AN: Packy and Kristen pre read (and pre cry). Mel betad. I tinkered stuff after they've worked on it, so any remaining mistakes are all mine.
Musical inspiration:
Staind - Outside
Grab on those tissues and see you at the bottom...
CHAPTER 12. Can't Have It Both Ways
~o~
NOW
~o~
The Capitol Hill Apartment. Sunday, June 9th, 2013.
Bella opens her eyes with a groan. Both her head and her stomach serve as painful reminders of the night before. She sits up on the bed, palming her forehead, taming her hair back from her face. She touches the side of the bed next to her, her fingers running over the crumpled, cold sheets. Edward is gone and has been for a while.
Guilt surges through her as bile rises to her throat. She really did it again—cornered him until he wasn't able to say no to her.
He didn't want a date—hell, neither did she—but she forced the situation in an effort to prove they could still be friends like before, even though they'd had sex.
Well, history had repeated itself, and she proved yet again to be unable to keep her feelings in check, or her hands off of him.
When she comes out of the bedroom, she breathes out in relief as she finds him out on the balcony, smoking. She knows he is probably pissed, but she hopes they can work it out.
His body is hunched over the rail with his arms resting on the edge. She slides the doors open and steps out. He doesn't turn to look at her.
"Hey." She fidgets with his knit sweater, having hastily thrown it on before coming out of the bedroom.
He still gazes at the city in front of him and takes another drag of his cigarette.
"I'm sorry about last night," she starts. He remains frozen in place. "I mean I don't regret that it happened because it was, well…a-amazing." She takes a deep breath before continuing. He does not move. "But I know it leaves us in the same tricky spot as before, and for that, I am sorry."
He takes another drag and exhales, looking down.
"I'm sorry that I suck, Edward, that I can't commit to you…or, well, to anything really. But in my gene pool, commitments mean heartbreak and loss and regret… And you deserve so much better than that… than this." She waves a hand down herself with a sigh, struggling to find the right words to say to him.
He remains quiet, stoic, gazing at the city while he smokes. "You know I love you, right?" She stands a few feet from him, expectantly.
When he finally turns to look at her, with a cigarette still dangling from his lips, his eyes are red with dark shadows under them, and it looks like he did not get any sleep.
Her stomach drops. He looks absolutely broken.
"Hey." She steps closer to him, reaching for his arm, but he recoils from her touch.
"I can't keep letting you do this to me, Bella." He puts out the cigarette on the ashtray in front of him and straightens his position.
"Edward…" She takes one more step in his direction.
"No. I mean it." He steps back, one hand up to stop her. "I can't take this anymore."
She freezes in place, staring at him. His words are final. He glares at her. He's never talked to her this way before.
"I get it, okay? I-I understand." One of his hands makes it to his chest. "You say you're not ready for commitment and I respect that. But you need to understand that I can't be both to you. I can't be your best friend and your fucktoy. I can't do it."
"Edward, I-"
"I'm serious, Bella. If you want me to be your friend no matter what, if you want us to keep living together, then we can't be this close. At least I can't. It hurts too much."
His words hit like a bucket of ice-cold water being thrown at her face. She clasps her hands together in front of her, trying to contain her tears, her fingers twiddling with each other.
"You can't come into my bed in the middle of the night after a date with some other guy. You can't fucking throw yourself at me every time we have a drink. You can't touch me like this, like you want me, like you care."
"Edward, but I do. I do want you and I do care," she whispers, looking up at him.
"This." He points at her face. "You can't look at me like this."
"How am I supposed to act around you then?" A void starts growing in the pit of her stomach, in realization of what she's done to him. To prevent her hands from reaching for him and doing more damage, she crosses her arms around herself.
"I don't know…" He hides his face under his hands. "I don't know," he mumbles, dropping on the chair.
"Edward…" she whispers, stopping herself midstep as her hands—and everything in her—ache with the need to reach for him.
"You can't say my name like that either." His hands slide down his face, and he groans, looking up at her. "And you can't wear my fucking clothes."
"You…you gave this to me." She looks down at his sweater, and her hands reach the hem on her thighs.
"Don't you dare take it off right now!" He growls from the chair, turning to look out over the balcony again and fisting the hair behind his head.
She stands there, beside him, at a loss for words. Her mouth opens and closes with every word she can't say. Her mind spins, drawing a blank on what she could say to make it better, until she's dizzy.
She sits in the chair next to his, careful not to come too close to him. "How can I fix this?"
Elbows on knees, head in hand, he turns to look at her with a sad smile. "I think I have to move out."
"What?!" Her eyes widen in surprise as the world around her crumbles. "Please, don't say stuff like that. I'll-"
"Bella, I am immensely unhappy." He says each word slowly, cautiously—meaningfully. "Last night was both the worst and the best night of my life. Having you touch me like that. Having you scream my name in pleasure like that. All while knowing that you're not mine. And from the looks of it, you never will be." His hands turn into fists on his thighs and he winces. "Fuck!" he mutters, his head dropping between his shoulders as he looks down. "I close my eyes, and I can still taste you in my mouth and in my soul."
Her mouth hangs open, her thighs pressed tight, but no words come out.
"I've waited for so long…but we fucking live together, and I see you every morning, when you parade around in just your underwear and my t-shirts. I see you with the assholes you date, which luckily never last, but there always seems to be another one waiting just around the fucking corner. I see you putting yourself out there every night, and it fucking kills me." He takes a deep breath, in an effort to calm himself down, while his hands rake through his hair. "It was barely manageable before. Tolerable, at best. But I can't go back to that now. Not after I've had you in my hands like that." He drops his head and stares at his hands.
