October 4, 2002
It was pouring down rain, and I decided to take a homework break and grab a soda from my fridge outside. We were only three weeks into school and already my homework was piling up like crazy. Going back to school had been hard. Just going back home at all had been hard.
Ashley had understood. I couldn't tell her that I sent Edward away because I thought he was a fictional character that had another fictional character he was meant to love somewhere in the world – so I just told her he left, which was the truth in some ways. She did all the things a best friend was supposed to do – she hated him, grabbed a tub of Ben & Jerry's and sat on the couch watching Pretty Woman and cried with me. I wanted to finish out the summer at the beach, after all, just because my summer was ruined didn't mean Ashley's had to be. I couldn't do it though. Everywhere I went I was reminded of him. After a while it hurt too much for me to stay there, and when Ashley suggested we go home I gladly took her up on the offer.
Being home was strange too. I missed Edward so much, but once school started up again I decided I couldn't just mope around the house feeling sorry for myself anymore. I threw myself into school, picked up a part-time job, and attempted to restart and revamp my social life. It was exhausting, and at the end of the day when all the business of my life stopped and I was surrounded by silence, I found myself thinking of cool, pale skin and golden eyes.
This was one of those days. I came home to an empty house and the silence around me was deafening. I poured myself into homework as much as I could and waited for the moment when my mom would be back so I could distract myself from her. I walked outside to the fridge in my garage and noticed my garage door was open. Just as I reached up to close it I noticed something at the bottom of my driveway. It was raining so hard I could barely make it out, but I knew it was a person, and as the person began walking up my driveway I knew immediately who it was.
I hadn't seen him in a month and a half. Was a month and a half all it took? For a moment I didn't know what to do. I couldn't even move. His figure kept gliding up my driveway though, and soon my feet were moving themselves towards the edge of my garage, even if my brain wasn't functioning enough to tell them to. I walked out in the pouring rain and met him halfway.
"Edward?" I asked, my mind not being able to comprehend that this was him.
"Hello, Charlotte." He whispered in return. If the flawless pale skin and perfect copper hair wasn't enough to convince me that Edward Cullen was standing in front of me, then his smooth, silky voice surely did it.
I didn't want to cry. I wanted to jump into his arms, kiss him and have myself be safe forever. Instead tears began to pour down my face. Edward was quick to pull me in his arms, but from the moment he did it something didn't feel right. His arms were stiff around my body and I could tell he was purposely keeping himself as far away from touching me as he could.
I pulled myself out of the awkward embrace and faced him again. "Edward, what does this mean? Does this mean it's not true? There's no Bella? We can be together?" My voice was full of anticipation and hope. My mind flashed back to our last night together in Charleston. He promised me that if there was no Bella he would come back to me, and now here he was standing before me. In my head it all connected. There was no Bella, Twilight was fiction, just a figment of Stephenie Meyer's imagination. This was all I wanted to believe, but the look on Edward's face told me otherwise.
"Edward?" I asked again, much quieter this time. His face dropped again and for the first time I noticed how black his eyes were. It scared me a little bit, the harshness of his face and the deep black unlike one I had ever seen but exactly as Stephenie Meyer had described it. I knew something was wrong. It was a gut feeling, intuition. I just didn't want to believe it.
"Charlotte," he finally answered his voice full of the emotions I knew he would be showing on his face if he only could. "I can't do it, Charlotte. I want to kill her. Do you know what that's like? I'm plotting murders in my head. I'm figuring out the best way to kill all of our classmates so that I can have her. It's gruesome. I'm leaving. I don't know what that book said, but Bella Swan and I are not going to fall in love. I'll kill her, Charlotte. I'm going away. Far, far away. So far away that even if I wanted to come back to Seattle and hurt her I couldn't. I just couldn't bring myself to leave without telling you first, so here I am."
I looked at him, absolutely shocked, hurt, and confused. "You mean she's real? Bella Swan exists?"
"Yes," he quietly answered back.
Edward Cullen had come back to break my heart. That was the only conclusion I could come to.
"Are you kidding me?" I asked him, my confusion quickly turning to absolute rage.
"Excuse me?" He asked, the dumbfounded look on his face clearly stating that he didn't understand why I was so angry.
"Do you have any idea what you mean to me? You fixed my heart! I was broken and you fixed me and I love you. I love you Edward Cullen, and not a single day over the past six weeks has gone by where I haven't thought of you. I've thrown myself into every other aspect of my life in an attempt to forget about you. You fixed me, and I gave you up. I gave you up so that you could be happy. I wanted you to have a chance at complete happiness, Edward. Bella is going to complete you. I told you this! I gave you up and told you to go make yourself happy, and you're giving up on all of that? And you came all the way back here to tell me that? What is wrong with you?" I paused and took in a huge breath, not even realizing that I had been shouting.
"Charlotte, I don't think I can do this. You don't understand. This is tearing me up. I hate myself for it. I didn't mean to come to you and upset you. You know I would never want to break your heart. I just don't know what else to do," he answered. I knew if he could cry he would be.
"Edward, you have to do this. I can't let myself live knowing I gave you up for no reason. She's going to make you the happiest person in the world, Edward. Please, if you won't do this for yourself, then do it for me."
"Charlotte…" he trailed off.
"You need to have more faith in yourself, Edward. Trust me; everyone thinks you can do this except yourself. I know you can do this. Bella knows you can do this. Bella believes in you more than anyone. Edward, I know how your story ends. You can do this."
"You always did believe in me more than I believed in myself."
"Edward, please just try for me. I can't give you up in vain. Please…" this time it was my turn to trail off.
"OK, Charlotte, but only for you. And I swear, if I kill her…"
"Thank you," I whispered.
I watched as he brought himself closer to me. I watched as he leaned in and brought his lips to my cheek in the slightest of touches and the fireworks I had felt so long ago appeared again. I watched him turn around and walk to the end of my driveway and then run out of my life yet again. I watched my heart break in two.
I sat down in the pouring rain. I couldn't tell whether I was crying or if it was the rain that streaked my face and blurred my vision. I couldn't believe that I had let him walk out of my life again. For the second time I had convinced the person I love to leave me, and I had found yet another difference between myself and Bella Swan - I was a much bigger masochist.