The Experiment

Teeny Tiny Twilight

I could feel the small notches in the steering wheel where my fingers had pressed too hard in the stress of the moment. I hadn't even noticed at the time how the plastic was slowly warped under the brutal strength of my hands. It was uncomfortable driving like that, my hands naturally resting at ten and two when the grooves rested at a lazy nine and three, having relaxed my hold as I had moved to get out of the car. My fingers wanted to slip into the grooves that were uniquely mine, while common sense warred to keep my hands placed correctly.

Oh moan, oh groan. Of all the things to complain about!

This was hardly the most major concern at the moment. The second most important matter was that I was slowly coming up, seeming to surface for air now. My chest wasn't so compressed, and that made it easier to breath, to open my mouth and pull in air without fear of the strange unknown weight finding its way down my throat and into my lungs.

Why I wanted to breathe was beyond me: the girl's scent was still stained into the seats. The scent was merely a faint echo of the actual smell of her. An echo only, but almost enough to convince me that I needed to turn around and personally take care of the primary discomfort that itched at the most sensitive places in my heart.

I had been seen.

This fear had my chest tighten in a different way from the drowning. It was easier to place, to work through. This feeling was like the scent that was slowly being aired out of my car; only a weak echo.

A strange thought entered my mind. The feelings the woman had pulled forth from me had been the first real thing I had felt in decades. That was why everything else felt so washed out and anaemic in comparison. The thought was only a faint whisper in my ear and so easy to push from my mind. I shook it off, moving on to more important things.

What had she seen? I couldn't quite grasp onto the memory of getting to the car. It, like the rest of this life, had been crystal clear, every inch of rust on the old car out front, just barely being touched by the light seeping through the entrance from the hotel lobby. I couldn't call forward if I had been running when she saw me, or running. The memory was …unsure, as I had been more concerned with grasping back onto reality, and less concerned with what my body was doing.

I started shaking.

What did it matter, really? The worst she could do was tell someone that some strange man had suddenly appeared in front of his car after having been on the second floor of a hotel just moments before. No one would take her seriously, and eventually that doubt would leak into the memory, and she would slowly rationalize the rude stranger. Human minds could be so easily deceived.

What was the danger, really?

I was still shaking, my jaw locked shut, a sound bubbling up my raw throat.

'Edward?'

My back stiffened, and then relaxed in defeat. I eased my foot off the gas slightly and the blue numbers stopped climbing higher and higher, instead levelling out at an even one-thirty. Alice, who had just moments before been racing through the forest parallel to my car, was now running close beside it. She pulled the door open and then slipped inside. There was only a short scream of wind before the door was violently slammed back against its body.

Gently—like letting a breath out—my lips parted for the sound in the perfectly miserable finale to cap off the night.

I had expected a heavy sigh, or maybe a low growl at myself. At the sheer stupidity of the moment because of course Alice would have seen me leaving. Running up north towards the sharp mountain air. To air out my mind as it would the car.

It was neither sound.

I started laughing—a strangely hard, breathless sound that shook my whole frame. The blue numbers started to climb sharply again.

I felt a little stoned.

"Edward?" Alice asked carefully, watching and listening to me as she tried to place this Edward she was seeing now with the reason I was leaving. "What's happening?" No horror, no terrible images of the strange girl's throat torn open, or even of my first—and presumably final—act of love.

Act of love? No, it hadn't been that at all.

I stayed silent, waiting for her to continue her questioning. Why did you do it? Are you going back? But it was neither of these questions. She was absolutely perplexed, trying to look into my future to find hints of the past with no visible luck.

And it struck me that she might actually not know. My mood started to slowly darken back to where it had been just a second ago as my finger again grazed the grooves. The stress.

The shame.

My shoulders drooped, and the laughter slowed into pitiful chuckles before ending in a sigh. I didn't want to tell her of what had just happened to me. Not yet. I needed a moment to rationalize it myself.

"Edward?" Alice asked again quietly. 'What happened to you?'

Her phone tinkled a light tone in the heavy mood of the car, and she waited a second, still watching me with concern before answering her phone, never taking her eyes off me. "Hey, Jaz. I'm here with him now."

"Can he hear me?" Jasper asked, his voice slightly off through the filter of the speakers, but the faint trace of his Texan accent and smooth way our kind spoke easily distinguished him. I concentrated on the short staccato lines in the road as they disappeared beside my car. They glowed in a brilliant line, leading me, tempting me back to where I had been before. I passed, watching the distance collect in my rear view mirror. I didn't like it.