Without her permission, her eyes start filling with tears as she fights the urge to reach for him and hug him or kiss him or something.
She's ruined it.
She's ruined him.
"I'm so sorry," she whispers, clasping her hands together over her legs without looking at him. "The last thing in the world I want to do is hurt you, Edward. I-I'll stop, I promise. All those things you said. I'll stop. I'll control myself." She tries to hold the tears back.
He stands up roughly next to her, the chair scratching the cement floor. He takes one deep breath, puffing his cheeks as he exhales. His hand reaches for her head but stops before his fingers touch her hair. "Well, I don't know if I can anymore," he barely whispers before he's gone.
~o~
The hours pass and Bella stares aimlessly at the TV, her eyes red and puffy from crying. She has a throw blanket wrapped around herself and a half-eaten pack of cookies on her lap.
When she finally hears keys in the door, she turns off the TV and jumps off the couch. She shakes the crumbs off the blanket before wrapping it around her again and takes a few steps closer to the door.
Edward enters the apartment, his eyes briefly connecting with hers, before he turns around and closes the door, both hands flat on the door, his back to her.
"Hey," she says shyly, without moving.
His palms stretch against the wooden surface, and he takes a deep breath, looking down, before pushing himself off the door.
When he turns around, he purposely avoids her eyes as he walks to the kitchen. He drops his gym bag on the floor after getting his water bottle out.
He starts refilling his bottle, hands clasped at each edge of the sink, while looking down.
In his training tank top, she can see the muscles straining on his shoulders as he holds on to the counter for dear life. His hair is dripping wet, but she can't tell whether it's from sweat or if he showered at the gym. She wonders if he was there all of this time.
Bella stands there as he circles the counter, bottle in hand, and retreats into the hallway to the bedrooms without saying a word to her.
With a sigh, she returns to the couch. She waits to see if he says anything about his sweater. The one he gave her the night prior and then said not to wear it anymore this morning. She had washed it, and it was now folded on his bed. She waits and waits, but he never comes back out.
It is dark out when Bella finally decides to retreat to her bedroom as well. She passes his bedroom on the way to hers and peeks through the half-open door.
Edward is on his bed, on top of the covers, still wearing the clothes and sneakers that he arrived in. She can hear him softly snoring, so she closes his door.
~o~
The Capitol Hill Apartment. Monday, June 10th, 2013.
When Bella wakes up the next morning, the first thing she notices is Edward's sweater, folded on top of her dresser.
She rushes out of the bedroom, passing by his room first. His bed is done and there's no sign of him. She looks at the clock—it's too early for him to have left for his shift at the studio already.
She sees Jazz in the kitchen as she comes out.
"Where is he?"
"I don't know." Jazz shrugs, sipping from his tea. "Punishing his body into oblivion at the gym or catching Pokémon somewhere?"
"Jazz, not funny…" Bella rushes back into Edward's bedroom for a closer look. Most of his things are there, but a few things are missing. His two guitars, and Charlie's hats, for example, are not hung on the wall anymore. She turns around to Jazz—devastation clear on her face.
"Did he leave?" Her eyes start filling with tears as Jazz walks up to her.
"I'm not sure. He didn't say." Jazz holds her hand and they move together to the couch. "He did take a few things."
"No…" Bella sobs, covering her face, sinking on the couch.
"So, what's the deal, Bella? You need to kiss a few frogs before you realize he's the one?"
"It's not like that…" She sniffles. "I already know he's the one."
"Then what is it? He worships the earth you walk on, Bella. He's madly in love with you. You can't seem to keep your hands off him—understandably so. Judging by the 'orgasm pancakes,' he's the best sex you've ever had, by far. So, what are you waiting for?"
"I'm scared, okay?! I'm petrified." She looks up at Jazz, the tears freely flowing now. "I know that when we get together, that's it. He's the one, Jazz. But I'm broken. I'm damaged. I don't work right. What if we peak too early? What if I can't keep him? What if I mess up and hurt him or lose him for good?"
"I get it, Bella. Trust me, I know it's scary. But those are all hypotheticals. This is real. Here and now."
She drops her head back on the couch and continues to cry softly.
"Sweetie, I'm afraid you can't have it both ways though. He can't be your best friend and also your intermittent dick. It's breaking him, Bella." Jazz runs a hand down her arm. "Like the compulsive workouts? While I appreciate the extra muscle definition—the biceps, the pecs, the abs?" Jazz eyes Bella, bringing his fingertips to his lips in a chef's kiss. "That can't be healthy, right? I don't know how much longer he can keep this up."
"I can't lose him, Jazz. I won't survive." She brings her body forward, against the weight of a guilty conscience pulling her down, and pushes her body off the couch.
She dries her tears and takes deep breaths until she makes it to her bedroom. On her nightstand, she grabs her phone.
Edward's number goes straight to voicemail, even after she tries three more times.
She scrolls through her recent calls then and presses the talk button.
It rings twice before he answers. "Hey, Bells, how are you?"
"Dad?" she says in a choked whisper before it all comes pouring out.
~o~
AN: A lot of you saw this coming. It needed to happen, right? Any guesses where he's gone to? How long he'll be away? I can't wait to read your theories. Happy weekend and see you Monday!
