I'm practically in tears as I write this. This is the last chapter of Bare. There will be an epilogue coming soon, but it's not necessary to read the epilogue to finish the fic. All the epilogue will be is a small glimpse into the future.

So many people to thank. This was my first Twific, and it's so scary to embark on that journey. Thank you to everyone who has recommended Bare, favorited Bare, reviewed Bare, alerted Bare, author alerted me... even to those who think it's a flowery piece of purple prose, thank you for reading it anyway.

Thank you especially to Ali, who has been there from the very beginning. You are my sunshine, my only sunshineeee... etc, etc.

Disclaimer: Until we meet again, this is not mine.

The Color of Your Soul

Winter always turns into spring, doesn't it? The white melts and the green grows and the world changes right before your eyes. One day, I woke up and the ground was clear, and I could wear a light jacket. And now, it is June, and I am graduating in a little under two hours.

Has my life changed since I wrote in this notebook last? Sure, I'd say so. It has been roughly six months since the ice of Christmas lay on the ground and covered our cheeks with pink little bites. It's now warm enough for a tank top, warm enough for Edward and I to lie in the meadow for hours, and let the sun color our faces.

I decided on UW for the fall. Jane and I are going to be roommates – can you believe it? We're getting a student apartment on campus, which are ugly and boring, but ours all the same. After much deliberation, Edward decided not to go to college in the Fall. Instead, he was offered a full-time art teaching position at the art studio he always guest teaches at in Port Angeles.

This means there will be distance between Edward and I for the first time in our relationship. We're not naïve enough (anymore) to believe that it will be easy, but as always, if we're able to be together… it's worth it for both of us.

We still have a summer to look forward to. Last summer, we were just getting together – getting used to each other, the newness and the foreign feelings, and it was beautiful in its own way. This summer I hope we can dedicate to reverence… to truly appreciating what we have, the bright white pulsing, thrumming star that always leads us home. We're young, but we've come to figure out that our love is anything but.

"Bella?"

Bella looked around. She placed her pen on the pages and looked up at her handsome father, shuffling in a suit. "Yes?"

"You about ready?" he asked, holding a box in his hand.

"Yes," she answered, smoothing her bright yellow gown. She vaguely remembered this time last year, watching Rosalie and Emmett and Jasper cross the stage, waving their diplomas in the air in triumph. "What are you holding?"

Charlie looked a little bashful. "It's, ah… well." He shoved the box towards her, and she took it, grinning at his fuchsia cheeks.

"It's a corsage," she grinned, tucking her hair behind her ear. "Thank you, Dad…" She hugged him tightly. He smelled like smoke and clean air. "Help me?"

Twenty minutes and a corsage on her wrist later, they pulled into the Forks High School parking lot. It was packed full of cars and pedestrians, all of which seemed to slow down once the cruiser rolled in.

Bella got out as Charlie went to find a place to park. She was bombarded with a hug.

"Oh, Bella!" It was Angela, nearly crying with joy. "Can you believe it's finally here?"

Bella shook her head, enjoying her friend's pure blue excitement. "I truly can't."

They looped arms and walked towards the field, waving at random people who called out hellos. She couldn't find a Cullen or a Hale in the sea of yellow, but she could feel that Edward was around somewhere, so she relaxed and enjoyed the sun and the joviality.

They were paraded into the gymnasium and instructed to line up in the alphabetic way they had rehearsed the day before. She was next to Jessica, and even though they had never really gotten along, there was something about graduating that made them smile and share memories with each other.

Jessica's gaze wandered after a couple minutes, and then Bella felt strong arms around her middle. She sighed and relaxed into the warm chest.

"Hi," he whispered in her hair, messing up the hat on her head.

"Where have you been?" she asked, turning in Edward's arms to gaze up at him.

"Alice," he said by way of explanation. "I've been following her around for the past half an hour… don't ask. Sorry I made you worry. Hi, Jessica."

Jessica blushed magenta, ducked her head and mumbled a hello. Edward and Bella's relationship was always kept private, so of course, it was always at the forefront of gossip. Jessica, being the queen of gossip, always talked out of both sides of her mouth.

"Hi," said Jessica, and then turned away.

"Go get in line," urged Bella, kissing Edward on the lips in front of everyone. He ducked down for another, and she laughed and shoved him. "Later, Casanova."

