Honestly I can't thank you all enough for your kind words! And here is to wishing you all a prosperous, healthy, happy 2021!
As typical with this story, when I sat down to expand on the following chapters, I found I was both plagued and miserably haunted by the scenes that, due to it's beginning, I have only been able to refer to in comments. I couldn't be more grateful to the patience, dedication and perseverance necessary with reading this story and in my gratitude and on account of reaching another big number, I have decided to ensure the next chapter is a little more light-hearted.
It has been vitally important to me to truthfully convey the devastation that entails in traumas such as these. But with that said, no person, event, story or response is every truly the same and ever really conveyable.
Light and dark are two sides of the same coin. And as much as there is strength in weakness, there is weakness in strength, too.
So without further ado...
The agony surrounding my shoulders and my ribcage is no less than a thousand pokers slipping through the muscular tissue. Gasping a little, I have to turn in a few different angles to lessen the pain. A headache peaks in, too. Quietly at first until ignoring the ache becomes an impossibility.
I'm on the brink of giving in when a muffled scream brings me up and all of a sudden my tearful, frantic inamorata is throwing herself into my arms. She is breathless, shaking uncontrollably. Arising in a start, I clasp her forearms to keep her steady watching thick bulbous tears drag under her jaw.
'Esme?!' I gasp, lifting her face up to meet mine. She is harrowed, her voice raspy from her haggard coughing. 'What? What is it?!'
She tries to get the words out. Stutters. Coughs. Gasps breathlessly. She tries again, freeing several sobs as her tensed fingers curl on my biceps, thumbs clawing into the bare skin. She almost slips in my hold, quite like she's about to faint but somehow I manage to keep her upright.
She's starting to cry again.
'Es, you're okay,' I whisper softly, trying to smooth the crumbled hoodie. It's only now that I realise it's a different one from the other night. It's likely to be her own but still excessively large. I could lose her within the fabric. 'You're okay,' I murmur again, rubbing her arm.
Water continues to streak down her face, rivers coming from her lashes as she tightens her fists on me. I think she's trying to talk but she keeps coughing and choking and gasping instead. I am paralysed for her.
'Carlisle,' she begs, her sore lips bruising my name. I feel cursed for ever forcing her to know such a sound, particularly as she stumbles over it. 'Please.'
Hesitant, I shroud her a little, holding her tighter so that the furious beating of her blood burns the palms of my hands. I move one hand closer to her back to try and settle the furious gasps. Wrong. I knew it to be wrong. Yet in my concern, all I could think to do was hold her. Bind her limbs together and refuse to let her fll apart.
'Babe, slowly.' I soothe, feeling the fiery tears fall onto my forearms. 'That's it, inhale…'
I do so as an example.
She copies, albeit brokenly, with limited success. I am starting to regret not pulling a jumper to sleep with now. Though I doubt she had the focus to spare, I was uncomfortable on making her uncomfortable. Though if she felt disgusted by my part torso's exposure, she didn't let on. Rather, her slick hands unfurl on my shoulders now, fingertips still clawing into the skin while I focus on instructing her, cautiously allowing my left hand to take ahold of her inner wrist.
The beat was heavy, fast on instruction and quickening in time.
'The window. My window, it's open,' she wavers towards me as I rub her back. She's talking at least so that meant there was breath in her lungs even if it was trying to suffocate her.
'I know,' I reassure. 'I opened it… Esme?!'
Her breath hitches. Rather than continuing to calm, her back against my palm as straightened, like an exclamation point, with her legs begin to cave from under her.
She stutters something, panting in sharp breaths. I follow her eyeline to the floor, supporting her by her elbow when I lead her toward the bedside. Now within reach of a paper bag, I realise her gasps are in my ear. I try to measure her pulse once more except she's shaking and panicked.
I don't quite catch what she says amongst this and so I'm forced to request she repeat herself.
'I can't breathe, Carlisle.'
Realistically, my instincts should've known it to be wrong but I pull Es tighter to me, rubbing my hand firmly up her spine.
'You can breathe.' I reassure her toughly. 'C'mon now, Love. You've got to remain calm.' I move the bag towards her, encouraging her to settle on the bed with a hard hand on her shoulder which she does, not from choice but from confusion. Tears are still slipping over her cheeks as she crumbles the bag in hand. In the first breath, she coughs desperately, skin still flushed and damp as she sobs.
'Listen to me, breathe deeply. Even breaths, Esme.'
She nods in assent, readjusting the bag on her nose and mouth in a way that it's haunting. While I listen for the sound of her calming, I reach to the side of the table to grab my stethoscope, unravelling it as I count her breaths.
Despite the air returning to her lungs, she flinches when I put it on her jumper. Hard.
'Shh-shhh,' I hush, bearing her up with my right shoulder. 'It's the stethoscope.'
This time I wait for her nod and once granted, I pull the metal across the fabric and listen. The sound of her sniffles are drowning out the subtle reassurances I'm looking for. In fact, she coughs several more breaths free and while distracted, I think to covering myself with a jumper.
Though she was undoubtedly suffering, I was aware that if not distracted, the sight of my battle wounds would simply disturb her more.
'I'm sorry,' she whispers, paining me further from just the cry of her lips.
I can't deny that the sentence irks me more than it should. For her to apologise. Apologise. Knowing the words to be too fierce, I simply shake my hair and try to forget the attempt.
'You're okay.' I promise, now cooling as she herself calms. 'Slowly, Esme.'
It takes a few minutes of us unmoving for her coughing to subside and once it does, the breaths fall like long clouds onto my neck. Exhausted, her expression drawn, I try not to move so as not to startle her but I couldn't deny that in spite of the wide, breaking pain that spread from my torso up, I was likewise saved. The alarm of having her so close to me stung bitterly. Yet I was breathing. I was... feeling.
After thirteen long minutes, her thick voice breaks the space between us, nervous and weighted.
'Can... Can you hear over my jumper?'
As ever, her questions sought the heart. Distrusting the exposure of my face, I hesitate.
'No. Not well. But I wasn't going to ask…'
Her wet eyelashes flicker up, the hit of her green eyes striking me, almost literally, in the face. I try to hold it still, letting her look into the cause of her pain. I hoped I was allowing my face to be a spyglass. Through me, she could take the world and not be harmed by it. She holds me suspended at her disposal for several breathless seconds and breaking first, I move to pull my sweatshirt over my head, covering that purple display as quickly as possible.
She hasn't broken the stare yet.
'Carlisle?' She asks, the sad melody of her voice rigging me to focus.
My heart breaks when I turn. She was simply looking, distantly touching me with the edge of her indented fingertips and yet I was being crushed under the immensity of it. The silk of her touch lifts the hair of every follicle.
'Mm?'
I am watching the erratic rise and fall of her chest in that awful hoodie.
'Go ahead.' She whispers.
I want to hesitate. Realistically we knew I was depending on the tool in my hand more for reassurance than specific need and yet the selflessness of the offer was the only thing that could keep my wondering concern sane.
