A/N: Okay, so I decided to make this just a two-shot. Thank you to those of you who reviewed and added me to their alerts/favorites. You make me smile :) Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I don't own it!

It was almost like the memory of the previous night's events was playing on a loop now that I remembered. I couldn't get it to stop and I was freaking out.

I slid down onto the bathroom floor, sitting with my back against the door of the cabinets under the sink. I pulled my legs up, wrapping my arms around them, and rested my chin on my knees. A little voice inside my head was nagging me to put some clothes on since I was still naked, but I ignored it. I had more important things to worry about right now.

I was torn as to how I should feel about all of this. Part of me was elated that I had slept with Edward, that I had given him my virginity. But then another part was saddened for the same reason.

I had never been one of those girls that wanted their first time to be all candles and romantic music. In reality I knew that it didn't really work that way. Most of the girls that I had talked to about their first time had done it on a whim. They had gotten caught up in the moment and it had just happened. Just like last night.

I did, however, want my first time to mean something and be with someone that I loved. Someone that cared about me.

Is that what I got?

Well you have been in love with him for forever my inner voice said.

Yeah but did it mean anything to HIM?

He told you he loved you.

Did he really? I mean I was damn near asleep when I thought I heard him say that. It could have just been my ears playing tricks on me.

Well, you could always ask.

Oh, right. Let's ask commitment-phobic-never-had-a-real-relationship-one-night-stand-king- Edward Cullen if he said that. And how would that conversation go? Yeah, Edward? So I was thinking about last night, you know when you thoroughly fucked me, ruining me for any other man, and I was just wondering. Did you happen to tell me that you love me right before I fell asleep? So not fucking happening. Besides I'm pretty sure that he had even more to drink than I did. There's a good chance he doesn't even remember what happened.

Maybe he does, maybe he doesn't. Just remember that more often than not, when people are drunk, that's when the truth comes out.

I let out a frustrated sigh, banging my forehead against my knees a few times. I didn't know what to do.

Would things get awkward between us now? How was I supposed to act around him? Should I just pretend like I didn't remember and just move on acting as though nothing happened?

Yeah, right. Good luck with that.

Oh fuck you!

Great, now not only was I talking to myself, I was yelling at myself, too. Wonderful.

I sat on the cold tile of the bathroom floor for another twenty minutes or so stewing over what I should do. I had more questions than answers and I was quickly becoming agitated with the whole thing, making me wish that it had never happened. Or at least wishing that things hadn't gone down the way they did. Had we both been sober this would have been so much easier.

Finally I just decided that I would just play things by ear. If Edward remembered and wanted to talk about it, then we would. If not, I would just pretend that I didn't remember a thing and go on with my life like it never happened.

Again… good luck with that.

Seriously? Isn't you inner voice supposed to be helpful in these situations?

I got up off of the floor and grabbed my robe off of the hook on the back of the door and pulled it on. There was no way I was going to go back in there still naked.

I prayed that Edward had woken up and gone back to his own room. I wasn't quite ready to face him on the off chance that he wanted to talk about last night. I inhaled a deep breath, let it out slowly, and pulled the door open.

GOD. FUCKING. HATES. ME.

Not only was Edward still in my bed, he was awake, sitting up against the headboard. The blankets had fallen down, exposing his naked torso. I think I may have drooled a little at the sight. His usual messy hair was in even more disarray than normal, giving anyone who looked at him a pretty good indicator of what had happened last night.

"Hey," he said as he flashed that damned crooked smile at me. "Why are you up? It's only eight o' clock."

I simply shrugged. I wasn't really able to form a complete thought with the reminder staring me in the face. Not to mention it dawned on me in that moment that he was still naked under that blanket.

"Well come back to bed. It's too early to be up." He let out a huge yawn as he opened his arms in invitation for me to join him.

It took every ounce of willpower I possessed in my body not to go to him, but I stood firm.

"No, I'm up so I might as well start the day," I replied. I was proud that my voice wasn't giving anything away. Of course I had to look away from him to accomplish that… but still!

"I think I'll get dressed and see what the damage is downstairs. I'm sure it looks like a bomb went off down there."

