A/N:
*This chapter contains overlaps. This means quick points of view that bounce between Edward and Bella.
*Thanks to my Beta, Susie, who is always amazing at keeping my ass in line with punctuation and grammar.
*Song is by Staind, and it is a sad song that fits so fucking well with this chapter. Enjoy.
*NEW Fic starting 01/15/2011. Make sure you have me on author alert!
EVERYTHING CHANGES (TURN BACK THE YEARS)
11
Covering my bases on sensitive issues:
DEEP SHIT AHEAD...
WARNING: THIS STORY AND/OR CHAPTER MAY CONTAIN INSTANCES OF NEAR SEXUAL ASSUALT IN THE FORM OF FLASHBACKS. IF YOU ARE UNDER THE AGE OF 16, OR IF THINGS OF THIS NATURE TRIGGER YOU, PLEASE USE CAUTION. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK...
-(*)-
*E_D_W_A_R_D*
-(*)-
If you just walked away
What could I really say?
Would it matter anyway?
Would it change how you feel?
I am the mess you choose
The closet you cannot close
The devil in you I suppose
'Cause the wounds never heal
But everything changes
If I could
Turn back the years
If you could
Learn to forgive me
Then I could learn to feel
The tires screeched passively as we rounded a sharp curve in the road, Rose's face was pale and consequently panicked as she still firmly gripped the steering wheel. I was coward against the passenger seat, my body being thrown against the leather material of the sports car with every turn she made. I made several attempts to speak, but every time, the car would speed on through the dark and I would be whacked forward against the dash, making it impossible to speak. Roses' face worried me. She was driving like hell, and her face never once wavered from the paved lines of the road, or the sharp hairpins the car made. The little bit of jumbled thoughts that raced in my mind were of her ingenious look when she asked who I wanted to save more. It was a peculiar question. Mike had offered to take her home. What was so bad about that? Sure, they had dated, and the jealous asshole in me didn't find comfort in this fact, there was nothing that connected my brain to this kind of reaction. Perhaps it was the crazy ass driving of Rose, or maybe, just maybe, in the back of my mind it was that I didn't really want to think of it; think of what Rose had clearly wanted to silently say. It just didn't click at the moment.
"We're almost there," Rose said, breaking my concentration (what little I had). "You will be closest to the door. When I pull up, get out and go," she said, taking her hand and shifting the car into third gear.
"Want to tell me what the fuck is going on here, Rose?" I turned to her, gripping the dash for support as she rolled on through a stop sign. "Mike took her home. Big fucking deal."
Rose laughed without humor. "'Big fucking deal'? You bet your ass it's a 'big fucking deal', Edward," she replied, shaking her head. "You have to trust me. You can't let her alone with him."
I looked away from Rose, and the instant that last sentence of hers seeped into my mind-fucked brain, I grasped the horrible, unadulterated truth. I slunk back into the seat and pushed my hand through my hair trying to stop the feeling of wanting to retch all over her leather interior. Mike mother-fucking Newton? Bella? It kicked in my head like a bullet bursting through my brain; painful and full of infliction. He was the one responsible for that night. He was the one who was with her in the darkened studio while she screamed. He is the one who made Bella the way she is...
"No," I whispered. "Not Bella."
"Yeah, Edward. Bella. I walked in on them. He looked right at me," she said, her hands tightening on the wheel as she remembered. "His fucking eyes peered right at me through the dark. I watched him release her wrists and run out the back of the studio like the fucking cowardly creep he really is," she finished as she looked sideways at me from the corner of her eyes. "Sorry to be the one to tell you."
I was quiet for a brief moment, and then, "I'll fucking kill him."
Now Rose laughed. She straightened in her seat and pointed to the street down from my studio. We were here. Rose stopped the car, her brakes screeching against the macadam in protest. As soon as the car stopped completely, I threw the passenger open and ran onto the sidewalk, down the walk that lead to her glass door. I could see lights on in her apartment from the door and windows.
"Bella!" I yelled, pounding on the glass with my fists. I didn't give a right shit if I broke the glass for a second time or not. "Isabella!"
I heard a sound behind me, and then Rose's fingers pushing at the buttons of the alarm. The beep of the alarm had me pushing the door open, slamming it back against the wall. Rose was right behind me as we shouted Bella's name. I ran into the living room, but it was deserted, except for the shoes Bella had been wearing tonight, which were strewn on the couch. My breathing stopped momentarily before me paraplegic body finally acted and I ran through her kitchen.
