I do not own Twilight.
"Sit wherever you'd like," Beth says when she opens the door.
I look at her strangely for a moment until I see the setup inside of the room where there was once a semi-circle of chairs.
Now, two chairs are side by side with a third before them at a ninety-degree angle. The fourth chair, the chair Edward is occupying, has been moved to the far side of the room and he's sitting with his hands cuffed, his leg bouncing up and down with anxiety, his fingers tugging at his bronze locks.
He glances up when the door opens and I see a momentary relaxation in his features.
I've come back for him.
Beth stands to the side and holds out an arm, motioning towards the other three chairs. My choice, she had said.
This feels more like the interrogation room I had first visited him in, and I don't like it.
"Does he need those?" I ask instead of sitting, because it's the first thing that pops into my head. I'm staring at his wrists as Beth answers.
"He knows that if he puts up a fight, restraints are returned."
I look at her in time to see her send Edward a knowing glance, but it's not authoritative or retributing. She looks like an adult scolding a child, trying to hide their amusement.
I sigh and sit down, purposefully choosing the seat furthest from him. There's a slight furrow to his brow that, if I hadn't known him so well, I would have missed the meaning to. He's wounded because the further I sit from him, the further I pull myself from him.
He's watching me with those forlorn emeralds that blaze with a hint of irritation and I cross my arms, turning my head to look at Beth instead. He's always been able to get me to say things with those eyes and I can't trust myself right now.
Beth smiles lightly at me. "Why don't you start by explaining why you didn't want Mike to come with you today?"
I pull at the hem of my shirt, looking down at my fingers. "I…didn't want Mike to feel threatened," I say.
"In what way?" she presses, but her voice is still soft. She's asking me to give him an answer.
"I didn't want him to think something was going to come out of this," I whisper and look back up at Beth. I refuse to meet Edward's eyes, though I can feel them burning a hole through my head.
"And what do you think Mike thought was going to come out of these sessions?" Beth asks.
I shake my head because I don't want to say it, and it's stupid because I can already feel the tears burning the corners of my eyes.
I stare at the wall to the left of me, the furthest focal point from both Edward and Beth.
"Maybe that you were trying to fix your relationship with Edward?" Beth asks and I know she wants to me say yes. I know she wants me to confront the issue head on, but I can't, so I stay silent.
"Bella," she chastises and I turn a bleary gaze on her.
"Yes," I say, my throat thick with the tears I refuse to let fall.
"Yes, what?" she urges because she wants me to say it and I know I need to say it because it's what everyone involved deserves and needs. An actual answer from me, but I'm beginning to doubt I know the answer myself.
I cross my arms tight as though it's a defense against my own body, but I still refuse to look at Edward because I don't want to see the pain that I know is so clear on his face, but I can hear it in his increasingly heavy breathing.
"Mike's afraid I still want to be with Edward."
The silence in the room is deafening. It rattles around my skull like a pebble inside of an empty can.
Edward's breathing has stopped and I know he's holding his breath for Beth's next question.
"And do you?" she eventually asks.
The rattle has become a full storm and I feel weak with its power.
I look at Beth, because I can't look at Edward as I answer.
"No."
The reactions are simultaneous.
There's a small, victorious smile on Beth's face because she can finally begin a different phase with Edward, healing, perhaps, but her smile is contradicted by the release of the air Edward has held steady in his lungs.
It's a sound of relief, and both Beth and I turn to look at him, her expression confused, mine wary.
He's only looking at me, his emerald gaze piercing straight through me as though he can see and hear everything, inside and out. It's a semblance of the boy I fell in love with; of the boy that held the world in his palm for me.
His mouth softens, evens and parts and it's my turn to hold my breath.
"You've always been a terrible liar, Bella."