going. What is the need of these questions? These questions are meaningful because then they can be at ease. If you are Hindu and they are also Hindu, they can relax -- the man is not very strange. But if you say that you are Mohammedan, the Hindu becomes tense. Then some danger is there, some stranger is there. He will make a little space between you and him; he cannot be at ease, he cannot relax. He may even change his seat. But even a Mohammedan is religious. If you say, "I am an atheist, I am not religious at all; I don't belong to any religion," then you are even more of a stranger. An atheist? Then he will feel that just sitting by your side he will become impure. You are like a disease; he will avoid you.
People start asking questions not because they are very curious about you; no, they just want to judge the situation -- whether they can relax, whether they are in a familiar atmosphere or if something strange is there. They are on their safeguard and this is their inquiry for safety.
Your face changes continuously. If you see a stranger you have a different face; if you see a friend, immediately the face changes; if your servant is there you have a different face; if your master is there you have a different face. You continuously change your masks because you depend on the situation. You don't have a soul, you are not integrated, things around you change you. That is not the case with a Joshu. With a Joshu, the case is totally different. He changes his surroundings, he is not changed by his surroundings.
Whatsoever happens around him is irrelevant, his face remains the same; there is no need to change the mask.
It is reported that once a governor came to see Joshu. Of course, he was a great politician, a powerful man -- a governor. He wrote on a paper, "I have come to see you," his name, and governor of this-and-this state. He must have knowingly or unknowingly wanted to influence Joshu.
Joshu looked at the paper, threw it away and said to the man who had brought the message, "Say I don't want to see this fellow at all. Throw him out."
The man went and said, "Joshu has said, 'Throw him out.' He has thrown your paper away and said, 'I don't want to see this fellow.' "
The governor understood. He wrote again on a paper just his name and, "I would like to see you."
The paper reached Joshu and he said, "So this is the fellow! Bring him in."
The governor came in and he asked, "But why did you behave in such a strange way? You said, 'Throw this man out.' "
Joshu said, "Faces are not allowed here. "Governor" is a face, a mask. I recognize you very well, but I don't recognize masks, and if you have come with a mask you are not allowed. Now it is okay; I know you very well but I don't know any governor. The next time you come leave the governor behind, leave it at your house; don't bring it with you." We are almost continuously using faces; immediately we change. If we see changes in the situation we change immediately, as if we have no integrated soul, no crystallized soul.
For Joshu, everything is the same -- this stranger, this friend, a disciple, this manager. With his response, "Have a cup of tea," he remains the same inside. And why have a cup of tea? This is a very symbolic thing for Zen masters. Tea was discovered by Zen masters and tea is not an ordinary thing for them. In every Zen monastery they have a tearoom. It is special, just like a temple. You will not be able to follow this... because tea is a very religious thing for a Zen master or a Zen monastery. Tea is just like prayer. It was discovered by them.
In India, if you see a sannyasin drinking tea, you will feel he is not a good man. Gandhi would not allow anybody in his ashram to drink tea. Tea was prohibited, it was a sin; nobody was allowed to take tea. If Gandhi had read this story he would have been hurt: an enlightened person, Joshu, asking people, inviting people to have tea? But Zen has a different attitude towards tea. The very name comes from a Chinese monastery, Ta.
There, for the first time, they discovered tea, and they found that tea helps meditation because tea makes you more alert, it gives you a certain awareness. That's why if you take tea you will find it difficult to go to sleep immediately. They found tea helps awareness, alertness, so in a Zen monastery tea is part of meditation. What more can Joshu offer than awareness? When he says, "Have a cup of tea," he is saying, " Have a cup of awareness." Tea is very symbolic for them. He says, "Have a cup of awareness." That is all that enlightenment can do. If you come to me what can I offer you? I have nothing other than a cup of tea.
To the familiar or unfamiliar, to a friend or a stranger, or even to the manager who has always been there managing his monastery, Have a cup of tea. That's all a Buddha can offer to anybody, but there is nothing more valuable than that. In Zen monasteries they have a tearoom. It is like a temple, the most sacred place. You cannot enter with your shoes because it is a tearoom; you cannot enter without taking a bath. Tea means awareness and the ritual is just like prayer. When people enter a tearoom they become silent; when they enter the room no talk is allowed, they become silent. They sit on the floor in a meditative posture and then the hostess or the host prepares tea. Everybody is silent. The tea starts boiling and everybody has to listen to it, to the sound, to the kettle creating music. Everybody has to listen to it. The drinking has started though the tea is not even ready.
If you ask Zen people they will say; tea is not something that you pour with unawareness and drink like any other drink. It is not a drink, it is meditation; it is prayer. So they listen to the kettle creating a melody, and in that listening they become more silent, more alert. Then cups are put before them and they touch them. Those cups are not ordinary; every monastery has its own unique cups, they prepare their own cups. Even if they are purchased from the market, first they break them then glue them again so the cup
becomes special, so you cannot find any replica of it anywhere else. Then everybody touches the cup, feels the cup. The cup means the body; if tea means awareness, then the cup means the body. And if you have to be alert, you have to be alert from the very roots of your body. Touching, they are alert, meditating. Then the tea is poured. The aroma comes, the smell. This takes a long time -- one hour, two hours -- so it is not just within a minute that you have drunk the tea, thrown the cup down and gone away. No, it is a long process -- slow, so that you become aware of each step. And then they drink. The taste, the heat -- everything has to be done with very alert mindfulness. That's why the master gives the tea to the disciple. With a master pouring tea in your cup you will be more alert and aware; with a servant pouring tea in your cup you can simply forget him. When Joshu pours tea in your cup -- if I come and pour tea in your cup -- your mind will stop, you will be silent. Something special is happening, something sacred. Tea becomes a meditation.
Joshu said, have a cup of tea, to all three. Tea was just an excuse. Joshu will give them more awareness, and awareness comes through sensitivity. You have to be more sensitive whatsoever you do, so even a trivial thing like tea... Can you find anything more trivial than tea? Can you find anything more mean, more ordinary than tea? No, you cannot.
And Zen monks and masters have raised this most ordinary thing into the most extraordinary. They have bridged "this" and "that", as if tea and God have become one. Unless tea becomes divine you will not be divine, because the least has to be raised to the most, the ordinary has to be raised to the extraordinary, the earth has to be made heaven. They have to be bridged, no gap should be left.
If you go to a Zen monastery and you see a master drinking tea, with an Indian mind you will feel very much disturbed. What type of man is this, drinking tea? Can you conceive Buddha under a Bodhi tree drinking tea? You cannot conceive it; it is inconceivable. The Indian mind has been talking about nonduality but has created much duality. You have been listening to advaita, the unity, the one, but whatsoever you have done, you have created two. And you have created such a gap between the two that they look unbridgeable. Because of this Shankara had to talk about maya and illusion. You have created such a gap between this world and that world, they cannot be bridged. So what to do?
Shankara said: This world is illusory. You need not bridge; this world is not. That is the only way to come to one; you have to deny the other completely. But denial won't help; even if you say this world is illusory, it is there. And why do you insist so much that it is illusory if it is not really there? What is the problem? Why is it that Shankara went his whole life teaching people this world is illusory? Nobody bothers if it is illusory. If Shankara knew it is illusory, then why bother about it? It seems some problem is there. It cannot be bridged so the only way is to drop it completely from consciousness, to say it is not there so only one remains. We have only one way to come to the one -- to deny the other.
Zen has another way to bridge, and I think it is more beautiful; there is no need to deny the other. And you cannot deny: even in denial you will assert. If you say this world doesn't exist, you have to indicate this world, which is nowhere, so what are you indicating? What are you pointing your finger at if there is nothing? Then you are foolish. This world exists, and if you say it is illusory, it is only an interpretation. If this world is illusory "that" cannot be real, because from "this", "that" has to be achieved. If this world
is illusory then your Brahma cannot be real. If the creation is illusory how can the creator be real? -- because the creation comes from the creator. If the Ganges is illusory how can the Gangotri be real? If I am illusory then my parents are bound to be illusory, because only out of dream is a dream born. If they are real then the child must be real.
Zen says both are real, but both are not two. Bridge them -- so tea becomes prayer, so the most profane thing becomes the most sacred. It is a symbol. And Zen says if your ordinary life becomes extraordinary, only then are you spiritual. Otherwise, you are not spiritual. In the ordinary the extraordinary has to be found; in the familiar, the strange; in the known, the unknown; in the near, the far; in "this," "that." So Joshu said, "Come and have a cup of tea."
One more dimension is there in the story and that dimension is of welcome. Everybody is welcome. Who you are is not relevant, you are welcome. At the gate of an enlightened master, at the gate of a Joshu or a Buddha, everybody is welcome. The door is, in a sense, open: Come in and have a cup of tea. What does this mean: Come in and have a cup of tea? Joshu was saying: Come in and relax.
If you go to other so-called masters, so-called monks and sannyasins, you will become more tense; you cannot relax. Go to a sannyasin: you become more tense, you become more afraid. And he creates guilt; he will look at you with condemnatory eyes, and the very way he will look at you will say you are a sinner. And he will start condemning: This is wrong, that is wrong; leave this, leave that. This is not the way of a really enlightened person. He will make you feel relaxed. There is a Chinese saying that if you reach a really great man you will feel relaxed with him; if you reach a false great man he will create tension within you. He will make, knowingly or unknowingly, every effort to show that you are low, a sinner; that he is high, above, transcendental.
A buddha will help you to relax, because only in your deep relaxation will you also become a buddha. There is no other way.
"Have a cup of tea," Joshu said. "Come relax with me." The tea is symbolic -- Relax. If you are drinking tea with a buddha, you will immediately feel that you are not alien, not strangers. Buddha pouring tea in your cup... Buddha has come down to you. Buddha has come to "this", he has brought "that" to "this". Christians, Jews, cannot conceive it; Mohammedans cannot conceive it. If you knock at the gate of heaven, can you conceive of God coming and telling you, "Come, have a cup of tea." It looks so profane. God will be sitting on his throne looking at you with his thousand eyes, looking at every nook and corner of your being, at how many sins you have committed. Judgment will be there.
This Joshu is nonjudgmental. He does not judge you, he simply accepts. Whatsoever you say, he accepts and says, "Come and relax with me." Relaxation is the point. And if you can relax with an enlightened person his enlightenment will start penetrating you, because when you are relaxed you become porous. When you are tense you are closed; when you relax he will enter. When you are relaxed, comfortable, drinking tea, Joshu is doing something then. He cannot enter through your mind but he can enter through your heart. Asking you to have a cup of tea is making you relaxed, friendly, bringing you nearer, closer. Remember, whenever you are taking food and drinking something with someone, you become very intimate. Food and sex are the only two intimacies. In sex you are intimate, in food you are intimate. And food is more basic an intimacy than sex, because when a child is born the first thing he will receive from the mother will be food. Sex will come later on when he becomes mature sexually, fourteen, fifteen years
afterwards. The first thing you received in this world was food and that food was a drink. So the first intimacy known in this world is between a mother and a child.
Joshu was saying, "Come, have a cup of tea. Let me become your mother. Let me give you a drink." And a master is a mother. I insist that a master is a mother. A master is not a father, and Christians are wrong when they call their priests "father," because father is a very unnatural thing, a societal phenomenon. The father doesn't exist anywhere in nature except in human society; it is a created thing, a cultured thing. The mother is natural. It exists without any culture, education, society, it is there in nature. Even trees have mothers. You may not have heard that not only does your mother give you life, but even a tree has a mother. They have been experimenting in England. There is a special lab, Delaware, where they have been experimenting with plants, and they have come to discover a very mysterious phenomenon. If a seed is thrown in the soil, and the mother from where the seed has been taken is near, it sprouts sooner. If the mother is not near, it takes a longer time. If the mother has been destroyed, cut, then it takes a very long time for the seed to sprout. The presence of the mother, even for a seed, is helpful.
A master is a mother, he is not a father. With a father you are related only intellectually, with a mother your relation is total. You have been part of your mother, you belong to her totally. The same is the case with a master in the reverse order. You have come out of the mother, you will go into the master. It is a returning back to the source.
So Zen masters always invite you for a drink. They are saying in a symbolic way, "Come and become a child to me, let me become your mother; let me become your second womb. Enter me, I will give you a rebirth."
Food is intimacy, and it is so deeprooted in you that your whole life is affected by it. Men all over the world, in different societies, different cultures, go on thinking of women's breasts. In paintings, sculpture, films, novels -- whatsoever -- the breast remains the central point. Why so much attraction for the breast? That has been the first intimacy with the world; you came to know existence through it. The breast was the first touch of the world. For the first time you came near to existence, for the first time you knew the other
-- from the breast. That's why so much attraction for the breast. You cannot be attracted towards a woman who has no breasts, flat breasts. It is difficult because you cannot feel the mother there. So even an ugly woman becomes attractive if she has beautiful breasts -
- as if breasts were the point, the central thing in the being. And what is the breast? The breast is food. Sex comes later, food comes first.
Joshu's calling all the three to come and have a cup of tea was calling them to an intimacy. Friends eat together, so if you see a stranger coming near you when you are eating you will feel uncomfortable. Strangers feel uncomfortable if they eat together. That's why in a hotel, in a restaurant, things have gone very wrong. Because you are eating with strangers the food becomes poisonous; you are so strained and tense. It is not a family you are not relaxed.
Food prepared by someone who loves you has a different quality altogether; even the chemical quality changes. And psychologists say when your wife is angry don't allow her to prepare food; it becomes poisonous.
It is difficult, because the wife is almost always angry. And psychologists say when you are eating, if your wife starts creating trouble -- talking, arguing -- stop eating.
But then you will die, because the wife almost always creates trouble while you are eating. This is a very non-loving world. The wife knows, if she has a small understanding, that the worst time to create any conflict is while the husband is taking food, because when he is strained, tense, not relaxed, food becomes poisonous and it will take a longer time to digest it. Psychologists say twice the time will be needed to digest the food and the whole body suffers.
Food is intimacy, it is love. And Zen masters always invite you for tea. They will take you in the tearoom and give you tea; they are giving you food, drink. They are telling you, "Become intimate. Don't stand so far away come nearer. Feel homey. ,"
These are the dimensions of the story, but they are dimensions of feeling. You cannot understand but you can feel, and feeling is a higher understanding love is a higher knowing. And the heart is the most supreme center of knowledge, not the mind; the mind is just secondary, workable, utilitarian. You can know the surface through the mind, you can never know the center.
But you have forgotten the heart completely, as if it has become a nothingness; you don't know anything about it.
If I talk about the heart, the heartcenter, you think about the lungs not about the heart. The lungs are not the heart; the lungs are just the body of the heartcenter. The heart is hidden in the lungs, somewhere deep down. Just as in your body the soul is hidden, in your lungs the heart is hidden. It is not a physical thing, so if you go to a physician he will say there is no heart, no heartcenter, only lungs.
The heart has its own ways of knowing. Joshu can be understood only through the heart. If you try to understand through the intellect it is possible you may misunderstand, but understanding is not possible - that much is certain.
Anything more? Question 1 BELOVED OSHO,
I FEEL I WANT TO BE CLOSE TO YOU, BUT AT THE SAME TIME I WANT TO RUN AS FAR AWAY FROM YOU AS I CAN. I DON'T UNDERSTAND THIS FEAR, SINCE I AM NOT AWARE OF A FEELING LIKE THIS ABOUT ANYONE ELSE.
It is natural, it is not something exceptional. Whenever you have a feeling to be closer to a man like me the fear will come, because to be close to me means to be dead, to be close to me means losing yourself. It is the same fear that grips a river when it comes to the ocean -- the banks will be lost, the river will be lost -- and every river tries to go back.
But there is no way.
If you feel a deep urge to come closer to me there is no way now to escape. You may try but you will be a failure; others have tried, others will go on trying. If you have a deep urge to come closer to me, you will have to come. You can only delay it; by escaping, struggling, you can delay it. You can postpone it, that's all, because the deep urge is
coming from your very being. Fear is only in the mind. The urge is coming from the deepest core of your being, to be closer. But fear comes in the mind because the closeness means death.
To be close to a master is death, your ego will have to go. The ego thinks, starts thinking, "I must escape before something happens; before I am lost, I must escape." The ego will continuously tell you to escape. The ego will find rationalizations; it will find faults in me just to help you escape; it will convince you in every way that this is the wrong man.
Love is deathlike, and no love is as deathlike as loving a master.
If you love a woman, you can dominate her. That's why lovers go on playing politics with each other, dominating, possessing; the fear is there that if you don't dominate you will be lost and the other will dominate, so they continuously fight. Husbands and wives, lovers, go on fighting; the fight is for existence, to survive. The fear is there, "I may be lost in the other."
But when you come to a master you cannot dominate him, you cannot fight with him. So fear is deeper because of that, because you cannot create any politics. Either you have to escape or merge, no other alternative is there. If you escape, from your very deep source of being you hear you are doing wrong; if you escape you will have to come back. If you come closer, the mind says: Where are you going? If you go closer still you may be burned. And it is right, the ego is right: The flame is there and if you come closer you will be burned. Conflict will be created; inner tension, anguish will be created. You can delay, that's all, sooner or later you will have to merge; no river can escape the ocean.
Once you have come closer you have come, and there is no way to go back. No way exists for going back.
You are here. You have traveled long; not only in physical space but also in the inner space you have traveled long. Many, many lives you have been traveling towards this point; you have desired it and now when the point has come nearer you become afraid. The fear is natural. Understand it, don't let it overpower you. Take a jump, and that jump will not only be a death it will be a rebirth. But you cannot know that. Only death, you see only death; the beyond that is hidden behind the death you cannot see. I can see it; I know you will be reborn.
But nobody can be reborn unless he dies; so death is not the goal and death is not the end, it is just a beginning. When you are ready to die you are ready to be reborn; the old will disappear and the absolutely new will come in its place. That new is struggling from the very core of your being; the old is struggling from the mind because the mind has memory -- the old, the past. The past and future are struggling within you. That is the problem.
Now it depends on you. If you are being overpowered by the past then you will delay, postpone, and you can delay it for many lives.
This is not the first time you have delayed; many times you have missed before. Many times you have come across a Buddha, a Mahavira, a Jesus and you escaped. You tried to avoid, you closed your eyes. Again and again you have been playing that game. But the game is natural to you I say, because you can see only death. The river can only see that she will dissolve, she cannot see that she will become the ocean. How can she see? That oceanic existence will be only when the river is no more, so the river cannot see. When your ego is no more, only then will you know who you are.
Don't allow the fear to overpower you, allow love to overpower you. Love comes from the center, fear always comes from the periphery; don't allow this periphery to be dominant. And what have you got to lose? Even if there is no rebirth -- there is rebirth -- but I say even if there is no rebirth and you simply die, what have you got to lose? What will be lost? What has the river got that is worth preserving? The life through the hills has been just a struggle; the life through the plains has been just a dirty passage. What has the river got to lose in the ocean? Nothing.
So think about it. What have you got to lose if you come closer? - your suffering? your madness? What have you got to lose? There is nothing to lose, but we never look within to see that we have got nothing to lose because that too gives fear. You like to think that you have got much to lose, that a treasure is there, and you will never look. There is no treasure, the house is empty; there has never been anything. But you are so afraid, you never look, because you know that there is nothing. Even a beggar dreams that he is an emperor; in dreams he becomes an emperor, enjoys. And then he is afraid: What if the kingdom is lost? But there has never been any kingdom.
You have come to me because there has never been any kingdom. You have nothing to lose, and now you become afraid. Look at the tricks of the mind, the deceptions of the mind; look into them.
A man entered a pet shop. He looked around, and he asked the shopkeeper, "How much will that big dog cost?" It was a very ferocious looking Alsatian.
The man said, "Five hundred rupees."
That was too much for him, so logically he said, "And how much will this small fellow cost?", - it was another dog of a smaller size.
The shopkeeper said, " One thousand rupees."
The man tried still.further. He said, "How much is this tiny one?" It was a very small dog. The man said, "Two thousand rupees."
The man became very puzzled and disturbed and then he asked, "How much will it cost if I don't purchase anything?" The rates are going higher and the dog is disappearing!
If I don't purchase anything, how much will it cost? - that is your fear. What will happen if you come closer to me? Nothing will happen because you have nothing to lose. And everything will happen, because once this nothing is lost everything becomes possible. Once this shelter which has become a bondage to you is lost the sky opens infinitely; once these banks which have been a prison to you are lost you become boundless, you become infinite.
Let the river move, unafraid, into the unknown, the uncharted. Death will be there, but death is always followed by rebirth. Die and be reborn, lose yourself and find. Fear comes from the mind, love comes from your heart; listen to the heart.
It happened once in a great palace of a king that there was a musical organ. He loved it very much but something had gone wrong, and the organ was so unique that nobody knew how to fix it. Nobody had ever seen one like it. This king had heard the organ when he was a very small child, when his father was alive, and since then something had gone wrong. But he loved the organ so much that he used to keep it in his room. It was beautiful; even from the outside it was beautiful. Many experts were called in vain. They made many efforts and things went from bad to worse; The organ was more and more destroyed. the king lost hope: the organ could not be fixed.
Then suddenly one day a beggar appeared. To the doorkeeper he said, "I have heard that something has gone wrong with the organ. I can fix it."The doorkeeper had the urge to laugh, because great experts from many capitals of the world had come, great musicians; they couldn't find what was wrong. They couldn't even recognize what type of organ this was and what type of music was created by it, it was so complex. He had the urge to laugh, but he looked at the beggar, and the voice, the beggar's eyes, seemed to be authentic; he was absolutely confident. He was a beggar but his face looked majestic. The doorkeeper's mind was saying, "It will be a wastage again," but his heart said," This man seems so confident, what is wrong if he tries?" So he took him to the king.
Looking at the beggar the king laughed, and he said, " Are you mad? Every type of expert has tried and failed. You must be mad. You think you can fix it?"
The beggar said, " Nothing more, no more harm can be done. The organ is already out of order, absolutely. I cannot harm it any more so what is the harm if you give me a chance?"
The king thought, "He is right, because nothing more harmful can be done." So he said, "Okay, you try." For many days the beggar disappeared behind the organ. He was working and working and working, and suddenly, one midnight, he started playing on the organ. The whole palace was filled with an unknown melody, something so divine that everybody ran to see. The king came out of his bedroom and said, "You have done it! It must have been very difficult. It was almost impossible. You have done a miracle!"
The man said, " No, it was not difficult because in the first place I made it. In your father's time I made this organ, so it was not difficult."
If you are ready, for one thing, no more harm can be done to you;
you are already harmed. I cannot harm you any more than you have been harmed - this much is certain. Look at my eyes and feel my voice; give me a chance. It is not difficult, I say to you. Once one is dissolved into the infinite, he is at the source of the thing from where he has come.
I am not there.
If I were there, if the ego were there, then it would be difficult. There is no expert in me; the expert died long ago. The ego is the expert; I don't know anything.
I am not there, I have disappeared; the ocean exists, God exists, not I.
In the first place, you are close to that thing from which you have come, and for God, nothing is impossible. In the first place, he created you. And I am not there, because otherwise it would be a very difficult thing. If I am there I will harm you; the ego can only harm. Experts can only destroy- they cannot fix you. You have been with many experts and they have done every type of thing that was possible, now you are beyond repair. But the river can fall in the ocean, and suddenly the melody arises; a music will come out of you, a music that you have not heard. It is just hidden in you -- the ego just has to be put out of the way.
I have heard: one school teacher was asking his first-graders, " How do you help your family at home?"
One small boy said, "I fix my bed myself."Another said, "I clean dishes." - and so on and so forth.
But then the teacher saw that one small boy, Johnny, had not answered. So he asked, " Johnny, what do you do?"
Johnny hesitated a moment and then he said, " Mostly, I keep out of the way."
You just keep yourself out of the way that's all! Don't come in between me and you, just keep out of the way. Even if you keep out of the way for a single moment the thing can happen: the old can die, the new can be born.
A Bird on the Wing Chapter #5
Chapter title: Master of the New Monastery 14 June 1974 am in Buddha Hall
Archive code: 7406140 ShortTitle: WING05 Audio: Yes Video: No
Length: 91 mins
BELOVED MASTER,
HYAKUJO CALLED HIS MONKS TOGETHER AS HE WISHED TO SEND ONE OF THEM TO OPEN A NEW MONASTERY. PLACING A FILLED WATER JAR ON THE GROUND, HE SAID, "WHO CAN SAY WHAT THIS IS WITHOUT USING ITS NAME?"
THE CHIEF MONK, WHO EXPECTED TO GET THE POSITION, SAID, "NO ONE CAN CALL IT A WOODEN SHOE." ANOTHER MONK SAID, "IT'S NOT A POND BECAUSE IT CAN BE CARRIED." THE COOKING MONK, WHO WAS STANDING NEARBY, WALKED OUT, KICKED THE JAR OVER, AND THEN WALKED AWAY.
HYAKUJO SMILED AND SAID, "THE COOKING MONK BECOMES THE MASTER OF THE NEW MONASTERY."
Reality cannot be known through thinking, it can be known through action. Thinking is just a dreamlike phenomenon, but the moment you act you have become part of the reality. Reality is activity, action; thinking is fragmentary. When you act you are total; whatever the action your whole being is involved in it. Thinking goes on in only a part of the mind, your whole being is not involved; without you thinking can continue as an automatic process.
This has to be understood deeply. This is one of the most basic things for those who are in search of truth and not in search of anything else. Religion and philosophy are distinct in this sense: religion is action, philosophy is thinking.
This story has many implications. The master wanted one, one disciple, to become the chief of the new monastery that was going to be opened. Who should be sent? Who should be made the guide there -- a man who has much philosophy in his mind, a man who can talk, discuss, argue, a man who is bookish, knowledgeable, or a man who can act spontaneously? He may not know much; he may be simple, not intellectual, but he will be total.
The chief disciple must have started dreaming, thinking he was going to be chosen. The mind is always ambitious. He must have planned how to behave, what to do, so that he
would be chosen as the chief of the new monastery. He must not have slept for many days, his mind must have been revolving around and around.
The ego plans and whatsoever it plans will miss reality. Reality can only be encountered spontaneously; if you think about it beforehand you may be ready but you will miss. A ready person will miss; this is the contradiction. A person who is not ready, who has not planned anything, who acts spontaneously, reaches the very heart of reality.
The chief disciple must have theorized, many alternatives must have come to his mind: The master is going to choose; there is going to be some sort of test. He must have consulted the scriptures. In the old days too, masters had been choosing disciples to be sent to new monasteries. How have they chosen? What sort of examination has to be passed? How could he succeed?
There are many stories from the ancient days but this has been, almost always, one of the basic tests Zen masters have put before their disciples -- they ask them to express something without using language. They say, "Say something about this thing but don't use any name. The name is not the thing."
The chair is here and I am sitting on it. A Zen master will say, "Say something about this chair but don't use the name. The word chair is not the chair. Don't use any verbal expression, don't use language and say something."