"Rose? Her shoes are in the living room, she has to be here somewhere," I shouted.
Rose shouted to me from a room behind the kitchen. I jogged quickly to where her voice came. It was a bedroom-Bella's-and Rose was leaning over the bed.
"Rose?"
"Edward, she's not here," she said softly, picking something off the bed and hugging it to her body. "She was here, but she's gone."
She turned around and held up something that filtered in the light from the lamps on either side of her bed.
"Is that-?" I started.
On the white dress Bella wore this evening was a deep, red stain across the middle, there were swatches of deep magenta all around the stain.
"Blood," Rose confirmed.
-(*)-
*B_E_L_L_A*
-(*)-
Sometimes the things I say
In moments of disarray
Succumbing to the games we play
To make sure that it's real
But everything changes
If I could
Turn back the years
If you could
Learn to forgive me
Then I could learn to feel
When it's just me and you
Who knows what we could do
If we can just make it through
The toughest part of the day
I sat with the light on, looking at my hands in the tinted light as if there was no skin on them. The red tinged my fingertips and flowed downward toward my wrists, drying slightly from the heat emanating from the light fixtures; my eyes scanned absently to the walls and ceiling. I was lying on my back, the silence permeating around me. I turned my head to the right and grasped out to my hand and picked up the broken mess beside me. The tears came without shame, running down my cheek and splashing on the table underneath my body. I didn't want to move; I didn't want my body to be frozen with the paralyzing truth, but there was no other way around it. My hand hit the smooth roughness, my fingers gliding down until the frayed edges ended, causing me to bring my hand back close to my body and sob silently.
My memories led me back to the night we danced, how careless and free it seemed, in that moment, to be swaying in Edward's arms, looking into his liquid-onyx eyes as we twirled. My mind flashed to the small, but needy kisses and the way his eyes lifted to mine when he lifted my chin. As my mind drifted to the studio this afternoon, and the willingness to give into my own desires, the last bit of my sanity seemed to crumble, adding to the cataclysm that seemed to make my body numb. I thought I could trust Edward with everything, that he would tell me the truth about everything. But, obviously, that wasn't the case. I only heard part of the conversation in the closet; a snippet of Edward's true selfishness.
I didn't know how much he knew-the extent to which he knew-but he did know. He knew of what happened to me four years ago, and so did Angie. In that moment of eavesdropping, I figured out that there was a reason for Edward's admissions of fucking Angie here and there. He had once told me that it was something he had to do, but not necessarily what he wanted to do. He had told me that she had something on him, blackmailing of sorts. It was clear as I lay on my back, my eyes closing with vague tiredness, that the blackmailing she held on him was information on me. Edward knew, which meant he did nothing that night. Destroying the small amount of happiness I had come to feel in four years with the realization that Edward Masen was responsible for my fucked up, illogical reactions to men getting close to me. I had let Edward in, and he had lied to me, hiding things from me that I had every right to know. The question was not if I deserved to know, it was if I was really prepared to handle it.
Clearly, as I sobbed once again, I was not.
The last but most hurtful of everything, was that Edward had to ask Mike, the man who almost took my will with him when he nearly raped me, how he could get into my pants. It made me feel dirty to know that the man who put his filthy, dirty motherfucking hands on me talked to the man I fell in love with, and told him how to do it. Edward had said he would wait for me, for however long it took, but, just like he did with everything else, he lied. He wanted to have sex with me, and knowing full well I wasn't ready for that level at that moment, he took advantage of me, of my crumbling, disheveled will and made me give in. Having sex with Edward Masen was the biggest mistake I ever made...even compared to dating Michael Newton? Could that be possible?
Michael Newton.
I groaned again at the name as the fresh sobs caught in my throat. I turned on my side and wretched my eyes shut. I pressed my fingers to my wrist. The throbbing pain crept up my arm and I winced. He still had a grip of a gorilla, and his pressure had dug into my wrist, making purplish bruises slowly fade in on my milky white skin. I opened my eyes and trailed my fingers away from the bruise, letting my fingers trail to the broken wood frame that rested close to my head. My fingers reached out to the painted onyx eye on the torn canvas.
