We do not own Twilight. We can barely even count. All rights and respects to Stephenie Meyer, Mike D, MCA and Ad-Rock, Led Zeppelin, Etta James, Lou Reed and Bishop.
TeamBella is my partner in this.
Lovelybrutal is our beta. babyblue, I love you more than jinx texts.
Led Zeppelin - What is and What Should Never Be: And if I say to you tomorrow, take my hand, child, come with me, it's to a castle I will take you. Where what's to be, they say will be... And if you say to me tomorrow, oh what fun it all would be, then what's to stop us, pretty baby? But what is and what should never be?
Chapter Eleven - B
It's the middle of January when my mom pulls into the Cullens' driveway and I spy Ally waiting for me on the porch swing. She's bundled up under an oversized lumberjack hat with floppy-furry ears over her long blonde hair, hiding the bottom half of her face behind fuzzy black mittens. When she moves them to wave, she shows off the biggest-ever smile.
Alice and Jasper almost had sex last night. She texted me at two-thirty this morning while he was in the bathroom.
"Oh my God, B." She grins, standing and clapping her mittens together as I climb the few porch steps. "Oh my shit, c'mon!" She takes my bag from me and practically drags me inside.
I laugh, barely in the door and not moving near fast enough for her liking. She kicks her Chucks off and taps her foot impatiently as I step out of my boots.
"Morning, Bliss." Esme yawns happily from the kitchen, still in her silky white robe. The house is warm all around me, and I can smell coffee brewing. She's got a can of biscuits in her hand, and her hair is a beautiful morning mess.
I love it here. All the time, I love this place so much.
Alice drops my bag and her winter wear next to it, leaving her hat on. Esme ties her robe over her nightgown and pulls a mug from the cabinet. "You guys want some breakfast?"
"Not right now, Mom!" Ally grabs my hand the second I get my own coat hung on the rack. "C'mon, c'mon!" She laughs and tugs me along.
Laughing too, I follow her sock-steps with my own. "In a little bit," I tell Esme as we pass the kitchen. Crazy news or not, I'm not about to miss out on a Saturday morning breakfast.
In my dark, skin tight skinnies, I keep up just a half a step behind my over-excited best friend in her faded light hip-huggers. I can't help but grin ear to ear at her giddiness. She hasn't been so pumped about anything since she landed her first inward heelflip a few months ago. Seeing her tickled boy-crazy is a trip.
"I can't even, oh my gosh, just wait—" She stops abruptly when we turn the corner, almost running right into her brother at the bottom of the stairs. "Shit, move it, Dusty!"
Edward laughs, bare foot in his black sleep sweats. His tired smile and barely open eyes wake my butterflies up. Alice doesn't give me a chance to linger. She takes the steps superfast, her excitement unconquerable. "C'mon, Bliss!"
I follow, barely catching Edward's sleepy blues for half a second before we turn in opposite directions. A short, shared glance is all that's possible. Even more than we're allowed. And not even close to enough.
"I can't believe it." Alice laughs, leading me up to her room. "You won't even believe it, Bliss. Not in a million years."
She turns her stereo on, Intergalactic up, and closes her door behind me. Waving her hands around like a complete girly-girl, she giggles without a bit of sound. It makes me wave my hands around like a crazy person, too. I maybe jump up and down. Maybe so does she.
"Tell me! Tell me everything! What happened?" I whisper-squeal.
Alice grins from ear to ear and pulls her black v-neck to the side. The top of her shoulder is covered with purple-pink hickies. My eyes open wider, and I pull her shirt to get a better look. Edward's pink-white teeth marks come to mind, but there are none of those here. These are like deep pink kiss-blossoms made only with lips and tongue and love.
"That's not even the half of it." Her blue eyes light up crazy bright. "Not. Even. Half." She sits down on her bed and closes her eyes, bending her legs criss-cross applesauce. Relaxing her hands on her knees, she exhales slowly like she's meditating.
I giggle and sit down just the same across from her. "So? C'mon, tell me! What happened? Did you see his...?"
She shakes her head, but her eyes sparkle-shine. She blushes. Alice actually blushes.
"No. Well, no. Not really," she says, shimmer-smiling. "I felt it, though. He let me feel it."
Holy. Crazy.
I've never. I can't even imagine.
"Just through his jeans," she clarifies, tucking some blonde behind her left ear, playing with her earrings. "He wouldn't let me undo them..."
She sounds disappointed, even though her face says everything but. "I kind of, sort of let him undo mine, though."
Oh. My.
Ally covers her face with both hands and blush-giggles like I've never seen. She blows out a breath that makes her bangs fly up to the right. She leans, and I lean, too, so that we're practically nose to nose. And even though the music is up and it's obvious nobody can hear anything she says but me, she whispers so, so, so quietly.
"I had a fucking orgasm, Bliss."
My eyes go from wide to insane-wide. Alice's do, too. The sky blue light around her pupils is almost blinding-beautiful.
My mouth drops open. I can't even process the information she just laid on me. I sit back, covering my gaping mouth, wondering through my fingers. "Oh my gosh... Is it... Are you sure...?"
"Oh—" She stops me, holding her hand up and squaring her shoulders. She puts her other hand over her heart, pledge of allegiance style. "I am one hundred percent fucking sure. It's like... Oh, my God, it's like..."
She flexes her fingers on the hand between us. "It's like..."
I laugh, because this is too good, too funny, too amazing.
"It's like..." She starts again and closes her blinding blues, scrunching her forehead up. "It's like... No, it's like Christmas. It's like all the lights and warm cookies, and snowflakes on your eyelashes, and hot-hot-chocolate, and so many surprise presents, and that feeling when you first get home from the cold outside, and love, all around, everywhere..." She's talking fast and I'm following her as best as I can. I try not to think of Edward, but I feel like I know enough to understand what she's talking about. I feel like I might know, but then she pauses.
Alice exhales the happiest, most relaxed sounding sigh ever, and I know in this moment that I have no idea.
"It's like that. Like Christmas explodes through every single part of your whole entire body," she tells me. "It's like Christmastime with Fourth of July fireworks, on a tipsy birthday-candy-rush ... for every part of your body."
My comprehension, nor my imagination can follow her there. I want to. I wish I could. I think back to the first night Edward kissed me, the way he pushed between my legs and made me feel like I was on fire in the most wonderful way. I feel like I could know, like I can imagine, maybe...
"Ally-pally." I breathe out, my mind exasperated at just the thought of something so entirely affecting.
"Blissy-sissy." She breathes back. "Seriously. Holy fuck. Seriously. Get a boyfriend so you can see what I mean!"
I laugh, more nervous than anything at the turn in conversation.
"C'mon, don't you want to?" She nudges my knee playfully. "Don't you want to kiss a boy? You're so pretty, pretty, pretty, Bliss. What are you waiting for?"
It suddenly seems amazingly lucky we've avoided this conversation as long as we have.
Still smiling, I shrug. What am I supposed to say? I can't tell her the boy I do kiss is making me wait because he thinks I'm too little. I can't tell her that boy is her brother.
My hopped-up-on-first-orgasm-endorphins best friend giggles, guiding my attention back.
"Garrett would, you know."
My cognition stumbles at the unexpected mention of our totally platonic friend. "What?"
Ally rolls her eyes. "He can give you Christmas explosions. You know he would."
I duck-lip shush her. "Pffffft, no way. Garrett's with Claire, and..."
What do I say? Why aren't I doing and being all these things that are totally natural and make perfect sense?
It's not that I don't want Christmas explosions. I don't have anything against Garrett. He's nice. Boys are nice to me. But to do that with him or anyone else...
I could never.
