Hi guys. I hope you all had a fantastic Thanksgiving, and got nice and fatted on yummy food. I know I did. My Thanksgiving weekend was… hectic… to say the least.

Sorry this took so long to get up. Normally, my life is pretty monotonous for the most part, but this past week has been crazy chaotic. On top of all the normal Thanksgiving hustle and bustle, we had a family emergency on Friday night, (well, more like Saturday at 2 in the morning), and I was at the hospital for most of the day Saturday. My older brother and one of his friends were stabbed at a party. I'm happy to say they're both doing good, (as good as you can be doing with stab wounds in you) and my brother was able to come home already. They will both make full recoveries.

Seriously, I'm not condoning violence in any way, shape, or form, but if you're going to fight, fight with your fists. Don't take the coward's way out and pull weapons on people. Have some regard for human life.

Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or any of its fuckhawt characters. I just have fun playing around with them. Everything is property of Stephenie Meyer.

*

EPOV

Darkness of early morning gave way to the light of dawn as I walked aimlessly through the streets. I was trembling with anger, and my feet carried me, blindly, along the sidewalk. I paid no attention to where I was going, had no conception of the amount of time that passed. I just walked.

I barely even noticed how cold it was outside, even though I didn't have a jacket on. My body was hot with the anger that pulsed through me. I absently realized that I must have left my jacket at Bella's. Thinking her name made my chest ache.

It all flashed through my mind at warp speed; her angry voice, the crumpled expression on her face when I walked out the door, her pleading eyes in the ballroom, fabricated images of Mike touching her. They played over and over again in my mind, with no chronology or sense, making my head spin. I had to sit down.

I sat on a bench and leaned my elbows on my knees, dropping my face into my hands.

"Edward, I'm a call girl." Her voice echoed inside my head.

I squeezed my eyes closed, trying to drive out the sound of her voice. It was useless. She was there; since the first time I saw her, she was inside of me, an unshakeable part of me.

I pulled my head from my hands and looked around at my surroundings for the first time. It was light out by now, but not sunny. Dark, ominous clouds plagued the sky, promising one hell of a storm. It seemed fitting. And then I groaned, when I realized where I was. Great. I was in the park just a few blocks from my building; the same one Bella and I had gone to the first time we hung out. How did I even end up here? I had been walking for hours, for fuck's sake! I must've been walking in fucking circles.

I sighed, aggravated, and shoved my hand inside my pants pocket for my cigarettes. I pulled the pack out and flipped open the top. Empty. Fuck my life.

I scowled up at the gloomy sky. I must've been a pretty fucking terrible person in my past life to deserve the one I was living now. I hoped someone up there was getting a good kick out of my suffering.

I lifted myself off the bench and left the park, walking in the direction of the convenience store. I checked my watch for the time. It was just after 7 in the morning. I had been out all night, and had nothing to show for it. I was not calmed down; I was just barely keeping my anger under control. And I had nothing figured out except for the fact that I had a lot of fucking thinking to do.

In the store, I asked for two packs of cigarettes out of habit. I quickly corrected myself.

When I got back outside, I unwrapped the cellophane and pulled out a cigarette. I lit it and inhaled a long drag of smoke. I knew, between last night and this morning, I had smoked almost two packs of cigarettes, but I didn't care. I leaned against the side of the store and smoked, not wanting to go back home yet. I wasn't ready. Instead, I thought about the irony of the whole situation I had gotten myself into.

I moved out of my parents' house for a fresh start. I wanted to prove my independence, my resilience, and that I could create healthy relationships for myself. But I just had to meet Bella, had to be drawn in by her, had to care about her. She was about the unhealthiest relationship I could have. She was just as damaged and fucked up as I was, and I think a part of me knew that from the start. Maybe that's part of the reason I was drawn to her in the first place. And even now, even knowing what she did for a living, even as angry as I was with her, the feelings I had for her didn't even falter. Shit, am I fucked up, or what?

I shook my head at myself. Everything I ever felt for her was a lie. She wasn't who I thought she was. I had been projecting the Bella I wanted her to be onto her, deluding myself into falling for her. I liked the idea of her more than I actually liked her as a person. Or, at least that's what I was telling myself to try and make it hurt a little less.

