Thank you so much IamTheAlleyCat for beta'ing and Ncsupnatfan for pre-reading. Thank you all for reading and reviewing. You're all awesome. You've made Saturdays my favourite day of the week as I get to hear from so many of you. I'm putting out an extra update this week because it's a horrible day and I need something good to come of it. Hope you enjoy xxx


Chapter Five

Bella

His eyes were dark, and he looked almost enraged.

Carlisle was the gentlest vampire I knew. He would never hurt me physically, I knew. The worst he would do was leave me, and I had survived that once already. But I hadn't ever seen him like this before, not even when James had been set on hunting me.

Uncomfortable, I looked away from him out over the horizon. It was beautiful here, and I had been having such a good day with him. Why did we have to ruin it by talking about things that were better left dead and forgotten?

Cool fingers touched my jaw. They didn't attempt to move me; they were a request, not a demand. "Bella," he said softly.

I looked back at him. "Yes?"

"You're wrong."

I frowned. "About…?" There was one thing he could be talking about, but I knew I wasn't wrong about that. I had been there. He hadn't.

"Edward."

I shook my head. "I don't want to talk about this, Carlisle."

"No, I don't imagine you do, but I think we should. Edward didn't leave because he didn't want you anymore. He left because he wanted you too much."

I raised an eyebrow. "On what planet does that make sense?"

He smiled sadly. "He wanted you alive, in the world, and happy. He needed that. He loved you so much that it was enough for him to know you were out there somewhere than to be with you, placing you in constant danger."

"You're wrong," I said apologetically. "I don't know what he told you, but I know what he said to me, and it wasn't about me. It was about him and what he wanted."

"Edward is a gifted actor. We all are. We have to be for our lives."

"Exactly. Did you consider that when he was telling you all about how he needed and loved me that he was acting?"

"Did you?" he countered. "Bella, believe me, I know my son, and I know why he did the things he did. He left you because he loved you, because he couldn't imagine life without you."

I scoffed, feeling almost irritated that Carlisle was not only dragging these things up again but also trying to make me believe that, somehow, I was wrong. I had been there. I had heard every word and had seen the absence of emotion, let alone love, Edward had felt for me in his face.

"If he couldn't imagine life without me, why did he leave me?" I asked.

"Because it was you in the world he needed more. What happened with Jasper made him realize that your presence in our world was going to be the end of you one way or another, and he couldn't bear that. I told you about his belief in souls and their loss."

"Which is ridiculous," I interjected.

"Not to him," Carlisle said gently. "It is also not the point. He adored you, Bella. He loved you enough to let you go so you could have the life you deserve."

"That's not what he said." I was being obstinate now because it was easier than to consider what he was saying was the truth. The idea that Edward truly loved me, had left to protect me would change everything, and I didn't want to consider that possibility.

"What did he say?"

"I don't want to talk about this," I said again.

"I'm sorry, Bella, but you need to. I need you to. You have to understand what happened."

"Why?" I asked plaintively.

He didn't answer directly, he just asked once more, "What did he say, Bella?"

Irritation surging, I snapped, "He said he didn't want me!"

Carlisle looked sad. "He lied."

"How do you know?" I still didn't believe, but I was in the moment now, and I had to know.

"Because I saw what it did to him to leave you."

I frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Bella," he said so softly it made me lean in to hear him, "leaving you broke him."


Carlisle

It had been a year of sadness for my family. We were without two of our number, and though we knew the absence of one was for the best—she was better off without us—the other was wrong and painful.

I had been without Edward once before in my life, when he left to live a traditional lifestyle, but I had solace then that I didn't have now. He had been doing what he wanted then; I could believe he was happy. I knew in my heart now that he wasn't remotely happy. How could he possibly be? He had left his heart behind in Forks when he left Bella.

I didn't worry for his physical safety. I knew he was more than a match for Victoria, imbued with talent as he was. Emmett, who was the strongest fighter I knew outside of the Volturi, couldn't best him. It was his mental state that worried me.

When he first left, he would call at least weekly. Though I knew his motivation was to speak to Alice and learn clues of Victoria, he always made time to speak to me during those calls. He would reassure me that all was well, and I would have a chance to ask him if he was still sure he was making the right choice being away from us and Bella. His reply was always the same, but as time passed, it became less impassioned until I became certain he was doubting his decision.

The last time he called, he had sounded more doubtful than ever. I had hoped then that he would come back to us or, even better, back to Bella. But then he had broken my heart. We never exchanged farewells traditionally, it was never goodbye but 'I will call soon,' even though we both knew it wouldn't be soon enough. That last call, in which he had sounded devastated, he said, "Goodbye, Carlisle," and promptly ended the call. Naturally, I had tried to call him back at once, but he had switched his phone off. He had broken the bond of contact between us, and I despaired.

Alice had talked me down from my panic. She could still see him. He was okay. Though, as I learned shortly after, okay was relative. He was at least alive. That was the best thing that could be said for the state he was in.

Without a means to contact him myself, I lasted another two weeks before making plans. It was one of the free weeks before I was due to return to my teaching duties, and I knew if I was to go to him, that was the time.

Alice, who at the time was in Mississippi, researching her human past, called as soon as she saw my decision. She asked that she and Jasper be allowed to go in my place. She cited the fact they would find him easier than I would. Suspicions aroused, I asked what I would find, and her answer had scared me. "He's not the same, Carlisle."

My decision was made then. I had to go to him. I extracted a location from Alice—a ghetto district of Rio—and left that night with Emmett. Jasper would meet us in Denver, and we would travel together from there.