I don't want to. And even if I did ... I'm Edward's. I could never with another.
I start again. "Maybe I'm..."
Think, Bliss.
"What?" Alice laughs, still bubbling with delight. She moves her arms and neck like a robot dancer to the Beastie Boys' beats.
I intergalactic planetary-dance my arms too and mechanical-wiggle my fingers with hers, trying to think, think, think of a cover-excuse. "Maybe I'm..."
Ally laughs silly. I am exactly who I am.
"Maybe I'm saving it." I smile shyly higher as I say the words. "Myself, I mean. Maybe I'm saving myself."
"Awwwww." Alice laughs. "Isn't that sweet?" She snorts and laughs harder. I do, too. I can't help it. Her laugh is impossibly contagious. We crack up until we're up on our knees bouncing.
"Prude," she teases. "Innocent little Isabella Bliss. Silly little virgin girl."
"Hey!" I laughingly defend. This can work. This works. This is who I am. Who I have to be. And I really am saving myself.
Kind of. Sort of.
Edward's making me save myself.
"You're still technically a virgin, too," I remind her.
"True." She points her finger at me in mock seriousness. "True, but that's okay. Not for long. Don't you worry, shy sissy girl," she says, generosity and matter-of-factness in her tone. "I'll let you live vicariously through my awesome love life."
She bounces higher on her bed. I do, too. We dance-dance and silly-grin giggle to the music and the love she's bursting, and fall on our backs together in the pause between songs. Body Movin starts and Alice holds my hand between our sides. She covers her goofy gladness with her other hand and sighs like total contentment.
I lean my head on her shoulder and blow strands of blonde flyaways away from my nose. I listen to my heart beating like the rush of her breathing. She smells like sleeping in, vanilla, and coconut lime shampoo, and she sounds like a sweet dream.
Alice is in love.
Alice is going to have sex. And soon.
"Are you nervous?" I ask after a few seconds.
Ally shrugs, pressing our palms together. "Yes. No. No, I'm not."
"But you said yes at first," I point out.
She plays with my fingertips. "I mean, I was. I guess I am, because what if it hurts or whatever. But..."
"But?"
"It's Jasper," she says, like it answers everything, like it explains everything. When I don't say anything for a few seconds, she continues, sort of thinking out loud, "It's like he cares about me more than he cares about himself. Like, he'd do anything and everything for me. Love is like that, y'know?"
I nod. I want to tell her I know. I want to know that, too.
But I don't.
And it makes the muscle in my chest pinch with hurt, because I should. I know enough to know that I should know that feeling.
"I'm not nervous because it's him, and I know he loves me the same way I love him. I don't know. Maybe that's dumb. I just feel it," she tells me. "We match."
The pinch in my heart pulls. I swallow and play with her knuckles while she thumbs over my nail beds. I nod again, like I understand.
"Don't worry," she says a second time. "You go ahead and save your virtue, princess Bliss. When you find the right frog for the job, you'll know."
Her wording makes me smile, and the pinch in my heart stings a little less. And in the next second, it goes from a pinch to a different feeling altogether.
"Edward!" Esme calls a floor below us. "Get the girls and come have breakfast."
Alice and I chuckle together, leaning up onto our elbows. When her brother knocks and opens her door, his hair remains in a morning mess. He's still in his sweats, but his eyes are clear and his smile is wide-awake. "You guys coming or what?"
The pinch in my heart turns into a warm-melty feeling, like ice-cream on hot cherry pie. I can feel his relaxed lightness in the air. I want to wrap myself in the feel of his good, good mood and kiss his lazy, upturned lips. I want to nuzzle my nose in his neck and breathe him in.
"Yeah, yeah." Alice continues to bubble-beam joy as she sits up. We both get off her bed, and I follow her to her door. Edward leans against the frame. So tall. He's so tall.
"Morning, punkass," he mumble-grins, pushing Ally's shoulder. He curls some of my red-blonde around two of his fingers as I pass behind her. He tugs. He smiles. He smiles so easy-going-beautiful my knees tingle. "Morning, sunny side."
Alice walks ahead, all but skipping toward the kitchen, and I try not to smile any higher. I keep my tickled-happiness less than super obvious as her brother walks beside me. He's so tall now. My peripheral vision is level with his shoulder.
I'm careful not to walk too close. I want to look up. I wish I could look up.
"Morning, Edward," I say quietly.
He gets to the bottom of the stairs one step before me. I look up.
His smirk makes me thirsty.
He licks his lips and smiles before he turns away.
I want to freaking attack him. I want to jump on his back and kiss, kiss, kiss him until he pulls me around.
But I don't.
Because I can't.
Because we can't.
We're not anything anyone else can ever see or hear, or know. We're a fraction of a touch from the top of his bare foot to sole of my light-pink socked one, for just a second, once everyone is sitting down around us at the table. We're the lightest, quickest, most secret-secret contact between Carlisle passing Esme the orange juice, and Alice blowing bubbles in her chocolate milk.
We're a tenuous and insubstantial fragment of what we could be, should be, and actually are.
We're hopeless.
But I'm more than thankful. Fragments are more than hopeless could ever even ask for.
.
.
.
The second half of freshman year is going much better than the first. I still have French with Victoria, but the positives definitely outweigh the negatives. My locker pops with the greatest of ease, and I haven't had to sit dead front and center in any of my classes.
I see Edward around the halls every now and then. He's tight-lipped, but he at least acknowledges my existence sometimes when I'm with Alice. He'll pull her hood down and put mine all the way up, over my eyes so I can't even see. It's the same kind of dumb, little sister attention his friends show us, but it's whatever. It's more contact than he gives any other girl at school. He doesn't even touch Victoria unless it's to push her away.
Another bonus to this semester is having lunch hour with just Alice. All our other friends don't get lunch break until we're already back in class, and it's kind of cool, just the two of us. We sit in the far corner of the cafeteria, closest to the windows, on the table top with our feet on the benches. We can see pretty much everything from our sort of perch, and no one tells us to get down because we're not rambunctious.
"So, I know tomorrow's Thursday and it's a school day..." Alice starts, leaning back on the heels of her hands on the table top. Her bangles dangle over hemp twisted bracelets, and she's got her Black Keys tee-shirt tied up over her right hip. "But do you think your mom would let you come stay the night?"
I shrug and lean back on my hands, too. "Yeah, I don't see why not." I press my black jean covered knees together and let my boots slide apart. I glance from the countless conversations around us over to Ally. There's a smile hiding just under her aloofness.
"What's up?" I ask curiously, nudging her elbow with mine.
Her smile looks harder to hide. She brings her hand up and coughs to clear her throat. She smiles higher.
I go from curious to eager. "Ally, what?"
"Well, I mean, I should have asked if you were doing anything..."
"No." I do a quick mental check. Nope, just like I thought. It's a Thursday night. Pretty sure I'll do homework, have dinner, and eventually go to bed, just like every other school night. "I'm not doing anything. What's going on?"
I glance from her, to the tables around us, to the surrounding walls, all decorated with red and white bulletins, and pink hearts.
Ohhh.
Of course I don't have any plans tomorrow night. The boy I kiss would never make those kinds of plans.
"It's totally stupid," Ally starts to ramble. "It's so dumb. Just because we're boyfriend and girlfriend or whatever. It's just another day of the year that Hallmark decided to capitalize on so that—"
I sit up and face her, smiling the smile she won't dare set free on her own lips. I lower my voice, but my excitement for her is uncontainable. "No way, Alice Cullen." I can't believe the words even as I say them. "Are you going to talk to me about Valentine's Day?"
