I'm the winner of cards I can't play

Written by: walking with a ghost
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All Credit goes to the original author

I'm the winner of cards I can't play

The mermaid kissed his high, smooth forehead, and stroked back his wet hair;

he seemed to her like the marble statue in her little garden, and she kissed him

again, and wished that he might live.– The Little Mermaid

At five years old, Bella had mastered the role of “Mummy.” She had spent all her waking hours, so it seemed, across the road playing in her neighbour’s new pink Wendy house.

She had learned to cook invisible meals and change empty dolls’ nappies, diligently. She took great pride in her position, taking care of each doll or stuffed animal with tender care and devotion.

At one point, however, an argument had broken out over the necessity of fake plastic peas, when baking a birthday cake for Sir Hugkins (her “most favoritest” teddy bear). Bella, being a pragmatist, even at that young age, had insisted that the mud cake should be made as realistically as possible, and that her Mummy had never gone near canned peas when baking her birthday cakes.

Sarah, her best friend at the time, had not cared and had thrown the plastic can of peas at Sir Hugkins in protest. Naturally, this resulted in the most bitter of disputes, ending with two crying five year olds.

When her mother had come to drag her home that night, Bella had cried in her arms and whined; “Honey, it's just a game,” Her mother had insisted. This had not done a thing to solve her daughter’s prominent pout; in fact, she huffed in protest and muttered, “You don't get it.”

In a way, five-year-old Bella was right. Her mother, flighty and carefree, would never understand her serious little girl, or her role as caregiver.

As she grew, Bella had moved from Forks to Arizona, then back to Forks. The locations changed, the weather changed too, but her role never did.

She picked up dry cleaning, found missing remotes, made sure the spring cleaning got done, and that milk was always in the refrigerator.

First, it was Renee, then Charlie.

It came naturally to her, too, it was just who she was, so when Edward Cullen had blown into her life she had been somewhat unsettled to find that role evaporated.

Sometimes she wondered, if she would ever feel that sense of purpose again, she had no real identity without it. It was usually then that her mind would drift to daydreams of what could have been – college, marriage, babies... sweet little children with dimples and her deep brown eyes. She couldn't escape the pang of guilt that came with them. Edward was her world now, it would be wrong to expect more.

So she ignored the tears that formed when he whispered a sweet tale of a world with no vampires, just Edward and Bella.

Because that feeling of completeness when he held her in her sleep, it was everything.