He didn't say anything. He simply looked at me, studying my face in a similar fashion as he had last night before he whisked me up here. He gave me a small, sort of sad smile and nodded his head before lying back down and burrowing into the covers. I brushed it off, assuming he was just tired because not thirty seconds later, he was snoring.

Glad that I had dodged that bullet for now, I grabbed a clean change of clothes and headed back into the bathroom to shower and get ready for the day.

Once I was clean, dressed, and minty fresh, I quietly made my way out of the room and down the stairs. I couldn't have been more correct in my theory of what the downstairs looked like. Bomb wasn't quite enough though. It looked more like a nuclear warhead was set off in the middle of the living room. The kitchen was just as bad.

I was surprised to find that there were no stragglers asleep on the couch, or the floor for that matter.

Now normally I wouldn't really care about the mess. I wasn't a clean freak by any means, but this was just ridiculous.

There were plastic cups covering every surface in the living room and kitchen. I could also see a ton of them lined up on the railing on the deck out back. The floor was covered in napkins, crumbs, and yet more plastic cups. Something sticky coated the countertop on the kitchen island and judging from the smell, I was sure I'd find vomit somewhere in the living room.

Right now would be about the time that I would march my ass up the steps, screaming for the three stooges to wake the fuck up and come clean up their mess. This usually involved me literally dragging one or more of them from their bed by the ankle. These parties were their thing and we had an agreement that they would be responsible for cleanup afterward.

Today, I needed the distraction.

I used my arm to sweep a huge pile of garbage from in front of the coffee pot onto the floor. Once the coffee was perking away, I rounded up the cleaning supplies. I had a feeling I was going to end up going for more garbage bags by the time this was all said and done.

After gulping down a cup of black coffee, and burning off most of my taste buds in the process, I plugged my IPOD into the dock on the counter and got to work.

Two garbage bags, four cleaning rags, half a bottle of Mean Green, and two hours later the kitchen was spotless.

Just as I was getting ready to head in and start on the living room, Emmett made his way into the kitchen.

"Morning, Bella-Boo."

"Good morning, Bear. What are you doing up? I didn't expect you to drag your dead ass out of bed 'til at least one."

He shrugged his shoulders and opened his mouth to yawn, but cut it off abruptly and looked around the kitchen.

"What the hell are you doing?"

"This would be called cleaning, Emmett. You know, it's what you do when there's a mess."

"Oh, you're hilarious. I mean WHY are you cleaning? This is supposed to be our job."

I shrugged and turned around to grab my cleaning supplies. "I was up and I got bored."

"Yeah, well you're done. Once Jasper and Edward get up we'll finish it."

"No, Em. The living room smells like puke and the back deck looks like a plastic cup factory exploded. I'm not gonna let that sit until Larry and Curly decide to drag their asses down here. I don't mind, really."

I stepped around Emmett to head to the living room but he grabbed my arm to stop me. The next words from his mouth nearly gave me a coronary.

"By the way, did you have a good time last night?" He waggled his eyebrows suggestively and raw panic flooded my system.

He knows. Oh God he knows. How could he know? There was no way we were that loud. Were we? I mean, I know we were kind of loud but how could he have heard anything over the loud music and all the people that were here. Did he see us go upstairs? Did he come to my room and see us in bed together? Oh God, Oh God, Oh God!

I did my best to hide the panic I was feeling, praying that he didn't notice. I tried my best to feign indifference as I answered.

"It wasn't bad. You know me, parties really aren't my thing, but it was fun."

He didn't say anything in response. He just gave me a knowing smirk and continued on into the kitchen like he didn't have a care in the world.

I brushed off his behavior and got to work cleaning up the living room.

Eventually, Jasper and Edward both made their way downstairs. Jasper actually tore the garbage bag I was filling from my hand and kicked me out of the living room. Edward took it upon himself to clean up the deck. I was sitting on a bar stool at the kitchen counter when Edward walked through to head out back. Before he opened the door he turned to me, gave me that same small almost sad smile, and went outside.

Oh God he regrets it. He remembers and he regrets it. Fuck!

Okay, just calm down. Maybe he just thinks that you don't remember and he's sad because of that.

I was just staring off into space, trying to not bust out into tears, when I heard both stools on either side of me scrape across the floor. I looked to my left to see a rough-looking Angela. On my right was the perky little pixie Alice Brandon. I smirked when I took in their attire.

