Author's Note 1-10-21: The first few chapters of The Gift were my first ever published fan fic. My writing has grown a lot since then and so I'm going back to edit for readability. I am changing some typos and sentence structure. I am not adding or taking out anything that changes the story. Thanks for reading!

I awoke with a small jump as one of my constant nightmares scared me awake. In the nightmare, I had been running through the forest after the only man I have ever loved. He got farther and farther away with each frantic step I took in his direction. These nightmares were a nightly occurrence since he left me a few months ago. He disappeared with no way for me to contact him. He told me he didn't love me and that I couldn't hold his attention. His whole family had disappeared along with him, taking my best friends as well.

I have spent months broken, empty and extremely lonely no matter who I was with or what I was doing. I knew deep down that it would happen eventually. How could someone as ordinary as me possibly hold the attention the likes of him? I'm a clumsy, awkward human girl that could never compare to his speed, gracefulness, and intelligence, not to mention looks. It was easy to see why he had left me. But that didn't make his leaving easier for me.

Everything I am missed him dearly. His face, his melodic voice, his golden eyes, the way he smirked when he knew I wouldn't enjoy something, like Alice about to ask me shopping, but didn't want to spoil the fun by telling me what he had already heard in someone's thoughts.

Don't think about him, Bella. You'll tear in two.

I didn't want to open my eyes and face the day. If I could sleep forever, unthinking, unmoving, I would. But my room was cold. Why was it so cold? Slowly, I opened my eyes and noticed that my window was open by about an inch. I quickly got up and closed it, trying to remember when I would have gotten too hot in the night and opened it, but couldn't remember.

With a shiver, I walked across my room to get back in bed but stopped as my eyes landed on a box sitting on top of my desk. It was elegantly wrapped in silver paper and tied with a bold blue bow on top. The early morning sun was shining in and making it sparkle, almost like he did in the sun. Stop thinking about him, Bella. I thought to myself. It will only hurt you.

Had someone been in my room? It hit me that it was Christmas Eve. It must have been Charlie leaving me an early present before he left for work, but Charlie couldn't wrap this neatly. Perhaps one of the ladies at the department store wrapped it for him.

Despite my desire to crawl back in my warm bed and pretend not to exist, curiosity got the better of me. I reached out and gently grabbed the tag sitting beside the perfectly tied bow. "To: Bella" it said in a lovely, familiar cursive font.

My breath caught in my throat and it immediately felt as if I would rip apart with the pain of memories, memories of him, but my heart fluttered as well because a part of me knew what this meant. He had broken his promise.

It wasn't as if he never existed because there was proof right in front of me in the box wrapped with such care. This couldn't be one of my delusions of him. I was just not this creative. I would have never dreamed of anything but his gorgeous face, or his voice whispering sweetly in my ear.

I gently pushed the bow off the package, careful not to untie it, and paused. What in the world could this be? Edward doesn't love me, why would he send me a gift?

The wind of realization hit me full force and nearly knocked me over onto the floor, Edward didn't send me a gift, he brought it to me. I didn't open my window last night, he did, and he left it open just enough so that I would know he was here, but not enough to make me freeze or wake me too suddenly.

He wanted me to find this and know instantly it was him, but why didn't he stay? Did he not want to talk to me? Is this a more official goodbye?

With tears forming in my eyes, my hands slowly undid the paper. I couldn't remember how to breathe.

Under the paper was an ornate, glossed cardboard box, like the type used to store photos and small keepsakes. It was also silver and blue. Leave it to a vampire to have no detail unaccounted for. A card was on top with my name written in his beautiful cursive in a dark, black ink. I paused again. The contents of this box will change everything, for better or for worse, and he must be nearby if he wanted me to know that he was here. I took a calming breath and reached for the card with shaking hands and then opened the envelope containing the card and the card as well.

"Bella," his old-fashioned handwriting said, "You are my everything." I choked on my tears and continued reading, desperate to know what he had to say "In the woods, I lied to you and I will regret it for the rest of my days. It was the blackest kind of blasphemy to force myself to tell you that I didn't love you, when my unbeating heart was breaking into a million pieces in front of you. I couldn't stand the thought of being away from you, but please know that I did it out of love. I am a soulless monster. There is a lot of blood on my hands. Please think about this carefully.

