SM owns Twilight and its characters. I own this story. 2010.

Thank you, BilliCullen and Scooterstale.


I Will Only Complicate You


All around me hot, gray mist eddied and swirled, licking up the foggy glass walls and tumbling over the tops. The vapor was almost alive in the way it moved, curling and bending, expanding and drifting as if it had a mind and direction of its own. It poured out of my small space, filling the entire room and making everything smoky and indistinct. Beyond, against the far wall, the row of lights above the vanity was nothing more than a fuzzy blur, bathing the room in soft yellow. When I closed my eyes and listened, I could just make out the whir of the ineffective vent fan over the hard, echoing rap of water against glass and marble tile.

Steam rose off my now red skin, but I didn't move, instead purposefully planting myself beneath the relentless, beating rain, trying in vain to relax and to loosen my muscles and nerves. Despite the ticking minutes, however, my breathing remained ragged, even as I sucked in the scalding air and felt the heat spread through my lungs and chest. Slowly opening my eyes, forcing some semblance of calm, I counted to ten and stared at streaking droplets, watching the way their paths meandered and merged as they traveled down the glass, creating a spider web of clear trails that cut through opaque gray.

I couldn't do this. I shouldn't. But fuck, I wanted to.

Ten days had passed since I'd somehow conquered myself, however briefly, and managed to not destroy Bella's birthday dinner. Granted, by the time I finally made it home that night, I was nothing more than a catatonic mess inside, too numb and too exhausted to even form a coherent sentence. Like always, Bella seemed to know exactly what was going on, even when I did not; I could tell it from the way she gripped my hand a little too tightly and from the unnatural ring in her voice as she distracted Alice the entire trip back to Forks. Unlike any other, she understood the turmoil that I couldn't seem to ever escape, and more than likely, while she said nothing in front of her sister, she knew that I wasn't really capable of fully dealing with the night's events on my own.

But I didn't want her to have to deal with my shit. And I'd had my fill of people and talking and pretending and trying to be normal, so when the car pulled into her driveway, before I had a chance to see the concern, or worse, the pity, in her eyes, I waved her off and said good night as if nothing were wrong. That way I could fall apart alone, the way I preferred, the way I needed.

The only thing I remembered after stepping through my front door was stumbling toward my kitchen in a frantic, blind search for temporary salvation to my reeling, quaking psyche. Later, I woke up on the bathroom floor, like usual, reeking of alcohol and sweat.

Strangely, however, when I did open my eyes, even though my head throbbed in protest, my spine ached, and my guts felt empty and nauseated, I somehow felt… lighter, even amidst the ever-present self-disgust at my own weakness and idiocy. That much I was used to – that was my normal – but with dawn came some measure of acceptance, and maybe even a little pride. I wasn't so lost that I was incapable of seeing it, that I couldn't claim a victory, however small and flawed. Yes, I'd given in and yes, I was on my back on a cold tile floor like so many nights before, but for the first time in years, I'd held it together, at least in public. I hadn't flown off the handle, I hadn't gotten wasted in front of her, never mind how desperately I'd craved the release, and I hadn't fallen into the tangles of memory.

Days later, part of me was still flying a little high, from that and from the days afterward. Because the next day gave me yet one more reason to smile. Sure to her word and to my not-so-secret relief, Alice left, and once again, I had Bella all to myself, if she still wanted me.

I wasn't stupid. I knew how ridiculous it was that I'd grown so accustomed to our schedule, how I'd come to depend upon it for whatever semblance of happiness I occasionally felt. It was embarrassing and dangerous in what it could - no, likely would – do to me later, but for now, I didn't care and I was selfish and I wanted more than just night after night of painting from her. Better sense no longer mattered. So from my upstairs perch, still hung over and like a goddamned nervous teenager, I stared out the window and counted the minutes from the time that yellow car sped away to the time the phone rang.

When I showed up on her doorstep at five before ten, my heart clapped against my ribcage and my hands dug deep into my pockets to hide their fidgeting. Standing there, wondering and waiting, I wasn't sure what I expected – maybe nothing, maybe the Inquisition. For some reason, the idea of admitting my failure, were she to ask, left my mouth sour and my throat dry, and I dreaded the awkwardness that would surely ensue if she did. More so, after two weeks and so little one-on-one time, I wasn't entirely sure where we stood, what she wanted, or what the fuck was supposed to come next.

All my fears were for naught, however, for as soon as the door swung wide, it was as though no time at all had passed and nothing had changed. The questions never came. Dressed in her usual ragged blue pullover and faded jeans, instead of launching into a barrage of queries and accusations, Bella simply grinned my grin, and my whole being swelled. And then before I knew what was happening or could even walk through the door, she shoved a paintbrush under my nose.

