I'm With The Band O/S Contest via Wayward Pushers
Prompt Used: Pic 7
Rating: M
Pairing: Bella/Edward
Genre: AH
Word Count: 9469
Summary: Bella had expected to have a great time at the rock concert. What she hadn't expected was to have the best night of her life. M for language, lemons and drug use.
Disclaimer: All characters owned by Stephenie Meyer
I'm Not With The Band
"Are you all right?" a voice asked.
I knew I probably didn't look all right, but I felt fucking fantastic. I was covered in mud, even to the point that my hair was matted with it. My heart was racing, I was panting, and I was as high as a fucking kite, even though I hadn't taken anything.
"What happened to you?"
The voice spoke again, and this guy was killing my buzz. Was he blind, not to mention stupid? The moshpit happened to me, or you could say I happened to the moshpit, and it's called Rock Festival, aka having a good time. Pushing enough soggy strands of hair out of my eyes to tell him exactly that, I didn't get any further than just managing to open my mouth before I registered two things. One, holy shit, he was gorgeous. Two, he had one of those Access All Areas laminate things on a cord around his neck. Was he a concert official? Perhaps he'd seen me crowd-surfing and it wasn't allowed, and he had come to tell me off.
"Am I in trouble?" I asked.
"That's what I'm asking you," he answered. "Are you?"
"Are you some sort of concert site police-type person?"
"No."
"Well, I'm just fine, thank you for asking, and if you don't mind I need to go and join the queue for the toilets."
I don't do gorgeous. Gorgeous guys belong with bimbos, and good luck to all of them. I'll take clever over gorgeous any day, and I had no reason to speak to him. I went to walk on past.
"You have mud all over you," he pointed out.
"Are you FBI? Have you got satellite surveillance? How could you possibly know that about me?" I asked. My tongue can be terrible.
"You can't spend the rest of the day like that. The mud will dry and you'll be uncomfortable. There are showers backstage for the performers. If you like, I can take you back there, and you can clean up, and I can probably sort out something for you to change into as well," he said.
Well, Sir Good Galahad Samaritan, to what do we owe this honor? "Thanks, that's very kind of you, but I just really need to be in the toilet queue right now," I answered.
"If you got in the queue a quarter of an hour ago you'd still have another half an hour to wait," he said, pointing over to where the row of temporary toilets were set up. He was right, as there was a line of people stretching back as far as the eye could see.
"There's no waiting backstage," he added.
"Who are you anyway? How can you get me past security?" I questioned, but I'd already decided I'd go with him. I'd left the front of stage area because I needed to pee, and it was starting to get a little urgent. The thought of not having to wait was outweighing my concern at wandering off somewhere with a complete stranger. Aware that there were security guards everywhere, I reasoned I'd be all right.
"I'm the photographer with The Dangerous Ones. My name is Edward - " he started to answer.
"The Dangerous Ones? Are you kidding me? They're the reason I'm here! They're my favorite band. Can I meet them? Would you introduce me to them?" I said excitedly.
"Not in that state," he grimaced, looking down at my clothes.
"Haven't you heard? Mud is the new black," I retorted, but I was walking along beside him by now.
There had been temporary fences erected across the showgrounds to separate the artists' area from the commoners, and we were approaching one of the gates in the fence. Two burly boys in blue stood there, looking formidable. Edward spoke to one of them, who talked into the little mic on his headset and then nodded and we were waved through.
"I didn't know it was that easy," I remarked, and Edward snorted.
"It's not," he said. "I just have friends in high places. Come on."
We went past a collection of demountable rooms set up in two rows facing one another as an avenue, with shade cloths covering the space between them. There were tables and chairs and even potted palms. Half the rock stars on the bill were there sitting around drinking and laughing. At the end of the avenue, away from the shade cloths and in full sun there was a swimming pool, and I saw Jasper Whitlock from The Civil War Heroes in it. Jasper fucking Whitlock. The pool wasn't deep, and I figured if I waited long enough he'd stand up. And I'd see his chest. And then I'd die and go to heaven.
"I thought you needed the bathroom?" Edward's voice said beside me and I'd actually forgotten all about the call of nature, because another of nature's urges had momentarily taken over. The urge to perv. Damn.
"Oh yeah," I said.
It turned out The Dangerous Ones hadn't been given one of the temporary rooms, they had one of the dressing rooms in the auditorium that was the biggest performance space in our town. Edward showed me in, pointed out the bathroom, and said he'd be back in five minutes.
He was as good as his word, standing there holding a pair of jeans and a t-shirt.
"These are Senna's, she's about the same build as you," he said, handing me a towel as well. Senna's? I was going to be wearing Senna from The Dangerous Ones' jeans?
"Well, dip me in honey and throw me to the lesbians," I replied, and he looked confused. I really do have a terrible tongue.
There were soap and hair products in the bathroom, and very expensive-smelling moisturizer with some European name I'd never heard of. Maybe when you're a rock star you buy all your stuff from exclusive little boutiques in Amsterdam or wherever when you're off world-touring, and you don't just grab what's on special offer at Target like normal people do.
I emerged from the shower feeling refreshed and pampered, and opened my mouth to thank Edward profusely when I realized that suddenly the room was full of people. Girl people. Dangerous Ones people, to be specific. Alice, Katie, Senna, Mia and Siobhan were all in there, appearing somewhat surprised.
