Warning: Reference to suicidal thoughts and physical child abuse in this chapter.
Disclaimer: Characters belong to Stephanie Meyers. Plot belongs to me.
"Those who looked on the Gorgon's head must have had the sort of experience I've just undergone after spotting a really beautiful woman." – Lucian Images, trans. by Keith Sidwell
Chapter 6
Edward was imagining again the spiral pattern that the chair would make if he threw it against the windows, the ripples of broken glass surging outward in slow motion, bubbling and billowing.
A fall from that height probably wouldn't kill Edward. He would have to go to the roof for that. Ten stories.
'I'll push you,' a voice in his head volunteered.
Edward cocked his head to the side in surprise at the words. The voice had a soothing cadence, like bells.
He sat up straighter. He recognized the voice.
It belonged to Isabella fucking Swan.
It only made sense that he would be imagining her voice making an offer like that. Once upon a time, she would have been more than willing to push him off a roof.
But now?
Edward considered the remaining gulf between the two of them. Despite all of his mockery, he could see that she had her whole life ahead of her. Her students liked her. She would be graduating soon.
While an outsider might say that Edward had accomplished far more than her—he was more or less established in a career, well into his residency—he was on thin ice at the hospital. He knew that.
And what friends did he really have? (He didn't mean Tanya and her crowd. Real friends.)
He barely spoke to his family.
He'd only gone to that last happy hour because Emmett had said Bella was going to be there.
Edward had a good reason to be reluctant: Enduring another round of his family's questions and comments wasn't exactly appealing.
Which made it all the more strange that he'd changed his mind. At the time, Edward told himself that, with Bella there, the ordeal of seeing his relatives would be slightly more tolerable, if only because at least some of the attention would be on her. But there was more to it. To be honest, he enjoyed getting a rise out of her. His family had long since given up trying to match wits with him and would just ignore his quips.
And Bella hadn't disappointed either. She had matched him barb for barb, countering all of his jabs.
"What would it take to turn you on?" he'd asked.
She'd tried to avoid the question. But then she'd admitted that it was an intellectual challenge she really wanted.
Edward had been all-too-eager to see where this line of discussion would take them. Yet Bella had turned the tables on him, saying that he was the one with the real problem. "You. Habituation. You've gotten bored with sex. So you keep pushing the limits with places like Breaking Dawn. But you can't keep upping the ante. It's just not feasible."
She'd figured him out alright, not that Edward was about to admit that. He had kept up the show, like it was just a friendly debate, when it was anything but.
Then, like an idiot, he had dared Bella to write down her intentions for him.
Writing his own intentions out on a napkin, it had been tempting to lie—to write something else down—but a wild kind of impetuous feeling had come over him. So what if Bella learned the truth?
Watching her drop her own napkin into the envelope, it had been all he could do not to snatch it away from her so that he could read what she'd written.
Get it together, he'd told himself.
But then she had just walked out. Just like that.
Watching her leave—as if she thought that he was a waste of time—Edward had started to crumple the envelope, but he'd stopped himself. He'd realized that he could just open it and have all of his questions answered.
Or could he? Had she told the truth?
He had yet to make a decision when Rosalie and Emmett returned from their game of darts. He had handed over the envelope with a cryptic request that Rosalie hold onto it for a while, then made his own departure.
And now here he was, staring out a window, and imagining Bella's voice.
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"Gracias. Dios mio, gracias."
Edward tried to extricate himself from the sobbing woman.
"Mi niño."
Edward wasn't a complete monster. Intellectually, he understood the woman's fears.
But she would have to steel herself for the inevitable. There was no point in prevaricating.
He wondered what Bella would think of that, and handed the weeping madre off to one of the nurses.
Realizing that he'd let Bella intrude upon his thoughts once again, Edward grimaced in annoyance.
Then he wondered if she would be at Newton's that night.
Was he actually looking forward to seeing her again? That couldn't possibly be true.
He tried to reason that his interest was purely scientific. Bella was like a fantastic bird long since thought extinct—going around as if she was so much better than everyone else. It was only fair that she be brought down to earth with the other mortals.
A lingering moral sense—more a learned knowledge of textbook right and wrong as opposed to any innate belief—told Edward that he was wrong for thinking it, but part of him wanted Bella just as she was, prized, like the nearly extinct creature she was, unobtainable, for everyone else at least, but not...
He didn't want to finish the thought.
It would be a challenge.
Something inside of him wanted it, and it had been a while since he had really wanted anything.