"Yes." And then she handed me the phone, anticipating his next question.

I took it. "Can I speak with Carlisle?"

There was a surprised pause, and then, "Yes, of course, Edward. Are you..."

"Yes. I'd like to speak with him now please, Jasper." I cut him off before he could finish as politely as I was capable of. I wasn't angry at Jasper.

There was no sound on the other end of the phone. It was suddenly just Carlisle's voice. "Edward, son, how are you?"

There was a wonderful moment in that simple question where Carlisle had called me son, confidently claiming me as his own when I didn't deserve it. I knew he would continue to call me his son, continue to offer me a place beside him even as I continued to do nothing to deserve it, bound by those first years where we were the only one the other had. One person to confide in when the thirst reared up strong and ugly to steal away the humanity Carlisle helped me re-cultivate, or the admittance of feeling alone, or questioning if living this unfulfilled life redeemed us any in the eyes of God.

It gave me the strength to tell him of the weakness, just as I had over eighty years ago. I swallowed thickly, taking a deep breath as Alice calmed down enough to pick up on the faint scent of human in the car.

Curiously, she sniffed the head rest.

"Have you ever encountered a human that smelled better than any other?" I wondered quietly as I followed the curve in the road, my hands sliding into the new addition to my steering wheel comfortably.

It was silent for a while on the other end of the phone, and I started to worry that he hadn't. That this was wrong. So much worse than it had been before. But then his voice was there, reassuring in my ear. "Yes." And then there was the unmistakable sound of him switching roles, from Carlisle my father, to Carlisle the doctor that couldn't judge. "Now I need to know. Are they okay?"

"Yes." Maybe confused, trying to grasp back onto the thin threads of reality just as I was, but okay. For now.

"Are you okay?" Carlisle, my father, was back.

"Shaken." I whispered. "And something else happened." I hesitated, unsure how to best phrase this. The question. Would any of them even know the answer? Maybe what I had felt was simply the reaction of...becoming intimate with a human. Something about their warmth and fragility that elicited a feeling in the chilled and stony.

Being intimate with her didn't seem to reflect the mood at the time, either.

"What is it?" Carlisle seemed at ease, sure that the girl was safe now, his kindly nature was satisfied. Alice must have told him I was leaving, and he seemed to agree now it was a good idea. I could always return, but if I stayed, and I killed someone...well, that wasn't so reversible.

If only he knew I was running from cowardice.

"She was"—I corrected myself. She still was. Still breathing. Still—"is a prostitute." I let that sink in, and then, much more quietly: "And I paid her for her…services." I felt the shame of the moment falling over me that seemed to have skipped me during the actual act. "I took her body." I said even more quietly, and I felt that the disgust must be showing itself on my skin, becoming a permanent part of my flesh. Reflecting the inside.

It was absolutely silent. Alice, who had been halfway turned to better smell the seat that Chime had been in, froze, her mouth falling open, looking like she had been caught in the act of taking a large bite out of my head rest. It was absolutely silent on Carlisle's end.

I didn't say anything. Simply let it sink in.

I don't think it did.

Carlisle was quiet in that nonjudgmental silence of his that only he seemed capable of for a long moment, before finally saying goodbye. "I hope you find what you're looking for Edward. May you return soon, my son."

I nodded, throat tight.

The line went dead before I could answer.

For some strange, inexplicable reason, Alice decided to stay with me rather than return home to Jasper.

For that I was immensely grateful.

And annoyed.

"Alice, please understand how touched I am that you are here with me now. You can have no idea what that means to me. But right now, maybe you should be back at home."

'Everything before but is bullshit.' She thought the saying sourly to herself.

"I mean it."

"Then why should I leave you? It makes no sense. You're in a moment of great change. You just lost your virginity! If not to celebrate that occasion—"

"It is nothing to celebrate." I snapped, too loud and sharp in the close car. Slowly, I pulled the girl's scent in, trying to calm myself and not doing well at all. I tried again in a much more level voice when all I wanted to do was scream. "Without me there, everyone is vulnerable. What if someone recognizes something familiar about us from a movie, or a book, or"—An unstable prostitute raving about mad men with super powers? I let that thought trail off before picking it up again. "Without you there to watch for these things, something, could—conceivably—happen to them."

"Or I could watch them from beside you, and nothing could happen. And even if something did—conceivably—happen"—she was mocking me now—"I would only be a phone call away. There's no danger. You need me, so this is where I'll be."