"Don't trip," he warned her, and she groaned.

But she didn't trip. She made it all the way across, grinning when she heard Jacob and Charlie and Billy and all the Quileute boys going nuts. She heard Jasper and Jane catcall, and Alice's cheers. She felt Edward's quiet smile, and that same smile was on his face later that evening, after graduation dinner. They spent a quiet night with each other, laughing and loving, and when the sun greeted them the next morning, Bella was high off an orgasm, and Edward was still between her thighs, resting his stubbly cheek against her skin.

She ran her hands through his hair and felt his warm breath against her skin. They had been together for almost a year now, save for the three weeks they had been apart, and their silences were not golden. They were clear, void of anything heavy, anything too bright – they were just that: silent, quiet, reverent, awed, and loved.

He moved, and she smiled down at him. "Getting uncomfortable down there?"

He slowly stretched and gave her a sleepy grin. "Never. Just afraid of falling asleep with a crick in my neck."

She looked up at him, naked and nestled in his thick cotton sheets. Her hair was everywhere, and the white cotton was barely covering her skin. He looked down at her and winked, and then everything went still.

He looked like a deer caught in headlights. His verdant eyes went wide, and his hands clenched in rough fists. "Oh god."

"What? Edward?" She moved to get up, but he shot out a hand and put her back down.

"Don't move. Stay exactly… stay right… don't move."

"Edward, you're scaring me." But she stayed where she was, powerless to resist a command from him.

"It's okay… Bella, it's okay. I just… I need… god, where's my paint?"

"Your paint," she repeated.

"My brush, and my paint, oh god, where is it?"

"Right where it always is – why do you need it?"

He turned to her, and his eyes were wild. He climbed on top of her and kissed her, fisting her hair and melting into her skin. "You'll be all right, Bella. Won't you? You'll be all right. You won't leave me."

"I'll never leave you," she whispered back, clutching at him. "Edward, you know that. I love you. I adore you. What is this about?"

"You love me," he whispered, not a question.

"I love you, Edward."

"God, Bella…" He kissed her again, searing her mouth with his. "I love you. I worship you. You know that, don't you?"

"Yes… yes, Edward, I know that. God, what are you doing?"

"You're perfect. God, you're so fucking beautiful, Bella. Just don't move. The light – it's perfect. You're perfect. Oh god."

That's when it hit her – he was going to paint her.

After their break up in September, Bella had never mentioned paintings involving herself again. She knew what it felt like to lose Edward, and that fear consumed her every day until she felt confident in their relationship again. She couldn't imagine how it overtook him every single time he picked up a brush and wanted to direct it towards someone he loved.

Edward had told Bella a few months prior that his therapist, Irina, had been giving him small homework assignments – painting little things and working him up to more important objects. Soon, she had turned him to painting animals. She had him paint a bird that sat in her office every day, and although he shook the entire time, that bird lived, and was still alive to this day.

Bella was unsure about the exercises that followed, because it was rare that Edward wanted to voice exactly what happened in his hour-long sessions. But Bella didn't mind – that growth was something personal to Edward.

But she never dreamed in a million years he would find the strength, the willpower to paint her.

He came back into the room, paints and brushes stuffed into his mouth and a canvas underneath his arm. She watched him work – he was mouthing something to himself, silently, behind a wall of ash grey confusion. When he was all set up, he turned to her.

"Bella…" Then he crawled on top of her and kissed her, again, feeling her, soaking in her warmth and light and dear god, please, please let this work. "I want you to know – you have to know this. I am… p-p-painting you out of reverence, out of my adoration for you. I love you. I'm in love with you. You walked into my life – you made this past year the happiest I've ever… if something happens to you, Bella, I'm coming with you."

"Edward, don't be ridiculous – "

"I'm coming with you. I've decided that. I don't know if this is some fatalistic jump into oblivion with you, or if this is going to start our new life together… a life where I don't have to worry. But either way, I get you."

Bella started crying. "Edward, don't… stop, no – don't paint me, I can't – "

"Lay there," he told her, and then kissed her. "Lay there, and be beautiful, and let me paint you. You've told me time and again that everything will be all right. I'm ready – I want to see that…."

So she did. Her face was bright pink, still flushed from her orgasm and the excitement Edward had caused her by talking about painting. Her eyes were rimmed with red from her tears, and she was certain her heart was making indentions against her chest.