"Agirl? Edward, you brought a girl in here?" Katie enquired, as if it was a never-seen-before occasion. They all turned to Edward for confirmation, before checking me out thoroughly.
Edward didn't answer. His eyes were raking over me, from my wet hair, my face, my shoulders, my waist, my hips and legs to my feet and back up again. It wasn't sexual, but it was a little weird. He was scrutinizing me. I hadn't put my bra back on, because it was wet. Were my nipples showing or something? I didn't understand the way he was looking at me, and I didn't know how to respond. My mouth responded for me by embarking on a mini-rave.
"Um, hi everyone. Edward rescued me when I was in a bit of a mess, and I'm Bella, and I really like you guys, and I'm looking forward to your performance tonight, and I'll go now and thank you for everything. I didn't mean to intrude," I offered.
Alice Cullen flashed a brilliant smile and came forward to take my hand. I had read about her in magazines, and watched her on youtube, and had seen the band three times before. Portrayals of her in the media made her appear a little other-wordly; in real life she was just dazzling.
"Don't rush off Bella, it's nice to meet you. Edward never helps anyone, he's the least helpful person ever, are you sure you're not hallucinating?" she said.
"No, really, he did help me," I answered. "I had a bit of a mud situation and he brought me here to wash. Oh, and thank you, Senna, for the clothes."
Senna shrugged and nodded. "No probs."
Alice beamed even brighter. "It's lovely to have you here Bella, and you can be our mascot for the show. Our lucky charm. Let's have a chat and get to know each other. Oh, do you need anything? A drink? Something to eat? Edward, have you been being hospitable to our guest or just your usual rude self?"
Edward snorted. "She was in the bathroom, Alice. I was letting her get on with it. I was hardly going to barge in on her in the shower to give her orange juice and a taco, was I?"
"No, of course you weren't," Alice replied. "I remember all those beatings you got from Mom and Dad trying to get some manners into you. It's a shame about the brain damage of course, but at least some of the indoctrination worked."
Edward pulled a face at her while I processed what she'd just said.
"Are you two brother and sister?" I asked in surprise.
"Unfortunately," Edward said drily. "Now Bella, you don't have to listen to Alice's prattle. Here's a schedule of all the playing times for today. Would you like to go and see another band? We can watch from side of stage. I've organized a Triple A Pass for you and someone should be bringing it here any minute."
I had no idea why today had turned out to be my lucky day, but I wasn't going to waste it.
"I sure would. What time is it? Who's on now? Oh, and I don't mean I don't want to talk to you, Alice. I'd really love to stay here and talk. But are you going to come and see some bands? Could we go together?" I said.
"Tell you what, you stick with me for a little while and have some fun, and you can hang out with Edward later. Really, he can be quite boring. He'll prove it," Alice smirked, and she took the sheet of paper Edward was reading, ignoring his protest.
"Exiled In Brazil are on the mainstage now, they've got another twenty minutes to go, and then Wolfspirit are on. Hey, and do you like The Civil War Heroes? They're friends of ours. We could go and see if they're in their room," she continued.
"Alice, I'm coming, too," Edward insisted, and she inclined her head.
"Relax, I'm not stealing Bella," she said, but she nodded.
A knock on the door accompanied the arrival of my laminate, and I was set to go. Alice skipped along next to me like a kid from primary school and the three of us went and found the main stage area, simply gliding through security guards and bunches of site crew with nobody sparing us a glance. Edward was quiet, but Alice chatted away, telling me what was probably juicy gossip about various members of various bands, and I was too stunned to take very much of it in.
We watched Exiled in Brazil, who were awesome, and I just couldn't believe it. Alice was so casual about it all, and I took my cues from her and tried to act casual as well. Some of the members of Wolfspirit were standing there too, and Sam Uley and Quil Ateara were close enough for me to have touched them. I had to be very discreet about my hyperventilating.
And somehow during the songs, even though I was paying rapt attention, Alice was getting all sorts of information out of me. Not just the basics - she covered those in minutes. She was asking things like, "If you could go back in time and visit one pivotal event in history, what would you choose?" and, "If you could have saved one species that's now extinct, what would it be?"
Edward stood right next to us and appeared to be listening, although he didn't comment as his sister turned my brain inside out. I'd read a fair bit about her, and in the media she came across as quixotic and cute - not like this relentless philosophical inquisitor. Once I'd gotten into my stride though, I gave as good as I got.
"What's more important, art or science?" I asked her.
Halfway through Wolfspirit, she suggested we go look for The Civil War Heroes.
"Just so you know, I've got a thing for Jasper Whitlock. He's not aware of it yet, but his fate is sealed."
"Oh, yeah, well I don't blame you. I'd sure like to climb him like a tree," I said, adding hastily, "But that's never gonna happen, in a million years. Because actually I wouldn't like it at all."
"Well, who have you got a thing for?" she asked, and I was looking straight at her as she said it. Her tone was playful, but the look on her face was anything but. Edward was regarding me intently as well.
"Uh, no-one just now," I said, a little flustered. A muscle moved in Edward's jaw, and Alice said, "Hmm. A lot can change very quickly, you know."
Pondering this remark, I followed her, and the three of us went back to the avenue of pre-fab rooms. Jasper was sitting, fully clothed, at a table with a couple of other people playing cards.
"Hey, Alice Cullen, pretty flamingo," he smiled, pulling a chair out for her. Alice shuffled the chair so that it was right next to him, and she sat down, leaning in close straight away.
