disclaimer: it's stephAnie, not stephEnie
a/n: gobble, gobble. translation: sorry for the fucking long delay. also, happy thanksgiving! think of this chapter as a...turkey day miracle? idk. huge ass thanks to my beta arra584 who, despite having almost cut her finger off the other day, and being in the midst of holiday hell, took the time to look over my silly story. ily R.
point of clarification: many were confused over the ending of last chapter. concerning edward's crooked smile. i updated my blog about it, but i'm unsure of how many go there. so lemme 'splain it quickly here. edward's smile pre accident was nt crooked. post accident it is. it's deliciously crooked, but edward doesn't see it that way. he only sees imperfection and asymmetry. this was my way of having fun with the canon edward's crooked smile. just a twist to shake things up a bit. *shrugs*
also, edward really is just...idk. sometimes i worry about just wtf goes on in his mind. so, apologies if he offends any of you with his crude thoughts, words, behavior. i can't be held responsible. bc i can't keep him in check. the man will do whatever he damn well feels like i suppose. his thoughst are not my own. freals.
chapter title comes from Big Tymer's "Still Fly." lyrics not applicable tho they do crack me up
chapter songs: "The Good Life" by Weezer
"I Caught Myself" by Paramore (for a little view inside bella's thoughts)
"How?" I choked out the word, hating how deeply I was affected by the asymmetry on my face.
"The only cause I can guess at would be the muscles tightening too much from improper use and stretching."
"Are you saying this is permanent?"
James, sensing I was .2 seconds away from freaking out, put a hand on my shoulder.
"Try smiling more...bigger, I mean. Perhaps it doesn't affect your full range of motion."
I watched myself in the mirror as my smile grew and grew. It started to even out but only when I had the cheesiest goddamn smile I'd ever seen.
"You expect me to smile…like this?" I asked James as I kept the dumb look plastered on my face. James only shrugged.
"I honestly don't know or care how you smile, Edward. But maybe that's a good sign, the muscles will loosen as time goes by."
"You look kind of silly, Dr. C." Lauren giggled at me, causing an immediate smile-turned-upside-down to occur.
Frowning looked the same no matter how fucked up a smile was. Small sense of comfort there I guess.
"Strange how Nurse Swan seemed to react, don't you think?" Lauren was back in my face, smiling in hopes of coaxing me to do the same.
Lauren had seen my smile pre-accident. Bella hadn't. So Lauren had no idea that Bella's reaction hadn't been strange. It was totally justified. And that just made the frown deepen to a scowl.
"Aw, cheer up, Dr. C."
"Yeah, Dr. C." James voice was thick with disdain. "Your face is all healed up so quit moping already."
If these two didn't shut up, the frown would be permanently etched on my face.
"I'd like to be alone, if you please." Lauren, cheerful as ever, left with a little wave. The false politeness did not escape James's notice.
"Listen, Edward. I'm sorry you think your smile is all fucked up. But it could be worse. A lot worse. And you still have so much more healing in store. There are more important things to worry about here. In the grand scheme of things, your face is not important. Focus on your leg healing so you can walk. How about that?"
Which just proved how off the mark James was. More wrong he could not be.
--
I had never been more grateful that Bella didn't have to come into work. My mood was toxic. I didn't want to lash out on my favorite Nurse. It wasn't her fault my smile was a train wreck of epic proportions. Though if this changed how she treated me, I would have to result to desperate measures.
So desperate I had no fucking clue what I'd do.
I was so pissed off that I had reverted to the total douche patient I was before getting to know Bella. If I wasn't snapping at the help, I was feigning sleep again. It wasn't so bad at first, except that a lot of the nursing staff seemed to feel as if they could talk to me. Had I changed so much since I'd taken an interest in Bella? These bitches thought they had a right to talk to me instead of letting me sleep? Unacceptable.
Mom came in for my bath at the usual time. Unfortunately, so did Carlisle. I wanted to call him out on his bullshit, throw him under the fucking proverbial bus, but I couldn't do it. Not in front of Mom. That would hurt her too much. So I just stewed, making everything that much worse.
