Is it Possible to Love you More?
Chapter 10: A Marriage of Ideals
A/N: This is back in the poet character's perspective.
My throat is dry but my hands are wet.
My eyes are itching with unshed tears but I don't dare entertain letting them flow freely because it will ruin my makeup.
My insides are twisting in discomfort but I push the feeling aside for I no longer have the time for this.
The hours and minutes have finally ticked down to this. To this big moment. And I feel like my heart is going to burst from my chest.
Yet I can't blame myself for my current wretched state. I was the one to suggest this, and I did nothing to stop it when slowly by slowly my words became a reality, one that I could not escape from.
I will be happy. I will be happy.
I whisper it to myself as if somehow it will convince me this is the truth. That this is how it should be- how it will be.
And maybe it can be? Maybe this isn't the end- isn't the end to us- because once I say yes, it's all over. I can only be loyal to one, and it's not going to be her.
She had her chance, I tell myself. I wouldn't give her any more. I wouldn't.
I twist the white material between my fingers and sit down, feeling stiff in the tight cloth adorning my body.
If I'm going to be happy, than why do I feel so scared? Why do I want to run?
"There you are, beautiful," Edward's voice makes me jolt up from my chair so fast I nearly trip. "Hey, careful there." His hands slide around from the back and lace in front of my stomach. His lips graze my shoulder where the skin is bare. My skin pebbles up but in cold dread and with him here I feel suffocated. Feel weighed down with iron in the very pit of my stomach.
I was the one who wanted this, I remind my self. And I did. At the time. At the time when I had just released my book and was fretting about it's reception. It had done superbly well. Surprisingly so. My publishers wanted more from me like that and I was willingly to oblige once I got over my terror. What if she read it? What if she knew about my pitiful pinning of her, and she sat and she laughed and spat cruel words in my face?
I couldn't take that. I needed support, I needed the safety of unfailing bonds of romance to someone else to show her that I didn't want her like that. That it wasn't really her I had written about. Yes, I had wanted to get my true feelings out there, but now I was scared that they were too true. That I hadn't protected them with enough falsities, instead leaving them bare and cold for anyone to pick and prod at and deride.
"Edward, we're not supposed to see each other before." My voice comes out soft and it trembles. His keen ears catch that. "It's bad luck." I've had enough bad luck in romance to last me a while.
"I just had to see you. To make sure you're okay." He is too perceptive. He knows I'm not over her yet, but he is willing to give me another chance and serve as the distraction I well need and deserve. It turns out I'm not the only one with lingering feelings that won't depart. Edward has still held me close to his heart for so long and I appreciate that at the same moment I hate him for it.
Why can he love so easily and she can't? I don't deserve him; he should be with someone else who will love him better. Who will treat him better.
I can't do that when she still takes up the number one spot in my heart no matter how many times I have tried vanquishing her from there.
She remains stubbornly in place, like a wine stain on a rug.
I turn in his arms, flash him a smile that is all teeth no sincerity. "I'm okay. Just getting a bit nervous. It is somewhat of a big deal today."
"I know. I'm nervous too." He takes my hand and brushes his lips against my knuckles. "But seeing you has steadied my nerves and my resolve." He drops my hand and gives me a crooked smile. His smile was the first thing I feel in love with all those years ago, but will it keep me in love with him? Will it last? Will this, last?
Questions I am afraid to hear the answer to.
He leaves me alone in the room now and I sit back down, waiting for Alice to zoom in and finish my makeup. She's wearing a light fuchsia dress; her instance that it be the color for this event. I couldn't say no to her, not when she had much better tastes than me.
She's a chatter box, flitting around my face like a fairy, using light touches to apply my mask of beauty. I clench my knees hard and mutter out one word responses because her annoyingly happy attitude only makes my anxiety worse. She's elated for me, for this huge step in my life, telling me how I should have settled down years ago like she did. She's giving me tips of how to keep a man satisfied and I swallow down the bile that rises in my throat. It's too much too soon.
