Why Edward?
This is the question that burns under almost every Twific I write. According to interviews, it was one of the main questions that Rob asked Stephenie Meyer: why would a boy stay with the vampire who turned him? What was it he saw? In Ithaca is Gorges, I gave a partial answer:
Unbeknownst to me, the venom had reached his brain in fewer than twelve hours, and so he had quickly become privy not only to the words I was speaking, but also to the internal monologue that ran parallel to the story I told him. I unintentionally laid myself bare to Edward as he was being changed, revealing to him my deepest emotions: the crushing pain of my loneliness, my terror that he would despise me for his entire existence, my fervent hope that he might someday know me as a companion, perhaps even as family.
By the time he awoke, Edward knew me better than I did. And then he quietly stepped in to fill the void he saw in my still heart.
But as I wrote more and more, I realized that to give that question a full answer required capturing Carlisle all the way back; exploring each of the things which ripped at him, and every moment that helped create that void.
And so I started working on Stregoni.
And yet, when after twenty three chapters, I get to part where I try to give the answer, I wonder if it feels unsatisfying. I finished this chapter in late June of this year, and felt pleased with it then. But part of what pleases me about it is exactly that I don’t think I answered the question.
Because I’m not sure there is any one single answer.
Why Edward? is the ongoing question. Why Edward? drives everything about Carlisle’s relationship with his son. Carlisle will spend the rest of eternity unpacking this moment and this day; and I wanted to do his effort justice in the way that I wrote it.
As always I owe my beta, Openhome, great thanks for her help in tweaking this chapter so that it rang every bell I needed it to ring.
Why Edward?
It drives Carlisle as a father.
It drives me as a writer.
Happy Reading.
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