"Are you serious?" I muttered, staring at her in disbelief.

"What?" she laughed. "Did you think I'd give you a break?"

Aimlessly twirling the white-speckled handle, I noted the flair of the well-used bristles. It was unnerving how naturally it fit in my hand, how feeling the smoothness of the curved wood settled my frayed nerves. It brought back the calmness and security of our schedule – that assurance and promise of time with her. Rather than sounding like an idiot and voicing my girlish thoughts, however, I shook my head and asked, "You want to paint? Tonight?"

"Why not?" Her voice was high and heavy on sarcasm, teasing me in words and in tone, and her eyes were glittering in amusement. In the dim yellow of the porch light, looking up at me and full of mischief, she looked so young.

Barely resisting a responding smile, I shrugged nonchalantly, motioning at the now-empty space of gravel in her driveway. "I don't know. Alice left like six hours ago, right?"

"And?" Bella countered, arching both brows as though I were the one who was crazy.

"You don't want to… fuck, I don't know… relax or some shit?"

Bella reached up and snatched the paintbrush from between my fingers. She shook it at me and then playfully slapped me on the chest with it as she explained, "Painting is relaxing, Edward. I'd have thought that you would have understood that by now."

In my periphery, I saw a shadow peeking from beneath the hem of her shirtsleeve. It was slight, just a hint of something there – a reminder. As if she knew my mind, something flashed across her face, but I was too slow and too dumb to recognize it. Before I thought, I spoke, "What are you stressed about?" The emphasis was all wrong; it was too serious, too probing.

In some kind of twisted logic and fuckall for timing, I suddenly wanted Bella to tell me the rest of her story about James and the baby and why she had hurt herself – why she had tried to end her life. My stomach twisted, recoiling from the very notion. I wanted her to tell me that she was better and that there was no risk of her ever trying that again, because every time my mind drifted there, I couldn't breathe and my head throbbed with misery. The idea of Bella – my Bella – no longer breathing was… incomprehensible. In so many ways, it was worse than the pain I knew already.

Beyond that, selfishly – because I was that – I wanted her to justify why I was allowed to have her in my life and to tell me that I wasn't drowning her. I wanted to know that maybe in some small way, I could be good enough for her. But I needed Bella to tell me all of this because there was no way in hell that I had the wherewithal to ask her myself, and the more time that passed, the less inclined I was to say anything even close to the truth. I wasn't certain how she'd respond if I told her that her sister had betrayed her confidence and that I was too self-interested and weak to admit it. I imagined that she'd be more angry about the latter than anything. Were our situations reversed, I knew that my response would be pitifully predictable. I'd be furious, I thought.

Quietly, she motioned for me to come inside, her expression unreadable. Without speaking, I ducked my head and followed her in, both hoping and fearing what she'd read in my face. When the door clicked behind me, she turned and laid the brush on the side table in the hall.

Stunning me – flooring me – her head cocked to the side and her lips turned up into an impish smile that seemed to banish all else. Unable to look away, confused but damned near mesmerized, I started when I felt the light whisper of a finger running down my chest and stomach, only to hook around one of my belt loops. In that single action and point of contact, my breath stuttered and my previous worries and wishes flew out the window.

"Well… for starters," she answered. "I just got my house back after two solid weeks of entertaining. Then, I have to go to work on Monday, where I have to read and grade forty essays on the feminine ideal in Victorian literature, half of which will likely fail, by the way."

Bella tugged me forward, surprising me yet again, this time from both her suddenness and her force. Swallowing, I looked down, trying but not really wanting to suppress the flood of heat traveling south. Dark, liquid eyes stared up at me as if she wanted to climb me, and when she licked her lips, mine involuntarily copied.

"And…" she went on, "I've still got three rooms that are the ugliest shade of apartment beige I've ever seen. I think my landlord might be colorblind."

Like that, whatever spell she was weaving broke and my lips pursed and twitched, trying to contain a laugh.

Bella wanted to play. This was nothing new; my splatter-painted shirts bore evidence of that. Yet at the same time, this was entirely new and something else I really didn't know how to do. God only knew I wanted to, however.

One brow arched, I stepped into her, closing the space between us such that her neck craned and I could feel the exquisite brush of her chest against mine. "Colorblind? You think?"

Still holding on to my jeans, she backed up a step. Her smile morphed into a smirk and her eyes literally sparkled. "Yes," she answered, drawing out the 's'. "I do. It's atrocious really. Nauseating."

"You really shouldn't have said that," I warned.

