An electric guitar wailed into Bella's ear, and she bolted upright, her heart hammering and her breaths rushing in fast and loud. The room that materialized around her was almost totally dark. There was only a hint of grayish illumination. It was just enough for her to discern grainy figures interrupting the wall she was facing—threatening, bulky shapes that seemed to loom over her, too close and too tall.
She felt for the scar on her hand, jerking her thumb back and forth across the raised crescent of cooler skin where vampire teeth had once slashed and burned her.
For one bottomless, free-falling second, she had no clue where she was.
The guitar cried out again. This time, she recognized the riff.
Bella turned expectantly toward the music, immediately locating her phone. The screen was on, its glow muffled by the fact that it had been left face down on the pillow beside her. As she lifted it, the iron flowers twined throughout the bed frame over her head were revealed by the now-unobstructed light, and, all at once, everything slotted neatly into a comforting place.
She was in Edward's room. She was back in Forks, visiting with Edward. They had watched a movie and remained on the couch long after the end credits stopped rolling, talking about the film's plot, and its characters, and how and why it was made. It was Bella's first time seeing it, but she saw some parallels between the impressionable, unknowingly foolish protagonist and Lydia from Pride and Prejudice. Edward had countered that the circumstances influencing the characters' respective mistakes were too dissimilar to be compared in any meaningful way. He smiled crookedly and shook his head at her when she told him she might start showing the film to her literature students (she had only been looking to amuse him with the suggestion anyway).
All too soon, her occasional yawns had become annoyingly frequent, and her eyelids began to resist her efforts to keep them apart. It took repeated prodding from Edward, but eventually Bella had been forced to admit defeat and say goodnight. She'd held Edward's hand for hours by then, a reassuring and solid weight in her lap which she'd occasionally caressed when she hoped it wouldn't be too obvious. His fingers were uniquely frictionless yet unyielding, like silken cables of steel. They drank in her warmth.
By the time she released it, his hand hadn't felt cold at all.
The guitar riff started over for the third and likely final time. Bella dragged up on her phone to answer the call, eyeing the name on the screen with a little flutter of apprehension.
"Hey, Mom." Her throat was dry and thick with sleep. She wet her lips and swallowed, trying to clear it. "Everything okay?"
Laughter erupted from the speaker, no less bubbly or contagious than it would have sounded in person.
Bella smiled fondly.
"Oh, sorry, baby!" Renee exclaimed in a hurry. "I didn't wake you, did I?"
"No, you're good. I was just… reading something. What's up?"
"I got us reservations at that new vegetarian restaurant for next Saturday. You know, the one that just opened a few weeks ago that always has a line out the door every time we pass it?"
"Oh. You mean Green Table."
"Yes! I knew you'd remember what the name of it was. Leave it to me to forget already."
"Sounds great, Mom." Bella reached over and felt around for the lamp on the nightstand. It took some fumbling, but she managed to locate the switch without knocking anything over and turned it on. She squinted at the sudden brightness. And then she frowned. "I thought they were having some kind of special event there that day."
Renee laughed, but it was slightly sheepish now. "They are. Speed dating. I thought we could try it together."
Bella's stomach went sour as she laid in a bed Edward had purchased with Edward's belongings all around her. Did Renee have to be telling her about this right now? Couldn't she have asked first, before going ahead and booking the reservations?
She sighed, more at herself than her mother. That was just Renee. Asking first didn't come naturally to her, and, if Bella got irritated, it would only serve to hurt her feelings. Which was one of the worst feelings in the world.
"I'm not sure that's the best idea," she said as gently as possible. "I mean, you know, for me. I'm really not interested in dating anyone. Especially not a bunch of people all at once."
"Well, you should start taking an interest in it again sometime, sweetie. You're not getting any younger. And I hate seeing you alone."
"I'm fine alone."
"I know, but..." Renee clicked her tongue. When she started talking again, the words were higher and rapidly spoken, as if she just recalled where Bella was speaking to her from and a bunch of things she wanted to ask her about it before she lost her train of thought. "Oh! How is Forks? Is it raining? Did you say hi to Charlie for me?"
"So far, so good. Of course it's raining. Charlie says hi too."
"Did you run into anyone you used to go to school with?"
"Not yet. I haven't really spent much time outside or around town, though."
"Have you seen Edward at all?"
Bella dropped her gaze to the gold comforter spread over her legs, trying to fix a snag in the stitching without success. "No. I told you he doesn't live here anymore."
