A/N: New chapter, yay! I just want to say thank you to everyone who reviewed. Really, you are all way too kind. Each one is appreciated greatly. Love you all. Also, I would have had this chapter up way sooner except fanfiction was having some problems and I wasn't able to update/edit any of my Twilight stories. I don't know why :/ Sorry about that!

Well, I've been afraid of changing/
Cause I've built my life around you/
But time makes us bolder/ children get older/
I'm getting older too
- "Landslide" by Dixie Chicks

Chapter Five

In The Open

Carlisle and Esme's phone conversation haunted me for the next few days, always resurfacing when I thought I had finally put it past me.

Though Carlisle and I kept relatively busy and there were a myriad of sights and experiences to keep me preoccupied, the memory of that conversation never failed to unsettle me. Only yesterday we had visited the Louvre, a magnificent art museum in central Paris, and were having a perfectly good time before my thoughts came in for the ambush. I passed it off as a headache (which, in all honesty, wasn't far from the truth) and we went back to the hotel. I had a feeling Carlisle was not at all convinced but he kept silent, for my sake.

I felt awful knowing I was making this trip even harder on him than it already was. The least I could do to repay him for his tolerance of me, though I could tell it was waning, was to be good company.

I gathered my resolve, picking myself up off the couch, and walked to the room's balcony, where I knew Carlisle had been since we'd got back from lunch this afternoon. I slid the glass door open, letting a burst of cool Paris air permeate the room and stepped barefoot onto the marble tiling.

Carlisle was resting his arms on the balcony railing, gazing out at the city skyline. Our room really had a striking view of Paris; the old and new buildings clustered along winding roads had the beauty and elegance that one would think only a painter's hand could capture. The sounds of the city and it's people, preparing for another night, swirled against the wind and the smell of baking bread and perfume carried above the rooftops. The sight of the city against Carlisle's inhumanly beautiful figure almost made me retreat back to the room for my sketchpad, but I remembered I had a pressing reason to be here.

I sidled up to him in silence, placing my hands on the railing in a motion similar to his. I was silent, desperately concocting some apology or reasoning for my behaviour but Carlisle took the burden of speaking first off of me.

"How's your headache?"

I was confused for a moment, before I remembered my lie.

"Oh…um, fine."

I almost slapped myself across the face. I had come out here to offer some sort of sentimental apology and this was all I could come up with. Typical.

"No, actually, I'm not fine." I said quickly, recovering from my prior ineptitude. Carlisle turned his head to look at me. I took a deep breath. "There's something that's kind of been bothering me."

I knew this was it. I was going to tell him that I had overheard, rather, eavesdropped on his and Esme's conversation. That the fact that they'd been arguing over me specifically had been plaguing my every thought. I prepared a scrambled speech in my brain and my palms were ra[idly becoming sweaty and sliding along the metal railing. I opened my mouth to start but his response threw off my nerve.

"To be honest, there's something that's bothering me as well, Bella."

I stopped my train of thought abruptly. "What's that?"

Was he going to confide in me about Esme? I anchored my hands on the railing harder to get a firm grip. My heart beat loudly in my ears.

"I called back home," He said, indicating the cell phone in his hand that I had not seen at first. "And there's a problem."

I attempted to swallow down the hard lump in my throat. What had Esme said now? Things must have been getting worse for I could see Carlisle was visibly stressed; his forehead was creased and his eyes were tightened, weighing my reaction to this piece of news. I tried to stay visibly calm, but I was not sure how well I was faring.

"And?" I prompted.

"Bella…they still haven't caught Victoria." He sighed, letting the words rush out. "They were close yesterday, very close, but she managed to slip past them again."

He was very still, analysing my face. In all truth and honesty, I had forgotten about Victoria. The only thing that triggered my current and visible state of alarm was that Carlisle's news had absolutely nothing to do with Esme, meaning that I would have to be the one to bring it up. This was what panicked me most of all.

"Don't worry, Bella," He said suddenly, noticing my panic and mistaking it for a reaction to Victoria's evasion, "They will find her. And once they deal with her, we can go home again. I promise you, Bella, I swear it."

I shook my head slightly, trying to clear it. I turned away, not considering any of Carlisle's words, but my own approach as to how I was going to bring up the Esme problem now. Was it even my business? I wondered whether I could just ignore that I had said anything in the first place, but I knew Carlisle would not let it go. I could hear him coming up behind me. He placed a hand on my shoulder.

"Bella," He said gently, "Listen to me."

I decided to turn back around to face him. His expression was, as always, sincere.

"You have absolutely nothing to worry about. Not when you're here. Not when you're with me. If I ever felt that you were in danger, or your life was compromised, I would do everything in my power and ability to protect you. Do you understand me?"

I nodded.

"I hope you realize how much you mean to me. To all of us. Your safety is never something that's taken lightly, I promise. So you have nothing to worry about. Ever. Not as long as you have us, Bella."