Edward left the hospital soon after finishing with the grateful madre. It was late. The streetlights were on, but the sidewalks were surprisingly crowded. It was only by chance that he happened to glimpse Bella.
She was walking in the opposite direction, down the other side of the street, a backpack slung behind her and books in her arms. Edward hesitated for only a few seconds, then continued down the sidewalk, his eyes resolutely on the ground, daring to glance back at her only after they'd passed each other.
But she was already out of sight.
Strangely irritated, Edward found himself wandering back in her direction.
He got to the corner and saw Bella passing under a streetlight a few blocks down. He wasn't sure how she'd managed to cover so much ground in such a short amount of time, but he sprinted to catch up, weaving his way through the traffic to cross the street and dodging a few pedestrians.
He stopped again when the street opened up onto a large thoroughfare. Swinging his head from side-to-side, Edward spied her on the next street over, waiting at a light. He took off again.
No longer caring about avoiding detection, Edward yelled Bella's name. But she kept walking, as if she couldn't hear him.
He wondered if she was ignoring him on purpose.
A pack of young females clearly out for a night on the town suddenly appeared in front of Edward, taking up the entire sidewalk with arms slung around each other. Edward maneuvered around them, shouting Bella's name again.
She'd already made it to the end of the next block by the time that Edward caught up with her.
He reached for her shoulder, but they were suddenly engulfed by a crowd of rowdy theater-goers.
Jostled by the mob, Bella stumbled. Edward steadied her, and pulled towards her to the side, backing the two of them into an alley.
Looking down at Bella, Edward started to laugh. "Where were you—"
He stopped.
Bella was gazing back at him, her eyes locked on his. It was unnerving.
Edward had noticed before how Bella tended to avoid his eyes. Unless she was angry, that is. She clearly had no qualms about staring him down whenever he said something to annoy her.
Her eyes now were strangely dark. And large.
He was going to ask if she was alright, but he couldn't get the words out.
And the expression on her face—
Edward's heart was hammering and it had nothing to do with the way he'd run to catch up with her.
He realized that he was still holding her by the elbows. Without even being consciously aware of just what he was doing, he found himself sliding his hands up her arms to her shoulders.
So soft.
God, her arms were so soft. Like down.
He slid a hand behind her neck, and took her chin in his other hand.
Shaking, he lowered his mouth, hesitating an inch away from her lips. She smelled like sunshine. He breathed in her scent, staring into her eyes.
Unable to take it anymore, he closed his eyes and turned her head to the side. He pressed his lips to the side of her mouth.
Edward shuddered against Bella's cool skin as a noise like a coo escaped her mouth. He slid his hands back down her arms, and froze.
Confused, he pulled back, looking at her arms.
Feathers. Her arms were covered in tiny feathers.
Edward felt lips moving against the skin of his neck. Then he felt a nip on his chin. Bella was trying to kiss him.
He tried to push her away.
She nipped him again; it hurt.
He pushed her away more forcibly, and this time she retreated. She retreated too quickly.
Edward could feel her slipping through his hands, and he reached out for her again.
Ghostly soft down tickled his fingertips as she slipped away.
He made a wild grab but she evaded him, ducking into the shadows of the alley.
Then, even as he watched she began to shift. To change.
Edward woke from this dream uncomfortably aroused.
He was fully aware that he was completely and utterly pitiful.
No, not pitiful. Not something deserving of pity. Because he deserved everything he got.
He certainly didn't think that a dream like this boded well for his progress in overcoming his…condition.
Gnashing his teeth in frustration, Edward heaved himself out of bed, resigned to blaming Bella.
Not that he wanted to fuck her.
No, that couldn't be it.
Edward just wanted to understand her. To name her species. That wasn't so strange was it?
And yeah, maybe he wanted to bring her down a peg or two.
It would be a public service. Everyone would be much better off without Bella going around looking down her nose at them.
In fact, Bella herself would probably be grateful. She'd be happy just to fit in.
Right.
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Edward looked for Bella every day. He scanned the sidewalks, looking for her as he went to and from work.
On one occasion, he had been so distracted while driving that he had narrowly avoided a kid who'd jumped right in front of his car running after a ball.
Because that's just what Edward's karma needed. A dead kid.
By the time Edward got to Newton's for the weekly happy hour, his beloved siblings were already there, as was Rosalie. But Bella had yet to show.
Alice updated Edward about her shop.
"You should come see it," she said. "I might even put you to work."
"I'd be about as useful in a clothes boutique as you would be in an OR," Edward replied.
