Catwoman 4
He waits for me outside of the church, hands in pockets. His white shirt and tan pants crisply outline long limbs against the green grass and clear blue sky. The line of his shoulders is stronger than Jasper's but more graceful than Emmett's. His smile is close-lipped, his eyes are round with interest and his hair shines like a crown. Clean Shaven. I know he smells good—back at the church, yeah, I'd been sitting in it, near it, breathing it. I am slipping on my sunglasses to spare myself some of his magnificence, but all it does is soften the glare with a rich green patina and heighten his masculine outlines and angles, pulling me with interest. Parked along the street is the silver Volvo he drives. I think it's made of melted harps.
My beater is parked a bit beyond, a faded red classic behemoth Charlie bought me in high school. It had been just enough of a vehicle to get me around Forks, but not too far, and if I had an accident in its tank-like shell, I was most likely the one coming out of it, at least that was Charlie's psychology. I never tested the theory.
"I like this little church," Edward says, looking over my shoulder at the thick brown-stoned building that looks like a small gingerbread and stained glass castle.
I join Edward's perusal, nodding my head with approval. "Many of my most poignant moments have taken place here." I'm talking in terms of marriages, deaths, and sessions of convicting guilt smeared with a kind of peace.
Pastor Ben bursts out of the arched wooden door, black robe slung over his arm. The much taller Angela hurries behind him, pulling three year old Riley with her.
"C'mon you two," Ben says good naturedly, gesturing to Edward and me. "The diner gets jammed if we don't beat the Methodists."
"Pastor Cheney," he introduces himself to Edward, gripping his hand, and pulling him forward.
"Edward Cullen," he says, allowing Ben to turn him toward the street, even while he looks at me, laughter in his eyes, a shrug of his shoulders.
"Wife Angela, son Riley," Ben gestures, but he never really stops. "You two coming? It's cubed-steak today, with brown gravy."
Ben has moved on to his car. Angela stoops toward the backseat helping Riley into his car-seat. "Might as well come, Bella. If you keep putting him off we'll just move closer to the holidays, and he'll draft you into all kinds of work," she straightens. "And you, Edward, this could stave off the deacons calling on you when you're trying to watch television in your boxers. They never phone first." She moves swiftly into the front seat where Ben is already starting the car.
And that's how we end up in the cracked red vinyl booth at Fork's diner, eating cubed steak and laughing at Ben's stories about Emmett McCarty in high school. Angela's father was the coach at Fork's high, so there was lots of material.
Ben was good. I'd learned more about Edward than I would have learned on my own.
I was wedged into one side of the booth with Angela. I sat across from Edward. He shared with Ben, and now Riley, who'd been loosed from the booster seat strapped to a chair, and knelt in the small space between the two men.
Edward's crisp white shirt had a smear of catsup on the shoulder where Riley had leaned against him casually munching a fry. Edward had been gracious, though on some level, he was a little thrown, but not thrown enough to accept Angela's Tide stick.
I accidently bumped Edward's foot for the third time. I apologized, "Oh sorry," just so he'd be clear I wasn't trying to play footsies. However, somewhere during the cherry pie, I felt Edward's feet trap one of my own. When I shot him a look, he smiled. He tapped the side of his shoe against the side of mine to let me know he was aware of what he was doing. I pulled my feet all the way back, my heels softly thudding against the booth. What the heck?
He was telling Ben and Angela about his success in the cell phone business, and how he got out. For years he'd lived at a high stress point, on call twenty-four hours a day. Then his mother, Elizabeth, had gotten sick, and it had been expensive. For a while he'd worked harder than ever, answering his fear for his mother with more work. But in the end, time became the most important thing. He tried to spend every waking moment with her, learning to give her much of the care she required.
She'd died a little over a year ago. After she was gone, he'd sold his company. Sense of the shortness of time and all that. I certainly understood. We had this great sad thing in common. Coming to Forks was him seeking a type of idealism, it sounded like to me. Forks was how he put the brakes on. I didn't know how to tell him, life would keep happening, even in Forks.
It was happening to me, as I observed him and wondered at this effect. My eyes were welling with tears as I sensed his sadness, his sweetness. I had to ask Angela to let me out of the booth. Being Angela, she followed me into the nasty little bathroom. I told her I was fine as I rinsed my face, but Angela and Ben faced people's sadness for a living, so she patted my back the whole time, inviting me to spill.
"I just had a flash back of you patting my back while I hurled into Alice's toilet during a party once," I said, drying my face on a paper towel.
She laughed at that. "Which time?"
