much that Bella would ask him. That she had not done so had rattled his confidence. Now he was in an uncomfortable bind - I enjoyed his discomfort more than I should - because Jessica Stanley had just asked him to the dance. He didn't want to say "yes," still hopeful that Bella would choose him (and prove him the victor over his rivals), but he didn't want to say "no" and end up missing the dance altogether. Jessica, hurt by his hesitation and guessing the reason behind it, was thinking daggers at Bella. Again, I had the instinct to place myself between Jessica's angry thoughts and Bella. I understood the instinct better now, but that only made it more frustrating when I could not act on it.
To think it had come to this! I was utterly fixated on the petty high school dramas that I'd once held so in contempt.
Mike was working up his nerve as he walked Bella to biology. I listened to his struggles as I waited for them to arrive. The boy was weak. He had waited for this dance purposely, afraid to make his infatuation known before she had shown a marked preference for him. He didn't want to make himself vulnerable to rejection, preferring that she make that leap first.
Coward.
He sat down on our table again, comfortable with long familiarity, and I imagined the sound it would make if his body hit the opposite wall with enough force to break most of his bones.
"So," he said to the girl, his eyes on the floor. "Jessica asked me to the spring dance."
"That's great," Bella answered immediately and with enthusiasm. It was hard not to smile as her tone sunk in to Mike's awareness. He'd been hoping for dismay. "You'll have a lot of fun with Jessica."
He scrambled for the right response. "Well..." he hesitated, and almost chickened out. Then he rallied. "I told her I had to think about it."
"Why would you do that?" she demanded. Her tone was one of disapproval, but there was the faintest hint of relief there as well.
What did that mean? An unexpected, intense fury made my hands clench into fists.
Mike did not hear the relief. His face was red with blood - fierce as I suddenly felt, this seemed like an invitation - and he looked at the floor again as he spoke. "I was wondering if...well, if you might be planning to ask me."
Bella hesitated.
In that moment of her hesitation, I saw the future more clearly than Alice ever had.
The girl might say yes to Mike's unspoken question now, and she might not, but either way, someday soon, she would say yes to someone. She was lovely and intriguing, and human males were not oblivious to this fact. Whether she would settle for someone in this lackluster crowd, or wait until she was free from Forks, the day would come that she would say yes.
I saw her life as I had before - college, career...love, marriage. I saw her on her father's arm again, dressed in gauzy white, her face flushed with happiness as she moved to the sound of Wagner's march.
The pain was more than anything I'd felt before. A human would have to be on the point of death to feel this pain - a human would not live through it.
And not just pain, but outright rage.
The fury ached for some kind of physical outlet. Though this insignificant, undeserving boy might not be the one that Bella would say yes to, I yearned to crush his skull in my hand, to let him stand as a representative for whoever it would be.
I didn't understand this emotion - it was such a tangle of pain and rage and desire and despair. I had never felt it before; I couldn't put a name to it.
"Mike, I think you should tell her yes," Bella said in a gentle voice.
Mike's hopes plummeted. I would have enjoyed that under other circumstances, but I was lost in the aftershock of the pain - and the remorse for what the pain and rage had done to me.
Alice was right. I was not strong enough.
Right now, Alice would be watching the future spin and twist, become mangled again. Would this please her?
"Did you already ask someone?" Mike asked sullenly. He glanced at me, suspicious for the first time in many weeks. I realized I had betrayed my interest; my head was inclined in Bella's direction.