My apologies for the wait! Real life has been hectic these last few weeks but things are about to slow way down for me (yay!) so that means more updates! YESSS!

All my thanks to Fran for fixing my mistakes and my prereaders for telling me like it is. Enjoy!

Edward

It always stops me in my tracks.

It never did before, and I've lived here in Jacksonville my whole life, so the opportunity to watch the sun rise has always been an option for me, but I never bothered with it.

Until a few months ago, the only time I would be awake to see the sun rising was if I hadn't gone to sleep for the night yet. And even then, I was always too sloshed to even care. It was always just a backdrop to whatever stunt I was putting myself through.

But now, and every morning for the last few weeks, I've watched it, purposely, and wondered why I took something so beautiful for granted.

I sit on the sand, my legs bent at the knees as I watch it rise from what looks like the depths of the ocean. It warms me with each passing minute as I sit and look, sit and wait, for the peace of the sun to seep into my skin.

If someone had told me a few months ago I would be sitting on the beach at the literal ass crack of dawn, purposely waiting for the sun to rise, I would never have believed it. But now, as my world has shifted without me having a say in it, I can't imagine my day without it.

Kate had suggested it a few sessions ago. Told me that a new, healthy hobby would help me in my transition back to, well, living again.

The problem was, I didn't know what my hobbies were now. I had told Kate as much, told her I still didn't feel like myself, and in some ways felt like a completely different person altogether. Victoria had rattled off a list of everything I had liked to do before the accident, and to be honest; there weren't many of them that didn't involve some type of alcohol or drug or something to enhance the world I had deemed too hard to sludge through each day.

So in true Kate fashion, she had shrugged and told me not to force it, and it would come to me whenever I was ready.

And that's exactly what had happened.

I had woken up from another dream I didn't understand, another cold sweat soaking my pillowcase, so I just got up from my bed and left the apartment in search of something I still had no idea of.

Before I left, I made sure I had something on my feet, as I had gotten my boot off a few days before, and just walked out of the apartment with no destination in mind.

I just walked.

It was still dark out, dawn just beginning to creep onto the sidewalks beneath my feet, but I didn't let it stop me, and I just walked.

And I kept going.

The beach isn't far from our apartment, so I wasn't hurting too bad by the time I had reached the sand, but the urge to sit was strong and persistent.

So, after I walked, I sat.

I sat for an exceedingly long time on the beach that morning, the sand slipping between my fingers as I allowed my thoughts to drift and let the waves take them away.

Is it possible to wake up one day and be a completely different person?

No matter what I thought about that morning, my mind always came back to that question. Was it possible?

The more the days trickled by, the more I believed it was true. How else would I explain how easy it was for me to say goodbye to some of Masen's crutches? His, or my, old habits?

Since I had woken up as Edward, it was the one thing that had been undeniably easy.

When I attend the AA meetings, I listen to the people. I watch as they struggle to repair the damage they've done to themselves and others; I listen as they spill their stories of heartache and redemption. The only connection between them and myself is that we take each day one at a time, but that's where it stops. The idea of taking each day one day at a time resonates with me, especially when I feel such a disconnect between what I feel and the life I'm living. Some days I feel so uncomfortable in my own skin, in my own apartment, in my own cubicle at work that my skin begins to itch, and my heart begins to race.

Other days, I manage. I can suck it up and plaster a fake smile on my face, somehow make it through a day of work and a night at home with Victoria. Sometimes, when I'm with my family, I can smile and actually mean it.

Not always. Most times being with my family is another reminder of who we're missing. Losing Emmett is still too raw, and now that I'm mostly healed from the accident, the void he left behind in our lives has become unavoidable. The month I had been asleep in the hospital turned out to be a distraction of sorts for them all, and now that the dust had settled and the concerned phone calls had stopped, we're left with nothing but each other and the hole Emmett left behind.

In a way, it's been easier for me to deal with Emmett's death than the others. I have no idea how these things work, but while I was in my coma, I was able to speak to him. He came to me while I was sleeping, and I wasn't Masen, the addict who loved his brother but loved his own individuality more. Instead, I was Edward, someone who soaked in every extra minute I had with my twin brother as we sat on a beach in a place I've never been to before, and we just talked. We talked about everything and nothing, time working differently in whatever place we were. I felt like we sat together for hours, filling each other in on the aspects of our lives that Masen felt too embarrassed to share. I don't remember our whole conversation, only snippets here and there, but I'll never forget how I felt seeing him. I'll never forget how he looked. I'll always remember the strength in his voice, the deep bass of his laugh as we sat on the beach.

