A/N: Sorry for the late update.

Just to clear some things up:

Bella is still not a virgin, I'm not gonna magically have Edward slip and say "oh, gotcha!" so, that clears that up I hope.

This is about friendship first and romance second.

So, keep that in mind.

Edward's hands were on my hips in an instant. The cast on his hand dug into the skin there and I resisted the urge to wince. I didn't mean it, this wasn't supposed to happen. I shouldn't have kissed him, but I did.

Was the only possible way to get through to him with physical actions only? My stomach dropped at the thought. My mind went directly back to the first time when he touched me—it seemed so great, my entire body tingled at that time. All I wanted was more, and I got it.

And then last time… last time when he turned his back, which was worse than any physical pain I'd ever felt. I couldn't have a repeat of that.

My body screamed at my mind. It'd been too long. I needed some kind of release, a real release, not something that weighed heavily on my conscience. I couldn't even think to touch myself after all that, every time I even moved my fingers in the slightest I saw his face in the darkness of my room, that horrible night.

His fingers moved to the skin of my back, smothering my flesh with his warm palm. I gasped and his hips pushed into my stomach. Oh no. No, I couldn't do this. It was too soon… but I wanted it, oh God, more than anything I wanted it.

His tongue brushed my lower lip and my nipples went hard in an instant. The cold from my wet bra helped with that. They brushed against his hot chest and this time my hips bucked roughly into him. It was so natural, so right, we were meant for these kinds of feelings; but at the same time it was one huge mistake.

Somehow I managed to pull away from him. Edward took that as a sign to keep going on my neck. It felt so good; his teeth nipped and pulled at my skin, working the hollow of my throat with his tongue. How could something so horribly wrong feel so incredibly right?

"No, Edward… oh God, please stop… we have to stop!" My voice held absolutely no conviction.

"Why?" He panted. "You started this…" But his lips pulled away from me then, and he backed up a couple steps.

So he did have some control.

"I know," I whispered once I caught my breath. I could hear his panting breath and it honestly didn't help my weak resolve.

He grunted a bit before shoving his hands in his pockets and closing his eyes briefly.

"I just, I think we need to talk."

"Yeah," he sighed. He pulled his keys from the ground where they'd fallen and unlocked the door. The bright lights of the foyer lit up as soon as the door was fully opened.

The sound of metal bounded behind me as he deposited his keys in the bowl by the front door. His shoes went next, dropping to the small rug by the front door before he tapped my shoulder and walked upstairs.

I tried not to drip on the clean carpets, but it was hard. I had to wrap my hair under Edward's jacket and bunch my skirt up so that I leak anything. By the time I made it into his room he bolted for the closet.

His absence allowed me to release the breath I'd been holding for a good minute. My frayed nerves simmered down a bit before he came back into his room with a few articles of clothing and then pushed me toward his bathroom.

"You wreak of Kool Aid, and not the good kind." He wrinkled his nose and tried to lift his hard mouth into a teasing smile, but it was lost on me.

I nodded a bit and then walked into his bathroom. I'd been here so many times, but it seemed so cold and empty now. This house didn't feel like it was my home anymore; I felt like an invader. My mind was getting ahead of me. I was thinking too much again.

I stripped without feeling, throwing Edward's stained jacket into the hamper in the corner of his bathroom. I took off my drenched bra and skirt and saved my panties. By the time I was finished the bathtub was almost full of water.

My mind was at a stand still but as soon as I was relaxed in the tub, it went a million miles an hour. I was confused, scared, lonely, hurt, embarrassed and over all just exhausted. Silent tears slid down my cheeks and I sunk into the water, letting my sobs be muffled under the water's surface.

My need for air forced me up after a while and I decided to get lost in the scent of his soap. His shampoo made my heart stop, his conditioner made my brain turn and his body wash made my stomach drop. I hadn't expected this reaction from myself, but I welcomed it with open arms. For the first time in days I didn't feel like such a hopeless wreck.

