Chapter 28 – Just Feel
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The pain is what wakes me.
Aching, sore and persistent, throbs throughout my lower abdomen, stealing my sleep away. My eyes scrunch tightly shut at the discomfort, and I roll over onto my back, grimacing at the movement.
"Bella?" Edward asks softly, his voice near a whisper. The tip of his finger skirts from my temple to my cheek to the corner of my lip. "What is it?"
I blink my eyes open slowly, smiling automatically at the sight of Edward despite the pain. "Hi."
"Hello," he greets back, mimicking my grin. "But you are awake too early." His smile slips as his frown dips, glancing at the hand I hadn't realised was clutching at my stomach. "What is it?" he asks again, insistent.
As the last few dregs of sleep drain away, I find myself blushing – both at his proximity and his question.
"It's, ah . . . it's nothing."
His eyes narrow a bit, watching the red in my cheeks. I wince unwittingly as an especially sharp pang rattles me.
"You are in pain." His voice is panicked, his eyes – wide, just like when I cut myself. His gaze goes back to my stomach, and I watch as the colour drains away from his irises, leaving them pale. "Is it . . . like before, when I . . . when I left you?"
My eyes widen. "It's nothing like that," I say, hurriedly, shaking my head for good measure. "I promise."
Silver, cold and quick, flashes across his gaze a moment.
"It's just," I start, blooming red again when his glance sinks in. I can't help the embarrassment while I wonder what he does and doesn't know. "It's . . . normal," I settle for, lamely.
He looks at my stomach, my hand. "Normal?"
I nod, then grimace. "Human nature."
He doesn't say anything in reply, only lifts his hand and gently places it on top of mine resting on my stomach. I watch him closely. Subdued frustration paints his brow, his lips.
"What's wrong?" I ask softly.
His gaze doesn't waver from our touching hands. "I wish I had paid more attention."
On the pillow, my head twitches to the side in confusion. "What do you mean?"
He sighs a bit, his thumb drawing circles on my skin. "When they were teaching us about you. I wish I had listened more."
I reply, I lift a hand and gently place it in his hair, letting my fingers run through – remembering Renee do the same, once.
"I think you're doing great," I say honestly, and unwittingly, my mind casts back to the moment he pulled me away from the door after Charlie left, and made everything alright again. And to all the other moments – so many – starting the minute I set foot in his house.
He hums, curling his fingers around mine a little.
"Really," I continue softly. "I think you know what I need even before I do." And it's true. I've never been good at organising my thoughts into sensible actions. I think-feel first, but can never act later.
In his responding quiet, my eyes drift shut again. The comfort of his touch lulls me, until I almost forget about the ache that woke me in the first place. Almost.
"You feel different," he says, quietly.
My eyes snap open at that, my skin warming. I open my mouth to reply . . . but slowly close it again when I realise I have no idea what to say next. His softly-spoken words have tipped me back into the kitchen two days ago, when he kissed my hand and –
"Tablets," I blurt suddenly, sitting up so quickly his hand falls away. Without waiting for a reply, I draw myself up and lean over, rooting through my bedside drawer. I do my best to ignore the tremble in my arm, but the ache in my stomach compiled with the unexpected bout of butterflies roving in it isn't so easily dispelled.
My fingers close around cardboard, and I pull the little box out, feeling ill. Just before I can swallow them, there's suddenly a glass of water hovering right in front of me, long fingers overlapping on see-through.
I take it from him with a quiet thanks, but he ducks down to meet me before I can hide.
He watches me closely as I swallow them down, his eyes shivering between gold and grey. "They will stop the pain?"
Placing the glass back down, I nod. I try to shake away the lingering thoughts and feelings of before, but I still feel too warm. The influx of shame that hits me only adds to it.
I peer up at him, interlocking my fingers tightly together. "In a little while."
The gold in his gaze heightens, the grey surrendering to sun. Softly, he asks, "Is there anything I can do?"
A small, shaky smile overtakes my lips. I shake my head. "I just need to lie down for a bit." And then I ease myself down into my bed again, slipping under the covers as I go. When my head hits the pillow I realise how tired I actually am, and I sigh unwittingly as my bones grow soft atop the mattress.
