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20. Beautiful Player

Edward shuffles in at four in the morning as rumpled looking as I expected. He's a wrinkled white T-shirt and hair that's been pulled at by some girl's fingers. He looks tired but he still smiles and sits next to me by the pool.

"Hey."

"Hi." I offer him a cigarette. "To start paying my debt."

Edward smiles enough to squint his eyes. "Thanks. What've you been doing?"

"Thinking," I say.

He smirks with his cigarette between his lips, his hands going up to cup the flame of his lighter. "You're always thinking." He exhales the first gust of smoke and shakes his head. "Gets exhausting after a while, doesn't it?"

"Yeah," I murmur.

He leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees. He glances up at the sky and exhales. "I'm tired."

"Go to bed, then."

His curved smile is wry and halfway sad. "Not that kind of tired." He flicks ash carelessly. "Born tired and never got rested."

"The Black Keys," I say.

His smile is more genuine now. "Yeah."

I pull my legs up to my chest and rest my head on my knees, staring at Edward as he stares at the sky. The red motel sign and the green pool cast all kinds of crazy Christmas shadows on him.

"What?" he asks, cutting his eyes over to me.

I debate on not speaking. But then I decide against it. "Alice said you were a good guy, not bad like you think."

Edward looks away from me, down at his hands. He has strong hands, I notice: hands with big knuckles and veins running beneath motor-oil stained skin and an ever-present dinginess beneath his fingernails. The same all car mechanics have. But his fingers are long, like an artist's.

"You gotta stop believing everything you hear, sweetheart."

I frown. "Alice should know. She's known you a long time."

"She doesn't know me, though." Edward grows agitated and runs a hand through his messy hair. "She doesn't know anything." He tosses his cigarette and clenches his jaw.

I keep quiet because his anger is simmering and scary, slow but strong. I don't know his kind of anger. I know sudden fury and drunken rage. I know high rampages and jealous fits. But I don't know him and I don't know this.

Edward looks over at me, catches something in my eyes—probably suspicion or fear—and expels whatever darkness overtook him with a sigh. He's calm again and shaking his head. He drops his head into his hands and rubs at his face, groaning. "I'm just tired," he repeats quietly.

He stays with his head bent and face covered, and it's a vulnerable position, like he's praying almost. Maybe he is. Or maybe he's just drowning in his own misery.

I see my hand reach out instinctually, but I don't really realize what I'm doing until I feel the warmth of his neck and the softness of his hair.

Edward gets so still, but his face is still covered, so I keep touching, playing carefully with the messy-warm curls. Then I slip my hand lower, over his shoulder, down his arm. The soft fabric of his T-shirt beneath my palm turns to smooth-hot skin over really hard muscle.

I never really noticed how muscular he was before, maybe because he's still lean and slim, not bulky like Emmett. I think this might be better but I'm not really sure how I feel about it.

Edward lifts his head up and straightens out his arm, letting my fingers run down his bicep and lower, tracing the veins in his forearm. I like those—the veins—I don't know why. Maybe because it makes him seem stronger or something.

But stronger is scary so that can't be it.

Then I pull my hand away and look up into Edward's waiting gaze. He looks calmer, maybe a little surprised.

I flush and look away. I can feel my heartbeat, but I'm not scared. I don't think I am, anyway. It's weird and confusing and I don't like it.

You like him. I know you do.

Alice's words replay in my head, but I push them back furiously. I don't like him like that. He's older and he swears he's bad and he does do bad things and he's a boy. A man.

He's dangerous.

Edward clears his throat. Out of my peripheral, I can see him look away from me and back to the sky. I can breathe again.

"Bella?"

"What?" I ask.

"How old are you?"

I let out a small laugh and glance over to meet his smile and gaze. I just shake my head. "Goodnight, Edward."

His eyes soften a little. "Night."

There's this weird hesitation in me, and I don't get up right away. Edward's already looking back up at the sky, his face as close to peaceful as I guess it can get. But he still looks so sad. I feel bad for him, the same way I feel bad for Rose and Alice and all of them. Just because he's a boy doesn't mean he doesn't deserve my kindness.

Grandma would be disappointed in me.

So I lean in and kiss his cheek.

I feel rather than hear Edward's sharp intake of breath. It's a quick up-down motion of his chest, and he turns his head in surprise.

Our noses bump with the sudden movement.

But he pulls away immediately so I don't have to.

His eyes are all wide shock.

I get red-faced again and feel silly so I just get up and go into my room and hope he doesn't think it meant something significant. Because it didn't.

Okay, so a really good point was brought to my attention last night. Alice is only 19, which means if her and Edward were together as suggested, she would have been super young. That was not my intention. I honestly just forgot how old I'd made Alice. *hides* So all that probably happened when she was around 17 or 18, I guess. I don't really know. I honestly didn't put that much thought into it because Alice and Edward being together isn't a big plot point. It's not going to be something that's even mentioned again, I doubt, unless Bella thinks about it. It won't turn into a cheap way to create drama or anything. It just happened since Edward and Alice are all kinds of mixed up.

So I'm headed home this week (yay!), and hopefully, the updates will pick up again. Thanks for sticking with me, y'all! I know it's frustrating!

oxoxoxo