"Will you go with me to Seattle?"
"Will you go to Seattle with me?"
"Why don't you sit with me today?" He asked, smiling.
"Won't you sit with me today?" I asked her.
When I come across inconsistencies like this, I always wonder why they exist, for a few reasons.
Firstly, the most likely explanation is that Stephanie Meyer has terrible editors--which of course I already knew.
But then I catch myself wondering if the editors aren't so terrible and they did catch it, but she asked them to leave it in, or even if it's intentional. And if that's the case, why?
Which makes me question if there's an in-universe reason for the discrepancy.
If these first-person narrative books--written in past tense-- can be viewed, like Jane Eyre, as Memoirs, then the best explanation is that it's written from Bella's imperfect human memories, recalled as a vampire. It's logical that she misremembers little pieces of syntax. Of course, Edward's recollection is the one to be trusted, since his memories of these interactions are crystal clear.
However the memoir idea is maybe unlikely (though not impossible), since, unlike Jane Eyre, Bella and Edward never address the reader.
So if it's not a memoir, then it's a running internal narrative taking place in real time, on a few seconds delay, like closed captioning. If this is the case, which seems most likely, then Edward's account is still the one to be taken as gospel as far as details like wording go, since the imperfection of the human memory can still be used as an explanation. I know l forget the exact wording of some things even seconds after I've heard them.
I also notice that the wording as Bella recalls it is more... romantic? Compared to Edward's. Edward recalls simple, plain-spoken wording "will you go with me to Seattle" "won't you sit with me today?" While Bella recalls more seductive and old-fashioned wordings "why don't you sit with me today?" "Will you go with me to Seattle".
But then I remember that's it really is probably just sucky editing.
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