Midnight Sun Chapter 02 – Fuck this girl’s safety.

Previously: Edward had some dirty, dark fantasies and they all involved Bella dead.
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Annie: Edward is laying half-buried in snow, out in the Denali wilds. He’s being very emo about how he’s been hiding out for six whole days, but still can’t shake the scent and face of this rather “unremarkable” human. Meyer uses a lot of descriptive language to talk about the ice and how it feels like velvet, and the clear, but star-filled sky.

Marines: Truly, this was three paragraphs full of very Meyer-esque writing. The ice feels like velvet underneath Edward’s skin which… what? The description of the stars as “majestic, swirling shapes” only to then call the universe empty. And then a reminder that Bella is a basic ass bitch with a plain ole face. We really are back here, reading this again, huh? 

Catherine: As someone who lives in the northeast, ice feels like fucking ice, Meyer. 

Annie: Edward can hear the thoughts of someone approaching before he hears their footsteps. It’s Tanya, and Edward knew that she was going to follow him, because he could tell from his vampire power that she’d been thinking and planning what she wanted to say to him.

Tanya is wearing only a cotton cami and shorts, so Edward notes that she isn’t dressed for human eyes… Because humans HATE cotton, I guess? 

She think-speaks ‘Cannonball’ in Edward’s head and then jumps into a pile of snow, covering Edward in more snow. He lays there, “in the feathery ice,” (C: That’s not a thing. ICE IS JUST ICE.) but finds being buried in snow doesn’t help him; he still feels the pain of smelling Bella. 

Kirsti: With every page I turn, I become more and more offended that trees had to die to be turned into paper just so this garbage could be printed.

Annie: Tanya takes his moping as irritation for covering him in snow, which I don’t blame her for. She apologizes and tells him it was just a joke. Edward tells her it was funny. Because he’s totally acting like it was funny.

Mari: I’m not gonna lie; I find this all hilarious. Edward just sinking into snow drifts, looking into the sky, super sad mostly because he keeps looking at beautiful things like the sky and Tanya, but he can barely register beautiful because all he wants is to remark on how unremarkable Bella is. 

Annie: Tanya tells Edward that Irina and Kate have told her to leave Edward alone while he mopes, because she’s definitely annoying him. Edward tells her that it’s actually him that has been rude. 

Tanya asks if he’s going home, and he tells her that he hasn’t decided yet. He’s not staying here, though, because it’s not helping. Tanya gets pouty while asking him if it’s her fault. Edward says that isn’t the case, but Tanya tells him not to be a gentleman, accusing him of being uncomfortable with her advances. He swears he isn’t, but Tanya doesn’t believe him.

“She raised one eyebrow, her expression so disbelieving that I had to laugh. One short laugh, followed by another sigh. “All right,” I admitted. “A little bit.”

Edward reassures her that she’s totes hot and all, but he’s stubborn. Tanya doesn’t like rejection and gets all pouty again. (M: The number of time she pouts, wow.) Edward explains that Tanya prefers human men. Silly me thought this was a ‘to women’ discussion, but this is Stephenie Meyer. He meant human men instead of vampire men. (K: But of course.)

Tanya is treating Edward to a soft-porn slideshow in his head of all her many men, and Edward calls her a succubus. Edward gives us some unnecessary background on how Tanya and her sisters only more recently became the non-murdery vampire types.

Mari: Apparently, they only changed their minds because they really liked having sex with men? And so they thought, “hmm, maybe we should stop killing them.” It’s kind of a wild and weird way of backing into this particular morality, that at one point, their lust lust finally outran their blood lust. 

K: It’s probably also hard to be a single, hot female in Alaska and not draw suspicion if you keep hooking up with dudes who are never seen again… 

Mari: That’s fair and makes more sense. It’s the whole “they like sleeping with men too much to kill them” framing that was like what now. 

It’s also worth nothing that this is giving Tanya some sexuality and agency, something that Meyer doesn’t give her main female character. Meyer also spends most of the time calling Tanya pouty and petulant, though, because sexy females are the worst, am I right? 

