For BohemianBuffalo who graduated today. Congrats sis.
The Twilight Twenty-Five
Prompt: Fragments
Pen name: LightStarDusting
Character POV: Bella
Rating: M
Chapter 16 – Yesterday
2006
Memory is a slippery thing, hard to hold onto. Why was it so easy to remember some things and not others? I'm able to remember so clearly the before. But the after? That night, the night of the mistake, is like a dam in the stream. Smooth and clear leading up to it, but then what spills over the top is churning and overwhelming. The time after that night has always come to me in fragments. Jumbled thoughts are present, only showing themselves randomly and when I least expect them.
Of course I should have handled things differently. I was young and I was awkward and I didn't know how to deal. So instead of confronting Jasper, I pulled away. I said nothing. I didn't focus on the two solid months of friendship. Instead, I obsessed over the missing condoms and the unanswered questions, the awkward pauses and the long stares.
The opportunities were there. They presented themselves over and over, openly mocking me with my cowardice. In the back of my head, I knew that I should talk to him.
But I didn't.
I ran. What's more is, I ran… and he didn't follow. As much as I didn't talk to him, he didn't talk to me either. And that spoke volumes.
Here we are, all these years later with uncomfortable silences, unsaid words, and unspoken bonds that despite everything, tie us together. In essence, I'm still running. Fate kept him close at my heels, but we're as far apart today as we were in the immediate after of yesterday.
1999
Lucy woke up later that morning, brimming with questions about the date party. She didn't know when I had snuck in the room, didn't realize that it had been mere hours since I tiptoed back to my bed. Considering that she didn't know that, I focused on telling her about the actual events of the date party and not what happened after.
I continued playing hide and seek with my emotions. I feigned being physically ill and stayed in bed the majority of the day. I croaked out the story, wrapped up in my comforter and felt bad when she bought everything I said (and didn't say), hook, line, and sinker. She made me a Lipton meal of Pasta Alfredo in her contraband crock pot and shooed our floormates away. She took care of me.
I kept the shade pulled and when Jasper called later that day, Lucy lied and told him I was sleeping because I asked her to.
She ran her fingers through my hair and did not ask questions.
2006
"You've been quiet lately. Everything okay?"
My finger traced a fold of fabric on his shirt. My eyes stayed trained on the show we were watching, unable to look into his. "I'm okay. Just have a lot on my mind. Work, life in general, there's a lot going on lately."
He ran his fingers through my hair and did not ask questions.
1999
Midterms were a blur. I somehow dealt with them and managed to do well, despite my emotional turmoil and the fact that my mind was not in the classroom but replaying that night and the morning after. The first day back to regular classes, I had to face Public Speaking. Lucy questioned if I was well enough to go and while I would have rather hid in my bed for the rest of my life, I knew I would have to face him eventually. I couldn't avoid him forever, so I decided the best course of action when I finally saw him would be to be act cordial. Not like we had been. Never like we had been.
We didn't have a written exam in Public Speaking but a ten minute persuasive speech. Technically this was my last mid-term. I'd arrived to the class at the last minute, sliding into a seat near the door instead of my normal place in the back, next to Jasper. Thankfully I wasn't scheduled for that day; I would have never gotten through.
I barely paid attention while six students gave their speeches, although you wouldn't have known it. I kept my eyes trained on each speaker while my mind ran wild. I could feel his presence behind me; while I couldn't see him, I spent the entire class thinking of him.
When the last student finished, the professor dismissed us. I gathered my notebook and threw it into my bag, attempting to get out of the room before he had a chance to get to me. Apparently my fastest was slow compared to him.
"Bella."
"Hey, Jasper. How goes it?" How goes it? Really Bella? Best you can do?
"Okay. Are you walking back to the dorm? Maybe we can walk together?"
Even though I already knew my answer, I pretended to consider his offer. I pushed the words out of my mouth, the sensation of lying to him feeling wrong and heavy on my tongue and in my heart. "Nah, you go ahead. I have to talk to the professor about my speech topic. Maybe we can catch up later." To further my ruse, I waved my hand, shooing him along. Hanging back, my palms pressed into the metal tray of the chalk board, the ridges making indentations on my hands as I silently chided myself for caring so much despite the fact I felt betrayed.
He looked back at me once, before one of the girls from our dorm caught up with him, nudging him with her elbow. I watched him walk out of the room with her.
I silently yelled at myself for being so stupid.
2006
Rosalie and I stood together, huddled under the red shingled awning of the restaurant, waiting for Emmett and Edward to bring the car around the block. I giggled as she hummed November Rain under her breath.
She and Emmett had tried very hard not to monopolize the entire dinner conversation with talk of their wedding, but they couldn't help it. Each day brought them closer to the reality of their spring wedding. They were excited and wanted to share their plans.
"Who do you think will be next? You guys or Alice and Jasper?" She raised her eyebrows and her bright eyes flashed from her finger, adorned with a diamond, to my bare one.
I frowned at the question. "Oh Rose, I don't know. He's there. I'm not… yet. Maybe it will be Alice and Jasper."
