Stephenie Meyer owns Twilight and its characters. No copyright infringement is intended.
All original characters, plots, and the storyline contained within this derivative work are the property of Lazykate. This story may not be reproduced or reposted without permission from the author. This story is rated M for Mature and is not intended for anyone under the age of eighteen.
Chapter Eleven
I'd gone into auto-pilot mode from the moment I'd seen the DVDs spilled across the backseat of Edward's car. It didn't matter why they were there, or where he got them, all I could focus on was the one that I was in.
But that was ridiculous. Real life didn't work that way. Coincidences like that only happened in bad romance novels when the author needed a handy climax to start the heroine's life down a shitty road.
There were millions of porno flicks in the world. How Edward ended up with one of the first ones I'd made was beyond me. But Rose was right, I didn't have a choice anymore, and so I told him. I thought it would be like the terror of skydiving, but instead it felt like the sickening realization that your plane is going down, and there's not a goddamn thing you can do about it.
Edward froze at my last words, before his lips just barely parted. "What?"
I gripped the DVD more tightly in my hand, wishing I could just smash it, and every single copy, into tiny little bits. "I work with Rose."
"You work..."
"I don't work in public relations. I make porn."
As I saw his face go bone-white even under the faint dome light, I could feel every part of my body slowly turning to ice. My muscles clenched, my lungs froze, and that impenetrable barrier I'd built up around my heart a long time ago settled into place. I realized with sudden clarity that this would be the moment when I lost him, the moment when my lies came back to ruin the best thing that had happened to me in probably my whole life.
"Are you kidding?" His voice was raspy, and he hadn't blinked yet.
"No. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I'm so fucking sorry..." The ice around my heart trembled when he suddenly clamped his eyes shut so hard that his entire face crumpled.
"Why...why didn't you tell me?"
I swallowed thickly. "I wanted you to like me."
"You wanted me to..." He barked out a short laugh before wrenching his door open and stumbling out into the parking lot. I followed him in what felt like slow-motion, knowing that this was my penance for lying, for not finding another way to support Charlie, for not giving Edward a chance when he might have taken it at one time after all.
He staggered a few steps away from the car, his back to me, hands clenched tightly in his hair. I could see his shoulders heaving, but I kept myself a few feet distant. I didn't have the right to touch him anymore.
"Why didn't you just tell me the truth, Bella?" he grated out after a moment. "You didn't...you didn't just keep it from me, you fucking lied to me. Is that...is that what you were doing in San Diego last week? Making porn?"
"I was in LA with Rose," I replied dully, and that was when Edward really exploded.
"You were in fucking LA?" he screamed, whipping around, and I recoiled instinctively from the fury in his voice. "You were...doing...you were letting guys fuck you all week...and then talking to me on the phone like there was nothing..."
"I'm sorry!" I cried again, feeling tears start to well up in my eyes.
His fists clenched at his side and I could tell even in the dimly-lit parking lot that he was shaking. "You...do all that shit? You let them do that to you? Why you, Bella, why fucking you?"
From the corner of my eye, I saw a burly form come out the bar's door and head directly towards us. "Edward, please calm down, please."
"You expect me to calm the fuck down when my fucking girlfriend is telling me that she lets guys screw her in every conceivable sick way for a living? Really?"
"Edward..."
"Have we got a problem here?" He was close enough now that I recognized Pat, the regular bartender, and I knew he recognized me too. "Bella, you okay?"
"Yes, we're okay, I swear."
Pat shot a glare at Edward, who had shut his eyes again and was rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet. "Is this guy giving you a problem?"
"No, Pat, it's okay. Please?"
He gave me a long searching look before turning reluctantly around. "I'll be back out here if I hear yelling again."
"Okay," I whispered, before turning my attention back to Edward.
He stood silent for a long minute, his eyes still shut. "Tell me why."
"I didn't...I didn't know I was going to end up feeling the way I do for you. And I was scared if you knew..."
"No," he interrupted. "Tell me why you do it."
Tears finally began rolling down my cheeks. "Charlie."
I could see the moment when realization dawned over his face, understanding followed immediately by horror. "Bella..."
"You didn't see..." I stopped and took a deep breath. "The nursing home they wanted to put him in, the only one his insurance would approve with the therapy he needed...it was like a warehouse with people just rotting there. Do you really think I was going to leave him there?"