Catherine: Also should be noted that Tanya, the one woman that she gave sexual agency to, is also the man-stealing slut in the first book that Bella lowkey hates and constantly compares herself to despite never having met her. So no points for Meyer. 

Annie: Tanya tells him that when Edward showed up, she figured he had changed his mind… All the descriptions and dialogue and yet, they only allude to what that might be about. Edward apologizes for getting Tanya’s expectations up. (Okay? Like, we know it’s because Edward is super hot and everyone wants Edward, human and vampire alike, but Meyer doesn’t really spell it out and I find that really funny for some reason.) (M: He doesn’t know he’s beautiful, and that’s what makes him beautiful.) (K: Na na na na na na naaaaaaaah na na.) Tanya asks what has brought Edward to skulk about in their wilds, but he doesn’t want to talk about it. She asks if he’s going to go back home again. Edward doesn’t know, but he’s mad about it. He’s mad that he’s such a coward and that he’s running away from something instead of to something.

Tanya assures Edward that no matter what or who is haunting him, he’ll be able to face it. Her out loud words match her head words, and that gives Edward all he needs to visualize himself doing the damn thing! You go, Edward!

Mari: Go face that wanting to murder a child head on! Buck up, buddy! You’ve got this!

Catherine: He is literally just like “I can’t think of anywhere else I want to go that seems interesting so fuck this teenage girl’s safety.” 

Annie: Edward kisses her on the cheek, and tells her that she is way too good for him. Tanya vampire-runs away, leaving no footprints in the snow except for the “whispers of footprints” because she is so fast. 

Mari: I think I’ve read about this! You can’t see these footprints, but if you put your ear close to the snow, you hear whispers of footprints. They say like “footprints should be here” or something. 

K: Honestly, I’m just picturing Legolas right now, but in shorts and a cami top and it’s HILARIOUS.

Annie: Edward broods about not wanting to hurt Tanya’s feelings, even though they aren’t that deep or pure. He suddenly really wants to be home with his family, but not before he does some more emo shit:

“I put my chin on my knees and stared up at the stars again, though I was suddenly anxious to be on my way.”

Friend, in what world can you put your chin on your knees, and also look up at stars at the same time? Try it, I’ll wait.

Mari: Okay, well, 1- I’m really short, short legs you know, and pudgy around the middle so putting my chin on my knee was not comfortable to begin with but 2- even less so when I was trying to also look up. In the end, I had to roll my eyes so far up that it was almost painful? I held this position for 1 second before I thought “I’ve suffered enough pain at the hands of Meyer.” 

In conclusion: possible-ish but not probable, not comfortable, and not good writing. 

K: I’m 5’9″ and about 5′ of it is leg so putting my chin on my knees is uncomfortable at the best of times. Given how much weight I’ve gained in lockdown, I’m not even going to attempt it because I’ll probably injure myself so I’ll just take your word for it, Mari.

Catherine: Instructions unclear. Accidentally kneed myself in the throat. 

Annie: I really should have known better than risk your safety trying something Meyer wrote, because she clearly doesn’t know how bodies work. Sorry, friends.

Edward’s super anxious to get going, but still spends some time thinking about how happy it will make his family for him to be home. Then he pictures Bella’s eyes again, upset that he can’t even hear her thoughts in his imagination, and wonder what it will mean for her if he returns.

He keeps talking about how he can’t have an unobstructed view of the stars because Bella’s big dumb eyes keep getting in the way. (M: Honestly, it’s probably the chin on the knee thing, Eddie. You aren’t looking up right!) He gives up on trying to see the stars, because he’s super anxious to get home. He vampire-runs back to Carlisle’s car.

We cut to the next day? A few days later? Who knows. (K: Time is irrelevant. All that matters is Edward’s obsession with Bella. Duh.) But the vampire siblings are back at school and in the cafeteria. They’re forming some kind of huddle around Edward, totally killing the whole acting like normal humans thing.

Edward is upset. If he didn’t trust himself to not go into a murderous thirst when the school’s HVAC system blew scents around the wrong way, he definitely would not have put himself into this position. He thinks the way his ‘siblings’ are being so hyper-vigilant to make sure he doesn’t lose it and murder the new girl would be funny, if it wasn’t so annoying. 