At least Carlisle had the decency to turn away while Mom cleaned me up.
"If your leg continues to heal as it has been, I fully expect they will start rehabilitating it in the very near future." Leave it to Carlisle to bring it right to medical issues.
It was good news though. Walking meant no more catheter. That also meant having the ability to fuck. The mere thought of getting Bella under me was enough to make my dick twitch, only Mom's washing put a stop to that. Thank God. I did not want a chubby with my mother's hands on me. Disgusting.
"That's great news, Edward!" Mom could sense some weird tension in the room and, like usual, tried her hardest to lighten things.
"Yes, I'm excited to get out of here. I'm sure Carlisle is too. No more meaningless trips to visit me anymore, right?" Carlisle was still facing away from me, but I could see his shoulders tighten and strain, a bodily wince at what I had just said.
"Nonsense, son, you know I enjoy my visits with you." He turned to smile at me just as Mom finished.
"What the fu…"
"Edward." Mom interrupted, already anticipating something foul about to come out of my mouth.
Carlisle deserved every foul word in the English language. He just straight up lied. He didn't come to visit me. Who the hell knew where he went. It was bad enough he wasn't where he said he was. But it was totally unacceptable to spit lies in front of both Mom and me, especially when I knew the truth.
I opted out of saying anything though, knowing this situation could not end well. And like I'd hoped, both Mom and Carlisle left shortly after the fight that almost was.
Unfortunately, I didn't know what to do with myself once they'd left. I flipped through all ten of the channels available on the television mounted on the wall in front of me. This place needed a serious upgrade. The flat panel, premium channel kind.
I wished I was able to drink myself stupid just to escape the boredom and disappointment I felt. Then I felt like a goddamn alcoholic, wanting to escape in a bottle of Grey Goose. I was pathetic.
Maybe James was right. I should worry about the rest of my body. I shouldn't be so vain. My face wasn't everything. Right.
Thank god the bandages are off, I can finally do this again…
I pinched the bridge of my nose and felt a small sense of relief. At least I could try and calm down in the normal fashion, even if my smile was so fucking abnormal.
I was only fooling myself. I could not curb my vanity issues in one day. I cared about not only Bella's, but the world's, thoughts concerning my looks too damn much. So while I'd try to let it go, I knew it would take time.
Rome wasn't built in a day. Or in this case, an entire empire's worth of narcissism deconstructed.
I tried focusing on...shit, I don't even know...positive thinking to help heal me faster or some shit. But my mind kept drifting to my stupid smile. More times than I cared to admit, I found my hand reaching for the small mirror at my side.
I couldn't remember a time I'd smiled more. Hell, in one day I'd probably smiled more than my entire life. Try as I might, I couldn't not look at the imperfection of my now crooked smile.
The rest of the night passed in a similar fashion, trying like hell to avoid catching my reflection but always giving in to the masochistic need to hate on my fugly smile. I didn't sleep well again. After the early rise and shine from the morning before, I slept through breakfast and Nurse Lauren. Pretty sure she tried to rouse me from sleep, but I wasn't having it. Sleep. I needed sleep to just recover some and feel marginally better.
I was still dozing when Bella came in. She looked like she could use some shut-eye. It made me miss the one time she'd come in, happy as can be and full of energy. I wanted her like that again, if only to try and leech some happiness from her.
"Hello, Edward." She hardly looked at me as she got to doing all her…nursely duties. It worried me that she was being too formal, too polite. But at least there was no "Dr. Cullen" shit.
"Hi, Bella." Now it was my turn to avoid looking at her. I felt uncomfortable in my own skin, something I wasn't used to.
"I heard you're starting physical therapy for your leg soon."
"Yeah."
"That's good."
"It is."
"Excited to be walking again?"
"I am."
"Cool."
The entire exchange took maybe thirty seconds to get through. There were no pregnant pauses, which made it worse. Worse because things were so awkward between us we were rushing through mundane patient/nurse convos. That wasn't like us. I had no idea why Bella would feel so weird around me. I mean, sure she found me unattractive but she didn't have to feel bad about it. Totally wasn't her fault.
