After the confrontation with my friends, I made my way to the apartment Bella shared with Alice as quickly as the rain-soaked streets of Seattle would allow me. I ran to her door and stood there pounding on it for nearly half an hour before I accepted the fact that she was either refusing to let me in or she wasn't home at all. Just as I gave in and slid to the ground in front of her door, Alice arrived home. I looked at her, silently pleading with my eyes for her to give me a break and let me in. She nodded and put her key in the door. I was dying to burst through the doorway bellowing Bella's name, but I forced myself to use some restraint and calmly walk to her bedroom door, which was open. I peered inside. I'd been in Bella's room so many times that it was as familiar as my own. I had been expecting her to have taken down pictures of me and anything else that might have reminded her of our relationship, but her room shouldn't be this empty. Her bookshelf wasn't empty, but her bedraggled collection of well-thumbed favorites were gone. The clothing that remained in the closet were things Alice had chosen for her, not her favorite hoodies and T-shirts. Her I-pod and laptop were missing as well. Everything that she would have taken with her to make a weekend visit home to Forks was gone. I left her room and went in search of Alice.
"Alice, Bella's not here and took a lot of her stuff with her. Did she say anything to you about going to Forks?"
Alice shook her head, looking slightly concerned.
"Did she text you? Maybe leave a note?" Another head shake. I searched the apartment for any clues Bella might have left about her whereabouts while Alice sent a text on her cell phone. After several minutes, Alice hadn't received a response, so she called Bella and left a voice mail. I called Emmett, Rosalie, and Jasper, but none of them had heard from her. Alice laid a comforting hand on my arm. "We need to give her a little time to respond. Maybe she went home to Forks and fell asleep. We should probably wait until morning before we start worrying."
"I can't go home, Alice. I won't be able to relax until I find out where she is."
"Fine," she nodded in sympathy. "You can stay here."
It was already nearly three in the morning, so I would only have to wait a few hours to begin the search for Bella again. I laid down on the couch as Alice went into her own bedroom, but I couldn't make my mind turn off. I had been so stupid. I had never wanted hurt her like I had. It had nearly killed me to lie to her and tell her I didn't want her anymore, but at least I'd had the comfort of knowing that I was doing the right thing for her and eventually she would be grateful that I hadn't let her give up on her dreams, but now I was completely doubting my decision. I was also doubting the motivation behind my decision. All along I had told myself I was doing what was best for her because she would never choose to put her own happiness before someone else's. Now I wondered if I hadn't pushed her away as a way of protecting myself, hurting her before she could hurt me. Throughout the course of our relationship, I had always been the strong, confident one, always reassuring Bella of how special she was and how much I cared for her because she couldn't see why I would want to be with her. She couldn't see herself clearly. Sometimes it was exhausting trying to calm her fears. Sometimes I felt like she was trying to push me out the door before I could leave her. I had always tried my best to show her just how much she meant to me and tried to boost her confidence.
Maybe I had secretly resented her for not believing in herself. If she were to come to Boston with me, I would always be wondering whether she were truly happy being with me or if she was just putting on a brave face. While she'd gotten better the longer we'd been together, even near the end of our relationship, she's always seemed like subconsciously she was waiting for the other shoe to drop, for me to wake up one day and completely change my mind. Her insecurities had always gnawed at me, making me wonder what I was doing that was causing her to doubt me, what more I could do to make her feel more comfortable. With the pressure of medical school and relocating across the country looming over my head, I realized that the stresses that had always been an undercurrent in our relationship for me had suddenly surfaced and I had ended things instead of taking the time to talk things out with her. Running away instead of a mature discussion. Very adult move there, buddy.
With this sudden clarity of mind, I could clearly see my next move. I needed to find Bella and really get down to the heart of the matter with her. I wanted to be with her, but it was important that she go to England and try out her wings. I truly believed that we could work through our issues, that our relationship was strong enough to survive long-distance, if I could just get her to listen to me. With a huge weight taken off my mind, I was actually able to get some sleep, but not before I swiped one of the pillows off of her bed so I could fall asleep surrounded by her scent.
I jolted awake to the sound of voices. My cell phone said it was just after nine in the morning. I got up and walked toward the kitchen, where the voices were coming from. Alice, Jasper, Emmett, and Rosalie were there. They all looked grim. I looked from one to another, willing someone to tell me what was going on.
Alice finally broke the tense silence. "I got ahold of Charlie early this morning. She's gone, Edward."
"I figured she would need a few days away. She leaves for England next week, right?" Everyone nodded. "Is she going to stay in Forks until she leaves?"
"She's not in Forks, Edward. She went to Jacksonville last night. She called Charlie and asked him to come move the rest of her stuff back to Forks next week to put into storage. I just got off the phone with her a few minutes ago. She hasn't been answering my calls and texts because she just got off the plane in Florida."
My mind was spinning, trying to process the new information and formulate a plan. "Okay, so she's really upset. I guess I'll see how soon I can get on a flight to Jacksonville."
