POV:Edward
Summary: A socially awkward Edward has to deal with his long time best friend falling in love. He soon discovers that girls aren't the horrible things that he's been afraid of for so long.
Author's note: This story is a sequel to my story Geek Love, which is written from Bella's point of view. These two stories happen simultaneously. I would suggest that you read it first, but it is not necessary. If you impatient for an ending, however then you can read Bella's side of the story which was meant t be read fist.
Disclaimer: I own none of the Twilight characters. If I did I wouldn't share.
Chapter 1
Girls had always been crawling over each other to get to me. Since I turned fifteen I had felt a bit like a piece of meat that two dogs were fighting over. I hated it.
Jasper had always informed me that any straight man would love of all the attention that I got from females, but I just flat out hated it.
Girls were attacked to my looks. It was the same way for Jasper. We were attractive and therefore we were wanted. But the problem was, once any girl even took the time to get to know me, she didn't care. They seemed to want to talk about clothes and shoes, about what some stupid movie actor that apparently everybody was in love with was filming next. They wanted to hear how pretty they were and how they were special. They weren't special. Most of these girls had never picked up a book without the threat of a bad grade if they didn't. They went and saw movies for whoever was in them, not for the plot.
I knew that there were other kinds of girls out there. I knew that not every girl was shallow and self-centered, but it never seemed to be any of the ones who talked to me.
In high school, if a girl wanted to talk to me I would humor her. I'd talk to her about books that she had never heard of, much less read. I'd talk to her about music, the good kind, not the crap that was played on most radio stations and considered cool. I'd talk about school. I liked school. I liked learning. I liked being smart. These kinds of conversations would always send them running away screaming.
I always hoped that they would be different, but they never were. It was always the same old story. Then there were the ones who never bothered to talk to me, but were just obsessed from a distance.
I had my fair share of female stalkers back in high school. I told them all nicely that I wasn't interested and a few managed to back away, but there was always one or two that clung to some ridiculous fantasy involving me.
I had begun to just ignore them. It worked the best. I wasn't very social anyway, so ignoring them and being rude when they were persistent was easiest. Sure, sometimes it made me feel like a bad person, but they were wasting my time as well as their own. Why not squish the dreams early so we could both move on with our lives?
Now that I was in college I still had to deal with them. The first day of classes was always the worst. There was always one in each class that had to parade herself in front of me. I was concerned that these girls actually thought that low neck lined sweaters were an appropriate way to get a guy to like them. I may have been rude to them, but all of these girls deserved better than some guy who judged them on the contents of their t-shirts.
I spent the first hours of my day in the music building. I didn't need any of the music classes, but the piano teacher let me hang around and play on the grand piano in the mornings. It was better than the old hunk of junk upright that I had gotten for school. Uprights never had good sound.
Girls in the elementary piano class always found some excuse or another to walk past me, always flashing a smile. Part of me knew that I should smile back, just to try being nice for once, but I hated to encourage them. Jasper said that if I ever let myself get close to one of them then maybe I might find someone that I like. I always pointed out that he had never had a girlfriend either so he had no business giving me relationship advice.
The history classroom was empty when I got there. Part of me wished that it would stay that way. I could just sit here by myself and for the rest of the day. I'd like that. No people sounded nice.
I pulled my disintegrated copy of "The Wastelands" out of my backpack. If I read the book one more time it was going to fall apart on me.
I paid no attention as the door to the classroom opened and closed a few times. What interest did I have in my classmates?
Someone sat down next to me, which was odd. You didn't sit next to people when there were other seats to choose from. I didn't care, but it was strange when people went against the social norm. I could tell just by the motion that the person who sat next to me was a girl.
My insides seized up. Another one to deal with. Another dream to crush, or whatever. I really didn't enjoy all of this. Maybe she would leave me alone.
I heard her sigh softly to herself, but I didn't look up. She tapped her pencil on the side of her desk, keeping in perfect rhythm with the ticking of the clock on the wall.
The tapping stopped and her pencil fell to the open sheet of binder paper. I could feel her gaze on the side of my face. I was used to this, and did my best to ignore it, but it wasn't long before my instincts kicked in and I looked back.
She had pale delicate skin that was almost as white as mine. Her pale complexion was made even more pronounced by the long wavy brown hair that she half hid her face in and the dark chocolate colored eyes.
When those brown eyes registered that I was looking back at her, that delicate skin of hers went up in flames. Her whole face turned red so quickly I was momentarily concerned for the girl's health. She ripped her eyes away from mine and stared pointedly at the opposite wall.
