Chapter 3 – Meeting Edward

I woke up once again, this time because of something cold and wet being applied to my body. My eyes popped open to see a nurse, around my age, most likely. She was holding a sponge, and there was a cart with a bucket of what I could only assume was water off to the side.

She saw me awake, and very visibly rolled her eyes. She plunked the sponge back into the water, muttered something about being finished, and wheeled the cart out the door. Confused, I looked down to see that I was wearing a different gown than I had been when I'd arrived. My wrists and ankles were still bound, but the second IV was now absent, as were the monitors. Now it was just me, tied down to the bed like a bona fide mad hatter. I didn't even want to know how they took care of my bathroom needs. Which, now that I thought about it...

Just then, the door opened. Expecting to see the eye-roller again, I was taken aback when a young man in green scrubs entered the room. He appraised me for a moment before closing the door behind him. Even though my imminent death weighed heavily on my mind, I couldn't help but find the man very attractive indeed. He was tall, but not towering, toned, but not overly so, had gorgeous reddish brown hair, a beautiful face... He was too far away to see what color his eyes were, but I found myself wanting to know.

The man walked toward me and pulled the chair over that the doctor had sat on earlier. Whenever earlier was. Looking me dead in the face—green, his eyes were a beautiful, emerald green—the man leaned over. A moment later, I heard the electric whir of the bed, inclining so that I was sitting up now rather than laying flat on my back. The whir stopped, and I looked at the man.

"My father said to call you Bella," he said, in a most familiar voice. My eyes widened as I remembered.

"You're the one who—" I began, but was cut off.

"Who stopped you from jumping through the window? Yeah. Lucky you. You would have dislocated your shoulder." The man, Edward, as I recalled Carlisle saying, had a strange tilt to his words, like a parent who was trying not to yell at their naughty children.

"How do you know that? How do you know it wouldn't have killed me?" I rebuked, my brows knitting together. Edward chuckled darkly.

"Come on, Bella. Look around you. You're in a mental institution. You honestly think you're the first to try that one? I've seen it a hundred times. It's steel reinforced glass, double plated. You would have broken a thing or two if you'd run into it, and you most certainly would not have succeeded in going through it. It is a peculiar thing, to watch it over and over. I could literally see the wheels in your head turning when you figured out the door wouldn't open."

I hadn't thought of that. Of course there had been others. I wasn't that special.

Edward spoke again. "And just for the record? If you're going to slit your wrists, don't do it right next to the door. The only reason you're alive right now is because a neighbor of yours saw the blood coming out into the hallway from under your door."

His words stung. No one on this god forsaken earth wanted me alive. "I'm sure you have medicines available. If you want me dead so badly, then overdose me on morphine," I spat. Edward jerked back in his chair.

"I never—"

"You didn't have to! Why else would you say what you did? You pretty much told me to kill myself somewhere more private next time. Maybe I will!"

"No, I was telling you that so that you would think about what you did! Do you think it's by chance you were found? Your neighbor cared enough about some stranger than you did about yourself! Why am I arguing with you? Jessica is right, you're just going to kill yourself as soon as you get out of here anyway. But Dad took a special interest in you. Don't ask me why, it's obviously futile. I wanted to see for myself if there was any life left in you, any chance at all that you wanted to live, but I'll have to tell him to drop it. I can see you won't change. Why should I bother being nice to another one of his basket cases when it'll be for nothing in the end?"

I was speechless. I didn't expect that here. I expected it to be all bullshit and roses, a bunch of lies to get me to change my mind, but not this. This was pure, honest feeling. I couldn't imagine how many before me this man had tried to crack, just to be let down. Well, I just wouldn't give him the opportunity to get close to me, if that's what he was afraid of. He didn't have to pity me. I didn't want his sympathy anyway.

Edward sighed at my silence. "I'm supposed to let you go to the bathroom, and then to the cafeteria. But I won't unless you promise not to run, and not to try and hurt yourself again." I jerked my head in agreement, and Edward began unbuckling my restraints.

As he undid the second wrist restraint, his hand brushed against my arm, and an electric-like shock zipped through my body, rippling from the one contact point on my arm. My eyes snapped to his, and we stared at each other, both slack-jawed. Then Edward jerked out of it and hastened to unbuckle my ankles, but my skin continued to tingle where he'd touched it and a low pink blush crept over my face.

I sat up on the bed, rubbing my wrists where the cuffs had been. Not daring to look at each other again, we walked out the door and into the hallway in silence. Now that I wasn't running, I had an opportunity to actually look at the place. It looked like any other hospital I'd ever been in, except for one noticeable difference. It was like some nesting mother had baby-proofed the entire hospital. No sharp edges, no objects left unattended, nothing. Not even windows. Talk about depressing.

There were a few patients out and about. The first we came upon didn't even seem to notice we were there, and he was holding a conversation with himself, too, as he walked on by. The second patient we saw was leaning on an IV pole with a glassed over look in her eyes. There were others, but there didn't look to be anything visibly wrong with them.

We reached the bathroom, and Edward stood politely outside the door while I did my business. Even the toilets were proofed. Built in seat, button flush, shallow water. The toilet paper was sitting on a welded-on, round-cornered shelf built right into the stall wall. No dispensers in sight, nothing that could be taken apart and used as a weapon against anyone, and especially against oneself.

I washed my hands at the automatic sink, and walked back out to where Edward was waiting. He looked at me, then pushed off the wall and we began walking down the hallway once more. I stole a glance at Edward out of the corner of my eye. I don't know why I felt such an attraction to this stranger, especially since I wouldn't be here long enough to get to know him more. Perhaps in a different life, I could have known him better, maybe even dated him.

Pain stung through my body as I remembered the last person I'd dated, and what had resulted of that relationship. Pure, literal pain ripped through my center and I collapsed to the floor. Edward's shouts sounded far away as I fell into a flashback.

I was back home in Forks, asleep in my bed. I was woken up by the sounds of thumping on the stairs. Renee was here for the week, for my birthday, and was staying in Charlie's room, while he slept on the couch. Confused, I sat up and rubbed my eyes. The thumping reached the bottom of the stairs, then a sliding sound. All I could think of as I bolted out of bed was Renee. The first thought that popped into my head was that she had maybe fallen out of bed and hurt herself.

I opened the door and stepped out into the darkness, turning to go down the stairs. With all the noise she was making, I was confused as to why it hadn't woken Charlie up. I stepped into the stairwell and immediately slipped. I slid down three or four stairs before I managed to grab the banister and pull myself upright.

It was dark, so I couldn't see what was all over the stairs. My hand was covered in it, though, so I brought it to my nose and inhaled. A sharp, metallic odor washed over me, and I recognized it immediately as blood. My severe squeamishness took over and I passed out, sliding down the rest of the stairs.

I opened my eyes to find Edward standing over me. My flashback had ended, though there was still a dull ache in my abdomen. I closed my eyes briefly and took several deep breaths.

"What the hell was that?" Edward questioned me as he held out his hand to help me up. I shook my head shortly. I was not letting him in. I would not give him the chance to know me, poor, pathetic shell that I was.

I brushed myself off, turned, and continued our walk down the hall.

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