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BPOV

"As we soared above the town that never loved me

I realized I finally had a family
Soon enough we reached Neverland
Peacefully my feet hit the sand and ever since that day..." I suddenly stopped when I felt Edward's presence. I could feel his eyes boring into the back of my head as he stood right behind me. "What do you want, Edward?"

"You weren't in Biology."

I shrugged lightly. "Went to the nurses office."

"Are you okay?"

"Fine," I lied- I was so far from fine, far from even being remotely okay. I was exhausted. I hadn't slept a full night in days. This wretched feeling hadn't faded since Edward walked out of my house that night. Edward took a seat right next to me. I was about to get up and leave when he grabbed my hand. I looked into his eyes could see the pleas for me to stay.

I didn't make it easy for him today. I took every precaution so that I wouldn't be alone with him, I knew once I was alone with him, I'd cave. He was my Achille's heel. It was strange having my suspicions confirmed, knowing what would happen and having it happen are two very different experiences. I was damaged, tainted. He had told me many times that no one would ever be able to love me. Not after that. He had so many utterances that ingrained themselves into my conscious that I believed them too. I believed no one could love me. No one would believe me. That no one cared about me. Edward just confirmed what I already knew. At least that's what I told myself. The more rational, more mature side of me understood that what I had told Edward was a difficult concept to grasp. It wasn't an easy story to hear and I couldn't fault him for that. I had years to try and understand what happened in Phoenix and I still couldn't make sense of it. I'd given Edward minutes.

"I was arrested, you know," he stated out of the blue.

My eyes widened and eyebrows raised at the abrupt confession. It didn't go unnoticed that I found myself incredibly concerned for Edward. "What? Is everything okay?"

He nodded, but the solemn look never left his face. "Two, maybe three years ago. Aggravated assault and battery. The guy did something to someone I really care about. It's not really my story to tell, but it was bad. He drugged her and did a lot of other things. Jasper, Emmett, and I found him alone. I talked them into letting me take the fall."

I always wondered why Edward was a self-proclaimed loner. He was funny, smart, and absolutely gorgeous. I noticed that people stayed away from him and I found myself wondering about it before. Honestly, I thought the reason people stayed away from him was because of me. It was strange, but Edward always seemed kind of perfect. It was nice to know he was at least a little messed up like me. "Why?"

"They're both older. They had more to lose than I did. No one's going to charge a 14-15 year old white kid as an adult," he shrugged like it wasn't a big deal. A no-brainer or something when it was absolutely a big deal. "Anyway, they came up with this comprehensive plan to rehabilitate me, fix my anger issues," he chuckled.

"Anger issues?" I asked with an eyebrow quirked.

He chuckled, "Yeah, you didn't see the guy's face. They said I beat him half to death."

"And they believed you?"

"I think your dad suspected, but he understood my reasoning."

"Charlie?"

Edward nodded and lightly chuckled. "He's the one who arrested me."

"I'm sorry."

He shook his head, still looking down at the keys. "Don't be- I'm not."

"You're not?"

"I never told anyone this, but I don't regret it. Warren got what was coming to him, so I've never regretted it for a single second." Was it wrong that I was kind of impressed by Edward? It took a lot of courage to take the fall for something like that. Took guts to take action instead of run away. I didn't have that. I was glad he told me all of that. Even more glad that I was the only person who he was honest with about that night. "I got off pretty easy, community service and supervision until I'm 18."

"You didn't tell me you were on supervision, you could've gotten in a lot of trouble if they caught us driving like that," I ranted, remembering my first attempt at scaring Edward off all those weeks ago.

He shrugged. "It didn't stop me from almost kicking Mike Newton's ass today either."

My head quickly turned to look at Edward. There wasn't an ounce of humor in his voice. He was serious, he'd almost fought Mike Newton. "When did that happen?"

"After you left, he call you some...unfortunate names. I called him out."

"Don't get sent to jail on my behalf. I can take care of myself," I mumbled. I didn't want Edward's pity. I could handle the names and rumors on my own. I didn't need him defending my honor. It had been a mistake to even approach Mike and Jessica's table today. I just didn't feel like being alone, especially in our spot where I knew Edward would find me. The second I turned my back I heard them whispering their theories and spreading rumors about me. Typically I wouldn't give a fuck, but I was already emotionally raw, emotionally drained and exhausted. I knew it was bad because Charlie let me stay home most of last week. I spent the entire week trying, and failing, to sort myself out.