I would find my son and bring him home, and from there I'd decide what to do.


My sense of foreboding grew to an oppressive weight as I approached the abandoned apartment building Jasper led us to. At the time, I thought Alice had given him more exact directions than she had me. I learned later that he had known where to go as he had been following Edward's misery like a homing signal.

As we scaled the concrete stairway, stained with filth, blood, and graffiti, my heart grew heavier. Why would he have chosen a place like this for his retreat? It made no sense until I saw him.

The door to the attic apartment he had taken was not locked, and I went in first. As I caught sight of him, I gasped. My son was a wreck of a man. He was sitting on the edge of a dirty mattress on a rusted bedstead. He didn't look up as I entered, nor as Jasper and Emmett followed. He stayed perfectly still, like a statue, until I was crouched in front of him and my hand cupped his chin.

When he did move, shifting only his eyes to meet mine, I almost wished he hadn't. He was ruined. I felt as though I had borrowed Jasper's gift, so obvious was his pain. It was as though it infected the room we were in, like poison gas. His eyes were black and shadowed deeper than I had seen since seeing my own reflection in my newborn days, before that fateful deer.

"Oh, Edward," I sighed, "what have you done"

He licked his lips and spoke in a hoarse voice. "Hello, Carlisle."

I turned back to Jasper and Emmett. Jasper's mouth was pressed into a thin line—I guessed he was suffering under the weight of pain in the room—and Emmett looked stunned. "Would you mind giving us a moment alone?" I asked them.

They both nodded and backed out of the room. When I could no longer sense them close, I turned to Edward and ducked my head so I could look him in the eyes. "Edward, you cannot do this to yourself. You must go back to her."

He smiled, a twisted and bitter thing. "I am fighting that need every moment of every day."

"Then listen to that need. Go to her. You cannot sustain like this. When did you last hunt?"

He shrugged his shoulders.

"You have to feed," I said emphatically.

"The thirst doesn't even burn anymore. The pain of everything else is too much to feel anything but that."

This was too much for me to bear, and a sob ripped from me. I had known pain. In the days after my change, when I realized what I had become and that I could not end myself, I had suffered. I had known that, eventually, I would lose my mind from the thirst and I would kill against my will. That idea had caused me agony. My son was suffering even more than I could imagine.

"Please, Son," I begged. "Please go to her."

He stared into my eyes. "I'm scared."

"Scared of what?"

He shook his head and looked down at his hands where they were fisted on his lap. "I am scared she won't want me anymore, and I am scared she will. I want her safe so much, and I want her with me. I don't know which I want more." He sighed. "I have to do something, though, as I feel like I'm dying without her."

"Go back," I urged. "Go home to her."

He nodded without looking at me. "I think I have to. It doesn't feel like a choice anymore. I have to see."

I gripped the back of his neck and pulled his face against my shoulder then turned my head and kissed his cheek. "Thank you, son. Thank you."


Bella

Carlisle stared into my eyes as he finished his tale, searching for my reaction. I didn't know what to do or say. My heart ached and, at the same time, I was angry.

"He didn't come," I said eventually.

"What makes you think that?"

"I think I would have noticed him if I'd seen him. He stands out."

"If you had seen him."

"You think he came and didn't show himself?" I asked, my anger building.

Carlisle frowned, perhaps sensing my reaction and confused by it. "Yes. I know he did."

"That…jerk! What the hell? How is that fair? As if he hadn't already screwed me over once, he did it again. I don't even…"

"Bella," Carlisle said gently, "he was acting—"

"If you say for the best, I will walk away now," I warned.

Carlisle fell silent. He merely looked at me.

"He left me," I said slowly. "He didn't discuss it. He didn't explain. He made me believe he didn't want me anymore. Do you have any idea what that did to me? Of course you don't. How could you?" I got to my feet and walked away, staring out at the ocean. Thankfully, he didn't follow. "I was not a child, Carlisle. I wasn't stupid. He didn't need to do that to me."

None of them did. They all left me behind after saying I was family and that they loved me. Not one of them thought to give me the comfort of the truth. They let him destroy me. If I had known why he really left, it would have hurt me, but I could have handled it. I could not handle what he did when I thought it was because I wasn't good enough anymore.

And it had all been for nothing. I hadn't been safe. He hadn't been happy and distracted without me. I had been hurt immeasurably by what he had done. He had broken me and himself, too. All because he didn't stop to think about being honest with me.

My once beloved fool.

"Why didn't he come to me?" I asked,

"I don't know," Carlisle admitted. "He called me, around a week after he left for Forks, and merely said he was too late. From there, he went to Volterra, and we have never discussed it since."

I shook my head dolefully. All my suffering, all of his, and there was nothing I could do to fix it now. It was too late.

"If he had come then, it would have been so different." I looked at Carlisle, taking in his misery. "I would never have been able to say no to him."

"But you could now," he stated, his tone desolate.

I bit my lip "Yes. He ruined me so completely I had to change myself to heal. The person I am now has no room for that kind of heartbreak again." I took a breath. "I moved on."

Carlisle bowed his head. "I think I knew that already. I think I knew from the moment I spoke to you again."

"But?" I asked.

He hesitated on the verge of speech for a moment and then sighed. "But nothing. I am happy that you are happy again. It is all I, all he…it is all any of us wanted for you."

I smiled slightly. "Thank you, Carlisle."


So… That is Edward's story. This is A Bella/Edward story and they will be together again, but it's not going to be the easy return to a relationship the way I have written before. I hope you can be patient with me as I have tried to tell a good story at a fair pace instead of rushing to the part I want.

Until next time…

Simaril xxx