The worst part, the thing that killed me the most, was that I actually thought I was starting to know her. I felt like I was not only learning the shell she showed to the world, but also like I was starting to crack the shell, getting a peek inside to the part of her she hid from everyone else. She stole that from me, and it hurt like hell. I was so sure of this… connection, whatever, that we had; and here she was, slapping me in the face and telling me I was wrong. Or more like punching me in the face. I rubbed the left side of my jaw, and winced. That was going to leave a bruise… and not just on my face.

The anger boiled up again inside of me, almost to it's breaking point this time. I whipped around to face the brick wall and drove my hand into it with all my might.

"Hey! Slow down there, tough guy." A middle-aged man in a ball cap shouted at me as he walked by. I glared at him, then walked away.

I just had to be done with her. That was my only option. I had to cut Bella, cold turkey. I had to drop her like a bad habit, because that's what she was becoming, and I couldn't afford another one of those. She was the vice I needed to break before it broke me. I had to quit her, before it got to the point where there was no turning back. In the back of my mind, I wondered if it was already too late.

*

When I got back to the building, I recognized Alice's pixie frame in the lobby, waiting for the elevator. She turned to look at me as I walked in and slammed the heavy wooden door behind me, and I saw her blanch.

"H-hi Edward." She said awkwardly.

I gave her a curt nod and stood behind her, my back pressed against the wall. She turned around to face the elevator doors.

It seemed like it took forever for the elevator to chime and the doors to slide open. I stood opposite her in the elevator, facing forward, not saying a word. I didn't have the control to speak to her steadily at the moment. From my peripheral vision, I saw the tiny woman shifting her weight uncomfortably from one foot to the other. A few times, she turned her face toward me and opened her mouth as if to speak, but then she just closed it and faced forward again. Finally, the doors opened to let us out on to the fourth floor. When we were both off, I turned to her.

"I'm not going to tell Jasper –yet. But if you don't do it soon, Alice, I will." I turned and walked to my door.

My apartment held no interest for me. It felt more and more like a cage and that much less like a sanctuary with each passing minute. Unlike when I was outside all night, the time inside passed by painstakingly slow. I flipped apathetically through the channels on the TV, and when I felt like a good chunk of time had passed, I'd look at the clock to discover that only minutes had gone by. I was waiting for nothing, but the sluggish passage of time was torturous.

I showered just for something to do. I didn't eat or drink anything; my stomach felt too weak to even think about food. I stared at the TV, out the window, at the fucking walls, and paced divots into the rug. After a few interminable hours, I couldn't stand to be in the house anymore. It felt like the walls were fucking closing in on me. I grabbed my leather jacket from the closet and barreled out the door, not even stopping to lock the deadbolt.

Once I got outside, my breaths came easier. As I was walking away from the building, I stopped to light a cigarette. The hairs on the back of my neck rose suddenly, having nothing to do with the cold, and I had the compulsion to turn around. I looked behind me, but there was nothing there.

I was about to turn back around, and my eyes slid upward idly, when something caught my eye. It was Bella, sitting on her fire escape four floors up, smoking. It was hard to tell from the distance, but it seemed like she was staring right at me. I turned back around, and walked as quickly as I could down the street without running. The farther I got from her, the more I wanted to turn back around.

I walked down the street aimlessly for the second time in less than twenty-four hours. This time, I took what I thought was a different route than I had last night. I walked past a section of one of the streets that was full of stores and restaurants that I didn't recognize. I walked right past a store, then stopped and walked back a few feet when it caught my interest. It stood there like a shining beacon among the dreariness that was my day. I furrowed my eyebrows. I knew I shouldn't go in, but what else could I do? I just wanted to escape.

So, I walked into the liquor store, nodding at the man behind the counter who looked up when the bell on the door rang, announcing my arrival. I ambled down the aisles, running my fingers over the labels on the bottles. Whiskey, vodka, scotch, brandy; I thought about how good it would feel not to feel right now. I reached out to grab the neck of the smallest bottle of whiskey. Just one drink, I reasoned with myself. One drink, and nothing more. No harm done. I was about to pull it off the shelf when my phone rang.

I fished it out of my pocket and looked at the screen. With a sigh, I let go of the bottle and walked outside to take the call.

"Hey Dad." I said as I picked up.

"Hi, Edward." His calm, cheery voice greeted me. "How'd you make out last night?"

I froze. How did he know about that?

"Did you see Dr. Snow at all?"

Oh, the benefit. I wracked my hand through my hair and tried to think back on details of my night out. The gala was hardly the most eventful part of the evening.

