The Other Side of Me
Chapter 2
The downtown skyline shrank away as the ferry swept toward Staten Island. After I took a few pictures of The Statue of Liberty, Edward and I sat and rested in silence watching the water. There weren't very many people around us, and some were doing exactly the same thing we were; just there to travel to and from Staten Island, blink at the statue, but not enough time to stop. A few tourists held video cameras in front of their faces. One couple asked Edward to take their photo. Their embrace was captured on film, preserved forever, while the two of them dropped their arms and stepped away from each other the moment the photo was snapped.
I drew my journal from my bag to write down some of the highlights of my morning, write a description of the warm wind on my face, lifting my hair and twisting through Edward's. My sunglasses protected the wind from my eyes, but Edward had to squint and blink it out of his.
"What are you writing?" Edward asked.
"About today," I said. "I like today. I want to remember it."
"You ever leave home without your journal?"
"I hate when I forget it. It's like I forgot to get dressed. I have to find napkins to write on or something, anything."
"I'm that way with my sketchbook."
"I know," I said. "But you don't have it here." I'd rarely seen him without his backpack over his shoulders, his sketchbook and tin of pencils inside.
"Because I thought I'd head home after coffee this morning. But it doesn't matter. I haven't missed it. My mind has been well-occupied."
I looked up at him, his small smile.
Outside the Whitehall Ferry terminal, the sun beat down on us as we waited for a taxi. I lifted my hair to cool my neck.
Our next visit would be The Museum of Modern Art, and since we had to head back up to midtown, Edward took me to a restaurant along the way to break up the distance. It was a sushi place with outdoor seating, and we ate our lunch at the river's edge. The air was growing increasingly hotter, and there was barely any movement. Had I planned on a day out like this, I would have worn shorts.
"I don't know about this," I said, after my plate had been placed in front of me. I lifted it, turned it, let it drop. Maybe my lunch would look more appealing from a different angle. The change didn't seem to help. I'd had sushi rolls on many occasions. They were familiar enough. The rice, of course, was fine too. But those other shapes on my plate, the sashimi... I poked at the pink thing with a chopstick. It was bouncy. "It's uncooked. Is that safe?"
He laughed at me. "Just try it."
"I will," I said, though I didn't make a move to take a bite.
I pushed my sunglasses onto my head because, while dining, I preferred to look at people as we spoke. It felt more respectful. But with the sun cutting into my eyes, I squinted. Edward wasn't wearing sunglasses either, and the unfiltered sunlight brightened his eyes, just as it did the river. His eyes were exactly like the river here, but more vibrant.
I opened my mouth to tell him how pretty his eyes were, but caught myself. It was an odd feeling. A simple compliment to an easy, longtime friend made me nervous.
"Your eyes are so beautiful," Edward said.
I laughed.
"Why is that funny?"
"They're just brown."
"There's no such thing as just brown. Yours are really light right now. They look like gold."
"Thank you." I looked away from him self-consciously, as if what I was truly feeling inside—feelings I couldn't quite make sense of myself—would be exposed through my eyes.
"Is it strange that I said that?" he asked.
"No, not at all. Believe me, not at all."
An employee took an umbrella stand, rolling it on its edge, and stood it near us, then raised the umbrella. Finally we had shade.
I turned my attention to my plate, once again contemplating the pink, slimy looking globs, thinking about pretending to try it. Maybe I could distract Edward and throw it into the river. I was sure worse things had been thrown into that river, but he was looking at me with this smile on his face like he knew I was up to something. He wouldn't look away, even as he ate. So, I caved. I followed Edward's lead, picked a pink one up with chopsticks, dipped it in soy sauce, and tasted it, expecting to have to hide a gag, but I was pleasantly surprised by the flavor.
"It's good, actually."
"You hate it," he said.
I laughed and shook my head, taking another bite. "No, really, as long as I don't look at it or think about what I'm eating, it's good."
"Would you come back here?" He poured me some more Sake.
"Of course. And not just for the Sake."