Alice just laughs. And laughs. And covers her mouth and laughs harder. It's the silent-shushed-up kind that you have to keep quiet because if you don't, everyone in the world will know you're off your rocker.
"You so are!" I whisper hysterically at her. "What about it? What's happening?"
"Okay, okay, stop laughing!" She keeps grinning, her own laugh vibrating through her whisper. "Okay, nothing crazy. At all. Jasper just happened to inform me that his parents are going out, and if I wanted to come over, I ... y'know ... could."
She barely gets the last two words out before her eyes open wider, and she taps both my knees in rapid succession with both her hands.
"Ally!" I whisper-squeak, tapping her knees the same way. "Is this it? Are you guys going to—"
She shakes her head, blinking her blues closed for a moment. "No. Yes. Maybe. I don't know. Maybe!" She takes a sip of her orange drink and exhales to calm down before she explains. "Okay, this is why I need you to stay over. No way Dad would let me go over to a boy's so late on a school night, especially on Valentine's day. And I've never snuck out of the house before, even though I'm sure it will probably be fine. I just feel like if you're there, they'll never suspect it at all, y'know?"
I nod more than agreeably. It's not like I'm doing anything anyways. I'm glad and grateful to help Alice. Someone should get a happy Valentine's Day, and I know better. Edward's nice to me when no one else is around, super sweet sometimes even, but I don't fool myself into hoping for a single second that Valentine's Day will be different from any other day. It never has been. I don't allow myself to even think about it.
"Totally," I tell her, sipping from her juice when she offers it. "And a perfect plan. Of course I'll come cover for you."
"Thanks, love." She smiles, leaning her head against my shoulder as we turn our eyes back to the crowded cafeteria. She sighs a peaceful sound, a relieved and in love sound. She happy-taps the dirty toes of her Chucks on the bench below us.
"I'd do the same for you," she says.
My heart cracks splinters in my chest while I just nod, and kiss the top of her head.
.
.
.
The next morning, I put on the black bra Alice bought me last week, and I love it. I love how the dark-dark satin looks on my soft-soft skin. I love how sexy it makes me feel.
I don't have any black unders to match it, though. I think about taking it off, but I like how it looks with the sweater I want to wear, so I keep it on and pull light lavender lace up my legs.
In my own defiance against Cupid, I've neglected all the pink in my wardrobe today in favor of jeans and a black merino sweater. Edward isn't the only one who can ignore a day dedicated to loving.
I pull my hair up in a messy-high bun because my shirt dips in the back and shows off a little bit of skin between my shoulders. It adds to my sexy confidence.
At school, everyone is love-stupid. Everyone's buying red roses from the student treasury table set up in the foyer. Everyone's either paired up or avoiding the whole idea of celebrating romance. Everyone of course, except Edward and his friends.
The boys not only blow the holiday off, but have apparently skipped the school day altogether.
Kim doesn't seem bothered. She walks around with a gleam in her eyes that says Petey took or is going to take plenty good care of her. And Victoria doesn't seem fazed one way or another in French class. She's wearing black, too, and makes her anti-Valentine's sentiments unmistakably clear.
It makes me wish I could change my clothes. C'est la vie.
Alice shows up to lunch with two Ring Pops. "They're from Jasper," she says, smiling. "He gave them to me for us, so we'd both have one. He knows who my real valentine is."
"Good thing." I smile back at her, opening the purple ring she handed me. I hold my hand out for hers and slide the little plastic band onto her ring finger. She puts the red candy ring on mine and we're married in crystallized sweetness. "Are you excited for tonight?" I ask, taking our table top seat, admiring my strawberry red ring.
"Maybe." She laughs casually. "Okay, maybe a lot, a lot."
It's funny-wonderful, seeing her so enamored.
The rest of the day passes fairly normally. I haven't heard from Edward, but no part of me really expected to, so I don't let his absence or my phone's silence bother me. We have what we have in snuck-stolen fragments and secret nights behind his closed door. Our day times and school days are spent so far apart, no one could ever think otherwise. It's who we have to be, and the older I get, the easier that fact is to understand, or at least accept.
I know it's just a number, and I know it's not even a very big number, but I'm fourteen now. Even just saying it feels different.
Fourteen.
It's closer to sixteen than thirteen was, that's for sure.
But...
As soon as I start thinking about our ages, my stomach tightens up.
Edward will be seventeen this summer, in less than six months...
Seventeen.
I sigh and take my seat in biology. I swallow, even though it feels impossible.
I know we say love. I know we mean forever. Edward says he'll never leave without me. He swears when I'm eighteen everything will be different. We'll leave together. And I know with my head that two years isn't really so long, but there's this teeny, tiny, little twisting in the pit of my stomach—
"Hey,"Garrett says, setting his pen and pencil down on the table. There's paint on his hands, sunshiny daffodil yellow, streaks of white and a million hues of pink. He smiles and unzips his backpack. "I know Ally's your Valentine..." He pulls a pack of Fun-Dip from his bag. "But happy corporate holiday."
"Oh, my gosh!" I smile back, teeny tiny fears forgotten. I take the packet of candy and grin higher. "Garrett, thank you!" I lean my head on his shoulder and hug his arm as he sits down. He's solid under his long black sleeve, strong. I tear the corner of the envelope packet to open the grape powdered sugar first, licking the white candy stick before dipping it in. "This is awesome. I haven't had Fun-Dip since I was like, a kid."
He laughs through his perfect, perfect smile. It's the sound of selfless sincerity, and it makes me feel warm down to my bones. I lick another dip of sugar, and we open our books when Mr. Glasser starts class.
"What'd you get for Claire?" I whisper a little later, once Glasser has sat down and left us all to our microscopes.
Garrett smiles. It's not false-hearted, but it's not Fun-Dip sized either, and I can't help remembering what Alice said a few weeks ago. About him like-liking me. About him making me Christmas explode. I push the thought away when he replies, "Some roses or whatever."
I nod, watching his fingers set up our slides. He looks into the microscope and makes some notes on our worksheet. I dip another grape flavored lick and bite the stick. "Pretty overrated, right?" I ask about this silly seeming day of the year.
He shrugs and says, sure, and that's it.
It's quiet for a few minutes, but the quiet with Garrett is nice, easy-relaxed. Only when we're nearly finished and I point out that the organisms under our lens look like strange little alien seahorses does he laugh again.
Alice and Jasper greet us in the hall after class. Her ring is long gone, and her eyes are bright shining. "Fun-Dip!" she exclaims, glancing between Garrett and myself before draping her arm around my shoulder.
The boys walk behind us, and I put my arm around her, too, offering her the open packet of cherry powder. I finished the grape and green apple, and the candy stick forever ago. I've been pinkie dipping pink powdered sugar for half an hour or so.
Ally licks her pinkie fingertip and dips in. "That was nice." She side-eyes me with a smirk. "And thoughtful."
"Shut your face." I smile back. "He got his girlfriend flowers. Fun-Dip is nothing," I tell her in a lower voice.
Alice is unimpressed and unconvinced. "Every girlfriend gets flowers," she says. "That shit's basic. Required. Like, standard." She makes side-eye contact. "You mentioned Fun-Dip at the movies a fucking month ago, genius."
I totally and completely forgot.
The face I make as I remember makes my best friend snort-giggle. She dips her pinkie again. So do I, using the sugary sweetness to distract myself from what has just become blazing obvious to me.
We bundle up snugly and say bye to the boys. Alice winks at Jasper. She thinks she's slick, but none of us missed it. Her boy smiles shyly in return.