Strange, that was not the reaction that I usually got from females. If I caught them looking they would either look away then look back and smile or they would just smile and start talking. This girl blushed, rather violently. I had given this girl no reason to blush and yet she had turned redder than a fire truck when I looked at her.
She spent the rest of the class desperately trying to not look at me again. Her behavior was very strange and I found it almost impossible to not focus my attention on her.
Throughout the rest of the day that girls face followed me. Her reactions were so atypical of what I was used to. I guessed that the fact that this was new and unfamiliar to me was the reason that she seemed to have taken over my thoughts. I had never focus on any other female before in my life, what was so special about this one? Probably nothing.
That evening Jasper did notice my preoccupation. I explained the situation to him and all Jasper said was, "that means she likes you."
"Very helpful," I said sardonically. "I could have figured that one out on my own."
"You should be used to this by now." Jasper was right, I should be, and I was. But this one had caught me off guard.
"Most of the girls that I deal with have more confidence," I pointed out. "They immediately want to talk to me and expect me to ask them out instantaneously. I'm not used to blushing."
Jasper snorted. "You've just never noticed it before. She's just another girl. Don't tell me that after all of these years of fighting them off you are finally going to let one of them get to you."
I glared at Jasper. Of course I wasn't.
********
"Partners will be, these two rows, these two rows," the teacher laid a palm down on my desk, "and these two rows. Every day I will give you an assignment like this," She handed me a stack of half sheets of paper with questions on them. I took the top one and handed the rest back. "Everyday you and your partner will answer four questions on the previous nights reading. These questions will come up again in the lectures. These quizzes are worth twenty percent of your grade so I suggest that you work together. Normally I would only give you ten minuets, but today I'll give you an extra five to get to know each other. Get to it!"
I started to flip through the pages of my textbook to find the beginning of the first chapter. I could feel the girl from the day before looking at me. I didn't look back.
"I'm Bella," she said. I could hear her attempt to keep her voice even, but it shook nonetheless.
I glanced at her out of the corner of my eye. Her face wasn't red yet, but seemed much pinker than it probably was naturally.
"Edward," I responded blandly.
She looked at little upset by my indifference. A worried look crossed her eyes and she chewed on her bottom lip in thought.
"Did you read the chapter?" I asked with a sigh. Most partners that I had ever had never did the reading. I was always stuck with someone who made me do all the work.
"Yes," she said indignantly, her eyebrows knitted together. "Do I look like I didn't?" she snapped at me.
I almost laughed. One minuet she's timid and shy then the next she's telling me off. I've never met a girl, other than Rose, who would stand up to me like that when I said something rude. She just didn't have normal reactions.
"Sorry." I continued my attempt to find the right page. "I'm used to always being stuck with people who do nothing."
Bella's scowl eased away. She knew the feeling. "Well, I'd be happy to do my part if you let me look at the questions."
I handed her the sheet of paper and went back to the book.
"Do you want to split them up or work together?" I asked. This girl was fast becoming too interesting. I needed to find a way to get away from her otherwise I would end up thinking about her for the rest of the day again.
"I think the idea was for us to work together," she spoke through her teeth. I was getting on her nerves. Well, that was something.
"Fine. Do you want to write, or shall I?"
"You probably should," she shrugged. "I have the handwriting of a six year old boy."
I couldn't help but laugh at that one. She glared slightly. I didn't understand why, she was the one who had made the joke after all.
I paused, getting ready to write the first answer. Before I could write one sentence Bella answered the whole question without so much as a glance at her textbook that lay firmly shut on her desk. I had to admit, I was impressed. I doubted that Jasper could have come up with that answer so fast.
We finished early and she made an attempt to talk to me. I didn't want to talk. Talking invites them in. I didn't want to invite Bella in, I thought. Bella seemed a little too smart and a little too shy, like it was all some sort of plan or something. She had gotten my attention, which was, in my opinion, a bad thing. I didn't want to spend my days pondering what was going on in this girls mind when most girls were so easy to read. I came to the conclusion that she must have been the same as all the other girls; I just wasn't seeing it yet.
At the end of class she swung her bag over her shoulder and smiled at me. "See you next time," she said cheerfully.
Her smile caught me off guard. How could you smile at someone who had been so dismissive to you for the last hour?
I waved at her without a word. Weird girl.
Yay, I finally got this up. Sorry it took me so long but I am currently working on about eight stories at once. So, like Bella's version the fisr couple of chapters are a little haphazardly thrown up there, but it gets more sensical as the story movies forward. This story is a closer look into the inticacies of Edward's personality and (hopefully) will explain why he acts so weird for the first half of the story.
Thanks for reading! :)
