Chapter 7: Half a Monument

I point Angela toward Ben's camera, and she poses as if she's pounding in the last trail marker with a sledgehammer. Her skinny arms tremble with the effort of holding the heavy hammer still.

"Hurry up!" she laughs.

Ben huddles with her and points something out on the camera's screen that makes her laugh. It's only when I squint at the digital display that I see it: a ring, glinting in the sunlight. It's been on her hand this whole time.

I seize her fingers, rolling my eyes at myself. "Please tell me you haven't been wearing this for more than a week. I'm the least observant coworker ever."

She breaks into a toothy smile when she sees my own grin. "I wasn't sure…I mean, the timing. I don't know."

"Are you kidding me? Congratulations. You guys. I've had money on this happening some time before Memorial Day. I want my fifty bucks!" I crane my neck, looking around for Lauren. She's handing out snacks to the volunteers.

"You knew?" Angela casts a sideways glance at Ben, who shrugs.

"He didn't say anything. I just had a hunch." She's been asking for more responsibility and dropping hints about saving for a down payment; I could tell she was settling down with Ben, at the very least.

I'm happy for her. I'm surprised at how happy I am for her, actually. The way they are—nothing about it feels like that could have been me. Even after five years together, it's all giddy excitement, all moony-eyed peas in a pod. Cute. And utterly, absolutely foreign to me.

I'm satisfied with my work and my friends. I know how to be on my own and content; I've done it before. The sun on my face feels good, and I can hear the wind in the trees. The new hiking trail is something to be proud of—clean, safe, easy to navigate. With the influx of donations from Jasper's loved ones, we're ahead of schedule on completing our capital improvement projects for the year.

~.~

I've finally entered Edward's name into the contacts on my phone, thinking: another first. When we were in college, almost no one had cell phones. And in any case, he was always just…around. Face to face. I'm on the porch watering my attempt at a flower garden when he calls. His voice is tentative. I'm surprised that I can distinguish it; this is only the third time we've talked on the phone.

The first time, the morning after I read his letters, my call went straight to his voicemail. He called me back from the land line in the hospital room, holding the receiver up to Jasper's ear so I could say hello. We stuck to subjects that seemed safe, if not exactly easy. Jasper and Wild Clallam, for the most part. I probed just enough to tease out that sense of calm I knew he was looking for. Yeah. That's just like Jasper. I remember. I bit my tongue and changed the subject when he asked how I was doing, thinking: that's private. Thinking: I miss Ed, his soft tee shirts, his weight next to me on the bed. I decided Edward didn't need to know details about my situation—not now. Not while Jasper was his 24/7 concern.

The second time he called, he was at his apartment in Seattle. My files are here. Bunch of contracts and checks in the mail. I need to get some shit done, he'd said. He worked as a freelance illustrator, he'd told me. Magazines and book covers. That type of thing. And then Dad had a service in to clean up. My coffee table is missing—smashed, probably. I guess there was some broken glass; I didn't even realize. That's how I knew he was with Jasper when it happened, so we talked about that. A voice inside me said: he lives alone, then.

He was easy and forthcoming, rambling on and on. It should have softened me, weakened my resolve to keep my distance, but instead it reminded me of waiting for a different ambulance for Jasper on a different evening in a different decade. Staring at the detritus littering a different coffee table. Maybe the same coffee table, it occurred to me.

This time, though, Edward is hesitant. He has a request. More precisely, he is the messenger of a request.

I move inside to find a scrap of paper and scribble down details, mentally listing the tasks I'll need Angela and Lauren to handle while I'm away.

"Hey…thanks for coming here in person for this, and on your weekend. I know it isn't easy. But Jasper—he…"

"Oh, hey. Of course."

He talks me through the directions. Even though my destination is a mere twenty miles across the water, visible from the Dungeness Lighthouse, getting there from here involves a seven-hour journey and two border crossings. I rummage for a second scrap of paper to jot down schedules for the three ferries I'll need to take. Edward's voice sounds more relaxed as he describes the last stretch of road before I'll reach his and Jasper's childhood home on Lopez Island. And I thought Forks was remote.

"You can park your car at Iceberg Point, where Mackaye Harbor Road dead ends. I'll be over to pick you up in the boat. We, uh…my parents, that is…they actually live on a very small island off the coast of Lopez. It isn't served by a regular ferry."

"No ferry? But how do you get your cars across?" The words are out before a memory comes to me: Edward flustered and waving off teasing about his driving. He didn't know how to parallel park. I started late, he'd said, truly embarrassed. I feel my ears turn pink, alone here in my kitchen.