"I'll tell you where to go." I growled angrily to myself as my fingers glided again over my marks.

Alice giggled quietly from beside me, her scent slowly becoming stronger than that short fit of weakness. My only slip in more than eighty years. It wasn't even really a slip, all things considered. She was able to walk away.

Maybe Alice was right; it wouldn't be the first time. This was a time of change for me…maybe I had just proved something to myself. I was strong enough to hold myself in this car while she sat so close. Was able to take her—most adequate description of the event so far—and still not kill her. Maybe this was a time of growth for me.

I allowed myself to smile a little with Alice's laughter, feeling the smallest bit lighter.

It was merely a time of growth.

"But it'll be a time of growth!"

I stared at Tanya flatly.

The snow had settled in soft sprinkles of dusty power around me, and I closed my eyes and concentrated on that rather than the ill feeling of frustration I felt with us both. Her, for having misunderstood my meaning when I had dubbed the occasion as something to grow from. Myself for allowing her to annoy me when I, of all people, knew she had—mostly—good intentions. And it is the thought that counts.

When I had said it was an experience to grow from, I had meant just that. Grow from. Away from. Never-to-experience-anything-so-disastrous-again, from.

She had imagined I meant that I would take the experience and run with it. Enjoy the merits of vampire-human intimacies. Join her in her quest to conquer the opposite sex in….er, sex.

At my look she dropped her arms and enthusiasm, reverting back to the Tanya I was slightly more comfortable with. "Well, now what?"

"Please," Just a moment. Just a second to myself to take inventory of the destruction that Chime had left me in. "I really would rather be alone."

'Well, I really would rather be in your pants, but you don't see me complaining. Much.' She was joking, trying to elicit a smile from my desolate expression. It had only occurred to me that this was a horrible place to be halfway through my story where I explained my difficulties with the human, her blood, and her body.

Of all the places to go, I visit the seductress's lair.

Finally I smiled, if only because I knew that Tanya would take it as a compliment to be called a seductress.

Tanya smiled grandly back, and I opened my eyes in time to see it come to full bloom on her face. Perfectly flawless. Gorgeous, even, with the background of the clear night sky behind her, a billion starts swirling together into perfect chaos.

And then my attention was unwillingly drawn back to the memory of being absolutely mesmerized for those few short moments on the uneven shape of her lips, and I wondered why I couldn't be captured in the same way by The Beautiful Tanya.

I looked back up to the sky, hoping to see the vivid colours of close planets and distant suns against all the empty space. Instead I only saw the plain shape of her face, her expression: not quite confident, not quite insecure, and not quite anything I had ever witnessed before.

I sighed.

"You know, Edward," Tanya said slyly, "As your very best friends, you know we can't just leave you here to mope."

Alice, who was quietly standing a few yards further back than Tanya—a comfortable distance—didn't feel at all strange to so easily be called my best friend. We had a bond that was not unlike mine and Carlisle's. Tanya, on the other hand, felt she was stepping past her bounds a bit. I didn't have the heart to tell her to turn around and see the difference was more than the five feet of space between them.

"I'm not moping." I said shortly. And then realized I was and quickly changed my expression to a more pensive one. "I'm thinking."

Tanya raised an eyebrow at me. "Very convincing."

Alice smiled, and then walked forward, into the conversation to—I hoped—help me.

I was wrong.

"Maybe it is a good idea." She said, slowly coming off the fence and choosing her side. The opposing one. "If only to get your confidence back. You don't have to do anything but go with us. Just look and realize that you are still you. Nothing changed, Edward." She smiled softly at the last part, 'As much as we all might sometimes wish, you are far too stubborn to be anything but you.'

I gave her a hard look, but some part of me was relieved to have been recognized. It was just like Alice to sense my despair. Sense the fear that I would walk out on the street and see women differently than I always had before. That the new monster was just as permanent a part of me as the old one was. Like a new kind of change in me had taken place. That I would feel the need to take all the women I saw here after into a dark corner and use them like the cad I had proven myself to be.

The smallest inkling of hope shone through. Or maybe Alice was right. The girl—Chime; I could at least have the decency to use her pseudo name—had set off my equilibrium. It would be just as reasonable to assume that I would suddenly thirst ravenously for every woman that passed as well.

I took a deep breath, and then sighed, standing up to a round of applause from both Alice and Tanya. And it scared me, because the standing part obviously hadn't been difficult enough to elicit that kind of response.

