A/N: Thanks so much for all your wonderful thoughts. With a bunch of end-of-summer tasks to complete, it took me longer to get this update ready than I'd planned. Hoping to get back on track and finish this up by the end of the month, before fall truly sets in.
Most characters belong to S. Meyer. The rest belongs to me. All mistakes are mine.
Chapter 6 - Cap'n Dad and Matey
This is sort of a continuation of the previous chapter, so we're still following Edward's POV here. :)
A few weeks ago, when we were still back home in New York City, Alice, Tristan, and I had a movie night where Alice introduced Tristan to her love for all things Zoe Saldana. Come to think of it, this may have been when she introduced Trist to Pop-Tarts as well.
Either way, what appeared to impress Tristan the most that night – and by that, I mean he sat still for ten minutes – was a movie set in the Caribbean, in which Zoe played a pirate. Enthralled by the swaggering image of adventuring swashbucklers sporting eyepatches, braids, and headscarves, I'd find him rummaging through drawers and coming up with clothing items that, like a true pirate, he'd press into a service completely different from their original one.
'Dad, look at me! Aargh, Cap'n!'
'That's great, Trist. Let's just make sure we take that underwear off your head before we head out.'
In keeping with his favorite cosplay theme, we rummaged through kitchen drawers this morning and found a couple of new dishrags, wrapping one around Tristan's head and the other around my forehead. Then I turned to load the dishwasher, and when I turned back, Tristan proudly brandished a knife between us.
"Holy…"
"Pirate knife!"
Dropping on one knee, I wrapped my hand around his and carefully lowered the wielded knife.
"Aunt Alice let me use the little, little knife as my pirate cutlass the other day!"
I shook my head and felt my jaw tighten. "Between this and the Pop-Tarts, your Aunt Alice'll be lucky if I don't make her walk the damn plank next time I see her."
Tristan's eyes rounded. "Can I walk the plank too, Dad?"
Carefully, I pulled the knife away and exhaled. "Never mind that. We don't play with knives, Trist. Ever. Not even little, little ones. And also, a pirate's sword is called a cutlass."
A bit of a mixed message, but you couldn't pretend- play pirates without a pirate sword.
"Cutlass!" Tristan repeated.
So, substituting a small, plastic sand shovel for a pirate's cutlass, Tristan and I were off.
Once at the beach, I recognized a few of the faces from the previous morning, people who'd apparently also visited the lone wetsuit outfitters in town. Chuckling under my breath at our collective lesson learned, I then snickered at the newly arrived tourists, who looked just as bewildered by a northwestern U.S. beach as Trist and I had been.
No longer, though. This morning, in wetsuits along with our sturdy, waterproof shoes, we were better prepared to appreciate a First Beach adventure. We scaled the mossy, rugged terrain like undaunted buccaneers. We dared the perilous shoreline like plunderers in search of treasure.
Well, I scaled the terrain, assigned the dual role of captain and ship, with Tristan's knobby knees wrapped around my shoulders and his hands using my hair as the ship's steering wheel. The crisp morning breeze whipped up by the dove-gray sky melded with the cresting waves, all of it providing a mesmerizing silver backdrop and an invigorating rhythm rather than any real threat.
My eyes panned upward. "You holding on tight up there, matey?"
"Aargh!"
"'Aargh' means you're mad," I imparted with a chuckle. "If you want to say yes, you say 'Aye, aye, Captain!'"
"Aye, aye, Cap'n Dad!"
"Cap'n Dad," I nodded. "I like the sound of that."
Granite-colored waves raced toward the shoreline, their whitecaps bubbling and frothing into milky peaks as they crashed against the beach's rocky terrain. For a moment, I stood still, with one foot propped on the next jutting outcrop, sea spray nipping my cheeks and rippling through my hair. As I drank in the undeniable beauty in a late, northwestern morning, I could almost believe myself a pirate, a bandit on unknown shores, off to find his corset-wearing, dark-haired, and ebony-eyed-
"Cap'n Dad, go! Go!"
Tristan's eager bouncing startled me back to the twenty-first century.
"All right, matey."
We trod on, even the sharp sting of misery caused by the previous evening's end insufficient to slow our roll. In our own, similar yet separate ways, Tristan and I were both enraptured by our surroundings. And despite the control and restraint that I, as an adult and father, was forced to display, it wasn't as if I didn't understand my son's exhilaration.
Because the entire scene was like an adrenaline rush, a mantra whispered by the wind, a reminder of the natural beauty to be discovered in this world by a father and his son, and all the possibilities that still lay within for us.
"Faster, Cap'n!"