"Uh, yeah. I ran into him for a minute. He said to tell you and Mom hello." Dr. Snow was one of my Dad's best friends from medical school, and they'd worked together at the hospital in Chicago before we uprooted to New York.

"It's a shame I had to work last night. I would've loved to see him."

"He was sorry he missed you too."

"So, did you have a good time?"

"I guess. I didn't –I didn't stay for long."

"Oh." He said, sounding surprised. "Why not?"

"There was, uh… there was someone there who I didn't want to see." I answered vaguely, rubbing at the back of my neck.

"Who might that be?"

A name popped into my head. "Mike Newton." I said his name with genuine scorn.

"Mike Newton? Why on earth wouldn't you want to see him? You two were quite the pair in high school. And that Tyler Crowley, too."

"He was there, too."

"What's the problem between the two of you?"

"I just…" Fuck. Excuse, excuse, please come to me. "He asked me about Tanya, and I didn't want to have to get into explaining about the relapse and the breakup and all that happy bullshit." Wow. Very impressive.

"Hm. Well, I suppose I don't blame you for that." He paused for a long moment. "Are you okay, son?"

"Yeah. Why?"

"You sound, I don't know, stressed out."

"No, I'm fine." I lied unconvincingly.

"You know you can talk to me, Edward."

"I know, Dad. I'm okay. Really. Just… tired, I guess."

That wasn't a lie. I really was starting to feel the weight of being awake for more than a day straight catching up with me.

"All right. I'll let you get some sleep then."

"I'll talk to you later. Tell Mom I said hi."

"I will. I love you."

"Love you too, Dad."

I hung up the phone and turned around to look at the store, running my hand through my hair. It suddenly held no sense of escape for me. That brief, unremarkable call from my Dad threw things back into focus. If I went back into that store and bought that bottle, I was being selfish. I'd spent way too much time being selfish, hurting my parents, my family, just because I was hurting. No more. I had to deal with my pain some other way.

I got back to my apartment just as the first clap of thunder boomed through the city, prompting an almost immediate downpour. I got changed into sweats and just stood in the middle of the room for a long moment, trying to decide what to do. I didn't want to be idle; I was afraid of what that could lead to. My eyes scanned around the room and locked on the piano in the corner. I hadn't touched it since I'd moved in. I walked over and flipped open the cover, running my fingers along the ivory keys. A sense of peace fell over me instantly as my fingers plucked notes from the beautiful instrument. I sat down on the bench, and let the music take me, losing myself in the notes that flowed deftly from my fingers. For the first time in a long time, I played well into the night.

*

I was finally able to fall asleep around four in the morning on Sunday. There was nothing restful about it, between the boisterous storm outside and the nagging thoughts circulating in my mind, but I knew that unless I wanted to drive myself straight into the ground, I needed to get some shuteye.

Late in the afternoon, I was woken up by a persistent pounding on my front door. I pulled a pair of sweatpants on over my briefs and shuffled down the hallway to the door, yawning as I went. I checked the clock as I passed it, and it said it was 3:57.

I opened the door, and was surprised to see Jasper standing there, looking distraught.

"Jazz?" I said confusedly, running my hand through my hair.

"Did you know?" He asked tersely.

"Know what?"

"That Alice and Bella are fucking hookers?"

That effectively chased away the rest of my grogginess. I poked my head out and looked up and down the hallway worriedly. Satisfied that no one had been around to hear what he had just said, I stepped to the side to let Jasper into my apartment. I was relieved that no one had heard him. I was still fucking protecting her.

"She told you?" I asked him when we got into the living room.

He plopped down onto the couch. "Guess that answers my question."

I sat down next to him. "I found out Friday."

"And, you didn't bother to tell me, because…"

"Bella asked me not to. She said Alice was planning on telling you soon, and I figured it'd be better for you to hear it from the horse's mouth than from me."

"You should have told me." He said dryly.

"I figured I'd let her explain herself to you."

He dropped his head into his hands. "What the fuck am I supposed to do?"

"I don't know."

"Well, what are you going to do about Bella?"

"If you're looking for advice, Jasper, I've got nothing for you. My situation and your situation are two entirely different things."

"What are you going to do?" He asked again.

I sighed. "What I have to. Let her go."

"I-I can't do that. I think… I don't know. Alice… she feels like the one or something." He ran his hands roughly over his face and through his hair. "This is messed up, Edward."

I sighed in agreement. "Yeah, tell me about it."