How, I thought desperately, could this possibly get any worse?

The first step, I was assured, was simple: get in the car. No problems there, other than Alice watching how my fingers naturally fit into the grooves on the steering wheel, and then my annoyed reaction as I placed them firmly in their appropriate positions.

The second step of the plan was to drive into town. Again, no problem. The day was just ending, and I realized with a shock that it would be about my third day since meeting the girl. Exactly, in a few hours. Time kept moving, the sun continued to rise and fall, her heart kept beating….nothing catastrophic had come of our meeting.

Then why did it feel like everything had suddenly changed? I thought for sure that the earth had at least fallen out of orbit, sending us careening towards the sun. I watched the people on the street that walked in the dull twilight here. Life went on, and that gave me some small degree of comfort that was quickly lost in step three.

I parked smoothly against the curb in front of a restaurant that had been closed since seven-thirty. There was a nearby sign that directed that should there be an overflow of customers, there was a second lot behind the building. It seemed quite optimistic for the state the restaurant was in.

I walked around to open both Tanya's and Alice's doors, but only Tanya waited for me. Alice was already on the side walk, waiting for us, her body leaning towards the nearest boutique. Tanya rose smoothly from the car, and I locked it, turning to face the two of them.

Alice was no longer just leaning towards the boutique, but slowly inching her way towards it with a strained expression, as if she were truly fighting the pull. I pursed my lips, looking politely past her at the elegant script of the sign, "Should we start there?"

"Only if you want to," Alice said cheerfully, already walking in that direction. I chuckled lowly and started to follow, Tanya keeping pace by my side. I should have trusted Alice, just getting me back with humans was slowly easing my fears. There were rules that applied here, and the structure soothed me.

A woman with a dark brown turtle neck sweater passed, with long, black, shiny hair. She had a very nice waist to hip ratio, but I felt not spark of interest. She spared me an appreciatory glance, but didn't slow down. I suppose she was pretty in a way that humans were, but I felt no need to bed her. Nothing about her called to me.

I smiled, taking a deep breath of the human saturated air. There was a particular feeling of relief that accompanied my indifference towards the stranger. Alice might just have been right, this was good for me.

"So," Tanya started, distracting me from my pleasant thoughts. "What's our battle plan?"

"That depends. Who are we at war with?"

Tanya laughed, knocking her shoulder into mine playfully. I subtly put an extra few careful inches between us. "Women, I suppose. I thought we could walk around the block and see if any of them particularly appealed to you." Tanya had definitely been wrong: this was a terrible idea.

There was a very noticeable difference between the way I said we and the way Tanya said we. I didn't like it. I gestured back at the woman with the fashionable sweater who was turning the corner without a look back at the beautiful strangers. She was happily, and newly, married. "But I've already…" I let that thought trail off, already hating the way it sounded before it was out of my mouth.

Tanya looked behind her, and I felt the disappointment in her that she wasn't blond. Specifically, that she wasn't strawberry blond, about five foot eight, one-hundred-twenty-five pounds, and gold-ish eyes with a vampire fetish.

"Why don't we go into the boutique? There must be women in there." I smiled placatingly. I was already reassured; I was only letting this carry on to convince Tanya that I hadn't really changed. I was still the Edward that only enjoyed her company as a friend. And maybe I would feel a little more comfortable if Alice was there to act as a buffer.

She looked at the boutique. "No." 'There won't be enough diversity….the mall might have more people, but that's on the other side of town.'

"Around the block then?"

She smiled brightly at me, "Sure."

I chuckled, "Tanya, you haven't changed a bit."

We hadn't been wandering long when the bars started to really open, groups of people walking in talking loudly with each other. There was an obvious difference between them, and Tanya and I. They seemed to easily integrate themselves into other people's small groups of friends while we seemed to be on the other side of a pane of glass. I was drawn into the minds of the barely matured adults, feeling the excitement of the anticipation of having fun, and winding down from their day. Most of them were coming from the local university.

I was also noticing that I was doing something unusual. I was looking at the women that passed in their groups. I was fearful for a moment before I realized I wasn't really looking at them. It wasn't at all my looking through them for something desirable, rather that I was looking for someone. This was absolutely ridiculous. I knew where Alice was: back at the boutique looking at the winter dress and sweater line.

I supposed she'd also pick me something up for the hospital benefit in a few weeks.