Nodding in time to her pulse, I touch her shoulder again and drag the instrument under the fabric along her spine until resting it against her lungs. She still trembles against the movement, curved back both moving more towards me than away from me, warm underhand. She still shakes and fearing the look on my face, I close my eyes and listen, one earbud free in preparation for her to revoke the offer. Moreover, it was important she didn't feel exposed under my eyes. Not anymore than she had been.
'Breathe in.' I instruct, wincing when she coughs and struggles. I loosen my hand on her, waiting for her to breath to slow. I grimace. She sounded perhaps a little wheezy. Nothing too unpredictable considering…
What was I even saying? Esme was sat here. In the space of my arms, leaning her weight into me, on our bed, trusting me despite it all. I was infuriated, disgusted with every molecule of myself.
My hand drags the tool across, quickly I hoped, without much notice.
'And out…'
She coughs so much this time that she becomes breathless, gasping into her fists, caving inward.
'Shh,' I try to soothe, moving my hand away to allow her the space to breathe again. 'Try not to cough if you can.' I urge, peering over the curtain of her hair to see her try to catch a breath. Before I can control myself, my hand comes to peel the strips of glowing bronze away from her mouth and behind her ear. She shivers in my arms, again ignoring the wealth of fabrics shrouding her.
'When we cough, we tend to fall into a cycle… If you can, try to conserve the energy.'
Es nods more laterally than vertically, trying to follow the suggestion but looking visibly pained.
'Don't distress your lungs.' I plead. She nods again but has to clear her throat, dizzying herself.
With every struggle, my lungs fight to imitate, the fabric of my pullover meeting the textures of hers like they are fighting to interweave. I wonder if she is uncomfortable by it. Or even by my presence. Or perhaps she is just very tired.
Either way I am not convinced she has been sleeping.
'Can I try again?' I ask, indicating the stethoscope, my heart restarting every time she put that face to me. She nods, eyes on my dark jeans, fingers interweaving.
This time, my grimaces are quiet. The panic attack while technically over had the potential to flare up again and though she was calmer, I hated the powerlessness that the threat left me. I try not to lean into her when I give her chest a third listening to but regardless, I knew I was so highly strung that just the very act of being near her was sending my nerves into madness.
I had never been so terrified to be with her. Despite how speechless she had a tendency to leave me.
When a hand is raised towards me, I nearly jump out my skin.
'My pulse?' She offers, again staring fiercely into my face.
Oh God, I was so in love with her. The agony of having her beautiful, haunted features acknowledge me, ignorant, consciously ignorant of all that I was doing to her. My hands are tight together, unqualified, incapable of making her better.
'My –' I shut my eyes again. 'If you are sure, Esme…'
She nods again, delusional, gazing at the way my fingers go immediately to the beat of her pulse. I look at my watch for a second, counting and doing the math before repeating the experiment, this time with my focus on the lightening day. I wondered how she could stand to be near me, if she had connected the dots yet and would realise how much safer she would be if I had never fallen victim to those feelings four years ago. If my self control had been what it should've been, I would've been capable of protecting her.
Feeling the shift in her breathing, I quickly spot her looking at my jaw with a frown on her face…
'How are you feeling?' I ask, cautious as ever. I feel the hesitation from her lips before she moves them. Esme didn't often lie to me, but I was waiting to hear it now.
She would lie to me and I would accept that.
'In pain….' She confesses, soundlessly. She tears her eyes from me now, ashamed as she watches the ceiling.
Time stops.
She trusted me in the same foolish way I had once trusted my flawed instincts. And once more, I give in to them.
Careful, frightened in fact, I gently touch her chin with my index finger and tilt her eyes to meet mine. The bolt of electricity in my cells does not go unnoticed.
'It's my job to fix that.' I tell her, firmly, watered by the cascade of water under her eyes.
'And if you can't?' She asks, still without volume. Her pink lips twist uncomfortably, eyes brimming with thick new tears.
'I'll try anyway,' I vow. And I wouldn't fail her. I couldn't.
When her gaze falls, I feel the sigh exude my lungs and shaking the hair from my face, I take the moment's break to try and replenish the control. I was slipping up so much. A touch, a call, a breath, a gaze….
I was taking advantage in loving her when I wasn't convinced she could handle it. I still couldn't understand why on Earth she had once accepted it before let alone respected it.
I couldn't handle it.
'Carlisle…'
And just the way she says my name has my throat closing. With the tools away from my hands, I regretfully part from the heat of her shoulder and wring my hands together a little. 'Yeah?'
'What's wrong with me?'
I flinch from instinct and hating myself for causing such a question to perturb her thoughts, like a coward, I try to avoid needing her to look at me.
I am what's wrong with you.
She was everything. She was the light of the dark and the stars to the night. She was the movement in life, the sound to rhythm, the breadth and the depth and the height of all that could be. She was the only cause for the humanity left in my capability.
She was the worthiest cause for any of the pain that would fall upon my shoulders.
But I did not want to be hers.
She was my una degna causa. Yet, I could never forgive myself if she made me hers.
'Exhaustion,' I begin, honestly, deliberately refusing to soften the diagnosis. 'Malnutrition. Dehydration. And probably...' I wait for her to sniffle again '...a cold, I'd say.'
I almost go to smile. The thought of a cold wearing upon her, desperate to break her spirit…
Suddenly, matters aren't as funny anymore.
'You know that's not what I meant…' she complains, tilting away.
I knew that. But that was all that was wrong with her. That. And her faith in shit people. I exhale quickly.
'Are you mad at me?' She asks, her voice low as she fidgets with her nails.
'Of course,' I say thoughtlessly. Of course I was mad with her. I was mad that she would ever let herself trust me. I was mad that she would allow me to love her. I was mad that she was good and loving and brilliant. I was mad with everything that had been done to her…
Mad at her. Never.
'I didn't mean that,' I try to amend frowning, 'I'm not mad, I'm just…yes?' my lips say are desperate not to lie once more. For a moment, she seems frightened and stumbling over my words I try to correct myself again but she is, rightly, distancing herself. 'I'm dyi-'
'Is that why you didn't look at it?' She interrupts, holding me accountable.
'The birth certificate?' I presume, regretful at the move of her nod. 'No, not entirely…'
There were multiple factors pertaining to my refusal to look at it. Most typically fear. I was terrified that after all that happened, the only information on it would be the stuff I knew. That she'd risked everything for a pathetic piece of paper detailing fuck-all.
'Then… why?' She asks, curiously. She's gentle still, cautious but the curiosity is still as familiar as her hands, clenched together and moving towards me.
The extent of my wrath was nothing more than utter desolation when in her presence. My chest caved, my eye was sore, I hurt all over and yet the ache to want that smile was all consuming.
'Esme…' I begin, unable the hide the crack of my voice.
'I-I'm sorry.' She stammers, holding a hand out to me. It chokes my lungs with salt water. 'I'll stop.'
'Please,' I beg, unable to control my own weather now. 'Please never do that again?'
Es looks at me curiously. Supposedly shocked at the obvious breakdown in my features, the clearing of my throat, the clench of my teeth. I try not to think of it, the silence of my day without her.
