Comfortably Numb.
Bella knew she should turn around and walk away. But the sweet temptation of seeing Edward again had her slipping onto the back of the bike, clinging to the mountain of russet muscle seated in front of her. Paul/Bella
Chapter Start.
"She thinks I've got a heart of stone
Because I left her all alone, lonely tonight
She thinks I'm gonna break her heart
I tell that I'm not, but maybe she's right
And I know I can't hold you like he does
I don't have those emotions in me
And it's true I can't love you like he does
But it's my kind of love."
Bella trudged from the movie theatre feeling awful. Not only had she bailed on Jessica five minutes into the movie, but she also felt hollow and bitter, torn open and raw from the overly dramatic love-scene that had caused her to flee to begin with. Crossing the road, she stuffed her cold hands into her pockets and walked absentmindedly towards an unknown destination.
Truth be told, Bella had no idea how she was going to get home. She'd told Jessica that she felt ill and would see her later. When Jess had offered to take Bella home, she had quickly waved the offer away. Now she was out in the cold, Bella realised how dumb that had been. The clattering of a bottle being kicked across the street had her head snapping up, eyes scanning the dark. The source of the noise turned out to be a group of guys outside a bar down an alley to her right.
Bella cocked her head, a weird sense of déjà vu befalling her as she assessed the situation. She paused without thinking, lip drawn between her teeth. Then it hit her. So hard she nearly stumbled. The memory of Edward saving her from a situation very much like this. Only this time there was no danger and Edward was not going to 'magically appear' to save the day.
As she stared, one of them looked up and Bella saw a flash of teeth in the dark. Bella quietly guffawed at the poorly veiled attempt to allure her with the bad-boy guise. She kicked the toe of her shoe against the gutter and contemplated venturing further into the alley. What could it hurt? If she got into any trouble, then she could simple scream for help. The assembled group was outside a bar after all.
As she took a step, Bella noted the one who had been watching her laughed loudly and elbowed one of his buddies. However, it was someone else that moved subtly and drew her attention. Another being she hadn't noticed to begin with. A hulking frame wrapped in shadows as he leant against the wall opposite the bistro. Rather than look up at her , he seemed to jolt, nose twitching, and then his head snapped around, eyes landing on her.
Bella froze on the sidewalk. For a second, just the briefest of moments, Bella could have sworn those eyes gleamed and reflected like that of an animal. But it happened so fast it was hard to tell.
Probably a trick of the light, she mused, shaking a head at herself and the scenario. What the hell was she doing? Since when did she knowingly walk into a potentially catastrophic situation? What would Charlie say? What would Edward think?
Why would he even care? An insidious voice sneered from a dark place in her mind. He left you, remember.
Bella flinched, curling in on herself for a second, as if someone had ripped all oxygen from her lungs and left her with a gapping hole in her lungs, body forever ruined in the wake of her anguish.
Struggling to breathe, Bella stumbled a shaky step backwards, tears blurring the world into a spectral kaleidoscope of lights and colour. As if sensing her mental instability, the guys seemed to do a double-take of her, no longer interested. Probably for the best if she was being honest.
These guys had a very definite air of menace all around them. There might as well have been a great, flashing billboard screaming 'danger, danger.' Yet, when the world stopped spinning and she could breathe again, Bella paced forwards. Ignoring all the warning signs as she toyed with the potentially disastrous position she was in. With no clue why, Bella walked towards them. Her first step completely in sync with the slow, deliberate unfolding of massive limbs in front of her.
As she marched towards the rowdy group, heart thundering, fists clenched at her side, shadow-man turned to mirror her posture, stepping towards her in perfect synchronization.
Bella stopped not a foot away from him, letting him close the small distance between them. And he did. His boots tapped against her own as he moved to be flush with her. Warm hand tucking under her chin to tilt it up. Bella breathed heavily through her nose, eyes closed, as she willed herself to be still, to be calm. His fingers burnt on her skin like fire. He was so warm. too warm. This touch was the stark opposites to Ed-His. It burnt but with an icy coldness that seeped into her bones and seemed to calm her frazzled nerves from within. Numbing her pain, anxiety, even lust.
This heat seemed to stock it, and in response Bella's heart raced as fear bubbled. Her eyes flicked open at his low rumble. A single word she couldn't ignore.
"Look."
Mr 'I-lurk-in-shadows' locked eyes with Bella and her vision was in lost in the sheer black of his eyes as she gravitated closer, like a moth to the flame.
She wasn't aware she was moving until her shins hit something hard and cold and it caused her to hiss in pain, snapping back to reality. At some point he'd pulled her over to his bike, and she stupidly walked into it despite his attempt to stop her movement.
The bike was… nice? Bella did not understand what make a good motorcycle. She was not mechanically gifted. To her it was just… metal and tubes. But this one looked big, and mean and sleek, like a wild animal, and when mystery man started the engine and growled and roared like a monster.
"Get on." ordered, and Bella was nodding, moving to sling a leg over the beast, straddling the seat as they wound her arms around taunt abdominal muscles that flexed and witched under her light touch. Who-ever this mystery-man was, he radiated a heat that was other-worldly.
"Hold tight." he growled, and Bella nodded again, feeling like a tiny boat being tossed about by a vast ocean during a terrible storm.
She locked her arms around him as the bike took off. Ed-His face was there instantly, curled in anger and dismay but they were going too fast for her to catch even a hint of what he was saying. She knew he was talking, could see his perfect marble features moving and twitching as his mouth curled to form words, but the roar of the motorcycle's engine and the rush of the wind made it impossible to hear.