The mind feels puzzled because the mind knows only language, nothing else. If language is barred, the mind is barred. What else is the mind except verbal accumulation -- names, words, language?
A master says, "Don't use the name." He is saying, "Don't use the mind. Do something so that which the chair is, is expressed."
The word god is not God, the word man is not man,
the word rose is not a rose. The rose exists when language is not there; when there is no language, the tree exists- it is not dependent on language.
This chief monk must have brooded over and over again. He must have chosen, beforehand, an alternative. He was dead, that very moment he failed.
Inside, if you decide what you are going to do and you act out of that decision, you will miss reality. Reality is an ever-flowing movement. Nobody knows what is going to happen, nobody can predict it; it is unpredictable.
There is a Zen story: Two monasteries existed side by side and both the masters had small boys to run errands. Both the boys used to go to the market to fetch things for the masters -- sometimes vegetables, sometimes other things.
These monasteries were antagonistic towards each other, but boys will be boys. They would forget the doctrines and meet on the way and talk, enjoy. It was really prohibited to talk -- the other monastery was the enemy.
One day, the boy from the first monastery came and said, "I am puzzled. As I was going to the market, I saw the boy from the other monastery and asked him, `Where are you going?' He replied, `Wherever the wind blows.' I was at a loss as to what to say; he puzzled me.
The master said, "This is not good. Nobody from our monastery
has ever been defeated by the other monastery, not even a servant, so you must fix that boy. Tomorrow, ask again where he is going. He will say, `Wherever the wind blows,' so you say, `If there is no wind, then?' "
The boy couldn't sleep the whole night. He tried and tried to conceive of what would happen the next day; he rehearsed many times. He would ask and the other boy would respond and then he would give his answer.
The next day he waited on the road. The other boy came and he asked, "Where are you going?" The boy said, "Wherever my feet lead me."
He was at a loss as to what to do. His answer was fixed; reality is unpredictable. He came back very sad and said to the master, "That boy is not trustworthy. He changed and I was at a loss as to what to do."
So the master said, "Next day when he answers, `Wherever my feet lead,' you tell him, `If you are crippled and your legs are cut off, then?' "
Again he couldn't sleep. He went early to wait on the road. When the boy came he asked, "Where are you going?" And the boy said "To fetch vegetables from the market."
He became very disturbed and said to the master, "This boy is impossible: he goes on changing."
Life is that boy. Reality is not a fixed phenomenon. You have to be present, spontaneously in it -- only then will the response be real. If your answer is fixed beforehand you are already dead, you have already missed. Then tomorrow will come but you will not be there; you will be fixed in the yesterday, that which has passed.
All the minds which are too verbal are fixed like this. Go to a pundit, a scholar, and ask, "What is God?" Before you have asked he will start answering. Your question is not answered because even before you had the question this man had the answer. The answer is dead; it is there already, it has just to be brought from the memory.
This is the difference between a man of wisdom and a man of knowledge. A man of knowledge has ready-made answers: you ask and the answer is already there. You are irrelevant, your question is irrelevant. Before the question, the answer exists; your question simply triggers the memory.
If you go to a man of wisdom he has no answers for you; he has nothing ready-made. He is open, he is silent. He'll respond but first your question will resound in his being, not in his memory. Through his being the response comes; nobody can predict that response. If you go the next day and ask the same question, the response will not be the same.
Once it happened that a man tried to judge the Buddha. Every year he would go and ask the same question. He thought, "If he really knows then the answer will be always the same. How can you change the answer? If I come and ask, `Is there God?'- if he knows he will say yes or he will say no, and next year, I will come again and ask."
So for many years the man came and he became more and more puzzled. Sometimes Buddha would say yes, sometimes no, sometimes he would remain silent, and sometimes he would simply smile and not answer anything.
The man became puzzled and said, "What is this? If you know, then you must be certain, your answer fixed. But you go on changing. Once you said yes then you said no. Have you forgotten that I asked this question before? Once you even remained silent and now you are smiling. That is why I have been coming with the gap of a year -- just to see if you know or not."
Buddha said, "When you came for the first time and asked, `Is there God,' I answered. But my answer was not to the question, it was to you. You have changed, now the same answer cannot be given. Not only have you changed, I also have changed. The Ganges
has flowed much; the same answer cannot be given. I am not a scripture to be opened and the same answer found there."
A buddha is a living river, and a river is ever-flowing. In the morning it is different -- it reflects the gold of the rising sun. The mood is different. In the evening it is different, and when the night comes and the stars are reflected in it, it is different. In the summer it shrinks; it floods during the rains. A river is not a painting, it is a live force.
A painting remains the same whether it is raining or it is summer. A painted river will not be flooded in the rains; it is dead; otherwise there would be change. There is only one thing that goes on continuously and that is revolution. Everything else is impermanent except revolution. It goes on and on.
This chief disciple must have decided; the conclusion was already there. He was waiting only for the master to ask. Then the master put a jug before them, a pot filled with water, and said, "Say something and don't use language."
You are creating an impossible situation. How can something be said without using language? But if you cannot say something about an ordinary jug filled with water without using language, how will you be able to say anything about God, who is filled with the whole universe? If you cannot indicate this jug without language, how will you be able to indicate the great jug, the universe, God, the truth?
If you cannot indicate this, how will you be made chief of a monastery? People will be coming to you, not to know words but to know reality. People won't be coming to you to be trained in philosophy; that can be done by the universities - they teach words.
So what is the purpose of a monastery? A monastery has to teach reality not words; religion not philosophy; existence not theories. And if you can't say anything about an ordinary pot, what will you do when someone asks: What is God? What will you do when someone asks: Who am I?
The chief disciple answered, and whenever the mind faces such a situation the only way is to define negatively. If someone says to say something about God -- without naming, what will you do? You can only state it negatively. You can say: God is not this world,God is not matter.
Look at the dictionaries. Go to the Encyclopaedia Britannica and see how it defines things. You will be surprised: if you turn to the page where mind is defined you will find it defined as that which is not matter. Then turn to the page where matter is defined; you will find it defined as that which is not mind. What type of definition is this? When you ask about mind they say no-matter; when you ask about matter they say no-mind.
Nothing is defined; it is a vicious circle. If I ask about A you say it is not B; if I ask about B you say it is not A. You define one thing by another indefinable thing. How can this be done? This is a tricky thing. Dictionaries are the trickiest things in the world; they don't say anything and they appear to be saying so much. Everything is defined and everything is indefinable. Nothing can be defined.
So the chief disciple said something negatively. When the mind is at a loss as to what to do it starts saying things negatively. So maybe atheism is just an escape. God is there but how to define it? When the mind feels at a loss the easiest escape is to say there is no God, then the problem is finished.
Somebody said, "It is not a pond because it can be carried by hand."
How can you define a water-filled jug by just saying it is not a pond? What is a pond? Say something without naming it.
Then the cook of the monastery came. He must have been a more real man than these pundits -- a cook, who has never been much interested in the scriptures; a cook, who has been working with reality, encountering it, not thinking about it. This cook kicked the pot and went out.
What did he say? He said something in a more realistic way. Kicking is not thinking, it is action. He kicked the pot and said to the master, "This is nonsense, you are talking absurdities. You say to us to say something without words. Something can be done without words, but nothing can be said." He caught the point. Something can be done without words but nothing can be said. So he did something - he kicked the pot.
The master said, "This cook has been chosen. He goes to the new monastery and there becomes the master. He knows how to act without the mind; he knows how to answer without using the mind. He has said that the problem is absurd."
Remember one thing: if the problem is absurd you cannot answer it in a rational way. If you try you will be foolish; it shows foolishness. If the problem is absurd you cannot answer in a rational way; for an absurd question there can be no rational answer. If you try, you simply prove that you are foolish. That chief disciple must have been a foolish man; the other scholar, who said, "This is not a pond,"must have been a foolish man.
Scholars are foolish, otherwise they wouldn't be scholars. They are wasting their lives in words, scriptures. Nobody can waste his life in words unless he is absolutely stupid.
This cook was wiser- he kicked. He was not kicking the pot, he was kicking the whole problem; he was not kicking the pot, he was kicking the whole situation. He saw that it was absurd. He was not saying anything, not using a word. Just imagine that cook kicking the pot with his whole being. He was involved in it completely, mind, body, soul. The kick was alive, spontaneous; he didn't know it was going to be there. He may not even have thought that he was answering, he was just seeing what was going on - suddenly, the kick happened.
In this state of being, when the cook was just action, there was no mind in him, just an emptiness. Out of that emptiness, out of that no-mind, the action arose. When the action comes from the actor it is dead; when the action comes from the ego it is premeditated. When the action comes without the ego, without the mind, without you being there, when it bubbles up out of your nothingness, it is from the divine, it is total.
The cook didn't kick; rather, it was as if the whole existence kicked. He kicked all scholarship, all scriptures, the whole intellect and its vicious circles, and he walked out. He didn't wait. If he had waited to see what the master said he would have missed, because that would have meant that the mind was looking for the conclusion, for the result.
The mind is always result-oriented: What is going to happen? If I do this, then what will happen? If the cause is there, what will be the effect? The mind is always for the result; the mind is result-oriented.
This cook simply walked out. He didn't wait for what was going to happen; he didn't think that he would be chosen. How can you think that just by kicking a pot you will be chosen the master of a monastery? No, he didn't bother.
This is what Krishna says to Arjuna in the Gita, "Do! Act! But don't ask for the result. Kick and walk out."
Arjuna said, "If I fight, if I go through with this war, what will happen? What will be the result? Will it be good or bad? Will I gain or lose? Will killing so many people be worth the effort?"
Krishna says, "Don't think of the result. Leave the result to me: you simply act."
The mind cannot do that. Before the mind acts it asks for the result; it acts because of the result. If there will be a result, only then will it act.
People come to me and ask, "If we meditate, what will happen? What will be the result?" Remember, meditation can never be result-oriented; you simply meditate, that's all.
Everything happens but it will not be a result. If you are seeking the result nothing will happen; meditation will be useless.
When you seek a result, it is the mind; when you don't seek a result, it is meditation. Kick the pot and walk out, meditate and walk out; don't ask for the result. Don't say, "What will happen?" If you think about what will happen you cannot meditate. The mind goes on thinking about the result; it cannot be here and now, it is always in the future. You are meditating and thinking, "When will the happiness come? It has not come yet."
If you forget the result completely, if there is not even a flicker in the mind for the result, not a single vibration moving into the future - when you have become a silent pool, here and now everything happens. In meditation cause and effect are not two -.cause is the effect; the act and the result are not two - the act is the result - they are not divided. In meditation the seed and the tree are not two -, the seed is the tree.
For the mind everything is divided: the seed and the tree are two, the act and the result are two. The result is always in the future and the act is here, you act because of the future. For the mind the present is always sacrificed for the future, and the future does not exist. There is always the present, the eternal now, and you are sacrificing this now for something which is nowhere and cannot be anywhere.
In meditation the whole process is reversed. The future is sacrificed for the present; that which is not is sacrificed for that which is. There is no result, no conclusion. Kick the pot and walk out.
That was the beauty of it. The cook simply walked out saying, "The whole thing is absurd
-. your question and these people's answers. This is a nonsense game. I don't belong here." He must have gone to his kitchen and started working - that is how a meditative mind will act. And the master said, "This man is chosen, he becomes the chief of the new monastery. He knows how to be total, to act spontaneously; he knows how to act without motivation; he knows how to act without the mind. This man can lead others into meditation, this man can become a guide. This man has achieved.
The story is beautiful and very rare; penetrate into it. You can penetrate it but only if you start acting the way the cook acted. There is a pitfall - you can premeditate it. If I put a pot before you and you kick, you will miss; you know the answer already. You will think, "Okay now, this is the opportunity. I'll kick the pot and walk out." That won't do. You cannot deceive because whenever your mind is there your total being gives a different vibration. You cannot deceive a master.
And remember, this incident has been repeated many times. Zen masters are really unique. They go on repeating the same problem again and again, and those who read the scriptures behave in the old way. They think they already know the answer: kick the pot, walk out, and become the chief.
But you cannot deceive a Zen master. He is not concerned with what you are doing, he is concerned with what you are in that moment of doing. That is a totally different thing.
You have a perfume, a different perfume, when you act out of emptiness. And when I say a different perfume I mean it literally, I'm not using a metaphor. When you act out of emptiness there is a freshness all around you, as if suddenly a morning has come in the middle of the day. If you kick the pot ego will be there; the ego will do the kicking and you will be aggressive. When this cook kicked the pot it was not aggressive, it was simply a statement of fact; there was no violence.
I have heard that one man, a poor beggar - and I say "poor beggar" because there are wealthy beggars also - came to ask for food. The lady of the house felt much compassion for him and said, "I'll give you food, and if you want some work there is wood to chop. I'll pay you for it."
So the man worked, chopped the wood, and in the evening when he was about to go, the lady of the house said, "There is a hole in your robe. Give it to me and within minutes I will repair it.
The man said, "No, a hole in my robe makes all the difference. When you have a repaired dress it is premeditated poverty; when you have a hole in your robe it may have happened just now, through some accident. But when you have patched it, it looks ancient - it has not happened accidentally, just now; it's happened long before and now it's been patched and repaired. It becomes premeditated poverty. Let my poverty be spontaneous."
Your whole mind is premeditated poverty; you have all the answers and not a single response. You have already decided what to do, and in that decision you have murdered yourself, committed suicide. The mind is suicide.
Start acting spontaneously. It will be difficult in the beginning, you will feel much discomfort. With a premeditated answer there is less discomfort, you are more certain. Why are we not spontaneous? It is because of fear, the fear that the answer may be wrong. It's better to decide beforehand then you can be certain; but certainty always belongs to death.
Remember, life is always uncertain. Everything dead is certain, life is always uncertain. Everything dead is solid, fixed - its nature cannot be changed; everything alive is moving, changing - a flow, a liquid thing, flexible, able to move in any direction. The more you become certain, the more you will miss life. And those who know, know life is God. If you miss life, you miss God.
Act spontaneously. If there is discomfort in the beginning allow it to be there; don't hide it and don't suppress it - and don't imitate. Be childlike but don't be childish. If you are childlike, you will become a great saint; if you are childish, you will become a great, knowledgeable person.
A man returned to his house one day. He saw his children and the neighbor's children sitting on the steps, so he asked, "What are you doing?"
They said, " We are playing church."
He was puzzled; they were just sitting there doing nothing. He inquired, "What type of church is this?"
They said, "We have sung, preached, prayed. Everything has been done, now we are sitting on the steps, smoking."
You can imitate - knowledgeability is imitation. A buddha says something: you interpret it, you play church, you cram it in your mind, you repeat it. This is childish.
Be childlike not childish. Childlikeness is spontaneity. A child is fresh with no answers, no accumulated experience; he has, really, no memory, he acts; whatever comes through his being, he acts. He is not motivated, not thinking about results, about the future; he is innocent.
This cook was really innocent. Innocence is meditation. Start being meditative in your acts, just with small things: while eating, be spontaneous; while talking, be spontaneous; while walking, be spontaneous. Allow life to be a response not an answer. If somebody asks you something, just watch whether you are repeating something you always do, just a habit, or whether the answer is a response. Just watch whether the mind is repeating an old habit, whether the answer is coming from memory, or whether it is coming from you. Everybody bores everybody else because everything is dead, borrowed, stale, and stinks of death. It is not fresh. Look at children playing and you feel a freshness. For a moment you may even forget that you have become old. Listen to the birds, look at the trees or flowers and for a moment, forget. Here there is no mind.
Flowers are flowering: just like the cook kicked they are kicking. Birds are singing, they are kicking. Life itself is kicking - but there are no theories. In the beginning it will be uncomfortable. Be patient, go through that discomfort; soon you will have an upsurge of energy. It is dangerous, that's why people avoid it.
To be spontaneous is dangerous because when anger comes, it comes. The mind says, " Think - don't be angry, it may be costly." So you always think and throw your anger on those weaker than you, not on those who are stronger than you. Love can happen but love is not allowed. You can have a loving attitude only towards your wife, but life does not know who is your wife and who is not. Life is absolutely amoral, it knows no morality.
You can fall in love with somebody else's wife, because life knows no relations, no fixed institutions. All institutions are man made; that is the danger. So the mind says, " Think before - she is not your wife. Don't look in such a loving way, don't smile." Whether you feel it or not is not the point, this is duty. That is how we have killed everybody.
Everybody lives in an institution, not in life.
Because of these dangers the mind thinks of what to say beforehand. You are late, and when you come home you are thinking, "What will my wife say? How will I answer?" The wife is waiting and she knows whatever you will say is wrong. She has heard your excuses before, the same old excuses.
I have heard that one man phoned his wife one day
and said, "One of my friends has come and I'm bringing him home for dinner."
The wife screamed and said, "You fool, you know very well the cook has left, the baby is cutting his teeth, and I have had a fever for three days."
The man replied, very calmly, "I know it well, that is why I want to bring him home. The fool is thinking of getting married."
The whole of life has become an institution, a madhouse in which duties are to be fulfilled not love; in which you have to behave, not be spontaneous; in which a pattern has to be followed, not the overflow of life and energy. That's why the mind thinks and decides everything, because there is danger.
I call a man a sannyasin who breaks out of these institutions and lives spontaneously. To be a sannyasin is the most courageous act possible. To be a sannyasin means to live without the mind, and the moment you live without mind you live without society. The mind has created society, and society has created the mind; they are interdependent. To
be a sannyasin means to renounce all that is false but not to renounce the world, to renounce all that is unauthentic, to renounce all the answers, to be responsive, spontaneously responsive, and not to think about the reasons, but to be real.
This is difficult: there is much investment in falsity, in the masks, in the faces, in the games you go on playing. To be initiated as a sannyasin means now you will try to be authentic; whatsoever the consequences, you will accept them and live in the present. You will sacrifice the future for the present; you will never sacrifice the present for the future. This moment will be the totality of your being, you will never move beforehand. This is what sannyas is - to kick the pot and walk out, and not to wait for the results.
Results will take care of themselves, they will follow you.
This story doesn't say it but I know, the master must have run out to catch hold of the cook and said, "Wait, you have been chosen. You go to the new monastery to guide people in life and meditation."
Anything more? Question 1 BELOVED OSHO,
EVERY DAY WHEN I SIT HERE, I TRY SITTING WITHOUT A QUESTION IN MY MIND, STAYING IN THE MOMENT WITH WHAT I M HEARING, NOT REHEARSING, AND TRYING NOT TO REHEARSE. THEN YOU SAY, "ANYTHING MORE?"
AND IT'S AS IF A SHIELD COMES DOWN AND I CAN'T REACH YOU. I AM TALKING TO MYSELF, AND THE MIND IS ALWAYS MAKING THINGS SAFE FOR ME.
It happens because we are always afraid, afraid something may go wrong. Don't be afraid before me; nothing can go wrong. If something goes wrong spontaneously then that is the right thing. Spontaneity is right.
The mind manipulates because of fear. You may ask something and others may start laughing; they may think you are foolish. So something has to be asked which nobody can laugh about; then everyone thinks you have asked a serious question, a meaningful question. That's why the mind is afraid and fear manipulates.
Near me there is no need for any fear. You can ask absurdities, foolish questions, because to me the mind is absurd. It cannot ask anything else so there is no problem. For the mind it can only appear as if something is serious because it cannot ask anything which is not foolish. All questions are foolish. The whole mind has to be dropped, only then will you not be a fool.
The fear is why we rehearse; the ego wants to feel important. Near me there is no need of fear; I'm not asking you to ask anything wise. Nothing wise can be asked; nobody has ever asked a wise question, that is impossible. When you become wise questions drop; when you are wise there are no questions.
You can imitate wisdom also by not asking; that will not help. Those who are not asking should not think that they are wise and that the questioner is a fool. He is just your representative so he is bound to feel more foolish than you. With so much foolishness represented in him, all together, he is bound to feel afraid; it is natural.
By and by, drop the manipulations, because when you drop manipulations you become natural near me and this will give you the first glimpse. To be natural will give you the
first glimpse, and then you can gather courage to be natural in life. For if you cannot be spontaneous near me how will it be possible to be spontaneous in life?
If you go to other so-called masters they will create fear. You cannot laugh before them; that would be taken as an offense. You have to have a serious, sad face; you have to appear very serious. Look at the churches and mosques, at the so-called masters with long faces. Christians say Jesus never laughed. How can a Jesus laugh? If he laughs he becomes ordinary, he becomes profane.
I say to you such seriousness is a shield; it will protect all that is nonsensical in you. Allow it to come up; don't force it within, don't repress it in any way. Near me be natural, and in this being natural you will learn that which cannot be learned in any other way.
Just being near me, being spontaneous, you will drop the mind and be meditative.
I answer you not because I am concerned with your questions; they are irrelevant. I'm not satisfying your questions in any way, they cannot be satisfied. Then what am I doing? I am just being here with you; the answer is just an excuse, the question is just an excuse to be near and closer.
Why can't we sit silently? I can, but it will be difficult for you. We can sit silently - I, not talking, you, not asking - but inside you will go on talking, chattering. Tremendous chattering will go on, more than ordinarily, because when you say to the mind, " Sit silently," the mind rebels, it goes mad. It creates more words, more questions, a monologue. You cannot sit silently; that's why I ask you to ask, that's why I answer you. If I am talking, your mind will not talk. And my talking is not destructive, your talking is destructive. When I talk, you get absorbed in it, you may even have a few glimpses of silence.
This is how life is paradoxical - you have glimpses of silence while I am talking; you get so absorbed, engaged, occupied, your mind gets so tense listening, so alert, that nothing is missed. In that alertness the inner talk stops, you become silent. That gap is my answer.
My answers are not the real thing so they go on changing. People feel that I am inconsistent. I go on saying things - today something, tomorrow something else - they are irrelevant. I am not concerned with consistency; my answering is like music being played on a guitar. You never ask inconsistently; you play the same thing again and again. The musician goes on changing, and if you get absorbed into the music you will have some gaps of silence. In those gaps, you will become aware for the first time, and that awareness, by and by, will become crystallized.
So don't bother about what you are asking. Whatever you ask is okay; don't rehearse it, let it be more spontaneous. It will be difficult for you - spontaneity is difficult.
I have heard about one preacher. He was going into the pulpit for the first time so for the whole night he rehearsed what to say. He had chosen a very beautiful passage about Jesus, and this was to be a great crisis in his life - whether he would succeed or fail. The first success or failure means much, so the whole night, standing in his room, he rehearsed and rehearsed lecturing to the audience. But by the morning he was so tired, so sleepy, that when he stood at the pulpit his mind went blank.
He had chosen a beautiful passage: Behold I come! He said, "Behold I come!" and his mind went blank. He couldn't find anything so he thought, "If I repeat it again, maybe the flow will come."
Again he leaned forward and said, "Behold I come!" but nothing came.
To appear nonchalant, he leaned forward more, as if it was not by accident that he was repeating, and again he said, "Behold I come!"
Under his pressure the pulpit collapsed and he fell into the lap of an old woman. He said, feeling very embarrassed, "Sorry, I never meant it to happen."
The woman said, "No need to say anything. You warned me three times when you said,
`Behold I come!' It's not your fault."
There is no need to rehearse, to premeditate; let things happen. But the way things go in the world questions and answers have to be thought over. Both are dead, and when the dead things meet there is no spark. I know it is difficult for you but try. By and by it will happen, and once it happens you will have a freedom from the mind; you will become weightless and have wings into the sky.
Anything more? Question 2 BELOVED OSHO,
MY MIND IS ALREADY WORKING ON THE PARADOX I FIND BETWEEN YESTERDAY'S TALK AND TODAY'S.
TODAY YOU HAVE BEEN TALKING ABOUT SPONTANEITY OF RESPONSE TO NEW SITUATIONS, SEEING THEM AS FRESH. YESTERDAY, ONE OF THE MESSAGES FROM THE STORY ABOUT JOSHU WAS THAT SITUATIONS ARE ALL THE SAME, PEOPLE THE SAME. HENCE JOSHU OFFERED THREE PEOPLE A CUP OF TEA.
TO ME, THIS IS A PARADOX.
Yesterday is no more; Joshu has died. Only today is - and even that has passed. Only this moment is.
The mind looks at things and finds paradoxes because the mind thinks of the past, the present and the future. Only the present is. The mind finds paradoxes because the mind is always moving from the past to the present and then to the future. Once you were a tiny cell in the womb of your mother, so tiny that you could not be seen by naked eyes. Now you are totally different, you are young, but sooner or later, you will be old, crippled.
Now you are alive but the day will come when you are dead.
When the mind thinks all these things together, a child and an old man become a paradox. How can a child be old, a young man old? For the mind birth and death become a paradox because they can both be thought; for existence, when there is birth there is no death, when there is death there is no birth. For existence there is nothing paradoxical, but the mind can look at the past, the present and the future, and these are paradoxes.
Yesterday you heard me; be finished with it. There is no more yesterday but the mind carries it. If you really heard me yesterday you will not carry it, for if you carry it how can you hear me today? The smoke of yesterday will be a disturbance; there will be that smoke and you will only hear me through yesterday and you will miss.
Yesterday should be dropped so you can be here and now. There is no paradox, but if you compare yesterday and today then it comes. If you compare birth and death, the paradox comes. Today and yesterday cannot exist together, they can exist together only in the memory. Existence is non-paradoxical, the mind is paradoxical.
Why think about yesterday? If you are thinking about it how can you be here? That will be difficult. Because of yesterday you will not be able to hear me today.
Did you hear me yesterday? - for there have been other yesterdays. And will you be able to hear me tomorrow? - for this today will have become yesterday. The film of all the yesterdays is there; through that film it is difficult to penetrate into the present.
So all that I can say is be here, Joshu is dead. The man who was talking here yesterday is no more; he is dead. There is no question of consistency or inconsistency.
Tomorrow I will not be here, you will not be here; it will be absolutely fresh. And when two freshnesses meet there is a spark, a spark that dances, and a dance that is always consistent.
A carried past creates problems. The problem is not what I said yesterday or what I am saying today; the problem is that you carry yesterdays and miss today. And whatever you think you have heard, I've not said. You may think you have heard it, but through so many yesterdays you will interpret whatever I say. You will think meanings into it which are not there; you will miss things that are there, and it will become something of your own. Then you will create many paradoxes and the mind will become puzzled and confused. Go on dropping the yesterdays.
I am not a philosopher or a systematizer; I am absolutely anarchistic, as anarchistic as life itself. I don't believe in systems.
If you go to a Hegel or a Kant and say that this is contradictory, immediately they will say no; they will immediately show that it is not contradictory. If you can prove that it is contradictory they will drop one part so their system becomes consistent.
One gambler was saying to another gambler, "Yesterday I met this guy, a wonderful man, a great mathematician and economist. He has discovered a system through which a family can live without money."
The other gambler became interested wanting to know immediately what the system was. He asked, " Does it work?"
The friend replied, "The system is wonderful but there is one loophole - it doesn't work. That's the only loophole; otherwise the system is wonderful."