"Um…we leave them on the mainland. I mean, Lopez. All we keep here is a tractor, because…well, we don't exactly have roads."

"No roads?"

"Uh-uh. Reconsidering?"

"No. No, I'm sorry. Just surprised." I make a note to charge my phone.

"No worries. I get that a lot."

My brain wants to dwell on "a lot"—from whom? I shake my head. "Um, I'd like to bring a friend with me, if that's all right. To help with the driving. Eddie."

"Oh—wait, what? Did you just call me Eddie?"

"No, I was telling you…his name is Eddie."

"Um, yeah. We have a bunch of spare rooms. Or—what am I saying?—he can stay with you. You can choose, I mean. Whatever you like."

"He's just a friend."

He clears his throat. "Well, we'll make him welcome. Your friend Eddie." We say goodbye—the see you soon type.

~.~

I've rearranged the furniture since Ed moved out. The sun falls on my bed now in such a way that it helps me wake up in the morning. I'm getting used to the quiet, to the cupboards that don't empty themselves mysteriously. I watch my fill of idiotic reality TV shows. I don't miss Ed's nail clippings in the sink. I don't miss him complaining that my shower is fogging up the mirror while he shaves. Well, maybe a little.

I tug my duffle bag from the dusty recesses of the closet and let my eyes wander to a cardboard box at the back. With a shrug, I reach for it. My journals. The really old ones.

~.~

An after-work gathering at the Evergreen Lodge turns into an impromptu engagement party for Angela and Ben. Emmett shows up and gives Eduardo a hard time about his flip flops and tank top. Lauren and Eddie have a long conversation about the various skills an aspiring international spy should perfect. Knife-throwing. Skydiving. Poker.

When Lauren pauses to Google underwater welding on her phone, Eddie reaches a hand under the table and pats my knee. It's our code for Do you need to leave? But I shake my head. I'm fine.

I watch Ed across the bar, half-surrounded by his teacher friends. He looks rested, the color in his face rosy. I try to figure out what else is different, and then I realize: he doesn't keep his distance from wandering hands. Fingers brush his arm from time to time; I can see him trying to be normal about it. I'm ninety percent happy to see it, only ten percent wistful. He clinks glasses with Ben. Before he takes a drink, his eyes find mine. He gives me a cautious smile, then a real and glowing smile, raising his glass.

~.~

We're in line for the Coho ferry leaving Port Angeles when Eddie finally broaches the subject I know has been gnawing at him. I'm amazed he lasted this long. He's even gone so far as to soften me up with a milkshake from the Fish Shack. He relishes the term "Fish Shack milkshakes." Yum.

He takes a long pull on his straw, shuddering from the chill. "So, I'm trying to figure out why you aren't half as excited as I am to see this guy. I've never laid eyes on him in my life and I'm excited. Maybe that's why, huh? Or—oh, no. Did he lose his boyish good looks? You saw him and it was a letdown, huh? In my imagination, he had boyish good looks once upon a time. Don't ruin it for me."

I can't stop myself from chuckling. "Is there caffeine in that?"

"What do you think?" He holds his hand out, and we both watch it tremble like a leaf in the breeze.

"He's as boyishly good looking as ever."

"As ever, huh? Guess I'll have to discover for myself."

He's quiet for a moment, and I can only imagine the visuals he's conjuring up.

"I know you guys broke up the winter before you and I met…but you were on campus together until he graduated, right?"

The gates at the end of the dock have gone up, and the line of cars ahead of me starts moving into the belly of the ferry. I make a show of concentrating on maneuvering the car until we're parked aboard the ship.

"Um…we would have been. For part of my sophomore year—his junior year—we were on campus together...keeping a polite distance. But I spent my Spring semester abroad, and then when I was back, he was abroad." I roll up my window and get out of the car. "And then he should have been on campus for one last semester, but...it got complicated."

I flash him a look I hope says it's a long story.

Eddie sucks on his straw, hollowing out his cheeks. He's the only person I know who can look deep in thought while doing so. "Complicated, huh? So, off to France, left him in your dust, fast forward a decade or so to the hospital cafeteria?"

A memory comes to me out of the blue. A moment in an airport one summer—2007? 2006?—when a body brushed past me and left a wake of something that made my stomach flip. His breath, his hair, the smell of his skin. I never saw a face, not even the curve of a shoulder. I searched. I did. I reversed my steps and stalked the terminal for fifteen minutes, telling myself I had time to kill before my flight anyways.

"Sort of. Come on, let's walk up to the deck."

Between the driving distances and the ferry schedules, we have a long trip ahead of us. And I have a feeling I need Eddie to know this stuff. I start by telling him about Paris.