I could feel the trembling in my legs—something that was so familiar—and I knew I was getting better just by being able to smell him.

My jaw chattered a bit and my right hand skimmed down my stomach. A breathless pant left my mouth as my fingers brushed over my thigh. The recognition made a shiver run down my spine. Yes, please.

My index finger ran around my slit and my head tipped backwards. Just as I started to massage my clit, three quick raps sounded from the door. My eyes closed briefly before I heard his voice.

"Bella? Are you okay in there?" My throat constricted at his voice and my stomach did a flip. My finger pushed down on my clit and my back arched.

"Um, yeah… just trying to get this gunk… out of my hair." My voice didn't shake nearly as bad as I thought it would.

"Alright," he sighed quietly and I could hear something touch the door lightly. I closed my eyes tightly before removing my hand from its warm spot and standing up.

Great timing, Edward.

I wrapped his plain white towel around my body and toweled my hair dry. I was covered in his scent and I sighed to myself. My body was on sensory overload. My thighs were stuck to together, trying to stop the incredible strength of my body's need.

I got dressed quickly and made my mind focus on every little detail before I shrugged on a pair of his flannels and walked out of the sanctuary of his bathroom.

The air outside the bathroom was cold, and I shivered a little before making my way to sit on his bed. He wasn't in the room, but the TV was on, lightly humming the voice of the newscaster. Someone was shot in a subway station; the man who did it was going to prison.

Some woman tried to smother her husband while he slept. Another woman was found cheating with her husband's best friend; he killed her later on that night. There was a serial rapist who escaped and was hiding somewhere in Seattle. There was a rough sketch of him, and he reminded me of coach Clapp a little.

Why is it that they only show the bad stuff? A pretty news caster went on about how some woman was running a charity for fostered children, immediately afterwards they went into a segment about a child molester living in Olympia.

I grabbed the remote and turned the TV off. This morbid stuff made me forget, but now I was depressed.

There was banging from downstairs and then I heard his heavy footsteps coming down the hallway. My eyes widened a bit. I needed more time!

But before I could even think of running back into the bathroom he was in front of me, throwing a bundle of movies at me.

"It's not Wednesday, but we skipped this week." He shrugged. My hands started to shake beneath the movies. What the hell was going on with me?

I pushed a random movie at him and he popped it in the DVD player before jumping onto the bed. He seemed so at ease, like he wasn't even bothered by the fact that I was sitting here and we'd just made out on his front porch. Was I the only one perturbed by that?

We sat in silence watching some horrible comedy. The main character's nose was big, and people constantly made comments on it, but that was all I got about it. There were a couple serious scenes that were meant to be sappy, and then someone would come in to be the comic relief.

I'd seen this same plot about a thousand times. But I still sat there and watched without paying attention, and by the time it was over, I was much more relaxed. My nerves weren't as frayed anymore, and I cleared my head enough to think that I could make it through a conversation.

This was just… too weird. Edward was always the one who was straight forward, the one who never avoided things that needed to be said. He sat completely still, his eyes trained too intently on the TV. So he was just buying himself some time. I decided to sit back and let it go. I'd get my chance; I needed my chance.

Edward popped up from his spot to take the DVD out and put it back in the case before grabbing another one.

"Um, Edward?" He turned around at the sound of my voice and raised an eyebrow. Was he waiting for me to speak?

"Yeah?"

"Well, you know… talking?" I stumbled over my words, and by the end I wasn't even sure what the hell I was talking about. But he figured it out and sat in front of me on his bed; still a good distance away.

When he sat, his warm scent wafted over to me and I honestly could have rolled my eyes back into my head. The warm familiarity made my nerves light back up. This just couldn't be easy.

"Alright, talk,"

I hesitated before I sat on my knees and was head level with him. He mouth wasn't as tight anymore, but his cheekbones were getting taught, which meant I only had a limited time before he became impatient.

"Thank you," I blurted.

He cocked his head to the side a fraction and then half-smiled a bit. "Not a problem, best friend. Wish I had something more than water. There wasn't much milk left, but bleach would have been better."

