Stephenie Meyer owns Twilight. I only own my mistakes.

~~~o~~~

We stop by Edward's place on the way to the park to get Sam. Edward doesn't say much on the way there or on the hike up. He also seems in a rush, which makes him stumble a few times along the way. It's slightly drizzling out so we are both out of breath and completely soaked when we reach the top.

We drink water in silence, and I hold his hand and guide him to our usual rock where we sit.

We sit there for a while, in silence, as the sky clears out and the rain stops.

I give him his time. I know he needs to say something regarding the surgery his father mentioned over brunch — the one that could give him his sight back.

Out of nowhere, he starts: "There's a tumor inside my head. A pituitary gland tumor, to be precise." He pauses and takes a deep breath. "When it started to grow, it pressed on my optic nerve, which is what made me blind."

Oh my god...

My heart sinks to my stomach. A million scenarios flash through my head.

Tumor?

Cancer?

Is he okay? Is he going to be okay?

"To top it off, it has another pesky side effect," he continues.

"The headaches?" I ask through a whisper, squeezing his hand out of instinct.

"Precisely."

"Is there any treatment?"

"For the tumor?"

"Yes," I choke out.

"Well, I used to try whatever my dad seemed fit. Some of the treatments worked to stop its growth, but not to reduce its size. It would need to be removed, but the current procedures for it don't have the best stats. The risks outweigh the benefits. Or so we thought..." He shrugs, still facing the view in front of us, while his thumb runs circles in the palm of my hand.

"Could it get worse?"

"Unlikely. It's a benign tumor… so it's not like it's cancer or anything."

Benign… thank God!

I breathe out in relief. He is okay. He will be okay. "What about the headaches?"

"I go through phases, but it's really not too bad."

I'm not sure if he is playing it down or not. The headache he had at our open mic night seemed excruciating to me.

There's another couple of silent seconds until I ask, "so is that what your dad was talking about?"

"My dad, the neurosurgeon, has been following this new procedure for a few years now… where they surgically remove tumors like mine, but instead of having to crack your skull open, they go in through the nose. Transsphenoidal endoscopic surgery," he explains. "I guess anything is possible in the new millennium," he adds with a scoff.

"That sounds… scary." I shake my head at the term. Just to think about some kind of tool poking into his brain makes me shudder.

"Not as bad as going through your skull." He tries for a smile, facing me, but it doesn't come out quite right.

"Right, true." I look down at our hands, twisting and untwisting our fingers, the immensity of the situation crashing down on me. I am glad he was comfortable enough sharing this with me, and I am already sure I will support whatever decision he takes regarding this surgery.

I wonder what he would think of me if he could see me. Before my insecurities hit me, he speaks again.

"The thing is, Bella, I've been blind for almost ten years. I'm okay with it. Plus there's no guarantee it will work. They could remove the whole tumor and my optic nerves could still be damaged enough to keep me blind. My family and I…" he takes a deep breath. "We've gone through this, so many times! I'm just tired of disappointing them every time it doesn't work."

I can see it in him — the resolve. He won't have this surgery.

"What if it does work this time?"

"Bella…" he gets up suddenly, leaving my hand and my side. He stands in front of me while his hands turn the water bottle around nervously. "I wanted you to know because… I mean, you're the only person besides my family who knows about this. I… I know we've been spending a lot of time together, and, to be honest, my time with you is the highlight of my days. But this is what I am, Bella, and I can't be fixed. I just… I just wanted you to know..."

He runs a hand through his hair, which is still damp, and faces down, to the bottle and his feet. His eyebrows scrunch over his glasses and he opens his mouth a couple times — as if he was going to say something else — but then closes it, exhaling through his nose.

He looks so troubled and shaken from what he just shared with me, all I want to do is get my arms around him and comfort him.

"Hey," I whisper, getting up and standing right in front of him. My hand cups his face and I pull his face down to me. "You don't need any fixing, okay?"

"I can't have you wanting to change me too," he pleads.

On an impulse, my fingers grab a hold of his sunglasses. I pause, tentatively, waiting to see if he would stop me.

He doesn't.

I don't know what exactly I expected his eyes to look like, but it was definitely not the deep emerald green that stuns me in place. His eyes look completely normal, stunningly beautiful even, except they seem lost as they are not focused on me or anything in particular.

"I don't want to change you," I say pulling him even closer. "I don't," I say again, before our lips meet.

He is unresponsive at first, but then his hands find my waist and he reciprocates, letting go of his worries and losing himself in me.

~~~o~~~