I expected to feel amused at her optimism; that I would be coming back soon enough to attend, but the idea wasn't at all unappealing. It seemed silly in this clear crisp air, surrounded by the dull concoction of scent that all these humans contributed to that I had been so seized by her scent. The idea was almost as ridiculous as the futile compulsion to search.

Which I was still doing.

I briefly met the eyes of a woman with clear skin and symmetrical features. One of the boys in the group of six clearly fancied her, but all I felt was a sense of disappointment. She looked away from me quickly. Her eyes were playful and at ease and she felt uncomfortable under my gaze. They were not at all sharp or shrewd in this moment.

It was the same routine over and over with different women. I would notice something about a woman that by all logical standards were attractive. Yet, all I felt looking at them was a throbbing sense of disappointment, like the consistent rhythmic ebb and flow of waves on the shore. The feeling would fade until I noticed something else and it would return as strongly as before to crash onto me again.

I felt suddenly ill as I realized what I was looking for. Shrewd eyes, a vivid contrast between their hair and skin, longer hair and petite stature. The silence. I felt my muscles tighten in stress as I understood I was expecting her, as if she would suddenly walk out from an alley or one of the clubs that dotted the streets in this section of town.

I had been seeing her face again, the questioning angle of her brow, the worried shape of her lips as she watched as I dressed in a flurry of shock and fear, so when a petite brunette did walk out of a nearby alley just a few feet from us, I gave a yelp and jumped. If not for Tanya's quick reaction to my own incredibly bizarre response, I would have crashed into her. She shot me an irritated look.

Alice stood there with two shopping bags hanging from her arms, one on each wrist. She cocked an eyebrow at me. "You okay?" She had been just as started by my reaction as I had been by her appearance. I had been so completely caught up in my own thoughts I hadn't been paying attention to anyone else's.

I shook my head, clearing it of the unpleasantness, trying to regain the composure I'd had just moments before. "Yes. Are we done here?" I offered my arm, and Alice let me take the bags for her. She walked close to my side, taking her alley short cut back to the car. She chatted nonchalantly about the change in styles and that she had gotten a text from Jasper telling her he was going to hunt before school tomorrow so she wouldn't have to look for him. She thought this was a sweet gesture, but I knew she probably would be looking for him anyways tomorrow. And the next day. And the next.

IIiInside her head was a different conversation. 'Edward, what's going on with you? You look like you're waiting for someone to run out and jump you.'

I glanced at Tanya, not purposely, not to single her out as my reason for my stress, it just happened to be a natural reaction to her words. Tanya was listening to Alice ramble, oblivious to our own private conversation.

Alice noticed the look and managed to rein in the sarcasm enough to avoid rolling her eyes and continue her public conversation without a hint of the underlying one. Alice could multitask. 'Well, obviously. Anyone else?'

I hesitated. I was being ridiculous. Chime was all the way back in Chicago. There was no reason for her to be here.

So then why did I continue to search for her in the faces of these humans?

I looked at the rain battered red brick of the building to my right, and then to the left to the identical wall there. Alice understood I was shaking my head, but she was still doubtful. 'You'll tell me if something changes?'

I looked up at the night sky, and then back to the way we were heading. She nodded to herself in response, understanding.

'Edward looks like he's going to be leaving soon. He might not even stay long at the house. I have to talk to him now. But how do I get him alone...?' Tanya continued to struggle with herself. I didn't know what about. She had already turned the conversation she planned to have with me over in her head and moved on to the more practical aspects.

I was surprised to find she was right. I was ready to go home, to see my family again. I wanted to make Esme happy, and bring Alice home, and not be run off by some frail human girl who I would never see again anyways. I wanted to settle back into the comfort of my ersatz life. I wanted that last one most of all. I wanted to get rid of the face in my head, and feeling like I was waiting for her. Once I was back in my routine, I was sure it would all disappear, chased away by the predictability. The security of structure.

I stopped and some part of my mind waited for the feeling of something soft and warm to thump lightly into my back at the suddenness of it.Tanya stopped in time, and I felt the disappointment come over me again.

Ridiculous.

"Here, Alice, could you take these and bring the car around?" I handed her my keys and kept her bags as she continued on her way to the car. She wasn't at all surprised by the parting vision of us on our way home tonight.

I watched her disappear, keeping tabs on her whereabouts. Old habits die hard, and letting a woman walk around these streets at night—vampire or not—still made me nervous. Rosalie was the only exception to this rule for obvious reasons.

