Star gazing
"Ready?"
He would actually know better than she would, given he had packed everything. All the same, he always asked.
"Uh huh." She was distracted. Thinking. He let out a small sigh.
"Bella, everything will be fine. A little faith, please."
"Uh huh."
He then took both of her hands, which she had been nervously picking at, in one of his. With the other, he gently cradled her fragile cheek. Pale porcelain, she always seem so very breakable to him.
"Bella," he lowered his eyes to meet hers, "what's worrying you?"
"It's just…what if something happens and Charlie comes home early or—"
"If that is the case," he interrupted with a tone so self-assured it was almost annoying, "Alice will call me, and we'll be back with time to spare. What else could you possibly be worrying about?"
She began to chew her lip. "I don't know," she answered, "but it just makes me nervous. How aren't you worried?"
"I have quite a bit of practice going undetected."
She quieted then, allowing his complete confidence to soothe her own fears.
"You know, you probably should've fallen for someone a slightly more rebellious."
He laughed. "I'll try to remember that for next time." Then he pulled her into his arms briefly before grabbing the backpack off the floor of Charlie's house. Her favorite crooked smile set firmly on his features, and his arm wrapped comfortingly around her waist, he opened the door and they stepped out into the evening air.
He lighted guided her toward the silver Volvo waiting in the drive. He sped at the last second, using his inhuman speed to reach the car door and open before she could. She stopped and rolled her eyes.
"Shouldn't you be used to this by now?"
"Doesn't make it any less unnecessary," she muttered under her breath as she reluctantly climbed into the passenger seat, folding her arms neatly across her chest. Then it was his turn to roll his eyes.
As they drove, she calmed a little. Charlie was still supposed to be fishing for another two days after all. And Edward surely wouldn't have been so relaxed about it if there were any chance of major trouble. He didn't want her grounded any more than she wanted to be grounded. She let the tension fall from her posture and took a long breath.
"So…where are we going?" she asked.
"I'm still not going to tell you."
"I'd probably be less worried if I knew."
"I know," he answered, smirking. "But you have no reason to be worried anyway. And, following that logic, you fear is irrational and shouldn't depend on your knowledge of such insignificant details, such as our destination.
In other words, she wasn't getting an answer anytime soon. He was enjoying it too much. Know-it-all.
They rode in silence for a few more minutes, the lush landscape of the Olympic Peninsula blurring, always too fast, past the windows. The leaves were the dark green of late summer. Just a hint of color showed here and there, in patches, as a hint of the coming cold. It really was beautiful, but some days she still ached for the heated severity of the Arizona desert. She could never tell what the land here actually looked like underneath the towering trees and dense masses of undergrowth. But she couldn't deny that she had grown to love it, to think of it all as home. Perhaps that was the affect of time, but it was more likely due to the fact that she still struggled to picture him in the bright sun and burning heat of Phoenix. No, he belonged here, in a land that whispered legends and ached with the weight of timeless secrets.
"Why don't you like surprises?" he asked, interrupting her wandering thoughts. "I understand your preference for knowledge over ignorance, but doesn't the possibility of something that could exceed your expectations intrigue you?"
"You think I'll like it that much?" she dodged the question. "Be careful, some people might, you know, hypothetically, think you sound arrogant."
"But not you."
"No, but then again, I'm used to it.
"So I am arrogant?"
"And a show-off." She grinned – pleased with distracting him from analyzing her opinion on the unexpected. He, meanwhile, twisted his mouth in a playful grimace.
"In my defense, I am unusually gifted."
"Of course." He smiled, flashing a wide grin as he gazed at her.
She was about to make another snide comment, but then noticed that the car had slowed to a reasonable pace.
"We're there?"
"There's still a bit of a walk." His answer came just as the Volvo slid to a stop at the end of a poorly paved road surrounded by trees. It was completely dark now, and the moon was just a sliver of white through the windshield.
"I love you."
The words were soft, just barely giving shape to a breath. She turned toward him and was surprised by the severity of his expression. She could see so much there: worry, love, hope, but burning through all of that was a desire for her to believe him, to comprehend just how much he cared for her. He, in turn, watched the puzzlement in her wide brown eyes fade into understanding as she leaned across the small space and rested her head on his shoulder.
"I already knew that, you know," she answered quietly. "As difficult as it may be for me to grasp why you love me, it is much more challenging to deny that you do, given the evidence." She paused then, turning her face to whisper a kiss to his neck, and murmured, "And I love you, too."
He smiled, his arms folding around her, and pressed his lips to her head. They rested against each other in comfortable silence. He and she were at once two bodies, rejoicing in each other's touch, and two souls, curling around one another until it was impossible to distinguish where one stopped and the other began.
"We should probably get going," he spoke into her hair, then moved to lightly kiss her forehead, "or we'll miss the stars."
She sighed and moved to open her door, only to find that he was already there, patiently holding it open. She knew it was a nice gesture, but it was just another something that kept them out of balance. Maybe that doesn't really matter in the long run. Maybe he's right. She contemplated that for a minute. Perhaps her stubborn rejection of such small niceties was really a bit ridiculous.
She knew that in the end that was probably the correct conclusion, but it didn't feel ridiculous to her. She was generally just not a very lucky person. She was the kind of person who had to study everything, because when she had to guess she would usually guess wrong. And playing the lottery probably wasn't a good career option. But being with him felt lucky. Not like I-found-a-penny-on-the-ground lucky, but really, truly lucky. Which, of course, meant it felt totally out of balance with the way things were supposed to work.
