Author's Note: Home is about Bella dealing with C-PTSD. C-PTSD is a newer diagnosis and something that I suffer with personally. It's the result of complex, repeated traumas such as growing up in an abusive or emotionally neglectful home. I've often wondered if Bella didn't have some sort of trauma from Edward's leaving and I wanted to explore that.

This will be a somewhat shorter series and it won't have any major plot points besides their healing. Several of my other stories deal with Victoria and such, but I wanted to put something out there that really focuses on them as people and their relationship. It will be a bit angsty.

I've had this one on the backburner for a while and I'd like to pay it some attention while I do some heavy work on a new fic I hope to put out soon. Enjoy!

Bella woke up an hour later despite Edward's attempts to calm her down with his touch and quiet humming. She was breathing shallowly and trembling. Her heart was racing. She wasn't opening her eyes, but he knew that she was awake.

"Bella?" he whispered.

She gasped. He gently squeezed her hip with his hand, reassuring her that he was there.

Tears fell from her eyes and she grabbed his hand and held on to it tighter than she ever had. He carefully wiped away her tears.

"It feels so real." she said quietly to herself.

"It is real. I'm here." He kissed her cheek, and she turned her head towards him, kissing his lips. He happily kissed her back and held her in his arms. Something still wasn't right, but he wasn't sure how to help her or even what to ask. Instead, he showed his love with physical touch, doing the best he could to calm her with his kisses and caresses.

Eventually her heart settled down and with a sigh of defeat, knowing she would have to snap out of her fantasy and face the day, she opened her eyes. She jumped as her eyes met his.

"Sorry, I know I haven't hunted lately. I won't hurt you. I promise."

"Edward!" she exclaimed, wrapping her arms around him so tightly that he knew it had to hurt her for the second time that evening. She was still crying.

"What is it, love?"

She was trembling, terrified to believe that he was real. She couldn't shake his voice in her head over and over…I don't want you to come. You're not good for me. but yet, here he was! If this was an illusion, it was the best one yet.

Bella couldn't trust that this was really him. Maybe she had finally gone crazy. She should be overwhelmingly happy, and a part of her was, but another part of her just couldn't shake the emotions of feeling as she had that day he left her in the forest. The day she was truly all alone. It was this state of aloneness she had felt for months. Emptiness. Bleakness.

"Bella?" he asked when she didn't answer. She shook her head and got comfortable, still holding him tightly as she cried herself back to sleep in his arms. Her sobs hurt him so much, but he didn't know what to do to help her other than be there, kissing her head gently and brushing her hair between his fingers.

Edward didn't understand why she wouldn't look at him at first, nor why she wouldn't talk to him, but assumed she must have had a nightmare. He knew that he still had a lot of apologies to give but would hold her close until it was time for the mysteries to start to unravel, until the end of time if that's what it took.

Bella twitched constantly in her sleep, like her mind was racing and her body wanted to follow. Her heart was pounding in her chest. Nightmare after nightmare assaulted her.

Sometimes, the nightmares were visual, and she would watch as Edward left her in the woods over, and over, and over. But mostly, her nightmares were emotional. Sometimes she ran towards something – Edward, other times, she ran away from things – school, people mocking her, the void that threatened to swallow her whole. They didn't always have to have a visual component, though it gripped her heart even harder when they did.

These nightmares, regardless of the shape they took, reminded her of the lowest point in her life. They gripped her emotionally. She was terrified, betrayed, and unwanted. Unloved. Abandoned.

Edward decided that this shallow sleep, the tossing and turning, the heart racing, couldn't be good for her after a while and woke her up by kissing her cheek gently. He caressed her warm face in his cool hands.

"Wake up, love." he said softly. Her motions stilled, but she didn't open her eyes. "I'm here. It's alright. They're just bad dreams."

"Edward." she whispered, nearly too quiet to hear.

"I've got you. You're safe. I love you."

She gasped and seemed to hold her breath, heart beating a frantic rhythm as she opened her eyes and took in his appearance.

"Bella, what have I done to you? I am more sorry than I will ever be able to tell you."

"Please be real this time." This time? Had she been hallucinating me before? Edward thought.

"I'm real. I'm here. I'm not leaving."

"Prove it."

"Alright." he said, proving that he was real the only way he knew how. He leaned towards her slowly, at a human pace so she could say no or pull away if she wanted, though she hadn't given any protest yet, and he kissed her gently, lovingly. She tangled her hands in his hair and kissed him back, slowly at first but then passionately, urgently. He followed her lead, more than willing to give her anything he possibly could, even if it were just his attentions.

