AN: Nagyon köszönöm to Project Team Beta and my crack team of LoveofEscapism, Lulu M, and nowforruin. I really cannot say how grateful I am to them enough.
As always, lyrics are SManson and Co's, original characters are SMeyers. No copyright infringement intended, ever. All the rest is mine.
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Chapter 24: Deadwood
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Look me in the eye
I'm about to dive
Can you live your life
without me?
I don't need you anymore
I can't use you anymore
Killing the fire
And you kill my desire
I don't need you anymore
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Edward,
This is it. I never got to say good bye to you, so I am now, six years after the fact. You can consider this our awkward post-break-up conversation, however one-sided it may be. I wish it didn't have to be like this, but I understand why.
Part of me thinks it's ridiculous that I'm still writing to you. You are never going to read this, and yet I am compelled to put these words on paper nonetheless. I need to get this out into the universe, as Renee would say. Don't worry, this is the very last one; I promise, and just like you, I keep my promises.
Today is the last day I'm planning on calling Forks home for a long time, and I've decided to visit your old home. I'm probably one of the few people in town who still knows it's there. The road is entirely hidden and the house itself is barely identifiable. If someone were to pass by it, they could hardly recognize it as a house now. It's entirely taken over by the surrounding forest, so it's been reclaimed by nature, where it always belonged.
God, I loved that house. It always seemed like it was straight out of some fairy tale, gingerbread trim and happily-ever-afters. It's all too good too be true. Seeing it like this makes me wonder where your perfect family is, if they are, just like this house, falling apart. I hope not.
I was always attracted to, forgive me, how you all sparkled among the rest of us. I'd like to think that you're just somewhere else doing the exact same thing. I've imagined it so often that I almost think I've willed it to be true. I can picture Rosalie still turning heads, Esme and Carlisle being so kind, and Alice brimming over with her special kind of energy.
Sometimes I wonder if I'd imagined it all. I have a few reminders left. A blue dress that I know I'll never wear again but can't part with. A pair of earrings from Esme's collection that I try on when I'm feeling particularly nostalgic. A scar on my hand that only I know is there. Nothing from you though.
I used to wish that I had some small piece of you to keep close to me, a bit of flotsam to help me cling to that sinking ship. I'm glad now that I didn't. I would have never let you go, and I needed to more than anything.
Perhaps you've been keeping tabs on me through Alice. I want you to know how very happy I am, more so than I deserve, I've often thought. I've been incredibly lucky. Before, when you first left and for a long while after, I was a mess. If I hadn't had my friends to help keep me afloat, I would have surely drowned.
This isn't what I wanted to write you about, though. That time is over and has been for a long time, thank goodness. I mostly wanted to say thank you. I never got the chance to before. You did something that I could never do, and I'm so grateful to you for being courageous enough to walk away. If you had stayed, we would have doomed ourselves to misery and pain.
As much as we talked about being masochistic, I'm glad that we didn't really mean it. We had reached our crossroads. You were the only one who was willing to see it though. I was so blinded by you that I couldn't recognize it for what it was. I can't imagine how different my life would have been if you hadn't made that final decision, if I even would have had one still…
Perfectly happy endings aren't real, and our story would have been tragic if we had continued it. I've never really wanted to play the part of Juliet. I love the story, but I'm so glad it's not mine.
So thank you for knowing when to say when. I didn't have the experience or faith in my own voice to be able to. Looking back, I can't believe how naïve I was. I've learned since then that good relationships are a partnership between equals, and what we had was certainly not that, not even close.
You were my god, and I idolized you beyond reason. Because of that, I allowed you to make decisions for the both of us. You decided where we went, what we did, who we could do it with. It was insane. I was so afraid that you would finally see how fallible I was compared to you that I allowed it. I know better now.
When we were together, I was young and stupid, and you thought you were older and wiser. You may have been around longer, but I'm positive that we were both equally inexperienced. Neither of us knew what we were doing then, and it's so painfully obvious now. We were both the lost lambs, but we were never equals, Edward, never.
We were no good together. It was like we were addicts. That's not healthy. It took me this long to recognize it for what it was, an unhealthy and more than slightly scary symbiotic relationship. We fed off of each other in the worst way. For a while, I felt completely lost without you. I wasn't lost though; I was free.
I'm with someone now who loves me, faults and all. I'm not afraid to show him who I really am or what I truly want. It's just how it is supposed to be, with respect and trust. We work together so well; it's almost as if we can read each other's minds. I remember you saying how much you wished you knew what I was thinking. Jake knows, he's always known. We don't have to struggle to understand each other, we just do.
Wherever you are, I want you to be as content as I am. Maybe you've met someone who you can share your life with? I truly hope so. You deserve it. Be happy.
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Bella
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AN: Thank you everyone for all of your kind words and votes last week! I didn't win anything, but I really appreciate your support and fabulousity.
One chapter and an epilogue left!