"Bella..." he croaked again, taking a step forward.
"I was going to move back home, to try and take care of him by myself. I was back in LA to pack up my stuff when I met James." My shoulders slumped as memories from the past three years roared over me. "I make enough so that Charlie can stay at home, with twenty-four-hour nursing care. I make enough so he isn't sitting in some shitty institution, staring at the wall and waiting to die. You think I don't owe that to him? Do you know what he gave up for me? Don't you think..."
"Do you think he'd want you to do this?" The anger was slowly melting away from Edward's face, but it was being replaced by an anguish that was cutting me more deeply than his fury had.
"He can't really say one way or the other now, can he?"
My final words, colder than I'd meant them, hung in the air between us. Edward slumped a little more after a moment, before lifting his head and looking me directly in the eyes.
"Get in the car."
"I don't think you should be driving..."
"Get in the car, please. We've got to talk about this, but I'm not doing it in some shithole parking lot."
I backed slowly towards the passenger side of his car. "Where are we going?"
"Back to my place." The anger was almost completely gone now, but he looked sick beyond measure. "Please, Bella, I need you to fucking talk to me. I'm getting behind the wheel and I'm leaving. I want you to go with me, but I'm not going to force you or beg you. Just do it, okay?"
My mouth went dry; part of me said that it would not be a good idea to go with him. I wasn't at all afraid that he'd hurt me, but years of automatic self-defense in a field where women were routinely used and then thrown away were hard to forget. The other part, though, reminded me that he deserved a long-overdue explanation, and that for anything remotely resembling respect to be salvaged between us, I owed him that.
I got in the car.
Edward slammed his own door, and we rode to his apartment in silence. Despite my worry, he drove carefully, almost mechanically, as though his emotions had checked out for the ride. When we arrived at his apartment I followed him inside, to where he strode directly to the freezer and retrieved a bottle of vodka. He took a long swallow, grimacing at the icy bite, and then offered it wordlessly in my direction.
"No thanks," I whispered.
He shrugged, dumped some ice in a glass, and poured a hearty slug of the vodka over it. Still without speaking, he went into the living room and dropped down onto the couch, staring into space in front of him. I curled up on the other end of the couch and waited.
"You're a porn star." It was a statement now, no longer a question.
"Yes."
"You...do all that stuff. Fucking."
"Yes."
"Do you fuck girls?"
"Yes."
"And all that other stuff...you do that too?"
"Edward..."
"Bella, just please fucking answer me. If I have to leave it up to what's going through my brain right now, I'll lose my fucking mind."
"Okay."
"You fuck guys too."
"Yes."
"How many?"
"I don't know." My voice threatened to break on the words.
"Without condoms?"
"Yes."
"Do you suck their dicks?"
"Yes."
"And they come on your face."
"Sometimes."
"You let them fuck you up the ass?"
I flinched. "We tried a couple of times but it hurt too much."
"Do you do more than one guy at a time?"
"Sometimes."
"Do you do that really nasty shit..." He stopped, and I imagined what scenes might be going through his mind, the kind of things that stayed in LA. Ass-to-mouth, hardcore gangbangs, humiliation...shit that made my stomach turn even though I'd seen it all.
"No. James is...we don't do the crazy shit here. I can honestly say...I've never done anything that I wouldn't do otherwise with someone I cared about and trusted."
I expected him to react to my last words, but instead he kept staring into space before slowly bringing the glass back up to his lips. "Do you like it?" he asked finally.
"Jesus Christ, no!"
"Do you fake it every time, or do you actually get off?"
For the briefest moment I thought about not telling him, but I'd already told him too much truth to start lying again now. "Most of the time it's faked. Sometimes it...happens, just because...sometimes it can feel good and your body just reacts. But I never look forward to it."
"This morning..." he started slowly, "Why...what..."
I shuddered involuntarily. "A long time ago...the last actual relationship I had...I didn't tell him about it. And we...when he found out later, he was disgusted that I hadn't told him before I had sex with him. I took away that choice from him, to know about my past. And I wasn't going to do that to you."
The hand holding the glass drooped a little. "Is there something I should know?"