With a laugh, Bella spun on her heel and raced back into house toward the kitchen. Calling over her shoulder, I could just make out her taunt, "I'm not afraid of you!"

I was no fool and I took my cue, streaking into the kitchen behind her. Two laps around the breakfast table and thirty seconds of feints and dodges later, I stared down at a still smirking, but now slightly breathless, Bella, who I had pinned against the counter, one arm on either side.

"What were you saying?" I growled.

"They weren't lying," she huffed, even as her thumbs traced my sides.

"What?"

"You are fast."

I shrugged and laughed, reveling in the weightlessness of it all. Leaning down, grazing the flushed skin of her cheek with my lips, I whispered in her ear, "Maybe. But I don't think you were trying very hard to get away. Either that or you are really, really slow."

There was a catch in her breathing and her fingers dug in, clutching now. "And that's a problem?" she whispered back.

"Not really. I would have caught you anyway." Her body was so close to mine that it was impossible for me to concentrate on anything else.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

A pair of hands slid underneath my shirt, flattening against my abdomen, and my eyes nearly rolled back in my head. All taunting gone, Bella licked her lips again and murmured, "So are you ever going to kiss me or am I going to ha-"

The kitchen could very well have been burning to the ground and I wouldn't have known it. Like every time my mouth was on her, my mind shut down in a fog of lust and want, all mingled with something else. There was nothing but her. For as far as I could see, dark eyes opened and closed, filled with and mirroring the same wonder-lust that bubbled inside me. There was nothing but lips and hands and warmth, and my lungs were filled with some unnamable perfume only ascribed to her.

I grabbed her face, unconsciously pressing my body tighter against hers, despising everything that separated us. It was like I couldn't breathe unless I was breathing the same air she breathed. I wanted more; I wanted to absorb her, to crawl into her space and never leave.

Her mouth opened and her tongue slid against mine, languidly licking and coaxing. At some point, my shirt rolled up my chest, stopping its journey only because my arms were still in my sleeves, and then there were fingers pawing everywhere, sending skittering shockwaves underneath my skin. They were in my hair and on my neck, and then they were skimming down to the waistband of my jeans and threading through the hair below my navel. Bella, or maybe I, moaned a soft, breathless moan, and I almost came unglued.

Our kisses grew more frantic, and without permission, my hands dropped to her small waist, sneaking beneath the hemline to touch the soft skin of her stomach. As they climbed upward, creeping beneath the wire of her bra to palm her breasts, her skin pebbled, and there were more breathless sounds filling my ears, making me as drunk as anything I'd ever consumed. Vaguely, through the haze of groping hands and moving lips, I was aware that flush against her, she could feel everything that she was doing to me, but when her hips shifted, searching for friction, I couldn't find it in me to care.

It was heaven and it was hell all at once – heaven in that I couldn't imagine ever wanting to stop and hell in that I longed for more than I could stand to articulate.

A half a dozen other nights, all similar and stopping somehow too short and too long – inevitably when my conscience finally kicked in – led me here. To now, to standing alone and wanting, fighting something that I couldn't decide was right or wrong.

Steam rose and swirled, hot in my mouth and in my lungs. The water was scalding and beating against my back, but its rhythm and temperature helped to take my mind off both reality and the less than gentlemanly dreams it elicited. Since we'd resumed our routine, this time with a lot less painting, every night I spent at her house, I went to bed smelling like her and for the last three mornings in a row, I'd woken up like this, wanting – no, needing – some kind of relief.

And cold showers didn't do shit.

Goddamnit, Edward, I berated myself. What? Can you not fucking get off now?

I was angry with myself, angry and timid and feeling utterly ridiculous.

How long has it been? I couldn't help but wonder. Over the years, I'd lost track of time, but quick math told me more than four years had passed since I'd been with anyone. Not since Tanya, and what little we had together had been obliterated the moment I'd wrapped my car around that tree. I didn't even know where she was or what became of her, and if I were honest, I didn't care at all. It'd never been serious with her, nothing remotely close to what I felt now – what I wanted now.

How long since I've even been interested? I could barely remember those times. Before Bella, months, at least, had passed since I'd felt an inkling of desire. And even then, as sporadically as the times had been, seeking that relief had been perfunctory and without pleasure, nothing more than a quick physical release to nameless images. I just hadn't cared. I wasn't interested in feeling anything remotely close to that kind of bliss.

I was now. Fuck, I was interested, even as warning pangs of impending remorse shot through my middle. A week and a half's worth of flirting and touching and brief flashes of skin rendered that bitter voice momentarily mute.

I closed my eyes and pressed a flattened palm against the nearest shower wall. The marble was cool beneath my splayed fingers, a sharp contrast to the scorching heat of the water hitting my back, a sharp contrast to the heat building inside that stole the breath from my lungs.