"I don't know what to do." He grumbled.

"I don't know either, Jasper." I shrugged. "Is she worth it?"

"What, you mean, is she worth compromising my morals, my ethics, my ego, my fucking pride, to accept her terrible decisions as human error and keep being with her regardless?"

"I wouldn't have gone so philosophical with it, but sure, let's go with that."

He was the one sighing this time. "I think she is."

"Then there's your answer, right?"

"Oh, gee, that was easy." He said, rolling his eyes and throwing himself back against the couch cushion. "Fuck." He looked over at me. "How do you feel about commiserating for a while?"

"Miserate all you want, but the co is out. I'm done stressing about it. I can't have her and her problems in my life." The words were mechanical, with no real feeling behind them. He noticed.

"Just like that, huh?" He asked, unconvinced.

"Yeah. No." I ran my hand through my hair. "I mean, really, what choice do I have? I need her out of my life, permanently."

"So, how are you planning on doing that?" He said sarcastically.

"Fuck, if I know how. I just know that I have to."

"Good luck."

I barked a dry, humorless laugh. He looked at me for a long moment, then nodded.

"What the hell are you staring at?" I said with mock harshness.

He shook his head. "It's so amazing how far you've come, Edward."

I stood up. "Don't start with the happy 'I'm so proud of you' shit today, all right? I can't fucking take it. It's too early."

"It's four o'clock."

"Exactly. Too early. Now, if I have to deal with your ass being here, I'm going to have to make some coffee. Want some?"

"Yeah."

I put on a pot of coffee, while Jasper flicked on the TV and tuned it to a football game between two teams neither one of us gave a shit about. We sat in silence and brooded separately for the next few hours.

*

Monday morning, I stormed into the garage, late. Rosalie poked her head out from under the car hood she was working on in order to shoot a glare my way.

"So nice of you to show up." She said sarcastically.

"I'm here, aren't I?" I spat at her.

Her scornful expression morphed into one of confusion. She cocked an eyebrow at me questioningly, but I just stalked off toward the office.

A little while later, I was working on the back end of a Buick when Austin, one of the guys who worked up front in the shop, came over to me.

"Hey Edward?"

"What?"

"There's a customer out front who needs a 16" fan belt, and the computer says we have them, but I can't find any."

"We just got a shipment in last week." I said.

"Well, there aren't any left."

"Did you check the stock room?"

"Yeah. Nothing."

"I don't know what to tell you. If we don't have them, I can't magically pull one out of my ass."

"Do you think I should just-"

"You know how to do your job, right? Then go do it, because I'm sure as hell not going to do it for you." I snapped.

Rosalie came over then, her face full of concern. I turned my full attention to the car I was working on. "What's up Austin?"

"We're out of 16" fan belts, but the computer says we should still have some." He said nervously.

"I have a box of them in the office. There was a problem with the lot number, but I got it sorted out. They're right by the desk, if you want to grab them." Austin nodded, and Rose said quietly. "Don't mind him. He's having a bad day." Austin nodded again and walked away.

Rose turned to me. "Let's take an early lunch."

"I have to finish this." I said without looking at her.

"I'll have Seth take care of it. He's just sitting on is ass right now anyways. Come on."

"Fine."

Rosalie and I went to a Chinese food restaurant not far from the garage. She was quiet on the walk over, and by the time we got seated at our booth, I got the sense that there was something she wanted to tell me, but she was stalling on bringing it up. I just let her mull over her kung pao chicken. She would speak up when she was ready to; that was Rosalie's way.

After a few minutes of eating in silence, she cleared her throat. "Tanya called me this weekend." She said apprehensively.

Ding, ding, ding, we have a winner. This was not a subject I wanted to talk about right now. "How's she doing?" I forced out.

"Good, really good. She loves London."

"Well, that's great."

She paused for a long moment. "She asked about you." She said hesitantly.

"What'd she say?"

"She wanted to know how you were doing since you got out. I told her that you moved out on your own, and you're doing good."

I furrowed my eyebrows. I'd been out of rehab for over a year. "When's the last time you talked to her?"

"She calls me about once a month, but… that was the first time she brought you up."

I nodded. That was understandable. If I were her, I wouldn't much care what the fuck happened to me either.

"I didn't tell her you're seeing someone." She continued.

"Why would you? I'm not."

"Right." She scoffed and narrowed her eyes. "Don't lie to me. I think it's good that you're putting yourself out there again. It's about time."