I only close my eyes for a moment, but when I open them again, Edward is lying beside me once more. Slowly, he lifts a hand and carefully places it on my stomach. The heat of his skin sears through the sheets, and my sigh this time is one of relief as it momentarily steals away the worst of the pain.
His eyes dart up to mine, uncertain.
"You're really warm," I whisper in explanation, feeling just that.
His eyes widen, but before he can remove his hand, instinct pulls mine out of the blanket and places it on top of his – a backwards mirror of how they were earlier.
"It's nice." I blush. "I mean . . . it feels good – better."
His responding smile is as soft as the down on his feathers. Leaning closer, he quietly curls himself around me, until his burnt orange touches my neck and his forehead presses against my temple. My stomach flutters, but I've surrendered to the warmth before I can think to push it down.
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"How's the case going?"
"Not too bad. It's more paper work than anything." His sigh tumbles down the line – tired – and my heart gives a little tug in my chest. I frown, even though he can't see me.
Tracing the sofa cushion with my finger, I ask, "You'll be home soon?"
He hums in reply. "Should be." Quiet and then – "How're things there, Bell? You keeping okay?"
Without thinking about it first, my eyes dart upwards, and I can't help but smile.
"Things are good," I reply, watching Edward watch the tree. He intermittently lifts a hand to push it through his hair, while one dusky orange wing curls itself around his shoulder. "We put the tree up." It just slips out, that pronoun, and I close my eyes, hoping he didn't notice.
But he's a cop. So – "We?"
"Um," I fill-stammer. "A . . . Angela and I. We . . . we put it up." I'm a terrible liar, but I'm hoping he can't see through my tone. "A couple of days ago." For a moment after that I freeze, remembering that we hadn't put the tree up since . . . and I don't know if . . .
But then he hums, and I can hear his smile through the line. "I'll be glad to see it."
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"You have read hundreds of books here. Why not one about their biology?"
Edward gave a shrug, his burning wings lifting with his shoulders and catching the wind, keeping it from his skin. "It had never interested me – before," he amended, and then his tone grew impatient. "Will you not just tell me?"
Jasper grinned. "Where has all your patience gone?"
Edward stared back – his gaze a wordless complaint.
His friend held his hands up in surrender, but couldn't rein in his smile. His blond curls dashed when he shook his head. "You grow more human by the day, brother."
Before, Edward would have flown from where he'd sat and brooded in his temporary house for days on end at the comment, but now . . .
Well, now he smiled.
Jasper clapped a hand on Edward's shoulder (a move he'd seen many, many times) and began, "Every month, humans – human females, that is – go through a process called menstruation. The lining of the uterus – "
"Uterus?" Edward interrupted, frowning in confusion.
His purple-winged friend laughed. "You better seek out your patience again, my friend, because this could take a while."
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Lazy and still a bit sore, I curl up on the sofa in front of the telly and flick through the channels until my finger abruptly freezes on the remote. It was just an ordinary, daytime show, and it took me a minute to register why it seemed so familiar – why I'd paused.
Television hadn't been of much interest to me the past couple of years. I didn't so much as watch it as use it as a distraction. Charlie always had it turned onto something sporty, and I'd found it comforting because he liked it.
But now my mind pauses, because all of a sudden all I can think about is the way, every morning, Renee would inevitably settle herself in front of the telly while she folded laundry, or pressed flowers into little books, or braided my hair before school. Now that I think about it, I realise it might have been a distraction for her, too.
Still, I let the remote fall. And I pay attention so hard the glare makes my eyes ache.
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I don't so much as hear Edward's return as sense it.
I look up from the book in my lap the exact moment he appears in the doorway. Renee's show had finished about an hour ago, and I'd wavered between relief and sadness as the hosts had said their goodbyes. Woodenly, I'd picked up a book off the side and tried to set my mind to reading it, but I felt slow – sluggish, even. And for all that focusing on bright colours and made-up faces and all that pretence, I just wanted to sleep.
I smile tentatively at his figure in the threshold, pushing the book away from me.
"How's Jasper?" I ask, when he makes no move – or sound – towards me.
He nods, slowly. "He is well," he replies, voice soft. "Alice will be enrolling on Monday . . . he said she's excited to meet you."
Some of the tension in my chest relaxes. "Me too."