I laughed along with him, the idea of sour milk entered my mind and I laughed like it didn't matter that I was just publically humiliated in front of most of the high school and college student body.

"I did like your action line, though. I could imagine Samuel L. Jackson coming in next to you, 'I've have enough with you motherfucking bitches on this motherfucking plane!'"

A loud laugh came from his throat and he looked like he might cry. "I was in the middle of rescuing you; I couldn't come up with anything witty!" Our laughing consumed the quiet room and it felt like old times again.

We leaned forward, a natural pull towards one another. And in truth, it wasn't even that funny to me. I just liked this. The way that I was leaned up against his shoulder laughing with wild abandon, spurred on by his loud laughs that were undoubtedly forming because of mine.

And then I could feel the warmth of his neck on my already hot face, and the heady scent of him on my tongue, and even the sweet breath that was corrupt by liquor. In that instance, it was like nothing else existed except for the slowly calming boy next to me.

His fingers touched my chin, and tilted my head up to him. I hadn't even noticed that we'd been perfectly still from what could have been minutes. His emerald eyes met mine, and I saw the light pleasure in them that drove me crazy any time I saw them.

His cheeks were a little pink, and his hair was a complete disaster on his head. I saw the little scar right above his left eyebrow that you couldn't see unless you knew it was there. The dimple that was right on it was smoothed out, and I knew that he was completely calmed, concentrating on me.

And in that instant I knew that out bodies weren't total strangers. He'd said it before, that no matter how long we knew each other, our bodies couldn't distinguish each other.

But my mind could distinguish his body, and his mind could distinguish mine, so why couldn't it balance out?

Why couldn't we just make this work?

His head tilted slightly, and he bent down slowly. His hand moved upward so that it was palming my cheek, and I brought my hands to his shoulder. Because God knows, I'd need support for this.

He lightly brushed his lips to mine, and I could smell his delicious breath flow over me. His soft lips slid past mine sensually, but I could feel the slight lip of skin that was there because of his chapped lips. But I didn't care, because my lips were worse. I dove head first into all of him.

Our lips pulled together instantly. It was so natural that I couldn't even think of what could be wrong and what could be right. It just didn't matter; how could this be wrong? How could feeling this wonderfully amazing be wrong?

The shock waves from before ran screamingly fast down my spine. Lightning bolts smothered the stars behind my eyes and I could have sat here, receiving Edward's slick tongue between my teeth for an eternity.

His hand was on my skin in an instant. He was every where in a heart beat. I wanted to scream just from that small amount of contact, but I desperately wanted more.

I pressed my entire body against his and I didn't have the ability to think twice about it. I wanted this, I needed this, and I was so tired of just ignoring it.

My shirt was gone in an instant. His hands brushed the skin on its way and we barely broke away to take it off. Pressure built astoundingly fast between my legs. I'd been sitting here moist and gathering more as time passed, and now it all pushed out and soaked my relatively dry panties.

Edward's fingers were on my chest, his large, warm hands covering my breasts and squeezing them until fire bolts were sent through my body and directly down to my panties. He moved his cast so that it wouldn't scrape me, and I'd only now realized I hadn't brought myself to worry enough to ask what he did to get it.

His fingers twisted and pulled harder and I jumped up. I could feel my clit, swollen and painful, and I rubbed my thighs together as roughly as I could.

His finger tugged at my nipples, pressing into them and twisting while his mouth did wonderful things down my chin and neck, thoroughly lapping at the skin of my collarbone and then the skin of my chest. One hand left and his mouth was on me in that same instant.

Loud noises left my throat and I couldn't even hear myself, just feeling the loud vibrations rocking my body. I could have sworn that the vibrations from my throat were rocking me to my very core, but I came down to reality just enough to realize that Edward's hand was rubbing me through my pants.

Tears stung at my eyes. This was possibly the greatest I'd ever felt before. Edward was everywhere around me; his hands, his mouth, his broad body and his seductive words that I could barely make out as he murmured into my chest.