She was almost to the door when the crushing weight of silence finally broke me.
"Bella, wait." She turned to face me, only her eyes were still downcast. "What's going on between us?"
"What do you mean? There's nothing going on between us." Well that was painfully obvious, wasn't it?
"Things just seem…different ever since…"
Bella's shoulders sagged in something resembling defeat.
"You're right. It's my fault. I left. But I couldn't help it, Edward. I swear, I didn't…" She started rambling like normal. While it was usually cute, now it was just depressing. She couldn't find the right way to tell me she was completely turned off by my looks.
"It's not your fault."
"Of course it is." Her lips were drawn tight as she finally looked at me.
"You can't help that I look disgusting now."
"Right, I know that but…wait, what?" She stopped, somehow confused despite previously agreeing to my statement. "Did you say disgusting?"
"Yes."
"Edward, you think I'm disgusted by you?"
"I can see that you are despite trying to play it off."
"You don't know anything." She stormed out of the room leaving me even more confused and depressed than before.
Twenty minutes later Bella came back in.
"I think we should start over."
"What?"
"Like start over the day, start over our conversation. Is that ok?"
I didn't think it would help, let alone be possible, but I figured I'd go along just for the sake of appeasing Bella. So I nodded and watched as she seemed to try and physically shake off the weirdness between us.
"Hey, Edward!" Too cheerful. Especially with how worn-out she still looked.
"Hey, Bella." It was half-hearted at best.
"Wrong."
"Excuse me?"
"You should've said 'hey, Shortcake'." At her words, I grinned. So cute. But I immediately stopped when I noticed her eyes go all deer in headlights at me.
Fuck, I almost forgot about the smile for five seconds. Bella made me forget.
"Hi, Shortcake." I focused on the flashing television, desperately needing to focus in on something else. I didn't know when I'd become such a goddamn pussy but I hated how weak I felt just now.
"You're lookin' good, Dr. C." Bella mimicked Lauren. It was pretty damn good and I would've laughed, only I heard those words and knew the lie behind them.
"No."
"What?"
"Just…no." I didn't want to hear her lie to try and console my stupid need for self admiration.
"Edward," Fuck, was that pity I heard in her voice? "You do look good."
"Whatever." I felt like a petulant child, moments away from pouting and crossing my arms or some shit.
"I wish…"
"Nurse Swan?" A redhead I'd never seen before poked her head in.
"Yes, Vanessa?"
"Mr. Banner in 301 is asking for you."
"Ok, I'll be right there."
The redhead left. Bella turned back towards me, opened her mouth as if to speak, then shut it. Without another word she left me, sour and questioning how she wanted to finish that sentence. She didn't come back the rest of her shift either.
--
The next day I was told Dr. Denali would be paying me a visit. Irina was the resident PT, the best Seattle had to offer. Plus she was all legs and big tits. So you know, bonus. She knew she was gorgeous with that white blonde hair and those ice blue eyes. She didn't flaunt it though. In fact, she seemed to try and hide it. I think all the male attention got to her. She never flirted, not even with me.
Naturally, I assumed she liked to munch box.
I was excited that Irina was coming in for a consult. In no time, I'd be up and walking around. Before it would have excited me to know I could work on charming Bella. But then, the whole smile situation happened. Now I was pretty sure I'd have to drop the lofty pussy dreams...not by choice but force. Having two working legs could carry me away from Bella to someone more…willing.
Bella came in and we both assumed an air of normalcy. Things still seemed tense between us but we both ignored the rather obvious, ugly elephant in the room. Me.
"Good luck with your first PT session."
"Thanks, Shortcake."
Not joking, laughing and just generally bullshitting around with Bella left me feeling…empty. Not something I was used to feeling, I didn't know how to make it go away. Nor did I understand just exactly why I felt that way.
"Cullen, are you ready for a serious workout?" Irina came in, all boot camp Sarge on my ass.
"I'm only walking, how serious can it be?"