~.~

I never expected to see Edward on my last night in Paris.

I'd stayed on for the summer after my semester ended, using Alice's money to go in on a flat with two Egyptian girls named Kebi and Tia, whom I'd met through school. I told myself I needed a summer's worth of data on the parks, but I told Alice in my journal all about the crispy shells of macarons, the kids racing tricycles in the Luxembourg Gardens, and eating falafel in the street.

Rose was spending the summer backpacking around Europe, and I said Sure when she emailed me about crashing on my couch for a few days. We had worked out a vaguely friendly tolerance for one another by then. She needled me about going all out on my last night before leaving, and then Kebi's boyfriend Amun said he knew of a party in the 15th arrondissement, so—just like that—we had a plan for the night.

It was the end of August and hot. Rose made me trade my swingy skirt for her short tight one, and then nixed my sandals, promising that tight and short with tall, spiky platforms wouldn't look trampy. Not on you, anyways, she said. Somehow, she was right. She tossed a blousy Joy Division tee my way, slashing and twisting the sleeves into ropy straps. I felt cheeky and powerful. We got ridiculous then, and she piled bracelets on me like matching wristbands and pasted a tiny constellation of glittery stars across my temple. I propped my packed luggage next to the door in case we were out all night, and we left for the Metro.

Rose planned on migrating from my couch to a hostel where her backpacking friends were staying, and Amun said Sure about inviting those friends to meet up with us at the party. It was the backpackers who brought Edward.

I saw the shape of his neck from across the crowded room, and then I saw Rose watching me notice. It was him, all right. Eventually I found myself standing next to him in the kitchen, smelling his clean soap and warm skin smell before I looked to my right and was sure. I bunched up my courage and turned my face and said, Fancy meeting you here, and he saw me and blinked and said, Yes, it is. Fancy. I was taller in these shoes. We were eye to eye, and he was smiling. Without warning, the last year and a half fell away, and I was looking into the eyes I looked into every time we kissed. It confused me. It physically startled me, actually, and I backed away.

His smile faded as he nodded his head, his face retreating into that mask people wear when they meet strangers.

I knew I had about ten seconds of moxie left in me before I'd descend into some sort of weird confused crying jag, so I flashed him a lopsided grin and sauntered back into the living room, weaving through the crowd, hoping my ass in this skirt still looked the way it had an hour ago. I laughed at myself a little. This was how it was going to be, then. No matter how much time elapsed, I'd see him, and my knees would be jelly. But it wasn't exactly like when we crossed paths back at school. This time, I cared less if he caught me staring. And he did catch me.

I concentrated on soaking in all the messy energy of the night before a plane would take me back to my normal life. I munched on slivers of almond cake and tiny gruyere and mushroom pastries. I danced with Rose and Tia amidst a clump of flailing, sweaty strangers. Edward sat with Kebi and Amun for a while, playing dice. The news reached me that Edward was on his way to his own semester abroad in Italy. He'd be away through January.

It was late when I found myself sipping a third glass of champagne on a beanbag chair on the floor of the living room. A couple of American backpackers were parked on the sofa next to me.

"Isn't that the little cutie from La Poost?" I looked up to see the face of whoever was mispronouncing the French term for post office. He had a narrow forehead and a heavy jaw. He was gawking at somebody across the room.

A guy next to him sat with his legs splayed out, rubbing his crewcut with one hand. "Oh, shit, look at Edward."

I wondered where Rose had wandered off to. I let a few seconds go by, then threw a glance over to where Edward was leaning against the door frame, his head bent down close to some woman's head. She had wavy brownish-blond hair and a curvy body. I'd seen her before. She'd given me a hard time about not paying for my stamps with exact change. I shifted in my seat, self-consciously taking slow breaths to calm my twisting stomach.

"He's all confused." Crewcut made his hands into a cone and spoke in a muffled public-service-announcement voice, just loud enough for our little couch area to hear. "That's the mail clerk, bro. She's supposed to deliver packages to you. Not the other way around."

While they cackled, I downed the rest of my glass, planning my route out the door. I didn't necessarily need to see this. I rooted around in my bag for the wristwatch I kept stashed in there. Rose was oddly vigilant about hourly check-ins, but the next one was still a ways off. I sighed.

A shadow passed across me, and then Edward was sitting in the hard chair across from me, the naked bulb from the lamp making his hair glow.

"She shoot you down?" Ape-jaw twisted his mouth into a snide grin. "Aw, can't blame yourself. Maybe there's a general strike among government workers."