All systems are wonderful. Those of Hegel, Kant, Marx are all wonderful. The only loophole is this - they are dead.
I have no system. Systems can only be dead, they cannot be alive. I am a nonsystematic, anarchistic flow; not even a person, just a process. I don't know what I said to you yesterday. The person who said it is not here to answer; he is gone, I am here. And I am answerable only for this moment, so don't wait for tomorrow for I will not be here. And who is going to make consistency, who is going to find a thread that is not contradictory? There is nobody. And I would like you to be the same.
Just this moment exists, absolutely consistent, for there can be no comparison. There is no past, no future; only this moment is. How can you compare? If you live in this moment there will come a consistency which is not of a system, which is of life, which is of the energy itself. That will be an inner consistency of your very being, not of the mind. I am interested in the being not in the mind, so don't take my answers very seriously; they are just play, play with words. Enjoy them and forget them; enjoy me but don't try to systematize me. The whole effort is useless, and in that effort you miss much that is beautiful; you miss much that can become a deep ecstasy in you.
Look at me and don't be bothered with what I say; be with me and don't be bothered about theories and words. Act with me, listen to me, and don't try to think about it; and
this listening should be an act, not a mental effort. I am not trying to convince you, I am not trying to give you a belief; I am not trying to create any religion or sect - no doctrine is implied. When talking to you, I am there; talking is just an excuse. I may be using one sect today, another tomorrow. If you look at my sect, you will say, " You are inconsistent. Yesterday you had this sect and today, this."
I say :Look at me, words are just dressings. I am consistent, my being is consistent; it cannot be otherwise. How can your being be inconsistent? There is no gap in it, it is a continuum, but the mind starts thinking, comparing, and then problems arise.
Once it happened that a disciple came to a Zen master and asked, "Why are a few people so intelligent and a few so stupid? Why are a few people so beautiful and a few so ugly? Why this inconsistency? If God is everywhere, if he is the creator, then why does he create one ugly and another beautiful? And don't talk to me about karmas. I have heard all those nonsensical answers - that because of karmas, past lives, one is beautiful, another is ugly. I am not concerned with past lives. In the beginning, when there was no yesterday, how did the difference come? Why was one created beautiful and another ugly? And if everyone was created equal, equally beautiful and intelligent, how can they act differently, how can they have different karmas?"
The master said, "Wait! This is such a secret thing that I will tell you when everybody has left." So the man sat, eager, but people kept coming and going and there was no chance. But by the evening everybody had left so the man said, "Now?"
And the master said, "Come out with me." The moon was coming up and the master took him in the garden and said, "Look, that tree there is small, this tree here is so tall. I have been living with these trees for many years and they have never raised the question of why that tree is small and this tree is big.
"When there was mind in me, I used to ask the same question sitting under these trees. Then my mind dropped, and the question dropped. Now I know. This tree is small and that tree is big; there is no problem. So look! There is no problem."
The mind compares. How can you compare when the mind is not? How can you say this tree is small and that tree big? When the mind drops, comparison drops, and when there is no comparison the beauty of existence erupts. It becomes a volcanic eruption, it explodes. Then you see the small is big and the big is small; then all contradictions are lost and the inner consistency is seen.
Drop the mind and listen to me, then you will not ask, "Why yesterday? Why this today and that yesterday?" Then there is no yesterday and no today; then I am here and you are here. There is a meeting, and this here and now, when the mind is not there, becomes a communion.
I am not interested in communicating something to you, I am interested in communion. Communication means my mind talking to your mind. Communion means I am not a mind, you are not a mind - just your heart melting into my heart, no words.
That's what the story is: Say something about this pot without using words. The cook kicked and walked out. Whatsoever I say, kick and go in.
A Bird on the Wing Chapter #6
Chapter title: The Miracle of Ordinariness 15 June 1974 am in Buddha Hall
Archive code: 7406150 ShortTitle: WING06 Audio: Yes Video: No
Length: 102 mins
BELOVED OSHO,
BANKEI WAS PREACHING QUIETLY TO HIS FOLLOWERS ONE DAY WHEN HIS TALKING WAS INTERRUPTED BY A PRIEST FROM ANOTHER SECT. THIS SECT BELIEVED IN THE POWER OF MIRACLES, AND THOUGHT THAT SALVATION CAME FROM REPEATING HOLY WORDS.
BANKEI STOPPED TALKING, AND ASKED THE PRIEST WHAT HE WANTED TO SAY.
THE PRIEST BOASTED THAT THE FOUNDER OF HIS RELIGION COULD STAND ON ONE BANK OF THE RIVER WITH A BRUSH IN HIS HAND AND WRITE A HOLY NAME ON A PIECE OF PAPER HELD BY AN ASSISTANT ON THE OPPOSITE BANK OF THE RIVER. THE PRIEST ASKED, "WHAT MIRACLES CAN YOU DO?"
BANKEI REPLIED,"ONLY ONE. WHEN I AM HUNGRY I EAT, AND WHEN I AM THIRSTY I DRINK."
The only miracle, the impossible miracle, is to be just ordinary.
The longing of the mind is to be extraordinary. The ego thirsts and hungers for the recognition that you are somebody. Somebody achieves that dream through wealth, somebody else achieves that dream through power, politics, somebody else can achieve that dream through miracles, jugglery, but the dream remains the same: I cannot tolerate being nobody.
And this is a miracle -- when you accept your nobodiness, when you are just as ordinary as anybody else, when you don't ask for any recognition, when you can exist as if you are not existing. To be absent is the miracle.
This story is beautiful, one of the most beautiful Zen anecdotes, and Bankei is one of the superb masters. But Bankei was an ordinary man.
Once it happened that Bankei was working in his garden. Somebody came, a seeker, a man in search of a master, and he asked Bankei, "Gardener, where is the master?" Bankei laughed and said, "Wait. Come from that door, inside you will find the master." So the man went round and came inside. He saw Bankei sitting on a throne, the same man who was the gardener outside. The seeker said, "Are you kidding? Get down from this throne. This is sacrilegious, you don't pay any respect to the master."
Bankei got down, sat on the ground, and said, "Now then, it is difficult. Now you will not find the master here because I am the master."
It was difficult for that man to see that a great master could work in the garden, could be just ordinary. He left. He couldn't believe that this man was the master; he missed.
We are all in search of the extraordinary. But why are you in search of the extraordinary? It is because you also long to be extraordinary. With an ordinary master, how can you become extraordinary, exceptional?
Bankei was talking, lecturing, and one man stood and asked about miracles. He belonged to some other sect, a sect which worked through mantras, holy names. Remember that a mantra is a secret technique to achieve more power. A mantra is not spiritual, it is political, but the politics are of the inner space, not of the outer.
The mind can become powerful if you narrow it down; narrowing is the method. The more narrow the mind, the more powerful it becomes. It is just like the sun's rays falling to the ground. If you focus those waves, those rays, through a lens, fire can be created. Those rays were falling all spread out but now they have been narrowed down through the lens. They have become one-pointed, concentrated; now fire is possible.
The mind is energy, in fact, the same energy that comes through the sun, the same subtle rays. Ask the physicists. They say the mind has a voltage of electricity, that it is electrical.
If you can focus the mind through a lens, the mantra is a lens, and you go on repeating Ram, Ram, Ram, or Om, Om, Om, or anything, just one word -- if you go repeating and repeating and repeating it, and the mind's whole energy is centered in that one word -- it becomes a lens. Now all the rays are passing through that lens. Narrowed to one point it becomes powerful, you can do miracles. Just by thinking you can do miracles.
But remember, those miracles are not spiritual.Power is never spiritual. Powerlessness, helplessness, to be nothing, is spiritual;.power is never spiritual. This is the difference between magic and religion; magic is after power, religion is after nothingness.
A mantra is a part of magic not of religion at all, but everything is a big mess, mixed up. People who are doing miracles are magicians, not spiritual in any way. They are even anti-spiritual because they are spreading magic in the name of religion, which is very dangerous.
Through a mantra the mind is narrowed; it is more narrowed, more powerful, and then anything can be done. There is only one thing you will miss -- you will miss yourself. All miracles will be possible, the ultimate miracle you will miss. You will miss yourself because through narrowing down you can achieve an object. The more the mind is narrowed, the more it becomes fixed to an object; it becomes objective. You are hidden behind and the object is outside.
So if you are a man of mantras you can say to this tree, "Die," and the tree will die; you can say to a man, "Be healthy," and the disease will disappear, or, "Be unhealthy," and the disease will enter -- many things you can do. You can become somebody, and people will recognize you as a man of power but never a man of God.
A man of God is born when the mind is not narrowed at all, when the mind is not flowing in one direction but is overflowing in all directions. There is no lens, no mantra, just the energy flowing in all dimensions everywhere. That flowing energy, that energy overflowing everywhere, will make you alert about yourself because then there is no object. Only you, only subjectivity exists, and through you, you will become aware of God, not through any power.
This man asked Bankei, "What type of miracles can you do? My master, through mantra, through the holy name, can do miracles. He will stand on one bank of the river, and disciples will stand on the other bank with a paper in their hands, a half-mile distant, and he will write from here and the words will come on the paper on the other bank. This our master can do. What can you do?"
And Bankei said, "We know only one miracle here, and that is when I feel hungry I eat, and when I feel sleepy I sleep. Only this much." Not much of a miracle. Your mind will say, "What type of a miracle is this? It is nothing to be proud of." But I say to you Bankei has said the real thing. That's what a Buddha can do, that's what a Mahavira is doing, that's what a Jesus is to do. Only then is he a Christ, otherwise not. What he is saying is such a simple thing. He says, "When I am hungry I eat." Is it so difficult that he calls it a miracle? I say it is difficult for you; for the mind it is the most difficult thing -- not to interfere. When you feel hungry the mind says, "No, this is a religious day and I am on a fast." When you don't feel hungry the mind says, "Eat, because this is the time every day that you eat." And when the stomach is overfilled the mind says, "Go on eating, the food is delicious." Your mind interferes.
What is Bankei saying? He is saying, "My mind has stopped interfering. When I feel hungry I eat, when I don't feel hungry I don't eat. Eating has become a spontaneous thing; the mind is not a continuous interference.
When I feel sleepy I go to sleep." No, you are not doing this. You go to sleep as a ritual, not when you feel sleepy. You get up as a ritual because it is brahmamuhurta, and you are a Hindu and you must get up before sunrise. Because you are a Hindu, you get up. Who is this Hindu? It is the mind. You cannot be a Hindu, you cannot be a Mohammedan; there is no sect for you but the mind. The mind says, "You are a Hindu, you must get up," so you get up.
When the mind says, "Now it is time to go to sleep," you go to sleep. You follow the mind, not nature.
Bankei is saying, "I flow with nature; whatsoever my whole being feels, I do it. There is no fragmentary mind manipulating it, manipulation is the problem. You go on manipulating and this disturbance, interference, this manipulation from the mind is the problem.
Even in dreams you go on manipulating -- ask the psychologists; they say while awake, you continue manipulating. The mind doesn't allow you to see what is there, it projects; the mind doesn't allow you to hear what is being said to you, it interprets.
Even in dreams you are false because the mind goes on playing tricks on you. Freud discovered that our dreams are also false. You want to kill your father so in the dream you don't kill your father. You want to poison your wife but you don't poison your wife even in a dream, you poison some woman who somehow resembles your wife. The mind is interfering continuously.
I have heard that one man was saying to another, to his friend, "Did I dream last night! What a dream! I went to Coney Island -- What delicious ice cream, such a tasteful dinner.I have never eaten such a thing in my whole life."
The other man said,"You are kidding.You call that a wonderful dream? Last night I dreamt that on one side was Elizabeth Taylor, on the other side was Marilyn Monroe, both in the nude.
The other became excited and said, "Then why didn't you call me?" The man said: "I called you, but your wife said you had already left for Coney Island."
Even in dreams the mind goes on creating the world -- Coney Islands, Elizabeth Taylors -
- and you become jealous even about another's dream:Why didn't you call me?
Bankei is saying: "We know only one miracle. We allow nature to have its own course, we don't interfere." Through interference comes the ego: the more you interfere, the more you manipulate, the more you feel you are somebody.
Look at the ascetics -- their egos are so refined and subtle, so shiny. Why? It is because they have interfered the most; you have not interfered so much. They have killed their sex, they have destroyed their love, they have suppressed their anger, they have completely destroyed their hunger and the feeling of the body. They have reason to be egoists: they are somebodies. Look in their eyes, there is nothing except ego.
Their bodies may be almost dead but their egos are at the supreme-most peak. They have become Everests.
These monks and saints will not be able to understand what Bankei means.He says, "We know only one miracle -- to allow nature to have its own course.
We don't interfere." If you don't interfere, you will disappear. Fighting is the way to be there.
People come to me and ask how to drop the ego. I tell them, Who will drop it? If you try to drop it you will be the ego, and someday you will claim that you have dropped the ego. And who is this claimer, who is claiming it? This is the ego, and the most subtle ego always tries to pretend egolessness.
I also know only one miracle, to let nature have its course, to allow it. Whatsoever is happening, don't interfere, don't come in the way, and suddenly you will disappear. You cannot be there without resistance, fight, aggression, violence; the ego exists through resistance. This has to be understood very deeply -- the more you fight, the more you will be there.
Why do soldiers feel so happy fighting? Fighting is not such a beautiful thing, war is just ugly, but why do soldiers feel so happy fighting? If you have once been to a war you will never be happy again in peace because the ego comes to such a peak fighting. Why, in competition, do you feel so happy? It is because something, your ego, arises; fighting, you become stronger.
But fighting with another is never so ego-fulfilling because you may be defeated -- the possibility is there -- but fighting with yourself you cannot be defeated. You are always going to be the winner, "There is nobody else except you. Fighting with another there is fear, the fear of being a failure; fighting with yourself there is no fear, you are alone. You are going to win today or tomorrow, but finally you will win because there is nobody else.
The ascetic is fighting with himself; the soldier is fighting with others; the businessman, fighting with others; the monk, fighting with himself. The monk and the ascetic are more cunning, they have chosen a path where victory is inevitable. You are not so calculating, your path is hazardous. You may be a success, you may be a failure, and your success can turn into a failure any moment because there are so many fighters around you, and you are such a small, tiny existence -- you can be destroyed.
But fighting with yourself you are alone, there is no competition. So those who are very cunning escape from the world and start fighting with themselves. Those who are not so cunning, are more simple, are in the world and go on fighting with others. But the basic essential thing remains the same -- fighting.
Bankei is saying, "I am not a fighter; I don't fight at all. When I feel hungry I eat, when I feel sleepy I go to sleep; when I am alive I am alive, and when I die I will die. I don't come in the way." And he says,"This is the only miracle we know."
But why call it a miracle? Animals are doing it already, trees are doing it already, birds are doing it already; the whole existence is doing it already. Why call it a miracle? Man cannot do it.
The whole existence is a miracle except man. The Christian story seems to be very meaningful: that man has been turned out of the Garden of Eden seems to be very relevant, most significant. The whole existence is a continuous miracle, it is a continuum; miracles are happening every moment. Existence is miraculous but man has been turned out.
Why has man been turned out? The story says because he ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge and God had forbidden it. God said, "don't eat the fruit of this tree, the tree of knowledge. All the trees are open to you except this one."
But the Devil persuaded. Of course he persuaded Eve first; the Devil always enters through the woman. Why? It is because woman is the weakest point of man, the weakest link from where the Devil can enter. To enter man directly is difficult because he will give a good fight, it will be difficult, but through woman the Devil can persuade man.
So the Devil said to woman, to Eve, "This is the only fruit worth eating, and that's why God has prohibited it. If you eat this fruit you will be like gods. You will be a god yourself."
Eve couldn't resist, the temptation was too much. She persuaded Adam. Adam tried to say it was not good because God had prohibited it, but when it is a problem of choosing between your wife and God, you will choose your wife.
Really, there is no real alternative because she will create such trouble, in twenty-four hours, such trouble... God cannot create so much trouble
So finally Adam had to eat, and the moment he ate the fruit he became conscious of the ego; he became aware that "I am."Immediately he was thrown out of the Garden of Eden. It is a beautiful story; the story is really a key to all the secrets.
This knowledge has turned you out of the miraculous world that you are in. Before this Adam was like a child -- naked but not aware that he was naked; naked but not aware that there was some guilt in it. He loved Eve but the love was natural; he was never aware that something wrong was going on or that there was some sin.
There was no sin; before knowledge there is no sin. A child cannot commit sin; only an old man can be a sinner, so all sinners are old. A child cannot be a sinner. How can it be a sinner? A child is innocent because a child is not aware of himself, that he is.
Adam was like a child, Eve was like a child; they enjoyed but there was no one who was enjoying. They were part of this mystery, of the miracle. When they felt hungry they ate, when they felt sleepy they slept, when they felt like loving they loved. But everything was a natural phenomenon, the mind was not there as the manipulator. They were part of this universe -- flowing like rivers, flowering like trees, singing like birds -- they were not separate. Separation came with the knowledge that "I am."
The first thing Adam and Eve did was to try to hide their nakedness; the childhood was lost. Whenever a child begins to feel that he is naked, that is the point where Adam and Eve were turned out of the Garden of Eden.
It has always been my feeling that the answer to the Christian story exists in Mahavira -- not in Jesus, but in Mahavira -- because if by eating the fruit of knowledge Adam became aware and felt guilty that he was naked, then the answer exists in Mahavira. The moment Mahavira became silent the first thing he did was to become naked.
And I say Mahavira entered the Garden of Eden again, he became a child again. The Christian story is half, the Jain story is the other half; they make the whole. The whole existence is a miracle; you have fallen out of it.
Bankei said, "We know only one miracle; we have entered in this great miracle again. We are no more separate as egos, we are not individuals. Hunger is there but there is no one who is hungry. Sleep comes but there is no one who is sleepy. The ego is not there to resist or to decide; we flow, we drift." Nothing is wrong and nothing is good. This is the beyondness, the transcendental attitude where no evil exists and no good. You have become innocent.
Your saints cannot be innocents because their goodness is forced too much; their goodness is already ugly. Their goodness is managed, controlled, cultivated, it is not innocent.
I have heard about one old woman. She served a buddhist monk for thirty years, did everything for that monk; she was just like a mother and a disciple both. And the buddhist monk meditated and meditated and meditated. The day the old woman was going to die she called a prostitute from the town and said, "Go to that monk's hut. Enter the hut, go near him, caress the monk, and just come and tell me how he reacts. This night I am going to die, and I want to be certain whether I was serving a man who is innocent. I am not certain."
The prostitute became afraid. She said, "He is such a good man, so saintly, we have never seen such a saintly man."
Even the prostitute felt guilty to go there and touch this man, but the old woman bribed her. She went, she opened the door. The monk was meditating. It was midnight; in that isolated part nobody was near. The monk opened his eyes, looked at the prostitute, jumped to his feet and said, "why are you coming in? Get out!"
His whole body trembled. The prostitute went nearer. The monk jumped out of the hut and cried, "This woman is trying to seduce me!"
The prostitute returned, she told the whole thing and the old woman sent her servants to burn the hut of the monk. She said, "This man is of no use; he has not become innocent yet. He may be a saint but his saintliness is ugly, it is manipulated. Why should he see a prostitute so suddenly? A woman was entering not a prostitute; why should he think that she had come to seduce him? He should have been at least gentlemanly. He should have said, 'Come, sit, why have you come?' He should have at least shown a little compassion. And even if she had embraced him, why should he be afraid? He has been telling me for thirty years, 'I am not the body.'If he is not the body then why should he be so much afraid of the body? No, his saintliness is cultivated, it is a pose. It is not from the inner, it is from the outer. He has managed it all right, but inside he is not innocent, he is not childlike."
And unless saintliness becomes childlike, it is not saintliness at all, it is just a sinner hiding, hiding through a facade.
Bankei has said, "We know only one miracle." What is that miracle? It is to be childlike. Whenever a child feels hungry he starts crying -- he is hungry. Whenever he feels sleepy, he goes to sleep.
We try to manage even a child; we destroy him.In the West now there are books, guides for mothers. And what type of world is there going to be when a guide is needed even for a mother -- guidelines that say: After three hours give milk, never before, but each three hours, give. The child is crying, but that's not the point because the guidebook says after three hours. The mother is waiting, and when the three hours are completed she will feed the child.
Even motherhood is not enough, a guide is needed; and a child's authentic cry is not to be trusted, as if the child may be trying to deceive. Why should the child deceive? If he is hungry, he is crying.
But we are trying to destroy childhood. Sooner or later he will follow us, he will also look at the clock, and when the three hours are complete he will give a cry that he is hungry. This hunger will be false, and when hunger goes false everything goes false. We go on forcing children to go to sleep when we think it is time. But sleep is not to be manipulated by time, sleep is something inner. When the child feels sleepy he will go to sleep, but mother and father go on forcing the child to go to sleep, as if sleep can be ordered.
Children must think that you are foolish, they think that something has gone wrong in your mind. How can a child force sleep? He can pretend, so when you are there he can close the eyes and when you have gone he can open the eyes, because sleep cannot be forced. Nobody, not even you, can force sleep. If you don't feel sleepy how can you go to sleep?
But this is how society destroys. That's how the Devil persuades, that's how we bring every child out of the Garden of Eden. Remember, not only were Adam and Eve born in the Garden, every child is born there because that is the birthplace, and then society brings the child out. So society is the Devil. Society persuades: Do this, do that, and bring the child out. Make him an ego, make him a manipulator.
And the only miracle that is possible is to enter this Garden of Eden again, to become childlike, to allow nature its flow. Don't block it, don't stand in the way, don't push it; just flow with it. You are nature, you are Tao; you are part of the continuous mystery that is happening. Bankei was right, it is difficult for us because we have become so much addicted to the mind and its manipulation. And even if I say to you, be natural, you will try to be natural and then you will miss. How can one try to be natural? If I say don't do anything
you try not to do anything; if I say be inactive then you make every effort to be inactive, but the effort is the activity. So this has to be understood: no effort is needed. Any effort on your part and you will miss the miracle.
Then what is to be done? Nothing is to be done, just a simple feeling -- allow nature. In the beginning it will be difficult because you have always been jumping in the way, always interfering. In the beginning it will be difficult but for just three weeks allow nature. When you feel hungry, eat, when you feel sleepy, go to sleep.
When you don't feel hungry, don't eat. It is not a fast, remember, because a fast is from the mind, and you are feeling hungry but you are on a fast. There is no harm if you don't feel sleepy; there is no harm because the body doesn't need it, so don't force it. Stay
awake, enjoy, go for a walk, have a little dance in the room or sing or meditate, but don't force sleep. When you feel sleepy, when the eyes say: Now go to sleep....
And don't force yourself in the morning to come out of bed; allow your inner being, give it a chance. It will give you the indication, the eyes will open by themselves.
For a few days there will be difficulty but within three weeks and I say within three
weeks if you don't interfere; if you interfere, then three lives are not enough. Don't interfere and just wait for things to happen, and allow them. Within three weeks you will fall into nature again, and suddenly you will see that you have been existing in the Garden of Eden and Adam has never been expelled -- he only thinks he has. That's what the knowledge of the fruit means.
You simply think that you have been expelled. Where can you be expelled to? The whole nature is the Garden of Eden -- where can you be expelled to? The whole house is God so where can you be expelled to? Bankei said, "I have entered the Garden again."
Bankei was going to die. The disciples were very worried and they asked, "What should we do? What should we do with your body? Should we preserve it? Should be burn it, as Hindus do, as Buddhists do? Should we bury it in the ground, as Mohammedans and Christians do? We don't know who you are, a Hindu, a Buddhist, a Mohammedan? You have confused us too much we don't know who you are, so what should we do?"
Bankei said, "Wait, let me die first. Why are you in such a hurry? The mind always jumps ahead. Why are you in such a hurry? And you call yourselves my disciples? Let me die and do whatsoever you like, because Bankei will not be there. Whether you bury, whether you burn, or whether you preserve, it makes no difference to Bankei; Bankei will not be there. But let me die first then do whatsoever you like. It makes no difference but don't jump ahead. The mind has a tendency to jump ahead, always to jump ahead.
"One minister invited his congregation for a garden party. He forgot a little old lady. Just at the eleventh hour he remembered, so he phoned because that lady was dangerous, very religious, and very religious people are always dangerous. He was afraid that she might create trouble or mischief. She was one of the oldest members of his congregation and contributed to the church and everything. She could create trouble. So he phoned and told the old lady, "Come. Just by mistake I forgot, but forgive me and you must come."
The old lady said, "It is too late now, I have already prayed for rain."
There was going to be a garden party and she had not been invited, and she had already prayed for rain so it was too late. See, it was no use; now, nothing could be done.
The mind goes on jumping ahead, that is the way of the mind. Make jumps less and less, or if it is very difficult for you, then allow the mind to jog but don't jump ahead. Jogging is meditation, it is a jogging; you are jumping on the same ground and the mind is accustomed to jump ahead.
It may be difficult to stop it completely, so do half-half -- don't jump ahead, jump on the ground, jog. Half is cut. Then, by and by, slow down; then stand, then sit down. When you are here and now, sitting totally, not jumping ahead, the miracle has happened. To be in the moment is the miracle.
But I know Bankei will not appeal to you. Sai Baba can appeal to you because with Sai Baba your mind has a logic, a tuning. With Bankei your mind cannot be tuned, it has to be dropped -- only then can that tuning happen. With Sai Baba you can understand things
-- with logic it is the same -- what your mind says is that a miracle is happening.
This is not religion at all, this is simply magic. And there is no difference between a Houdini and a Sai Baba. The only difference, if there is any, is that Houdini was more honest than Sai Baba because he simply said that he was a magician, that these were tricks. And all that Sai Baba can do, any magician can do, but you will not pay much respect to a magician because he is so sincere and honest that he says, "These are tricks." So you say, "Okay, so these are tricks; no miracle."
When somebody says, "These are not tricks, this is a miracle, divine power manifesting through me," then your mind starts jumping. Then you think, "If I can become a close disciple of this man then I also can become somebody, I can also do something."
If you have come in search of such a miracle from me
you have come to the wrong person. I am Bankei reborn. I know only one miracle -- to be here and now: when feeling hungry, to eat; when feeling sleepy, to sleep; just to be ordinary and just to be part of the cosmos.
If you are in search of such a miracle much can happen near me, but if you are not in such a search nothing will happen near me. And remember, you will be responsible for it because your whole search is wrong, and then there can be no tuning with me. So decide clearly in your mind, come to an understanding of what type of miracle you are searching for.
I can make you most ordinary, I can make you simple human beings, I can make you like trees and birds. There is no magic around here, only religion, but if you can see, this is the greatest miracle.
Anything more? Question 1
OUR BELOVED MASTER,
YOU WERE JUST TALKING ABOUT FOOD, AND NOW IN THE WEST FOOD IS A BIG CULT. IT'S ONE OF THE THINGS COMING IN AS A BASIS OF SPIRITUALITY.