"Faster, huh, matey?" Tightening my grip, because the boy knew no fear and I wouldn't put it past him to fling himself off my shoulders, I sprinted forward, bounding from rock to rock, and grinning from ear to ear as the cold wind snapped at my face, and Tristan shrieked in joy.
"Man, if your grandmothers could see us now."
"They'd make us walk the plank, Cap'n Dad?"
I laughed, hearing my mom's protests in my head.
'Be careful, Edward! My goodness, he's just like you!' That echo was followed up by a similar line from Chelsea, though spoken in harsher tones. 'He got that streak of defiance from you because my Katie wasn't like that!'
The thought made me snort. I had no idea whether, at his current age, Tristan was more like me than like his mom, and I'd likely never know. Since Kate's passing, I'd realized that while Chelsea adored her grandson, she wasn't a dependable source when it came to providing facts on Kate's youth. My wife's past tended to change depending on how it suited Chelsea's purpose. For a time, I'd depended on Kate's twin sister, Tanya, for accurate retellings of those bits and pieces from Tristan's mom's past that could be passed down. But…that had stopped being a good idea.
What I did know was that my instincts would always prioritize Tristan's well-being above all. Those instincts were what made moments like this – moments when he was still young enough to request thrills rather than seek them out on his own – another learning lesson for us both.
'It's hard enough as a grown woman for her to deal with the way the Chief tries to shelter her.'
Those words, along with a shitload of other words and events from last evening, had circled in my head into the early hours of the morning. Although there were still many questions, I knew much more about Bella Dwyer this morning than I'd known last night. She'd sustained a serious injury, but I had no clue regarding the nature of that injury. Neither could I help wondering how she handled the daily juxtaposition between her godfather's need to protect her versus her own need for-
"Move, Cap'n Dad! Move!"
"What? Oh, sorry, matey. We're moving; we're moving!" I resumed our walk, inwardly musing for a while. "Kate…" I whispered, "is this what you meant by moving on? This sense of…slow awakening?"
My breath hitched when it was Bella Dwyer's voice, rather than my dead wife's, who answered. In my memory, her words were as clear, as confident…and as melodious as they'd been last evening.
'He's got this sweet, little heart, Edward…one that easily reminds you how children are just younger versions of adults…they crave much of what we crave, though on a less corrupted scale…'
There was no denying that Tristan was feeling a younger, purer version of what I'd been feeling for the past few days. Yet all this raised more questions:
How had Bella known all that? How had she read my son so easily after having just met him? From beginning to now and in between, what was her story that had her seeing my son in a manner similar to how I saw him?
And why did I care how she saw him? After all, I'd learned to treat most strangers' intentions toward my son as suspect. There were the individuals at the pediatrician's office pretending to commiserate with Tristan's ailments; the ones at the supermarkets who feigned interest in the foods my son consumed; the woman on the flight over from New York who-
"Dad, you's lost in your brain again, like before breakfast?" Tristan asked, impatience now mingling with annoyance in his tone.
"What?"
"Cuz you said we was moving, but we's not moving!"
"Yeah," I snorted. "I guess I'm just a bit lost in my head again. Here we go for real. Aye, aye, matey?"
"Aye, aye!"
No, I hadn't suspected Bella of having a hidden agenda; at least I could pat myself on the back for that since I couldn't pat myself on the back for anything else I'd done or said to the woman. Because even though I hadn't, for one single moment, considered her fascination with my son a sham, I'd somehow inanely concluded that the Chief's goddaughter was a drunk.
I cringed at my stupidity.
"Cap'n Dad, look! The water makes bubbles like the bubbles Bella made me and Esme at the bar-q!"
And there it was, further proof of how in sync my son's and my thoughts were this morning.
"Esme and me at the barbecue," I corrected.
"Not you, Dad! Bella didn't make you bubbles at the bar-q! She didn't play with you," he stressed, the grammatical corrections going over his head.
"Rub it in, son."
"Huh?"
"Never mind."
"She played with me and Esme," he continued, "and made us bubbles that went 'Pop! Pop!' But these bubbles goes like this."
I felt him lean forward and raised my head, laughing heartily when he stuck out his tongue and flicked it against the air.
"The sea spray licks at your face, huh?"
We ventured as far as we could without seriously risking life and limb. I stopped at a small outcrop where we could gaze out on our panoramic view of the slate-toned Pacific sparkling as if it really did conceal a treasure chest full of dark diamonds. Further down and bending to the left, the terrain roughened then sloped upward, eventually forming bluffs far out in the distance. The constantly crashing surf resounded like rolling thunder, lulling me. For a couple of seconds, I shut my eyes and saw an undeniably beautiful pair of eyes, as darkly luminescent as the water before me.
