BELLA SWAN

I woke up the next morning, the remnants of my dream hanging on the back of my mind like the lyrics of a song stuck on repeat. I kept replaying it to myself like a flicker of bad memories. Wolves, and a clearing that had previously housed a fight against a newborn contingent set on my demise. This time, Victoria was absent. And the wolves were no longer our allies.

Edward noticed something was wrong yet again, but this morning he decided to let me dwell in silence. He simply kissed me good-morning before I slipped away to the shower. His silence meant he was thinking as well, which worried me. On what was he concentrating? Had something happened during the night, perhaps?

When I returned from my shower, hair towel-dried and only slightly damp, Edward was sitting on the edge of my bed in clean clothes, a set of fresh clothes laid out beside him. He looked up at me apologetically when I cocked an eyebrow at the ensemble, which included my most well-loved pair of jeans and his favorite blue blouse, and asked, "Special occasion?"

He nodded. "Every day that I wake up beside you is a special occasion, Bella."

I smiled at him before he slipped out of my room, allowing me to dress in privacy. On his way out, he kissed the top of my head gently. I pulled on the clothes quickly and met Edward in the hallway. I hadn't checked the time, but it was late enough that Charlie had left for work already.

Edward led me down the stairwell and out to the driveway, where the Volvo waited. I noticed for the first time his own clothing: a clean, crisp white shirt with pearly buttons, the top two buttons undone casually, and his favorite pair of jeans. It was different than his usual apparel, which usually included a slightly-rumpled blue collared shirt, or his navy blue long-sleeved Henley, or the soft gray shirt that he knew I loved.

It was a special occasion. But what occasion could it be? I mentally tallied everything up in my brain as Edward helped me into the car and began driving.

It wasn't anyone's birthday, as far as I could recall. Charlie's was in January, and the Cullens had given up holding birthday parties since my last. I was almost certain that every option had been accounted for and dismissed, when I realized Edward was driving towards the meadow.

"What's going on?" I asked. Edward simply grinned at the windshield at he kept going.

It was an overcast day. I watched the clouds move as Edward came to a stop at the pavement's end, all the while wondering what he was up to and whether I should just go along with it. He knew I hated surprises.

He opened my door for me and offered me his hand; when I took it, he swung me swiftly onto his back, and then he was running.

I buried my face into shoulder. I wasn't as afraid of the speed anymore, but the notion of moving at a speed that could and would kill me were Edward to falter somehow (not that it seemed likely) often gave me a sure sense of motion sickness, a feeling which was avoided if I simply didn't look.

After just two minutes, he slowed to a walk. I felt the cool breeze he'd created with his sheer speed stop altogether, so I looked up from his shoulder as he neared the center of the field.

His entire family stood in the meadow, each dressed casually, but each looking somehow as if they'd stepped off the pages of some windswept photo-shoot. Carlisle smiled at us as Edward helped me off his back. I looked around at all of them.

"What's going on?" I asked again, my gaze narrowing as my eyes swept around to Alice and then, finally, back to Edward.

Esme smiled at me. "It was all Edward's idea. Alice wasn't too happy…"

"…But, I promised her all her hard work wouldn't go to waste, and she agreed." Edward was grinning at Alice, who rolled her eyes at him but kept smiling.

The pieces still weren't really meshing in my head. "Agreed to what?"

Edward's cool hand enveloped mine. "When we were speaking yesterday, and Alice said that she would ensure nothing went badly on the wedding day, I started to think about all the ways that something could go wrong," he said. I snorted.

"Of course you would," I said. Emmett chuckled.

Edward continued. "And when I thought about it, I realized that three weeks is too long to wait."

A titter flared up behind me; I spun to see what the commotion was and saw Esme with a hand to her lips, her eyes sparkling with joy. My eyes slid to Alice, who was smiling widely beside Jasper, who was snickering at my confounded expression. Rosalie, who at least wasn't scowling, next to Emmett, who's goofy expression made me grin. And Carlisle, who nodded at me once my eyes met his. His nod felt like approval, like acceptance and love and friendship. I couldn't not want this, a family. I couldn't disagree with whatever was happening, if every one of the people I held most dear—except for Charlie and Jacob—were here encouraging me to do it, a promise tha tif I simply said yes, the world was mine.

I took a deep breath before my eyes completed the circle and landed again on Edward, who's eyes danced with excitement. It was the first time I'd seen him this happy in a few days. My mood, being instantly effected by his as it always had been, instantly picked up, so that I was almost giddily content as I watched him drop to one knee. I couldn't even find in me the anger or embarrassment this action might have warranted under different circumstances.

"Isabella Swan," he started, "I know that I have asked this question before. And I know that you have given me an answer," he said, almost as if he were unsure of it.

"My answer will never change," I said quietly, kneeling down so I was even with him as his family watched from behind. "Ten days, twenty years, all of eternity—the answer to that question has always been and will forever remain a resolute yes."

