A/N: I don't even know what to say, I knew this story would be slow, but this was really slow…sorry! hopefully the length of this chapter partially makes up for the wait

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Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight :(

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Song for this chapter: I'd lie- Taylor Swift

BPOV

"Bella you better hurry up other wise the busses are going to leave without you!" Alice shouted at me over the phone as I packed the last of my necessary items for our week at camp.

"Alice I promise I'll be there in two minutes." I sighed. "Just relax."

I was looking forward to this week, a week away from home and work, and a week with friends. But the one thing I couldn't stop thinking about was the fact that Edward was going to be there.

I couldn't help but wonder how things would pan out with us being together for a week. But then again, 152 people from my school were going, so maybe we wouldn't even see each other. At a place like Hume Lake, if you didn't want to see people, you didn't have to. It was such a big place that it was hard to find anyone unless you already knew where they would be.

My dad hurried me to the loading zone where all of the busses were and helped jam in my bags while I signed in and turned in all my medical forms. There were so many people around us waiting to get on the busses, but I found that the one person I wanted to see was the one person that seemed to not be in the room. I walked back outside to find him and a few other guys loading the last of the bags, which meant mine.

"Geeze Bella," one of them groaned as he lifted up my bag, "What's in this thing?" he asked. "It weighs as much as Edward." He laughed as he passed the bag on to Edward who shoved it into the bus with ease.

"Sorry," I shrugged, "I tend to over pack some times."

I looked around the crowd and found Alice easily; she was on top of a tree trunk directing people where to go.

"Bella!" she hugged me. "Guess what, were on the same bus!" she smiled.

"I know I found out when I checked in," I laughed. "Should we go grab our seats?" I asked.

"I don't know if they're letting people in yet, but yeah sure, why not." She laughed.

I don't know what I would have done if Alice and I weren't on the same bus. Our school had three different busses and there were definitely some people here that I didn't want to be on the same bus as.

We couldn't decide where we wanted to sit so we ended up grabbing seats right in the middle so we wouldn't be too far back or too far forward. Unfortunately right after we chose our seats, I noticed Jessica walk on to our bus…but at least she wasn't sitting too close to us.

I never really officially closed things off with Jessica but I figured after all this time she probably got the hint. I hadn't really talked to her at all since April but I didn't really feel the want to open all of those old wounds again so I just sat quietly as she walked past us.

But once I saw Edward walk onto our bus it was time for drastic measures. Why were the gods of the universe doing this to me? There is only so much a person -can take. Alice, being oh-so-observant, noticed me sigh.

"What's wrong?" she asked. I didn't even have it in me to respond so I just glanced over in his direction and she understood. She tried to take my mind off of it, but Edward kept walking on and off the bus, as if he forgot something or wanted a drink of water or was just doing it to annoy me. I doubted the latter but some part of me wanted him to know it was bothering me.

"Bella," he smiled as he walked on to the bus (hopefully for the last time) and walked straight up to me. I had been trying to look right past him but apparently that didn't work. Instead, to my shock, surprise and displeasure, he sat right on top of me.

"Are you excited for Hume Lake?" he asked in a lively tone, sounding like a two year old. A very, very, very cute two year old.

"Um…yeah I guess…" Words were failing me.

"Me too." He smiled.

"Uh, Edward…can you get off me?" I asked, feeling my cheeks starting to turn red.

He laughed and stood up, walking back to his seat. Alice let me sit in my thoughts for a few minutes while we finally pulled out of the parking lot and headed towards the freeway.

How had this happened? I was so confused again! I had thought I had finally gotten everything straight with my emotions and hidden feelings but Edward had to go and mess them up again. I couldn't even deal with myself anymore so I decided to join Alice in a nap.

I woke up in a place free of troubles, free of cares, free of everything. But that was just In n Out.

I shared a few awkward glances with Edward until everyone had to get back on the busses. We took our same seats as before, but I was so much more aware of Jessica sitting two seats behind me that I couldn't fall back to sleep. I tried to focus on the movie that was playing until we got there.