"No… I… can't…" As quickly as this whole thing had progressed, he pulled away from me, his face red and his chest heaving from panting.

"No," I whimpered, my arms reaching for him.

"God, Bella… we can't… talking, remember?" His jaw clenched and his eyes wandered down my chest before he snapped them up.

"Talking later!" I snapped, throwing myself at him. He caught me by my shoulders and held me back.

"No, no, no," he muttered, his eyes closed tightly.

It hit me then, this wasn't the time for that. He was making an effort to control himself and my over heated, needy body was controlling me. I could wait for him; I would have to wait for him.

I wrapped my arms around my chest and looked back him, surprisingly not embarrassed. That could have been because of the thorough evidence in his pants. My body shuddered at the straining zipper and the way I could nearly see him throbbing.

"S-sorry," I whispered.

"It's fine." He sighed, his eyes opening slowly. "As much as I'd like to have kept that up, I think we already know where physical talking leads us." He smiled grimly and I looked away.

"Yeah," my voice was quiet at the thought of his face. My eyes closed briefly before I looked back up at him.

"You remember back in freshman year when we went to that party?" he asked suddenly, I nodded. "Remember when I told you about Tanya and that whole… mess?"

"Yeah, I remember."

"Would you believe me if I told you I saw her at that party tonight?"

I blanched. "No way,"

"Yeah, I was thinking about that earlier this evening. I was really just a kid then, but it's never sat well with me. You know how I tried to repress all that, and I finally thought about it tonight."

"And what's the conclusion?"

"Well, I thought about it after she propositioned me."

"You… you went with her again—"

"No! No, that's one mistake I'll never make again. And besides, I think she got another breast aug done. You know my rule about plastic surgery." He smiled wryly and I found myself smile along with him. "She spotted me before I saw her; she knew my name and everything. She said her cousin talked about me all the time. She wanted to see if I was worth her time."

"C-cousin? You don't mean… she was blonde right? Lauren, you mean?" he nodded at me. What a small world… or town.

"Yeah, you hit the nail on the head."

"So you didn't go with her then?"

"Exactly."

"Why?"

"Because I had absolutely no want or need or drive to." I raised an eyebrow and he smiled a little. "I don't know. I haven't really noticed it over the last couple days, but sex just doesn't seem appealing with anyone anymore."

I could feel my face go gaunt at his words. Is that why he stopped me? He didn't have a sex drive anymore so he just dumped me completely off of him with a jolly attitude all of a sudden—

"Would you calm down? Jesus, Bella, I haven't even finished yet!"

"Go on," I croaked.

"Okay, I haven't had the want or pull to sleep with anyone because I've already had the forbidden fruit—so to speak—and anything after that just doesn't even compare in appraisal or value." His eyes softened a bit at the end.

"S-so what are you saying? You had a bite of forbidden fruit and you don't want anything else. So what does that even mean? I told you Edward, I can't do that 'friends with benefits' thing."

"That's not what I mean!" he shouted exasperatedly. "God, Bella, is it that fucking hard to understand?"

I snapped then. My confusion roared over me and I dropped my arms from my chest to stand up from his bed. I locked my eyes on his, not willing to look away. I needed to understand this; his emotions and attitudes were giving me a severe case of whiplash.

"Yes, Edward, it is! I don't understand you! I haven't been able to get a grasp on you for a long time now, and these cryptic messages aren't helping at all. If you don't want to be friends or friends with benefits, or even neighbours anymore, just say it would you!?"

"You're an idiot!" he roared. "How hard is it to understand? How fucking difficult is this for you to grasp? How many more times can I put myself out there on the line without you taking the bait?"

"Because maybe you should just be Edward and be blunt about it! I miss the old Edward, so just come out and sa—"

"I love you!"

My heart did a flutter and then deflated before it felt like it was going to jump out of my chest. That was definitely not what I had expected. How many times had I dreamt of those words, though?

The room went silent and then he suddenly looked away. I saw the column of his throat expand in a swallow before he shook his head lightly.