He sketched first, his lips between his teeth, looking back and forth between her and the canvas. He was still naked, and she was shocked at the erection that was up against his stomach. She wanted to ask him about it, because Bella wasn't that scantily clad – a sheet covered all of her naughty bits – but she didn't know if this was an Edward she could tease. He was so sexy, so beautiful, his full concentration on the lines of her body, and she could feel the stirring of her arousal underneath the white cotton.

He stopped with the sketch, and then without a word, went over to her, parted her legs, and used his tongue where she needed him most.

And that was the pattern over the next several hours. They only moved to eat or use the facilities. Edward would paint her, Bella would lie there, and then when he was overcome, he would go down on her, to get her smell, her taste all over him. It would ground him, center him, and allow him to continue.

It was nearing eight PM when he finally dropped his paintbrush. He fell to his knees, staggered, his eyes the color of a lackluster emerald.

Bella scrambled up. "Edward." She reached for him – his skin was tepid. He allowed her to pull him up into her arms, and he fell against her body, all of his weight, holding her down.

Then it was like an exorcism – everything in his body tensed, and when it relaxed, the tears came. They were harsh, ragged, punishing black sky against her ear, cheek, neck. But she held him so fiercely, so tightly, letting her white-hot passion and her never-fading red love for this man anchor them to the bed.

Three Months Later

Bella walked up the steps to the second floor of Edward's apartment building. It was September, and the first weekend she was able to sneak away from UW. Jane was busy with her boyfriend and practically shooed Bella out of their small apartment, so she went, laughing.

And now she was here, and she could hear Edward banging around inside. He was decorating his new place, right near the harbor. She knocked on the door – he wasn't expecting her.

He greeted her with a surprised shout and a giant hug, and oh, how she missed him when he wasn't near. He smelled so good, and she loved him so much – the strong man he had become, and the traces of the troubled boy she could still see in his eyes.

"Come in, sweet girl – you surprised the shit out of me…" He took her hand and walked her in, and gave her a small little tour.

They had a beautiful summer together. After painting her, Edward had held onto her for hours, shaking and crying at random intervals. It was like he was waiting for a certain time to pass. He had explained it to her later – all the deaths that had occurred at his hand were practically instantaneous. Two hours, three hours passed, and still Bella breathed in his arms, and it was like something was lifted off of him. The next day, and all the days after that, his smile always reached his eyes.

Bella wasn't arrogant enough to proclaim him as "cured." Could you ever be cured from such awful coincidences? But he did start to learn to cope with the fact that they were just that… awful, terrible coincidences.

"Here, let me show you something… I need your opinion on where to hang this."

Bella's heart quickened. He had never shown her the painting he had done of her, and she was fairly certain he was about to.

And she was right. Oh, god.

She couldn't even concentrate on herself in the painting. She was there, covered in the white sheet, with the wide eyes, staring out into nothing. Her hair was a mess, and she had a small smile playing on her lips. But Edward… Edward had painted himself into it. He was hovering over her, staring down at her like she was the most precious thing in the world to him.

"Is that how you look at me when I'm not looking?" she whispered, moving forward to the canvas propped against the wall.

"Like how?" he whispered, following her, kissing every inch of skin he could reach.

"Like… your soul – it's just, I can see it. Your heart, how you feel, all of it is just…"

Then she reached for the paintbrush that was lying on the table, still wet with paint he had been using earlier. She drew across it the word that completed her thought, right over the place Edward's heart would be in the painting.

Bare.

I have posted the first chapter of my new fic, Bad Fauxmance. It's going to be very, very different from Bare. Here is a summary:

I, Edward Cullen lose a bet - what bet, you ask? God, does it even matter? I lose a bet, and now I'm here, in this gay club, with this huge guy grinding on me. There are perfect girls everywhere, enjoying the freedom of dancing without wandering male eyes, unaware of my gaze following the sway of their tits. Little do I know that the big guy grinding on me will become my gaytor, or so he calls himself - my gay tutor. Because I, Edward Cullen, will have to pretend to be gay to keep the man-hating Bella Swan in my life, as my roommate, my best friend, and the girl I fall in love with.

I hope you go check it out! Expect the Bare epilogue within the next month.

Always,

Stella