Alice shook her head. "I don't think that's a good idea. I tried to tell her that you wanted to talk to her, but she hung up on me. I've tried to call her back a few times since then, but she's not answering. She told me she'd call me when she gets settled in England."
"Edward, I think you should give her a few days to cool down," Jasper suggested. My best friend could sense how upset I was getting. Having known me all my life, he was really the only person who could talk sense into me. "You don't want to scare her away, man. She was so upset that she ran clear across the country. If you don't give her some time, you'll end up making it worse."
I knew he was right, but it didn't make waiting any easier. I nodded at my brother and friends, unable to force any words out, then turned to head home and wallow in my guilt and pain.
True to her word, Bella waited nearly a week to call Alice. Alice assured me that she had tried to tell Bella that I wanted to talk to her, but Bella wouldn't let her get the words out. Bella continued to refuse to talk about me and even hung up on Alice several times after Alice pushed her too far. Each time she hung up on Alice, Bella refused to contact her for several days, driving the point home even further. I was dying to talk to Bella, but I was also proud of her for sticking to her guns. The Bella I knew never had the guts to stand up for what she wanted because she would be too afraid of hurting Alice's feelings. My friends spent a lot of time trying to talk me out of jumping on a plane to England and begging her to take me back. Deep down, I realized that if she refused to even allow Alice to mention my name, she wouldn't handle my showing up in England very well.
Weeks passed and I left for Boston with a heavy heart. I threw myself into my studies to keep my mind occupied and pretty much avoided my new classmates. Every time my cell phone flashed the name of one of my friends back in Seattle, I fell over myself in my rush to pick up the phone, desperately hoping that this would be the day that I would hear that Bella wanted to talk to me.
Summer turned into fall, then winter came, and I eventually gave up hope that I could work things out with Bella. Alice and Emmett kept me informed on what was going on in her life. She still didn't want to talk about me, but she was really doing well and settling into her life at Oxford. She loved her classes and professors and was becoming close friends with a small group of her peers. While it hurt, I was extremely proud of her for making the most of this opportunity. This was, after all, exactly what I had wanted for her. Without me around, she was turning into the strong, confident woman I'd always known she could be. I began to wonder if maybe our relationship hadn't been good for her at all.
I remained in Boston for Thanksgiving break, but planned to spend the first part of my winter break in Seattle. I found out that Bella had deliberately timed her two-week visit home around mine so that she could avoid me entirely. That was an incredibly painful hit, but not the worst to come. As the spring semester progressed, Alice reluctantly informed me that Bella had started dating. When I first heard, I went out and got drunker than I ever have in my life. I woke up with my face sticking to the tile floor of my bathroom the next morning and vowed never to do that again. I threw myself into my studies even harder than ever before. By the end of my first year of medical school, I was near the top of my class, but I barely knew any of my fellow students.
Realizing that I had basically isolated myself and turned into a hermit while Bella was moving on with her life caused me to make some changes. It made me crazy to think of her with someone else, but I knew that's what was best for her. I had pushed her in this direction and it was time for me to let go and figure out what my own future would look like. I decided to stay in Boston and take a few summer classes. It made sense because my Seattle friends would be visiting Bella in Europe for several weeks, so I would have been on my own in Seattle anyway. I worked hard in my summer classes, but I spent most of my time getting to know my classmates. I went to every party I heard of, and gradually began to make some good friends. I concentrated on my studies once school started up again in the fall, but this year I spent a lot more of my time around actual people. Through shared labs and study groups, I became very close with three people in particular. Peter, Charlotte, Carmen, and Mike became almost as important to me as my friends back home.
Peter and Charlotte were like Rose and Emmett, joined at the hip almost the moment they met. Carmen had just ended a long-term relationship with her high school sweetheart back home in New Jersey when she left for med school. She and I bonded over our recent painful break-ups. Toward the end of our second year, we actually tried dating for a little while, but we quickly decided we were better off as friends. The two of us shared an apartment that summer and became closer than ever. I dated around a lot during my third year, but didn't really meet anyone special. I didn't really have a lot of extra time for a relationship because this year our hours of hospital rounds were drastically increased and I really had to step up my game to stay at the top of my class. I really enjoyed medical school, finding working in the emergency room to be the most rewarding. I considered making this my specialty down the line. My father was a surgeon, and while I respected him to no end, I couldn't see myself following his footsteps.
I had always made it a policy not to date coworkers, but during my last year of med school, I made an exception. Heidi was a nurse in the emergency room and we had worked closely together on several cases. She was actually two years younger than me, fresh out of nursing school and extremely passionate about her job. We crossed the line between colleagues that respected each other immensely to lovers when we comforted each other over a lost patient, a little girl on a bike who'd been hit head-on by a drunk driver. Heidi was a lot like Bella in many ways, but very different in others. She lived with her heart on her sleeve and all of her emotions on the surface. Unlike Bella, she was like an open book and I never wondered what she was thinking. She threw herself into every aspect of her life with everything she had. It was refreshing and she was the first person besides Bella that I could actually picture a future with.