I leaned back against the wall, the rough brick edge catching onto the fabric of my sweater. Tanya started without hesitation. "How much did you hear?"

"The getting me alone part."

Tanya smiled a little, "You're going to have to be more specific."

Oh no. "The getting me alone to speakwith me," I said, my defences already starting to rise.

"Okay," Tanya said, and then, "I want you to stay with me." 'We could make each other happy.'

I could see what she saw. That now that I had chosen the life of intimacy with humans, I practically belonged with her family. In her eyes.

"Tanya—" I started, unwillingly. I hated these conversations. I always walked away feeling less than gentlemanly even if her attentions weren't exactly innocent.

"Edward," she cut me off quickly, "Kiss me." I stared at her blankly. "Just kiss me and then tell me no."

I ran my hand irritably through my hair."Don't, Tanya, please."

"You'll never know," she said, and then her eyes dropped to my lips and a hundred images all ran through her head at once, not all of them particularly focused on kissing. I winced.

Looking at her lips, too, I found they were beautiful, perfectly full and even, and a gorgeous shade of red. Absolutely flawless. These were very attractive lips, I told myself, just as the face they were set in was just as paradisiacal.

She looked up at me again, and the sky was reflected there, captured in her perpetual beauty. It was quite a sight. Any artist in the world would give their heart to only see this, to let her inspire them as their muse. A hundred symphonies would be composed in her honour. A thousand sculptures. Millions of paintings, all for this one single image.

I didn't feel it though. I could just as easily look up and see the sky as I could see it in her eyes. Nothing hindered me from seeing the original, so why settle for a duplicate? I closed my eyes, seeing neither now.

I tried to force all thoughts from my mind. I leaned down towards her, and she kept her eyes open, kept them on me. There was so little space between our faces; I was sure that it really wasn't much space at all if I were to measure it in miles, or feet, or even inches.

I could see my face moving towards her s slowly through her mind, and it felt so wrong. I felt I was being videotaped, like not just I could see this, but the whole world. I was just waiting for the radio announcer to start the colour commentary.

Then, inexplicably, all I could think about was my ridiculously dented steering wheel. I had spent the whole ride up here waiting for when my fingers could slip into the grooves, a mould that was distinctly, and uniquely, mine.

I wasn't fitting here. I wasn't me when I was doing this.

"This is wrong," I whispered. I could see my brows knit together through her eyes, and the way my lips moved. The sound they made brushing together.

'It'll feel good later.' Tanya promised unthinkingly, leaning towards me now.

I pulled away instantly. All the shame that hadn't been with Chime was suddenly here. For the first time in decades, I felt truly ill. Tanya opened her eyes. "Edward?"

I shook my head. "I'm sorry, Tanya. You are, by far, the loveliest creature I have ever laid eyes on." I smiled at her glum expression. "You know it's true."

She laughed half-heartedly, looking away from me. "Thanks so much."

I gathered her into my arms instantly, resting my cheek on her head, sighing. "I can't, Tanya. I'm so sorry, but I can't. Not to you."

I felt her finally smile. "Not to me, hmm? You know this provides the inconvenience of having to find another All American Boy."

I moved her away from me, keeping her at length so she could see my answering smile. "You will always be my favourite Russian." Alice was coming, her thoughts warning in case she was to intrude on the end of our 'moment'. I was ready to wave the white flag to end the moment.

"If you fall in love with another Russian, I warn you now, Edward, you will find my foot up your ass with no one to blame but yourself."

I threw my head back and laughed. Tanya smiled, and then looked sourly towards my silver Volvo that was slowly inching into view cautiously. I walked over, feeling the extra distance that Tanya put between us still stung from the rejection, and opened the door for her and then for Alice as she skipped around to graciously give up her passenger seat for Tanya. I nodded my thanks to her before stepping around into the driver's seat.

I turned us around, pulling away from the curb and towards home. My home.

My fingers settled comfortably into the ridges.

A/N: Whoooo! I'm on twilighted (dot) net now. ^_^ I have the same pen name (teeny tiny twilight) and the story has the same title. I'll continue to update on here with this story, but it shall have no more sex. I'll edit it out. If you want the full, NC-17 version, go to twilighted. If you just want to see Edward and Bella hang out and have clean fun, stay here. :) I hope you all enjoy.

Oh, and if you don't know the drill by now, here it is. I drop off the face of the earth during the summer, but I'll be back in September. ^_^