He smiled, his hand curling around my own, his other hand reaching up to brush a stray strand of hair away from my face and landing there on my cheek. "Bella, will you marry me?"

I nodded.

Edward's smile brightened again. "Will you marry me today?"

My breathing hitched. The clothing, the meadow, his family gathered here. . . I knew it'd all been leading up to something big. I had almost been convinced that his third proposal to me would be the occasion, cementing that proposal in front of his family before the wedding date, to solidify it. But, of course, when it came to Edward and his plans, I was usually wrong, and this proved no different.

"T-today?" I stammered. Edward nodded, still smiling.

A million different reasons of why I shouldn't ran through my head. Charlie and Renee were absent, for one. Jacob wasn't here, either—though I hadn't been exactly expecting him at the ceremony anyways, no matter how much I wished he would be there. There was no minister, I didn't have my dress, Edward had no tux, our rings (simple white gold bands, tradition and modernity mixed into a simplistic symbol of eternity) were still at the jeweler's getting fitted, there were no flowers. . .

And then there was one, blaringly bright reason as to why I would do it. Love. A promise of forever made on a prom night which seemed a lifetime ago already. A family.

Edward.

Instead of answering, I closed the foot-wide distance between us, my arms locking around his neck, my lips crashing hard against his. This is what I wanted, forever, every part of it. Living without it wasn't an option.

When I surfaced a minute later—at Edward's persuasion—I turned to Alice. "If we do it now, we still have to have a ceremony, right?"

She nodded. "We can make it official now, but we still have to make it public."

I rolled my eyes at her before Edward helped me to my feet, grinning. Once I had wiped the grass and weed remnants from my knees, Edward turned to his family, still lined up in a neat row. "Emmett?"

Emmett stepped forward with a large, cheesy grin. He winked one honey-brown eye at me before he assumed a spot in front of Edward, whose hand was linked with mine.

"Ready, Bella?" Edward asked quietly. I took one deep breath, my eyes closed, and as I exhaled I found that all the dim-witted reasons I could have used to get out of this had disappeared.

When I opened my eyes again, Edward was watching me, apprehensive. His ocher eyes sparkled with insecurity.

I squeezed his hand once and nodded. He sighed.

Emmett cleared his throat.

"Well, then," he said, "let's get this thing started."

The ceremony wasn't very long, nor did it feel like a ceremony. It wasn't the organza- and tulle-infested extravaganza I'd seen in movies and half expected Alice to pull out of her sleeves on July 19th.

Emmett had breezed through the official part quickly and easily—I wondered vaguely how long it'd taken him to complete his online course—and only when it came to the vows did he stop talking. He looked at Edward with a raised eyebrow, and then Edward turned to face me. I followed suit, and he caught my free hand in his.

"Bella," he said, his voice low. His eyes shone. "For more than a century I have lived with a loving family, a content life. But one thing was missing. It had always been missing, even before this," he gestured to himself, his eyes, to indicate his change. "I wasn't complete. It felt as if the sun were only partially visible, the rest obscured by some dim-witted cloud that was keeping me away from everything I wanted.

"And then you were there, tempting me, changing me. The cloud moved aside, and I finally saw the sun's light properly. It changed the way I viewed the world, the way I treated others. It changed me. Irrevocably, uniquivocably. Bella, you are my other half. There will never be any reason for my to need anyone else. It has always been you—before I knew who you were or when you would come to be—and forever shall it remain you."

There was a low whisper-like sigh behind us, but I ignored it. Emmett had turned to me, but Edward's words were swirling around my head, twisting in and out and latching themselves into the special part of my heart where I stowed every memory I held dear. This moment would last forever there, like a precious jewel tucked safely away in the hidden compartment of a jewelry box.

"Bella?"

Emmett's voice brought me to, and I took a deep breath.

"I can't find words perfect enough to describe how I feel about you, Edward," I said, somewhat clumsily. My voice shook. "I can't find the right metephor to describe the difference you've made in my life. I can only tell you, and hope that you understand, that I love you more than life itself. I love you more than the air I need to breathe, or the blood that pumps through my veins, or the heart that beats within my chest. I can't live without them, but it is you that it would truly hurt to lose. You are my life, my soul, my air, my heart. And there's no reason for the world if you aren't in it."

While I'd been speaking, Edward had moved closer to me, as I had to him. Our foreheads were now just two inches away from each other.

Emmett had said the words, "you may kiss the bride," so quietly that I almost didn't hear. Edward had, however, and he closed the distance between us quickly.

When we separated a minute later, he leaned his forehead against mine.

"I'm sorry my vows kind of sucked," I whispered. Edward laughed, then shook his head.

"Never," he said. "They were perfect." And he kissed the tip of my nose.

-- -- --

Disclaimer.
[on phone] What do you mean, it's not mine? Hmph. Fine. [hangs up phone] Guys, it's not mine. Apparently.

Author's Note.
Go ahead, float away on your fluffy fluff clouds. I know I did. =)
Reviews would be loverly.