Whatever he was saying… could not have been more terrifying than his expression. Eyes lost to darkness as he snarled and reached for her, hands like marble talons. Startled by His unusual animosity, Bella turned to hide her face against the warm leather in front of her. She did not want to remember Him like that. Snarling and… scary. Instead, she tightly clenched her eyes closed and took in the scent of pine and tobacco. A comforting aroma despite her aversion to cigarettes. The smell reminded her of Billy, and how her truck had smelt when she'd first gotten it.
Because Bella's thoughts were elsewhere, it never occurred to her where she might end up, or where the stranger she was clinging to was taking her. So when the trip came to a smooth but the sudden stop, Bella was slow to unwind her arms from Mr Shadow and even slower to blink open her eyes.
When Bella fluttered open her eyes, she realised she was on the Rez, out front of a little, poorly maintained house. It was almost like the Black's house, only green and terrible shape. The front door hung off his hinges, the lawn was littered with empty beer cans and someone had shattered many of the little house's windows.
An abandoned house that was probably a party house and hook-up spot, Bella theorised. She'd heard of a few from Jacob.
"C'mere." her 'friendly' stranger growled, voice washing over Bella like something soft and warm and tangible as she carefully pulled the helmet from her head before scooping her up into his arms. It was too natural, too easy for Bella to wrap her legs around the strangers waist, arms hooking around his neck as he carried her towards the house as if she weighed nothing.
What… what if he wanted… What if he thought this was a hookup? What if there were others? What if he wanted to do drugs? Or drink?
The real, very dangerous reality of everything left Bella panting, breathless and terrified. More alarmingly, is her unwillingness to struggle, scream or make any attempt to free herself from the strangers hold. What… what was happening.
It was like being around Ed-Him, all over again. As if someone had laid a blanket of fuzz over her thoughts and feelings. Everything was slow and delayed. A second thought. Barely important.
"Are you scared?" Mr stranger asked and Bella felt her breath catch, afraid he could somehow read her thoughts. While Bella was not scared in the traditional sense, it alarmed her how calm she felt about… everything. It was like being mind-rolled by Jasper, but tenfold.
"No… and that concerns me." Bella confessed, not aware she was speaking until she heard her own voice. After he carried her through the house's threshold, Bella was lowered and allowed to stand on her own two-feet. Something she appreciated. It meant he was giving her the chance to run, should she want to. Bella didn't, and that made her want to flee. Instead, she watched him switch on a few lights, momentarily blinding her, and then hold out a hand. Bella was reaching for it before she even realised she'd moved. Fingertips brushing over his calloused palms.
Her eyes flitted from his mouth, which had twitched up into a half-smile to his eyes. Eyes she felt like she could drown in. Like twin pools of bottomless black. It wasn't until Bella saw herself reflected in them, that she realised the reason she was so inexplicably drawn to them, to him was because it was like looking into her own reflexion. The hurt, the loss, and the emptiness she felt was clear in his eyes. He, whoever he was, was just as hurt and empty as she was. Reaching out for something to fill the void.
"Paul." He answered her unspoken question.
"Bella." She mirrored, nodding at his nod.
"Can I-" He started, a free hand extending towards her, and Bella cut him off, knowing what he wanted.
"Yes."
His hand slid across her cheek as his other hand pulled her closer. The hurt of abandonment still ached in her chest like she'd been hit with buckshot, but in the wake of his warmth, the months of internally bottling up her emotions felt less suffocation. Felt like less like raw nerve ending. It caused a shaky gasp to tumble from her lips as she nuzzled into the smell of leather, spice and tobacco.
The hand fisted in her hair, not roughly, but with enough strength to lift her against him. His lips ghosted over hers, not a kiss, but a promise of one. If she was brave enough to want it.
Was she? Brave enough that is. Could she… want? Was she capable of wanting anyone but Ed-Him? No… but she needed someone. She needed someone to fill the gap in her life. If only for a minute, an hour… or a night.
It was a far-cry from how she'd imagined her first time. But if this was what it meant to be alive… to be human, then it was Ed-His wish for her to live it, to experience it.
They collided, ice and fire. He melted her, and she cooled him. Hands exploring and learning as her mouth dared to press more firmly against his. Taking what he teased. She did not understand what she was doing, and he knew too well. When she was lost he took charge, but when he was too worked up, she swept over him to calm his hasty, rough, raw bites and kisses.
They never made it to a bed. Never even looked for one. He picked her up and held her against the wall, and she raked her nails over his clothes until they seemed to vanish, leaving nothing under her touch but smooth, warm skin. It tasted like salt when she bit him, stifling her sounds of pain as he moved to find a place to fit in her. He was too large, and she was too small but through the pain and size discrepancy, they found a rhythm, a pattern, a missing puzzle piece that fit.
Her tears were cold by the time they landed on his skin, and his breath was hot over her ear as he spoke in hushed tones, words in a dialect she didn't know but their meaning somehow understood.
Mine. He was chanting it over and over. Bella wanted to point out it was just for now… just for tonight. But her mouth wouldn't cooperate, and instead she heard herself cry out in crescendo,
"Paul, mine!"
His echoing answer, hips crashing against her as he followed her into the abyss, left her gasping.
"Always."
Bella never had time to ask him on it though, because as the endorphins wore off, Bella realised she had a bleeding bite mark on her shoulder which ached and the aroma of blood had her feeling feint and nauseous.
As the world swirled down to a single beam of light, Paul's rapturous expression as he gently pulled himself from Bella was the last thing she saw before, with a weak moan of pain, surrendered to the pull of unconsciousness.
Chapter End.
Just a short little artsy- fartsy something that was stuck in my head. Trying to get back into writing. If y'all like it, let me know. Not sure If I am leaving it there or making it a multi-chapter.