Midnight Sun(58)

"Nope."
She flicked my ear with her finger.
"Be nice, Alice," Esme chided. "Edward is being a gentleman."
"But I want to know."
I laughed at the whining tone she put on. Then I said, "Here, Esme," and began playing her favorite song,
an unnamed tribute to the love I'd watched between her and Carlisle for so many years.
"Thank you, dear." She squeezed my shoulder again.
I didn't have to concentrate to play the familiar piece. Instead I thought of Rosalie, still figuratively
writhing in mortification in the garage, and I grinned to myself.
Having just discovered the potency of jealousy for myself, I had a small amount of pity for her. It was a
wretched way to feel. Of course, her jealously was a thousand times more petty than mine. Quite the
fox in the manger scenario.
I wondered how Rosalie's life and personality would have been different if she had not always been the
most beautiful. Would she have been a happier person if beauty hadn't at all times been her strongest
selling point? Less egocentric? More compassionate? Well, I supposed it was useless to wonder, because
the past was done, and she always had been the most beautiful. Even when human, she had ever lived
in the spotlight of her own loveliness. Not that she'd minded. The opposite-she'd loved admiration
above almost anything else. That hadn't changed with the loss of her mortality.
It was no surprise then, taking this need as a given, that she'd been offended when I had not, from the
beginning, worshiped her beauty the way she expected all males to worship. Not that she'd wanted me
in any way-far from it. But it had aggravated her that I did not want her, despite that. She was used to
being wanted.
It was different with Jasper and Carlisle-they were already both in love. I was completely unattached,
and yet still remained obstinately unmoved.
I'd thought that old resentment was buried. That she was long passed it.
And she had been...until the day that I finally found someone whose beauty touched me the way hers
had not.
Rosalie had relied on the belief that if I did not find her beauty worth worshiping, then certainly there
was no beauty on earth that would reach me. She'd been furious since the moment I'd saved Bella's life,
guessing, with her shrewd female intuition, the interest that I was all but unconscious of myself.
Rosalie was mortally offended that I found some insignificant human girl more appealing than her. I
suppressed the urge to laugh again.
It bothered me some, though, the way she saw Bella. Rosalie actually thought the girl was plain. How
could she believe that? It seemed incomprehensible to me. A product of the jealousy, no doubt.
"Oh!" Alice said abruptly. "Jasper, guess what?"
I saw what she'd just seen, and my hands froze on the keys.
"What, Alice?" Jasper asked.
"Peter and Charlotte are coming to visit next week! They're going to be in the neighborhood, isn't that
nice?"
"What's wrong, Edward?" Esme asked, feeling the tension in my shoulders.
"Peter and Charlotte are coming to Forks?" I hissed at Alice
She rolled her eyes at me. "Calm down, Edward. It's not their first visit."
My teeth clenched together. It was their first visit since Bella had arrived, and her sweet blood didn't
appeal just to me.
Alice frowned at my expression. "They never hunt here. You know that."
But Jasper's brother of sorts and the little vampire he loved were not like us; they hunted the usual way.
They could not be trusted around Bella.
"When?" I demanded.
She pursed her lips unhappily, but told me what I needed to know. Monday morning. No one is going to
hurt Bella.
"No," I agreed, and then turned away from her. "You ready, Emmett?"
"I thought we were leaving in the morning?"
"We're coming back by midnight Sunday. I guess it's up to you when you want to leave."
"Okay, fine. Let me say goodbye to Rose first."
"Sure." With the mood Rosalie was in, it would be a short goodbye.
You really have lost it, Edward, he thought as he headed toward the back door.
"I suppose I have."
"Play the new song for me, one more time," Esme asked.
"If you'd like that," I agreed, though I was a little hesitant to follow the tune to its unavoidable end-the#p#分页标题#e#
end that had set me aching in unfamiliar ways. I thought for a moment, and then pulled the bottle cap
from my pocket and set it on the empty music stand. That helped a bit-my little memento of her yes.
I nodded to myself, and started playing.
Esme and Alice exchanged a glance, but neither one asked.
"Hasn't anyone ever told you not to play with your food?" I called to Emmett.
"Oh, hey Edward!" he shouted back, grinning and waving at me. The bear took advantage of his
distraction to rake its heavy paw across Emmett's chest. The sharp claws shredded through his shirt, and