Hello, everyone! Here's the new chapter, hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think.

EPOV

I knew something was wrong the second I saw Bella. I wasn't anything she said, it was the distant look on her face. The act of indifference she had dropped in our first few times hanging out that was rearing its ugly head. I stood on the porch of her house and I could feel that something wasn't right. I tried to find her at the hospital, but my dad said she had gone home already. That I should let her rest, but here I was. And I was regretting it. You know that feeling when you get when something doesn't feel right? Like you shouldn't have left your house or even bed? Like the person you care about most is about to tell you to go away? Yeah, I had that feeling of dread in spades.

"Bella?" Maybe she was still in shock about our near death experience.

"Huh?" she answered distractedly.

"Everything okay?"

"I'm fine." Alarms were going off in my head. Didn't everyone say how when your girlfriend said she was fine she isn't fine? Wasn't that a thing? Not that Bella was even my girlfriend. No, we hadn't really talked about that. I was always worried about scaring her off- that she was too free-spirited to give us a definitive label. It bothered me, but not enough to say anything.

"All of your friends were worried about you," I offered.

"I don't have friends."

"Admirers?"

"No."

I shrugged bashfully. "I'm one."

"You're the last person in this town that should be admiring me." I could hear the vulnerability in her voice.

"Can you tell me what's wrong? What I can do to fix it?"

"I think we should stop hanging out, Edward," she blurted out. And I could feel my heart splintering, slowly breaking into a million little pieces.

"What-Why?" She wouldn't meet my eyes. "Why are you pushing me away?"

"I just- I shouldn't have let it go this far, Edward, but it doesn't even really matter because we're done. I'm sorry." My mouth opened but before I could say anything, Bella was closing the door. "Good-bye, Edward."

I went home feeling really pissed off, confused, and sad with a severe case of emotional whiplash. How could we be done? Done was such a 180 from where we were this morning, we'd just started it couldn't be done. Such a drastic pivot that it made me dizzy to think about.

The rest of the evening I spent in my room alone listening to the CD Bella had given me. The lyrics were angsty, a little dramatic. The melodies were intense and almost haunting. Still, I found myself actually really liking it.

"Think I'll miss you forever, like the stars miss the sun in the morning sky."

I smiled sadly as I remembered last night when she had given me that. The night we kissed for the first time. She'd given me her own copy and told me it was to get an actual music education. I closed my eyes and listened closely. I didn't realize that I had fallen asleep until I felt someone standing over me.

"Since when do you listen to this?" My eyes flew open to find Emmett standing over me. I snatched the CD case out of his hand and glared at him.

"What do you want, Emmett?" I asked humorlessly, very clearly in no mood to deal with my brother.

"Nothing, I thought you'd be with Bella. Thought I'd introduce myself or embarrass you, I hadn't decided yet."

"Well, I'm not."

"Clearly," he snarked. "So why aren't you?"

I sighed, knowing full well that he would leave until he got every detail out of me. "She broke up with me- Not that we were together or anything...but, yeah, we're done."

"You two are idiots," Alice spoke from my doorway. I never hated the thin walls in this house more than I did right now. And that I shared a wall with Alice, who had superhuman hearing when it came to gossip.

"Can everyone please go away? I just want to be alone," I groaned into my pillow.

"Not until you figure out how to fix things with Bella," Alice demanded.

I lifted my head and glared at Alice. "There's nothing to fix."

Alice rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. "Will you quit being dramatic and just listen?"

I reluctantly nodded. For over half an hour, I listened to Alice rant and rave about how I needed to put myself out there. Make myself emotional vulnerable. I needed to lay all of my cards out on the table and she could almost guarantee that Bella wouldn't walk away.

It took a bit of plotting and scheming, but suddenly I couldn't wait for the next morning.

I pulled up to the house that I'd been effectively dumped in front of and waited. I made sure the chief's car wasn't there and I waited for Bella to leave. This only really worked if she came to school today. Someone was listening to me up there because through the dense fog, I saw Bella walk out of her door. She wasn't dressed like she normally was. Granted it was still pretty cold today though it was no different from every other day she'd worn her cropped band shirts and torn jeans. Today she donned a black hoodie with legging and those same bright red Chucks.

Was she really planning on walking to school?