"Cap'n Dad?"
"Yeah, matey?" I murmured, eyes still shut.
"Can we's climb up there?"
With a sigh, I reopened my eyes. Tristan pointed at the cliffs.
"Maybe in the truck, one of these days."
"Why come not on our ship?"
"Because our ship will break its neck and the neck of its first mate if it tries to climb up there."
Abruptly, a handful of young men and women, blurred by the distance, popped up from the opposite face of the cliffs. Perched on the cliff like birds, they hooted and hollered, their words muffled.
"But they is up there on their feet!" Tristan protested.
"They are up there."
"I know!"
When one of the cliff climbers abruptly leaped into the water, Tristan's breath caught.
"Cap'n Dad! Can we's-"
"No way, Tristan."
"Not fair!"
Like a dark storm in a pirate's horizon, I sensed a tantrum heading my way. Employing evasive tactics, I looped us away from the cliffs and turned us back toward the beach instead. Tristan balked.
"Dad, don't turn! I wanna see them jump!"
"How 'bout we see what's going on over here?"
"Daaad!"
Tightening my grip on his left hip, I lifted my right hand and formed a fist, leaving a narrow hole in its center. "Look through this spyglass."
"That's not a spyglass! It's your hand!" he spouted, Cosplay time apparently over.
"It is a spyglass, and if you squint your eye and look through it, you'll see amazing treasures, matey," I said as persuasively as possible.
"No!"
"No? Okay, then." I shrugged carelessly. "I'm pulling away the spyglass, and you'll miss all the treasures on this-"
"Dad!" Tristan huffed. When he wedged his eye against my fist, I swallowed back a chuckle.
On the other side of the beach, angry swells curled toward the shoreline, inviting the day's surfers to pick and choose their optimal wave. In the center of those swells and surfers, a pair stood out like colorful pebbles amid plain sand.
"Looks like it's a morning for thrill-seekers," I muttered to myself.
A new wave formed far offshore, and the pair of surfers – a man and a woman – jumped smoothly onto their boards, both with their legs bent at the knee, arms offset. The man's stance was obviously the sharper and steadier of the two. He took the lead, expertly riding the ensuing curl toward the shore.
"They is soafing!" Tristan exclaimed.
"Yep, they're surfing."
"Waves so, so high! Almost to the sky! Cap'n Dad, can we's soaf?"
Tristan asked the question in the pleading tone of a toddler who'd been denied way too many requests.
"Tristan, I don't think that's…that's…" When the next surfer, the female, demanded my full attention, I trailed off.
She didn't demand it outright, no. In fact, she didn't even glance my way. The compulsion, the need to watch her, arose from an intangible though no less dominant instinct – one that may as well have been developed through thousands of years of evolution. It wasn't even that she was anywhere near as good as the first surfer - she teetered precariously atop her turquoise surfboard.
But, despite her less-than-masterful form, she rode the wave toward the shoreline with the grace of a conquering queen riding in on her white horse, long, dark hair sweeping behind her, glimmering like a bejeweled crown. A few, pounding heartbeats later, she cut the distance sufficiently for her features to sharpen and for my eyes to confirm what that intangible instinct had already told me.
"Bella! Dad, Dad, it's Bella! She's soafing!" Tristan yelled – right before Bella's turquoise surfboard flipped over.
In the next moment, it floated belly-up, ending its race to the shoreline bereft of its rider.
"Where'd Bella go?" Tristan wondered with all the innocence of a three-year-old.
I spat out a harsh oath, breaking one of my own rules – the first of a few, as it would turn out. Frenzied instructions followed.
"Trist, hold on tight!"
Spinning around, my eyes scanned the rocky formation. In two seconds, I'd mentally mapped out the quickest path off the rocks. In the next second, I acknowledged the need to find another adult to leave Tristan with before I dove into the rough waters. A half-second after that, all my breath left me in a horrified rush as I re-examined my plan:
For one, I'd have to pick either speed or safety off of these rocks, both vastly different paths, with Tristan in tow.
For another, I'd have to leave Tristan with a stranger, on a rough beach, with no vetting of this potential person.
While I stood there for two more seconds, mentally cursing the colossal flaws to my hastily-conceived rescue plan, she – the woman who'd haunted me for the past few days – screamed, her cries muted by the roaring waves.
Nonetheless, they spurred me into action.
A handful of heartbeats after she went into the water, I took a twisting path, halfway between safe and utterly reckless, through the rocks.
