AN: Unbeta'd. For my twilight20 (community./twilight20) prompt #1: Hero, on my Edward/Bella claim. My goal with this claim is to write a realistic journey towards a sexual relationship for them. All fics for this claim will be at: planetgal471./999133.html.
Disclaimer: These characters belong to Stephenie Meyer. I'm making no money for this.
Everything in the Right Order
There was another reason she wanted him to wait, more fleeting, impractical, and difficult to grasp: the cliche. The princess always falls into a trap laid by her enemy, needing to be rescued by a knight, and is stolen away to marry him. The wedding ends, presumably, with the happy couple riding away in some large, white carriage pulled by unicorns.
Bella had never liked the princess protagonists, growing up. They always did the same things. Why couldn't they have common sense, or be more circumspect about the situations they were in? Why did they always fall in love, often nearly immediately, with their rescuer? How come they never got themselves out of these situations, or at least not without the help of animal sidekicks and men in shining armor. Bella swallowed hard. Her situation was totally different. Her animal sidekicks weren't really animals, and her knight shone without the need of armor.
She simply needed to distance herself for a moment from the battle, from watching Victoria torn to pieces by Edward, from watching Seth take on Riley. She did not want to remember her first time as the aftermath of a fight. She didn't want to look into a mirror and see the damsel in distress. Bad enough that she often felt so helpless now, as a human. She had every intention of leaving behind her helpless role with her humanity. She did not want reminders lodged in her memories.
And so, she clung stubbornly to fighting for the causes of Charlie, Renee, and Alice. They were good causes, but they were not the only ones. She simply could not give herself to Edward while he was still her hero. She'd rather wait until he returned to the usual fretful un-dead ethical philosopher that she loved so much.