Mari: Speaking of would be funny if it weren’t so annoying, THE PUNCTUATION IN THIS SENTENCE: 

“The sudden shift from our normal, even playful morning– it had snowed in the night, and Emmett and Jasper were not above taking advantage of my distraction to bombard me with slush balls; when they got bored with my lack of response, they’d turned on each other– to this overdone vigilance would have been comical if it weren’t so irritating.” 

I think Stephenie thought that was one sentence, but she’s got a semi-colon in a parenthetical and oh my god. 

K: Who cares about punctuation when you have an ETERNAL LOVE?

Annie: Alice is trying to go over their plan, as I guess she’s using her Vision Google to make sure everything’s going to be okay. 

Edward can hardly believe it was only last week that he found the cafeteria so damn boring, and I have to quote this to highlight how truly stupid it sounds:

“Was it just last week that this long, drab room had seemed so killingly dull to me? That it had seemed almost like sleep, like a coma, to be here?”

He’s hyper-alert and using all of his special vampire senses to be on the look out for this girl, except for scent. There would be no breathing.

Edward keeps scanning the minds of those around him, looking for people thinking about them or him. He seems almost disappointed that no one is thinking about the 5 vampires, although I’m confused because I thought their gig was to blend in and not be seen as creatures of the night?

He’s also super upset that after the way he acted towards Bella, she hadn’t confided in anyone about how creeped out or scared she’d felt after the staring and glaring:

“There was no way that she had not noticed my black murderous glare. I had seen her react to it. Surely, I’d traumatized her. I was convinced that she would have mentioned it to someone, maybe even have exaggerated the story a bit to make it better. Given me a few menacing lines.”

I’m sorry. SURELY HE HAD TRAUMATIZED HER? He’s a real fucking treat.

Mari: This whole thing was a rollercoaster. At first, I also was really confused as to why he expected everyone to be thinking about him. It takes a paragraph to get to the point where he admits that he figured he’d made wanting to kill Bella so apparent, that she would’ve told other people about it.

The real kicker of this is that Bella didn’t register his murderous intent as such at all, basically because she was too busy falling in love with him. He walks in to school thinking “surely, she told everyone I was legitimately awful to her.” Nope, Edward! You know you were, and we know you were, but Stephenie Meyer wrote Bella as mostly ~intrigued~. 

Annie: Edward also knows that Bella caught him trying to get out of the class they had together, so between that and all the creepy murderous glaring, he cannot understand why she didn’t confide in anyone about her experience. Edward knows that a normal girl who had had a terrifying encounter with some creep totally should have confided in people she’d just met to see if they’d also been terrorized by him.

Mari: THERE IS SOMETHING REALLY GROSS ABOUT THIS? 

“A normal girl would have asked around, compared her experience to others’, looked for common ground that would explain my behavior so she didn’t feel singled out. Humans were constantly desperate to feel normal, to fit in. To blend in with everyone else around them, like a featureless flock of sheep. The need was particularly strong during the insecure adolescent years. This girl would be no exception to that rule.” 

I JUST.

This isn’t just a case of Edward being rude. In fact, he knows that he acted so badly and so wildly out of “normal” toward her, that his expectation is that he traumatized her. Meyer is writing about this in a way that is akin to experiencing harassment. Edward thinks that surely Bella would’ve talked to someone else about it, but then says it would be for the purpose of not being singled out??? To then insult humans for sharing experiences of harassment or whatever and the way that can help people feel normal as being FEATURELESS and SHEEP. As if people talk about these things to FIT IN and not that harassment is usually UNDER REPORTED and KEPT A SECRET because people are afraid of STANDING OUT?

AND THEN! She sets up that Bella is going to be the exception to the rule and that’s what makes her special. Any other girl would’ve been traumatized by Edward sitting next to them, wanting to eat her for an hour, but NOT BELLA. WHAT A GAL. 

Catherine: Also, what the fuck is his deal with sheep? This is like the third time he’s mentioned sheep in two chapters. 