The other two people wandered off as it seemed Jasper had lost interest in cards, and Edward and I took their seats.
"Thanks to Alice's mad interrogating skills I know quite a lot about you," he remarked to me. "That's hardly fair. Would you like to ask anything about me?"
"Where's your camera?" I said.
He laughed.
"Oh, it's back in the room. I'm only taking shots when the girls are on stage. The last thing I'd want to do all day is follow my sister around taking snaps of her. She already has an ego the size of a planet, you must have noticed."
"I have a heart the size of a planet. And my ego is exactly the size it deserves to be," Alice retorted, earning one of Jasper's trademark face-splitting grins.
"Um, okay, some questions for you. Where do you stand on the big issues? Tea or coffee?" I asked Edward. "Dogs or cats? Blue or green?"
We fell into a conversation that was humorous and easy, consisting of silly questions and silly answers, with a stream of interruptions from Alice, who was carrying on two discussions at once.
"Hey, are you guys kicking on later tonight?" Jasper asked suddenly. "Menu-man should be by pretty soon."
Menu-man?
"No, we're good, but we'll be around later, sure," Edward answered carefully.
Right on cue, a man appeared with a notebook and a pencil, next to the table.
"Orders, please," he said.
"Aro, it's always such a pleasure. What's on offer this fine day?" Jasper asked him.
Aro was skinny and pale and aquiline, and he looked vaguely aristocratic. I had no idea what the ordering business was to do with, but maybe he was from the catering staff.
"Blow, go, puff, muffins, E, and A," he answered.
I started to realize what they'd been talking about.
Jasper nodded to Aro, saying, "I'll have E and puff. You joining me, miss?"
He raised an eyebrow towards Alice.
"We're coming out tonight, but we're already sorted," she said, and Aro scribbled on his notepad.
"Delivery this afternoon or this evening?" he said.
"This evening, my criminal enabler friend. After we play, and before we party," Jasper said, and Aro retreated, leaving me wide-eyed. Is this what went on when you hung out with rock stars? Drug deals being conducted in broad daylight, as if you were discussing what flavor of ice cream cone you felt like?
"Bella, I didn't ask if you wanted anything. So much for my much-vaunted manners," Edward said, breaking into my thoughts. "We've got some stuff of our own that we're into, and you're more than welcome to try it if you like. It's good, it's mild, you'll feel nice."
I've experimented with one or two illegal substances, and I don't take any moral issue with people who like to get out of it every now and again. I've never tried hard stuff, and I never will, but a bit of altered reality is fine by me. Besides, it sounded like he was including me in their plans for later in the day.
"What is it?" I asked him. Jasper and Alice had gone back to talking, so it was just me and Edward again.
"It's similar to MDMA. We call it immortality. It's synthesized by a friend of ours who is a chemist, and because it's tailor-made, it's never gotten onto the streets. It causes sensory stimulation and euphoria, like ecstasy does. We'll all take it after the girls play. Most of the bands are staying in the same hotel and there's a piano bar there, as well as a nightclub, and after the show tonight a lot of people will go for drinks in the bar or dancing at the club. Alice and I would love to have you along with us."
I was already entranced by Alice. Any feeling of being star-struck had disappeared with the natural and quick way she'd treated me like a real friend. And Edward, despite being gorgeous, was down-to-earth. But why? Why had he even stopped to speak to me, and now why was he asking me to spend the evening with him and his friends?
"Are you short of company?" I asked him abruptly. "You don't even know me, there are loads of girls around, and guys too. You didn't have to pull somebody out of a puddle of mud to talk to them - look at all the lovely pre-washed people!"
"Come on, let's go to the catering tent and get you something to eat. The immortalities are appetite suppressants, so if you don't eat now you won't want to later. And no, I'm not short of company," he said. "I don't know why I wanted to talk to you. But if you want to leave, just say so."
There was no way I wanted to leave, so I avoided his last statement.
"You and Alice don't look anything alike."
"We're adopted, both of us."
"It's kinda weird of you, acquiring a stranger like this."
"You're not strange."
"I don't have enough money to buy some food. I only have my cab fare home."
"The food is free."
We'd arrived at the tent by then, and the array of dishes on display was endless. Mexican, sushi, indian, chinese, all tempting.
"Pinch me," I said.
"I beg your pardon?"
I'd worked it out. "It's the night before the festival, and I'm asleep, and this isn't real. You're not real, are you? I haven't met you, or Alice, or Jasper, and I'm going to wake up soon and be on a massive downer."
Edward was tall, and he looked down at me, the lights inside the tent glinting off his hair, and casting shadows under his eyelashes. Did I say gorgeous? Amend that to spectacular. Further evidence that I was dreaming.
"We've got half an hour before the Dangerous Ones are on. I'm photographing them, remember? Let's get some food in your stomach, and then you can have your Chuang Tzu moment," he said.
"You think I don't know what that means, don't you? But I do," I said smugly, as I took a tray and a plate and a spoonful of every kind of food there was.
"Okay, bright girl, what does it mean?" he challenged.
"Can't talk. Eating," I mumbled, although I went on to negate that statement, with my cheeks puffed out like a chipmunk's, by adding, "Man, dream nachos are the bomb. Why aren't you having anything?"
"I ate earlier. With a little less palate-confusion," he answered, and that's when I started to like him. The liking came on pretty quickly - I was sitting there stuffing my face in front of him without a care in the world, and then I was mortified that I was chomping on a mouthful that consisted of half chicken curry, half chili beans.