He smiled gently. I couldn't help but smile back. The weight of these promises burdened me moreso than they comforted me but I would never let him know that.

I simply responded with a pitiful, "Thank you."

He watched me closely still and evidently saw the worry in my eyes remain so he pulled me into his chest, letting me wrap my arms around his torso. A hand gently stroked my hair and I closed my eyes.

Then the words came up from inside me, unexpectedly.

"I heard you on the phone with Esme, Carlisle."

His hand stopped. I kept my eyes shut.

"I was talking to Jasper, Bella." He said slowly, "He's the one who told me about Victoria."

I knew he knew what I meant. I could hear it in his voice, which was, for once, shaky.

I didn't answer him. I wanted him to be the first to do something; speak, walk away, yell, anything. I was so out of my place right now, bringing this up, so I was leaving it up to him to continue the conversation. I waited.

He grasped my shoulders and slowly pulled me off him. Carlisle peered into my eyes, looking to see whether I truly knew what he had tried to hide from me. Evidently, he found his answer because he responded with a deep sigh.

"I want to show you something." He said abruptly.

Carlisle took my hand and led me to the edge of the balcony. I could see all the way to the ground from here. I had never been afraid of heights, but this drop was definitely daunting. I looked up at him, anxiously waiting to see what he'd wanted to show me.

He dropped my hand and stepped closer to the wall.

"Edward and you have climbed trees before. It will be exactly the same thing." He explained.

I understood then what he wanted me to do. I lifted my arms soundly and wrapped them around his neck, and then curled my legs around his hips. I closed my eyes and felt Carlisle leave the safety of the balcony and scale the wall, steadily climbing higher.

Then, all too quickly, he stopped. "Okay, climb down now. Careful."

I opened my eyes. We were on the roof of the hotel. Carefully, I unwrapped myself from around him and found a sturdy place to plant my feet. The roof of the building was comprised of wide, flat strip of granite running through the middle, and on each side it slanted steeply. Carlisle had stopped us on the flat stone, so there was no immediate danger of falling. Still, I felt unsure, so when I shakily sat beside him on the ledge, Carlisle wrapped a firm arm around me.

"I won't let you fall," He said, smiling at my strained expression.

"I know you won't. Edward would kill you."

He merely chuckled.

"It's beautiful up here." I breathed, "You can see for miles."

He merely nodded his assent. We were silent for a few long minutes before I could no longer bear the awkward tension. I cleared my throat.

"So."

"So." He agreed.

He wasn't being very helpful. I tried to incite him to speak again. I decided to start with something simple; a fact.

"I've never heard you two fight before."

"I never thought we would, to be honest." He said quietly.

The wind was cooler up here. Carlisle pulled his jacket off, moving as little as possible so he wouldn't have to take his arm out from around me, and draped it over my shoulders. I said a quiet thanks.

"You know," I said truthfully, "It was a little bit unsettling to me. I know that you were, you know, fighting because of me. I'm sorry."

He nodded and simply said, "No need to be. Things have been deteriorating either way."

I sat quietly and let his strained whisper reverberate in my head until he decided to speak again.

"I've just been with her for so long. Lately it seems like we're not actually together… just roommates unceremoniously thrust together." He laughed humourlessly.

"So," I said quietly, "You've been fighting for a while then."

"Not fighting exactly. Just…drifting. Realizing we want different things out of life." His eyebrows contracted, as if he himself wasn't following along. "It's hard to explain."

I nodded. Carlisle gazed out at the endless sky, which was now turning a pale pink with the imminent setting of the sun. I sat quietly beside him, pulling the jacket closer around me, and wondered how two people like Esme and Carlisle could so convincingly seem to be in love, when really, they were falling out of it. When Edward and I fought, everyone would know. We were surly and unpleasant at best. But Carlisle never seemed to possess that nature; he never even had a hair out of place as far as I knew.

Maybe his type of suffering was different then. Maybe the quiet and reserved nature he had just masked the worry and grief raging inside. I had never paid attention before, but I realized now that Carlisle was not a man of outright emotion. And in that sense, he and Edward were polar opposites. Edward was dramatic, the stunt in Italy proved that, but Carlisle was not prone to creating a spectacle out of his grief. Even in the most stressful situation, he could will himself to keep a straight head. It was not surprising that I had not sensed the turmoil in his and Esme's relationship.

"Do you, well…do you still…" I started clumsily, trying to restart the conversation.

His eyes were still trained on the sky, docile and vacant. I let myself trail off, hoping he'd been so immersed in his own thoughts that he hadn't heard mine.

"Love her?" He murmured quietly, letting his gaze drift back to me, and his thoughts to our conversation. I shrugged embarrassedly and looked appropriately abashed. I couldn't bear to see his expression so I looked down at his hand, curled around my waist.