Annie: Edward wonders if maybe she’s confided in her father, maybe he is the one she’s closest to in town. But seeing as Bella isn’t around Forks that much, Edward decides that can’t be it. Even so, Edward decides he will swing by her house and spy on poor old Charlie. (M: Oh my god.) (K: Y.i.k.e.s.) (C: He doesn’t know where her therapist’s house is.)

Jasper asks Edward if he’s hearing anything new, and Edward tells them that Bella must not have said anything about them. The Cullens are surprised, and I can’t believe how much of this is dedicated to Edward being upset he didn’t traumatize Bella enough that she felt like she needed to talk to someone about it. Alice tells the group that Bella is about to enter the cafeteria and tells them to ‘act human’ lolz.

Mari: YOU’VE BEEN IN THE CAFETERIA THIS WHOLE TIME WHY WEREN’T YOU ACTING HUMAN? 

Annie: Emmett throws an ice ball he’d been hiding towards Alice and she uses her vampire powers to flick the ice ball away. The ball flies across the cafeteria, smashing into the wall, the ice shattering and leaving a crack in the wall of the cafeteria.

K: And everyone just stares at the ice on the floor before shrugging and moving on with their lives? IT CRACKS A FUCKING BRICK, WTF FORKS.

Annie: Edward is pretending to pay attention to the antics of his ‘siblings’, but he’s really doubling-down on the Jessica hate. I mean, spying on Bella by seeing through Jessica’s eyes. He can see that Bella is blushing again. Mike is with them, and Edward is immediately irritated, because Mike is asking what’s up with Bella. Edward thinks Mike’s thoughts about Bella are distasteful. Excuse me, sir. You haven’t even spoken a word to this girl, have spent a good amount of time considering whether or not you were going to kill her, and have been scanning everyone’s thoughts to see if she’s been talking about you, but it’s Mike’s thoughts that we’re worried about. Ooookay.

Bella is only getting a drink from the cafeteria, and Jessica notices she’s not getting anything to eat. Bella explains that she’s not feeling well. Mike is feeling protective of Bella, which irritates Edward. Then again, maybe this is just the feeling that Bella inspires in people, because Edward also felt pretty protective of Bella, you know. After the whole he wanted to kill her business.

Catherine: Bella “inspiring protectiveness” in people, but mostly good-looking guys, is like a Mary Sue greatest hit.

Annie: Edward can’t keep reading Mike’s thoughts about Bella, so he shifts back to ‘watching’ her through Jessica’s eyes. (M: I thought I’d seen it all in “hot guy stalks his love interest” and yet.) They settle at a table in the cafeteria with Jessica’s friends, downwind as Alice predicted. Alice warns in thought-speak that Bella is going to look their way soon, and tosses a handful of shaved ice (some might call that snow) (M: dying.) at Emmett and the Cullens laugh and all try to look human. Edward picks up on someone’s thoughts about how Bella’s staring at the Cullens again. He can’t help but turn to look at Bella, but she quickly hides behind her hair. 

Jessica tells Bella that Edward is staring at her. Bella asks if he looks angry at her, and Jessica seems confused. Clearly, Bella had noticed Edward’s weird reaction to her. No shit, buddy.

Bella tells Jessica that she doesn’t think Edward likes her, and Jessica tells her that the Cullens don’t like anyone. Bella asks Jessica to stop looking over at the Cullen’s table. Bella doesn’t look back at the Cullens’ table for the rest of lunch, and Edward figures that it must be on purpose, because as he’s watching her the whole damn time, he thinks he’s caught her moving slightly to look at him, but then she stops herself. 

K: All of this is super weird but the weirdest part is that Edward calls her “the girl” the entire time. And it’s weird because it feels way more serial killer-y for him to refuse to use her name…

Catherine: It definitely reads like he wants to make a suit out of her skin. 

Annie: Lunch ends and all of the boring, regular humans leave. Edward and the Cullens stay at their table, waiting to see what Edward is going to do next. Is he going to go to his science class and sit next to Bella and try to not eat her?

Despite the various concerns of his family, he’s decided that he wants to try going to class. Honestly, what’s the worst that could happen?

Mari: We have a pretty concrete answer to that, as chapter one was literally about the worst that could happen: Edward eats Bella and slaughters 18 children and 1 science teacher of medium intellect. But sure, Ed. Go ahead to science class. 