"Hold on tight, buddy, okay? Hold on tight!"
"Aye, aye, Cap'n Dad!" Tristan replied, wholly unaware we were no longer pirates. "I holding tight to the wheel!"
Heart hammering, I sprinted forward, terror mounting with every step and panic surging through me like the wild surge of the tide. But the panic also fueled me, pumped adrenaline into my muscles.
"Cap'n Dad, look!"
"Not now, Trist!"
"But Cap'n Dad-"
"NOT NOW, TRIST! We've got to get off these-"
"Bella!" Tristan giggled.
It was his exuberance as he spouted her name that made me glance over my shoulder. At the sight of a dark head of hair bobbing above the rough swells, arms extended, waving wildly into the misty air, I ended up doing a double-take. Despite the horrific sight, it infused me with a modicum of relief. At least, she'd manage a breath or two while I figured out how to get to her. At least, she-
"Woo-hoo! Yeah!" Bella shook her fists at the sky while my brow furrowed. "YEAH! WOO-HOO! WHO'S YOUR MOMMA?"
I tilted my head sideways and watched, immobile now, as she swam through the choppy and tempestuous waters of First Beach, toward the shoreline if not with the speed and dexterity, then with the fierceness of an Olympian. A minute later, she reached the shore. Plucking the turquoise board that bobbed back and forth at the water's edge, Bella Dwyer made her way to the sandy beach without a care in the world.
Meanwhile, I scraped my hanging jaw off the slick rocks while concurrently staving off the heart attack that had been imminent just seconds earlier. As I bounded, much more steadily although with growing confusion, off the last rock, Bella approached her surfing partner. He'd apparently been waiting for her on the beach – a fact which, if noted earlier, may have saved me a few years now shaved off my life. In my urgency to get to her, I'd missed that bit.
Now, it was he who pulled her against his chest and wrapped her up in a bear hug. At the same time, Tristan bounced on my shoulders and called out her name; the pirate turned cheerleader here.
"Bella, Bella, Bella! Bella, Bella, Bella!"
Unfortunately for the Cullen men, between the roar of the waves, the howling of the wind, and Bella's focus on her surfer buddy, we went unnoticed. Her inattention notwithstanding, I stalked my son and me toward Bella like sailors drawn by a siren, heedless of the danger that lay ahead in the bewitching pull. Although I knew she wasn't in danger, the woman was danger personified; there was no denying it.
With every step, my emotions morphed from bewilderment to relief to building fury because for the past few days, I'd watched this woman struggle with her balance, regardless of how gracefully she conducted that struggle. My indignation was born of her apparent lack of self-preservation, comingled with the fact that I could've fucking broken my neck, never mind the potential injuries that could've befallen Tristan as I rushed, injuries which I couldn't even contemplate. And here she was, cool as a damn cucumber, unfazed, smiling up beguilingly at Surfer Buddy.
A few new questions arose regarding Bella Dwyer, and stomping through the sand, with Tristan chanting "Bella, Bella, Bella!" on my shoulders on repeat, I was determined to get answers.
"Bella, Bella, Bella!"
Bella's head snapped up, and I was determined to-
"Tristan?"
I was in fucking trouble. The downfall to maintaining a firm grip on righteous indignation is apparently sometimes as simple as a grin – and one not even aimed at you. When Bella spotted Tristan, all my fury and indignation melted like polar caps in the sun.
"Tristan!"
The brilliant grin that overspread her features might as well have been the missing sunshine in the gray morning; its heat source; its blinding rays. For a moment, as that fiery, dark gaze panned in slow motion to me, it reached and burned in my very core. When I blinked, like a fantastical oasis dreamed up where there was none, I found her eyes still on Tristan.
"Dad, down! Down!" Tristan jostled and fidgeted on my shoulders. "Down! I want Bella!"
"All right. Hold on, Trist," I breathed quietly. "Let's walk over calmly, like two self-respecting men rather than a couple of-"
As I lifted and heaved him over my head before he could catapult off my shoulders, Tristan bolted.
"Tristan!"
Miniscule legs raced toward Bella, kicking wet mounds of sand into my face.
"Tristan, be-" I started before choking on sand and before Bella's eyes did meet mine. In the middle of that misty beach, a wordless understanding passed between us.
It wasn't a romantic one, not even one similar to what I knew we'd both felt last evening, under the starry sky, an awareness of a mutual attraction, at least, before I ruined everything. Yet this understanding was no less potent.