YOU SAID IF WE'RE NATURAL, WE'LL KNOW WHAT TO EAT AND WHEN TO EAT, BUT NOW WE ARE OUT OF TOUCH WITH OUR CHILDLIKE NATURE. ALSO, MANY RELIGIONS SAY THAT THE FOOD YOU EAT DOES MAKE A DIFFERENCE TO ONE'S SPIRITUAL PATH.
IS THERE ANYTHING YOU CAN TELL US ABOUT FOOD AS A GUIDE FOR THE WEST?
It is the other way round: food cannot make you spiritual, but if you are spiritual your food habits will change.
Eating anything will not make much difference. You can be a vegetarian and cruel to the extreme, and violent; you can be a non-vegetarian and kind and loving. Food will not make much difference.
In India there are communities who have lived totally with vegetarian food; many Brahmins have lived totally with vegetarian food. They are non-violent but they are not spiritual.
And Jains are the most materialistic community in India, the most attracted by possessions, accumulation; that's why they have become the wealthiest. They are the
Jews in India. But a non-vegetarian world in the West is not in any way different from these vegetarian communities in India.
Rather, on the contrary, a very important thing has to be remembered: if you are violent and your food is vegetarian, then your violence will have to find some other way of expression. It is natural, because eating non-vegetarian food gives release to your violence.
So if you know some hunters you may have come to realize that hunters are the most loving people. Their whole violence is released in hunting, they are most friendly, loving. But a businessman vegetarian has no way for his violence to be released so his whole violence becomes a search for wealth and power; it becomes narrowed down.
But it happens the other way round. It happened to Mahavira. Mahavira came from a warrior family, he was a Kshatriya. Violence must have been easy for him, and then a deep meditative effort, a twelve-year-long silence changed his inner essence. When the essence changed the expression changed; when the innermost being changed, his character changed. But that character change was not basic, it was a consequence. So I say to you, if you become more meditative you will become more and more vegetarian automatically. You need not bother about it.
And only if this happens, that through meditation vegetarian food comes into you not through mind manipulation, it is good.But manipulating by the mind, argument, reasoning that vegetarian food is good, that it will help you to gain spirituality, is not going to help anything. Your clothes, your food, your habits of life, your style, everything will change; but this change is not basic. The basic change is going to be in you and then everything else follows.
If you meditate long enough, deep enough, it is impossible for you to hurt anybody for food; it is impossible. It is not a question of argument, it is not a question of scriptures, it is not who says what, it is not a question of calculating that if you take vegetarian food you will become spiritual; it is automatic. It is not a question of cunningness, you simply become spiritual. The whole thing seems so absurd. Just for food, killing animals, birds, seems so absurd, it falls down.
Your clothes change automatically; by and by you like looser and looser clothes. The more relaxed you are inside -- loose clothes. Automatically I say; there will be no decision on your part. By and by, if you use tight clothes you will feel uneasy. Tight clothes belong to a tense mind, loose clothes belong to a relaxed mind.
But the inner change is the first thing and everything else is just a consequence. If you reverse the order you will miss then you will become a food addict.
One man came to me. He was just lean and thin and pale, and any moment he could die, and he said, "I want to live only on water because everything else is a hindrance to spirituality. Now I want to live on pure water."
This man is going to die. There have been a few people who have lived on pure water but that happened to them naturally, it cannot be practised. They were freaks, accidents; their body mechanism and chemistry worked differently. It has happened -- somebody can survive on water but nobody can practise it.
Someday science may be able to find the basic chemical change and then everybody will be able to survive on water; then science will change your body chemistry and you will survive just on air. It is possible but you cannot practise it. And the whole effort is
meaningless and the whole suffering is unnecessary, but there are mad people who try things like that. It has never happened by effort.
There was one woman in Bengal -- she lived forty years without food, but it simply happened. Her husband died and she couldn't eat for a few days.just out of misery, out of sorrow, she couldn't eat. But suddenly she realized that without eating she was feeling better than ever. Then she realized that in the past whenever she was eating, she was always ill, and suddenly she became healthy as she never was. Then she lived for forty years without eating anything, just the air was the food. And this has happened in many cases.
There was one woman in Europe -- for thirty years she lived without eating. She became a saint because Christians thought it a miracle. They examined her with every scientific instrument to see what was happening and they couldn't find out anything; then it seemed a miracle. It was not a miracle.
Yoga says there is a possibility of a body change, of a body chemistry change. Right now you are doing the same just by an intermediary. You cannot eat sunrays directly because your body chemistry is not in such a state; the mechanism is not such that it can absorb sunrays directly. So first the fruit of the tree absorbs the sunrays, it becomes vitamin B in the fruit, then you eat the fruit, then the vitamin B goes into your body. The fruit is just an intermediary; the fruit is working just as your agent to absorb the sunrays and then give them to you. You can absorb them through the fruit, not directly.
But if the fruit can absorb directly, why not you? So someday there is going to be a scientific discovery that some body changes will help you to absorb directly, and then fruit will not be needed. In the future -- and I think not very long, fifty years -- science is bound to discover it.It has to be discovered, otherwise humanity is going to die because food will not be possible. And birth control is not helping, nothing is helping; the population goes on growing. Some way has to be found so food can be dropped and direct absorption of cosmic rays becomes possible. It has happened in individual cases but it was by accident. If it can happen to one individual, it can happen to every individual but not as an accident; it will happen as a scientific change.
But don't try such things, they are not spiritual. Even if you eat sunrays directly there is nothing spiritual. What is spiritual? Just by dropping the intermediary of fruit you become spiritual? If you live only on water, nothing is spiritual.
What you eat makes no difference; what you are is a totally different phenomenon. And when that changes, everything will change; but that change will not be from the mind, it will be from the innermost being. Then things will change automatically.
Sex will disappear by and by. So I don't say be a brahamachari, be a celibate. That is foolish, because if you force celibacy you will become more and more sexual in the mind and your whole mind will become ugly and dirty; you will think only of sex and nothing else. That is not the way. you will go crazy and insane. Freud says that ninety percent of madmen are mad because of repressed sexuality.
I don't say change sex, I don't say change food; I say change your being and then things will start changing.
Why is so much sex needed? Because you are tense, sex becomes a release. Your tensions are released through it -- you feel relaxed, you can go to sleep; if you repress it, you remain tense. And if you repress sex -- the only release, the only possibility of
release -- what will happen? You will go mad. Where will you release your tensions then?
You eat food; it is needed by the body, and the body rejects only things which are not needed. Whatsoever you are eating is somehow needed by the body. If you are taking animal food, if you are taking non-vegetarian food, your mind, your body, your whole being is violent. And it is needed. don't change it otherwise your violence will have to find another channel.
Change yourself and food will change, clothes will change, sex will change. But change should come from the innermost core, it should not come from the periphery. And all turmoil is on the periphery; deep down there is no turmoil. You are just like the sea -- go and watch the sea. All the turmoil, all the waves clashing, is just on the surface; deep, the deeper you go, there is more and more calm. At the deepest part in the sea there is no turmoil, not a single wave.
First go deeper into your sea so you achieve a calm crystallization, so you achieve the point where no disturbance ever reaches. Stand there. From there every change comes, every transformation comes. Once you are there you have become a master; Now whatsoever is unnecessary can be dropped, and can be dropped without any struggle and fight.
Whenever you drop something by fight, it is never dropped. You can drop smoking by fighting, and then you will start doing something else which will become a substitute. You may start chewing gum, it is the same; You may start chewing pan, it is the same, there is no difference. You need something to do with your mouth -- smoking, chewing, anything. When your mouth goes on working, you feel at ease because through the mouth tensions are released. So whenever a man feels tense he starts smoking. Why is it that through smoking or chewing gum or tobacco tensions are released?
Just look at a small child. Whenever he feels tense he will put his hand in his mouth, he will start chewing his own hand. This is his substitute for smoking. And why does he feel good when his thumb is in his mouth? Why does the child feel good and go to sleep? This is the way of almost all children. Whenever they feel sleep is not coming they will put the thumb inside the mouth, feel at ease, and fall asleep. Why? The thumb becomes a substitute for the mother's breast, and food is relaxing. You cannot go to sleep on a hungry stomach, it is difficult to get sleep. When the stomach is full you feel sleepy, the body needs rest. So whenever the child takes the breast in his mouth, food is flowing, warmth, love. He is relaxed, he need not worry; tensions are relaxed. The thumb is just a substitute for the breast; it is not giving milk, it is a false thing, but still it gives the feeling.
When this child grows, if he takes his thumb in public you will think he is foolish, so he takes a cigarette. A cigarette is not foolish, it is accepted. It is just the thumb, and more harmful than the thumb. It is better if you smoke your thumb, go on smoking to your grave; it is not harmful, it is better. No harm is done but then people think you are childish, juvenile, then people think what you are doing is stupid. But there is a need so it has to be substituted.
And in countries where breast-feeding has stopped, more smoking will automatically be there. That's why the West smokes more than the East -- because no mother is ready to give her breast to the child because the shape is lost. So in the West smoking is increasing more and more; even small children are smoking.
I have heard that one mother said to her child, "I don't want neighbors to tell me that you have started smoking. Be truthful and whenever you start smoking, tell me." The child said, "Don't bother Mom, I have already stopped. It is one year now, that I have stopped smoking. It is one year now so don't you bother, don't you get worried about it."
Small children smoking, and the mother is not aware that it is because the breast has been taken away.
In all primitive communities a seven-year-old child, or even an eight or nine-year-old child, will continue breast-feeding. Then there is a satisfaction and smoking will not be so necessary. That's why in primitive communities men are not so much interested in women's breasts; there is no problem that somebody will attack them. Nobody looks at the breasts.
If you had been given the breast for ten years continuously, you would get fed up and bored, you would say, "Stop now!" But every child has been taken away from the breast prematurely, and that remains a wound. So all civilized countries are obsessed with breasts. Even an old man, dying, is obsessed with breasts, goes on searching for breasts. This seems mad, and it is, but the basic cause is there -- children should be given the breast otherwise they will become addicted to it, the whole life they will be in search of it.
You cannot stop smoking directly because it has many related things, implications. You are tense, and if you stop smoking you will start something else and the other may be more harmful. Don't go on escaping problems, face them. The problem is that you are tense, so the goal should be how to be non-tense, not, smoking or not smoking.
Meditate. Relax your tensions without any object into the sky, allow catharsis to happen. When you are non-tense these things will become absurd, foolish, and they will drop.
Food will change, your styles of living will change.
But my insistence is on you. Character is secondary, behavior is secondary, the essential you is the primary thing. Don't pay too much attention to what you do, pay much attention to what you are; being should become the focus, and doing should be left to itself. When being changes, doing follows.
Anything more? Question 2
OUR BELOVED OSHO,
WHENEVER YOU SPEAK OF OUR FAILINGS, YOU USUALLY MENTION ANGER, SEX AND JEALOUSY. ANGER AND SEX SEEM FAIRLY STRAIGHTFORWARD, BUT THERE'S SOME CONFUSION ABOUT EXACTLY WHAT JEALOUSY IS, AND IT'S HARDER TO GET TO THE CORE.
WOULD YOU TELL US ABOUT JEALOUSY?
Yes, I make more mention of anger, sex, and less of jealousy, because jealousy is not a primary thing. It is secondary, it is a secondary part of sex.
Whenever you have a sexual urge in your mind, a sexual happening in your being, whenever you feel sexually attracted and related to somebody, jealousy enters because you are not in love. If you are in love, jealousy never enters.
Try to understand the whole thing. Whenever you are sexually related you are afraid, because sex is really not a relationship, it is an exploitation. If you are attached to a woman or man sexually, you are always afraid that this woman may go to somebody else,
this man may move to somebody else. There is no relationship really, it is just mutual exploitation. You are exploiting each other, but you don't love and you know it, so you are afraid.
This fear becomes jealousy so you may not allow things, you will guard; you will make every security arrangement so this man cannot look at another woman. Even looking will be a danger signal. This man should not talk to another woman because talking and
you feel afraid he may leave. So you will close all the paths, all the ways of this man going to another woman, of this woman going to another man; you will close all the ways, all the doors.
But then a problem arises. When all the doors are closed, the man becomes dead, the woman becomes dead, a prisoner, a slave, and you cannot love a dead thing. You cannot love one who is not free because love is beautiful only when it is given freely, when it is not taken and demanded and forced.
First you make security arrangements, then the person becomes dead, becomes like an object. A beloved may be a person, a wife becomes an object; a beloved may be a person, a husband becomes an object to be guarded, possessed, controlled. But the more you control, the more you are killing, because freedom is lost. And the other person may be there for other reasons, but not for love, because how can you love a person who possesses you? He looks like an enemy.
Sex creates jealousy but it is a secondary thing. So it is not a question of how to drop jealousy; you cannot drop it because you cannot drop sex. The question is how to transform sex into love, then jealousy disappears.
If you love a person, the very love is enough guarantee, the very love is enough security. If you love a person, you know he cannot go to anybody else. And if he goes, he goes; nothing can be done. What can you do? You can kill the person, but a dead person will not be of much use.
When you love a person you trust that he cannot go to anybody. If he goes, there is no love and nothing can be done. Love brings this understanding. There is no jealousy.
So if jealousy is there, know well there is no love. You are playing a game, you are hiding sex behind love. Love is just a painted word, the reality is sex.
In India, because love is not allowed much, not allowed at all -- marriage is arranged -- tremendous jealousy exists. A husband is always afraid. He has never loved so he knows
-- and the wife is always afraid because she has never loved, so she knows -- that this has been an arrangement. The parents arranged, astrologers arranged, society arranged; the wife and husband were never asked. In many cases they never knew each other, they had never seen each other. So fear exists. The wife is afraid, the husband is afraid, and both are spying on each other. The very possibility is lost.
How can love grow in fear? They can live together, but that living together is also not living together; they only tolerate together, they somehow carry on together. It is just utilitarian, and out of utility you may manage, but ecstasy is not possible. You cannot celebrate it, it cannot become festive; it will be a burdensome affair.
So a husband is dead before death, and a wife is dead before death. It is two dead persons taking revenge on each other, because each thinks that one has killed the other. Taking revenge, angry, jealous -- the whole thing becomes so ugly.
But in the West a different type of phenomenon is happening which is the same on the other extreme. They dropped arranged marriage and it is good, that institution is not
worth keeping, but by dropping it, love has not arisen, only sex has become free. And when sex is free you are always afraid, because it is always a temporary arrangement. You are with this girl tonight, tomorrow she will be with somebody else, and yesterday she was with somebody else. Yesterday the girl was with somebody else, tomorrow she will again be with somebody else; only tonight she is with you.
How can this be very intimate and deep? It can only be a meeting of the surfaces. You cannot penetrate each other because penetration needs seasoning, it needs time, it needs depth, intimacy, living together, being together. A long time is needed then depth opens -
- depths talking to each other....
This is just acquaintance. It may not even be acquaintance -- in the West you can meet a woman on the train and make love, and at midnight you drop her at some station. She never bothers that she may never know you again; she may not even have asked your name.
If sex becomes such a trivial thing -- just a bodily affair where surfaces meet and separate
-- your depth remains untouched. You are again missing something -- something great, something very mysterious -- because you become aware of your own depth only when somebody else touches it. Only through the other do you become aware of your inner being; only in deep relationship does somebody's love resound in you and bring your depth into being. Only through somebody else do you discover yourself.
There are two ways of discovery. One is meditation -- without the other you search for the depth; another is love -- with the other you search for the depth. He becomes a root to reach to yourself. The other creates a circle, and both lovers help each other. The deeper love goes, the deeper they feel they are; their inner-beings are revealed. But then there is no jealousy. Love cannot be jealous, it is impossible. Love is always trusting, and if something happens that breaks your trust you have to accept it; nothing can be done about it because whatsoever you do will destroy the other.
Trust cannot be forced; jealousy tries to force it. Jealousy tries, makes you make every effort so that trust can be maintained, but trust is not something to be maintained. It is there, or it is not there, and I say that nothing can be done about it. If it is there, you go through it; if it is not there, better separate.
But don't fight for it because you are wasting time, life. If you love someone and your depth speaks to the other's depth -- you have a meeting in being -- it is okay, beautiful; if it is not happening, separate. But don't create any conflict, struggle
or fight for it, because it cannot be achieved through fight, and time is lost -- and not only time, your capacity will be damaged. You may start again with another person repeating the whole pattern.
If there is no trust, separate -- the sooner, the better -- so you are not destroyed, so you are not damaged, so your capacity to love remains fresh and you can love somebody else.
This is not the place, this is not the man, this is not the woman for you. Move, but don't destroy each other.
Life is very short and capacities are very delicate. They can be destroyed, and once damaged there is no possibility of repairing them.
I have heard that once it happened that Winston Churchill was invited to speak in a small club of friends. Everybody knew that Churchill was a drunkard and loved alcohol very much, and the man who introduced him, the president of the club, said, "Sir Winston has
drunk so much wine up to now, that if we pour all the wine into this hall the level will come up to my head." It was a big hall, and he was just joking.
Winston Churchill stood, looked at the imaginary line, looked at the ceiling -- the ceiling was high -- became very sad, and he said, "So much still to be done, and so little time left to do it."
As far as love is concerned, so much is to be done for everyone and so little time is left to do it. Don't waste your energy in fighting, jealousy, conflict; move, and move in a friendly way.
Search somewhere else for the person who exists who will love you. Don't get fixed with someone who is wrong, not for you. Don't be angry, there is no point in it, and don't try to force trust; nobody can force it, it never happens. You will miss the time, you will miss the energy, and you may only become aware when nothing can be done. Move. Either trust or move.
Love always trusts, or if it finds that the trust is not possible it simply moves in a friendly way; there is no conflict and fight. Sex creates jealousy; find, discover love. Don't make sex the basic thing -- it is not.
India missed with arranged marriage; the West is missing with free love.
India missed love because parents were too calculating and cunning. They would not allow falling in love: that is dangerous, nobody knows where it will lead. They were too clever, and through cleverness India missed all possibility of love.
In the West they are too rebellious, too young; not clever -- too young, too childish. They have made sex a free thing, available everywhere: no need to go so deep to discover love, enjoy sex and be finished.
Through sex, the West is missing: through marriage, the East has missed. But if you are alert you need not be Eastern, you need not be Western. Love is neither Eastern nor Western.
Go on discovering love within you. And if you love, sooner or later the person will happen to you, because a loving heart, sooner or later, comes to a loving heart -- it always happens. You will find the right person. But if you are jealous you will not find, if you are simply for sex you will not find, if you live only for security you will not find.
Love is a dangerous path and only those who have courage can travel it. And I say to you it is the same, just like meditation -- only for those who are courageous. And there are only two ways to reach the divine: either meditation or love. Find out which is your way, which can be your destiny.
A Bird on the Wing Chapter #7
Chapter title: The Severe Teacher 16 June 1974 am in Buddha Hall
Archive code: 7406160 ShortTitle: WING07 Audio: Yes Video: No
Length: 97 mins
BELOVED OSHO,
THE JAPANESE MASTER EKIDO WAS A SEVERE TEACHER AND HIS PUPILS FEARED HIM.
ONE DAY, AS ONE OF HIS PUPILS WAS STRIKING THE TIME OF DAY ON THE TEMPLE GONG, HE MISSED A BEAT BECAUSE HE WAS WATCHING A BEAUTIFUL GIRL WHO WAS PASSING THE GATES.
UNKNOWN TO THE PUPIL, EKIDO WAS STANDING BEHIND HIM. EKIDO STRUCK THE PUPIL WITH HIS STAFF, AND THE SHOCK STOPPED THE HEART OF THE PUPIL, AND HE DIED.
BECAUSE THE OLD CUSTOM OF THE PUPIL SIGNING HIS LIFE OVER TO THE MASTER HAD SUNK TO A MERE FORMALITY, EKIDO WAS DISCREDITED BY THE GENERAL PUBLIC.
BUT AFTER THIS INCIDENT, EKIDO PRODUCED TEN ENLIGHTENED SUCCESSORS, AN UNUSUALLY HIGH NUMBER.
This type of phenomenon is special to Zen and to Zen masters. Only a Zen master beats his disciples, and sometimes it happens that the disciple dies through beating. Ordinarily, this looks very cruel, violent, mad. Religious people cannot conceive how a master can be so cruel as to kill a disciple, but those who know feel differently.
A man who is enlightened knows well that nobody is ever killed. The inner is eternal, it goes on and on. It may change bodies but the change is only of houses, the change is only of dresses the change is only of vehicles. The traveler goes on and on, nothing dies.
The moment of death can become the moment of enlightenment also, both are so similar. When someone becomes enlightened it is a death deeper than ordinary death; when someone becomes enlightened he comes to know that he is not the body. The attachment, the identification, disappears. For the first time he can see an unbridgeable gap. He is here, the body is there; there is an abyss between. He has never been the body and the body has never been him. This death is deeper than ordinary death; when you die ordinarily you are still identified with the body.
This death is still deeper. Not only are you unidentified with the body, your identification with the mind, with the ego, also disappears. You are left simply as an emptiness, as an inner space, boundless, you are neither the body nor the mind.
In ordinary death only the body dies; the mind goes on following you like a shadow. The mind is the problem, not the body. Through the mind you have become one with the body, and unless the mind disappears you will go on getting into newer bodies, into newer vehicles, and the wheel of life will go on and on. When you become enlightened suddenly you are not the body, you are not the mind. Only then do you come to know who you are. The body is a seed, the mind is also a seed; hidden beyond them is you.
Sometimes it happens that a Zen master can coincide the moment of your death with your enlightenment. In the right moment he can hit you: the body falls down -- everybody can see that -- but deep within the ego falls down also. Only you and the master know. It is not cruelty, it is the highest form of compassion, and only a very great master can do it. It is very subtle to feel the moment of your death, and to make it a point of inner transformation and transfiguration.
Look at this story and you may think-it is how the story appears-that the master killed his disciple. That is not the thing. The disciple was going to die anyhow; it was the moment
for his death. The master knew it; he simply used the moment of death for the disciple's enlightenment. But this is an inner secret, something esoteric, and I could not defend Ekido in a court with this. The court would say he is a murderer. Anyhow, there would be no way to prove he knew the disciple was going to die in that moment.
Why not use death? An ignorant person cannot use life; an enlightened person can even use death. That's how a master should be, using everything for enlightenment.
Ekido was just standing behind the disciple; he was beating the gong of the temple and the master was watching. If this disciple can die in awareness, death will become the turning-point of the wheel. If he can die in awareness, if he can fall but remain conscious, if the body can fall, but deep down he can remain centered, alert, aware, this will be the last death; he will not need to be reborn again. Remember, if you can die with full awareness the wheel of life stops; you can enter a new body only if you are unaware, unconscious. When someone dies fully conscious, this world disappears, there is no birth again.
That's why we say an enlightened person never comes again. A buddha simply disappears; you will not be able to meet him again in the body. You can meet him in bodilessness -- he is everywhere then -- but not in the body. You cannot meet Buddha somewhere because only a body exists somewhere. When the body disappears Buddha exists everywhere, or nowhere. You can meet him here, you can meet him there, you can meet him anywhere, but don't look for him in the body.
The body exists somewhere; when the body disappears, the soul, the consciousness exists everywhere. You can meet Buddha anywhere; wherever you go you can meet him.
The body is there because the mind seeks desires through the body; desires cannot be fulfilled without the body. You can be completely fulfilled without the body, but desires cannot be fulfilled without the body. Desire needs the body; the body is the vehicle of desire. That's why possession happens. You have heard, you must have heard, many stories about a ghost possessing somebody else. Why is a ghost so interested in possessing somebody else? It is because of desires. Desires cannot be fulfilled without a body, so he enters somebody's body to fulfill his desires.
The same is the case when you enter a womb, enter into a fresh body, and start the journey of desires. But if you die alert, in that alertness not only the body dies, all desires evaporate. Then there is no entering into a womb. Then entering a womb is such a painful process, it is so painful that consciously you cannot do it; only unconsciously you can do it.
The English word anxiety comes from a Latin root which means narrowing down, and in the beginning the word was used for the entry of a soul into a womb. So the first anxiety is felt when a soul enters a womb, because everything is narrowed down; an infinite soul becomes a small body. This is the most painful process possible, as if the whole sky has been forced to enter into a seed. You don't know it because it is so painful that you become totally unconscious.
There are two painful processes. You may have heard Buddha's saying, "Birth is pain, death is pain." These are the greatest pains, the greatest anguishes possible. When the infinite becomes finite in the womb, it is painful, it is anxiety; and when the infinite is taken out of the body again there is anguish and pain.
So whenever someone dies consciously, he disappears. Then there is no more entry into the body. Then there is no more anxiety, because anxiety is the consequence of desire;
then you need not be narrowed down because there is no desire to be fulfilled. You can remain infinite; there is no need to enter a vehicle because now you are going nowhere. This disciple who was beating the gong of the temple must have been near his death, close, and the master was standing behind him because of this fact. The disciple was going to die any moment. This is not said in the story, this cannot be said but this is how the thing happened; otherwise there was no need for the master to stand behind the disciple when he was beating the gong. There are many more important things for the master to do. Beating the going is just an ordinary thing, an everyday ritual. Why was the master standing behind him? This Ekido seems to be strange fellow. Had he not anything more significant to do? At that moment there was nothing more significant, because this disciple was going to die anyhow and this death had to be used. And only a master can use death -- out of compassion. He was waiting to see whether he remained alert at the moment of death or not. He missed. The story is beautiful and very significant. He saw a beautiful girl passing and his whole consciousness was lost. He became a desire, his whole being became a desire: he wanted to follow this girl, to possess this girl. And whenever there is desire, consciousness is lost because both cannot exist together. Desire exists with unconsciousness, it cannot exist with consciousness; when you move in desire, consciousness disappears. Hence so much insistence by all the buddhas and Jainas for desirelessness. When you are desireless you will be aware; when you are aware you will be desireless. These are two aspects of the same coin -- on one aspect, desirelessness; on another aspect, alertness, consciousness.
The story is significant. Seeing a beautiful girl pass, the disciple missed himself. He was no more there; he became a desire. He started following the girl, he entered a dream, he became sleepy, he became unconscious.
Sex is the mid-point between death and birth; between birth and death is sex. Really, between birth and death.there is nothing but sex, an extension of sex. You are conceived out of sex, and from the moment you are conceived you start on a journey of sexual pleasure. The moment you die, this continues. And sex is so powerful that even if death is standing there, you will forget it. If sex takes the grip then everything can be forgotten; you become completely mad.
The form of the girl caught his mind; he was no more there. He was alert just a moment before, now he was not alert.
You may have heard stories, Indian stories, of rishis, seekers, doing austerities, meditating in their forest abodes in the hills. Always it happens that whenever they reach a point of awareness, suddenly sex arises. Apsaras, nymphs from heaven, descend as if they are just waiting for someone to come to a point of awareness, as if there is a subtle conspiracy against achieving awareness. Hidden deep in a forest someone achieves a little alertness, and suddenly nymphs are there, beautiful girls from heaven -- not of this earth, perfect; You cannot conceive anything more perfect; the bodies are as if of gold, transparent. Suddenly awareness is lost and the rishi has become a man of desire. He falls.