I need some space. Some time. To gather myself.
When's she done, I tell her I need some time alone to calm my nerves. She chuckles and wishes me luck before flitting out. But being alone only makes it worse for I have nothing to distract me from my thoughts and the pain in my gut intensifies.
I want to do this. I want to do this, I force my words to bring up my mood, to soothe my innards. The words only taste like ash in my mouth.
There is a loud slam of a door and I jump again.
"Edward, be careful. You really need to stop scaring me like this-" I turn to the doorway and my words freeze in my throat, choking me as my legs sway.
She's here, hair frazzled, eyes wild, and chest heaving. She looks like a mess; I've never seen her like this. There are bags under her eyes, her skin is pale and lackluster, her clothes don't fit her like they should, yet she still looks as beautiful as ever. My heart thumps in my chest painful. It hurts so much to see her here, as if the heartbreak occurred just yesterday. However, I cannot tear my eyes away from her, drinking in her image greedily. I long to touch her, to kiss her upon her soft lips, to make her mine for once and for all. Alas, that chance has long passed.
She takes in my white dress, my carefully styled hair, and my makeup, and her face falls. "You're getting married. I can't believe this." Her voice is one of pure disbelief and...heartbreak. "Why?"
I give her a wry smile. "What do you mean, why? Isn't it obvious. People in love marry. I love Edward." The word love preceding Edward's name feels wrong. And it is even more wrong that I am the one who loves him.
"You don't love him. You love me." She says this surely, and takes a step into the room, than another. Slams the door shut behind her. She never was any good at doing things quietly. Or gently. She fumbles in her pocket for something. Pulls out a wrinkled piece of paper. It looks like it has been read and re-read several times. The words are blurred where tears have fallen.
She straightens the paper out. "I read your book."
I should have expected that. She reads all my works.
I shrug, trying to look nonchalant. "So?"
"I know how you feel about me."
Suddenly anger hits me. I'm tired of denying this, of being ashamed of my feelings. It's not like I can bend over backwards now. I am at the point of no return. "So what? You want a fucking gold star? Congratulations, you figured out the big secret I kept from you all these years in order to preserve our friendship. And if you don't like it- if you're here to fucking spit on me for it- than go ahead. I don't care!" My voice is rising in pitch and my hands go up in the air with it.
Her eyes flash with hurt at my assumptions but I am feeling defensive and vulnerable and I do not need her here on my special day, ruining it.
She opens her mouth- to argue I am sure, to reprimand me for yelling pointlessly at her- and reads the poem from my book she has selected.
"I know it is love because my heart strings tug to you,
trying to pull me closer despite every step you take farther away.
They long to beat in rhythm with yours, yet my heart isn't strong enough
or big enough to love for two,
because you saw to it with each man in your bed that
it would chip away a little and little more each day at my red organ
until it was like fish tank with holes, holes that leaked out water bit by bit so that the fish in it,
lovely things of color and stripes, innocent, died gasping and unable to do anything to change their fate
one of a slow death
I know it is love because my eyes remain glued to you,
unable to look anywhere else, for you are my world
all I want to do is drink you in; you are indeed a sight for sore eyes
and my eyes trace the gentle swoop of your neck,
the long lashes framing your brown honey eyes which are sweeter than the sweetest nectar,
and the soft pillows of your lips, in which I want to immerse myself into and never leave,
on which dreams are made on
Looking at you, mesmerized in even the simplest of expressions of joy or anger, makes my eyes water
Looking at you causes me pain, because I know no matter how much I look I am only window shopping
and you will be picked up by someone who can actually afford to keep you
I know it is love because of the way my breath catches in my throat
I feel like I am drowning on land
like I am in the vacuum of space
like I am suffocating on the words of passion my breath wills to be spoken but which cannot be
I want to say I love you so badly,
want to say it with every cell of my body,
yet I cannot for I have buried these words for so deep and so long that I can't even tell
once they come up, if they will be the same.
Instead of a simple I love you,
will it be, I love you so fucking much?
or I love you, so why won't you love me?