It wasn't so much the words as his tone.
He wasn't actively trying to be cruel. He actually liked Alice—he probably liked her more than any of his other relatives. But that probably wasn't saying very much.
An awkward silence followed Edward's comment.
Annoyed, Rosalie decided that he deserved a little of his own medicine. "What's up with that envelope you gave me last week?" she asked.
"Just a bet Swan and I have going," Edward told her.
"Does the winner get a lap dance?" Rosalie laughed.
Edward grunted. He and Bella had never really specified the terms of their bet.
"Did you two fight last time?" Emmett asked.
"Who?" Edward quirked an eyebrow, feigning ignorance even though he knew damn well what Emmett was talking about.
"You and Bella. She ran away before we could come back to the table. Were you a jerk again?"
Assuming a haughty tone, Edward replied, "On the contrary, our conversation was quite friendly."
Emmett snorted, while Alice and Rosalie merely shook their heads.
Edward assumed an even haughtier tone. "I am capable of carrying on polite conversation."
Emmett raised his glass in a salute. "And I am capable of making this my last drink of the night." He drank it down in one long swallow, then grinned. "But it would go against my nature."
Edward glanced at the door.
"So, why does she still hate you so much?" Emmett asked. "I never understood why the two of you would go at each other."
Emmett was four years younger than Edward and three years younger than Bella. And while Emmett knew that something had happened between Edward and Bella, neither he nor Alice knew just what it was.
Edward shrugged. "It's not that interesting."
"You sleep with her boyfriend?" Rosalie asked.
Edward glared at her.
"It's a fair question," she defended herself. "I hear that you've pissed off a lot of people by sleeping with their significant others."
He shook his head. "Unless she's a lesbian, I don't think that's the problem."
"Maybe she doesn't like doctors," Rosalie continued speculating.
"Why wouldn't she like doctors?"
"You stick people with needles for fun," Alice pointed out.
"I fucking save lives, is what I do." This was why he avoided seeing his family. They piled on.
"You've saved lives?" Emmett asked. "Who?"
"Who what?" Edward was in no mood for Emmett's games.
"Who have you saved?"
"Orphans and babies, who the hell do you think? People. I save people. Just yesterday, a woman came in with a knife wound to the chest because her husband had tried to kill her. She would have died without me." Edward glanced back at the door, looking for Bella.
"What was her name?"
Edward craned his neck, trying to see around a gaggle of interns who'd just walked in, still in their scrubs. "What?"
"Her. Name." Emmett spoke slowly if to a child. "What. Was. It?"
Edward noticed a brunette—Bella?
No, she was too short.
Edward turned back to Emmett. "I haven't the slightest idea what her name was. My job's to save them, not set up their Facebook profiles."
"You don't even remember her name?" Alice sounded a little shocked.
"It's better if we don't think of the patients as people. Subjectivity can complicate treatment."
Rosalie huffed. "So what you're saying is, you don't treat the patients like humans because it would make it harder for you to do your job."
"Exactly." Edward started tapping his foot. If Bella didn't show up right now—
Emmett tilted his glass in Edward's direction. "Except that they are humans and your job is to make their lives better as humans."
Edward glared at his brother. "I'd like to see you do my job and keep up your jovial façade. It's not as easy as it looks."
"Never said it looked easy. And just to be clear, you couldn't do my job either. But I'm better at mine than you are at yours."
That got Edward's attention. "How do you figure?"
"I have a job and a girlfriend and a life and a family and somehow I manage to continue functioning. What have you got?"
Edward heard Alice gasp at Emmett's words, but he also noticed that she wasn't jumping in to call Emmett out for his crap.
"I've got a job that has me working eighty hours a week," Edward pointed out.
Emmett snorted again. "You should see me during playoffs. And dude, there's always a playoff. I even cover curling."
Edward blinked. "Curling?"
"Hey," Emmett admonished, "don't knock it until you've tried it. Better yet, don't mock anything that keeps your dear brother in the black."
Edward glanced at the door again.
"Looking for someone?" Rosalie smirked.
"Bella said that she'd try to come," Alice announced. "But she has a lot of work this week."
Alice said that Bella had promised to try, but that she had a lot of work that week.
Edward stuck around for another hour before he gave up on Bella showing. Explaining that he had an early surgery the next morning, Edward left the bar.
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Edward was running. When he first went to live in Forks with his father, Carlisle, and his father's new wife, Esme, he'd been given all of the encouragement he needed to go out for sports.