"Truly, I am appreciating all the nuances of these flavors. I'm just acting like a pig as a social experiment," I responded, making matters worse. "I'm seeing how easily offended people can be. Your tolerance is pretty high. Very good, I'll write it up in my report."
He smiled, and that's when I started to really like him. I had a tendency to dismiss handsome men, assuming they had no substance, but with Edward it seemed underneath the cheekbones and the eyes and the perfection was a sense of humor. In my somewhat limited experience, a sense of humor was usually accompanied by a sharp mind. And Edward wasn't flirting, wasn't being arrogant, or self-centered, or any of the other things I associated with handsome men. He was being attentive and interesting.
I finished up and we went back to the auditorium. Edward collected some camera equipment from the band room and then ushered me away.
"They're doing warmups in there now," he said. "It's very, very private. They pull faces and stick their tongues out and sing arpeggios and shout 'gug, gug, gug'. Alice tells me it's about resonating in the correct facial chambers."
"And you buy that?" I asked.
"I don't care what it's about as long as I don't have to hear it. Look, the set is forty minutes and I'll be out front for the whole thing. Do you want to watch from the side and I'll collect you afterwards? The girls don't like anyone in their room when they come off stage, they need a while to themselves to cool off. We can wait till they're ready, and then we'll probably all head back to the hotel. Does that sound okay to you?"
It sounded perfectly okay. Me, The Dangerous Ones, and Edward, their photographer. All together in one sentence. "Sure, but aren't you planning to stay for the last couple of bands?" I asked.
"I doubt it. This is quite a long tour and we've got plenty of opportunity to see everyone several times over. I think the girls are keen to do some socializing, and Alice wants to move onto phase two of her Secure The Affections Of Jasper Whitlock plan, which is to corner him in a bar while he's helpless."
He left me standing next to a speaker stack at the side of the stage, making sure I wouldn't be in the way of any roadies who might have to run up and fix the cymbals in the middle of the set, or various other things that I'd seen roadies do. A minute later he was down the front, in between the stage itself and the barrier erected to keep the audience back.
Another minute later and The Dangerous Ones filed past me.
From the moment Siobhan started the first song with a huge, thunderous drumbeat, the perfomance was spellbinding and I experienced forty minutes of sheer rock heaven. They played twisted, heavy lines on the guitar and bass, with Alice's ethereal, baroque vocal melodies weaving over the top. Best band ever. They were so different to anybody else, so insistent and yet haunting. I kept finding my eyes closing so that I could concentrate on the sounds, and then I was opening them in case I missed anything. Watching from the side was a new experience for me, and I was so glad to have an uninterrupted view. I loved the excitement of the moshpit, and the sheer energy of jumping up and down with a hundred other people, but being by myself meant no anonymous accidental or deliberate groping took place and no-one stood on me or elbowed me. I could stand there and enjoy a mud-free, fondle-free listening environment.
After they finished Alice gave me a damp kiss on the cheek on her way past. I waited for Edward, who I'd barely cast a glance towards during the performance.
"You must be so proud of them all," I said as soon as I saw him. "Did you get lots of good shots?"
"Yes, I think so," he answered.
"Thanks for letting me be a part of this. I still don't know why you did."
"When I figure it out I'll tell you."
We took a leisurely way back, allowing the band their chill out time before their room got invaded, and by the time we got there the door was open.
Alice pulled me in and tried to get me to share a chair with her. The two of us simply didn't fit, but the wriggling was fun. Slinging an arm around my shoulders, she giggled into my ear, and even her laughter was musical.
"We're going to take the things now. You know, what Edward was telling you about earlier. Are you sure you want to? We'll keep an eye on you, and you'll be fine. You'll start to feel the effects in about half an hour," she said breathlessly. "I can't wait to see Jasper. I cannot wait. We'll go back and get changed, and Senna will have something else you can wear. She won't mind, it's fine. Honestly. Do you need anything else? Make-up? You're so lovely. I am really excited. Can you tell?"
She was talking like she'd already had a couple of lines of speed, but I was sure it was just adrenalin from the show, and anticipation at seeing Jasper in a while. I took the little white pill she handed me, and swallowed it down with water, wondering what I was getting myself into. The others were all taking them, and I saw that Edward did too. He came and waited with me while they got their stuff together and he said he had my muddy clothes from earlier in his bag.
"We can get them washed at the hotel and you can have them back tonight," he said.
And then, there was a small van waiting for us all in the car lot. We piled into it in a tangle of legs, because with me along for the ride there was one passenger too many. Edward offered to have me on his lap but Alice looked immediately alarmed and said, "I don't recommend that Bella, at all. He has the knobbliest knees in the world," so he ended up on the floor between the two rows of seats.
At the hotel, Alice whisked me up in the elevator to the suite she was sharing with Mia and Senna.
"Such luxury - I'm still not used to it," she confided, showing me around. There were two bedrooms, one with a kingsize bed and the other with two doubles. "All the hotels are like this. We take turns getting the room with the big bed. Poor Siobhan and Katie are with Edward this time around, and of course he always has the big room, because no one wants to share with him and his boy cooties, and besides, who'd want to listen to him snoring all night?"
She flung her suitcase open on the bed and started pulling things out. Then she went to the closet and it turned out there were more clothes in there.
Musing all the while, she said, "I don't know whether to wear something that'll knock Jasper's eyes out, or be visually subtle and let my personality win him over. What do you think?"