I used to think time would tell- that one day you would fall in love with me
But I've seen time has only made things worse
so maybe it's time to move on
to someone who will love me like you cannot
She finishes reading the poem, her hands shaking as she folds the paper back up.
Why has she read this to me? What is she trying to prove? How pathetic I sound? I am well aware of that.
"Your poems all resonate so much with me. They are the words which I do not know how to speak." A sigh, heavy and deep. Burdened. "I was so stupid," she begins with, running a hand through her hair. "I was so blind. I spent so much time focusing on my own emotions, on my own suffering, on hiding my feelings, that I never noticed yours even when they were so blatant." She sucks in a breath; looks like she is going to die from nerves.
She picks her eyes up, the orbs glowing with sincerity. Her speech is soft now.
"I love you. I've loved you all this time. Ever since we first met."
Her words hit me like a ton of bricks and I can't breathe. I'm happy, angry, confused. I don't know what to do with myself. "Are you...for real?" I feel faint on my feet.
"Yes. I am serious. As serious as I can be. And I'm so sorry I didn't see all this before. So sorry I was such a bitch to you, that you felt like I treated you like trash. I never meant to." Her voice is on the verge of breaking but her eyes are dry. "And I want to rectify that. I want to make things right by you. I want us to stop denying what we have between each other."
Oh, she wants to do that now? Now when it's too late? An ugly laugh makes it out of my throat before I can stop myself. "I'm getting married. Married to Edward. And now you want to to do this?"
"I never received the wedding invitation. I only found out now-"
"Of course you only found out now! If you had talked to me at all-" I'm waving my hands around frantically.
"I know. We can't communicate," she shoots me a wistful look. "That's what lead to this whole misunderstanding. To this whole mess of- god, has it really been sixteen years?" She gives a humorless laugh, rubs the bridge of her nose. "Sixteen years of this shit? Of running around in circles around each other?"
I can hear faint music beginning to play from outside. It's the wedding march. I'll have to walk down the aisle soon. My nerves are gone, I guess I should thank her for that. She's truly come and distracted me. All I am is angry now. And wistful. Why hadn't she come sooner?
"So that's why, I'm going to tell you this: I quit my modeling career."
"You what-?" I can't help my gasp. I'm truly shocked.
"I don't want to leave you anymore. I hated doing that in the first place, I was always afraid you would leave me for someone else, for Edward." Another humorless laugh. "Guess I was right about that one."
My lips thin tightly. "You don't have a right to forbid me from him when you slept with how many other men." I am jealous and bitter but I have every right to be, because she could have been mine all along and she instead choose to spend her time with other people even though she loved me.
"I know, I know," she says softly. "Like I said, I was shitty. Probably a worse word than that. So I want to fix things. I want to cherish you properly and I can't do that if you're marrying Edward." She gets down on one knee.
My stomach backflips as I suddenly realize what she's going to do. My eyes prick with tears. "Please, don't do this. Please don't-" don't give me the chance to chose because it will be you every time but you don't deserve that.
She wants to sabotage the wedding. She pulls out a shiny metal band from her pocket. It's beautiful. It's the ring I always wanted but could never have. "Isabella Marie Swan, will you marry me?"
Tears are streaming down my face freely and my hands are in my hair, pulling painfully, ruining the careful construction of my wedding day look. "Oh god, Rosalie, why are you doing this to me? You know Edward-"
As if summoned by my name he storms in, worried. "Bella, the wedding-" he stops when he sees Rosalie on bent knee and me crying.
He comprehends the situation in seconds. He's had his suspicions for years now.
He smiles meanly. "You've had your chance Rosalie. Bella is mine now."
"Fuck you!" Rosalie rises in one smooth motion and punches Edward so hard his nose breaks.
A/N: Their names are revealed in this chapter because they finally have confessed their love to one another, so they can truly see each other for who they are; can see each other for the first time.
I'm thinking there should only be a couple more chapters left- one or two- before the epilogue.