Annie: Alice uses her vampire power and she assures everyone that it will probably be okay. (M: “Probably safe” in this case means it is more likely that Edward will Bella than it is that someone get pregnant while using a condom.) (C: Well, we saw what happened with the pregnancy.) Jasper asks Edward if he wants to push it, and Emmett says the worst that could happen is that he’d murder Bella and they’d all have to move. 

Edward really doesn’t want to inconvenience his family by making them have to move, but also, he really wants to go to his biology class. Because he needs to see Bella’s face again. He’s way too curious; he needs to go see why he can’t read her thoughts. Edward wonders if his curiosity about Bella is enough to keep Bella alive. Oooof. 

Mari: Be interesting or die, ladies, am I right! 

Annie: Edward takes a big, deep breath and holds it before he enters his biology class. It seems as though he’s forgotten that he doesn’t have to breathe?

Catherine: He also forgot that shit in the first chapter when he was trying not to kill her. Maybe skim the Vampire Instruction Manual now and again, Edward? 

Annie: Edward finds Bella at their table, and she is doodling. Always the creepy stalker creep, Edward checks out what she’s doodling as a way to get some insight into her thoughts, but she’s only drawing loops. Edward figures she must be thinking about something else, then.

I’m not sure what he was expecting to see. Bella drawing big hearts around his name?

K: Possibly a pattern that reads “KILL ME EDWARD”?

Mari: “God, I’m ready to die ❤️❤️❤️” in calligraphy? 

Annie: Who knows.

Edward pulls his chair out making a whole lot of noise because humans like it better when people announce their arrival. Bella has noticed that Edward has arrived, but she doesn’t look up. Edward figures it’s because she’s frightened and decides it’s time to gaslight her.

“Probably she was frightened. I must be sure to leave her with a different impression this time. Make her think she had been imagining things before.”

It’s really super awesome of Meyer to confirm what we’ve always all thought: Edward is a complete fucking psycho. Cool, cool, cool.

K: 😬😬😬

Mari: Especially because this is not coming from a change of heart place? Edward has not once said that he wants to kill Bella less. His main objection has been MOVING after killing her. He seems to find her interesting mostly because he can’t hear her thoughts and against his own objections. So to come back and be like “gotta change her mind about me!” It’s 100% gaslighting because his motivation is tricking her, belittling her feelings, and serving himself. 

Annie: BuT iT’s RoMaNtiC.

Edward says hello to Bella in a weird voice, smiling without showing his teeth and Bella looks at him with her eyes (How else would she look at him, really?), which he describes as both milk chocolate and strong tea. Edward decides someone so vulnerable couldn’t possibly be deserving of hate for just existing! Congratulations Bella! You deserve to live apparently.

Mari: Strong women deserve to die, am I right! 

Catherine: Girls who don’t know they’re beautiful that’s what makes them beautiful oh-oh, deserve to live. Girls who know their own self-worth can die. If Bella had listened to even one Beyonce song this book would have been much shorter. 

Annie: Bella blushes and Edward is trying not to think about how tasty her skin looks. He has enough breath to speak for a while longer without inhaling, and I am confused. Vampires need to breathe?

K: Continuity schmontinuity.

Mari: He’s got a breath bank? So he can talk? But he doesn’t need breath to breathe? I’m spitballing here. 

Annie: Edward introduces himself and laughs (M: Woah major withdrawal from the breath bank) when Bella asked how he knows her name. Edward tells her that everyone knows her name, and they’ve all been waiting for her (K: Definitely makes him seem cool and casual and not at all like a cult leader nope nope nope). Edward’s got his head so far up his ass and he’s so focused on trying to figure out why Bella isn’t excited about all the attention like humans usually are when in fact she wants to know why he is calling her Bella instead of Isabella. Oops. Bella picked up on his fuck up, which is impressive that she’s so perceptive when she’s so terrified of him.

Mari: Edward is so confused about why Bella is questioning this, because he listened to the thoughts of plenty of people or super-listened to Bella say a few times that she prefers Bella. Even though he’s hella superior, he’s apparently too stupid to figure any of this out and wonders if “all human [were] this incomprehensible without the mental context as a guide.” Eddie, my least favorite murderer, tell me: what the fuck is incomprehensible about this. 