Turns out, very serious. The muscles in my left leg had weakened drastically. Everything hurt as exercise after exercise had me using a part of my body I'd basically forgotten about. James was right. I should've focused on my leg. Clearly, I had taken the use of it for fucking granted.
In pain, tired as hell, and grouchy as fuck from what I assumed lack of improvement, I took my aggression out on Irina. She was in the middle of helping me back into a wheelchair, going over stretches and lifts I could do from my own bed. Her tone suggested irritation and her words were clipped as she went through the different routines. Everything out of her mouth was a command. I didn't take that shit well. I snapped.
"So tell me, Irina. Do all the girls you sleep with enjoy this hard-ass routine?"
"Excuse me?"
"You know, do they like being dominated? Like it when you bend them over and use your strap…"
"Don't finish that sentence." Her voice was shrill. We'd never really gotten along, since she didn't appreciate my good looks like every other female. Again, she liked women, not men. But I don't think I'd ever gotten close to crossing that fine line of jokingly insulting and just plain being inappropriate. "You're disgusting! I should slap your arrogant face and then slap your ass with a sexual harassment suit!"
Clearly, I had gone and done it. Shit.
"I was only kidding, Irina." Well, I was now at least. "Honestly. I'm sorry I lashed out. Tense day, you know? I didn't realize how hard this would be."
Some of her anger seemed to melt away.
"I can imagine. I work with people just like you every day. Try not to take it out on me though. Use that anger, filter it into your work-outs. Make it productive."
"Sounds much more beneficial than being sued for sexual harassment." I smiled, knowing I'd been forgiven.
Irina's face showed a similar reaction to Bella's upon seeing me smile. Round eyes and cheeks losing their color.
Fuck. Ugly smile. Remember?
Before I could get upset and scowl at her, however, I watched as she continued to respond. Her face transformed into something else. Her eyes grew soft, lidded. Her lips curled into a smile. Color returned to her face, blush staining her high cheekbones.
She looked…turned-on?
"Irina?"
"Yes, Edward?" Her accent came out thicker than normal. I had to test out what I was hoping was true. What I was fucking praying was the reason behind her reaction.
"I'm glad we're working together." Her eyes grew warm. "You're probably the only one who could handle me like this." Truer words…but I did wonder how she'd respond as I kept going. "And if I had to get hot and sweaty with anyone, of course I'd choose you."
"Oh, well…" Then Irina did something she almost never did when I blatantly flirted with her. She smiled. "I'm glad we're working together too."
What in the fuck was that?
You know what that is. That right there is lust. She wants you.
But even with my smile?
Especially with your smile. She didn't act that way until you grinned at her. And let's face it, when has she ever reacted this way to you? Never.
Could it be?
As I got wheeled back to my room, I made a point to smirk at every female I crossed paths with. The strangest, fucking best thing happened. Girls swooned left and right. Some woman, probably visiting a family member, walked right into a closed door. A nurse dropped the urine sample she was trotting off to the lab with. Gross. And even Nurse Murray flushed and stumbled through his greeting when I flashed my pearly whites at him.
Hey, I had to know how powerful my new smile was.
Because I had come to the realization that it was powerful. And definitely not something to agonize over. My smile may be lopsided, but apparently that was sexy. I'd never had such a strong reaction. Never this strong of an appeal towards women. Which was saying something. Because my smile before had been perfect. But now it was better than perfect, if such a thing were even possible.
Panty dropping times ten.
But what about Bella? She had left so suddenly, so quickly, I may not have had time to see her full reaction. Like with Irina, maybe she'd have blushed that beautiful strawberry color and looked at me with longing. Either way, I couldn't fucking wait to see my Shortcake.
"Hello, Beautiful." I thought I'd deviate from the norm today.
"Beautiful?" Bella blushed not ten seconds after first stepping through the door. New record.
"Mhm. You look very lovely today."
Though she'd done nothing special, I wasn't lying. She was always lovely. And believing she could still want me made her look even better.
"Ok then...hello, handsome." Bella winked at me and it was so goddamn cute I laughed.