Part of me went back to the night Edward was drunk, and had asked me if someone had done something to me. My lie was because the look in his eyes was one of someone hoping it wasn't the case. Nobody wants damaged goods, you know. Nobody wants to be the one to date the 'recluse' or the 'broken' girl who was someone's play toy. I had listened to the conversation between Angela and him, and felt my heart drop to the floor. How long had he known? How long had he kept it secret? How long had he played the part of the 'boyfriend who had no idea'? But in the end, it didn't really matter what the answer to those questions were...it only mattered that he had a hand in what happened to me.
I had heard him calling after me as I fled, which is what I do best, flee and avoid, but it changed nothing within me to hear his voice say my name. There was no real comfort this time in it. It was a reaction to getting caught, and not about anything else.
If I could turn back the years, make everything disappear; Mike, me, that night...Edward...everything, I would in a heartbeat and not regret the decision to do so. Would it really matter? But then, I supposed anything was better than lying on a table, crying about the mess in my life, wondering if the man I had fallen in love with-the man I gave a chance to-really did love me the same way in return. Liars put masks up; unfaltering in their characters, playing parts that they really didn't really want.
I dropped the painted canvas that held the onyx eye, watching it flitter to the floor with a small clank as it settled. I covered my face with the palm of my hand and cried silently, feeling all the regret and all the hurt swell inside me, making a knot in my belly.
Edward Masen would never hurt me again. He would never lie to me or touch me ever again. I felt the love that I saved for him; for what he gave me in the time we knew each other fall away from me. I figured, anyway, that Edward would walk away from me eventually, considering the circumstances and my past. For what he did, what he knew was bad, but what I did, letting him inside my heart, inside my world, was worse.
Everything had changed...
-(*)-
*E_D_W_A_R_D*
-(*)-
But everything changes
If I could
Turn back the years
If you could
Learn to forgive me
Then I could
Learn how to feel
Then we could
Stay here together
And we could
Conquer the world
If we could
Say that forever
Is more than just a word
I squinted speculatively at the stain one the dress, my finger reaching out to scratch at the stain with my fingernail. I recognized the stain upon further investigation.
"Hold on a second," I said, bringing my eyes slowly up to meet Rose's. "This isn't blood."
"Then what the fuck is it?" Rose demanded, though her voice filled with relief. "Sure the hell looks like blood."
"Its magenta paint," I told her as I lifted my head toward the hall. "The studio," I whispered.
"Where are you going?" Rose asked, following me as I started toward the door.
"The paint on the dress is oil," I explained, turning toward Rose and rolling my eyes in irritation. "You can tell from the way it dried. Oil dries solidly."
"And?"
"And Bella only owns, uses, and swears by watercolors. The oil paints are mine. I use them all the time, and I can spot my paint anywhere. I know where she is," I told her, comparatively matching her tone as she rolled her eyes in turn.
"I'll come, too." Rose tried to walk past me, but my arm jutted out to stop her. "If you want to keep that arm, Masen, I'd move it."
"Please," I asked her softly. "Please let me do this alone. Let me fix this, like I wanted to in the first place," I told her, my face pleading and my eyes deep as I lowered my arm.
"I doubt she wants to talk to you."
"Then why is she at my studio?" I raised my eyebrows. "Please, Rose?"
She sighed deeply, but nodded. "I don't know, Edward. Maybe she's there for the sheer fun of it," she replied mockingly. "You make sure you call me if she's there. I don't want to have to worry the entire night of her whereabouts."
"I will call you right away," I said, turning from her and walking out of the open glass door. "Thank you, Rose."
"I really hope she understands whatever you tell her. I doubt Bella will be in the mood to listen to you, though."
"I know," I said softly. "And I hope so, too."
"Good luck," Rose said as I started down the walk toward my studio.
The lukewarm air swirled around me as I walked briskly along the lit street, the streetlamps sending shards of light into my path as I made my way to the studio. I had no idea what I would say to her when I got there, but I knew relief would wafer through me. There were the questions, like what happened with Mike, how she got into my studio, and what was with the paint on the dress-but there would also be answers. I would have to risk telling her the truth, risk her leaving me. I wouldn't lie about anything to her anymore. There was one thing that I would do if I got the chance. Michael Newton's ass belonged to me. I would fuck him up; make him look like a Picasso painting by the time I was done for what he did to Bella. There was still the question of what had happened on her ride home with him. At the thought, my pace quickened tersely as I saw the familiar facades of the buildings around me, letting me know that I was very close. I passed Jake's, the lights, music and laughter filtering out into the street, making the wind melodic and the shadows psychedelically bright.