This was the type of wordless understanding that only existed between a few select individuals and me. It was an understanding that sometimes passed between my mom and me, Alice and me, or even Chelsea and me. It was the type of understanding I knew would've frequently passed between Kate and me where Tristan was concerned. It definitely wasn't an understanding that should've existed between a woman I'd just met and me.
'You got him?'
'Yeah, I've got him.'
But, bewilderingly, it did exist I had no doubt, whatsoever, that Bella had him.
"Bella! Bella! Bella!"
"Tristan! Come here, sweet pea!"
Tristan raced headlong toward Bella, where she waited without open arms, lifting and spinning him around and eliciting peals of thrilled laughter from my son. For a moment, I stood there, dumbfounded yet again, before panic set in.
Bella was spinning Tristan around in her arms.
For the umpteenth time that morning, instinct ruled me. I started forward, shooting a hand out in front of me before recalling something else Emmett shared last evening.
'Bella has good days, she has in-between days, and some days, she has off days…'
Instantly, a mixture of shame blended with lingering caution and annihilated any sense of calm. I retracted my hand, inhaling and exhaling the salty air in heavy breaths. When I looked up, my eyes met Bella's yet again.
With my son in her arms, she quirked a brow, and I knew she'd caught my hasty moment of doubt. Remorse flooded me, but Bella turned away before I could express it in more than my expression.
Retreating toward the water to disguise my agitation, bits and pieces of their conversation wafted toward me.
"I sees you soaf from all the way up on the rocks!"
"You were up on the rocks and saw me surf, Trist? You've got good eyes, sweet pea! But what were you doing on the rocks?"
"I was a pirate hunting for treasure!"
"Hunting for treasure! By yourself?"
"Uh-huh!"
Bella's delighted laughter carried in the breeze while I reacted to my son's lie with a smirk aimed at the gray horizon.
"By yourself, huh?" I murmured to myself. "That's a wildly misleading narrative for a kid who literally just learned to wipe his own behind."
Meanwhile, Bella played along with Trist's version of events. "Trist, I want to hear all about this one-man adventure!"
While Tristan entertained Bella with his story, I took a moment or two to take stock of my fluctuating emotions.
First, I'd wildly miscalculated – yet again – where Bella was concerned. She'd been nowhere near drowning, merely wiped out on her surfboard like any regular surfer. Afterward, she was obviously fine. And yeah, I'd wronged the woman; I knew I had, and I knew I owed her an honest apology. At the same time, I had to acknowledge that there was…an attraction, the sort of attraction I hadn't felt…in a while.
But I hadn't traveled across the country for the summer searching for an attraction. I'd wanted to clear my head, to leave behind a bit of the past and a couple of errors in judgment, and to see if I could finally figure out what my dead wife meant by moving on.
"Calm down," I whispered to myself, raking a hand through my hair and yanking off the damn 'pirate rag' I realized I still sported. "Calm. Down. She's just a woman – a woman who's undeniably fiery, brave, enchanting, and…and so damn good to your son. Other than that," I snorted, "she's just a woman."
Repeating this 'just a woman' mantra a few times, I drew in a handful of cleansing breaths and turned, determined to apologize, retrieve my son, and get the hell out of dodge – or First Beach.
When I reached them, Bella and Tristan had taken a seat on top of Bella's surfboard. Interestingly, Bella's surfing buddy sat across from them on his own board. For a few minutes, I'd forgotten about him. But now, all three appeared all caught up, Tristan giggling happily on Bella's lap while she tickled him, and Surfer Buddy looked on with a grin. In a morning of a few realizations, yet another one hit me:
There was a huge chance here that the joke was wholly on me, and the past twelve hours or so of angst and internal musings regarding my undeniable attraction to Bella may have been a study in masochism…and nothing more.
Surfer Buddy was the first to acknowledge my intrusion into their circle. In one quick and begrudgingly impressive motion, he jumped from a sitting position to his feet, wiping his hands on his thighs as he approached me.
"Big Bro, you've got a cool, little bro, here."
"Thanks," I said, accepting his handshake while biting back the urge to tag on a 'bro' of my own.
"I'm Ty."
"Edward."
"Edward Cullen, Esquire, Attorney-at-Law."
My eyes flashed to Bella and caught the tail-end of an undeniably impish grin.
"Edward Cullen, Esquai! That's my Dad!"
The grin fell from her face, dark eyes widening as if, for a moment, she'd forgotten.
"Yeah, sweet pea," she said softly, raking a hand through his hair. "Yeah, that is your dad."
"So, you're the benny lawyer everyone's been talking about, who's here for the summer," Ty continued.
"Not sure what a benny is," I said, "but the rest sounds accurate."
"It just means you're not a local," Bella clarified.