Should I honk? Get out of the car? I started to panic like the ball of anxiety I am because I wasn't exactly sure how to do this. Apparently I didn't have to do anything. Bella noticed me when she made it past her driveway.

Oh God, what if she didn't want to get in the car with me? I couldn't force her to get in, could I? No, that'd be fucked up. Would I walk with her? Was driving with me worse than walking to school? I hadn't really slept last night with all of the anticipation and anxiety, and I was regretting having that 3rd cup of coffee which wasn't really making me anymore alert it just made my heart pound considerably faster.

I rolled down my window when she was a foot away from the car. "Need a ride?"

"What are you doing here?" She hissed.

"Well, I figured your car would be in the shop. That tire looked really messed up after the accident, so I figured I'd drive you."

"Did you forget what I told you? Hm... Just yesterday?"

I ignored that and stuck to my guns. "Come on, it's cold and wet out there. Nice and warm in here!"

She rolled her eyes but moved to open the car door. That was a lot easier than I thought it would be.

"Thanks," she mumbled.

I drove for a few minutes in complete silence. My hands were clammy and my heart raced as the silence got more and more tense. I looked at the time. 7:15. School didn't start until 8:15. "Well we're pretty early. Breakfast?"

"What are you doing, Edward?" Her voice was cold, uncaring. So different than the Bella I knew.

"Taking you to school?" I said like it was obvious.

"Yeah, I can see that but why?" Her indifference was grating.

"Well if you could stop being a dick for a second, I would tell you," I snapped. It took me a minute to recompose myself after that. Once I did, Bella wasn't even looking at me anymore. I groaned in frustration and pulled over.

"What are you doin-"

I slammed the gear shift into park and turned to look at Bella. "I'm in love with you, Bella," I rushed out. Shit, that was not how I wanted to say that, but there it was, all the cards laid out on the table.

"You're what?" her breath sucked in and for a second, just a split second, I saw the entire facade crumble.

"I'm in love with you. And I don't want you to push me away because it's easier. I know you, Bella. I feel like I've known you forever."

"We've known each other like 2 months. You don't know anything about me," she laughed coldly. I had never seen Bella like this, she had asshole tendencies, but this was more than that. This was almost cruel, apathetic. This was her pushing me away, shutting me out. Trying to be dismissive and make me feel small so I'd give up. "You see what I want you to see, but this- this is all a lie. You're in love with a lie, Edward- I meant it when I told you I wasn't any good. I told you so many times, Edward. But you believe something that isn't real. None of this is real..." she trailed off, looking out the window to the woods.

"Then what is real?"

She laughed again, when she turned to face me her eyes were all glassy like she was a second away from giving in and letting me back in. "I don't have a fucking clue. But I can tell you, you don't want to know. You enjoy the show, the act. The broken-ness, just like everyone else." She licked her lips and I saw tears forming. I don't know how she did it, but it was there one second, gone the next. How many times had I seen her do that? How many had she done that before I knew her to make her such an expert at it? "But that's not me. You'd run away if you knew half of my baggage. You wouldn't even look at me the same. And I wouldn't even blame you."

"You're right," I cleared my throat. I was pissed. Pissed because she wouldn't let me in. Pissed because I wanted to help her. I was so frustrated, but my mind was made up. I felt all riled up and prepared to show Bella just how well I knew her. 2 months wasn't a long time, I knew that. 2 months was nothing. But even Bella couldn't deny the connection. Even beyond the connection, the way we just understood each other. It'd been like that since our first conversation. "You do put on a good show, but I'm willing to bet you're suffering more than you let on- I wouldn't even bet because I know. I've seen it. Every time you pull away from me, you think I don't know there's a reason? I know there's a reason you refuse to sit still. You can't hurt while you're having fun, right?" I took a deep breath. "I won't let you tear us apart, Bella...I just won't. I can deal with whatever you throw at me. Just give me a chance." After all that, I could only hope that I got through to her. "All I need is a chance."

I swallowed all the fears and doubt that had formed in my throat. "Now, have you eaten?"

She silently shook her head. I looked at her and finally saw that Bella that I had come to know and love.

"Let's go get breakfast," I nodded, pulling back onto the road.

"We'll be late," Bella objected, her voice still quiet and hoarse.

"Who cares?" I smiled.

So... they didn't really address their issues, but that is coming. Hope you enjoyed! See you very soon!