Prompt: Defy
oOo
Edward Cullen woke with the most splitting headache mankind had ever known. He tried to open his eyes, but they felt as if someone had glued his eyelids together.
Water.
What he needed was water.
Blinking, he saw the edge of a coffee table, and a green carpet.
Fuck, did he vomit on that?
He tried to remember, but his brain refused to work.
Water.
What he needed was water.
Finally forcing his eyes open, Edward tried to decipher where he was.
He had just decided that this was a very good plan, when a glass with a bubbly white fluid was placed on the coffee table with a shattering thud.
Edward groaned and turned away, pulling the blanket – oh, there was a blanket – over his ears and closed his eyes.
Bad idea.
His stomach and brain immediately went on a rollercoaster, making Edward jump and run, making it just in time to the bathroom, where he was violently sick.
.
When Edward woke the next time, he was covered with fresh-smelling sheets. The room was quiet and dark. Next to him, on the nightstand, was a large glass of water, a bottle of aspirin and a plate with a few slices of toast.
The ancient alarm clock that had once belonged to his grandmother told him that it was six-thirty.
It couldn't be six-thirty. He could dimly remember the morning sun shining into the living room when he had woken the first time. A look out the window of the guest room he was in confirmed his suspicion: it was six-thirty, p.m.
Slowly, he sat up, defying the lingering nausea.
He gulped down the glass of water, throwing in an aspirin in between.
His head felt like someone was drilling holes from the inside.
His stomach growled and he eyed the toast, but shuddered at the idea of food.
The only thing he wanted to do was to pull the sheets back over his head. But he knew that he was too old to pull off that kind of shit. And that Ro would never talk to him again.
That thought finally made Edward Cullen leave the bed, and the room.
The house was silent as he walked to the bathroom at the end of the hallway. Edward slipped into the shower after he'd raided the cabinets for a spare toothbrush, scrubbing violently. He wrapped a towel around his waist when he was done and hurried back to the guestroom, where he had no choice but to pull on his clothes from last night.
He felt disgusting as he began his walk of shame, passing the huge black-and-white photographs in the hallway. Those photographs he loved so much. One showed a rose, but it was only recognizable if one looked closely.
Rosalie was sitting in her room, silently typing at her laptop. Edward knocked on her open door and she turned around. She was wearing her glasses. She smiled, but she was clearly tired.
"Ro." He stepped into her room. "I'm so sorry." He leant against the doorframe.
"You were so much better over the last year," Rosalie said. "Ever since you returned from New York…"
"I know," Edward replied. "It was… It's just that Milo…" He shrugged helplessly. "We had him since he was a puppy. We picked him up from that farm. We were taking a walk, and there he was… And it was our honeymoon…" He shut his eyes for a moment, remembering that sunny day at the South of France, a lifetime away, so many years ago, when things had been good, when he had been happy.
He opened his eyes and took a deep breath.
"Will you help me bury him?"
oOo
