Disclaimer: Sadly Twilight isn't mine. I wish it was, but it's not. Because if it was, I totally would have spent my Valentine's Day with our favorite boy vampires. Also, while I may write this story, I am not a musician or songwriter - all songs & lyrics belong to the respective artists/composers.
A/N: So Bella flipped out when Edward showed up and now she has her own little plan in place. It should be interesting to how it plays out, but before we get to that, we get to take another trip back to Edward and see how he handles seeing Bella for the first time in five years. I want to give a huge thank you to the awesome ImaTwitard who was kind enough to design banners for this story. Be sure to stop by my profile to check them out, and make sure to check out ImaTwitard's profile too and check out her stories because she writes some really good stuff! Thanks again to all of you for reading and reviewing, especially dumbledore047 for rec'ing me to twific pimps! Be sure to check out their blog at www(dot)twificpimps(dot)com and don't forget to check out the blog for this story (link is on my profile).
Chapter 12: Broken – Part 2
Song: Broken by Lifehouse
***EPOV***
I had been hunting for a while and decided to just call an early end to my trip and head back home. I toss the carcass of the animal I had just finished draining aside and start running home. As I run, my mind is assaulted with the memories of when I used to run with Bella through the forests back in Forks. Sighing, I try to refocus my thoughts but it's no use, everything I do seems to remind me of her. Lost in my thoughts, I find myself walking through the front door of the house before I even really realize that I'm home. When I first walk in I see that the living room is empty, and I start to walk through the house to find the rest of the family.
"Where is everyone?" I say, and then I stop dead in my tracks. As I look into the den, I see that my whole family is here, but it isn't them who make me stop. It's the other person in the room. The one person I have been praying to find again for the past five years. Bella is here, and for the first time in a long time I feel like the weight of the world has been lifted off my shoulders. As I look at the only woman who has ever held my heart – the woman who still owns my heart – I notice the changes in her. She's thinner than she used to be and she looks as though she's exhausted, but none of that matters because she is still the most beautiful creature to have ever walked the earth.
For what feels like an eternity I say nothing as I struggle to find the means to speak. "Bella?" I finally say, in a voice that is barely a whisper, "Is that really you?" I move to close the space between us, and before I even manage to take two steps she looks at me and I stop dead in my tracks.
If looks could kill and I was actually living, the glare Bella gives me would have caused me to drop dead on the spot, and I am caught off guard by the pure, unadulterated hatred I can hear in her voice when she finally speaks to me.
"You don't get to speak to me. You don't get to even come near me, so don't even think about taking another step into this room" she shouts at me. If it were possible for my heart to break any more, it would have in this moment. I rarely ever saw Bella angry back in Forks, but this Bella that is here now is so filled with anger, and it hurts more than I can bear to know that it is because of me.
It seems in the brief amount of time that it took for me to walk into the room that all chaos has broken loose. I can feel Jasper trying to calm everyone down, but it isn't working. Alice, Esme, and Emmett are all shouting at me, but I can't make out what they are saying they are all yelling so fast and at the same time, plus I'm still only focused on Bella. Rosalie is trying to speak to her, and I'm confused by what she says.
"Bella, you have to know, we didn't think he was going to be home. Alice didn't see him coming back here while you were at the house, if we'd have known, we would never have had you come to the house. Please Bella, you have to know that."
The way Rosalie sounds, it's as if they have all known about Bella for a while. Unsure of what to make of that, I tuck the thought aside for later and just try to think of what I need to do now to get Bella to listen to me because I have so much I want to say to her, if she'll just give me the chance. I'm brought out of my thoughts when I hear Bella starting to yell again.
"You promised me! You all promised me, and all of you went back on your word. I trusted all of you. How could you do this? I finally trusted you enough to ask for help and this is what happens. I should have known better. I should have known that none of you would change, that nothing would change" I watch as she screams at my family and I can see her body shaking as she tries to keep herself together.
I'm just about to try to move towards her when she spins around and starts yelling at me again as she points her finger at me. "And you…well all I have to say to you is GO FUCK YOURSELF!" As she turns away from me I can see the tears streaming down her face. I want nothing more than to go to her and comfort her, but her last words to me have rendered me incapable of moving and I can only watch as the love of my life runs out of the house ignoring the shouts from my family for her to come back.
As soon as we all hear the door slam shut, I see my family members all turn around and just stare at me. Unsure of what to do or say, I make my way into the den and sit down on the couch. Everyone is still just looking at me like I owe them an explanation for something, so I say "Well don't look at me, I don't have a clue as to what just happened, but someone really needs to explain everything to me and tell me why Bella was here, why I didn't know about it, and why she just ran out the way she did."
"Not now Edward. We have bigger problems we need to try to fix right now" says Esme. She then turns to Alice and says "Can you see anything in her future right now? Something, anything that will give us a clue as to where she's going?"
"No" says Alice as she shakes her head. "Everything is fuzzy and unclear right now. She's either not making any definite decisions or she decided to just deal with this in her usual way. Either way, I can't get a read on what she's doing."
I don't know what Alice means when she refers to Bella's usual way of dealing, or why she looked at Carlisle when she says this, but I'm tired of being the one person in the room who doesn't any clue at all about what's going on. "Will someone please explain this to me because I really don't like being left in the dark here" I shout.