It was wrong, so utterly wrong but to think of her gone, without a goodbye… I mean, she ought to do whatever she wanted. She owned the right to leave on her own accord but my life without her was soulless… I couldn't think on it. The very idea was crushing.
Literally crushing.
Her face flushes for a moment, her hands retreating into the cuffs of her jumper.
'Do...?' She asks, quietly.
'You just up and went….' I start to babble. 'Twice and I… oh God, I thought I'd lost…'
No. I couldn't. I just couldn't. Gasping now, I move quickly from the black hole between us, desperate to cling on to the pain of unrequited rather than to have it vanish beneath my grip. Both my hands clap against my lips, fearful for the confessions that will tumble out.
I would give everything to ensure her safety. Freely give it. But to not even have that goodbye. Not even to someone I loved but to one of my closest friends.
Edward has been instrumental to my humanity in this life.
But it was Esme to whom I gave my vulnerability.
I was not a man moulded for the repercussions of adoration. I was never meant to befriend strangers; I was never meant to involve my life with another. I had always known it to be a danger I couldn't face.
Time had proven me correct. I would accept to losing her all over again if I was given one day to savour the good. The last time I would hear her call my name with life in the sound. The last time I would face the hit of her woodland eyes, the full cheeks, her joyous teasing, the twist of her hands…
'I thought you were gone, Esme…'
She still could be.
I am still looking at the handles of my bedside drawer when I hear her speak, and not predicting the sound, the rage within her tone knocks me for six.
'How can you say that when you were leaving anyway?!' She demands, fiercely.
The confusion is clear on my features. She was angry? She was angry that I was leaving? Why wasn't she angry I wasn't already gone?
'What?'
'This whole time Carlisle!' She wavers a little, standing on legs that are too tired, too shaky to be sturdy. She is on the brink of tears, teeth bared. 'You were preparing every day to leave-'
'Necessity!' I swear, hotly. Had we not had that very conversation a week ago? Had we not discussed how vital it was that I leave to protect their anonymity? And even refuting that, I had just recently proved how predatory the Press could be.
'Necessity?!' She repeats, furious. 'Bullshit! I would never have left you like you were going to leave me!'
'I wasn't leaving you, I was trying to protect you!'
'By leaving me.' She growls, tears tender in her thick throat. My stance falters. She was looking up at me so like Es, so like her normal self except now there was something on the brink of destruction.
The magnet is my chest drags me towards her but she startles and starts to back away.
'I was always coming back for you. You know that. Esme, I-.' She is staring at my pullover, breathing furiously for fury, I hope, rather than pain. 'I could not last a single week without-'
'Stay away from me!' She warns, frightfully.
It had my gut splintering.
I jump, unaware that I had moved towards her and leaning my weight back, I come back towards the drawers. Thankfully the bed pushes a lot of space between us. She was standing closer to the corner of the room than she is near me.
I drop my hands to my sides but stay facing her.
'I'm just trying to explain to you-'
'Don't you come near me!' She yells, chest suddenly expanding as she gasps. I needed to keep her calm. She was too exhausted for this. I certainly couldn't handle it-
'My Love,' I implore weakly, placing my hands flat against the wall behind, splayed in indication. 'I'm nowhere near you…?'
She is still looking at me though from the stress of her screams, I am not sure if she sees me or where I am standing. I stay very still against the wall, remaining deathly calm despite my erratic heart.
'Don't fucking touch me!'
'What? Es?' I beg, miserably. 'I'm not touching you?' She stutters despite this, tears now falling and she tries to rub them away with anger. 'It's okay, look…?'
I try to reference the space between us, the way I'm pressed to brick and cement rather than ever risk hurting her. I raise both hands.
'I'll kill you.' She screams. 'I'll fucking kill you.'
I open my mouth to plead with her, to apologise, to beg for forgiveness, anything, but she quickly escapes the room, leaving me jailed with my thoughts alone.
Knowing that sleep still evaded me thus, I wait until I hear noise to let myself move again. She lets the water run in the bathroom and taking in the state of my bedroom, my own staggered posture, I change into slacks and a shirt.
Even now with action in my steps, I am hiding from the discomfort in myself. I'd frightened her, petrified her, disgusted her… and I didn't know how to make that better.
I close the window in her room first, remake my bed exhaustedly and slip down the stairs with my attention still disturbed. The dining room table is still a mess so I clear my textbooks, the paperwork to the end of the table and set it thoughtlessly.
We hadn't slept. We hadn't eaten. I couldn't remember the last time I looked into the kitchen with hunger in my stomach and hating myself for it, I try to locate something light for her to eat. She hadn't eaten in too long. She'd undoubtedly be in pain but I didn't want to make her feel worse by introducing carbohydrates into her system when she hadn't managed the task herself.
I settle instead for soup and clearing the contents of the kitchen away, I find the distraction comforting. I don't put the radio on, I don't turn on reports of the Neo-natal unit, I don't check my emails or my pager, I just give myself to the small task at hand.
It makes me crave the desperation of work to keep my hands busy. It was the least I could do to keep momentum.
The water shuts off not long after that and though the fear of rejection is high on my concern, I still call up the stairs incase she dreads my approach. I would let her come to me.
If she wanted to.
'I'm downstairs Esme,' I call up to her.
I think she replies, I hear something but not making out the words, I return to stirring the soup on the counter-top. It was hot now but I didn't want it to burn so I stir it round several times and fill a glass with ice and water.
Hesitating slightly, I pound two aspirin tablets to a fine powder and stir this into her food, too. At the very least, I knew it would help a little. Following my own suggestion, I take two, swallowing them quickly and without deliberation.
My headache had returned with a vengeance. The pounding behind both my eyes making the room spin fast, the sweat gathering at my neck. Ah the temperature. I check the heating and noticing that Edward has put it down several notches, and intending to lower that still, the memory of Esme's ferocious shivers drag my hand higher rather than lower.
The roses and the lilies are still in a vase by the window, darkening in the light, crumbling with age so refreshing the water, I try further to keep my fingers moving. At a little past the hour from which I had frightened her, her familiar footsteps drop with precision on the staircase.
As if preparing for an interview, I carefully rearrange my stance and brushing my hair back, I come to warn her that I am standing in the kitchen.
She doesn't see me though her eyes look up. Fresh yet incredibly flushed from the shower, her hair drops down the back of her jumper, patches of water spreading along her shoulders and her back. Her eyes are a lot heavier than they were before. They're almost bruised under the light, squinting from the sensitivity, red like her cheeks and her hands. She doesn't acknowledge me at first. She moves to the front door and accepting the new locks as old news, she informs me that she's just checking they're locked.
'It's bolted.' I promise.
She whips round, surprised to see me and moves a little further away, sniffing through a blocked nose. It provided the aspirin purpose.
'Huh?'
Under the intensity of her confusion, I feel myself falter.
'Y-you said you were checking to make sure it was locked.' I explain concerned at the shiver she gives her shoulders to. It's just a small tremor at first and then the shake rips through her so violently it's almost like a minute seizure.
Food. She needed food.