"Per our contracts, we're tested every twenty-one or thirty days," I recited automatically. "We're tested across the board for STDs as well as for drugs. A positive test means suspension or termination, maybe even a lawsuit. And you're black-balled in the industry from then on."
"Have you ever tested positive?"
"No."
"This morning...if we'd...would you have faked it with me?"
I looked directly into the hurt in his green eyes. "I wouldn't have needed to. I've never, ever felt this way about anyone else. I would have told anyone else a hell of a lot sooner, as messed up as that sounds."
He grunted faintly before slumping back into the couch cushions and then slowly draining the remaining contents of his glass. "Bella...oh God..."
"I'm sorry."
"Stop fucking saying that!" he snapped suddenly. "I don't...I don't want to hear you say..."
I scrubbed my fist over my eyes, suddenly feeling so very very tired, very small, and very far away. "I'll call Rose and ask her to come pick me up..."
"No!" He dropped his glass onto the coffee table with a sharp staccato tinkling of ice against glass. "I mean...if you want to go, go. But otherwise, just...just fucking stay here with me. I don't know what to think right now. I don't know what to say, or do. But if I'm going to figure out what the fuck to do when I get up tomorrow, I want you here to remind me that you're worth it. Don't make me talk or anything, just please stay."
My breath squeezed out as a soft pant instead of a sob. "I'll stay with you."
"Just stay with me again tonight and let me get this through my head. It hurts to fucking think about, Bella, my girl..."
I stood up then, the aching in my chest increasing exponentially. He staggered toward me and his face was buried in the crook of my neck in the next second, burrowing there as though he were trying to force the whole world away. One of my arms wound around his back as the other reached up behind his shoulder, allowing my fingers to rake through his hair, letting me pretend that I was only comforting him when really I was the one hurting him. "I'll stay."
"Bella..."
"Shh," I whispered, tugging him more tightly against me. "I'll stay. I'll stay."
After a moment he stumbled off toward the bathroom and I took the moment to quickly fire off a text to Rose, letting her know I was okay and wouldn't be home that night. I'd just stepped into the bedroom I'd left only that morning when the adjoining bathroom door opened and Edward walked out slowly, clutching his balled-up clothes, clad only in his boxers. "Bella?"
He dropped his cell phone on the bedside table as I yanked back the sheets and covers on his bed, gently guiding him under them. He moved as though he were sleepwalking, limbs bumping clumsily, but his fingers immediately tightened around the clothes I still had on. "Please..."
There was nothing sexual in his question and as such nothing in my response. His head lay unmoving against the pillows, watching through flat eyes as I stripped, tearing away everything that had hidden me from him in more ways than one. I was down to my bra and panties when I crawled into bed beside him, molded my body against his back, and tucked my chin onto his shoulder.
"Will you still be here in the morning?" His voice was slurred, whether from the straight vodka or the shock, I didn't know.
"Yes, I'll be here. I promise. There's nowhere else I want to be."
We lay together silently for a long time after that, neither of us sleeping right away. His breathing was ragged, whereas I tried to make myself as silent and still as possible, hoping that he would drift off. It was still relatively early, and I had enough thoughts ricocheting around in my head to keep me awake all night.
I knew that his reaction tonight didn't necessarily predict what he would think or how he would behave in the morning. I knew he stunned, to say nothing of the pain and betrayal that had been reflected on his face. He'd wanted me to stay with him for tonight, but tomorrow morning, with the stark truth staring at him in daylight, with his emotional outburst exhausted, he might decide I wasn't worth it.
It wasn't until his breathing finally slowed and evened out that I allowed myself to cry again, and even then I only let a few more tears slide down my cheeks before I clamped my lips together and forced myself to stop. All the tears in the world weren't going to fix this situation, and I didn't want to guilt-trip Edward into behaving one way or another.
Although I didn't think it was possible, I must have dozed off, because I jerked slightly when Edward's voice quietly broke the silence between us. The faintest shade of gray was coming through the window, indicating that morning had arrived.
"Bella?"
"Yes?"
"Why didn't you tell me?"
I sighed softly and shifted in the bed; at some point he'd rolled over onto his back and I could see that he was staring at the ceiling. "Edward, I never ever anticipated falling for you as fast as I did. I didn't want to tell you on our first date because I thought it would be a bad first impression. I didn't want to tell you on our second date because I didn't want you to look at me differently. And from there I just kept finding reasons and excuses not to tell you, because I so desperately wanted you to care for me as much as I already did for you."