I even briefly contemplated leaving. Where? I had no clue, I didn't have anywhere to go. But the idea of cutting and running briefly sounded good. At least until I thought about Edward and Charlie, Charlie would worry himself sick if I left and I couldn't do that to the one person who unconditionally loved me. And Edward, for reasons beyond my comprehension I couldn't stand the thought of never seeing him again. Seeing his crooked smile, hearing his laugh, looking into those emerald eyes. It didn't feel right, so I stayed. I stayed and by the time Monday rolled around I knew I had to pull myself back together again. And like I'd done many times before, I picked myself back up and went on with my life.

"Oh, trust me I know you can," he chuckled.

As the quiet settled over us, I started talking never once looking up from the white and black keys. My fingers lightly grazed them, not hard enough to play a single note. He'd been so honest with me, so open. I had given him the worst parts of my story and he was here. Right beside me like he promised. Was it strange that his confession made me trust him? That I found myself so easily willing to open myself back up to him? "I was thirteen- it's kind of sad thinking about how young I was. That I never had a chance to be a person, you know? I'll never know who I couldn't have been if things had gone differently. I don't even remember what I was like before, only after." I cleared my throat and continued, "Anyway I was thirteen when Renee moved him into our home. They hadn't known each other long so the first time I met him was the day he moved in. Renee had been beaming with happiness when she met Phil, I never said it but I always thought it was the whole whirlwind romance thing that sucked her in. They had only known each other 2 months when they married- eloped would actually be more accurate. I didn't even know they married until they came back from their impromptu vacation. A week later I was watching the boxes pile up in our living room."

"You must be Isabella?"

"Bella," I corrected. I decided the moment I saw him that I didn't like him. That sixth sense, the gut feeling that something wasn't right. Well, the alarms were sounding in my head. Even at thirteen I knew that something wasn't right about all of this. In the coming weeks, I got even more wary of who this man was and that he was just living in our home now.

I tried telling Renee about what I was feeling. She said that I was being rude and disrespectful. That he was my stepfather now, we just needed to spend some time together and I'd see what she saw. I didn't agree. I actively avoided places I knew Phil would be hanging out in. I didn't like the way he watched me. Renee never noticed, too in love to think straight I guess. My sleeves got longer and shorts turned into pants. The way his eyes roamed over my body made me feel incredibly vulnerable, more uncomfortable than I'd ever felt with what I thought was a trusted adult. I thought maybe it was me, maybe I had made him uncomfortable. But that gut feeling never went away.

Only a few weeks after Phil moved in, Renee had a night shift. It wasn't that uncommon, just her first one back from her elopement. I was incredibly aware of Phil that night, all of the alarms were blaring in my head now. But my mom trusted this man, shouldn't I be able to do the same? Before he moved in I did all of my homework on the kitchen table. After, I'd keep all my books in my room and did my homework on my small desk. Renee never thought anything of it. Looking back, there had been so many signs that she'd missed. Or ignored.

I was doing my homework with my headphones on when I looked up for the briefest second and saw him standing in the reflection of the window. Had he tried to say something? How long had he been standing there? How did he even get in here, I explicitly remembered closing and locking the door?

I jumped when I saw his reflection and ripped off my headphones. "Phil," I gasped. "I...um...didn't see you there. Did you need something?"

He didn't say a word, just slowly approached me with a strange look in his eyes.

That was the night that kicked off years of abuse. Years of trying to kick him off of me and begging him to leave me alone. He never did.

It wasn't long before one of my teachers, my music teacher, noticed I'd changed a lot from the beginning to middle of the semester. She was the first and only person to notice that something wasn't right. I hadn't gone down that dark path of drinking and partying like there was no tomorrow yet. I was withdrawn, abnormally quiet. Abnormally dressed for the Phoenix heat. She gave me piano lessons after school in an attempt to get me to open up, or to tell her what was really happening. During that first year, those lessons were my only solace, my last comfort. I'd be at school until 7 or 8 o'clock just practicing in the music room. Looking back on it, anyone who would have paid a little attention could have put everything together. My mother marrying a man she hardly knew. Moving that man in with her and her daughter. Then only a few months later her daughter starts acting strange, she has cuts and bruises on her face, she's dressing differently. All the signs were there just nobody gave a fuck.