Another moment passes in quiet, and my eyes dart to Edward's in confusion as he hovers in place. But before I can voice my question –
"Jasper also informed me on some biology – yours, in particular." I blink at him, and his gaze fixes on mine, before drifting down to my stomach, where it sticks. "You are menstruating," he says, as if he's telling me it's raining outside.
Immediately – and inevitably – I blush.
Slightly mortified, I lift my hands and rub them over my red cheeks before surrendering my vision to darkness. I guess he hadn't known that much earlier, but he certainly does now. I let out a quiet groan.
And then immediately – and inevitably – he's at my side.
"Bella?" he asks, his voice a coloured shade of concern. I can feel his feathers brush against my skin and his fingertips spanning touches over my stomach. I quiver and tense at the same time. "What is it?"
I huff against my palms, and they grow damp. "You asked him?"
"Yes," he replies easily, as if it were the only possible thing to do.
Discomfort lodges itself into my stomach. "Why?"
"I . . . I wanted to know, I . . . " he trails off, and his voice dips. When I peek at him through the gaps between my fingers, I can see his eyes swirling. "I wanted to be able to help you, if I could. You said it was in your nature, and I do not think I know enough about that." His eyes seek mine through my self-inflicted dark, and I let my hands fall. "Understanding your body is important," he says, glancing at the cut on my hand. His eyebrows lower. "I know only the minimum."
My embarrassment gives way to affection, squeezing my heart until it aches. Slowly, I reach across and take his hand in mine, and his fingers immediately curl around my palm. "I think you understand me better than anyone," I say quietly, but honestly. Then I lift my other hand and trace my fingertips over his knuckles, only finding the faintest of light-blue vein despite the paleness of his skin.
"But you did not wish for me to know?" he queries, probably referring to my aforementioned groan.
I glance up at him quickly, dropping my eyes again at his stare. "It's not that." I turn our hands over and run my finger up and down his wrist repetitively, wishing I wasn't burning but unable to help it. I had started late, and Renee had already been gone – even before she left physically – so I didn't have anyone close to me to talk to. School and even Charlie had given me the basics, and the internet the rest. But it had either been factual or awkward – or both – and so abrupt and cold when all I wanted was someone to just hold my hand for a minute.
I close my eyes, shaking my head slightly. "It's . . . it's embarrassing."
Quiet for a moment and then –
A hand on my chin, drawing my closed gaze up, up, up.
"Why?" Soft, like his thumb on my cheek.
Not knowing how to answer, my shoulders simply lift in a shrug.
He hums; the vibration rattling the air and settling on my skin – raising goose bumps. "When Zefdatrites come of age, we are sent to earth . . . but we change, too."
Warily, I blink my eyes open. "How?" I ask.
He smiles, almost shy. Without speaking, he lifts a wing and brushes it gently across my cheek.
"Your wings?"
"They grow," he confirms, his eyes glinting as his orange feathers across my flush. "Shortly before we are sent here, on an average of about five days, the feathers we already have lengthen, and new ones pierce the span." He spreads a wing out in example, stretching his autumn down wide. "Or our skin." In one smooth, simple move, his back is to me, and my eyes widen as I see the fading aches – where the softest things have so violently jabbed themselves through his flesh.
Wincing, I lift a hand and hover it over his back, scared to touch. "Did it hurt?"
"Yes."
Gently, I rest my hand just to the side, near his shoulder. "I'm sorry."
He turns back around to face me then, so quickly that my hand is on his chest before I can lift it from his back. "You needn't be," he says, his smile crinkling the corners of his eyes and threatening to spill gold onto his lips. "It's just in my nature."
I grin, recalling my words from earlier.
"And it still happens," he continues. "They must fall out often, but I hardly notice it. It's not as drastic as the first time it occurs, but our feathers are continually replacing themselves."
My gaze darts to his wings. I guess it shouldn't be surprising that there's a constant influx and fall out, and it's not that really, but more the idea that it's painful to regrow them. Being a human, growth is something that doesn't feel like anything. It just happens.
"Does it hurt all of the time?"
He shakes his head. "Not like then. I feel something slight on occasion, but I would have to lose many for it to truly hurt." His gaze clouds for a minute, the sun disappearing behind them before the rays dissipate the rain. "But I am lucky. It is the only physical pain I've ever really felt." At this, his gaze drops down to my hand, and then my stomach.
