Disclaimer: All characters belong to Stephenie Meyer.

In Six Months I Lost My Mind And Found My Heart

Chapter Thirty-Two: Promises

July 3rd

Last Day Left

Edward's POV

She was leaving and I was losing my mind. I needed her here. I have no idea how I'm meant to cope with the upcoming summer without Bella around. We weren't addressing the situation though. So far this morning we had continued like nothing was special about today although she would be leaving the following morning.

Last night we spent our time eating under the stars and being in complete bliss. I was trying to make the most of our time together and Bella was not objecting. We woke up this morning with breakfast in bed, curtsey of Alice, and spent our time resting before getting up for our last day with one another.

Currently we were outside lying on the grass, Bella's head on my lap as we looked up at the clouds. She was slowly running her fingers across my arm and every so often kissing my hand while I slowly caressed her hip.

"What's going to happen?" Bella asked, turning over so her chin was resting on my chest.

"I don't know but we will work it out. You live three hours away and if I have to drive three hours to you every day and three hours back then I will. Plus it's two months or something until we're off to university. We'll speak to one another every other day and we're bound to see each other sometime." She nodded and kissed me softly.

"I'm going to miss this, miss you."

"Me too."

"You guys don't dwell on this; we're going to see each other. Anyway get off the grass and stop moping about spending your last day together. Come on, we're going to do something fun!" Alice chimed enthusiastically.

Bella looked at me with wide eyes causing me to chuckle as I helped her up, brushing the grass off of us both.

"Don't worry love; I'll make sure nothing bad happens." She nodded but didn't seem convinced.

"We are going to play hide and seek!" Alice called once we were all gathered round.

"Are you serious?" Rose asked, looking at Alice like she had just grown a second head.

"Yeah of course."

"But Alice I don't want to hide from Bella." I said as I wrapped my arms round Bella's waist to hold her tight against me.

"Fine, you two can hide together. Now let's play. Emmett you have to find everyone." With that Alice ran off as Emmett began to count down from 100.

"Come on, I know just where to hide." I said, walking across towards the house.

"Where are we going?" Bella asked warily as we walked to the top floor of the house.

"We're going to the attic." I opened the door that looked like a regular closet door and ascended up the stone stairs with Bella following behind.

"I never knew you had an attic."

"Yeah… we never really use it except for storage but it's big so we can hide in here and even if Emmett does enter he will struggle finding up."

Bella's POV

Edward wasn't kidding when he said it was big. It was one big room, no walls, that was a whole other floor of its own. There were neatly stacked crates down one side of the room and boxes on the other, with an old grand piano (who knows how they got that up here?) and pieces of furniture around the place.

Now when he said attic I expected some dusty room with boxes etc. but this was nothing like that. The place was spotless, not a speck of dust anywhere. The place was far too clean since nobody used it often.

"What's in the crates?" I asked as Edward moved me down the side of the room, behind a load of boxes that were roughly our height.

"Paintings and other old artefacts we couldn't have downstairs in the old wing. They're worth a lot so we can't throw them out but ugly so we don't put them up." I nodded and followed him round the boxes where there was a very comfy looking couch.

Her lay down and pulled me down with him so I was practically lying on him rather than the couch. We wouldn't be seen here, that was for sure. Emmett would have to do a complete walk around the room to find us and I'm not sure if he would look back here. If you didn't know there was a couch here then you would never look.

"I love you." Edward whispered, kissing my forehead. "And I'm going to go crazy without you." I smiled softly at him and nodded.

"I'll miss you too."

"I wish I had told you how I felt sooner. I mean we would have had so much more time together, properly, none of that friends with benefits thing we were doing."

"I know. I wish I had told you too and I'm sorry for breaking things off just before they got serious. I thought you would marry Tanya and that would have devastated me if I became too attached, even though I already had."

"I wouldn't have married her by choice Bella. I only wanted to be with you." I sighed and lay my head flat on his chest. It was going to hurt so much leaving him and I really didn't want to.

"Well I can gladly say this has been the best six months of my life." I told him honestly, looking into his butterscotch eyes and melting.

"Me too, though I do have to say you had me quite confused and very angry at different points in our relationship."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that someone like me, a Marquess shouldn't marry someone without any title etc. It's just not heard of."

"But we're not married Edward." I pointed out.

"Not yet."

"What do you mean not yet? When did I say we were getting married?" I asked loudly sitting up.

"You didn't say but I can't see us spending the rest of our lives together unmarried, especially if we were to start a family-"

"Whoa back up." I told him. "Edward I am not even ready to plan what I'm doing this summer. Please let's not jump light-years ahead of us here. The thought of marriage kinda scares me and the thought of children terrifies me, let's not go there." He smiled and kissed me but nodded.

"Okay, we won't go there now but one day we will have to." I rolled my eyes and settled back down on his chest.

"Even if I don't want to?"

"Yeah. Unless you don't want to marry me?"

"You haven't asked." I pointed out.

"Do you want me to ask?"

"No."

"Oh." I turned to him and kissed him quickly before he got the wrong idea.

"I'm not ready for marriage yet, that doesn't mean I won't be in many years to come." He nodded and I could see understanding in his eyes.

"I'm sorry; I don't mean to rush you."

"I know Edward. Don't worry about it." I kissed him again and settled on his chest, listening to his steady heartbeat.