I love you so much that I will let you go if that's what you want. It's what you deserve. You deserve a warm, loving husband, to go to college, travel, have children and so many things that I cannot give you in the traditional sense. This is why I left you and why I had to convince you that I didn't love you. Please know that if you have moved on as I intended, I will not interfere. You have my word. This is what is best for you.

I'm not good for you Bella, no matter how much I adore you. I will always be close by if you need me though, only a call away. I will not forsake you and your trust again.

I tried to stay away and keep my promise, but you are the one who owns my heart and all that is me. I couldn't stay away from you any longer. I had to see that you are alive and well with my own eyes. If you want to talk, you can find me at our house in Forks.

Love,

Edward"

I sat the card on my desk and let out a loud sob. Edward is in Forks. And he loves me. He was lying to me in the forest. All these months of pain were because of his misguided sense of morals and his thoughts that he doesn't have a soul.

I almost grabbed my coat and ran out of the house right then, but I was angry too. He decided for both of us and I had to pay the price. For months, I had barely felt alive. I hadn't slept or eaten well. I lost touch with most of my friends and family. If he truly loved me, how could he do this to me?

I sat on the bed, arms wrapped around my legs and cried, unsure what to believe. I was angry, but happy he was near, but I couldn't trust myself to be happy because what if he leaves me again?

After a few minutes of crying and rocking myself on the bed, I remembered that there was still an unopened box on my desk. Wiping my eyes, I carefully pulled off the lid. I at least owed it to him and myself to see what he wanted me to have so much that he would come into my room, but not stay. The tears that fell from my face were tenfold more than the ones shed a moment before when I saw the contents of his gift to me.

On top was a picture of me and the entire Cullen family, minus Jasper, the photographer I guessed, sitting on the giant couch in their living room and enjoying an intense debate between Emmett and Edward about the best movies to come out of the 1970s. We were trying to decide what to watch. Everyone was smiling and content with each other's company. No one seemed to notice the photographer. I was snuggled up to Alice on one side and Edward on another. I looked like another member of the big, loving family, not a human interloper as I sometimes thought that I was

Under the photo was another, this one of me, Edward, Alice, and Jasper playing Scrabble around the dining room table. I didn't remember this one being taken either. Alice had a mischievous glint in her eye and Edward was holding one of my hands under the table and smiling at me with a look of pure adoration. I had to stop and wipe my eyes.

Holding my breath, I picked up a picture of Edward and me at prom. We were dancing together outside, both smiling as we held each other and danced. I had never seen a picture of myself beside Edward where I actually felt worthy of his attention until this one. I wasn't a plain Jane. I was his lovely date, all dolled up by Alice. I was glowing.

I stared at the three photos on my desk for several minutes. My heart was pounding. Tears were flying from my eyes and landing all over my face and neck and wetting the top of my pajamas. Why did he give me these if he didn't truly love me, if he didn't intend to come back?

I forced myself to calm down a little and went back to the box on my desk. The next item was in a small box of its own. It was a locket, clearly not a modern one, made of silver. It had a flower I didn't recognize engraved on the front and when I opened it, I nearly threw it from shock, but I held my hands steady. Inside were two pictures of Edward. The left, I had never seen before. He had copper hair and green eyes the depth of which took me by surprise. This was Edward Masen, the human. On the right side was a picture of Edward Cullen, my vampire. My vampire? Were things really going to go back to normal so quickly?

The inside of the locket moved and that there were two more sections behind the moving part in the middle. Inside the moving section was a small lock of hair, his hair. I instantly thought of how in his human time, this was meant to show seriousness and love for someone. You loved them so much that you were willing to give them a living part of yourself. The back part of the inside of the locket was also engraved, this part with text, "All of me belongs to you, past, present and future."

I clutched the locket to my chest, crying yet again. It was going to be a day of many tears. I sat it aside for a moment, curious what could possibly top this but knowing he had packaged the best for last.

It was another small jewelry box. This one contained a silver ring with a small sapphire and a tiny diamond on either side. There was a note in the box with it. "This ring was my mothers, she meant everything to me. I know that you don't like expensive gifts, but I hope you will accept this ring as my promise that I will never refuse you or break my word to you again, regardless of your decision."