"Ahh, okay." I offered her a grateful smile for the lesson in surfer speak, but her gaze remained on Tristan, who played with the spiral waves the ocean created in her hair.
"Are I a benny too?" Tristan wondered.
"You're a benny, too," Bella confirmed with a chuckle. "A cute little benny."
"It's all tubular, bro," Ty grinned, shaking a shaka my way while sweeping his long, wind-blown, bleached hair from side to side. "So, you surf?"
The conversation took off from there, with most of the discussion between Ty and me revolving around our mutual experiences and non-experiences surrounding surfing. All the while, Tristan monopolized Bella's attention. I wasn't sure why, but I got the distinct impression that though she appeared wholly consumed in Tristan, there was a wickedly mischievous part of her that was at least vaguely aware of the exchange between Surfer Buddy and me. If she was aware, she had to be getting a stealthy kick out of it.
Either way, I was forced to acknowledge a couple of things silently. The first was that though Ty was the epitome of a northwest surfer dude, with the long, bleached hair, the surfer lingo, the laid-back attitude, and the overdone surfer's build, if that was Bella's type, he seemed like an okay guy.
I also accepted I wouldn't have the opportunity to apologize to Bella – not this morning. Not only were both Tristan and Ty obviously determined to remain glued to her, but apart from her initial ribbing and the awareness that, on some level, she was laughing at me, Bella wouldn't even look my way.
"Dad, Ty teached Bella to soaf and he said he could teach me too!"
"I don't know about that, buddy," I grinned uncomfortably now.
"It's all tubular, dude," Ty said, leaning back and swaying from side to side. "Little bro was all amped up, so I offered to show him the big guns and to hang ten."
"I wanna hang ten!"
"I think Trist might be better off hanging on to solid ground until he's a bit older." Like fifty.
"Never too young to hit the lip and feel the juice," Ty grinned lazily.
"I want juice!"
Before I could lose my patience with Ty and say something that would likely earn me no brownie points with her, Bella spoke up.
"Ty, I told you to stop. He's only three."
"But I wanna soaf like you, Bella."
She offered Trist one of her brilliant smiles. "Maybe someday, you will," she said, tapping his nose, "but for now, let's stick to the adventures the other counselors and I have planned for you guys when camp begins in a couple of days."
"Is we going to play pirates?"
"Of course we are! And since you already know all about being a pirate, you can be my special helper."
"Oh, boy! Dad, Bella, and I are going to play pirates!"
Just like that, not only did a grammatical correction finally get through to Tristan, but Bella shut down Ty and his unwanted surfing lessons without my having to resort to cursing him the fuck out and without Trist having to resort to tantrums. I ached to show her my gratitude for handling us Cullen men so perfectly, but Bella refused to look my way.
"Sounds good, Trist. Now come on, buddy. We've got to make a few stops in town before we head home. Say goodbye to Bella and Ty."
"Daaad!" Tristan whined, clinging to Bella.
"Trist," I said firmly.
Bella brushed her lips against Tristan's sandy forehead. "Trist, can you hold up two fingers for me?" When Trist did as she asked, Bella rewarded him with smile. "Good job. Now, there are only two days left 'til camp begins. When you wake up tomorrow, you fold down one finger." Gently, she folded down one of Tristan's raised fingers. "The morning after that, you fold down the other, and then…" she folded down his last finger, "we'll be together at camp!"
"So, when my hand is like this" – beaming, Tristan held up his closed fist – "we'll be together at camp?"
"Exactly!"
"YAY!"
Chuckling, I held out a hand and reassured once again, Trist took it with no more issues.
"Come on, buddy. Ty, it was good meeting you."
"Hang loose, bro! Maybe I'll catch you on dawn patrol!" He offered me the shaka sign once more, which I returned.
"Yeah. Sure. Hang loose." Clearing my throat, I turned my attention to Bella, whose eyes sparkled impishly once again, her lips pressed together to suppress her mirth.
"Bella, thanks for your help with Trist."
"No problem." She swept her gaze toward the water. "Goodbye, Edward."
OOOOO
Early the next morning, the FedEx truck arrived. For the next hour or so, while I sent Chelsea an email thanking her and replied to other morning emails, the long-awaited and deeply missed Blanket served Tristan as everything from an actual blanket under which to cuddle to a superhero cape.
We were in the backyard, on the deck, when the doorbell rang again. I'd been playing around with my new toolbox and with the lumber supplies purchased the day before in town, planning out a deck repair job that had sounded better in my head than it looked in person.
Sporting his cape and his superhero underwear – the cosplay theme of the day – Tristan ran through the house and to the front door.