"Don't ask me. What I know about guys could fit on a postage stamp. I have no idea how to get a guy to like me," I told her.
"Well, maybe you don't have to try," Alice answered. "Let's go and raid Senna. What do you want to wear?"
I elected to stay in the jeans I was already wearing, and I picked out one of Senna's t-shirts. It was very plain, just black with the word "cantare" in white cursive script across the front.
"Is this a band?" I asked Senna.
"It's an Italian word. It means to sing," she answered.
"Oh, it's very inappropriate then. I couldn't sing to save my life," I said.
"The shirt looks good on you anyway. Wear it. You can probably sing in ways you never knew you could," she said.
Alice emerged from her room in jeans and a very tight little t-shirt, and she regarded me approvingly.
"Hey sister, go sister, soul sister, go sister," she started, and since she was chanting instead of singing, I joined in. We were still chanting when we got to the bar.
"Now Bella, just stick to water, okay? You don't need to drink on these pills we've taken," she said. "Find us some seats and I'll be back in a tic."
The bar was large and softly lit, with sofas and armchairs arranged around small tables. Edward was already there, and he stood as I approached.
"How are you going?" he asked, gazing into my eyes. Probably checking for signs of pupil enlargement, I thought. As yet, I was feeling normal.
"Good. Fine so far."
"Okay. Tell me if you start to feel strange or uncomfortable. We're all used to these things, but obviously, you're not. I'll look after you."
Alice brought me sparkling water, but she'd spotted Jasper, and she took off immediately. The other girls seemed to melt away to somewhere else, and Edward I were left, facing each other over a low table.
"Do you mind if I come over there?" he asked, and at my headshake he sat next to me.
"Could I see your photos from today?" I asked him.
"Maybe later," he nodded. "When I've uploaded them. Have you reached a conclusion regarding your state of consciousness yet?"
"Oh, yes I've decided I'm probably awake, because if this was all a dream something odd would happen, wouldn't it? Like a rhino crashing through the wall, or all my teeth falling out, or me realizing that I have no clothes on..."
I wasn't inviting him to picture that last scenario, and from the fact that he didn't get any sort of a skeezy expression, I guessed that he hadn't. Phew. Although... would I really mind?
"Well, if you are asleep, who's in charge in your dreams? If it's you, don't manifest the rhino, please. There's a very fine piano in here. It woud be a real shame if it was damaged," he was saying, as I tried to tug my mind back from the train of thought it had just embarked on.
"A piano?" I echoed. "Hence the title, Piano Bar? Does anyone get up and play it?"
I love piano music. In fact, I love it about as much as I love dark, moody, twining strands of melody with breathy female vocals.
"We were in here last night and somebody played," Edward nodded.
"Who was it? Are they here tonight? Can you see them?" I asked, hoping the pianist would show up again. I was in the mood to be swept away.
"Yes, they're here. I don't know if they'll play," he said. "I guess it depends on various factors."
"Employment factors? Monetary factors? Inducement factors?"
Barely even noticing it, I was starting to feel different. A little tingley, a little excited, a little nervous, and energetic at the same time as feeling slow. Well, I didn't feel slow actually, it felt like things around me were slow. And I was noticing stuff. In this light Edward's hair was a different color to how it had looked today. It was deeper, a rich brown highlighted with red. His eyes looked like jewels. God, he was beautiful.
Distracted now, I looked around, puzzled that the murmur of other voices seemed to coming from far away. Although the room was filling up, to me a vast chasm lay between me and everybody but Edward. I was so physically aware of him I could feel him with my skin, despite the fact that we weren't touching.
"Bella?" his voice came to me, sounding like something I could float on.
"Yes?" I answered.
"Alice is beckoning to me. Come on, we'll see what she wants."
He took my hand, and his grip sent sparks up my arm. I didn't know how I'd lived so long without having him touch me. The feelings just came on and on, soft and subtle, changing the way I saw. Of course I knew Alice was pretty, the whole western world knew Alice was pretty, but tonight she was exquisite. And Jasper! I no longer wanted to climb him like a tree, nothing so vulgar, but if I could paint, I'd want to paint him. His skin was smooth as a baby's, his eyes were a palette of green and gold splendor and the sweep of his throat would have made Modigliani weep.
"Bella, it's working for you now, isn't it?" Alice asked softly, and she kissed me on the cheek for the second time that night. "Soul sister," she whispered. "Edward is going to entertain us for a while, so sit with me and Jasper."
"Edward's going to entertain us? What is he, a tap dancer?" I asked, and we sank into a couch, the cushions around us as feather-soft as clouds.
Moments later notes rippled from the piano, and I turned curiously to discover Edward seated at the keyboard, frowning in absorption. I didn't know the piece he was performing, but it was intricate, with notes chasing one another up and down the scales, time signatures shifting, and chords forming and unforming as his hands coaxed the keys' secrets from them.
Alice was grinning in sheer pleasure, and Jasper was watching with his lips slightly parted, pupils dark and huge. Gradually the talk stopped in the room as people were captivated, and the sound filled the air around the furniture and plants, reaching out to us all.
My eyes showed Alice my surprise, and she nodded. "Oh yes, Edward's the musical one in the family. Compared to him, I'm just a dilettante."
I didn't know how long he played for, but by the time he stopped I felt like my cells were dancing. I didn't know how my epidermis was managing to contain the huge sense of thrill that was inside me. When he came back I grabbed his hands, his magic hands, and tried to find the words to tell him how moved I was.