"You couldn't tell that I did?"
"Yes, I could tell." The quiet and dimness of the room was making brutal honesty much easier. "And that just made it worse. In retrospect, I should have told you right away, before you started getting...attached to me."
"But there's more?"
"Of course there is. Edward..." I took a deep breath. "Your family, your mother..."
He huffed softly. "I wondered if that had something to do with it. My parents aren't the elitist fucking snobs some people probably think they are, you know."
"I never said they were," I said gently. "But their world, their orbit...it doesn't ever intersect with someone like me."
"Someone like you..." He reached up and rubbed his eyes. "Bella, you're everything they could or would ever want for me."
"Except for the obvious. Be honest, Edward. I know that your mom is one of the most giving, selfless people in the entire city, but what mother would actually want her child, her only child, to be with a porn star?" He didn't answer, and I doggedly continued. "In some ways, the idea of her reaction, and your dad's, scared me more than yours."
He didn't answer right away, and I knew deep in my heart that Edward was acknowledging the truth in my words. To even pretend to deny them would only compound the lies we were trying to unravel now.
"Is it worth it?" he finally asked.
"Yes," I replied immediately. "I...I know that's not what you want to hear, but you have to understand my point of view. Like I told you last night...the nursing home they were going to put him into...Jesus, Edward, you're a doctor. You have to know what some of those places are like. I knew it was bad when I toured it...people lined up in the hallway in wheelchairs, staring at the wall or bent over so far they were practically falling on the floor. It fucking stunk, like shit and puke and death and I could still smell it on me after I left. The hospital was discharging him regardless, so I thought maybe I could get a transfer arranged within a day or two and get him out of there. He freaked out so bad, though, that they ended up sending him back to the hospital by the end of the day.
"His insurance through the police department was barely covering anything, and we were working on trying to get his Social Security Disability set up, but he didn't qualify for Medicare yet, and the social worker told me the state's Medicaid program wasn't going to pay for anything other than what he'd already been put into. So I flew back to LA to sell my car and pack everything up, to move back to Forks and see what I could do about getting some kind of job to help supplement his SSDI, or to see if I could take care of him at home myself. That was a pipe dream, of course."
"What happened then?" he asked quietly.
"I met James," I said simply. "I was working part-time, waitressing, and I went in to tell my boss I was quitting, and why. James was in LA on business, and he overheard part of the conversation and...well, made me an offer. He said I could give it a try for a month without a contract, to see if it would work out. Then he fronted me enough money to live off of for a couple of weeks.
"The money was, and still is, good. Charlie had to spend six weeks in the nursing home before I had enough to get him back home again, and he'd lost so much weight, and was in such bad condition..." I squeezed my eyes shut against the memory. "When I think of how he looked then, and how he looks now, then yeah...I can't say anything but of course it's all worth it. It doesn't mean I like it, but it's worth it."
"But if he knew..."
"Edward, in a perfect world, I wouldn't be in the position I am now, making decisions for a man who was completely healthy before one split second took it all away. But just like he made decisions for me when I was a kid, I'm making them for him now. Just because he'd probably rather be in that shitty nursing home than to have me doing porn, it doesn't mean I'm changing a goddamn thing."
"Isn't he getting Medicare now?"
"Yes, but it doesn't pay enough to cover all the care that he needs, in-home."
Edward's phone chirped from the bedside table, and he grabbed it, muttered a curse, and then began typing out a text message.
"Do you want me to go? So you can get ready for work?"
He snorted and threw his phone back onto the bedside table. "Yeah, like I'd really be able to concentrate at work today. That was my dad, I just told him I'm taking a sick day."
"Okay," I said simply, and then waited as he went back to rubbing his eyes.
"All right, Bella, I'm just going to ask the stupid fucking asshole question here, not because I don't think you've considered it, but..."
"Of course I've thought of doing something, anything else," I cut him off, knowing immediately where he was going with his query. "But I'm a college dropout who was majoring in history. My last two years of work experience have been in the adult film industry. It doesn't make for a pretty resume. McDonalds would probably even turn me down."
"Have you got enough money to take care of him for as long as he lives?"