Water lapped and my eyes drifted toward the river. There was a low, wrought iron railing encasing us in the dining patio, protecting the clumsy ones or the little ones from falling over the edge into the water. The railing was hardly noticeable under the green-leaf vine growing up and around it, like a thousand arms twisting and swirling in an effort to hide the dark heaviness of the railing completely. The leaves moved easily in a barely felt breeze, too warm to cool anything, and my eyes found their way back to Edward.
I took a moment to look at him, smiling at me when our eyes met, taking another sip of his drink. Edward, my best friend's brother. I hadn't thought of him in that way in three years. He'd become my friend, one of my bests, him and James. But this was the first time in all the years we'd been friends that Edward and I had hung out for a long period of time without James around. We'd never had the chance to really talk, just the two of us. I'd felt as comfortable as I always had with Edward earlier that morning, but as the day progressed, so did my discomfort.
Why was I this nervous?
I dabbed at my face with my napkin, ran my tongue over my teeth feeling for stray food pieces. Something in our dynamic was changing, and it was nearly tangible. I could almost reach out and touch it as easily as I could a leaf on that vine. I wondered if he felt it too, this change. Or maybe my imagination was running rampant. I spoke to keep my mind off of whatever this difference was.
"Edward, why don't you talk about girls you date? You avoided answering earlier."
He stopped chewing, swallowed, and placed his chopsticks on his plate. He let out a little nervous laugh.
"Be straight with me."
His smile slowly faded, and he wiped his mouth with a napkin, his eyes unfocused on anything, and I knew he was in thought.
"Okay, Bella… you're—we've been friends for a long time and... I respect you. I just, I have a ton of respect for you, you know?" He replaced his napkin in his lap, and sat back in his chair. "But I avoid serious relationships, so anything I'd have to talk about… let's just say that I wouldn't want to offend you."
I nodded, and smiled, hoping to let him know that I was grateful for his honesty. "Fair enough." The problem with me was, I couldn't help but press him further. "But how disrespectful are you to these women?" I eyed him, wondering if anything he'd say could change how I felt about him, dilute the respect I had for him.
He shook his head. "Don't get me wrong. I make sure the girls I date understand that I'm not into, or um, looking for a relationship."
"You wouldn't take advantage?"
"No."
"I didn't think so," I said, and took a sip of my Sake. "I was ready to give you a lecture though, if you'd answered differently."
"Jay," he said. "He's the one you'd want to lecture."
"Oh, I have. I definitely have."
"Me too." Edward smiled. "Your turn," he said. "Who's Jacob? From your graduation." He sipped his Sake, his head tilting back, his gaze remaining on me.
"Jake? We go way back." I shrugged. "We used to-"
"Date?"
"Well, yeah, we dated through high school. Up until graduation. But I was going to say, play together."
Edward raised his eyebrows.
"When we were kids! There was a loose board in the fence behind my house. We used to sneak through it and run around in the field behind it. Once, it started raining while we were out there. Usually we'd run home, but that day we stayed anyway, sliding down the hills in the dirt that had slushed to mud. By the time we got home we were both covered with it. My dad was due home soon and we didn't want to get in trouble, so we took a shower."
"You took a shower with him?"
"We had all our clothes on; we were trying to clean them. It didn't mean anything—god—we were only eleven. But we did clog the drain so..."
With a low laugh, Edward rubbed his forehead. "So, you broke his heart? Poor guy."
I looked at my hands, fingers linked in my lap. I pulled them apart.
"Nope. The other way around. Jake broke up with me. He wanted to start seeing this other girl from La Push. He said he was drawn to her. Said he couldn't explain it."
"Sorry." Edward looked at his plate and pushed some rice around. "I never would've guessed that."
"Don't worry about it. That was a long time ago. I still question whether I really loved him or if I was just used to him. I was definitely sad when he broke up with me, but I got over it and never felt like I wanted him back. We've been able to remain really good, platonic friends, mostly because my dad loves him. I think they're closer than Jake and I ever were. It's pretty funny when I really think about it. When I think about everything Jake and I did together, and then to think that he now hangs out with my dad."
"Was he your first, um…"
"Edward!"
"Kiss?"
I shook my head and threw my crumpled napkin at him. He caught it and laughed.
"Yes," I said. "He was my first everything, okay. My first boyfriend, my first kiss, my first, first, first."