He was healed.

"Now it's your time," I remember him saying to me before we parted. Where either of us were going, I had no idea at the time, but in hindsight, I know Emmett was off to his new, much better place, and I was on my way back here.

Here. Hmm.

Here right now, consists of me sitting solitaire on the beach in the sand, waiting for the sun to rise and give me the fuel I need to make it through another day.

I had discovered that morning a few weeks ago that sitting and watching the sun rise made me feel closer to my brother than anywhere else. I wake every morning before heading into work to see this, experience this, before starting my day. I can feel his voice in the sun's warmth.

It gives me the strength I need to find out where I'm supposed to be now that I'm this new person.

This is how I stumbled on the new hobby my life had needed.

Cool sand not heated yet by the day's sun still fills my hands as I close my eyes and let the glare radiate over my skin. I focus on my breathing, one deep breath in before letting it all out again, hoping the waves lapping against the shore can take some of my thoughts with them on their retreat back to sea.

I wonder if today will be the day. The day I'll find some answers to the meaning of all this. It's what I ask for every morning as I walk along the beach, and today is no different. I hope today I can find peace in where I am and what I'm doing.

And if today is not that day, I pray to make it through another without letting this emptiness inside take over.

I've never said any of this to anyone, and though they all might have an idea I'm feeling somewhat misplaced these days, they don't know the extent of it.

They don't know about my dreams.

They don't know I think about them all the time, trying to understand what I see.

They don't know I want more.

Even though I wake up in a panic each night, as if I was sling-shot back to my bed, that moment of unconsciousness makes me feel like I'm home more than anything else.

The rising sun, though beautiful, does not bring me the answers I crave this morning.

I bring it up to Kate at our next session a few days later.

"And it's the same girl each time?"

Running a hand through my hair, I exhale in earnest and give her a nod. "Same girl."

"And you've never seen her before?"

"Not that I know of, no," I answer with a shake of my head. "But every day, I wake up and feel like I do. Know her. Or should know her."

"And you're not getting glimpses of this girl like the other images you were having. This girl is with you longer?"

"No, not just glimpses." I purse my lips and nod my head in confirmation. "Longer."

I won't elaborate, and it's not just because some of the instances with this mystery brunette I've conjured in my dreams are filled with passion and lust, but because I'm just not ready to share it with anyone yet. Simple as that. While sharing these thoughts with Kate would probably help me, and I know she would never judge me for the content of my dreams, I feel almost protective of them—like they're too intimate to share with anyone other than me...and the girl who haunts my dreams and the lucid moments in between.

As I've mentioned to Kate, I've never seen this girl before, other than in the dreams that come to me at night. She's not there every night, but I always close my eyes and wonder if she will be.

When the dreams first started, I had seen random objects, things that would flash in front of me too quickly to understand why. I couldn't link the images together, and at first, it had bothered me, but then she came along, and everything else was long forgotten.

She smiles in my dreams and makes the world slow down. She laughs, and it's like a symphony to my ears. And when she kisses me, I swear I've never tasted anything so sweet.

Sometimes it's a smile and a kiss, and she's gone, leaving me in a whirlwind of wanting her to stay and confused about why she's here and who she is in the first place.

Other times, she stays. I don't know her name or where she's from. I don't know how she knows me or what her purpose of reoccurring in my dreams is for.

But I do know I miss her something fierce when I wake up in the morning and on the nights when she's not there.

How, exactly, do I explain that to anyone?

I can't even explain it to myself.

How do my fingers know the feel of her skin? How do I know the coconut smell of her hair? How do my lips mold with hers like we've done this countless times before?

How can I not be disgusted with myself when I look over at Victoria asleep in bed next to me while I'm dreaming of another woman? A stranger?

"Just because this unknown woman appears in some of your dreams, doesn't mean you're being unfaithful to Victoria," Kate says to me after I tell her my discomfort about the dreams and Victoria, leaving out the details I need to keep private for now.

"Yeah, I know. I still feel guilty, though." I stare out the small window in Kate's office. "Real or not."