"I had no idea! You said you were a photographer! You're a magician. You can call tones from the air and weave them into gossamer threads that spill and fly, and you know the color of beauty and the cadence of thought and you take wordlessness and give it meaning in a transcendant language. You find the spaces between gaps and you fill them with more spaces... you take incompletion and voice it and make it yearning and perfect..."
He just frowned more, his eyes even blacker than Jasper's, and he wrenched them from me to turn to Alice. She gave him a slight nod, and some sort of silent communication was passing between them.
"I like her a lot, Edward," she breathed. I didn't care, because I suddenly wanted to pirouette. Since I didn't know how, I tried a little spin. Edward caught me before I could topple over.
"You're going to need some help if you want to dance," he told me, a slight waver in his voice.
"Dance? I don't want to dance, but can we run somewhere? Can we jump from the rooftop? I'm going to burst, and I want to feel like this forever. Right on the verge of bursting. Is there somewhere we could waterski?"
"We can do anything you want, but I have to say most of your suggestions are sadly unadvisable."
After I'd had the waterskiing idea, the thought of plunging into water was very inviting.
"There must be a hotel pool. We could swim!" I suggested.
"No, that wouldn't be wise. We're staying on land, and we're not going anywhere the roof," he answered.
"There are spas in the rooms!" I said triumphantly. "Could we have a spa?"
"We?" he asked, and took a deep breath.
"We. You and me. Or me and you. Whatever. Can we just go? I have to move," I begged, so stirred up I couldn't remain still. And suddenly, somehow, I couldn't possibly be anywhere without him.
"Yes, let's go upstairs," he said. There was the familiarity of my hand in his again, the feeling that our hands linked together perfectly, and belonged that way.
Up in his suite, he said, "I'll run the bath for you, and I'll sit on the floor next to you. I won't get in."
"You have to," I insisted. "That's the point. Aren't you just vibrating right now? Buzzing?"
"Yes, I am. That's why one of us needs to stay out of the water."
Bending, he turned the taps on and found some sort of lotion that he poured in, and the graceful, billowing mounds of soft bubbles rose up, twinkling with all their little spectra. For all that it looked inviting, I was actually way too restless to think about sitting in it, and I wandered away into the main room, and stood at the french windows. We were on the tenth floor, and the view was stunning. A blanket of purple, indigo night lay overhead, punctuated with tiny lights, shining and winking on us. Did we wink at them? Did earth reflect sunlight back into the depths of space?
"Can people see us from space?" I asked, as Edward's reflection appeared behind me. "We don't know if they're up there - do they know that we're down here?"
I leaned back against him. "And look, the stars are too far away, so we've made our own. The street lights and the car headlights are fixed and shifting constellations - there's a galaxy at our feet, Edward. We're standing in a milky way that people made with machines in factories. It's beautiful and wrong. Do you like fireworks? I love fireworks because you can't touch them, they're hot and dangerous and ephemeral, and they're gone if you blink. Do you think the universe is like that? We're existing in a blink?"
Edward's hands came up to my shoulders, but then he dropped them again, seemingly unsure if he could touch me or not.
I turned around.
"Is there alcohol here? I want some. Can I have some?"
"You shouldn't drink much, Bella. But yes, there's a bar in the kitchen, or we could have something sent up."
"I only want a taste. I want Pernod, or Grand Marnier, something extreme. Just one sip. My senses are going crazy. I can hear everything, Edward. I can hear my own blood and the traffic outside, and the people talking downstairs. I can feel myself from the inside. I can see motes in between here and the moon. It's unbearable, but if it ever stops, I'll die of missing it."
Edward went to the kitchen, and I couldn't stand to have him so far away from me so I went as well, following so closely that when he stopped I bumped into him.
"No liqueur. I'll call down for some," he said, hands on my waist. I needed to go to the bathroom, and I didn't want to be apart from him for a second. Briefly, I contemplated asking him to come with me, and I really thought I wouldn't mind sitting there for a pee with him watching, but then I thought he might think it was a little too much. I excused myself momentarily.
The phone was on a small cabinet next to the sofa, and Edward was sitting making the call when I got back. It was absolutely imperative that I was near him, and I sank down, both hands clasping onto his leg like a limpet. Moved almost to tears by his beauty, I couldn't stop staring at his jaw, with the faint stubble there, and the way his skin stretched tight across strong bones, and the softness of his throat underneath in contrast. I raised a hand and touched his lip as he spoke. It startled him and he flinched.
"It'll be five minutes. Bella, what are you doing?"
"Nothing. Just this...do you mind?" I said, moving my fingers to his collar. His shirt was a burgundy color, with pale grey pinstripes, and a complicated design of flowers and spirals in the same pale grey running over the stripes. It fascinated me, and I began tracing the patterns delicately, enjoying the fine texture of the fabric, and imagining that the lines were raised, and would be apparent under my fingertips if I closed my eyes.
"No, I don't mind," he breathed.
"Don't spirals contain the meaning of life?" I asked, continuing to explore.
"Not exactly," he answered, "but they are represented frequently in nature - "
"I couldn't be a butterfly, dreaming," I broke in. "A butterfly could picture a spiral, yes. Flowers, too. But music and architecture and philosophy - the whole complexity of existence? Never."
"So you do know of Chuang Tzu."
"What do you dream of, Edward?"