From where do these apsaras come? Do they really come from heaven? Is there some conspiracy against awareness? -- no. They come out of the mind of the seeker. The mind, when it sees that everything is going to be lost, uses sex as the last weapon. When the mind sees that now awareness is reaching a crystallization, and that crystallized the mind
will not have any say, the mind will be dropped, this is its last struggle -- suddenly the mind creates sex and the desire for sex, the mind projects.
I say to you, there may have been no girl passing. It was just the moment of death, and this man was aware, so the mind played the last trick. That is the last; if you win that you have won the mind. The mind will play other tricks and always preserve sex as the last resort. If sex cannot work then nothing can work. The mind depends basically on sex.
Look into your mind: you will find it is ninety percent sex, thinking about sex, dreaming about sex. Projecting in the future, remembering the past, it is always about sex. And sometimes, even if you feel it is not thinking about sex, ponder over it, meditate -- it desires other things also because of sex. You may think about becoming wealthy -- what will you do with your wealth? Just ask the mind, and the mind says: Then you can enjoy the body, then you can get the most beautiful woman possible. The mind may think: become a Napoleon, a Hitler. But ask the mind what you will do with power. Suddenly you will find, hidden somewhere, sex and desire.
This girl may not have been passing there. Or, even if the girl was passing there, the girl may not have been as beautiful as she looked, as she appeared. In the first place I think there was no girl -- just the moment of death and this man's awareness. He was beating the gong fully alert. This is part of meditation in a Zen monastery -- whatsoever you do, do it with awareness. When you walk, walk fully alert; when you move your head, be fully alert. Whatsoever you do, follow it with alertness; don't miss it, don't think of anything else. Be there in it as a light and everything is revealed. Every act, every nook and corner of it is lighted; nothing is in darkness. When you eat, eat with awareness. This is all one has to do in a Zen monastery -- twenty-four hours of alertness.
This disciple must have been beating the gong with full alertness. The gong is beaten to make everybody alert, and he must have been alert with the sound resounding in the monastery. Suddenly the girl appeared -- from where? In the first place I think there was no girl; the mind projected. In the second place, even if there was a girl, the girl was not so beautiful as the mind thought -- it projected. The girl was just a screen; the dream came from the mind and was projected.
That's how it is happening to everybody. When for the first time you fall in love, the girl is not of this world; she comes from somewhere else -- she is an apsara, a nymph from heaven. But by and by, the more you become acquainted, the girl becomes more and more earthly, ordinary, homely. Suddenly you find there is nothing -- this is just an ordinary girl -- and then you think you have been deceived, that this girl has deceived you.
Nobody has deceived you. Your mind projected; your mind projected so that desire could move. Beauty doesn't exist in things; beauty is a projection. Beauty is not objective; it is subjective. So one day somebody looks beautiful, another day the same person becomes ugly. It is you who projects, it is you who withdraws, the other works just as a screen.
Once you come to know that the mind projects beauty and ugliness, that the mind projects good and bad, you stop projecting. Then for the first time you come to know what objective reality is. It is neither good nor bad, it is neither beautiful nor ugly; it simply is. All your interpretations drop with the projections.
So this disciple at the moment of death was going to be alert and aware, and the mind did the last thing, its final resort -- a beautiful girl appeared. The mind created beauty around
her and awareness was lost. The mind became dim and desire arose; the soul was there no more. The disciple became the body.
That's why all religions insist so much
on transcending sex. Unless you transcend sex the mind will play the last trick, and it will be the winner, not you. But repression is not transcendence, It is escape. Move into desire with full awareness; try to be in the sex act but alert. By and by, you will see the emphasis changing: the energy will be moving more into alertness and less into the sex act. Now the thing has happened, the basic thing has happened. Sooner or later the whole sex energy becomes meditative energy, then you have transcended. Then, whether you stand in the market or sit in a forest, apsaras cannot come to you. They may be passing on the street but they will be there no more for you. If your mind is there absent apsaras become present; if your mind is not there present apsaras disappear.
At this moment when the disciple missed awareness, the master hit him hard on the head. I would like to do the same for you in your moment of death, but it cannot be tolerated here. In Japan it was one of the oldest traditions: whenever a disciple came to a master, he said "My life, my death -- both are yours. If you want to kill me, you can." This is what surrender is. And he signed, he wrote it down; he gave it in writing because the law, the state, won't listen. The law will not listen if you say that because he was going to die, that's why you hit him. The law will say: you hit him, that's why he has died.
The law moves from the visible and a master moves from the invisible. The master is seeing the invisible death reaching, and he hits just to make the disciple alert. And a very hard hit is needed. When the mind is moving in sex an ordinary hit won't do; a real hit is needed, a real electric shock-like thing.
It is an old story. If in the future there are monasteries like old Zen monasteries, there will be no need to hit with a staff. An electric shock can be given -- but something so shocking that the whole being trembles, something so shocking that there is a break in the desire that is leading you out.
The master hit the disciple so hard that he died. This is the visible part of it -- he fell down and died. What happened inside? What is the inside story? When the master hit the disciple, it was the moment of his death, but desire was arising. And in the moment of death if sex is there, only then can you enter into another womb; otherwise you cannot enter.
Men dying in bed, if they are conscious, always think of sex. It may be strange but an old man, even a man of a hundred years, dying in bed, almost always thinks of sex, because sex is the first and the last in the body's life. He may have been thinking of God before, he may have been chanting Ram, Ram, Ram, but suddenly at the moment of death everything drops and sex appears again. It is natural: the first must be the last. You were conceived out of sex and you must die with sex in your mind.
So, dirty, old men are not just a myth. The body is almost dead but the mind continues to think. And old men think more about sex than young men, because young men can do something about it. Old men cannot do, they can only think; the whole phenomenon becomes cerebral, mental.
In the moment of death you are preparing for a re-entry, for entering the womb. Try to understand deeply why there is so much attraction in entering the feminine body, the female body. What do you gain out of it? While making love, when your whole being wants to penetrate the feminine body, what do you gain out of it? Psychologists say --
and spiritualists have always been alert about it -- that it is again the same symbolic act of entry. It is not only when you are born that your being enters into the womb of a woman, this persists your whole life. Again and again you want to penetrate the female body; you want to reach the womb again and again.
Sex means the urge to penetrate the feminine body, to enter again into the womb. They are both the same: whether you enter as a seed or whether you enter just in a sex act, the urge is to enter.
At the moment of death sex must come into the mind, and if it comes, you have missed. You have created a desire, and now this desire will lead you again into another womb. You will enter.
The master was waiting behind. Masters are always waiting behind disciples, whether physically or nonphysically, and this is one of the greatest moments -- when a person is going to die. The master hit him hard, his body fell down, but inside he became alert. The desire disappeared; the girl passing was no more, the street was there no more.
Everything dropped with the body, shattered; he became alert. In that alertness, he died. And if you can join alertness and death you have become enlightened. That's why a miracle happened. Ekido's tradition became one of the most significant traditions in Japan. Ten persons attained enlightenment. People started to wonder: this cruel man who has killed, this aggressive and violent man who has killed, why are his disciples becoming enlightened?
It is a rare number, Ten is rare. With one master, ten disciples becoming enlightened is very rare. Even to help one to become enlightened is too much.
But there is nothing strange, it is plain arithmetic -- only this type of master can help. And whenever I have read this story I have always wondered why others missed. This man could have enlightened many. But those who were afraid, scared, filled with fear, simply must have escaped from this man. People would have stopped coming to his monastery because he was dangerous.
One thing is said about Ekido -- that when this disciple died he never said anything about it, he never said: The disciple is dead. He continued as if nothing had happened, and whenever somebody would ask: What about the disciple? he would laugh. He never said anything about it: he never said the disciple was dead, he never said something had gone wrong, he never said it was just an accident. Whenever someone would ask he would laugh. Why was he laughing? -- because of the inside story.
People can know only from the outside. If I hit you hard and you die, people can only know that you are dead; no one will be able to know what has happened inwardly.
This disciple achieved something, something which buddhas make efforts for many lives to attain -- and Ekido did it in a single moment. He was a great artist, a great master. He used the moment of death so beautifully and the disciple attained. The disciple disappeared not only from the body, the disciple also disappeared from the mind. The disciple was never born again; this was total death with no rebirth.
But in Japan people had become accustomed to such things. You would go to a master, he would hit you; he might throw you out of the window; he would jump on you and start beating you. You were asking a philosophical question -- whether God exists or not -- and he would start beating you. Ekido helped many persons to become enlightened. Only such a man with such deep compassion can help, but a very great surrender is needed.
It is said that the disciple's parents came when the disciple was dead. They came to see Ekido and they were very angry, obviously -- they had only one child and he was dead. They were old and they were depending on him. And they were waiting -- sooner or later he was to come back from the monastery and help in their old age.
In Japan, monastery life is a periodical thing. You can go to a monastery, become a sannyasin, remain there for a time, study, meditate, attain a certain quantity of alertness, a certain quality of being, and then come back to live the life of an ordinary householder.
Sometimes, if you feel that you are missing and the mind has become dim and confused, you go again. It is not a permanent style of life to become a sannyasin in Japan. Only few people follow it their whole life; that is their decision; you can come back and this is not thought of with guilt.
In India there is guilt. If once you become a sannyasin and then come back, get married and become a householder, then everyone looks at you as if you have fallen. This is nonsense, this is foolish because the whole country cannot become sannyasins Only a few people can be sannyasins, not doing anything, and they will have to depend on others who are doing, who are active in life.
Sannyas should be available to everybody. The whole country must be able to become sannyasins, but that is possible only if you can be a sannyasin in ordinary life -- if you can go to the office, if you can work in a shop, if you can be a laborer, or a teacher, or a doctor, or an engineer and still be a sannyasin.
So in Japan people move to the monastery -- that is just a training period so the whole time is devoted to meditation -- then they come back. They carry the quality with them and come back to ordinary life, become ordinary citizens again and work in life -- as far as the outward life is concerned. Inside they go on trying deeply for the inner flame.
Whenever they feel something is becoming dim, whenever they feel they are missing consciousness, they go again to the monastery, stay there for a period and come back again.
This old couple was waiting for the boy to come back -- and he was dead. They must have been angry; they must have thought many things against this master Ekido. So they came, they looked at Ekido and they were waiting for him to say something kind to them. What did Ekido say? He said, "Why are you waiting? Follow the boy. You have wasted enough life, don't waste any more."
And when they looked at Ekido's eyes they forgot their anger. This man could not be cruel; the compassion was flowing. They had come to complain but they simply thanked Ekido and went back.
When you come to a master, be ready to die. Beating any gong, falling in desire, following a girl -- the master can hit you any moment. If you have not surrendered the hit will be useless; the master will not hit you because you will miss, it will not be of much use.
This disciple must have been one of the closest, most intimate, and so surrendered that he would die but would not complain. He fell down without a complaint, as if the body dropped like an old dress. And inside there was light, more light; he entered that light.
Be ready to die; only then can you be reborn into an altogether different dimension. That dimension is the dimension of the divine. Don't protect yourself -- your protection is your undoing; don't try to safeguard. Near a master be insecure because he is your security. Be unsafe, leave everything to him and wait for his hit; any moment it can descend on you.
But if you have not surrendered it will not descend, because no master is interested in hitting you, no master is interested in killing you. Masters are interested only in making you fully enlightened, and that can happen only when your death and your awareness meet -- a very difficult, very rare combination.
A master can see when you are going to die. It is written, because your body has a fixed span; it can be read. An astrologer may miss it; a palmist may not be able to read it because you are such a liar that even your palm lies. You are so deceptive that even your forehead will not say the truth. And you are so afraid of death that unknowingly, unconsciously, you hide the knowledge of it in the innermost chamber. If you are a true person, authentic, you yourself will become aware of when you are going to die.
Zen masters have been forecasting their deaths. They can always tell when they are going to die, but even then people don't believe them. How can we believe that you can know death? -- we have hidden it so deep, and we never look at it.
Astrology may fail because it is an outer science, reading something from the outer towards the inner. Palmistry may fail because it cannot be very certain. Your hands cannot be believed, you cannot be believed; your whole body lies. And the lines on your palm can be changed very easily. For fifteen days think of suicide and your life line will be broken. Continuously, for fifteen days, don't think of anything else, just think of suicide, of committing suicide, picturing, dreaming. Within fifteen days your life line will be broken.
The mind can create or change. If you go to a palmist and he says within three months you are going to die, he may have misinterpreted, but if this idea settles deep in you, you will die in three months. And within three months your life line will be finished. Your hand is not influencing your mind, your mind is continuously influencing your hand.
I have heard about one Egyptian king. He was very much afraid of death; he was very weak and ill and always on his death bed. He came to know about one astrologer who predicted the death of one of his minsters, and exactly on time, the minister died.
The king thought, "this man is dangerous." The king thought, "This man has done something like black magic. He has killed, and to allow this man to be alive is dangerous
-- he can do the same to me."
He called the astrologer and asked him, "Tell me something about my death. When am I going to die?"
The astrologer looked at the king's face and felt something dangerous; the king was very ferocious. He suspected something, so he made the chart, studied it, and then said, "You will die after I have died, within one week."
So the king called all his doctors to look after this man. A palace was created for him with the best of food and of everything. The greatest doctors were called,
just in his service, and told, "Preserve him, because he says if he dies within seven days " It is said that the king lived very long because that man was alive; he was a very
healthy man. And the king died only when that man died; within a week the king was dead.
Your mind goes on changing, and if your mind is a liar, don't go to any palmist; the palmist will be deceived. But you cannot deceive a master because he never reads your palm, he never looks at your forehead, he is not worried about your stars; he looks deep in you. He knows the exact moment of your death, and if you surrender the death can be used.
This story is beautiful, meditate on it. The same can happen to you but much readiness is needed, ripeness is needed, and surrender.
Anything more? Question 1 BELOVED OSHO,
THE LAST LINE OF THIS ZEN STORY SAYS TEN WERE ENLIGHTENED AND THAT THIS WAS A GREAT NUMBER. TEN DOESN'T SEEM A GREAT NUMBER TO ME. CAN WE BUY YOUR STICK AND USE IT ON OURSELVES TO HELP SURRENDER HAPPEN?
Ten is really a big number because enlightenment is so arduous, so difficult to achieve, almost impossible. Ten is a big number but even bigger numbers have happened. With Buddha hundreds became enlightened; with Mahavira hundreds became enlightened. The basic thing is not how to buy my stick -- you cannot buy it -- it is how to allow it. It is not a question of the master hitting you, it is a question of receiving the hit, welcoming it. If you resist, nothing can be done; and resistance is there. In ordinary things resistance is there, and death is very big, the ultimate. In ordinary things resistance is there.
One man was here and he said, "I want to surrender."
I told him, "Think about it -- what do you mean? It is difficult; it is not so easy that you can come and say, 'I surrender.'" I told the man, "Go and first shave your head."
The man said, "That's very difficult, that I cannot do; I love long hair."
The man had completely forgotten he was going to surrender to me, but he could not cut his hair. And hair is dead already, hair is not a live part of you; that is why you can cut it and you are not harmed. Hair is dead, already dead, something which has gone dead and been thrown out of the body as dead cells. This man says he cannot cut his hair because he loves long hair -- and he is ready to surrender. He doesn't know what surrender means. Someone comes to me and says, "I am ready to surrender." And I say to him, "Change to ochre." Then he says, "That will be awkward, it will be difficult." He cannot change his dress to ochre yet he is ready to surrender.
The word surrender has become meaningless, it carries no meaning for him. He is not aware of what he is saying, otherwise to utter the word surrender would make his whole being tremble and shake, because it means death.
My stick is there; I can hit you but your readiness is not there. If I hit you before you are ready, you will simply escape from me. Many escape, many have escaped because I have hit them somehow or other.
And don't think that the stick is really a visible thing; I use subtle sticks. Just a word can hit you to death; you are shattered. Your logic, your religion, your concepts are hit and you are shattered, and you never come back again to me. I hit your emotions, then you become antagonistic to me. Your ripeness is needed: you have to welcome the hit, wait and pray for it.
In Zen it has been one of the oldest traditions that whenever a disciple is hit, the whole monastery becomes happy, and the disciple is received as something special. The master has hit him; the disciple has been chosen. People wait for years to be hit by the master. They pray, they ask the master, "When will we be capable?" or, "When will we be fortunate enough to be hit? When will your stick, your staff, descend upon us?"
A deep receptivity is needed. There is no need to buy my staff, it is always yours. Only have a welcoming heart, a deep receptivity, patience; it can descend on you at any moment. Sometimes it comes near to you and you become scared. Sometimes, on many centers of your body I hit but then you are scared, then you want to escape from it.
Be alert to the mind; the mind will always tell you to escape. Wherever there is danger the mind will tell you: run away from here.
The mind has two ways of encouraging a situation -- one is fight, another is flight. Your mind starts fighting with me, I can see. When I am talking, I can see in your eyes whether you are fighting or fleeing. Your very look, the way you sit, the way you hear, shows that you are fighting, resisting, withdrawn -- creating a space so I cannot enter in you. Or, you are on a flight, and then you are sleepy and you are not listening at all. Or you are somewhere else, thinking something else, you are engaged within so you can escape.
When you are ready neither flight nor fight exists, just a prayerful patience and waiting. There is not even an impatience about it... because impatience creates tension. You are not even impatient, just patiently waiting, passively waiting with a prayerful mood.
The hit is yours; I am waiting for it, and many more than Ekido's disciples can become enlightened. The possibility is there; the opportunity is there, the river is flowing, but whether you will bow down and take a drink, or whether you will remain egoistic and turn away from the river, thinking either of flight or of fight and creating all your own ideas around you -- whether you will allow your mind to take you away from me, or whether you will put it aside and allow me to hit you -- everything depends on you. The hit is always near but you go on wavering.
This disciple was hit by Ekido; he was really surrendered. And after his death many more were ready. From somewhere the chain is to be broken. When one light is kindled, many more follow. Who will be the first to die? -- that's the question. Once this disciple was dead and inside, enlightened, many followed; ten became enlightened.
This word ten is also worth thinking about. This ten is symbolic... because ten is the greatest number. It is not exactly ten, it is not arithmetical; ten is just the greatest number. Man started counting on his fingers, and there are ten fingers. Even now in the villages people count on their fingers. Ten is the highest number and all other numbers are repetitive. Eleven means one upon one, twelve means two upon one; there is repetition.
Ten is the basic number in all the languages of the world, because everywhere man has ten fingers. These are the ten digits so ten is the highest number; it is symbolic.
One dropped into infinity, then many followed. Once the abyss is open and you see someone entering it, and you see the bliss, the benediction, you can also enter it very easily; you can take the jump as well.
Many are getting ready, but even if you are ninety-nine percent ready, the hit cannot descend on you. The hit can descend on you only when you are one hundred percent ready, because then it is a revolution. You can turn back even from ninety-nine percent, that's the problem. It is very unfortunate but it happens.
I have been working with many, many people, and sometimes they turn when the right moment was going to be; exactly before that moment they turn away. And the mind is cunning enough; it can philosophize, it can say why you have turned away. Exactly at the moment when something was going to happen, you can turn away. There is more possibility for you to turn away from that moment than from any other moment; it is unfortunate but it happens. You wait and wait and wait, and then the moment is nearing
where the evaporating point can be reached, and suddenly you turn away. To resist that turning is very difficult. It is just like death reaching nearer, nearer, nearer, and seeing the abyss you turn away and run as fast as you can.
Remain alert. This misfortune happens to seekers; it can happen to you.
Buddha passed through a village many times in his forty years of traveling. One man used to come; he would listen for a few minutes then get up and go away. And this had become a habit; he never listened to Buddha for the whole time Buddha was speaking. He would come, that was certain, and whenever Buddha would come to the town he would wait for that man. He would come, that was certain. He would sit and for a few minutes he would listen, then, respectfully bowing down to Buddha, he would go away.
Ananda once asked that man, "Why do you do this?"
The man said, "Sometimes this is the peak hour for my business, but I must come just to pay my respects; that's why I come. But my shop is open and customers are there, and they will not wait. Enlightenment can wait; next time I will hear." It happened again and again.
The day Buddha died he was near the village, and before his death he said to Ananda, "That man has not come. This is exceptional -- he never missed. He always missed in a sense but he never missed. He has always come, now he has not come."
Then Buddha asked his disciples, "Do you have anything to ask -- because soon I will enter into the final samadhi, the final ecstasy, and then I will not be able to come back and answer you."
They started weeping and crying but there was no question. And Ananda said, "We have asked everything, you have answered everything, and there is nothing. Our minds are blank just thinking that you are going to disappear."
Buddha asked thrice, again and again. There was no question so he went behind the tree and closed his eyes, just to dissolve into the infinite, to leave the body, and then suddenly the man came. He started fighting with the monks and said, "I must see him. This is the last time; I will not be able to see him again. For forty years I have been missing and I have a question to ask. I have never been able to ask it before because sometimes there was a marriage in my family, sometimes business was at a peak, sometimes I was ill or my wife was ill, and sometimes there were relatives staying. I always missed but now don't prevent me."
The disciples said, "It is not possible; now he is dissolving."
Buddha came out from his ecstasy, from his final samadhi. He came in front of the tree and he said, "Don't prevent that man. He may have been foolish, he may have missed because of his ignorance, but I cannot be hard on him. I am still alive so let him come. No one should say that Buddha was alive and a man who had come begging was sent back." Buddha said, "What have you come to ask?"
The man had forgotten the question. He said, "When I came, I knew, but now I can't remember. Next time I see you I will bring the question." ... And there was going to be no next time.
Buddha died that day, and that man must be wandering somewhere on this or some other earth, seeking a man who can answer his question. That man missed Buddha continuously for forty years.
You can miss me -- always remember that possibility. But it will be because of you, not because of me; I am always ready. Whenever you are ready I will hit you, but a deep
surrender is needed; before that nothing can be done. You have to die, die as you are, so that which you really are can be born out of you. You have to die as an appearance so that the real can be born. You have to die on the periphery, so that the center evolves and comes out in its luminousness, in its full perfection.
All hits are to destroy the seed so that the tree is born. Anything more?
Question 2 BELOVED OSHO,
THERE HAVE BEEN SEVERAL QUESTIONS CONCERNING WHAT YOU WERE SAYING ABOUT WARRIORS AND BUSINESSMEN. SINCE MOST OF US WERE BUSINESSMAN AND PROFESSIONALS, AND NOT WARRIORS, ARE WE GOING TO MISS ENLIGHTENMENT?
To be a warrior doesn't mean to be a soldier, it is a quality of the mind. You can be a businessmanand be a warrior; you can be a warriorand be a businessman. "Businessman" means a quality of the mind which is always bargaining, trying to give less and get more. That's what I mean when I say businessman: trying to give less and get more, always bargaining, always thinking about profit. A warrior is again a quality of the mind, the quality of the gambler, not of the bargainer, the quality which can stake everything this way or that -- a noncompromising mind.
If a businessman thinks of enlightenment, he thinks of it as a commodity like many other commodities. He has a list: he has to make a big palace, he has to purchase this and that, and in the end he has to purchase enlightenment also; but enlightenment is always the last
-- when everything is done, then; when nothing remains to be done, then. And that enlightenment is also to be purchased because he understands only money.
It happened that a great and rich man came to Mahavira. He was really very rich; he could purchase anything, even kingdoms. Even kings borrowed money from him.
He came to Mahavira and he said, "I have been hearing so much about meditation, dhyan, and during the time you have been here you have created a craze in people; everybody is talking about dhyan. What is dhyan? How much does it cost and can I purchase it?" Mahavira hesitated, so the man said, "Don't you think about the cost at all. You simply say and I will pay; there is no problem about it."
How to talk to this man? -- Mahavira was at a loss as to what to say to him. Finally Mahavira said, "You go. In your town there is a man, a very poor man; he may be willing to sell his dhyan. He has achieved, and he is so poor that he may be ready to sell it."
The man thanked Mahavira, rushed to the poor man, knocked on his door and said, "How much do you want for your dhyan? I want to purchase your meditation."
The man started laughing. He said, "You can purchase me, that's okay. But how can I give you my dhyan? It is a quality of my being, it is not a commodity."
But businessmen have always been thinking in this way. They donate to purchase, they create temples to purchase. They give but their giving is never a giving; it is always to get something, it is an investment.
When I say to you to be a warrior, I mean to be a gambler, to put everything at stake. Then enlightenment becomes a question of life and death, not a commodity, and you are ready to throw away everything for it. And you are not thinking about the profit.
People come to me and they ask, "What will we gain out of meditation? What is the purpose of it? What will be the profit out of it? If one hour is devoted to meditation what will be the gain?" Their whole life is economy.
A warrior is not after gain; a warrior is after a peak, after a peak of experiencing. What does a warrior gain when he fights in a war? Your soldiers are not warriors any longer, they are just servants. Warriors are no longer on this earth because the whole thing is being done by technology. You drop a bomb on Hiroshima; the dropper is not a warrior. Any child can do that, any madman can do that -- really, only a madman can do it.
Dropping a bomb on Hiroshima is not being a fighter or a warrior.
War is no more the same as it was in the past; now anybody can do it, and sooner or later only mechanical devices will do it. A plane without a pilot can do it -- and the plane is not a warrior. The quality is lost. The warrior was facing, encountering the enemy, face to face.
Just imagine two persons with drawn swords encountering each other: can they think? If they think they will miss. Thinking stops; when swords are drawn thinking stops. They cannot plan because if they plan, in that moment the other will hit. They move spontaneously, they become no-minds. The danger is so much, the possibility of death is so near, that the mind cannot be allowed to function. The mind needs time; in emergencies the mind cannot be allowed. When you are sitting in your chair you can think, but when you are facing an enemy you cannot think.
If you pass through a street, a dark street, and suddenly you see a snake, a dangerous snake sitting there, what will you do? Will you start thinking? No, you will jump. And this jump will not be out of your mind because the mind needs time, and snakes don't have any time; they don't have any mind. The snake will strike you -- so the mind cannot be allowed. While facing a snake you jump, and that jump comes out of your being; it comes before thought. You jump first and then you think. This is what I mean by the quality of a warrior: action comes without thinking, action is without mind; action is total. You can become a warrior without going to war, there is no need to go to war.
The whole of life is an emergency, and everywhere there are enemies and snakes, and ferocious wild animals ready to attack you. The whole of life is a war. If you are alert you will see that the whole of life is a war, and any moment you can die; so the emergency is permanent. Be alert, be like a warrior as if moving amidst the enemy. Any moment, from anywhere, death can jump on you; don't allow the mind. And be a gambler -- only gamblers can take this jump. The jump is so much that those who think of profit cannot take it. It is a risk, the greatest risk; you may be lost and nothing may be gained. When you come to me you may lose everything and you may not gain anything.