Hesitantly – resigned – I gripped myself, sucking in air the moment my fingers tightened. Behind closed lids, a flood of disjointed, incomplete images, some real and some borne from my mind's creation, assaulted me. I could see her, I could hear her, and I damned sure could feel her.

Bella straddling my lap, her slight, delicious weight settled on top of me… Nails scraping up and down, teasing, biting into my skin…

Her mouth on my neck, wet and hot and sucking, licking the line of my jaw… Her fist in my hair, impatient and pulling my head back…

"Touch me," she whispers against my skin and then strips her shirt over her head…

And I'm touching her, sliding my hands all over her… Tracing her collarbones, my thumbs following the delicate lines to her throat… trailing down the valley between her breasts…

When she arches into me, I'm scrambling and reaching around to unclasp her bra…

I sigh and feel her breasts fill my hands, rising and falling with her ragged breaths… Her nipples, pink against pale cream, so pert and so hard between my fingers… I want to suck on them… I want her to moan my name when she comes… God, I want to hear her…

"God," I panted, fisting myself harder, my balls already tightening.

She's grinding herself against me… and I'm aching to be inside her, to feel the heat and to feel her body hugging and constricting around mine… I want to fuck…

"No. No, not fuck," I grunted, hating the way it sounded coupled with her name and face. Guilt surged, even as my head lolled back and my hand sped its motions.

She's grinding herself against me… over and over… I'm tonguing her nipples, taking turns, sucking them into my mouth, tugging and rolling… teasing them with my teeth, making them harder still…

I'm running my hands down her ribs, tickling and following each one, traveling the subtle ridges and dips… Her skin is so soft and she urges me lower to the swells of her hips… We're kissing, kissing like we kissed last night… hard and desperate, needy and sloppy… I'm so lost in feeling… So lost…

She lifts up her knees and I slowly slide her waistband down until her pants are around her knees and then they're gone… She copies me, staring at me in a way that makes me crazy, and she smiles my smile as she tugs my jeans and boxers off…

And there's nothing but thin lace separating us… and she's on top of me again… and she's so fucking hot that I can feel her damp heat on my cock…

"Please, Edward," Bella moans, wrapping her hand around me. I want to touch her, to be inside before I die, but she wants to touch me, too. And I know exactly what she wants, and it makes me feel powerful, invincible…

She's running a finger around my head and I can't stop myself from jerking upward…

Slowly, agonizingly slowly, she's stroking me, squeezing and twisting…

"More," I beg, as I touch her through lace…

She mewls and the sound goes straight down my abdomen… Squirming against my hand, her motions speed and her fist tightens and her mouth is doing sinful things to mine… I can smell her, sweet and light and all girl…It's everywhere, and I greedily breathe her in… I want to devour her…

And I can't think beyond the moment… I'm so close… So fucking close…

All I can do is feel and beg and…

"That's it…Oh, Christ," I groaned, my voice somewhere high above me, echoing inside the shower walls. My hand spasmed and smacked against marble, as my eyes clenched shut and my world exploded in a single, perfect moment of color and sound and sensation.

For a moment, half-delirious, I stood there under the hot rain, listening to the river of rushing blood between my ears, feeling nothing but the blank relief and tiredness that I hadn't in so long. My body was limp and spent, my spine gelatinous and weak. Exhausted, I swayed until my back hit the wall. The once cool tile now felt cold compared to the hot spray, and like a bucket of ice water, it brought me back to the present and reminded me that my fantasy wasn't real. That none of it was real and that I'd just masturbated to images of Bella. My Bella. I'd jacked off like a goddamned seventeen-year-old prick to Bella. This had to be wrong somehow.

Those pangs that I'd ignored came back one hundred fold, tearing and twisting my guts. Sighing, I looked up, staring into the gray fog, unsure and confused. Streams washed over my face, plastering my hair to my forehead, dripping down and following my scowl lines and wrinkles. The water stung my eyes and seeped into my mouth, pouring and pooling onto my tongue. Like a drowning man, I swallowed it down, feeling the punishing heat burn me from the inside. My throat was so thick, like I couldn't breathe, like my airways were closing up to suffocate me. Tears welled, and I hated them because I didn't want to feel this – whatever it was. I was crumbling inside; everything in me was imploding and contracting.

"You dumb fuck," I spat, as shame crested and I folded to the floor.

.

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A/n: Just for clarity, we're now ten days after last chapter's dinner, so for any keeping score, that makes it Monday, Sept. 27.


Chapter title: Lyrics from Sober, by Tool