My silence was deafening even to my own ears. I couldn't seem to hear anything besides my own heart hammering away at my chest.

My mind couldn't even grasp the concept. I knew he loved me, I knew that since we were little kids, but this was so much more complicated than that. This was one fucked up wiring company of emotions and betrayals and all these crazy teenage love notions didn't even register on that company's map.

I looked at him, and just had to watch him for a minute. The boy that I grew up with, the boy who I'd spent my first night in the hospital, jail, and even a bus station with loved me enough to share his bed with me.

The boy who callously flirted with girls and slept with them, but still tried to convince himself he was morally justified, was in love with me. The boy who asked me to be his student while he broke my heart and my spirit and even my trust, loved me.

But most of all, the scared little boy who was still stuck in a time that he didn't belong in was brave enough to reach out to me and stop playing behind his ridiculous façade and come out to admit something that we both knew was true from the start.

I loved him, too.

"This was a mistake." He whispered to himself. He stood up on visibly shaky legs before he brushed passed me with his head down at the carpet. "I'm sorry."

His hand touched the doorknob to his room and that's when I realized he was just going to leave again. That scared little boy was controlling his actions again and he was going to leave me high and dry once more.

My body reacted. The love sick little girl reached out to him, not willing to be hurt and torn apart again. Every other thought left my mind and I ran myself into his firm back, knocking him into the door and stopping him.

"Don't leave me!" I yelled. Tears freely left my eyes, staining my cheeks as they slid slowly. My hands slid to his chest and I fisted his shirt to hold onto him.

It all came crashing down on me at that point. The unbearable pain—physical, emotional, and mental—all receded into my body and I shook violently against him. Edward turned around instantly and his arms were constricting me against his body.

I saw not only his face, his back, his eyes on that cold lonely night, but I saw everything that I'd been pouring into that one moment.

"I'm so—sorry." I sobbed into his chest.

"No, Bella, you have nothing to be sorry for. Don't cry, don't cry… please, don't cry."

"No!" I buried my face deeper into his chest. I felt his body slide down to the floor so that I was between his legs with his arms wrapped securely around me. My legs were ready to give out at that point anyway.

It could all wait. I could tell him it wasn't his fault later, but I needed to cry now. The pain of everything crashed around me and I wailed awful sounds into his skin, hiding my pain inside of him, letting it all wash away… for the moment.

All the little girl insecurities came out. I'm not pretty enough, I'm not smart enough, I'm not fun enough, I'm not good enough. All of those events that seemed so insignificant at the time pushed down on me and I couldn't hold it in. I would regret crying over those later, but now they seemed so huge and their weight forced another sob to explode.

The fights that I'd heard through the walls at night were shoved in my ears. Cotton balls of arguments were stuffed in my hearing and I was deaf to anything but the names that my parents called each other. The late nights that Charlie came home; the way he tried his hardest to be there for me when I knew it was killing him to see me drifting away with my mom.

I screamed for every death that I'd ever encountered because suddenly it didn't seem like it was enough to shed a tear for them. I cried for my first and only dog, and then my gold fish whose names I'd forgotten long ago. I cried for my grandma even though she was mean to me and hit me with her cane when she was angry.

All of this was so selfish, but I cried because I didn't want to cry for what Edward had done to me. In the grand scheme, he'd done so much more good for me. He made me laugh, helped me through boredom… lent me a shoulder to cry on… even his whole body.

Some hours later, after I was pretty much dehydrated, I looked up him through my painful puffy eyes. His eyes were red, his bottom lashes curved with dried tears.

"Edward," I whimpered. He smiled a little, his eyes filling with unshed tears again.

I pulled back and wrapped my arms around his neck. And in that movement, I poured every ounce of love and ardent affection in my entire body out to him.

But he gladly received every drop of that.

A/N: I love this chapter... sigh.

I love next chapter, too. I couldn't resist bringin' in Carlisle for another chapter. He's mah fav. :D

Don't forget to review!