"Goodbye, Love"
Chapter 3, 'Leaving' Scene, Rewrite.
Note: Before you read this, remember that in this version, Bella suspects that Edward doesn't love her, but it's in the very back of her mind. She doesn't let herself consider it, but it's like she already knows.( In the real version she has no idea what Edward is about to do.)
"Come for a walk with me," he suggested in an unemotional voice, taking my hand. I didn't answer right away, for a moment I lost my voice.
"Wait, Edward. We need to talk. I feel like you don't-"
"Calm down, Bella," he interrupted in a serious, yet still detached voice, "I'll explain everything in a moment. Let's walk."
He pulled me by the hand to the east side of the yard, where the forest just began to encroach. I trailed along, torn. Part of me wanted to stop him, demand that he explain it all now. The other part wanted to run. I just wanted to escape my thoughts. The theory I held in the blackest depths of my mind eagerly began to creep to the surface. After all that happened in the last few days, the theory seemed logical, possible even; but on top of that, infinitely agonizing. The panic choked me.
We were barely concealed in the edge of the forest when he stopped. The house was clearly visible. Some walk.
As he leaned against a tall spruce, he looked down and said nothing. The panic that choked me before, was now strangling me. It was almost painful.
"Alright, let's talk." I was surprised that I could speak at all. The fear was closing my throat, I couldn't breathe right.
"Bella, we're leaving." He stared at me with cold, unfriendly eyes. It didn't hurt so much now. It was the same looked he thrashed out for the last three days.
My theory was almost near the brim of my conscious mind. Before, I had only subconsciously considered it, but brushed it off. Now, with him standing before me with remote, detached eyes, it seemed that much more likely.
"Why?" It was a simple question, yet, it was one of the hardest ones I'd ever had to ask. A simple question that's many possible answers could literally kill me where I stood.
He took a deep breath, and held it for several minutes. He finally exhaled in a sigh. He looked at the ground again; I wasn't sure what he saw. I stood in the same place as before, frozen, unable to even blink.
"It's time. Did you really think we could stay in Forks much longer? Carlisle can barely pass for thirty, and he's claiming thirty-three now."
A startling, sharp pain seemed to stab at the top of my head, slowly making its way through me. I realized the pain splitting me in two, was a pain of agony, defeat, and expectancy. The pain stopped right in my core, the center of my stomach. It felt like a knife slashed across my abdomen, leaving me awed in pain, with a gaping hole across my chest. I had a feeling that this pain was not a one-time-thing. I stopped breathing, looking for a way to escape the agony.
"So, when you say we-" I spat out, a hysterical edge to my voice, but I was growing angry for some incomprehensible reason.
"I mean my family and myself," he said, cutting me off, while matching my tone without the hysteria.
No, no, no.
I stood silent for a moment; trying to gather my scrambled thoughts. Edward waited, patient, but expressionless.
As I stared at his cold, unemotional face, the theory once again rose to the surface of my consciousness.
This time it scared me. He told me he was leaving, and I felt a sense of…conviction? No. Confirmation... Yes. I expected this. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I knew it was coming. I wanted so badly to deny it. Yet, I would always know that it was pure fiction, our love. It was something to unbelievable to be true. How could someone like him, ever want someone like me?
I felt it coming. I knew what he was trying to tell me. I wasn't so sure of myself, though. He swore his love to me so many times. How could this be true? The pain and anger I felt helped me to think clearly; be decisive. I decided I would play dumb. I would not believe it until he spoke the words himself.
"Fine," I said, surprised at how calm I sounded. "I'll come with you."
"You can't, Bella. Where we're going…it's not the right place for you." He seemed almost nervous as he said this. I decided to try and force his true intentions out of him. I had a strange sense that I would regret it.
"Where you are is the right place for me. I love you, Edward." I whispered the words with pain in my voice, true pain, I wasn't playing anymore; I needed to know the truth.
"I'm not good for you, Bella." He continued to look down. He had not looked at my face since we began talking.
"Don't be ridiculous, if anything, I'm not good for you!" I started to yell. He was about to say it. I knew it.
"Bella…I don't want you to come with me."
The pain of that sentence took my breath away. I gasped, and he finally looked up. When I looked into his eyes, it made everything worse. They were cold, colder than they had ever been; unloving, to say the least. There was not a single trace of any emotion anywhere on his face.
I tried to think through the words, to find another meaning, I couldn't accept it. I couldn't let him go.
"You…don't…want me?" I tried out the words. They sounded strange, placed in that order.
"No." He stared back at me; his eyes were deep gold, frozen gold, cold. I felt like I could see into them for miles, but nowhere in their bottomless depths could I find a contradiction to the word he'd spoken.
After the confusion ran its course, it was replaced by pain, and anger; a lot of anger. Some voice in the back of my mind told me not to be difficult, that it would only hurt me later, but I couldn't concentrate on the voice, the anger drowned it out.
"But…you…you said…" I couldn't form coherent sentences. "Don't you love me anymore?" I was surprised I could utter that sentence; it was painful even in thought.