"Your body is just doing what it's supposed to do," he says softly, pressing his palm low on my stomach. Heat immediately creeps through his hand and onto my skin. "It's telling you that you're okay, that you're alive. But I'm sorry it hurts you." Unbidden, my mind conjures up his whispered voice from what seems so long ago now. They die. They always die.
I shudder.
But his touch is persistent. His gaze never wavers.
I swallow. "But your change is . . . is beautiful," I whisper, forever glance glance glancing at the brightly burning colour surrounding him, making him shine.
The hand not on my stomach lifts, fingertips gliding over damp skin, capturing heat only he can feel. "So is yours."
And suddenly he's so, so close.
Helplessly, I find myself falling into the soft toffee of his eyes, feeling hot caramel tide over every ache and soft point until my bones are sponge, soaking up all his sweet, and warm. I can feel everything; the heat from his body, his breath on my lips. Before Edward, my skin was just another organ – something I needed – but ever since then it's took on the life force of an amplifier, experiencing everything ten, a hundred times over – making need desperate, making it want.
I exhale – shakily.
His eyes simmer, on the verge of burning.
"Thank you," I breathe.
A gently murmured, "Why?"
"For . . . " I break, searching for air, imagining his exhale is my inhale. "For . . . for understanding. For . . . " I trail off once more, because I'm back in the kitchen again, his lips on my skin, my arms and legs around him – keeping him close, his wings around me – keeping me warm.
Edward's hand on my stomach glides until he's gripping my side, holding my waist steady as his other hand flits from my neck to my cheek. My head is already touching the sofa cushion by the time I realise he had been slowly lowering us, leaving me lying flat, and him, hovering just above.
My breath catches. I'm closer to Edward more often than I am away, but this is different. We'd hugged and held and slept so close so many times, but this isn't that. This is something else entirely.
His eyes don't leave mine, and mine don't leave his. His golden is growing darker by the second – like honeyed chocolate now, mixed with sparks of deep orange, like he has a constant fire flickering, hot and close, behind his gaze. He melts into me, and I imagine that sweetened heat dripping down, sinking into my skin.
I don't think-feel. I just feel.
And then I act.
My hands slip-slide into his hair, tugging gently as his feathers brush against bare skin. I drag my fingertips down his neck, across his broad shoulders, until they find purchase on his back. I find his aches and my touch is soft, even though my skin is desperate.
His eyes grow heavy, his lashes tangling as honey escapes and sticks to his fringed black. My body thrums, nerves skirting with strange excitement as I feel his warmth all over – encompassing me until it's all I can feel. The outside cold, the pain, the distraction – it all disappears, until there's just this now. Just me and him.
Slowly, he lowers his head, gazing at me until he can't anymore. My eyes fall shut when his nose touches my neck, and I bite my lip when his hand travels up my side, meeting its partner in the trailed out length of my hair.
His lips press against my collarbone.
My sigh is long and weighted as it leaves my chest, my heart, and my fingertips climb back up into his hair, pulling on the bright strands, tilting my head and feeling his skin burn beneath my lips as I kiss him, for the very first time.
I find his jaw, his cheek, his neck, until he lets out a long, weighted sound of his own.
I tremble, but I'm not nervous. I burn, but I'm not embarrassed.
My blood is hot and my heart is swelling, and each kiss is a thank you, an, I want you, an, I love –
My eyes snap open, but before I can freeze or run or think, his kisses draw away the panic and soak me in his touch. Slowly, my eyes drift closed again, my hands tighten on him – so solid and real and alive – and I just feel.
An, I love you.
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A/N: *peeks* Anyone still reading this sweet little thing?
Sorry sorry SORRY for the wait. I really have no excuse. I should be better at updating, but I'm not. Patience isn't a virtue. You guys shouldn't have to deal with this. Sorry sorry sorry. SORRY.
Anywho. Hope this was okay! After the posting of each chapter I always go into a mini meltdown, and this plus sleepiness (it's just gone 3 AM, thank Jebus for Sundays!) makes for an unhappy novice. So I reeeeeally hope you liked it. And please forgive any typos, it's late (err, early).
As always, thank you for reading. :) xo