Thinking that maybe physical touch was what she needed for reassurance, he put his hands just under her shirt and rubbed her back. He felt her smile into their kiss and knew it was the right choice.

What surprised him was the flood of her tears as she pulled away from their kiss and hid her face on his shoulder again. "What's wrong?"

"You left me."

"It was the worst mistake of my existence."

"You don't want me."

Edward reacted before he could think, raising her head up off of his shoulder a little rougher than he intended to look her in the eye. He prayed that he hadn't hurt her. "Everything I told you in the woods was a lie. You are everything I want. Everything I need. I came back because I couldn't live another second without you, even knowing that I'm no good for you. Even if you didn't want me, not the other way around."

Bella looked up at him and really looked into his dark eyes. He was unkept and unfed. He looked exhausted. Dream Edward never looked this haggard.

Her heart and her breathing were calming down with the reassurances of his cold touch, his wonderful scent. Her hallucinations and dreams could never come this close to the real thing. There was just no imitating him.

"I'm sorry." she whispered, coming to her senses a little.

"Why on Earth are you sorry? You haven't done a thing wrong."

"I can't stop crying. I'm so scared."

"I promise you I won't hurt you." he said, thinking about the dark color of his eyes.

"I know." she answered, the color of his eyes being the last of her concerns.

He wiped away her tears with his hands. "I didn't hurt you just now, did I? I didn't mean to be rough with you."

"You didn't."

"How can I make you feel better?"

"Talk to me." she sniffled, wiping her eyes.

"Alright, what would you like to know?"

She held him tightly, so tightly that he knew she was uncomfortable. It was as if she was still terrified he would run away. If he were to leap out the window, she wanted to make sure that he had no choice but to take her with him this time. She wasn't going to let him go again without a fight.

"What really made you come home?"

"You." That was the easiest possible question to ask, so he gave the easiest, truest answer.

Bella looked at him, expectantly, hoping he would continue, so he did. "I haven't stopped thinking about you for even a second since I left, although since we met would be more accurate. I needed to come see that you were alright. I thought perhaps if I convinced myself that you had moved on and you were happy then it would make being without you less painful and that I could watch you from afar. Protect you. Love you without you even having to know. But then I saw you in your dad's thoughts. I realized that you aren't going to move on. You don't want to. And I'm the reason for all of your pain. I had to set things right."

"You're here because you feel guilty." she cried. "Not because you want me."

"I want you, more than I have ever wanted anything. I do feel guilty, yes, but that's not why I'm here. I'm here because I can't live without you anymore. I thought staying away from you was keeping you safe and happy. Human. But clearly that didn't work for either of us. And I can't stand to be the cause of any more of your distress."

She cried into his shirt and he did his best to comfort her, rocking her, kissing her hair.

"Carlisle told you how I feel about souls and immortals."

She nodded.

"I thought I was protecting your soul." he said quietly, being careful to not wake Charlie.

"But why did you have to say such awful things? You could have told me the truth."

"You wouldn't have let me go. You would have waited. Searched for me. I wanted you to have a chance to move on from me."

"But I don't want to." she insisted.

"I know that now."

"I told you that before."

"And I wouldn't listen. Alice tried to tell me too. The whole family did." he wished he had listened to them and spared them all months of pain. He had been stupid, foolish, inconsiderate. He did still worry about her soul, but surely there was an alternate way to love her that didn't involve killing her?

"They don't really like me that much, do they? I just keep ruining things for them."

"What on Earth do you mean? They adore you. I'm surprised they even agreed to go. It took a lot of fighting on my part and insisting that it was best for you."

"I'm just a human to them. A human who made you all have to kill, and move, and risk your lives just because I had to figure out your secret."

"None of this is your fault." he insisted, trying unsuccessfully to get her to look at him again. "If you hadn't figured out what I was, I would have told you soon enough anyhow. I would have tried to scare you away. But I know you, and I know me. It wouldn't have worked. Neither of us wanted you to be scared away.

Them moving...that is entirely my fault. James…well…we would have done the same for any member of our family under threat. And you are a member of our family, maybe even more so than me these days." Edward thought about it for a moment, suddenly realizing the source of some of their problems. "Is that why you believed me so easily? When I left?"

"When you told me you didn't love me and didn't want me to come with you?" she sobbed. "Yeah. I've always known you would go one day. I'm not anyone special. I can't possibly hold your interest."

"You're wrong." he said, lifting her chin gently in his hand so that she would finally look at him. "You are so, very wrong. How do I convince you of that?"

"Stay with me."