Alice drifted in and out through out the ride and would occasionally ask me how I was doing. I would lie, but she seemed too determined to have a good time that she pretended she didn't know I was lying.

After what seemed like an eternity, we finally arrived at Hume. Now I was excited for the week and I promised myself I wouldn't spend it worrying about Edward. I would enjoy myself no matter what.

Alice and I were of course in the same cabin so we walked up the hill to our cabin with the other nine girls in our cabin and quickly settled in. Alice and I somehow managed to get the noisiest bunks in the room but I was determined to not let anything ruin my good mood.

"I'm impressed Bella." Alice laughed as I tried to get the stain out of my shirt with a smile on my face.

"I told you Alice, nothing is getting in my way of having a good time. Not Edward, not this stain," I struggled, almost getting it all out. "Nothing." I finished.

"Ok well hurry up so we can get outside and watch all the cute guys play volleyball!" she smiled.

I rolled my eyes but walked out with her regardless and headed over to the volleyball courts. We met a few people we had seen last summer and a few we hadn't met before, it was nice. A few other girls from our school joined us, thankfully not Jessica, and that brought over even more people.

"Ooh!" Alice squealed. "There's Max!" she pointed. "Remember I met him last year?"

"More like stalked him last year." I joked.

"Shhh!"

"Alice?" He walked up to us.

"Oh hey." Alice tried to play it cool.

"I just wanted to say hey," he explained. "do you remember we met last year?" he asked.

"Oh yeah, I remember." She was still trying to play it cool. "What have you been up to?" she asked.

"Not much, my friends and I just got here a few days ago."

"Oh, we just got here today."

"That's cool," he looked around and saw that his friends were heading back to their cabins. "Well I better go, I'll see you around."

"Bye Max."

Alice and I squealed for a few minutes after he left but soon enough the curfew bell rang through out the camp and we all had to head back to our cabins.

"Well I'd say we had a very successful first day at camp." Alice reflected as we started up the descent of the ominous, tortuous hill up to our cabin.

"I'd say so too." I smiled. "And that guy Max you met last year, I didn't remember him being that cute!" I laughed.

"Ok girls, lights out in fifteen!" our counselor announced as Alice and I walked in.

There wasn't much time for talking after we changed but we would have all week to talk. I crashed on my bed and was instantly exhausted, the weight of the whole day just now dropping on me.

I closed my eyes but for some reason saw something else besides the darkness of my eyelids. Edward's smiling face flashed into my mind but was gone as quickly as it had come. It was so clear as if I had just opened my eyes and he was standing right there. This wasn't surprising to me since I had probably thought about him more today than in a while, but I still wasn't happy about it.

I had opened my eyes in shock but after a few minutes I closed them again and hoped that maybe my dreams would resolve things for me.

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The next few days went by quickly, and thankfully, Edward free. I was so proud of myself that I had hardly thought about him in the past three days. I wished that we could have had this week to talk like we used to, but he was so hard to figure out. It seemed that if I acknowledged him, he thought nothing of it, but if I ignored him, he would go out of his way to say hi to me. It was beginning to really get on my nerves, but I was determined to not let it get to me.

Alice and I had been in our cabin all afternoon, talking and resting, the lack of sleep was really starting to get to us. We had to wake up pretty early every morning for breakfast.

"I am so tired of these walls." Alice finally spoke after another one of our thoughtful silences.

"Agreed. Let's go get a smoothie or something." I got up and started to put my jacket on.

"Wait, I need to fix my hair first." Alice declared. "Yours could use some help too." She smiled gently.

"Ugh fine, do your worst." I reluctantly let her play Bella Barbie for the first time this week.

"Yay!" her smile was far too wide and I tried to block out the next ten minutes of my life.

Not soon enough we were walking down to the smoothie shop near the lake. The walk down the hill wasn't too bad, but I knew we were going to have to walk up it again soon, and did not take comfort in that fact.