I groaned softly as his words punched into my head the single biggest worry that made me sick with anxiety whenever I thought about it. "Of course not. And I'm not stupid enough to think that I'll be in this business forever, or even too much longer...there's always someone new, willing to work for less, willing to do more, someone younger and prettier. If you make it to thirty in this industry, it's a miracle. I just don't know yet what I'll do. For now I'm willing to do whatever it takes to put away every single penny I can, planning for the day when they tell me I'm through."
"It's that much, his expenses?"
"It's thousands every month, Edward. Not just for the nurses, but for all his medical equipment, his medications, physical therapy, arranging transportation to Seattle for his doctor appointments...even with the benefits he has now, it's still more than what most people make at their day job in a month."
"And you make that much money, doing...porn?"
"Give or take a little, I made right around ten grand for this past week. Granted it was a busier week than normal, but yeah. It pays well."
He fixed his eyes back on the ceiling again. "What's it like?"
"Why do you want to know?" I asked cautiously.
"Because I don't want there to be any more fucking lies or secrets between us, Bella. I want to know the truth about all this. I want to know what's real and what's all in my head."
This is it, was the bleak thought that ran through my head. He'd asked last night about some of the specific acts I performed, but I somehow knew that this moment would be the tipping point of whether or not we still had any kind of relationship.
"The company that we all work for, it's basically split into two parts. James runs the outfit here, his sister Victoria runs the one out of LA. The LA department is the more hardcore stuff, lower budget, faster turnover. Here James has a dedicated studio and he does the higher-end films, more still photo shoots, things like that. Comparatively speaking, I'm lucky that James found me instead of Victoria."
I saw his jaw clench. "So...when you went to LA...were you...?"
"No! It's just that outdoor shoots aren't very practical here, so sometimes we're sent down there to get exterior scenes done. James' assistant producer goes with us anytime we shoot in LA, to make sure Victoria doesn't try anything shady. She's an evil bitch, to put it nicely."
"How do you do it? I mean, how do you actually get into a mindset where you can do that?"
"It took a long time," I murmured, remembering back to the first few dark months when I'd started, waking up every morning and wishing I was dead. "I just...I check out. I turn my brain off and just do what I'm told to do. They all know me as Isabella, so it's easier to pretend it's not the real me doing all those things. And...it got easier after a while. I was lucky that Rose showed me the ropes, she made it a lot easier for me. Once you know the ins and outs, the tricks of the trade, how to make a scene go right the first time, it just runs smoother.
"You know how you hear about Hollywood actors saying there's nothing sexy about filming sex scenes? You'd be surprised how true it is for porn too. Especially with James, and his visions of cinematic grandeur...we're constantly having to stop and start, get into positions that don't feel remotely sexy, and by the end of the day you're pretty much worn out."
"Do some of them like it?"
"Of course. Rose enjoyed the hell out of it until she met Emmett. Granted she had a plan for life beyond porn, but she liked it."
I could see his eyebrows scrunch together. "Did you ever, ah...with Rose..."
"Yeah," I laughed softly. "More than once. My very first scene was with her, that was how we met."
"Your first film was a...lesbian shoot? Isn't that weird?"
"No...for new girls who are completely inexperienced, a lot of times they have a girl-on-girl shoot as her first one. Scenes with guys tend to be, uh, a little more aggressive in general, and then the whole thing with knowing how to pose, what to do, how to end it..." I shifted nervously, this was getting more detailed than I was sure he wanted to hear. "At least with another woman, unless you get some diva bitch, she's going to know how to make you feel better, and empathize with you."
"That's fucked up," he stated simply.
"That's your opinion," I replied immediately. "Rose got me through something that probably would have killed me to do otherwise. And like I said...it gets easier."
"So why hasn't Emmett seen any of your films, and recognized you?"
I shrugged slightly into the pillow. "He probably has. We look a lot different when we're all made up and have our hair done. That one he gave you...the one with me in it...we were supposed to be club kids so we were all wearing these crazy wigs. Mine was pink."
Once again a heavy silence settled over the room, and Edward lay unmoving, one arm flung over his eyes. "So...that's it, huh?"
"Unless there's anything else you want to know."
"I take it that's a hickey on your collarbone?"
"Yes. I wanted to keep the sweatshirt on for the 5k because I had ropeburns from the last shoot on Friday."