We sat in silence for a few minutes before we heard the door open that led to the stairs up here. Edward motioned for me to stay quiet and he slowly got up from the couch, keeping me on it. I mouthed to him asking what he was doing but he just smiled crookedly as Emmett's booming footsteps came closer.

"Where are you? I know someone's in here because this is one of the best hiding places in the house. Now, come on out!" Emmett called, there was shuffling of boxes and furniture moving before I saw Edward crouch behind the wall of boxes.

Emmett was standing on the other side and couldn't see that we were here but we could see him between the spaces of the boxes. Edward grabbed a blanket that was lying a few feet away and unravelled it in his hands very slowly, trying not to make noise. Without any warning he jumped towards the boxes, throwing the blanket over Emmett who screamed like a little girl.

"Oh my God! Get it off me! Get it off me! Rose…help me!" He whined as I watched him punch the blanket in his hysterical state.

"Relax Emmett it's just a blanket, no need to get worked up." Edward said, putting his hand on Emmett's shoulder.

"You little bas-" He lunged forward, still unable to see and brought him and Edward to the floor with a crash. I looked on with wide eyes, not quite sure what to do before Alice, Jasper and Rose ran in.

Jasper and Rose came forward pulling each of them apart as Edward was laughing and Emmett looked pissed.

"That was so unfair Edward. I'm totally going to get you for that, just remember that." He stropped over to Rose and pouted at her as she rolled her eyes but kissed him anyway.

"Well I guess that games done." Alice said, inspecting the room.

"I take it you were all found." Edward said, coming over to me and pulling me into his arms.

"Yeah, we were all looking for you two." Alice spun into Jaspers arms and that's when I noticed something in her hair.

"Alice, you've got leaves in your hair." She shot a glare at Emmett who had started laughing while Jasper removed the offending leaves.

"Someone thought it would be a good idea to tackle me to the ground when they spotted me in my hiding position, though they didn't take into account I already was crouch on the ground so really I just got flattened." Jasper tried to soothe Alice as Emmett was trying to apologise through his laughter.

We headed downstairs, so Alice could properly check for any leaves, and went into the living room. We were running out of things to do so decided to watch a few movies together. About five movies later we were still all in the same positions on the couches when Esme and Carlisle walked in with pizzas for us.

Edward and I were curled up together on the three seat couch with a blanket draped over our limbs and sharing a pizza. Looking round the room I felt saddened that tomorrow I would be saying bye to everyone and this would be my last night here. I wonder if they would forget about me once I left. I mean yeah I'm going to university with them but over the summer holidays they might move on from me. Edward, who seemed to know what I was thinking, kissed my cheek and whispered into my ear.

"We will never forget you Bella; we all love you too much to do that." I smiled and kissed him before settling down again to watch the remainder of the movies Alice selected and just enjoy my last night with the Cullens.

Leaving Day

Bella's POV

Morning came far too soon. Before I knew it Edward and I were up eating breakfast with everyone in the dining hall and then my bags were being loaded in the car to take me back to Charlie's. I was trying my hardest to keep my tears at bay but it was getting every second that ticked by. I needed my Edward and leaving him was killing me.

We were all standing outside their house and I was just about to leave. The driver was waiting in the car to take me back and my bags were in the trunk. I had no reason to stay anymore.

"Go Bella I'm going to miss you so much. You have to call me and we have to meet up over the holidays. Promise me that we'll go shopping before Oxford so we can buy a whole new wardrobe to rock those Oxford boys." Alice chimed, hugging me. Jasper and Edward suddenly looked concerned and a bit wary but I just laughed it off.

"Yeah I promise." She smiled and hugged me again before Jasper came over to wish me goodbye. I said goodbye to Rose, Emmett, Esme and Carlisle before they all headed inside to give me and Edward some privacy to say goodbye to one another.

We were standing about twenty feet away from each other just staring into each other's eyes. I was holding back the tears but so close to letting them spill over.

"What are you thinking?" Edward asked softly.

"I don't want to go." He nodded and slowly walked forward, prolonging the time we had.

"I love you and wish you could stay."

"Me too. I love you so much and this is killing me, saying goodbye."

"It's not goodbye forever, thank god. That would kill me." I wrapped my arms round his neck and kissed him passionately, one last time. When I pulled away his eyes were glossed over and he groaned. "Wow."

"So you don't forget me." I whispered.

"How could I forget a kiss like that?"

"Exactly." I looked over to the car and back at Edward. "I love you and I'm already missing you. I don't want to leave but I know if I don't go know then I won't."

"That wouldn't be a problem with me." He whispered, holding me tight to his chest.

"I know but Charlie would have a problem. He already hates you as it is, let's not add another reason to his list." Edward smiled and leant his forehead against mine.

"Promise me that you'll call me. I don't care what time it is at, just call so I can hear your voice."

"I will." He nodded and pecked me on the lips before I stepped back towards the car.

The tears slowly fell down my cheeks as I nervously bit my lip and got into the backseats. The engine started and the car was driving away from the love of my life standing outside his house. Eventually I couldn't see through the tears so put my head against the cold window and let my sobs out. My phone started ringing so I answered it quickly, thinking it was Charlie asking where I was.

"Hel-lo?" I managed to get out, controlling my tears.

"Don't cry." I smiled and pushed my tears away. "We'll be together soon, I promise." I smiled at how sure he sounded. Maybe things aren't going to be as bad as I think.