"Hi, what can I get for you?" the man at the counter asked us.

"Two ice blended mochas please." Alice ordered for the both of us.

We sat on the stools on the dock where the pick up window was and I noticed two things.

First thing, Edward was walking towards the smoothie shop.

Second thing, the ordering window was far too close to the pick up window.

"Bella!" he smiled.

"Hey Edward."

He ordered and gave the man his money before turning back to me.

"Bella, why do you hate me??" he asked, playfully exaggerating each word.

"What are you talking about?" I asked.

"You never talk to me anymore." He looked sad.

"You never talk to me anymore." I pointed out.

Alice grabbed both of our drinks and I began nervously sipping on mine. I felt so terrible. I didn't realize Edward even noticed or cared that I had been kind of avoiding him lately.

"I'm sorry, I just never see you anymore."

"Okay," Edward grabbed his drink but kept his eyes on me. "We need to talk more from now on." He insisted.

"Okay." I smiled, all the while kicking myself. It was just then I noticed he had a guitar in his hand. "What's with the guitar?" I asked.

"I'm writing a song for the talent show." He explained.

"Really?" I asked. "I didn't know you played the guitar."

He nodded and smiled.

"Can I hear the song?" I asked.

"Well…it's not finished yet…"

"Please?" Alice asked.

"Okay, okay." He rolled his eyes and sighed, taking a seat next to me and starting to strum on his guitar.

I was in a daze.

That's the only way to describe what was happening.

I turned to Alice and mouthed 'kill me', she laughed quietly, not realizing how serious I was.

I had spent most of our week here trying to avoid Edward and thoughts of Edward, but here he was, singing and playing the guitar far too beautifully.

This was not good.

Edward continued playing, and about halfway through, I tried not to focus on beating myself up, but tried to focus on the song. I couldn't really understand all of the lyrics, but the melody was heartbreakingly amazing.

He started to fade out, apparently the part that he hadn't finished.

"Yeah, that's pretty much all I've got so far."

"That was great!" I smiled.

"Thanks." He strummed on the guitar mindlessly.

"Ok well we're going to go down to the lake, but we'll see you later." I smiled.

"Bye guys." He gave me a quick hug and grabbed his drink, heading in the opposite direction.

"Gahhhh!" I whined to Alice. "Why, why, why???"

"Bella, think of it this way, maybe it's a good thing." Alice tried to comfort me.

It didn't work. I glared at her, not happy with her optimism.

"Can we please just forget about it." I sighed. "Let's go see who's on the lake." I suggested.

"What ever you say." Alice smiled smugly. She thought she was right about this, but I really doubted this was a good thing.

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Alice walked into the game arena after dinner that night and I still wasn't very happy. And something that made me especially unhappy was the fact that our friend Anna had saved seats for us in the same row as Edward. That meant that we had to walk past him to get to our seats.

This place used to be a church so there were rows of pews we were all sitting in. Tonight was the last night at camp so we would watch a clip of everything they had recorded of us over the week and then we would head up to victory circle.

"Not so fast," Edward put up his feet after Alice passed him so I couldn't get past him. "What's the magic word?" he asked teasingly.

"Please?" I asked.

"Nope that's not it, what are the three magic words?" he asked again.

"Now it's three words?" I asked incredulously. Suddenly I realized exactly what he was hinting at, three words, but that hit way too close to home. There was no way I was saying that. "Hmm…" I pretended not to know what he wanted me to say.

"Oh fine, I see how it is." He laughed and rolled his eyes, but there was a hint of sadness as he let me past. I felt bad, especially after learning that he noticed how I had been avoiding him.

"Just kidding, I love you Edward!" I teased as I passed him.

"I love you too Bella!" he laughed along with me and now it was my turn to roll my eyes.

If only he knew how almost true that statement was. I say almost true because I knew I didn't love Edward, but I knew I cared for him, a lot. More than I should.