I nod to the table, at the water by her placemat and then lay her soup down. She stares at it for a second, allowing me the time to fix myself food and a drink. By the time I've returned to the table, she has seated herself.
I move the water closer to her, trying not to watch the way her hands cling together at her lap. She stays staring, mildly confused at the display.
'Eat?' I beg her.
Her chapped lips grimace.
'Is this because I was sick at the Masen's?'
I feel my face change. Liz had not mentioned Es being ill and while I appreciated that she would respect the privacy between them, I also knew that it would be the kind of information that she wouldn't hide from me.
Though Es certainly didn't look well and I could understand feeling nauseous, particularly without any food in her system….
'No?' I question, shaking my hair from my eyes.
Her attention to detail, even while sleepless, astounds me.
'I was sick at the Masen's, right?'
I feel myself hesitate again, and careful to hide my face, I lift my glass to my lip. 'I don't know,' I confess, shrugging. 'But I don't think so.'
With the edge of my spoon, I move the yoghurt and the granola together, chewing on the textures as though I'm eating dry sand and swallowing it with difficulty.
'Carlisle?'
There we are. My name again. The tortuous caress of my name in her capture. I regretfully look up to find her looking rather lost in the coloured liquid of her food.
'This is… soup, right?'
I have to flick my fringe out of my eyes again and struggling, I wrench my hand through it, dreaming of a haircut.
'Why do you ask?'
She shrugs, loosening her stature a little more when she shields herself in the confusion. 'It's just that…' she begins ominously, flicking her eyes to my wrist and back not unlike the move of a Yo-yo. 'It's not yet six in the Morning and-'
It was actually very close to six in the morning. Nevertheless, it was not exactly the type to constitute breakfast food.
'Yeah,' I sigh. 'Yeah, you're eating soup.'
Or would be with hope?
'Is this a bad time to tell you I already ate?'
Possible aversion tactic. She often did the same when we would eat together. I would have to be firm.
'No you didn't.' I refute, too harshly for my liking, just praying she will concede. I was praying for just one spoonful. Just a small amount, nothing more. Just the attempt.
When I force myself to watch her, I realise she is actually conceding. Raising the spoon with a shaky hand to her lips, she hesitates and takes it in. It's only once she swallows that the fresh air can reach about my limbic system. She takes another cautious mouthful and once that's gone, finds the energy to argue with me again.
'I did…' she tries to correct. 'I made toast..'
Rather than just aversion, it might have been an easy way of telling me she was full. Yet she still swallows another mouthful, unaware of the movements. Relief was not a new feeling for me but it kept me sane.
'And tea?' I presume she will add. I try to chew on the contents of my own breakfast and disliking the taste, explain lest I sound bitter. 'The bread is still in the toaster and the two cups untouched by the sink.'
When I look up at her expression, I realise the revelation is a harsh one. Rather than give in at the exposure, she seems confused, disorientated.
'But,' she utters quietly. 'But I remember …'
'Hey,' I whisper softly, letting the spoon clatter as I reach across to her hand. With a start, I remember her tears from an hour ago and quickly drag my hand away. 'You're just exhausted.'
'I'm not crazy.' She states, daringly and then twists her mouth into a question.
Oh my Dear, you are exactly the kind of crazy I will favour forever.
'You're not crazy,' I try to agree, ignorant to my face's movement.
She eats silently for a moment, focused on the actions required while I try to copy. I am so relieved to see her eating; I can barely look at my own crockery. She eats over half the contents and apparently full, takes the water to her lips and drains it within seconds. Theorising, I push my own glass towards her, surprise evident when she finishes that too without her face flickering in disgust.
I move before she does and placing the carton on the table and a water jug, I watch as she opts for the dairy product.
'You must be tired,' I comment, allowing a laugh to break.
I wasn't sure it was a laugh. More the high, dopey sound of gratitude moving within my lips. Obviously I didn't want her to over-exert herself… the trust was there. More than trust. With every spoonful, every sip, I could almost… almost believe that she might be okay.
Eventually.
'What makes you say that?' She gasps, wiping her sleeve across the top of her lip and filling what is possibly her third glass with the cream liquid.
'You never drink milk.' I remind her, nodding.
'I don't like milk.' She replies automatically. Her face furrows, surprised at her own speed as she looks at me and asks under her breath 'I did actually say that, didn't I-?'
It was like sleep talking except that she was awake. Perhaps stupidly, I consider it a relief again. It was an open window into her symptoms, her thoughts.
'You did,' I confirm trying to soften the sound with a chuckle but she still seems confused. It quickly shuts me up. She looks silently at the edge of the table for a moment, absent for a blip before turning her head to the glass.
'I don't understand why I'm so tired. All I've done for three days is sleep.'
Four. I correct silently. Four days.
She looks quietly at her food now and resting a hand under her jaw, tilts her head as if holding it up is too strenuous. Her eyelashes are flickering, slowly, with her hand resting on the glass.
'I don't think you did.' I murmur through a mouthful, watching her refute the suggestion. Instead she sips from the cup, putting the mouth to the rim where my own mouth had touched… Did she realise? If she did, did she care?
'Great.' She mutters, sleepily. 'I am crazy.'
I shake my head quickly. 'No, I just think you told yourself you were asleep when you weren't…'
'Right,' she dismisses, touching an eyelid carefully.
My lips hesitate.
'I think that's also why you keep mumbling to yourself… you do that when you're drunk, too.'
'I do?' She asks, frowning and now I remember that it is not the time for revelations.
'Occasionally…'
She drops her hand away, frowning. 'Oh how ridiculous!'
This time, I don't smile. I look at the bowl in front of me and push around the contents again before losing my appetite. I quickly cast it aside. She pushes away from the table in a similar manner, looking up at my expression.
The guilt is obvious.
'I've been eating.' I attempt to tease though the comment sounds so salty. She lowers her eyebrows.
'I wasn't going to ask…'
I wince a little. I had hoped it wouldn't have come across as harshly as it did. I had hoped for a lot of things but the least I could settle for was consistency. Looking up to her now, I was inexcusably out of my depth. She had been inconsolable an hour before and now she was saying the right things but sounding so far removed, so distant…
Yet she was here. She was still sat barely a metre from me.
Thinking of her gone had my chest palpitating once more. What would I do? Other than try and send Edward away too, that was clear. I would wake up, I would go to work, eat food, sleep, repeat.
At least then, I couldn't hurt anyone.
The bitterness of silence in my loneliness might kill me.
Esme's eyes follow me for a second. They shock my sight awake, woodland eyes swimming in my blue tones. They quickly fall to my face, reading the bruising like pages of a mistreated book before ending up at my knuckles.
Even shuffling under the watch does little to remove her attention.
It was like being seized by another set of cameras, committing all bruises to an unforgiving memory. She was possibly still angry. Her delicate features may not suggest such a thing. Exhaustion was a peculiar trope. All consuming, it ate her expressions and rewrote them with fatigue.
How many moments would I get before she wanted me to leave? Till we were far past breaking point…
I clear my throat and start to speak, not knowing how the noise will bear across the table.