Outside the school, Esme is waiting for us with the most brilliant smile on her face when we get in the car. Her hair is in curlers, but you'd never know because the windows are tinted so dark. And even if they weren't, she's got a pretty silk scarf wrapped around them. She has seductive and smoky sounding jazz music up and is literally beaming.
"What are you so smiley about?" Alice asks as she buckles up in the front seat, a twinkling twinkle of excitement in her eyes as she absorbs her mother's beautiful light.
I buckle myself in the middle of the backseat as Esme starts to drive.
"Your father cleared his evening and is taking me to Bridge's." She shines as she explains, radiating joyful in-love-ness. "He's at home getting ready now."
Ally opens a huge box of Turtles, and Esme tells us both to help ourselves. They were part of a gift from Carlisle. "They're Mom's favorite," his daughter informs me as she passes the box back.
I take one gratefully, knowing a few things that Alice may or may not. Bridge's is a crazy fancy restaurant. Dad had to make reservations almost two months in advance to take Mom there for their anniversary. Which means Carlisle has either been secretly planning this surprise for that long, or he really did cancel all his commitments today on a whim and his name has a pull strong enough to get him and his wife in at the nicest restaurant around without any reservations. Either way, if I was Esme, I'd be shining bright on cloud nine, too. How ridiculously romantic.
"There are flautas and rice, and stuff for dinner if you guys want. And candy on the table. Don't wait up." Esme winks at us as we pull into the driveway.
Ally rolls her eyes as we get out. "Gross, Mom!"
Esme wraps her arms around us both and I can feel her glowing warmth. She's radiant. It makes me smile.
"I love you guys!" she calls as Alice and I slip out of our shoes, hang our coats, and head upstairs.
Ally's excitement has doubled at the fact that her parents are going to be way away, thus allowing her to leave sooner and easier. I sit on her bed and smile in support while she changes into outfit after outfit. After a few, she's dead-set on her favorite jeans, but keeps switching shirts.
"You know," I start matter-of-factly, "you could always wear one of those dresses that still has the tags on them." I stretch my legs out and give my untouched Ring Pop a taste. Alice looks at me like I've forgotten who I'm talking to. "What?" I play-ask with a wink. "Easy access."
She laughs and pulls a tenth shirt over her head, going back to her dresser. "This shouldn't be so hard!" she groans. Alice tries to smile, but I can tell she's losing her patience. It sucks not being able to find what you want to match what you feel. I know.
Ally digs through her drawers like a mad woman, blonde hair everywhere around her face. "They're just clothes! Ughhhh, Bliss, make me pretty!"
I'm at her frustrated side in an instant. "You're gorgeous," I tell her, but she doesn't look up. She keeps rifling through her tops. "Mary Alice!" I laugh loudly, grabbing her hands. She blows her insane bangs up, and I turn her to face me. "You're fucking beautiful," I say, smiling in all honest seriousness. "And they are just clothes."
Alice grins, wide-eyed. "You just said fuck."
I laugh. I know I did. It just kind of, sort of came out. "Well, it's the truth, and you need to know it, and never forget it. You are fucking beautiful!"
I know she doesn't want to wear a dress, but I have such an idea. Opening her closet, I push all the hoodies and tee-shirts down, and pull a dark purple, almost black strapless halter dress from the back corner.
"No way." She shakes, laughing disbelief. "You can say fuck all you want, but I'm not wearing a fucking dress. No, no, no, nope."
"It's not going to be a dress," I sing-song promise, holding it in front of her, working my idea out in my mind. "Just trust me. Trust me and put it on. I need to see something."
She gives me a skeptical look, but takes the hanger. Shaking her head and mumbling some more skepticism, she pulls the dress over her head. The skirt part hangs just above her knees, and I can't believe what I'm about to do.
"Looks like a dress to me." Alice smirks as I walk to her desk and grab scissors.
"Just wait." I kneel in front of her and blow a breath out to steady my hands. Taking the bottom of a dress I wish I could wear, but could never fill out like Ally is, I bring the scissors up and start cutting.
Alice squeaks like a girl.
I giggle and cut more confidently, all the way up her leg, to just a couple inches below her hip. Turning and folding, and turning, and folding the fabric so that no lines or loose ends show, I tie what's left in a poofy dark purple bow just above her left hipbone. A peep of tummy skin shows, just when she moves and she's left in a brand new halter top.
"Holy shit fuck," she says with a smile, turning from side to side in her mirror. She slips her bra off and I help her better tie the straps behind her neck. Her boobs look amazing, and there's no way a boy will ever know her shirt used to be a dress. Ally's smile shines. "I'll never make fun of you for watching Project Runway again!"
"Yes, you will." I laugh back, playing with her hair.
Esme calls her goodbyes up the stairs while I'm re-straightening her daughter's hair. We're by ourselves in the house then.
"Are you sure you don't mind doing this?" Alice asks for the billionth time, checking her mascara. "You'll be here all by yourself."
"Oh my gosh, if you ask me one more time." I plop back down on her bed and open one of the music magazines on her nightstand. "It's fine, seriously-truly. I'm going to raid your mom's snack pantry and watch television you or my parents never let me watch." I smile, wholly sincere. "It's fine. Really. Somebody's gotta show me the way, and it should definitely be you."
Alice looks proud and happy to accept her role as our sexual frontier explorer. Jasper texts her. He's on his way in his brother's car. We head downstairs a few minutes later, and Alice thanks me again as she hugs me. Jasper beeps twice outside.
"Go!" I nudge her, rocking on my toes. I brush her hair back and kiss her nose. "I love you. Text me when you're on your way back."
"I will. I love you like too many hot chocolates. Thank you for this. Oh my gosh, thank you!" She zips a hoodie up over her top and puts her sunglasses on. "I love you," she says again. "Do wait up. I'll be back with very important lessons for you."
I laugh and lean against the wall, and then, she's out the door.
And I am alone in the Cullen house.
I wiggle my toes in my baby blue socks and smile a little. It's strange, being here alone, but not bad. Not at all. I make my way lazily to the kitchen and think about calling Edward, but I haven't heard from him all day. So, I don't. He's probably just as gone for the night as everyone else is, but I refuse to let that thought get to me.
Taking one of the flautas from the box on the stove, I walk from the kitchen to the dining room. The sight on the table is more than impressive. Piled two, three, and four high are boxes upon boxes of specialty confections. Macadamia toffees and sea salt caramels. White and dark, and milk, and semi-sweet chocolates, cremes and clusters. Champagne truffles and chai spiced divinity. It makes my lips open for a laugh and my heart swell.
No one woman could eat so much candy. Not even me. But I bet Esme overjoyed out loud when she first saw it all. I bet she hugged and kissed Carlisle so happily, and I bet he was elated to have lifted her smile so high.
I pour a mug of white milk with a sigh and take a few pieces of candy on a napkin into the living room with me. I curl up in the very middle of the sofa and turn the television on, flipping channels until I find Heidi Klum and Tim Gunn.
I watch and nibble for a few minutes. I bite into a raspberry caramel and think about Carlisle and Esme again. I think about my own mom and dad. It's definitely less extravagant at my house, but their love is no less. Dad got up earlier than usual and made Mom breakfast in bed. There were flowers and a heart shaped box of candy, and a new copy of one of her favorite books, and when I asked if I could stay with Alice tonight, Mom was more than okay with saying yes.
I gross out a little and push away the thought that follows. I take a cold drink and think about Ally. I think about how I wish I could be all boy-crazy-love-struck with her. I want to tell her so many things, but I can't tell anyone anything, because I'm me and he's him.