"Sweetheart. Edward is a great guy and you guys are great together. You've been together for a long time. He's waiting on you and because he's him, he'll wait for you to be sure. That's all I'm saying." The words were kind but the look was disapproving.
I silently yelled at myself for being so stupid.
1999
Jasper and Maria were standing together in the breezeway. The wind whipped the rain around and into my face, giving me good reason to lower my head and my umbrella, picking up the pace as I walked past. He was laughing at something she had said. It was the low chuckle. The one that I had heard countless times before, when he and I were together. The one that until a month and a half ago, I considered mine but was no longer.
Maria had mentioned wanting to get to know him better. I guess it's her chuckle now.
I shook my umbrella out in the stairwell and continued up to my room. When I flopped down on my bed, I could still see them standing there, in the breezeway of the building directly across and under his room. I watched as he ran his hand through his hair and she offered him a cigarette. Interested, I leaned closer, bumping my nose on the glass of the window as I watched him shake his head, refusing the offer.
Then he wrapped his arm around her shoulder and led her inside.
2006
We'd been out for drinks after work and wound up walking through the diamond district.
Pulling me tight to his chest, Edward tilted my chin back with his fingers and his lips found mine. Right in the middle of the sidewalk with people walking past us, he kissed me. It was the sort of kiss that we would share while in private, full of heat and passion and commitment. He raised his eyebrows and looked at the store awning next to us before his eyes found mine again, silently asking if I wanted to go inside.
I shook my head, but I knew it wasn't a definitive shake. It was slow and uncertain. As was I. We'd been together for nearly six years and while it wasn't an extraordinarily long time to date before marriage, I needed more time. I knew he was the one for me and one day I would get there. I just wasn't exactly sure when one day would be.
"Come on, Bella. Just to look. Humor me."
I sighed, feeling the tiny smile tugging at the corners of my lips. "Okay," I conceded, repeating his words back to him. "Just to look."
Then he wrapped his arm around my shoulder and led me inside.
1999
Designated study hours in the dorm loomed over us and an eerie hush had swept the campus as we all prepared for finals.
I was running on fumes, a mix of coffee, adrenaline and the knowledge that soon the semester would be over and I'd have the chance to go home and sleep for a month.
The library had been invaded, yet again, by people who didn't belong. I had spent a lot of time there before, but after, it became my sanctuary. It was a safe haven where I could get away from Lucy's perceptiveness and the dorm in general, where I knew that Jasper wouldn't be lurking around the corner. I was able to hide in the stacks, sitting on the floor if I couldn't find a chair, just to be alone with my cd player (which thankfully had the no-skip feature) and my notebooks.
Finally, Lucy cornered me before I left one morning, requesting to meet for a coffee or a lunch date. I felt bad for spending so much time away so I agreed, telling her to catch me after her ten o'clock final exam.
We neared the coffee bar and I raised my head, only to see Jasper, standing at the counter. Of course, I leave my refuge for two hours and there he is. The air left my lungs hastily as I turned and pressed myself against the wall near the stairwell.
"I… I forgot to check my mail. Do you want to meet back here?"
I turned and headed back down to the steps, toward the mail room. Lucy bounded down the steps behind me; I could hear her footfalls close behind, her voice following me and surrounding me in the echoing stairwell, making it far louder than it would have been otherwise.
"I never thought I'd see the day when you'd suddenly change your mind about getting coffee but you have and I have a strong feeling it's only because you're trying to avoid Jasper." She finally caught me at the bottom step and she grabbed the strap of my bag, stopping me in my tracks. Using her leverage on the bag, she spun me around to face her.
"You want to tell me what the hell is going on?"
New Year's Eve 2006
I finished rinsing the dishes and put the last one into the dishwasher. My foot automatically curled under the door of the dishwasher, lightly tapping it closed. Not ready to join Edward or our company just yet, I rested my hands on the smooth counter top, closing my eyes and trying to pull myself together.
Our New Year's parties had changed drastically in some ways, but not as much as I would have expected given the time that had passed. One of Edward's holiday gifts had been a Nintendo Wii, which meant that everyone had descended on our house for the count down to 2007. Dinner parties, drinking, and playing Wii in our home wasn't too far from the activities of college, yet it felt so different.
I knew I'd been unusually quiet throughout the evening. Interactions with Jasper were still uncomfortable. After the concert in September and the conversation in the car, it had been awhile until we were able to look each other in the eye. Slowly we eased back into the uncomfortable numbness that we shared around each other. The uneasy peace we had found in the intervening years since that night had been shattered, and we were still redefining our truce, albeit without talking to one another.
I heard their voices rise in laughter while Alice groaned in frustration at the game they were currently playing. I knew it would not be long before my absence was conspicuous. The radio station that was playing in the background had switched from a Dave Matthews Band song to an all too familiar Beatles song and it threw me into a tailspin. I just needed a chance to regroup. Regroup, alone. Oxymoronic Bella. Or just plain moronic.
"You want to tell me what the hell is going on?"
Now I need a place to hide away – The Beatles
KrisBCullen makes me think, hope and believe. Thank you for being my beta.
Pre-readers LoreliD, TheHeartofLife, ElleCC, and Miztrezboo went to TOWN on this chapter. I can't say enough about their love and support. Thank you.
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