'When I was about seven…' she looks to my mouth and finding it moving, reads the words from my lip, the cuffs of her hand held to the lower side of her nose. 'I used to go to the market with one of the chefs. Lovely Italian woman.' Chiara; as warm as she was stout, 'We used to buy these gorgeous tomatoes-' I reimagine one, holding it in my fingers, trying hard to visualise the burning red of the fruit, so bulbous with juice and hold it up for Esme to see. She is looking through the gap to my face though her gaze flickers as if trying to see the image.
Unfruitful, she gives in and stares more at me.
'So sweet,' I continue with admiration. 'And so ripe that with one bite, the seeds would shoot out the other side.'
I pull my leg towards my chest now resting on the knee in caution for what she might want to hear and what would frighten her more. Taking the air into my lungs, sharply, without risking concern, I move on, eyes drifting to the table again.
'She used to take me to these local markets and if ever I didn't know where I was, I should head to this... errr...fountain and she would find me. ' Was this explicit enough? Fontana? Monumento? Visualizzazione di marmo?… Did it capture the image? I look up briefly to realise that though her hair is starting to wave against her cheek, she is still inclined towards listening, silently taking the words in. When I continue, it's as though I am conscious of the weight in my words.
'One day, when I was closer to eight, I… got lost.' Wincing at my own euphemism, I try to remember it is not Edward but Esme I am talking to and though I desperately wanted to shield her from the traumas of the world… well, she wasn't that naïve.
'Well, no, I didn't,' I correct myself, stumbling. 'Where we lived… it wasn't far from the city, tourists everywhere and one day she sat me by the fountain, took my left shoe and-'
I feel the breath waver a little. My ribs were hurting more now with every thud of my heart. Looking at her made it worse, thuds became a beat drumming into my bones like an RSI.
'Slapped me so hard, I fell in the water.' I confess, still feeling the pain on my cheek from the rubber edge. Shoes that I had specifically been bought on the provision they be worn anywhere but inside the grounds. I almost smile. The ties that children bore to materialistic items were ironic.
Opposite me, Es fiddles with the cloth on her sleeve, still watching me as if to comment.
'It hurt, obviously. But being acquainted with the swimming pool, I managed to pull myself out only to find she was gone. And being very lost, I obviously burst into tears.'
'Anyone would.' She reassures, softly and I find my head nodding even if I don't believe it necessarily.
In the options between fight or flight, I often took the coward's way out.
'The markets in Italy open fairly early and the place was swarmed.' I could still see it, the masses of people towering over me from a distance. Sunglasses tilted upwards to avoid catching my eye. 'No came near me, the Polizia seemed to think it was a stunt and warned people away. So I didn't move. I waited and didn't move.'
Entranced till this point, as if this might be one of Aesop's fables, I hesitate at my rather artistic beginning. The rose tinted glasses had sought to build the images in lavish colours of gold and red. I didn't want her to believe it had been oh so beautiful, which it had at times…
'The only food I had were scraps-' more, scraps that I'd found rather than had. 'And I wet myself because I was too terrified that I wouldn't find her.'
Her mouth drops open, hands folding together on the table.
'It was horrific.' I murmur in agreement to her nod. 'Anyway, on the third night, she came back. She found that I hadn't moved and she sobbed the entire way home.'
'Three nights?!' Es bursts in, frown turning stiff, 'What about the care system-'
I hesitate to answer her and instead continue the point.
'When I got home, I ran crying to my father to find he wasn't there. The study was packed up.' The frown on her far too delicate face, the heart shape curve of her cheeks leading to her chin leads her face upwards. She stares so hard at me that I can feel my nerves start to bristle. 'On the night she'd left me, she'd presented the shoe to him as evidence of my escape… but he didn't come looking. He packed…'
I snort but she doesn't smile.
'A while later, he was contacted and returned to find me hysterically crying for forgiveness. He was so…repulsed to see me with my snotting nose and red cheeks.'
Tell her, Carlisle. Tell her. I inhale through my nose and let the ache brutalise me.
'I've had an irrational fear of being left ever since….'
And though it often accompanied the desperation to run, in comparison the loneliness was debilitating, dehumanising and unavoidable. When I look up to meet her face, I notice my hands are shaking a little and use them to push my knee back to the floor.
I felt tired, embarrassed, nauseous but…unmistakably… lighter. And far more bitter than I was several months ago.
'It's not irrational, Carlisle...' she whispers, watching my hands fidget together.
'Esme,' I move across the distance to her, my right hand outstretched but she flinches and witnessing the mistake, I quickly pull my hand back, opening them now towards our ceiling.
They're still a little sore on the palms, scraped and grazed. I didn't know who I was addressing when I began to speak but I felt that both recipients would need to hear the confessions of my sins.
'I… I can't pretend like I have the solution… But I'm-'
'Devastated,' she interrupts harshly. 'I know. I know you are devastated, I'm sorry-'
It was like being hit with a golf club. To apologise. To me. As if she felt I needed to hear her apologies. As if she blamed herself. It would make me insipidly angry if it didn't break my heart.
'No.' I insist, letting the sound bleed forth as pathetically as it sounded in my mind. In an effort to protect us both, I try addressing Him, saving the misery from abusing her further. 'I'm dying from the reality that I can't fix this for you. That I can't fix whatever it is.'
I'm looking at her again, pleading as her hands start to twist and grip.
'But I need you know that for as long as you want me… I will never leave you.'
'Don't say that,' her lips say, she flinches a little, shutting her eyes closed from the never ceasing light. Light on her nose, on her forehead, hiding the summer greens of her eyes, the thick eyelashes, the freckle under her right eye.
Her bruising, too.
Did she want me gone? Was the house now becoming as haunted and as cold to her as it was to me? Did she shudder at the sounds of doors closing? Did she count the number of times she had checked the doors were locked, whether the blinds and curtains were closed?
'Why?' I ask, clearly projecting my own desperation for familiarity through her lips.
'You can't possibly understand-' she complains, silencing the air with the blade of her words.
Help me to.
'Do you want me to leave?' I ask urgently, desperate to do right. Be the right thing. Fix the ends and amend the issues.
'What?!' She asks, hazily, pushing herself further from the table, further away.
'I-if you want-'
'Do you really think I want you to go?!' She demands, curling into a glare and she tries, with difficulty to plant her feet into the floor. She's standing, hands out as if to coach her from inevitably falling. Her features are hazy, sleepily, dizzy as she fights to close her eyes. 'Carlisle if you go I have nothing.'
She would have peace, anonymity, security. She would have freedom and sanctity and family. I couldn't help except abide her wishes. I was a weak, foolish husk of a person and I couldn't disobey her needs.
As she holds her eyes closed, I hesitantly move in my chair. My eyes slip shut, my hands still open.
Sir. 'Tell me how to help in times of-'
'Can't leave-' she demands, louder over the address of my prayer. My words keep coming. I pull my hands together now, interlacing the fingers and holding them there, gripping in case the warmth makes them slip.
Prayers were louder when they were spoken aloud. Though it did feel crass of me to pray in English rather than the familiar tongue.