"I'm not." I repeated.

"Edward, I love Tanya, but I like Bella too. I'm not going to go all bitch on you for being with her."

"You not going all bitch on me? Now that's a dream." I snorted.

"Yeah, that's true." She agreed. "But still. You really don't have to deny it."

"There's nothing to deny. Me and Bella are not dating. We're nothing, period." I said, picking at my rice with my fork.

"Is that why you're being exceptionally unpleasant today?"

"I'm fine." I was really starting to hate having to say that to everyone.

"Yeah, I'm not buying that bullshit."

"Rose…"

"Spill, Edward. You're obviously upset about something. You know you're not supposed to bottle that shit up. It's not healthy."

I looked at her and dropped my fork with a sigh. I always told Rosalie everything; she was pretty much my best friend when it came down to it. She had always been there to support me from day one, because she understood my struggles more than anyone else in my life. She'd been through it before.

I took a deep breath and proceeded to tell her everything that happened on Friday night. I told her about the walk that took hours and brought me nowhere, about the trip to the liquor store, and the fact that I'd probably have gotten drunk off my ass and God knows what else if not for a well timed call from my father. She listened to every word I said in silence, nodding, and watching me with pensive eyes.

"Edward, you just need to stay away from her." She said when I finished.

"That's the plan." I said weakly.

"I'm serious."

"I know."

"No, I don't think you do. You've known her for, what, two months? Less? And she already has you jeopardizing your sobriety."

"It's not her fault." After all that had happened, I was defending her. "She doesn't even know about my drug problem."

Rose's eyes tightened, and she pursed her lips. Her head shook infinitesimally, and I knew there was something she wanted to say that she didn't think I was going to like very much.

"Spit it out Rose."

And she did. "Isn't that just a little hypocritical?"

"How do you figure?" I said defensively.

"She kept something from you, and you tear her a new asshole about it. But you're keeping something from her, too."

"That's different."

"Yeah, maybe in your mind."

I rolled my eyes at her.

She let it go. "So, what happened to your face?" She said around a bite of food.

"Bella punched me."

"Huh. Can't say you didn't deserve it." She put down her fork and leaned across the table, grabbing my face, and turning it to the side. "Well, I'll give her this much. It looks like girlie has a mean right hook."

"Yeah. I was pretty surprised, actually."

Rosalie settled back down on to her side of the booth. "Maybe she wasn't lying when she said she could take care of herself."

I rolled my eyes again. "Give me a break." I put my elbows on the table and rubbed my hands over my face.

"Whoa. What the fuck happened to your hand?"

I pulled my hands away from my face and hid them under the table. "Nothing."

"Bullshit. Let me see." I didn't move. She sighed and came around the table to sit next to me, grabbing my arm. She took my swollen hand in hers, examining it. "Jesus fucking Christ, Edward. What the hell did you do?"

"I punched a wall."

"You punched a wall?" She looked at me like I was crazy.

"A brick one."

"Are you in fucking sane? You have to get this checked out."

"It's no big deal."

"No big deal? It's swollen like a damn beach ball. It's probably broken. You need to go see Carlisle."

"No. Rose, Dad doesn't find out about this. No one finds out about it, okay? If you tell them, then I'm going to have to deal with them breathing down my fucking neck, just waiting for me to fall off the wagon, and I can't take that right now."

"Okay. Fine. But I'm taking you to the hospital." She said stubbornly.

"Rose-"

"Uh, uh, uh. No protests. I will use force if need be."

I knew arguing with her was futile, unless I wanted her foot shoved up my ass, so I surrendered. She drove me to the local hospital in her red Mercedes.

It turned out, my hand was broken. The ER doctor said I wouldn't need a plaster cast if I promised to keep the brace on for at least six weeks. I agreed. He tried to prescribe me pain meds, but when I told him about my condition, he wrote me a script for Motrin 800 instead.

"I told you we shouldn't have gone." I said to Rosalie as we were getting into the car. "Now I have to leave you high and dry. Again."

"Dude, I think your well-being is just a tiny bit more important than the shop. I'll survive." She threw me a sly sideways glance. "Besides, you get desk duty now. Paperwork and phone calls all day long."

I groaned. "My favorite. Maybe I should've broken my right hand instead."

"Too late now." She said smugly.

When we got back to the shop, Rose kicked me out of the garage and told me that if I didn't go home, she'd sneak into my apartment while I was sleeping and use a blender on my most cherished man parts. I winced at just the idea of that happening.