I moved quickly on until I could see the glass doors of my studio. The light inside was dim, but noticeable. This gave me some hope, because I had, for a fact, turned the lights off before leaving to conserve energy. I reached for the door and opened it hesitantly, part of me wanting to put off what I would inevitably be faced with. I took a deep breath, said a silent prayer that she would understand, and walked inside, letting the door close with a brief snap.
"Isabella?" I called out into the dimly lit parlor. "Are you here?"
I looked around and could see the office lights on, and just beyond that, under the closed door of my studio, a small, innocuous light. I stepped in through the office and stood at the door, my hand resting against the cold wood, and placed my ear to the door. I could hear nothing but muffled acoustics through the wood. I sighed and slid my hand to the knob. Carefully, I cracked the door open and slipped my head in the doorway.
"Bella?" I called again. My eyes scanned the room, and there, on the table in which we made love this afternoon, Bella lay curled, her cheek on the table, and her sobs echoing softly in the dim light of the studio. "Bella, I'm so-"
"Don't come any closer, Edward. Don't you dare," she commanded thickly, her voice filled with tearful hoarseness.
"Please at least give me a chance to explain," I begged of her, moving closer despite her request.
So quickly, so that she was almost a blur, she rolled on her back and lifted her body, dangling her legs over the edge of the table. Her eyes were very red, and her clothing, which consisted of black yoga pants and a white tank top, were marred in paint, much like the stain on the dress. She reached her pale, painted hands to her eyes and wiped them.
"Edward," she said, putting her hand up to stop my advancement. "All you seem to do is explain. I don't want to hear your lies anymore."
I stopped my movements and stilled; my hands went to my hair and my fingers wrapped into the strands in agitation. I knew this would be difficult, I just thought she'd give me the reservation to explain.
"I didn't lie to you, not really," I told her. "No, listen! I didn't lie to you, Isabella. I held it in, made it a secret that I knew, but I never lied to you, Bella. Not about this."
She laughed without humor. "You knew it was me...the one from four years ago. You never bothered to think that I might have wanted to know that you were responsible for my fucking issues? You knew and kept it from me. I don't know what the hell your definition of lying is, but it's what you did." She turned from me and put her palms down on the table and hung her head.
"I didn't know that it was you that Angie walked in on until this afternoon when Rose told me!" I defended, watching as she shook her head.
"Rose?"
"Rose came by the studio this afternoon and told me she saw Angie that night come from the back," I explained to her as she turned to face me, fresh tears on her cheeks making my heart hurt. "I had no idea it was you."
"Did it matter who it was?" she asked, closing her eyes and rocking back and forth on her heels. "So why did you pretend everything was alright when you picked me up this afternoon instead of telling me the goddamn truth?"
I sighed and walked forward, reached for her hand. Though she let me hold it, her grasp was limp and cold. "I wanted to, but Rose talked me out of it. She said that you were happy and she didn't want to ruin it. Did you really want to relive it all again, anyway?"
"I already do," she answered softly.
"What happened on the way here?" I asked suddenly, remembering how she had gotten here in the first place. "If he fucking touched you-"
She shook her head and disengaged her hand from mine. "Emmett saw me leave with him. There's no way he'd try something with witnesses around," she explained.
"And Rose's dress?"
"It was an accident. I went home to change out of the dress once I dripped the paint on it, and came back to finish."
"Finish what?"
Instead of verbally answering me, Bella moved aside, away from the table. On the table stood pieces of a canvas, the torn bits and wooden frame smashed and slashed violently. Bella's eyes traveled sadly from the mess to my eyes.
"What is that?"
"Your painting I've been working on. I smashed it to bits, Edward. I didn't want it in my apartment anymore," she said, picking up a piece of the broken mess and hurling it at me. It's as fucked up as you are."