'Lord, tell me what to do-'
'I can't,' she snaps through gritted teeth. I keep my eyes wrenched closed, trusting that If I asked, it may be provided. If I ask for the support, I might receive the support, if I asked for the strength, the compassion, the ability… I didn't know what else to do.
'I can't do this,' she groans, audibly throwing the chair out of her way as if eager to throw it against the table.
'Give me the strength to support, to rectify the wrongs done by and to those in need. Give me the trust-'
'Carlisle!' She shrieks, and at her horror, I feel my stubbornness waver, I had to keep going. I needed to keep going. 'No. I can't do this.'
No matter how much I pleaded with myself, I couldn't stop. I couldn't shut up.
'And the faith to-'
'I can't do this without you.' She snivels, tears now slipping into her voice as she coughs and chokes, water building. 'Please,' she utters desperately. 'Please stop… Listen to me.'
At her cry, I wrench my hands and eyes open and find that she is faltering, leaning on one side, fists curled as tears slip down to her neck. She pulls the hair behind her ears, full display of the vulnerability on her face.
She wavers again, faltering as lightly as thread would and concerned over the stance, I move carefully, ready to clasp a hold.
'I need you to listen-' At this, I silence my prayers. I shut my mouth. Comparatively, she lets her tears fall, and drops to her knees but she doesn't reach the floor.
I have moved quickly to wrap my arms tightly around her, containing the sobs beneath the shackles of my arms, holding her tremors as though she had spent the last seven days in the arctic. With a tense hand, she wraps her fingers in the bottom of my hair and gasping, feeds heavy and relentless tears into my neck.
With minimal ability left in my calves, I lift her and hold her tight, carrying us both to the edge of the sofa until the tears subside into the mid morning and she sleeps, cautiously in my arms.
The focus of keeping my limbs deathly still leads to an inevitable ache stretching from my triceps into my shoulders and down the edges of my spine. She slept for longer than I thought she would and once her roughened breathing had stretched enough to indicate the depth of her restfulness, I fought with myself for the distance she had requested. I returned her to her room. Wrapped more blankets around and over her. Found more pillows to build around her. And hesitantly gifted myself four silent minutes of wanting so desperately to untangle her waves, to fold armed limbs across her like a barricade. To place a distant, open-soulled, enamoured kiss to her temples...
Like a story, I instead encased her in a tower of cushions and hoped that in whatever direction she faced, she was supported with warmth.
In spite of the ache therefore, I awake sometime after my beloved, having tuned out the throbbing from all areas, I sleep peacefully on the sofa and without much disruption.
'Where is Edward?' Esme asks from above and flinching from the surprise, I have to calm myself before thinking to open my mouth.
She is leering above, her long waves now messily pulled into a bun behind her head. She seems strangely assertive and holds a drink to her mouth, a mug of something hot judging from the steam.
'Are you-?'
'I was sick.' She says with a shrug, but when I start to pull myself up off the sofa she moves as if to keep me still. Conceding, I drop my head back and wince when it irritates my returning headache. 'Edward?' She repeats, urgently.
'Err, classes, I think.' I answer distractedly.
'Oh.'
She sips the drink lightly, hand shaking though she tames it with a glare.
'Are you okay?' I repeat looking at her again. I was curious to know what had happened. If we had reached an recognition. If we had breached the edges or if I was simply delusional. Had I forced my arms around her?
The avoidance of her gaze would almost suggest as so though her determination to pull her posture rigid...
'Why wouldn't I be?' she says stiffly.
This time, I don't hesitate pulling myself up and though it makes the room spin, it allows the space to come back into focus. The T.V is on, nothing sinister showing just some old documentary about Gothic buildings. I don't know when it was turned on though I hope not too long ago. I don't feel comfortable with the idea that I've been foolishly sleeping while she's in pain.
The noise from that stupid machine is making my eyes hurt.
'You said you didn't feel too good?' I murmur in question, preparing myself as though buttoning up my lap coat.
She shrugs again. 'Maybe it was the milk?' I find myself nodding skeptically. I should've known she was drinking too fast. Stupid. I was't paying enough attention 'When is Edward coming home?'
I hesitate again. Lying wasn't going to get us anywhere. Though I needn't be as explicit as she feared, I couldn't decide what I was feeling now looking at her. She was facing me, more than I'd expected her to, but she was likewise... straight. Blase, almost.
I needed to be honest with her. If she'd felt uncomfortable at my informality this Morning, and she had a right to... well I needed to tell her the real extent. My hand is stiff when I use it to wipe any beads of warmth from my forehead.
'Es,' I begin, unable to deny myself the familiarity. 'Maybe you should sit down?'
Judging from her response to this, she is clearly more patronised than I had meant the words to be. She neither kinks a playful eyebrow or juts out a curved hip. In fact, her voice has that soreness to it when she responds.
'I'm fine standing.'
I hadn't even noticed her response when I pulled her from my arms just an hour or so ago. I didn't know what she said, how she felt, if it was a sudden decision or if she had wanted us to part from the second I had my hands on her. She is wearing jeans now, a long t-shirt with a top underneath and a thick cardigan but no shoes. Her socks were moving carefully across our floor, cautious to lead her from one place to another.
Perhaps she had been awake for a while.
'I think he wants to stay elsewhere for a few days…' I say honestly, referring to our the third housemate. I hadn't had chance to check my cell yet but I suspected he was okay. At worst, he hadn't told me he was moving out yet. At best I could probably hope for a choice teases as he referred to his father's temper.
'Why?' She asks, voice breaking almost.
Between my knees my hands pull together. Angling myself towards her, I try to be sincere though not over readable. I had no idea how much she might hate me. Or even come to hate me. Yet I was pretty sure it was about to get considerably worse. She must have thought I had banned him from the house.
And she must have hated me for it.
'A lot has-'
'I don't blame him.' She snarls and now I realise she had observed oh so wisely the crux of the issue. Edward gone meant change. Es was superstitious regarding change. Not against it per se, but wary. I was careful to try and bridge any distrust between the two. If Edward were a coward, it was undoubtedly my fault and he didn't deserve to shoulder the fault of that.
Likewise I didn't want her to punish him like I had tried to do. He'd been hurt enough.
And so had she.
'I know,' I rush in quickly. 'He knows that. It's more that he feels that we have some things to say to each other.'
Impressive really the extent to which I was opening myself up.
'Why?' She demands, curling both her hands over the edge of the sofa.
I think she notices the guilt seep into my face and she doesn't let me vanish from it. She waits until it's stuck on every visible fibre before letting her distaste be visible.
'Will you sit with me?' I ask weakly.
She doesn't answer in so many words. Hesitant, she moves to the centre of the room, judging each option carefully before choosing to sit on the armchair across from me. She perches cautiously on the edge, errant strands of her locks waving under her chin. I realise now that she's wearing make up, nothing overtly colourful, more natural enhancements.
She had quite literally drawn on a face to look at me.
'What's up?' She says shortly.