"He's an idiot to let you go." Edward was looking right at me, the slightest curve to his lips, and it seemed like he really meant it. All I could do was look away and answer in sarcasm.
"You're telling me," I said.
Jacob and I, we really had spent much of our childhood together. It only seemed natural to take the next step with each other. The first time he kissed me, we were fourteen. I followed him through my fence and down the hill alive with ferns. We were out of sight from my house. Even if my dad had been peering out the second story window he couldn't have seen us. The only creature watching us may have been the oversized orange cat sitting at the top of my fence, but even he seemed to be busy bathing his bushy fur, a hairball possibly building in his stomach.
Jake turned around so abruptly that I almost knocked right into him, and he kissed me. It was fast and wet, and I didn't feel anything special. I always thought first kisses were supposed to be really something. So I placed my hands softly on his shoulders and leaned in; we were practically the same height back then. I tilted my head like I'd studied the girls on TV, and I pressed my lips to his and just waited. I stood there with my lips on his until his lips started moving against mine. Little by little we discovered, then taught each other, how we liked our kisses. We'd guide the other's head or demonstrate what we liked with our tongues until we got so good at it that Jacob thought kissing just wasn't enough.
"This is strange," Edward said, pointing a chopstick at me. "It's like we know each other, but don't. I know the New York you, but I have no idea about the Forks you. The little girl who was afraid of falling through docks but snuck through fences and took showers with boys."
"One boy," I said, and then I considered his statement. By now, my friendship with Edward had spanned longer than the two years I'd been friends with Alice before I moved away, but I had little idea of who he was before New York. Their family had moved from Chicago to Forks at the beginning of my Junior year. Edward was already in college, so I'd never met him. He came home during the summer, but at that time I was in Phoenix visiting my mother. Or staying at her house, anyway, while she was off gallivanting around with some man, leaving me on my own. She always apologized, though, giving me her justification that she'd married too young and she needed to make up for it before she got all old and wrinkly. I wanted to tell her that she'd been divorced for twelve years and already had plenty of make up years under her belt, but, of course, I didn't say that. I just read books or wrote stories and tried to find ways to keep cool. It was harder to keep cool in Arizona than it was in New York in the summer.
I looked across at Edward. "Let's go see some art and you can tell me about your first love."
"Art, yes; love, no." He tossed some cash on the table and held out a hand. His palm was warm and smooth, and when I imagined linking fingers with him, I let go, slipping my fingertips into the back pocket of my jeans.
"What do you mean, love, no? I told you what you wanted to know."
"I mean there's no love to talk about. I've never been in love." We left the quiet of the river behind, heading toward the busy street.
"There must be somebody," I said.
"You don't know what it was like having Alice as a sister. She drove all the girls away."
"Sweet little Alice?"
"Sweet Alice. Right. She was rude to any girl I brought home. In high school, back in Chicago? My prom date came over for dinner. I know at prom you usually go out to dinner, but my mom had to cook for us. I'm sure you know how she likes to be in control."
I nodded. Alice had done her share of complaining about her mother. Her mother was the reason Alice didn't have a boyfriend all through high school. She had to invent lies just to go to school games or parties because boys would be there. She was granted a reprieve for prom but had a strict curfew, and her mom insisted on meeting the boy well ahead of time. Mrs. Masen had cooked our prom dinner, too, so I could picture her cooking for Edward in her apron, her long dark curls, and her pink, smiling lips that hid any agenda she might have in manipulating her children's lives.
"Yeah, so I wonder where Alice gets it," Edward said. He told me that all through dinner, Alice kept eyeing Katie until Katie finally asked what Alice was staring at, and Alice said she wasn't staring at anything. She was just wondering why Katie had chosen that particular dress with her particular body type. "I almost choked on my steak. Katie looked at me like she wanted me to defend her, but I didn't know what to say. And Alice was kind of right; it wasn't the best looking dress. It was this bright teal color and had one of those—I don't know what they're called—where the waist is way up here?" He held his hands just under his chest.
"Empire waist?'
"Yeah, but it had all these layers from there down. She looked pregnant."
We both laughed. "So, did you say anything?" I asked. "To make her feel better?"
"I told her she looked fine."