I press the last bite of raspberry-red caramel to the roof of my mouth with my tongue and feel it melt. I don't think about the this dumb excuse for a holiday or having to avoid it, or about the haze my boy is probably spending it in. I just think about him, my Edward. I take the last small drink of cold milk with a little taste of caramel still in my mouth and close my eyes. I swallow and sink easily down into the overstuffed sofa.
I think about Edward kissing me awake in the barely illuminated morning, and the way his blues look when he first opens them. I think about firefly nights and riding on his back, and hide-and-seek spins, and the very first night I crawled into his cozy-cool bed. I breathe in and want my hoodie, his hoodie. I want to be wrapped up in his existence. I think about how his hands feel around my hands, and his weight on top of me, and the way his breath tickles my cheek, and how he uses his lips to feel my skin...
I open my eyes because I'm overheating.
I ache. There's a lot I don't know or understand, but I know that this ache is needing. It's like thirst or hunger, but different. Deeper. It's yearning and craving, and unfathomable feeling. To an unbelievable extent. I press my legs tightly together, as has become the inadequate solution to a more and more frequent strain. But it's all I can do.
I know that I need ... something.
I think about Christmas-tingle explosions, and I wonder.
Then it hits me.
Standing much too quickly, my knees wobbling, I shut the TV off, put my mug in the dishwasher and make for the stairs.
I know with every step exactly where I ache, and I kind of, sort of know why. And I think I know what I need, because I think an explosion sounds pretty accurate, and I think maybe ... if I can just—
Rounding the top of the staircase, I think soothing my need on my own is a grand idea until I get exactly where I want to be to do it. Tummy butterflies spin in crazy circles with my down-low tingles as I approach Edward's door. They flutter frantic-insane while I reach for the handle.
It's cool. Or my hand is warm. Or maybe both.
I turn the door open slowly and close it behind myself. Just being in his room is instantly comforting and inside-shiver-quadrupling at the same time.
Normally, I'm a little sad to be alone in Edward's room, but there is none of that today. Not right now. Being here today feels sneaky-thrilling. Right now, having his room to myself doesn't daunt; it excites.
Fairly clean, save for cluttered notebooks and papers on his desk, Edward's bedroom space is late daytime lit and so welcoming warm. His gray-black comforter is pulled up, but you can tell by the lighter gray sheets unevenly peeking out underneath it they're still a slept-in mess.
I glimmer-shine a little from my heart outward. I love knowing exactly what his sheets feel and smell like, and how they sound when we slide between them together in the dark. I love that this place is just ours, only ours. I love all the things only I know.
I touch the corner of his bedspread and curl my fingers in the familiar fabric. I think about soft kisses with his lips and the touch of his palms over my bra, and the sound and feel of his groans in my mouth. I open my hand up and walk my fingers around the corner of his comforter and glance at his cracked open window. I think about sitting there, on his lap while he smokes, and about how he bites my fingertips sometimes when I feed him Reese's Pieces. I think about his teeth and his strength, and how deep down our love goes.
My low-low aching twists tighter, and I press my lips together. I think about the sound of my name just under my ear.
"Bliss, baby. ... Baby, baby, baby Bliss."
My weak knees go wobbly again, and I drop caution to the early spring breeze barely coming in. Placing both hands on his bed, I climb onto the foot of it and crawl to the middle. I stretch out on my back and turn the side of my face into his pillows. It smells mostly like him: boy soap and pot, and sweet sleep. When I breathe even deeper. I can smell me, too. Faintly, under his scent, I can smell lavender and tea tree shampoo, and powdered sugar.
I go from glimmer-shining inside to bona fide gleaming.
The needy ache in the pit of my stomach pulses with every one of my heartbeats. I bend my knees, press my thighs together, and spread my arms out across our bed. Feeling my way across his cool cotton blankets with the backs of my hands, I bring my hands back to myself and slip them under the lower edge of my sweater without a single hesitation. I touch-cover my belly button and think about loving, and belonging. I think about how even as I tried to fight it, even as I know it's heart-risky and sanity-fraying, I really do belong to Edward. Belly button. Heart. And soul. I am his.
It doesn't scare me, and it doesn't feel wrong, or bad, or dangerous. Belonging to Edward feels so, so, so good. Nothing in the whole world feels like he makes me feel, like I feel when I'm with him. Nothing even comes close.
I turn a little and breathe in, and draw absent minded circle shapes around my tummy button and the bottom of my belly. I trace a line above the edge of my jeans, right where the denim touches my skin. I feel warm all over. So warm. Burning warm.
I need. I want the boy I kiss and love and belong to, to be here.
I dip just the tippy tips of my right fingers under my jeans and nearly jump off the bed and right out of my too-warm skin when my back pocket vibrates.
"Shit—" I say out loud, half-sitting up to reset my startled nerves as I retrieve my phone. A picture Alice sent me a few weeks ago of Edward blowing a huge pink bubble inside a bubble lights my screen up.
"Shit," I say again, letting a breath out while my phone continues to vibrate in my hand. My cheeks feel so hot and my heart is thumping hard in my chest.
The thought of what I'm doing here, what I almost did, makes me giggle-calm, because really, who ever has to know? Nobody, unless I want him to.
Laying my head back down, I feel coolly confident in my own sneaky secretness. I press the button to answer and bring my phone to my ear. "Hi, hoodlum boy," I say evenly.
"Hey, pretty, pretty princess baby." Edward's smokey dark, high lighthearted voice fills my ears and covers my whole being. I can hear his smile. I close my eyes and I can see his, sparkling spring sky colored trouble that I love. "What are you doing right now?"
I smile to myself. "Not much. Missing you. What are you doing?"
"I thought about you a lot today," he replies, his tone so mellow glad. "What are you doing really? Are your parents home right now?"
I crinkle my eyebrows, curious as to where he's going and how I should reply. I hadn't expected him to call at all. I love that he did, I just hadn't thought this far in advance.
"Yeah," I say, glancing my screen for the time. It's a little after six. I'd probably just be having dinner if I was at my own house. "Yeah, they're home..." I feel my cheeks blush more. "But, I'm not."
"Where are you?" Edward's driving. I can hear muffled music and passing cars, and the wind.
I smile even higher. "You'll never ever even guess."
He laughs lightly. "Are you with my sister?"
I shake my head. I circle my belly button through my sweater. "Nope."
"Leah?"
"Nope."
He laughs again, a little darker. I can see his grin so clearly in my mind. "Go ahead," he says. "Tell me you're with Garrett so I can lay that motherfucker out."
"I'm not," I tell him, not laughing, but not not smiling either. "And that's not nice, Edward. Garrett's never done anything to you."
"Whatever." He's still grinning. I can still hear it. "Tell me where you are, baby girl. I've got something for you."
"For me?" My heart does cartwheels.
"Yeah, for you. You're my fucking girl aren't you?"
I go from gleaming to straight up sunshine beaming. I smile much, much harder than I probably should. My voice comes out shy and small in my effort to keep from stupid squeaking. "Yes," I tell him.
I hear his car door shut and the sound echoes. I soar at the idea of surprising him here, like this.
"Where are you?" he asks again, wind blows around his voice.
"Where do you want me to be?" I ask back, bending and unbending my legs, knowing he's high. I blink my eyes opened and closed again, hoping for that unfiltered honesty that makes me wild inside.
Edward chuckles again. I hear his keys. "Right now?" I hear the front door open. "In my bed, underneath me and holding on, legs open."
My whole entire body blushes. I know it does. I feel my blood heat up under my skin, everywhere. I half-hum in want and half-giggle in shyness, and my legs fall open all on their own. I press my free hand gently lower down my belly, holding that knotted up spot at the very bottom of it where I'm twisting and burning and needing.
"Where are you, little girl? Let me come see you."