"I don't know. I don't remember. This is very dreamlike, though."
"This?" I whispered. "Touching?"
I was still stroking his shirt, but more firmly now. Beneath the interwoven warp and weft of the threads, I could feel a roughness that must be his chest hair, and the firm surface of his chest itself. I could feel the skin overlaying his muscles. His breathing quickened, his chest rising and falling more quickly than before.
"Yes," he whispered back. "Don't stop."
My purposeless fingers, meandering on their tactile discovery of his shirt, grazed over something small and firm and I realized I'd just felt his nipple. I lingered there, circling it with a detached curiosity that rapidly became undetached as my own nipples flooded with a rush of blood, as did my cheeks. A change had taken place, swift and unexpected. No matter how deeply I inhaled, I couldn't get enough breath. My heart was threatening to thump out of my chest. Catching his eyes, I saw that he'd experienced it too. There was some sort of wild energy surging around us both, and this was no longer about his shirt.
"Bella," he muttered, and my nipples tingled now.
He put his hands up, catching mine, and stilling my fingers. His gaze never wavered from mine as he exhaled slowly.
"Do you want to go back downstairs and join the others?" he asked huskily.
"No," I shook my head. "Not at all."
I wanted to go to his bedroom. Before I could think better of my impulse, I was up on my knees and clambering across him, straddling his thighs. I dipped my face to his, and ran my tongue across his upper lip.
With a groan, he took my head in his hands and pressed his open mouth to mine. My body's response was instant and instinctive, my lips welcoming him, an answering groan generating from deep in my throat. His tongue was hot and sure as it invaded me, and I held it lightly with my teeth, learning it with my own and unwilling to surrender it back to him.
Was it the immortality - the drug? I'd had ecstasy before, and this was similar, although rather more intense. When I'd been on ecstasy I hadn't been so enthralled by talking to somebody that I'd spouted all sorts of rambling wordmess with no mental editing. Neither had I been so overcome by an attraction to somebody that the only thing that stemmed the wordmess was that I'd wanted to scramble onto them and never let their lips free of mine. I'd never felt such little fires uncurling in my chest and spreading everywhere, rendering me almost oblivious to all external stimuli. The one thing I was achingly aware of was the gap between our bodies, which seemed far too wide and I wriggled to close it, wanting his hips.
Moving his hands to my back, he commenced a slow descent, until they curved around my backside and pulled me into him. I gasped as I felt him down there - his erection was a good deal harder than his nipple had been, and I was already highly sensitized.
Dimly though, I registered that the knocking noise I'd assumed was my pulse beating in my ears was actually coming from the direction of the door.
"It's room service," Edward muttered against my lips. "You'll have to answer the door, Bella, I don't think I can go."
If he was worried about decency, and I assumed he was, he was justified. Climbing off him, I could see he looked positively indecent. For my part, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror over the sofa and saw my hair tangled and messy, my face flushed, my mouth puffy and reddened, my nipples taut and my breasts heaving. I looked every bit as indecent. I looked like someone was just about to make love to me.
The room service guy must have seen everything and more. He held up a tray with a bottle of cointreau on it and didn't bat an eyelid at the state I was in. I had to take the chit to Edward to sign and return it to the porter, then I stood over the couch and twisted the lid off the bottle.
"Some for you?" I asked.
"Not my thing," he answered with a shake of his head.
"You don't like it?" I queried in alarm, suddenly concerned that if I drank the liqueur he wouldn't want to keep kissing me.
He read my mind, it seemed. "I don't really drink alcohol, but I'm sure I'll find the taste of that stuff in your mouth is divine."
Raising the bottle, I took a generous sip, which was all I wanted, really.
"So we haven't finished?" I said.
"Bella, we haven't even started."
We went in to his room and he shut the door and I started to pull his clothes off, at first in haste, but then slowing so that I could savor him. I kissed every inch of his chest and abdomen, and I sank to my knees once he was free of his trousers, taking him in my mouth and making him growl and slam his hands against the door behind him for support. He didn't let me taste him for long though, lifting me to my feet and stripping me bare, his tongue following his hands over me, the way I'd done it to him. We stumbled to the bed, collapsing on it with limbs and tongues already entwined. I felt his lips exploring softly, past my navel and beyond, and I writhed in the agony and the ecstasy of it until I was ready to ram my hips up into his face. As mind-blowing as his mouth was, I wanted the rest of him. I raised myself up on one elbow and reached for his shoulder, and when he looked up at me, his eyelids were heavy, his expression glazed, and his lips were glistening with the mix of him and me. I'd never seen a man more intoxicating.
"Come here," I invited, no, ordered, and he didn't hesitate. We melted together into a whirlpool of sensation and pleasure, desire and abandonment. Everything I thought I understood, and everything I'd ever done before was forgotten. Everything I'd felt, or imagined, or known, all of it now redundant and superceded by new knowledge - the knowledge of him and me. When he entered me he was the only thing that existed in the universe. I felt taken gently apart, stand by fiber by filament by element, and reformed as a new Bella, just for him. He was inside me for hours, and inbetween we marvelled at the discovery of each other and we practised braille and spoke in hushed tones and made promises and declarations with our fingers until we couldn't stop ourselves from going again.
The last time I looked at the clock on the nightstand, it said five o'clock, and Edward was underneath me, rocking upwards, his hands hard at my hips and his mouth soft at my breasts.
The next time I looked at it, it said half-past ten. I must have fallen asleep.