Looks like I'm not the only one who had a good time last night.

Angela was dressed in one of Emmett's huge t-shirts that she had tied in a knot in the back to make it fit better, and a pair of his boxers. Alice was dressed in a similar fashion, only in Jasper's clothes.

I was actually ecstatic that the two of them were here. Emmett hadn't dated much since Rosalie. He had really liked her and it broke his heart when she dumped him. Jasper had had a thing for Alice since he met her a year ago during a study group for one of his history classes. He had just been too chicken shit to make a move.

"Well good morning ladies," I said smiling at the two of them. "And how was your night?"

They both giggled before answering in unison.

"Fine."

A week went by and Edward had barely spoken two words to me. In fact he could barely look me in the eye. I knew that he remembered everything, just as I had, and the tension between us had grown to epic proportions. Jasper had tried on several occasions throughout the week to get me to talk about it but I just couldn't bring myself to do it.

I was well aware that everyone knew that we had slept together. Between the glares of death that Jasper was constantly shooting in Edward's direction and Emmett's suggestive comments, it was obvious.

It was Sunday afternoon, a week and a day since that night, and we were all hanging together at the house. Emmett had decided to give me a break from cooking, deciding instead that he was going to fire up the grill.

While the guys stood around the grill talking about whatever it is guys talk about, us girls were lying in lounge chairs just soaking up some sun.

"So, Bella," Alice said out of the blue. "When are you going to put on your big girl panties and talk to Edward about what happened last weekend?"

I lifted my sunglasses away from my face and looked at her with a raised eyebrow silently asking her if she had gone mental.

"Oh come on. The tension between the two of you is so thick it damn near suffocates the rest of us when we share the same air space. Not to mention it's obvious that the poor guy is heartbroken that you're just ignoring what happened."

"Alice, I'm not ignoring anything. If he's so heartbroken, which he's not by the way, he is just as capable of coming to me as I am of going to him to talk. I just figured that since he hasn't brought it up he wants to forget that it happened."

"Bella, has it ever occurred to you that maybe he hasn't come to you because he might be scared?" Angela asked.

"Scared? What the hell could he possibly be scared of?"

"Think about it. When was the last time he was in a relationship? Or for that matter, when was the last time you saw him with the same girl for more than one night? It's obvious by the way that he looks at you that his feelings run pretty fucking deep. He looks at you like some love sick puppy."

"That's bullshit, Ang."

"Is it?" Alice interjected. "I've known Edward for just over a year. During a nice chunk of that time I hadn't seen him go more than a day or two without hooking up with some chick. How long has it been since he's had a girl over? How long since he's even gone out?"

I racked my brain trying to remember the last girl I had seen Edward with. Tanya was her name. Tall, blonde, busty. But that was like six months ago. There had to be more since then. Right?

I thought and thought but came up empty handed. I also realized that it had been a little over three months since he went out on his own. Each time it had been with Emmett and Jasper and they always came home alone.

"Now she's getting it," Alice said as she patted my shoulder.

"I still don't see what this has to do with last weekend. Okay, so he hasn't hooked up with anyone in awhile. Maybe he just ran out of prospects that he deemed worth his time. Maybe when he hooked up with me he was just really drunk and horny and I was just there."

"Okay, maybe she's not getting it." Alice sighed and took off her sunglasses. She sat up and in her lounge chair and turned toward me. "Look, I'm gonna tell you something. I swear on all that is Holy, if you tell him I told you I will burn your first edition Jane Austen and cut up every pair of chucks you own and replace them with heels. Do we understand each other?"

I simply nodded and she continued.

"Okay, so you know that Edward and I had English together last semester. Well Jessica Stanley was also in that class. I'm sure you remember her. He hooked up with her just before Tanya."

I nodded again indicating that I knew who she was talking about.

"Right, so anyway, shortly after he hooked up with Tanya, Jessica approached him in class. She spouted off some bullshit about how she missed and him and wanted to know when she could see him again. He seemed kind of hesitant to answer her and he kept looking at me like he wanted me to go away or something. Of course, there was no way. If he wanted to speak with her privately he could have taken her somewhere else. He finally told her that he wasn't interested because he had found someone. When Jessica asked who she was he said and I quote: 'Who she is isn't important. All you need to know is that I love her; probably have for a long time, and she's the only girl I want.'

