So, Bella, I was following your scent through the woods after I'd left your room where I was watching you sleep...Yes that would be quite the ice breaker.

Could a dead, frozen heart beat again? It felt like mine was about to.

I’ve never tried to keep a specific person alive before, and it’s much more troublesome than I would have believed. But that’s probably just because it’s you. Ordinary people seem to make it through the day without so many catastrophes.

You could run from someone you feared, you could try to fight someone you hated. All my reactions were geared toward those kinds of killers – the monsters, the enemies. When you loved the one who was killing you, it left you no options. How could you run, how could you fight, when doing so would hurt that beloved one? If your life was all you had to give your beloved, how could you not give it? If it was someone you truly loved?

Did you seriously just stamp your foot? I thought girls only did that on TV.

I was thinking about how disjointedly time seemed to flow, 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.

Do I dazzle you?" I voiced my curiosity impulsively, and then the words were out, and it was too late to recall them. But before I had time to too deeply regret speaking the words aloud, she answered "Frequently." And her cheeks took on a faint pink glow. I dazzled her. My silent heart swelled with a hope more intense than I could ever remember having felt before.