I frown at my hands and try again. It was a one-eighty spin from a few hours ago and I was overtly aware that it was most likely the fault of my over familiarity. Starting the conversation on a timid foot was never going to get the point across… and as Edward mentioned… we had a lot of explanations to get to. If she was going to be inexplicably mad at me, I felt it best to get the pain over with now, in one lump sum rather than spread the guilt over the next so many years in my life.
In truth, I would be doing that anyway. I might as well begin my atonement with immediacy.
'Es... the other night…?'
Watching the direction of my tone, she flinches and turns her eyes from me. I have to keep my voice very tense to stop it from breaking. There was also a chance she might not know what I was referring to, there were too many 'other night's' in the recesses of her thoughts.
'Do you remember coming home?'
'Get to the point…' she curses, impatiently. I scrunch both fists together.
'Thursday evening.' I answer quickly. 'You were sick in the night…'. She stays unblinking. 'Esme, I…'
I rearrange my features and try to distantly imagine how the conversation would go if I were at work instead. At the very least, I imagined I wouldn't be fighting the urge not to be sick into my hands. But in truth, whose to say? I had never had to face a matter like it. 'I cleaned you up and amended the bandages and-'
'Are you saying you undressed me?' She asks neutrally.
Rather than take the comment calmly, I am struck silent and feel my stubbled chin nod.
'Well,' she murmurs. 'I guess it's nothing you haven't seen before…'
Purgatory seemed a horrible union of frustrated silences and unprofitable anger. She's so impossible to read in this moment that I try to limit my vocal responses in case they said more than I wanted them too. It was worth noting that she wasn't wearing any bandages now but that she was likewise covering every wound.
'It wasn't like that.' I explain, quietly. She nods as though she doesn't care to hear.
'Did we have sex?' She asks, bored almost.
The glass in my stomach shatters into sharp triangular shards and bury themselves, like an explosion, throughout every corridor of my veins.
'Of course not.' I reproach, irritatingly. 'Do you really think that lowly of me?'
Again, rather than seem likewise bruised by my sudden anger, her blank stare twists into disinterested surprise.
'No.' She murmurs, humoured. She shrugs again. I had nothing to suggest she was telling the truth. Nothing was pointing to a lie either… I wondered if this is what we were about to transgress into; fury and soulless murmurings. 'Why? Do you think that lowly of me?'
I earnestly shake my head, regretting the stupid words and my stupid mouth. She sniffs, her cold changing the sound of her breath as she looks to the TV, mouth smiling for a second before I realise it's satirical.
'Maybe you should.' She says under her breath.
I part my lips to refute the comment but she has already removed herself from the scene, lifting with such an airy jump, she could almost be dancing as she slips upstairs.
This time, it is irrefutably more difficult to not disturb her and though the brutality of her words couldn't be denied, I wasn't foolish enough to ignore that no matter what pain I was in, she was suffering so much more, and trying her best to disguise it.
Simply opening myself up to the threat of conversation was like walking along a desert gulf of geysers, ready for them to implode under my clumsy feet.
By lunch time, I try to entice her out with something homemade. I struggle at first, going through the cupboards and noticing that Alice and I had slightly different appreciations in cuisines. I also needed something plain, unlikely to disturb her stomach and settle for making bread. I hadn't done so since young. It takes some time, thankfully. The kneading of my hands keeps other thoughts absent and when I'm reading the recipe, I realise I don't have to panic about studying.
Or rather, since avoiding my own submission to therapists, I could ignore the need to study.
The smell also makes the kitchen warmer, more welcoming.
When I knock on her door that afternoon, I keep a tight hand on the plate. Held away from me as an offering, I wait for the permission to enter. She doesn't grant it.
'I made lunch?' I announce hopefully to the wood.
'M not hungry..' she retorts back
'Esme..' I murmur through the door, resting my head on the wall and listening out for further frustrations.
'I said I'm not hungry.'
'Can I come in?' I beg, trying to grip onto that stubbornness that had bore me through most of my infancy in Medical School.
She doesn't reply and so knocking once, I enter on my own accord.
'You need to eat something.' I say firmly. She's curled up her side on the bed, gripping her stomach and facing the wall with an emotional glare disturbing her features. The self-loathing immediately leaks from my pores. 'Es?'
'I'm not hungry.' she repeats stiffly, grinding her jaw together as she tightens both forearms across her stomach, wincing and snivelling. Discarding the food on her desk, I come to sit behind her back, tugging my sleeves above my elbow.
'Let me see?' I request, gently. She gasps as she loosens the fold of her arms, gripping onto the cover beneath her with a clammy fist. Her face is looking flushed again, on account of the multiple layers and the closed window. 'Can I feel your stomach?' I ask, hoping that she will raise the jumper for me. Instead, she shakes her head quickly.
'Over the clothes?' I amend. She hesitates, wincing with irritation and eventually nods.
I place both hands together and carefully feel around her stomach, assessing the area while keeping my eyes on her face. I try not to take too long, particularly when she is revolted by the touch but I am more concerned about her pain than her current discomfort.
'You're hungry.' I murmur, gently. She furiously shakes her head against the bedding.
'I just feel sick.'
'Honey, you haven't eaten properly in four days. Right now your stomach is trying to do this.' I clench my hand and mime the cramping so that she can get an idea of where the pain stems from. 'If we don't change that, not only will you struggle to simply stand, you could end up really hurting yourself.'
'I ate today.' she fights weakly, curving in again when another cramp starts to seize her. Her eyebrows interweave, fingers undoing the bedding and clenching a colder part of the duvet.
'You were sick today.' I remind her. 'You need to eat something…'
She crosses her arms around her again, trying to pull herself up though settling for a half try, eyes still shut tightly as her shoulders waver.
'Dizzy? I presume. She nods, miserably. 'Here.'
I pass her the plate cautiously. She takes it from my hands in a half snatch, guiltily looking beneath her lashes at me. Her fingertips touch the crust of the food before rubbing the crumbs back on the crockery. Hesitant, she breathes in, and frowns.
At this point I couldn't tell if she was pink, white or green. Just an unfortunate palette of all three.
'It's warm.' Her lips say, confused, trying to move the bread from her as the nausea hits. The guilt is evident in my face and it is with frustrated loyalty that I try my best to hide it.
I nod. 'You can wait till it cools if you prefer. I don't care so long as it gets eaten.'
'Hard bargain,' she mutters. I almost go to smile, and then I remember I'm trying to stay firm at the risk she'll persuade me otherwise.
I'm still half perched on her bed, the new bedding unfamiliar and neatly pulled to each side of the corners. Her shampoo is still evident, roasting almost in the box of the room, warming through the double-glazed windows till the whole area was brimming with summer fruits. From the corner of my eye, she pulls the plate towards her nose, inhales and winces. It's difficult not to watch her. Really I should leave, let her have the freedom to discard the thing out the window. If she was in pain now…
'I'm not hungry,' she murmurs again. The cold ceramic of the plate edge is touching my arm now, her voice dialled down to a hush. I feel myself nod and then I turn towards her again and request the plate.