"Trist, don't open the door 'til I get there, buddy! And you've got to get pants on! Trist!"
Tristan pulled open the door, and in bounded little Esme McCarty, who took one look at Tristan and shrieked, pointing at him in horror.
"He's in his undies! Mommy, Daddy! Tristan is in his undies!"
Tristan grinned proudly, placing his hands on his hips and puffing out his chest.
"I Captain America!"
Once again, Esme shrieked.
Emmett followed in behind his daughter and burst into laughter. His wife, Rosalie, sauntered in behind, unfazed by the sight that greeted her.
"That's what you get for running into someone's house without waiting to be invited first."
"But Mommy, he's in his undies!"
"Sorry, guys," I chuckled. "Trist was playing superhero, and I was involved in figuring out how to tackle a deck repair project that may be beyond my carpenter abilities, so I didn't realize he was answering the door in his underwear until it was too late."
"Edward, stop apologizing in your own house – well, your summer house," Rose said. "Tristan, sweetheart, those undies are adorable, as is your cape slash blanket. Esme, sweetie, stop being a prude. Those are likely the cutest underwear you'll ever see."
"That's my wife," Emmett chortled. "Captain America! Oh, yeah! Give it here, little man!" He stretched out a massive palm, which Tristan heartily smacked.
"I do like Iron Man," Esme giggled.
"There ya go," Rose said, winking at her daughter. "That's Mommy's girl right there."
"How 'bout Thor?" Emmett asked his daughter. "Give him curly hair and smooth, black skin, and that's Dad right there!"
"Daddy, you don't look like a thing like Thor," Esme laughed.
"Daddy wishes he did, honey. Daddy wishes hard," Rose stressed.
"Yeah, Rosie?" Emmett grinned. "You know what else I do hard?"
Crossing my arms, I cleared my throat and reminded them both of the preschoolers' presence with a jerk of my jaw.
"Almost forgot myself. You see what you do to me, Rosie?"
Rose rolled her eyes. "Edward, I like what you've done to the place. Can't ask for more from a single guy."
"Thanks?"
"All right, Tristan," she clapped her hands and shot my son a tender smile, crouching to his eye level. "As adorbs as you look pant-less, go get your bottoms on, honey. We're off to the Chief's for breakfast. Chop, chop."
"Uhm…" I scratched my head. Tristan, however, had no qualms.
"Yes, Miss Rosie!"
"Aunt Rosie!" Rose called out as he ran up to his room, followed by Esme.
"Aunt Rosie!" Trist called down.
Smiling after them, Rose sighed and straightened before looking up at me.
"Oh, crap. Edward, I probably should've asked first. We're just pretty informal with one another around here."
"No, it's fine. It's just…" I waved off her semi-apology, thinking of Bella and how I hadn't hesitated for a moment in entrusting my son to her care. It wasn't that I didn't trust Rose. What's more, I was past believing the Forks Police Force and their partners were kidnappers. It was just new to me, this practice of releasing Tristan to anyone other than people I'd known my entire life.
"Ed, take advantage of the offer, man," Emmett pretended to whisper. He quirked a brow. "Might come in handy one of these days to have someone ready to be a sitter."
Rose poked him in the ribs and hissed something in his ear too fast and low for me to catch before turning back to me.
"We'll only be a couple of blocks down at the Chief's house for brunch. It's so close, you can holler out the window, and we'll hear. I'll even leave you my husband as collateral so that he can help out with that repair project you mentioned."
"Now, that's as good an offer as you're going to get," Emmett grinned.
"I'm sold," I chuckled. "Thanks."
OOOOO
After Rose and the kids left, Emmett and I made our way to the backyard, where I showed him the side of the deck where the rain was beginning to rot the wood. Emmett agreed replacing them was a good idea, and we got down to business.
For a few minutes, the conversation revolved around the task at hand.
"So, you guys are going over to the Chief's for brunch, huh?" I kept my tone casual as I pulled up the first of the rotted boards. Meanwhile, Emmett prepped the tools because apparently, I'd done a shit job at laying them out.
"Yeah, we all are," he mumbled, his tone distracted, focused on the job.
"Mm," I nodded, gripping the next board and yanking hard before what he said hit me. "Wait, what?"
Gaze narrowed and tongue pressed against his top lip in concentration, Emmett attached the bit to the drill.
"Yeah. We all have brunch together on Sundays. Hey, pass me that other bit there. This ain't the right one, counselor." He side-eyed me.
"Eff you," I chuckled. "In New York City, we make a phone call."
