A/N- Sorry for the long update wait Finals ate my life. But now they are done and school is done and there is another chapter and all is good :)

You can give credit to FishFriend for this being readable!

Disclaimer: Ummmmmmm shhhh i dont want to alarm anyone but I do not own any of this...

"Edward." I barely more than breathed that name.

"Bella, you finally came." He sounded angry and disappointed like I should have come back right away.

"Look Edward I really don't want to do this right now. So please just leave me alone." I kept my head tilted to keep my hair in front of the bruise.

"No, we need to do this now." I kept my eyes to the floor.

"Bella look at me." Edward said sternly.

I raised my head slowly to keep my hair in place.

"What is there to say? I was weak, I couldn't stop myself, and I was to ashamed to come to you for help. There that seems to cover it all."

Then Edward did something I did not expect, he came over to me and enveloped me in a tight hug. I had not been shown such love since before he left and it was all to much for me to take. I jumped back and that was when he saw my face.

Edward scowled darkly and the emotion in his eyes quickly changed from loving to furious, "Who did that to you?!"

"It- it doesn't matter." I stuttered, "I already took care of it."

I saw him do it but I there was nothing I could do to stop him, with one sniff he knew who my attacker was. "Laurent." He said quietly, then his voice rose, "Where were you?"

"Edward, please this is pointless, I took care of it. " I repeated myself, for some reason I did not want to see Laurent get hurt. I knew that after today I didn't owe anything to him but I could not help the feeling in me to make sure he was not harmed.

"Where were you?" He repeated as if he hadn't even heard me. "Tell me you did not go to see him."

"No- no, or course not! I didn't! He found me." My voice was shaking, I was obviously upset about the encounter but Edward didn't seem to notice.

"Where?"

"Look Edward I don't see why this matters, okay? It's my problem. Not yours." I desperately wanted him to drop it.

"Isabella, where was Laurent?" Edward's voice was so cold it didn't sound like him.

"The town park." I said it monotone, no emotion. I was tired of emotion I just wanted to lie back and not think. Not think about anything. It was times like these when I longed to be some unintelligent animal that didn't care about anything and went purely off instincts. Okay time to eat, time to mate, time to sleep, and then time to eat again.

Edward was gone, I vacantly wondered if he was going to tell the others about what he was doing, or what he even was doing. Chances were rare that Laurent would have just stayed there waiting for someone to come, which he must of known would happen. I hoped Edward wouldn't go on a full on tracking game, I needed him here. I needed him to stay and support me.

I leaned against the wall and slowly sank down to fetal position.

I don't know how long I sat like that but eventually Esme came up to see how I was.

"Bella, sweetheart are you okay?"

I hadn't moved for what felt like eternity, when Esme spoke I spun my neck around so fast that it should have hurt.

"Huh? Oh yeah…erm not really, I just… I just need some time." I struggled to get the words out.

"Well you know that I am hear, if you ever wanted to talk right?" She was being so sweet, I felt guilty for not being able to talk to her, but how could I? Esme had no idea what I was going through; it would have been like a woman talking of childbirth to a man.

"Yes well, I am fine but I appreciate the offer." I politely let her know that I would not be coming to her anytime soon.

"Well okay. We are all downstairs picking out board games if you want to play." I could hear the disappointment in her voice.

"All?" Was Edward already back? Maybe he didn't go after Laurent.

"Yes. All of us, Edward would love for you to come down and play, we all would."

I snorted. Yeah…like that was likely. "Rosalie?"

"Oh Isabella I know that she can be a little," Esme hesitated looking for the right word, "…abrasive, but you just have to give her a chance to warm up to you and get used to the idea that there is another beauty in the house now." Esme has a small grin on her face as she pointed out some key character flaws of her 'daughter'. I hoped Rosalie or Emmett wasn't listening in.

I stood up and ran my hand down my shirt trying to flatten out the ruffles in it, "I see no harm in a little board game fun." I wanted to make the Cullens happy, if suffering through a few painful hours of dice and cards was what I needed to do, then so be it.

When I entered the room the atmosphere changed from carefree to walking on egg shells. No one wanted to say something that might upset the fragile little Bella who can't even keep herself from killing innocent little humans.

My eyes found Edward right away, then they almost instantly found the huge red gash going from his left ear to chin. So maybe he did go… I gasped and he locked eyes with me for a fraction of a second before looking away, but in that second I saw a look full of regret and uncryable tears.

I knew all too soon that this was not going to be a very fun game.

Situating myself on the floor in front of a large coffee table, where the game was to be played, I waited. People asked me which game I wanted to play and I merely shrugged. I hadn't done anything like this since I lived in Arizona and frankly, I wasn't sure how to handle it. Finally after much whining and complaining, the Cullens settled on, of course the longest game, monopoly.

The family then scrambled and fought over which character they got to move around the small cardboard playing map. I took what was left, a thimble. After a few failed attempts the Cullens caught on that I would not be making much small talk that evening, and continued on with their own naïve conversations that dealt with a whole lot of nothing.

Instead of talking I spent the whole time staring at Edward who was silently and discreetly wiping out every one else while speaking even less than me and avoiding my gaze the whole time. Eventually the game came down to Alice, who had the unfair advantage of foresight, and Edward, who could read his opponents mind.

As much as I didn't care how I did I also found the whole thing quite funny at how Alice was freaking out. She was yelling about how Edward must have been reading her mind and that she should just win by default, while Edward just smiled his crooked smile and ultimately won.

After the game Edward dismissed himself and I followed. Just as he was about to close the door to his room, which was furnished exactly like the one in Forks, I called out to him.

"What do you want, Isabella?" His voice was hard, but unemotional like he was detaching himself from the situation.

"Well, I would like to talk." I spoke softly afraid of what Edward would do next.

"You didn't seem to want to earlier. What is of importance now?" Edward was being rude but I knew I deserved it. He still hadn't stepped out of the doorway his hand was still on the handle.

"Hmmm, maybe that huge gash on the side of your face." I wanted to walk to him, to kiss him; I wanted to be the old Bella.

"Laurent loves you Bella, you seem to love him." Edward stated simply.

"Just give me awhile to wrap my head around that." He shut his door on me.

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