"No more Bella." She said sternly to me through the window as I started the car.

"That won't be a problem." I answered and pushed the button to roll the window up. She gave me a doubtful look as I pulled out of the lot, but I ignored her.

*

BPOV

The rest of the weekend passed slowly, dismally. Sleep didn't come easy. Usually, I slept really well when it rained; the sound of it pounding softly against the bricks and metal of the building made me feel an odd sense of serenity. But the thunder was too loud that weekend, the lightening too bright, and as soon as I started to doze off, I'd be jolted back into consciousness by one or the other.

Alice called me to come over on Sunday afternoon. She'd had her talk with Jasper earlier that day, and it hadn't gone bad, but it was draining for her. When I stepped off the elevator in the lobby of my building, on my way to Alice's place, I almost walked right into Jasper. I looked up at him, and his face wasn't exactly angry, but more distressed than anything. He didn't say anything to me; he just walked right past me into the elevator.

As soon as I walked into Alice's door, I asked her about it.

"How did everything go with Jasper?"

She sighed as I sat down beside her at the kitchen table. "As good as it could've went, I guess. I told him everything. Starting with James and the baby, all the way up to the fact that I'm a call girl."

"How'd he take it?"

"He was angry at first. Like, really, really angry. Not that I blame him. But after he was done ranting and raving, he calmed down enough to let me explain everything."

"What did you say?"

"I told him that was the reason I wouldn't kiss him or anything. That I didn't want things to go further without him knowing the truth. That I cared enough about him to give him the choice."

"And what did he say?"

"He said he respected me for being so protective of what we have. He said he needs time to think, and he'll call me when he figures things out."

"Wow."

After that, Alice and I got plastered drunk off cheap wine just to avoid our 'what ifs' and 'coulda, shoulda, wouldas'.

Monday went by in a blur. I ended up spending Sunday night at Alice's, and we slept in really late. We went out for a late lunch, and by the time I got home, I had to start getting ready for the client I had later on that night. There wasn't much time for me to sit around and be miserable; something I was more than a little grateful for.

Tuesday was a different story. Despite the fact that I didn't get in until three that morning, I was wide-awake by nine. I cleaned my entire apartment, took care of Paul's litter box, showered, dressed, and was done with it all by noon. Then, I had a whole empty day of nothingness stretching ahead of me until nine PM, and I already felt bored. I grabbed a book off my shelf and sat down on the couch, ready to throw myself into a different time and place to escape the problems I had in the here and now.

As soon as I was truly melting into the story in my hands, my cell phone started going off across the room. With a sigh, I got up and plucked it off my nightstand. My eyebrows furrowed when I saw the name on the screen. I pressed the green button and held it to my ear.

"Hello?"

"Bella? It's Rose."

"Hey Rose. What's up?"

"Are you doing anything right now?"

"No. Why?" I asked, confused.

"Do you think you could meet me? We need to talk." She paused. "It's about Edward."

My stomach dropped. "Uh, yeah, sure, I guess. Where?"

She told me to meet her at a coffee shop near her and Edward's garage. I took my truck to go meet her, but I was too nervous to appreciate the fact that my truck was running better than it ever had, since Rosalie serviced it.

I jogged the short distance through the drizzle from the parking lot to the front door. When I got into the coffee shop, Rosalie was already there, sitting at a two-seater table by the window, waiting for me. The sides of her mouth were turned down in a pout, her eyebrows drawn together. I walked toward her.

"Hey Rose."

"Hi Bella." She looked up at me and smiled, but it didn't touch her eyes. "Sit down."

I sat across from her. "How are you?"

"Good." We stared at each other in an awkward silence for a minute. Her face returned to a pout, and I turned my head to look out the window.

"Edward told me everything." Rosalie said carefully after a moment.

I turned my face back to her, blanching. "So, you know that I'm…"

"Yeah." I ran a hand through my hair anxiously. "Don't worry, I'm not going to tell anybody. And I'm not here to judge you. This is solely about Edward."

"Okay." I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding. "He's pretty pissed at me, isn't he?"

"Yeah." She said vehemently. "He's… kind of a wreck about the whole situation. He's hurting, bad."

I scoffed. "He's a wreck? After all the shit he said to me, he's the one that's hurting?"

"I think he's allowed to be hurt when someone he cares about lies straight to his fucking face, Bella." She said defensively.