I will repeat one of Jesus' sayings: Whosoever clings to life, whosoever tries to preserve it, will lose it; and whosoever is ready to lose it will preserve it.
This is talking in the language of a gambler: Lose it -- this is the way to preserve it. Die -- that is the way to reach the eternal life, the immortal life.
When I say a businessman, I say a calculating, cunning mind. Don't be cunning minds. No child is ever a businessman, and it is difficult to find an old man who is not a businessmen. Every child is a warrior and every old man is a businessman. How every warrior becomes a businessman is a long story: the whole society, education, culture, conditioning, makes you more and more fearful, afraid. You cannot take a risk and everything that is beautiful is risky. Love is a risk. Life is a risk. God is a risk.
God is the greatest risk, and through mathematics you will not reach -- only through taking the ultimate risk, putting everything that you have at stake. And you don't know the unknown; the known you risk and the unknown you don't know.
The business mind will say,"What are you doing -- losing that which you have for that which no one knows exists or not? Preserve that which is in hand and don't long for the unknown." The warrior mind says, "The known has been known already, now there is nothing in it; it has become a burden and to carry it is useless. The unknown must be known now, and I must risk the known for the unknown."
And if you can risk, totally risk, not preserving anything, not playing tricks with yourself, not withholding anything, suddenly the unknown envelops you. And when it comes you become aware that it is not only the unknown, it is the unknowable. It is not against the known, it is beyond the known. To move in that darkness, to move in that uncharted place without any maps and without any pathways, to move alone into that absolute, the quality of the warrior is needed.
Many of you still have a little of it left because you were once children; you were all warriors, you were all dreamers of the unknown. That childhood is hidden but it cannot be destroyed; it is there, it still has its own corner in your being. Allow it to function; be childlike and you will be warriors again. That's what I mean.
And don't feel depressed because you run a shop and you are a businessman. Don't feel depressed; you can be a warrior anywhere. To take risks is a quality of the mind, a childlike quality -- to trust and to move beyond that which is secure.
A Bird on the Wing Chapter #8
Chapter title: Zen Without Writing 17 June 1974 am in Buddha Hall
Archive code: 7406170 ShortTitle: WING08 Audio: Yes Video: No
Length: 91 mins
BELOVED OSHO,
THE ZEN MASTER MU-NAN HAD ONLY ONE SUCCESSOR. HIS NAME WAS SHOJU.
AFTER SHOJU HAD COMPLETED HIS STUDY OF ZEN, MU-NAN CALLED HIM INTO HIS ROOM AND SAID, "I AM GETTING OLD, AND AS FAR AS I KNOW YOU ARE THE ONLY ONE WHO WILL CARRY ON THIS TEACHING. HERE IS A BOOK. IT HAS BEEN PASSED DOWN FROM MASTER TO MASTER FOR SEVEN GENERATIONS, AND I HAVE ALSO ADDED MANY POINTS ACCORDING TO MY UNDERSTANDING. THIS BOOK IS VERY PRECIOUS, AND I AM GIVING IT TO YOU TO REPRESENT YOUR SUCCESSORSHIP."
SHOJU REPLIED, "PLEASE KEEP THE BOOK. I RECEIVED YOUR ZEN WITHOUT WRITING, AND I WAS VERY HAPPY WITH IT, THANK YOU."
MU-NAN REPLIED, "I KNOW THAT, BUT THIS GREAT WORK HAS BEEN CARRIED FROM MASTER TO MASTER FOR SEVEN GENERATIONS, AND IT WILL BE A SYMBOL OF YOUR LEARNING. HERE, TAKE THE BOOK." THE TWO WERE TALKING IN FRONT OF A FIRE, AND THE INSTANT SHOJU FELT THE BOOK IN HIS HANDS HE THRUST IT INTO THE FLAMES.
MU-NAN, WHO HAD NEVER IN HIS LIFE BEEN ANGRY BEFORE, SHOUTED, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?"
AND SHOJU SHOUTED BACK, "AND WHAT ARE YOU SAYING?"
All books are dead, and that is how it should be; they cannot be alive. All scriptures are graveyards, they cannot be anything else. A word, the moment it is uttered, goes wrong. Unuttered, it is okay; uttered, it is falsified by the very utterance.
Truth cannot be said, cannot be written, cannot be indicated in any way. If it can be said, you will attain to truth just by hearing it; if it can be written, you will attain to truth just by reading it; if it can be indicated, you will attain to truth by mere indication. This is not possible, there is no way to transfer truth to you; there exists no bridge. It cannot be given, it cannot be communicated.
But people become addicted to scriptures, books, words, theories, because for the mind it is easy to understand a theory, it is easy to read a book, it is easy to carry a tradition. With anything dead the mind is always the master; with anything alive the mind becomes the slave.
So the mind is always afraid of life; it is the dead part in you. Just as I said that hairs and nails are dead parts of your body, the parts that have died already and that the body is throwing out, so the mind is the dead part of your consciousness. It is the part that has already become dead, and the consciousness wants to get rid of it.
What is the mind? It is the past, the memory, the accumulated experience. But the moment you have experienced the thing, it is dead. Experiencing is in the present, experience is in the past.
Why are you listening to me? Just in the moment, just here and now, it is an experiencing, it is an alive process, but the moment you say, "I have heard," it has become dead, it has become an experience. While listening to me the mind is not there, you are there. The moment the mind comes in it says, "I have understood, I have heard, I know." What do you mean? You mean the mind has taken possession. The word can be possessed by the mind -- anything dead can be possessed by the mind; and only dead things can be possessed. If you try to possess a live thing there are only two ways: either you will not be able to possess it, or you will have to kill it first and then you can possess it. So wherever there is possession, there is murdering, killing.
If you love a person, love in itself is an experiencing, a moment-to-moment flow with no past being carried; the river remains fresh. But the mind says, "Possess this woman, possess this man, because who knows about the future? Possess! She may escape, she may go to somebody else, she may fall in love with someone else. Possess her and block all the ways of escape, close all the doors so she remains always yours." The mind has entered and now this woman will be killed, now this man will be murdered. There will be a husband, there will be a wife, but there will not be two live persons.
And this is the mischief the mind goes on doing everywhere. The moment you say, "I love," it has become an experience, it is already dead. Loving is something else; it is a
process. Why when in love can you not say, "I love?" That would be profane. How can you say, "I love?" In love you are not, the possessor is not, so how can you say, "I love?" In love there is no 'I'; love is there of course but you are not.
While an experience is alive, experiencing, there is no ego. The process is there and you can say love is there, but you cannot say, "I love." In that love you have dissolved, you have merged and melted. Anything live, alive, is greater than you; anything dead and the mind can jump, just like a cat jumps on a mouse and catches hold of it.
Truth cannot be delivered, there is no way to deliver it. Once delivered it is dead, it has already become untrue.
Lao Tzu insisted on not saying anything about the truth his whole life. Whenever someone asked about truth he would say many things, but he would not say anything about the truth; he would avoid it. In the end he was forced to say something. Disciples, lovers, said he should write because he had known something which was rarely known, he had become something which was unique -- there would be no Lao Tzu again. So he wrote a small book, Tao Te Ching, but the first thing he said in it was, "Tao cannot be said, Truth cannot be uttered. And the moment you utter it, it is already false." And then he said, "Now I can write at ease. I have declared the basic fact: uttered, truth becomes false; written, it has already gone wrong."
Why is the word false? One thing: it always belongs to the past. Another thing: the word in itself cannot carry the experience to you. I say I am silent. You hear the words; the word in itself cannot carry the experience to you. I say I am silent. You hear the words -- the word silent is heard, but what do you understand? If you have never been silent, if you have never tasted it, if it has never stirred your heart, if it has never overwhelmed you, overpowered you, how can you understand? And if it has overpowered you, if there has been a gap when you disappeared and silence was there, there will be no need for me to talk about silence. The moment you see me, you will know; the moment you come near me, you will feel. The word will not be needed.
The word is needed because you don't know, this is the problem. Because you don't know, the word is needed, so how can the word express? That which you don't know, the word cannot say to you. The word may be heard, you may memorize it, you may understand the meaning written in the dictionary -- what silence means is written in the dictionary, and you know it already -- but that is not the meaning.
When I say I am silent, the silence that I am here is not written in the dictionary, cannot be written in the dictionary, cannot be written there. If you are silent you will understand, but then there is no need to say. If you are not silent whatsoever you understand will be wrong -- but then there is need to say.
I have heard a story. Once a villager entered a big bank; many people were coming and going and much business was going on. Suddenly the villager cried, shouted at the top of his voice, "Did somebody drop a wad of notes with a rubber band around it?" Many people cried, "Yes, I did," and they ran towards him. A crowd gathered and everybody was claiming the money. The villager said, "I have found the rubber band."
Whenever I say truth, whenever I say silence, you will only find the rubber band; the notes will be missing. The word will reach you but not with the weight of the notes. Those notes will be left behind -- they are in my heart; the word will reach but it is just a rubber band. It may have been around the notes, but still it is just a rubber band.
Truth is incommunicable, but then what have masters been doing? They seem to be involved in an absurd activity. Yes, that is right: they are trying to say something which cannot be said, and they are indicating something which cannot be indicated. They are trying to communicate something which has never been communicated and never will be communicated. Then what are they doing? Their whole effort is absurd, but still there is something in their effort -- their compassion.
Knowing well that I cannot say that which I want to say, the easiest course is that I should remain silent, because if I know it cannot be said then why bother? You cannot understand my words, but will you be able to understand my silence? So it is a trial between two evils.
It is better I remain silent; that would be more consistent. It cannot be said therefore I should remain silent. But will you be able to understand my silence? The word you may not be able to understand but you can hear it, and some possibility is open. Hearing it continuously, you may become aware of something which has not been said in the word. Listening to me, by and by, you may become aware of me, not of what I am saying. The word will help, just as a bait -- you may be caught in the net. But if I am silent, you will pass by my side. You will not even become aware that I am there, and even that possibility will be lost.
So when masters speak, they don't speak to tell the truth that cannot be told. They have a choice: either they can remain silent or they can talk. With silence you will miss them completely. With words a possibility opens, not a certainty because everything depends on you, but a possibility opens. Listening continuously to a buddha you will someday become silent, because just being near a buddha is being near a pool of silence, an energy, a tremendous energy which has become silent. This is what Indians call satsang -- to be near the truth. It is not a question of communication. Just to be near the truth can be infectious -- just as you come near a river and the breeze becomes cooler. You may not see the river; it may still be far away, but the breeze carries the message and you feel a coolness coming.
When you come near a buddha the words are carrying just such a coolness -- buddha is somewhere near. You may start groping for him; you may be lost in his words. Then you are lost in the forest and the river is missed. But if you are alert, intelligent, then, by and by, you will feel from where this wind is blowing, from where these words are coming. And these words carry a silence around them. It may be just a rubber band, but that rubber band has been in deep contact with the notes. It carries something, something of the sound from where this breeze is coming. If you can follow intelligently sooner or later you will reach the source.
The words of a buddha may not be able to communicate the truth, but they can communicate the music, the music that exists in one who is enlightened. They carry the melody, something of the source, a tiny part, a very tiny part, but something of the source. It should be so, because when a word comes out of a buddha it carries something of the buddha. It has to be so. The word has been vibrating in his being, it has been in touch with buddha's heartbeat, it has passed through the buddha's silence, it has been in the womb, the womb of the buddha. It carries the scent, the fragrance. It is a very far off cry, but still....
You may be lost in the words -- then you miss the buddha -- but if you are aware that the word cannot carry the truth, then you will always put aside the word and follow the
perfume, put aside the word and follow the music, put aside the word and follow the presence. If I suddenly say, "Hey!" you look at me. The word is meaningless, but the look Suddenly you become aware of me. That awareness has to be followed, so then,
words can become a help. They may not tell the truth but they can become a help, a step towards the truth.
This story is beautiful. A master is on his dying bed, and soon he has to leave this earth and its vehicle, the body, and he would like to have a successor who can carry the flame that he has kindled, one who will be able to continue the work that he has started. He chooses a disciple, calls him near, and says to him, "You are the most capable of those around me and you are going to be my successor. You will have to continue this work. For seven generations a book has been passed from the master to the disciple who is going to be the successor. I received this book from my master and I give it to you. It is a very precious, a unique treasury. Seven enlightened persons have noted down their experiences of truth in it, and I have also added a few of my own understandings.
Preserve it. Don't lose it; don't let it be lost."
The disciple said, "But I have achieved the experience without any book, and I am happy and blissful. I am not even a little bit dissatisfied, so why add this burden to me, why give an unnecessary responsibility to me? I have already experienced the truth and the book was not needed. It is unnecessary."
The master still insisted, "Much that is valuable is written in it. It is no ordinary book, it isthe book, The Bible. So don't be sacrilegious, pay respect to this book, keep it and hand it over to your successor. By giving this book to you I certify this book is a representation that you are my successor."
The master gave the book to the disciple. It must have been a cold night because the fire was burning. In one hand the disciple received the book, and in the same instant he thrust it into the fire. The master, who had never been angry in his life, shouted, "What are you doing?"
And the disciple shouted, even louder than the master, "What are you saying?"
This is beautiful, the master must have died peacefully. This was the right man. The book had to be thrust into the fire or the disciple would have missed. If he had kept the book he would have missed, and then he would not have been the successor. You keep the book only when the thing has not happened to you. Who is bothered about words when the truth is with you? Who is bothered about a book when the real thing has happened within? Who is bothered about explanations when the experience is there? Explanations are precious because the experience is lacking; theories are significant because there is no knowledge. When you know, you can throw theories -- they are rubber bands. And when the notes are with you, you can throw the rubber band. Preserving a rubber band shows foolishness.
This book was not precious -- no book is precious -- and the master was playing a game, the same that his master must have played with him. Nobody knows what was written in the book, but I tell you nothing was written in it. It was empty. Had the disciple preserved it, when the master died he would have opened it, and then he would have cried. Nothing was written in the book. It was just a game, an old game. Every master tries to test the experience of a disciple, whether he knows. And if he knows, he will not be addicted to the book. Why? -- there is no point in it. That is why the disciple said, "What are you
saying? To preserve the book when I have achieved without it, when I have already achieved? What are you saying?
The master provoked a situation, and in that situation the disciple proved his mettle. He proved that he knew. Even a slight inclination to preserve and he would have missed, he would not have been the successor. He didn't even look in the book to see what was there. He was not even curious, because only ignorance is curious. If you know, you know.
What is curiosity? What would have happened to you? The first thing the mind would have said was: At least look in it, see what is there. But that gesture would have been enough to prove that you had not achieved. Curiosity means ignorance. Wisdom is not curious. Curiosity asks questions; wisdom has no questions to ask.
What would you have done? The first thing that comes to the mind: At least see what is there. If my master insists that this precious book has to be preserved, handed down from one generation to another with seven enlightened persons having written in it, and with my own master having added his own understanding to it, at least have a look before you throw it in the fire.
But I tell you -- if he had looked, he would have been thrown out of the house with the book: Get out, and never come back again! He acted out of a deep understanding. How can the master who knows insist that the book is precious? There must be some game. The master had never been angry, never in his life, and suddenly he was angry and said, "What are you doing?" He created the whole situation.
In the anger the disciple may have yielded, may have said, "I have done something wrong, forgive me. This is how the mind functions. The mind might have come in and thought, "I have done something wrong. The master may not appoint me as successor now. If my master is so angry, it means I have done something wrong, and I may miss being the successor. I was going to be the chief, I was going to be the master of the monastery and millions would have followed me. Thousands would have been my disciples, and now I have done something wrong. A man who has never been angry is angry, shouting."
If you had been there, you would have touched the feet of the master and said, "Forgive me, but appoint me." But the disciple said, "And what are you saying?" If the master can play at anger the disciple can also play. but this can happen only when both know. He answered in the right coin. He answered correctly and the master was satisfied: This is the man. He became the successor, he was the successor.
But this has been done by every religion: they preserve books and do nothing else. Christians preserve their Bible, Mohammedans preserve their Koran, Hindus preserve their Gita -- and they have missed. They are not the successors. Mohammedans do not belong to Mohammed; they cannot belong. The Koran must be in the fire before they can belong. Christians don't know anything about Christ because they preserve The Bible, and Hindus have no understanding of Krishna because of the Gita -- they go on carrying the burden. All the Vedas, and all the Bibles, and all the Korans are for those who don't understand. They carry the burden and the burden becomes so much that they are crushed under it, they are not freed through it, they become slaves to it.
A religious person is always beyond the book; a religious consciousness is never addicted to words and the verbal. The whole thing is childish. A religious man is in search of authentic experience, not borrowed words, not experiences of others. Unless he knows -- buddhas may have existed, but they are useless. Unless he knows, there is no truth
because truth can only be his experience. Only then is it there. The whole world may say there is light and there is a rainbow in the sky and the sun is rising, but if my eyes are closed what does it mean to me? The rainbow, the colors, the sunrise, the whole thing is nonexistential to me. My eyes are closed, I am blind. And if I listen to them too much, and if I start believing in them too much, and if I borrow their words and I also start talking about the rainbow that I have not seen, about colors which I cannot see, about the sunrise which is not my experience, I may be lost in the forest of words.
It is better to say, "I am blind. I don't know any color and I don't know any light, and unless my eyes open, there is no sun and there can be no sunrise." Insist, so that you can work upon your eyes. Don't carry the books; they talk about rainbows seen by others, they talk about sunrises experienced by others. Don't carry the borrowed God when you can encounter him directly, immediately. Why create barriers of books between you and him? Burn the books! -- that is the message -- throw them in the fire.
That doesn't mean go and throw your Gita in the fire -- that will not be of much help, because if a Gita cannot help towards truth how can burning a Gita be helpful? That is not the point. You can throw away all the books and you can remain addicted to theories, doctrines. When I say burn the books, I say: Burn the mind, drop the mind. Don't be verbal. Seek authentic experience. But your inquiry may have arisen out of the books -- that is the problem -- your questions may have arisen out of books. If your questioning is itself bookish, your whole inquiry has started in a wrong direction.
People come to me and ask, "What is God?" And I ask them, "Did this question come out of your own life or have you read some book which talks about God and so you have become curious? If your curiosity has arisen out of learning it is useless. It is not your question. And if the question is not yours, no answer can be of any help. When the basic thing is borrowed, when even the question is borrowed, you will go on borrowing the answers. Seek your authentic question. What is your question?"
I have heard about a philosopher who entered a London car showroom. He looked around and became fascinated with a beautiful car, a streamlined sports car. The salesman became alert because he was looking so interested. He came nearer and asked, "Are you interested in this car?"
The man said, "Yes, I am interested. Is it fast?"
The salesman said, "Fast? You cannot find a faster car than this. If you get in it right now, by tomorrow morning at three o'clock, you will be in Aberdeen. Are you really interested in buying it?"
The philosopher said, "I will think about it."
The next day he came and said, "No, I don't want to purchase that car. The whole night I couldn't sleep. I remained awake thinking and thinking and thinking, and I could not find any reason why I should like to be in Aberdeen at three o'clock in the morning." Whenever you read a book, ask, inquire, for what reason you would like to be in Aberdeen at three o'clock in the morning.
You read a book. You read something about God, you read something about moksha, you read something about the soul, you read something about bliss -- you become fascinated -
- words of those who know are really fascinating -- but you forget completely for what reason you would like to encounter God. Just by reading a book, just by reading a man -- for example, reading Jesus -- you will become fascinated, because this man is drunk with God, his every word is alcoholic. If you hear him, you will feel drunk. But close the
Bible, escape from this Jesus, brood over whether this is your inquiry or whether this man has sold his inquiry to you. With another's inquiry your own search becomes false.
The first thing to remember is: your question must be yours. Then the second thing to remember is: the answer must be yours. Books supply both. That's why I said: Burn the books and be authentic. Come out of the jungle of words and feel what you want, what your desire is, and follow it wheresoever it leads. Sooner or later you will come to the divine. It may take a little longer, but the search will be real.
If all books were burnt, the world would be more religious. There are so many books and readymade answers that everybody knows the question, the answer. It has become a game; it is not your life. The world should be freed of books, should be freed of all ideals, should be freed of all borrowed inquiries. Every man should start feeling his own heartbeat, his own pulse -- where it leads, what it desires, what his question is. If you can find your question, the answer is waiting just nearby. It may be that in finding the question you have already found the answer, because the answer lies in authenticity. If the question is authentic, if you have become authentic in questioning, fifty percent of the problem is already solved. Just a little more effort, going a little deeper, and the question always hides the answer behind it.
Questioning is just one aspect of the coin. The other aspect is the answer. Just behind questioning, the answer is lying waiting for you. But if you have not come to your question, how can you come to your answer? And only the answer that is yours will free you, will make you free.
Jesus says truth liberates. Yes, truth liberates, but never borrowed truth. Jesus' truth will not liberate you. But Christians believe that Jesus' truth will liberate them. Not only that, they think that just by Jesus' crucifixion humanity is already liberated. This is being blind, absolutely blind. Nothing is liberated, nobody is liberated; salvation has not happened. Jesus was crucified, that's okay, but through Jesus' crucifixion Jesus was liberated, not you. The whole thing seems to be a trick. Jesus died on the cross and humanity, particularly Christianity, is liberated; one who is a Christian is already liberated.
This is how the mind thinks: it goes on throwing responsibility onto somebody else. If you are a sinner you are a sinner because Adam sinned and was thrown out of heaven, and now you are liberated because Jesus has again entered the kingdom of God. So Adam and Jesus are the authentic persons; you are just shadows. Adam sins, and you have become a sinner -- so who are you? You are a shadow. Adam is thrown out of heaven, therefore you are thrown out. This can happen only to a shadow, not to a real person. If I am thrown out of this house, only my shadow will be thrown with me, nothing else. And if I enter the kingdom of God, only my shadow will enter with me; you cannot enter.
Jesus solved everything. He entered the kingdom of God, and all humanity entered with him. Nobody has entered, nobody can enter in such an easy way. You have to pay the cost, you have to carry your own cross, you have to be crucified through suffering -- your suffering, remember. Neither Jesus' suffering, nor anybody else's will open the doors.
They are closed, and you cannot enter just following Jesus. Nobody can enter that way. The doors open for the individual, because the individual is the authentic reality.
The disciple said, "I have already entered, master, so why are you giving this map to me? A map is needed for one who is lost -- but I have reached the goal, so why this map?" And the master said, "The map is very precious. All the paths are indicated on it."
Would the disciple hesitate for a single moment? The master's penetrating eyes were searching his heart to see if he would hesitate, if he would say, "Okay, maybe the master is right and the map is precious " But what does a man need a map for when he has
reached the goal? So he threw the book in the fire, he threw away the map. I have heard: A man driving his car on a lonely road suspected that he had missed the path, suspected that he was moving in a wrong direction. He saw a beggar walking, so he stopped the car and asked the beggar, "Does this road lead to Delhi?"
The beggar said, "I don't know."
So the man asked, "Does this road lead to Agra?" The beggar said, "I don't know."
The man, who was already irritated, became more irritated, and said to the beggar in anger, "So you don't know much." The beggar laughed and said, "But I am not lost." So the question is not of knowledge. The question is whether you are lost or not. The beggar said, "But I am not lost. Whether I know or not is not the point." When you are
lost a map is needed, knowledge is needed, a book is needed. When you are not lost, what is the point of carrying a book, a map? And an enlightened person is at the goal everywhere. Wherever he is, is the goal. Once you become aware that you are the goal you cannot be lost.
The beggar is not lost. Why? -- because he is not going to Delhi, he is not going to Agra, he is not going anywhere. Wherever he reaches, that is the goal. He is not lost because he is not moving in any direction; he is not lost because there is no desired goal.
This disciple threw away the map because there is no goal. He is the goal now. Wherever he is, he is at peace, at home. There is no desire and no motivation. The future has disappeared, this moment is enough.
Throw away all the maps because you are the goal. Maps can help if the goal is somewhere else; maps cannot help if you are the goal. They may even distract you, because when you look at a map you cannot look at yourself Books cannot help, because you are the truth and there is no book in which you are written. The book is you, no other book. Here you are, written in this book, which is you. You have to be deciphered, and if you are wrong all books that you carry will go wrong. All maps that you carry will be wrong and will indicate wrongly, because who will read those books and who will follow the instructions indicated in the map?
I have heard: A man was driving and his wife was looking at the map. Suddenly the wife cried out in panic and said, "We are lost -- because this map is upside down. The map is upside down. We are lost!"
The map can be put right side up; no map is upside down by itself. But the wife must have been upside down. If you are upside down all the books you read will turn upside down. If you are disturbed it will be reflected in your Koran, in your Bible, in your Gita; if you are mad your interpretations of the Vedas will be mad; if you are afraid you will meet fear wherever you go. Whatsoever you do your doing will come out of you; your interpretations will come out of you and you will be wrong.
So a master is not interested in giving you a right book. There are none. No right book exists, only right people and wrong people, right persons and wrong persons. A real master is interested in putting you right side up. A master is interested in changing you, the person; he is not interested in giving you a book.
That's why the disciple said, "What are you saying? Such a nonsensical thing you have never said before. You have gone mad saying: Keep, preserve the book, it is precious!" No book is precious. Only the person is precious. But when you don't know your value you think the book is precious. When you don't know the precious value of your being, then every type of theory becomes valuable. Words are valuable because you have not known the value of the being.
Anything more? Question 1 BELOVED OSHO,
THERE WILL BE A PRECIOUS VALUE TO THIS BOOK WHEN IT COMES OUT, BECAUSE IT CAN TELL PEOPLE THAT THERE IS A BUDDHA AVAILABLE NOW, AND THAT HE HAS METHODS SUITABLE TO THE TIME AND TO US. BUT ONE OF THE QUESTIONS WHICH HAS ARISEN HERE AND WILL CERTAINLY ARISE IN THE WEST IS: HOW DO I KNOW I NEED A MASTER?
Yes, this book is going to be very precious. Keep, preserve it. Seven generations of masters have given it to me and I have given it to you. Now it depends on what you do. I have added my understanding to it, but as far as I'm concerned I am giving you this book just to throw in the fire. The day you can throw it in the fire will be the day you have understood it. If you go on preserving it you have missed.
But the book is needed, because if it is not there what will you throw in the fire? It is needed. Try to preserve it -- it is very precious -- and when you understand you will throw it in the fire.
So I am not saying give only the Koran to the fire; give my books to the fire also, because they can be more dangerous than the Koran and Gita and Bible which have become out of date in a sense. You are very, very far away from Mohammed, even further away from Krishna. Their voices have become very, very distant, dim things. My voice is nearer to you. It is immediate; it is direct. It may become a greater prison for you, because it is more alive right now. It can capture you; it can become more of a burden. If a living master can free you, a living master can become more of a prison also. It depends.