He grimaced. "I don't want to know anymore about that."
"Edward...I'm not saying you have to make a decision here and now, but I need to know what you're thinking. If you want anything more to do with me, or if there's even going to be an 'us' now." I wasn't sure where the strength in my voice came from, but the self-respect that I still had buried somewhere deep down inside was stirring. I'd laid myself bare before him, but I wasn't going to beg or humiliate myself to get him to stay. I couldn't do that and still respect him in the end. "If you need some time to think, I understand. But if you already know the answer now, just tell me."
He rolled over onto his side then to face me, and for the first time I saw tears sparkling in his bloodshot eyes. "Bella...I was falling in love with you. So much that it scared me, because it's not supposed to work that way, that fast. But I was willing to dive in headfirst because I'd never felt that way before. And I'd have been a fool to blow that chance just because we weren't following the rules."
He was speaking in the past tense, and the ominousness of it made my stomach heave. "I know."
"I had all these thoughts and plans, thinking about us doing things in the future, there being an us. I was so happy it almost didn't seem possible, or real. And then all of a sudden I found out that in a lot of ways, it wasn't."
I caught the sob building in my chest before it could erupt from my lips and give me away, exposing the pieces of me that were falling apart at the raw honesty in his words. "I understand."
"It would be like starting over again, trying to wrap my brain around this. I mean…I'm fucking crazy about you, Bella. I want to try. I want to tell you and tell myself that it doesn't matter, but that's bullshit because we both know that it does matter."
"Yeah." The lump in my throat was twisting and constricting my words now.
"Because you won't, or can't give it up, can you?" He reached out a single finger and touched my cheek gently, as though I were spun sugar or a snowflake, something that might melt and disappear against the heat of his skin.
"I can't."
He swallowed hard. "You don't want to do this, but you're doing it because it's worth it. And you've found ways to deal with it, because in the long run, it's worth it."
"Yes."
"I want to do that too, Bella. You're worth it. God, you're worth it. I just don't know how. I don't know how to convince myself it's okay for another man to have sex with you. I don't know how to keep away the insecurity that's going to hit me every time I kiss you or touch you or make love to you. I don't know how to make it all right in my brain, but God, I want to try. I just don't know how."
"I don't know how either," I whispered, tears erupting again and trickling down my cheeks. "There's never been anyone who mattered enough for me to try. But I'll do anything and everything I can to make us work, if that's what you want."
"Bella," he groaned, and in the next second the space between us vanished as he reached out to wrap his arms around me and dragged me close to the warmth of his body, against his smooth skin. "I want you. God, I've wanted you from the minute I saw you, a whole fucking eleven days ago. Everything about you tells me that there's something special about you, about who we are when we're together. I want to be strong enough to be there for you, to be secure enough to know you want only me, but I'm so goddamn scared. I'm scared that this whole fucked-up thing could ruin one of the best things that's ever happened to me."
I tilted my head back, my wet cheek sliding against his, seeing determination in eyes that were swimming in an ocean of uncertainty. "I'm scared too. I don't know what to say or what to do to make all this okay. Maybe there isn't any way to. But if you're willing to try, then I am too."
He pulled me tighter against him, tucking my head under his chin and beginning a slow rhythmic stroking of my hair, a motion meant to soothe me even as I felt the slight tremble in his body. "I'm willing to try."
I closed my eyes and breathed in the warm scent of him, those words being the only reassurance I needed. He was willing to try. And for now, that was enough.
xoxoxoxo
A/N:
Okay, first off, for all of you who are reading both this fic and Dirty Little Secrets, I do apologize for the unfortunate timing of both of the last chapters. You know what I mean. It was NOT planned that way, but sometimes it just ends up happening.
Second, THANK YOU for all the AWESOME reviews, theories, and thoughts you shared on the last chapter! I've said it before and I'll say it again…your reviews mean more than you may realize. Sometimes they make me think about something I've never considered, sometimes they just give me motivation when I need it the most. You guys rock!
Lastly…Edward is willing to try. Because of course Bella is worth it! Words are good in theory but can be harder to put into practice…any thoughts on what obstacles these two are setting themselves up against?
As always, I'm on Twitter as lazykatevamp, please feel free to hit me up for a follow! Talk to you soon!