Even if I did ever tell Victoria about the girl of my dreams - God, I'm cringing even thinking of saying those words to her out loud - I wouldn't know what to say. Where to start. How to make it sound like I have a modicum of sense.

So I won't. I don't plan on telling anyone about the girl or the dreams just yet. Even confessing to Kate I had dreams like these at all is enough to make me weary.

I'll keep her to myself for now. Perhaps I prefer it that way, anyway.

"You're back to work, yes?" Kate asks towards the end of our session, which I admit has been mostly filled with me lost in my head with the occasional question from Kate. Some sessions are like this, though, and I never feel pressured to fill in the silences.

"Yeah," I answer. "It's going okay."

"How are you adjusting?"

"I like it, actually." I clear my throat and add, "Well, I like the routine of getting up and having somewhere to go. Something to do."

My job is something I will never enjoy, whether it was as Masen then or Edward now. It's something I tolerate, monitoring claims at an insurance company, as it keeps a roof over my head and me out of trouble.

"And you're driving again?" Kate questions with a smirk on her face. It's one I can't help but shoot back at her, though it's brief and not as engaging as hers.

"Just to and from work for now. I thought I'd be going everywhere once I was cleared to drive again, but I'm just not…quite there yet."

I did drive here with a new car I had gotten after the accident, but partly because her office is on my way home from work.

"And that's fine," Kate remarks. "You know that right, Edward? I know we've been focusing a lot on your dreams and your time in a coma, but we also can't forget you're here because of two traumatic experiences that happened to you on the same day."

I swallow hard and lean back into the back of the couch, my hands folded on my lap. "Emmett and the accident."

Kate nods and tilts her head as she speaks. "It's not unusual for someone in your situation to feel hesitant to get behind the wheel of a car again."

I'm not hesitant, though. I'm not scared. It's just another one of those things that just doesn't feel right yet.

"I don't think that's it," I say both to myself and Kate. "I'm embarrassed to say I remember the day of the accident but nothing about driving home that night."

The amount of money I paid in fines for driving under the influence in the state of Florida is cringeworthy enough. It's a direct testament to my behavior, and even though I have no problem owning up to my mistakes, it's a hard burden to bear.

"Being embarrassed is better than feeling numb."

"Is it, though?" I ask Kate in disbelief. "I hate living with this shame of what I put my family through during the worst time of their lives."

"I didn't say it was a great feeling," she laughs. "I said it was a better feeling. Feeling embarrassed or ashamed is exactly that - a feeling. And we need you to do that these days. Feel things."

I sigh again, my hands buried in my hair as I'm weighed down with the brunt of everything I already have been feeling lately. "I know."

—-m—-

The ground is wet when I walk outside of Kate's office at the end of our session. The rain has stopped, and the sidewalk steams from its aftermath. The air is sticky now as I walk to my car parked a little further down the street tucked into a small parking lot. My shirt begins to stick to my back, uncomfortable in the heat even though the early evening rain has cooled the temperature for the next few hours. While most of the dark clouds still hover above, threatening to spill their fill down again, there is a small break in the distance. I can see a small patch of blue sky, a tiny little promise of better weather on the horizon.

I shake my head at the irony, always somewhat more positive every time I leave my weekly session with Kate. I can't help but see the comparisons to my own life; how things may be dark and unsettled right now, but they won't be forever. That little streak of blue reminds me that one day, I'll get there.

And if I don't know my way there at this moment, I'll still be okay.

I just have to convince myself, remind myself, to rely on the people around me to help me remember who I used to be.

It will help me remember who I am now, and who I'm supposed to be.

It's the realist personality trait of Masen's that has stuck around; no matter how much I remind myself of who I'm supposed to be now, there's a part of me that tries to tell me I already know.

And I'm suppressing the person I am now because I'm afraid to lose anything else in my life. I feel like I'm clinging to a life before my accident that no longer belongs to me. I'm associating with people and things and interests that belong to Masen - not Edward.

Talking about myself in the third person becomes exhausting after a while.

I want there to be a time when I won't have to question myself about what I'm doing or why I'm doing it. I just want to know.

I shake the thought that pops into my head, telling me the closest I am to feeling like myself again is when I'm dreaming of her.

Needing a break from the dumpster fire that is my life, I know I'm in desperate need of a distraction. Looking into my mirror, I safely merge into the right lane before turning down a quiet street a little over a mile from Kate's office.