I wasn't pulled out of my thoughts until I saw everyone around me stand up and head out the doors. I was half way asleep as everyone headed up to victory circle. This week had really taken a lot out of me, not getting sleep as well as worrying about Edward, I wasn't sure I'd be able to stay awake at Victory Circle.

It was a place up further into the woods than most of our cabins were where everyone sang around a humongous campfire and talked about the good times they had this week. I didn't understand how people could do that. Sure, I had a good time here, but I would never stand up in front of a thousand people and explain to them how I'm going back a changed person or not.

To my extreme surprise, about half way through, Edward stood up. His voice was shaky and full of emotion.

"I've had a lot of problems with…substances…back in my home town. I couldn't go a day with out some form of high; I became way too dependent on everything. But," he took a deep breath, "all of the supportive cabin counselors along with the campers this week have made me determined to change. I don't want to go back and be the same person, and this week gave me a lot more confidence to believe that I can change."

Everyone around the campfire started clapping as Edward took his seat next to his friends who were patting him on the shoulder supportively. I felt even worse for ignoring him now. I felt like if I hadn't then I could have helped or something. I don't know if he would have wanted help, but I felt like it could have been better if I wasn't so wrapped up in all my confusion.

Nothing else interesting happened the rest of the night, so I found myself thinking about Edward way more than I had even this week. With all of this dangerous thinking my mind was doing, it's no surprise that I had a dream about him.

He was sitting on a pier with me and our friends Woody and Kenzie.

"Bella, who do you love?" Woody asked me.

"I don't know…" I stuttered, "…Not really anyone at the moment." I tried to sound like I wasn't lying. "Who do you love?" I tried to get the spotlight off of me.

"No one really." He responded.

"Woody, your girlfriend is right next to you." I reminded him.

He looked over to Kenzie. "Oh right, I love her." He smiled.

She didn't seem to hear us, and neither did Edward, so they were both sitting there staring out to the lake.

"Bella," Edward asked. "Do you think I should get my hair cut?"

"No!" I responded.

"Bella, are you okay?" I heard Alice's voice, but I couldn't see her.

"Alice?" I looked around for her.

"I'm right here Bella," she said and everything started fading to black until I opened my eyes.

"Alice!" I accused her. "Why the hell did you wake me up?" I asked.

"Bella it's already 8:15 and we have to go to breakfast soon." She explained.

I sighed and frowned. "I was having a good dream."

She laughed as she walked back into the bathroom. "About what?"

"I don't really know," I answered. "Woody, Kenzie and Edward were there. We were sitting on the pier of the lake."

"Interesting…"

"Yeah," I tried to get lost in my thoughts, thinking what would have happened next in my dream; I always liked dreams much more than reality.

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I blinked and suddenly we were home, I instantly missed camp. I didn't want to be home; it was too boring and gave me way too much time to think.

That night I saw that Edward was online and decided to talk to him.

B: hey hey

E: hey, what's up?

B: nothing…bored without camp lol

E: same! I miss it already.

B: yeah and I really just noticed how boring it is here, I miss everything we could do there

E: yeah I miss not having any temptations or anything. Like tonight my friends were drinking and smoking, and it was sooo hard to say no, but I did!!!

B: :))) Yay!

E: :))))

B: did you get the cd from that band at Hume?

E: yeah I got the white one, that song with the piano is my favorite. I listen to it every night before I go to sleep

B: aw that song makes me cry! But I do love it

E: yeah it's only the second song ever to make me cry

B: yeah its like crying in a good way though at least for me. But that cd is definitely my new favorite car cd haha

E: yup. Did you hear my song?!?!?!

B: I heard part of it when you were playing it before loading the buses...but i still need to hear the whole thing! i heard it was really good :))

E: idk I guess it is haha. Im recording it though, got the guitar part done today, and working on the vocals tomorrow.

B: no way that's really cool :)) I call a copy once you're done!