I hear him just a floor below me, shuffling around, taking too long. "Come see me," I say so softly. "Come upstairs."
Edward is quiet for one, two, three beats.
Then he hangs up.
Then I hear his footsteps.
He takes the stairs two at a time, and my heart thunder-thumps so strong I feel like it's going to burst right through my chest. My anxious excitement comes up and out like a little laugh. I bend my knees again, closer to myself, spreading my legs open the smallest bit just as I hear his hand turn the door handle.
His devious curved smile makes me giggle pure joy.
I love when he comes home.
"Baby." He's got his gray hood up, backpack and black jeans on, black Chucks, and he's holding his sunglasses in his left hand along with a small white box. Edward contemplates me with his eyes as he grins even bigger, shaking his head like he can't believe it. He drops his bag and his glasses, and the box. "What are you doing here? Where's Alice?"
He takes measured steps as he speaks, while eyes never leaving mine. I fidget my fingers in his blankets, watching him come slowly closer. "With her valentine. Where were you all day?"
When he reaches my side of the bed, Edwards grabs each of my ankles and pulls, straightening my legs out. "With the boys." He tugs me, and I slip from my elbows to my back. I giggle, and he pulls me to the edge of the bed so that my calves hang over and my feet dangle, not even reaching the floor. "How long do I have you?" he asks, brushing his hands up my legs, curving them behind my knees. "How much time do we have?"
I smile so high I'm almost squinting, still flat on my back as he stands above me, between my legs. He strokes my kneecaps through my jeans with his thumbs. I curve my ankles around the backs of his calves, wanting more, wanting him closer. "How much time do we need?" I ask, kind of playful, sort of completely serious.
"All of it," he tells me without a moment of doubt or thought. "Every second."
He looks down at me under his high-heavy lids. He looks at my mouth, my chest. He searches my eyes. His smile lifts on the left side. He looks at me like he knows my secret already, and it makes me twice as aware of my blush. He scoots me back a little and comes down to me. "What were you doing when I called you, little B?"
He touches his nose and lips, and breath to my neck, making me tilt my head tilt back. I close my eyes against his pillows, and feel my face burn raspberry-sweet pink as I remember with perfect clarity exactly what I was doing. "Nothing," I fib.
Edward gives the underside of my jaw soft kisses. "Liar," he whispers, taunting and daunting. "Tell me what you were doing in my bed without me, Bliss."
He nips the corner of my jaw and kisses my head further back. I open my mouth for a breath. Does he know? How can he even know? "Thinking of you," I whisper back, so the truth.
Edward hums and open mouth kisses the front of my neck. He loves my skin with his teeth and tongue, and makes me make the most desperate little sounds with every breath I take.
"Careful," I remind him so quietly, afraid of marks I want so much, but know I won't be able to hide. I arch under him and push, and pull. "Careful, be careful."
His kisses soften, but his hands grip my sides tighter and his weight feels heavier. He drags his parted lips lower down my neck, pushing my sweater out of the way as he goes. He opens his mouth just below the dip in my throat and kiss-bites gently there, working his hands under my back, arching me better for him.
My needy knots twist hotter. I want comfort, relief, help, something.
I push my hands under Edward's hood and curl my fingers in his hair. I hold him close. I wrap my legs around his hips to hold him even tighter to where I'm burning. He groans against my chest and rocks against my center. I feel him and squeeze my legs, lifting my own hips to feel him better, and it's so good, so right just like this.
I shiver and try to open my legs more. I hold tighter to the back of his neck and Edward laughs against my skin. He sounds just as breathless as I feel, but is somehow still coherent in his control. He kisses the sensitive pink skin his teeth have been touching and moves his hands from my back to my legs. He pushes down on my knees until I understand, and let him go. He lifts his weight from me, and I blow out a long exhale, ten times needier and more sore than I felt just a few minutes ago.
Why can't he just do it? We both want it. We both need it. I know we do.
"C'mon," he says, kissing my temple as he sits up, moving me with him. "I got you something."
Frustrated as I feel, I can't help melting a little. "Show me." I nod as I bend my legs under myself and smooth my hair out while he stands to retrieve the box from the floor. Still so happily surprised by his presence, I smile. It's Valentines day and Edward is here with me. The most vital part of my heart, the other side of forever is here, right where he wants to be, and he's about to put a gift in my hands.
The source of all my heart-thumps and tummy flutters, and all my aching tingles grabs his backpack before he returns. "Don't give me the details," he says, "but do you have any idea when Alice is coming back?"
He sits down on the edge of the bed, feet flat on the floor and unzips his bag. I nod. "Yeah, kind of. I mean, not for a while. She's going to text me when she's on her way. Why?"
Edward pulls something out of one of the inside zipper compartments. "Because I got you these," he says as he turns toward me and hands me the gift box. "But I think you'll like them even more if you smoke this with me."
What he pulled from his bag is a blunt, and I laugh because I can't even believe it.
"Do you want to?" he asks, excitement lighting his eyes up.
I think about my parents. I think about "right" and "wrong". I think about the punkass boy in front of me, who makes me feel so loved my heart turns into a flood at his touch.
"I ... I do, um..." I press my lips together. I pick at the ankle edges of my jeans. I think about my birthday, when they all blew hits in my face, and how electric-light I felt. I weigh my thoughts with careful quickness.
"I..." I put the re-rolled cigar to my nose and smell it: warm sunny-honey-dipped strawberries and dank-sweet green trees. I think about right here. I think about today and this chance like none other. I think about the strength and the safety, and straight boldness I feel in this place.
"Yes," I say. "I want to."
Edward explores my eyes, like he's checking out my levels of trust and certainty. It only makes me feel safer.
He smiles sweet and gives my lips a chaste kiss. "Hold this." He hands me the cigar and stands up, crossing the room to open his window, then to his dresser to turn music on. I don't know the song, but I recognize the drift of Robert's voice and the dreamy-breeze of Jimmy's guitar.
Eyes on only me and smiling totally genuine, everything else in our worlds let go of and forgotten, Edward pats his pockets as he walks back to me. I smile-sigh back. I feel my shoulders relax. When he makes it close enough to the bed to reach for me, he does. He picks my right foot up and tugs my sock off.
"Hey!" I laugh, wiggling my now naked, Pink about It! painted toes. He grins crooked, reaching for my left foot and tickling my sole. I squirm and giggle. "Stop that!"
He pulls that powder blue sock off, too, narrowing his mischief-lit eyes. "C'mere," he says, tugging me by my ankle, like I weigh next to nothing at all. When I get to the edge of his bed, I sit up and raise my eyes curiously.
He slips his hands under my sweater and starts pushing it up.
I laugh, but I lift my arms and let him take my shirt off as well. My thin gray camisole still hugs my middle. "What are you doing?" I ask, confused. "I thought—"
Edward shushes me softly and dips his fingers under my tank top. He tickle-strokes my sides. I'm equal parts hopeful and nervous suddenly. I'm ready for what this looks like, but I don't understand.
"You stopped me, just a minute ago," I think out loud. "I thought we weren't—"
"We're not," he replies quietly, sliding his hands back so that his palms and fingers cover my sides completely. He brushes my bottom ribs with his thumbs, angling my body back slightly as he starts to nudge my undershirt up, too. He pauses under my arms, holding my focus as he speaks. "But you can't go back to your parents tomorrow with this smell all over your clothes. Your dad would never let you come back. I'd have to break into the chief's house just to see you."
I smirk-smile, seeing his point and knowing he's right. "You'd do that?"
Edward grips my body the slightest bit tighter. "You know I would." He smiles back at me, and he's right again.