There are directions in the book. It is a map, a map into the world of consciousness, a map of how to get roots into the earth, a map of how to get wings into the sky. But trees don't need it. If I tell them how to get roots into the earth they will say, "Don't disturb us, we have already got roots into the earth" If I tell them how to get wings into the sky they will say, "Don't disturb the silence. We are always standing in the sky, swaying in the sky." And if I tell them to preserve this book they will laugh, and if they can find a fire they will throw the book in it.
So what am I saying? I am saying to you: Get roots and throw away the maps; get wings and throw away the maps. Don't get fixed on what I say, don't be obsessed with what I say. Put the words aside and look at me. And what I hope is that one day, if I say, "Preserve this book," you will be able to shout at me and say, "What are you saying?
Have you gone mad?" You can say that without reaching the point where it becomes meaningful -- but you cannot deceive me. You can throw the book into the fire without throwing the attachment. Then you are imitating. Imitation won't help. Buddhas have existed on the earth, disciples have existed; everything has happened that can happen and everything is written. You may decide you can imitate, but imitation won't help.
It happened once that a man came to a Zen master. He had read all the scriptures, memorized them, and had become a great philosopher because he was very efficient at using words, logic. And this Zen master was just a villager, just like the beggar who said, "I am not lost." He had never read the Lotus Sutra, one of the greatest Buddhist scriptures, worth preserving, always keeping near. Just as there are bedside books, so the Lotus Sutra is a heartside book; it is concerned with the heart. The lotus is the symbol for the heart: fully bloomed, in full bloom, it is the heart. And Buddhists think there is nothing comparable to the Lotus Sutra.
This man had memorized the whole Lotus Sutra. He could repeat it from anywhere. Ask any question and immediately he would answer -- like a computer, very efficiently. So he asked the Zen master, "Have you read the Lotus Sutra?"
The Zen master said, "Lotus Sutra? Never heard of it."
The man, the pundit, the scholar, said, "Never heard of it? And people think you are enlightened!"
The Zen master said, "People must be wrong. I am an ignorant man, how can I be enlightened?"
The scholar was at ease now, so he said, "Now I will repeat the Lotus Sutra. Can you read?"
The monk said, "I can't read."
So the man said, "Okay, then listen to me and I will explain anything you want to ask." He had come to seek a master but now he had become a master. The ego never wants to be a disciple, it is always in search of being a master. How the buddha must have laughed at the situation! The master became the disciple, and the disciple became the master and said, "Listen."
The master started listening. The disciple said, "Okay." He began to repeat the Lotus Sutra.
In the Lotus Sutra, it is said everything is emptiness -- this world is empty, hell is empty, heaven is empty, God is empty, everything is emptiness. Emptiness is the nature of all things, nothingness, so be attuned to nothingness and you will achieve.
Suddenly the master jumped and hit the pundit on the head. The pundit became mad. He started shouting and said, "Not only are you not enlightened, not only are you ignorant, you seem to be neurotic also. What are you doing?"
The master sat again and said, "If everything is nothingness, from where does this anger come? The world is emptiness, heaven is emptiness, hell is emptiness, the nature of things is nothingness. From where does this anger come?"
The pundit was puzzled. He said, "It is not written in the Lotus Sutra. You ask foolish questions. It is not written in the Lotus Sutra. The whole Sutra I have memorized -- and this is no way of asking a question, hitting me is no way of asking a question."
But this is the only way. Theories are not of much help. You can say that everything is nothingness, but just a little hit and anger arises out of nothingness; a woman passes and sex arises out of nothingness; you look at a beautiful house and the desire to possess arises out of nothingness. When Buddha said everything is nothingness, he was saying: If you can understand this, nothing will arise. How can anything arise out of nothingness? Nothingness is a meditation, not a theory; it is a falling into the abyss. Then anger cannot arise and sex cannot arise -- how can they?
There are two types of persons: one, those who are in search of theories -- and please don't be that type, because that is the most stupid type; and the other type is the wise type, those in search of experience, not of theories.
This book and whatsoever I say can become a theory for you; then you miss. It can become a thirst, a hunger, a deep urge to experience; then you have got the point. But don't be addicted to the words; don't carry the container, remember the content. When the disciple threw the book into the fire he was throwing away the container; the content was preserved in his heart. And the master was happy that this man had understood: the container has to be thrown away and the content preserved.
Whatsoever I say, throw it in the fire. But whatsoever happens to you in my presence, that is the content. Preserve it, it is precious. But there is no need to preserve it: if it happens, you will preserve it; if you know, it is preserved, and then there is no way to throw it in the fire. Only books can be thrown in the fire, truth cannot.
That's why the disciple shouted, "What are you saying? Can a precious thing be thrown into the fire? Can a precious thing be burned in the fire? If the fire can burn your book, what type of preciousness is it? What type of truth is this? If the fire can burn the truth, it is not worth preserving."
That which cannot be burned, that which cannot be dead, even through fire it becomes more alive, more pure -- that is the truth. That's why I said throw The Bible into the fire: not that I am against The Bible, I am against the container. The content cannot be thrown. The container is the Lotus Sutra. The content is in your lotus, and that is your heart.
Anything more? Question 2 BELOVED OSHO,
A LOT OF PEOPLE SAY THEY CAN'T REALLY LET THEMSELVES GO IN MEDITATION BECAUSE OF THE PHYSICAL PAIN, BECAUSE OF BUMPING INTO EACH OTHER AND FALLING DOWN. THEY FEEL THIS MAY BE SOME SORT OF EXCUSE FOR NOT REALLY LETTING GO.
COULD YOU TALK TO US ABOUT THIS PHYSICAL ASPECT?
A child can fall but he will not feel hurt. A drunkard, walking in the street, falls, but his body is preserved, his bones are not fractured. What is happening? The real thing is not the other bumping into you, the real thing is your resistance. You are afraid the other may bump into you, so you are resisting the whole time. Somebody may not bump into you, but you are afraid. Fear closes you, you become stiff, and if somebody then bumps into you that stiffness is hurt, not you. But you feel that you are hurt, and then your mind says, "You were right to be afraid from the very beginning, and it was good to be alert so that nobody would bump into you."
The mind is a vicious circle. It gives you an idea, and because of that idea certain things happen. Then that idea becomes more fixed, you become more afraid, and then you are constantly in fear. How will you do meditation?
In Japan they have a science of wrestling -- they call it judo or ju-jitsu -- and the whole science consists of a very meditative thing: the judo wrestler learns how not to resist. When somebody attacks you, you have to absorb his energy, not resist, as if he is giving energy to you. Absorb his energy; don't resist. He is not the enemy, he is the friend coming to you; and when he hits you with his hand or his fist much energy is released.
Soon he will be exhausted, so absorb the energy that is released from his fist. When he is exhausted, just by absorbing his energy you will feel stronger, stronger than ever. But you resist, you shrink, you become stiff so that you may not be hurt. Then his energy and your energy clash, and in that clash pain happens. It is you.
In meditation, remember this: if somebody bumps into you, absorb his energy. And here is a meditative person bumping into you -- you are lucky. He is releasing beautiful energy. A meditative energy is coming out of him; absorb it. Feel happy, feel thankful, and start jumping again. Don't be stiff, don't resist, because he was sharing his energy with you, unknowingly. Share it and soon you will come to know a different quality -- that of nonresistance. The whole body and mind then behave in a different way. You know a secret.
You fall on the ground suddenly: fall as if the ground, the earth, is your mother. Make it a rest, not a clash. Fall down but don't be stiff. If you are stiff you may get a fracture; the fracture will happen because you were stiff and there was a fight between you and the earth. And the earth is, of course, greater than you so you will be a loser. Fall down just like a drunkard. You see them falling every day on the street, but by the morning they are back, completely okay. Every night they fall down and their bones are never fractured.
These drunkards know a certain secret that you don't know. What do they know? They fall without any consciousness on their part, without any ego there. They just fall. There is nobody to fight with the earth. The earth absorbs them and they absorb the earth.
Be a drunkard: fall without the ego. Enjoy the fall and feel friendly, intimate, with the earth. Soon you will be back on your feet with more energy than ever, and once you know the knack there will be no disturbance. You are hurt because you are in a fight, a continuous fight; you are hurt because you are always resisting. Consciously, unconsciously, you are always ready to resist. And when so many people are doing meditation you become afraid that somebody may hit you -- but if there is this fear, how will you meditate?
Rather than being in fear, be in love. With so many persons meditating much divine energy is released. This is a celebration, so why be in fear? Be in love. Enjoy this group consciousness, so many people dancing. Become part, lose your ego, be one with this collective force and energy. It will be difficult in the beginning because many lives have been lived with a fixed attitude of resistance. But someday you will become aware; someday a gap will be cleared and you will see. One experience will do. If you someday fall on the earth and there is no hurt and you feel beautiful, you have come to know a secret, you have stumbled upon the key. Now this key can be used on many locks. It is a master key.
Whenever someone comes to fight you, absorb him; when someone insults you, absorb him and see -- his insult becomes a flower. He is releasing energy. When someone insults you, he is giving away energy. He is foolish, stupid, so you absorb his energy, thank him, and go back and see what happens. When someone is ready to fight, simply allow him to hit you. Be as if you are not there and he is fighting an emptiness. Allow him, don't resist, and you will come to know. There is no other way; just listening to me will not do.
This is an art, it is not a science. Science can be explained, art has to be experienced.
It is just like swimming. If you tell a non-swimmer, "There is nothing to it, you just take a jump and start throwing your arms around," he will say, "What are you saying? This will be suicide." How can you explain to a non-swimmer that swimming is beautiful, the most
beautiful experience of any that the body can give to you? It is such a flowing experience, such a oneness with the river. The whole body, every fiber of it, every cell, is alive. The water is life -- because all life arises out of the water. Water is vital. In your body you are eighty-five percent water, so eighty-five percent water, liquid, is meeting with a big river, or the ocean. You have come to the original source of vitality.
But you cannot explain to anyone who is a non-swimmer. It is not a science. You have to take him step by step -- in the beginning shallow water so he becomes confident, then by and by deeper and deeper water. In the beginning he will be awkward, he will be afraid, he will be fighting with the river, afraid that it might drown him. He will feel the river as being antagonistic, but soon he will realize that the river is not antagonistic, that it enjoys him swimming there, that it feels happy that one of its parts has come back. It is a celebrating moment for the river. A river with no one swimming in it is sad, but where many people dance and swim and enjoy, the river is happy. Soon he will feel that the river is helping him, that he is unnecessarily fighting, and by and by he will drop his movements and activity. When a swimmer becomes perfect he simply floats on the river. No activity is needed; the river does everything and the swimmer simply floats on the river.
In old yoga traditions there is a particular meditation -- just float on the river and feel one with it. Don't make any movement, don't move the body, let the river do the work. And if the river is doing the work and you are simply floating, nondoing, you will have the feeling of the whole existence. This is how existence floats. You are unnecessarily fighting.
In meditation you are entering a river of consciousness. So many people around you creates a tremendous force, a stream. Enter into it like a swimmer, not fighting, just floating, and see what happens. It is an art.
I cannot tell you, I can just indicate, and you have to experience. You have to wait until the experience happens to you, a single moment of experience that nobody is against you, nobody is going to harm you. The existence is whole, there will be no hurt.
And I say: Even if your bone is broken there will be no pain, there will be no hurt. If you fall down and you die, even then there will be no pain. If you are just falling back to mother earth there will be no pain. You are simply absorbed.
And who knows? -- in meditation, just someone bumping into you may become your first glimpse of an enlightenment, because it is a shock -- a sudden awareness comes to you.
Who knows? -- just falling on the ground and breaking a bone may become your first satori, your first enlightenment. Nobody knows -- life is mysterious. Enlightenment has happened in such different ways. Nobody knows.
Do it in love. Feel at home and allow things. If somebody bumps into you, let him bump. And let him pass through you. Don't be a wall; don't come in his way. Allow him to pass. Be porous.
A Bird on the Wing Chapter #9
Chapter title: Save the Cat
18 June 1974 am in Buddha Hall
Archive code: 7406180 ShortTitle: WING09 Audio: Yes Video: No
Length: 92 mins
BELOVED OSHO,
NANSEN FOUND TWO GROUPS OF MONKS SQUABBLING OVER THE OWNERSHIP OF A CAT.
NANSEN WENT TO THE KITCHEN AND BROUGHT BACK A CHOPPER. HE PICKED UP THE CAT AND SAID TO THE MONKS, "IF ANY OF YOU CAN SAY A GOOD WORD, YOU CAN SAVE THE CAT."
NOT A WORD WAS SAID, SO NANSEN CUT THE CAT IN TWO AND GAVE HALF TO EACH GROUP.
WHEN JOSHU RETURNED THAT EVENING, NANSEN TOLD HIM WHAT HAD HAPPENED. JOSHU SAID NOTHING. HE JUST PUT HIS SANDALS ON HIS HEAD AND WALKED OUT.
NANSEN SAID, "IF YOU HAD BEEN THERE, YOU COULD HAVE SAVED THE CAT."
Nothing is saved by the mind, by thinking, by logic, and if you try to save by logic you will lose. Life can be saved only through an irrational jump, through something that is not intellectual but total.
But the whole story seems to be too cruel. Nansen's disciples were struggling over a cat. Nansen had a big monastery and the monastery had two wings. This cat was moving from one wing to another and both wings claimed that the cat belonged to them -- and the cat was a beautiful one.
The first thing to be understood is: a real sannyasin cannot claim any ownership. A sannyasin means one who has left all possessions, or all possessiveness, which is deeper and more basic. You can leave possessions, that is easy; but to leave possessiveness is difficult because it goes deeper in the mind. You can leave the world, but the mind goes on clinging to it.
These monks, Nansen's disciples, had left the world behind -- their homes, their wives, their children -- but now they were fighting over the ownership of a cat. This is how the mind works. You leave one thing and the mind claims another, but the basic thing remains the same and it makes no difference if the object of ownership changes -- it makes no difference. The difference, the revolution, the real change, comes only when the subjectivity changes, when the owner changes. This is the first thing to be understood. Monks claiming ownership of a cat looks foolish, but this is how monks have been acting all over the world. They leave their houses, then they claim ownership of the temple, of the church. They leave everything but they can't leave their minds, and the mind creates new worlds for them continuously.
So it is not a question of possessing a kingdom; even a cat will do. And wherever possession comes in, fighting, violence and aggression are bound to be there. Whenever you possess, you are fighting, because that which you possess belongs to the whole. You cannot possess anything; you can use it, that's all. How can we possess the sky and how
can we possess the earth? But we possess -- and that possession creates all types of conflict, struggle, wars, violence and so on.
Man has been fighting and fighting and fighting continuously. Historians say that within the last three thousand years there have been wars almost continuously somewhere or other on the earth. In three thousand years, we have fought at least fourteen thousand wars. Why so much fighting? It is because of possession. If you possess you have started a war with the whole.
Buddha, Mahavira or Jesus, all said, "If you possess, you can't enter the kingdom of God." Jesus said, "It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven." It is impossible, because when you possess you are constantly fighting with God. When you claim ownership, from whom are you claiming ownership? The whole belongs to the whole; the part cannot claim the whole. The part cannot even claim the part. Every claim is aggression. So those who possess cannot be in deep contact with the divine.
Nonpossessiveness doesn't mean you should not live in a house. Live in a house, but be thankful to the whole, to the divine. Use it but don't possess it. If you can use things without being possessive you have become a sanysain.
These followers of Nansen have left the world, but their minds have followed them like shadows. Now they claim ownership of a cat. The whole thing is foolish.
But the mind is foolish. The mind always goes on searching for excuses to fight. If you have a mind you have a potential fighter within you who is always in search of a fight with somebody. Why is the mind always in search of a fight? By fighting, ego is accumulated, becomes stronger. Through fighting your ego grows; if you don't fight, ego disappears.
Mahavira and Buddha both insisted on nonviolence. The basic reason for not fighting is that once you stop fighting the ego cannot exist. Ego exists in fight; it is a consequence of fight. The more you fight the more ego exists. If you alone remained on the earth, nobody to fight with, would you have an ego? You would not have an ego. The other is needed to create it; the other is a must. Ego is a relationship, it is not in you. Remember, the ego is not in you, it is not located within you. It is always located within you and the other -- somewhere in between, where fight exists.
There are two types of relationship: one is of fight, fear, hatred -- this creates ego -- the other is of love, compassion, sympathy. These are the two types of relationship.
Wherever love is, fight ceases, ego drops. This is why you cannot love. It is difficult, because to love means to drop the ego, to drop yourself. Love means not to be.
So look at the strange phenomenon: lovers go on fighting. How can lovers fight? If there is love fight should drop and the ego will disappear. Your whole being thirsts for love, your whole mind thirsts for ego. So you make a compromise: you love and you fight.
The lover becomes an intimate enemy, but the enmity remains. All lovers go on fighting and go on loving. They have made a compromise: in some moments they are loving, then they drop the ego. But the mind feels uneasy, and again the mind starts fighting. So in the morning they fight, in the evening they make love, and the next morning they fight again. Then a rhythm of fight and love is created.
True love means the fight has disappeared, the two have become one. Their bodies exist separately but their being has mingled. The boundaries are lost, there is no division.
There is no 'I' and no 'thou', no one exists.
These monks of Nansen had left everything, but the mind was there. It wanted to possess, it wanted to create a fight, it wanted to be egoistic. A cat became just an excuse. Nansen called all the monks, all the disciples, caught hold of the cat, and he said, "Say something which can save this cat."
What did he mean when he said, "Say something which can save this cat?" He meant: Say something Zen-like, say something meditative, say something of the other world, say something of ecstasy, say something which doesn't belong to the mind. This cat can be saved if you say something which comes from no-mind, which comes from your inner silence. He demanded the impossible. If there had been inner silence these monks would not have been claiming possession; if there had been inner silence it would have been impossible for them to fight.
The monks were at a loss. They knew if they said something it would come from the mind and the cat would be killed, so they remained silent. But that silence was not real silence; otherwise the cat would have been saved. They remained silent not because they were silent; they remained silent because they couldn't find anything to say which came from no-mind, which came from an inner source, from the very being, from the center. They remained silent as a strategy. It was tactics: it is better to remain silent because the master may be deceived that this silence is our response -- this is what they were saying. But you cannot deceive a master. And if you can deceive a master, then that master is not a master at all. Their silence was false. Inside there was turmoil, inside there was continuous chattering. They were thinking and thinking, in search of one answer so that this cat might be saved. They were very troubled inside; the whole mind was functioning fast. The master must have looked at them. Their minds were not inactive, they were not inactive; there was no meditation, there was no silence. Their silence was just a false facade. You can sit silently without being silent and you can talk and be silent; you can walk and be inactive and you can sit statuelike and be active. The mind is complex. You can walk, run, move, and inside, deep at the center, nothing happens, you are inactive.
I am talking to you and I am silent. You are not talking to me and you are not silent; the mind continues. The inner chattering goes on and on and on. The mind is a monkey, It cannot sit silently. Darwin discovered that man comes from the monkeys, but in the East meditators have always been aware that whether man comes from monkeys or not, the mind definitely comes from monkeys. It is monkeyish -- jumping, chattering, doing something or other, never silent.
What Nansen said to his disciples was, "If you stop behaving like monkeys, this cat can be saved." But they couldn't help it. You cannot help it: if the mind is there what can you do? If you try to hold it still it becomes more active; if you force it to be silent it talks more; if you suppress it, it rebels. You cannot suppress it, you cannot persuade it; you cannot do anything about it, because the moment you do something it is the mind which is doing. This is the problem.
They all wanted to save the cat, they all wanted to possess the cat; the cat was really beautiful. But how can a mind which is possessive be silent? And how can a mind which is possessive save anybody? It can only kill.
Remember, it was not Nansen who killed the cat, it was these monks who killed it; this is the secret key in the story. Nansen gave an opportunity. He said, "You can save this cat. Say something which comes from no-mind, from your very being. And if you don't say anything I am going to cut this cat and divide it in two so both parties can possess it." It
was not Nansen who killed the cat. It seemed as though he killed it, but in fact the monks killed the cat. Whenever you possess a live thing, you have already killed it. Whenever you claim that you possess a live person, you have murdered, because life cannot be possessed. The cat was moving from this wing to that. The cat was alive, fully alive, more alive than these monks. She had no home, she didn't belong to anybody. She was just like a breeze -- sometimes passing through the left wing, sometimes passing through the right. And the cat never claimed that these monks belonged to her, or those monks belonged to her. She never possessed.
Animals are nonpossessive, trees are nonpossessive; only man is possessive. And with possessiveness man has missed all that is alive. You can possess only a dead thing. The moment you possess you are making something dead. You love a woman and then you try to possess her: you kill her. A wife is a thing not a person; a husband is a thing not a person.
This is the misery -- you love a person and then you start possessing. Unknowingly you are poisoning. And sooner or later the day will come when you have poisoned the person completely. Now you possess, but how can you love a thing? The love happened in the first place because the person was alive. Now the flow has stopped, now life doesn't move, now all the doors of freedom are closed. Now it has become a frozen thing. The river is frozen, now there is no movement. Certainly now this person cannot go to another. You possess him completely. But how can you love a dead person? This is the misery of love. You cannot love a dead person, yet whenever you love you start possessing. All possession creates death. Only things can be possessed.
These monks had already killed the cat. Nansen was not going to kill it, he was only going to make manifest what had already happened. This story has been used against Zen monks, Zen masters, to show that these people are violent. Think of a Christian theologian reading this story: he will say, "What type of religious man is this Nansen? He killed the cat, a poor cat. Those monks who claimed it were better. At least they were not killing. What type of master is this? What manner of man?" If Jainas -- not Mahavira, if Jainas read this story, they will throw Nansen into hell. He has killed a cat.
Nansen is violent in appearance only to those who cannot understand. To those who can understand he is simply manifesting a thing which has already happened. The cat was dead the moment it was possessed, the moment people started claiming it. He gave them one more opportunity, but they couldn't use that opportunity. They remained silent. But if the silence had been real the cat would have been alive. The silence was false, the silence was only on the surface, on the faces, skin-deep. Inside, the mad mind was functioning fast. It was whirling, spinning. Many answers must have come to those monks, but not the answer. So Nansen had to kill. He chopped the cat in two, one part to the left-wing claimers, another part to the right-wing claimers. Those monks must have been happy, happy in the sense that at least they possessed half the cat. That is what is happening to you all. Whenever you fight, life goes dead and is divided. A father and mother fight over a son -- there is continuous fighting over children. The father says that the son belongs to him, that he should follow him, and the mother thinks the son belongs to her, that he should follow her. Claiming, they are killing. Sooner or later the son will be divided in two halves, chopped. Half of the son will belong to the father, half to the mother. And his whole life is destroyed, because now it will be very difficult for him to be whole. Half of his heart will always belong to the mother and half always to the father. One half will be
against the mother and one half will be against the father. Now he is divided. Now this division is going to follow him his whole life. He is chopped in two.
This is what Nansen was saying by chopping the cat in two: Don't fight over a person, don't try to possess a person, because you will chop him. Visibly he may seem one, but deep down in his heart he has become two, and now there will be constant conflict.
The mother and father were fighting over the son; now the mother may be dead and the father may be dead, but they will go on fighting within the son -- sometimes the voice of the mother, sometimes the voice of the father. The son will always be at a loss whom to follow, and he cannot be whole.
You come to me in search of being whole, and I always say: To be whole is to be holy. There is no other way to be holy; just be whole. Divisions within you must fall, you must become a unity. But you are a conflict. Your father is fighting, your mother is fighting, your brothers are fighting, your teachers are fighting, your gurus are fighting -- everybody is fighting to possess you. There are many claimants. They have fragmented you, they have chopped you into many parts. You have become many, you are not one; you are a crowd. Neurosis comes out of it, madness comes out of it, comes out of it. Have you ever observed how many souls you have, many selves you have? You are not one, that is certain.
In my university days I used to live with a boy. He would never get up in the morning at five, but every day he would set the alarm. So I asked him, "Why do you set it? Why do you bother? -- because you never get up. You always turn the alarm off and go to sleep again. So why bother and why be disturbed every morning?
He laughed, but his laugh was hollow. He knew himself that he would not get up. But in the evening another self said, "No, tomorrow morning I am going to get up."
I said, "Okay, try." And at the time he was setting the alarm he was confident, absolutely confident that he would get up in the morning at five. There was no suspicion. But this was only one fragment who said, "Absolutely, you have to get up. You have slept enough. No more time is left; the exam is coming near."
At five I was waiting for him. He looked at me when the alarm went off. He looked at me
-- I was aware, I was sitting on my bed -- he smiled, put off the alarm, changed sides and went to sleep again.
Later in the morning, at eight o'clock when he used to get up, I asked him about it. He said, "I thought, Just for a few minutes... And what is wrong in just sleeping for a few minutes more? I was feeling so sleepy, and the night was so cold. But tomorrow you will see, I will get up."
These are two different fragments -- and he was not aware that the one who said, "Get up at five," was a different part, completely unaware of the part who would say, "Go to sleep. The night is very cold."
You are doing the same: you decide a thing and the next moment you have simply forgotten what you decided. You say you are not going to be angry again, and even the next moment is very far away. If someone starts arguing with you, saying no, you will become angry. You may become angry because he is arguing -- immediately anger can come to you, and you had decided not to be angry. A divided house you are. There are many rooms in your house not connected with each other; the connections are broken, the
bridges have dropped. You exist as a polypsychic being with many minds, so whatsoever you possess you will chop it. You are already chopped.
Those monks could not save the cat because they were divided. Nansen was saying, "Do something, say something, in a whole way, in a holy way, undivided. Act as a unity and this cat can be saved." Not a single one could act, and the cat was chopped.
A question arises: How could Nansen cut the cat? Is it just a parable, a symbolic story, or did he really chop the cat? There are people who would like to save Nansen; I am not one of them. He really did cut the cat. It is not a parable, it is not an anecdote, symbolic, metaphorical. No. Literally, it happened exactly the way it is said. He cut the cat in two. Could a saintly man do that? I say to you: Only a saintly man can do that.
That's what Krishna said to Arjuna in the Gita: Then don't bother! Chop these fellows. These who are standing against you, cut them down, kill them, but remember only one thing: that which is hidden in them cannot be destroyed. Only the body can be destroyed, because the body is already dead. Only what is dead can be destroyed. What is alive remains alive; it is eternal, nothing can be done to it. Fire cannot burn it, weapons cannot cut it. NAINAM CHHINDANTI SHASTRANI -- no weapon can cut it, no fire can burn it -- only the form. But don't bother about the form, because form is unreal, it is part of illusion.
This Nansen must have been in the same state of mind as Krishna, in the same state of consciousness as Krishna. He chopped the cat. He knows the soul of the cat cannot be destroyed; he knows that only the form can be changed.
And one thing more which is very difficult to understand, because moralists have created so much confusion and smoke around it: when a cat is chopped by a Nansen, it is beneficial to the cat, is is a blessing to the cat. This cat must have been rare -- and now this cat will not be reborn as a cat, she will be reborn as a man. To be chopped by Nansen is a rare opportunity, and the cat must have been wandering around the monastery waiting for this moment.