"I knew immediately that he was talking about you. After Jessica walked away he turned back to me and apparently realized that I knew who he was talking about. He made me promise not to say anything; that he would come to you in his own time.

"I feel bad that I broke that promise, but desperate times call for desperate measures. Someday I'm sure he'll thank me."

I had zoned out after she said she knew he was talking about me. My brain was finding it difficult to wrap itself around this information.

Could he really love me?

Searching deep inside myself, I found just enough confidence to make the decision that there was only one way to find out. I got up out of my chair and headed for the guys. They all stopped talking and turned to me when they noticed my approach.

"Edward, can I talk to you inside, please?"

He looked at Jasper and Emmett briefly before turning back to me. "Umm… yeah, sure."

I grabbed his hand and led him into the house and up the stairs to my bedroom. I figured since this is where everything went down it was an appropriate venue for our little chat.

"Sit," I told him, pointing to the bed.

He did as I asked, well demanded, and I began pacing in front of him.

"Okay, so I want to talk about what happened last weekend."

"Bella, before you say…" I held up my hand to cut him off.

"Edward, please. Just let me say what I have to say before I lose my nerve completely. I'm already on the verge of saying fuck it and bolting from the room. So, please, just listen."

He gave me a small smile and waved his hand, encouraging me to continue.

"I feel like what happened between us has fucked up our relationship beyond all recognition. You've barely spoken to me since it happened and every time you've looked at me the only thing I see in your eyes is regret. It hurts more than you can imagine seeing that because I don't regret it at all. Maybe making a drunken decision to lose my virginity was not the best decision I have ever made, but I wouldn't change it for anything. The fact that I even remember it is a huge fucking miracle considering the amount of alcohol I drank that night. But I do remember. Every detail, every word, every touch, every sound. It's all ingrained into my memory and my mind hasn't allowed even an hour to go by without replaying everything about that night."

My voice had become no more than a whisper and tears were starting to well up in my eyes as I prepared myself for what I was about to do. Our friendship was already ruined. I might as well put it all out on the table.

I took a deep breath and looked him square in the eye. I don't know where the confidence came from, but I knew that I wanted him to see that I meant what I was about to say. This could only turn out one of two ways and I prayed with all my might that I wasn't making a huge mistake.

"I love you, Edward. I don't know when it stopped being a crush and turned into me being head over fucking heels in love with you, but it did. I've tried not to but I can't stop."

The tears broke free and began streaming down my face.

Edward reached out and grabbed my hands, pulling me down into his lap. He wrapped his arms around me and held me tight for a moment before reaching up and using the tips of his fingers to gently brush away the tears.

"Shhh… don't cry, baby. No one so beautiful should ever cry."

His words just made the tears come faster.

"Is it my turn to talk now?" he asked after giving me a minute to calm down.

I just nodded, not moving my head from its position on his shoulder.

"I need you to look at me, Bella."

I sat unmoving, not sure if I wanted to comply. I wouldn't be able to stand looking him in the eye if he was about to reject me.

"Love, look at me." He grabbed my chin and forced my head up so I had no choice but to look at him.

"I DO NOT regret what happened between us that night. I regret the way that it happened because you deserve better than that. I didn't want to bring up what happened because I thought that YOU regretted it. The next morning, you acted like you would rather be anywhere than in that room with me when I asked you to come back to bed. It broke my heart to think that you would have to remember your first time as a drunken mistake. That was the regret you saw. It was for the circumstances, not what happened."

I let out a sigh of relief. I hadn't realized how much better it would make me feel to know that he didn't look at what happened at a mistake. I took a deep breath, bracing myself for the rest of this conversation. I had just professed my love for him and I was anxious to see what he had to say about that.

He was silent for a moment. I could see the conflict in his eyes and I instantly thought the worst.

And here comes the rejection.

"I've never been in a relationship, Bella." He began, "Even in high school I never had a girlfriend. Girls threw themselves at me all the time. I could have any girl I wanted, so why limit myself to just one? The idea held no appeal to me. Not to mention every girl in my high school that I was even remotely attracted to turned out to be an airhead.