"Of course, I do, very much."

For some reason, this weighed on me heavily.

"But," He continued quickly, "You see, Bella, and this may be hard to understand, but once you've spent such a long time with a person, feelings can change. Esme and I have been together for centuries. These feelings that we share... they've become platonic. No longer do I feel a physical need for her, out of lust or passion, like before. I find myself simply needing her because…well, because she is such a big part of who I am, my existence. And if she were to leave, I'm sure I would not know how to fully function or continue with routine without her presence. She's embedded in every aspect of my life, my soul…but not my heart. At least not in that way anymore. I rather find that my love for her has morphed into the kind of love I have for Edward or Alice…or any of my family. She is family. I love her as family."

I took in his quiet speech with great reverence. This explained a lot. With Rosalie and Emmett, there was evident physical affection. With Alice and Jasper, though it was subdued in company, the attraction was palpable. Carlisle and Esme had always seemed to have a demeanor that was too wise, too controlled, for outright passion. But even once, I had never seen much more than a fleeting squeezing of a hand or a swift hug between the two of them. I realized now that in the time I had known the Cullens, I had never once seen Carlisle kiss Esme or Esme kiss Carlisle.

I felt ignorant now to have never noticed.

"And does Esme…" I let myself trail off again, knowing he'd understand.

"She agrees. And I know this will be a shock to you, but she feels utterly the same way as I. Admittedly, she's more strong-willed out of the two of us. She thinks our distance now, both physically and emotionally, will somehow bring us back together. You yourself heard how well that's turning out."

I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. I merely nodded.

"I hate to be the pessimistic one," He continued after a moment, "But I doubt anything will be able to mend us. Something has changed permanently. For some reason, I don't think I can ever be the same with her again. I can't explain it. For centuries I've not changed but I feel something coming now…a kind of catalyst."

"How do the others feel about this?" I asked tentatively. Edward had not told me a single thing but he must have seen it coming far off. He could read thoughts, after all. For him to have missed something like this was hard to believe.

Carlisle's brow now furrowed.

"Jasper has, of course, sensed the change in our emotions. But you know him," He said gravely, "He'll observe everything closely but will never say a word where it is not his place to. It may just be his nature not to meddle, but I rather think he doesn't want to hurt anyone by bringing the matter up aloud. He wants us to work it out ourselves."

He sighed now. "Edward knows a lot of it, I'm sure, try as we may to hide it from him. But he never says a word about it. He will just get very tight-lipped if he overhears one of us thinking about it. I don't know whether I should talk to him. I may just do more harm than good... Edward feels things too violently."

Carlisle's eyes tightened sadly and he stared off vacantly again.

I didn't want to be intrusive of his thoughts but I spoke anyway, needing to make him understand that this was just as affecting to me. "I wish Edward would have told me something about it. Maybe I could've helped."

The offer seemed feeble, but Carlisle understood the intention. He chuckled sadly. "If you could aid such a sordid affair than I'm sure he would've told you. But, Bella, this is beyond even your capable fingers." He gave me a small squeeze. I felt even worse; Carlisle was trying to make me feel better about this when his own feelings were wounded beyond repair.

"Edward is so protective of you," He continued, "I'm sure he wanted to spare you any worry or grief about the unfortunate troubles of vampires."

"Still," I insisted, feeling myself getting upset, "I wish I had known. I would've tried anyway."

"I know. Don't think I don't know that." Carlisle's eyes were trained on mine. "But don't you think on it anymore, alright? Not for a moment longer."

"I just.. I don't want you to be sad, Carlisle." I admitted, "I don't like that."

He forced a smile. "I am not unhappy. I am sitting in the presence of such a wonderful companion. How could I ever be unhappy in your presence, Bella? Never. It's blasphemous to think of it."

He was trying to cheer me up, trying to make me smile. Through all the pain and grief I knew was plaguing him, here he was protecting me from pain, as always. His compassion was a curse as much as it was a gift.

"Where do you and Esme go from here then?" I asked cautiously.

For a brief moment, his eyes tightened again. "I can honestly say that I don't know. Wherever life takes us, I guess. I know that's not a good answer." He grimaced.

"No, it's not. But I understand." I smiled gently.

I looked out at the sky. The sun was setting now; the oranges and pinks reflected in the sky played on our skin in interesting contrasts. The breeze was light but poignant. It was amazing how such beauty could shine in a time of such pain.

I did not stop to question it when Carlisle placed a light kiss on my cheek. I knew what it meant; an unspoken thank-you, measuring the emotion that words could not express. I sidled closer as his arm became firmer around my waist.

We sat and watched, in mutual silence, as the sun's last rays of daylight were consumed by darkness. And only once night had fallen, and the blackness afforded us a blanket of cover for the emotions playing on our faces, did we retreat back to our room, hand in hand.

Review?