Annie: Edward is now out of air and he can’t possibly talk anymore without breathing. He doesn’t want to be rude by not talking, so instead he acts like a complete weirdo and twists his head out to the aisle away from the Bella stench and takes a deep breath.

Folks, I feel like I’m having a fever dream. Again I ask, did Meyer not tell us that her vampires do not have to breathe? Didn’t she make a point to tell us that her vampires pretend to breathe so they appear more human? What is going on here?

K: The most galling part is that she had 12 years to fix this shit and SHE FUCKING DIDN’T.

Mari: I honestly would be fine with the explanation that they don’t need to breathe to live but they do need the air to talk, but she doesn’t do anything to make that particularly clear. She just writes it like another Meyer contradiction. 

Annie: Edward can taste her on his tongue even without smelling her and it is super painful. (M: Bella is like a ghost pepper.) (C: Edward will kill her and then make a Youtube challenge about eating her.)

The teacher tells the class to get started and they get to work on the lab, which Meyer doesn’t actually explain. I keep noticing these weird disconnects where Meyer will kill us with details about certain things but not even mention other things that help with the flow of the book. But her writing has improved SO MUCH from the first Twilight books, sure. (C: LMAO she didn’t even bother to edit this. This is the SAME writing.)

They get to work identifying phases of mitosis with Edward wanting to check Bella’s work because she clearly can’t be trusted to know how to science; she’s just a stupid human. They have another tense moment when their fingers brush against each other while handling the slides and the heat of her skin burns Edward, and he has to breathe quietly. What the fuck?

K: Is it because he’s panting like a dog and he doesn’t want her to think he’s even more of a creeper than he already appears? Because that’s what I’m assuming.

Annie: Edward is obsessed, overanalyzing and overthinking each second of their interactions as they work not really speaking to each other and not making eye contact. They finish the lab before everyone else because people like Mike are distracted by watching Bella and Edward and feeling jealous and hating on Edward. Edward’s interpretations, not mine. (K: I’m guessing the hating on Edward part is right, because Edward is a dick.)

Edward finds it amusing that Bella, plain and simple, is causing so much havoc. He can even see what Mike finds so appealing. Bella is pretty for a human, although Edward feels her face is unexpected (whatever the fuck that means) and he gets lost in thought about Bella. Until he notices Bella staring at him again. She asks him if he’s gotten contacts because she’s noticed his eyes are different. Edward realizes too late that he should have just said yes because Bella is noticing too much about him, and it’s not like he can just tell her that his eyes change colour because he’s a vampire!

Catherine: It’s not like she’d fucking guess it from that. That’s not a thing, Edward. 

Annie: The science teacher shows up at their table then to be misogynistic because clearly Edward did all of the work. (K: Hey wow dude you have NO PLACE in teaching, go fuck yourself.) (C: We STOOD UP FOR YOU, Mr. Banner!) When Edward tells him Bella had done her share and the teacher figures it must be because Bella has done this lab before. Bella explained she’s done a similar lab and that she was in advanced placement at her old school. Edward decides that makes sense because Bella must be super smart, you know, for a human. The teacher moves on and Bella goes back to doodling and Edward goes back to worrying about slipping up twice in one hour.

Edward decides that he needs to leave a good impression on Bella so he starts up with some small talk gold: the weather. Edward asks why Bella moved to Forks. Bella tells Edward that it’s complicated, which only makes Edward more curious. Bella tells Edward about how her mother remarried and her stepfather plays minor league baseball so Bella sent herself to live with her dad so her mother can travel around with Phil. As Edward is listening to her talk, all he can think about is how she wasn’t like the other humans. This time, it’s because Bella is clearly selfless. Edward tells Bella that he can clearly see that she doesn’t let on about how much she is truly suffering. He can’t believe that Bella isn’t your average martyr. Bella wants to know why it matters to Edward that she’s suffering in silence, and Edward has no idea. Why does he care about her silly stupid human things?