During my second year of med school, I had stopped asking Alice for details of Bella's life. I still kept track of her, wanting her to be happy, but it was easier to let her go now that I was beginning to build a life in Boston. We both managed to time our visits home so that we never saw each other. My friends visited Europe at least one more time each, and I was able to listen to their stories and look at pictures with Bella in them without pain. It hurt a little when I found out she was dating someone seriously, but I was also truly happy for her, especially when I started getting serious about Heidi. My friends and family met her and really liked her. She didn't fit into the group quite as neatly as Bella had, but I was learning as I got older that life didn't have to be perfect as long as you were happy.
As graduation grew closer, I had to make a decision about where to do my residency. I loved New England, but I really missed home and I couldn't see myself living that far away from my parents and friends for the rest of my life. In the end, I chose to accept a position with the university hospital in Seattle. I would stay with my parents for a few weeks until I got settled and found a place of my own. I had decided to buy a house that would need some work and spend my time off fixing it up. Heidi and I had discussed her coming to Seattle with me. She understood my need to be closer to my family and was willing to move with me. I seriously considered proposing to her. Our relationship was comfortable and I knew we could have a good life together. Her passionate nature was one of the things I loved most about her, but she desperately wanted children in the near future. I knew I wanted to be a father, but I wanted to get through my residency and be more established in my career before that happened. I wanted to be a hands-on parent like my own had been and the crazy hours of residency wouldn't allow for that. I decided it wasn't fair to Heidi to force her to leave behind her home and put her dreams on hold. I was sad when we ended our relationship, but my heart wasn't broken, probably because deep down, I was still comparing her to Bella. I had moved on, but my heart wasn't completely free.
The big move was coming closer and my life was suddenly busier than ever. Without Heidi to fill my time, I tried to be supportive to Jasper as he finished his dissertation and prepared to marry the love of his life. Unfortunately, most of my free time was devoted to long phone conversations trying to console my brother, whose marriage had suddenly imploded. Emmett was dreading seeing Rosalie for the first time since she served him with divorce papers at Jasper's wedding, but I could tell he was secretly excited. As for me, I knew it would be impossible for the best man to avoid the maid of honor, not that I planned to try. I had a date, a fellow future intern named Tanya that I had met during my visit to Seattle over spring break. She was actually finishing up med school at U-Dub and would be starting her internship with me in the fall. We had exchanged e-mails and texts after spring break and were becoming friends, so I felt comfortable asking her to be my date at my best friend's wedding. I wasn't looking for anything serious after my recent break-up with Heidi and I had a feeling my attention would be focused more on Bella than Tanya.
I knew that Bella was also relocating to Seattle permanently after the wedding. I was nervous about seeing her, but also excited. My relationship with Heidi and the subsequent ending had put a lot of things in perspective for me. I realized that my relationship with Bella had been very one-sided, with me taking control of most situations and her happy to let me. My tendency to be controlling had been an issue I'd had to work on with Heidi, but I had gotten over it rather quickly because she wasn't about to be anything less than an equal partner. I wanted to get settled in my new home and get into a routine with my internship, but I knew that I wanted to be in a new relationship within the next six months. What I had with Heidi, and more importantly, what I saw between Jasper and Alice and my parents, made me want to find someone I could spend the rest of my life with. I had grown up a lot with Heidi and I knew now that I could be a good partner. Yes, things happened like with Rosalie and Emmett, but I now realized that good relationships required honest communication and hard work on the part of both partners. Rosalie and Emmett had stopped talking near the end. He'd been traveling almost constantly for work and hadn't made their relationship a priority. I hoped he had learned from his mistake. I certainly had.
I wasn't expecting to fall back into a relationship with Bella. We had too many issues to work through before anything could progress on that front. But I didn't rule it out as a possibility. I would be open to anything she wanted, whether it be friendship or something more. I had to admit that I hoped for something more, though. Even after all this time, she was still constantly at the back of my mind. I smiled over the little stories Alice shared with me and desperately hoped that she was happy. From the sound of it, she had grown tremendously as a person just like me in the years since we'd seen each other. She'd become stronger, more confident, more outgoing, and more sure of herself. I held out hope that the changes both of us had experienced would make us stronger were we to start a relationship, on more equal footing than we had been before. No matter what the future held, I couldn't wait to see her and get to know the person she had become.
AN: I am marking this story complete for now. Someday down the road, Edward may decide that he has more to say, but I feel like he has told his side of the story and now the rest is up to Bella. Edward and Bella had very different experiences growing up. He had a stable home with parents that loved each other (Carlisle and Esme will show up at some point) while Bella's parents' divorce and the way her flighty mom raised her has left her with some self-esteem issues. Edward isn't perfect, he realizes that he can be too controlling, but Bella's neuroses made it even worse for him. He has acknowledged the mistakes he made in their relationship and worked on improving himself in his next serious relationship with Heidi. Edward has dealt with all of the issues he had with Bella and he is ready to settle down, whether it's with Bella or someone else. Bella may have moved on with her life, but she still has a lot of issues to work through. Therefore, the rest of this story will be in Bella's voice, so if you want to know what happens to Edward, you will have to read Last Kiss!