It was almost a year before Renee noticed that I had been out that late each night. She accused me of partying and doing drugs. It burned at me to think that of all the glaringly obvious signs that something wasn't right, she choose to cherry pick the signs that blamed me for everything. The ones that made me a bad person, made me the one in the wrong. So I stopped piano lessons and became the exactly person my mother thought I was.

Right before I stopped attending our unofficial lessons, my teacher asked me outright. It caught me so off guard, but at the same time it was completely expected. I mean that was why she was giving me free piano lessons. She asked me if something was happening at home, if I needed help. I was 14 and scared that Phil would follow through on his many threats, so I said no. It had always been one of my greatest regrets. If I had been braver, stronger. If I hadn't been a coward, I wouldn't be here. There was no one to blame but myself for that.

I remembered that day like the back of my hand. Telling my teacher that I was quitting lessons, having to give up my last reprieve broke me that day. Something inside of me snapped and never healed. I was crying in the bathroom, when an upperclassmen asked me if I was okay. She took pity on me. Took me under her wing. She offered me my first cigarette that day and even though I hated the smell and act, I took it anyway. That was one of the few times I'd ever tried smoking. She asked me if I wanted to hang out with her friends. They taught me everything I knew. How to get attention, attention I'd been craving so badly. How to stand tall and not rely on a single person. They turned the broken shards and made something beautiful- they made molded me into the person I turned into.

"And that's how I ended up here," I laughed halfheartedly. That was it, I'd explained everything to the one person I trusted most- even though I still didn't know if I should. I didn't tell him how much of a coward I felt. I didn't tell him it was an upperclassmen that took pity on me and introduced me to her friends. How her friends became mine. How they were my lifeline. I figured he'd had enough of traumatic storytelling for now.

His eyes never left me as I told the story. He was once again looking at me like I was the most interesting person in the world."You never told your mother?"

I shook my head. "I knew who's side she'd take."

"That's why you call her Renee," Edward nodded. I was both glad and terrified that he was now putting the pieces together.

I shrugged, pretending to be indifferent about my relationship with Renee. But I cared- of course I cared. My own mother didn't care enough about me to protect me. She didn't love me enough to keep me when things got tough. No, she discarded me like a toy that didn't work anymore. "I figure she's a mother about 5% of the time, so she's entitled to that title 5% of the time. Most of the time she's Renee to me."

"I'm sorry I left."

"I understand."

"Don't do that," he said sharply. "Don't understand, Bella. It's a shitty thing that happened to you- more than shitty, but I don't have a better word for it. But it doesn't change anything between us." I rolled my eyes, because it changed everything. "I'm serious. I love you. I don't-I'm not letting you go."

I didn't know what to think. I loved Edward, I'd known that for a while. And in spite of last week, I trusted him. He'd never given me a reason not to and gave me every reason to trust him. "Can I see it, Bella?"

I understood what he was asking so I nodded and pulled down my waistband to where you could only barely see the burn. "It's pretty nasty. You may not want to get that close," I warned as Edward's finger started tracing around it.

When his finger made contact with the burn, I sucked in a breath. It didn't hurt, just felt oddly intimate. Edward's eyes found mine as his hand pulled away. "Does it hurt?"

I shook my head and abruptly pulled my waistband back up, trying not to show the embarrassment in my face. I'd only shown that to him out of anger, I never wanted him to see all of those ugly parts of me. But I did and he was still here. Here, listening to my sob story without an ounce of pity or disdain in his eyes. At that told me everything I needed to know. "I told you it's pretty ugly. It's usually covered up."

He vehemently shook his head. "It's not... you're perfect- you've always been perfect," he whispered, slowly leaning in to press his lips to mine.

"I love you too," I responded to Edward previous declaration as soon as he pulled away, knowing fully well that was the first time I'd ever said that to Edward.

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