"Well, you ain't in NYC anymore!" he roared.
With the correct bit in place, he stood and retrieved the new boards from where they were propped against the wall.
"I wouldn't want to intrude," I said as I pulled up the last board. "Sue and the Chief have been amazing enough without my inviting myself to Sunday brunch now."
Emmett knelt again. "What are you talkin' about inviting yourself? Get out of the way, dude, and lemme start fitting these. Sue told me to come get you guys this morn-" He set down the board and looked up, tapping a finger against his chin. "Oh, wait. Come to think of it, I was supposed to text you last night before you made any plans. Shit," he grinned. "Oh, well. See, as my Rosie said, you forget all these formalities 'round these parts when you see everyone every day." Fitting a board into place, he marked off the drill holes, then pulled the board back up, handing it to me. "Start drilling, Ed. So, do you have plans?"
"Nope. I was about to make a late breakfast for Tristan and me. But..."
Emmett waited for the drill's whir to die down before prompting me. "But?"
"Is Bella going to be there?"
Peripherally, I caught Emmett's eyes flashing to me before returning to his part of the job.
"At Sunday brunch? Yeah. Most likely. It's one of the few things Charlie puts his foot down about with the girls that Sue totally agrees with," he snorted. "They like starting the week out as a fam."
We exchanged another board, and setting down the drill, I scrubbed my jaw with my palm.
"I saw her yesterday."
"Oh, yeah?" He sounded thoroughly uninterested.
"At First Beach. She was surfing."
"Yeah," Emmett snorted. "She tends to do that when she can. So who was she with? Ty?"
"Yeah. Ty. Took me by surprise."
"What, the surfing or the Ty?"
"Both, honestly. I didn't know she surfed. Or had a boyfriend. I almost had a coronary."
Emmett stopped for a moment and quirked a brow. "Over the surfing or the-"
"Emmett, how does she surf considering her-"
"Ed, the surfing ain't for me to touch on. As for Ty being her boyfriend? All I'll say there is, don't get me wrong; dude's a great guy, but he's way too in love with himself and his surfboard to be anyone's boyfriend."
Undeniable relief coursed through me.
"Really now?" I grinned, then cleared my throat and my expression when Emmett side-eyed me again. "What I mean is, after that whole screw-up the other night, I'm not so sure Bella would want me showing up at a family breakfast."
He didn't answer right away.
"So, how'd she act at the beach, Ed?"
"With Tristan? Amazing. With me…" I sighed. "She treated me better than I deserved."
"She's still pissed off." It was more of a statement than a question.
"Oh, yeah."
Emmett snickered. "My girl. Look, without saying more than is my place to say, let's just say Bella's been through stuff."
What damn stuff?
"But you see what she's like."
What is she like? And what made her that way?
In the case of the woman whose dark eyes shone brighter than the stars above her – even in a place as starry as Forks, where the stars outnumbered the population – what was her story?
The questions were so prominent, so at the forefront of everything that I had to resort to mindless drilling to keep from asking.
"She'll make her temper known, but she ain't about to hold a grudge over something as harmless as a misunderstanding," Emmett continued. "At least, not a big grudge. Maybe a medium-sized grudge. A grievance, if you will. You know what? Just keep your little man near at all times. She's got a real soft spot for him, it seems."
"Well, I don't know about hiding behind my three-year-old son as a long-term tactic to earning her forgiveness," I smirked. "But yeah. There sure as hell seems to be a mutual fascination between them."
"Oh, I've noticed the mutual fascination," Emmett said as he fit the next board into the frame. "Trust me, I've noticed. One would have to be deaf, dumb, and blind not to notice. Hand me the next board, will ya since you've decided to watch and talk and be useless."
I handed him the board. "So, you think she'll let me apologize now?"
He paused and looked up at me, cradling his jaw in one hand while pondering the question.
"I'd say it's been long enough where if you try, you won't have to guard your balls too much. But don't quote me," he qualified.
"I guess I can't ask for more than that."
Emmett held my gaze steadily for a few heartbeats before returning to the deck repair, sporting a shit-eating grin.
"You sure you can't?"
"What?"
"Never mind. Nothing. I didn't say nothing. Nothing at all," he said, but he kept right on grinning.
When he added whistling to his routine, I rammed his shoulder hard enough to lay him out on his ass, almost toppling off the deck. At which point, he proceeded to roll back and forth, spouting "Mutual fascination! Woo, boy! Mutual Fascination!" in between peals of belly-cradling laughter.
"Let's get this done, smart-ass," I chuckled. "I find I'm suddenly ravenous for brunch."
A/N: Thoughts?