Hidden Pain Chapter 1: Hidden Pain, a twilight fanfic

Homework. That is what you get after you run off to Italy for 3 days with your long lost vampire best friend, to save your vampire ex-boyfriend from intentionally trying to get killed by evil royal vampires. So that is what I have been doing for the past few hours on the floor in front of the couch.

I was mostly just trying to distract myself from missing Edward and the images from Volterra that I saw every time I let my mind wander. The look on the face of the women with the rosary as she was led to her death-

No. That is exactly what I was trying to forget. Edward tried to get me to talk about it, but I refused. If he saw what it was doing to me, it would just cause him more pain. He already felt guilty enough.

Charlie was currently sitting on the couch behind me watching baseball. I started working a few minutes after he kicked Edward out as part of my punishment. I pushed the panic of being apart from him down, knowing that I would see him after Charlie went to bed.

He was going to go hunting in the morning for the first time since we got back. That was four days ago. I dreaded the time apart, but tried my hardest not to think about it. Hence the four hour long homework/study time. If I could focus on this then I could forget all the other things eating away at my brain at the moment.

Charlie got up and went to the kitchen to get another beer. While he was in there the phone rang.

"Hello," I heard from the kitchen. There was a long pause, then I heard him mutter, "Ya, just a second," to whoever was on the other end of the line. I waited, expecting him to yell that the phone was for me, but instead I heard him, shuffle into the other room to take the call.

Oh well, it was probably just private work stuff. Or maybe he got a girlfriend. It's not like I would have really noticed the past few months seeing as I was pretty much a zombie for most of it.

After about 20 minutes he came back into the room looking slightly nervous and unsure. I lifted an eyebrow at him questioningly, but he just shook his head and came back to sit on the couch next to me. I'm curious about what the call could have been about, but if Charlie wanted to tell me, he would have. I shrugged and went back to my never ending mountain of homework.

Not too long after that Charlie got up and said that he was going to bed. I followed not to long after him, eager to see Edward again. I went up the stairs and into my room to find it empty. I was disappointed, but figured he would be there when I got back from getting ready for bed.

After showering, brushing my teeth and putting on my ratty old pajamas, I started back to my room. On the way back it hit me how tired I really was. I started to get a little bit dizzy but shook my head and kept going. That had been happening a lot lately, but I didn't want to worry anyone so I just ignored it. It's wasn't that bad.

Once I managed to stumble my way back to my room I found Edward sprawled out on my bed. I just stood there in the door way studying him for a minute.

I couldn't believe I had him back. He seemed to be very deep in thought. When he finally looked at me he almost looked pained, but he quickly changed that into one of my favorite crooked smile. It didn't quite reach his eyes though.

"Hello love," he said.

"Hi," I answered back as I went over to him, crawling under the blankets and curling up into a tight ball next to him. This is how I had gotten used to sleeping over the past few months, trying to hold myself together though the nightmares. I took a deep breath inhaling his amazing sent that always seemed to calm me and make me feel safe. He still had a weird look in his pitch black eyes though.

"What's the matter?" I asked him. He looked down deep into my eyes.

Time lost all meaning. We could have been staring at each other for years and I wouldn't have noticed. I'm not sure what he found in my eyes but soon his eyebrows came together making a crease in between them.

"Breath Bella," he said.

Oops, forgot about that. Once I found my lungs again I took a deep breath, taking in his amazing sent again. He chuckled slightly at this.

"You didn't answer my question," I reminded him.

"Nothings wrong," he said a bit too innocently. I knew it was a lie but before I could voice this he continued on, obviously trying to distract me.

"Carlisle and Esme were wondering if you would like to come over tomorrow and spend some of the day at the house while I'm gone hunting. Carlisle said that he would like to spend some time with you and talk with you."

I winced slightly at the mention of him leaving to go hunting. The only time he had left me since we got back were the few hours between the time Charlie kicked him out and the time it took for him to come crawling through my window that night.

"I would love to, but… we both know that Charlie would never let me." I said between a yawn. I ached to spend time with my 2nd pair of parents. The only time I had spent with them is when we got back from Italy at the airport and the other night when we voted on my whole 'me becoming immortal or not' thing. Both times I was unable to really talk to them.

Edward looked down at me mischievously. "I have a feeling that he will make an exception considering Esme called earlier and told him I'm going to be back in LA packing stuff up to get moved back here."

Well I guess that was who was on the phone earlier. It still didn't explain the secrecy of Charlie going in the room or the weird look he gave me when he came back in the room. I wanted to question Edward some more but I was barely hanging on to conciseness as it was. Edward seemed to notice this.

"You need sleep. Esme already made all of the arrangements with Charlie and Emmett will be here tomorrow to pick you up and take you to my house." he said while pulling the blanket up more securely around me, before wrapping me in his cold stone arms.

"M' kay," I muttered, too tired to argue that I could drive myself. And to think I would have given anything to be in this exact position less than a week ago.

With that thought I snuggled up as close as I could get to Edward's icy chest and slowly drifted off to sleep to Edward softly humming my lullaby.

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