E: haha defintely

B: :))

E: who'd you heard it was good from?

B: um like everyone lol. Be proud. :)

E: haah thanks

B: oh, I kind of wanted to talk to you about something…I'm really sorry for avoiding/ not talking to you lately…feel really bad cause I didnt realize you noticed and I thought I was being all sneaky about it.

E: yeah what's up with that?!?!

B: im sorryyyy :///

E: why though?

B:i guess i kinda realized that i was getting closer to some graduated people mostly you, so i guess i figured if i didnt get more invloved then it wouldnt make as much of a difference when you left…but obvoiusly at hume I was like wow this is dumb haha

E: I'm not leaving though!!! Haha

B: well you know what I mean…just not around…

E: yeah :/

B: but now I feel really stupid because I wasted like the whole summer…but there's still a few weeks left I guess.

E: you going to Smit's house tomorrow for the senior farewell?

B: duh :)

E: good

B: I promise I wont ignore you lol

E: ahah GOOD!!!! Its gonna be sad though…

B: yeah…I don't care though. I'm not saying goodbye to you. I'm just saying see you later. Goodbye is way too sad.

E: haha good lol :))

B:lol i still feel really bad i didnt know you noticed. speak up sooner next time! not that there will be a next time

E: haha I notice those things lol. Don't think I don't.

B: haha pshh..sure lol

E: well obvoiusly I did so ha!

B: ok you noticed that one thing

E: is there other things I should have noticed? Lol

I waited a few seconds to respond, obviously I wasn't going to tell him, but I wanted him to think there was a reason behind my waiting to answer, since there was a reason behind it.

B: haha nevermindd

E: lol alright

B: haha so much for being observant :p lol i gotta go...text me or something when you finish your song though. And since I'm not ignoring you I will definitely talk to you later. Bye!

E: bye

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"I'm really worried about him," I explained to my friend Anna as we drove to dinner before the senior farewell. Alice had texted me last night and told me she heard that Edward had gotten drunk and then had a break down.

"I know what you mean. I don't know him too well, but he's always been really nice, and I had no idea he was…you know, having all these problems." She paused. "Maybe we should talk to him tonight." She suggested.

"Yeah," I agreed. "but maybe it was a good break down, you know? Like he realized what he was doing."

"You think so?" she asked.

"I hope so." I sighed.

"We'll talk to him tonight."

We finally got to Smit and Trae's house but didn't see Edward there yet. I hoped he was just running late, but with every few minutes that went by, I got more and more anxious. What if he wasn't going to show up? Or what if he did and got mad at Alice and me for confronting him? So many things could go wrong.

We had now been here for an hour and still no Edward. Smit and Trae were family friends with a ton of kids that graduated so they had this party for everyone at their house and soon enough everyone gathere around a campfire and the seniors started speaking, giving little speeches to the underclassmen about what they liked or would have done differently.

I was starting to get really worried about Edward. I got a text from Alice saying 'you should text him'. I looked at the time and it had now been an hour and a half so I decided to text him.

'hey its Bella, are you coming to Smit's?'

'yeah im almost there' he responded.

'okay good :)' I decided I'd leave it at that and talk to him once he got here.

It was pretty crowded around the campfire so once Edward got into the backyard, he had to sit on the other side of the campfire away from me. I was happy to watch him look around and finally rest his eyes on mine.

"Hi," he mouthed.

"hi," I mouthed back and smiled.

"Edward," Smit handed the candle they were passing around, "Would you like to say anything?"

"What? I just got here like two seconds ago," Smit handed him the candle anyways and said something about going in a circle so he was next, "Well, I didn't really have any time to think about this, um, I guess I'd just say lean on your friends." He glanced up at me. "they'll always be there for you, so be there for them."

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A/N: I'm so sorry guys, I haven't had enough time for anything lately, but this story was really on my heart this week so I pushed myself to finally finish this chapter.

Please review! It may not seem like one review can make a differnce, but belive me, they do.

:))))