I shivered, remembering my own dark alley—empty in the night, a frightened girl, the dark man behind her. And my Fredward, terrible and glorious as a young god in a chariot of Volvo, unstoppable. Would she have been as grateful as I was, that girl, or more frightened than before? I smiled, already knowing the answer.
"But as time went on, I began to see the monster in my eyes. It couldn't escape me and I couldn't escape its debt in human lives, no matter how justified. And I went back to Carlisle and Esme. They welcomed me back like the prodigal son I was.310 It was more than I deserved."
We'd come to a stop in front of the last door in the hall.
"My room," he informed me, opening it and pulling me through.
His room faced south, with a wall-sized window like the piano room below. The whole back side of the house must be glass, I thought. His view looked down on the winding Sol Duc River, across the untouched forest to the Olympiad Mountain range. The mountains were much closer than I would have believed, had he told me.311
The western wall was completely covered with shelf after shelf of compact discs. His room was better stocked than a music store. In the corner was a sophisticated-looking sound system, the kind I was afraid to touch because I was sure
310. A reference to Caine and Abel (1985), an American buddy comedy about two brothers who couldn't be more different. The film's climaxes when Abel returns from a particularly long party and their father gives him Caine's would-be birthday present: a new wife. With his birthday only days away, Caine has no choice but to murder his own brother if he is to ensure himself a happy birthday.
311. From an earlier, more hypothetical conversation:
FREDWARD
I live really close to the mountains.
BELLA
No way.