"Just hoping he might've moved back. I liked him. He really made you happy. I could tell."
"Yeah, he does. Did."
A persistent series of beeps started sounding off in the background, growing louder as Renee presumably approached the source. "Oh, baby, I've got to go. I think I burned my eggplant."
"You're cooking?" Bella stifled a groan, checking the time on her phone in disbelief. "All the smoke detectors in the house are working, right?"
"Hmm… No, I unscrewed the ones in the kitchen and the hallway. They wouldn't stop going off."
"That's because the batteries need replaced, Mom."
"Bella, you worry too much! I'll see you when you get back. Find something pretty to wear for next Saturday, okay? Don't make me go by myself. I love you."
The phone chimed at a pitch that didn't sound anything like the timer on the stove. She'd ended the call.
"Love you too," Bella muttered in affectionate exasperation, trying not to let her mind plunge directly off the deep end of worst-case scenarios.
She set her phone on the nightstand and flopped back onto the pillows. The sheets held a floral, freshly laundered smell that wafted up around her like an exhale. The bed had been immaculately made when she had first sunk into it, the blankets free of wrinkles and folded down in inviting, pristine lines. She was glad she hadn't disturbed it too much in her sleep. It still appeared neat, draping solidly over her, though she had shifted from the center of the bed to the far side of it sometime while she'd been unconscious.
An empty space remained mostly untouched beside her, just slightly mussed from when she had tried to occupy the whole mattress herself.
Bella glanced overhead, her eyes latching onto the anomaly in the pattern of the bed frame, the place where there had once been a flower but Edward had snapped the metal as easily as she would pluck an actual, living stem. She couldn't stop focusing on what was missing. She couldn't resist the reminders all around her of how wonderful it felt to lay in this exact place with Edward's arms surrounding her, cradling her to his chest. She wanted to hear him hum a lullaby. She craved the nearly undetectable press of his lips in her hair.
It was a destructive thing to yearn for, an incredibly selfish one that would be that much more damaging when she had to return to Phoenix and the real world. Edward only ever asked her for clarity, and seeking that kind of affection from him would do nothing but confuse matters all over again when they'd just reaffirmed they were strictly friends. She couldn't do that to him. She wasn't going to give in.
Her mouth didn't get the memo.
"Edward?" She surrendered quietly. She told herself it was in hopes that he wouldn't hear, but, truthfully, she knew he would.
There was, however, no instantaneous response. The house remained silent and still. Had he left? She peered at the expanse of glass that made up the south wall, unable to make out any shapes outside or signs of movement. She wondered if he was racing through the trees somewhere. Exhilarated, enjoying himself—hopefully. The night-darkened window didn't reveal anything beyond the glare of the lamp inside the room.
"Edward?" She tried again, using a normal speaking voice and enunciating clearly. "Are you there?"
A slight breeze blew through the cracks in the bedroom door. He answered her from just outside. "I was downstairs. Is there something you need?"
He sounded so concerned about her, so eager to do anything to help. It made it much easier to obey the wiser, more selfless parts of herself and do the right thing.
She backpedaled. "No, no, that's okay. It's nothing. It's silly. I'll go back to sleep."
"Are you worrying about your mother?"
"Heh." She was a little embarrassed but not surprised. If he was downstairs, of course he would have heard the phone call too. "Well, yeah."
"May I come in?"
"It's your room."
The door opened, the hinges squealing as it was pushed aside. The hinges never used to squeal like that before.
Edward gave her a close-lipped smile and avoided the bed, opting to sit on the black leather sofa. "Was my room, Bella. Past tense."
"Where's your room now?"
"It… varies." He shrugged, a bit too casually.
Bella's brow furrowed at that. It wasn't that she hadn't noticed how general most of the information he shared with her through texts and phone calls had become, but, whenever she asked for more details, he neatly sidestepped her questions, and she knew she wasn't in any position to press.
"What does that mean?" Her heart ached. "You're homeless?"
"Hardly. I happen to enjoy traveling, Bella. It's not nearly as pitiful an existence as your expression would suggest."
Bella looked away guiltily, attempting to discipline her features into some less sad, more neutral display. "How does your family feel about your travels?"
"They are supportive of whatever I wish to do."
"I bet they miss you, though. Especially Esme. And Carlisle, and Alice, probably." Bella paused for a moment, distracted. "I still email Alice once in awhile, you know. We don't really talk about you, but she seems good. She keeps trying to get me to order this pair of boots offline, but the heels are so high, I'd probably break an ankle in them."