"I didn't deliberately set out to lie to him, Rose. I never meant to hurt him."

"I know that. And I know you care about him." She took a deep breath. "Look, I didn't call you here to yell at you."

"Then why did you call me here?"

She looked at me intensely. "I'm not trying to accuse you of anything, okay? I want you to know that." She shrugged. "People make fucked up choices. Whatever, I get that. Hell if it's my place to judge, I've made plenty of fucking mistakes. But you have to understand that my brother can't handle these mistakes the way other people can."

"What do you mean?"

She sighed. "This is so difficult to try to explain." She paused for a moment, thinking. "How much do you know about his past?"

"He told me that his parents died when he was a baby, and that he was in foster care until he was fourteen. I know that he was abused for most of his childhood, until the Cullens adopted him."

She nodded thoughtfully. "And, you obviously know that he has… issues… with his anger."

"Yeah. I think that's been made perfectly clear."

"Well, it's not just the anger. Edward doesn't do anything halfway. When he feels something, he fucking feels it with everything he's got. So when he's hurting, it tears him up. Even if he's too damn proud to show it. So stress, any kind of stress… he feels that amplified, too. And it's not good for him. It's not good for anybody, really, but especially not for him. If he gets overly… angry, or sad, or upset, something very bad could happen."

By the way she was talking, she was making it sound like Edward was the Incredible Hulk or something. I had a brief mental flash of Edward busting out of his clothes and turning green. I was so confused.

"Like what?"

She sighed in frustration and flipped her perfect blonde locks over her shoulder. "God, this is so fucking hard. I wish I could just..." She shook her head infinitesimally. "Edward could revert to doing something really, really dangerous to deal with his problems. Something that could potentially kill him."

My eyes widened. "Rosalie, I really don't understand."

"I know. Fuck. I'm a blunt bitch for a reason." She huffed. "I'm terrible at this cryptic, beating around the bush bullshit."

"Then just tell me."

"I wish it were that simple. But I can't. It wouldn't be right for me to tell you."

I sighed, annoyed. "That's so frustrating, you know."

"I know."

"So, why did you call me here then?" She never really got to the point.

She looked at me hesitantly. "To tell you to stay away from Edward." She said slowly.

"What?" I asked in disbelief.

"It's nothing against you personally. I like you a lot Bella, and I consider you a friend. So, as a friend, I'm asking you to keep your distance from him."

"That's… ridiculous." I scoffed.

She shook her head. "It's not."

"Rose, we had an argument. We had a fight, but we can sort it out. We can make up from this." I shook my head in denial. "You can't ask me to cut him out of my life." My voice was unrecognizable to me, a sound of desperation that I'd never heard from myself before.

"I have to. My brother is… vulnerable. If you care about him, which I know you do, you'll do what I'm asking. You're not good for him to have in his life."

"So, because I'm a call girl, I'm not even good enough to be his friend?" The truth of the words hit me like a sledgehammer to the gut as they came from my mouth.

"It's not what you do, it's all that it entails. The bullshit that comes along with your job is way too much for him to handle."

"Isn't that for Edward to decide?"

"I don't want to fight with you about this. Edward knows you're bad for him, and I told him to stay away from you. I don't know if he'll listen to me, but I'm hoping you will." As she talked, I continued shaking my head at her. I refused to believe that we couldn't be in each other's life.

Finally, she sighed and leaned in toward me across the table, with a look of pity in her eyes that wrenched at my insides. "Bella, you're toxic to him." She said quietly.

That last sentence hit me, and hit me hard, as I considered not having Edward in my life. Two months ago, if you had asked me if there was any one person I couldn't live without, I would've laughed in your face. But, to my dismay, that had all changed. I knew that I needed Edward now. I'd never needed anyone, never depended on anyone, but he changed all of that. He was under my skin, swimming in my veins, and there was no eradicating that.

I usually had clean-cut relationships with people –no damage going in, no damage coming out. But there was nothing clean or easy about the way Edward and I were. He had plunged into my life abruptly and haphazardly, his influence clinging to me just as hard as I clung back to him. Could I live without that? Could I be without the way he made me feel? The way Rose was making it sound, my staying away from him was life or death. So if it was for him, I knew I had to. I'd do anything for him.

I took a deep breath and squeezed my eyes shut. When I opened them again, I nodded. "Okay. I can do that. I-I'll stay away from him."