"Fine?" I stopped where I was. A man in a suit walked swiftly by us, his briefcase squeaking at his side. "Not pretty or beautiful or sexy?"
Edward turned to face me. "Well, that wouldn't have been true, would it?"
"But Edward, it was prom."
"Sorry, Bella, all I said was, 'You look fine.'"
I couldn't help but laugh again. "I think you're more at fault for sabotaging that relationship than Alice."
"I know. It wasn't good. She wouldn't talk to me. I had to kiss her ass the rest of the night. I don't even think she smiled in the pictures."
"So, wasn't there any girl who prevailed over Alice?" I tried to picture Alice with her doe eyes and pixie cut being rude to anyone, and I just couldn't imagine it. She was always so bubbly around me. Sometimes too bubbly. She was friends with nearly everybody in our high school.
Edward started walking again and I fell into step with him. I could hear the roar of cars on the street, though they weren't in sight yet.
"Tanya came the closest. She held her own. But we were older. I dated her my first year of college and brought her to Forks for a week in the summer. Alice wasn't as bad as she used to be, but she still made it clear that she didn't like Tanya. She told me that I could do better while Tanya was in the room. Tanya came over to me and put her hand on my chest. She told Alice that maybe she was right, but I had chosen her anyway. Alice gave up after that. She told me later that she knew Tanya and I wouldn't last so she let if fade out on its own."
"Did it fade out?"
"It just ended. She tried to move in with me. She didn't even ask, she just literally started moving in. She brought her stuff over, a little more each day, and then she announced that she was subletting her apartment. So I did the only thing I could do."
"Told her not to sublet?"
"Broke up with her."
"Oh, of course." I frowned at him. "That only makes sense. I wonder if some guy is telling her right now that you missed out." I pointed at him.
"Let him."
~::::::~
Our tour through the Museum of Modern Art was fast. We only had two hours to follow the white walls brightened by color on canvas, or to take in the occasional sculpture or piece of architecture. People became ghosts here, barely noticeable as they inched along, taking their time, standing still, posed and gazing. It was an immense open place, but as quiet as a library.
Edward was like a little kid here—adorable the way he pulled me past the art he didn't really care for, and up escalators, all enthusiastic to get to his favorites before the museum closed. He'd look at the painting, then look at me looking at the painting trying to gauge my reaction. If he didn't think I appeared excited enough about the piece, he'd explain what he loved about it. Of course he liked the surrealism and the abstract pieces the most; those were his niche, what he painted at home in his free time. He said that everyone took something different away from it, and he couldn't quite fathom the possibility that no two people saw the same thing, that a lot of a person's perception of these pieces came from life experience. That was when it was my turn to watch his gaze.
"It's philosophy you can see," he said.
"Edward, I don't think I could have appreciated this place so much with anybody else. You love it here. We're coming back sometime."
"Oh, no Bella. I mean we can come back, sure, but, girl, this is New York." He held up his arms as if we were standing right in the middle of it, the entire city surrounding us, and in truth, we were. Standing here in midtown, art all around us, and then belted snugly by constellations of buildings and cultures, all of it triangled by rivers. We were in the center of it all. "There is so much more art to see than what is right here."
I wanted to hug him. I had never felt more compelled to put my arms around him than right then. I locked my hands behind my back, clasping my fingers to fight the urge. I smiled at him, and that's when he put his arm around my shoulders, effectively demolishing my will-power. Both of my arms wrapped around his waist and I squeezed, dropping my head to his shoulder, then hid my disappointment when we parted.
A painting caught my eye as Edward was trying to swiftly pass it. It was oil on canvas by Edouard Vuillard. I stood still and stared at it for a moment. There was a woman, part of her clothing the same pattern as the wall she seemed to be peeling herself out of. I pointed at it. "This reminds me so much of one of my favorite short stories. Charlotte Perkins Gilman."
"What is it?"
"The Yellow Wallpaper. It's about a woman going through depression, who's basically forced to live trapped in a room. She convinces herself there is a woman struggling to get out from behind her disgusting wallpaper. Sometimes it's one woman, other times it's several women, and in the end, it's her."
"Haunting."
"Exactly."
He stood still and quiet behind me, allowing me to take in the painting a bit longer.