"You don't have to compliment me just because I did. This isn't tit for tat, Shortcake."
"I know." She frowned. "I was being sincere." She blushed harder and looked away, busying herself with the blinds on my windows.
"Well, in that case, thank you." I anticipated her gaze to come back to me after my show of gratitude. I didn't dish it out often. She'd be sure to look at me, probably try and figure out why I was being so nice. She didn't disappoint. Her head swiveled back towards me. I had a smile waiting for her.
"Y-y-you're welcome, Edward." Pale face, check. Wide eyes, check. I was waiting for more now.
"I like you calling me handsome. Maybe even more than 'Edward'." I didn't stop smiling once.
"I don't think I can go around calling you handsome, Edward."
"Why not? You said it was sincere."
"It's unprofessional."
"So is 'Shortcake.' Or calling you beautiful. Do you want me to stop calling you beautiful?"
"It would probably be for the best. We wouldn't want people getting the wrong idea." But her answering blush and coy smile told a different story.
Ah!
"Well, I won't tell if you won't." My smile grew into something purposely secretive, wicked...sexy.
Bella giggled at me, then looked shocked at her behavior. Her cheeks were so red I was sure I'd be able to feel the heat on my hands. As if hearing my thoughts, she brought her hands to her face. I didn't know if it was to cool her flaming cheeks or hide the blush.
Either way I liked it.
And either way she was blushing. Her eyes were soft, gorgeous, all liquid chocolate. She was also smiling, though I could tell she was trying to stop that. Full lower lip all pouting out begging for me to bite and suck it into my mouth.
"Edward, I..."
"Nuh-uh. I only answer to Handsome now."
"I'm not going to call you that!" She was half-shrieking, half-laughing.
"Why not?" My face was starting to grow tired from all the smiling. Whoever said it took more muscles to frown than smile clearly had never gone through anything like this before.
"Because." She was grinning like a fool. I wanted so badly to kiss her right now, in the midst of this silly playing around. And I could, no more mummy, but she was still with that tool. Patience...
--
Things between Bella and I got progressively better, yet simultaneously worse. We were chatting like normal, but with this flirtatious current weaving its way through everything we said and did. I fucking loved how she would pretend to be all embarrassed when I called her Beautiful, or fake annoyance when I asked her to call me Handsome. She always caved though, no matter how much she bickered. That's how I knew, knew there was something there between us. That something more I had been hoping for.
Still, though, I had to tread carefully. Because if I pushed things too far, if I was too inappropriate - because let's face it, that's an easy thing for me - she'd back off. Shortcake would go a little cold and distant. I knew it was because of her situation with her tool boyfriend. She was still with him. Still happily chatting about trip plans and bullshit. It made me angry. She needed to drop that loser like a bad habit and come back to my place...as soon as I could get out of the hospital that is. It was odd, how flirtatious she could be with me one second, only to switch to how excited she was to visit Jacob.
And then weirder still, sometimes she came in to check on me with this new nurse. Vanessa. Admittedly, she was rather pretty. Natural red, wavy hair. Green eyes. Nice rack from what I could tell. But she wasn't Bella. And so I kept all of my attention focused on Shortcake whenever they'd come in, despite her attempts at drawing the conversation to Vanessa. At first I thought it was simply due to the fact that Vanessa was new, much like Bella, and in need of assistance and a friend. But the more it happened, the more it seemed like Bella was trying to set something up.
That shit would not fly.
You can't have your cake and eat it too, Shortcake. Either you want me or you don't. I know you want me. Drop the charade.
A few days after my revelation, I was in bed trying to follow Irina's instructions. I needed the strength back in my leg. Like, right fucking now. PT sessions were grueling, but helpful. Stretching and moving my leg like Irina told me would help. I wasn't cocky or stubborn enough to not listen to her. Because I could see improvement. I could walk...sort of. I more like gimped my way around, knee shaking and trembling whenever I put weight on it. But it was improvement.