Located on a quiet cul-de-sac near the center of town is the house Emmett and Rose built. They designed and constructed the house before Emmett had been diagnosed, and it boasts of everything Emmett wanted in his life: a garage for his cars, a pool for his cannonballs, and plenty of bedrooms for his children.

He lived to experience two of those three things, and it's bittersweet to know he was so close to experiencing all three. Even though he told me personally during that dream trip to the beach that he knew all about the pregnancy and watched them as if he had never left, the whole situation still pierces my heart. Rose, going through the trials of pregnancy without Emmett by her side, their child never getting to experience life with Emmett, my parents never getting to see Emmett interact with a child of his own.

It's all just…unfair. Even though we'll have Emmett's child with us in a few months, a gift of his from beyond the grave, it's just a shadow of what we all really want.

"Is it really Edward I see right now on my front porch?" Rose's voice interrupts my assaulting thoughts as she peers through her screened door.

"I'm having a hard time believing it myself," I kid, though it never gets easier to hear how much of a recluse I had turned into over the years before my accident.

Now, look at me, voluntarily visiting my sister-in-law. Crazy how a person can change after a single incident.

"I'll say," Rose laughs and moves to open the door for me. "Come in, come in."

"You sure? I don't want to impose or anything."

"Please," she answers with a roll of her eyes. "You're always welcome here."

"Thanks, Rose."

I follow her into the house, closing the door softly behind me. I've been here so many times over the years, but this is the first I've been here without Emmett, and my breath catches in my chest. I tighten my eyes against the torment of emotion that barrels through me, forcing myself to think of the last time I saw Emmett and our conversation on that beach. He was happy. Laughing. Whole. But I still expect to turn the corner of their foyer and see him sitting in his living room in his favorite chair, or through the kitchen window standing behind a grill overlooking the pool.

The sound of Rose's voice reminds me where I am. "You need anything? Coffee? Water? Iced tea?"

Pinching the bridge of my nose with my fingers, I sniff my emotions away and follow her into the kitchen. "I'll take a coffee if you don't mind."

Rose smiles and reaches into the cabinet for two mugs. "I was hoping you'd say that. Iced coffee is all I want to drink these days." She's buzzing around the kitchen as she gathers the ingredients for what seems to be her latest pregnancy craving. I can't help but watch in amazement as she hums a little to herself, rubbing her growing belly as she prepares our coffee.

"All you want to drink? Or all baby wants to drink?" I correct her with a laugh.

Rose shrugs good-naturedly and laughs as well. "Does it matter these days?" She emphasizes her words with an extra rub of her belly.

"No," I answer with joking reassurance. I motion towards the gourmet iced coffee she's somehow concocted in her own kitchen. Rose and my unborn niece or nephew deserve some of life's simple pleasures after everything they've been through. "Just enjoy it."

She hands me my mug, the ice cubes clanking together as I reach out to grab it from her. I take a tentative sip, unsure if iced is how I prefer my coffee at the moment, but with one taste on my tongue, I feel almost pregnant myself when it comes to how badly I'm suddenly craving this iced coffee like Rose.

"You, too." She holds up her own mug and closes her eyes to her latest indulgence. "It's my nightly treat. Decaf, of course, so no one can run their mouths about a pregnant woman having caffeine."

"I would never judge you for that," I shake my head. "Your choice of football team, maybe. But you're safe with this." I take another sip of the heavenly mixture and exhale a breath of refreshment.

"It's incredible, isn't it?" Rose jokes.

"Kind of perfect right now, actually."

"Almost perfect," she answers with a shake of her head before pointing towards the back window in the kitchen. "Deck?"

"Sure."

As we make our way outside, the dip of Florida's sun greets us as we settle ourselves into the patio furniture. We're sitting on the deck Emmett built himself, and I can feel him like the warmth of the sun.

He's everywhere.

"Now it's perfect," Rose says, sunglasses on, feet up as she stretches on the patio couch. "See? She likes it."

She points to her stomach, and right on schedule, I watch as her stomach rolls in response. My jaw drops at the sight of nature's magic beneath her skin. Dazed as I watch life unfold before me, it takes me a minute to fully hear what she said.

"She?" I smile. "The doctor told you?"

Rose shakes her head and takes another sip of coffee. "No, just a guess," she replies and rubs her belly again affectionately. "Some days we're a she, some days we're a he."