His tone grew slightly less guarded. "You should refrain from ordering them, then."
"I'm trying. Alice is..."
"Persistent?"
"Try pushy. I'll probably come home to find them delivered on the front porch. That is if there's any porch left to dump them on."
Edward relaxed. Or made the very mild adjustments to his positioning and regard that seemed to be the vampire equivalent of relaxing, at least. He didn't slouch or lean back at all, having no use for the cushions behind him. There was just a little tension that drained almost imperceptibly from him, softening the set of his jaw and easing minute creases around his eyes.
If Bella hadn't spent years marveling over each detail of his face, determined to memorize every facet of his inhuman beauty, she never would have caught it.
"Is Renee's cooking truly so dangerous?"
"You'd be surprised. I guess it's usually more weird and unappetizing than a fire hazard, though. I just hate knowing she's totally alone there."
"You can't be with her all the time, Bella."
"I know. It's just..."
Now it was her turn to feel defensive, vulnerable, exposed. And she was human, so that meant she was prone to fidgeting. A lot.
Bella threw off the covers and hopped out of the bed. She strode over to one of the hulking shapes that had appeared so menacing to her when she first woke up, eyeing the now-recognizable cabinet with purpose. Edward's music was not as well organized or stocked as it had been when she used to come here. That was to be expected, she guessed, since he had officially moved out, but she wondered where he was keeping the parts of his collection that had vanished if he wasn't staying anywhere on a permanent basis.
There were wide gaps in the shelves. A few of them were almost completely empty. She flipped through the CD titles that remained, the cases grouped together loosely, rendered unsteady by the excess space. She cringed as a bunch she had just finished sorting through clattered and tumbled over onto the (thankfully carpeted) floor.
"Oops. I'm so sorry."
"What are you looking for?"
"Um, the CD Phil gave me for my birthday, the one we both had? Is yours here?"
"No, that one wouldn't be here."
Edward rose from the couch and slowly approached to inspect the contents of the cabinet with her, in spite of the unwavering certainty in his voice. Maybe he was just humoring her.
Bella felt a chill like a raindrop striking the back of her neck and dribbling down the length of her spine. Sometimes she wondered whether her survival instincts were really as nonexistent as Edward claimed they were when it came to him. She could always feel it, physically, when he was close. Her body never neglected to alert her to his proximity.
Then again, if that were case, she should have been resisting the urge to recoil, to step away. Not fighting the impulse to step into him, to inch backward and eliminate the thin gap between them that had been created when he leaned over her shoulder. Which was what she was actually doing. Her imagination only seemed interested in dwelling on how near to each other their lips would be if she twisted around right then and faced him.
"Is there a particular reason you wanted that CD?" His cool breath blew into her hair.
She shivered.
Edward straightened, crossing to the stereo and glancing at a couple more discs that had been left on top of it.
Bella knelt to gather the ones that had fallen. She raked her fingers along the soft tips of the carpet fibers, dragging the CDs into a tidy stack. "I guess I wanted to listen to something that Phil liked. Renee threw out all of his stuff, after the accident. It was too hard on her to go through it when we were moving back to Phoenix."
There was a faint buzz as Edward powered on the stereo. Static feedback hissed through the speakers in the walls as though the system was audibly clearing its throat after forsaking a prolonged vow of silence.
"What other albums did he enjoy listening to?"
Bella listed as many as she could think of off the top of her head.
At length, Edward's eyes brightened, and he withdrew one of the names she'd mentioned from a box shoved up against the closet door. He returned to the stereo, put it in, and pressed play.
Like most of Phil's favorites, Bella found the immediate onslaught of the opening track to be grating and a little off-putting initially, but her opinion improved the longer it went on. She remembered the third song especially. It had been playing in the car the day Phil took her to her driver's test. She'd just turned sixteen and was about ready to bounce out of the seat with nerves.
When she told him she passed, she remembered being startled by how big and genuine his grin was—like he was really proud of her, even though he and Renee hadn't been dating more than a few months at that point.
Bella's eyes started to itch. She scrubbed at them with the heel of her hand.
The music stopped.
Edward was holding a small remote which he lowered it to his side. "If you're feeling tired again, you only need to say so, Bella. I know it's the middle of the night, and these songs, while innovative, aren't exactly conducive to sleeping. We can listen to more tomorrow, if you like, once you've rested."
Bella looked at the large, gold bed and thought of other songs that were much better suited for sleeping. But her only response was to nod.