"Edward," I said. "Thank you for the tours and the sushi and art. I know it was just a joke at first, but I really had a good time."
"We're not done yet, Bella. There's one more place I want to take you." I let him lead me outside to the edge of the street, where he hailed a cab, and then directed the driver to some uptown address.
It was simply called 'The Lounge.' Inside, the lighting was dim and the walls were a deep gold, as were the velvet booths. It was still early, so Edward, the bartender, and I were the only ones there. We ordered cocktails, and then Edward asked if I would be okay alone for a minute.
"I'll try to manage it," I said. I thought he must have had to go to the bathroom, but instead of walking toward the restrooms he headed to the piano and started playing. I knew he could play, knew he'd minored in music, but I'd never actually heard him play before. It was so beautiful that I almost wondered if he was really the one playing, or if it was one of those self-playing pianos. I decided that just as he had asked me to list all the places I'd experienced in New York, I'd have him list all the things he couldn't do, because that list would certainly be shorter than the list of things he could do.
I went to the piano and sat with him on the bench. "Wow."
"Thanks." He spoke without missing a note. "I work here, you know? A few nights a month, I come and play. Just, don't tell James. I don't need him showing up here and getting wasted and starting a fight."
"Don't worry," I said. "I won't tell him. Yeah, this place is a little too classy for liquid Jay. Even if he does make the best desserts known to human-kind."
"Those things were good this morning, weren't they? Do you still have them?"
I patted my bag. "Right here."
We decided the only thing to do then was to return to our booth and eat every last one of the canolli. They were a little melted and squished but still as delicious as ever. We didn't even have to eat dinner because we filled ourselves up with dessert. There was no room left for anything else.
"Bella, why do you think we've never talked like this before? We always talk about what's keeping us busy here, or just joke around, but we've never really talked about who we are."
"I think that's obvious."
"You do?"
"Yeah, one word, James. Whenever we get into any sort of 'real' conversation, he cracks some joke or changes the subject with sarcasm."
He laughed. "You're right, completely obvious. Even on our drive here, you were telling us about your mom leaving when you were little, and he asked if she was as hot as you." We both laughed at that memory but then his face relaxed into a serious expression, and he looked at me until my laughter faded into self-consciousness.
"What?" I wiped at the corners of my mouth just in case.
"How about you two? You ever hang out without me?"
"A few times. Not a lot, though. You were almost always there. Sometimes he just turns up at my apartment and says things like, 'I have to go to the library and you're coming with me,' or 'I have a date, help me find a shirt.' And one time he had me go to dinner with him and his dad because James can't stand to be alone with him. I made sure he understood it wasn't a date because… well, because."
"I bet he wished it was a date."
I sipped my cocktail instead of answering.
I knew that Edward was aware of James's mock-flirting with me, but I wondered if Edward knew that James had seriously asked me out a few times. I was running out of kind ways to turn him down. The first time he asked, two years ago, I thought he was joking. We were at the library and he pulled a book from the shelf, opened it, and without looking away from it he said, "We should go out for real—dinner and a movie."
I laughed. First of all, I couldn't imagine his hyper ass sitting quietly through an entire movie, and second, I thought it was just more of his sarcastic humor. But I knew something was up when he didn't laugh at his own 'joke.' He always laughed at his jokes.
"James?"
He closed the book and placed it back on the shelf. His finger drifted down the aisle, over the spines of the books. He didn't answer me.
"I think it's best if we stay friends. We shouldn't complicate things."
He was quiet, too quiet for James. He found the book he needed, silently checked out, and then walked me to a cab. He didn't say goodbye or get in with me, but he did pay the guy, finally speaking to tell the driver where to go. The next time I saw him was at our coffee house with Edward, and he was his regular goofy self again, making fun of me for missing out on the "good stuff."
"You're quiet," Edward said.
"Just thinking about how fast life or relationships can change. You can be as comfortable as ever just the way things are, not even looking for anything different, and all of a sudden, you wake up one morning and everything, everyone is different. Like when my mom left. My dad wasn't himself anymore. It seemed to take forever for him to get his sense of humor back, and he would force his smile around me. Even at six years old, I could tell the difference between his forced smiles and his genuine ones. His genuine smiles were so far and few between. It's just sad."