To be honest, Carlisle and Esme just wanted Edward to get a chance to play, like the kid he was.
But Edward wasn't exactly a playful teenager. He would sometimes horse around with Emmett, who was only ten when Edward moved in, but that was mostly to keep Emmett happy.
Edward had never really played sports before moving to Forks. There'd be a game of pick-up basketball now and then, but he and his friends always had to be careful to avoid the dealers, who'd get riled up over how the game was going or would want the court for themselves. Edward had taken PE in school, of course, but there were only so many times you could make a kid run around an inner city school gymnasium.
Forks was different. There were wide open spaces with just miles and miles of—of space. Edward could run and run and run until he passed out.
A week after Edward's arrival in Forks, he went running. Really, it was just to get away from his family. The Cullens weren't so bad. They were nothing like his mother, Victoria. But sometimes that was the problem. The Cullens were just so fucking good to him. And sometimes he couldn't take it.
So he told them that he was going running.
Edward disappeared for two hours and by the time that he got back, Carlisle was on the phone with the park service, demanding that they send out a search party for his son.
After that, Edward had to promise to bring his phone with him whenever he went running. The cell service didn't actually work all that well out in the woods, but everyone ignored that little tidbit. And anytime Edward felt overwhelmed, he'd go running. Carlisle and Esme could see that it was good for him—it helped with his obvious anxiety—but they were also worried that Edward was spending too much time alone.
So they encouraged him to try out for a sports team. He didn't do well with contact sports. The fear that another player might come at him was almost enough to cause Edward to have a full-blown panic attack, but that also encouraged him to run all the faster. So he played baseball. Track and field was a no-brainer. The team practiced together and Edward had to work on hand-offs for the relay, but Edward still ran by himself as often as he could.
When he went away to college, Edward continued running. He ran all the way through med school and through his internship, even when he was utterly exhausted. When everyone else was taking uppers, Edward declined—he didn't want to be anything like his mother—and went running instead. He'd run with headphones, listening to lectures that he'd recorded or listening to his own voice reading aloud from his notes, the words working into his subconscious as he forced himself to go just another mile, his lips silently mouthing the phrases.
Now that he was a resident, Edward continued running. When he was still high with adrenaline from a surgery, instead of taking a downer, he'd run.
There was something soothing about it. Muscle memory taking over when everything else in him was long past the point of giving up. The rhythmic sound of his breathing and the tattoo of his feet against the pavement. It was meditative.
Edward was always careful to avoid drugs and alcohol. They were his mother's weaknesses.
But avoiding the obvious pitfalls just made it that much more difficult for Edward to realize that he had followed in his mother's footsteps after all. It was a while before he recognized his addiction.
He was addicted to running, of course. Unfortunately, that wasn't the only thing that he was addicted to.
And since running was by far the least harmful of the two addictions, he figured that he'd keep running until he'd handled his other issue.
As a result, he was running more and more these days.
Some weeks, Edward would run for up to two hours a day.
He'd run and he'd think.
And what he was thinking about these days was Bella.
He was annoyed.
He was annoyed that he was thinking about her at all.
A part of him had even decided that it was, in fact, all of her fault. That he never would have developed his addiction to sex in the first place if not for Bella.
Because the first time he ordered Lauren Mallory to get on her knees, it was to spite Bella. He was the one with his dick in Lauren's mouth, and he was the one who told her to put it there, but it wouldn't have happened—not like that, not then—if not for Bella.
That was bullshit, of course. If anyone was to blame for Edward's condition, it was Edward. And if not him, then it was his bitch of a mother, Victoria.
But hating his mother just fueled his addiction. He'd read enough psycho-babble to know that.
And yes, he still though it was just psycho-babble. Edward had been forced into therapy when he was a teenager and had not been impressed.
He had recently considered giving it another go, but he didn't think it would work. A patient was vulnerable to his therapist, and Edward couldn't make himself that vulnerable to anyone, no matter the reason. His career depended on his ability to remain in control. In charge.
Nevertheless, Edward was smart enough to look into the literature surrounding his condition. And everything said that he had to forgive his mother.
Yeah, fuck that.
Every time he thought of her, it was just tunnel-vision, a rage that he couldn't get rid of without running and running and running.
And as for his other addiction?
Well, the psycho-babble all said that it was just an attempt to compensate for a feeling of inadequacy.
Like he didn't already know that.
He was fourteen when the police finally took him away from his mother. Fourteen.
By then, he'd already bought into all of the crap she was feeding him.