"I promise this time. No qualifiers. No 'if it's what's best for you.' Nothing. I will stay."

She smiled faintly, still trembling in fear that this was all a dream, and she would wake up alone again. She took his face in her hands, grounding herself to him through touch, proving to herself that he was real. He closed his eyes and smiled at her warmth.

"What have you been doing all this time?" she asked after a few minutes.

"Nothing, honestly. I tried my hand at tracking but wasn't very good at it. Mostly just sat still and let time pass me by. I couldn't get your face out of my mind. I've nearly come back to you so many times."

"I wish you had."

"Me too. What have you been doing?"

"School." she said. That was really all there was to say. Some people had tried to be her friend, like Jacob Black, but she wasn't interested. She could barely make herself even socialize with her father. The kids at school talked about her behind her back constantly. They thought she was pouting and 'moping' because Edward was gone, but that wasn't it. At least not all of it.

It felt like everything Bella cared about had been taken away from her in Edward's absence. She felt unloved and unlovable. She felt worthless and couldn't help but remember all the times she had let someone down, especially Edward and the Cullens.

Bella had always understood why they left her. She was human. Average. Boring. The hardest part wasn't missing them but realizing that she was completely and totally alone. Sure, Charlie loved her, but he was also incredibly annoyed with her and her dramatics. She wished that she could be normal for him, but truthfully, Bella had just felt numb once everyone left her.

She was devastated, sad, heartbroken…but it was easier to feel nothing. So, that's what she did. She felt nothing. She did nothing. She did only what was expected of her like going to school and robotically doing her chores, biding her time until she wouldn't be a burden to Charlie anymore either. An unwanted house guest, like a poltergeist that lived upstairs, spent a little of his money here and there and occasionally made him dinner.

"What I wouldn't give to be able to read your mind just once." Edward said quietly.

"You wouldn't like it."

"I wouldn't be so sure of that."

"You'll think I'm a freak."

"Bella, I'm a vampire. If either of us is a freak, it's definitely not you." he insisted.

"Maybe someday we'll figure out why I'm defective so you can read my mind too. Maybe if you could have…nevermind."

"Bella." he said gently, kissing her cheek a few times, trying to show his love. "You aren't defective. You're special. Hell, maybe you're even gifted. Perhaps you're blocking me somehow. I don't know. But I can assure you that I left for no other reason except for my own stubbornness and need to protect you. Nothing you could have done or said would have stopped that."

"That's what scares me so much. What if I let myself feel again and you make me really happy and then just….leave…." she sobbed, clutching him tightly.

She wanted to feel his love, to bask in it, to cry tears of joy and spend hours just kissing him and enjoying that he was home, with her, but bad things always happened to Bella. She couldn't stop waiting for the other shoe to drop. Nothing she loved dearly had ever worked out for her in the end.

His heart ached for her. He knew leaving her meant hurting her, but he never imagined how much. He had witnessed hundreds of humans falling in and out of love over trivial things through their thoughts. Human love was fickle. Fleeting. It almost always faded with time. But this…he wanted to cry himself if it were possible. This was something more. Way more than he had ever realized or given her credit for. He had an awful habit of underestimating Bella.

He quietly repeated his promise that he wasn't going to leave this time and held her until she cried herself to sleep. If his heart weren't already breaking for her and her suffering, it would have done so again at her confession. How wrong he had been to do this to her. What a stupid, painful mistake to make. He prayed that he could still fix things. That he could help her see how much he loved her.

That he could give her everything she wanted and needed to be happy, even if it meant risking her soul, though he hated even the thought of it.

Edward knew that he would need support regardless of his next steps, and so would Bella. Though he nearly smashed his phone dozens of times, it was still in one piece in his pocket. He had charged it in the car on the drive over just in case he wanted to update the family about Bella. He knew they missed her too, perhaps even more than they had missed him.

Though he knew he didn't deserve their love for what he had done to them and though he had always been moping, pessimistic and a bit obtuse, he knew his family loved him. There were no doubts in his mind that he could call upon them to help.

A call wasn't even necessary. The phone lit up quietly with a text. It didn't say who it was from, but it didn't matter. It simply read: We're coming home.

Author's Note: In case you're curious, what Bella went through in Edward's absence is called disassociation. It's a common symptom trauma survivors experience. Per WebMB "Dissociation is a break in how your mind handles information. You may feel disconnected from your thoughts, feelings, memories, and surroundings. It can affect your sense of identity and your perception of time. "

The family returns in the next chapter, and we're going to learn a little bit more about why Bella is being so negative. Does she remind you of anyone else we know? Lol.