"Neither did Bella, asshole" Emmett says as he brushes past me and sits down. "Everyone calm down" says Carlisle, and then he turns to me. "Edward, I understand that you want an explanation. I promise you that we'll give you one, or at least explain what we can without telling you things that aren't our story to tell. But right now we need to just make sure Bella is ok." I just nod, even though I'm still confused, and the fact that everyone is shielding their thoughts from me isn't helping any.
For the next hour, everyone tries getting in touch with Bella. I wanted to help but they all said that it wouldn't be a good idea. Finally, they agree to just try calling every half hour or so, and sit down to talk to me.
Everyone is sitting down and they are all glaring at me, and we're all quiet for a while. Alice finally breaks the silence. "I guess it should be me who explains this to you, but I need you to promise to just let me explain everything and not interrupt me." I sigh, knowing it's going to be a hard promise to keep, but I know it's the only way I'll find out what's going on. "Fine Alice, you have my word."
Alice nods and begins to explain everything to me. "We found Bella on her birthday. It was completely by accident. Jasper and I decided to just go walk around town that day after class. We figured we may as well see what's around here since we're planning on being here for a while and I guess we lost track of where we were walking. The next thing we knew, we were in front of this apartment building and I recognized Bella's scent. She showed up a few minutes later. She was less than thrilled to see us to say the least. She has so much anger in her and is so hurt still from when we left Forks. It took everything me and Jasper could think of to just get her to agree to talk to us, let alone get her to agree to eventually meet up with the rest of the family. She's in a really bad place right now and she's all alone. Before she ran into us she had absolutely no one."
As I listen to Alice talk, I feel even worse about my decision to leave Bella. I knew I had made the wrong decision, but I never thought it would have caused Bella this much pain. All I had ever wanted was for her to be able to have the happy life that she deserved. Its then that what Rose said to Bella earlier about them not knowing I was going to be home pops back into my head, and I realize that the whole family knew and were keeping Bella a secret from me.
"You all knew about her and didn't say anything?" I asked my family. I couldn't believe they kept something like this from me. "You all knew how much I've regretted what I've done and how badly I've wanted to be able to find Bella and make things right with her" I shout, and it takes Jasper manipulating my emotions to calm me down enough to keep me from completely lashing out and doing something I'd later regret.
"She didn't want you to know Edward. She's not the same Bella anymore" Alice says as an explanation. I shake my head, not wanting to believe what Alice says, but I know Alice, she's always been honest with me, and if that wasn't enough she lets me see in her thoughts a conversation she had with Bella about this and in her thoughts I can see Bella as she tells Alice "Edward is not to know about me. I don't care what you have to do, but I don't want him knowing I'm back in your lives."
I don't know what to do in this situation; I stand up and start pacing as I run my hand through my hair. Emmett stops me before I can wear a hole through the floor. "I'm really sorry Edward. I didn't want to keep this a secret, but I had to honor Bella's wishes. I owed her at least that much for leaving her the way we did, and the fact is when she first came back to us, she told us that she didn't want you in her life" he says. I guess he's trying to comfort me, but the reality is what he says makes me hurt more than I ever thought I possibly could.
The entire time since Bella walked out of this house tonight, I've been trying to work out my plan in my head of how I was going to make things right with her and try to get her back, but as soon as I hear those words – she didn't want you in her life – it's as though I was hit by a truck. Those seven words cut me like a knife and I realize for the first time, that while I'm still determined to try, that there may not be a chance for me to get Bella back.
It's been almost three hours since Bella left, and Rose is getting antsy. "I'm worried about her you guys" she says. "I think we should go look for her. Alice, go check the places that you've been to with her, Jasper go back by your apartment and see if she's there. Carlisle and Emmett, you guys follow her scent from the house; see if you can track her that way. I'll stay here with Esme in case she decides to come back. We'll all meet up back here in an hour."
Everyone just nods and gets up to go look for Bella. As much as I'm dying to go and look for her myself, I know from everything that has been said, that I'm the last person Bella wants to see right now, so I just sit and watch as the rest of my family leaves to try to find her, and pray that they actually do. I guess my prayer goes unanswered because an hour later everyone is back at the house, no one having had any luck with Bella. She must be wandering around because her scent keeps crossing over itself, and she wasn't in any of the places that Alice went to check.
It's clear that none of us know what to do at this point. Bella isn't answering her phone or responding to the texts everyone is sending her, and she wasn't anywhere anyone looked for her. Now all we could do was sit and wait to see if Bella contacts us. I'm not sure how much time goes by, but all of a sudden, everyone's phones go off at once.
Alice turns to me and says "Its Bella, she says fine. She's at work and wants us all to meet her there at eleven tonight. Edward, she wants you to come with us." I'm relieved to hear that she's ok, but when Alice says that Bella wanted me to go with them to meet up with her later, I can't help but smile a little and think that there may be a little bit of hope for us after all.
A/N: I hope you all enjoyed getting into Edward's head a bit. I feel bad getting his hopes up about things with Bella, but sadly it had to be done. Next chapter is the big reveal about Bella's job and is the chapter which contains the song that the story is named after. Please let me know what you thought of the chapter and review, I love hearing from you guys. I read and respond to all of my reviews, and I promise that if you review, I'll send you a snippet from the next chapter which should be up sometime between Friday and Saturday. Also, don't forget to check out the blog for the story. The address for the blog is lvtwilight09(dot)blogspot(dot)com just be sure to put in the actual dots. The blog has pictures and such for this story and there is also a link to it on my profile. Thanks for reading!
Some Recs for all of you:
With the Grace of a Woman by ImaTwitard
A Rough Start by ItzMegan73
My Viking by sheviking