And yeah, there times when it felt like he was just fulfilling destiny, when he acted like the fuck up she had always told him he was.
He hated the fact that he was making her right—that fucking bitch—because it was like confirming that he had deserved every single fucking thing that she'd ever done to him.
And that hatred had only added more fuel to his desire to act on his worst impulses.
Because what was the fucking point of trying to resist?
It was a circle.
Meanwhile, his condition had gotten out of control.
He'd been caught having sex at work. He'd nearly lost his job.
He'd even introduced Tanya to his parents.
Fucking Tanya.
He had taken her to Forks for the weekend, not caring anymore what his parents thought of him.
No, that wasn't true. Edward cared what Esme and Carlisle thought of him. That was the problem. He wanted to destroy the picture they had in their head of him. He wanted them to know just how fucked up he really was. Because they kept giving Edward chance after chance. Even when he slept with Emmett's girlfriend.
And Edward had just gotten in trouble at work. It was only a matter of time before he lost his job.
Edward wanted nothing more than for his family to cut him off once and for all.
But that trip to meet his parents was a disaster from beginning to end.
That first day, Esme brought out the goddamn family albums and home movies, like she thought that she could resurrect the old Edward from a couple of pieces of celluloid.
Then Carlisle told Edward the news.
It turned out that Carlisle had been keeping tabs on Victoria through the years. Not that Carlisle owed that bitch anything. Carlisle's name wasn't even on Edward's original birth certificate, but Edward knew his name thanks to Victoria's drunken stories about the guy who'd knocked her up, Carlisle fucking Cullen. Thus, Edward was able to give Carlisle's name to Child Protective Services, not that Edward expected his father to step in and do any good. According to Victoria, Carlisle Cullen was a useless fuck who'd been on the fast track to nowhere. Fortunately for Edward, the social worker assigned to his case tracked Victoria Masen all of the way back to Forks, Victoria's hometown, and discovered that a Carlisle Cullen was indeed in residence. The community had started a fund and paid for Carlisle's education with the agreement that he'd come back after he got his medical license and open up a practice. The other Masens, Victoria's family, had long since scattered, but Carlisle had a wife, and two children from his wife's previous marriage, Alice and Emmett. Carlisle had no idea that Edward even existed, but there could be no doubting the physical resemblance, and a DNA test confirmed their relationship.
It wasn't difficult for Carlisle to secure full custody of Edward.
That was just another spit in Edward's face, the way that Victoria didn't even try to keep him. She could have gotten counselling. She could have done something. But no.
So why the fuck was Carlisle suddenly expecting Edward to give a shit about her?
Carlisle sympathized with Edward's position, but he always assumed that Edward would want to see his mother again one day, to try and get closure if nothing else.
Thus, Carlisle was very disappointed to learn that she had died from an overdose.
As it turned out, however, Edward didn't give a fuck.
"Why are you telling me this?" he asked Carlisle. The Cullens were Edward's real family, weren't they? So why the fuck was Carlisle telling him this?
Carlisle tried to explain, and after a while, Edward seemed to calm down. In fact, he appeared to be perfectly at peace as he bid his parents farewell, and returned to Seattle with Tanya.
It was the kind of calm that comes over a person when he decides to throw it all away.
He was right there, on the precipice.
With a woman he'd met at Breaking Dawn.
They'd gone to a hotel a block away from the bar. It wasn't the first time he'd brought a woman there. Many of the bar's patrons regularly got rooms for an hour or two if not the whole night.
He had blindfolded the woman, because she said that she wanted him to. And he was standing over the bed watching her writhe in anticipation, his hands shaking with the awful desire washing over him.
And he was smoking. He never smoked. But his mother had smoked like a chimney.
He could feel this thing inside of him, this thing wanting to come out.
And it was like the smoke was part of this thing, this fucking monster uncurling inside of him and licking through his veins, the need, the awful tearing need, to—
And he stopped.
Because what the fuck was he doing?
What the fuck was he doing?
What the actual fuck was he really doing?
Because he knew that it wouldn't be enough.
The satisfaction wouldn't fill whatever was missing inside of him.
And he didn't want to be like his mother.
Like his fucking mother, that goddamn bitch.
Edward untied the woman and left.
He hadn't had sex since. The last time that he'd had sex, it was that weekend with Tanya at his parents. And Edward had been turning down all of Tanya's invitations since. He had been ignoring all of the solicitations of the so-called friends he'd met through Tanya or through Breaking Dawn.