So, on the one hand, holding a door open was an easy thing to do and shouldn't really matter, one way or another. But on the other, it was part of a larger concept that she still struggled to accept. It meant that this was real, and it was lasting, and that she deserved it. And she wasn't sure if she was ready to really believe any of those were true, but she hid her grimace as she climbed out of the car.
Just as she was about to start walking, he grabbed her unexpectedly in a tight embrace.
"I'm so sorry," he whispered as he held her. "I know, for whatever reason, you find it difficult to accept gifts or favors from me. I cannot fathom why. I doubt I'll ever truly understand it. But I am sorry. I'm sorry that you can't see how much I owe you, why I can never stop trying to give you things. You seem to think you are somehow indebted to me, but that's not the case. It's reversed. I owe you. However, even if I didn't, I would open doors for you anyway, because I love you, Bella Swan. And nothing will ever change that."
Perhaps she hadn't hidden her grimace as well as she'd thought.
She wasn't sure what to say, so she just held him tighter and whispered a thank you in his ear.
When they broke from their embrace, he walked with her at human pace to the trunk of the car. He picked up the bag he had packed for her. It looked enormous, stuffed as it was with everything she could possibly need. She smiled and shook her head.
"Now, we could walk, but it may take some time. Running would be more efficient, but the choice is, of course, yours." He looked at her inquisitively.
"Walking is very slow."
He smiled and scooped her up in his arms, cradling her to his chest for just a moment before taking off into the night.
He was always so peaceful when he ran. The motion was smooth and natural, and the joy and exhilaration showed clearly on his face.
It was only a minute before they slowed to a stop. He set her down wordlessly, and she gazed around them. They had run out of the trees and stood in an open field. It was much larger than the meadow had been, and had far fewer flowers. It was no less beautiful, however. And abundance of grasses waved gently in the light breeze, flowing like a wistful sea set on top of the land. In the distance, she could see the mountain thrusting up from the ground. They lay upon the earth as sleeping giants. Behind her, the forest from which they had come was far off, farther than she had thought. Then she turned her gaze up.
"Oh." She gasped.
"It's easier to see if you lay down."
She then noticed the blankets he had laid out. She walked over and sat down beside him, and they both laid back together, staring up at the sky.
"It's amazing." The night was perfectly clear. They both stared up into the sky, where thousands of stars burned in beautiful clarity. "There are so many."
They lay in silence for an endless moment. The quiet was peaceful and content, not wanting for words.
She was filled with childlike wonder, growing as the minutes past. Stars always made her feel immeasurably young. She was used to feeling young, though. Hanging out with a bunch of vampires all the time will do that to a person, she thought sarcastically. But this was different, deeper. This was feeling young and small and naïve and innocent. This was feeling the brevity of a lifespan, any lifespan, in the gaze of that which has no grasp of time, of that which burns through a million years without change. It left her in quiet awe and feeling content to rest in her own insignificance.
His words didn't break the silence; instead they seem merely to create a bubble around them for soft noises. "What's your favorite part?"
She described the smallness and the youth she felt. "I guess it's nice to know that even my biggest mistakes couldn't affect the stars. What's yours?"
He smiled. His eyes left hers to drift back up to the stars. "It changes. I suppose I used to like the adventure. The thought of flying out to the stars was fascinating to me." He paused to flash a brief smile. "That was in better times. During my 'rebellion,' I avoid the stars when I could. They, like anything good or beautiful, seemed to accuse me without words. It was hard to justify my actions, even to myself, when I felt the stars watching.
"After I returned to Carlisle, I found I could once again stare at the stars. And I did. I would lie out for hours, sometimes days, at a time, and just watch as the sky shifted above me. But there wasn't emotion in my observations. I studied them in great detail, but detached myself form the experience. It is hard to say if I had any part that I enjoyed above the rest until I met you. That's when I couldn't see them at all."
When she turned to him in confusion, she found him smiling as though he was holding back laughter at some inside joke. "What?"
His grin widened at the bewilderment in her eyes and pucker on her forehead. He let out a short laugh before he explained.
"Do you remember when I disappeared to Alaska?"
She nodded.
"I was technically staying with the Denali sisters, but in truth I spent most of my time laying outside, especially at night. I suppose I was trying to go back to that emotionless observation, as if through that I could prove to myself that you were of no importance to me. I certainly was eager to act as though you had no affect on me, even when nothing could have been further from the truth. Either way it failed miserably. I could barely see the stars through the pair of bewildered chocolate brown eyes that never left my vision."
He had rolled onto his side as he finished, angling himself so he could watch her face more easily.
"Sorry," she muttered, blushing deeply under his gaze. He laughed and gently lowered his head until it came to rest on her chest, with his ear pressed to her heart. She ran a hand through his hair.
Eventually, the inevitable cold set in, and they sat up. He reached over to the backpack and drew out yet more blankets and a huge thermos of hot chocolate. She drank from the bottle of steaming liquid until the warmth had spread all the way to her toes. The she wrapped herself up a blanket and settled into his arms. He grabbed another blanket and draped it over her for good measure. She rolled her eyes, but she still snuggled up closer to him. He kisses her head and they stayed there the rest of night, with her head tucked into his shoulder, until she woke with the sunrise.
As her eyes flutter open in the pink early morning light, she heard his soft good morning. The first thing she saw, before even the beautiful light enveloping them, was his golden eyes looking tenderly into hers.
"I love you, Edward," she whispered, her voice hoarse with sleep.
"I love you, too," he spoke softly in reply.