Dazedly, I rubbed my eyes and put a hand out, expecting to feel him next to me but he wasn't there.
I sat up, and looked around, hazy now and lacking the sharpness and clarity from the night before. My clothes, or at least the clothes I'd borrowed from Senna, were neatly folded over the chair in the corner of the room. Edward's clothes were nowhere to be seen.
There was a towel on the chair as well, which I picked up and draped around me.
"Edward?" I called softly, thinking he must be in the bathroom. There was no response.
"Hello? Anyone?"
A wander through the silent suite brought me to the slow and awful realization that I was alone. No-one was in the other bedroom, where Mia and Katie should have been, and there were no suitcases there. There were no bottles of anything other than hotel-issue shampoo and conditioner in either of the bathrooms. Signs of recent occupation were in the main room - a fashion magazine dropped on the sofa; sections of a newspaper spread on the coffee table, and a bouquet of flowers the size of a small shrub propped against the wall. It must have been delivered for one of the girls, and maybe they couldn't take it on the bus or the plane, or however they were traveling. Maybe they were just blase about gifts from fans and admirers. Whatever it was, the flowers, along with the magazine and newspaper were as left behind as I was.
Looking at my reflection in the mirror of what had been Edward's bathroom, I noticed my body bore the marks of his fingers and teeth, and realized that they would continue to do so for days.
I didn't know what I had expected for the morning after a night like we'd had, but it wasn't this utter desertion. Couldn't we have gotten up together? Showered together? Eaten breakfast together? After the way he'd murmured and sighed and groaned to me all night, I'd have thought that he'd write my fucking phone number in permanent ink on his forearm so he could never lose it. I would have thought we'd make arrangements to somehow see each other again, or at least to stay in touch. I would never, ever have thought he wouldn't even say goodbye.
But obviously, never having done anything like this before, I didn't know the rules. The rules are Fuck And Run, Bella. Congratulations, you are a groupie. Groupies never, ever get the guy. They might get to ride on his cock for the night, but then in the morning it's a new day, and he's got a new town to look forward to, and a new girl. I was a rock and roll ingenue, and really dumb to think that something that had happened under the influence of mind-altering chemicals meant anything to anyone.
My own clothes didn't seem to have been returned to me, so after I showered I dressed again in Senna's t-shirt and jeans, and found my other belongings on the nightstand - cellphone, house-key, wallet. The laminated Access Pass was still lying there too. I was going to leave it, until I realized that it was valid for the entire tour that all the bands were on. One of the hotel cleaners could find it and sell it, and it was probably worth a fair bit of money.
God, I was deflated. A silly girl, with a few lovebites and a souvenir concert pass to show for her night hanging out with rockstars.
"This is the come-down off drugs, this is just one of the reasons they're bad for you," I told myself, but that wasn't all it was. I was quietly devastated at Edward's easy and quick departure. Alongside that, I was disappointed that there'd been no farewell from Alice. She'd called me Soul Sister and told Edward she liked me! It could be she'd gotten so involved with Jasper that her mind was on different matters. It could be that she'd thought I was a novelty, and she'd finished finding me amusing.
And that was that. Nowhere near ready to face the day but unable to stay in the room, I walked down to the lobby. Presumably it was all paid for already? A more experienced groupie than me would know how these things worked. A more experienced groupie than me would saunter out of here, status enhanced and with all expectations met, having been so thoroughly fucked. And boy, had I been thoroughly fucked. It had happened at least four times, I thought, although where each episode had ended and the next began was blurred. Maybe it had been one long fuck. One long, dazzling, dizzying delirious encounter with a seductive man who assumed I knew what I was doing. Well, he didn't have to care. Let's face it, he was probably halfway to the next state by now.
A few girls were straggling around the revolving door at the hotel entrance, and as I walked past them they must have caught sight of the pass hanging on its lanyard around my neck.
"The Dangerous Ones?" one of them asked eagerly, and they crowded around me. "Are you with the band?"
The answer tripped from my lips with difficulty. "Not really. I just kind of met them. So, no."
Head high, pretending that my pride and self-esteem were intact, I stepped out into the morning and hailed a cab. Once behind the tinted windows, I crumpled into tears.
My self esteem wasn't anywhere intact, it was in tatters. I'd never given myself up like that before - I hadn't even known I could. Meeting someone I connected with on every level, drowning in his kisses and losing myself in his lovemaking...and taking for granted it was fully mutual, only to find him gone the next morning...My intuition had told me that I could only have been so deeply affected by someone if I had affected him equally as deeply. I couldn't believe my intuition had been so wrong.
The first thing I did when I got home was get out my Dangerous Ones cds. According to the liner notes, Edward had taken all the cover photos. Knowing I couldn't bear to listen to any of the music again, I threw them away.
I drifted listlessly through days, which turned into weeks, trying to study, trying to get through my coursework, trying to be resilient.
Six weeks later, still feeling hollow, I was looking for a book I needed and I remembered I'd left it at my friend Eli's house. Damn. If I got hold of him tonight he could bring it to Uni for me tomorrow.
Entering an "E" in the Search Contacts function on my cell, I scrolled down. And stopped dead.
There was an entry I hadn't put there - a name and number.
Oh.
Edward Cullen.
.
.
.
.
Hey sister soul sister go sister soul sister from Lady Marmalade written by Bob Crewe and Kenny Nolan
Pretty Flamingo by Mark Barkan