"Oh come on, I wasn't that bad," I said as she smoothed some hair behind my ear.
"Edward Cullen is quite the guy," she said.
"He's my neighbor," I warned her.
"Don't make me quote Scripture at you."
"If you're a cat, he could be straight from the fiery place."
"Why's that?"
I told her about the cat dilemma. "Bella, don't you dare let those cats ruin your chance to get to know Edward. It's Eve and Adam, not Eve and Tabby."
"Angela…it's an emotional issue. The cats I mean. The cats." I wiped a couple of fresh leaks.
"Talk to Ben. He majored in conflict resolution. He's practically King Solomon."
"No, no, don't bring it up." I tossed the paper towel. "Another thing, Cullen's messing with my foot under the table."
"Just now?"
"Yeah, just now. When else?"
"I mean…what does that mean?"
"I don't know. He's like tapping my foot and stuff."
"Seriously? Is that pervy to you?"
"No idea."
"You can tell he's interested. He looks mostly at you. All the time. Even if you pick up your fork, his eyes go right to your hand."
"I threw bread at him."
"What? Like during communion?"
"No. Yesterday, at my house, I threw bread at him. Two loaves. He was talking about the cats…"
I gave her a few more details, but it still sounded nuts.
So we ended up laughing on our way back to the booth. My ricocheting emotions made me feel a little drunk, but I'd only had a Pepsi. Ben was chattering away, but Edward's gaze was on me. He seemed concerned. And his beauty left me kind of amazed, like always. Riley was sitting on his lap, rubbing his grimy napkin over Edward's face. Edward was gentle in response, smiling at Riley and thanking him for cleaning his face so well.
"Oh, Riley, you need to get off of Mr. Cullen, now. He can wipe his own face," Angela said with apology.
Ben and Edward went back and forth over paying for the meal, with Ben going to the counter for the check, and Edward blocked by Riley. We said good-bye to the Cheney's in the parking lot with a loose commitment to get together some evening. To cover my unease, I said we should also ask Emmett so he'd have a chance to add his perspective to Ben's.
"Good-bye, Edward."
"Bella," he followed me to the driver's side, reaching around me to open my door, "I hope I didn't upset you in there when I brought up my mother."
He was close so I slowly angled myself away. "No. I'm not that delicate. I just…the grief just comes out of nowhere. Like yesterday. It wasn't you guys. Just…memories."
"I understand. Believe me."
"I…shouldn't have thrown that bread. I mean…there's a restaurant in Missouri where I've heard they throw hot rolls…." I looked at him, and he was smiling.
"I didn't let it hit the ground, you know. I kind of feel like I earned those two. I mean..."
I laughed a little, and it grew quiet, so we kind of looked at one another for a moment. "I'm glad you told us about your mom. It helps to share those things. I think. But some days…it makes it worse. There's just no formula here." I sighed, also aware I'd made him sound like the keynote speaker at grief group. With him standing so close, and living so close, I knew I was pushing for some space. "What was that thing with your foot?" I said.
"Oh, sorry about that. I was trying to get you to see Riley's hand behind my arm. He was secretly wiping his greasy little hand on the back of my shirt while he munched a fry. Edward turned to show me the crumpled shoulder area.
"Yep, throw that one away."
We laughed a little. I felt a tiny bit of disappointment, but also relief. I was all over the place. "His dad bought you that seven dollar lunch, and his son ruined a forty dollar shirt. I'd say you've had a profitable afternoon, Mr. Cullen."
"I'd have to agree, Miss Swan. I really like the three of them. I think Riley could light a cigarette and take a few puffs before Ben would interfere. And what is a Tide stick?"
"You have many mysteries to yet unlock, young grasshopper." When I resorted to 'grasshopper' quotes it was definitely time to take a scrap of dignity home.
I got in the car then and Edward closed my door. He stayed by my window so I started the car and rolled the glass down.
"When we get home," he made it sound like we lived together. There was that road of 'ill will' between us, even if he had called it 'good intentions,' "I wonder if I could collect on my bread. I think you kind of owe me considering I caught both of them with the skill from four years of quarterbacking for the Chicago Comets."
"Oh.…" I thought of the heart arrangement the loaves were in on my table. I'd yet to break it apart. But more than that, he was prolonging this. He was lonely. He was kind of up for grabs. Of maybe he just liked bread.
"Sure," I said.
He jammed his hands back in his pockets. "I mean…if you're busy…"
I took in a breath. Of course he was close enough that the breathing didn't help. "See you at the house." Now I'd made it sound like we lived together.