"I preferred things that way. I laughed at all the guys that I saw being dragged around by the short and curlies by their girlfriends. I had no desire to ever be that way, to allow some woman to tell me what to do and when to do it. I loved that fact that I could go out and party all night and never had anyone to answer to."

My heart was breaking piece by piece with every word he spoke. My mind was screaming at me to flee. I needed to get the fuck out of this room. I felt like I couldn't breathe. Here I had just told this man that I loved him and he was practically telling me that the idea of being in a committed relationship was almost vomit-worthy.

I didn't want to hear anymore. I wanted to just tune out the sound of his voice. When the next words left his lips I was thankful that I hadn't.

"Six months ago, that changed."

My ears perked up at this. Alice's words reverberated loud and clear inside my head.

"I had always looked at you as a friend, a best friend, but still just a friend. I don't know what triggered it; I don't even remember what we were doing when it happened. All I remember is looking at you and it was like I was seeing you for the first time. I knew in that moment that I wanted you, and only you."

As he spoke, I saw so much love and adoration reflected in his beautiful emerald eyes that it quite literally took my breath away.

"I don't know how to be a boyfriend, Bella. I can't promise that I won't fuck this up. I can't promise that I won't forget important anniversaries or even your birthday. What I can promise is that I will love you every day with everything I am. I can promise that not a single day will go by that you won't know how beautiful you are and how much adore everything about you; from your crazy obsession with vampire movies to the adorable way you chew your lip when you're nervous or deep in thought. I love you, Isabella Swan. Please, tell me you'll be mine."

The smile of all smiles broke out on my face.

Instead of answering with words I grabbed his face and, with as much love and passion as I could muster, I kissed him.

When I pulled away we were both panting for air.

"Is that a yes?" he teased.

I laughed. "No, that was a HELL yes!"

He grinned at me and leaned in to resume our kiss. It was different this time. The last time we had kissed like this there was passion and heat, but this? This was fire starting. I wouldn't have been surprised if I had pulled away and found that the room had been engulfed in flames.

Things began to heat up further has hands roamed and lips wandered. I felt his fingers at the base of my neck, toying with the tie of my bathing suit top. I felt him grasp it between his fingers but before he could untie it, I stopped him.

"Hold that thought," I whispered before running my tongue lightly over the shell of his ear. I grinned as I felt him shiver in response.

I stood up from my spot in his lap and walked as quietly as possible to the door. I reached for the doorknob and quickly yanked the door open.

Edward burst out laughing as Emmett, Jasper, Alice, and Angela all came tumbling down, landing in a heap at my feet.

They all looked up at me with innocent expressions on their faces.

"Something you need?" I asked in a sweet voice.

"Uh… we were just… ummm…" I did my best to contain my giggles as Emmett struggled to come up with an excuse as to why they were all camped out outside my door.

"You were just… eavesdropping?" I supplied.

"Oh, Alice do you hear that?" Angela asked. "I think I hear our phones ringing."

They both jumped up and moved as quickly as possible down the hall toward the stairs.

I looked back at Emmett and Jasper, raising a questioning eyebrow, waiting for them to say something.

They both jumped up, stuttering out an apology, and followed after Angela and Alice.

I shook my head and let my giggles escape as I closed the door behind them, locking it for good measure. I turned back to a still chuckling Edward. He smiled at me and held his arms open.

"Come here, beautiful."

This time there was no hesitation. I bounded back to the bed and jumped into his arms. He chuckled at my antics and wrapped his arms around me in a tight embrace, placing the sweetest kiss on my lips.

"I love you, Edward Cullen."

He smiled, leaning his forehead against mine.

"Say it again," he said.

"I love you, Edward."

He tightened his hold and kissed me again.

"Again," he demanded.

I giggled.

"I love you… I love you… I love you…" I repeated over and over, placing kisses to his soft lips after each phrase.

"I'll never get tired of hearing that. I love you too, baby. Always."

He captured my lips with his, kissing me good and deep.

I couldn't help but smile into the kiss as I realized that the small prayer I had sent up earlier had been answered. My Edward loved me just as I loved him.

I guess God doesn't hate me after all.

A/N: I had a lot of ideas for where I could take this but it just felt right to end it here. I have tons of story ideas that I'm trying to work out so I'm sure that I'll be back soon!

Leave me some love :)