She put her hand on mine and squeezed. "I'm sorry I have to ask you to do this. I really am, Bella."

"No hard feelings." I said weakly.

"This is the right thing for both of you."

I just nodded, and started to stand up. "I'm just going to go, okay? I'll… see you later or something."

I didn't wait for her to respond. I stood up and walked out of the coffee shop into the pounding rain. It had picked up since I'd been in there, and it was beating down now, angry in its force. I pulled my hood over my head and ran to the truck, but it was no use. I was soaked through by the time I got the door open. I hurled myself into the cab, pulled off my hood, and started the truck. I turned the heat up to full blast and then leaned my forehead against the steering wheel, trying to calm my breathing. After a few minutes, I pulled my head from the wheel and shifted the truck into gear. I turned the radio on and put the volume all the way up, effectively making it impossible for me to think clearly. I would save the brooding for when I got home.

At home, I changed into dry clothes and sat down on the couch. I stared blankly at the TV and let my conversation with Rosalie run through my mind. One sentence kept repeating itself over and over in my head, interrupting every other thought I had, resounding venomously in my ears. She didn't say it with malice, but those four words hurt more than anything Edward had said to me the other night, probably because I knew they were 100% true.

"You're toxic to him."

I scoffed out loud at myself. Toxic. That was one way to describe me. I knew I wasn't good enough to be in Edward's life. I knew I was bad for him; I was bad for everyone. I was an epidemic of damages and pain and shattered pieces. There was nothing good about me. It was selfish of me to miss him, selfish to want to have him in my life when I could do nothing but hurt him. And now, Rosalie had bestowed upon me this knowledge of something that plagued Edward. I didn't know what it was, she was so cryptic about it, but I knew I needed to stay away from him, just like she said.

Even knowing that it was right, it hurt. To think I'd never hear his laugh again, or see the way his eyes crinkled almost to the point of disappearing when he laughed really hard. That I wouldn't feel the warmth of his big hand around mine, or even cringe at the way he scraped his teeth against his fork when we ate together, just because he knew it annoyed me. The way you could tell his mood just by his eyebrows; they were so expressive and shifting, it was comical sometimes. That was all lost to me now, had to be lost to me, if I could give him any chance at a happy existence. An existence that couldn't include me, no matter how much I wanted it to.

A faint sound pulled me out of my painful reverie. I pressed the mute button on the TV remote and cocked my head, listening. It sounded like someone was playing classical music. I stood up slowly and walked down the hall toward my front door, the music growing louder as I did. When I got to the door, I opened it a crack. The music was coming from Edward's apartment, and I immediately knew that it wasn't from a CD. He was playing the piano.

I knew he played piano; I had seen the one her had in his apartment. But whenever I had asked him to play something for me, he always refused. Hearing him play now, I had no idea why he wouldn't play for me. The sound was so beautiful. I shut the door and leaned my head against it, closing my eyes. I pictured him sitting on the bench, his long fingers moving gracefully over the keys, making pure beauty out of just sounds. My eyes filled with tears as I realized that I would never see him play, never see the expression on his face, or the glint I knew would be in his emeralds as he hit those poignant notes. It nearly tore me up.

I was done trying to make sense of my actions or my feelings; nothing had ever been the same since I met him, and I had to just accept that rather than fighting it anymore. It was a battle that I'd already lost as soon as he showed up at my door. So, I did something so pathetic, that I fervently hoped no other human being would ever find out about it. I jogged to my bed and pulled a pillow and blanket off of it. Then, I went back down the hall and settled myself down, pressed up against the door, just so I could listen to him play. I let myself forget about how sad and weak I was being, and pretended that he was playing just for me. Uncomfortable as the position was, I fell asleep to the beautiful notes.

The last thing that went through my mind before I fell asleep: I am so fucked.

*

I have to be honest and say that I don't really like this chapter. I rewrote every part at least twice, but I'm not satisfied. I don't exactly know why. I think the whole stress & sleep deprivation thing is getting to me. Sigh. But I wanted to make sure I didn't leave you guys hanging for too long; you've been so good to me. I'll probably end up going back and rewriting this again at some point, and if that happens, I'll make sure to let you all know.

I'll be taking on the role of doting baby sister to my brother for the next 1-2 weeks, so I'm not sure when I'll have time to get the next post up. Luckily, I already have the next chapter outlined so I'm hoping to have it for you early next week. No promises though. So, until then, leave me lots of love my babies!