So as I lay there, all tired and shit, the strongest need to take a piss hit me. I tried to, I don't know, wait it out or something, for as long as possible. No longer having the use of a catheter - so much better, except in cases like this - I needed help getting to and from the bathroom. I normally tried to time things out so Bella would not be the nurse to assist me in my more base functions. Because if I needed to take a shit, I definitely did not want Bella knowing. Or hearing. Or god, smelling.
Ugh.
But I had downed close to 40 ounces of water in one go, wanting to keep myself hydrated before my next PT session. I had to piss like a race horse. There was no avoiding it. I hit the "call nurse" button, needing my Shortcake to hurry before I wet the bed. Because of course thinking about how bad I had to go only made things worse. I was told Bella was busy with another patient and to expect her shortly. I think I held out for a minute before the need to relieve myself got too unbearable. I decided to just throw caution to the wind.
I got up. Slowly. The side table would have to make do as a walker. So, leaning on it as much as I dared, I very carefully made my way to the bathroom. It was hell. If I leaned down too much, the table was sure to topple over, taking me with it. The whole ten feet walk was excruciating. When I finally made it to the toilet bowl, I wanted to cry from the relief of being able to put both hands down on the solid porcelain.
"Edward?" Shortcake's voice interrupted my long, drawn-out sigh of relief. "Edward, where are you?"
"Bathroom," I managed to grunt out.
"Why didn't you wait for me? You could've hurt yourse..." She stopped abruptly. I heard little giggles behind me. "Edward, do you feel a draft?"
Huh? Then I realized what she meant. Hospital gown does not equal adequate coverage. My ass was hanging out. Fuuuck. Worst of all, I was self-conscious about it. Did she like what she saw?
"Like what you see?" It was an honest question. I turned to see her face after she helped me over to wash my hands. She was biting her lower lip, eyes dancing with laughter. Not a good sign.
"Let's get you back in bed." No answer. Fucking fantastic.
Before I knew it, Bella's shift was over, with no more mention of my ass. Nurse Murray came by to wheel me over to Irina's office. I was looking forward to getting my leg back in shape, anxious to channel the pent-up energy somewhere beneficial. But when we left my room, I saw my Shortcake standing at the nurse's station. She was chatting with Vanessa. Neither saw me as we walked by, something that really upset me. I had lifted my hand to wave and was seconds away from opening my mouth to say hi when I heard my name.
"...walked in and there it was. Bam."
"Well? What did you think?" Both of the girls were giggling now. I had a pretty good idea what they were talking about.
"It's, er, nice." I could just make out the pink of her cheeks, Bella's face turned away from me as she spoke. "He's got a nice butt." I heard a little squeal that I imagined came from Vanessa. "Yeah, I know. He even has those dimples, you know, the ones right above the butt that..."
"You just want to press your fingers into while you get fucked?"
"Vanessa!" More laughter.
"Don't act like you weren't thinking the same thing."
I was too far away to see Bella's face without turning around. But I thought I heard her mutter "not the point" as Nurse Murray picked up the pace.
Oh, hell yes!
She liked what she saw. My sweet, little Strawberry liked my ass. And apparently my "back dimples." I didn't realize I had those. But hearing what Vanessa suggested Bella could do with them...
I definitely don't mind if Shortcake does that while I fuck her.
let it be known, all you who so crave a BPOV for this story, that i willingly offered up my writing for the FGB ran by ninapolitan, LolaShoes, and tby789. anniej13 bought up a PT outtake (the proposal, anyone?). so be expecting that soon. she's being very generous, allowing it to be shared. no one jumped for a BPOV outtake for taita. i'm partly to blame, bc i joined the auction late. and i didn't update before to let you all know, besides the a/n. still, there won't be any bpov in this story. sorry. perhaps when it's finished i will provide a few outtakes. til then, suffer like vampward does from bella's mental silence.
in other news: how did you like NM? i loved it. despite robward's wonky left nipple (my attention was directed somewhere a tad lower, if ya know what i mean *nudge nudge*) and jake calling bella "loca" *facepalm*
i would love to hear your thoughts on the chapter...did things happen like you thought? reviews are better than being de-cathed and taking a piss by yourself.