"You're part of a we," I chuckle at her words. "I love that."

"So do I," she answers, and then she's silent for a few minutes. I know why she's silent; she's disappeared into the world where Emmett is alive and well and here. When she's forced back into the present, she sighs and looks over at me. "This is why we decided to get pregnant, you know. So I wouldn't be alone once it was time for him to go."

"Rose, you'd never be alone. Baby or not," I remind her, even though I know we're suffering through two different voids in our lives. Though we lost the same person, we lost the different roles Emmett played in our lives; twin brother to me, and husband to Rose.

Different kinds of losses, but still a loss, nonetheless.

"I know." Rose acknowledges and tilts her face back into the sun again. "It just helps, you know? For times like these when the house is quiet, and it's just me."

I get it. A house Emmett built with their dreams in mind suddenly stopped in its prime.

"I think it's a great thing," I say softly. An image flashes of a small child with Emmett's dark hair and deep dimples. "A beautiful thing."

She tries to hide it, but I can hear her voice catch in her throat at her question. "What does he think? Did he tell you?"

Rose knows about the visit I had with Emmett while I was sleeping. I haven't told her everything, and I don't think I ever will, but I did confess to her one night after the accident what I remembered. What was supposed to be a quiet dinner with my family ended up being the opposite when Rose was unable to escape the fog of grief she had woken up to. We all understood that some days are more difficult than others, and in a desperate moment when my heart could no longer watch her suffering, I offered her the story of Emmett and me meeting in the other realm.

I think back to the conversation I had with Emmett that day; he was filled with so much joy at the thought of Rose and their child. I offer her a hand, and she takes it, squeezing it in preparation for my words. "He was the happiest I've seen him in so long, Rose."

She wipes the tears from her face but smiles as she does so.

"The Emmett we knew?"

The happy-go-lucky, carefree, easy-going jokester of a man was alive and well on the beach that day.

I nod through tears of my own and repeat her own words back to her. "The Emmett we knew." We welcome the silence as we allow our feelings to take hold. Denying our grief only brings more grief. At least, that's something I tell myself when it becomes too much.

"God, I needed this today. Needed to hear it," Rose breaks the silence.

"Me, too." I can't agree more. "I was just on my way back from therapy and passed your street. Figured you would be the only one who would understand how I'm feeling right now."

"You okay?"

"Yes," I lie, and then I remember who I'm talking to. "No. I'm trying, though."

"I can see that. You may not feel like you are, but I can see it." She finishes the last of her coffee and sets it down on the table. "You're different."

"I know." I sigh, her words reminding me how feeling different has placed me in a difficult spot these days. "In a good way?"

"Well, being good now implies there was something bad before. There was nothing bad about you before, Edward."

I blow a soft laugh out of my nose. "You and Em always were able to separate the person from the disease."

No matter how awful I was, I always knew Emmett saw the person beneath the addiction.

"You're his twin, Edward. All those demons you faced? He faced them, too."

"So did you, then."

"Yeah." She purses her lips in thought. "But that's not a struggle for you anymore, is it?"

"No," I'm hesitant of oversharing, but I continue. "Something happened when I was sleeping, I guess. Kicked that dependence like it was never a part of me, to begin with."

"Strange," Rose is intrigued. "Does that happen often? Coma patients suddenly overcome their hardest life obstacles all because of an extended nap?"

"I don't know about other people," I laugh. "But it's what happened to me. I don't really have any other words to explain it."

"Does Victoria know?"

"Fuck," I falter at her name. "No. This is all a lot of information to unpack."

"Sure, sure." She says it like she agrees with me, but I can tell she doesn't. "But that's what she's there for, Edward. You have to let her back in."

I shift uncomfortably in my seat. "Yeah."

"What's the worst that could happen? You try and make it work, and it doesn't? You owe it to yourself to fight for your happiness." She grabs my hand again, and the next words out of her mouth shower me with the relief I didn't know I needed. "With or without Victoria."

Rose's words sit with me for my drive back home. They sit with me the following day at work. They're still there the following week when I reach for Victoria's hand in the dark.

They disappear later that night when I find out the name of the girl in my dream.

Bella.

And suddenly I'm chasing a life I wasn't supposed to remember.

It's starting! Ahh – what will he remember? And how? And when! SOON.

Review and let me know your thoughts!

See you soon!