"Yeah, but not always. I mean some change is good." He put his hand palm up on the table and gestured with his fingers for my hand. I placed my hand on top of his and his fingers enclosed mine. "Like this," he said. "Us, together, without James. It's completely different, but I can't think of anyone I'd rather be alone with right now."
My breath caught in my chest. He had never said anything like that to me before, never held my hand like that, never rubbed my knuckles with his thumb like that, or looked into my eyes quite like he was just then.
I closed my eyes, his thumb still moving against my hand. I wanted his fingers to keep touching me, move up along my arm. "I know what you mean," I said.
"Bella?"
I opened my eyes and waited for him to speak, but nothing came.
He sighed, letting go of my hand. It rested alone in the center of the table. "You ready to go?" he asked.
I said I was, even though it wasn't true. I wasn't ready to go home, be away from him. Not yet. But I couldn't say that.
On our way out, I noticed the place was getting more crowded and some of the people, I guessed they were regulars, knew Edward. They nodded or shook his hand as we passed by.
"You and your secrets." I nudged his side with my elbow. He put his arm around my shoulder. I made a mental note to remember that a little elbow-nudge gets an arm wrap.
"No more," he said. "That's my only secret. Other than piano at The Lounge, I'm an open book."
~::::::~
Edward asked the taxi driver to wait for him while he walked me to my door. Well, really, he walked me to my steps because my apartment was on the first floor, which actually meant slightly underground. I thanked him again and turned to head down the steps.
"Bella?" he said. I turned around.
Again, just like at The Lounge, he didn't finish his thought.
"Is there something you want to say to me?" I took a step toward him.
"Sort of. I wanted to try something, if it's okay."
"What?" I wasn't exactly sure what he meant, but still my heart rate picked up.
He placed his hand on the side of my shoulder. "Earlier today, at the coffee house…" he inched closer "I thought I felt…" his breath was warm on my face "...something." His lips touched mine.
"Wait."
He let go of me, his hands fleeing to his pockets. "I'm sorry. I thought…" He looked at the ground.
"No, it's just—you're Edward."
"Yeah," he smiled, his face still down, but his eyes lifting toward me. "And you're Bella."
"You were about to kiss me."
"I'm aware of that, yes."
"Don't you think things could get weird between us if we kiss?"
"I don't know, since we haven't kissed yet." He took my hand in his. "But things don't have to get weird. They could get better."
"That's true."
"So do you want to? Is it worth the risk of weird to find out?"
"I think so."
"You think so? So should I um, kiss you?" He rubbed his eyebrow. "Or not?"
I nodded. "Kiss me."
He brought to my cheek, and he leaned toward me again. I tried to close my eyes, but they were stubborn, locked on Edward's eyes. His were closed. And his face was so close to mine, I let out a quiet gasp.
"Wait," I said again.
"Bella..." His hands fled from me for the second time. "If you don't want to, it's fine."
"It's not that, I swear. But can we make sure things don't get weird? If this kiss isn't what we expect, can we make sure our friendship doesn't change?"
"I promise, it won't change on my end. We've been friends for too long to let it go over one kiss. But to be honest, this…" he pointed back and forth between us "...what's happening now is getting a little weird."
"I'm sorry. I've ruined the moment. It won't happen again. You can kiss me. I won't stop you this time."
"I don't believe you. My ego's been squashed about as small as it can get in one night." He touched his thumb to his index finger to show me just how small his ego felt.
I closed my eyes, and then I let out an exasperated sigh. Now, my eyes closed.
"Edward…"
"It's okay, Bella. It's fine."
I looked up at him. "I spoiled our night."
He shook his head. "You didn't. Not at all. It just... it wasn't meant to happen, I guess."
I looked down at the cement, all the gum that had become a part of it over time, black and gray splotches now.
He lifted my chin with a finger. "Hey," he said, his voice soft. "Shakespeare tomorrow?"
I nodded.
He smiled and I couldn't help but smile back. "Go on inside," he said. "I'll see you tomorrow.
I walked down the steps into my apartment, my fingers on my lips. The lips that could have been on Edward's, but instead, they were so empty I could feel the nothingness on them, they throbbed.