"Bella, what happened the other night made me realize that it's time for a change. Because I'm…tired of pretending to be something I'm not, Bella. I'm not human." As I stared at his perfect, icy face, I knew he was right. He was not human. But I also knew he was avoiding my question, and I begun to hope without allowing myself to. "I've let this go on much too long, and I'm sorry for that."
I was getting angrier. I allowed myself to get angry because I knew it would temporarily drown out the pain. For one brief second, I wanted to hurt him as much as he was hurting me. If he truly did not love me, these words would mean nothing. But if he still cared, I could show him the pain he was showing me.
"No. Don't be sorry. I don't want to hear it. You never answered my question, though. Do you love me?" It took a lot of effort to bring my voice to the same indifferent, cold tone, which Edward had sported for these last three days.
"Bella, please don't make me-" He said this in an almost annoyed tone, it made me enraged.
"Yes or no? Just answer." I was getting more furious by the second. How could he do this to me? I couldn't even think of any possible motives.
"I did." He looked down as he said this, almost as if he had to control his expression. I doubted that, though. What would he need to control? What was I to him?
I instantly regretted making him answer my question. The pain made me fall to my knees. Edward acted as if he hadn't noticed. I was shaking with sobs by the time he spoke again, but he had no trace of concern or compassion in his velvet voice.
"I will make you a promise, Isabella Swan. I promise that this will be the last time you'll see me. I won't come back. I won't put you through anything like this again. You can go on with your life without anymore interference from me. It will be as if I never existed."
I looked up at his glorious face, and managed to scoff at his ridiculous promise. The sound that escaped my lips was much more a cry than a scoff, but he seemed to understand that I did not take his promise seriously; or at least was not confident in his ability to keep it.
He looked at my agonized expression with fierce confusion, almost anger.
"Explain yourself," he said, sounding nearly appalled.
In that second I finally understood the source of my anger. I wasn't angry at him, if anything I was grateful for what he had given me these few months. I was furious with myself; for not being enough for him.
I stared at his confused expression, with sad eyes. The anger had faded; I would try to be honest now, and let him know exactly how I felt about this whole mess.
"Don't misunderstand; I have no doubt that you'll be able to stay away. But do you honestly believe that I would forget you? I hope that you do not think so poorly of me." The words came out in a hushed, agonized whisper. I could not look at his face; I stared unseeingly into the forest behind him.
He didn't respond. Neither of us spoke or moved. Finally, Edward broke the silence with a question.
"I'd like to ask a favor, if it's not too much," he said in a serene, tranquil voice.
"Anything," I vowed, slightly confused. What would he want from me?
"Don't do anything reckless or stupid; do you understand what I'm saying?" He spoke so intensely, it shattered my concentration. It sounded almost like he….No, he told me he didn't. I could never doubt him.
A hint of my previous anger flared inside me. "How do you expect me to keep such a promise?"
"Bella, please, for Charlie." The distance returned.
The sound of Charlie's name struck a chord. The anger died down again. "Fine."
"Honestly," he pried; as if doubting my words.
"I will," I whispered; I tried to sound genuine. In the back of my mind, I was already thinking of possible ways to betray my own words.
He seemed to relax a little.
"Alright, that's all. We won't bother you again."
The pain I was buried in subdued the shock of the plural he used. I had a feeling the others were gone. It seemed as though he was about to leave; I had to act quickly.
"Please, don't leave me," I begged. I was sobbing again, this hurt so much. I was still kneeling on the wet dirt; I wrapped my arms around myself; I feared that the hole in my chest would literally tear me in two.
He didn't respond. He eyes were still remote and distant, and had been for three days. With a sudden piercing stab of sorrow, I realized that my Edward left already. Three days ago.
"Goodbye, Bella." He was calm, peaceful. He looked as if he just had a great weight lifted from his chest.
I closed my eyes. With my arms still wrapped around my torso, I laid my head on my knees and sobbed.
There was a light, unnatural breeze. I snapped my head up, searching, but I knew he was already gone. The ferns gently swayed with the wind of his passage.
I couldn't move for a few hours, I just stayed curled up on the forest floor. Finally I heard an approaching car, Charlie once again, popped into my mind. I jumped up, and ran to the back of the house. I opened the slider, sprinted inside, and slammed it shut. As I took to the stairs, I felt a dull numbness spread over my body. I couldn't feel anymore; it scared me.
On the last step before the landing, I tripped over uneven carpet. I glanced down and saw a nail sticking out of the stair. I was too numb to care. As I stood, I felt a shearing pain in my left wrist. I looked down, and sure enough, there was a clean slice across my forearm. I didn't concentrate on the blood. The only thing I could think of was the pain. I could feel again. The numbness was gone. It was almost as if I…enjoyed the pain.
At that precise moment, I knew there was one way to erase the numbness, and feel again. But my idea went strictly against what I promised…him…in the forest.
Fringe benefits, I thought to myself.