Snickers erupted from the couch. Edward's face was blank. "She has other plans." He took a sip from his beer and wiped his mouth, meeting my eye for a fraction of a second.

I don't know what came over me. Maybe the champagne made me bold, or else I was struck by some odd impulse to hand power to him, to make him bigger than these crude clowns. And so I said what I thought, loud enough so everyone could hear me. I crossed one leg over the other and rotated my ankle before I spoke, like I was making a grand entrance into the conversation.

"Her loss. She doesn't have the slightest idea what she's missing." My own voice sounded foreign to my ears, theatrical and oh-so-daring.

Edward kept his eyes trained on the beer bottle he was holding, scraping his fingernail in a line through the damp label. It seemed possible that he hadn't been paying attention.

I looked down at the tips of my shoes like I was playing coy. Except, I really was coy. To cover my awkwardness, or to follow through on this odd act I was playing at, I'm not sure which, I ran my finger around the inside of the champagne glass and put it between my lips, tasting sour and warm on my tongue.

The loudmouths on the couch were quiet now. When I raised my eyes up again, Edward was watching me. His eyes bored straight into mine. He leaned forward and set his empty beer on the table between us, and then—unbelievably—beckoned for me to lean in.

He cupped his hands around my ear and whispered. "Sometimes not knowing is better." Before I could straighten up and sort out what on earth he meant, he was gone.

Well, that wasn't how I thought that would go. I waited a beat before standing and teetering away, thinking it might look like Wait a beat and teeter after me was what he'd whispered. All I knew was I needed to move.

I opened and closed random doors until I felt fresh air, then darted out onto a narrow balcony and almost went flying, stumbling over legs. Edward's legs. His arms flew up to brace my shins, steadying me. A cigarette dangled from his lips.

"Jesus, Swan. Just take them off."

He had a point. These shoes were a hazard. I sighed as I eased my feet out and wiggled my red toes. Finally free. The stony balcony floor was cool and soothing under my feet.

"I didn't know you were out here."

He leaned his head back against the brick wall. I wondered if he was translating the view of dark purple skies and amber-lit buildings into a painting.

"Yeah. I'm out here."

I looked down at my abandoned pair of heels. I wasn't about to bend over in this short skirt to retrieve them, so I tried hooking them up with my toe. Then there was the matter of lifting my leg without giving an indecent show. I tried stooping over with my leg straight out in front, keeping my knees together by bending the other knee. Awkward. Edward watched.

"Am I bothering you?"

"No. I wouldn't call this bothering. I don't know what I would call it." He shook his head.

All I could seem to manage was to keep the thing dangling from my toe. He reached his hands out to still my ankle and pluck my shoe off. He passed them up to me one at a time, keeping hold of my bare arch. I looked down at him. He was gazing expressionless at the grey rooftops while he squeezed and pressed the muscles in my foot. His hands were warm.

"These shoes. Rose said…I thought…well, I figured I should do Paris proud. Try to glam it up."

"Glam, huh? Well, aside from being death traps, they suit you. They make you look…" I readied myself for this. He'd always had a certain way of seeing things. "Coltish. Like a colt. More so than usual."

I considered this. Colts were male horses, but there was no such word as fillyish. "So, not exactly graceful?"

His hands stilled on my foot for a moment, and a wry smile bent his lips. I could almost feel his gaze on my ankle. "Graceful is overrated."

"Not a foal?" I waited to feel the pad of his thumb stroke across my skin. I waited, but it didn't come. He resumed pressing the soreness away, never letting his touch turn into a caress.

"Definitely not a foal." He looked away from me, up at the sky. "That year or two…it's a big deal in the life of a horse."

His hands on my foot felt…comfortable. He'd always known how to do this without tickling me. Always. As in, more than a year ago.

I frowned. "Am I having a dream?"

He laughed out of the side of his mouth, pinching his cigarette with his teeth. "I really don't know. Other foot."

As long as we didn't make eye contact, this was fine. It was strange, but strange felt like what I remembered most about him, and at any rate we were on a balcony 5,000 miles from where we'd started, talking about young horses, Tunisian house music playing in the next room.

I switched feet. "So. Italy. I heard."

"Italy. In fall. Painting. It's practically a requirement."

"The light is supposed to be…something."

"I think I've heard that." He smiled and looked up at me. "I've always enjoyed how we understand each other, B."

I didn't really have a response to that.

"And what about you? Home?"

Non-sequiturs crowded into my brain, as if we were playing a word association game. Here. You. But I just said, "Yeah. Tomorrow."