"But the paint-"
I watched as Bella walked past me and reached her hand to the light switch. She flicked the lights on all the way. My eyes tried to adjust to the change in brightness, but I immediately wished they hadn't. My eyes scanned my studio, and the gasp from my mouth escaped loudly. Every single painting in my studio, the finished prints, and the ones still needing to be done all had bright red oil X's all painted across their surfaces, my paints were dumped into a pile on the floor, some of which had dried, my brushes were all broken and thrown into the paint pile, and, on top of all of that were the render sketches and half completed drawing for her portrait, the one Newton ruined. Red paint dripped from the walls all around the studio, and the kiln in the corner had its temperature gauge smashed in, glass all around the floor like bullets. Glass paint jars stood broken all over the tables and the easel was overturned in the middle of the room. The only thing untouched was the table she was laying on when I came in. My disbelief took over the expression on my face.
"You destroyed my studio?" I seethed, grinding my teeth and putting my hands on top of my head. "What the fuck did you do this for?"
"Guess you should ask Mike why. I'm sure he'd love to give you more advice," she said, her voice low. "Maybe he can tell you more ways to get into my pants?"
I dropped my hands and looked at her wildly, the whole situation wearing on me. My studio would be out of commission for a while, and I was not happy. Least of all, she wouldn't listen to my explanations. Something inside me broke down, my desire to remain calm and explain things to her properly gone with the red drips on the walls. Mike was already getting his ass kicked, so I could add the fact that he told Bella about that to the total dent I would make in his ass.
I looked at her and said the first thing in my mind.
"I wouldn't have had to ask if you would have fucking stopped with the touching shit! I had no idea when you walked in the fucking door that day that you were fucked up," I spat at her, watching her face drain at my words. "Maybe he should have finished things with you! Then you wouldn't be so fucking hard to get my dick into."
Her mouth opened slightly, and the closed. She stood there a moment, and then walked around me toward the door. My eyes followed her, and I waited until she reached her hand to the door before reaching out to grab her upper arm.
"Isabella…please, forgive me for what I said, I didn't mean it," I told her softly. "I never meant for any of this to happen, I promise."
She turned her eyes to look at me and smiled a sad, disheartened smile that shook me to my marrow. Her other hand came up and pushed my hand off her arm.
"I'm just a little too fucked up for you, Edward. You don't want some fragile armature to mend and mold into something you can have without convictions. After all, you have to work hard to get your dick in me. Guess that means I'm no use to you anymore." She was crying again, now. "I'm sure Angie is still up for your games. Blackmailing you with the knowledge that it was me who called out for help?" She sobbed now, her chest heaving as she exploded into tears.
"No, you have it all wrong. "Please, Bella. Please don't walk out that door without trying to work this out…without hearing me out?" I begged her, reaching my hand to her chin like I always did when needing her eye contact. "Please, baby. We can work this out. Fuck the studio, it can be repaired, the paintings can be redone!"
"Edward…" she started.
"I fucking want and need you, Isabella Swan. And you need me. I want to be with you. I love you, and I'm sorry for what I said. Don't end it like this, Bella," I begged her, gripping her chin firmly.
Bella smiled a sad, watery smile, reached to remove my hand from her face, and then leaned in to kiss my lips in a chaste kiss.
"Goodbye, Edward," she said, turning from me, pushing on the open door and disappearing.
I don't know how long I stood there at the door, my hand reaching into nothing and wondering about all the unanswered and unexplained things that weren't addressed before my office phone rang. Mechanically, as if my body was full of concrete, I walked over and answered.
"You found her?" Rose asked sternly. "I only assume that because she just walked in totally fucked up, you moron."
I sighed and closed my eyes before answering her.
"Yeah, Rose. Then I lost her."
I hung up the phone and sat on the desk, pulling out the picture I placed in my tuxedo jacket. Bella looked so happy in the picture, not even a comparison to the way she left here a bit ago. I took the picture and bend over the side of the desk, discarding the picture, and the happy face of Bella into the trash.
If only nothing changed, and I could turn back the years...
….But everything changed and the time stood still…
*So…Mike is STILL not sporting a busted ball sac…but that is very soon to change…
*Will Edward ever talk Bella into forgiving him? Oh, ho…unexpectedness next chapter…
*This is actually my OUTTAKE version…I typed out another chapter to use for my main outline, but right before Christmas, my laptop crashed, and this was saved to my USB…
*As always, thoughts are welcomed, but please be considerate of the fact I am NOT Stephen Fucking King or Stephanie Goddamn Meyers.
