This is it. I mean it's really it. I'm leaving this house for the last time.
It's so empty. All traces of anyone living here are gone; it looks eerie.
I stand in the upstairs hallway, looking at each empty room. One after the other, completely desolate. I go down the stairs, to where my favourite sofa should have been. But it's not. It's on a ship, far away from here. I sit on the floor of the living room, gaping at the bare walls.
Seems kind of silly to just sit here, in the middle of the room, but what else was I to do? Edward is packing last minute things, and Elizabeth is fast asleep in the car. Alice is, knowing her, already at the airport checking in. I can picture her checking her watch as she sits in the departure lounge sipping coffee. I smile.
Alice had been a very good sport about the wedding. Despite it being held in another country, she had managed to book a venue (Melbourne Botanical Gardens), a large tent, chairs, organised a cake, flowers and other assorted things. I can't imagine a better wedding planner.
Edward derails my train of thought as he stops in the hallway, noticing me of course. He looks at me blankly, confused as to why I am sitting in the middle of the living room floor. I smile at him sadly. He smiles back, and walks to come sit with me, dropping his bag on the floor.
"Hey," he says plainly.
"Hi," I mumble back. I lean into his shoulder, and he wraps his arms around me.
"So this is it," he chuckles, kissing the top of my head.
"Yeah," I croak, aware that tears were on the verge of falling. Edward rubs my back soothingly.
"Just think, we'll be in Australia tomorrow… well, not counting the time difference of course… but my point is that we'll be away from all of this stress, this… this mess," he says positively. I nod, smiling at the thought. He's right of course. Then again, Edward is always right.
"Now come on, we're out of here," he announces, getting up. He offers me hand so I can get up, which I willingly take. What I did not expect however, is that when I got up he would pull me into a vice tight hug, followed by a passionate kiss. When he breaks away I'm gasping for air, and I forget everything I was sad about, which was clearly his intention.
We walk out to the car, where Elizabeth is still blissfully asleep. After making sure (again) that she is properly strapped in the car cradle, I climb into the front seat. Edward gives me a smile that could only say 'this is it'.
"I know," I reply.
As we pull into the airport, I can see Steve and Alice, waiting impatiently for us to arrive. Alice is her usual bouncy self, almost jumping in place as we get closer to them.
Steve is here, not only to drive the car back to the studio once we've gone (and then sell it), but to say goodbye to us one more time, as he can't come to the wedding. We'd been 'partners in crime', as he referred to it once, for a long time, and it would hard to say goodbye to someone who you've known so long.
We pull up to the front of the terminal, and the butterflies in my tummy get worse. We pull to a stop, get out, both receive hugs from Alice, carefully get Elizabeth out, unload our bags and head to check in counter. Carrying a baby, a travel case and dragging a suitcase is very difficult, but I seem to manage.
Check in is easy, even though supposedly check ins with infants can be tricky, even for first class. It's funny, I always dreaded a flight with a screaming baby, and always thought the mothers should control them, but now I am the mother of a potentially screaming baby… quite ironic in a way.
Security is something I always hated. Not because I was ever carrying anything illegal, but it felt like an invasion of privacy. I don't particularly like having my bag of things rummaged through. This time was fine, nothing beeped or anything.
Our flight wasn't for another hour, so we went and had our last American coffee, Edward and I. Steve and Alice had coffee too, but of course, they would be returning to America. I thought about buying some lame American souvenirs or something, to remind me of my home country, but then I remembered I'm happy to be leaving.
I don't understand how my daughter is still asleep, but she is. Hopes she stays like this on the plane. That would awesome. No screaming baby to annoy everyone.
After some awkward conversation, as it always is when your leaving people, we see on the screen above that our flight is boarding. The butterflies return to my tummy, reminding me of what I'm about to do.
We all walk to the departure gate, where passengers are starting to board. Edward grabs my hand and I take a deep breath in. I turn around, remembering Steve. He has a miserable look on his face, and he looks like he's about to cry.
"Oh Steve!" I give him a hug. "You'll come visit us sometime, right?" I ask hopefully.
"Yeah, I'll try," he mumbles. I give him a friendly kiss on the cheek and smile. He smiles back. He plants a kiss on the still sleeping Elizabeth's forehead.
He goes to give Edward a hand shake, but they end up in a hug, patting each other on the back, as guys do. They don't say a word, also as guys do.
We give a final wave, and proceed to the line for boarding.
The flight attendant recognises me as soon as I give her my boarding pass. She smiles hugely at me, scans my pass, then asks me for an autograph, which, with a roll of my eyes, I give her. Edward chuckles as I shake my head at the crazed fan. Thankfully they were becoming less common; most of my fans hate me now.
We walk down the corridor connecting the plane and the terminal. The butterflies in my stomach grow with anticipation with every step. I grab Edward's hand as we see the door of the plane. As we get within earshot of the male flight attendant, I can hear that he welcomes each person by name after he sees your boarding pass. Well that's nice. It's not often that the flight attendants care what your name is.
He gets to us, and sees my boarding pass, and his eyes instantly light up.
"Well hello there, Bella. Or should I call you Penny?" he chuckles. I laugh too.
"Bella will do," I say, smiling. We hop on, in the directing that he's pointed us in.
We sit in the comfortable seats (I love first class) for what seems like a while. Doesn't help the nerves. It's not that I'm not a good flyer, it's just the thought of not getting on the return plane. One way tickets. We're never coming back.