He gave my foot a final squeeze and set it down before reaching to stub his cigarette out on the stony balcony floor. He looked out at the low, cloudy sky again. I couldn't look at any part of his face without remembering that furrow between his brows and his lower lip going slack. A lock of his hair grazing my forehead. The way he used to say under his breath Look at me. Look at me. And now: Sometimes not knowing is better. Was this what he meant?

"Well, I think I'll—" I turned to go.

"Wait." He levered himself to his feet in one smooth motion. "What I said to you before…"

I watched his eyelashes bat the air as he cast around for something to look at. He finally looked me in the eye.

"I didn't want you to do what you were trying to do."

I leaned my hip against the balcony railing and tried to read his face.

He glanced out into the night and back again. His eyes were dark. "Lumping yourself in with that girl in there. I wasn't going to do anything with her. But even if I did want to…"

My eyes blurred and cleared again; I didn't cry.

He continued, "Would you really wish that on her, knowing what you know? For me to make her feel something and then walk away?"

He held the wrought iron railing and locked his elbow, his ramrod-straight arm propping him up. His arm was a blockade.

Nonetheless, his body leaned toward me. "Well, you're wrong about it anyways. I mean, do you really think…this…is what she would feel? I was standing right next to her, Bella. As close I am to you now. Do you think her heart beat like this?"

He wasn't even touching me. I risked looking into his eyes, but they were focused somewhere around my collarbone. My chest was hammering like I had pistons working under my skin.

"Well…it didn't. Not hers. Not anyone's. No one but you."

"Edward…" I didn't trust myself to speak. I could already hear my voice breaking. What was I going to say—hold that thought until you see me again in five months?

He held my wrist and placed my hand on his chest. More pistons. His heart seemed stronger than mine. Wilder, even. He rested his temple on the top of my head.

I felt his thumb graze my brow, and he held up a glittery star in front of my eyes before dusting it to the ground. "I know how people like to talk and talk like nothing's private anymore. But don't become that person, Bella. Please. It isn't you. Don't even pretend."

Abruptly, he pulled me into a hug. I could feel the hammering in my rib cage now, his and mine. His hands were pressed to my back, unmoving, bunched into fists. I couldn't bear it. How could a person make me feel so safe and so shaken all at once? I need to say this while I still felt his arms around me.

"I still think about you."

It seemed like too much and too little to say. Too little because, well, obviously, and too much because every day was implied.

He puffed his chest up with a sharp inhale. He was sweating.

"I know." I heard Me, too in his voice. I was sure of it. He extended his arms and twisted away, all caution. "Bella, I can't do this. Not like this. I can't stay. I'm sorry."

He rotated me around to switch places with him on the balcony. "Here, sit."

"But you—"

"Sit. You can only see it from there." He squatted alongside me, helping me ease myself down to where he had just been sitting. I was still clutching my dusty platform heels.

"See what?" But then I saw it. Just a portion of the Eiffel Tower, floating above rooftops and in between two buildings. Call me blasphemous, but the thing hadn't captured my interest throughout this trip. It seemed so obvious and overly familiar. This view was different, though. It was like a secret.

"Oh. I like it like that."

When I looked back to see why he was so quiet, he was gone.

~.~

Eddie is staring into the middle distance with a glazed expression. "Christ, Bella. He was away until January? What happened when you made your move? Please tell me you did."

"Well. I meant to. I really did intend to." I take a deep breath. "I went to his apartment when I knew he'd be back from Rome. I had it all worked out in my mind. My grand gesture."

I smile in spite of myself. I had such a plan. Such a sweet little plan. Eddie is riveted. I feel my face fall into a frown.

"But nothing ever happens the way you expect it to. I never even saw him. I found Jasper in Edward's living room instead." The memory makes me clutch my coat closer. "His…pupils. I remember his pupils were too small. He was pretty incoherent, and it got worse as I sat there and talked with him. Bad enough to make me call 911. By the time they pulled up, he was vomiting and convulsing. I found out later that Edward left campus to take care of Jasper at home." I raise my head to look at Eddie. "And he never came back."

If he wants to ask me why I never made another effort, I'll tell him. I'll tell him what Jasper said to me that day, what he told me Edward told him. How Edward really felt. And how, after rereading my old journals all week, I can see he was right. For now, Eddie's face is mirroring my too sad face.

The ferry sounds its horn—our cue to make our way back to the parked car, down a ramp into Canada, and beyond.

~.~

AN: Thanks so much for reading! Many thanks to happymelt, midsouthmama, and faireyfan who multiply the fun for me (and minimize the errors and wayward rambles for you). If there really were a tiny habitable island to be found off the coast of Lopez, I'd totally have a party there with these ladies.