I admired the ring for a minute. It was lovely and understated, but not huge or crazy expensive as his gifts tended to be. This one was completely from his heart. He wanted me to have something of his mothers to show me that I wasn't just a girlfriend. "I will never refuse you…." Does that mean that he is willing to change me? Could I really be with him forever? Would he stick around this time?

My eyes couldn't possibly shed any more tears, but my heart was still pounding. For months, I had felt nothing, had been a zombie forcing myself to do the bare minimum to stay alive and out of trouble. I hadn't heard from him or his family except in my nightmares and delusions. And now, I wanted to hope, but I was so scared. I wanted to cry and scream, but I wanted to smile and be joyful. Most of all, I wanted Edward. I couldn't wait another minute to see him and prove to myself that this was real.

I ran to the bathroom and quickly ran a brush through my hair and my teeth. Back in my room, I hastily threw on the first set of clothes I could find, not caring a bit about matching or how it would look. I paused from my frantic motions and for the first time in months, a smile crept its way onto my face as I put on the ring and locket. I was still angry at Edward for leaving me, still broken from the time without him as well, but I loved him, and he loved me. That's all I needed for the moment.

I almost tripped down the stairs in my haste to get to him, but made it unharmed and ran to my truck. The engine came to life and my foot floored the pedal. It was a good thing that Charlie was the only cop working on Christmas Eve. Driving as fast as my truck could possibly go, I chuckled a little at the thought of him stopping his own daughter to give her a speeding ticket in the truck he bought for her.

It seemed like an eternity in the time it took to reach the Cullen's driveway. I felt my hands reach up and brush my locket several times along the way, feeling a physical representation of Edward's love for me. Edward's love for me, I thought. That sounded so good and so right. My anger was forgotten for the time being. I still found it hard to believe, but with the physical proof on my body, I had no choice but to believe that he loved me, or else why would he come back for me? Why would he give me something of his mothers, who meant so much to him?

My truck flew up the long drive, stirring up a massive cloud of dust and throwing gravels everywhere. Esme wouldn't be happy if she were here to see it, but in that moment, it didn't matter. I put the truck in park and hopped out, prepared to run into the house after my Edward.

Of course, he had heard me making a giant dust cloud with my truck. I was so loud that he didn't even need his super vampire hearing to notice my approach.

Edward was standing a few feet away, just in front of the porch, unmoving. I could tell that he didn't want to assume my feelings. For all he knew, his true love had come to curse him for returning. His clothes were disheveled and wrinkled. His bronze hair was the messiest I had ever seen it. His head was down, defeated. His eyes were dark but focused only on me. He had purple bags under them, the worst I'd ever seen. I wondered when he'd last eaten but pushed the thought away quickly as I started walking towards him, still a little hesitant.

There was a change in his eyes the second he noticed me wearing his locket. My body was inches away from his when he smiled, a sincere smile that made his dark eyes sparkle and had me dazzled before I even touched him.

Edward, my Edward, caught me in his arms as I jumped towards him, closing the gap between us. He held his arms around me crushing me to his chest. I was sure that I would have a few bruises tomorrow from the firmness of his grip, but they would be worth it, as a reminder of our reunion and of his true feelings. He didn't mean to harm me, only to hold me tightly and never let me go.

We stood like this together for a while, his arms around me, holding me, and my arms and legs around him as well as he held me off the ground. Edward was planting kisses in my hair and sobbing quietly. I was overjoyed as I took in his embrace, his smell, his coldness against me. I moved one of my hands from his shoulder to his hair and ran my fingers through his messy, bronze locks.

"Bella." He whispered in my ear, like he was saying the name of his most revered god. He lifted his head from my shoulder to look me in the eyes. What I found there was pure joy, with just a hint of the toll the months apart had taken on him. "You came back to me. Are you sure –"

Before he could finish his question and start doubting me, doubting us at all, I took his face in my hand, deliberately looked in his eyes and forcefully pushed my lips to his. He gasped and started running his fingers through my hair.

All my anxiety melted away with the feel on his lips on mine. Through his loving touch and the passionate movement of his lips, I had no doubts that he loved me. It was hard to believe, that someone as majestic as him could love someone as plain as me, but he did, and I was not going to argue with it.

It was not going to be the day for difficult talks, for anger, for fear. It was going to be a day of happy reunion and healing our broken hearts together. The talking could come later.