K: We’re only at the 7% mark of this book and my eyeballs already hurt because I’ve rolled them so much.

Mari: Really, my eyeballs still hurt from having my chin on my knee and looking up. 

Annie: Edward thinks Bella is irritated because he has not answered her question. Edward finds it amusing that Bella has no idea that he could just murder her at any point. lolol. Hilarious.

Apparently, that’s not why she’s irritated, though. She’s actually mad at herself because she thinks her face is easy to read. Edward tells her that her face was actually hard to read, and Bella tells him he must be a good reader then. Edward suddenly feels her should warn her off as all the things that scare usual humans away don’t seem to be working on smart-for-a-human Bella. He smiles at her, showing all his teeth.

Mari: For those keeping track at home, he went from being bored by her, to wanting to murder her, to hating her, to being fascinated by her, to not hating her because she’s too weak to hate, to being nice to her to gaslight her, to now deciding it was time to use his teeth to scare her. Romance progressing so nicely. 

Annie: We are saved by the teacher who interrupts Edward and Bella to call the class back to order. But this just gives Edward more time to focus on the fact that he’s getting obsessed with Bella. Bella tosses her hair just as Edward breathes in. Again, what the fuck is with all these breathing nonsense? I feel like I’m losing my mind.

K: As if we hadn’t all done enough of that in 2020 already…

Annie: Luckily, Edward is slightly more in control this time, and he probably won’t murder Bella right this second. He doesn’t even break anything this time.

Edward can’t find Bella fascinating or interesting because that means she’s more likely to be murdered by Edward. (M: Way to establish that the more he gets to know her, the more he’ll want to murder her…)

When the bell rings, Edward runs out of the class to breathe in the Bella-stench-free air. He finds Emmett waiting outside their Spanish class. Emmett think-asks how it went. Edward is worried by how close he had been to maybe killing Bella. Emmett is not concerned. I mean Edward could just kill Bella, no big deal. Everyone makes mistakes every so often. And he decides to show Edward the time he slipped up and murdered a human by treating Edward to a picture showing in his head.

K: Definitely not a serial killer thing to relive your kills in your head, Emmett. Nope. Not a serial killer thing at all. Very very normal. Yup.

Catherine: I get that they’re vampires, but since they’re supposed to be the “good guys” it’s so messed up that Emmett is so cavalier about killing an innocent human girl. Like, what’s been keeping him on the no-human-blood wagon this whole time if he’s so chill about it? Is Rosalie just that good at sex? 

Mari: Obviously Rosalie is, but also Meyer is trying to fool us into thinking this vampires are the heroes. 

Annie: The Emmett show is making Edward start to look sick, and he has to run out of the room. The teacher sends Emmett to go check on him. Emmett apologizes and asks if it’s really that bad. Edward tells him it’s worse. Emmett returns to class, and Edward goes to hide in his car. But he spends all of his time reading all of the minds to spy on Bella. Totally healthy and not at all obsessive stalker-ish. He finds Bella with Mike Newton, who happens to be thinking about Edward. This makes Edward mad so he puts on some angry music.

He spends the rest of his time totally not spying on Bella, except for when he is spying on Bella but only to see when she’s going to be coming to the parking lot.

The class lets out and Edward gets out of his car as people are leaving. He doesn’t know why he gets out of his car, but it definitely has nothing to do with the fact that he is now clearly stalking Bella. He watches her like a creep as she goes to her truck (K: Awww, the Wow. Free. Truck! We missed you, old friend.) and gets in, disappointed that she doesn’t have to walk past him to get to her truck. He watches her until she quickly glances his way. She backs out almost crashing into another car.

Bella takes extra care after her near-miss to make sure that she’s not going to crash in to anyone else. Edward find it super hilarious that Bella is worried that she may possibly be dangerous and he finds it’s so funny that he laughs like a lunatic as Bella drives past him.

Well, at least we now know why Edward was laughing, because it was a huge burning question that Meyer never resolved in Twilight. Super glad this book exists to answer these important questions.

  

Corresponding Twilight Recap: Twilight Chapter 02 – She’s the worst.

Next time on Midnight Sun: Remember Tyler’s van? Big sigh in Chapter 03.