Handling the blunt carefully, I lift both my arms for him and let him take my cami off. He tosses it to his floor with my other clothes, and I'm left in my jeans and black bra that I'm now so glad I decided to wear this morning.
He takes the cigar from me, and I square my shoulders back, pulling my legs under myself once more. I move my empty hands through my messy ponytail and then over my jeans. There's afternoon sunlight shining all over my exposed skin, warming me.
Edward sits down across from me in the middle of his bed, our criss-crossed knees bumping as he puts the cigar to his lips and sets fire to it. He pulls a few shallow puffs back to back, to back, making the lit end burn, burn, burn until it's smoldering slow and steady. He exhales to his left before taking a longer, deeper pull. He makes it look so easy. Breathing and blowing smoke, he extends the delicious smelling contraband toward my anxiously awaiting hands.
"I just like ... breathe it in?" Okay as I know I am here, I still don't want to look dumb.
Edward nods, leaning forward so we're closer together. He holds the blunt up, lit end facing him and points to the mouth end with his other hand. "Just pull from this until you feel it right here." He touches his free fingers so lightly to the front of my throat. "And when you feel it there, stop, and take another little breath in, and hold it."
I nod. He grins, crooked-fucking-beautiful. "You want to watch me do it again first?"
I've watched him do it a million times, but I'll gladly go for a million and one. His inhale is ridiculously, unreasonably, like, stupid sexy, and out of this world alluring. Returning the blunt to his perfectly pursed lips, Edward presses them closed around the end and breathes in.
The tip glows. His chest rises up a little under his jacket. His lids lower and his lashes flutter closed, then open again slowly. He parts his lips open, takes a breath in and holds it behind his smile. His eyes lift to mine and his lips curve higher. He exhales the smoke out his nose.
I giggle and he laughs, and more smoke comes out of his mouth. I sit up straighter and nod my head again, ready. Breathing all the air out that I possibly can, I lean forward so that we're even closer.
Bringing the blunt up so that his fingertips just touch my lips, Edward never takes his eyes off me as I slowly start to pull smoke. I can feel him watching even as my own lash-lids lower. I don't feel anything, so I pull a little harder until I feel the invisible tickle in my throat just like he said I would.
I lean back, quick gasp, and cover my mouth as I hold my breath. Edward rests his hand with the blunt on his knee and moves his other into my hair above my ear. His smile entreats and enchants. He whispers after a second. "Breathe out, baby."
I let my air go, but it's not air that comes out between my fingers. It's smoke, a thin-floating, warm-feeling little puff cloud of sweet smoke. I laugh because I can't believe it, and Edward laughs, too, probably because he can't believe it either.
I lick my lips. They taste like strawberry candy. I want more. "Can I do it again?" I ask, sitting up onto my knees, making us eye-level.
Edward nods as he takes another hit. Thicker smoke seeps out between his lips and the cigar before he sucks it all in, sending it to his lungs. "Yeah," his voice is scratched and deep. He breathes out and covers my chest and shoulders with his hit. "Take your hands down."
I do as he says and he presses the blunt back to my waiting lips. I pull again, just like he showed me, and I feel the tickle sooner, deeper, fuller. I cough as I exhale this time. Edward chuckles. I crack up. We both do.
We take turns. Edward pulls amazing-deep lungfuls. I breathe in steady little hits, lots of them. I climb onto his lap at some point and wrap my legs around his waist, with my arms loosely around his neck. He holds the blunt to my lips, and I hold onto him.
Smoke floats around us with D'yer Mak'er in the background. Setting sunlight burn-glows everything in his room golden. I can hear birds chirp, chirp, chirping outside, and I can feel my heart thump, thump, thumping in my fingertips. Edward runs his nose along my neck, breathing smoke all over me. I can't stop giggling or touching him. His hair is brushy soft between my fingers, and the skin on the back of his neck is so warm.
"I can feel how red your hair is," I whisper without knowing why, tasting the strawberry rasp in my voice. I play with his hair, feeling like I'm going to float-fly away. But he breathes smoke under my ear and his left arm curves around my back. I'm held, kept, loved.
I know I'm high. I have to be high because it feels like gravity is working in reverse. The thought makes me giggle some more, harder, which somehow makes me feel lighter. He laughs, too, and he's hard underneath me. I can feel him between my legs, but he doesn't push up or pull me down. He just holds me close, steady, safe, allowing me ride the breeze between us.
The song changes. Upbeat, quickly-picked guitar starts, and I want to Bron-Y-Aur Stomp dance, so I do. Kind of. It's more like I wobble up onto my feet, and when I almost fall over because Edward's bed is not sturdy for standing; he catches me. We're a vibrating mess of breathless laughs.
"I want to dance on your bed!" I tell him, smiling so high I don't know how my eyes are still even open.
"So dance, high-baby. Strawberry sunny side girl." He's all wonderful love, and he helps me balance my bare feet on his bed.
He lies on his back, and I clap my hands. Everything is different up here—higher, brighter, freer. I move with the quick drums beats and guitar string sounds, and his bed is bouncy under my so light feeling weight. So I bounce.
It tickles my tummy, so I laugh and bounce again, watching Edward watching me. His grin is promising and mesmerizing, and his eyes look dark, heavy, gorgeous, and his cheeks are pink. He pulls a hit and blows smoke up, and I jump, bounce, silly dance.
I bounce high, high, higher in the air and land on my butt next to him. I feel his carefree laugh in my own chest, and I feel this heightened sense of connectedness to him in the air around us, and I swear I can feel the rotation of the Earth.
"Pretty, pretty princess." Edward might mean to tease, but his words come out spring breeze soft as he leans up onto his elbow, sort of over me. "Princess baby, baby, baby Bliss."
My heart smiles. My lips have a pulse. "I love you," I say, touching his arm, his shoulder, feeling his solid strength through all his dark cotton layers. "I love you. I love you. I love, love, love you."
My love takes a deep hit and reaches over me to set the cigar down on his nightstand He leans above me and tilts my head back with his left hand while he strokes my naked side with his right. He brushes his thumb over the corner of my mouth and whispers so close to my lips, "Open, baby."
I part my mouth for him, and Edward touches his lips to mine so gently. He breathes smoke into me, resting his forehead on mine when he's sent his entire hit toward my lungs.
I can't take it all. Smoke floats around and between us, but the bit that I do get sends me crazy. I close my eyes and breathe it out, and my awareness swims. My heart rate doubles and the blood in my veins rocks and rolls.
Our lips touch, but we don't kiss. He doesn't lift his forehead from mine, and when I blink my eyelashes open to look up at him, his are closed. I let mine close, too, and just feel.
My brain ceases to work with words. My thoughts are all syllable-less wanting, loving, flying.
"How do you feel?" I hear Edward ask, his voice so hot-soft on my heart-beating lips. They tingle. My skin tingles all over.
"Touch me," I whisper back, stretching under him, feeling his bed and blankets dip and slide along my skin as I reach to get closer. "Touch my skin, please."
Edward groans; it sounds like he's starving. It's needy and provocative, and I've got it so fucking bad for him. I can feel my heart and my soul, spirit, whole self so wrapped up in this.
He plants his hands firmly on both sides of my stomach and runs his nose against the side of mine. He brushes his nose and lips down my cheek, around the corner of my open lips, over my chin.
My head falls back. My spine curves up. I hear myself whimper and hum, and smile out loud. He shifts onto his knees and glides his nose down my neck. It starts there, under his teasing affection, and spreads out all over me. Every millimeter of my skin tingle-burns for him.
I grip onto his sleeves. I breathe faster. I drift and stretch, and beg. "Touch, touch, touch..."