Nansen changed the form. The cat will be reborn as a higher being just because Nansen has chopped her.In that moment the cat was more silent than the monks, the cat was more ecstatic than the monks. And being chopped by Nansen is not an act of aggression, it is an act of love. Nansen freed the cat from the form, from the form of cat. She will be reborn as a higher being. But this is difficult to follow, and I am not telling you to go and free people from their forms so they will be reborn as higher beings. Don't chop anybody
-- you would like to, you would enjoy it. But for Nansen, it was an act of deep prayer. He must have been watching this cat. This cat was no ordinary cat. There are animals who are crying out to be freed from their forms.
It happened at a camp in Matheran. I was staying very far away from the campus ground. The first evening, when I was going to my bungalow, a dog followed -- really a rare dog. Then the dog remained continuously. Three times I would go to conduct the camp, and three times I would return. It was half an hour's journey. Three times I was asleep, and he would sit just on the veranda. Even when he went to eat something he never left me. For the whole camp this was his routine. He would follow me to the camp, and when others were meditating he would sit more silently, more deeply, than those who were attending the camp. And then he would go back with me.
The last day, when I left Matheran by train, he followed the train. He was running by the side of the train, and the guard took compassion on him and he took him in. Up to Neral
he came. This train was a slow train, a toy train, coming from Matheran to Neral, traveling just seven miles in two hours, and the dog could follow. But from Neral it is a fast train, when I took the train from Neral to Bombay others were standing there on the platform weeping and crying, and the dog was also standing there in tears.
I know that cat must have been extraordinary; otherwise Nansen would not have taken such trouble to chop it. He created an opportunity for his disciples, and he used that opportunity for the cat also. He hit two targets with one stone. This is possible. If you are ready, then your form can be destroyed and you will receive a higher form, because your higher form depends on the moment when you die. The cat died in the hands of Nansen -- a very rare opportunity. Such a silent man was Nansen, the cat must have caught the silence; such an ecstatic being, the cat must have been filled with his ecstasy. And then he chopped it. The cat was not afraid, she must have enjoyed the game. It was a surgical act. The cat must be born in the next life as a very much higher soul. But that is an inner story and cannot be understood by ordinary morality. And persons like Nansen don't follow ordinary morality, they follow the inner rules, the inner laws. Ordinary morality is for ordinary men.
And then by the evening another monk came in from outside, another disciple who had not been in the monastery. Nansen told the story to him, "This has happened, and I had to cut the cat. I had to divide it in two because there was no way These foolish fellows
couldn't save the cat. They couldn't save the cat -- they couldn't utter a single word, they couldn't act in a Zenlike way, they couldn't prove their Zen. Only Zen could have saved the cat, nothing else."
The disciple listened to the story, put his shoes on his head and walked out. Nansen called him and said, "If you had been here, the cat would have been saved."
This was the right man. What did he do? He took his shoes off, put them on his head, and walked out. He said many things without speaking. The first thing: He listened to the story and didn't comment on it. The monkey was silent; the mind was not chattering. He didn't try to think out an answer, he simply acted. That action was not from the mind, the action was from his total being. And what did he do? He put his shoes on his head.
Absurd! But he said that the mind, the head, is no more valuable than the shoes. Shoes, the meanest thing -- he put them on his head. He said by this act, "The mind is nothing but shoes. The mind is valueless, thinking cannot help. The mind has to be thrown to the shoes. Even shoes are more worthy and command more respect than the mind." That's what he said, and then he simply walked out.
And Nansen said, "Had you been here this morning, you could have saved the cat. The cat would have been saved.
Here was a man who didn't believe in the mind, who didn't believe in answers. Here was a man who could act spontaneously. Life can be saved only if you can act spontaneously
-- not only the cat's life, your life also. Throw the mind to the shoes. It is not more worthy in any way. And shoes have not troubled you so much; sometimes they may pinch, but only sometimes, and if they are the right size they are always okay. But the mind has been pinching you for many many lives, and it is never the right size, it is always the wrong size. The mind is never the right size. Shoes can be the right size, but the mind is always the wrong size. It goes on pinching. The mind is the wrong size. You cannot make a good mind, there is no possibility. You cannot make a beautiful ugliness, you cannot make a healthy disease, that is impossible. The mind is always wrong. It goes on
pinching. And whether you think or whether you pray, if the mind is there everything goes wrong. The mind is the factor which creates wrongness in life. This is the source of error, perversion, neurosis. Life can be saved only when you drop the mind.
What did this disciple do? It was difficult to drop the head, it was easier to put the shoes on the head. But it was symbolic. He was saying, "I have dropped the head. Don't ask me foolish questions" and he acted, that's the thing.
Meditation is not contemplation, it is action -- action of the whole, of the total being. In the West particularly. Christianity has created a false impression, and meditation looks like contemplation. It is not. Because of Christianity the West has missed many things, and one of them is meditation, the rarest flowering of a human being, because they have made it equivalent to contemplation. Contemplation is thinking. Meditation is no- thinking.
For DHYAN, Zen, there exists no equivalent in the English language, because meditation itself means thinking -- to meditate upon. Some object is there. Remember, dhyan is the original word. Dhyan traveled to China with Bodhidharma and in the Chinese language it became CH'AN. And then from China it traveled to Japan and in Japanese it became first ZAN, and then ZEN; but the original root is dhyan -- Ch'an, Zan, Zen. In English there is no word equivalent to it. Meditation also means thinking, a consistent thinking.
Contemplation means thinking too. It may be thinking about God, but it is thinking, and dhyan or Zen is a no-thinking state. It is action, without thought. Thought needs time.
In the morning the monks were sitting thinking what to do. They thought and thought and couldn't find. Thought will never find the right answer. The cat had to be chopped. Life became death because thought is poisonous; thinking leads to death, not to more life. The cat had to be chopped. Nansen couldn't help -- those monks killed the cat.
This man, this disciple who came in the evening, listened to the story without commenting, without saying anything. He simply took off his shoes, put them on his head and walked out. He acted -- he said something through his action, not through his mind.
He didn't use words, he used himself. And he didn't wait, he didn't contemplate, he didn't try to find the answer to how the cat should have been saved.
If you had been there in the evening and you were told the story, you would surely have started to think: How? When the how comes, mind has come. This disciple acted without the how; he simply acted, and the act was spontaneous, very symbolic. Putting the shoes on his head he said something -- he said the head is valueless.
This Nansen, the master, used to ask people,"What is the most valueless thing in the world?" He used to give it as a meditation to his disciples: think, what is the most valueless thing in the world? His master also gave this koan to him. He meditated, meditated, then one day he came and told his master, "The head. The master asked, "Why?" So Nansen said, "Cut a head and go to the market and try to sell it. Nobody will purchase it."
This is what Nansen's disciple did. By putting shoes on his head he said, "Worthless head!" And you go on insisting, asking head-questions. There is no answer. How can the shoes answer? He walked out, and Nansen said, "You could have saved the cat. Had you been there this morning the cat would have been alive and kicking. Some absurd act was needed -- absurd, spontaneous. Rational? No, something irrational was needed, because "ir-reason" is deeper than reason. That's why if you are too much head-fixated, you cannot fall in love, because love is irrational, absurd. The head goes on saying, "This is
useless. What will you gain out of it? There is no profit, you may even get into trouble. Think about it."
It is said of Immanuel Kant, one of the greatest systematizers, that one girl proposed to him. In the first place it is bad that the girl should propose, it is always the boy who proposes. But the girl must have waited and waited and Kant wouldn't propose; the idea never occurred to him. He was so much rooted in his head, the heart was denied. So the girl, feeling too much time had been lost, proposed. Kant said, "I will think it over."
How can you think about love? Either it is there or not. It is not a question to be solved, it is a situation to respond to. Either your heart says yes or your heart says no and it is finished. What will you think? It is not a business proposal. But it was a business proposal to Kant. Too much head-orientation makes everything businesslike. So he thought, and he not only thought, he went to the library and concentrated on the books about love, marriage. Then he noted down in his notebook all that was in favor of marriage and all that was against. And he thought and thought and thought, and it is said that weighing the pros and cons, he decided in favor of marriage because a few points were more in favor than against. So it was a logical decision.
Then he went and knocked at the girl's door, and the father said, "She is already married and a mother of three children. So much time passed... you come a little late."
Time is needed for the mind. The mind is always late because time will be needed and the situation will be lost. And when you knock at the door, the girl has moved -- she is already a mother of three children. And this is happening every moment. Remember, a situation is there, so act, don't think, because if you think the situation will not wait for you. The girl will have moved. And when you are ready to respond there will be nothing to respond to. Kant was ready, but the mind takes time and situations are moving. Life is a flow, a flux, it is not static; otherwise the mind would have found the answer. If the girl had remained But the girl was getting old, she was missing life. She could not wait, she
had to move, make a decision.
Life is not static. If life were static there would be no need for meditation. The mind would do. Then you could think, and whenever, after many lives, you knocked at the door, the girl would be waiting for you. But life is a flux, a movement. Every moment it is changing and becoming new. If you miss a moment, you have missed.
This disciple didn't miss a single moment. He heard the story, took off his shoes, put them on his head and walked out. If he had waited a single moment to think Nansen would have beaten him. I tell you, he would have been beaten. Because the cat was not there any more he might have chopped this disciple -- but he acted.
Action without the mind is the most beautiful thing possible. But you are afraid because you think if you act without the mind you may do something wrong. Because this fear exists the mind exploits it -- think first, then act. But you go on missing the train. Leave this fear, otherwise you will never be meditative. Act! In the beginning there will be a deep shaking and trembling, because you have always been acting out of thinking.
It is just like a man who has been living in a prison, in a dark cell, for many years. His eyes have become attuned to darkness. If he is suddenly brought out of the cell he will not be able to open his eyes. The sun will be too much, the light will be too much. His whole being will tremble and he will say, "Let me go back to my cell.
This is what has happened to you, to everybody. We have lived in the mind for many many lives, and we have become attuned to its darkness, its ugliness, futility. When you act without the mind, your whole being trembles. You are moving on a dangerous path. The mind says, "Be alert! Think first, then act." But if you think first and then do something, your doing will always be dead, stale. It will be out of thought, it will not be real and authentic. Then you cannot love, then you cannot meditate, then you cannot really live and you cannot die. You become a phantom, a phony existence. Love knocks at your heart and you say, "Wait! I will think about it." Life goes on knocking at your gates and you say, "Wait! I will think about it."
This disciple must have been deep in meditation. He acted, he simply acted. He could have saved the cat. This means he has already saved it -- he has already saved all that is alive. Don't think about the story, otherwise I will have to chop the cat. You can save it; otherwise the cat will have to be chopped again, and you will be responsible. Act!
But the story won't help you. Don't try to put your shoes on your head, that won't help. It helped that disciple but it won't help you. The cat will have to be chopped if you put the shoes on your head and walk out, because that will be false again, that will be from the mind. You know the story. The mind cannot give you the real; whatsoever you do, don't imitate.
I have heard that in a Chinese town there was one big restaurant, very rich, the most beautiful, rich restaurant in the town. And just near that restaurant lived a poor Chinese. He couldn't go in the restaurant, it was too costly. But the smell of food, the aroma He
used to sniff it, and when he took his lunch or dinner he took a chair out of his house and went as near to the restaurant as he dared, and he would sit there and sniff the aroma, the smell that was coming from the restaurant, and eat his food. He enjoyed it. He ran a small laundry.
But one day he was surprised. There came a man, the owner of the restaurant, with a bill for the smell of the food. That poor man ran into his house, brought his tiny money box, rattled it in the ears of the owner and said, "Hereby I pay for the smell of your food, by the sound of my money."
The mind is just smell and sound, nothing real. Whatsoever you do, the mind is smell and sound, nothing authentic. It is the source of all falsity.
So you have heard the story: don't try now to imitate it. You can do it easily now, now the secret is known. You can put the shoes on your head and walk, but the cat will be chopped. It will not save it, it will not help it. Act spontaneously. Put aside the mind and do something, and doing it you will come to know the cat has never been chopped, because the cat cannot die. Putting aside the mind you will come to know your own eternity, and the very same moment you know the eternity of the cat also. The mind is mortal, not you. You are immortal. The mind has a death waiting for it, not you. You are deathless. Putting aside the mind you will laugh, and you will say this Nansen played a trick. The cat cannot be killed.
That's what Krishna went on saying to Arjuna: "Don't you be worried. You chop these fellows, because nobody can be killed."
The Gita is very dangerous. Nowhere on the earth does such a dangerous book exist, so nobody has followed it. People recite it but nobody follows it. It is dangerous, and even people who love it very much and respect it very much, never listen to what it says. Even a man like Mahatma Gandhi, who called Gita his mother, wouldn't listen to it. How could
Mahatma Gandhi listen to it? He believed in nonviolence and this Krishna said, "Chop these fellows! Nothing exists; it is like a dream. And I tell you, nobody is killed, so don't bother about it."
How could Gandhi believe? So he had to play a trick. This is how the mind plays tricks. He said, "This is a parable, this is metaphorical; don't take it literally, the fight is not real. The Kauravas and the Pandavas, these two groups of warriors, are just a story. Kauravas represent evil and Pandavas represent good. It is the fight between good and evil, between God and the Devil, it is not a real fight." But this was Gandhi's mind playing tricks.
There have been Buddhist interpreters of Nansen also. They said, "This is just a parable. There was no real cat, and this never happened."
But I tell you this happened. The cat was real, as real as Nansen, and the cat was chopped. Nansen could do it. Nansen was a Krishna. He knew nothing is destroyed. This word, the English word destruction, is very beautiful, meaningful. The word destruction means de-structuring -- nothing is destroyed, only the structure changes, a new structure arises. The old structure goes out of existence and a new structure arises. Destruction means de-structuring. Only the form changes. The cat may be sitting here --
it is more possible than anywhere else! When you go back home, look in the mirror. You may be the cat, and you have come here again. Do something, otherwise I will chop you again.
And remember, now nobody can save you. That time the monks could have saved you. This time you are a monk, so nobody can save you except yourself. Action out of immediacy, spontaneous action, saves life. That is the only savior. There exists no other savior.
Anything more? Question 1 BELOVED OSHO,
IN PLACE OF THE TEN COMMANDMENTS, WITH WHICH I WAS BROUGHT UP, I HAVE GIVEN MYSELF A NEW SET OF RULES -- BE ALERT, BE PATIENT, BE SPONTANEOUS, ACCEPT MYSELF.
All questions are mind questions -- no question comes out of no-mind -- and all answers are no-mind answers. So questions and answers never meet. You ask a question and I give you an answer. They never meet, they cannot meet, because your question runs on the track of the mind and my answer runs on the track of no-mind. They may run parallel but they never meet. Either I should drop my no-mind -- then there can be a meeting -- or you should drop the mind. Then there can be a meeting. And remember, I am not going to drop my no-mind. It cannot be dropped, because how can you drop a no-thing? You can drop a thing, but you cannot drop a no-thing. So you have to drop the mind. Then the answer will be heard, understood. Then it will penetrate you.
And the mind is a deeper source of new questions, new puzzles, new riddles, so you can change the ten commandments -- you can create another ten. That will not do, because if they are created by the mind nothing changes.
Now the ten commandments have become very old, out of date. They speak in a language of the past. At that time that language was relevant, but now they don't look relevant. You can change, you can make new commandments, but those new commandments, if they
are put together by the mind, will not be of any use. Your mind can think and put them together and they may look beautiful, but they will be false. You can make let-go a commandment, total acceptance a commandment, but if they are put by the mind they are meaningless. Why? It is because the mind cannot allow itself to be a total let-go. It can pretend, but it cannot really allow itself to let go. And the mind cannot accept because the mind exists through rejection; that is why the mind always likes to say no rather than yes. Whenever you say no you feel the ego; whenever you say yes you don't feel the ego.
That's why people go on saying no more than yes. They say yes only when it becomes absolutely necessary; otherwise they say no. Whenever something is asked the first thing that arises in your mind is no -- because when you reject, you are, and when you accept, you are not there. Yes-saying will create a no-mind. So a theist is a yes-sayer, and an atheist is a no-sayer -- he says no -- and when you say there is no God, then you feel a tremendous energy in the ego. Then you are.
Nietzsche has said, "If God is then I won't want to be, and if I am, then I won't allow God to be, because both cannot exist." And he is right. How can both exist, you and God together? If you are there, then you are the God. God cannot exist. If he exists, then how can you exist? The ultimate no comes to the mind -- no God.
The mind rejects, cannot accept. So you can change, you can think about it, you can change the old ten commandments and create a new ten, but if they come out of the mind they are useless. And if they do not come out of the mind, what is the need? If the no- mind has happened and you feel it, what is the need of commandments? Commandments are for the mind. They are from the mind and for the mind. Rules exist for the mind, because the mind cannot exist without rules. This is one of the most basic things. Rules exist for the false, not for the real. The real can exist without rules, but the false cannot exist; it has to be propped, helped, supported by the rules. You play a game, you play cards -- can you play cards without rules? There can be no possibility. If you say, "I will follow my rules and you follow your rules and we play the game," there will be no game. We have to follow the rules -- and we both know that rules are just rules, nothing real in them. We have agreed on the rules, that's why they exist.
A game cannot continue if rules are not followed, but life will continue without rules. What rules are these trees following? What rules does the sun follow? What rules does the sky follow? The human mind is such that it thinks they are also following rules, moving according to rules. The sun moves, it follows a rule, so there is a ruler -- the God who controls everything. He is like a great super-manager. He goes spying on everybody
-- who is following, who is not following. This is a mind creation.
Life exists without rules; games cannot exist without rules. So real religion is always without rules; only false religion has rules, because false religion is a game.
I have heard that one young woman came to a barber's shop with her young boy. The boy was dressed like a soldier, looked very dangerous, and he had a toy six-shooter.
Immediately he jumped on the chair and said, "Bang! Bang!" He just made noise.
And the lady said to the barber, "I am going to leave my son here for half an hour, I have some shopping to do."
The barber became uneasy and he said, "If this young man becomes too restless, what am I supposed to do?" -- and that young boy was standing with his six-shooter on the chair looking very dangerous, soldierlike.
The young lady said, "If he gets too restless, you will simply have to drop dead a few times, that's all. If he says, 'Bang!' -- you drop dead. Follow the rule -- that's the rule -- then he will not be restless. So you have to drop dead a few times, and then he will be happy and there will be no trouble."
All the commandments are, "Bang! Drop dead!" For real life there is no commandment. You flow in it without any rules. You simply be. Why follow rules? Out of your being, everything will happen. These things you say will happen if you are simply there without any rules. Then acceptance will come, let-go will come; then the mind will drop. So these rules cannot be made rules. They are consequences of being spontaneous and total. If somebody follows them, and he has made a commandment that he has to accept everything, and then accepts, it is false, because in accepting he has already rejected. And if you have to accept something because of the commandment, you have already rejected. Your mind says: Accept! Why accept? Before it has said: Reject. Then rejection has come before the acceptance. But if there is no rejection, how will you be aware of acceptance? You will simply accept and flow.
Become riverlike. Become a white cloud floating in the sky, and let the winds take you wheresoever they take. Don't, don't follow any rules. This is what I mean when I say: Be a sannyasin. Just be. Your ochre robes, your mala -- these are rules. This is a game. This is not what I mean by real sannyas. But you are so accustomed to games that before I lead you to a ruleless life, in the transitory period you will need rules. Moving from this world of rules, of games, to that world without rules and games, a bridge has to be passed. Your orange clothes, your mala, are just for that transitory period. You cannot drop rules immediately, so I give you new rules.
But be fully alert that your robes are not your sannyas, your mala is not your sannyas, your new name is not your sannyas. Sannyas will be there when there is no name, when you become nameless. Then there will be no rules. Then you will be so ordinary, you will not be recognized. Only then....
But don't think that now it is okay, so no need to take sannyas and no need to take an orange robe. That is again a trick. You have to pass through this, you have to go through this. You cannot bypass it -- and if you try to bypass you will never reach to the other shore.
Rules of the world, then rules of sannyas, and then comes a no-rule state; no, commandments are needed. Don't change the old commandments -- they are okay as they are. You be, simply be, and follow and flow into the being.
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A huge Maya city has been discovered centuries after it disappeared under jungle canopy in Mexico.
Archaeologists found pyramids, sports fields, causeways connecting districts and amphitheatres in the southeastern state of Campeche.
They found the hidden complex - which they have called Valeriana - using Lidar, a type of laser survey that maps structures buried under vegetation.
They believe it is second in density only to Calakmul, thought to be the largest Maya site in ancient Latin America.
The team discovered three sites in total, which are the size of Scotland's capital Edinburgh, “by accident” when one archaeologist browsed data on the internet.
“I was on something like page 16 of Google search and found a laser survey done by a Mexican organisation for environmental monitoring,” explains Luke Auld-Thomas, a PhD student at Tulane university in the US.
It was a Lidar survey, a remote sensing technique which fires thousands of laser pulses from a plane and maps objects below using the time the signal takes to return.
But when Mr Auld-Thomas processed the data with methods used by archaeologists, he saw what others had missed - a huge ancient city which may have been home to 30-50,000 people at its peak from 750 to 850 AD.
That is more than the number of people who live in the region today, the researchers say.
Mr Auld-Thomas and his colleagues named the city Valeriana after a nearby lagoon.
The find helps change an idea in Western thinking that the Tropics was where “civilisations went to die”, says Professor Marcello Canuto, a co-author in the research.
Instead, this part of the world was home to rich and complex cultures, he explains.
We can’t be sure what led to the demise and eventual abandonment of the city, but the archaeologists say climate change was a major factor.Valeriana has the “hallmarks of a capital city” and was second only in density of buildings to the spectacular Calakmul site, around 100km away (62 miles).
It is “hidden in plain sight”, the archaeologists say, as it is just 15 minutes hike from a major road near Xpujil where mostly Maya people now live.
There are no known pictures of the lost city because “no-one has ever been there”, the researchers say, although local people may have suspected there were ruins under the mounds of earth.
The city, which was about 16.6 sq km, had two major centres with large buildings around 2km (1.2 miles) apart, linked by dense houses and causeways.
It has two plazas with temple pyramids, where Maya people would have worshipped, hidden treasures like jade masks and buried their dead.
It also had a court where people would have played an ancient ball game.
There was also evidence of a reservoir, indicating that people used the landscape to support a large population.
In total, Mr Auld-Thomas and Prof Canuto surveyed three different sites in the jungle. They found 6,764 buildings of various sizes.
Professor Elizabeth Graham from University College London, who was not involved in the research, says it supports claims that Maya lived in complex cities or towns, not in isolated villages.
"The point is that the landscape is definitely settled - that is, settled in the past - and not, as it appears to the naked eye, uninhabited or ‘wild’," she says.
The research suggests that when Maya civilisations collapsed from 800AD onwards, it was partly because they were so densely populated and could not survive climate problems.
"It's suggesting that the landscape was just completely full of people at the onset of drought conditions and it didn't have a lot of flexibility left. And so maybe the entire system basically unravelled as people moved farther away," says Mr Auld-Thomas.
Warfare and the conquest of the region by Spanish invaders in the 16th century also contributed to eradication of Maya city states.Many more cities could be found
Lidar technology has revolutionised how archaeologists survey areas covered in vegetation, like the Tropics, opening up a world of lost civilisations, explains Prof Canuto.
In the early years of his career, surveys were done by foot and hand, using simple instruments to check the ground inch by inch.
But in the decade since Lidar was used in the Mesoamerican region, he says it’s mapped around 10 times the area that archaeologists managed in about a century of work.
Mr Auld-Thomas says his work suggests there are many sites out there that archaeologists have no idea about.
In fact so many sites have been found that researchers cannot hope to excavate them all.
"I've got to go to Valeriana at some point. It's so close to the road, how could you not? But I can't say we will do a project there," says Mr Auld-Thomas.
"One of the downsides of discovering lots of new Maya cities in the era of Lidar is that there are more of them than we can ever hope to study," he adds.
The research is published in the academic journal Antiquity.
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atellite images analysed Verify show damage to a number of military sites in Iran from Israeli air strikes on Saturday.
They include sites experts say were used for missile production and air defence, including one previously linked to Iran’s nuclear programme.Satellite imagery following the Israeli strikes shows damage to buildings at what experts say is a major weapons development and production facility at Parchin, about 30km (18.5 miles) east of Tehran.
The site has been linked to rocket production according to experts from the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS).
Comparing high-resolution satellite imagery taken on 9 September with an image captured on 27 October, it appears that at least four structures have been significantly damaged.
One of these structures, known as Taleghan 2, has been previously linked to Iran’s nuclear programme by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
In 2016 the IAEA found evidence of uranium particles at the site, raising questions about banned nuclear activity there.Another site apparently targeted in the Israeli air strikes is at Khojir, about 20km north-west of Parchin.
Fabian Hinz of the ISS says “Khojir is known as the area with the highest concentration of ballistic missile-related infrastructure within Iran.”
It was the site of a mysterious large explosion in 2020.
Satellite photos show at least two buildings in the complex appear to have been severely damaged.A military site at Shahroud, about 350km to the east of Tehran, has also sustained damage, according to satellite imagery taken after the Israeli strikes.
Located in the northern province of Semnan, this area is significant because it’s been involved in the production of long-range missile components, according to Fabian Hinz of the IISS.
Nearby is the Shahroud Space Centre, controlled by the Revolutionary Guards Corps, from which Iran launched a military satellite into space in 2020.Israel has claimed that it successfully targeted Iran’s aerial defence systems at number of locations but it’s difficult to confirm this with the satellite imagery available.
We have obtained satellite imagery which appears to show damage to a site described by experts as a radar installation.
It's located on Shah Nakhjir mountain close to the western city of Ilam, and Jeremy Binnie, Middle East specialist at Janes, a defence intelligence company, says this may have been a newly updated radar defence system.
The site itself was established decades ago, but satellite pictures analysed by open source experts show it has undergone major renovation in recent years.We've also identified what appears to be damage to a storage unit at the Abadan Oil Refinery based in the south-western province of Khuzestan.
However, we don’t know what caused it and there is likely to be damage in some areas across Iran caused by debris or misfiring defence systems.
The New York Times cited Israeli officials as saying that the Abadan oil refinery was one of the sites targeted in its air strikes on Saturday morning.
Iranian authorities confirmed on Saturday that Khuzestan province had been targeted by Israel.
Abadan oil refinery is the country’s largest, capable of producing 500,000 barrels a day, according to its chief executive.
Satellite imagery isn't always conclusive in identifying damaged structures.
For example, a photograph we have verified showing smoke rising near Hazrat Amir Brigade Air Defence base suggested it had been successfully targeted. But satellite imagery of the area captured on Sunday has too many shadows to confirm any damage to the site.
Iran launched a missile attack on Israel at the start of October for the second time this year, after firing 300 missiles and drones in April.
