A/N: I'm sorry, once again for the long wait. Family and personal issues, but once finals are done I'll be updating more frequently.

This is, in my opinion, the best chapter in this story. I know its really short, but I wrote a side-note at the end of this detailing how it felt to write it. That gut wrenching feeling that you get when you're really intensely in touch with your characters. I want them to be happy, but it's like they're telling me how important it is to take it step-by-step. This is new to me because it's stronger than my love for my Memento Mori characters.

So... hope I do them justice.

"How was school?" Edward asked, drying a dish I handed him.

"Alright, pretty boring and slow." I answered. "How was work?"

"So far it's been alright," he nudged my shoulder with his arm and we both knew what so far meant. "How do you feel about Little Miss Persistent?"

"You mean Little Miss Can't-Take-A-Hint? Annoyed,"

"We could do something about it…"

"I know,"

He put the dish into the pile of plates and turned to me, dropping the rag. "Okay, what's going on? At first I thought you were just trying to get brownie points with customer service but this isn't like you."

"That's Lauren Mallory," I answered picking up another dish and focusing all of my attention on scrubbing the crusty sauce from the plate.

Edward stood still for a minute, contemplating that like I just told him he had three months to live. He faced forward again and braced his hands on the counter. One hand slipped off and ran through his hair.

"That's the queen bitch?" he mumbled. "Well I'll be damned… why didn't you tell me this before, Bella?"

"I didn't think it mattered." I muttered.

"Bella," he said in a bewildered voice. "Do you honestly think I believe that for one God damn minute? Why didn't you tell me?"

He turned to face me now, removing the plate from my hands and putting a hand on my shoulder to turn me so I was looking at him. His eyebrows were pushed together and pulled upward in anger and disbelief.

"I don't want her to know who you are." I answered honestly.

"What? Why?"

"The one thing she doesn't have on us, the one thing that I couldn't live with if everyone knew, they don't know you, they can't really judge us if they don't know you."

"Other kids from your school have seen us before. Last Saturday at the grocery store that girl and her boyfriend, you said you knew them and nothing happened." He argued.

"That was Angela Weber, we used to be best friends, she's indifferent to me now. Lauren's different, though. You know those girls on TV whose daddy spoils them and they're super bitches—those shows are based on her life."

"Bella, you're being overdramatic about this whole thing. One kiss on the cheek or pet name could end this." He rolled his eyes.

"No, I just—she can't have that power. I know I'm being overdramatic, but it's bad enough at school, and I know it's bad at work, but I can't—" I sucked in a sharp breath as the front door's bells sounded through the restaurant at exactly four o'clock.

Edward's eyes darted over to the chef's window and his face contorted into a grimace as she sat at the counter and blew off the waiter trying to take her order. She saw Edward and winked at him.

Maybe I was I overreacting or it was just getting to me at that moment, but I threw my dish rag down in the sink and stormed out of the kitchen and through the back doors. I wiped the ridiculous tears from my eyes and slunk down the wall on the opposite side of the dumpster just wanting this day to be over with.

The back door slammed open a minute after I came out and Edward fell to his knees in front of me, an angry look on his face.

"So that's it? When things get tough you're just gonna walk away and cry?" he barked.

"What?" I asked. Edward never raised his voice at me in all the time I'd known him. He'd never looked at me like—like he was pissed.

"Bella, I'm not letting you walk away from me, okay?" his hands grabbed my shoulders and he shook a little. "I'm scared—every fucking day—that you'll just walk out on me. I know you're going through hell right now and it's because of me—"

"No, Edward—"

"You can't keep denying it!"

"It's my decision, it's my choice! I choose you! I choose only you, over my friends, my family, everything!"

"You can change your mind one day. Your mom is right, she's absolutely right…" he pulled his hands away from me and stood up to pace and run his hands through his hair compulsively.

Part of my mind began to panic at the irrational crap he was sputtering, and part of my mind knew that he was finally putting his fears out there and that we weren't as secure as we thought we were.

He paced back and forth, muttering things under his breath while his mind deliberated and butted heads. I wondered what he was thinking; feeling like nothing good could come from this.

One wrong step and this—us—we could be done for. It was relationship sadomasochism that we were in. One wrong step and we would both end up completely destroyed.

But if we could do this, if we could make it and really learn that love truly does conquer everything, money, bills, school, impossibility. We were meant to be together, we both knew this so thoroughly and completely that neither one could deny it, but it was just so… hard.

"I don't think I'm good enough." I blurted.

His pacing stopped and he turned to me, eyes incredulous. His mouth opened to speak but he snapped it closed again. He swallowed a couple times and when he spoke his voice cracked.

"I think I'm boring and I can't hold your interest for much longer." He whispered.

"I'm afraid you'll ask me to leave,"

"I'm afraid to go to sleep because sometimes I dream that you're not there in the morning."

"The last time we had sex I scratched your shoulders and neck so girls would see it at work and leave you alone."

"I put hickies on your hips because when you stretch, my sweatshirt goes over your hips and I know how much high school guys feel intimidated by experienced girls." He didn't pause as he kept listing. "I have a picture of you sleeping in my wallet because I'm afraid I'll never see it again when I come home. I have nightmares about your dad busting down the door with evidence of statutory rape before you were eighteen and hauling me off to jail—on our wedding day."

"You dream about us getting married?" I whispered.

He nodded. "Yeah, all the time,"

"Me, too," he sat on the ground in front of me, his eyes softer now and more like the Edward I loved eyes. "I think about how good you would look in a tux."

He laughed. "Whenever I see a white dress I think about you in it, and us somewhere on a beach without a care in the world."

"That'll be us, someday," I whispered. He picked up my hand and kissed the back of it.

"When I get out of student loans and start a job as a doctor in some big hospital with a big paycheck I'll take you to Bermuda on pink sandy beaches."

I leaned forward on my knees and wrapped my arms around his neck. We stayed like that for a moment, just the two of us in love and sad but still together and hopeful.

"We need to get back to work." I sighed.

"I know," he responded lamely. "I need to get to school, too."

We walked back inside and while he got his backpack and books and I contemplated slowly. He walked out through the server's door and upon seeing him Lauren perked and so did her chest.

He was just about to walk by her and open the door when I tugged on his arm and he turned around, a smile playing on his lips. I reached up on the tips of my toes and pressed my lips firmly to his, reveling in the sense of purposefulness.

A/N: Thoughts, questions, opinions, predictions? Anything's welcome.

Don't forget to review!