'Elizabeth used to make her own bread,' I murmur, breaking the roll carefully in my hands and offering her the other half. She takes it but doesn't make any sign that she intended to eat it. 'In the summer when I'd stay with them, there'd be weeks where Senior had to work. Liz isn't a fan of driving so she used to find ways to keep us entertained at home…'
I take a bite of the bread, skeptically. It was fine. Warm, doughy, soft. Not as good as Elizabeth's of course. It never would be. Besides, food never tasted as good when you weren't hungry. I point half the food towards her.
'It's not as good.' I confess. 'My home economics clearly didn't pay off.'
Delicately, she presses the bread together till it becomes dough again. She grimaces and cautiously, bites a small chunk off. I stare at her the whole time.
'You haven't left it to prove for long enough,' she explains, delicately and clearly spotting my frown matches it with her own. 'It's not bad...'
'It's too salty.' I complain. She hesitates, bites another bit and nods.
'Yeah…' and she passes the roll back with the suggestion of amusement in her eyebrow. 'Maybe just stick to the Italian food from now on?'
'Can I get you something else?'
She shakes her head. 'You were telling me about your classes…'
The exhaustion is obvious now. She is still in discomfort, still curled away from me… though keen to distract herself.
'Eat something first?' I ask, clearly appealing to every angle of her sympathy. She was well within her right to say no… and I would sulk off. And suffer. Her hard frown turns harder and with a tough exhale, she starts to move.
'I'll get it.' I insist, already moving. 'Tell me what you want and I'll get it.'
'I have got legs, you know.'
'I'm already up.' I insist, retreating towards her door again. She rolls her eyes, perhaps scathingly, and confesses she was hoping we had soup left. So I reheat soup, a different kind, and offer it as a gift with a handful of tablets. Nothing too strong.
I suspect she may be getting somewhat fed up of me by now. Pulling out a chair at her desk, she moves her camera and a few sketchbooks to the end of her bed and sits in front of the bowl, her head balanced against her fingertips.
'You really going to watch me eat?
'Sorry,' I murmur, nodding.
'For how long?'
'Hm?'
'How many weeks can I expect this to go on?' She asks and then frowning, she tears her gaze back to her food and stirs.
'Not long.' I promise somewhat optimistically. 'Just till you can keep it down…'
'How do you know it's not just a bug?' She demands, her voice still quiet. 'You weren't exactly forcing food down my throat last week when I was ill…'
'I am sorry…' I repeat spinelessly. I've put my hands in my pockets now, concerned for their excessive fidgeting but at her command to sit, I hesitate and settle against the bed frame at the floor, perched on a rug with my eyes on my knees and my focus on her. She pauses again, her back still curved with both legs pulled towards her.
Then, marvellously, she eats.
'Go on, then.' She complains. 'Home Economics?'
'Well, it was just that.' I confess. 'It's possibly one of the reasons stitches come fairly naturally to me.'
'You can sew?' She asks, looking behind to me. I nod.
'Yes. Considering it is such an integral part of my job I prefer not to entertain the skill in private.'
She pauses in raising the spoon to her mouth, stops and lowers it.
'Full?' I ask.
'So music, arts, cooking? Anything else?'
'She also taught me to dance.' I add, shyly.
'And three, four languages?'
Conceding with this rather generous estimation, I nod, guiltily though that couldn't solely be put down to Elizabeth's shoulders. My father had a rather strong hand in that. As had Edward senior.
'And gardening, too?' She adds.
'Some.' I confess. 'Admittedly I didn't retain too much of those lessons. How come?'
She quickly takes another spoonful, eager to hide the reason for her curiosity. She twists her eyes to the window for a second and back to her food, still cramped on the edge of her chair though hopefully comfortable. She at least seemed not to be voicing her actions this time. But that could simply be put down to the distraction of eating.
It was so much easier to be consumed with pain when there was nothing surrounding to distract you.
'They are very good to me.' I say, wondering aloud if this may be the direction of her thoughts. 'Sponsoring me, even. Taking me on travel holidays, theaters, balls… giving me a career.'
'What about Edward? What did he get?'
'Much the same.' I say at first and then I shake my head. 'Perhaps less from his father. Or rather, more in materials to make up for the friction of personalities. It's part of his skill, I guess. Mr Masen can be very argumentative.'
'Lawyers.' She curses.
I smile.
'Is Edward mad with me?' She asks after some time, her voice even quieter. She has hung her head a little as if regretful. The honesty in my reply is not forced in the slightest.
'No.' I promise, staring at bruised hands and wondering why it was so difficult to feel them whenever I was around her.
'Really?' She scoffs.
'Really.' I repeat, sincerely. 'If anyone, he is likely to be furious with me.'
'You've been arguing.'
It wasn't a question, just an acknowledgement. She turns in her chair to peer at me. Now I don't look at her. I keep my guilty expression away.
'Yes.'
'You never argue.'
'We do sometimes.' I amend. 'But it is rare.'
Likewise it is exhausting and an utter waste of both our time. We never got very far arguing.
'Will he come home?' She asks, emotively. It makes my chest ache again. I hesitate before nodding.
'Yes.'
'Carlisle.'
I wince again. 'In time. Like I said, I think he felt he was intruding…'
'How could he think like that?'
'I don't know.' I agree. 'I tried to say the same. Alas, he was adamant we talk.'
'Why?' she asks.
'Communication is important to him.' I suppose. 'He's very intuitive. I think it frustrates him when people aren't honest to each other.'
'Like us?' She guesses. 'We're not very honest to him.'
Us. What a peculiarly violent phrase. 'I am not very honest with you, Esme.'
She surprises me in snorting.
'Are you finished?' I ask, peering to look at the bowl in front of her. She'd left some of it, not too much for me to be disappointed, enough really considering she was still in pain. Though she had not yet touched the pills.
'For now.' She agrees, removing herself from the table and jumping when I come to take the bowl from her. Consciously, I move farther away.
The very act makes her uncomfortable, I was aware, but I was determined not to expect her to over exert herself as she had this Morning. She was already looking tired again and decides to wait for me to move a significant distance till she resigns herself to the head of her bed again. I already knew the words were going to come, she was to dismiss me and I wouldn't have a reason to ignore her wishes.
I tilt my chin in a nod and realising that she fully intends to sleep more, pulling the cover over her curled posture and facing the wall away from me, I leave silently.
'Carlisle?' she asks as I pull the door to. Cracking it open a little, I lean on the wood of the frame, cautious of the struggled sniffling... until I realise she's not just suffering from a cold. Rather that tears are slipping heavily down her cheeks. Compulsion slips a hand over the strings in my chest and drags me forward till I am precariously balancing on my toes towards her.
I try not to get too close. I try to stay as far as I can but she is crying and it makes my heart bleed. I acknowledge her broken voice with a delicate hum of affirmation.
'Can you book an appointment?'
She didn't need to clarify what appointment. She didn't need to.
'Of course, My Love.' I kept doing it, I kept slipping, kept trying to throw my love onto her with violent demands. She snivels a little more, coughing a breath free as she buries her head. 'For when?'
'Now.' She mutters.
'Now?' I repeat unsure.
'Now. I need to go now.'