Frills and Lace
My clothes lay neatly folded in my suitcase; that was the one thing that was always immaculate, my neatly folded clothes.
I smiled as I ran a finger across the soft cotton of my watermelon pink baby tee, I'd worn it several times throughout the summer, the faded summer that whispered in the wind some days still, I had always believed that that shirt was lucky, every time that I wore it something good always happened.
The first and second times that I had worn it had been my first and second kisses, and they had both been with Edward frickin' Cullen, it didn't get much luckier than that, and if it did, I had yet to hear about this.
Eventually, I wore the shirt continuously, like a bad habit, hoping desperately for something to happen in it, and it did, I slept with the infamous Edward frickin' Cullen, and I regretted it ever since, I guess that it's sufficient to say that I never wore that shirt again, it brought back pain that was far too fresh, wounds that were far too new, still raw, bloody and open like a book, and anybody could see into them because I wore my heart on my sleeve.
My eyes filled with tears a little bit, and I pulled the shirt back out from the suitcase, examining it, from its neat lines and creases, to the fading watermelon pink color and the stretched out cap sleeves that reminded me of the way that Edward tugged harshly at them to rip my arms out of the top, the creases in it just made me remember the way that I had washed Edward's scent out of the top (machine-washed and dried three times, then thoroughly sprayed with Jean-Paul Gaultier) then folded it neatly as I always did, (my mother had always loved this fact and exploited it) and then I placed it in the back of my drawer in my room at Rosalie's house.
Rosalie had told me the truth, Edward was a dickhead and a douchebag, he'll fuck you, then he'll fuck you up, it's what he does, Rosalie told me after I told her about my first date with Edward, two weeks after our first kiss. Oh fuck you, Rose, you're just jealous that you're stuck with that meathead Emmett, and the fact that you didn't get Edward first – it's always going to eat at you, isn't it? She laughed at me harsh and bitter, her long blonde hair dancing in the shining summer sun, she knew it then, and she was still anticipating it – I couldn't tell her that I had already given it up to him, not because I didn't want her to know that she was right, but because I was ashamed of what I had done.
I'd given my virginity – my most precious gift – to a beautiful, virtual stranger named Edward Cullen. I had never been outside of Arizona apart from Washington to visit my father in his rainy hometown of Forks, so the chance to stay in Los Angeles with my lifelong best friend Rosalie Hale was an opportunity that I couldn't miss out on, and I had always had aspirations of up and going to LA one day, so I got to kill two birds with one stone, one fateful summer.
I couldn't tell Rosalie the truth, I could never let her known that I had slept with him, she wouldn't hate me, she never could, but she would resent me for as long as we both lived, this much I knew, she would exile her own sister if she even so much looked at Edward Cullen wrong, Rose would resent me forever, she could never find out, so I washed the sheets (I scrubbed at the red-black blood stain until my hands were red and raw, with a light wash of watered down hymen blood) and I turned the mattress and redid the whole bed until it sparkled of cleanliness and purity, something that I was now missing, and it felt like a big, gaping hole inside of me.
I emptied my underwear drawer, mostly bikini cut underwear, a few thongs, some lacies and frillies too, things that Rose had never even known that I owned.
I grinned a little at my Captain Hook underwear, Blast that Boy!, they said on the back, blast him indeed.
I folded my underwear neatly, green, black, purple, frills, lace, string, and then put away the last one, a black and pink thong, all pink satin and black floral lace and transparent black frills. I noticed the blood on the inside and I held them up to my face for closer inspection.
They were the ones that I'd hastily pulled back on to forgo being nude after Edward left me, blood dripped onto them, and I had never wanted to see the stupid thing again. I'd stuffed it right into the back of the drawer, deciding that when the time was right I would bring them out, look at the blood stain, remind myself what Edward had done to me and burn them or throw them out, instead tears stung at my eyes and I remember what a damn fool I had been, I should have trusted Rosalie, but instead I had gone with my heart for the first time ever, and I had regretted it ever since, I wished for nothing more than to go back to the beginning, use my brain and forget my damn heart, because hearts were good for nothing but pain anyway.
I went to Frederick of Hollywood's when I first decided that I wanted to lose my virginity to Edward, he'd once told me that he loved black, but he loved me in pink, so I got a black and pink corset and thong, amongst other things, but the corset and matching thong was what I would wear on the magic night, and I did; not that I wore them for too long before the corset was at my feet and the thong was lost somewhere near the foot of my bed.
I never washed the underwear because it was the only tangible thing that I had from that night, I had washed away most of the other evidence, I wanted it to be over, but I wanted to still remember that it had happened, I wanted to remember how stupid I had been, how big a mistake that I had made, the hurt that I had put myself through, all for a stupid boy.
I kept the damn underwear because I needed to know that it hadn't been some stupid dream, that I had once been in love, even if he hadn't loved me back. I hugged the lacy material to my chest, my eyes red and bleeding with fat, translucent tears. I threw them under my faded watermelon pink baby tee, because I still wanted to remember the way that it had been, I wanted to remember the truth, because I knew that I could never speak of it, so I would keep the truth, keep it alive for as long as I could, and I would honor what I had once had with Edward, because despite it all, I would always love him, amongst all the frills and lace, what Edward and I had would always be real.