Because sex, sometimes, is an addiction.
Of course, Edward knew that sex was healthy. That it should be healthy. Even rough sex. Even kinky sex.
Edward knew this, intellectually at least, and he'd been trying to convince Bella of this as much as himself with all of that talk about the value of sex.
And even though part of Edward was still angry at Bella for that stunt involving Lauren Mallory all of those years ago, Edward knew that his addiction wasn't Bella's fault.
Unfortunately, he wasn't so sure that about his own part in what looked like an aversion to sex on Bella's part. It wouldn't be his fault, not directly, but he was there that night in Port Angeles. And he'd certainly made a mistake with regard to Bella's mother.
So yeah, Edward was running and thinking about Bella. He was still struggling with his addiction—and he was mad at himself for caving the other night and walking into Breaking Dawn. Then there was his anxiety about the situation he'd gotten himself into at work, to say nothing of the mistakes he'd made with his family.
And on top of it all, here was Bella.
Exhausted, but forcing himself to run just one more mile, Edward returned to his apartment drained.
And in his relaxed state, Edward was able to admit that seeing Bella again wasn't all bad.
At least she knew him. There would always be a part of him that was Masen, not Cullen. His so-called relatives might think that they loved him, but it was for precisely that reason that they would never really understand him. Bella was different.
Edward knew it the first time they met. The first time he looked into her eyes. She was broken. Just like him. And he hated her for it.
Newly showered and dressed, Edward was still tired from his run, but he didn't have to work and he didn't want to sit at home.
A few months ago, a day with nothing to do would have brought him to Breaking Dawn, looking for a woman—or two—to pick up. Today, he decided to head downtown.
Edward had never been particularly fond of window shopping, but it had been a long time since he had let himself just wander around, taking in the sights, with nowhere to go and nothing to do.
When Edward saw the woman standing on the other side of the street, the scene was so reminiscent of his dream that at first he thought that he was asleep again.
He was awake, though. And there was Bella, alive and in the flesh.
Walking into his favorite sex shop.
AN:
No, Edward is not "hearing voices." It's just his imagination.
If Edward's freaking you out: Reminder, he does engage in consensual rough sex, but that's it. This is the one and only chapter that has Edward teetering on the edge like this. He's recognized that he's at a precipice and I think that's an issue worth looking at, if only because we all of us, victims of abuse or not, have the potential to wreak very real damage on others, physical or not. I've certainly been stuck in the moment, when I've considered the next words that could come out of my mouth, when I've wondered if I really want to hurt a person as much as I could with what I'm thinking of saying. I've teetered at the edge. My Edward has done his own teetering, in a way that's much more physical, but this story's a metaphor, isn't it? Having stood on the precipice and stepped back, does that mean that I never open my mouth again? Does that mean that Edward never has sex again? Or that he only has vanilla sex for now on? Where's the line?
I think it's important to explore these questions, because ignoring them means ignoring the degree to which we're responsible for our actions. We might be inclined in certain directions (by previous experiences), but we choose to follow our inclinations or to head in another direction. By ignoring the fact that some people see the temptation and refuse to follow it, I'm afraid we enable abusers to excuse their own behavior by saying it's natural/inevitable/they can't help themselves.
Again, Edward's never going to be physically abusive. But neither he nor Bella are perfect. They have and will do things that can be interpreted as mentally abusive. This story is about them learning how to break the cycle.
This isn't a story about feeling sorry for abusive people. It's a story about how people who are inclined towards unhealthy behavior learn to take responsibility for their lives and change.
If you're in a physically or mentally abusive relationship, get out. It doesn't matter if the person abusing you is your lover or your friend or a relative. I've been in mentally abusive relationships. The person who's abusing you will try to make it your fault. It's not. They're choosing to do this to you. You don't deserve it. Don't feel sorry for them. Speaking from personal experience, I know that you can become addicted to being with a person who's abusive. And this story is about addicts breaking free.
I think that this is the last long AN in this story.
Diamond in the rough Rec: Blind Date from Hell? by bebe86 Bella is unlucky in love and has been set up on one bad blind date after another by Alice and Rose. She finally agrees to one last blind date with Edward Cullen, but is this going to be the worst blind date yet? Rated M for language and lemons. AH, B/E - Twilight - Rated: M - English - Romance/Humor - Chapters: 34 - Words: 104,173 - Reviews: 756 - Favs: 805 - Follows: 473 - Updated: Feb 20, 2010 - Published: Aug 28, 2009 - Bella, Edward - Complete