He makes another sound, more of a moan than a groan this time. He kisses the spot where his nose is circling, between my breasts, just above black satin. He slides his hands up my sides and my pulse beat skyrockets.
I press my lips together to quiet the louder whimper that comes up, and Edward kisses down my stomach, sliding one hand under my back and the other across the top of my tummy. "It's okay, B," he whisper-kisses around my belly button. "You don't have to be quiet. Let me hear you, baby love."
My lips fall open and a sound I can't even control comes out. I grip his shoulders through his shirts. "Edward..."
"Baby beautiful," he breathes in response, kissing lower, right over where his tingle-knots are twist, twist, twisting. "So beautiful, baby," he whispers like he's lost in my skin. "My girl. My fucking girl. I love you so much, Isabella baby."
I fly under him. I coo for every kiss and ooh for every touch. His fingers tickle smooth designs, and his palms tingle hot spots that he slides all across me. He takes hold of my hips and turns me left a little first, then right a little. He swirls his thumbs around my hipbones and runs the backs of his fingertips under the edge of my jeans. I feel him soft-pop the button.
I open my eyes and suck in a deep breath. His dark gold room is spinning. He tugs my zipper down. The click-zip sound fills my ears up as I realize what he's doing.
"Edward," I say, my voice airy and weightless-weak. I circle my hips away, hesitating because, even though I know it's dumb, my unders don't match my bra and I don't want to look silly.
"It's okay," he tells the bottom of my stomach, parting my jeans open. I feel his fingers touch my lace and I gasp high pitched. "It's okay," he insists, hooking his grip into my denim and tugging gently down. "I just want to see you. Let me see you."
He lifts my hips, and I move with him. I bend and shimmy, and help, made brave by his words. We never get to lie in the light like this and matching or not, I want to give him what he wants.
"Thank you, baby. Pretty girl, good girl, thank you, thank you." He kisses my legs between praise whispers. He tickle-touches down my thighs and behind my knees. He squeezes my calves so, so, so gently and nips my ankles with his parted lips.
The aching in my stomach spreads hotter, all throughout me. The needful burning he lights in me prickles painfully under the surface of all my skin.
He whispers and worships. I pant and plead.
He kisses up the inside of my left leg, feeling his way up the outside of my right. He breathes along my inner thigh and brushes his nose and lips along the lace edge of my unders. When he presses his hands into my legs and nudges me more open, and breathes hot right over my center, I yearn and crave, and feel like I'm going to die of love-starvation.
"Edward, please, please, please..." I grip his hair and pull. I try to circle my hips, but he holds me down. I fucking burn. "God, please, Edward."
I just want one kiss, right there—right where I can feel him breathing hot, hot, hot-heavy. Just one kiss.
He doesn't give it.
He grips my hips tighter and turns his face back to my inner thigh. He kisses way up to my hip and holds down my desperate circling. He bites my hipbone and drags my lavender lace down with his teeth. Just a little. Just maybe an inch.
I feel him breathing through his nose. I hear my own, and the birds, and the music, and his phone. It's muffled down in his pockets somewhere, but I hear his phone, and it pulls me out of my haze.
He kisses my skin with his tongue and teeth, ignoring the sound until it stops. Then it starts again, and I hate it. I don't know who it is at all, but it makes me think thoughts I don't want in my head here. It makes my heart feel pinched up and hurt and bothered, because behind my high-lids, all I can suddenly see is Victoria.
I push Edward's shoulders. "Stop," I tell him, my voice not even half as strong as I need it to be. "Your phone's ringing, stop."
He doesn't. He kisses up from my hip, around my belly button again, continuing to ignore the sound of a third call. It screws my high-love-bubble all up and frustrates my light-flying-carefreeness.
"Edward, stop," I say again, stronger this time.
Pulling away abruptly, Edward plucks his phone from his back pocket, practically jerks the battery out, and tosses both pieces across his room. "You stop," he warns, meeting my eyes. He's not angry. He doesn't raise his voice, but he is serious. He grabs my hips and pulls me closer. "None of that shit matters, Bella. Be with me here."
I swallow hard and hold onto his hands, feeling him hold onto me. My high swirls and blurs. Everything swims. "Okay," I nod. "Okay."
He swallows too and leans back down, pressing his lips to my belly again. His kisses are heavier this time, his teeth-touches harder. His hands glide down my thighs and grip, and squeeze, alternating between tight and easy-gentle. His attention soothes just as it starts to thrill again.
I try not to think.
I try just to feel.
But I can't.
Why not me? Why everyone but me?
Like he needs to protect me? Like he even is? Like I don't know the weight and feel of his need and frustration better than anyone else? I know it best. And maybe if he'd just give in and let me help him carry it, he wouldn't need all those other girls anymore.
"I'm here, Bella," Edward says against my skin. He speaks low and soft and insistent, but he sounds tortured underneath his careful tone. "Be here with me."
He thinks he's protecting me, preserving me, this, us, but his choices hurt.
"I am here," I tell him, trying to make myself be, even as my heart stings. It hurts to swallow a breath, but I have to to keep from crying. "I'm here," I say again, trying so hard.
"Then fucking be here," he quietly scolds, hushed and threatening, gripping tighter and pulling me closer. He brings my right hip right under his lips and closes them over me. I cry out at the roughness of his kiss and curl my hands into fistfuls of his jacket. He sucks and bites, and digs his teeth in. He licks and kisses, and marks me. I can feel my blood rushing from my heart to under his lips. I can feel my skin turn purple for him.
He hums and groans, and breathes hot over his mark. His hands and lips soften. I let go of my hesitance and let the adrenaline he lights in my veins run its course. I tug his shoulders gently. My brain and heart are spinning hurt and surrender, and need, and love, and too many different feelings.
I just want him.
"Edward?" I whisper so quietly I barely hear myself. I blink and my eyelashes feel wet. I didn't mean to cry. I couldn't help it. I can't.
"Shhhh, don't cry, baby." His voice is strong. "Don't cry." His voice is soft at the same time and he moves up my stomach, kissing over my shaking butterflies and black satin, over and over, and over my trembling heart.
I nod, not crying, holding his eyes with mine as he settles between my legs and covers my body with his just like I needed and didn't even know. He warms me. He melts me. He calms me just by being so near.
"I love you," he tells me, wiping my accidental tears away with his thumbs. "Do you know that? I love you always."
I nod, because even though it slaughters, and even though it's impossible, I do know. I know it better than I know anything else. I know it because it's what my bones are made of.
"I know," I promise, holding onto him so tight.
Edward touches his nose and forehead to mine. He kisses my top lip, my bottom one. I need more. I could die right now for his kiss.
He blinks. He deadbolts our eyes. "You were made to love me," he says against my lips. "It's why you were born."
I nod, shake, shake, shaking like an earth quake, because I do know. I know exactly.
"I know," I say again, kissing his top lip, his bottom one, just like he did mine. "I do love you. I love you so much. Please kiss me, please, please—"
His lips are on mine before I get the third please out. He kisses me with his tongue and his lips, and I can feel his heart beating in his chest, thumping hard and fast against my own. He kisses me and everything goes from glowing gold to feather-heaven-soft white.
We melt together. We're liquid loving, blending, blurring, becoming one pulsing, permanent ache. Our kissing isn't a Christmas explosion, but it's bigger than that. Greater. It's soothing and soul-symphonizing, and claiming. It's promising. It's binding.
It's knowing, even though knowing doesn't change a thing.
Edward surrounds me with love and pulls me with a kind of all-consuming and cradling care only he possesses, and I let him, regardless of the direction he chooses. I let him, because I love his hold.