The safety video starts to play, and recognise the flight attendant from before. He gives me a wink as he moves into his position. I giggle, to which Edward looks at me strangely.
As the plane starts to move, I feel like I'm about to burst with nervousness. I try thinking about something else. The wedding will do. How I've dreamed for a long time of walking down a lavish isle, to Edward, dressed in a marvellous tux, and making all the girls envious of me, the one who is marrying him. I can imagine his smile, the smile that says: 'I'm the happiest man alive'. I close my eyes, partly because of tiredness.
We take off, a feeling that always bothers me. It's like the plane takes off, but your stomach has a delayed reaction, and you feel dizzy because of the sudden change in altitude. I keep my eyes closed, just in case I happen to look out the window, to my home, disappearing beneath me. Oh, I had left America plenty of times, but I always returned.
We're never coming back. I phrase I go over in my mind a million times. It's hard to wrap my head around, I don't think it's hit me yet. A feeling of joy also spreads through me; we're getting away from the stress, the noise, the paparazzi, and the pressure. I sigh in contentment.
The flight is very long. I manage to watch five movies, eat lunch, and eventually, dinner. It would take me a while to get used to the time change, with a 19 hour difference between Melbourne and L.A. So we left at 12… and they said we would arrive in Melbourne at 10pm, 2 days ahead of when we left, yet it's a 15 and half hour flight… ugh my brain!
I forget trying to work in out, and go back to watching Moulin Rouge.
For a good portion of the flight, I slept on Edward's shoulder. I had to put a pillow on, because it's so bony, but he wrapped his arms around me, rubbing my back, and with it, my fears. Good thing these chairs are big. Wouldn't have been able to do this in Economy.
Elizabeth slept (god bless) for the entire flight. I always knew she was an angel. My perfect child – never a hassle, always a pleasure. I'm all the baby sitters she'll have will be very relaxed with her.
The flight attendant says over the speaker that we will be landing shortly, and to please put your seatbelts on. Aw man, Moulin Rouge is only half way through! Oh well, I've seen it a million times anyway.
I feel the cabin pressure change, so that must mean we're on our way down. The butterflies return as I consider that fact.
The landing doesn't bother me as much. It's just a bump, not a funny feeling. We touch down on the Melbournian runway, and we're in Australia, our new home.
As we're in first class, we get to get out first (aren't we lucky?). We step off the plane, and the first thing I notice is that it's very cold. Edward tells me the temperature is 19 degrees Celsius, which I find out later is 66 degrees Fahrenheit. Wow. It's late March, and it's 66 degrees, even though they just had summer. Edward tells me the Melbournian weather is totally unpredictable, and it's renowned for this.
I'm going to have to get used to the metric system. Measuring things is these weird things called metres, instead of feet. Kilometres instead of miles. Ugh. Not to mention the whole temperature thing.
We step out into the terminal. I recognise it, because I've been here before, but I still marvel at it, because I'm here to stay. I won't be returning here in four days, or even two weeks. We walk down the long hallway, catching the looks of some people. As we come to Customs, and I notice Alice gets a little jittery.
"Alice, are you okay?" I ask her.
"Oh… um, yeah. I just… had a bad experience with Customs once…" she mumbles.
"What happened?" Edward asks curiously.
"I… brought some fresh cherries into America from my trip to Italy… just something I bought to eat on the plane, you know. I totally forgot that I had them in my bag, so I forgot to declare them. They found them, and fined me $200. And there was like, 2 cherries left…" She shakes her head and scowls in the general direction of one of the customs officers.
"Well, you haven't forgot anything this time have you?" I ask, confident that she hadn't. It was very rare of Alice to forget something.
"Of course not. I'm not stupid enough to make the same mistake twice."
I smile at my sister. I wish I could be that confident.
We get through customs with no problem, of course. They brought out the sniffer beagles; they're so cute! It was an effort not to pet them, but I knew I couldn't.
We finally get to baggage claim, and pick up our bags. As we move to the arrival gate, my butterflies picked up their speed.
We see a bunch of people waiting for their loved ones and friends. As I step through, in a typical celebrity brisk walk (in heels I might add). Some people point and stare as I walk out. The others look at me, shaking their heads, almost as if they were saying 'tsk tsk". I ignore them, and head to the nearest coffee shop for some much needed sustenance.
While drinking my coffee (which I got for free, from a star struck barista), I think about where I am. Away from the noisy and crowded life of a pop star. No annoying journalists here. Or at least not as many.
We finish our coffee, and head out of the airport. We call a cab (I'm going to have to get used to calling them taxis) and head to our new house on the inner suburbs of Melbourne.
All the beautiful things I saw on my first trip are still here, even though the leaves on the trees are turning nice shades of yellow and red. We drive through the bustling city streets (it isn't on the way to our house, but I wanted to see it), and pass my favourite place in Melbourne, Flinder's Street Station. When I last came here I didn't know what it was called. I had to ask one of the locals to tell me.
As drive closer to our new home, in Toorak, I make a list of the possible schooling options for Elizabeth. We pass Wesley College, a large school just outside of the CBD, which looks promising. I think I'll look into that one.
The cab (ugh! Taxi.) pulls up to a very large white house, which I recognise. I saw the photos. The cab driver whistles in amazement.
Edward and I get out, me holding our daughter. We stare at the house for a long time.
As we walk towards the door, he grabs my hand. Both of our hands turn the doorknob.
And we take the first step towards our new lives.